Righteous, Peace, and Joy

 

 

Romans 14:17

The kingdom of God is not a matter of eating and drinking, but of righteous, peace and joy in the Holy Spirit.

 

God’s kingdom is characterized by righteousness.

God’s kingdom is characterized by peace.

Go’s kingdom is characterized by joy.

 

2 Corinthians 5:21 says, “For our sake He made Him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in Him we might become the righteousness of God.”

 

Jesus was sinless and perfectly righteous, and He became guilty of our sin and our unrighteousness so that by our accepting His death as the payment for our sin, we would then become credited with His righteousness.

 

Righteousness is not something we can earn; it is bestowed on us through Jesus. But once we have been declared righteous, we have to live it out. We have the power to live the righteousness out through the indwelling presence of the Holy Spirit.

 

Raise the Roof and Remove the Walls is knowing that, through Jesus, we have been declared righteous and that by the power of the Holy Spirit we have the ability to live out that righteousness.

 

Ephesians 2:14-17

For He Himself is our peace, who has made us both one and has broken down in His flesh the dividing wall of hostility by abolishing the law of commandments expressed in ordinances, that He might create in Himself one new man in place of the two, so making peace, and might reconcile us both to God in one body through the cross, thereby killing hostility. An He came and preached peace to you who were far off and peace to those who were near.

 

The peace that we as part of God’s kingdom can experience is the shalom of God. It is a rest in God no matter the circumstances. It is an eternal security we have because of our relationship with Jesus.

 

In John 14:27 Jesus says “Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. Not as the world gives do I give to you. Let not your hearts be troubled, neither let them be afraid.”

 

The world’s peace is conditional based on circumstance.

God’s peace is unconditional based on Jesus.

 

God’s peace is based in Jesus regardless of the circumstances.

 

1 Thessalonians 5:16

Rejoice always.

 

Philippians 4:4

Rejoice in the Lord always; again I say, rejoice.

 

These verses are commands. We as members of the kingdom of God are to be joyful people.

 

Joy is a well-being in our spirit produced by the Holy Spirit, as the Holy Spirit reveals to us the beauty of Jesus in us and in the world.

 

Joy, like peace, is not based on circumstances but on the reality of Jesus in our lives and the work the Holy Spirit in our lives. We experience joy in our lives because of Jesus and through the Holy Spirit.

 

Raise the Roof and Remove the Walls is having a daily joy in our lives because we know Jesus and we know that He loves us.

 

We come to be righteous though accepting Jesus as our Savior and Lord. When we are made righteous, we experience the peace of God. When we experience peace with God, we come to know real joy.

 

God’s kingdom is not about eating and drinking, material things.

God’s kingdom is about righteous, peace, and joy, the eternal things of God.   

 

With God’s Righteous, Peace, and Joy

Raising the Roof and Removing the Walls,

Joe

 

Humility, Contentment, and Thanksgiving

 

In 2 Corinthians 6:20 Paul says, “For you were bought with a price. So, glorify God in your body.”

 

How can we do that? I think we do that as followers of Jesus by allowing the Holy Spirit to produce godly character in our lives. Godly character is the reality of Jesus being manifested in and through our lives.

 

Romans 8:29 says that God is conforming those of us who God foreknew and predestined to the image of His Son.

 

2 Corinthians 3:18 says we are being transformed into Jesus by the Holy Spirit.

 

So, I want to mention the characteristics of Jesus that the Holy Spirit is producing in our lives as followers of Jesus.

 

Luke 18:14

Everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted.

 

In James 4:6 and 1 Peter 5:5 we are told that God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble.

 

Humility is placing ourselves in the proper position:

Recognizing God’s superiority

Under God’s authority

Not superior to others

Willing to serve God and others

 

Raise the Roof and Remove the Walls is allowing the Holy Spirit to manifest the humility of Jesus in and through our lives so, when we proclaim the gospel, our lives back up the truth of what we are sharing.

