BLESSED ASSURANCE! EXPECTANT JOY!

Posted on December 22, 2021 by randscallawayffm

If we knew and really believed there could be no one or not one thing on earth that could separate us from the love God has for us, would that change how we approach each day of living on earth?  Even today?

If we really believe that Jesus is coming back at any time of day or night, to get those who believe, love and follow Him and take us back with him to live with Him forever in the rooms He has been preparing for us, would that change how we begin today?  Would joy flood our souls with this expectant hope? 

Let me put this notion of expectant joy another way.  We are approaching that time when presents will be opened on Christmas Day as a way to honor the birth of our Savior, “God with us”, God’s gift of salvation to humanity.  Do we have as much expectant joy for Jesus’ return as children have for the gifts they will soon open on Christmas morning?  Multiply that joy times a million—to infinity and beyond!

Through good times and bad, Jesus is “God with us”.  If salvation of our souls wasn’t enough, God is not finished yet!  We live in expectant joy for the return of Christ to claim His own who believe, truly believe, in Him.  The Spirit of God is arousing us within.  God is ALSO expectantly joyful for what is coming next for us!  Friends, did you ever stop to realize that God is just as excited to see us as we are to see Him?  Yes!  Amen!

However, we are not good at waiting, so God provides His Spirit to help us…” the moment we get tired in the waiting, God’s Spirit is right alongside helping us along.”  When the hard times on earth get too hard for us to bear, God’s Holy Spirit steps in to give us the words of prayer that fail us in those moments of despair… “If we don’t know how or what to pray, it doesn’t matter. He does our praying in and for us, making prayer out of our wordless sighs, our aching groans.”

If that wasn’t enough, God loves us with the same love He has for His Son, Jesus!  “He decided from the outset to shape the lives of those who love him along the same lines as the life of his Son.”  What God starts in us, He completes through us.  He knows us by name.  He created us to worship, yes, but He also created us for purpose, unique to each one of us!  “After God made that decision of what his children should be like, he followed it up by calling people by name. After he called them by name, he set them on a solid basis with himself. And then, after getting them established, he stayed with them to the end, gloriously completing what he had begun.”

AND, don’t mess with what God is doing in each of us!  God is for us!  Hallelujah!  God knows what He is doing in us!  God knows you!  God knows me!  Warts and all, He knows what He is doing in us!  God will work ALL that happens around us and to us, in this world, the good and the bad, and create beauty from ashes.  “That’s why we can be so sure that every detail in our lives of love for God is worked into something good.”  Our God is amazing like that!

BLESSED ASSURANCE/EXPECTANT JOY

Believers, we are His Chosen.  “And who would dare tangle with God by messing with one of God’s chosen? Who would dare even to point a finger? The One who died for us—who was raised to life for us!—is in the presence of God at this very moment sticking up for us.” 

Oh, dear Friends, I don’t know about you, but in the hustle and bustle of preparing for Christmas, family gatherings, helping people, and preparing for Christmas Eve services to help others know and follow Jesus, I NEEDED to read and really understand once more the depth of God’s love for me and others who believe.  How about you?

Once more, like Paul, “I’m absolutely convinced that nothing—nothing living or dead, angelic or demonic, today or tomorrow, high or low, thinkable or unthinkable—absolutely nothing can get between us and God’s love because of the way that Jesus our Master has embraced us.

Take a beat, take a deep breath and breathe in these words of God’s assurance of His love for us.  May this season be filled with blessed assurance and expectant joy in you, through you and in your households.  God love us.  Let’s love each other like He loves us.  No matter what happens—love and grace wins.

ROMANS—OUR CARE AND CALLING

Romans 8:17-39, The Message

We go through exactly what Christ goes through. If we go through the hard times with him, then we’re certainly going to go through the good times with him!

18-21 That’s why I don’t think there’s any comparison between the present hard times and the coming good times. The created world itself can hardly wait for what’s coming next. Everything in creation is being more or less held back. God reins it in until both creation and all the creatures are ready and can be released at the same moment into the glorious times ahead. Meanwhile, the joyful anticipation deepens.

22-25 All around us we observe a pregnant creation. The difficult times of pain throughout the world are simply birth pangs. But it’s not only around us; it’s within us. The Spirit of God is arousing us within. We’re also feeling the birth pangs. These sterile and barren bodies of ours are yearning for full deliverance. That is why waiting does not diminish us, any more than waiting diminishes a pregnant mother. We are enlarged in the waiting. We, of course, don’t see what is enlarging us. But the longer we wait, the larger we become, and the more joyful our expectancy.

26-28 Meanwhile, the moment we get tired in the waiting, God’s Spirit is right alongside helping us along. If we don’t know how or what to pray, it doesn’t matter. He does our praying in and for us, making prayer out of our wordless sighs, our aching groans. He knows us far better than we know ourselves, knows our pregnant condition, and keeps us present before God. That’s why we can be so sure that every detail in our lives of love for God is worked into something good.

29-30 God knew what he was doing from the very beginning. He decided from the outset to shape the lives of those who love him along the same lines as the life of his Son. The Son stands first in the line of humanity he restored. We see the original and intended shape of our lives there in him. After God made that decision of what his children should be like, he followed it up by calling people by name. After he called them by name, he set them on a solid basis with himself. And then, after getting them established, he stayed with them to the end, gloriously completing what he had begun.

31-39 So, what do you think? With God on our side like this, how can we lose? If God didn’t hesitate to put everything on the line for us, embracing our condition and exposing himself to the worst by sending his own Son, is there anything else he wouldn’t gladly and freely do for us? And who would dare tangle with God by messing with one of God’s chosen? Who would dare even to point a finger? The One who died for us—who was raised to life for us!—is in the presence of God at this very moment sticking up for us. Do you think anyone is going to be able to drive a wedge between us and Christ’s love for us? There is no way! Not trouble, not hard times, not hatred, not hunger, not homelessness, not bullying threats, not backstabbing, not even the worst sins listed in Scripture:

They kill us in cold blood because they hate you.
We’re sitting ducks; they pick us off one by one.

None of this fazes us because Jesus loves us. I’m absolutely convinced that nothing—nothing living or dead, angelic or demonic, today or tomorrow, high or low, thinkable or unthinkable—absolutely nothing can get between us and God’s love because of the way that Jesus our Master has embraced us.

Lord,

Thank you for your blessed assurance that stirs our expectant joy of your return.  May your peace and confidence permeate all our lives as we live for you.

In Jesus Name, For Your Glory, Amen

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LIFE SOLUTION: THE ARRIVAL

Posted on December 21, 2021 by randscallawayffm

There is nothing on earth more scary-exciting than giving birth to a child!  Right?!  In a span of five years, Randy and I welcomed three babies into this world!  Tomorrow, in fact, will be the birthday of the youngest child.  The pain of childbirth is duly accepted as part of the birth process as you realize what your body is really doing!  We may fight it but we can’t really do anything about it, thanks to Adam and Eve.  The process includes pain.  But then that final push brings your baby from the darkness of the womb into the bright light of the birth room. 

The heathy reactions of our infant are closed eyes with pitiful crying.  The infant had some had work to do, too.  He or she had to leave one safe place with venerable trust for a new place.  This arrival is welcomed by the delivery doc and nurses.  Mom and dad do what they are told to do until the babe wrapped like a burrito is in their arms.  I remember the next daunting thoughts…this arrival would not bring solutions to our problems.  It would multiply them!  As parents, we had to change all routines and regular habits as we adjusted our lives around the arrival of the newborn.  

At this time of year we celebrate THE ARRIVAL of a newborn that became the only answer, the only solution to life’s problems.  We celebrate the birth of Jesus, Emmanuel–God with us, Messiah, Savior, King of kings and Lord of lords.  Jesus, the One and Only who solves our sin-death condition once and for all for those who believe in Him.

