Reflections

Sure Guidance

Behind the multiplicity of circumstances there is a thread that unifies the whole of life. That thread is the unerring guidance of our good and gracious God.

If we are to make our way steadfastly and contentedly through this world then we must do as the navigators do and take our bearings from fixed and pre-determined points. The great art of navigation depends on the existence of certain definite points from which a skilful navigator can take a bearing and guide his ship toward its destination. It may be a star, a lighthouse or a prominent headland- but it must be fixed. He cannot take his bearing from a cloud. or a floating spar, for navigation is possible as one takes a bearing from that which is solid, definite and immovable.

It is not dissimilar with the voyage of life. We who are conscious of being participants in the universal scheme of things, need from time to time to take our bearings from certain fixed and immovable points. God in His great and everlasting love has given us those points, and as we navigate by them we make our way safely past the rocks and shoals to the safety of the heavenly harbour I believe in the things that God has fixed in this world to help me navigate toward eternity. I believe in His love. I believe in His Word. I believe in Prayer. I believe in the Cross. These are fixed points. Accurate navigation depends on the fact one can be sure about something. You and I can be sure of God.

Reflections

A Bible- based Image of God.

The carry -over from an earthly to a Heavenly Father is seen quite clearly in Matt. 7:11. It calls us that a child can expect to see the virtues of his parents magnified in his Heavenly Father.

J.B. Phillips writes, the early concept of God is invariably founded upon the child's idea of his Father. If he is lucky enough to have a good father this is all to the good, providing of course that the concept of God grows with the rest of his personality. But if the child is afraid, or worse still afraid and feeling guilty because of his own father he is afraid, the chances are that his father in Heaven will appear to him a fearful Being. If a child had experience a good deal of negative feeling in his relationship with the earthly authority figures in his life, then he tends to carry this over into his concept of God later in adult life.

When a person becomes  a christian, although he has access to the true picture of God in the Bible, he retains to a certain extent attitudes and feelings drawn from the past which are difficult to break. The influence of twenty or more years do not just fall away. God doesn't descent on a new Christian, drill a hole in his head and place there a new concept of Himself instead. He encourages that person to delve deep into His Word to gain a picture of what He is really like, so that the expulsive power of the Scripture's truth concerning God can eventually and ultimately cancel out what is untrue and bring that person into a true understanding of what He is really like.

Reflections

Christ or Circumstances

If we do not allow ourselves to be led by the Lord then we shall be driven by our circumstances, or by the people who surround us. When the Israelites rebelled against God and refused to follow Him, then God informed them that He  would not travel with them. Moffat translates Ex.33:3 in this way; 'I

will not go with you. I will send an angel in front of you'. Religion became a secondhand affair in which they were led by an angel, rather than by direct contact with God.

When we lack a living real contact with God through His Son Jesus Christ we turn to things we can see, rather than depend on the invisible but reliable  wisdom that supports the universe. Some Christians turn to the stars for guidance, but it is sheer materialism to believe your life is determined by lumps of matter floating in space. It is a sign of inner collapse when someone who professes faith in Christ draws their inspiration from a daily horoscope rather than from a vital contact with God through His Word. Instead of facing the facts of life in the spirit and power which Jesus Christ gives to all those who are His, they turn to the stars to determine their destiny, only to find that instead of being led into sure ways, they are led into a swamp.

We must regain the sense of being led for if we are not led by God, then we will allow ourselves to be led by anything that comes. We Christians must work from principles not pressures, and experience a vital daily contact  with God and the Lord Jesus Christ. I say again, we will be led either by Christ or by circumstances.

Reflections
The priority f Repentance
Repentance is the primary plank to every Christian foundation, and without this there can be no continuance in the Christian life. Repentance means a change of mind, in which a sinner changes his mind about what he believes to what  he knows what God believes. As the root of sin is self-centredness , it is from this we must turn if we are to experience the salvation of God in the way the New Testament unfolds it.
Charles Finney, the great revivalist of  a previous generation saw and witnessed the genuine conversion of thousands of souls because of his insistence on the need for a real and radical repentance. He presented the claims of Jesus Christ in a way that people had to repent in order to become Christians. His way was no slip into the Kingdom by the- side door type of evangelism but a confrontation with sinners that led them to see that the only way into the Kingdom of God was through the door of real repentance.
The word Repentance implies the conviction that God is wholly right and the sinner wholly wrong. When a person comes into the Christian life with this conviction clearly  established he discovers a significant principle at the beginning of his christian experience which enables him, in any subsequent encounters with God, to agree with the Almighty and believe that He is always wholly right and never wrong. We do not do men and women a service unless we confront them with the real issue of repentance, for without it there can be no meaningful continuance in the christian life.

Reflections

The Prod to Prayer

The question often arises in the minds of God's children: Why does God allow so many problems to crowd into my life? Why does He permit me to face such severe pressures? There are many answers to this question, such as He permits things in order that our characters might develop, or that through the irritation finer qualities might emerge in our spirits, but the main reason why God allows problems and difficulties is that they become a prod to prayer. It is so often our need that drives us to the Throne of Grace, in fervent believing prayer.

