Salty

 

You are the salt of the earth. But what good is salt if it has lost its flavor? Can you make it salty again? It will be thrown out and trampled underfoot as worthless. Matthew 5:13 (NLT)

Many people have heard about Jesus and that He taught, healed, fed the hungry, and died on a cross, a brutal death of suffocation. Jesus taught on many things. Each teaching was about loving God by obeying Him, and believing Jesus is the Son of God, the prophesied Messiah.

The passage above comes from Matthew’s account of Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount. It speaks about saltiness. I’ve learned saltiness is slang for being sarcastic. A person is salty when he or she is sarcastic. People can be too salty. It comes from adding our humanness to an already difficult situation.

Jesus covered many aspects of life when He taught during His Sermon on the Mount. Their messages taught about loving God with our heart, mind, body, and spirit and loving other people as we want to be loved. In Matthew 5:13, Jesus spoke about a common commodity, salt. At that time, people used salt for preserving food, flavoring it, and caring for people’s and animals’ health. People understood salt. Jesus used this common item to teach the people a truth a truth. He used a parable.

When we consider this passage, we must wonder, can salt become unsalty? Have you ever heard of unsalty salt? In my mind, its flavor dictates its name. What good is unsalty salt? How can we make sure we have pure salt? How can we get it? What was the deeper meaning of this parable Jesus told? As we consider this passage briefly, let’s consider these questions and their answers.

Can salt be unsalty? Salt can lose its flavor, preservative, and disinfecting power if people add other things to it. This combined salt is impure. When people or a company create salt and add another ingredient to it, like iodine or carbon, the salt loses its saltiness. The shelf-life of iodized salt is five years. After five years, it loses its flavor and purposes. It can no longer be used to preserve meats or flavor food. In Israel, salt from the Dead Sea in southern Judah was not pure. The people could not use it for flavoring, preserving meat, or disinfecting wounds. Pure salt is sodium chloride. The only place people could get pure salt in that region was from the Mediterranean Sea. Obviously, salt was important to them, and is important today.

What can we do with unsalty salt? When this salt is worthless for its original purpose, people used it to clean ovens and pots. They used it as an abrasive. Unsalty salt absorbs the odor of garlic. It deodorizes strong odors, like bicarbonate soda does, because it combines carbon dioxide with sodium. When impure salt has lost its saltiness, it becomes an abrasive and deodorizer.

Impure salt is only good for its purposes for a short time, then it’s used for dirty activities. People add something to unsalty salt to it to make it salty for a short time. Nobody can add anything to manmade salt to make it permanently salty. Nothing can make impure salt salty again.

Did you catch that? Impure salt is manmade. Are we like impure salt? Do we try to make ourselves into good enough to be accepted by God and gain entrance into heaven upon our physical death on earth? People often will try to donate their time and money, strive for the highest position, or seek more money trying to be good enough. Of course, sometimes those actions are an excuse when people want power, position, status, and wealth. We must realize that nothing we do or say can make us righteous. Adding something good to our personal resume will not remove our sins. Just adding good words and actions to our personal sinfulness does not move us on the scale from sinful to holy/righteous.

Because we can do nothing to make ourselves righteous, since we have a sinful nature, the God the Father sent Jesus His Son to die on the cross in our place. His sinlessness means He is holy. His sacrifice of His life on the cross was as a substitute for ours. Jesus died so we do not have to die for our sins, the judgment we deserve from holy God. When we believe Jesus is the Son of God who died for us and confess and repent of our sins, we are not adding Jesus to ourselves. We are giving ourselves-heart, mind, body, and soul-to Jesus to cleanse and remake us into His image. Jesus is not an addition we make to our lives, like money, status, and fame. He makes us in His image-holy/righteous and renewed, born again. Our old selves are gone; the new has come. Paul wrote this in 2 Corinthians 5:17. He wrote, “This means anyone who belongs to Christ has become a new person. The old life is gone; a new life has begun.” (NLT)

Consider yourself. Are you adding to yourself good works and things, hoping you’ll be good enough for God and enter heaven? When we do that, we add to our impurity, even if those things are good. We, like the manmade salt, are impure. To be and do good, we need Jesus to make us righteous. We are the impure salt until we believe in Jesus and confess and repent.

Don’t add good to impurity. It will not be good enough and will only be cast away. Let Jesus purify and remake you. Know you will be with God in heaven. Live out your faith in Jesus by your words, actions, and thoughts. Show the pure salt from heaven so others choose Jesus, and He makes them the salt and light of the world. Will you seek Jesus, who will remake you into pure salt and use you to share about Him?

You are the salt of the earth, but if salt has lost its taste, how shall its saltiness be restored? It is no longer good for anything except to be thrown out and trampled under people’s feet. You are the light of the world. A city set on a hill cannot be hidden. Nor do people light a lamp and put it under a basket, but on a stand, and it gives light to all in the house. In the same way, let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father who is in heaven. Matthew 5:13-16 (NLT)

 

 

 

The Substitute

 

I tell you, unless your righteousness surpasses that of the Pharisees and the teachers of the law, you will certainly not enter the kingdom of heaven. Matthew 5:20 (NIV)

Jesus said this in His Sermon on the Mount. He pointed out that the people the Israelites looked up to as righteous were not righteous enough to be with God in His kingdom. This must have concerned them. The hearers of Jesus that day must have wondered how they could be with God in eternity. I am sure Jesus realized what was in the hearts and minds of the people listening to Him that day. He already had the plan in place. God has had the plan in place since time began of how sinful people, people He loves, can be with Him. He knows holiness cannot exist together with sin. That is not a choice, but a fact. Where sin is, no holiness exists, just like where holiness is, no sin can exist. Other writers and speakers give this example. When one enters a completely sealed and dark room, no light exists, but as soon as a person strikes a match, darkness is shattered, and the light pushes it away.

