Knowing God's Freedom

I was thinking this morning about various conversations I have had with others about God. Often times this sort of statement has been made, I think there is a "god" but I don't think or believe that he is involved with us in any intimate way. This line of thinking got me to thinking. If this is what some think then they do know that there is a "god". As the Bible says in the book of Romans 1:19,

For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them.
(Romans 1:19 ESV)

If this is true, and it is, then why do many people deny that God is real and active in the world. I believe that the answer is freedom, and not freedom int he sense that freedom is generally thought about, but more specifically freedom to be in control. We see it everywhere we look and live. Little children saying, "no let me do it myself" even when they need help. We see it in advertisements telling us that we are in charge of everything in our lives from the kind of car we drive to what we should expect from those around us. It is everywhere.

Now comes the problem, if there is a God, and there is, and He is who He says he is, and He is, then He is really in control. For many this becomes the problem, because if they believe in God, really believe in what He says about who He is and what He has done for us, then they come to the sudden realization that they are not really in control. The problem is that some believe that there is a greater being of some sort, a "god" but this "god' is not in control of things, they are. The truth is that God is real, and He is loving, and just, and righteous, and wrathful, and merciful, and good, and great, and gracious, and glorious, and He is completely sovereign over all of His creation.

It all boils down to a sort of wait a minute, you want me to surrender control of my life to God? The answer to the question is yes. Look at what God says in 2 Corinthians 3:17-18

Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom. And we all, with unveiled face, beholding the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another. For this comes from the Lord who is the Spirit.

(2 Corinthians 3:17-18 ESV)

Where the Spirit of the Lord is there is freedom. That is really a big statement, and it contradicts what most people think about God's control. Many think God just has a bunch of rules He wants us to follow and that is that. The real truth is that this idea isn't truth at all.
In john 14:6 Jesus says this,

Jesus said to him, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.
(John 14:6 ESV)

Jesus is God come to earth and taking on human form, and he says he is the truth. In John 8:31-36 jesus tells us this,

So Jesus said to the Jews who had believed him, “If you abide in my word, you are truly my disciples, and you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.” They answered him, “We are offspring of Abraham and have never been enslaved to anyone. How is it that you say, ‘You will become free’?” Jesus answered them, “Truly, truly, I say to you, everyone who practices sin is a slave to sin. The slave does not remain in the house forever; the son remains forever. So if the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed.

(John 8:31-36 ESV)

So the problem is our desire to be free is really a desire to be in control of things we really have no power to be in control over. The problem is our sinful rebellion in refusing to surrender to a good, great, glorious, and gracious and all powerful sovereign God. God came to us as the man Jesus Christ to bring us freedom, not the freedom to do as we please, but freedom from sin and death. He gave up his own life to buy our freedom, because He is God and He is involved and intimate with his creation and He loves us, all of us.

I am in a process every day of learning how to surrender to God in the same way Jesus did. It is not always easy but I have been set free of the burden of trying to control things that in reality I cannot even begin to control. Surrender to God is a process that takes time, but it is a process that solves a problem. It is my prayer that if you are still trying to be in control of your life that you would seriously consider trusting your life to Jesus, just spend some time thinking about it. One good place to start is by clicking on the "The Story" link on this blog page and read it. After that go to the Bible. Read the Gospel of John, read it through in one sitting and then think about what God has said to you in those words He wrote through John.

Yours in Christ's Amazing love, Bob Best

Thoughts on being frustrated and trusting God

Over the past few weeks I have been frustrated about where I am in my walk with Christ and where I am in being discipled and making disciples. The biggest problem in this frustration was where it placed me in relationship to God and others, and how it affected how I interacted with others face to face and with God in my prayer life. Long story short, I was not recognizing where I was not believing the gospel and how it works in my life. God wants the best for us, that is why He sent his Son to save us to bring us this "good news". It is why His word tells us that we cannot be separated from His love no matter what. As I realized the things I had neglected to believe about the greatness and completeness of the gospel, I realized I needed to give up the things that I felt uncomfortable in and just move on in the direction God has laid out before me. Even when we think we are trying to serve Jesus, when we are doing it in our own power and not being still and listening it just becomes uncomfortable. In 2 Corinthians 1:3-7 it says,

Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies and God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our affliction, so that we may be able to comfort those who are in any affliction, with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God. For as we share abundantly in Christ's sufferings, so through Christ we share abundantly in comfort too. If we are afflicted, it is for your comfort and salvation; and if we are comforted, it is for your comfort, which you experience when you patiently endure the same sufferings that we suffer. Our hope for you is unshaken, for we know that as you share in our sufferings, you will also share in our comfort.

