WELCOME TO CONFUSION

WELCOME TO CONFUSION

Many people complain to me that they have surrendered their life to Jesus but nothing dramatic has happened. That is the norm, I have found in my life, that most of the time you just ran by faith and led a very normal life. It is only when we look back and see what God has done, it begins to dawn on us that God was working all the time. In fact, when we think something great is being done, it is usually not God working (though it can be) because God’s version of great is often different from mine.

When Abraham entered the Promised land what he found was famine (Genesis 12:10). Moses on his journey to the Promised land, just went from one crisis to another, and spoke of his frustration to God. Jeremiah was so disillusioned with his call that he said God had cheated him and he wished he had died (Jer 20:7, 14f).

O Lord, You induced me, and I was persuaded;
You are stronger than I, and have prevailed.
I am in derision daily;
Everyone mocks me.

Cursed be the day in which I was born!
Let the day not be blessed in which my mother bore me!
Let the man be cursed
Who brought news to my father, saying,
“A male child has been born to you!”
Making him very glad.

But all of them created history in their life.

When we come to God we surrender control of our life to God, so that God’s purpose for our life is fulfilled. Psalm 139:13-16 and Eph 2:10

For You formed my inward parts;
You covered me in my mother’s womb.
I will praise You, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made;
Marvelous are Your works,
And that my soul knows very well.
My frame was not hidden from You,
When I was made in secret,
And skillfully wrought in the lowest parts of the earth.
Your eyes saw my substance, being yet unformed.
And in Your book they all were written,
The days fashioned for me,
When as yet there were none of them.

For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them.

says that God has a predefined purpose for us, but we do not know what this purpose is till after the event. So our life tends to become a roller coaster, where we only know the present and the immediate future of our life. We may have a long range plan for our organization but we cannot have a long range plan for our life.

The life we lead and the work we do, are not by our power but by the power of God, as it says in Eph 1:17-20,

that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give to you the spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of Him, the eyes of your understanding being enlightened; that you may know what is the hope of His calling, what are the riches of the glory of His inheritance in the saints, and what is the exceeding greatness of His power toward us who believe, according to the working of His mighty power which He worked in Christ when He raised Him from the dead and seated Him at His right hand in the heavenly places,

If it is God’s power, which is too great for me to comprehend, how do I plan and do my daily work? Often you just cannot, and all that you can do is to be faithful to what you are doing, and continue. You are on the roller coaster, and you are being faithful to what has been revealed to you. At times it may seem that God has abandoned you. At times, you feel confident that you are in the centre of God’s will. But by faith we KNOW that God is present with us and we continue in faithfulness.

We see these acts of faith in the widow of Zarephath, who in faith did what God has ordered – show hospitality to strangers, and was blessed by the power of God. Joseph, who as a slave and then a prisoner was faithful and was recognized by Potiphar and the jail warden for his work. Jeremiah was faithful, and the long list in Hebrews 11 records the faithfulness of people, who never saw more than the present and the immediate future, but trusted Yahweh for their life. Set goals of faith and work towards it, and expect God to do powerful things beyond what you can imagine, even if you are feeling abandoned by God. He never leaves you.

James says that God will give us the wisdom to understand His will and purpose. For this, we need to turn away from worldly thinking and its certainties and seek the wisdom of God (Romans 12:2).

And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God.

Once you turn away from the worldly perspective of things, you have lost your moorings in this world and you are now on a different plane. No longer do worldly plans work the way they used to, rather you see the power of God doing things in a way only God understands. As we seek God’s perspective, we get to see what God is doing, but often we feel overwhelmed. If this be the case what should I do?

Prepare yourself for the place God has put you in, studying and learning how to interpret the Bible. Read extensively on the context God has put you in, so that you have the information to process what God is doing.

More importantly, let the fruit of the Spirit manifest in your life, and be a blessing to people wherever you are. As you bless people intentionally, and seek the welfare of others, you will understand the heart of God.

1 Thess 1:5 says that the gospel comes in power, and this power is seen in a transformed life.

For our gospel did not come to you in word only, but also in power, and in the Holy Spirit and in much assurance, as you know what kind of men we were among you for your sake.

Let that transformation be a reality in your life. Experience victory over sins and addictions as God sets you free. Do not aim to be a star, just aim to be faithful. Wanting to be a star is of the world. The desire to be faithful is of the kingdom of God.

