Loving Our Enemies

I have read the Bible many times, so it is always amazing and awesome when I read a passage that I have read time after time and Jesus reveals something new and life-changing. That happened this week. And Jesus has kept this passages in front of me all week.

The passage is Luke 6:27-36

It says:

But I tell you who hear Me: Love you enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who mistreat you. If someone strikes you on one cheek, turn to him the other also. If someone takes your cloak, do not stop him from taking your tunic. Give to everyone who asks you, and if anyone takes what belongs to you, do not demand it back. Do to others as you would have them do to you. If you love those who love you, what credit is that to you? Even ‘sinners’ love those who love them. And if you do good to those who are good to you, what credit is that to you? Even ‘sinners’ do that. And if you lend to those from whom you expect repayment, what credit is that to you? Even ‘sinners’ lend to ‘sinners’, expecting to be repaid in full. But love your enemies, do good to them, and lend to them without expecting to get anything back. Then your reward will be great, and you will be sons of the Most High, because He is kind to the ungrateful and wicked. Be merciful, just as your Father is merciful.

This passage challenges me in three ways.

It first challenges me in how I view others.

I struggle with loving my enemies.

I struggle with blessing those who curse me.

I struggle with praying for those who mistreat me.

I want to hate my enemies.

I want to curse those who curse me.

I want to condemn those who mistreat me.

I see in our culture the habit of demonizing anyone we don’t like or who disagrees with us.

Jesus is telling me to love not only those that I don’t like or don’t agree with but also to love those people who deliberately hurt me.

That goes against everything in my fallen nature.

I also see this same attitude of demonizing others happening in the church.

Not only do we many times condemn those outside the church that we have labeled ‘sinners’, but we condemn those inside the church with whom we disagree.

We condemn those who:

Don’t use the right translation of the Bible

Don’t like the same worship style

Don’t hold to the same theological position on things

Don’t belong to the same political party or same political viewpoint

Jesus tells us that the two marks of being His disciples are love and unity.

Jesus tells us that the second most important commandment is to love our neighbor as our self.

Now, I cannot do that in my natural self. I need the supernatural presence of Jesus through the filling of the Holy Spirit to accomplish this kind of loving others and doing good toward them.

Raise the Roof and Remove the Walls is loving others through the power of the Holy Spirit.

Secondly, it challenges me in how I view my possessions.

When Jesus says that if someone takes something from me, I should not demand it back. I shouldn’t even try to stop them.

I remember when a young man stole my son’s car. When I was asked by the district attorney what I wanted to happen to the young man, I said that I wanted to be reimbursed. I wanted something back for what I had lost. Only after that did I also say that I wanted for the young man to get help.

God is a God of justice. He will make things right, but I don’t have to make that my focus.

I am not to put such importance on my possessions that they define who I am.

I am not to put should importance on my possessions that they are a hindrance to me giving grace and love to others.

Raise the Roof and Remove the Walls is not letting my possessions define me, but letting my relationship with Jesus define me.

Thirdly, it challenges me to use my resources to grow the kingdom and not my bank account.

I don’t invest my life in Jesus and His kingdom.

I give my life to Jesus and His kingdom.

I remember my son coming to me and asking if we could lend him some money so they could buy their first house. I say, “No.” I told him that we would give him the money. I was not going make my son obligated to me. I had the resources and I wanted those resources to be freely given to help him.

I have had people come to me as pastor and ask to borrow money from the church. My response is that the church is not in the business of lending money because we are not a business. We are a family and a family helps others.

I have to say that this passage has me thinking about our whole economic system and the greed that seems to permeate the system.

When Jesus died on the cross, His first words were, “Father forgive them, they do not know what they are doing.” He didn’t say forgive them when they acknowledge Me as the Messiah. It was Jesus praying for God’s grace on all of us.

God loves us unconditionally and pours out His grace on us and His grace is always undeserved.

Raise the Roof and Remove the Walls is about giving with no thought of return.

I want, as a follower of Jesus, to be like Him. I want my life to reflect the truth of who Jesus is to the world.

This passage challenges me to allow God to make me into a new creation and to allow Jesus to live His resurrected life through me.