THE ARRIVAL came into the world expectantly by some who still believed He would come, but unexpectedly by those living in darkness.  The Arrival brought God’s Light of love, mercy and grace into the world like it had never seen before the Light.  The Arrival with all the details was foretold centuries in advance.  But many got tired of waiting and turned away from God who promised a Messiah.  Maybe it was because their notion of Messiah was more about creating better living conditions with no thought about their souls’ condition.  So, there was that.  But for those who still believed, they knew and worshiped The Arrival promised.

The Chosen film series as given us more to think about as we mentally form the scene of The Arrival of Jesus over 2000 years ago. God, through His Son, came down to earth in the form of helpless, venerable newborn.  Only God can do that!  Then, to add to the excitement, The Arrival did not happen at home!  They were ordered, along with hundreds of others to leave their community, go to their district assigned as Bethlehem to be counted by the oppressive government so more taxes could be collected for the government!  After walking and riding a donkey, many miles, nine months pregnant the time came, ordained by God while His angels watched on.  Imagine the scene in heaven, too!

So, if you are nine months and want it all to happen, you could ride a donkey for a few miles?  Mm, maybe not.  Back to the barn, The Arrival was completely in the hands of Mary and Joseph who were spiritually prepared nine months earlier by the words of angels but now the baby is really coming!  I’m sure they didn’t imagine or prepare for the Arrival to be on the dirt, cold barn floor, with the smell of dung mixed with hay and straw.  They didn’t prepare to be away from home, but maybe this was a kindness to Mary whose reputation was soiled by misunderstanding God’s Plan for her from the hometown folks. 

But back to the birth pains, it is time for The Arrival!  Knowing that this arrival was Messiah, the Solution to our Sin Problem, Mary and Joseph did what God told them to do.  God chose His Son’s parents-on-earth well. There was nothing else to do, the Baby is coming!  Let’s do this!  God protected as He watched the birth.  Mary and Joseph, with child-like faith, trusted God.

Paul’s message today tells us how The Arrival affects all of humanity!  Those who really believe God and His Plan to save us through Jesus, His Son, are set free from the jailhouse of sin!  No more death, only Life!  So, what do we choose?  The Solution is Jesus!

Our old routines, habits and schedules are completely rearranged because of The Arrival of Jesus into our hearts, minds and souls.  Our new, redeemed lives now revolve around His life and teaching, HIS will and purpose for us, as live real life on God’s terms.  God is in charge!  He traded our worst for His best.  Oh, how He loves us!

ROMANS—OUR CARE AND CALLING

Romans 8, The Message

The Solution Is Life on God’s Terms

1-2 With the arrival of Jesus, the Messiah, that fateful dilemma is resolved. Those who enter into Christ’s being-here-for-us no longer have to live under a continuous, low-lying black cloud. A new power is in operation. The Spirit of life in Christ, like a strong wind, has magnificently cleared the air, freeing you from a fated lifetime of brutal tyranny at the hands of sin and death.

3-4 God went for the jugular when he sent his own Son. He didn’t deal with the problem as something remote and unimportant. In his Son, Jesus, he personally took on the human condition, entered the disordered mess of struggling humanity in order to set it right once and for all. The law code, weakened as it always was by fractured human nature, could never have done that.

The law always ended up being used as a Band-Aid on sin instead of a deep healing of it. And now what the law code asked for but we couldn’t deliver is accomplished as we, instead of redoubling our own efforts, simply embrace what the Spirit is doing in us.

5-8 Those who think they can do it on their own end up obsessed with measuring their own moral muscle but never get around to exercising it in real life. Those who trust God’s action in them find that God’s Spirit is in them—living and breathing God! Obsession with self in these matters is a dead end; attention to God leads us out into the open, into a spacious, free life. Focusing on the self is the opposite of focusing on God. Anyone completely absorbed in self ignores God, ends up thinking more about self than God. That person ignores who God is and what he is doing. And God isn’t pleased at being ignored.

9-11 But if God himself has taken up residence in your life, you can hardly be thinking more of yourself than of him. Anyone, of course, who has not welcomed this invisible but clearly present God, the Spirit of Christ, won’t know what we’re talking about. But for you who welcome him, in whom he dwells—even though you still experience all the limitations of sin—you yourself experience life on God’s terms. It stands to reason, doesn’t it, that if the alive-and-present God who raised Jesus from the dead moves into your life, he’ll do the same thing in you that he did in Jesus, bringing you alive to himself? When God lives and breathes in you (and he does, as surely as he did in Jesus), you are delivered from that dead life. With his Spirit living in you, your body will be as alive as Christ’s!

12-14 So don’t you see that we don’t owe this old do-it-yourself life one red cent. There’s nothing in it for us, nothing at all. The best thing to do is give it a decent burial and get on with your new life. God’s Spirit beckons. There are things to do and places to go!

15-17 This resurrection life you received from God is not a timid, grave-tending life. It’s adventurously expectant, greeting God with a childlike “What’s next, Papa?” God’s Spirit touches our spirits and confirms who we really are.

We know who he is, and we know who we are: Father and children. And we know we are going to get what’s coming to us—an unbelievable inheritance! We go through exactly what Christ goes through. If we go through the hard times with him, then we’re certainly going to go through the good times with him!

HOW DID “THE ARRIVAL” AFFECT HUMANITY?

  • “With the arrival of Jesus, the Messiah, that fateful dilemma is resolved. Those who enter into Christ’s being-here-for-us no longer have to live under a continuous, low-lying black cloud.”
  • “In his Son, Jesus, God personally took on the human condition, entered the disordered mess of struggling humanity in order to set it right once and for all.”
  • To all who believe and follow Jesus comes the amazing realization that The Arrival of Jesus is the Solution to Real Life.  “God with us” living in us!
  • “What’s next, Papa?” This is expectant, joyful, free from sin and death living in the wide-open spaces of God’s love and care.

Lord,

Thank you for leaving the comfort of heaven to come to save us.  God, thank you for sacrificing Your One and Only Son.  Thank you for loving us the way you do.  Help us to love like you love us.

In Jesus Name, Amen

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SPOILER ALERT:  I CANNOT BE GOOD

Posted on December 20, 2021 by randscallawayffm

God gave Randy and I quite a few opportunities to direct church camps back in our younger adult ministry years.  Our goal was always to teach kids more than “come and be saved”, but to go beyond that concept to living the life Jesus taught us.  We felt we were doing them a disservice if we didn’t.  We were seeing so many kids stream to the altar, over and over again, after a powerful message and then testify, “Now I will be good.”  Each year.  Same kids.  No sooner were the words out of their mouths than evil displayed its power of sin over the ones who declared themselves sin free.  Proclaiming “I will be good from now on” became their first mistake in their new life with Jesus.  With their declaration, pride and boastfulness seeped in like a lion on the prowl, as they misunderstood immediately WHO is should be now in control of their lives.

Dear Friends, we cannot, no matter how much we declare it, be “good” on our own.  We need the power of Jesus in us, the power of God’s Holy Spirit helping us, in the choices we will make.  Life offers a million choices each day.  Jesus is not a twelve-step program, Jesus is the life-giver, sustainer, forgiver, redeemer and THE answer to all of life’s choices. Ask for His wisdom and He promises to give it!

Read as Paul, who knows he cannot be good on his own, explains…

ROMANS—OUR CARE AND CALLING

Romans 7, The Message

Torn Between One Way and Another

1-3 You shouldn’t have any trouble understanding this, friends, for you know all the ins and outs of the law—how it works and how its power touches only the living. For instance, a wife is legally tied to her husband while he lives, but if he dies, she’s free. If she lives with another man while her husband is living, she’s obviously an adulteress. But if he dies, she is quite free to marry another man in good conscience, with no one’s disapproval.

4-6 So, my friends, this is something like what has taken place with you. When Christ died he took that entire rule-dominated way of life down with him and left it in the tomb, leaving you free to “marry” a resurrection life and bear “offspring” of faith for God. For as long as we lived that old way of life, doing whatever we felt we could get away with, sin was calling most of the shots as the old law code hemmed us in. And this made us all the more rebellious. In the end, all we had to show for it was miscarriages and stillbirths. But now that we’re no longer shackled to that domineering mate of sin, and out from under all those oppressive regulations and fine print, we’re free to live a new life in the freedom of God.

