Every knee will bow.

Romans 14:11 (Paul quotes from Isaiah 45:23)

It is written:“‘As surely as I live,’ says the Lord,‘every knee will bow before me; every tongue will acknowledge God.’”

Here's a simple, but hard truth. Every knee will bow before Jesus. Every person will submit to him as the one true God who reigns over the whole universe.

Note: Jesus is God, along with God the father and God the Holy Spirit. They are all the same one true God, but in three persons with three different roles. That idea is hard to fathom and work through, but just keep in mind that God is immeasurably wiser than us and he can do what he wants (even if we can't quite grasp it)

The thing is, these people will come in two categories.

Those who bow the knee now and willingly.
Christians are the people who will submit to God here and now. We are the ones who (by the Holy Spirit working in our lives and God's grace) have recognised that we are sinful and that we deserve God's wrath. We realise that disobedience to God means that we fall short of his standard (perfection), and therefore we deserve his justice, which means hell eternally.

But, Christians also know that God is merciful and gracious. Instead of just allowing us to face his wrath he made a way for us to be forgiven. He sent Jesus into the world, his one and only son. Jesus came to earth and lived a perfect life. He did not disobey God at all. Therefore he alone did not deserve to face God's punishment (death and then hell). Yet Jesus came to earth to die in our place and take God's wrath for us.

On the cross Jesus took the punishment that we should have suffered for eternity in hell. He did not do it because of anything desirable in us, because where is nothing good or worthwhile in us (we are wretched, horrible sinners) - he did it entirely out of his awesome mercy, grace and love. It hurts to hear that. But that is what Christians believe.

As a result we repent of our sins - we say sorry for them and try to obey God, and we trust that Jesus has truly dealt with our sin and God's perfect just wrath against them. As a result we bow the knee willingly. We submit to God in our lives here and will rejoice when he (Jesus/God) returns to judge the living and the dead, because we will know that through Jesus alone we are completely forgiven and will go to be with him forever in heaven. We will rejoice and should rejoice now to submit to Jesus.

Those who will be forced to bow the knee at judgement.
But there is another category. Jesus has promised that he will return to judge all people. The thing is that all people deserve his punishment (hell) because all people have sinned.

When Jesus returns it will be awful for those who have not given there lives to him, for those who have tried to liv their best life now on tis earth. Jesus will return, and there will be no more time to repent and turn to him - there will only be his justice. And Justice means hell for all those who refused to give up their sins and be forgiven by Jesus.

On the last day these people will bow the knee to Jesus, but it won't be with rejoicing. It will be with much crying and wailing and terror. It will be terrible. They will stand before God's throne condemned, like we all should have been, because they don't stand there with Jesus interceding with God for them.

The challenge.

• First up: Are you a Christian? Are you submitting to God now? Or are you continuing to reject him and live your own way? We are all sinners and we all deserve hell. It's only those who put their faith in Jesus who will be saved. If you aren't then talk to people about it! Ask the questions you have and keep asking until someone gives you and answer that makes sense. If you want then send me a message or an email - I'm more than happy to chat! Read the bible, look into what this is all about and be honest with yourself.

• If you are a Christian then you should love those around you enough to tell them the gospel. If their continued rejection of God will lead them to his punishment in hell eternally and we love them, that should terrify us. I don't want my friends, my grandpa, or even my enemies to suffer that wrath. We need to tell people about God and Jesus! In saying that, this is one of the areas of my life that I fall short in all the time. I am constantly chickening out and not sharing the gospel with people who I should be telling it to. I am always making excuses. I fail at it miserably. Thankfully God is forgiving and merciful. But that's something I've got to change - maybe you do to.

• Keep in mind that God is not the evil one in this scenario. We are the evil ones. He is the good one. He judges because he is just, god and right, and because we are evil, wretched and sinful. He shows his mercy entirely out of his grace and who he is - not based on anything in us. God isn't the bad guy. We're the bad guys.

Soli Deo Gloria!
God Bless!
Nat.


Philippians 2:5b-11

have the same mindset as Christ Jesus:

Who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be used to his own advantage;
rather, he made himself nothing
by taking the very nature of a servant,
being made in human likeness.

And being found in appearance as a man,
he humbled himself
by becoming obedient to death—
even death on a cross!

Therefore God exalted him to the highest place
and gave him the name that is above every name,
that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow,
in heaven and on earth and under the earth,
and every tongue acknowledge that Jesus Christ is Lord,
to the glory of God the Father.

"Love must be sincere..."

Romans 12:9

Love must be sincere. Hate what is evil; cling to what is good.

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Here we have three commands. They're short and simple, but so full of depth and application if we take them on board. Today I'll just be looking at the first one.

Love must be Sincere.

The word used for love here is "agape" which means unconditional love. Love that is entirely selfless like God's love for us.

