When we were yet enemies

Rom 5:10 For if, when we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, much more, being reconciled, we shall be saved by his life.

When running across this scripture in times past, I would read this scripture and think that it was talking about me being an enemy of God...BEFORE I was born again. This is often the interpretation that most Christians would give anyone who would enquire about this verse as well, however, that is a wrong assumption. Let's assess who would be God's enemy, shall we?

Well, we can correctly assume that the devil is the enemy of God, seeing that he stands for the opposite of what God stands for. God is Righteous, Satan is rebellious (Is 14:12). God is Truthful, Satan is referred to in the Bible as the Father of lies. God is Life in Christ, Satan is called the Lord of the flies, ( and anyone who has ever studied anything about flies knows that when something dies, it soon produces worms and flies are born from these disgusting worms.) God is good, while the devil is cruel. God edifies through the Holy Spirit, while the devil condemns and discourages. So we can safely assess that the devil is God's opposite and His enemy.

And the bible DOES make reference to us being satan's spawn before we are "converted" or born again, but people often take this as an implication to assume that we were God's enemy because we were not born again. Let's re-examine the scripture we began with in Rom 5:1 though: it states that "while we were yet God's enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of His Son..." Let's use some reasoning here: If we were God's enemy, then how could He reconcile us to Himself by killing His Perfect Son that He loved? That doesn't make sense. So some would say, "Well, that's just God, He just has mercy." Tell me something, have you ever seen someone that truly had an enemy, have mercy on them? The answer is NO! But the Bible clearly states that we were redeemed by Christ. Hmmm, allow us to try from a different angle here; if anyone that is reading has children, they know that they love their children. Could we safely say that we love our own children more than we love someone else's child? Any good parent would not take their child, whom they love more than they love themselves and kill their child so that someone else's brat kid could be saved! I wouldn't give up my beautiful loving little boy for someone else's problem child, yet God took His ONLY Son, (The Only person to EVER walk this earth in total Perfection, pleasing God in every way, form, fashion, thought, word and in deed). If God looked at us as though we were His enemy, than how could He give up Jesus for us, (we would be the "brat kid and problem child" in this scenario.)

Could there possibly be something wrong with they way that WE have thought about GOD? Meaning, could the phrase, "while we were yet enemies" mean that in our own minds, we thought that we were God's enemy? If we truly think about it, we could safely come to the conclusion that there quite possibly could have been something wrong with our own thinking and assumptions about God. God has NEVER seen us as His enemy, even when we were not acting like His children would act. EVEN when we were not truly "born again" and we still acted like the devil, He still looked at us as His kids. How can that be true?

Hosea 2:23 speaks about this subject when the prophet states that even though we had never obtained mercy, He would give us mercy. And even though we were not His people, He would say to us, "You are my people," and because He said that to us first, we would say, "You are my God."

People paint a picture of God as though He is this mean judgmental fireball in the sky looking down on us from a distance, just waiting for us to mess up enough times so that He can smite us and send us to hell to burn forever and forever. That has NEVER been the heart of God, nor will it ever be. In fact, if we never knew of God's love for us, we would never turn to Him. 1 John 4:19 says it like this, " We love Him, because He first loved us."

I am convinced that the reason that people don't come to Christ is because: 1. they don't acknowledge that they NEED God or His Love, 2. they don't think God really loves them, or 3. they don't think that they are worthy of His Love. But God's not like us, He doesn't require that we earn His love, He just loves. We can get mad at Him, cuss Him, shake our fists, even give up on Him, and He is still there and doesn't love us any less than before we did all those things. He loves us so much, that while we were yet sinners....let's go back even further, 2000 years ago He killed the Son He loved, that WE might be able to be with Him forever! We were FAR from being thought of....and He thought of us. When we were in our sin, we were too deep, too dark, too dirty...but He reached way down, into the darkness that we were, and got dirty just to show us His love.

Beloved, God's not mad at you. He loves you with an "everlasting love" (Jer 31:3), that means forevermore, into eternity, long lasting and never failing, always...won't you come to Him and let Him love you?!