7 But I can hear you say, “If the law code was as bad as all that, it’s no better than sin itself.” That’s certainly not true. The law code had a perfectly legitimate function. Without its clear guidelines for right and wrong, moral behavior would be mostly guesswork. Apart from the succinct, surgical command, “You shall not covet,” I could have dressed covetousness up to look like a virtue and ruined my life with it.

8-12 Don’t you remember how it was? I do, perfectly well. The law code started out as an excellent piece of work. What happened, though, was that sin found a way to pervert the command into a temptation, making a piece of “forbidden fruit” out of it. The law code, instead of being used to guide me, was used to seduce me. Without all the paraphernalia of the law code, sin looked pretty dull and lifeless, and I went along without paying much attention to it. But once sin got its hands on the law code and decked itself out in all that finery, I was fooled, and fell for it. The very command that was supposed to guide me into life was cleverly used to trip me up, throwing me headlong. So sin was plenty alive, and I was stone dead. But the law code itself is God’s good and common sense, each command sane and holy counsel.

13 I can already hear your next question: “Does that mean I can’t even trust what is good [that is, the law]? Is good just as dangerous as evil?” No again! Sin simply did what sin is so famous for doing: using the good as a cover to tempt me to do what would finally destroy me. By hiding within God’s good commandment, sin did far more mischief than it could ever have accomplished on its own.

14-16 I can anticipate the response that is coming: “I know that all God’s commands are spiritual, but I’m not. Isn’t this also your experience?” Yes. I’m full of myself—after all, I’ve spent a long time in sin’s prison. What I don’t understand about myself is that I decide one way, but then I act another, doing things I absolutely despise. So if I can’t be trusted to figure out what is best for myself and then do it, it becomes obvious that God’s command is necessary.

17-20 But I need something more! For if I know the law but still can’t keep it, and if the power of sin within me keeps sabotaging my best intentions, I obviously need help! I realize that I don’t have what it takes. I can will it, but I can’t do it. I decide to do good, but I don’t really do it; I decide not to do bad, but then I do it anyway. My decisions, such as they are, don’t result in actions. Something has gone wrong deep within me and gets the better of me every time.

21-23 It happens so regularly that it’s predictable. The moment I decide to do good, sin is there to trip me up. I truly delight in God’s commands, but it’s pretty obvious that not all of me joins in that delight. Parts of me covertly rebel, and just when I least expect it, they take charge.

24 I’ve tried everything and nothing helps. I’m at the end of my rope. Is there no one who can do anything for me? Isn’t that the real question?

25 The answer, thank God, is that Jesus Christ can and does. He acted to set things right in this life of contradictions where I want to serve God with all my heart and mind, but am pulled by the influence of sin to do something totally different.

WHAT DO WE LEARN?

We cannot be good on our own.  We need help.

Jesus died to free us and rose again to save us from ourselves and the power sin has over us.

Jesus sets things right with God on our behalf no matter who we are, where we’ve been or what we have done.  Go to Jesus, ask for His forgiveness.  Then invite the Holy Spirit to speak to your heart.  He will.  Then we must focus our hearts, minds and souls to follow the promptings of God’s Spirit who has our best interests at heart.  If and when we get too busy to hear, wander out from under His protection and power, run back to God.  Like the earthly father wanting for His prodigal son to return, as soon as we take the first step, Jesus runs to us with His forgiveness and powerful help.  The power of God has, is and always will be more powerful than the evil who opposes God.  “You, dear children, are from God and have overcome them, because the one who is in you is greater than the one who is in the world.” 1 John 4:4.

“See, I have engraved you on the palms of my hands; your walls are ever before me.” Isaiah 49:16. God know you.  God knows what you are facing today.  God knows the choices before you.  Remember, try to wrap your mind around this truth:  God knew you before you were formed in the womb of your mother.  He knows the “walls” we face each day and gave us the supreme answer to all of life’s questions. 

Our names are now firmly written on the nail-scarred hands of Jesus. Jesus knew us and knows us.  He thought of us while on the cross dying for our sins. Our sin held him there until it was finished. 

Consider this:  Who do you think loves you more and wants to help you be like Him?  Pray and meditate.  Take all the time you need.  I am and I will, all day long.

Lord,

You died and rose again to set our lives right with God.  God, you had a plan from the beginning to save us and then teach us your best way to walk, talk and live, explaining the full intention for The Law.  Your Plan’s root is based on your love for us.  I cannot thank you enough for all you have done, are doing and continue to do in my life.  I cannot be good on my own.  I gave up that notion long ago and now lean on you for wisdom, insight and understanding because of your great, loving, redeeming act of saving my soul.  Help me to hear you with focus to follow you without hesitation all day long today and every day of my life here while waiting to be with you there.  Thank you for being with us now.

In Jesus Name, For Your Glory, Amen

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WHY GO BACK THERE?

Posted on December 18, 2021 by randscallawayffm

A couple of months ago, Randy and I took a quick trip back to Oklahoma where we were raised. It was a spontaneous trip, planned in about 24 hours, complete with flight, rental and hotel, to see OU play football.  While there, we spent some time going back to revisit all the “haunts” where we grew up, taught school, had fun times, where family resided years earlier.  We visited the church where we gave our lives to Christ as children, then much later served as a ministry couple. 

This brought back many good memories but it also reminded us of all the mistakes, troubles and sin in our growing up years.  And we sighed.  What made it bearable was to realize, in grateful praise, all that God brought us through, how He saved our souls and made us whole.  Since that time, God has taken us on a journey, day by day, step by step, to follow Him no matter what’s happening around us.  We still make mistakes, but He forgives us and helps us keep moving closer to Him.  We don’t reside in that sin-place of thinking anymore.  In Jesus, we found new life and a new way to live.  We decided a long time ago, we’re not going back to where we were!  There is nothing there for us.  Sin no longer has a hold on us!  Only God, through Jesus, His Son! 

Why go back there?  Not Oklahoma, the state, but the sin that enslaves us?  We discovered you can go back home physically, but there is no reason to go back to place where sin tied us down.  We thank God for teaching us His way of life that leads to freedom.

Consider this…Imagine being given a brand-new car as a tax-free gift!  Your excitement is over the moon!  However, you still remember the fun you had with your old, present car.  You just can’t let go of the old clunker that was not dependable, full of dirt and rust in the undercarriage, and stained by all that you and your family had done to it.  Would you park the new car in the garage and never experience driving around in it, enjoying all the benefits of the newness?  Would you cling to the old car as if it was your only mode of transportation until it completely disintegrated?  Here is a better question, which one do you trust more to get you where you need to go?  New or old? 

Are we coming a little closer to understanding the difference between old and new?

Paul gave us the best explanation of all!  When we repented of our sins to Jesus, we packed up and left where sin lives.  To show this to the world, we were baptized as a witness the world that our sin was buried in the waters!  We were then raised up from the burial water alive in Christ!  We declared that we no longer live where sin is, the sin-world that separates us from God.  “We entered a new country of grace!”  Why go back there? says Paul.  Why go back to death when we can have life eternal?  Hang on to every word God says!  What God says is His best for us.  Always.  “Sin speaks a dead language.”  God speaks words of life.  I’m not who I used to be, praise God.  God is shaping me daily into all He created me to be.  I love Him heart, mind and soul.  All of me desires all of Him working in and through me for His glory. 

We cannot help but sing praises for all God has done, is doing, and will do for eternity all because of His great love for us.  He gave us Jesus and with Jesus we have a brand-new life.  Why go back there…to the old life that only leads to death when we can have life, Real Life?

