Church Discipline

Posted on by korgrocker

“I can hardly believe the report about the sexual immorality going on among you—something that even pagans don’t do. I am told that a man in your church is living in sin with his stepmother. You are so proud of yourselves, but you should be mourning in sorrow and shame. And you should remove this man from your fellowship.”
1 Corinthians 5:1-2 NLT

Jesus gave us some teaching about church discipline. This has only rarely had to be followed, in my experience, but the process is there. There was a real problem in the Corinthian church because they were accepting an immoral and adulterous relationship between a man and his stepmother. Perhaps they had misinterpreted Paul’s teaching about grace. In Romans 5:20-21, he wrote, “The law was brought in so that the trespass might increase. But where sin increased, grace increased all the more, so that, just as sin reigned in death, so also grace might reign through righteousness to bring eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord“. Paul was effectively saying that as sin increases, God’s grace increases even more. In other words, sin cannot grow past God’s capacity to give good to those who deserve His angry judgment instead. Paul concludes that God’s grace is the greater ruler. It reigns over sin and death. How? He declares righteous all of us sinners who, by faith, receive his grace-gift of Jesus’ death for our sin on the cross. He wrote this letter to the Romans probably while he was staying with the Corinthians, so it is very likely that Paul shared his understanding of God’s grace with the Corinthian church. Did they therefore decide that sinning was fine because God’s grace would cover it? They may have deliberately ignored the verses that Paul wrote over the page in Romans 6:1-4, “What shall we say, then? Shall we go on sinning, so that grace may increase? By no means! We are those who have died to sin; how can we live in it any longer? Or don’t you know that all of us who were baptised into Christ Jesus were baptised into his death? We were therefore buried with him through baptism into death in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, we too may live a new life”. So we have sin and God’s grace, and a congregation that seemed to be setting their own rules, based on a misunderstanding, deliberate or otherwise, of Paul’s teaching.

But Paul soon had them back on track, pointing out that rather than pridefully accepting the immoral situation, they should instead have been “mourning in sorrow and shame” and started the process of evicting the man (and presumably his step-mother) from the church. But back to what Jesus taught, something we find in Matthew 18. There are three steps to follow:

  1. Matthew 18:15, “If your brother or sister sins, go and point out their fault, just between the two of you. If they listen to you, you have won them over”. The first step involves a low-key opportunity to point out that there is a sin that needs to be dealt with, and the sinner and the one who has observed it have a chat and hopefully resolve the problem at that point. Such an approach requires much love and gentleness, with the situation kept strictly private and confidential. Of course, there has to be a good relational and trustworthy bridge with the one who is the sinner, who must also be prepared to be obedient, repentant, and recognise the fact that God is at work in his life. 
  2. Matthew 18:16, “But if they will not listen, take one or two others along, so that ‘every matter may be established by the testimony of two or three witnesses’”. Things are getting a bit more serious now because the sinner involved has failed to respond to the first step. But the second step is still intent on the restoration of the miscreant, with additional witnesses helping to resolve the problem. Again, privacy, love and gentleness are involved because the “brother or sister” will by now be feeling a bit under siege. It may at this point be helpful to involve a church leader, who would be able to assist with a plan of action and would be able to follow up with some Biblical help.
  3. Matthew 18:17, “If they still refuse to listen, tell it to the church; and if they refuse to listen even to the church, treat them as you would a pagan or a tax collector”. The third step is the nuclear option, and the one that Paul was advising the Corinthian church to follow. There is still a chance of repentance and restoration, and it would be a very stubborn and hardened sinner who would let things go this far. However, note that Jesus didn’t teach that the sinner should be excluded from the church. Instead, he or she would be allowed to sit in the meeting, as if they were a random unbeliever who walked through the doors. If such a thing happens in our churches today, we welcome the visitor and treat them with love and acceptance, and if sin is apparent, then we still love the sinner but hate the sin. 

To be fair, my experience is that after the first step, the poor person involved is more likely to leave the church and find another, or reject the idea of church, and even God, for good. In the case of the situation in Corinth, Paul was so appalled about what was going on that he advised that the man involved be ejected from the church, perhaps an early example of the practice of excommunication. 

So what can we pilgrims learn from this? We need to guard our hearts and lives, striving for a sinless existence. Some Christians have a tendency to think that any private sin can be brushed under the carpet, and they can continue to appear righteous and holy in the pews. But there is a verse in Numbers 32:23 that reads, “But if you fail to keep your word, then you will have sinned against the Lord, and you may be sure that your sin will find you out”. I can think of one high profile Christian leader whose sins found him out when he was caught with a prostitute, and I know from my own experience about a church pastor who turned up one day at church with a new car, paid for, he said, from a businessman’s gift, but sadly he lied about a win through a scratch card purchased from his local newsagent. In 1 John 1:8-9, we read, “If we claim we have no sin, we are only fooling ourselves and not living in the truth. But if we confess our sins to him, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all wickedness”. We pilgrims must walk in holiness and truth, and be secure in our knowledge that God loves us and wants our highest good. That’s why Jesus came, to seek and save the lost, those who otherwise, through their sins, were heading for a lost eternity. And we soberly remember that one day that was us, dead in our trespasses and sins. But we are now children of God “ … created to be like God in true righteousness and holiness” (Ephesians 4:24b). What a wonderful Saviour! And as each believer functions in the way that God desires, any problems within the church will be nonexistent, eliminating the need for “church discipline“.

Father God. In the same way that You discipline Your children, You will discipline Your church. One day, we will all attend the wedding feast as the Bride of Christ, without sin and being holy and righteous in Your presence. Thank You. Amen.

Pretentious Speeches

Posted on by korgrocker

“Some of you have become arrogant, thinking I will not visit you again. But I will come—and soon—if the Lord lets me, and then I’ll find out whether these arrogant people just give pretentious speeches or whether they really have God’s power. For the Kingdom of God is not just a lot of talk; it is living by God’s power. Which do you choose? Should I come with a rod to punish you, or should I come with love and a gentle spirit?”
1 Corinthians 4:18-21 NLT

Can we remember those days as a young child, having been caught out for some misdemeanour, or having been sent home from school with a bad report? Our mother said, “Wait until your father gets home!” and there was then a long wait, full of dread, as we anticipated a major telling-off or worse. Possibly, sanctions would follow, such as a loss of liberty, a favourite toy or some other punishment. Well, Paul said to the Corinthians that some naughty children amongst them reckoned that he was too busy elsewhere to return and bring correction and discipline. These “arrogant” people thought that without Paul with them, they could continue in their pretentious ways without fear of getting a telling off and being made to look the small people that they really were inside. 