With that idea, we should consider what Jesus offers so people could be with God. The people on the mountain that day realized He had been speaking about God and eternal life with Him. Jesus taught them the Beatitudes, about what is more important than gathering things for yourself in this life. He explained that what is in a person causes the sin and offered His listeners a glimpse at the new covenant. Jesus explained He fulfilled the Law and brought the new covenant based on God’s mercy and grace. Nothing people can do can earn it for them. The first covenant required the Israelites to obey the Ten Commandments, which the religious leaders expanded to 622 regulations. Jesus said He fulfilled those laws in the Sermon on the Mount. With His life and death, Jesus provided what was necessary for redemption from sins forever and for each believer to have eternal life.

This idea that one must be righteous is not new to the New Testament. From God’s laws, the Israelites knew He required twice daily sin sacrifices to atone for their sins, their wrongdoings. These animal sacrifices were never enough for the complete and permanent cleansing of the sins they committed. Nothing a person could do would make the stains from sins and the condemnation because of sins go away permanently. Yet, God declared righteous some people in the Old Testament. If we are familiar with the Old Testament, we remember of a few people from memory, like Elijah, Moses, David, and Abraham. There were others, too, who God stated were righteous. Consider Ezekiel 14:12-23. Four times, in His condemnation of Jerusalem, God compared Noah, Daniel, and Job as having a righteousness that exceeds any person in Jerusalem. He stated explicitly in verses 14, 16, 18, & 20, “Even if Noah, Daniel, and Job were there, their righteousness would save no one but themselves, says the Sovereign LORD.” God declared Noah, Daniel, and Job righteous because of their faith. (Hebrews 11:7, Job 1:1. In the book of Daniel, Daniel told the king the interpretation from God of the dreams God had given the king. By doing this, he was a prophet of God. God called His prophets righteous in Hebrew 11:32, & 39-40) God, with the first covenant with the Israelites agreed upon at Mount Sinai, declared the Israelites His people, His nation. This first covenant was to lead them to Him and let other nations know they are His people, whom He will protect. It provided for their faithlessness to their covenant with Him by explaining what He would do to discipline/punish them. This first covenant to the Israelites, the Mosaic covenant, provided no means of eternal salvation by works or by offering animal, grain, and oil sacrifices. Some of the Israelites intentionally sought and believed God deeply. They changed their lives to follow how He led them. Each of these Israelites allowed God to be the Sovereign LORD of their lives, just as God stated in Ezekiel 14.

God declared several Old Testament people righteous because of their belief in Him that led them to revere, love, and follow Him with their lives. Understand, He did not love just a few people. God loves all people. He seeks to have a personal relationship with each person. God understood the first covenant was not one giving redemption. That’s why He planned from creation to give a second covenant. That second covenant occurred when Jesus allowed Himself to be crucified on the cross and buried, three days after which He rose from death. Jesus conquered sin and death with this Messianic covenant. No other sacrifice does a person need to offer for his or her sins. Belief in Jesus, with the individual’s profession of faith in Him, and a confession and repentance of his or her sins brings the person into a saving, cleansing, eternal relationship with God. Nothing else. No one’s faith can provide salvation for anyone else.

God told Ezekiel to tell the people of Jerusalem that having God-fearing and righteous people in their city would not keep them from God’s righteous judgment and wrath. His wrath came because of their repeated sins against Him, each other, and other nations. They could not rest on the righteousness of others-not priest, prophet, grandparent, parent, or siblings, etc. No one is righteous except through God declaring them so.

When a person believes in Jesus Christ and He washes the sins of that person from his or her record, then God declares the person clean and righteous, just like He declared Noah, Daniel, Job, Abraham, Moses, and others of the Bible righteous. God provided a way for each person to be declared clean and righteous with the sacrificial death of His sinless Son in substitution for each of us. We do not have to die an eternal death of separation from God. By our belief and because of His grace, God will declare a person righteous. Paul said this in Ephesians 2:8, “For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith, and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God.”

None of us knows where another person truly stands in his or her relationship with God, but we each realize where we ourselves stand. Do you have a saving faith in Jesus? Do you believe Jesus is God’s Son, who died the death you deserve because of your sins against God? God will apply the death of Jesus against your sin judgment. He will apply His resurrection from the dead to you so that you will live eternally with Him in His kingdom. Now is your chance to confess your sins to God and repent of them asking Him to give you the direction and strength to avoid temptation and live a righteous life? What keeps you from believing in Him and receiving His grace?

As it is written:

There is no one righteous, not even one;

there is no one who understands; there is no one who seeks God.

All have turned away, they have together become worthless;

there is no one who does good, not even one.

Their throats are open graves;

their tongues practice deceit.

The poison of vipers is on their lips.

Their mouths are full of cursing and bitterness.

Their feet are swift to shed blood;

ruin and misery mark their ways, and the way of peace they do not know.

There is no fear of God before their eyes.

²³ For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.

(Romans 3:10-18 & 23 [NIV])

Good Enough or Complete?

Therefore, you are to be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect. (Matthew 5:48 [NASB])

I’ve been in a few cars with flat tires. They happen. The challenge is changing them with the spare. Think about this. If the last time you had a flat, you took your flat tire to the mechanic for repair and he/she filled it with air and gave it back to you. What would happen when you replaced your newest flat tire with that old flat tire filled with air? If the mechanic didn’t find the cause for the hole and repair it, your replacement tire would be no better than your current flat tire. For the mechanic, the refilled tire was good enough. For your purposes, you didn’t need good enough. You needed perfect, a job done completely. Jesus spoke about lives lived completely instead of in a “good enough” way. Consider what He taught in Matthew 5.

In Matthew 5, Jesus began preaching His Sermon on the Mount with the Beatitudes. He began this famous sermon by proclaiming certain people are blessed, people who may not have ever considered themselves blessed. Jesus said these groups of people are blessed: the poor in spirit, those who mourn, the gentle, those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, the merciful, the pure in heart, the peacemakers, those who have been persecuted for the sake of righteousness, and the people who are insulted, persecuted, and have false things said about them because of their relationship to Him.

We look at this list of people, and we may see one of more of these attitudes to which we can identify and say, “Yes, that happened to me!” If we consider these attitudes closer, we realize, Jesus described His experience on earth with each one of them. This should make us consider again, has what we experienced been like what Jesus experienced? Are we really that much like Jesus?

