Following Jesus – Everything is About God

Along the Way to Bethlehem

Part One

As the new year begins, and thinking back on the Christmas season, I noticed a couple of things. One, the New Testament began with a connection to the Old, a continuation of God’s story. Secondly, I noticed that the very first chapter of the New Testament revealed the greatest reason of all for the Christmas season, the primary reason why Jesus came!

First, the continuation from Old to New. Notice the very first verse of the New Testament, “The record of the genealogy of Jesus, the Messiah (Christ), the Son of David, the son of Abraham.” Abraham shows up the first time in Genesis 11:26, “Terah lived seventy years, and became the father of Abram, Nahor, and Haran.” A few verses later, in Genesis 12:1-3, God speaks to him. “Now the LORD said to Abram, ‘Go forth … To the land which I will show you; And I will make you a great nation, And I will bless you … And in you all the families of the earth will be blessed.”

The rest of the Old Testament, in one way or another, tells the story of God’s interaction with Abraham (his name was changed from Abram to Abraham) and his descendants. David was a distant descendant of Abraham, and Jesus was an even further descendant. In fact, it was well over 2000 years from Abraham to Jesus. God is apparently in charge of history on a long-term scale, Old Testament, New Testament, and continuing!

Now, the second thing I noticed was in the dream of Joseph, a small-town carpenter whose fiancé was pregnant, and not by him! He was most certainly in emotional turmoil, yet we are told that, “… Joseph … being a righteous man and not wanting to disgrace her, planned to send her away secretly.” But God interrupted his plans; “… behold, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream, saying, ‘Joseph, son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary as your wife; for the Child who has been conceived in her is of the Holy Spirit. She will bear a Son; and you shall call His name Jesus, for He will save His people from their sins.” (Matthew 1:18-21)

Wait! Don’t miss the reason here stated, “He will save His people from their sins.” That’s it! The point of it all, the reason for the season! From Genesis 3 onward, it’s been obvious that the problem above all problems is sin! Everything God has done since that point (and even before then) has been to save us from the sins that cause all our problems! In fact, the New Testament tells us how Jesus accomplished this goal; in the gospels, and then throughout the entire New Testament, to the very end of the last book, Revelation!

No room here to tell the “how” this was accomplished, but I have to ask myself how well this goal is being accomplished in my life, daily? And in your life? Have you been saved “from” sin? Are you being daily saved “from” sin? Or, do you just go along sinning daily and expecting that the Scripture meant only to save us from the ultimate, final, eternal, result of our sins? If you’ve been saved from slavery, you are not still a slave. If you’ve been saved from drowning, you are not still in the water! If you’ve been saved from sin, you are not continuing to live a life dominated by sin!

Listen, Jesus came to save us FROM our sins!

work out your own salvation

The words were right there; I stared at them and read them again. Seemed like they were in bold print, “… work out your own salvation with fear and trembling.” I felt like God was talking to me!

I was young, maybe ten or eleven years old, when that phrase from the Bible grabbed my attention. I didn’t get the real meaning for a while; I didn’t even see the rest of Philippians chapter two, just that part of verse twelve. I read the words “work out” as a challenge, like a math problem, and thought I needed to figure it out, to work out the real meaning of salvation, to understand it! So, not even realizing the importance of that decision, I started on my own personal life-time journey to figure it out! At that young age, I know now that my attempt was shallow, and my understanding was immature, and I know that I’ve stumbled many times along the way, but that really was the first “big” decision of my spiritual journey. No matter how young you are or how old you are, God will come to you and speak to you on your own level; He will meet you right where you are!

That verse became a rule to guide me as I tried to learn and understand everything I could about God and what it means to be a Christian. Instead of just doing what I was told or believing what someone else told me to believe, I decided that God wanted me to figure things out for myself. I wanted to know for myself what I believed and why I believed it! I wanted to learn for myself what the Bible said and what it really means. I wanted God’s Word to work its way into every part of my life so that I could actually live as a Christian in every part of my life to the very best of my ability. I was very serious when I asked God to help me “work out my own salvation”! And nearly sixty years later, I am still trying, still learning, still attempting to actually work out in real life the things I learn!

Desperate to Know the Ways of God

Great desperation filled his voice as Moses bowed low before God, as he cried out for mercy! So much had happened, yet he knew he was incapable of dealing with what was yet to come. Inside this “tent of meeting” (Ex 33:9) God was speaking, “Depart, go up from here … I will send an angel before you … for I will not go up in your midst, because you are an obstinate people, and I might destroy you on the way” (Ex 33:1-3). Afraid to attempt the impossible without God’s presence, Moses cried out for mercy!

