Does that describe the hearts of people during a season which I’ve come to call the season of discontent – are they satisfied with less?
Are you?
I call it a season of discontent because when asked, rather than an “I have everything I need”” people young and old readily state what they want for Christmas. In reality, discontent rather than contentment is a problem for many people and the materialism of the season feeds that felt need for more or better.
This isn’t a rant on that but it is meant to challenge you to consider your desires. You see, I believe that the desire which God has for your life is far greater and better than what you want for and from it. I Believe that most people are simply satisfied with less than what God in Christ wants for them.
Those outside of faith in Jesus Christ are perfectly content to be in the condition I just described and that fact makes clear to me that while some people are never truly content with the things they possess – more are simply content with less.
Jesus Christ promised abundant life (John 10:10) to those who trust in Him – abundant life now and forever more but so many people are satisfied with less than that.
So many are satisfied with less because they can’t imagine a better life, a fuller life or a happier life than the one they have – they are satisfied with less because they don’t know or believe that there is more or better than what they have now or that they can have it.
God sent His Son to usher in better things – whether you know it or not, more than anything else, you really have need of those better things – of grace, mercy, forgiveness, eternal life and an eternal relationship with the Lord.
In Christ, those better things have been provided and are yours for the asking.
I received a make-up kit at a family Christmas party the other day. The party was themed “white-elephant” which is a kind of gift game where people bring a gift, draw a number, pick a gift and then the laughs begin. Needless to say – I re-gifted the make-up kit that I had received.
No one re-gifts something they treasure of course; we re-gift things we either don’t like, don’t need or already own often with the intention of not injuring the relationship we have with the one who gave the gift in the first place. The previous comment is true in nearly EVERY situation but one in my mind – no one re-gifts something they treasure…no one that is, but the one who has received Jesus Christ by faith.
In Acts chapter 3 we read of Peter and John entering into the temple in Jerusalem to pray. Peter and John were among the first of those called by Jesus Christ to follow Him; they were not present when He was born but they were with Him as He taught about the Kingdom of God and as He healed the sick and delivered the demon possessed. These men were with Jesus when He was arrested, they saw Him tortured and humiliated – John saw Him hanging on the cross and both men, three days later saw Him alive again.
As Peter and John approached the temple they encountered a man lame, literally cripple from birth who was daily set beside the gate called Beautiful where he begged for alms (help or charity) from those passing by. As Peter and John passed by, he cried out to them for help; what happened next was a miracle.
Peter and John fixed their eyes upon the man and told him to look at them, which the lame man expecting to receive something from them did; then Peter spoke and said (v.6): “Silver and gold I do not have, but what I do have I give you: In the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, rise up and walk.”
The beggar knew what he wanted but not what he needed. Peter and John didn’t have what he wanted but offered him what they had – THAT was exactly what he needed. You see Peter and John did not have money but they had faith in Jesus Christ and they offered the man a chance for a brand new life in Jesus name and the man, by faith in Jesus’ name (v.16) rose up and walked for the first time in his life!!!
Can you imagine the joy?! The man (v.8) lept “up, stood and walked and entered the temple with them—walking, leaping, and praising God.”
Peter wasn’t done though; you see the people marveled at the mans healing but Peter wanted them to know that it was the one which the Jews rejected – that it was Jesus Christ who healed Him and he called those people to (v.19-21) : “Repent therefore and be converted, that your sins may be blotted out, so that times of refreshing may come from the presence of the Lord, and that He may send Jesus Christ, who was preached to you before, whom heaven must receive until the times of restoration of all things, which God has spoken by the mouth of all His holy prophets since the world began.”
Listen, we were ALL born spiritually lame, cripple from birth and unable to walk with God but by faith in Jesus’ name those who have believed in Jesus have received new life! Now we CAN walk with God in newness of life!
But the gift we’ve been given is meant to be shared.
During this season of giving and getting you may not really be sure what to give the people in your life. We may not know what they want but we know what every soul needs. Share your faith. Tell them about Jesus Christ.
