Accounting. Yikes!

Numbers 26:63-65 These are the ones counted by Moses and Eleazar the priest when they counted the Israelites on the plains of Moab by the Jordan across from Jericho. 64 Not one of them was among those counted by Moses and Aaron the priest when they counted the Israelites in the Desert of Sinai. 65 For the LORD had told those Israelites they would surely die in the wilderness, and not one of them was left except Caleb son of Jephunneh and Joshua son of Nun.

     There are some portions of Scripture that most of us have a hard time understanding why they are there. Like some sections of the book of Numbers. There are two censuses in the book. One happens shortly after the Israelites are delivered from Egypt. The other happens nearly forty years later when they are about to enter the Promised Land. They are counted by clan, and the numbers are included in the text.
     But what do those numbers have to do with the plan of God revealed in Scripture?
     That is a great question! I am glad you asked. The key is the phrase "not one of them" which is repeated in the text. You see, they had made a listing of the people who came out of Egypt, who had seen the miracles face to face, who had subsequently chosen not to believe the LORD's promise. So the LORD made another promise. "Not one of them" would enter the Promised Land.
     So the counting demonstrates the faithfulness of the LORD. He keeps His word, even when we fail. He can be counted on (pun intended) to keep His promises to us. So the counting confirmed that what He said had happened. When He says it, it will happen.
     So the promises He has made concerning the forgiveness of our sin because of the sacrifice Jesus made for us can be trusted. The future home He has prepared for us is there. When He calls us to repentance, we can rest assured that He is waiting with open arms to receive us back into fellowship with Himself. We can trust Him completely. Or to say it in current vernacular, "He has our back."
     So today, turn to Him and know that He is there waiting for us to return, whether it has been a long journey away, or just a short day trip. He wants to share His presence with us. What is stopping you from returning?

Forgiveness

1 John 5:16-17

          Some things are worse than others, but some people act as though one bump in the road is as bad as any other, that all bumps are of equal consequences. They get a hangnail and the end of the world has come. Their reaction doesn’t match the event.

          I love looking through museums. Being able to get up close and personal with some of the rarest and most beautiful things in the world lifts my spirit. It gives me hope as I gaze in wonder at the genius given to us by the LORD.

          But there is something that bugs me when I am there. I see the signs that state “Don’t touch” and yet some people just ignore the signs. I remember walking into the Sistine Chapel in Rome and seeing a Japanese tourist just walk up, right in front of the guard, and reach out and touch a tapestry. They were willing to ruin the tapestry for the sake of their own tactile need.

          In a similar category are the “Danger” or “Construction Zone” signs. How about “Cliff Ahead”, “Unstable Ground”, “Avalanche Danger” or “Do Not Enter” signs. And yet people ignore the sign and then others risk their lives to rescue them.

          John has given us two very distinct warnings in connection to our faith. The false teachers were perverting the Truth by warping the nature of Jesus they preached. They also ignored the straight forward command to love fellow believers. These two themes have permeated the fabric of this short letter. And yet some even today would ignore these warnings and venture into dangerous spiritual territory.

          These are two sins that lead to spiritual death. Denial of Christ leads to death in that He is the only source of life available. So to reject Him in His fullness is to reject salvation itself. And if we aren’t loving each other, then the primary evidence of the presence of the Holy Spirit working in our lives is absent. No love, no life. These two sins lead to spiritual death.

          So if we see a fellow Jesus-follower in any other sin, we can be assured that prayer can make a difference. They can be forgiven. They can be restored. They have not cut themselves off from the grace that is found in Jesus.

          But if they have abandoned Jesus with evidence of a lack of love, then prayer for them won’t necessarily bring forgiveness and restoration. They must repent first. They must return to a correct understanding of Jesus’ person and work before sin can be forgiven.

          But why do people not heed the warning? Why do they run headlong into sin knowing that with sin comes death? We are a stubborn bunch, aren’t we!

Guilty, but Not Guilty

1 John 3:20

          Most of us know someone who has a hyperactive sense of guilt. There are lots of jokes about being raised Catholic when this topic comes up. But some families are just better at imposing a sense of guilt on children than other families. Some spouses use guilt to force their will on the other. And guilt like this can be passed along for generations. It can even become embedded in certain cultural practices.

          But on the practical, personal sense, misplaced guilt can be a powerful negative drag on our spiritual life. If we feel guilty for things we either didn’t do, or for things for which we have asked for and received forgiveness, it is misplaced guilt. Some weights we just don’t need to carry.