Jesus, next, in verses thirteen through sixteen, told His disciples what they would be if they closely aligned themselves with Him. They will be salt of the earth. His disciples are to bring flavor back to life by telling people about Him. While Jesus has not returned to earth to claim it for Himself and cast Satan into the pit, Satan roams free in the world. Life is flavorless; no distinction exists between Satan and another way to live. It’s a bland existence. When Jesus came to earth the first time, He called, and continues to call, people to be His disciples. His disciples bring a new flavor, a freshness, to life. Jesus’ disciples are salt in the world. Blandness gets cast away by the new flavor, new Life. Jesus also told His disciples they would be the light of the world. Blandness comes from having just one influence, Satan.  When a new leader enters, new light illumines the darkness of what life was really like before the Light, Jesus, came into the world. Disciples are to be the light, which the Light of the world ignited so the city, the people of the world, can see the things Satan hid in the dark. When the disciples show their light, people will glorify the Father in heaven who sent the Light.

After Jesus taught about the Beatitudes and who would receive the reward of heaven and after He explained the role of His disciples, He made a stunning statement to the Jews. He said He did not come to abolish the Law or Prophets, but to fulfill them. The Jews expected the Messiah to come as their warrior King defeating their enemy, the Romans, and re-establishing the kingdom of David. The Pharisees would have sat straighter at this statement. Yet, Jesus continued by saying, “Whoever annuls one of the least of these commandments and teaches others to do the same, shall be called least in the kingdom of heaven, but whoever teaches them, he shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven.” (Matt. 5:19 [NASB]) Maybe it went over the heads of the Pharisees, maybe it didn’t. The Pharisees often required more of the Jews than the Laws of God required. They changed the Laws to make it harder on the people and to show their own holiness as greater than others. What Jesus said next, He stated plainly. The Pharisees could not have missed His meaning in verse twenty. Jesus said, “For I say to you that unless your righteousness surpasses that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will not enter the kingdom of heaven.” [NASB] Can you imagine the shock on the faces of the Pharisees who listened that day and on the faces of the Pharisees who heard about it? Can you imagine the rage that would have engulfed them for a man born in small Nazareth as a carpenter’s son, to teach the people they had to have righteousness greater than the Pharisees? The hidden meaning of Jesus’ statement was that the Pharisees were not righteous. They were not poor in spirit, gentle, merciful, and all the other descriptors Jesus used of those who would inherit the kingdom of heaven.

Jesus began His Sermon on the Mount describing those who would inherit the kingdom of heaven. He then taught what His disciples must be in the world. By speaking next on the Law and Prophets, righteousness, and the Pharisees, He contrasted the people of the opening attitudes and disciples with the Pharisees. The people might have wondered, if the Pharisees are not to be our standard or goal in life, then who is? What must I do to be perfect? Jesus answered this with verses twenty-one through forty-seven. He teaches the people listening to Him on the mount about going beyond the Law and Prophets. Jesus taught them about loving their neighbor as themselves, as He would in Matthew 22:39. Then He reminded these Jews, even the Gentiles did these things, and they did not believe in Yahweh. So, if the people are no better than the Gentiles and they are to be better than the Pharisees, who are they to be like then? Who is their standard?

With verse forty-eight, Jesus explained to the people who they were to be like. He said, “Therefore, you are to be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect.” Jesus contrasted His statement from verse twenty when He said, “For I say to you that unless your righteousness surpasses that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will not enter the kingdom of heaven” with verse forty-eight. Jesus gave the people a new standard, their heavenly Father, the One who gave them life and gives new life through regeneration, being born again. Our heavenly Father is the standard not only because He’s our Creator, but because He is perfect, the definer of perfect. “Perfect” comes from the Greek word, teleios. Teleios means being complete as in maturity, a going through stages to reach the end goal, like a spiritual journey. For God, He has always been perfect. Our goal is to be made in His image, to be like Christ. That is our spiritual journey; it is having the mind and character of Christ, as Paul said in Philippians 2:5-8. When our spiritual journey is complete, which will only occur when we are in the kingdom of God, then we will be like Christ. We will be perfect, and our journey will be complete.

Just as Jesus gave the attitudes of the people who were like Him, gentle, meek, merciful, etc. in verses one through eleven, and so He was on earth and is in heaven, and just as His disciples are the salt of the earth and a light to the world telling of Him, we, as those whose righteousness surpasses the scribes and Pharisees in our world, will become perfect as our heavenly Father is perfect.

Jesus told the people what their lives will be like on earth as His followers and told them who should be their standard. Today, as people living on the earth as Jesus lived and taught on earth need to realize Jesus teaches us this same message. We will have difficulties and hardships. People will persecute us because of our relationship with Him. But we can rejoice and be glad, for our reward is in heaven and it is great. (Matt. 5:12) When God is our standard, we will suffer at times, but we can know our Father, the One who created us and is re-creating us in His image, calls us His children and gives us hope and joy knowing we have a reward in His kingdom with Him. Our standard is not the world’s standards, not the standards of the scribes and Pharisees. Our standard is God and we will become perfect as He is perfect.

If we choose to live a life according to the world’s standards, it can be good enough according to the world, but it will always fall flat. If we live a complete and perfect life with God as our standard, then our lives will be full of hope and joy. Though we may endure hardships, God will always be there and provide all we need to endure and get through it. He won’t be like the mechanic who just did a good enough job by refilling the tire. He will do a perfect job, fix the problem, and give us all the help we need. Do we want to live by the world’s standards where the answer is good enough and we continue needing air put in our tires because the problem is not remedied? Or, do we want to live by God’s standard, trust God who gives us everything we need for each situation, and live knowing, with God as our Savior, we are complete. We have every good and perfect gift that comes from God above? (James 1:17)

To whose standard do you live?

In whose image do you stand?