(2 Corinthians 1:3-7 ESV)

God confronts and comforts us and in turn He will provide us with opportunities to comfort others. In other words don't be satisfied with being uncomfortable, endure the sufferings, the frustrations, the discomfort, but as you do remember the gospel. Remember God loves you, His Son gave His life for you and now mediates for you with the Father in heaven. Remember God sent His Holy Spirit to bring power into your life, and this power is greater than your frustrations, and your discomfort. Once I realized this and began to believe it my frustrations melted away and I found answers to relieve my discomfort. What these answers are is for me to understand and apply to my life through the grace and mercies of the gospel. It is all part of my heart being changed by the only power in the universe that can change a man's heart. For those who may read this know that the power, presence, and purpose of the gospel is for you as well and my prayer is that you will receive God's grace and mercy everyday and that it will change your life just as it changes mine.

Yours in Christ's amazing grace, Bob Best

My Comments on the Global Leadership Summit 2011

This week on 11 and 12 August 2011 I attended the Willow Creek Associations Global Leadership Summit via a simulcast. The summit overall was very good. The speakers all presented very informative and helpful ideas and approaches to leadership both in the secular arena and the church. I was impressed with everything about the summit and the way it was conducted.

Some of the highlights for me were, Len Sclessinger speaking on using "Entrepreneurship" to provide the kind of organizations we would aspire to create. Michelle Rhee speaking about the importance of educating children as well as speaking up for those who can't speak for themselves, and her willingness to speak out about her present spiritual struggles with coming to faith in Christ. Corey Booker urging us to stand for something because others were willing to stand for us and God expects nothing less from us.

Bill Hybels passionate and wonderful explanation of how we as Christians are not anti-anyone concerning the withdrawal of Howard Schultz from his speaking commitment at the summit because of a petition stating that the WCA was anti-gay. As Hybels said, Willow is not only not anti-gay the church is not anti-anybody and the mat at all of the doors of Willow says "WELCOME". He went on to say that what is true is that Willow Creek Church challenges both homosexuals and heterosexuals to live out the sexual ethics laid out in the scriptures for their sexual conduct. I was delighted when Mama Maggie Groban spoke urging us to leave everything behind to find the beauty and power of God and how when we are willing to become nothing God is everything.

John Dickson's presentation about what humility really is, and Steven Furtick urging us to dig those ditches and then see what God does with them. Dr. Henry Cloud speaking on how to deal with truth and reality and what a person does and how they react when the truth comes to them. Patrick Lencioni related to us the importance of vulnerability in service and how our job isn’t to look smart it’s to help other people do their work better.

For me there was only one low point in the summit and that was the concluding speaker Erwin McManus. He spoke on the necessity of a mind shift in leaders in relation to a reformation of reality. He started well, at what I think is the best place to start, that being scripture. Unfortunately it went downhill for me from there. He started out in Ecclesiastes 1:1-11 and spoke about where Solomon says there is nothing new under the sun. Then he proceeded to tell some 150,000 plus listeners that Solomon was wrong. McManus said, “Something inside my soul felt like I was suffocating under this theological framework” McManus also went on to explain that he did not think the Bible was wrong but what Solomon said was wrong. I understand how sometimes things we read in scripture can be difficult to understand and even accept, but we have to accept the truth of the difficult parts as well as the truth of the parts we like so somehow along the way I lost his logic on this one.