          Often abusers are very good at getting the abused person to feel guilty for things they didn’t do. They use their anger most often to accuse and point the finger. The words “If you hadn’t” and “You made me” seem to crop up frequently. And because of the furor of the verbal assault, the abused often accepts the words because to reject them would mean further violence. Accepting the blame is easier than facing more abuse. And then over time the abused person often begins to believe the lie.

          But there is a way to put our hearts at rest. The battle that rages inwardly around guilt, both real and imposed, can be settled. And for the Jesus-follower it is a settled issue. We know that when we confess our sins we are forgiven. And if we are forgiven, we are no longer guilty. Our guilt has been taken, and mercy is what we receive. Mercy is getting what we don’t deserve. We can live without guilt for sins committed.

          Out text tells us that sometimes our hearts tell us something that isn’t true. Sometimes our hearts tell us that we, even though we are believers, are condemned. We live with a sense of condemnation. We walk around wondering if the next sin will be “the big one” that will push us beyond God’s grace.

          This misplaced guilt can keep us from drawing in near to the LORD and into fellowship with each other. Satan is like a spouse abuser. He makes people feel guilty for things they didn’t do. He brings up the past failures as a way to keep guilt alive. As if we don’t have enough trouble controlling our own history of failure, he pokes and prods at just the right moments.

          But before we start seeing Satan behind every guilty thought, we need to recognize the influence of our own upbringing and culture. Maybe it isn’t a mortal sin to eat meat on Fridays. Maybe it is OK to laugh in church. Maybe we can enjoy life.

          The truth is that the LORD knows everything, and if He doesn’t condemn us, what right do we have to condemn ourselves?

Mountain Movers

Mark 11:22-25

      Sometimes we make things so complicated, especially things connected to the LORD. We add if’s, and’s and but’s to so many discussions. Sometimes things really are simple. We add prenuptial agreements to a marriage because we don’t really trust people, even the people we are going to marry. We have to have custom invitations and individualized gift table markers. Doves and butterflies need to be released just before the horse drawn carriage pulls up to take us on our Amazonian skydiving survival adventure. We do all this when really all we need are the “I do’s” in front of two witnesses and an official.

      We complicate so many things. Couples choose to argue about so many things, very few of which are really that significant. We focus on the small stuff instead of keeping our eyes on those things that we admire in the other. We argue about where the shoes land instead of making sure the shoes get put away. We make relationship so complicated, but it really is pretty easy.

      Jesus has a way of cutting through the complicated. He tells His disciples to “Have faith in God.” How much simpler could it be! Trust the LORD. He is the only One who can truly be trusted. He never changes. He always keeps His promises. So we reach out to Him and trust Him. That trust, His calling us and our responding to that call, makes the greatest change possible in life. It moves us from dark into the light, from death to life, from separation from God to intimacy with God. That is a mountain. What was possible is now possible.

      Jesus uses a literary device called hyperbole as He talks about faith in action. He uses the most impossible thing to demonstrate the possible thing. Moving a mountain is not possible. Jerusalem being spiritually vibrant was not possible. Using a fig tree to demonstrate the spiritual condition of Jerusalem is possible.

      Prayer is about aligning our will with His. If we pray anything according to His will, it will be done. So if we want answered prayers, pray as the Spirit leads you in fulfilling His will. If it isn’t His will, it isn’t going to happen as a result of prayer. We might be able to muscle something through, but it won’t be because of prayer.

      But we must be people who trust Him. That is what belief is about. Do we really trust Him to take care of us, or do we think we must help Him out?

      Jesus is not giving us a magic formula for answered prayers. He is not telling us to muscle up enough faith, to try harder to believe, to really mean it when we pray. It isn’t about how much faith we have, but where we put our faith, who we are trusting. If we put our little bit of faith wholeheartedly in the LORD, then His strength is enough to accomplish His will in our lives and in our world.

      Unforgiveness gets in the way of trust. If we don’t trust Him enough to balance the spreadsheet of wrongs, to bring about justice, then we don’t really trust Him. We have to be willing to let things go, to not continue to carry the hurt from the past injuries. We need to place the offenders in a list that allows God’s grace to work in their lives, that allows mercy to flow rather than judgment.

Right Between the Eyes

Mark 10:10-12

      Sometimes the truth strikes us right between the eyes. It hits us with such force that we get knocked over, our lives forever altered. We are knocked off balance and we must find a new center of gravity. We can’t go back to the way things used to be. The past has been redefined by that moment. It has become a large exclamation point in our life story. It ended one chapter and signaled the beginning of another.

