More...who is your mother?

We move on in our Bibles and we come to Jacob.

An interesting guy…but this isn’t about him, this is about our mother.

Jacob needed/wanted a wife. He found one, her name was Rachel and he loved her. However, Laban, Rachel’s father, tricked Jacob and instead married off Leah, Rachel’s older sister, to Jacob. It was a rotten thing for Laban to do but in a way it is also kind of funny. Jacob basically got married thinking he was marrying Rachel and woke up in the morning and it was Leah looking at him from across the pillow. I think poor old Jacob got quite a shock! The fact is Jacob was in such a hurry he failed to unveil his bride…you know when the groom turns back the veil at weddings today well this is a response to the mistake Jacob made all those years ago! You have to make sure you got the right one! None of us want to wake up beside Leah. You see Jacob loved Rachel and Rachel was very beautiful; Leah, on the other hand, was, well, not so beautiful!

The upshot of this story is that Jacob after jumping through a few hoops finally got Rachel and so we get back the question…who is your mother?

The name Leah means ‘weary’. The name Rachel means ‘ewe’ or ‘female sheep’. We will think about the characteristics of the meanings a little later for this is important in understanding the types represented by Leah and Rachel. It is also important that we know that Leah is the older, Rachel the younger. Leah, you see, is a type of the law, Rachel a type of grace and law came first followed by grace.

It is also important to reflect on the story of Jacob and Leah a little longer because there is significance there for our topic. Remember Jacob failed to unveil Leah, a veil brings blindness and the fact is the law blinds.

You know I feel like I should say something here. I do not want you to get the idea that I believe the law is wrong. This is not my purpose for I categorically state that the law is completely right. The law is an absolute reflection of the character and nature of God. The law reflects his holiness, the standard of God and if you want a definition of ‘right’ then this is it. This never changes. However, we need to gather the purpose of the law. Its sole purpose was to reveal, bring to light, to show our need for God. Its sole purpose was to reveal that we needed God. It said you must do this or that, or not do this or that, and if you are able then we will be right with God. This was not possible and the law stated that death was the result for one unable to follow. We were unable to follow and sadly we were even unable to die for our sin and so Jesus did it for us. Jesus once said that He didn’t come to do away with the law but to fulfil it. He is the complete fulfilment of the law. When we today hang on to the law we are nullifying His fulfilment of the law. By His grace in sacrifice He died the death we could not and He fulfilled the requirements of the law to the absolute letter and so today, if we believe in Him, we are free from the law and are brought into His grace, His total and complete love, His favour unmerited.

The law blinds. While we hang on to law we are blinded to grace. God’s desire is for us to be unveiled. The veil is a picture of the law. The Bible says in 2 Corinthians 3: 14 that ‘their minds were blinded. For until this day the same veil remains unlifted in the reading of the Old Testament, because the veil is taken away in Christ’. (As we read the Old Testament we must seek for the pointing forward to Jesus for it is only in Him is the truth of the Old Testament revealed). We are blinded with an unlifted veil and so we marry Leah.

Beloved, stop looking to your performance under the law to be justified, stop pursuing blessing under the measure of your obedience. Look to Christ because it is in Him the veil is removed; see Him and Him only as your justification. Step into the New Covenant ratified in His blood and receive the promise that you are completely justified in Him, not according to your performance but according to His finished work, and nothing more.

This is a true dilemma. Consider this; we have the delight of someone staggering into our church and receiving Jesus as their personal Saviour. They come to Him with all their stuff and He receives them and then we go to town on them and try to effect change. We aren’t prepared to wait on Jesus to transform and so we force it on them by introducing a few rules and regulations. We identify things that need changing and we want them changed now. This is best for them we consider…and frankly we can’t have people in our church behaving in such a way so we need to effect change. A bit of law is introduced and along with it comes the purpose of the law – condemnation. Not only does our new convert then get a measure of blindness as we ‘force’ them down the path of change with an injection of law, just to sort them out, but our good intended ‘rules’ mean they are then ‘veiled’ to grace.

The fact is that grace effects change but it is slow.

Jacob had Leah and he had Rachel. Leah worked fast and gave Jacob sons starting with Reuben. Rachel even got frustrated and introduced Bilhad, her maid servant, to Jacob and so by the time Rachel finally gave birth to Joseph Jacob already had ten sons by Leah and others.

Give grace time. Grace works slow for it works from the inside out. Law has the appearance of working fast but the fact it is it is tiring. Remember the meaning of the name Leah is ‘weary’. Law is tiring because it is based in our performance and our performance doesn’t last. Be honest no matter how hard you try you cannot effect lasting change. Only grace can bring change. Only receiving the love of God in Christ will the mountains be removed in our lives.