And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, so that you may prove what the will of God is, that which is good and acceptable and perfect. (Romans 12:2 [NASB])

Brethren, I do not regard myself as having laid hold of it yet; but one thing I do: forgetting what lies behind and reaching forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus. Let us therefore, as many as are perfect, have this attitude; and if in anything you have a different attitude, God will reveal that also to you; however, let us keep living by that same standard to which we have attained. (Philippians 3:13-16 [NASB])

Lord, I am not perfect; I am not yet complete in You. Lord, thank you for wanting me, providing a way for me, and calling me to Yourself. Thank you that You were willing to provide the sin sacrifice for my sins because of Your love and mercy for me. Lead me in Your paths and for Your glory. Help me walk in Your ways and to Your standard, not allowing the morals of the world to be “good enough”, but instead always seeking You. Use me to be salt and light in this world so people will know there is more to life than what they see and to the limited time of earth. Lord, show people Yourself through me so they want to give their lives to You in faith and by confession. Give them Your hope and love. Thank you for what You have done and what You are going to do. Thank you for being the definer perfect and complete. Amen.

Salted and Best

“Have salt in yourselves and be at peace with one another.” Mark 9:50b [ESV]

In Matthew 5:27-30 and Mark 9:42-50, Jesus taught His disciples a lesson about intentions and actions. He made the point in the Matthew passage that a person’s thoughts, their intentions, can be as sinful as the sinful act or word. In Matthew 5, Jesus prefaced it with a teaching about adultery and so people often equate the teaching about the eye and hand to adulterous sins. When they do that, they miss the lesson. In these passages, Jesus taught about all sins. He did not intend we denote sexual sins as the greatest sins and so hold our “small” sins as not a big deal. That was not Jesus’ intention with this teaching in both Matthew and Mark.

In Matthew, Jesus made this point very obvious with His Beatitudes. Each of these eight verses of Matthew 5:3-10 speak about a person’s internal life, their emotions, attitudes, and intentions. A follower of Jesus is a follower internally first, then externally with actions and words. For, as Jesus said in Matthew 15:11, “It is not what goes into the mouth that defiles a person, but what comes out of the mouth; this defiles the person.” [ESV] Paul made a similar distinction when he said in Romans 10:9 that people must confess with their lips Jesus is Lord and believe in their hearts God raised Him from the dead to be saved. Internal action, belief, goes along with external action, confession. With Matthew 5:20, Jesus further pointed to the internal motivations of a person when He said, “I tell you that unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.” [ESV] The scribes and Pharisees thought righteousness came from actions. With verse twenty-two, Jesus again highlighted that a person’s internal motivations/intentions are what God will judge. He said in this verse, “Anyone who is angry with his brother will be subject to judgment.” [ESV] Each of these teachings come before Jesus’ teaching about removing an eye (seeing) and hand (doing) to keep one from sinning.

Before his writing about this lesson from Jesus about the hand, eye, and foot, Mark told of Peter, James, and John witnessing Jesus’ transfiguration and talking with Moses and Elijah in Mark 9:2-13. It terrified the three disciples. Peter babbled about setting up three tents for Jesus, Moses, and Elijah, then a voice from a cloud, God’s voice, told them to listen to Jesus. In essence, don’t make plans, but seek the Lord and His purposes and will. Possibly the intentions of Peter to erect three tents was solely for honor of the three men, or maybe he meant he, James, and John were more highly regarded and so felt they should establish themselves by establishing these three tents. Next in this chapter, Mark relayed Jesus healed a boy with an unclean spirit (Mark 9:14-29). The boy’s father asked the disciples to heal him and they couldn’t. They asked Jesus why they could not heal the boy, and Jesus said this healing can only happen with prayer. Were the disciples unable to heal the boy because of an oral action or because of their internal action, little belief? Were they seeking the fame? Jesus spoke about a faithless generation in reference to the disciples being unable to cast out the evil spirit from the boy in verse nineteen. In Mark 9:30-32, Jesus foretold His death and resurrection again and His disciples misunderstood. Was it because they did not believe because they knew people cannot live again after dying? Jesus spoke again about faith, and internal action. In Mark 9:33:37, the disciples were concerned about their status in importance. Who was the most important of Jesus’ followers? Their intentions caused their argument. In Mark 9:38-41, John told Jesus a man was casting out demons in Jesus’ name and he and other disciples tried to stop him because he was not following them. Again, they were seeking fame and greatness among people. Jesus told them if a person is not against Him and them, he is for Him and them. Each of these segments of Mark 9 show us Jesus was teaching the disciples about internal motivations-intentions-and how they can be sinful. Actions and words are not the only ways for sin to occur. Intentions, attitudes, and thoughts can cause a person to sin, too.

What is the lesson Matthew and Mark tell us Jesus taught? Paraphrasing, if your hand, foot, or eye causes another person (be they a child or one less mature in the faith) to stumble in their faith or fall away from faith in Jesus Christ, then remove it. This sounds harsh. Consider some of the passages that preceded Matthew 5:28 and Mark 9:43. If the disciples had convinced the man who cast out demons to follow them, he would have had no power to heal people from demon possession. If one disciple was greater than another in status, only people who followed that one disciple would be right, and it would take away preeminent stature from Jesus. Only by and through Jesus can people be saved. If a disciple had this status, fewer people would be saved. If people could be angry and still worship God, then no necessity would exist for Jesus to bring righteousness. It would mean a wall could exist, a wall of hate. It would be contrary to the Law and mean God would be pleased without sacrifices and heart worship. Finally, with the Pharisees form of righteousness through the Law, the Law would not be fulfilled, people would not be cleansed from sin, and they would be unable to know Yahweh God, the eternal One.  

