The Apostle Paul, by the Holy Spirit, counseled all and sundry that tough times, troubles, hurts, and sufferings of our lives after all are quite small and won’t last very long. Yet this short time of distress will result in God’s richest blessings in our lives (2 Corianthians 4:18 TLB). It is for this reason that we must thank God for the tough times of our lives, knowing that we can use them for our good.
To this end the Scripture does testify saying: “We know that all things work together for good for those who love God, who are called according to His purpose. For those whom He foreknew He also predestined to be conformed to the image of His son in order that he might be the first born within a large family. And those whom He called, He also justified, and those whom He justified He also glorified” (Romans 8:28-30).
Take for instance Joseph the son of Jacob who was told by Pharoah the King of Egypt “See I have set you over all the land of Egypt” (Genesis 41:41). Let’s face it, this was after all he suffered at the hands of his brothers. It is not much fun having your own brothers sell you as a slave to a group of passing foreigners. It is not very enjoyable spending time in prison for something you didn’t do. In like manner, it is very painful when those with whom you are in fellowship choose to hurt you. These hurts are deep when they are inflicted without provocation.
This explains why during tough times doubts are often a constant companion, a condition of mind that may lead to self-pity, self-defense and an overwhelming sense of being under siege. It is wisdom to remind ourselves that the root of doubt is in lack of understanding regarding what God gave us in Christ. In Christ we are allowed to enter into our inheritance in Him where every problem has a solution.
We must, therefore, learn to draw upon Christ and to sink our being into Him. When we do so, we will emerge finding ourselves in the deeper will of the living God. It is then that we are changed with that power that fell on the disciples of old. It is the forging of our way into the uplands of the faith.
In Zechariah, a prophet in Israel was asked this question: “What are these wounds on your chest?” In answer he said, “The wounds I received in the house of my friends” (Zechariah 13:6). “Rejoice, therefore, and be glad for your reward is great” (Matthew 5:12).
Joseph, the son of Israel, eventually saw that God was working in these events that made up his life. Proof that Joseph understood God’s dealing was evident in the names that he gave his sons. Manasseh means God has made me forget all my toil and all my father’s house”. He called his other son Ephraim which means, “God has saved me to be fruitful in the land of my affliction” (Genesis 41:50-52). How clearly through the Old Testament types, symbols, and stories, the Holy Spirit flashes light upon this mystery. This mystery is the fact that we can benefit from tough times.
Joseph is buried in an Egyptian prison before he rises to become a savior seated on the throne that he seemed to share with the mighty Pharoah (Genesis 39:19-23, 41:38).
Forty years on the lonely slopes of Midian the fiery Moses is schooled. There were graves, if one may so speak, scattered all over. The mountain sides were where hope after hope was buried until at last self went into utter humiliation. Except for these graves the man of God, who became the moral giant of antiquity, who spoke face to face with Jehovah, and whose guiding hand will be felt in the affairs of nations until the end of time, could not have been (Exodus 2:15-24; Exodus 33:12-23).
If we have tasted of the Lord, if we pant after the vine of heaven, if we cannot be satisfied with anything short of the fullness of the Spirit, and if our hearts are “furnaces of desire” for the deep things of God, then welcome tough times in your life’s journey.
David does not come to the throne until in the caves of the Philistines, where he was hunted down like a dog by the infuriated Saul. He literally went through the shadow of the valley of death several times. The Psalms, in all their varied loveliness so adapted to human woe, their seraphic unfolding of the life of communion could not have come about except for the inner submission which allows him to welcome the tough times of the persecutions he endured. It is wisdom to welcome tough times.
In 1775 the life of Fenelon on earth came to an end. During his life time he wrote many pieces that gave insight and understanding regarding the straight and narrow path we must all walk as believers. In The Seeking Heart he reminded us that tough times are difficult moments of our lives which encourage us to take cover every time we encounter them. We are told to embrace the difficult circumstances we find ourselves in, even when we feel they will overwhelm us. We must allow God to mold us through the events he has permitted to enter our lives. It makes us flexible toward the will of God.