 

1 Timothy 6:6 says, “But godliness with contentment is great gain.

 

2 Corinthians 3:5

Not that we are sufficient in ourselves to claim anything as coming from us, but our sufficiency is from God.  

 

Contentment means that we find Jesus sufficient for everything in our lives: our earthly lives and our eternal lives.

 

It does not mean that we don’t want to grow in our relationship with Jesus or allow God to use us more. It means that I look to Jesus for all I need and trust Him to provide it.

 

Raise the Roof and Remove the Walls is looking to and trusting Jesus for all that I need physically, emotionally, and spiritually.

 

Psalm 100:4-5 says, “Enter His gates with thanksgiving and His courts with praise; give thanks to Him and praise His name. For the Lord is good and His love endures forever; His faithfulness continues through all generations.

 

Thankfulness to God is a recognition that God in His grace, goodness, and faithfulness has provided for us and cared for us, both physically and spiritually. It is recognition that we are totally dependent upon Him and that all we are and have comes from God.

 

Thankfulness acknowledges God’s goodness and exalts the person of God.

 

Raise the Roof and Remove the Walls is acknowledging our dependence on God and praising Him for who He is and thanking Him for what He has done.

 

In humility we acknowledge God’s majesty, in contentment we acknowledge God’s grace, and in thankfulness we acknowledge God’s goodness.

 

When we allow the Holy Spirit to produce these characteristics in and through our lives, it testifies to the truth of Jesus.

 

Being Made to Look Like Jesus and Raising the Roof

and Removing the Walls,

Joe

Lessons from Jonah

 

 

I have been listening this past week to a series of teachings on the book of Jonah. I have always loved the book of Jonah and found it very interesting. I have found God revealing some essential truths in the book of Jonah.

 

Jonah 1:1-2

Now the word of the Lord came to Jonah the son of Amittai, saying “Arise, go to Nineveh, that great city, and call out against it, for their evil has come up before Me.”

 

Truth #1: God is a God of the world.

 

God is concerned about all people coming to know, obey, and serve Him. The Jews are God’s chosen people, but they are chosen to be used by God to take Him to all the people of the world.

 

Jonah does not want to go to Nineveh because he hates the people of Nineveh and does not want them to repent. Jonah wants God to wipe them out. Jonah runs away and goes in the opposite direction that God is telling him to go.

 

Raise the Roof and Remove the Walls is seeing God as the God for all people as the one true God.

 

Jonah 1:4

But the Lord hurled a great wind upon the sea, and there was a mighty tempest on the sea, so that the ship threated to break up.

 

Jonah 1:17

And the Lord appointed a great fish to swallow up Jonah. And Jonah was in the belly of the fish three days and tree nights.

 

Truth #2: You cannot run away from God.

 

God did not give up on Jonah. God sent a storm to get Jonah and the ship crew’s attention. When Jonah was thrown overboard, God sent a big fish to swallow him and give him an extended period of time to consider where he was going and why.

 

Raise the Roof and Remove the Walls is believing that God does not give up on us, that in fact He pursues us.

 

Jonah 3:1-3

Then the word of the Lord came to Jonah the second time, saying, “Arise, go to Nineveh, that great city, and call out against it the message that I tell you.” So, Jonah arose and went to Nineveh, according to the word of the Lord. Now Nineveh was an exceedingly great city, three day’s journey in breath.   

 

Truth #3: God is a God of grace.

 

Jonah had disobeyed God and run from Him. God pursued him and gave him a second chance. That is grace! God could have killed Jonah and selected someone else to go to Nineveh, but He did not. God stayed with Jonah and gave him another chance and Jonah obeyed.

 

Raise the Roof and Remove the Walls is experiencing God as the God of grace and sharing His grace with others.  