Why was Paul feared so much by the Corinthian congregation? After all, he was only a man and wasn’t even very good at preaching, so they thought. But we find that Paul had one attribute that they couldn’t dispute, and which provided authenticity to his presence. 1 Corinthians 2:1-5, “When I first came to you, dear brothers and sisters, I didn’t use lofty words and impressive wisdom to tell you God’s secret plan. For I decided that while I was with you, I would forget everything except Jesus Christ, the one who was crucified. I came to you in weakness—timid and trembling. And my message and my preaching were very plain. Rather than relying on clever and persuasive speeches, I relied solely on the power of the Holy Spirit. I did this so you would trust not in human wisdom. Still, in the power of God”. The power of the Holy Spirit was something that would have filled them with dread. His was the opposite approach to those “arrogant people” who were giving puffed up speeches full of their own claims and arrogance, but were nothing more than hot air. It was one thing to claim greatness. Still, another to prove it by “the power of the Holy Spirit“.

Of course, there would have been those who claimed that God was full of grace and love and would never do anything harmful to anyone. But I wonder if the story of Ananias and Sapphira had reached the Corinthians? Perhaps it had, and the news would have filled them with dread. Acts 5: 3, 5, 10, “Then Peter said, “Ananias, why have you let Satan fill your heart? You lied to the Holy Spirit, and you kept some of the money for yourself. …  As soon as Ananias heard these words, he fell to the floor and died. Everyone who heard about it was terrified.  … Instantly, she fell to the floor and died. When the young men came in and saw that she was dead, they carried her out and buried her beside her husband”. Those present when all this happened, we are told, were terrified. I expect they were, because in those days, such a manifestation of the Holy Spirit’s power gave an incredible weight to the Word of God, and His expectation for integrity and honesty in the hearts and deeds of believers everywhere. On the positive side, there was the account of the lame beggar, healed at the Temple’s Beautiful Gate, an account we can read in Acts 3. But despite all this, there were still some in the Corinthian church who must have had little respect for the Holy Spirit and instead displayed an arrogant tendency to make “pretentious speeches” before the rest of the congregation. It is one thing to claim greatness but another to prove it through the Holy Spirit’s power. 

Perhaps those arrogant and pretentious members of the Corinthian church would have done well to read a couple of Scriptures, which they would have had access to, because they are both in the Hebrew Bible. Proverbs 16:18, “Pride goes before destruction, and haughtiness before a fall”, might have been a good one to remember. Another we find in Hannah’s prayer in 1 Samuel 2:3, “Stop acting so proud and haughty! Don’t speak with such arrogance! For the Lord is a God who knows what you have done; he will judge your actions”. But Paul said that the final arbiter was the answer to the question – did “they really have God’s power”? It is not by their words that they would be judged, but by their actions.

We pilgrims can learn much from these verses at the end of 1 Corinthians 4. It does not matter what we say in our Christian lives. Those around us will soon sniff out a fraud. Someone who acts all religious on a Sunday morning will soon be caught out if they act in a worldly way in the office on a Monday, with foul and unedifying speech and demeaning behaviour. Arrogant claims are just a puff of wind and will soon be discerned by the Godly. In the presence of brothers and sisters in Christ, such arrogant people can have a disruptive and negative effect, leading to division, quarrelling and strife. Factions will develop, and before soon, a church will start to disintegrate. It is just as well today that the Holy Spirit’s power is not manifested in an Ananias and Sapphira way, because with such a manifestation, much of our national religious denominational structure would collapse overnight. Imagine the chaos, the anxiety, fear and soul-searching! But that is not to say that God will not achieve His own ends in other ways. There may be nothing so dramatic (however, it would be foolish to discount such a move of God, by the way), but He is patient and kind in this season of grace, and nothing will get in the way of His will and purposes for His church. Remember that one day we pilgrims will form part of the Bride of Christ, wedded to Jesus forever (Revelation 19:7-9). 

In Philippians 2, Paul set out the true way that we believers should behave and present ourselves in our churches and fellowships. Philippians 2:3-5, “Don’t be selfish; don’t try to impress others. Be humble, thinking of others as better than yourselves. Don’t look out only for your own interests, but take an interest in others, too. You must have the same attitude that Christ Jesus had“. No “pretentious speeches” were ever heard from the lips of Jesus, and none should come out of our mouths either. 

Dear Father, we need Your help. Our humanity gets in the way of our spiritual desires, and we all have a tendency to act in a worldly way. Please forgive us and lead us on the path of true righteousness. In Jesus’ name. Amen.

Spiritual Fathers

Posted on by korgrocker

“I am not writing these things to shame you, but to warn you as my beloved children. For even if you had ten thousand others to teach you about Christ, you have only one spiritual father. For I became your father in Christ Jesus when I preached the Good News to you. So I urge you to imitate me.”
1 Corinthians 4:14-16 NLT

Is Paul on an ego trip here? He was claiming to be the Corinthians’ “spiritual father” because it was he who brought the Gospel to Corinth and started a church there. Other men (and presumably at some point women), may have taught them about Christ, but Paul reminded them that he was the one who started it all. Paul was, however, only doing what Jesus had asked of all of us – “Therefore, go and make disciples of all the nations, baptising them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Teach these new disciples to obey all the commands I have given you. And be sure of this: I am with you always, even to the end of the age” (Matthew 28:19-20). Even though Paul would not have heard Jesus’ words at the same time as the rest of the disciples, he had a personal revelation of Jesus, and he also spent time with the other Apostles and early disciples, learning what he could. But why did Paul have to remind all the Corinthians of his pedigree? It was because they had moved into error by neglecting their own missions, and they were squabbling over who was the best teacher. 

