Right or Wrong?

Do you make decisions in life based on what is "right" and what is "wrong"?

Is in't it easy to fall into the trap of analyzing each of our thoughts and actions based on the moral standard we have been given by our religion, culture or education?

Yet, let's not forget that in the very scene of creation, the Creator specifically instructed the creation NOT to eat from the tree of knowledge of right and wrong.

We were not originally created to live by a moral standard, or a list of do's and don'ts. Lets not forget that Jesus had to die to restore us from the dead religion created as a result of the creation eating from the tree of knowledge of right and wrong.

Thank God that there was tree of LIFE in the garden!

Let's just allow the one who said "I am the way, the truth and the LIFE" and "I have come so that you may have LIFE", to live his life in and through us. When He does it (and He is), we just live! Freely! Free from the need to live by right and wrong!

"Who told you that you were naked?"

What made the humanity to become so self-centered? When God created Adam and Eve, they weren't self-centered. They were God-centered. They walked naked in the garden. They didn't care the fact that they were naked. The man and his wife were both naked, and they felt no shame (Genesis 2:25). Look at the animals. All of them are naked.

[This is one thing the evolutionists can't answer. When did humanity start wearing cloths to hide their genitals? What was the origin of the thing called shame? Monkeys don't wear cloths. All of a sudden when the monkey became a human, he started going for shopping at Macy's?]

Adam and Eve bore the glorious image of God when they were created. God created man in his own image. He breathed into his nostrils the breath of life. They were blinded (in a good way) by the glorious harmony they had with God. They not only felt free, but they were truly free. God gave them total freedom, including the freedom to choose evil. (If freedom didn't include freedom to sin, it isn't real freedom.)

They chose to eat from the wrong tree, lost their god-centeredness and gained self-centeredness. They weren't created to posess a knowledge of good and evil, yet they chose to have it. Bible says, "then the eyes of both of them were opened". Ha! All of a sudden, they are looking at themselves. Now they are seeing everything through that newly opened set of eyes. It says, they sewed fig leaves together and made coverings for themselves and then they hid.

When God came looking for them, He found them hiding out of shame and asks this question, "Who told you that you were naked?". Which implies that the only third person there, which is God himself, not seeing them as naked. They became sin-conscious. Their god-consciousness died.

The good news is, the Second Adam (Christ) restored it for you an me. He cleansed our conscience (Heb 9:14). He don't expect you to feel shame today. He don't want you to hide from Him. He don't want you to sew your own filthy rags (obedience to the law, self effort, good works etc) today.

If you are in Christ and still going to God begging for forgiveness, thinking that you are rejected by Him when you sin, he is going to ask you this question: "Who told you that you were naked?". It is the law what tells you that you are naked (not worthy, sinful etc). It is the knowledge of good and evil (law) that makes you self-centered. Law only condemns! Law has no place in a Christian's life. (Gal 3:23-25) So, dump the knowledge of good and evil (which you were never meant to have) and eat from the Tree of Life. There is freedom, because there is no condemnation!

The law is holy

When we make statements such as,

'Law is the ministry of death', - 2 Cor 3:7

'Those who are under the law are under a curse', - Galatians 3:10

'Law kills us' etc, Romans 7:10

some people get it as if we are saying the law itself is bad and unholy. They immediately put on the coat of defense and start quoting Scriptures such as,

the law is holy, and the commandment is holy, righteous and good. - Romans 7:12

law is spiritual - Romans 7:14

This seems apparently contradicting and to make it even worse both those contrasting statements were made by Apostle Paul.

What can we conclude from this? Either Paul is contradicting himself or we are missing something.

Let's see if we can get this straight...

If law is holy, righteous and good, why would Paul spend so many pages of the Bible telling us that we, as believers should be totally free from the law?

Paul says, law cannot justify us (which many people agree) and he also says, law cannot help us to live a righteous life AFTER our justification (where many disagree).

Here are some verses clearly saying we are not to live by the law even after our salvation:

by dying to what once bound us, we have been released from the law so that we serve in the new way of the Spirit, and not in the old way of the written code. - Romans 7:6

Now that faith has come, we are no longer under the supervision of the law. - Galatians 3:25

(There are many other verses, but this is good for now)

So many honest, dedicated, well meaning Christians want to live a holy life and they earnestly try to follow the law. I admire their desire. But there is only one problem : they will burn out and fail and knowingly or unknowingly they are under a curse!