If the Bible is the inspired word of God written by men, such as Solomon, under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, and God's word is truth and without error, and being wrong is being in error, then how can Solomon record something wrong (i.e. something in error) in the Bible and not then have the Bible itself be wrong? This just doesn't make sense.

Erwin McManus just told anyone who was listening, all around the world, that a biblical author inspired by the Holy Spirit got it all wrong! McManus then went on to say, Solomon said there is nothing new. He's wrong, I don't believe him so let me tell you how the world actually is. If you read between the lines what Erwin McManus just told us was to ignore what an inspired author of scripture and one who was given a gift of wisdom by God Himself says about the world, because he (Solomon) is wrong, and let me (Erwin McManus) tell you how the world actually is. Mr McManus said at the beginning of his presentation that he believes the Bible, but then went on to say, "I don't believe the Bible is wrong...Solomon is wrong".

This is confusing on a number of levels but I think we need to work this idea out to a logical conclusion. If this idea is true what stops Mr. McManus from deciding that the Bible isn't wrong but Paul is wrong, or the Bible isn't wrong, but Peter is wrong, or eventually even saying the Bible isn't wrong but what Jesus said is wrong. Do you see how this whole idea of Solomon being wrong which is what Mr. McManus built his whole presentation on just falls apart when worked out to its logical conclusion?

I want to point out that Mr. McManus had some good things to say, I agree with him that there is apathy in the church in America, and that many who profess to be followers of Christ are sitting idly by waiting for God to do something. I agree with him that if you live your life outside of God you are destined for a life of endless repetition and monotony, but when you live in the light of Creation all things become new, which by the way is exactly what Solomon was telling us in the scripture passage where Mr. McManus tells us that Solomon is wrong.(If that is the case then isn't Mr. McManus telling us that he is wrong as well?)

I agree with him that when we live our lives connected to the Creator of the Universe, we become God’s instruments for creating the future. I agree with him that we have been entrusted with this stewardship to redeem our lives to reflect the heart of God. I agree that we need to be creative and to tell the great stories.The truth is that we need to tell the best story in all of creation and history, and that is the story of the gospel of Jesus Christ. That story is what the Bible is all about and we can't change that story by just simply saying that we as created beings think that one of the authors of Holy Spirit inspired scripture is wrong!

Mr. McManus is correct about needing creativity,beauty, good stories, and well stewarded human talents and abilities to participate with God in creating the future He has planned for us. Where he is wrong is in saying Solomon is wrong. Mr. McManus is wrong here because he has taken the words written by Solomon under the influence of the Holy Spirit and used them outside of their intended context, and what Mr McManus has done is at best just simply wrong and at worst extremely dangerous. The ability to be creative is built into us as beings created in the image of God. The truth is that beauty and renewal and majesty are realized only when we fear God and love him with all our heart soul mind and strength, and as His Son taught us to obey God's commandments the greatest of which are to love the Lord with all our heart, soul, mind, and strength, and to love our neighbors as ourselves. When we profess that someone who is an author of scripture is wrong we do neither.

The summit was an amazing time of learning and introspection and growing, the sad part for me as an attendee was that the summation of such a great event was sort of anti-climatic. Brenda Salter McNeil asked us what is it that moves us to action, what is your catalytic event? I think as we process the summit we need to ask ourselves what were the catalytic events for us as individuals as we experienced and participated in the GLS. For me the presentation by Erwin McManus was a catalytic event. It reinforced some ideas and perspectives I have about the church and leadership in it, our responsibilities to participate in God's plan for us and steward the gifts we have been given, as well as our responsibilities to listen to and trust in God's revelation to us in scripture. It also reinforced in me the importance of not using that scripture out of context and taking the risk of having someone ignore all you say because you are wrong about scripture being wrong. Taking scripture out of context is always wrong, even when it may reinforce a valuable understanding or belief.