Understanding this, what did Jesus mean by cutting off a hand or foot or gouging out an eye? Did He mean for us literally to do this? Considering the laws of the nations at that time, such as a thief had his hand removed as a punishment for stealing, stating the lesson this way made sense to the people. Jesus meant whatever causes you to sin in action, word, or thought (intentions, motivations, and attitudes), cast it away from you. Remove it from your life. For one person, being near money makes him or her want to steal it, then don’t work with money. Don’t be a bookkeeper, cashier, or other financial worker. For another person, if talking about other people is a problem for you, when someone begins to talk about someone else, excuse yourself from that conversation or relationship. If that person regularly slanders, backstabs, lies about, or tells gossip about another person, separate yourself from that person entirely. If being with a homeless person makes you prideful that you are “better than them,” then identify at where your pride lies in your life and remove that thing or position or give it to needy people. If you think you know better, have a better education, or your way is always the best, consider Who gave you the gifts to allow you to study, to learn, and to be a more informed and wiser decision-maker. Each gift God gives a person, unless given back to Him daily in recognition of from where it came and for what purpose He wants you to use it, can be used for something less than God intended just like a hand, eye, and foot are good. God, when He created humans, said it was very good. That means hands, feet, and eyes are very good. Yet, if we use any part of ourselves-heart, mind, spirit, and body-separate from God’s purposes and plans, they are not being used for God’s best. Each part of our being, as created by God, is good. All God gives us is good. How we use them and for Whom is what determines if it is merely good, or best. God’s plans and purposes are always best.

Consider this, if God gives a gift of being an exceptional organizer, being efficient, and understanding things quicker than others, that doesn’t mean every plan of that person’s is the best plan. God can use other people also to be organizers, efficient, and wise. Also, if that person to whom God gave these gifts does not submit his or her day and plans to God at the beginning of the day, the plans of that person may not be God’s plans; they may not be the best plans. Just because a person is gifted in a particular area, does not mean what that person says or does is always the best. Each day, each person must submit to God everything He has given to him or her. We must give back to God each gift He gives us-care, love, faith, mercy, humility, home, job, education, car, wisdom, understanding, organization, counting, medicine, teaching, preaching, medical, healing, etc. All gifts from God can be used merely for good by us, or they can be used for the best by God when we submit them back to His purposes each day.

Of what good is salt, if it has lost its saltiness? What good are God’s gifts if they aren’t used by and for Him? (Matthew 5:13)

“Whatever gain I had, I counted as loss for the sake of Christ. Indeed, I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord.” (Philippians 3:7a [ESV])

Lord, I get so caught up in my everyday life, I forget to come to You at the beginning of each day. I forget to give to You all You have given to me. Please forgive me for running headlong into the day without You. Forgive me for considering myself able to take care of everything and forgetting about You. It’s not that I don’t believe in You, but that I don’t give You high enough priority in my life. Without You, I am nothing; I have no existence. Forgive me, Lord. Lead me, Lord, to desire You above all else. Lead me to seek You first. Make my every breath and every heartbeat draw me closer to You, the source of my life, strength, and salvation. Thank you for saving me. Thank you for Your patience, mercy, compassion, and grace. I do not deserve You or Your goodness. You are almighty and all-knowing. Amen.

Intercession Regardless

He Himself bore the sin of many and interceded for the transgressors. Isaiah 53:12c [NASB]

This verse stands in stark contrast to how we would act after experiencing what Jesus did. Consider the verses before it. Isaiah prophesied in chapter 53 truths that occurred during Jesus’ life.

Isaiah said the Messiah grew up from parched land. This land was Judah a land of God’s chosen people who chose not to obey Him nor worship Him exclusively. Though Jesus lived in Judah, He carried no great stature among people. He was not a king or leader of the people according to their ways of life.

Isaiah continued with verses three and four by saying the people despised the Messiah and turned their back on Him. They considered Him contemptible and worthless. What He said did not matter to the Israelites and so they rejected Him. The people of Israel considered the Messiah as having no value for their lives and so forsook Him. Because of this, Jesus suffered and grieved for His pain and the people’s loss, the loss of relationship and salvation from God. The Messiah bore their sorrows and carried them, yet the Israelites considered Him someone whom God struck and afflicted, not One who took their punishments. They considered Him a heretic and an outcast.

Yet, Isaiah said, this Messiah was pierced for the sin, the rebellion against God, of the Israelites and the people of the world. He was contrite and shattered for their guilt. Jesus was broken-hearted for the people and broken-bodied on the cross because of the sin and guilt of people. He received the stripes, wounds, and bruises of the punishment for us so we could receive healing, and cleansing from our guilt and sins. So that none of us could say he didn’t cause the Messiah to die for them, Isaiah expressly pointed out we all, like sheep, have gone astray; we’ve wandered away from God and gone our own ways. Still, because of God’s great love for us, the sins and guilt of all of us fell on Him; Jesus bore them all for us.

Isaiah explained what happened to Jesus. He said He was oppressed, bowed down, and humbled, but He did not cry out, “Foul play,” or demand to be released. Instead, the Messiah walked like a meek lamb to His death. He did not demand a retrial, but bore the pain of our punishment because of His love for us. The oppression and judgment that was ours Jesus took and was led away to die.

While He laid aside His glory and majesty to be born as a man and suffer the indignities, judgment, and punishments from men, Jesus also was consigned to humiliation in death. The judges made Him die as a wicked man, consigned the worse form of death penalty reserved for the evilest people. The people humiliated the Messiah in life and death.

Still, God was pleased and delighted to break His Son, making Him to bear grief. He was pleased to do this so He would see His children. The Lord would increase the days of His people and His will would occur. Jesus humbled Himself to become a man, suffer persecution and infamy, and die as an evil person. It would enable God’s plan for His people to be with Him forever. Through the anguish and trouble of the Messiah, God’s judgment of the people would be satisfied. Because of the knowledge and wisdom of Jesus, God’s serving Son, who served both people and the Father, many would receive justification, cleansing and righteousness, through His carrying their burden of sin and guilt.

Because of all this what did Jesus do?  

·         Grew and lived in a parched land

·         Lived humbly as a man with no power or glory

·         Lived despised, considered worthless, and rejected by people

·         Knew sorrows and grief

·         Bore our grief, afflictions, pain, and sorrow

·         Became considered as a sinner stricken by God

·         Received our death punishment of sword, nail, and cross

·         Accepted the oppression and afflictions by people without crying out His personal innocence

·         Took the title of outcast as He was led outside the city gates

·         Died the worst death, that of a wicked man upon a cross

·         Bore the weight and punishment the sins and guilt of people

·         Received God’s pleasure

And despite what people did to Him, He interceded for the transgressors and continues to intercede for us. Jesus taught His followers to love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you in Matthew 5:44. He lived this out on earth and does it in heaven now.