 

Jonah 3:5-8

And the people of Nineveh believed God. They called for a fast and put on sackcloth, from the greatest of them to the least of them. The word reached the king of Nineveh, and he arose from his throne, removed his robe, covered himself with sackcloth, and sat in ashes. And he issued a proclamation and published through Nineveh, “By the decree of the king and his nobles: Let neither man nor beast, heard nor flock, taste anything. Let them not feed or drink water, but let man and beast be covered with sackcloth, and let them call out mightily to God. Let everyone turn from his evil way and from the violence that is in his hands.”

 

Truth #4: God can use us even if our faith in not perfect and our desire is not strong.

 

Jonah went to Nineveh, but he still did not want the people of Nineveh to be saved. He was not enthusiastic about what God had called him to do. God wants us to obey. Our obedience opens up His power to work through us. So, even with incomplete faith and less than great desire, God can and will use us to accomplish His will.

 

Raise the Roof and Remove the Walls is obeying God and allowing Him to use us in spite of our incompleteness.

 

Jonah 3:10

When God saw what they did, how they turned from their evil way. God relented of the disaster that He had said He would do to them, and He did not do it.  

 

Truth #5: God honors His word when we obey His word.

 

God sent Jonah to warn the people of Nineveh that they needed to repent. Jonah did not want to go because he knew that if the people repented God would not destroy them. And Jonah wanted them destroyed. God is faithful and will always do what He says that He will do.

 

Raise the Roof and Remove the Walls is believing God and taking Him at His word.

 

Jonah leaves the city and sits and is angry at God and has a pity party. God enables a vine to grow and give shade and comfort to Jonah. God then sent a worm and a dry wind to kill the vine. Jonah is sad over the vine dying.

 

Jonah 4:10-11

And the Lord said, “You pity the plant, for which you did not labor nor did you make it grow, which came into being in a night and perished in a night. And should not I pity Nineveh, that great city, in which there are more than 120,000 persons who do not know their right hand from their left, and also much cattle?

 

Truth #6: God cares about people.

 

Jonah was upset that a vine that he had nothing to do with coming into being and had not labored to help it grow was dead. God says that He had pity on the people of Nineveh because He did bring them into existence and loved them and wanted them to know Him. God is concerned about people, not things. He wants people to know Him because He loves them and, in coming to know God, obey God, and serve God, it is the best for us.

 

Raise the Roof and Remove the Walls is living with the knowledge that God cares for you.

 

Learning the Truth by Raising the Roof and Removing the Walls,

                                               Joe

In the Storm with Jesus

 

I have been through two tornadoes and one tropical storm. I didn’t enjoy any of these storms. But I realize that living in a fallen world means I will face storms.

 

I believe that we as disciples and followers of Jesus in America today are in the middle of a storm. It is storm of faith; a storm of trusting God.

 

Psalm 107:29 says that He made the storm be still, and the waves of the sea were hushed. God stills the storm and God calms the waves. That sounds really good, but is that what God does?

 

In Matthew 14:22-33 Jesus sends the disciples on ahead of Him in a boat to cross the Sea of Galilee. Jesus stays behind to pray. The disciples, as they are trying to cross the Sea of Galilee, run into a storm and are in real trouble. Jesus comes to their help by walking on the water. The disciples don’t know it is Jesus as He comes to them, and they are afraid. Jesus tells them that it is Him and for them not to be afraid. Peter says that if it really is Jesus, then tell him to come to Him on the water. Jesus says to Peter, “Come”. Peter steps out of the boat and walks on the water until he takes his focus off of Jesus and he begins to sink. He cries out for help and Jesus reaches down and pulls him up.

 

Then in Matthew 14:32-33 it says, “And when they got into the boat, the wind ceased. And those in the boat worshiped Him saying, ‘Truly you are the Son of God’.”

 

When Jesus healed a leper, the disciples did not worship Him.

When Jesus expelled many demons from a demon-possessed man, the disciples did not worship Him.

When Jesus raised Lazarus from the dead, the disciples did not worship Him.

 

Why did they worship Jesus when He stilled the storm? They worshiped because it was their lives He saved. This was not a theological miracle or a theoretical miracle; it was a personal saving-my-life miracle.