How To Do Good (part three)

Now that we know that there is no way to please God but to receive Christ, one would think that all of our troubles are over, right? Not exactly. The ideal way to live is to simply know that there is nothing that we can do to please God, but have Christ. If have Christ, then we have what it takes within our hearts to be pleasing to God. We are NOT saying that because you have Christ in your heart, that we are able to keep the Ten Commandments PERFECTLY as a result! We a s human beings will live in a body that was born in a sinful nature all of our lives, but sin should not dominate our lives. This means that occasionally, we will mess up, but all that we have to offer God is Christ, so we have nothing to worry about in this respect.

What happens when we receive Christ, is that we then receive God's Spirit which we did not have before, which is why it was utterly impossible for us to please God. Now that we are saved, The Holy Spirit begins to go to work in our lives and work on bringing our outward man up to the position of our inward man. hmmm, let me back up a second and explain that part. When we are born into this world, we leave our mother's womb and we're born physically alive, but spiritually dead. This means that we are alive in our fleshly body, but our spiritual man is not alive. Before Adam and Eve sinned in the Garden, they were alive physically and spiritually. Their fleshly body was sinless, AND they had God's Spirit, which made them totally and completely ONE with God. But...since they sinned, their spiritual man is the one that died, while their fleshly bodies remained alive for another 900+ years. So the reason that people say that we need to be born AGAIN is because they mean to say that our inward man (the spiritual man that died in the Garden of Eden) is not alive, but needs to be. When we receive Christ, our inward man (spiritual man) is born again or made alive again. Some religions teach that someone can be born again, then later born again again. This is incorrect. One can only be born again once. Then after we are born again, the Holy Spirit begins to bring out physical man in alignment with what God has done on the inside of us.

The other character that is rarely mentioned, only usually in passing, is the older brother. When the younger brother comes home and they kill the fatted calf, the father throws a party to celebrate the younger son's return. The older son doesn't join the party because he is jealous that the father has thrown a party for his younger brother, who left and lived sinfully, while he has never left and has always worked for his father. This older son is seldom spoken of, but is a KEY in learning to live for Christ effectively. The reason why we say this is because the older son thinks that he has to work hard to gain his father's approval. The father's response is "Son, you are with me, and all i have is yours," which what the father is saying is that he has never had to earn anything from his father. When we have our kids, and they live under our roof, we don't expect our kids to support themselves while living in our home. Why, because it is our job to provide for our children while they are in our care. The same is even truer for our Heavenly Father. God does NOT expect us to earn our salvation or work to keep our salvation. What He has given us is freely given to us, and there is nothing that we can take away from Christ's Finished Work, nor add to it. Everything that we will ever need exists in Christ paying the price for sin for us. If we are poor, sick, sad, sinful, hopeless, struggling, forsaken, and abandoned....those things are results of the fall of man due to sin. Christ paid the price for sin...so in effect, if we are poor....because we have Christ in our hearts, we then have the power to get wealth. If we have sickness in our physical body, because we have Christ in our lives, then by His stripes we are healed. These problems are not a result of our personal sins per say, but because we live in bodies that have been exposed to sin. Christ can heal us of all of our afflictions. Some of these happen miraculously and at once, others take years before they happen in our lives. But the fact is, Christ died to give it all to us.

Please, if you have received Christ in your heart, don't spend a lifetime like the oldest son working with boney fingers to earn what Christ came to give you for free. And if you are a wayward son, don't live in the pig pen when you could have a mansion in Christ. God loves you and is happy just being one with you. Won't you come to Him and Rest?

How To Do Good (part two)

We've just gotten through discussing the story of the Prodigal Son, in respects to the youngest son returning home. We mentioned that the father runs to meet his son, falls upon his neck and kisses him over and over again, being so happy that his son has returned home. In his return, there is no questioning about what it is that he has been doing, how he spent his money, or if he was sorry and if that was why he was returning. The reason why there is nothing but joy in the father receiving his son back to himself is because God is portraying His Grace in this element of the story. He is showing that it doesn't matter what it is that His son has done, but He is happy to receive him unto Himself again. This is important to note because God doesn't expect us to repent over and over again for all of our faults, we show that we are sorry by simply showing back up and desiring that He will receive us once again. All God wants is for us to come back to Him.