You remember David who went out against the mountain named Goliath he went with five stones. Five is the number of the grace of God, David went out knowing the grace of God and (any reading of the Psalms should convince you of this) it was in this unveiled place that he defeated the mountain.

Back to Rachel.

Rachel’s name means ‘ewe’ or ‘female sheep’.

Think of this…first of all the sheep directs us to the Lamb of God, Jesus, who became a sacrifice for us shedding His blood for our forgiveness and enduring the stripes for our healing.

Also the sheep is the epitome of submission. Isaiah describes a sheep as being led to the slaughter and before the shearers being dumb…this is a picture of submission. Submission Biblically represents agreement (not the world’s definition of submission) and we need to set aside anything of our own contribution to the plan of God to restore us and just accept His grace (unmerited favour).  

We can also see in Rachel the fact that God loves grace, not law. Jacob had two wives and he loved Rachel, not Leah. God loves grace not law. Yes law is holy but grace is beautiful and wonderful. Let me ask you…in your faith walk do you feel more for pursuing holiness or receiving grace? It is a much more beautiful state to receive Jesus than to pursue an unattainable goal of holiness in our own strength. Remember we are the righteousness of God in Christ.

Oh, absolutely I agree that the nature of God is to enforce the law, after all He is HOLY (with a capital ’H’) but, praise His name, He is also grace and mercy. That is why He sent His Son to endure the penalty of the sin of mankind and in so doing totally and completely satisfied His own holiness. It is in this fact and nothing else that we can declare in truth that we are the righteousness of God in Christ (2 Corinthians 5: 21).

This is what Rachel represents to us. Grace acceptance…Jesus acceptance for grace is a person and His name is Jesus.

Allowing grace to bring transformation can be seen in Rachel who ultimately gave birth to Joseph and Benjamin…which is another thought for another day.

You know only grace can truly bring transformation in a person’s life. The new Christian that has received Jesus who undoubtedly needs transformation will not be transformed by an injection of law.

I’m sorry, you may see short term results from this approach but it is only in the receiving of grace that you will see true and lasting transformation. The Bible says in Romans 5: 17 that ‘those who receive the abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness will reign in life through the One, Jesus Christ.’ Please understand here that ‘righteousness’ has nothing to do with right behaviour; this is the righteousness that is received only in the receiving of the free gift of Christ.

Only receiving grace (remember grace is a person…His name is Jesus) brings transformation. Why is it that we so often load new Christians with rules and regulations rather than allow grace to do His work? I hear some say “Are you kidding, we have to put boundaries on people of else they will do whatever they like!” This is a lie! Listen to the Bible…these are not my words, these are God’s words through Paul…Romans 6: 14, ‘For sin shall not have dominion over you, for you are not under law but under grace’.

We often quote this verse…’we love Him because He first loved us’…but what is the absolute truth of this? It is this…only as we receive and know His love can we love Him or anyone else. When we know His love then we will truly love God. As we receive Grace we will be so enamoured by Him that the dominion that the things that bound us will no longer have strength over us and this phenomenon will be an on-going transformation that will ultimately bring holiness. Nothing can stand before the love of God…read the latter verses of Romans 8.

Can you see the up-side-down nature of this? We think we need to pursue holiness and this will ALWAYS result in disappointment for it is based in us…the only true and lasting transformation comes from receiving Grace, ONLY under Grace will we see the destruction of the dominion of sin over us, ONLY UNDER GRACE, law can’t do it, ONLY GRACE.

There is a pivotal verse in the Bible found in Romans 8: 1. There is NO CONDEMNATION for them that are in Christ Jesus…the law brings condemnation, ONLY GRACE brings freedom, completeness, fullness, peace, hope, salvation, justification, forgiveness, and every other good thing. All things work together for good to them that are in Christ Jesus…note it makes no mention of our effort, obedience or strength, only being ‘in’ Him.

So who is your mother?

Leah? Leah is a type of law. Law who brings weariness? Law who brings burden? Law who brings condemnation?

Rachel? Rachel is a type of Grace. Grace who brings freedom? Grace who brings salvation? Grace who brings complete submission to the call and plan of God, a plan that is GOOD? Grace who brings true and lasting transformation?

Beloved choose Grace. Stop trying to obey to receive blessing. Just receive Him who is grace, Jesus. He is EVERYTHING.

And then there is Joseph…but that is for another time.

Who is your mother?

This is a very simple and interesting question which we could all answer in the natural…yes there are some who never knew their mothers but generally speaking we could all give an ‘appraisal’ of our natural mothers. A natural appraisal – hopefully a picture of one who nurtures and cares, who puts her children way ahead of all things, and before her own life. As I watch my wife and her interaction with our children I definitely see this picture.