 

Raise the Roof and Remove the Walls is recognizing that Jesus saved us and worshiping Him because He is our Savior.

 

The disciples recognized Jesus as who He was, the Son of God. They recognized Jesus as the Son of God because of the authority they saw in Him when He stilled the storm. No human could have done that.

 

Raise the Roof and Remove the Walls is acknowledging Jesus for who He is, the Son of God.

 

There is another storm mentioned in connection with Jesus and His disciples.

 

In Luke 8:22-25 Jesus and His disciples are crossing the Sea of Galilee and they run into a storm. Jesus is asleep in the boat. The disciples in a panic wake Jesus and tell Him the boat is sinking. Jesus rebukes the storm and it ceases.  

 

In Luke 8:25 it says, “He said to them, ‘Where is your faith?’ And they were afraid and they marveled, saying to one another, ‘Who then is this, that He commands even winds and water, and they obey Him?’”

 

The disciples had a reverent awe of Jesus. They saw His power and authority and that created a reverent awe of Him.

 

The disciples marveled at Jesus. They had a wonder of Him.

 

Raise the Roof and Remove the Walls is living in reverent awe and wonder of Jesus.  

 

We as disciples of Jesus are to have a reverent awe of Jesus because He is the All-Power, All-Knowing, Ever-Present, Sovereign, and Supreme God and Creator of All.

 

We as disciples of Jesus are to be in wonder of Him. Jesus is God and He gave up all the majesty and splendor of heaven to take our sin upon Himself to provide us with salvation.

 

We cannot make the storm cease, but Jesus can and He will.

 

We see the reality of the storm and cry out to Jesus.

We trust Jesus to still the storm.

We worship Jesus in the midst of the storm.

We show reverent awe of Jesus because He is God.

We show wonder of Jesus because He came and died for our sin.

 

And then we obey Jesus with nothing held back.

 

In the Middle of the Storm Raising the Roof and Removing the Walls,

                                                 Joe

Justice and Mercy

 

Justice is a topic we are hearing much about right now. It is not always a topic we hear taught about in the church. But it is a topic that God talks about a lot in Scripture. It is mentioned over 130 times in the Bible.

 

God has not hidden from us what He wants our lives to be. So, He gives us truths like the following one.

 

Micah 6:8

He has told you, O man, what is good; and what does the Lord require of you but to do justice, and to love mercy, and to walk humbly with your God?

 

In John 15:22 Jesus tells us that we have no excuse for our sin.

In Romans 2:1 we are told that we have no excuse for judging others.

 

In the Micah 6:8 passage we are told that we have no excuse because God has told us. In fact, in 2 Peter 1:3 we are told that God has given us all we need for life and godliness.

 

Raise the Roof and Remove the Walls is hearing God, believing God, and obeying God.

 

God has told us what is good.

 

Good comes from a root word that means to be delightful and to be beneficial and joyful.

 

We are to be delightful to God and beneficial to others which will lead to true joy for us.

 

Raise the Roof and Remove the Walls is doing good.

 

So, what is good from God’s perspective?

 

First, to do justice.

 

The Hebrew word for justice means acquitting or punishing every person on the merit of the case, regardless of race, social status, or material status. It also means giving every person the same opportunities no matter who they are or where they come from.

In James we are warned about showing partiality.

 

James 2:1

My brothers show no partiality as you hold the faith in our Lord Jesus Christ, the Lord of glory.

 

We are not to show partiality. Why?

 

James 2:9

But if you show partiality, you are committing sin and are convicted by the law as transgressors.

 

Because when we do, we are sinning and are going against God’s will.

 

We are to do justice. That means we are to take actions that are just and lead to justice for others. 

 

Raise the Roof and Remove the Walls is act justly and to work to provide justice for others.

 

Second, to love mercy.

 

The Hebrew word for mercy here means unconditional kindness and compassion. Mercy basically means give others the benefit of the doubt, not judging, and helping even when the person does not “deserve it”.