And I’m singing…Resurrection Song by Elevation…

By Your spirit I will rise
From the ashes of defeat
The resurrected King, is resurrecting me
In Your name I come alive
To declare Your victory
The resurrected King, is resurrecting me

ROMANS—OUR CARE AND CALLING

Romans 6:1-14, The Message

 When Death Becomes Life

1-3 So what do we do? Keep on sinning so God can keep on forgiving? I should hope not! If we’ve left the country where sin is sovereign, how can we still live in our old house there? Or didn’t you realize we packed up and left there for good? That is what happened in baptism. When we went under the water, we left the old country of sin behind; when we came up out of the water, we entered into the new country of grace—a new life in a new land!

3-5 That’s what baptism into the life of Jesus means. When we are lowered into the water, it is like the burial of Jesus; when we are raised up out of the water, it is like the resurrection of Jesus. Each of us is raised into a light-filled world by our Father so that we can see where we’re going in our new grace-sovereign country.

6-11 Could it be any clearer? Our old way of life was nailed to the cross with Christ, a decisive end to that sin-miserable life—no longer captive to sin’s demands! What we believe is this: If we get included in Christ’s sin-conquering death, we also get included in his life-saving resurrection. We know that when Jesus was raised from the dead it was a signal of the end of death-as-the-end. Never again will death have the last word. When Jesus died, he took sin down with him, but alive he brings God down to us. From now on, think of it this way: Sin speaks a dead language that means nothing to you; God speaks your mother tongue, and you hang on every word. You are dead to sin and alive to God. That’s what Jesus did.

12-14 That means you must not give sin a vote in the way you conduct your lives. Don’t give it the time of day. Don’t even run little errands that are connected with that old way of life. Throw yourselves wholeheartedly and full-time—remember, you’ve been raised from the dead!—into God’s way of doing things. Sin can’t tell you how to live. After all, you’re not living under that old tyranny any longer. You’re living in the freedom of God.

SO, WHAT DO WE LEARN?

Once sin is repented and we are saved by grace, sin no longer has a hold on us.  Don’t go back and give the old life the time of day, Paul teaches.  Give God ALL your life, the good, bad and ugly, and He will lead us into new life that is beyond our wildest dreams.  Go full-speed ahead, full-time, not part time, into God’s way of doing life.  Live in freedom with God for the glory of God.  Realize the depths of His love for us and then love others like He loves us.  Once you taste this pure freedom, you won’t want to go back!

My prayer for all of us, dear friends.

In Jesus Name, For His Glory, Amen.

The head that once was crowned with thorns
Is crowned with glory now
The Savior knelt to wash our feet
Now at His feet we bow

The One who wore our sin and shame
Now robed in majesty
The radiance of perfect love
Now shines for all to see

Your name, Your name
Is victory
All praise, will rise
To Christ, our king

Your name, Your name
Is victory
All praise, will rise
To Christ, our king

The fear that held us now gives way
To Him who is our peace
His final breath upon the cross
Is now alive in me

Your name, Your name
Is victory
All praise, will rise
To Christ, our king

Your name, Your name
Is victory
All praise, will rise
To Christ, our king

By Your spirit I will rise
From the ashes of defeat
The resurrected King, is resurrecting me
In Your name I come alive
To declare Your victory
The resurrected King, is resurrecting me…

Yeah, I’m not going back.

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HE’S THE ONE!

Posted on December 17, 2021 by randscallawayffm

At this time of year of gift giving, Randy and I like to reminisce over the gifts we have given to our children and grandchildren.  We think of the reactions and the looks on their faces when we got it right.  (We didn’t always get it right, for we are human).  In our lean years of ministry and teaching, our kids received clothes because that’s what they needed most along with one requested toy.  Because they had generous grandparents, aunts and uncles, they also had a variety of others gifts that brought joy to their faces and filled in what we couldn’t do financially at the time. I praise God for them.

When our grandchildren came along, we loved trying to bring joy to their faces with what we thought they wanted as opposed to what they needed.  That’s always a lot more fun in the giving, right?  When needing is coupled with wanting, then you really hit the jackpot of giving! (Smiling)  When we succeeded, it made gift giving all the more enjoyable.  I felt my heart skip a beat to know they were happy.  When a gift is received well, it encourages us to want to give all the more! 

One year, we gave one of our young grandsons a particular gift that he had been longing to have for quite some time.  Because children are fickle, what they say they want can change in 24 hours, we wondered if he still remembered asking for it.  As soon as the first big rip of the paper revealed his heart’s desire, he shouted, “It’s the one!”  “THIS is the one I wanted forever.”  Yes, children are dramatic.  That’s what we love about them—when we are on the receiving end of their ecstatic joy!  It brought tears to our eyes to hit the mark with him with just the right gift!

God gave us a Gift we didn’t know we needed until we realized we needed this Gift most.  His gift was Jesus, who came at just the right time to make things right for a world of individuals, His created, who might stop routines and receive this Gift with open hands and outstretched arms.  Embracing this Gift with both hands, we grasped a forever Life! 

Friends, I wonder, did God shed a tear of joy when we shouted, “HE’S THE ONE!”  “THIS is the ONE I wanted and needed!”, upon opening our Gift?  Jesus, the One and Only, is the forever Gift that keeps on giving.  Jesus is THE Gift that is the difference between life and death forever!  Jesus is the Gift that opened the door to God’s heart.  God, who loved us from the beginning, prepared this Gift in advance for us to redeem us from sin and death.

THIS is the message of the greatest Gift in a nutshell.  Paul explains… 

ROMANS—OUR CARE AND CALLING

Romans 5:12-21, The Message

The Death-Dealing Sin, the Life-Giving Gift

12-14 You know the story of how Adam landed us in the dilemma we’re in—first sin, then death, and no one exempt from either sin or death. That sin disturbed relations with God in everything and everyone, but the extent of the disturbance was not clear until God spelled it out in detail to Moses. So death, this huge abyss separating us from God, dominated the landscape from Adam to Moses. Even those who didn’t sin precisely as Adam did by disobeying a specific command of God still had to experience this termination of life, this separation from God. But Adam, who got us into this, also points ahead to the One who will get us out of it.

15-17 Yet the rescuing gift is not exactly parallel to the death-dealing sin. If one man’s sin put crowds of people at the dead-end abyss of separation from God, just think what God’s gift poured through one man, Jesus Christ, will do! There’s no comparison between that death-dealing sin and this generous, life-giving gift. The verdict on that one sin was the death sentence; the verdict on the many sins that followed was this wonderful life sentence. If death got the upper hand through one man’s wrongdoing, can you imagine the breathtaking recovery life makes, absolute life, in those who grasp with both hands this wildly extravagant life-gift, this grand setting-everything-right, that the one man Jesus Christ provides?

18-19 Here it is in a nutshell: Just as one person did it wrong and got us in all this trouble with sin and death, another person did it right and got us out of it. But more than just getting us out of trouble, he got us into life! One man said no to God and put many people in the wrong; one man said yes to God and put many in the right.

20-21 All that passing laws against sin did was produce more lawbreakers. But sin didn’t, and doesn’t, have a chance in competition with the aggressive forgiveness we call grace. When it’s sin versus grace, grace wins hands down. All sin can do is threaten us with death, and that’s the end of it. Grace, because God is putting everything together again through the Messiah, invites us into life—a life that goes on and on and on, world without end.

ICYMI:  THE GIFT OF GRACE WINS EVERY TIME!

  • Sin is the gift of death; it looks enticingly pretty on the outside, but is nasty on the inside.
  • Grace is the Gift of Jesus.  For a while, it was ugly on the outside because of the price paid on a cruel cross, but the inside of this Gift produced salvation for all. 
  • This Gift of Grace was planned before creation from a Love that is extravagant and unconditional. 
  • God had us on Him mind we He prepared the Gift to come to earth and live among humanity.  Jesus had us on His mind as He moved among us and taught us and then obeyed God with laying down is life for ours. 
  • Sin’s debt paid in full. 
  • This Gift is beyond our wildest hopes and dreams.  To receive this Gift and hold tightly to Him brings joy that we never knew before in life.  When Jesus, the Gift was unwrapped from grave clothes and brought back to life, Life eternal was born and is reborn in all who receive God’s Gift.   
  • Wow, there IS no comparison!