Through the series of dreadful miracles (the ten “plagues” that had fallen on Egypt), through the miraculous crossing of the Red Sea on dry ground, through the daily giving of the miracle food “manna” and finally through the hearing of the Voice of God from the mountain top, the nation had come from Egyptian slavery to the barren wilderness! Into the very presence of God Himself, at the base of Mount Sinai.

Having heard the Ten Commands from God Himself, the people had then watched Moses climb upward and disappear into the cloudy heights of God’s Presence. And they had waited for his return. And waited. And after many days he had not returned.

So, without a prophet and without a tangible god that they could see and touch, in fear and disobedience they reverted to the days of Egypt, making for themselves a god, a golden calf, an idol. Even though the Second of the Ten Commands had forbidden idols! “So the next day they rose early and offered burnt offerings, and brought peace offerings; and the people sat down to eat and to drink, and rose up to play” (Ex 32:6). But there was no peace. Far above, on the mountain top, the Lord saw. “Then the LORD spoke to Moses, ‘Go down at once, for your people … have corrupted themselves’” (Ex 32:7).

What happened next is difficult to know. God was seemingly ready to destroy them all, but Moses cried out, interceded, entreated God, prayed for His mercy, and reminded God of His past promises to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, the ancestors of these disobedient people. And equally hard to explain, “… the LORD changed His mind about the harm which He said He would do to His people” (Ex 32:14)! Moses ran down the mountain with the two stone tablets on which God had engraved His Law, the Ten Commands, and “… as soon as Moses came near the camp … he saw the calf and the dancing; and Moses’ anger burned, and he threw the tablets from his hands and shattered them at the foot of the mountain,” (Ex 32:19). The Law had already been broken and now the Tablets of the written Law were shattered. Moses ground the golden calf to powder, scattered it on the water and the people were made to drink it. Further judgement came and people died, slaughtered. Finally, an exhausted and emotionally overwhelmed Moses turned back to the Lord. As he desperately prayed for these people, Moses even begged that if God would not forgive their sin, then God should “… blot me out from Your book which You have written!” (Ex 32:32).

And so, God had stated, “… I will not go up in your midst, because you are an obstinate people, and I might destroy you on the way” (Ex 33:4). Then, in desperation, Moses said to the Lord, “See, You say to me, ‘Bring up this people!’ But You Yourself have not let me know whom You will send with me.” Further, Moses reminded the Lord that He had said to Moses, “I have known you by name, and you have also found favor in My sight” (Ex 33:12). Moses is confused, frustrated, and hurt, but he quickly gets to the heart of the issue, “Now therefore, I pray You, if I have found favor in Your sight, let me know Your ways that I may know You …” (Ex 33:13)!

Ah, there it is, the need of Moses, the nation of Israel, both your need and mine! If Moses, who by this time we think should have known God and His ways better than anyone, this Moses to whom God spoke “… face to face, just as a man speaks to his friend” (Ex 33:11), if Moses prayed this prayer, then certainly you and I need to pray it unto God! We need to know God! And therefore, as the first and most obvious way to know Him, we must learn His ways! We must pray, “Lord, let me know Your ways that I may know You.”

What is WRONG with people?

I offer here ten possible reasons for what is wrong with our world:

10. Discontented, we look around at what we don’t have – possessions, pleasure, power, stuff of all kinds – and we desire them! Not content with what we have or what we can earn on our own, we start wanting what other people have, or what we imagine that other people have, or what the many forms of advertisements say we need to have. We are discontented.

9. When people don’t respect the very concept of truth, the result will be lies and deception. Unhappy with the way things are, we lie to convince ourselves that things are or that they ought to be the way we want them to be! Or we lie to make others think something is true that isn’t. Unhappy with what is, we deceive.

8. Having no respect for what others possess, our discontent coupled with dishonesty and a lack of respect for others, we become thieves! Why should they have what I don’t?

7. Without respect for marriage or our marriage partner, or the marriage partner of another, we imagine that we aren’t loved and seek the love of another. Due to a lack of love and a lack of respect for ourselves or anyone else, we cheat sexually. People look at others as potential partners who can meet their needs. Needs that we think we have, that our husbands or wives aren’t meeting. And with the sexual boundaries lowered or removed in the society that surrounds us, we give ourselves and others permission to commit adultery, or have sexual relations in many other ways that should be off limits. Once the sexual boundaries have been removed, there will be no limits to which people will not go seeking fulfillment, or love, or simply pleasure.

6. Disrespect for life, our own lives and the lives of others, will result in anger, bitterness, resentment, hatred, and grudges. In turn, these emotions will produce conflict and violence. Then, murder or attempted murder, or random violence and the killing of innocent people, the shedding of innocent blood.