 

Justice is the action, and mercy is the motive behind the action.

 

Raise the Roof and Remove the Walls is extending mercy to the undeserving.

 

Third, to walk humbly with your God.

 

God opposes the proud, but He give grace to the humble. Humility is not viewing yourself as worthless or putting yourself down. True humility is putting yourself in the proper position which is under God’s authority. Humility is always exalting Jesus above all things including ourselves.

 

Raise the Roof and Remove the Walls is humbling ourselves under the mighty hand of God.     

Micah 6:8 is a summary of how God wants us to live. To walk humbly with God is to know Him intimately and to be attentive to what He desires and loves. And God loves justice and mercy.

 

We as God’s people, the church, need to be the Body of Christ and live in a humble, intimate relationship with Jesus, living justly and extending justice to all with no conditions because we have experienced the unconditional mercy and grace of Jesus.

 

With Justice and Mercy, Raising the Roof and Removing the Walls,

                                                Joe

New!

 

New. We don’t always like that word because it means change. New and change have always been hard for the church. We, as the church, have never embraced change very easily. That always seemed strange to me since when Jesus came, He brought and establish something new, a new covenant established by His blood. And in the Bible, there are over 200 references to “new”.

 

So, as we are about to enter a new year, let’s look at a new thing God did in the life of Elijah and in the life of His people.

 

1 Kings 18:17-19

When Ahab saw Elijah, Ahab said to him, “Is it you, troubler of Israel?” And he answered, “I have not troubled Israel, but you have, and your father’s house, because you have abandoned the commandments of the Lord and followed the Baals. Now therefore send and gather all Israel to me at Mount Carmel, and the 450 prophets of Baal and the 400 prophets of Asherah, who eat at Jezebel’s table.”

 

Raise the Roof and Remove the Walls is having the courage to confront false belief.

 

God moves to have Elijah challenge Ahab and 850 false prophets to meet with him on Mount Carmel.

 

In 1 Kings 18:21 Elijah asks the people gathered on Mount Carmel to not try to go back and forth between Baal and God but to decide who is really God and serve that God.

 

Raise the Roof and Remove the Walls being willing to challenge others to really believe and follow God.

 

Then in 1 Kings 18:23-24 Elijah set the rules for the contest. The false prophets would build an altar and put an animal sacrifice on it and pray to their gods. Elijah would build an altar and put an animal sacrifice on it and pray to God. The winner would be the God who sent fire to burn up the sacrifice.

 

Then in 1 Kings 18:25 Elijah lets the false prophets go first. This on the surface is a risky thing. What if Baal sets fire before Elijah and God even get a chance? Well, Elijah knew a truth, Baal does not exist and God is real. Elijah also knew that this whole contest was God’s idea.

 

Raise the Roof and Remove the Walls is trusting God enough to do the risky.

 

The outcome of the contest comes in 1 Kings 18:26-40. The false prophets try for hours to get Baal to bring fire and he doesn’t. Then Elijah sets up his altar and sacrifice and then three times pours water on it and then prays and God sends fire that burns up the sacrifice and the altar and licks up all the water. Then Elijah has all the false prophets killed. God removes the false influence that was separating His people from Him.

 

Raise the Roof and Remove the Walls is trusting God to be faithful to what He says.

 

There is never another time in all the Bible where God tells another person to have a contest like this. God uses Elijah to do something new that draws His people back to Him.

 

New is never easy or comfortable but it is always an adventure.

 

I have always been a little bit of a rebel and always a proponent of change, but this year has stretched me in the area of letting God do new things.

 

Early in the pandemic it was a question of whether we were to meet live or not. We chose to not meet live for seven weeks. It was the hardest seven weeks of all my years in local church ministry. We did it not because we were afraid or because a governor was telling us to or to please our people. We did it so that, like Jesus, we would enter into the suffering of our community. We had people who had no jobs to go to. We had people who could not operate their businesses. We had children who could not go to school. We had parents who had to figure what to do with their children. We wanted to say to them by our actions, “We are suffering with you.”