However the Bible encourages us to not look at the natural things for these are passing but rather to look at the spiritual things which are eternal in nature and will never pass away for they are established in the truth of God who is spirit and the Father of us all.

Think then with me of our spiritual mother.

The Bible is made up of two sections – the Old and the New. Often we avoid the Old because it is difficult but the truth is that seeking the truth of God, revealed in Jesus, in the Old Testament brings wonderful new light to the truth revealed in the New Testament. Often we need the Old to reveal the New and we definitely should never reject the Old because as we seek Jesus in the Old the Jesus in the New is revealed in greater truth. Whenever you read the Old Testament please always seek a revelation of Jesus because everything points forward to Him, just as everything in the New Testament reveals Him. Beloved, Jesus is EVERYTHING. He is THE centre, THE way, THE truth, THE life…I could go on and on. Read the gospel written by John and find the ‘I am’ passages; the places where Jesus says ‘I am…’ They are a worthy investigation.

So let’s look in the Old and think about two women, Sarah and Hagar.

Remember the question is ‘Who is your mother?’

Now I could write reams and reams in ‘analysing’ the story of Sarah and Hagar but I want to cut to the point and hopefully you will see why these two women are so important for any who have received Jesus today, in 2012, nearly 2013.

One woman represents to us law and the other grace.

If you have spent any time in ‘churchland’ then you will have heard it said that this is the ‘day of grace’. Sadly I believe that ‘churchland’ has a very limited understanding of what this actually means and so it has become one of those ‘cliches’ that we, well, just ‘use’. The sad truth is that ‘churchland’ has taken law and alloyed it with grace and produced something that has a smattering of grace but in reality is law which is clearly revealed in the Bible as being ‘bondage’. Do I need to remind you that the Bible is clear that ‘it was for freedom that Christ has set us free?’ An alloy of law and grace will not do. It is a lie and can only come from the father of lies, the thief, who is stealing from you. You see the enemy, the father of lies and deceipt, the great thief and murderer has stolen from you the truth of grace and he has used verses of the Bible to deceive you by presenting law and having us receive it as for today (the day of grace). ‘Churchland’ has received this ‘teaching’ and produced the great edifices of religiosity that we see before us who stand and claim to be ‘the Church’ but instead are feeding teaching that is an alloy of the truth and bring to the people only bondage.

How can I represent this work of deceipt and abuse to you? The enemy does not want you to know you are loved…that you are the Beloved. That is the bottom line. He tried the same on Jesus Himself. When Jesus was baptised heaven opened and God Himself declared that ‘This is My beloved Son in who I am well pleased.’ God declared His love. A short time later the enemy, in his temptation, said to Jesus, using scripture, ‘If you are the son of God command these stones to be made into bread’. He was using scripture to tempt…Jesus was hungry having not eaten for forty days and could have easily been tempted to command and eat but if He had then death would have been confirmed. But please note that the enemy left out the word ‘beloved’…only a short time before Jesus had been declared by God as ‘beloved Son’ but the enemy chose to leave this out. Beloved he is doing that today constantly to us…diverting us away from the love of God and leading us into teaching based on scripture but based in law and therefore bondage comes.

My hope is that with this blog you will reject law and receive grace and in that receiving receive freedom.

Have you watched the movie ‘The Avengers’? When Loki comes he declares that real freedom for people is to be controlled and he commands the people to kneel down before him. But one man refuses…let us be that one man! You see an alloy of law and grace even that which is taught in our churches is a means of control, and control is NOT of God.

So who is your mother?

Hagar is law. Hagar represents the old covenant which is the law, all that is bound in the Ten Commandments and everything associated with it.

 Sarah, on the other hand, is grace. Sarah represents the new covenant which is grace and nothing more.

As I said there is much analysis that could be made about this story but suffice to say this at this time. If you want a Bible passage to read along with this then look at Galatians 4: 21 – 31.

The promise of God was a son. There was much more but it was all based in Sarah, who was old and barren, giving birth to a promised son.

Ishmael came through self-effort as Abraham and Sarah tried to help God fulfil the promise He had made. Sarah gave her bondmaid to Abraham and Ishmael was born. Galatians 4: 23 says that Hagar, who represents the law, gave birth to Ishmael ‘according to the flesh’. The ‘flesh’ represents self-effort and human strength and human performance. Romans 8: 8 says that ‘those who are in the flesh cannot please God’. God isn’t pleased to see us trust in ourselves not because He is angry with us but because as a good Father He knows there is such a better way which we are missing.