“…imagine the breathtaking recovery life makes, absolute life, in those who grasp with both hands this wildly extravagant life-gift, this grand setting-everything-right, that the one man Jesus Christ provides…” Paul is overjoyed when telling about the Gift he received and wants everyone to receive as well.

This Gift is a “one-size fits all” for all who have sinned and fall short of the knowing the glory of God.  Believe and receive the Gift for HE’S THE ONE!

Lord,

The Gift has been received.  I will always believe for you keep on giving all that I need to mature in your love and grace.  There is no one like you.  There is no comparison between life or death, sin or grace.  Grace wins every time when compared to the alternative of life without you.  I choose life.  I choose the Gift of your salvation through you, dear Jesus.  Thank you, thank you, thank you, you ARE the One we want and need.  You are everything to me.  Thank you for your love that brought us together.  Help me to love like you love me.

In Jesus Name, Amen

And we’re singing, “Grace Wins” by Matthew West…

There’s a war between guilt and grace
And they’re fighting for a sacred space
But I’m living proof
Grace wins every time, yeah

No more lying down in death’s defeat
Now I’m rising up in victory
Singing Hallelujah
Grace wins every time

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PASSIONATE PATIENCE

Posted on December 16, 2021 by randscallawayffm

Who has it?  Who wants to do the work to get it?  Work?  Yes, it takes work to shape and form passionate patience.  This isn’t your normal, natural homegrown, do-it-yourself patience for short periods of time such as being okay with spilled milk of a child and helping them to clean it up.  This is God formed patience.  It is forming the kind of passionate patience that God has for us, forgiving us when we make a mess of things and come close to devastation of our lives and in the lives of those around us.  It does not come at once but is shaped over the years in our journey with Him.  The more we get to know our Lord, the more we become like Jesus in our thinking, talking and walking.  He then works in us as we begin to form His character traits. 

Just as children mirror their parents without even thinking, may we mirror the character traits of our Father in Heaven.  That’s what Jesus so perfectly mirrored to us while on earth!

Having patience in all troubles and circumstances is not easy.  Jesus told his disciples (and us), thought that there would always be troubles, but with the promise that HE has already overcome it all.  “I have told you all this so that you may have peace in me. Here on earth you will have many trials and sorrows. But take heart, because I have overcome the world.” John 16:33. So, therefore we are overcomers with Him. And what about that peace in Him!  Just to know that battles we face are only temporary and that victory is already ours, helps to frame life’s temporary skirmishes in our present circumstances into victory! 

Our Victor also sent the Holy Spirit to guide and develop passionate patience in us through troubles.  It is one of the character traits of God that Paul calls the fruits of the Spirit.  As we obey the work of God’s Holy Spirit living in us, as believers of Jesus, the Spirit begins to grow and mature us in all kinds of ways.  The closer to Jesus and the more pliable we are to His Spirit, we will discover that we are changing from the inside out. The deeper we go in His teaching, we see the “fruits” of His labor of love displayed in our lives, forming character traits which reflects the One we believe.  Passionate patience is one of those characteristics.  We cannot form this ourselves.  Patience for me is not a trait I was born with, it had to grow, it is still growing!

Paul tells us specifically of other fruits of God’s character, what they are and where they come from: “…the Holy Spirit produces this kind of fruit in our lives: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. There is no law against these things!”

“Those who belong to Christ Jesus have nailed the passions and desires of their sinful nature to his cross and crucified them there. Since we are living by the Spirit, let us follow the Spirit’s leading in every part of our lives. Let us not become conceited, or provoke one another, or be jealous of one another.”  Galatians 5:23-26

In this next passage, Paul tells us of the wonderful benefits of allowing God’s Holy Spirit to freely do His work in us.  Read on…

ROMANS—OUR CARE AND CALLING

Romans 5:1-11, The Message

Developing Patience

1-2 By entering through faith into what God has always wanted to do for us—set us right with him, make us fit for him—we have it all together with God because of our Master Jesus. And that’s not all: We throw open our doors to God and discover at the same moment that he has already thrown open his door to us. We find ourselves standing where we always hoped we might stand—out in the wide open spaces of God’s grace and glory, standing tall and shouting our praise.

3-5 There’s more to come: We continue to shout our praise even when we’re hemmed in with troubles, because we know how troubles can develop passionate patience in us, and how that patience in turn forges the tempered steel of virtue, keeping us alert for whatever God will do next. In alert expectancy such as this, we’re never left feeling shortchanged. Quite the contrary—we can’t round up enough containers to hold everything God generously pours into our lives through the Holy Spirit!

6-8 Christ arrives right on time to make this happen. He didn’t, and doesn’t, wait for us to get ready. He presented himself for this sacrificial death when we were far too weak and rebellious to do anything to get ourselves ready. And even if we hadn’t been so weak, we wouldn’t have known what to do anyway. We can understand someone dying for a person worth dying for, and we can understand how someone good and noble could inspire us to selfless sacrifice. But God put his love on the line for us by offering his Son in sacrificial death while we were of no use whatever to him.

9-11 Now that we are set right with God by means of this sacrificial death, the consummate blood sacrifice, there is no longer a question of being at odds with God in any way. If, when we were at our worst, we were put on friendly terms with God by the sacrificial death of his Son, now that we’re at our best, just think of how our lives will expand and deepen by means of his resurrection life! Now that we have actually received this amazing friendship with God, we are no longer content to simply say it in plodding prose. We sing and shout our praises to God through Jesus, the Messiah!

ICYMI:  THE BENEFITS OF THE HOLY SPIRITS WORK IN US…

“We find ourselves standing where we always hoped we might stand—out in the wide open spaces of God’s grace and glory, standing tall and shouting our praise.”

“We continue to shout our praise even when we’re hemmed in with troubles, because we know how troubles can develop passionate patience in us, and how that patience in turn forges the tempered steel of virtue, keeping us alert for whatever God will do next.”

“…we can’t round up enough containers to hold everything God generously pours into our lives through the Holy Spirit!”

“Christ arrives right on time to make this happen. He didn’t, and doesn’t, wait for us to get ready.”

“God put his love on the line for us by offering his Son in sacrificial death while we were of no use whatever to him.”

“…when we were at our worst, we were put on friendly terms with God by the sacrificial death of his Son, now that we’re at our best, just think of how our lives will expand and deepen by means of his resurrection life!”

We are friends with God!!  Because we believe in Jesus, we have this amazing friendship with God! 

Lord,

Our friendship just keeps growing and maturing and taking me to places I never thought possible.  You have had the patience to put up with my messes and shortcomings.  Your love and passionate patience is amazing.  You are the One and Only who sets things right with you.  Then, as an added bonus, you develop your kind of passionate patience in us.  I trust You. I trust in what you are doing continually in me.  Not there yet, but on my way.  Thank you, Lord.

In Jesus Name, Amen. 

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PURE TRUST—A TRUSTING-HIM-TO-DO-IT TRUST

Posted on December 15, 2021 by randscallawayffm

We can all agree there will times in our lives that we throw up our hands and shout, “I can’t, I just can’t”.  Life’s challenges overwhelm us to the point of asking God and whoever else is in earshot, “What is going on?”  With our heightened emotions, the questions we tend to fall back on are; “What did I do to deserve this?” “Why me?” “What do I need to do next to get out of this?”  The next thing we humans do in an effort to sort it all out is to blame others as well as our circumstances.  “If only Joe would have listened to me in the first place.”  “If we had more money, better jobs, etc. this would not be an issue.”  Above all this, we ask, “Where is God?” 

Maybe a better question is who do we really trust?  God has been there all along.

Paul takes us higher in our thinking about life challenges and life itself.  He teaches us more about our growing relationship with God than how to handle our circumstances.  Because he is talking to Jews who are embedded in tradition, he wisely begins with the story Abraham they all know well but then almost shouts, “plot twist!”  Paul then relates, “But the story we’re given is a God-story, not an Abraham-story.”  No matter what we face in this life, trust in God is a gift from God to set us right with Him.  Embrace God. Embrace what HE is doing.  There is nothing we do to get God’s attention, love, or salvation for life.  We only trust.  God sets things right through Jesus Christ His Son. 