Most people know what hearsay is – it is the repeating of something someone else heard another person say to someone else. It’s a lot like gossip and it is inadmissible in a court of law.
A. W. Tozer once wrote: “There are many in the churches of our day who talk some of the Christian language but who know God only by hearsay.” Continuing he wrote, “Most of them have read something about God but their own personal knowledge of God is very slight.” They are satisfied in hearing with out doing and letting someone else seek, find and then tell them about it.
May I ask, does that describe you, the reader today? It’s important even in this season when we focus on the incarnation of Christ to ask ourselves the hard questions. Do you know the Lord? Is your faith built on your experience or someone elses?
In the gospel of John (chapter 4) we read of a woman, an outcast in her community really who encountered Jesus one day beside a well. Without ever having met her before He told her (v29) “all things that (she) ever did.” She was so excited that she went back to her community and invited them to “come and see Him.”
At first, the Bible says, “many of the Samaritans of that city believed in Him because of” what she had told them (v. 39). Later, after an extended visit with the Lord Jesus they said to the woman, (v. 42) “Now we believe, not because of what you said, for we ourselves have heard Him, and we KNOW that He is indeed the Christ, the Savior of the world!“
Listen, no ones faith but your own can save you; not your wife’s, husband’s, parent’s or pastors faith can save you – hearsay faith is as inadmissible (even more so these days) in the court of the Lord as it is the court of man!
Don’t settle for it.
Don’t settle for a hearsay religion! Seek Him! Earnestly grope or grasp (Acts 17:26-27) for Him! He will be found, known and experienced by those who “seek Him with ALL of their hearts.” (Jeremiah 29:13)
“Behold, now is the accepted time; behold, now is the day of salvation.” (2 Corinthians 6:2)
Jesus Christ did not die on the cross and rise from the grave so that you could have victory SOME DAY. He did not reveal Himself so that people could have victory over the evil power and influences in their lives SOME DAY. He died to give people victory over sins power NOW! He died to transform lives NOW!
There is not merely a hope of victory and peace with God in the future. Jesus Christ didn’t die so that we’d be different when we arrive in Heaven. He did not die so that until the moment we are with Him in Heaven we’d be as we’ve been and then finally be changed in the kingdom.
He died so the we’d be different NOW!
Have victory NOW!
Be made new, NOW!!!
He didn’t merely give His life so that you’d have a place in Heaven SOMEDAY but so that Heaven would have a place in you…Today.
Some people are in pursuit of fame; they want to be known. Others are in pursuit of knowledge; they want to know. Still others are chasing after success believing that he who has the most stuff at the end of his life wins.
Some chase dreams, some chase shadows, some chase after the past and some a distant tomorrow…EVERYBODY is chasing something.
Your pursuit is your priority – your everything. You’ll move heaven and earth the acquire it. You may go broke chasing it, you may go crazy….you might even catch it but the chase WILL cost you something if what you’re chasing REALLY is your hearts desire.
Let me tell you about Jesus Christ
He left His Father’s side in a perfect place called heaven to come to our own very imperfect world. He did not come of His own accord….He was sent (John 3:16, Galatians 4:4) His Father sent Him. He was sent with a purpose: He was sent to acquire what His Father was in pursuit of – YOU and to accomplish His task He had to deal with the one thing that stood in the way – your sin.
He came in pursuit of you.
His Father was SO determined to connect with you that He not only SENT His eternal Son to be born into flesh but also to suffer the brutality of man and God’s own wrath to make the connection possible (Philippians 2:5-11). His pursuit cost Him His life but bought you an opportunity. You see, Jesus was not conquered by death, He conquered it (Hebrews 2:9, Isaiah 53:7-8, Acts 8:32-33), rising the third day (Matthew 16:21, Acts 10:40, 1 Corinthians 15:3-4) and in the process destroying every obstacle between you and God and yet…
To have what He died to provide you MUST receive it by faith (Matthew 10:40, John 1:12, Roman’s 10:9-10 Ephesians 2:8-10).