I've heard this love paralleled to the stretching out of a limb to it's fullest extent and then going further. We need to love people so much that we will go further then we think we possibly can to help them and to show that love to them. This love is meant to be the same as the love God has for us. How did he show this love?

You see, at just the right time, when we were still powerless, Christ died for the ungodly. Very rarely will anyone die for a righteous person, though for a good person someone might possibly dare to die. But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us. (Romans 5:6-8)

Jesus, who is God and was with God before time began, who was there at creation (John 1) and who is perfect and holy and cannot stand sin, willingly came to earth as a man. He was born in a stable - rejected from birth - and lived among us: sinful men and women. He suffered and was murdered by us. But that was his plan - so that he could be the sacrifice for us, taking our sin and God's wrath for that sin on himself. Because Jesus was God he could pay for our sins. Because he was perfect and yet human he could take our sins on himself and be the "lamb without blemish" that we needed. On the cross Jesus suffered what every christian rightfully should have suffered for eternity in hell. Then he died and was buried. On the third day he rose again to prove that he really was God and had truly paid for our sins, and now he has gone to heaven to prepare a place for us and to intercede for us before God continually until he returns to judge and brings all his people (Christians) to heaven.

That is sincere love. It is the type of love we are commanded to have. How does that compare to you and me? I find it hard to love people enough to give up my time money and energy to hang out with them when they need company. Jesus came and gave his life for sinners who hated him - would we die for people who hated and rejected us?

Firstly we need to ask this question: Do I even love God that much? Do I love him enough that I would die for him?
If the answer is yes, then do you love him enough to live for him here and now? To share the gospel even if it means people hate you for it? To be godly even if it means missing out on the "good" things in this life?
Without his mercy and grace we cannot even love God this much. Yet we are commanded to do so, and through the Holy Spirit God can work in our lives to change us and to create this unconditional love in us. He commands us not only to love him who has done so much for us, but to also love others that much.

What about loving those who are 'unlovable'? Those we just get annoyed at? Those who we clash with whenever we're around them?
We need to love them sincerely. That's hard! This isn't easy work - God doesn't call us to an easy life. It's so hard to love people, especially those we don't already get on with. And it's even harder to love them selflessly - not wanting anything back from them and not based on anything good about them. We need to love them because God loved us, because he loves them and because he has called us to love them. And we need to work hard to be sincere and honest in that love.

How do we develop this love?

• It has to flow from our love for God. So the first step is loving Him more - knowing who he is and what he has done and praying for his help to love him more. We show our love for God through obedience to him, and we also build it through trusting him enough to obey him even when it costs us. He will enable us to do so as we trust in him, pray, read his word and start putting it into practice.
• We also need to pray for his help to love others, realising that they are just as sinful as us, and yet Jesus died for them. There's no room for pride in sincere love, there is no room for selfishness. 
• It also comes down to just doing it. It's easy to say we don't love people as much as we should. But when we realise that, we need to work immediately to change it and start loving people in our actions. As we do that we pray that God will help us through the Holy Spirit to sincerely love those people like he loved us.

What does this love look like?

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Between Christians it looks like having a genuine interest in the lives of fellow Christians. Being deeply involved with them and ready to help them however we can and whenever we can. When people are sick, we should get along side them and help them. When they're struggling we should do the same. We should be praying with them and for them, listening to them, encouraging them and sharing God's word with them lovingly. We should also be ready to lovingly rebuke them for sin and challenge them, while also being ready to be corrected ourselves for where we are falling short of God's standard.

For us and Non-Christians it primarily has to be sharing the gospel. The result of rejecting God is his wrath eternally - we all sin, and his standard is perfection. Jesus is the only one who could take our sin and God's wrath for it. Therefore, if we love these people we need to share the gospel with them - tell them that they are dead in their sins, and cannot save themselves. And tell them that God provided a way for them to be saved: He sent his one and only son into the world, so that whoever repents of their sins and puts their faith in Jesus will be forgiven. he will take their sin and they will be saved by God's limitless grace. 

We also need to share the gospel with them by living it: By loving fellow Christians and obeying God. In doing so we prove that God does in fact change lives and we should that we are different. Being salt and light involves both words and actions.

How are you going with love? Do you love God as you should? Do you love others as you should? How about those people you just really dislike? 

"Love must be Sincere"

Soli Deo Gloria!

Nat.

Our Glorious, Awesome God.

Romans 11:33

Oh, the depth of the riches of the wisdom and knowledge of God!
How unsearchable his judgments,
and his paths beyond tracing out!

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Oh the depths of the riches of the wisdom and knowledge of God! How wonderful He is! How unfathomable, how awesome, how powerful! How perfect and holy!