The use of the word “father” can be a bit contentious in a religious sense because Jesus explicitly told His disciples, and by implication us as well, never to give anyone such a title. As recorded in Matthew 23:9, Jesus said,  “And don’t address anyone here on earth as ‘Father,’ for only God in heaven is your Father“. But there are references in the New Testament to the Apostles having spiritual children. Peter made such a reference about Mark in 1 Peter 5:13, “Your sister church here in Babylon sends you greetings, and so does my son Mark“. We know enough about Mark to know that he wasn’t naturally related to Peter, so the reference must have been spiritual. And of course we have the reference to Timothy being Paul’s son “in the faith” – “I am writing to Timothy, my true son in the faith. May God the Father and Christ Jesus our Lord give you grace, mercy, and peace” (1 Timothy 1:2). And another Apostle, this time John, referred to the church he founded as his “children” – “My dear children, I am writing this to you so that you will not sin. But if anyone does sin, we have an advocate who pleads our case before the Father. He is Jesus Christ, the one who is truly righteous” (1 John 2:1). But in all these cases, there is never a reference to anyone in the congregations calling their mentors “father”. 

The references to parents and children may seem a bit strange until we understand that there is a birthing process in operation. Jesus clearly spelt this out in John 3:5-7, “Jesus replied, “I assure you, no one can enter the Kingdom of God without being born of water and the Spirit. Humans can reproduce only human life, but the Holy Spirit gives birth to spiritual life. So don’t be surprised when I say, ‘You must be born again’”. I suppose it must be a natural conclusion because just as a physical birth resulted from a mother and a father, there is an analogy that a spiritual birth also has a parent. Perhaps we can also extend the analogy to include a “foster parent”, a man or woman who nurtures the young disciples through their early years in the faith. The whole principle of Christian discipleship involves a parent/child spiritual relationship, and the new disciples grow up in the faith and have their own “children” as well, thus fulfilling Jesus’ command to “go and make disciples” everywhere. And of course, we are aware that the ultimate “parent” is God Himself, 

A few years ago, I thought much about my spiritual parents, several men and women who, at various stages in my spiritual life, brought instruction and assistance. Their’s was a solid grounding for me, and I have had the opportunity to thank each one personally for their persistence and patience in keeping me on the “straight and narrow” pathway . Sadly, three wonderful parents are dead now, but their legacy – for me and others – still lives on. Being a parent can be a thankless task sometimes, as any natural parent will testify, but we are all spiritual parents in one degree or another to the “children” we encounter. 

We mustn’t forget the role of spiritual siblings, our brothers and sisters in Christ. For their benefit, we have all been provided with a spiritual gift designed to build each other up in the faith. 1 Corinthians 12:4, 7, “There are different kinds of spiritual gifts, but the same Spirit is the source of them all. … A spiritual gift is given to each of us so we can help each other”. Note that all Christians are provided with such a gift, and any believer who may be unsure should seek God through prayer to determine what their gift is. 

It is sad that in society today, being “born again” has such negative connotations, but it is an essential part of entering the Christian life. Being “born again” will divide cultural Christians from true Christians. Cultural Christians are those who want to live a good life (commendable, of course) but without the relational connection with God. Yes, they may go through the motions, singing the hymns and saying the prayers, but they have never come to that point where they submit to Christ through true repentance, trusting God for their future and handing their lives over to Him, and in the process being birthed through the Holy Spirit. The devil hates “born-again” Christians because he knows he has no jurisdiction over them, but there is no other way for a believer to start his or her walk of faith. We who are “born again” must never forget and respect our “spiritual fathers“, thanking them through Jesus for their faithfulness and love, teaching and spiritual nurturing.

Dear Father God. Thank You for the spiritual birthing process, because without it there was no way we could enter Your Kingdom. We pray too that You reveal to us clearly what Your gift is for us, so that we can benefit those around us. In Jesus’ name. Amen.

Life At The Bottom

Posted on by korgrocker

“You think you already have everything you need. You think you are already rich. You have begun to reign in God’s kingdom without us! I wish you really were reigning already, for then we would be reigning with you. Instead, I sometimes think God has put us apostles on display, like prisoners of war at the end of a victor’s parade, condemned to die. We have become a spectacle to the entire world—to people and angels alike. Our dedication to Christ makes us look like fools, but you claim to be so wise in Christ! We are weak, but you are so powerful! You are honoured, but we are ridiculed. Even now, we go hungry and thirsty, and we don’t have enough clothes to keep warm. We are often beaten and have no home. We work wearily with our own hands to earn our living. We bless those who curse us. We are patient with those who abuse us. We appeal gently when evil things are said about us. Yet we are treated like the world’s garbage, like everybody’s trash—right up to the present moment.”
1 Corinthians 4:8-13 NLT

Paul sets out a stark contrast between his life, living for Christ, and the life of the Corinthians, who displayed middle-class affluence and contentment. We can imagine such a scenario today, with the congregation arriving for the Sunday morning service at a quaint, post-card picture, type of church building in a similarly quaint English country village, with expensive houses skirting the village pond. Neatly manicured gardens and a graveyard, and well-dressed people in all their finery walking through the postern gate leading up to the church door. That was the image Paul was presenting about the Corinthian church. They were living like kings, he said. But compare that to a city-centre church today, with homeless men coming to the building for a bit of warmth and a hot meal if it is available that day. Their clothes were ragged and filthy, hair unkempt and dirty hands. Such a contrast. It is sad that such a situation is happening in our society today, but there have always been rich and poor people since the earliest times. 

Paul set out the conditions under which he was living as a worker for Christ. He compared weakness and power, honour and ridicule, hunger and plenty, homes and homelessness, blessings and curses, unclothed and clothed, and finally, he said he and his fellow workers were being beaten and treated like “the world’s garbage”. He and his fellow workers were truly living their lives “at the bottom”. So why did they do it? Paul had at one time so much going for him, as a Pharisee with a career in tent making. He could have had a comfortable living, much as the Corinthians had, should he have so chosen. But Paul had an encounter with the risen Jesus on the Damascus Road that transformed his life and turned it around. No more comfortable suburban life for him because he had been commissioned to take the Gospel to the Gentiles, and nothing was going to divert Paul from his mission. 

Paul points to himself and the other apostles of Jesus to show the contrast between their lifestyles and attitudes and those of the Corinthians. He wants the believers in Corinth to see the true path of those who live as servants of Christ. Paul writes that God has made him and the other apostles an exhibit of life at the bottom, in terms of earthly values. Instead of living as kings, as the Corinthians seemed to be trying to do, Paul and the other apostles lived as condemned men living on death row. Their lives were on display as a spectacle for all to see in both the natural and supernatural worlds. Both angels and men were watching how poorly they lived in human terms and made judgments about their choices. Paul had sacrificed much in his missionary service, and he wanted the Corinthians, and by implication, us pilgrims as well, to know that life being lived God’s way and in His Kingdom would not always be a comfortable existence.