Have you received Him into your life?
Assuming you have, are you now in pursuit of Him? Once upon a time, we all chased after things which pleased and gratified our flesh but also grieved the Lord, are you now pursuing Him with as much passion and intention? (2Cor 5:15)
If you have NOT yet received the Lord into your life, He is still relentlessly pursuing you, through circumstances, through other people, through His Word and by a gnawing conviction from His Spirit that you are incomplete, that you are a sinner in need of forgiveness.
Metamorphosis is the process of transformation of an insect or an amphibian from its immature form to its adult form in at least two distinct stages. Maggots become flies, tadpoles and polliwogs become toads and frogs and caterpillars become butterflies. Often, it is image of the transformation of the caterpillar in its chrysalis that Christians use to illustrate the process of a believers transformation.
But is that really what happened when you or I trusted in Jesus?
First of all, the caterpillar creates the cocoon into which it enters to begin the process of metamorphosis. Secondly, the entire process is natural, triggered by God given instinct; spiritual transformation is neither self initiated or naturally triggered. Finally, the person being transformed is not being reconstituted into something functionally and physically different – we still look the same the day after “all things have become new.“
So, what is spiritual transformation?
Spiritual transformation is a process initiated or begun in the heart (the seat of our emotions and thoughts) by the Holy Spirit the moment we trust in the Lord Jesus Christ. The Apostle Paul wrote in (2 Cor. 5:17 NKJV):
“Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new.”
Whether this verse is new to you or you are very familiar with it, a careful reading, even in context leaves the reader scratching his or her head asking themselves “since I have trusted in the Lord has EVERYTHING about me changed?” Since the obvious answer is “NO!” what is Paul talking about in this verse?
I think that Paul is here speaking of the fact that our justification in Christ changes our standing before Almighty God rather than the tension that remains between that reality and the fact that we are still living in a fallen world and struggling with the temptations of it. You see, as believers we are citizens of heaven still living on earth and waiting for our final salvation and because we are still in the flesh we are also still prone to sinning.
In one sense, we are immediately changed – we are justified, that is, we are made righteous by the Lord (2 Corinthians 5:21), forgiven by God (Ephesians 1:7, Colossians 1:14) and granted eternal life (1 John 5:11) the moment we trusted in Jesus Christ, but the process of bringing our lives in line with our new standing will take the rest of our lives and require our cooperation and complete submission (Galatians 5:16) to the Holy Spirit of God within us who began the process (see John 6:44) in the first place. Nevertheless, something will be OUTWARDLY different about a person the moment they trust in the Lord – it will be immediately apparent that SOMETHING has happened in the new believers life.
Consider the Apostle Paul himself for a moment, before he met the Lord, he was persecuting, imprisoning and consenting to the death of Christians and thinking that he was doing the will of Almighty God (see Acts 26:9-11; John 16:2) but after meeting Jesus on the Damascus road (see Acts 9:1-6) Paul the persecutor of Christians trusted the Lord Jesus with whom he had formerly been at war, and becoming a willing vessel unto the Lord He made him His ambassador to the gentile world.
In a moment, Paul’s heart was totally changed – he served a new master; but it would take a lifetime for his transformation to be completed (Philippians 3: 12-14 NKJV):
“Not that I have already attained, or am already perfected; but I press on, that I may lay hold of that for which Christ Jesus has also laid hold of me. Brethren, I do not count myself to have apprehended; but one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind and reaching forward to those things which are ahead, I press toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus.”
We’ll talk more about this towards the end of the week but I want to wrap up this post by reiterating the main point and asking you a question.
It is my belief that those who have been born again (see John 3:3) – given new life (spiritually speaking) from God through faith in the name and work of the Lord Jesus ARE IMMEDIATELY different in some recognizable way – even without words, they cannot help but give evidence that Father, Son and Spirit have all impacted his or her life.
My question to you is one that I have asked myself – what about you has changed as a result of trusting in Jesus? What unmistakable difference has the Lord made in your life?
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