Living like that requires complete surrender of my life and of the authority to control my life over to Jesus.

In the Image and Under the Authority of Jesus Raising the Roof and Removing the Walls,

                                                      Joe

Not Under the Curse

I was born under a curse. It was not placed on me by a person. It was placed upon me by my own fallen nature and my inability to obey the law. The truth is, we are all born under a curse. We all have a fallen nature with a tendency to sin and an inability to obey the law. The great news is that none of us has to stay under the curse.

Galatians 3:10

For all who rely on works of the law are under a curse; for it is written, “Cursed be everyone does not abide by all things written in the Book of the Law, and do them.”

If we are going to depend of the Law to save us and justify us, then we have to obey all the law, all the time, perfectly. If we don’t, we are cursed. That means we are all cursed.

Galatians 3:11

Now it is evident that no one is justified before God by the law, for “The righteous shall live by faith.”

Paul says that something is evident: no one is justified in God’s sight by the law. That is true because no person has ever perfectly obeyed the law. And the requirement is that, to be justified by the law, we have to keep the law perfectly.

Paul gives us the alternative to being justified by the law. It is to live by faith.

There are two ways to become righteous.

One: Obeying the law perfectly. That is impossible.

Two: By faith trusting what Jesus did on the cross.

The first is impossible for us to do and the second has already been done for us.    

Galatians 3:12

But the law is not of faith; rather, “The one who does them shall live by them.”

Paul again lays out the choices.

Live by the law, obey all the law perfectly (an impossibility) or trust Jesus for what He did on the cross.

Raise the Roof and Remove the Walls is acknowledging that we are not capable of obeying the law based upon God standards, and depending on Jesus’ finished work on the cross for our salvation.

How did Jesus redeem us from the curse of the law?

Galatians 3:13

Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us – for it is written, “Cursed is everyone who is hanged on a tree.”

Jesus redeemed us from the curse by becoming the curse.

The curse had to be broken. The curse had been in effect since Adam and Eve disobeyed God and thus rebelled against His authority. Jesus broke the curse by becoming the curse. He became cursed with our curse.

Jesus Himself was not cursed because Jesus obeyed the law perfectly. Jesus didn’t just come on the scene and say, “Oh, just forget about the law, just ignore it.”

Jesus didn’t say, “The time of the law is over,” therefore it has been abolished.

Jesus didn’t say, “God was only kidding with all this law stuff and so just forget it.”

Jesus says in Matthew 5:17 that He did not come to abolish the law, but He came to fulfill it.

Jesus fulfilled it by obeying the law perfectly.

Jesus was not under the curse because He did obey it perfectly. He met all of God’s standard.

Jesus chose to take the punishment, the punishment that we deserved, so we could be declared righteous.

Jesus became guilty of my curse.

I became the recipient of His righteousness.

Raise the Roof and Remove the Walls is depending on Jesus’ finished work on the cross to make us right with God.  

Galatians 3:14

So that in Christ Jesus the blessing of Abraham might come to the Gentiles, so that we might receive the promised Spirit through faith.

There are two other things that are accomplished by what Jesus did on the cross.

Through Jesus’ death on the cross we receive the blessing of Abraham.

The blessing of being God’s children.

The blessing of God’s protection and provision.

The blessing of knowing God.

Through Jesus’ death on the cross we receive the Holy Spirit.

Jesus promised that He would not leave His followers as orphans, but would send the Spirit to provide all that His followers needed.

This promise could only be fulfilled by, first, Jesus dying on the cross, and then the Spirit coming.

Raise the Roof and Remove the Walls is through the death of Jesus receiving the blessings of Abraham and the Holy Spirit.

We receive through Jesus’ death on the cross:

Pardon from the curse

The blessing of Abraham

The Holy Spirit

The law cannot make these things happen because we would have to obey the law perfectly and we are not capable doing that.

The cross of Jesus can make those happen because Jesus, who obeyed the law perfectly, gave Himself for us.

We receive that truth by faith.

We live in that truth by faith

We receive the benefits of the cross by faith.

By Faith Raising the Roof and Removing the Walls,

Joe

   

Jesus Is Risen!