Dear Father God. Living in Your Kingdom is not an easy choice. Jesus said that in this life we would have trouble, but we take heart, as did the early disciples, that He came to overcome the world. In deep gratitude, we move on step by step, towards our eternal home with You. Amen.

Reigning With Christ

Posted on by korgrocker

“You think you already have everything you need. You think you are already rich. You have begun to reign in God’s kingdom without us! I wish you really were reigning already, for then we would be reigning with you.”
1 Corinthians 4:8 NLT

Paul suggested with a bit of sarcasm that the Corinthians had begun to “reign in God’s Kingdom” without involving Paul and Apollos and, presumably, other leaders sent to bless this wayward congregation. They had developed this line of thinking because they thought they were already receiving the future blessings of Heaven in their earthly lives, not understanding that they had much to learn and consequently receive. God had graciously provided all the spiritual gifts they needed, as Paul said in 1 Corinthians 1:7, “Therefore you do not lack any spiritual gift as you eagerly wait for our Lord Jesus Christ to be revealed“. So perhaps the Corinthians thought that they didn’t need anything more, but Paul administered a good dose of realism with 1 Corinthians 1:26-27, “Brothers and sisters, think of what you were when you were called. Not many of you were wise by human standards; not many were influential; not many were of noble birth. But God chose the foolish things of the world to shame the wise; God chose the weak things of the world to shame the strong“. But their worldly behaviour in judging the merits of Paul and Apollos exposed a reality gap between what they thought they had become and what they really were. These were just ordinary people saved by God’s grace, but still needing the basics of God’s teaching so that they would grow up to become the people of the Spirit that God desired. 1 Corinthians 3:1-3, “Dear brothers and sisters, when I was with you, I couldn’t talk to you as I would to spiritual people. I had to talk as though you belonged to this world or as though you were infants in Christ. I had to feed you with milk, not with solid food, because you weren’t ready for anything stronger. And you still aren’t ready, for you are still controlled by your sinful nature. You are jealous of one another and quarrel with each other. Doesn’t that prove you are controlled by your sinful nature? Aren’t you living like people of the world?” The Corinthians seemed to have become so arrogant that they believed that they were “reigning with Christ” already, not realising that their worldly behaviour was getting in the way of God’s purposes.

So what does “reigning with Christ” really mean? In Romans 5:17, we receive some insight that provides an answer: “For if, by the trespass of the one man, death reigned through that one man, how much more will those who receive God’s abundant provision of grace and of the gift of righteousness reign in life through the one man, Jesus Christ!” Unbelievers live in a kingdom where death reigns. Romans 5:14, “Nevertheless, death reigned from the time of Adam to the time of Moses, even over those who did not sin by breaking a command, as did Adam, who is a pattern of the one to come”. Because of Adam, sin always brings death. Death became king. It ruled the lives of every person born from Adam, and it still rules our societies today. Until the point when we pilgrims became believers in Jesus, we too were living in the kingdom of this world, living in a place that was without hope and subject to a curse that would result in our ultimate “death” in a place we call hell. Of course, we are referring to spiritual death, and we know that through Jesus, life will reign supreme and eternal. Through His grace, we are reigning in God’s Kingdom, and it is all about Him, Jesus our Saviour. In other words, receiving God’s justification by placing our faith in Christ not only frees us from the kingdom of death, it allows us to rule in the kingdom of life alongside Jesus, as the very children of God.

Do we reign with Christ today? Romans 8:15-17 (MSG), “This resurrection life you received from God is not a timid, grave-tending life. It’s adventurously expectant, greeting God with a childlike “What’s next, Papa?” God’s Spirit touches our spirits and confirms who we really are. We know who he is, and we know who we are: Father and children. And we know we are going to get what’s coming to us—an unbelievable inheritance! We go through exactly what Christ goes through. If we go through the hard times with him, then we’re certainly going to go through the good times with him!” We pilgrims know the future because we have faith in God and His promises. But in the here and now, we receive a foretaste of what is to come, because we are co-heirs with Christ “Now if we are children, then we are heirs – heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ, if indeed we share in his sufferings so that we may also share in his glory” (Romans 8:17 NIV), but we note the added caveat – “sharing in [Christ’s] sufferings”. But what does this suffering look like? Well, for a start, we will be persecuted. It may be in a low-key way here in the West, or it may come to physical harm, as in other parts of the world. We will be ostracised in the office or in any other social gathering, considered as having “weird” beliefs. If we stand firm in our faith, it may reduce job opportunities and even exclusion from certain jobs. And we must also die to our previous sinful lives so that we can live a life of purity and holiness. 

If we wish to “reign with Christ” there is a cost, but ” … the God of all grace, who called you to his eternal glory in Christ, after you have suffered a little while, will himself restore you and make you strong, firm and steadfast” (1 Peter 5:10). Our life on this earth seems to have the potential to go on forever when a person is young, but the reality is that, compared to eternity, it is little more than a puff of wind. So, fellow pilgrims, let us reign together in God’s Kingdom, set free through the blood of Christ.

Dear Father in Heaven. Please help us in our lives today, as we reach out to You for the resources we need to be Your people of faith in a dark, sinful world. In Jesus’ name. Amen.