Consider Paul’s point.  If we solved all of life’s issues by ourselves, we would be boastful and arrogant and think we wouldn’t need God at all.  (And we would create an even bigger mess because of our lack of knowing.  Been there, done that!)  Doing life our way is not a great relationship to have with the God of Creation, Our Father in heaven, the one who knows all and is in all, the One and Only who knows us by name and knows what is in our hearts as well as what is in the hearts of others.  It is most certainly not the relationship God desires with us.  He knows we cannot solve problems on our own, battle evil’s constant arrows, while walking the tightrope between good and evil.  We need Him.  And He is there.  Waiting.

God knew from the beginning of creation that we couldn’t save ourselves.  He knew we needed a Savior to redeem us from our sins.  He sent Jesus, His Son.  God knew we would need a Guide so He gave us His Holy Spirit as a gift to live in us to help us.  And there’s more…

ROMANS—OUR CARE AND CALLING

Romans 4

Trusting God

1-3 So how do we fit what we know of Abraham, our first father in the faith, into this new way of looking at things? If Abraham, by what he did for God, got God to approve him, he could certainly have taken credit for it. But the story we’re given is a God-story, not an Abraham-story. What we read in Scripture is, “Abraham entered into what God was doing for him, and that was the turning point. He trusted God to set him right instead of trying to be right on his own.”

4-5 If you’re a hard worker and do a good job, you deserve your pay; we don’t call your wages a gift. But if you see that the job is too big for you, that it’s something only God can do, and you trust him to do it—you could never do it for yourself no matter how hard and long you worked—well, that trusting-him-to-do-it is what gets you set right with God, by God. Sheer gift.

6-9 David confirms this way of looking at it, saying that the one who trusts God to do the putting-everything-right without insisting on having a say in it is one fortunate man:

Fortunate those whose crimes are whisked away,
    whose sins are wiped clean from the slate.
Fortunate the person against
    whom the Lord does not keep score.

Do you think for a minute that this blessing is only pronounced over those of us who keep our religious ways and are circumcised? Or do you think it possible that the blessing could be given to those who never even heard of our ways, who were never brought up in the disciplines of God? We all agree, don’t we, that it was by embracing what God did for him that Abraham was declared fit before God?

10-11 Now think: Was that declaration made before or after he was marked by the covenant rite of circumcision? That’s right, before he was marked. That means that he underwent circumcision as evidence and confirmation of what God had done long before to bring him into this acceptable standing with himself, an act of God he had embraced with his whole life.

12 And it means further that Abraham is father of all people who embrace what God does for them while they are still on the “outs” with God, as yet unidentified as God’s, in an “uncircumcised” condition. It is precisely these people in this condition who are called “set right by God and with God”! Abraham is also, of course, father of those who have undergone the religious rite of circumcision not just because of the ritual but because they were willing to live in the risky faith-embrace of God’s action for them, the way Abraham lived long before he was marked by circumcision.

13-15 That famous promise God gave Abraham—that he and his children would possess the earth—was not given because of something Abraham did or would do. It was based on God’s decision to put everything together for him, which Abraham then entered when he believed. If those who get what God gives them only get it by doing everything they are told to do and filling out all the right forms properly signed, that eliminates personal trust completely and turns the promise into an ironclad contract! That’s not a holy promise; that’s a business deal. A contract drawn up by a hard-nosed lawyer and with plenty of fine print only makes sure that you will never be able to collect. But if there is no contract in the first place, simply a promise—and God’s promise at that—you can’t break it.

16 This is why the fulfillment of God’s promise depends entirely on trusting God and his way, and then simply embracing him and what he does. God’s promise arrives as pure gift. That’s the only way everyone can be sure to get in on it, those who keep the religious traditions and those who have never heard of them. For Abraham is father of us all. He is not our racial father—that’s reading the story backward. He is our faith father.

17-18 We call Abraham “father” not because he got God’s attention by living like a saint, but because God made something out of Abraham when he was a nobody. Isn’t that what we’ve always read in Scripture, God saying to Abraham, “I set you up as father of many peoples”? Abraham was first named “father” and then became a father because he dared to trust God to do what only God could do: raise the dead to life, with a word make something out of nothing. When everything was hopeless, Abraham believed anyway, deciding to live not on the basis of what he saw he couldn’t do but on what God said he would do. And so he was made father of a multitude of peoples. God himself said to him, “You’re going to have a big family, Abraham!”

19-25 Abraham didn’t focus on his own impotence and say, “It’s hopeless. This hundred-year-old body could never father a child.” Nor did he survey Sarah’s decades of infertility and give up. He didn’t tiptoe around God’s promise asking cautiously skeptical questions. He plunged into the promise and came up strong, ready for God, sure that God would make good on what he had said. That’s why it is said, “Abraham was declared fit before God by trusting God to set him right.” But it’s not just Abraham; it’s also us! The same thing gets said about us when we embrace and believe the One who brought Jesus to life when the conditions were equally hopeless. The sacrificed Jesus made us fit for God, set us right with God.

THINK ABOUT IT…

Are we willing to live in pure trust in God, with a “risky faith-embrace” of God’s actions in us?  Am I?

Do we really believe what we know about God really real?  This is the foundation of our trust.  So, we need to take time to ask and evaluate the strength of our faith-embrace in the God who knows us, acts on our behalf because He wants His best for us. 

Do we believe in God?  Do we believe God?

Is our relationship only a business deal with God?  “God, if you do this for me, I’ll do this for you?” 

“The fulfillment of God’s promise depends entirely on trusting God and his way, and then simply embracing him and what he does.”  Pure Trust in God.  Nothing more.  Nothing less.

When everything seems hopeless, who do we turn to?  “When everything was hopeless, Abraham believed anyway, deciding to live not on the basis of what he saw he couldn’t do but on what God said he would do.”

The Plot twist in our lives happens when we believe, “anyway”, and decide trust God to do what only He can do.  That’s when God intervenes.  Our trust is His “go button” it seems to do what only He can do.  Trust God.  Embrace and believe God.

“The same thing gets said about us when we embrace and believe the One who brought Jesus to life when the conditions were equally hopeless. The sacrificed Jesus made us fit for God, set us right with God.”

Lord,

Thank you for Paul’s message of hope, trust, faith, strength all because of YOU setting things right.  Your story is all about You making us fit and setting us right through you, dear Jesus.  Thank you for wanting an intimate, growing, holy relationship with me.  Abiding in you as you abide in me only serves to strength my trust, hope and faith in You.  Thank you for your love, your unconditional love, that was the foundation of the plan to save me, to save all who believe, who really believe.

In Jesus Name, For Your Glory, Amen.  I believe.

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ALL HAVE DONE IT WRONG, BUT ALL HAVE A WAY OUT!

Posted on December 14, 2021 by randscallawayffm

Years ago, our church had fallen to hard times.  We had to start over from scratch so to speak.  We asked God to guide us to what He wanted.  There was a program of calling people to ask if they attended and would they consider coming.  This was the start to declaring our testimony as a church of believers in Jesus.  The questions were brief and very simple that required only a quick response.  In six weeks, we met nightly and called over 20,000 people in the neighborhoods surrounding the driving distance to the church.  This quick survey was successful in reaching those who had never thought about coming to church previously. 

Some of the responses made us laugh.  Some made us sad.  Others we prayed with because they were lonely and waiting for someone to call them it seemed.  We had some friendly words as well as hateful words.  I remember one call I had that spoke volumes about this person’s belief.  When asked, are you a Christian, who knows and follows Jesus, this person responded vehemently, “No, I’m a Baptist!  My grandaddy was a Baptist, my daddy, and now I am a Baptist.”  Taken aback with how he responded along with what he said, I asked, So, you attend a Baptist church?  His response?  Every Christmas and Easter—religiously. 