As you focus on being faithful, your life will become more and more of a roller-coaster and you will wonder where God is taking you. See Paul’s description of His roller coaster ride in 2 Cor 11:22-29

Are they Hebrews? So am I. Are they Israelites? So am I. Are they the seed of Abraham? So am I. Are they ministers of Christ?—I speak as a fool—I am more: in labors more abundant, in stripes above measure, in prisons more frequently, in deaths often. From the Jews five times I received forty stripes minus one. Three times I was beaten with rods; once I was stoned; three times I was shipwrecked; a night and a day I have been in the deep; in journeys often, in perils of waters, in perils of robbers, in perils of my own countrymen, in perils of the Gentiles, in perils in the city, in perils in the wilderness, in perils in the sea, in perils among false brethren; in weariness and toil, in sleeplessness often, in hunger and thirst, in fastings often, in cold and nakedness— besides the other things, what comes upon me daily: my deep concern for all the churches. Who is weak, and I am not weak? Who is made to stumble, and I do not burn with indignation?

You will find your life becoming unbalanced and yourself stretched like an elastic band. You may wonder if you are overdoing it. But that is the Christian life surrendered to God. You are overdoing it, when you are trying to do things for God, or create history for God. When you are just being faithful to the responsibilities He has given you, it is not.

Does this mean that you neglect your ‘worldly’ responsibilities to do what God wants you to do? NO. There is no such thing as worldly responsibilities, all are from God. So, you cannot neglect any. Since you will be doing all that God has made you responsible for, you begin to get stretched. Am I allowed to rest? Yes. Take the Sabbath break. Take the festival breaks which were a week long. But see that you are faithful. You are not trying to prove anything, you are just trying to be faithful to what God has called you.

You may or not may not get feedback on your faithfulness. Most of the time you do not. But occasionally God encourages us with feedback that shows His power working through us.

Rev. David Corfe was my pastor in a fairly dead church, where we faithfully went to the Bible study of three or four people. Many years later I met him in UK and he shared that the period he spent in that church was the driest in his life, and he never understood why God sent him there. I told him, he was sent for me, as I made my commitment to Jesus in a sermon he had preached in the church. You may be wondering what are you doing in the place you are. God is working, you cannot see it.

One thing I have found, after several years, 10, 20 or 30 years, as you look back on your roller coaster ride, you can see how God had done great things through you, with you and sometimes in spite of you. So, don’t get discouraged at the seeming confusion around you, at the spontaneity of events as God works things,

Let us just make three commitments:-

1.      To surrender our lives to Jesus as Paul describes in Romans 6:1-6

2.      To commit ourselves to the Great Commandment to love people (especially our family and church) in Matthew 22:37-40

3.      To commit ourselves to the Great Commission in Matthew 28:19-20

The Meaning of Baptism

THE  MEANING  OF BAPTISM

There are so many controversies on the rite of baptism, that it divides not only churches but believers. The basic divide has been between those who accept child baptism and those who do not. Child baptism arose from a belief that baptism is essential for salvation, and so children were baptized, in case they died before adulthood.

But since we need to make a personal decision for Christ, they divided the rite into two, where the church baptized the child on the commitment of the parents, and the child made his or her personal commitment at confirmation. To me that is acceptable and I have no problem with it.

The Baptists do not believe that baptism is necessary for salvation and so chose to baptize as adults. My question is, if baptism is not necessary for salvation then why argue against confirmation replacing baptism for the individual who was baptized as a child.

There is a third group who believe in adult baptism and also baptism as essential for salvation. They then struggle with the issue of children dying before baptism and come up with a theology that to me makes little sense. So let us not go there.

There are some who see baptism as an expression of our repentance from sin. But that was the baptism for John the Baptist (Matthew 3:11) which is not the baptism we take as per Acts 19:4-5.

John 3:5-8 reads as follows:-

Jesus answered, “Most assuredly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit.  Do not marvel that I said to you, ‘You must be born again’. The wind blows where it wishes, and you hear the sound of it, but cannot tell where it comes from and where it goes. So is everyone who is born of the Spirit.”