Judgments

Posted on by korgrocker

“My conscience is clear, but that doesn’t prove I’m right. It is the Lord himself who will examine me and decide. So don’t make judgments about anyone ahead of time—before the Lord returns. For he will bring our darkest secrets to light and will reveal our private motives. Then God will give to each one whatever praise is due.”
1 Corinthians 4:4-5 NLT

Good news and bad news are coming on the Day of Judgment when the Lord returns. This will not be the time of the Great White Throne judgment, when all those whose names are not written in the Lamb’s Book of Life will find out their ultimate destination, an eternity spent in the company of the devil and his demons in a place called hell. No, this will be the Bema Judgement Seat of Christ, so named after the Greek word “Bema” meaning “judgement seat”, that we find in Romans 14:10, which reads, “So why do you condemn another believer? Why do you look down on another believer? Remember, we will all stand before the judgment seat of God”. Although this verse refers to God being the Judge, we know from John 5:22 that it will be Christ sitting on the Bema. This verse reads, “Moreover, the Father judges no one, but has entrusted all judgment to the Son”. So, the bad news for us believers is not having to fear the thought of spending eternity in hell, but that God “will bring our darkest secrets to light and will reveal our private motives”. That is for us pilgrims, and I don’t know about you, but the exposure of my “darkest secrets” will make for an uncomfortable time. The only mitigating factor is that everyone else’s “darkest secrets” are probably just as bad. But we also have some good news coming. Firstly, our salvation will be intact. This matter was settled by Christ’s sacrifice on our behalf ( 1 John 2:2, “He himself is the sacrifice that atones for our sins—and not only our sins but the sins of all the world“) and our faith in Him (John 3:16, “For this is how God loved the world: He gave his one and only Son, so that everyone who believes in him will not perish but have eternal life“). Secondly, Paul wrote that “God will give to each one whatever praise is due“. Will this be the time when we will hear Jesus say, “Well done, good and faithful servant” (Matthew 25:21, “The master was full of praise. ‘Well done, my good and faithful servant. You have been faithful in handling this small amount, so now I will give you many more responsibilities. Let’s celebrate together! ’”). 

Just as an aside, consider this word “eternity”. The natural view is to look at it from our perspective of time, meaning “eternity” is time without a beginning or an end. But “eternity” does not consist, in my view, of clocks ticking away forever. I prefer a definition of “eternity” as a state existing outside of time, meaning it is not subject to the passage of time as we experience it. Imagine all the things that are subject to the ravages of time lasting for all “eternity”. Our eternal bodies will never wear out, and many things more, but “eternity” is something that we will not be able to get our human-bound minds around in this life, but there is a time coming when we will be able to. 

But Paul was reflecting on the human tendency to judge others. We go through our lives making judgments all the time, purely because we have to. It is part of human existence. For example, if we see a person walking towards us, we subconsciously make a judgment to protect ourselves, just in case the person approaching us wants to do us harm. Most of the time, no action is required, but occasionally we will think it prudent to cross the road just in case. Or in a conversation, a statement made by the other person will require analysis and judgment to extract what it means for us. For example, if my boss at work starts talking about redundancies, I will immediately start to judge what he is saying, whether it will impact me. But on a more negative note, all the time we have our value systems at work, we judge others against them. And that is where the problem can lie, because most of the time our values are based on how a person looks, dresses or behaves, rather than what really exists within their hearts. Our values are established from an early age and reflect what we have been taught in the nurturing years. But our values do not provide us with a system for making judgments that is worth anything. God is the only Person qualified to judge. His “value system” is true, righteous, and just.

So what will happen when we give an account of our lives to Jesus? He will inspect our work. What did we do with the resources God gave us? How faithful were we? Were we yielded to the Spirit, seeking to honour Christ and further His work in the world? Did we neglect our opportunities to serve the Lord? In Matthew 10:41-42, Jesus said, “If you receive a prophet as one who speaks for God, you will be given the same reward as a prophet. And if you receive righteous people because of their righteousness, you will be given a reward like theirs. And if you give even a cup of cold water to one of the least of my followers, you will surely be rewarded“. It doesn’t matter how small something we have done for Jesus is, because each act of service will have a reward. The converse is also true, with neglect leading to a loss of reward. 

So, Paul advised the Corinthians to not get ahead of themselves and instead leave judgment to the Lord. Only Jesus is qualified to judge, and this will happen one day. If people, particularly other believers, act in ways that violate our values, we must not judge them, and instead we must pray for them. And if we can do that, it takes the pressure off us. One day, everyone will have to stand before one of two judgment seats and starting that process ourselves ahead of time is pointless.

Dear Heavenly Judge. We know that it is only You who is qualified to judge the human race. Please help us to look at our fellow members of society, believers and unbelievers, through Your eyes. In Jesus’ name. Amen.

A Clear Conscience

Posted on by korgrocker

“As for me, it matters very little how I might be evaluated by you or by any human authority. I don’t even trust my own judgment on this point. My conscience is clear, but that doesn’t prove I’m right. It is the Lord himself who will examine me and decide.”
1 Corinthians 4:3-4 NLT

Did Paul really not care much for the opinions of others? Was he behaving with an inbuilt arrogance that clouded his judgment and the way he conducted himself in his life? Was he going to continue to teach the Corinthians in the way he thought best without any reference to what other people thought of either him or his teachings? If we try and step into Paul’s shoes, what would we think about ourselves? Paul stated quite clearly that those in the Corinthian church who chose to judge him were of little consequence to him. But that is a hard place to be in, because if we took that approach, it would tend to exclude people who otherwise would affirm us, something that all human beings need. It’s not easy to be the unpopular one in the office who is shunned by the other workers. Or the one who walks into a social gathering and finds that the conversations taking place go silent. And all because the opinions of others are against us. To Paul, such a reaction “matters very little” to him because he was focused on one thing and one thing only – the propagation of the Gospel. He then said he had a clear conscience, because to Paul, there was only one evaluation or judgment that mattered, and that was from the Lord Himself. Paul added a caveat that even though his conscience was clear, that didn’t mean that he was right. We know that humans have a tendency to view themselves incorrectly; Jeremiah wrote, “The human heart is the most deceitful of all things, and desperately wicked. Who really knows how bad it is?” (Jeremiah 17:9). What was he getting at? It was because human beings can distort what they think about themselves, instead forming a subjective assessment ultimately driven by their sinful natures. 

Paul knew that it was Jesus who would ultimately provide an assessment, and to him, this was the only one that mattered. He had trusted his life to serving God one hundred per cent, a trust that extended into how he delivered the message that God had given him. His trust in God extended into his behaviour, his personal safety, every facet of his life, and he had a total disregard for anything, even his own life, that would get in the way of his mission. The next verse in Jeremiah drove his opinion of himself, “But I, the Lord, search all hearts and examine secret motives. I give all people their due rewards, according to what their actions deserve” (Jeremiah 17:10). Paul was never going to be diverted from his mission field because that was all that mattered to him.