There is a very important aspect we would like to refer to at this part in the story: In Luke 15:23, the father instructs his servants to "bring the fatted calf, kill it, eat and be merry." This is very significant because our salvation hinges on this verse (in this particular story). This is a direct reference to the slaying of Jesus Christ for our sins. The reason that the father never asks the returning son about his past wayward experiences is because he knows that the payment for the son's sin is the fatted calf. Jesus was actually the "Lamb of God," but in old testament times, there were times that Israelites would bring a calf, or a lamb, or a turtledove if they were poor....the key is, they brought the best animal that they had to be killed in order that their sin would be covered. The difference between those sacrifices and the Sacrifice of Christ, is that Christ was the Last and Final Sacrifice. God sent His Perfect and Only Son to live a perfect life, and then kill Him, so that Christ would be able to redeem an entire WORLD of sinful people. God is willing that NONE should perish, but that ALL would come to repentance. How do we "come to repentance?" We accept that sacrifice that Jesus made to pay for our sins, that we might once again be Sons and Daughters of God.

Christ was the only one that ever "did good." Because there is "none good but God," we should also know that Christ is God. God came in the form of a man to redeem mankind back to Himself. We couldn't keep the Ten Commandments, but Christ did. Now all we have to do to "do good," is to accept the only One that ever 'did good."

If we have received Christ in our hearts, then God sees us as "(Put Your Name Here) IN CHRIST." So when God looks at you, He doesn't see you, He sees Christ. Therefore, there is nothing that you can do or not do that will please God, because Christ already pleased God when He gave His perfect life for us!

It seems that we keep prolonging this story, but we feel there are very important elements to discuss and hope to bring them out extensively, without tiring the eyes of the reader. As a result we are going to continue into a third teaching of "How to do Good."

**If you haven't received Jesus into your heart, we invited you to meet Christ today. Jesus loves you and is the only way into Heaven. God doesn't care what you have done, He just wants you to come Home. Jesus Christ is Home. If you will come to Him, He will run and meet you half way, you will feel His love and your life will never be the same. All you need to do is ask Him into your heart, tell Him that you are sorry for your sins, and believe in your heart and you will be born again.

If you have done this just now, please email us and let us know so we can continue to keep you in prayer and help you in any way possible: email at pastor@crosslineministries.com

How To Do Good (part one)

Recently, there has been a subject just sort of resinating in my heart because when you watch tv preaching, this is what the main subject seems to be in almost every sermon I've heard. The general idea is: You shun the good and either ignor or avoid the bad, and that will make you pleasing to God. WRONG! I know...it may sound like I am about to teach something unscriptural, but we will not teach things that are not in the Bible in this ministry, we at least, deliver truth to folk in the most pure form that we know how to.

I remember back in those days when I was not saved, talking to a friend of mine about God once. We were under the influence of alcohol, and felt the need to discuss such things as God, and Heaven and such. I remember very clearly talking about the Ten Commandments and saying openly to my friend, "There is NO WAY that ANYONE can live an entire life without ANY SIN! I wasn't ruling out Christ, because I had been taught that He came from God and was not completely like we mere humans....so I didn't exclude the fact that Christ DID live a perfect and sinless life, but I had come to the true and real conclusion that no one could DO that successfully unless He be from God. It's amazing that a sinner, not serving God could see that so clearly and know in their heart that WE CAN'T DO IT, but church people can't see that. My stance at that time in my life was this: I knew I couldn't do it, I was upset about that thought that I was expected to do something that I KNEW I couldn't do, and I was therefore unwilling to even try. That actually was both smart and yet sad, for two reasons. It was smart because I didn't go to work, trying harder than ever to do what I knew that I had no power to do: which was live a sinless and perfect life, which is the ONLY THING that God will accept. It is sad because no one ever told me that Christ did it all for me so I wouldn't have to! THAT would have been some useful information back then!!! It would have kept me from countless sins, heartaches, pains, sorrow, all of which eventually led me to a divorce and then one fine day, to the Lord. It was like going around my elbow to get to my thumb, but I got there finally.