This last statement of Isaiah 53 is important. Even though people and their sins caused the need for a sin sacrifice to cleanse us from our sins, Jesus interceded for us. Before He died and with His death, He interceded for us with God. Since His death, Jesus intercedes for us while sitting at the right hand of God. Paul stated this in Romans 8:34 when he said, “Christ Jesus is He who died, yes, rather who was raised, who is at the right hand of God, who also intercedes for us.” [NASB] Intercede means to plead for us, to supplicate or petition. Jesus petitions God for us for our salvation, needs, and forgiveness. Who of us, if we faced the inhumanity to the extreme Jesus did, would pray to God begging Him for mercy for the people who tormented, oppressed, and persecuted us? Yet that is what Jesus did and does for us even today. Isaiah told us of what the Jews would do to Jesus and expressed why Jesus came to live as a man on earth. This shows God’s great love for us even while we were/are sinners.

Isaiah closed this chapter of prophecy about the fore-coming Messiah by reminding the Israelites how great is God’s love for them. Even though they persecuted, oppressed, and killed His body, Jesus interceded for them to the Father in heaven to help them and us, and not to give us what any of us deserves. That is love! God gives us what we don’t deserve. Jesus pleads our cause even though we struck Him with our transgressions.

What greater love is there than God’s love!

Our love cannot compare to His.

“The chastening for our well-being fell upon Him, and by His scourging we are healed.” Isaiah 53:5b [NASB]

Lord, thank you for reminding me of my sin against You. Thank you for forgiving me each of my sins as I repent of them. Please help me remember how great Your love is that you would die for me and continue to plead for me with the Father. I do not deserve Your love, yet You give it anyway. Help me to live as Jesus did and pray for my enemies and those who I consider unworthy of help from You. Thank you for Your love. Amen.

The Person Who Prays - Loves Other People

Introduction

In last week’s Bible study, we learned what Peter meant when he told the believers in Asia Minor to have sound judgment and be sober-minded when they prayed. We came to understand this means believers must exercise self-control and consider themselves humbly in relation to God. This self-control comes through the indwelling Holy Spirit, if we let Him control our thoughts, emotions, actions, and words. With a sober mind, we believers can stay calm and collected in the face of persecution, trials, and adversity remembering Jesus faced these without sinning. Jesus’ life testified to God’s love, mercy, and grace continually. A believer, Jesus said, will face hard times so we should be guarded knowing hard times will come. Because we are believers, we can know the Holy Spirit is available to protect and guide us.

In the earlier Bible studies on the effective person of prayer, we learned the Bible teaches this person is to be righteous, alert, and fervent, believe God can do what we ask, pray in solitude, pray ceaselessly, and approach God with his or her whole being. This week we will learn from Jesus, Peter, and Paul. As believers, our relationship with other people – husband to wife, believer to believer, and believer to all people – affects our communing/prayer time with God.

Jesus’ Teaching – Relationship among Believers

Prayer with God is communing with Him through petition, intercession, thanksgiving, adoration. Communing with God includes all acts of worship while at church and in our daily lives. Prayer requires speaking and listening to God, just as any other growing relationship requires speaking and listening. God is not the only one who listens; we are supposed to listen to Him, too. Listening to God comes from reading the Bible, listening to preachers and teachers, and being aware of the Holy Spirit’s inward changes of our thoughts and resultant actions.

Being in a relationship with God means worshipping Him, too. Adoration results in worship. Within worship, believers sing, pray, listen, read, and bring offerings. True worship requires harmony between Christians. Jesus spoke to this point in Matthew 5:23-24. He said,

“Therefore, if you are presenting your offering at the altar and there remember that your brother has something against you, leave your offering there before the altar and go; first be reconciled to your brother and then come and present your offering.” [NASB]

In this passage, Jesus spoke about the relationship of Christians to each other. He said if anything hinders your relationship with another Christian it will affect your relationship with God. Jesus instructed the people to reconcile with other believers whom they offended or who had offended them then take their offering to God. Remember, God said He will hear the prayers of righteous people, not the unrighteous (Proverbs 15:29; Psalm 17:1 and 19:14; 1 Timothy 2:8; James 4:3 & 5:16; 1 Peter 3:12, and 1 John 5:14-15). He will listen to the prayers of those who genuinely seek Him. To be righteous before God, we must repent and confess our sins. By going to the fellow believer who has something against us and making the relationship right, we acknowledge our sins and repent of them.

We show our repentance by correcting our actions, words, and attitude. We turn from our old way of life to the new way Jesus has made for us and empowered us to have through His Holy Spirit living in us. After we repent and renew our walk in God’s ways, we go before God seeking His forgiveness. When Christians do these two things – repent and confess – God promises to forgive them of all their unrighteousness (1 John 1:9). When forgiveness occurs, we can be in His presence and He will accept our prayers and offerings.

When we as Christians reconcile with another believer, we are following Jesus’ teaching. Our offerings to God become acceptable because He made us righteous and holy through the forgiveness of our sins by the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. When we are made righteous by God, He will be with us and allow us to be in His presence, and will accept our offering. By obeying Jesus’ teaching and God’s command to love our neighbor, we show our love for God. Reconciled relationships among believers can bring unhindered prayer/communing with God.