Paul said he had a “clear conscience”, but what was that? One definition of a conscience is “an inner feeling that acts as a guide to the rightness or wrongness of one’s behaviour”. We know that we have done wrong because we have these nagging thoughts that won’t go away until we have put right the issue that caused them. A conscience is not just the domain of believers because unbelievers can also have a guilty conscience, perhaps caused when a misdemeanour violates one of our many laws, or their own inbuilt sense of human decency. Perhaps a parent is ashamed of an outburst against an unruly child, and then their conscience nags away at them. Perhaps a husband’s unfaithful behaviour towards his wife develops into a guilty conscience which won’t go away, and he tries all sorts of remedies to dull the pain, alcohol, drugs or even regular visits to a therapist. But it is only God who can take away the pain of a guilty conscience because ultimately, a violated conscience is caused by sin, rebellion against Him. In the Old Testament days, the sin which was the root behind a guilty conscience was redeemed by the shedding of blood through an animal sacrifice. But Jesus came to change all of that, because His blood sacrifice was once and for all, for all who put their trust and faith in Him. Hebrews 10:21-22, “And since we have a great High Priest who rules over God’s house, let us go right into the presence of God with sincere hearts fully trusting him. For our guilty consciences have been sprinkled with Christ’s blood to make us clean, and our bodies have been washed with pure water“. I love the verses in Psalm 103, “He forgives all my sins and heals all my diseases. …  He has removed our sins as far from us as the east is from the west” (Psalms 103:3, 12). We believers have a tendency to go back to the memories of sins that we have committed in the past, and we bring them once again before the Cross, asking for forgiveness. But Jesus asks, “What sin is that?” because when we repented of it the first time, the record was deleted. The sin data no longer exists, and no app in the world can ever recover the record from the sin archives. It’s gone for good. 

It is a wonderful place to be, to have a “clear conscience”. Jesus said, “So if the Son sets you free, you are truly free” (John 8:36). Paul may have had to face many difficulties – we can read all about them in 2 Corinthians 11 – but he did so with a “clear conscience”. We pilgrims too, can experience a “clear conscience” because we are followers of Christ, blood-bought, and forgiven. Nothing will get in the way of our acceptance into Heaven, and we read the confirmation in Romans 8:38-39, “For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord“. So, if we are feeling a bit wobbly about our faith, we must read over and over again Romans 8, and drum into our very souls. When we feel ostracised and shunned by those around us read Romans 8:31, “What, then, shall we say in response to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us?” Psalm 118:6, “The Lord is with me; I will not be afraid. What can mere mortals do to me?” In the end I would much rather have God’s endorsement than one from people around me. There is an old Gladys Knight song (Midnight Train to Georgia) where the chorus includes the line, “I’d rather live in his world than live without him in mine”. And that is my place today – “I’d rather live in His world than live without Him in mine”. And I’m sure Paul is humming that tune today, because after his Damascus Road conversion, the rest of his life was spent in God’s world. I know that I am now a citizen of Heaven, temporarily assigned to living out my days in the kingdom of the world, and so is each one of us pilgrims, but one day we will all be in God’s world. Forever and ever. Amen?

Dear Father God, we thank You for Your presence in our lives, because without You and Your Kingdom, we would be lost and without hope. Thankfully, because of Jesus, we are assured of a future with You. We worship You today. Amen.


Servants of Christ

Posted on by korgrocker

“So look at Apollos and me as mere servants of Christ who have been put in charge of explaining God’s mysteries. Now, a person who is put in charge as a manager must be faithful. As for me, it matters very little how I might be evaluated by you or by any human authority. I don’t even trust my own judgment on this point.”
1 Corinthians 4:1-3 NLT

Paul continued to write about the role of Apollos and himself in the next chapter. Consider us as managers (other Bible versions use the word “stewards”), he said, “mere servants of Christ”; Paul and Apollos were two men whose role was to teach the people about “God’s mysteries”. Typically for Paul, he was downplaying his role in the eyes of the Corinthian believers, telling them not to put either him or Apollos on a pedestal. They were just ordinary men with the ability of being able to teach and serve the people. Paul went on to explain that he wasn’t concerned with what the Corinthians thought of him, and then he said that he didn’t “even trust [his] own judgment on this point”. 

In the previous chapter, Paul explained the role of himself and Apollos, and by implication any other teacher who came to their church, as being the Lord’s workers. 1 Corinthians 3:5, “After all, who is Apollos? Who is Paul? We are only God’s servants through whom you believed the Good News. Each of us did the work the Lord gave us“. In 1 Corinthians 2:1-2, Paul made very clear his role in coming to Corinth, “When I first came to you, dear brothers and sisters, I didn’t use lofty words and impressive wisdom to tell you God’s secret plan. For I decided that while I was with you I would forget everything except Jesus Christ, the crucified one“. So what was it about the Corinthians that made Paul respond in the way he did? News had obviously got back to him that worldliness had crept into the church there, and the people were in a state of division, spending their time arguing about the merits or otherwise of the men who were serving them from the pulpit. But Paul said quite simply that he and Apollos were just “servants of Christ”.

So what makes a person a “servant of Christ”? Of course, Jesus was the ultimate example. He said, “For even the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve others and to give his life as a ransom for many” (Mark 10:45). This was a message that Jesus laid down for His disciples, and we read in the previous chapter, “He sat down, called the twelve disciples over to him, and said, “Whoever wants to be first must take last place and be the servant of everyone else”” (Mark 9:35). Paul wrote in Philippians 2:5-7, “In your relationships with one another, have the same mindset as Christ Jesus: who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be used to his own advantage; rather, he made himself nothing by taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness”. And as we read all about Jesus’s ministry years, we see the God-man going about Palestine serving all who came to Him. For example, look at Matthew 15:29, “Great crowds came to him, bringing the lame, the blind, the crippled, the mute and many others, and laid them at his feet; and he healed them“. No mention by Jesus about taking a lunch break or clocking off at 5pm. He was there for the people, serving the “great crowds”. Jesus also said, “However, those the Father has given me will come to me, and I will never reject them” (John 6:37). That’s servanthood.

In his role as a “mere servant of Christ”, Paul also said he was a manager or steward of the work entrusted to him. A steward is a servant who manages his master’s property, and stewards must be found to be faithful people of high integrity, working with excellence and honesty. But all this applies to us pilgrims as well. We are not only “servants of Christ” but we are also stewards, entrusted with sharing the wonderful truth of the Message of the Cross, the Gospel. But we mustn’t forget that we take the attitude of servanthood into the workplace, as Paul wrote in Ephesians 6:7-8, “Serve wholeheartedly, as if you were serving the Lord, not people, because you know that the Lord will reward each one for whatever good they do, whether they are slave or free”. That can be a hard one, particularly if we are stuck in a boring and unfulfilling job.