So…I understand what Paul is trying to say to the Jews.  Your religion isn’t going to save you, my friends!  Even if your grandaddy and daddy were Jews and now you are a Jew by hereditary birth, you are in the same boat with the rest of the sinners. 

Wait!  What?

ROMANS—OUR CARE AND CALLING

Romans 3:1-20, The Message

1-2 So what difference does it make who’s a Jew and who isn’t, who has been trained in God’s ways and who hasn’t? As it turns out, it makes a lot of difference—but not the difference so many have assumed.

2-6 First, there’s the matter of being put in charge of writing down and caring for God’s revelation, these Holy Scriptures. So, what if, in the course of doing that, some of those Jews abandoned their post? God didn’t abandon them. Do you think their faithlessness cancels out his faithfulness? Not on your life! Depend on it: God keeps his word even when the whole world is lying through its teeth. Scripture says the same:

Your words stand fast and true;
Rejection doesn’t faze you.

But if our wrongdoing only underlines and confirms God’s rightdoing, shouldn’t we be commended for helping out? Since our lies don’t even make a dent in his truth, isn’t it wrong of God to back us to the wall and hold us to our word? These questions come up. The answer to such questions is no, a most emphatic No! How else would things ever get straightened out if God didn’t do the straightening?

7-8 It’s simply perverse to say, “If my lies serve to show off God’s truth all the more gloriously, why blame me? I’m doing God a favor.” Some people are actually trying to put such words in our mouths, claiming that we go around saying, “The more evil we do, the more good God does, so let’s just do it!” That’s pure slander, as I’m sure you’ll agree.

We’re All in the Same Sinking Boat

9-20 So where does that put us? Do we Jews get a better break than the others? Not really. Basically, all of us, whether insiders or outsiders, start out in identical conditions, which is to say that we all start out as sinners. Scripture leaves no doubt about it:

There’s nobody living right, not even one,
    nobody who knows the score, nobody alert for God.
They’ve all taken the wrong turn;
    they’ve all wandered down blind alleys.
No one’s living right;
    I can’t find a single one.
Their throats are gaping graves,
    their tongues slick as mudslides.
Every word they speak is tinged with poison.
    They open their mouths and pollute the air.
They race for the honor of sinner-of-the-year,
    litter the land with heartbreak and ruin,
Don’t know the first thing about living with others.
    They never give God the time of day.

This makes it clear, doesn’t it, that whatever is written in these Scriptures is not what God says about others but to us to whom these Scriptures were addressed in the first place! And it’s clear enough, isn’t it, that we’re sinners, every one of us, in the same sinking boat with everybody else? Our involvement with God’s revelation doesn’t put us right with God. What it does is force us to face our complicity in everyone else’s sin.

WHAT DO WE LEARN?

All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. (v 23) We are all in the same “sinking boat” of sin.  We must all repent of our sins to Jesus who wipes clean the slate of our hearts, minds and souls of all our sin. God’s Plan for our salvation for eternal life.

It is not about us but about what God as done for and in us.  It is not about how many church services we attend, how much we give to the poor, or even how good and friendly we are to each other.  Without God, there is no real love guiding us.  (See 1 John 4).  Without sins forgiven, our lives are sinking.

Only God Has Set Things Right 

(Romans 3:21-31, The Message)

21-24 But in our time something new has been added. What Moses and the prophets witnessed to all those years has happened. The God-setting-things-right that we read about has become Jesus-setting-things-right for us. And not only for us, but for everyone who believes in him. For there is no difference between us and them in this. Since we’ve compiled this long and sorry record as sinners (both us and them) and proved that we are utterly incapable of living the glorious lives God wills for us, God did it for us. Out of sheer generosity he put us in right standing with himself. A pure gift. He got us out of the mess we’re in and restored us to where he always wanted us to be. And he did it by means of Jesus Christ.

25-26 God sacrificed Jesus on the altar of the world to clear that world of sin. Having faith in him sets us in the clear. God decided on this course of action in full view of the public—to set the world in the clear with himself through the sacrifice of Jesus, finally taking care of the sins he had so patiently endured. This is not only clear, but it’s now—this is current history! God sets things right. He also makes it possible for us to live in his rightness.

27-28 So where does that leave our proud Jewish insider claims and counterclaims? Canceled? Yes, canceled. What we’ve learned is this: God does not respond to what we do; we respond to what God does. We’ve finally figured it out. Our lives get in step with God and all others by letting him set the pace, not by proudly or anxiously trying to run the parade.

29-30 And where does that leave our proud Jewish claim of having a corner on God? Also canceled. God is the God of outsider non-Jews as well as insider Jews. How could it be otherwise since there is only one God? God sets right all who welcome his action and enter into it, both those who follow our religious system and those who have never heard of our religion.

31 But by shifting our focus from what we do to what God does, don’t we cancel out all our careful keeping of the rules and ways God commanded? Not at all. What happens, in fact, is that by putting that entire way of life in its proper place, we confirm it.

Lord,

I shift my focus completely to you once again.  I seek all you are and all you want for my best.  I love you with all that is in me.  Cleanse me.  Renew your Spirit in me.  Restore the joy of your salvation in me and through me.  Take away all that is offensive to you.  Help me to then love others like you love me—without conditions.  My life is yours.

In Jesus Name, For Your Glory, Amen

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WHO GUIDES US?

Posted on December 13, 2021 by randscallawayffm

Being a woman in leadership who is called by God for very specific tasks because of His gifts given to her is a journey that is different than a man’s journey.  Although Paul speaks of equality, the church still has varying opinions on the matter due only to traditions.  A woman who does not feel education is important and does not follow what is required of others to serve is in the wrong and does not have a platform to speak intelligently. She is hindered to help others as God would have her do.  But women who love God, heart, mind and soul, what to know all there is to know about God, willing to seek wisdom, education in God’s Word, insight and understanding before doing or saying anything for God are those truly called of God to do His bidding. 

Why write about women, when Paul is clearing talking out insiders and outsiders of the Jewish faith and tradition?  As a woman, called of God to lead very specific tasks, all my life, I know the feeling of being an “outsider” of tradition based on misinterpretation of Scripture. I have faced and still face those who think I am a little “less than” and feel I should always be mindful of my “place” in God’s work.  I’m not really being critical, just being honest.  So, my emotions are on full scale alert when reading about the uncircumcised Gentiles called outsiders and made to feel just a little lower as a believer. 

Because I know who God is and that Jesus came for all, His Holy Spirit in me has taught me to deal with this inequality as a servant…as Jesus served all of us.  (See Philippians 2).  I do not seek a higher position than a man, never have and never will.  I only seek God’s will, alongside my husband, then with other men and women called of God, truly wanting to see ALL people who have sinned and fall short of the glory of God of which I am one of them, to be saved by the blood of the Lamb, His Son, Jesus Christ.  My desire is for all people to not only know Him but to follow Him as the Guide of their lives.

Paul asked a very important question to ALL leaders, “Who is going to guide you?”  We can know all there is to know about Scripture, know all there is to know about culture and tradition; but if we don’t practice what we preach, love like Jesus loves us without conditions or prejudices, we are not truly following what God wants.  If God and His Holy Spirit isn’t guiding us, then we are just as lost, (Paul suggests even more so), as those who never claimed to know Jesus! 

Side thought:  When we are lost, humans naturally create division instead of unity and equality.  We have a constant battle with this because the fallen angel loves it when we divide ourselves.  We are easy prey to him when we are divided.

Jesus taught us to seek God first.  Then Love God.  Love Each Other.  These are two of the greatest commands, not tradition, that Jesus taught us to do as His true followers.  Jesus also showed his disciples, (and now us), clearly that He only did what His Guide, His Father, told him to think, say and do.  (See the gospels!)  Jesus was the supreme example of following God as our guide, seeking all that is of Him and what is best for our lives on earth and in heaven!  Jesus taught his disciples to seek God as Guide when He taught them to pray;

“Our Father, who is in heaven.  May your Kingdom come; may your will be done on earth as it is in heaven.  Give us this day our daily bread (all we need) to do your will.  And forgive us our sins as we forgive those who sin against us.  Lead us not into temptations but deliver us from evil.  For you have all power, to you be all the glory forevermore.”