 

So, by not meeting live, that meant we had to learn how to do online worship and Bible studies. We had to learn how to do all of our ministries in a new way.

 

So, what did God do in our faith family with all the new? Grew our worship attendance by 100 with our online people. Grew our Bible studies attendance by over 300 with our online people. Grew the effectiveness of our benevolence and outreach ministries. He even added new people to our faith family with new people coming live to our worship times and our live Bible studies.

 

The new was not our idea. The contest on Mount Carmel was not Elijah’s idea.

The new was not comfortable for us. The contest was not comfortable for Elijah.

The new resulted in greater honor for God. The contest resulted in greater honor for God.

 

New is not always comfortable and it is never easy.

New when initiated by God will always result in greater honor for Him when we as His people obey.

 

Have a Jesus joyful new year.

 

In the Newness of Jesus Raising the Roof and Removing the Walls,

                                             Joe

An Empty Christmas

 

Christmas is the birth of Jesus and MORE!

 

We tend to focus on Luke 2:7, “And she gave birth to her firstborn son and wrapped Him in swaddling cloths and laid Him in a manger, because there was no place for them in the inn.”

 

This is what Christmas is: The coming of Jesus, the Christ. But what does that really mean?

 

I want to use a word to describe Christmas that will sound a little strange but hang with me as I explain it.

 

The word is Empty.

 

In Philippians 2:6-7 Paul describes the first emptiness of Christmas. Paul writes, “Who though He was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied Himself by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men.”

 

The throne in heaven was empty. When Jesus left heaven for the manger in Bethlehem, He left the throne of God empty. Even though Jesus is the Son of God and was God, He gave up all of that, He emptied Himself. He gave up the glory and majesty of heaven to become a human and to serve all humanity.

 

Raise the Roof and Remove the Walls is acknowledging Jesus as God and being grateful for His coming into the world.

 

In Bethlehem Jesus came as a human baby and was born in a stable, a barn, and placed in a manger, an animal’s feed trough.

 

But Jesus did not stay a baby so the manger became empty. We don’t worship Jesus as a baby. We worship Him as God and as the Lord of all creation.

 

Raise the Roof and Remove the Walls is worshiping Jesus as Lord.

 

Jesus went to the cross.

 

In Matthew 27:26 it says that Pilate had Jesus scourged and delivered Him to be crucified.

 

But Jesus did not stay on the cross. John 19:38 says that Pilate gave the body of Jesus to Joseph of Arimathea after he confirmed that Jesus was dead. In John19:41 we are told that Jesus’ body was put into a tomb.

 

Jesus died on the cross as the atoning sacrifice for our sin, but Jesus did not stay on the cross. The cross is empty.

 

Raise the Roof and Remove the Walls is knowing that Jesus died for our sins but did not stay hanging on the cross.

 

Jesus was in the tomb. But on the third day something extraordinary happened.

 

In Matthew 28:5-6 we are given the account of what occurred on that Sunday morning. It says, “But the angel said to the women, ‘Do not be afraid, for I know that you seek Jesus who was crucified. He is not here, for He is risen, as He said. Come, see the place where He lay.’”

 

The tomb is empty. Jesus is no longer in the tomb He is risen and He is alive. He has returned to the throne as King of Kings and Lord of Lords.

 

Raise the Roof and Remove the Walls is experiencing the reality of the risen Jesus in our lives.

 

All of these mean that Jesus came into the world with the cross in mind. Since God is eternal and cannot die, the Son of God, the second person of the Trinity, entered into the human race through the virgin womb of Mary. He took on flesh and blood and became a man. He did this to offer Himself as the sacrifice for our sins. He was born to die, and He died to rise again. Because of His death, we can live forgiven; because of His resurrection, we can live forever.

 

That is why an “empty” Christmas is so fulfilling.

 

With the Reality of Jesus Empowering Us

to Raise the Roof and Remove the Walls,

Joe