If the law is holy, good and righteous, why in the world the people who are trying to follow the holy, good and righteous law are under a curse?

Apostle Paul graciously answers this question (I love this guy).

He says, when the law said 'do not covet' (which is a holy, good and righteous command), the 'sin' in him, 'seized the opportunity' and 'produced every kind of covetous desire in me'

Was it a problem of the law? No!

Was it a problem of Apostle Paul himself? No!

What was the problem then? The 'sin' living in him.

This is the very reason he said,

the law gives sin its power. - 1 Cor. 15:56

Law empowers the sin in us. Law stirs up the sin in us. Is law bad? No! Are we (believers) bad? No! What is bad? The sin living in us.

When we look in the mirror, we see the dirt on our face. Is that a problem of the mirror? No. Is that a problem of our face? No. What is the problem? The dirt on our face.

Have you ever wondered why God introduced a 'New' covenant? Was the old covenant bad?

Absolutely not! Why would God make a bad covenant?

What then was the problem of the old covenant?

For if there had been nothing wrong with that first covenant, no place would have been sought for another. But God found fault with the people - Heb 8:7-8

The problem was the people! They couldn't keep it. So even before laying the foundation of the earth, God in His awesome grace and mercy, designed a NEW covenant in which He said, "I will remember your sins no more" and to accomplish it, He sent His own Son to earth to take away our sins!

Folks, this is good news! It is mind blowing! You can only sit down and look at this God with an overflowing heart of gratitude.

Okay, now the question is, if the law can only do bad in a believer's life, how are we to live a righteous life? a self-controlled life? upright, godly life?

For the grace of God that brings salvation has appeared to all men. It (grace, the unconditional love of God) teaches us to say "No" to ungodliness and worldly passions, and to live self-controlled, upright and godly lives in this present age - Titus 2:11-12

We live by grace, guys! And it teaches us how to handle our freedom. It is the forgiveness of God what encourages me to forgive others. It is the love of God what motivates me to love others. It is my acceptance by God with all my weaknesses what enables me to accept others with all their weaknesses.

Let's soak ourselves in this great love and let's be careful not to give an opportunity to sin to 'seize' us by our neck, by putting ourselves under the law. Live in grace! Live in freedom!

10 Commandments - The ministry of death

...not only that, it is the ministry of condemnation as well.

I am not playing the safe game of 'balance' between law and grace here. Teaching that we are fully free from any form of law including 10 commandments is considered heretic and 'extreme' by a lot many Christians. They say it is only the ceremonial laws we are free from, not the 10 commandments. It's kind of funny when Christians themselves trying hard to prove Apostle Paul, who wrote the major part of NT, wrong! What we are not realizing is that when we make 10 commandments our sacred cow, we are in effect negating the work of Jesus on the cross.

The freedom from law and living under pure grace wasn't just an idea Paul came up with. In the Old Testament itself God gave us many typologies and even direct revelations (Jer 31:31-34) about the New Covenant and the righteousness apart from law, and how His mercy is going to triumph over the judgment which came from law.

Mercy triumphs over judgment! (James 2: 13)

The lid on the Ark of the Covenant in the OT was called the 'mercy seat'. There were three things in the Ark - Tablets of stone containing the Ten Commandments, Aaron's rod and a pot of manna. These three were covered by the Ark's cover called 'mercy seat'. It says that God's presence was between the two cherubims on the mercy seat, where the priests sprinkled the blood of the lamb. No one was allowed to look into the Ark, the tablets were kept hidden under the mercy seat. While God's presence dwelled on the mercy seat, He saw the the blood of the animals sprinkled on it, but NOT the tablets which are under the golden lid. The picture it shows is that God's mercy (blood of Jesus) triumphs over the judgment(Law).

It is also interesting to see the Hebrew word used for mercy seat (Kaporet) is same as the word for propitiation in NT, which literally means 'wipe out'. Jesus wiped out our sins for ever through His one sacrifice and kept the law hidden under His mercy, not only that he took the law (which was against us) away. I love the typologies in the Bible!