5. Disrespect for the family – not only for parents, but for children, and for the very idea of marriage – will result in broken hearts, broken homes, more anger, rebellion, and more violence.

Note: All of the above listed problems have to do with the way people treat one another. All are motivated ultimately by a lack of love and respect for other people or for ourselves. This lack of love and respect for people is really the result of a lack of love and respect for the One who created us. The next four reasons for the unacceptable situation of our world actually precede those already named.

4. Disrespect for the one day a week that God gave us for rest and for worship, His day, will cause us to treat all days alike and will result in life becoming overly stressed and too full of too many things, too many activities. Such busyness will not allow our bodies the rest they need; our minds and emotions will not rest. Disrespect for the Lord’s day will keep our minds away from any thoughts about God.

3. Disrespect for the reality of God, for the name of God, for God Himself, will result in disrespect for one another. Disrespect for God will also result in crude vocabularies, referring to God in unacceptable ways. There will also be disrespect for the people who claim to be God’s people, much of which is deserved because we have taken the name of God, calling ourselves “Christian” but not living as Christ taught us, many not even trying to live worthy of God!

2. Instead, we make “idols” of many things. We serve ideas, or possessions, or pleasures, or people, or more likely we simply worship and serve ourselves. People become their own gods.

1. Finally, the most basic cause of all that is WRONG in our world today, is simply that people refuse to submit to the God who created the universe that we live in. He has given us guidelines that, if followed, would make life better, would make the world a better place, would create a safer environment for our children, a more enjoyable and fulfilling existence for us all. Acknowledging God and being grateful to Him for all He has given us, including the gift of salvation, is the place to begin.

For background, read Exodus 20:1-17.

Temptation Three

Consider the third temptation of Jesus. (Concerning the first two temptations, I refer you to a couple of my previous posts.) “Again, the devil took Him to a very high mountain and showed Him all the kingdoms of the world and their glory; and he said to Him, ‘All these things I will give You, if You fall down and worship me’” (Matthew 4:8-9).

Understand that Jesus had come to earth to establish a kingdom! John the Baptist had already begun the work; his message was clear, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand” (Matthew 3:2). So, it appears that the devil was offering Jesus an easy way to accomplish the mission! Jesus simply had to submit to him, to accept the ways of the world, to follow the plan of Satan, the “god of this world” (2 Cor. 4:4). The Kingdom would quickly become a world wide kingdom! Mission accomplished!

Hmmm. Aren’t many churches today giving in to this same temptation? Trying to build God’s church by using the proven and effective methods of the world?!! This “worship” that Satan was asking Jesus to give him was not to sing songs of praise to Satan or to honor him as “god” – NO! All Jesus would have to do was simply “bow the knee” to Satan, to use the methods of the world system! Listen carefully, the temptation was to use the world’s methods to accomplish God’s goals.

Let’s make this personal for a moment. Do you primarily use the world’s system to reach your own goals – personal, financial, business, educational, family? Or do you search the Word of God for His plan, His way, His priorities, His methods for all the areas in your life? Just asking.

Jesus quickly saw through the lie, the deception, and commanded, “Go, Satan! For it is written, ‘YOU SHALL WORSHIP THE LORD YOUR GOD, AND SERVE HIM ONLY’” (Mt. 4:10). The Kingdom that Jesus came to establish was not an earthly kingdom but a heavenly kingdom! It could never be gained by using the world system, not by a compromise with the devil! Notice the command that Jesus quoted; the words “worship” and “serve” are both included! You will serve that which you worship and worship that which you serve. Perhaps, again, a little personal inventory is appropriate here.

The foundations of the ministry of Jesus were tested and established in those days of fasting, prayer, and temptation. Would His focus be on His personal needs? Would He expect God to protect Him even if He were not obedient to all the ways of God? Would He rely on the spectacular to draw the crowds and the methods of the world system to establish His kingdom? Or would He focus on every word that proceeds from the mouth of God, seeking to keep all of His ways in agreement with the ways of God, and trusting God to show Him what to do and when to do it? I encourage you to read those first eleven verses of Matthew four again and put yourself in the place of temptation.

Another quote to consider might be 1 John 2:15-17. “Do not love the world nor the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh and the lust of the eyes and the boastful pride of life, is not from the Father, but is from the world. The world is passing away, and also its lusts; but the one who does the will of God lives forever.” (NASB)

What if …

What if we lived in a world as God originally intended it to be? What would such a world be like? What would our lives be like? Is it even possible to know? When God completed the original creation, “God saw all that He had made, and behold, it was very good” (Genesis 1:31). What if it had stayed that way? How would God want us to be living our day by day lives in that perfect world?