      Truth has a way of doing this to people, me included. The only way we can go forward is to fully incorporate the truth into our view of the world. Or we can live in the room with the elephant, but simply act as if it doesn’t exist. We move around it, being careful not to allow its presence to touch ours. We build carefully designed boxes to keep it at a safe distance.

      I see this most often with grief. We lose a loved one. We have a choice in the months ahead: we can learn to live with the void or create a world where the void doesn’t exist. We fill the void with substitutes. Often addictions are put in the void. They have a way of numbing the pain, even if only temporarily.

      The Truth in today’s passage sounds very intolerant, to use the politically correct buzzword. Nothing is worse than intolerance, or so the media proclaims. And yet as they label us intolerant, they are demonstrating their own intolerance of our beliefs and practices. You can’t label someone intolerant without making a judgment statement about them. And making judgment statements are the heart of this new intolerance. They judge us for our beliefs, just as we supposedly judge them for theirs. And yet their judgment isn’t based on fact, but on fiction.

      Marriage is supposed to be between one man and one woman for life. If the bond gets broken and another union happens, that union is adultery. Forgiveness is possible, but it can’t happen without acknowledging the truth of the sin. You can’t get forgiveness for violating a command without first acknowledging the command and its relevance to your situation.

      Forgiveness is available. All sin has been paid for by Christ’s life, death, and resurrection. When we marry again we are committing adultery against that first spouse, an act that requires forgiveness from both God and the spouse. You can repent of your portion of the wrongs that fed the divorce, even if the portion is extremely small and limited. Forgiveness is available.

      If you have trouble with this straight forward Truth, you are not alone. The disciples had this same trouble. That is why they asked for clarification. If they had gotten the strictness of what Jesus was saying the first time, they would not have asked for clarification. Being a follower of Jesus requires our death, death to self, death to selfishness, death to self-centeredness, death to my way or the highway, death to stomped feet and pouting looks. Embrace the Truth, no matter what.

Forgiveness Available!

Mark 3:28-30

      Have you ever blown it in your relationship with someone that you didn’t think it was possible to fix it? I mean, those mistakes that are catastrophic, earth-shattering, usually morally based choices that bring into question all the previous history of the relationship. Or the betrayal that shows just how mean or vindictive you can really be. I am amazed at the ability of human beings to be so hurtful toward each other.

      Remember, Jesus’ family thinks He is nuts and are on their way to commit Him, taking Him out of the public eye to save them from embarrassment. They have heard that the crowds are so great, the crowds gathering to hear Him teach and see Him heal, that they don’t even have time to eat. The crowds are pressing in so much, that they can’t do normal things.

      The religious leaders in Jerusalem have sent an envoy to try and stop Jesus by applying their official label on His activities. They do this by saying that it is really Satan at work and not God. They look at His activities and can’t explain it through their lens, so they only have one alternative: it must be the work of Satan.

      Jesus sets them straight. He starts by giving us some really good news. There is forgiveness available for all. Even as Jesus is rebuking the religious scholars of His day for saying that the Holy Spirit’s work is really Satan’s work, Jesus tells us that there is forgiveness. This is the start of Jesus’ rebuke. Even these religious leaders can have forgiveness. I don’t know about you, but if I have just been called Satan’s tool, I am not sure my first response would be to offer forgiveness, but this is exactly what Jesus does. Even these religious leaders who misunderstand Jesus so much are offered forgiveness. Wow, that is grace in action.

      The next phrase has put many believers in a state of questioning and sometimes even panic. According to Jesus there is a sin for which there is no forgiveness. Many folks wonder if they have committed that sin at sometime in their lives.

      But look at the context. The religious leaders are in a state of denial about God’s power being present in Jesus. They are flipping things on their heads by saying that God’s work is Satan’s.

      A good way to think about this sin is this. This sin involves an attitude of continual defiance and hostility to the LORD. This attitude rejects the saving power expressed in the work of the Holy Spirit in the life of Jesus and in the world. It is a continual choice to reject God’s work in their life, His calling to repentance and intimacy with God. It is the choice to stay in the dark and in ignorance about the true nature of the world, sin, God and humanity.

      The good news is that if you are worried about having committed this sin, you haven’t! Those who have committed this sin don’t care. Since they deny sin’s existence and the saving role Jesus has, they don’t care if their life choices put them in the camp of God’s enemies. They like where they live and don’t want to leave. If they refuse to accept the one way of forgiveness, then forgiveness isn’t possible. There is only one way.

      But forgiveness is even offered to them, if they will just accept it.