I was curious about God, but has the wrong perception of Him and how to reach Him. This the stance of the world, and unfortunately most of the church as well. Most people have never been told what Christ really came to do, therefore, they don't know how to receive what He did as payment for their sins, thus leading them to do one of two things: 1. Not even try because they know they can't do it or 2. They work themselves to death trying to earn what Jesus freely gave them.

There is a story in the Bible that speaks of this very subject, although I rarely hear anyone talk much about one of the characters, while always slamming the other one. It is the story of the Prodigal Son, (Luke 15). The story is about a young man that decides that he wants to find out what the world holds out there for him, so he goes to his father and tells him that he wants his inheritance. This young man is actually the youngest of two sons, so what he receives is only whatever is leftover from what the oldest son would have gotten when their father died. We mention this because the youngest son is a symbol of our lives before we receive Christ in our hearts. The Bible says that the younger son spends his inheritance with riotous living...and he winds up broke, wallering in the dung with the pigs, (which to Jews, pigs are seen as the most unclean of animals, so for a Jew to even so much as touch a pig, let alone live with one...well, it was shameful and of total disgust for them to say the least.) Back in those days, the pigs were basically the cockroach of animals. Jews would take their "toilets," dishwater, and trash and fill a ditch with their waste...and the pigs ate it. So...in conjunction with our lives lived before Christ, we live the same way. All we are able to produce on our own leads to wasteful living and poverty of spirit. This is a picture of the unsaved life. The story goes on to mention that while starving in the pig pen the young man decides that his fathers servants live better than he is living and he decides to return home, desiring to ask his dad if he can just come be his servant.

The story goes on to share how the boy came into view, the father RAN to meet his son (which no self respecting adult male Jew would have done--is run), but it shows that the father was looking for the son to come home and was willing to meet him where he was at. This is a typology to show us our Heavenly Father's love for us, as He meets us right where we are at and will run to us if we will only show a desire in our hearts to be with Him.

This is all we have for this segment, but in our next blog we will discuss the other brother and also finish the conclusion of "How to do good."

Turn around

This morning, I started my day soaked in bitter tears. Not because someone in my family died, or because I was in physical pain, but because I felt almost hopeless. Even those that are the greatest of encouragers need encouragement at times. It seems that through the trials that my husband and I have been experiencing recently have just continued to increase, with the pressure mounting more and more each day. I'm not sharing this to find pity from others, but in order that people know that all of us have struggles of some sorts. What is a piece of cake for someone else to endure, might be utter hell for their neighbor.

I found myself in these times of tribulation, to lean towards small things to make me feel better or possibly even comforted. They are not sinful things, but in some respects, I was searching for a way to somehow escape the struggles by my reaching for something that I thought could tangibly comfort me. All the while knowing that it wasn't going to FIX anything, but rather serve as "padding" perhaps. One person might look to cigarettes in times of trials, others might look to food...mine, has been green tea. Again, not sinful...and don't laugh...for this might seem silly, but it was helping me. Anyhow, God has a way of removing things slowly, allowing us to see that He is the one that He wants us to depend upon...even for comfort in times like we have been having. My subject here is not green tea vs cigarettes, or even the fact that I had something that i reached for...but to explain what the small straw that broke the camel's back.

With little money in the bank, and payday not coming for two more days possibly...wondering if there was really going to be enough of everything that we needed to get through until then (gas, diapers, food, milk, TEA!!!) ha ha! Seriously though, the supplies was dwindling, and my hope slowly shrinking as well. With my faith flat-lining, I woke up this morning and got my husband off to work. I turned on the computer and put on a song that I had recently found that was ministering to me...one tear began to roll, which started an entire flood that wouldn't stop! It wasn't necessarily the financial struggle, or the thought that my tea was almost all gone, but rather than I needed the Lord's comfort, to know He was going to come through for what I needed most....which was not tea, it wasn't food, diapers, money....but purpose.