He forgave us all our sins, having canceled the written code, with its regulations, that was against us and that stood opposed to us; he took it away, nailing it to the cross. - Colossians 2:13-14

Isn't it ridiculous that we still want to unnail the 10 commandments from the cross and hang on our walls? and give permission to the Devil (the accuser of the brethren) to accuse us using the same?

...the ministry that brought death, which was engraved in letters on stone - 2 Cor 3:7

...the ministry that condemns men - 2 Cor 3:9

...for the letter kills - 2 Cor 3:5

We all know what was engraved in letters on stone. It's nothing but the 10 commandments. Let me make it clear, it was NOT the ceremonial laws what was engraved on the stones, it was the 10 commandments.

Why is the 10 commandments a ministry of death and condemnation?

It's quite simple: those two cold stones couldn't cleanse people from their sins, though it accused them. And that's exactly the purpose of the law was - to accuse us, to blame us, to condemns us, to take us to the end of our ropes, there by point us our desperate need for a savior.

Bible says, law is like a mirror which can show the dirt on our face, but couldn't make an ounce of difference to our condition (When we see dirt on our face, we don't use the mirror to wipe it, we use water). The law is perfect and holy, but it can't make us perfect and holy (But don't blame your mirror for showing you your true face. God found fault with the people - Heb 8:8). So, once law completes it's work in a person's life (pointing him/her to Christ), it has to be done away with and should get rid of it. Let's not give the Devil a tool to accuse us further.

We have better things to deal with today. We have God's mercy. We have a new spirit. We have a glorious New Covenant which brings righteousness. We have a ministry of the Spirit of which the glory lasts for ever unlike the Old Covenant which had a fading glory.

Moses had to hide his face with a veil, so that people wouldn't see the glory/radiance on his face was fading. He had to run back to the presence of God to get the radiance again. In Christ, the veil is taken away (2 Cor 3:9). So, today we don't have to shy away from God or from people, since our unveiled faces reflect God's everlasting glory and 'we are being transformed into his likeness with ever-increasing glory, which comes from the Lord, who is the Spirit'.

Even to this day when Moses is read, a veil covers their hearts. But whenever anyone turns to the Lord, the veil is taken away. (2 Cor 3:16)

Let's stop reading Moses, start reading Jesus.

For the law was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ. -John 1:17. Look, Law was given (keeping a distance), but grace came, to accomplish something for us which we couldn't accomplish ourselves through the law.

Law & Grace (Re-post)

Under Law Man Says	Under Grace Christ Says
Look at what I'm doing for you!	Look at what I did for you!
Look at how I went to church.	Look at how I went to Calvary.
Look at how I was raised in my denomination.	Look at how I was raised from dead.
Look at how I gave my money.	Look at how I gave My life.
Look at how I confessed my sins.	Look at how I took away your sins.
Look at how I stood against sin.	Look at how I died for your sins.
Look at how I judged the lost world.	Look at how I saved the lost world.
Look at how I marched against evil-doers.	Look at how I suffered for evil-doers.
Look at how I bowed down to you.	Look at how I became one of you.
Look at how I healed the sick.	Look at how I raised the dead.
Look at how I spoke in tongues.	Look at how I spoke in love.
Look at how successful my life was.	Look at how successful My death was.

Source: Classic Christianity Conference Manual

ivescrewedup

I am so moved by the multitudes that are forced to wear a mask due to the fear of religious judgment. What good the religion is doing in their life other than forcing them into depression?
I came across this website which allows people to confess their sins anonymously. It’s no a wonder that they open up under the title of ‘anonymous’. The world and the religion wouldn’t allow them to open up authentically. It’s not that we have to make all our secret sins public, but what if we have a group of people where we could confess to each other without the fear of judgment?
I think millions are dying in guilt, shame and fear due to many sins in their life. If we can stop acting that everything is hunky-dory in our life just because we are Christians, wouldn’t that be a lot better?

We, Christians are well known for the fact that we preach the salvation by grace through faith alone. We attract people telling them, no matter how sinful they are, they are still worthy for the salvation offered by Christ. They come with a lot of excitement and joy. Once we know that now they are ‘converted’, then we start giving the list of things they should be doing and the list of things they shouldn’t be doing. We preach the ‘finality of the cross’ with one side of our mouth and then preach the ‘biblical principles’ through the other side and we find pleasure in controlling people using law.