When the women went to the tomb on that Sunday morning to look at where Jesus had been laid, they encountered an angel. The angel gave them the greatest news that has ever been communicated: “He is not here; he has risen.”

Jesus died on the cross that Friday. There is overwhelming evidence verifying that Jesus died.

If I had a friend that died and I went to his funeral and looked in the coffin and saw his corpse, and then watched them put the coffin in the ground and cover it, and then three days later saw and talked to my friend at the grocery store, I would have to conclude either that I was crazy and had imagined his death, or that I was seeing things, or that he was supernatural.

Jesus was seen by at least 500 people at one time according to 1 Corinthians 15:6. Jesus was not only seen by the disciples but also ate and interacted with them. We have words Jesus spoke after He resurrected recorded in the Bible.

The evidence of the changed lives of the disciples testifies that they believed Jesus had risen from the dead. They all gave their lives based on their total belief that Jesus died and rose from the dead. People don’t willingly die for something they know is a lie.

The evidence strongly points to the truth that Jesus rose from the dead and is indeed supernatural.

Jesus claimed to be the Son of God, God in the flesh. The resurrection proclaims that Jesus is God in the flesh.

We really only have three choices about who Jesus is.

Jesus is a liar. He made it all up. He orchestrated the events of his life to match the prophecies about the Messiah, but he was a fraud.

Jesus is a lunatic. He really thought He was God. He was mentally deranged and thus has mislead millions of people.

Jesus is Lord. He is exactly who He claimed to be – God.

Now, if Jesus is a liar or a lunatic, then reject and ignore Him.

But if Jesus is Lord, then we have only one option – submit our lives to Jesus as the sole authority of our lives.

Raise the Roof and Remove the Walls is believing that Jesus is Lord and living a life based on that belief.

I could give you many theological aspects of what the resurrection of Jesus does and what it means. But I want to share six things that Jesus’ resurrection means to me personally.

1. It means I don’t have to live in fear.

I have a tendency to be fearful. It is one of the ways that my fallenness is manifested.

I have faced many fears in my life. The one that seems to be the greatest is the fear of failure. I hate not to succeed and I fear people not seeing me as good at what I do. This fear has done two big things. It has kept me from being willing to risk things for Jesus and hindered me from trusting God to work through my life to impact others.

1 John 4:4 tells us that greater is He (Jesus) that is in us than he (Satan) that is in the world.

2. It means that I have eternal life.

Paul tells us in 1 Corinthians 15 that, because Jesus rose, we will also be resurrected.

I will have eternal life in a perfect, eternal body with Jesus.

3. It means that I have a real, living hope.

1 Peter 1:3 says that by God’s mercy I have been given a new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ.

Jesus overcame death through His resurrection; that gives me hope.

Jesus overcame sin through His resurrection; that gives me hope.

Jesus overcame Satan through His resurrection; that gives me hope.

4. It means that I am not alone and never will be alone.

We are given the promise in Hebrews 13:5 that Jesus will never leave or abandon us. If Jesus died and didn’t resurrect, then I am alone and have only myself to depend on. But because Jesus did rise from the grave, I am not alone and will never have to be alone.

In the sixth hour, which would have been twelve noon, it became pitch dark. In the ninth hour, which would have been three o’clock, Jesus cried out, “My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me?”

Jesus hung on the cross for three hours separated from the Father for the first time in all eternity. Jesus died alone and then rose so we would never have to experience that kind of aloneness.

5. It means I serve a living Savior, not a dead martyr.

Jesus died but He did not stay dead.

Jesus is alive.

His resurrection means that I can relate to Jesus. You can’t relate to a dead person. I can talk to Him and know He is listening and hears me. I can hear from Him because, as a living Savior, He can communicate with me.

6. It means that I have victory.

I have victory over fear.

I have victory over sin.

I have victory over death.

I have victory over doubt and confusion.

Paul says in Galatians 2:20 that because he has been crucified with Jesus, that Jesus lives His life through him. If Jesus lives His life through us, that means He is alive, and by living His life through us, He has given us His victory.   

Raise the Roof and Remove the Walls is celebrating the resurrection of Jesus every day.

The truth is that, aside from the death and resurrection of Jesus, I have no hope. But because of the death and resurrection of Jesus, I have hope and the assurance of God’s love, presence, and power in my life every day.