John 3:5-6 if understood in a Hebrew frame if reference says that water baptism is of the flesh and what is required is baptism of the Holy Spirit, and this is an important concept to hold on to. John 3:8 says that we cannot force the Spirit to come on a person by any rite we do, and the Spirit will go to the person who has genuine faith (Gal 3:1-3). True to this, in Acts of the Apostles we find the Spirit coming on people before baptism, during baptism and after baptism. What is important is that the person needs to rest his faith on the presence of the Spirit in His life rather than having taken baptism!

So, what is baptism? According to the Baptists, it is not a sacrament, or a rite in which you get any spiritual benefit, but it is a public profession of your faith, made before the church. This seems to have little biblical support, or at least I could not find any.

In Acts 22:16

And now why are you waiting? Arise and be baptized, and wash away your sins, calling on the name of the Lord.’

Paul says that Ananias told him to wash his sins away in baptism. This essentially means that through baptism we obtain the benefits of Jesus’ work in the past present and future. This is also said in Col 2:12-14

buried with Him in baptism, in which you also were raised with Him through faith in the working of God, who raised Him from the dead. And you, being dead in your trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh, He has made alive together with Him, having forgiven you all trespasses  having wiped out the ^[a]handwriting of requirements that was against us, 

which was contrary to us. And He has taken it out of the way, having nailed it to the cross.

where Paul says we are buried with Christ in baptism as a result of which the requirements of the Law on us is removed and so we are freed from our sins.

In Titus 3:5

not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to His mercy He saved us, through the washing of regeneration and renewing of the Holy Spirit,

Paul seems to refer to baptism as the washing of regeneration and the renewing of the Holy Spirit. Here not only are we set free from our sins but also empowered by the Holy Spirit to live the life God wants us to lead.  The same thought is brought out by Peter in 1 Peter 3:21,

There is also an antitype which now saves us—baptism (not the removal of the filth of the flesh, but the answer of a good conscience toward God), through the resurrection of Jesus Christ,

where Peter gives more importance to the empowerment of the Holy Spirit. So Peter says, not the washing of sins but the renewing of the power of God (which raised Jesus from the dead).

From these passages, we see that there is a sacramental element to baptism, where the sacrifice of Jesus is applied to us and we are empowered by the Holy Spirit. It is argued that we take baptism because we are saved and so what does this sacramental element really do for us? Let us look at this question at the end. Before that let us look at what is the statement being made by the person taking baptism?

Every work we do is meant to be an expression of our faith. In Romans 14:23 Paul says that work which is not from faith is a sin!! In Acts 16:31-33 the jailer’s baptism was an expression of his faith.

According to Paul in Romans 6:1-6,

What shall we say then? Shall we continue in sin that grace may abound? Certainly not! How shall we who died to sin live any longer in it? Or do you not know that as many of us as were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into His death? Therefore we were buried with Him through baptism into death, that just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life.

For if we have been united together in the likeness of His death, certainly we also shall be in the likeness of His resurrection,  knowing this, that our old man was crucified with Him, that the body of sin might be ^[a]done away with, that we should no longer be slaves of sin.

what we express is our dying to the world with Jesus in baptism and being born again in the kingdom of God for the life Jesus gives us. So, baptism becomes a commitment to turn away from the world and to live for Jesus. God does not have to wait for you to make this commitment, as He knows your heart and we see in Acts 10:47-48, that sometimes God blesses us with His blessing even before we formally make the commitment. That does not absolve us from the need to make that commitment to God.

In Romans 8:9-14

But you are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if indeed the Spirit of God dwells in you. Now if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he is not His. And if Christ is in you, the body is dead because of sin, but the Spirit is life because of righteousness. But if the Spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, He who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies ^[a]through His Spirit who dwells in you.

Therefore, brethren, we are debtors—not to the flesh, to live according to the flesh. For if you live according to the flesh you will die; but if by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live.  For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, these are sons of God.

 Paul says that only those who are led by the Spirit are the sons of God. It is only when we have handed over the control of our life to the Spirit does salvation begin to work out in our lives. Baptism is the rite by which we hand over the controls of our life formally to the Spirit of God. You may have done this earlier, but now you formally make the commitment.

It is because of this commitment, which is made after you are saved, that the Spirit of God begins to manifest in your life in a powerful manner. As John 3 says, you cannot strait-jacket God, but it is important for me to do my part of making this commitment. In case I have taken baptism and not made this commitment, do I need to take baptism again? Not really. I need to get on my knees and make the commitment to surrender control of my life to the Holy Spirit.

Have you made that commitment?