This is because our impurities are melted and our old ways are lost. God is found in the middle of the events of our everyday life. Look past the obstacles and find Him (1992:14, 15; Spiritual Classic Vol. 4). It was Hosea the prophet who warned that the destruction of God’s people could only come due to lack of knowledge (Hosea 4:16). Tough times help us to really know God.
Commenting on the above verses, Dr. Lloyd John Ogilvie declared: There is nothing more important than the knowledge of God. With it life is sublime, without is there’s constant stress. It is the secret of true success, the source of wisdom beyond our understanding. It is the strength to endure in hard times. It is our ultimate goal, life’s greatest privilege, and our urgent need (Silent Strength 1990:40). Embrace tough times while submitting to the hand of the almighty God. He loves and cares for you.
T. Cyprian Kia
Saturday, February 18, 2012
Wednesday, February 8, 2012
Living Under the Headship of Christ
When a person’s life is beautified within by Christ’s presence, that life provides a radiant reflection of Him in all they do and say. The Christian life displays Christ before the world. Christ’s presence within produces a longing to be with all those who love and adore Christ with a pure heart. The Christian life, therefore, should not be driven by a mindset of organized religion. If we do, it would be morphed into the incarnation of man’s efforts to capture God and put Him in a house of human construction. This would result in our gathering as a people of God and at a location as a man-made institution which would be completely at odds with the fundamentals of Jesus’ life and message. God cannot be confined by limitations of our human mind.
The problem is not about where we gather, but in losing sight of why we have gathered and truly understanding what we have become in Him. We were once dead, but are now quickened by the Holy Spirit into life. We are now being fitted into a habitation of God. Therefore, individually and collectively we are now God’s space to encounter humanity; where God now receives true worship and adoration (Genesis 28:1-22; 1 Peter 2:5).
“Welcome to the Living Stone, the Source of Life. The workmen took one look and threw it out. God set it in the place of honor. Present yourselves as building stones for the construction of a sanctuary vibrant with life, in which you’ll serve as holy priests offering Christ approved lives up to God. The Scriptures provide precedent. Look, I am setting a stone in Zion, a cornerstone in the place of honor. Whoever trusts in this stone as a foundation will never have cause to regret it. To you who trust Him, He’s a stone to be proud of, but those who refuse to trust Him, the stone who the workmen threw out is now the chief foundation stone. For the untrusting it’s a stone to trip over, a boulder blocking the way.” (1 Peter 2:1-9, The Message).
The Holy Spirit that quickened us into living stones is the Spirit of Christ. Christ, therefore, is the Chief Cornerstone in God’s place of rest; the Church. In our collective expression of God’s resting place, Christ is the Head and our lives as believers should be lived totally and only in response to His leading and direction in our daily walk. (Ephesians 2: 16-20, 1 Peter 2: 4-6, 9).
In the first century the cornerstone was the first stone that was laid in the foundation. It was also the main stone of the building. It aligned and united all the other stones together. Each of the stones in the building was measured by the cornerstone. The building had to be in complete conformity with the cornerstone or else it could not be approved. Jesus Christ is the main stone, the Cornerstone in the foundation of God’s house; all things are measured by Him, united in Him and conformed to Him (1 Corinthians 3: 9-11).
What this tells us is that Christ, being the Chief Cornerstone, is Head of the collective expression of our Christian life on earth. Christ, therefore, should be allowed to make the decisions in our lives and in our midst. In reality, this means that the members of a local expression of the Lord’s body, the Church, should respond to their Head, which is Christ, through the collective view of the Body rather than through a few human persons who happened to be in a position of prominence. In other words, the Body of Christ, in union with the Head, expresses the Lord’s mind better as a collective then as a few making or taking decisions for the rest of the collective.
When the collective, under the headship of Christ, address problems and solve them, they learn the truth of being built together as one and discover what the Cross was in the process. The Cross is the instrument of death. It’s the principle whereby we lay down our own life in order that the Lord’s life may be fully expressed. The Cross means death to self, our ambitions, our preferences, our agendas, our opinions, our desires, and our wishes (Matthew 16:24, Mark 8:34-35, Luke 9:23-24). For what reason?, one may ask. So that Jesus Christ can have His preference, His agenda, His opinion and His desire. Body life is built on the principle of the cross. It is built on the resolute decision to live by the Lord’s own words: “Not my will, but Yours be done.”.
