Jude 1-24 Where To Draw The Line?

Jude spoke of people who were actually against God but who maybe didn’t even realize it.  They were particularly wanting to not call anything a sin that was sexual.  My commentary said that “their thought life is polluted.  Living in a world of filthy fantasies, they eventually find fulfillment of their dreams in sexual immorality.”

In verse 18, Jude said, “In the last times there will be people who laugh about God, following their own evil desires which are against God.”

What kept nagging at me here seemed to be whether there actually is a line between thoughts and actions or whether the Bible forbids us from even having the thoughts.  God often reminds me that it’s the thought that counts, and verse 8 sure sounds like thoughts, rolled around and allowed, will eventually lead to actions.  Then as I listened to Christian radio this morning, I heard the words of a song that said we’re all guilty of the same things --we think the thoughts but we do not carry them through.

It seemed to be the word desires in these verses where such a line might be drawn.  Our physical bodies, infected with the sin virus, are the starting places for desires as chemicals are manufactured and released into our bloodstream based on what we sense around us and what we think.  That seems to be where desire is stoked into thoughts.  And most likely that is where it also should be cut off – before it can cause that chemical bath to wash all over us, taking us out of control.

Jude ends, “God is strong and can help you not to fall.  He can bring you before His glory without any wrong in you, and can give you great joy.”  Physically, great joy seems to be what we seek, but we’re seeking it from the wrong sources when we sin.  Desires are natural to our bodies.  But unlike the unthinking animals Jude mentions in verse 10, God has given us His Holy Spirit to help us disconnect from the physical and thus avoid the sin.

Father, it’s so easy for our thought lives to become polluted when we don’t filter what we take in.  We can also feel entitled to the thoughts, claiming that we are strong enough to avoid them ever leading to actions, but Your Word says otherwise.  Help me to listen to You and not to my body.

Your Brother In Christ,

Gary Ford

Habakkuk 1-3 -- Waiting On God And Seeing Him Respond

I loved these conversations Habakkuk had with God.  He’d been waiting for an answer to his questions, and it seems that when he finally wrote them down, he received his answers.

He first complained about the sinful culture in Judah.  How long was God going to allow it to continue?  It sounds just like our cries today.  He asked and God answered:  “Watch and be amazed and shocked.   I will do something in YOUR lifetime that you won’t believe even when you are told about it!”

How was God going to get rid of that evil?  By bringing an even bigger evil in – Babylon.  My commentary said that Judah was actually sinning more because they were sinning against a greater light (knowledge of God).  But God’s choice of remedies seemed crazy to Habakkuk!  How could God punish Judah with a nation that was worse than they were?  Habakkuk said, “Your eyes are too good to look at evil.”  I wonder about this, since God knew who to go get, and God knew what the people of Judah were already doing.  Would this mean that, because He is all-knowing that He has to look at evil in order to see His children?

Given the seeming juxtaposition of all this, Habakkuk decides:  “I will wait to see what He will say to me.  I will WAIT to learn how God will answer my complaint.”  So often, we can’t see a way out of trouble, but God has already got an answer on the way, and we simply have to wait for His timing.

Habakkuk expresses the hope that God isn’t done working miracles – “Lord, I have heard the news about You.  I am amazed at what You have done.  Lord, do great things once again in our time; Make those things happen again in our own days.”

God fills Habakkuk with confidence in His watchcare, to the point where Habakkuk can pray that even though there are no crops in the field (Texas today) and no cattle in the barns (Texas today, since there is nothing for them to eat and they have to be sold), I will still be glad in the Lord; I will rejoice in God my Savior.  The Lord God is my strength!”

Father, as Job described, You give and You take away, but You are sovereign and You know what You are doing.  Still we can dare to ask, as Habakkuk did, for You to do great things again in our own times.  Bring our nation back to You, heal our land, and remove sin from our lives, God our Savior!

Your Brother In Christ,

Gary Ford

Amos 7-9 Which Way IS Up?

Three times Amos received visions from God about impending disasters for the northern kingdom of Israel.  After the first vision, Amos prayed, “Lord God, forgive us!  How could Israel live through this?”  So the Lord changed His mind and forestalled the punishment.  After the second vision, Amos prayed again, “Lord God, stop!  How can Israel live through this?”  It’s scary to think about even requesting that God stop a punishment that’s deserved, but Amos dared to pray, and God again relented.  The third vision was of the Lord standing by a straight wall with a plumb line in His hand.  The Lord said, “See, I will put a plumb line among My people Israel to show how crooked they are.  I will not look the other way any longer.”