I suddenly realized that with all of our "current situations" the thing I needed most was to know that in all of what I have experienced in my life, that God has a plan for my life and that He is going to fulfill it. Then at one point, the Lord had me turn the music off. When I did, He began to drop something in my spirit that really changed my outlook of this day:

He spoke something to my heart and gave me a melody to it....it was so beautiful! But it wasn't until I sang it for the first time that it ministered to me. He said, "Be still and know I'm moving, Be still and know I'm here. Just rest for I am with you, and you do not have to fear.....Be still." That may not minister to others like it did to me, especially since you can't hear the melody, but God was showing me that what He has begun in me is not over, it's not ended, but He's wholly at work even though I can't see what He is doing. The let me know that even when i feel forsaken, that He is here. Not that He is here beside me, but He is IN ME, which makes all things possible!

There is no end to what God can do in a person that knows that Christ loves them and is always with them in everything that they do.

Friend, know that God has not forgotten you! Know that He is still working. Even when you can't see it on the outside, He's moving on the inside and doing things in the midst of your trial that is going to bring forth something SO BEAUTIFUL, and it's only something that He can do!

Oh, and to finish up the testimony: I checked the mail and got some unexpected money from someone for something I had designed them. Then when my husband came home, he told me that someone at his work had given him some money as well. THEN, on top of all of THAT, someone else told my husband today that they have some land they have been trying to sell for a while...but felt like the Lord wants them to give it to us!!! It's not like my husband and my trials have ended, nor were these we have had been the beginning. It's been a long road with lots of bumps and rabbit trails, but God DOES reward those that diligently seek Him, (like our teaching from yesterday said). So...keep your head up, God has BIG and GREAT things in store for all of us! He loves you...

Edification

I received a much needed message from a friend today that the Lord knew that I desperately needed. So many times in our lives we are strongly desiring to make some sort of impact on this world and fulfill our purpose in life. The problem is that most of us have no idea IF we actually make a difference and WHAT that purpose might be. We're not going to claim to have every answer in this respect, but we will share what we know in where WE are at in our walk with these subjects.

People don't truly understand the HUGE IMPACT that Christ makes upon our life when we invite Him into our lives. Did you know that you can actually render Christ ineffective in your life? How can we make Christ ineffective in our lives? Unbelief and ignorance is usually what stunts the growth and potential of every Christian in the world. We ALL could come into a greater knowledge of WHO He is and WHAT He can be in our lives. This is just a small devotional, so we aren't able to cover this in detail, but if our readers will stay with us...these are things WE are seeking the Lord to understand more about as well! So there will be more on these subjects in the future.

Often times, as Christians, we get born again and then go on in our lives as though Christ never happened. I'm not rebuking anyone for doing so....in most cases it is because people lack the proper discipleship in their lives. We need people that know who they are in Christ to come along side of us and let us know who WE are in Him too. Without that, God could still move and teach, but it's much easier WITH that help than without it.

Here's the God's honest truth: If we stick out finger in the ocean, we don't make a dent. (Period). But that is us......without Christ. There is a story where Christ was walking with His disciples and He cursed a fig tree and it wilted and died. Then when the disciples inquired about this He told them that if they have faith and doubt not, that they would be able to say to a mountain "Be removed," and it would be removed and cast into the sea, (See Mark 21:21). This is NOT implying that we need to have "great faith." However, what this IS saying is that we need to know WHAT & WHO it is that we have inside of us once we receive Christ into our hearts. On our own, we could make no impact upon the world, but there is NO LIMIT to what can happen in the life of a believer that KNOWS who they are in Christ.

Our God is a BIG BIG GOD. Jesus IS God. There is NOTHING impossible for God, thus, there is nothing impossible for Christ. So...if we have Christ in our hearts, is there anything impossible for us? The Word of God says that if God be for us, than who can be against us? We as Christians need to understand that God is not trying to hinder us when things don't go the way that we think that they should. What we need to do in those situations is be willing to let the Lord teach us what He would have us to learn in the midst of the trials, and press in to get closer to God as well. In every trial and temptation we are facing, Christ is in us and with us. The devil means to take us out, but since we have Christ, we already are an Overcomer!