I think Erwin McManus believes in the saving power of the gospel of Jesus Christ. He has some great things to tell us about how we should steward the amazing gifts God has given us. The problem is that when you mix in just a little yeast it infiltrates the whole batch of dough. When you mix in a little untruth with the truth it corrupts the whole truth. By saying that Solomon was wrong Mr. McManus mixed in a little untruth and that untruth causes him to risk losing people recognizing the things he had to say that were valuable. For me that is an unacceptable risk and it is my hope and prayer that he will see it as an unacceptable risk as well and recognize as Solomon did that in untruth there is no beauty, majesty, or creativity, only meaninglessness.

I will pray that those who attended this years Global Leadership Summit will take what they heard and saw and use it to become better leaders and better witnesses of the love of Christ. I will also pray that God's word, the Bible, will always be seen for what it is; pure, beautiful, and perfect truth.

Yours in Christ's amazing love, Bob Best

How deep is the love of Christ?

I have been thinking a lot lately about love and more specifically , about how we as Christians, (believers in Jesus Christ) are supposed to live out love in our lives. I will be the first to admit that in the past I used to become what I called "righteously angry" at certain things people said or positions that they took. This attitude even extended to some who, as I do, call themselves followers of Christ. Lately however, as I read God's word and really look at how Jesus lived His life I have come to see things a bit differently. I have had to ask myself some hard questions like, "How do I live my life before others (believers and non-believers alike), and just as importantly how am I showing love, specifically the love of Christ as it is revealed in His gospel"? I hear Christians say things like, "We have to take our country back for Christ". My thought here is, that seems silly, when was it taken from Him? He is sovereign over everything isn't He? When we say things like this in front of people who don't know Jesus are we showing Christian love? I don't really think we are, and I have in the past been guilty of the same attitudes. If you ask people who aren't Christians about Christians they might say, "well they hate homosexuals". Where did they get that idea? The answer is probably from "Christians".
I am not advocating here that we overlook everything that happens, good or bad, in the name of love. If we ignore or enable evil in our own or someones life that is not love, but if we look at someone who is a broken fallen being just like we are and then say "well, I can't associate with that person, or they don't think like I do", that isn't love either. Most people can quote John 3:16, but most can't quote 1 John 3:16 which says,

"By this we know love, that he laid down his life for us, and we ought to lay down our lives for the brothers."

As believers in Christ, this verse tells us how we are to know love. It shows us the love of Christ, it shows us how deep His love is, He gave his life that we might live and so we ought to do the same. I think as followers of Christ we need to spend more time loving others through His gospel and less time complaining about what we don't like about the world. In closing I think Paul sums it all up perfectly in Ephesians chapter 3,

[14] For this reason I bow my knees before the Father, [15] from whom every family in heaven and on earth is named, [16] that according to the riches of his glory he may grant you to be strengthened with power through his Spirit in your inner being, [17] so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith—that you, being rooted and grounded in love, [18] may have strength to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, [19] and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled with all the fullness of God.

(Ephesians 3:14-19 ESV)

It is my hope and prayer for all of us as Christians that as Paul prays here in Ephesians, that Christ may dwell in our hearts through faith and that we remain rooted and grounded in love, and so we may be filled with the fullness of God and then follow Jesus by showing that love and fullness to others.

Yours in Christ's amazing love, Bob Best

Book Review: Because He Loves Me, by Elyse Fitzpatrick

I recently finished reading "Because He Loves Me": How Christ Transforms Our Daily Life by Elyse Fitzpatrick. This book is a wonderful read. It keeps the reader involved and is well laid out. Each chapter builds on the previous chapter in a delightful manner. The basic premise of the book is that as believers in Christ we sometimes, even often, forget Him. This forgetting is not in the sense that we are not aware of Him but that in our daily life we tend to live out our beliefs without a conscious awareness of, or acknowledgement of His presence. As an example of this the writer asks the question, "Where did the ongoing incarnation of Christ intersect your life yesterday"? I do not want to say much more and give away the beauty of reading this book except that it takes us on a journey of seeing and savoring Jesus and what He has done for us and how that should be the most significant characteristic of our faith and life in Him. I am no one special just a sinner saved from wrath by God's mercy and grace but "Well done Elyse" you touched my life with your book and through it I know I am loved, well, because He (Jesus) loves me.

Yours in Christs Amazing Love, Bob Best