If we act as if we have got all our acts clean, how can we expect the real people to come and share their struggles with us? It is sad that we don’t realize the law causes us to lose our authenticity. But grace causes us to be real and blunt. In grace, there is humility, understanding, compassion and true love. In law, there is only pride, guilt, fear and punishment. What good is that? Still we like to be called as ‘law keepers’, people with ‘principles’ etc.

Jesus said ‘It’s finished’. But standing at the foot of His cross, we are telling people, “No, it’s not finished, you have to work on your sins”. Does Jesus lead us to holiness or does holiness lead us to Jesus?
When Jesus said, ‘Father, forgive them for they don’t know what they are doing’, how much holy were those people whom He was addressing? How many sins the thief on the cross cleaned up for him to hear something like this from Jesus: “Today you will be with me in paradise”?

Jesus’ Gospel is supposed to be a ‘good’ news but didn’t the religion make it into ‘bad’ news?

The power of sin

I have dieted a lot in my life. My wife and I once tried 'Maker's diet'. This was before we came to an understanding of grace. We both were all excited about it because after all it is a 'biblical diet'. As Christians we always looked for the word 'biblical' or 'Christian' in front of anything- Christian handy man, Christian hair cut, Christian mortgage, Biblical eating habits, biblical way of losing weight and anything under the sun which says biblical or Christian. I think we were so much excited about 'Christianity' than Christ himself. What a tragedy!

Anyways, we tried that diet for quite a period of time. And you know what? It worked! We both started losing weight, people started noticing it and started commenting about our 'new' looks. We thought those comments paid for the struggle what we were going through. We acted as if it is not a big deal. Certainly there were many type of food we were giving up and the truth is, it was a big deal!

We went for about 30-40 days and finally we reached at the end of our rope. We slowly started giving up and started eating the things we enjoy eating. What a relief! The moral of the story is, I now weigh more than I weighed before I started that diet!

The attractiveness of law among Christians (or among any religious people) is that it works for a while. It does. It can give some wonderful results. But the truth is that while it's working, it is gaining all its power to fail you miserably in the future. Even the people who claim to be 'law keeping' Christians knows this truth, but they don't admit it. They hide it.

The sin itself has no power. Sin is just lying there, dead and powerless. It can't do anything by itself unless and until it is connected to its power source- the law. Sin gets all its power from the law. One of the verse which gave me a lot of revelation about the power of sin is found at I Cor. 15:56

The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law.

Yes, the power of sin is the law. I do not need any explanation to agree to this point. My own life proves it to me over and over, even today. When we put a hole in the wall, no one really cares. But the moment we hang a sign there saying 'do not look through this hole', we all know what happens! Until I told my daughter 'do not touch the stove' she never bothered. But now that I told her and she wants to touch it.

Paul talks about 'the sinful passions aroused by the law' in Romans. Our sinful passions are aroused by the law. That very well is the purpose of the law, 'so that every mouth may be silenced and the whole world held accountable to God' (Romans 3:19). This simple truth can save us from a lot of trouble. I praise God for law, without it, I would have never understood the significance of His grace.

The secret of not sinning is not the law, but unplugging it. Sin is always going to be with us till our last breath, but as long as it is unplugged from its power source, it will not take control over our life.

Why was Stephan stoned?

Stephan was stoned and killed because he preached Jesus and His grace.

He was a man full of God’s grace and power (Acts 6:8). His preaching was about the Righteous One – the Messiah (Acts 7: 52).

It is the Righteous One who brings righteousness to us. We don’t become righteous, we receive it as a gift and God imputes it unto us. That is the only righteousness acceptable by God; all the self efforts are like filthy rags (Isa. 64:6) in God's eyes.

The Jews could not take victory over the argument with Stephan (6:10) so they persuaded some men to lie against Stephan saying, "We heard him blaspheme Moses, and even God (6:11)".
So the elders and the teachers of the religious law arrested him and brought before the high council.

They complained that Jesus of Nazareth will destroy the temple and change the customs Moses handed down to us.

That’s the fear of many law-preachers. The freedom in Christ can shake their little kingdoms. They can’t conceive the extraordinary risk in allowing people to be free.
They shrink the freedom in Christ to 'freedom to dance' and 'freedom to sing'.
Thats is man made 'freedom'.

