A Quick Note on Pursuing Purity

Ephesians 1:3-4

³ Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places, ⁴ even as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before him.

Pursuing holy and pure character is essential to the Christian faith. All throughout Scripture commands and statements are made to remind us of this necessity. The good news of Jesus Christ is that through Him we have achieved holiness, because on our owns we are damned to failure. This is and should be common knowledge to the Christian, but then why do we struggle so much with bad character? Yes, we live in a fallen world and in the flesh, but there is more to it. We forget the blessings and promises of God. Peter writes in his second letter a list of character traits to pursue (1:5-7) and then says that his intent is to always remind us (1:12). We also need to be reminded that Jesus Christ has already died to make us pure and holy. We are blessed. Let us not forget that. Next time we catch ourselves falling into the constant temptations of this world let us remember that Christ has already suffered on the cross and paid the penalty for our sin, so that we may eternally enjoy the presence of God. Jesus suffered for the sake of our purity. How then should we live with this in mind?

Let Us Wonder

Let's face it one of the main problems facing the American church right now is spiritual boredom. We are bored with God, we are bored with His promises, and worst of all we don't seem to be doing much about it. Our culture is all about the newest and best movie, phone, or whatever. We want our satisfaction and we want it now. We don't commit, we prostitute ourselves out to any sort of new entertainment that looks pleasurable as it passes us. We aren't disciplined and we definitely aren't patient. 


Why? Why do we refuse to see God in all of His glory? Why do we choose to pursue anything less than our Creator? Why are we okay with being mediocre Christians?


C.S. Lewis' words from the "Weight of Glory" ring truer than ever today. "We are far too easily pleased." We choose to pursue and find our pleasure in the temporal and transient things of this world that are dying before our eyes. We take for granite the abundant luxuries we have, and we even take for granted the awe inspiring promises of God?


Where do we we get this boring insufficient view of God? Because it is definitely not coming from the Living Word.


We are fallen and flawed and incapable of loving God and others perfectly, but what scares me the most is that it doesn't even seem to bother anybody that we don't pursue God with the fervor and zeal that the writers of the Bible did.

Romans 5:7-8

⁷For one will scarcely die for a righteous person—though perhaps for a good person one would dare even to die— ⁸but God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.

But thankfully our God is gracious. He sent His only Son to die on the cross for our sins. Christ died not only for you and me, but because of you and me. Do we understand that? The awe and wonder those simple two verses inspire is indescribable. The message of Jesus is all about a transaction for which we pay nothing, Christ who knew no sin became sin, so that we may become the righteousness of God ( 2 Cor, 5:21). If we just meditated on this promise for 5 minutes every day for year our lives would be altered drastically. The love and grace of Christ dying, so that we may eternally enjoy the presence of our Creator is worthy of all praise and worship.

God is enough. He is truly worth everything. He gave up His Son and poured His wrath out on Him for us. We don't think or talk about the wrath of God enough at all. It's sobering and honestly just scary to think about, but thankfully Christ died to deliver believers from it. God doesn't desire for us to be punished, but He is just so sin had to be punished. God in all of His glory, before time, had a holy and divine plan to bring us near to Him through the sacrifice of His Son on the cross for the sins His people. It's God's desire for all to reach repentance, and He has made a way for us (2 Peter 3:9). Why do we spite Him by finding wonder and pleasure in the fleeting things of this world?

I want to challenge myself and anyone who reads this to make a commitment to meditate on just one promise of God every day for a month. It doesn't have to be for long period of time, but we need to take time to just wonder at God's grace. I believe and I know once we begin to do this we will see that we can never exhaust the glorious implications of God's promises. Isn't that awesome? We have been given something freely, not for free because it cost God His only Son, but we have been giving something freely from God that will eternally bring us pleasure and eternally mystify us.

How beautiful and different the church of God would be if we all took the time to be still before Him and meditate on His holiness. How different we would be if we treasured God above everything else. Just think how different our relationships and lives would look and as you think give all the praise and glory to God for the work He has done and continues to do. Worship God in wonder and awe because of His sufficient grace and perfect and sovereign hand that works through all things.