This passage always reminds me of climbing our town’s old north and south water towers.  After climbing at the slightly-less-than-vertical angle for some 100’, I’d reach the ladder that departed from that angle, going straight up through the catwalk to access it.  It always felt like I was climbing up an overhang, leaning outward as I climbed, because I’d been climbing for so long at the previous angle that it seemed that it was straight up when it really wasn’t.

Here, the people had been “climbing” or living at an angle away from what God wanted for so long that when He put a plumb line among them (Christ) to show His true angle, they too felt that the true angle had to be wrong, and that’s why, centuries later, they would deny that Christ is Messiah.

In chapter 8, God relates how the Jewish people would be spiritually blinded for denying Christ’s Messiahship:  “The days are coming when I will cause a time of [spiritual] hunger in the land.  The people will not be hungry for bread or thirsty for water, but they will be hungry for words from the Lord … they will search for the word of the Lord, but they won’t find it.”  Of course, God can sovereignly do that to anyone who willfully chooses to deny the truth of the Cross.

To show how badly they had fallen away from Him, God says, “I will keep watch over them, but I will keep watch to give them trouble, not to do them good.”  Oh, that would be horrible to hear!

Father, Your words to a people who were far from You, despite being chosen by You, remind me of the song, Living Life Upside Down.  The writer talks about trying to go his own way, without You, and finally realizing that, instead of climbing up to heaven, he’d been descending into a well, because he, like the people here, had been living life upside down.  He’d failed to take advantage of Christ, our Plumb Line, whom You sent to show us how to live for You.  Don’t ever let me forget having that same feeling, and the climb it took to get back to You.  Thank You for loving me enough to show me just how wrong I’d been.

Your Brother In Christ,

Gary Ford

Amos 5 & 6 -- They Didn't Even Realize

The Israelites were saying, “Come on, God … bring judgment and justice!”  But they did not know what they were asking, for they were living lives that would bring that divine justice back on their heads.  Instead of the Passover, in verse 17 God promises, “I will pass AMONG you to punish you.”

A great way to envision their spiritual blindness is this:  Imagine a typical Sunday morning at church, especially the worship service.  Everyone leaves with a smile on their faces, believing it was a good morning.  But then imagine instead hearing this from God:

“I completely hate your feasts; I cannot stand your religious meetings.  If you offer me … offerings, I won’t accept them.  You bring your best offerings, but I will ignore them.  Take the noise of your songs away from me!  I won’t listen to the music.”

Wouldn’t that be a shock to hear?  It certainly should have been for the Israelites, who probably thought they were “doing church right.”

But God point-blank said, “I know your many crimes, your terrible sins.”  They thought that what they did away from church had no effect on their worship at church, but as I’ve read before, “Work and worship do not sanctify sin.  Sin contaminates work and worship.”

God also gives them an “Oh, by the way …” revelation – they thought He didn’t know about it, but He said, “While you traveled in the desert for 40 years, you carried with you your king, the god Sakkuth, and Kaiwan your idol, and the star gods you made.”  Even as He was originally rescuing their ancestors and bringing them out of Egypt to the Promised Land, they were secretly (or so they thought) bringing along idols that they worshiped!

Despite their many sins, acknowledged or not yet known to God, He still called out to them twice here:  “Come to Me and live … Come to Me and live.”  Such love from our Creator and such apathy from His creations.

Father, our sins are bright as day to You, and they do taint our worship, casting an ugliness upon what should be a beautiful moment between the Creator and His creation.  Please help me to have an acute awareness of all sin in my own life and help me acknowledge it, quit it, and ask for forgiveness before I attempt to ever begin to worship You.

Your Brother In Christ,

Gary Ford

Amos 3 & 4 -- When God Speaks, People WILL Finally Listen

I was reminded of the phrase, “To whom much has been given, much is required,” as I read this.  In chastising the rogue nation of Israel, now separate from Judah, God said, “I have chosen ONLY you out of all the families of the earth, so I will punish you for all your sins.”  Israel had broken that agreement to walk with God.  God is now roaring at them as the Lion of Judah for good reason.  Israel’s sins were so blatant that they shouldn’t marvel at being caught in them.  The people had been warned again and again by God, yet they ignored the warnings. 