But even living in the world as it is today, what if we could know how God wants us to be living? In every area of life?

After the Fall, after sin came into this world, since that time, everything God has done seems to have been motivated by His intention to restore us, to restore the original creation, to “redeem” us from the results of sin. He desires to restore us to a right and good relationship to Himself! That’s why He chose Abraham and his descendants, why He gave the nation of Israel the Ten Commandments and the Old Testament Law! That’s why He sent prophets! That’s why He sent Jesus to die on the cross and open the way for us to be restored! For our sins to be forgiven and overcome! To set us free from slavery to sin! That’s why Jesus promised to return! That’s why God sent the Holy Spirit, why He has offered to us the reality of being “born again”!

And at the end of all things as we know it, we are promised a new earth and a new society perfectly in line with God’s original intentions, a society of God’s own making and design, perfect in every way! And what’s more, you and I, all of us, have been provided an opportunity to live there forever! Hip, hip, hooray! And Hallelujah!

But until then, how are we supposed to live? How are we to relate to God, to ourselves, to the people around us, to the world as it is? What are we supposed to be doing? Do we know? Can we know? What if God wanted to tell us, to show us, to help us know the way He intends for us to be living day by day, now, in the world as it is? What if He wanted to tell us the proper way for us to conduct ourselves in every area of life? How would He tell us, show us; how would He go about making us know the way we ought to be living?

I’d suggest there are as least three ways He might do it. First, He could put within our human nature some sort of inclination toward Him, a tendency or inner knowledge of the way He has planned for us to live. Secondly, maybe He could simply come into our world as one of us, to show us personally what He wants us to know and do. He could demonstrate the way; He could actually be the “way” He has designed for us to live. And thirdly, He could have it all written down, so that His words could be read, discussed, studied, and translated into every language! Then everyone could have these words, this book from God. That book could be printed and passed on to each succeeding generation! His words would be applicable to every culture and every society and for every time period until the end of time, until His ultimate and final plan is completed and the new earth and heavens are brought into existence! What if!

Just so you know, God has done all three of those things! We have no real excuse for not living the way He wants us to…

Temptation

Matthew 4:1, “Then Jesus was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil.” Interesting thought, that Jesus might be tempted! However, let’s remember that He was human, as we have previously seen. “Now the birth of Jesus Christ was as follows: when His mother Mary had been betrothed to Joseph, before they came together she was found to be with child by the Holy Spirit. … And Joseph … took Mary as his wife, but kept her a virgin until she gave birth to a Son; and he called His name Jesus” (Mt. 1:18, 24-25). As human, Jesus knew life as we know it, with all the difficulties of other humans. Hebrews 4:15 later reminds us that Jesus “… has been tempted in all things as we are, yet without sin.” He could have sinned, being human, but didn’t!

Luke tells us Jesus was about thirty years of age when He began His ministry (Lk. 3:23). He was a carpenter (Mk. 6:3), so we assume He was young, strong, and healthy – but after forty days without food!? “And after He had fasted forty days and forty nights, He then became hungry” (Mt. 4:2). That is, I am sure, an understatement! He had “fasted” – that is, He went without food for the purpose of prayer and was apparently seeking directions from the Heavenly Father concerning His mission. He had been baptized in water by John and had received the Holy Spirit to help Him and had now spent these days in prayer. It was in this physically weakened state that “… the tempter came …” (Mt. 4:3). And so we don’t misunderstand the identity of the “tempter” Mark 1:13 says, “And He was in the wilderness forty days being tempted by Satan …” and Luke 4:2 says He was “… being tempted by the devil.” Listen, temptations come to all of us. 1 Peter 5:8 reminds us, “… Your adversary, the devil, prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour.” That’s the bad news.

The good news is this: “No temptation has overtaken you but such as is common to man; and God is faithful, who will not allow you to be tempted beyond what you are able, but with the temptation will provide the way of escape also, so that you will be able to endure it” (1 Corinthians 10:13). Let me also remind you that Jesus taught us to pray about temptation this way, “And do not lead us into temptation, But deliver us from the evil one” (Mt. 6:13 NKJV). So, it is God’s plan that we have to endure temptation, but as we pray and follow (to the best of our ability) the way Jesus taught, we will (with God’s help) overcome temptation! Since Jesus taught us to pray for deliverance from the devil when he tempts us, then we can be certain that God wants to deliver us! Let’s trust Him and hang on!

Note: I want to address the three temptations of Jesus one by one in the future, and then I will get to my original subject, the Sermon on the Mount! So, be patient with me. And, by the way, I usually quote from the New American Standard Bible, just in case you were wondering. Thanks for reading.