Peter’s Teaching – Relationship between Husband and Wife

Jesus taught about right living in one kind of relationship – Christian to Christian. Peter taught of another important relationship that needs to be right before communing with God. In 1 Peter 3, Peter spoke to the believers in Asia Minor about the husband and wife relationship and its relevance to prayer. He said in verse seven, “You husbands in the same way, live with your wives in an understanding way, as with someone weaker, since she is a woman, and show her honor as a fellow heir of the grace of life so that your prayers will not be hindered.” [NASB]

In this verse, Peter taught Christian husbands to live with their wives recognizing she is physically weaker, and show her honor as a fellow heir of God’s grace. He reminded the husbands women are generally weaker physically. This fact is known and understood. More than that, and different than what the world knows, Peter told them to honor their wives because they are heirs of God’s grace, too. [Paul taught also about the love of a husband for his wife in Ephesians 5:25 and Colossians 3:19.] Unlike the cultural thought that women were property and only had status in the community by being the wife or mother of a man, Christian wives – Christian women – have value because God created them and saved them. They have the same status in God’s kingdom as men; they will inherit eternal life just like male believers. This value explains part of the definition of “honor” used in this 1 Peter 3:7. The honor due to women is two-fold. Honor women because God created her in His image. Honor Christian women because they will inherit the kingdom of God because of His grace.

Made in His image and redeemed by His blood - women, wives, men, husbands – all people have value. To view and treat them as lower than one’s self is sin and hinders prayer. The last part of this verse is the main point. To love God in word, but not in action shows that “love” to be false. True love of God shows itself in a person’s life, by godly actions, words, and attitudes. These show the real heart of a person. If one truly loves God, one will follow God’s commands, laws, and precepts. Jesus summed these up with two commandments. He said we are to love the Lord God will all our heart, soul, mind, and strength and to love our neighbor as ourselves. Though women and wives of the time had no value or status, the husbands and men were to treat them as having value. They were to honor them.

This holds true today. God made each person. He loves everyone. Jesus Christ, God’s Son, died for the sins of all people. That is true love. Who are we to devalue the people for whom Christ died? To be right before God so our prayers will not be hindered and He will listen to them, we must live right in this world. We must treat each person with respect because God made them. A Christian woman or man must honor her Christian husband or his Christian wife because she or he is a joint heir of God’s grace. We must love our neighbor as our self. Peter emphasized this when he repeated part of David’s prayer in Psalm 34:15-16. He said, “For the eyes of the Lord are toward the righteous and His ears attend to their prayer, but the face of the Lord is against those who do evil.” To look down on your spouse and dishonor him or her, Peter said, is unrighteous, and the Lord is against those who do evil. Come before the Lord in obedience. Come before Him seeking forgiveness and an unhindered relationship with Him.

Paul’s Teaching – Relationship among All People

In Matthew 5, Jesus taught Christians to live in harmony among themselves so their offerings to God would be acceptable to Him. In 1 Peter 3, Peter taught Christian men to honor their wives so their prayers would not be hindered. Paul taught about relationships and prayer, too. When he wrote to Timothy, he said in 1 Timothy 2:8, “Therefore, I want the men in every place to pray lifting up holy hands without wrath and dissension.”

In this passage, we learn about Paul speaking to Christians regarding their relationships with all people, not just their spouse or other believers. He told them to lift up holy hands –hands that have done no sin. Hands are important for worship. For by the hands, worshippers present offerings to God and they praise Him. Hands are offered to God for His service in the world. For God to receive and use something from a sinful person, it must be presented with holy hands, hands that have not sinned or been a part of sin. To have holy hands requires having a clean heart and performing only acts of love and care. It affects the heart, mind, and body, the areas by which a person is to love God. Having holy hands comes from loving God with one’s whole being, just as Jesus and Moses taught in Deuteronomy 6:5 and Matthew 22:37-39. James taught this, too, in James 4:8. He said, “Draw near to God and He will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners and purify your hearts you double-minded.” James spoke about the whole part of the being when he talked of cleansing hands and heart.

For a Christian to have holy hands, one of two things must occur. He or she must not sin, which is highly improbable because each person sins and falls short of the glory of God (Romans 3:23) or he or she must confess and repent upon which God will forgive him or her. The latter is most probable for a person to have holy hands because all people sin. Paul recognized the source of most uncleanness of hands. He said it comes with wrath and dissension. These words from the Greek language mean to be angry, have a temper and be violent, to doubt and dispute, to argue, and to question what is true. Wrath and dissension lead to a breakdown in relationships and chaos in community. God is not a God of chaos, but of love and peace (1 Corinthians 14:33). True worship and prayer to Him cannot come from chaos, anger, violence, and doubt. That is why Paul taught people to lift holy hands. He knew and taught people to seek God, confess and repent, receive His forgiveness, and restore a right relationship with Him. When people are cleansed of their sinful actions and words, which come from a person’s heart and mind, they have holy hands and can offer to God unselfish prayers, God-centered worship from a clean heart, and love offerings to God by their actions and words.

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Jesus’ Teaching – The Greatest Commandments

Jesus’ answer to the Pharisees’ and Sadducees’ question is the primary lesson about right relationships to God and all people. With these relationships being right, our offerings, prayers, and worship will be righteous and unhindered. God will commune with us and hear and answer our prayers.

In Matthew 22:37-39, Mark 12:29-31, and Luke 10:27-28, Jesus taught we are to love the Lord our God with all our heart, soul, mind, and strength and to love our neighbor as our selves. The teachers of the Law knew this. They learned it from their teachers who learned it from God through Moses in Deuteronomy 6:5 and Leviticus 19:18. Jesus reiterated it for the Jews who followed Him. He, Paul, and Peter taught it to the diaspora Jews and the Gentiles they discipled. By consolidating all God’s laws into these two great commandments, Jesus taught all the laws of God are about the love of God and the love we are to share with Him to other people. By teaching them side by side, he taught the love of other people is a top priority of God. When we do not love other people like God loves them, we do not love God with our whole being. We qualify our love. The teacher in Luke 10:29 wanted to qualify it, too, and justify himself when he asked, “Who is my neighbor?” Jesus replied with the parable of the Good Samaritan. This parable tells us our neighbor is any person whom we meet or know about, not necessarily our family or neighbor by proximity. The Jewish teacher understood the person who showed mercy to the beaten man was the man’s neighbor. Jesus commanded him to go do the same. Be the same to someone else. Our neighbor is any person who needs mercy and love.