We should be thrilled at who God is. We should be entirely overawed. His wisdom, His plans and ideas, His works are deeper and richer then we could ever fathom. They bring glory to Him and they work for the good, of all those who love Him - revealing His mercy, grace, love, patience, kindness, justice, holiness, perfection and peace to us. God has done more then we could even imagine or measure!

We should simply be over-awed at who God is. We should just stand and appreciate His work, His character, His love. We should just stop and enjoy it, glorying in it and glorifying him for it.

Yet so often we are disinterested. We shrug our shoulders and go back to work or to study or to our meaningless wealth or to our friendships. I do that constantly, in fact it is the rare occasion that I just bask in God's glory - it is very rare. But it is so precious.

The wisdom of God. God's wisdom is wiser then anything we can imagine, "the foolishness of God is wiser than human wisdom, and the weakness of God is stronger than human strength." (1 Corinthians 1:25). What did He decide to do? He sent Jesus, who was and is eternally God as a man, to suffer and die. To live among us, and to be murdered by us. Why? So He could save us, so He could forgive us for our sins, so He could reveal to us God's full character and so that He could love us. No, it isn't about us - it's about Him, but He did do it for us as well. What an awesome God!

What does this mean for us? 

• We can trust God! His wisdom and knowledge are unsearchable because we are so frail and ignorant. Therefore when things don't make sense, when we can't see how God is working, trust him! He knows infinitely more than us! We don't have to fret because He has promised to work everything for His glory and for the good of His people (Romans 8:28)
• We can "Rejoice in the Lord always" (Phil 4:4) because He has shown us His character and it is wonderful. Because He is infinite and unsearchable, yet has revealed himself to us, offering to save us even though we are ignorant and foolish. If we never lose sight of the awesome God we serve, then we never have reason to stop rejoicing, because we should simply be rejoicing in who He is, and that remains constant regardless of what is happening in our lives
• We need to be humble. God is infinite, His plans are so full, so deep, so rich, so perfect that they are unsearchable by us. Who are we to think we know better? Who are we to live in sin and rebellion to him? Who are we to ask why He does what He does? Who are we even to be noticed and loved by Him? Yet he cares for us (1 Peter 5:7) and in His mercy and grace He does call us to know Him and to ask questions. But we do that humbly, knowing that God is unfathomably more awesome then we can understand.
• Just enjoy God. Know His character and bask in the light of who He is. Pray for His help to do that, read His word so that you can understand it further. Just enjoy God for who He is!

God is in control and He works out everything to bring glory to Him in ways that we do not understand. His paths are more wonderful then we can understand, deeper and more glorious then we can search. We cannot comprehend all He does in the world around us, in our lives and the lives of others. But God knows what He does, and we can glorify Him that He is working through everything to bring about His good and perfect purpose. We can glorify Him for who He is, and we should do that.

Where is the Joy in your walk with God? Are you basking in who He is? Are you simply enjoying the God who created, sustains and saved us? Are you enjoying His creation, which sings his praises (Psalm 19)?

To God be the glory! Great things He has done!

Soli Deo Gloria!

Nat.

"The Kindness of God"

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Romans 11:22

Consider therefore the kindness and sternness of God: sternness to those who fell, but kindness to you, provided that you continue in his kindness. Otherwise, you also will be cut off.

"Consider therefore the Kindness of God". 

What has come before these verses is Paul's explanation of the Jews rejection of Christ and therefore the removal from their place as God's people, and the acceptance of the Gentiles and all who repent and believe in Jesus into God's family through Him. Well, Paul tells us to consider God's kindness. In what ways has God been kind to us?

Well the first, biggest, most obvious way (and the one that is most suitable to the context) is that he has saved us through Jesus. We sin, we disobey God. We hate him, we hate his creation. We hurt, we lie, we steal, we are selfish and self-glorifying (proud). We live constantly in disobedience to God's commands. His commands, which are a direct reflection of his character. We, like Adam and Eve who first sinned, are by nature sinners and therefore enemies of God's perfection. 

Yet, in his grace, God sent Jesus into the world as a man. He sent his only son who was eternally with him in perfect fellowship for all eternity. Jesus, who is God, willingly came to earth and became a man. he lived among sinful people, he suffered and he died. He was murdered by those he came to save. Why? To glorify God by showing his kindness, mercy, patience and love to us. We deserved God's justice, his judgement and his wrath for all eternity. Instead Jesus came to the earth and took that wrath on the cross. We cannot comprehend that, I cannot understand it. But it is beyond words to describe God's kindness and mercy to us in doing that for us.

Yet Jesus didn't only die for sin. He rose again, proving that he had truly dealt with all our sin and proving that he is God. He rose again, and everyone who puts their faith in him will be forgiven. When we turn to Christ our sin is put on him and we are forgiven.