Servanthood is at the very heart of our faith. Before we look to our own needs, we look to the needs of others. We put aside what we are doing, no matter how inconvenient it is, to meet someone else’s needs, serving them with love, kindness and compassion. And we look to Jesus as our Saviour and example. He said, “ … “‘You must love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, and all your mind.’ This is the first and greatest commandment. A second is equally important: ‘Love your neighbour as yourself.’ The entire law and all the demands of the prophets are based on these two commandments” (Matthew 22:37-40). God first and everyone else second, with an emphasis that we treat and serve them as we would like others to treat and serve us. Who is our neighbour? Well, that’s for another day.

Heavenly Father, we worship You with grateful hearts, grateful for all You have done for us. Please help us as we look for opportunities to serve others, day by day. In Jesus’ name. Amen.

The Temple of God (1)

Posted on by korgrocker

“Don’t you realise that all of you together are the temple of God and that the Spirit of God lives in you? God will destroy anyone who destroys this temple. For God’s temple is holy, and you are that temple.”
1 Corinthians 3:16-17 NLT

In these two verses in 1 Corinthians, Paul describes a “temple” that consists of all the people in the Corinthian church and he used an analogy of a physical building to describe a spiritual equivalent Already Paul has described the believers in Corinth as a field and building (1 Corinthians 3:9, “For we are both God’s workers. And you are God’s field. You are God’s building”) and now he is telling them that they are God’s temple, all corporate analogies for an ideal Christian church. Such a body of believers started with the “seed” of the Gospel, was then built up by the “washing of the word”, and was now functioning as a Holy-Spirit-indwelling group capable of doing much for God. Or they should have been. We know that the Corinthian church started life in the home of Titius Justus, a Gentile believer who lived next to the synagogue in Corinth (Acts 18), and the believers there then probably met in different home groups as the church grew in numbers. We remember the origins of the early church in Jerusalem from Acts 2:42, 46, “All the believers devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching, and to fellowship, and to sharing in meals (including the Lord’s Supper), and to prayer. …  They worshiped together at the Temple each day, met in homes for the Lord’s Supper, and shared their meals with great joy and generosity”.  So probably the Corinthian believers did the same, hiring a hall when needed, much as new churches and fellowships do today. But Paul wasn’t bothered by buildings and was only concerned with the “building” that mattered – a group of Spirit-filled believers in whom the Holy Spirit could thrive.

Further on in his first Corinthian letter, Paul reminded the believers there that their bodies individually were “temples of the Holy Spirit” (1 Corinthians 6:19), but we’ll get to that later. In the meantime, Paul could see the potential of the Holy Spirit working through a group of Spirit-filled believers in what could be achieved for God. But Paul mildly rebuked the believers in Corinth because he had a concern. What was this? Well, first of all, there was sin present. He wrote, “for you are still controlled by your sinful nature. You are jealous of one another and quarrel with each other. Doesn’t that prove you are controlled by your sinful nature? Aren’t you living like people of the world?” (1 Corinthians 3:3). One place the Holy Spirit cannot live is in an atmosphere of sin, and worldly people will not experience the indwelling of God’s Spirit. Another problem with these nascent believers was a lack of harmony between them. 1 Corinthians 1:10, “I appeal to you, dear brothers and sisters, by the authority of our Lord Jesus Christ, to live in harmony with each other. Let there be no divisions in the church. Rather, be of one mind, united in thought and purpose”. A lack of unity caused by factionalism will severely limit or even destroy the Holy Spirit’s power.

But Paul was on their case and knew what was holding them back. Of course, we believers today, pilgrims heading for glory, will never behave in such ways, but are our churches and fellowships filled with the power of the Holy Spirit with signs and miracles commonplace? In Acts 4, we read about a prayer meeting so powerful that the building shook. The prayer ended, “Stretch out your hand with healing power; may miraculous signs and wonders be done through the name of your holy servant Jesus” (Acts 4:30). The next verse then described what followed. “After this prayer, the meeting place shook, and they were all filled with the Holy Spirit. Then they preached the word of God with boldness”. Where is this power in our churches today? When was the last time we had a prayer meeting so powerful that the building shook? But we can’t look around at the other believers who worship with us. We have to look at ourselves and our desires for our group of believers. As an aside, we note that it wasn’t just a few believers who turned up for the prayer meeting; it was all the believers. Built together, we make up a corporate setting for the Holy Spirit to move, and if He doesn’t, what are we doing, or not doing, that is stopping him? 

The gift of the Holy Spirit was present in the Corinthian church regardless of their problems. We read in 1 Corinthians 1:7, “Now you have every spiritual gift you need as you eagerly wait for the return of our Lord Jesus Christ”. Where did these gifts originate? With God Himself, He is not a stingy God who capriciously bestows gifts on a whim. We only have to ask Him for the gifts we need. Jesus said, “So if you sinful people know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him” (Luke 11:13). But there is a cost. If we want to be really Spirit-filled people of God, are we prepared for what follows? A power-filled people who attend prayer meetings and expect God to move? Like at the start of the Hebridean revival, where two old ladies, Peggie (who was blind) and Christine Smith, aged 84 and 82, decided to pray. They were greatly burdened because they’d been told no young person attended public worship at their church. They decided to pray twice a week. On Tuesdays and Fridays, they got on their knees at ten in the evening, and remained there until three or four in the morning; two old women in a very humble cottage. And that’s how revival in the Hebrides broke out, leaving a legacy that we can find today, half a century or more later. 

Does the Holy Spirit live within us, pilgrims? I’m sure He does, and He is always able and willing to touch those around us as we preach the Word of God with the same boldness as the Acts 4 Christians. I heard a preacher recently in his evangelist message say that he was a “space invader”. The use of this phrase probably gave away his age, but it is a telling description of someone, full of the Holy Spirit’s power, invading the space of people they meet. People around us are wandering around without hope and full of fear for the future. They need to hear Good News, but who is there to tell them except us? Of course, God could reveal Himself directly to anyone He chooses, but the reality is that He has chosen us pilgrims to do His work for him. So, full of the Holy Spirit’s power, that is what we must do. We may feel totally inadequate for the task, but with the Holy Spirit guiding us into all truth, how can we fail? We may get knockbacks. We may find a lack of fertile ground prepared for the seed we have ready and waiting to plant, but with perseverance, we will succeed because the One who is within us is greater than the one who is in the world.