Relevance and Conclusion

A person can only truly love the Lord God by obeying Him that includes loving your neighbor as yourself. Hosea taught this in Hosea 6:6. He recorded God saying, “For I delight in loyalty rather than sacrifice, and in knowledge of God rather than burnt offerings.” Samuel said it to Saul in 1 Samuel 15:22 when he said, “Has the LORD as much delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices as in obeying the voice of the LORD? Behold, to obey is better than sacrifice, and to heed than the fat of rams.” Jesus carried this teaching forward and further. In Matthew 12:33, He spoke about the character of the person. He said, “Either make the tree good and its fruit good, or make the tree bad and its fruit bad; for the tree is known by its fruit.” With this passage Jesus condemned the Pharisees for leading the people astray with their teachings. These Pharisees could not worship God with clean hearts nor pray unhindered because they were not righteous. They had not accepted God’s grace, and it had not made them clean from their sins. If the Pharisees had loved God, they would have loved the people as God does. This showed their sinfulness and their split loyalty to God and their own selves. We must each decide if we will love our neighbors as our self and love God with all our heart, soul, mind, and strength. The teachings and commandments are still real and relevant today.

What have we learned from this lesson today?

• Every person has value and is worthy of love, care, honor, etc. because God created and loves him or her.
•  Honoring a person means you recognize the person’s value and worth in the eyes of God and act toward him or her with proper respect and care.
• When we honor and love the Lord, it should show in our actions as honor and love of our neighbors – all other people.
• When we do not honor and love other people, it shows we do not truly love and honor God.
• To go before God with offerings, prayer, and worship, we need to have holy hands, hands pure from anger, dissension, bitterness, hate, and neglect.
• To have holy hands, we must either not sin or repent and confess our sins to God and be forgiven by Him.
• When God reveals to us our negative attitudes towards a person, we should go make things right with the person. Only by obeying God’s commands to love your neighbor are you showing God’s love.
• The teachings of Peter and Paul about love of people and right worship and prayer are not their own teachings. God told these commands to the Israelites through Moses in Deuteronomy and Leviticus. Jesus reiterated and consolidated them in His teachings recorded in the Gospels.

Are your heart and hands clean before God?

Will your prayers, worship, and offerings be acceptable to Him?

Do you hold bitterness, anger, or hatred toward other people in your heart?

God offers a way for you to commune with Him.

Confess and repent of your sins to Him and He through His righteousness will forgive you and impart righteousness to you.

Come, now is the time to worship and pray with your whole heart.

God will be with you and hear you.

Repentance then New Life: A Psalm 51:10 Devotional

David realized his sin and the guilt he carried because of it. He recognized God would not fellowship with Him in his state of sinfulness. In verses two, seven, and nine, David stated he was a sinner full of iniquity, transgressions, and guilt. He admitted (confessed) his sins to God and repented of them.

After his three confessions of sinfulness, David petitioned God to create a clean heart in him. He did not ask only for cleansing, but a re-creating of his heart. The Hebrew word translated as “create” means to transform, reshape, or re-form. Ezekiel used it in 18:31-32 recognizing a clean heart comes because of getting away from sins and includes confessing and repenting. He realized only when a person was no longer tainted by sins and the guilt of sins would God create a new heart in the person. Paul agreed with this and applied New Testament theology to it. In Ephesians 2:10, Paul taught  that when God creates a clean heart in a person, He creates that person in the image of Christ Jesus to do good works. He said we (Christians) are God’s workmanship. Without His cleansing and purification, He would not give us/create in us a new heart.

From this, we get the understanding that a clean heart comes from the forgiveness of God and His washing away our sins by the sacrificial blood shed by His sinless Jesus Christ. The heart David, Ezekiel, Paul, and others speak of is the inner being of each person. The mind, will, heart, and soul of a person that decides to act morally – according to God’s ways – or immorally is the inner being. From Paul’s earlier verse we recognize we can keep a clean heart by doing the good works of God. David added through Psalm 24:3-4 the one who has a pure heart and clean hands is the one who does not lie or swear deceitfully. Only those people, he said, could ascend the hill of the Lord. Luke stated in Acts 15:9 the pure in heart are the ones whom God cleansed their hearts because of their faith in Jesus Christ as their Savior. Jesus taught in the Beatitudes the promise of seeing God for those with a clean heart (Matthew 5:8). Why would anyone not want to have a clean heart or be created in Jesus’ image? David, though he did not know the Savior, knew from God’s prophets God would send a Messiah. He sought the only way of being cleansed from his evil actions and thoughts, through God’s love and mercy, through God’s re-creating his heart.

David asked God for a second thing in this Psalm 51:10. He requested God renew a right spirit within him. This request for renewal shows David recognized his tainted and sinful being. He realized his sinfulness and repented to God. David realized only God, the original Creator of his being, could renew – remake – his inner being/heart so he could stand strong and not sin, not be weighed down by the guilt of his sins, and see God. With a heart restored by and to God, God became primary in his life once again.

With God as primary and relying upon Him, David could withstand temptations and trials and continue to be in fellowship with God. The word “right” David used comes from the Hebrew word meaning to be in alignment with God, and persevering, enduring, and being established in God and His ways because of love for Him. David spoke of a steadfast or right spirit other times, like in Psalm 78:36-37. He said in these verses a steadfast heart does not speak deceit or lies, but is faithful to God’s covenant with him/her.

David asked God to create in him a clean heart. He requested further that God re-make and transform his inner being - his heart - so he would be right with God – in a right relationship with Him because of being cleansed from his sins - and stand strong for Him persevering in faith no matter what trials and temptations arose.  We each need to ask ourselves daily if we are in a right relationship with God. Is there sin blocking our relationship with God and leading us to fall more often to temptation? Is there any stain and sin in our past we need to confess and repent as David recognized in himself and repented of to God? Only then will God create a new heart and establish a right relationship with Him for us. Remember, Jesus said, “Blessed are the pure in heart for they shall see God.”

v  Now is the time to confess and repent.

v  Now is the time to go before God seeking forgiveness and renewing.

God wants to be in a personal, intimate, and growing relationship with you.