Glory to the Father (3)

In my previous post, I wrote that answering our prayers enables Jesus to bring glory to His Father. A wonderful thought and the desire of His heart.

I furthermore reasoned that it would be wonderful for all the sons and daughters of God (us) to bring glory to our heavenly Father. How? By doing His will on earth as it is in heaven.

Now Jesus knew this to be true as well. He told His disciples (John 15:8):

👉When you produce much fruit, you are my true disciples. This brings great glory to my Father.

We are asked to produce MUCH fruit, not just a little. What does it mean to produce fruit? In my humble opinion, it means that godly character is visible in our lives, in the things we do or say (read Galatians 5:22-25). People will see God through us, just as they saw the Father through Jesus when He walked the earth.

We can do many things, good works even, but only if inspired by Jesus will it count for eternity. He said: Remain in me, and I will remain in you. For a branch cannot produce fruit if it is severed from the vine, and you cannot be fruitful unless you remain in me (John 15:4).

He even goes on (verse 5) to say that apart from Him we can do nothing! Let me put it this way, trying to be fruitful outside of Him, is useless and a waste of time. It does not bring glory to the Father. But being true disciples does!

Ever been stuck in Luke 6?

I have been there before and I am there again... Luke 6. How in the world does one get past such a chapter?

I do not want to leave, I want to linger just a little longer and savor the wisdom and the words of Jesus. This past week I have been reading the same words again ... and again each morning.

Love your enemies... yeah, right. We know that verse, we can quote it. But do we know how that verse (35) continues? 

Love your enemies! Do good to them. Lend to them without expecting  to be repaid. Then your reward will be very great, and you will truly be acting as children of the Most High, for he is kind to those who are unthankful and wicked. 

Lend to our enemies without expecting to be repaid? I'm not sure how that works out in real life, but I do not know of anyone who ever did this.

He is kind to those who are unthankful and wicked. Excuse me? God is kind to the wicked?

It feels like I have to push the reset button of my faith and start all over again, because the more I read the Bible, the more I realize I do know not anything :)

have you ever been there?

Purpose of the church (4)

'The five are called together for a common task ...' I wrote in my previous blog entry. I was referring to the apostles, prophets, evangelists, shepherds, and teachers as mentioned in Ephesians 4: 11-13. People who are appointed or given by Jesus for a certain task.

For the sake of clarity, let's go back to that text again:

So Christ himself gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the pastors and teachers, to equip his people for works of service (NIV translation). What is their job? Equiping believers for work in God's service. The Good News translation states: He did this to prepare all God's people for the work of Christian service...

That is quite a responsibility. Together (as a team) they must equip (prepare, get ready, arm) the believers to be of service to God. There is no one who can do this on his or her own. Nowadays I see shepherds (also called pastors, reverends, priests) struggle to do this all alone. It is, in my opinion, no wonder that many end up on the couch with a burn-out. Only Jesus himself was shepherd, as well as teacher (rabbi), apostle, evangelist and prophet!

It has never been His intention to put all those qualities in one person! He desires cooperation in a team so that we can keep each other accountable and no one will get the chance to rise above the other. There is no hierarchy in these five functions / tasks. If such a thing exists, we must base it on 1 Corinthians 12:28 where it says: And God has placed in the church first of all apostles, second prophets, third teachers...The shepherd and evangelist are not even mentioned here.

I truly believe we are missing something in our spiritual growth and development if we are being equipped by just one (perhaps two) of these people. Suppose you only listen to a teacher (preacher) and never learn from an apostle what it is like to be sent out and travel and plant churches. You could just end up sitting in a pew for thirty years (with a lot of knowledge, yes) without ever going into the world ....

Now, that is unthinkable, right ...?

Give me a D

In my Bible alphabet blog series D stands for Disciple.

Disciple actually means a follower or pupil of a teacher and comes from the verb discere which means 'learning'.

A disciple is someone with a teachable spirit, someone who is willing and committed to learn (not someone who thinks he/she knows everything already).

Jesus says some very important things to the people who want to be His disciple, for example: A disciple is not above his teacher, but everyone when he is fully trained will be like his teacher (Luke 6:40). Will be like Jesus ... in thinking, talking and acting!

Not everyone believes that Jesus is the Son of God, but in general people do agree that He is the greatest teacher who ever walked the earth. Is it not logical that we should learn from Him? This begins with the reading and studying of the four Gospels (do it!) and asking for wisdom and insight from the Holy Spirit.

The qualifications for discipleship are not very complicated, but quite radical: So therefore, any one of you who does not renounce all that he has cannot be my disciple. (Luke 14:33). In today's terms this basically means:

• that we must be willing to let go of everything we think to know
• that we should not hang on to our possessions and
• that we must be willing to give up our lives for Him

The journey...

A few years ago my husband and I started a non-profit organization called Traveling Light. Whenever we can, we travel all over Europe and the Mediterranean to visit Christian drugs- and alcohol rehabilitation centers, struggling churches, small-scale organizations etc. etc. We simply offer encouragement in forms of practical help, financial support and spiritual encouragement.

The other day I was reading (again) in Lynn Austin's book Pilgrimage, and I was touched and encouraged by the following paragraph, which really made me think. I hope it will stir up your thoughts as well:

'It might be our natural tendency to build impressive monuments for Christian ministry, but it isn't God's way. We are supposed to go out into the world, not wait for the world to come to us, even if God has to turn our comfortable lives upside down to get us to do it.

I'm told that in the original Greek language, the wording of Jesus' Great Commission reads: "As you are going into the world... make disciples." Jesus assumes that we will be going; His orders are to make disciples along the way. When He sent His disciples out two by two to teach in all of the villages, He didn't tell them to buy a chunk of land and build an impressive building. He said, "Take nothing for the journey except a staff - no bread, no bag, no money in your belts" (Mark 6:8). I call that traveling light.

Jesus wanted them to trust God and the Holy Spirit's leading, not build elaborate projects and programs and ministries.'

Sometimes I wonder what Christianity in the Western world has become... We are often really busy maintaining our buildings and ministries, which leaves no time for the journey...

I truly believe we have to go back to the simplicity of the assignment we have received as Christians: making disciples along the way, no matter whether our journey is local, national or international.