But it is the freedom in Christ what sets people really free - free from people pleasing, free from rituals, free from customs, free from law, free from 'authority', free from guilt, free from peer pressure, free from self-pity, free from self-righteousness, free from condemnation, free from anything and everything but Jesus! and Jesus alone! It is the freedom in dependence.

It is that freedom that teaches us to say "No" to unrighteousnesses , it is that freedom what enables us to give in free will. It is that freedom which gives us to enter the throne of Grace with courage and call the all sufficient, all powerful, omnipresent God, Abba Father!

It is the 'spirit of control' what takes us to the book of Malachi to establish the law of tithing. That is when we put people in guilt trip saying if you don’t tithe you are robbing God. It is the law that enables some people to use godliness as a means of financial gain. So they dwell on the law. Shame on them!

It is the law which allows the elders and authorities to control people – emotionally, spiritually and financially.

In Acts chapter 7 Stephan addressing the council and he declared fearlessly that the Most High doesn’t live in temples made by human hands and quoted Isa 66:1-2.

He used some strong words: you are heathen at heart and deaf to the truth. Must you forever resist the Holy Spirit?

Where there is Spirit of God, there is freedom!

He pointed out to them they failed to obey the law even though they speak about it all the time.

When Apostle Paul pointed the following to the people at Corinth, was he blaspheming Moses?

7Now if the ministry that brought death, which was engraved in letters on stone (10 Commandments!), came with glory, so that the Israelites could not look steadily at the face of Moses because of its glory, fading though it was, 8will not the ministry of the Spirit be even more glorious? 9If the ministry that condemns men is glorious, how much more glorious is the ministry that brings righteousness! 10For what was glorious has no glory now in comparison with the surpassing glory. 11And if what was fading away came with glory, how much greater is the glory of that which lasts! (2 Cor. 3)

He was being persecuted for this. (Gal 5:11)

And the persecution continues...and it will continue...

Law & Grace

Under Law Man Says	Under Grace Christ Says
Look at what I'm doing for you!	Look at what I did for you!
Look at how I went to church.	Look at how I went to Calvary.
Look at how I was raised in my denomination.	Look at how I was raised from dead.
Look at how I gave my money.	Look at how I gave My life.
Look at how I confessed my sins.	Look at how I took away your sins.
Look at how I stood against sin.	Look at how I died for your sins.
Look at how I judged the lost world.	Look at how I saved the lost world.
Look at how I marched against evil-doers.	Look at how I suffered for evil-doers.
Look at how I bowed down to you.	Look at how I became one of you.
Look at how I healed the sick.	Look at how I raised the dead.
Look at how I spoke in tongues.	Look at how I spoke in love.
Look at how successfull my life was.	Look at how successful My death was.

Source: Classic Christianity Conference Manual

Teaching Grace

This is a question which is kind of nagging me for past couple of days.

Can we really ‘teach’ Grace?

Few days ago I got an opportunity to share the message of Grace to two already saved people (at least they claim to be) but followers of some ritualistic religion.

When I told them that God forgave ALL of our sins and now He is not dealing with us on the basis of sins. It kind of offended one person. He interrupted and called it blasphemy.
For a moment I thought may be they are too early for the knowledge of Grace.

Then I asked them couple of questions such as:

Was it a result of earnest confession that Jesus said – ‘Father forgive them for they don’t know what they are doing’?

How many sins the thief on the cross confessed and asked forgiveness when Jesus said you will be with me in Paradise?

How many sins the adulterous woman asked forgiveness when Jesus said I don’t condemn you?

They said they agree all those but still think that it is our ‘pride’ that keeps us away from asking forgiveness for the day to day sins.

Oh, ok…

Overall it wasn’t that a pleasant conversation.

After all these my wife pointed out one thing to me which triggered some thoughts in me.

This is what she said in a nutshell - We can successfully teach law. But the understanding of Grace cannot be really “taught”.
The example she said was parent-children relationship. We can easily teach our kids the rules and its obedience.
But when it comes to the understanding of our love, they HAVE TO EXPERIENCE it. It can’t be just theory. It has to be practical.

Does this mean that we shouldn’t teach Grace at all?

I am not sure.

But one thing I know - it has to be experienced. We have to get hold of the meaning of the statement – “While we were yet sinners, God loved us through Christ”.

Any thoughts?