Dear God. Please lead and guide us to the people You have prepared in advance and who are ready and waiting to hear Your Good News. Please empower us with all the right words to say, and help us speak Your message with boldness, so that the people will know that we have met Jesus. In His precious name. Amen.

Wall of Flames

Posted on by korgrocker

“For no one can lay any foundation other than the one we already have—Jesus Christ. Anyone who builds on that foundation may use a variety of materials—gold, silver, jewels, wood, hay, or straw. But on the judgment day, fire will reveal what kind of work each builder has done. The fire will show if a person’s work has any value. If the work survives, that builder will receive a reward. But if the work is burned up, the builder will suffer great loss. The builder will be saved, but like someone barely escaping through a wall of flames.”
1 Corinthians 3:11-15 NLT

Paul wrote that there is a judgment day coming. But the description seemed to indicate that it will be a different occasion from the one in Revelation 20:11-12, “And I saw a great white throne and the one sitting on it. The earth and sky fled from his presence, but they found no place to hide. I saw the dead, both great and small, standing before God’s throne. And the books were opened, including the Book of Life. And the dead were judged according to what they had done, as recorded in the books”. The judgment Paul wrote about in 1 Corinthians 3:13 and 1 Corinthians 1:8 seemed to be for believers. Another Scripture to support this can be found in Romans 14:10-12, “So why do you condemn another believer? Why do you look down on another believer? Remember, we will all stand before the judgment seat of God. For the Scriptures say, “‘As surely as I live,’ says the Lord, ‘every knee will bend to me, and every tongue will declare allegiance to God.’” Yes, each of us will give a personal account to God”. Paul also made reference to this judgment day in his second epistle, 2 Corinthians 5:10 – “For we must all stand before Christ to be judged. We will each receive whatever we deserve for the good or evil we have done in this earthly body”. So the conclusion that the theologians have drawn is quite clear – every person will one day have to stand before God to give an account of their lives. The unbelievers will be called to account in the Great White Throne judgment of Revelation 20, and the believers will be called to give an account of their lives to Christ. In the case of the believers’ judgement, the “builders”, those responsible for teaching and building up the people of God, will experience a judgement more severe than the believers they were teaching – James 3:1, “Dear brothers and sisters, not many of you should become teachers in the church, for we who teach will be judged more strictly”. Believers will be called to give an account before Christ, and this is referred to as the “bema” seat judgment, “bema” coming from the Greek version of Romans 14:12.

So what do we pilgrims think of all this? Of course, we will be very relieved that we will not be called to stand before the Great White Throne to explain, as unbelievers will, about why they never believed in Jesus. Much will be said in mitigation, and we can be assured that the judgment and punishment will be fair, but there is only one verdict for those whose names are not written in the Lamb’s Book of Life – “guilty”. And the punishment will be severe and eternal. There are only two places where mankind can end up after death, and that is either in Heaven or hell. There is nowhere else. People who have rejected Heaven as their final home will by default have to spend eternity in the other place, along with the devil and his demons. In Philippians 2:9-11, we read that regardless of what they believe in this life, everyone who has ever lived, believer and unbeliever, will have to acknowledge the Lordship of Christ, “Therefore, God elevated him to the place of highest honour and gave him the name above all other names, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue declare that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father“.

Believers, however, will still be required to give an account of their lives before Christ. What will this look like? First of all, it will not be a place where sin will be discussed, because Jesus came and died for the forgiveness of sins. John 3:16, “For this is how God loved the world: He gave his one and only Son, so that everyone who believes in him will not perish but have eternal life“. About Jesus, John wrote in 1 John 2:2, “He himself is the sacrifice that atones for our sins—and not only our sins but the sins of all the world”. So all our sins are forgiven, and we will not have to give an account for any of them. What a relief! What a Saviour! All glory to the One who gave Himself for us! The confirming verse comes from the lips of Jesus Himself, “I tell you the truth, those who listen to my message and believe in God who sent me have eternal life. They will never be condemned for their sins, but they have already passed from death into life” (John 5:24). No condemnation, as it says in Romans 8:1.

In Luke 19, Jesus told a parable about ten servants. They were each given a sum of money and were told to invest it. Other translations refer to “talents”, but either interpretation gives the picture of the King, God Himself, requesting His servants to use wisely the money, the gifts that He has given them. The picture also emerges that although different people had different amounts of gifts, they were nevertheless asked to account for how they used them, and importantly, the King did not ask for unrealistic returns. None of them were held to account for something that they did not have. But here’s the thing. The servant who had a gift, one talent, never used it, and suffered the consequences of having what he was given taken away from him. Note as well that the servants who did well with their gifts were given rewards. And that is the purpose of the believers’ judgment. It’s all about Jesus giving out rewards for faithful works of service. And will we hear Him say, “Well done …”? I hope so.

Near the end of his life, Paul wrote to Timothy and included the words, “And now the prize awaits me—the crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous Judge, will give me on the day of his return. And the prize is not just for me but for all who eagerly look forward to his appearing” (1 Timothy 4:8). One day, faithful servants of Jesus will be given a crown. There’s another crown in James 1:12, “God blesses those who patiently endure testing and temptation. Afterward they will receive the crown of life that God has promised to those who love him“. And I’m sure there will be more, each one appropriate to the believer standing before Him and in accordance with what they have done for Jesus in this life here on earth.

Back in 1 Corinthians 3, we see a picture of those teachers (this might include us pilgrims, of course) being held to account for the quality of their teaching. Was it of poor quality, and unable to survive proper examination, the result being that it would disappear in fire? Or was it of a top-quality Gold standard, worthy of a reward from Jesus? Only time will tell, but in the meantime, we do our best for Jesus, not slacking from the works of service He has requested us to do. 

Dear Heavenly Father. We are so grateful for Jesus. Because of our faith in His atoning sacrifice, we are assured a future in Your presence. And it was all part of Your plan for our salvation. What can we do, other than bow before You in the deepest worship? Thank You. Amen.