Windows On The Soul

This was one of those verses that stopped me in my tracks. Surely Christ's suffering was completed at Calvary, the redemptive death for the sins of all mankind? But no: Paul writes to the Colossians, that through his own suffering, he is helping to finish the remainder of Christ's suffering. When we are called to take up our cross and follow Jesus, the suffering of cross carrying is not just some unfortunate side-effect. We are called as partners in Christ's redemptive plan of love to the world. Suffering is the work . We are to hunger and thirst after righteousness, and face persecution. To comfort mourners requires feeling with them. To be a peacemaker requires stepping between warring factions. This is citizenship of the Kingdom. ---xxxXxxx--- Col.1:24 "Part of my work is to suffer for you ... for I am helping to finish up the remainder of Christ's suffering for His body, the Church" Rom.8:17 "Joint heirs with Christ...that we suffer wit...

Traditionally, Christians have majored on caring for the outward symptoms of the sick, neglected, lonely and down-trodden of society. But when it comes to speaking up or acting against the causes of some of these situations, sadly we seem to have lost our voices. The symptoms are obvious and providing relief is fairly straight-forward. But discovering, understanding and doing something about causes requires effort, research, thought and insight. If ever the church needs people with gifts of wisdom, discernment and prophecy, it is in the sphere of social justice. When Jesus said that he had come to " preach release to the captives, the recovery of sight to the blind ", he was not talking (just) about palliative care, but of removal of the impediments causing the conditions (whether unjust laws or cataracts). In this "post Christian" age we seem to be living in, there are more situations than ever that Christians need to speak-up about. ----xxxXxxx---- Lk.4:18 ...

In reading last week, I was reminded of the difference between " accepting " Christ, and making a " decision " for Christ. " Acceptance " does not have the sense of completeness as does " decision ", which implies a cut-off point, a turn around, of burning one's bridges.  A favourite hymn states " I have decided to follow Jesus, No turning back ". A man recently came to the Lord later in life. He felt convicted about a criminal act in his past and sought to confess and make amends. Though he has forgiveness from the Lord, the law of the land did not, and he is now serving a prison sentence. For him, taking up his cross to follow Jesus has had an enormous price. Please pray for him, his family and church, and remember the prison ministries and other prisoners who have come to the Lord through them and are still serving their time. ----xxxXxxx---- Lk.9:23 "If any man would come after me, let him deny himself and take up ...

Have you ever considered that God Himself has a constant personal struggle? It could even be called an enigma on the horns of a dilemma. Martin Luther, the proponent of " Justification by Faith " was once challenged as to the true basis of Christianity, faith or righteousness. He responded " Righteousness " - our faith simply appropriates the redemptive work of Jesus in dying on the cross in our stead to satisfy God's basic righteousness - " The wages of sin is death ". Here then is God's dilemma in being both perfectly righteous and holy, and also infinitely gracious and lovingly forgiving. This is why prayer can be effective, why it is possible to ask God to turn away his righteous anger in favour of His grace. Thus the enigma of Christianity is that it is both but neither legalistically (self)righteous, and unconditionally forgiving (all you need is love)! ---xxxXxxx--- Ps.85:10 "Mercy & truth are met together; righteousness ...

One of the most frequently asked ‘spiritual’ questions among all people through all of time, is “ Why does God let that (death, illness, injury, evil, inhumanity, etc.) happen?” . Firstly, such questions are usually inherently ‘selfish’ because it is usually asked about one-self or some-one close - ie. “ I’m feeling sad/sorrowful/let-down/hurt! Why me? ”, as if it doesn’t matter that everybody else in the world suffers the same feeling at some time or another. But at the heart of such questions, is a wrong understanding of God and ‘nature’. Decay, pain and death are very much the ‘norm’ in the natural world. Scientists have a ‘law’ of thermodynamics that says that any system left to itself will ultimately decay chaotically, losing its ‘order’ or entropy. When the Bible says that sin entered the world and that nature has ‘fallen’, it is saying the same thing as the scientists, only 3-4000 years before them. Now God’s nature is quite the opposite. His nature is of love, redempt...