With God, these things are possible.  Without Him?  I don’t want to go there, do you?

ROMANS—Our Care and Calling

Romans 2:17-29, The Message

Religion Can’t Save You

17-24 If you’re brought up Jewish, don’t assume that you can lean back in the arms of your religion and take it easy, feeling smug because you’re an insider to God’s revelation, a connoisseur of the best things of God, informed on the latest doctrines! I have a special word of caution for you who are sure that you have it all together yourselves and, because you know God’s revealed Word inside and out, feel qualified to guide others through their blind alleys and dark nights and confused emotions to God. While you are guiding others, who is going to guide you? I’m quite serious. While preaching “Don’t steal!” are you going to rob people blind? Who would suspect you? The same with adultery. The same with idolatry. You can get by with almost anything if you front it with eloquent talk about God and his law. The line from Scripture, “It’s because of you Jews that the outsiders frown on God,” shows it’s an old problem that isn’t going to go away.

25-29 Circumcision, the surgical ritual that marks you as a Jew, is great if you live in accord with God’s law. But if you don’t, it’s worse than not being circumcised. The reverse is also true: The uncircumcised who keep God’s ways are as good as the circumcised—in fact, better. Better to keep God’s law uncircumcised than break it circumcised. Don’t you see: It’s not the cut of a knife that makes a Jew. You become a Jew by who you are. It’s the mark of God on your heart, not of a knife on your skin, that makes a Jew. And recognition comes from God, not legalistic critics.

THINK ABOUT IT…

Who is your guide?  Think about it.  Pray.  Meditate on this thought all day long. 

Who IS my guide?  Who do I listen to?  Who do I follow with all my heart, mind and soul?

Do I follow my religion, traditions of Christmas and Easter, without asking God what He wants daily from me no matter what the season or reason?

Do I follow the frenzy of the world who only knows Jesus as a baby in a manger?  Who do I listen to?  Really?  Seriously?

My behavior towards my family, friends or strangers in this world to me, but not to God will reflect what I truly believe.  Mm, it’s time to think this though, right?  Ask for God’s help.  I am.

Lord,

Your Holy Spirit hits us right in the heart every time we look into your Word and then up to You as our Guide, Protector, Provider, Sustainer, Teacher, and Director.  Oh Lord, guide my life.  May Your will be done.  I want what you want.  Show me your ways and I will walk in them.

In Jesus Name, Amen

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HEY, HOW’S THE WATER?

Posted on December 11, 2021 by randscallawayffm

I just chased and caught a tiny frog who jumped around on my kitchen floor at my feet while I was making my coffee this morning!  He was cute, at first.  But I knew he did not belong where I am.  He felt he was totally free, doing what frogs do best, in his new, cozy and warm environment on this December day.  However, he did not belong where I live!  After trapping him in a paper towel while guiding him in with a flyswatter, I picked him up and opened the back door.  I sent him back to HIS environment where he belonged, a place where other frogs do what frogs do.  Whew.  And Ew.

This life episode, along with reading our next passage, stimulates my thinking of remembering a book I read years ago, “A Frog in a Kettle” by George Barna, infamous Christian statistician, futurist and theologian.  Written in the 90’s, his book provided what Christians needed to know about life in the year 2000. He predicted,

“In just a few years, we will enter the 21st century. And life as we know it will have radically changed. But those changes won’t come all at once. They’ll come subtly and imperceptibly. And that’s what makes the coming changes so dangerous. Like a frog in a slowly boiling kettle of water, the church has found itself in an environment that is gradually changing. And that environment could become life-threatening if we don’t stay aware of the changes and how to respond. Because if we don’t know what people’s needs are and how to meet them, we run the risk of getting in the way of God’s life-giving message.”

Mm, have we succumbed to the warm, inviting waters of sin that was always sin, slowly accepting our warm environment as we boil to death?  For a quick evaluation, look back at the television shows you loved ten or twenty years ago, or even just five years ago, and notice the subtle changes in what our world environment now deems “acceptable”. 

Paul is looking at the environment around him and warning new believers who God is, what He wants, what is acceptable to Him, along with how to live a life for and in Jesus Christ as the best life to live.  Yes, it’s a tall order!  God’s calling for us was challenging then and still is now.  You will notice it is the same sins, expressed in different ways, but is still sin.  Sin against others is sin against God, Himself and is not the best life God planned for His beloved.  When we realize the depth of love God has for us we begin to love like He loves us. 

We ended with this passage yesterday, “Bullies, swaggerers, insufferable windbags! They keep inventing new ways of wrecking lives. They ditch their parents when they get in the way. Stupid, slimy, cruel, cold-blooded. And it’s not as if they don’t know better. They know perfectly well they’re spitting in God’s face. And they don’t care—worse, they hand out prizes to those who do the worst things best!” 

Here is the response Paul wrote to continue to teach us what God thinks…

ROMANS—OUR CARE AND CALLING

Romans 2:1-16, The Message 

God Is Kind, but Not Soft

1-2 Those people are on a dark spiral downward. But if you think that leaves you on the high ground where you can point your finger at others, think again. Every time you criticize someone, you condemn yourself. It takes one to know one. Judgmental criticism of others is a well-known way of escaping detection in your own crimes and misdemeanors. But God isn’t so easily diverted. He sees right through all such smoke screens and holds you to what you’ve done.

3-4 You didn’t think, did you, that just by pointing your finger at others you would distract God from seeing all your misdoings and from coming down on you hard? Or did you think that because he’s such a nice God, he’d let you off the hook? Better think this one through from the beginning. God is kind, but he’s not soft. In kindness he takes us firmly by the hand and leads us into a radical life-change.

5-8 You’re not getting by with anything. Every refusal and avoidance of God adds fuel to the fire. The day is coming when it’s going to blaze hot and high, God’s fiery and righteous judgment. Make no mistake: In the end you get what’s coming to you—Real Life for those who work on God’s side, but to those who insist on getting their own way and take the path of least resistance, Fire!

9-11 If you go against the grain, you get splinters, regardless of which neighborhood you’re from, what your parents taught you, what schools you attended. But if you embrace the way God does things, there are wonderful payoffs, again without regard to where you are from or how you were brought up. Being a Jew won’t give you an automatic stamp of approval. God pays no attention to what others say (or what you think) about you. He makes up his own mind.

12-13 If you sin without knowing what you’re doing, God takes that into account. But if you sin knowing full well what you’re doing, that’s a different story entirely. Merely hearing God’s law is a waste of your time if you don’t do what he commands. Doing, not hearing, is what makes the difference with God.

14-16 When outsiders who have never heard of God’s law follow it more or less by instinct, they confirm its truth by their obedience. They show that God’s law is not something alien, imposed on us from without, but woven into the very fabric of our creation. There is something deep within them that echoes God’s yes and no, right and wrong. Their response to God’s yes and no will become public knowledge on the day God makes his final decision about every man and woman. The Message from God that I proclaim through Jesus Christ takes into account all these differences.

IT’S ALL ABOUT GOD AND HIS LOVE FOR US!

“ALL have sinned and fall short of the glory of God”, writes Paul to the church, but he also writes we are forgiven when we ask!  God does not expect perfection, but He desires His best for us because of His love.  We are His beloved.  Say that over and over again until it is believed and sinks into the depths of our souls.  We are not sinless but we sin less when we realize we are His beloved.  God is kind, as Paul writes but he hates the sin that traps and enslaves us to this world.  God is on our side and promises to be with us always.  Read that again. We are His beloved.  He helps us.

Lord,

Thank you for Paul’s letter writing prompted by your Holy Spirit in him.  May your Holy Spirit have the run of my being today, leading and guiding me to your best life for me, living in the environment you choose for my growth in your love, care and calling.  I don’t want to be a mindless frog in a kettle, Lord!  Not today.  Not any day!  And thank you for giving me what I needed to get that frog out of my kitchen!

In Jesus Name, Amen

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