It starts with Jesus

I love the word "perfect." It refers to being complete or whole, lacking nothing. In Matthew 22:34-40, the Pharisees attempt to trap Jesus by asking Him what the greatest commandment is. Jesus replies "You shall love the Lord your God will all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind. This is first and great commandment." He then goes on to say the second is to love your neighbor as yourself, and that the WHOLE law and prophets hang by these concepts. I think we generally understand the first commandment to mean that we are to love God perfectly or completely: heart, soul, mind. But if we think about this a little more logically, I think we can see just how smart Christ's reply was. Jesus uses this term "perfect" many times when referring to Himself. Jesus came not to do away with the Law that had been taught to these people, but to perfect. He completed what God had always intended for man. Jesus then tells us that the foundation of our relationship to God is bases on loving Him competely. Later on in 1 John 4, we read how God, Himself, IS love. So basically we're told that thru Jesus we are able to be competed: thru Jesus we are able to love completely, and thus thru Jesus we are able to be competely made one with God. The symmetry of Jesus teaching is amazing! All these things tie together so beautifully! Now going back to Matthew 22: Christ gives us the foundation of the Gospel, the foundation of Himself. He gives us three things to focus on. These three things will pertain to everything Christ did, is doing, and will ever do. We'll look at each one of these over the next three weeks. Jesus basically tells the people that the greatest commandment, the most important thing you can do in this life, is to prepare yourself completely. Here's what we'll start looking at next week:
I. Preparing our Hearts
II. Preparing our Souls
III. Preparing our Minds

Lord, we praise you for all the things you have put in motion for us. We praise you for the things we take for granted everyday. Help to realize Your hand in our lives. Help us to see Jesus in the things we think, the things we say, and the things we do. Help us to know you completely. Increase our faith and give us hearts of servants. Amen

Motivation

To be completely honest, I must say that I struggle with a countless number a things in my pursuit of Christ. Recently it seems like motivation has been a serious stumbling block to me, whether it's dealing with my school work, my job, my family life, and especially my spiritual walk. Today I began thinking about how I had come to this point of my life, not necessarily referring to my lack of motivation but rather my current spiritual status. As I mentioned in my first post, my father started a chain of events in my life that seems to have snowballed (in a good way) into a thirst that never seems to be satisfied. When I study one thing and begin to draw conclusions, it leads to re-examine things I had taken for granted previously as well as look into things I never bothered contemplating. In an effort to let whoever reads this know a little bit more about me, I'll try to explain. My parents always raised my siblings and I to fear God and study His Word, but it always seemed like we did it because that is what they had always known. The things we learned were exactly what we were taught, there was no personally discovery so to speak. A few years ago I began to see a change in my father. The once towering and intimidating man (6'6") now seems humble, gentle and meek. But at the same time he seems so much happier and at peace with his life. We began having a running dialogue about all things spiritual, especially pertaining to Christ. My father and I began studying and realizing many of the things we had been taught do a great disservice to the character of Christ. These began a new time in my life, one that I hope will continue until I pass from this life to the next. Over the next few months I hope to share many of the things both my father and I have studied. I hope they encourage you to look deep with yourself and within the Word to find Christ, to see the power He has and the call He gives. I look forward to hearing from you and may God increase our faith and give us hearts of servants.

Power

When we think of the word "power" many of us no doubt would define it in different ways. Some of the standard dictionary definitions of the word include:
-great or marked ability to do or act; strength; might; force
-a person or thing that possesses or exercises authority or influence
Most of these definitions imply the ability to do something, and while this is true I can't help but think Christ had something else in mind. When we think of power we think of being able to do anything you want, having authority over others either at home or work, or maybe even being able to force others to do what you want. Certainly Christ was capable of doing all these things. All the elements of the earth were under His control. But one the many astonishing attributes of Jesus was the fact that maybe some of his greatest lessons were not when he exercised the power given to Him, but rather the fact that He chose not to. You can see countless numbers of examples from being tempted by Satan to allowing Lazarus to die before healing him to His mockery of a trial and even His death. The fact Jesus had the ability to do things beyond man's comprehension and yet restrained Himself caused many people to doubt. Paul tells us in I Corinthians 1:22-24

"Jews demand miraculous signs and Greeks look for wisdom, but we preach Christ crucified: a stumbling block to Jews and foolishness to Gentiles, but to those whom God has called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God."

To the Jews real power was taking back the City of Jerusalem, overthrowing the Romans and re-establishing the thrown of David on earth. To the Greeks, real power was the ability to orate and think on intellectual subjects and gain popularity through the masses. But Christ shows us true power. The real power of Christ wasn't the fact that He could control the universe and even people if He chose to. The real power of Christ is in the ability to cause people to change. In His life and death, Christ showed us how we can be transformed. He showed us how through humility, compassions, love, grace and mercy we can overcome sin and be like the Father. His real power is in how He changes us. Men can hurt my body, destroy my name, and even take away the things I love, but they can never touch my mind, heart and soul. Christ can reach into the inner depths of my being. He shows me a more excellent way. Praise the Lord, Christ has shown us the way! Not through a creed or doctrine, but through transformation of heart.

Lord, I pray you would allow your Son to penetrate the deepest parts of my being. Give me the courage and humility necessary to let Him change me. I struggle with holding on to my own desires and habits. Let Christ's grace tear down those walls. Let me know the peace and hope of being formed in Your image. Teach me the true power of your Son. Amen.

The Word of God: Not an instruction manual

Although I consider myself relatviely young (26 currently), I realized recently that I have been studying the Bible for as long as I can remember. Even before I learned to read I remember being taught of various characters in the Bible and the their stories. As I grew older this learning became deeper and more intense. This process continued on until a few years ago. At this point I began having detailed conversations with my father (maybe at some other time I'll tell you more about him). As a result of these running dialogues, I came to realize (when exactly I'm not sure) that in all my studying and memorizing, I completely missed the purpose of the Bible. The Bible offers so much information. I think we have a tendency many times to see it as a list of do's and don't's; however, if we really look deeply, we can see the truth. We see God. The Bible's sole purpose is to tell us about our Father. It tells us who He is, what He's like, what He's done in the past and why He's done it, what His plans are and so much more. I've entitled this blog "The Real Power of Christ". Hopefully together we can come to the knowledge of understanding what this is. I look forward to sharing and learning with you guys.