New Zealand (so  am told) is the home of more flightless birds than any other country in the world. The Kiwi, Kakapo, the Penguin and the Weka Rail. These birds , say the scholars once had wings, but they lost the use of them because of the fact that there were no dangerous animals to keep them on the alert. They had no necessity to fly and hence had no ability to fly. The cost of their immunity from fearsome and dangerous beasts was the power of their wings.

It might well be the same with us, were it not for the fact that God allows problems to crowd in upon us. The dangers we dread, and the problems we shrink from, are the invitation from heaven to expand our wings in the Spirit. If earth offered all that we need then we would be no greater that superior beasts without a thought above the clouds. But God allows difficulties to crowd our pathway and trials to come upon us to remind us that earth in itself does not contain everything we need. We need Him.

Reflections

Lovest thou Me?

When Jesus Christ was about to leave this world He placed His affairs largely in the hands of one man - Simon Peter (John 21:15-17). Now that, you must admit, appeared a very daring thing to do, especially as Peter had not proved too trustworthy in the past. Yet Jesus did not hesitate to do it.

Before handing to him the tremendous responsibility of holding the keys of the Kingdom, however, there was something about which Jesus wanted to be sure, and so taking Simon Peter aside He asked him a thrice-repeated question . What was it? "Peter are you familiar with the principles of public speaking?" No. "Peter do you understand the technical details of my religion?" No. "Peter are you able to handle the financial matters relating to My Church?" No. What was it then? It was this. "Peter do you love Me?" And that brothers and sisters, is the core of Christianity. 

It is fascinating to watch the play upon words here, for two Greek words come into focus in this passage. The word Jesus used in His probing question was Agape- Lovest (Agape) thou Me? Peter's reply, however, was  couched in the weaker Greek word Philio- meaning friendship. But if Christ was to build a Kingdom He needed more than loyalty from Peter - He needed his  complete and unqualified love. The third response Peter made included the the word Agape - "You know that I love you (Agape)" - Peter was now ready for his new responsibility in opening up the gates of the Kingdom of God at Pentecost. But this is not just a scrap of history, for Jesus is still standing on that shore looking straight into your eyes and asking that same question  "Do you love Me?" What is your response? Agape or Philio?

Reflections

"I Don't feel Like A Quiet Time!"

We need to develop a healthy spiritual appetite, through daily prayer and the reading of God's Word - the Bible. However the question to consider is this: Do we have to wait until we want to pray and read God's Word, or do we do it whether we feel like it or not? The answer is - we do it whether we feel like it or not.  

 The Christian life is not simply a belief in certain doctrines but a discipline in which we move beyond creeds - to deeds. The deed is really the creed - the thing we really believe in enough to put into practise. We do not believe in what we do not  practise. Those who go from week to week without establishing  a daily discipline of prayer and Bible reading are severing themselves from the very life by which they grow.

"But how," you ask, "do we go about changing our feelings so that we want to pray and read the Bible?" Firstly, examine your heart and see if there is anything in your life that needs to be corrected? Is there some sin or spiritual violation that needs to be put right? If there is, then attend to it at once. The old saying that "sin will keep you from prayer, but prayer will keep you from sin" is right. Secondly, recognise, that there is nothing you can do to change your feelings.  You cannot, for example, say to your heart - "feel happy", for the power to change your feelings lies beyond your will. What you can do, however, is to exert your will so that you keep your Quiet Time, and as you expose your thoughts to God in prayer and through the reading of the Word then your thoughts, opened up to God, will soon bring about a change in your feelings.

Reflections

Filled with the Spirit

The great preacher , C.H. Spurgeon , pointed out in relation to the text 'be filled with the Spirit' Eph.5:18, that it is not simply an experience to be enjoyed but a command to be obeyed. In other words, if we are not filled with the  the Spirit then we are disobedient Christians, and in need of some serious heart searching and self-discipline.

The term 'be filled with the Spirit, as is so often pointed out, is in present continuous tense, and rightly translated reads, 'be being filled with the Spirit.' We are not to think of the fullness  of the Spirit as something we experience at some given moment to last us for the rest of our lives. It is a

daily ongoing moment dependency on the Spirit's power in our lives  to flow through us and out of us wherever we are and wherever we may go. It is this daily drinking of the waters of the Spirits that neeeds (in my opinion) to be emhasised in today's Church for far too many believers tend to look to  some experience they received in the past, instead of relying day by on a fresh supply of the Spirit to fill and flow through their lives.

A Christian who is filled with the Spirit, in the sense it is described here, will have every compartment in his heart completely open to the Spirit's residency and presidency. And what will be the result? Probe the context and you will see. Your home, your business and your Church will all feel the effect of it when your life is being filled with the Spirit of God will never stop giving as long as we never stop receiving.