Identity (2)

Matthew 6:33 asks us to, ‘Seek first His kingdom and His righteousness…’

This word ‘seek’ can mean a desire to discover and respond to.  So, how do you go about seeking first His righteousness?

Last week we began to reflect on this topic by referencing 2 Corinthians 5:19 & 21.

¹⁹ namely, that God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and He has committed to us the word of reconciliation.

²¹ He made Him who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf, so that we might become the righteousness of God in Him.

Then we explored the implications of the phrase: “not counting their sins against them.”  Today we explore: “made Him who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf.

Jesus took all of our sin so that we could receive all of His righteousness.  He identified with us at our worst so we could be identified with Him at His best. This is why Paul wrote that he who has died is freed from sin (Romans 6: 3 – 7) and then concludes that we should ‘consider ourselves to be dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus.

Our sin is to be a place of learning and not a place of disqualification.  That is, ‘if Christ is in you, though the body is dead because of sin, yet the spirit is alive because of righteousness.’ (Romans 8: 10)  Paul goes on to say that: ‘if you are living…by the Spirit you are putting to death the deeds of the body, (and) you will live.  For all who are being led by the Spirit of God, these are the sons of God. (Romans 8: 13 – 14)

Paul is declaring that it is His righteousness we have received and this qualifies us to be Sons of God.  We are dealing with sin by learning from it so that the very life of Jesus is built into us.  However, our sin does not disqualify us from being Sons and relating to God as our loving Father.  Sin consciousness along with shame, guilt and condemnation result in us believing we are unworthy to be co-labourers with Jesus, doing the things He did and even greater things.  Paul explicitly says there is no condemnation (Romans 8:1) so we should never allow our sin to bring us into an inferior place of our identity as children of God.

God is not interested in what is wrong He is interested in what is missing.  He convicts us of our righteousness (John 16:10) because He is calling us ‘up’ into our identity, not calling us ‘out’ on our failure to then punish or judge us.  As we grasp these truths we can walk in our identity as ‘the righteousness of God in Christ Jesus.’

More of this next week.

Until next time may you be blessed with God’s favour and life.

Identity (1)

Over the next three weeks I will be posting some thoughts on our identity in Christ.  I will be using the following verses as the foundation:

2 Corinthians 5: 19 & 21

¹⁹ namely, that God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and He has committed to us the word of reconciliation.

²¹ He made Him who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf, so that we might become the righteousness of God in Him.

The first phrase that I want to explore is: “not counting their trespasses against them.”  Paul is declaring that God does not count any of our sins against us. Colossians 2: 13 – 14 affirms this position when Paul writes, “having forgiven us all our transgressions.”  This is how God feels about all of us NOW.  It is not something that happens when we die.  It is how God treats every living human being.

This is so important because sin consciousness disqualifies us from walking fully in who we are in Christ.  Sin consciousness accompanied by shame, guilt and condemnation causes us to be preoccupied with self at the expense of who we are in Christ.  We become convinced that God can’t work through us because we are not worth or qualified.  We begin to assume that we need to “do” more by way of spiritual disciplines or self effort to carry the presence of God.

It can be difficult to accept that God does not hold a ledger of our offences because we were raised by humans who did.  Not only did parents, teachers and peers count our sins against us they punished and judged us for them.  Then the Old Testament reveals God as a judge and one who punishes whole nations for the transgression of sins.

Jesus came revealing God as a Father not a judge.  In the garden of Eden God was a father. Adam and Eve’s disobedience placed the Father in the position of being a judge.  Religious spirits have from the garden onwards wanted man to believe God is a judge more than He is a father.  When we believe this we condemn ourselves but God is not. (Romans 8:1; 1 John 3:18 – 22)

John 16: 8 – 11 assures us that the only sin the Holy Spirit convicts us of is unbelief in who Jesus is.  Believing in Jesus connects us to the finished work of the cross and that truth that all our past, present and future sins were judged at the cross.  Once we believe in Jesus and work of the cross the Holy Spirit is concerned to convict us of our righteousness because He went to the Father.  That is, He wants us to live on the resurrection side of the cross and learn to become who we are in Christ.

More on this exciting topic next week.  Hold any judgement of what you are reading until July 1!

Until next time may you be blessed with God’s favour and life.

My Life (1)

This week I am in Sydney. It has been a joy to spend time in the ‘second best’ city in Australia!!!

Sydney holds so many memories.  I was born here in Manly hospital.  I spent the first 10 years of my life here.  There were those first few frightening days of school;  catching tadpoles in the creek near where we lived;  keeping local wildlife (lizards, tortoises and  snakes) as pets; catching the train to school and falling flat on my face on the platform jumping off the moving train……it seems I have always been in a hurry.

At the age of 20 I returned to Sydney to continue my university studies.  I meet Lyn at Macquarie Uni.  I meet Jesus at Phil and Christine Pringle’s church.  I established many life long friendships.  I loved playing water polo in the sea pools of Sydney.  Two of our children were born in Sydney.  We bought our first house here.

I have so much to be thankful for as I am here now making new friends.  I have so much to give others because of what and who this city has nurtured.  The circles and cycles of life are worth remembering as we again  discover the power of being thankful.

Until next time may you be blessed with God’s favour and life.

Disciple Making (3)

Jesus ministered in signs, word and deeds. Signs speak of power, word speaks of revelation and deeds speak of love. Unfortunately, different streams of the church have focussed on one aspect of Jesus ministry above the others. Pentecostals focus on power, evangelicals focus on the word and liberals focus on acts of love through social justice and meeting the needs of the poor.

Ambassadors of Australia are required and expected to present the full counsel of the government of the day. They are not allowed to bring their own political or philosophical ideas to filter what they say. Equally disciples of Jesus are ambassadors of heaven. Disciples of Jesus are to minister as Jesus did, that is, in signs, word and deeds.

Days are upon us where the Lord wants us to receive more revelation of who He is, who we are in Him and what Jesus wants to do through us. We can only give what we have received – freely you have received so freely give. So we are to posture ourselves to receive the kingdom and the ministry of Jesus. The world longs for the children of God to walk in intimacy with God, to accept their new identity in Christ and influence their cities and culture by releasing heaven on earth.

We posture ourselves by longing for love encounters, power encounters and revelatory encounters so that they can flow through our hearts. The book of Acts is full of experiential encounters that were supported by the word. It was these encounters that Jesus pointed to when he declared believers in Him would do what He did and even greater things than He did.

The ministry of signs, the word and deeds all begin by discovering the priority of heaven and following that priority. The priority of heaven is to worship God, be devoted to God, to be intimate with God and to be affectionate towards God. As we give ourselves to the priority of heaven encounter will flow to and through us for the benefit of others.

I am interested to hear how this works for you.

Until next time may you be blessed with His favour and life.