Deuteronomy 10:20-22

²⁰ Fear the LORD your God and serve him. Hold fast to him and take your oaths in his name. ²¹ He is your praise; he is your God, who performed for you those great and awesome wonders you saw with your own eyes. ²² Your forefathers who went down into Egypt were seventy in all, and now the LORD your God has made you as numerous as the stars in the sky.

Father, we confess that we satiated and bored;

Creation has bored us.

Work has bored us.

Family has bored us.

Friends have bored us.

Our homes bore us.

Television bores us.

Redemption has bored us.

Truth has bored us.

You have bored us.

No generation in history has ever had so much to entertain it.

We are jaded and cynical.

We think the world is our servant, so we are not thankful when things go well for us, and we are not patient when they do not.

We laugh, but we do not know joy.

We are captivated, but are never really awed.

We celebrate, but we do not worship.

Have mercy on us, and forgive us.

Amaze us with grace-blood stained, incarnate, Messianic grace.

Confession

Romans 7:19

For what I do is not the good I want to do; no, the evil I do not want to do-this I keep on doing.

I started this blog under the title koinonia, which is Greek for fellowship, because I earnestly desired Christian fellowship. I was moving to Gainesville and away from my strong Christian friends and family back home. This blog quickly became a place where I could hash out ideas for sermons and lessons that God was teaching me it was great and encouraging, but I neglected an important part of Christian fellowship, accountability. In James the Bible tells us to confess our sins before another so that we pray for each other and be healed (5:17), and I intend to confess before you so that I may take the opportunity to boast in the cross and in my weakness.

1 John 1:9

If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness. 

Obviously I haven't written much at all this semester, and it's not because God hasn't been revealing Himself to me. Honestly I'm quite surprised to see the amazing work God is doing in my life when I seem to be doing nothing. To put it plainly for the majority of this semester and this year I have felt overburdened and whenever this happens me the result is not to work harder, but to be apathetic. Consequently I have been more of a hearer of the word and less of a doer.  So instead of writing blogs about what God was teaching me and being an active partaker in God's kingdom I resided for the most part to keeping to myself and withdrawing from fellowship. 

Through all of this God has taught much more then I could ever hope to explain. Just the reality of experiencing what Paul says in 2 Timothy 2:13 that when "we are faithless, he remains faithful- for he cannot deny himself" (ESV) is beyond words. God is faithful and he will do what he has promised. He will complete the good work he started (Phil. 1:6). Through this period of trials the Lord has amazed by His love and continuing to bless me in ways I couldn't imagine. For example just last Sunday I was offered an internship at a church I don't regularly attend with a pastor that I have only met several times. God's love is faithful, patient, steadfast, and constant. And we are called to be the light shining God's love to the world. 

We cannot possibly do this on our own. We don't have the capability to love like Christ. I have been learning through this  difficult season that God afflicts us to remind us that we are weak and that He is strong. In 2 Corinthians chapter 12 Paul talks about God afflicted him with a thorn to keep him from becoming conceited. I needed a lesson in humility as I'm sure we all do. I don't understand what it means to make myself nothing like Christ did to glorify the Father. I need to be reminded again and again of my weakness and frailty. That I cannot do this on my own, because when I forget I do nothing.

Our God is the God who declares "For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways" (Isaiah 55:8 ESV). We are not like Him, we need Him, and that's the beauty of the cross. We couldn't justify ourselves, but God sent His only Son while we were still sinners to die for us. We need Him. We need reminders. We need affliction and whatever it takes to get our minds off of this transient world, off of ourselves, and to remind us to set our minds on the eternal Father who is in heaven. 

I'm writing this to remind us that we are weak, to ask for prayer, to remind us to pray for others, but most importantly to highlight that our God is glorious. He is worthy of all praise and He meets our every need. Let us learn as a community through fellowship what it really means to die to self and to seek first the heavenly kingdom relying on the Father's promises for security and boldness. Let us learn to be more open about our struggles so that we may lift each other up in prayer and encourage and comfort one another through the Word of God. God is a provider and He has given us all things let us praise Him and thank Him for His steadfast love.

Galatians 2:20

I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.

Romans 8:38-39

³⁸For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, ³⁹nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.