What's more is that we, christians are accepted into God's family. We are adopted as his children. We are "co-heirs with Christ" (Read Romans 8). We are his people and we will be with him for all eternity in heaven, enjoying his presence and glorifying him forever. God is certainly kind to us, and we need to praise him for that. We need to glorify him for his character - for his kindness, mercy and grace, and for his justice, holiness and righteousness. 

What other ways does God show his kindness for us? Life every morning, light from the sun every day, grass, trees, birds, mountains, rivers, lakes, water, family, friendships, warmness, coolness, even sickness and hardship can show forth God's kindness. There are countless examples - come up with your own as well and praise God for them.

We rejected him, even though he created us. We rejected him who directs the stars and the water molecules. We rejected him who holds all of creation together, who gives light to the sun and power to the waves. We rejected him. Yet he came and died in our place on the cross. "Hand that flung stars into space, To cruel nails surrendered" for our sakes.

Will you continue to reject his kindness?

When stress gets to you.

This week is shaping up to be an extremely busy and stressful one. I have my trial HSC exams next week and up to this point I've been busy doing assessments and haven't really had much chance to study. I've done my best with my time, but the question remains: what if it isn't enough? What if I don't get time to study everything I need to? What if the essay questions are terrible? What if my music performances fall apart on Wednesday? What if? How can I know?

Stress is a powerful force, it can be helpful (it's certainly a good motivator), but it can also be very harmful.

So what should my response be to stress according to the bible?

1 Peter 5:6-7

Humble yourselves, therefore, under God’s mighty hand, that he may lift you up in due time. Cast all your anxiety on him because he cares for you.

Humility

I have to say, it's nice to go well in exams. It's nice to see that you've done a good job at something. And it's also nice to get puffed up about those things - but that isn't good. It is sinful.

What I need to realise is that all I can do is my best. The rest is up to God. Nothing I do can make me go better, what I'm called to do is just to trust God.

That's pretty humbling. It's not about me, and it's not about my effort, it's about God, and its all for his glory. God is mighty, and he will achieve his perfect plan, so we don't need to stress about all this stuff. Just trust God.

Cast all your anxiety on him.

This is tied to being humble. We trust God, and therefore we trust him with our anxieties. We trust him with our stress. We pray for his help, we spend time honouring him and learning about him (even though that time could go into studying) and then we use our time wisely to honour him as well.

God loves us, and he cares for us. He calls us to cast our anxiety on him - You and I don't need to carry it on our own. God knows what we face and what we are struggling with and he wants us to trust him enough to cast it on him.

Don't get weighed down with the things of the world. Trust God, be humble and cast all your anxiety on him - he cares for you.

What are you anxious about? 

God is strong enough to deal with it and he is good. Cast t all on him.

God Bless!
Nat.

P.s. Prayers would be greatly appreciated over the next few weeks!

Who can come before God?

Psalm 24:3-4

Who may ascend the mountain of the Lord?
Who may stand in his holy place?
The one who has clean hands and a pure heart,
who does not trust in an idol
or swear by a false god.

 Who can come before God? Who can enter his presence? Who can stand before him? The short answer is that none of us can. Our hands are filthy, our hearts certainly aren't pure and we constantly put ourselves before God.

We are sinful, we disobey God and therefore we deserve his wrath. We cannot come before him asking for salvation while we're in this state, and we don't deserve anything except God's wrath. Yet he has made a way for us to be saved. He has provided someone who can enter his presence.

Jesus is God, he is perfect. He has clean hands, he is pure. He did not trust in himself or worship anything other than God (even though Satan tempted him to in Luke 4). He is God and he came to earth as a man, he lived perfectly and he died in our place.

Jesus, the creator of the universe, God the son, equally God along with the Holy Spirit and God the father from all eternity came to earth for our sakes and died in our place. Why? To take our sin, so that whoever turns to him can be entirely forgiven by him. He suffered the wrath that we deserve because he took our sin on himself. He was punished by God even though he was perfect so that he could save us.

So Repent and Believe! Turn to him! Jesus saves, put your faith in him, turn from sin and obey him. Jesus not only died, but he rose again. The wages of sin is death, and he suffered that, but he rose again proving that he had dealt with our sin in full, he had paid the price that we would spend eternity in hell paying. He rose again from the dead and ascended to heaven, and he is with God preparing a place for us.

Jesus has ascended the "mountain of the Lord" and he will return to judge the living and the dead. Everyone who puts their faith in him will be entirely forgiven and will be saved from his wrath. We will spend eternity with him in heaven, enjoying his presence. Anyone ho rejects him will be rejected by him and thrown into hell to suffer God's wrath on that day.

Jesus alone can save. He is the only true God: we need to worship him. He is the one who makes our hands and hearts clean, washing them in his blood so that we are righteous in God's sight. Nothing we can do can add to that or take away from it. Trust in him! Repent and Believe and be encouraged! Stand firm!

Jesus saves. This is love.

Soli Deo Gloria
Nat.