Sarah gave birth to Isaac. It is really interesting to note that Ishmael was a teenager by the time Isaac arrived so by this time Sarah was well past it and so was Abraham. Human performance certainly had nothing to do with the arrival of the promised son Isaac. Self-effort and human strength could not achieve the result that was Isaac and he was born of the Spirit totally and only out of the promise of God.

Beloved don’t play around with the law; you are children of grace. What does this mean practically for you? Simply don’t trust in your self-effort, your human strength, your performance to get right and remain right with God. Instead look to His promises, the promises of a Father who loves you without end, who looks at you daily, moment by moment, and sees you in the beauty and perfections of His Son who He gave up freely to bring you back.

Beloved, Galatians 4: 30 concludes that we are to cast out the bondwoman. Hagar and Ishmael were cast out…I once thought that Hagar and Ismael got a rough deal but there is much that I could share within this story from the Old Testament but the type for us today, right now, is this…we must cast her out…we must remove the law. Beloved you are no longer under it…you are the righteousness of God in Christ. Say it out loud…YOU ARE THE RIGHTEOUSNESS OF GOD IN CHRIST if you are in Christ…if you believe in Him and mustard seed size faith is enough.

 Practically we must reject the alloying of law and grace, we must stop listening to law preached, we must accept that we are loved and that love is not based in what we do but totally in the unquenchable love that the Father has for the Son, and in the totally and completely finished work of Jesus.

The law brings death. When the law was given 3000 people died (Exodus 32: 28), when God gave His Spirit 3000 people were saved (Acts 2: 41). Choose life, receive grace and nothing more. Receive the promises of God, they are not based in your efforts, they are based in the grace (unmerited favour) of God and the undeniable fact that He loves you (John 3: 16). You are His Beloved!

Who is your mother? Sarah is your mother for Sarah represents grace to you and you are a child of the promise. Cast out the bondwoman (law) and receive the free, the beautiful, wonderful grace of our God.

God bless you.

The name of Jesus...

It is nearly Christmas which is the time when we remember and recognise the birth of Jesus.
Do we?
Hmmm maybe that is for another post!

Jesus.
What's in a name?

Just been thinking today about the name...Jesus.

The Bible says in Philippians 2 that 'God highly exalted Him, and bestowed on Him a name which is above every name, that at the name of JESUS every knee should bow...'

The name Jesus means Jesus our Saviour.
Jesus in Hebrew is the name Yeshua.
The name Yeshuah contains an abbreviation of the name Yahweh.
Yahweh is the name of God in Hebrew.
Therefore the name of Jesus literally means Yahweh is our Saviour.
The LORD is our Saviour.

Wow!

No matter what you are in at the moment, no matter what the crisis is, no matter the problem; GOD ALMIGHTY is our Saviour.
Everytime you call on the name of Jesus you are calling on God to save you.
Everytime you call GOD ALMIGHTY will save you.
His promise to you is He will never leave you or forsake you.

How do you feel about that?

Jesus is the Saviour...

I remember years ago I was asked to speak at a presentation of Jesus...in church land we might call it a gospel rally, or a gospel celebration; 'gospel' translates good news...so it was an event where I was to tell those gathered the good news that had come, which is Jesus.
I gave what I felt was a reasonable presentation of this good news and a point came when I 'felt' it time to ask people whether they would agree to accept Jesus for themselves. So I mustered my best 'decision time' closing and delivered it and...nothing happened!

There were some hundreds of people of all ages sitting before me and not one person moved...you could have heard a pin drop!

At this point I entered into a communication with God that felt like it took an hour or two but probably only actually took a few seconds.
I started with the words, "Thanks a lot God, You bring me out here and give me this job to share Jesus and here I am and now I look like a right wally. Thanks for the complete embarrassment! Here I am standing up here because I thought that's what You wanted me to do and all I have achieved is to make myself look like a complete ..."

God replied, "Graeme, there is something you need to understand...you can preach all you like and I will give you unbelievable opportunities to preach but I do the saving!"

"Okay...Jesus is the Saviour," I considered.

"Now ask them again."

So I did and every person, man, woman and child rose up to receive Jesus.

What is the point...we must recognise that the successful salvation of mankind is not bound up in the quality of our preaching, the cleverness of our strategy, the intensity of our effort, the encouragement to to be missional...like everything else salvation is of the Lord and we must TRUST Him. He saves because He isn't willing that any should miss Him. We are just favoured to be a part of His good news delivery.

We are not the key, the key is recognising that He is the Key, and the Door, and the Way, and the Truth, and the Life, and the Bread of Life, and the Water of Life, and the Light of the World, and the Good Shepherd, and the Son of God, and the Saviour; He is EVERYTHING.

When we recognise that...truly see it then we will bring Jesus and He is the Saviour.