Like a father who stares incredulously at his child who was raised to know better but who has not utterly failed morally, God cries out, “The people don’t know how to do what is right.”  So like a loving Father, God invoked increasing levels of discipline, attempting to bring His children to their senses.  Yet with each harsher level of punishment, God saw no effect whatsoever, and His love for them cries out in this repeated phrase:  “Still you did not come back to Me.”

Israel then got to hear the message they didn’t ever WANT to hear:  “Get ready to meet your God, Israel.”  It’s going to be just as bad as it sounds.

My Bible’s sidebar says, “No one enjoys being disciplined.  Yet, it is often through the discomfort of chastisement that we return to the right path … You change your life by changing your heart.”

Father, help me to not just hear You when You speak, but also help me to listen to what You are telling me.  I’d rather hear it from You as my Friend than I would from You as my enemy as they did here.  Help me to change my heart and change my life.

Your Brother In Christ,

Gary Ford

Amos 1 & 2 -- Be Careful About Your Amens

A shepherd became an evangelist after getting his revival message from God, and I can just see the Israelites clustered around him, saying, “Amen!  Preach on, brother!” as he pronounced God’s coming judgment on their enemy neighbors.  “Syria will be destroyed!  Gaza will be punished!  I’ll punish Phoenicia, and Edom, Ammon and Moab!”  But starting in 2:4, my commentary says, “Now the Lord is getting uncomfortably close to home.”  Judah and Israel were listed next, and to be numbered among those Gentile nations must have been appalling.  “By their sin, Judah and Israel had forfeited all special recognition by Jehovah.”

God was about to send them all into captivity for ignoring Him and His teachings.  They’d been warned, but they hadn’t listened or made any changes.

The sidebar in my Bible today was from Hearing God’s Voice Above The Noise:  “When God speaks, do I listen?  When God roars from heaven and wants my attention, do I stop talking and listen?  Or is my life so busy that I only listen now and then?  Do I only listen to God when it doesn’t interfere with the normal course of events?  Or have I been so arrested by what God says that I stop dead in my tracks and listen?”

Father, You know how much I dislike it when I talk to Joseph about his behavior and he says, “I know, but …”  He’s actually saying that, yes, he agrees with me, but he doesn’t necessarily want to obey for some reason, trying to rationalize it all.  I often do that to You, Father.  I’m sorry.  I know that once I hear from You, my immediate reaction should be to change what I’m doing and not try to argue or rationalize.  Please help me to do that, Father.  I don’t want You to have to ever say about me, as You did about Judah, “He rejected the teachings of the Lord and did not keep His commands.”

Your Brother In Christ,

Gary Ford

Philippians 4 -- A Diet Of The Mind

“And God’s peace, which is so great we cannot understand it, will keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus.  Brothers, think about the things that are good and worthy of praise.  Think about the things that are true and honorable and right and pure and beautiful and respected.  Do what you learned and received from me, what I told you, and what you saw me do.  And the God who gives peace will be with you.”

Paul is talking about our thought life – that inside part of us that we can keep conveniently compartmentalized from the outside world, or so we think.  My commentary says:  “The Bible everywhere teaches that we can control what we think.”  We can’t simply give up and say we can’t help having unwelcome thoughts.  Here’s Paul’s secret:  “A person cannot entertain evil thoughts and thoughts about the Lord Jesus at the same time.  If, then, an evil thought should come to him, he should immediately get rid of it by meditating on the Person and work of Christ.”

We are so tempted to indulge ourselves with evil thoughts, I think, out of a sense of entitlement, reasoning that, because we don’t physically commit the sin, then we can at least allow ourselves the indulgence of the thought, almost in compensation for the sacrifice.  (It sounds a lot like someone who’s concerned about their weight and dieting deciding to indulge in a rich chocolate dessert as compensation for two days of healthy eating!)

Verse 7 tells us God’s peace will keep our hearts AND minds in Christ Jesus.  But my commentary adds that we have a responsibility there also.  “God does not garrison the thought life of a man who does not want it to be kept pure … Right living results from right thinking.  If a person’s thought life is pure, then his life will be pure … And we should always remember that if a person thinks an evil thought long enough, he will eventually do it.”  As God continues to remind me, “It’s the thought that counts.”

Father, this can be a difficult battle for all of us – me included.  Please help me never to feel entitled to let my thought roam into areas I shouldn’t.  Set off alarm bells and red flags in my mind when I get into this danger zone.  Remind me not to indulge myself.  Keep me on a diet of the mind.

Your Brother In Christ,

Gary Ford