Through Jesus’ Resurrection Raising the Roof and Removing the Walls

                                                     Joe

Faith Leads to Righteousness

There is a definition of insanity that I can I very much identify with. It says that insanity is doing something the same way over and over and expecting a different outcome.

I can identify because for years I attempted to please God by trying as hard as I could to do it all perfectly. I was depending on my effort and desire to make God love me. Then God showed me that He already loved me and that it was not about following all the rules but about depending on what Jesus did on the cross.

It is about grace and not the law.

In Galatians 3:1-9 Paul shares that salvation is by grace and not the law and then gives an example of that from the Old Testament.

Galatians 3:1

You foolish Galatians! Who has bewitched you? Before your very eyes, Jesus Christ was clearly portrayed as crucified.

Paul calls the Galatian believers foolish or unwise. Then he asks who has bewitched or deceived them.

Paul says that these Galatian believers knew that Jesus had been crucified. The implication here is clear, that the way the Galatian believers were trying to relate to God was not consistent with the truth that Jesus had been crucified.

Galatians 3:2-3

I would like to learn just one thing from you: Did you receive the Spirit by observing the law, or by believing what you heard? Are you so foolish? After beginning with the Spirit, are you now trying to attain your goal by human effort?

Paul has a question for these Galatian believers. Since you began this journey with Jesus based on His Spirit imparting grace to you, are you now trying to follow Jesus based on the law or human effort?

Jesus tells us that following Him is about denying self and taking up your cross daily. That is not something that the law can enable us to do. That is something that only the grace of God can enable us to do.

Following Jesus cannot be based on following the law because that is human effort. It can only be done by depending on the grace given us through the Holy Spirit.

Raise the Roof and Remove the Walls is depending on God’s grace to follow Jesus.

Galatians 3:4-5

Have you suffered so much for nothing – if it really was for nothing? Does God give you His Spirit and work miracles among you because you observe the law, or because you believe what you heard?

Why does God work in and among His people? Is it because they follow all the rules or because they believe God?

The answer is obvious. God is able to work in and through His people based on their trusting Him, not because they perfectly obey all the commands of God.

We will never perfectly and fully obey God’s command. Jesus did! When we depend on grace through faith we receive Jesus’ fulfillment of the law and the Father sees us has having perfectly fulfilled the law.

Jesus says that if our faith is the size of a mustard seed, we will say to a mountain, “Move,” and it will move. Trusting Jesus is the key.

Raise the Roof and Remove the Walls is, through faith in Jesus, seeing Him work in and through His people.   

Galatians 3:6-9

Consider Abraham: “He believed God, and it was credited to him as righteousness.” Understand, then that those who believe are children of Abraham. The Scriptures foresaw that God would justify the Gentiles by faith, and announced the gospel in advance to Abraham: “All nations will be blessed through you.” So those who have faith are blessed along with Abraham, the man of faith.

Paul uses Abraham as an example of righteousness received by faith.

In using Abraham as an example of righteousness by faith, Paul points out four truths.

Those who believe are children of Abraham.

Abraham received righteousness because he believed. We as children of Abraham received our righteousness in the same way, by believing God.

All people, including Gentiles, are justified by faith.

Scripture is clear that God is not a respecter of people. That means that God doesn’t treat one group one way and another group another way. He doesn’t treat people differently depending on the circumstances. God justifies all people, in all circumstances, in any time by faith. He never does it based on the law.

All nations will be blessed through Abraham because he believed God.

Everyone has been blessed because it was through Abraham’s line that Jesus was born into the world.    

Not only did Abraham’s faith serve as an example for us, God used Abraham to bring the Messiah to the earth.

Law came through Moses, but grace and truth came through Jesus.

Those who believe God will be blessed as Abraham was because he believed God.

How was Abraham blessed?

He was declared righteous.

He was provided for.

He was protected.

He was guided.

He was called a friend of God.

We will be blessed in the same way God blessed Abraham.

Raise the Roof and Remove the Walls is following the example Abraham and thus being blessed as he was.

Grace allows triumphs over sin.

Faith always leads to righteousness.