Jesus Christ, when given the rightful place in the heart and walk of His followers would become the visible expression of Him and the house of His rest. This corporate human expression is the house of God. The final criterion of that house is that when they gather together as believers, God is present as a witness and proclaims His pleasure. The individual in this collective has abandoned himself in Christ’s hand, committed to a shared life with others under His exclusive Headship, leaving all decisions to Him.
This is a high calling of our Christian life (Colossians 2: 19); a life that is lived in trust and dependence upon the unseen Christ who dwells within us. He is the Head and this is what it means to live under the headship of Christ as a believer.
The problem is not about where we gather, but in losing sight of why we have gathered and truly understanding what we have become in Him. We were once dead, but are now quickened by the Holy Spirit into life. We are now being fitted into a habitation of God. Therefore, individually and collectively we are now God’s space to encounter humanity; where God now receives true worship and adoration (Genesis 28:1-22; 1 Peter 2:5).
“Welcome to the Living Stone, the Source of Life. The workmen took one look and threw it out. God set it in the place of honor. Present yourselves as building stones for the construction of a sanctuary vibrant with life, in which you’ll serve as holy priests offering Christ approved lives up to God. The Scriptures provide precedent. Look, I am setting a stone in Zion, a cornerstone in the place of honor. Whoever trusts in this stone as a foundation will never have cause to regret it. To you who trust Him, He’s a stone to be proud of, but those who refuse to trust Him, the stone who the workmen threw out is now the chief foundation stone. For the untrusting it’s a stone to trip over, a boulder blocking the way.” (1 Peter 2:1-9, The Message).
The Holy Spirit that quickened us into living stones is the Spirit of Christ. Christ, therefore, is the Chief Cornerstone in God’s place of rest; the Church. In our collective expression of God’s resting place, Christ is the Head and our lives as believers should be lived totally and only in response to His leading and direction in our daily walk. (Ephesians 2: 16-20, 1 Peter 2: 4-6, 9).
In the first century the cornerstone was the first stone that was laid in the foundation. It was also the main stone of the building. It aligned and united all the other stones together. Each of the stones in the building was measured by the cornerstone. The building had to be in complete conformity with the cornerstone or else it could not be approved. Jesus Christ is the main stone, the Cornerstone in the foundation of God’s house; all things are measured by Him, united in Him and conformed to Him (1 Corinthians 3: 9-11).
What this tells us is that Christ, being the Chief Cornerstone, is Head of the collective expression of our Christian life on earth. Christ, therefore, should be allowed to make the decisions in our lives and in our midst. In reality, this means that the members of a local expression of the Lord’s body, the Church, should respond to their Head, which is Christ, through the collective view of the Body rather than through a few human persons who happened to be in a position of prominence. In other words, the Body of Christ, in union with the Head, expresses the Lord’s mind better as a collective then as a few making or taking decisions for the rest of the collective.
When the collective, under the headship of Christ, address problems and solve them, they learn the truth of being built together as one and discover what the Cross was in the process. The Cross is the instrument of death. It’s the principle whereby we lay down our own life in order that the Lord’s life may be fully expressed. The Cross means death to self, our ambitions, our preferences, our agendas, our opinions, our desires, and our wishes (Matthew 16:24, Mark 8:34-35, Luke 9:23-24). For what reason?, one may ask. So that Jesus Christ can have His preference, His agenda, His opinion and His desire. Body life is built on the principle of the cross. It is built on the resolute decision to live by the Lord’s own words: “Not my will, but Yours be done.”.
Jesus Christ, when given the rightful place in the heart and walk of His followers would become the visible expression of Him and the house of His rest. This corporate human expression is the house of God. The final criterion of that house is that when they gather together as believers, God is present as a witness and proclaims His pleasure. The individual in this collective has abandoned himself in Christ’s hand, committed to a shared life with others under His exclusive Headship, leaving all decisions to Him.
This is a high calling of our Christian life (Colossians 2: 19); a life that is lived in trust and dependence upon the unseen Christ who dwells within us. He is the Head and this is what it means to live under the headship of Christ as a believer.
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