We realize that we haven't addressed all that we would have liked to in this blog, but that is why we are able to write other ones to go with it...Beloved, know that God loves you, that He is in you, and trust that there is nothing impossible for your God. God's not waiting on our right actions or our perfect understanding. We are where we are because it is where God has us right now. There's nothing wrong with wanting to be further along, but we need to enjoy Christ being with us and in us, in whatever situation we are in at THIS time in our lives.

Enjoy the sunrise, (for it would truly be dark without it), soak up the laughter of your kids, (for it is better than hearing their cries of pain). Love the ones you are with, even when you hate the things they do...Hopefully we have been able to pass on just a little edification to you today in this blog. <3 We love you....

"Without Faith"

Recently, I was listening to a sermon, and the preacher quoted a portion of this scripture...and as I heard it, the Lord began to reveal something new to me about it that I had not formally known about it. With these words, it has always been my assumption that this scripture had a negative connotation associated with it, simply because I always felt either condemned or like there was much more work for me to do when I was reminded of it. Here is the scripture:

Hbr 11:6 But without faith [it is] impossible to please [him]: for he that cometh to God must believe that he is, and [that] he is a rewarder of them that diligently seek him.

It's the "without faith it is impossible to please Him," because I always felt as though perhaps I wasn't living up to my end of the deal where this scripture was concerned. I don't believe that I am alone in this assumption either, there are many other people out there that feel like it is up to them to maintain the correct amount of faith in order for God to be pleased or work on our behalf. And we think that if we are failing, it is because we don't have ENOUGH faith, or the right kind of faith.

The fact is, as mere human beings, there is NOTHING within ourselves that will actually EVER measure up to God's level of expectation. What God actually demands is absolute perfection on our behalf...........Does anyone else feel inadequate in this area? Have any of us ever lived and completely sinless life, full of nothing but perfect faith? Is there any good, the Bible says, "There is none righteous, no not one," (Rom 3:10). Is it so hard for us to believe that God demands perfection from us, knowing that we can't actually BE perfect all the time? Isn't that cruel of God? I thought He was Just?

The fact is that the problem has never lied in Him, but rather in humanity. And the truth is, God's not cruel, He is Just. He lovingly knew that there was no way that we would ever be able to live up to His level of expectation in our fallen state. Had Adam and Eve never fallen from perfection in the Garden and sinned, we wouldn't have the problems that we have now. Unfortunately we automatically inherited those curses without ever asking for them. But.....there is hope--Stay with me Beloved!

The only way that we can NOT have "faith," is to NOT have Christ. So if you are someone that has received Christ into your heart, you're in the clear. What that means, is that WE may not have had "enough faith" or the "correct object of faith," but when we accepted Christ, we accepted ALL that we NEED! So if what we need is faith to please God and we have Christ in our hearts, then we have what it takes to please God!!! So our ability to please God is not based upon ourselves or anything that we can do, but rather upon whether or not we have the One that God DOES accept!

Now, if we look at the last half of that verse, we can see something else that speaks about our daily journey with Christ. We'll quote it again, "...for he that cometh to God must believe that he is, and [that] he is a rewarder of them that diligently seek him." What this means is that in order to receive Christ into our lives, we had to "believe" that He was what we needed. If Christ is from God, and He is what we need, then if we can continually just KNOW that we are pleasing to God because we have Christ in our hearts, then God rewards us. He rewards us not by what we do, what we have done, or what we will someday in the future do, but because of what Jesus Christ has done at the Cross for us.

When Jesus Christ died upon that Cross, He did more than just lay down His life. He traded our life, for His. That means that if we have accepted Christ into our heart, than everything that we need is now WITHIN us!

This is where we don't discover the champion in us, but we discover the Champion that we are now that we are IN CHRIST!

***if you haven't received Jesus into your heart, we invite you to ask Him in today. There is no way to please God without Him, but WITH Christ, there are no limits to the good things that can happen in our lives. Won't you receive Him today and let God allow you to feel His Love for you?!***