By Grace Through Faith Raising the Roof and Removing the Walls,

                                              Joe

Alive in Jesus!

What is Christianity really all about? In one word, Christianity is about Jesus. It is not about rules or religion or theology. It is all about Jesus and having a relationship with God the Father through Jesus.

In Galatians 2:17-21 Paul makes reference to Christ or Son of God six times. Paul is saying it is all about Jesus.

So, what is it about Jesus in this passage that is essential?

Galatians 2:17-18

If, while we seek to be justified in Christ, it becomes evident that we ourselves are sinners, does that mean that Christ promotes sin? Absolutely not! If I rebuild what I destroyed, I prove that I am a lawbreaker.

In Jesus, we are justified.

Justification means that we have been made right with God. We are made right with God through our submission to the authority of Jesus to control our lives and by our acceptance of His death and resurrection to pay for and deliver us from our sin.

Justification comes only through Jesus and not through any other source. You cannot justify yourself. The law cannot justify you. The church cannot justify you. Good works cannot justify you.

Raise the Roof and Remove the Walls is being justified through Jesus.

Without Jesus, we are sinners and lawbreakers.

Romans 3:23 says, “All have sinned and come short of God’s standard.”

Sinners are people who have not lived up to God’s standards.

How many of us does that describe? Every one of us!

Outside of the justification through Jesus we are all the same – sinners.

James writes in James 2:10-11: “For whoever keeps the whole law and yet stumbles at just one point is guilty of breaking all of it. For He who said, ‘Do not commit adultery,’ also said, ‘Do not murder.’ If you do not commit adultery but do commit murder, you have become a lawbreaker.”

One broken command of God makes you a lawbreaker even if you keep all the rest. (Good luck doing that.)

Raise the Roof and Remove the Walls is knowing that without Jesus, we are sinners and lawbreakers.

Galatians 2:19

For through the law I died to the law so that I might live for God.

If I depend on keeping the law (rules and regulation and rituals) to bring justification, then I am not depending on Jesus.

If I depend on Jesus for justification, then I don’t have to depend on trying to keep all the law.

I have a great advantage over many people in that I knew at an early age I was not good at keeping rules. I don’t like rules. I am a rebel. I love doing it differently. I know that if my justification is dependent on keeping the law (rules), then I have no hope.

The truth is, if justification is dependent on keeping the law, we are all hopeless.

When a person dies to something it means that they are no longer bound to it or no longer dependent on it. We die to the law so that we can live for God. It means we are no longer dependent on the law but on Jesus to be right with God.

Raise the Roof and Remove the Walls is dying to the law and being alive in Jesus.

Galatians 2:20

I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for me.

I am crucified with Jesus so that He can live His life through me.

In Luke 9:23 Jesus says to all those who were with him that if they wanted to follow Him they needed to deny themselves, take up their cross daily, and then follow Him.

Taking up you cross daily means dying to self every day. It means saying no to the normal selfish desires we all have and thus saying yes to what Jesus wants.

In Colossians 1:27 Paul says it is Christ in you which is our hope.

We reckon ourselves dead, crucified with Jesus, to clear the way for Jesus to live His resurrected life through us.

The world does not need to see what I can do. The world wants to see what Jesus can do in and through me (and you).

Raise the Roof and Remove the Walls is giving up our lives to Jesus so He can live His life through us.   

Galatians 2:21

I do not set aside the grace of God, for if righteousness could be gained through the law, Christ died for nothing.

Grace brings righteousness through Jesus, not the law.

Another thing the law cannot do is make us righteousness.

In Isaiah 64:6 our efforts at being righteous are called filthy rags.

In Matthew 5:20 Jesus tells us that unless our righteousness exceeds the righteousness of the Pharisees we will not enter the Kingdom of Heaven.

The Pharisees had an outward, ceremonial righteousness. Jesus is saying that our righteousness is not to be just for outward appearance. It has to be a God-based righteousness that comes from Jesus living His life through us.

Raise the Roof and Remove the Walls is depending on Jesus for our righteousness.

Christianity is not rules, religion, or ritual. Christianity is about Jesus.

Making It All About Jesus Raising the Roof and Removing the Walls

                                                    Joe