Death where is thy sting?

1 Corinthians 15:55-57 New Living Translation (NLT)

55 O death, where is your victory? O death, where is your sting?”

56 For sin is the sting that results in death, and the law gives sin its power. 57 But thank God! He gives us victory over sin and death through our Lord Jesus Christ.

Jesus took the sting of death for us that we may have victory over sin. For sin demands payment, but Christ payed the price for our sins with His death.

A boy and his father were driving down a country road on a beautiful spring afternoon, when a bumblebee flew in the car window. The little boy, who was allergic to bee stings, was petrified. The father quickly reached out, grabbed the bee, squeezed it in his hand, and then released it. The boy grew frantic as it buzzed by him. Once again the father reached out his hand, but this time he pointed to his palm. There stuck in his skin was the stinger of the bee. "Do you see this?" he asked. "You don't need to be afraid anymore. I've taken the sting for you." We do not need to fear death anymore. Christ has died and risen again. He has taken the sting from death.

[Adrian Dieleman, Waupun, Wisconsin. Leadership, Vol. 15, no. 1.]

Jesus make things right

1 Corinthians 15:20-22 New Living Translation (NLT)

20 But in fact, Christ has been raised from the dead. He is the first of a great harvest of all who have died. 21 So you see, just as death came into the world through a man, now the resurrection from the dead has begun through another man. 22 Just as everyone dies because we all belong to Adam, everyone who belongs to Christ will be given new life.

Adam, a man, brought sin into the world, which affected every person. We all are descendants of Adam and carry that sin today. Jesus took those sins upon himself so that we could be given a life free from sin, a new life that would allow us to be with God at the given time. Jesus made things right with God. Then it's up to us.

In the movie The Words, a struggling young writer named Rory Jansen finds a mysterious manuscript stuffed in an old leather briefcase. Rory types the anonymous manuscript word-for-word and then submits it to a publisher pretending that it's his original work. To his surprise, the book becomes an instant bestseller and Rory wins literary acclaim.

Later in the film an old man confronts Rory and claims to be the true author of the book. The man informs Rory that he originally wrote the story in an attempt to deal with the pain of his child's death and his subsequent divorce. Tragically, his precious manuscript was lost.

Later on, Rory, wracked with remorse, locates the old man, who is working in a greenhouse tending plants. With the two of them alone in the greenhouse, Rory tells the old man, "I want to fix this."

"There's nothing to fix," the old man replies. "You just go and live the life you've made for yourself."

Rory tries to hand the old man a packet of money as he says, "This is all yours. I'm going to take my name off the book and tell everyone the truth."

The old man says, "Then you're even more of a fool than I thought you were."

**Rory asks, "What is this about then?"

The old man says, "It's about my life. It's about my wife and about my child. It's about the joy and the pain that gave birth to those words. You take those words. You take the pain. Why don't you buy a plant with that money?"

The old man shoves a plant into Rory's hands and says, "Take your plant and your money and get out of here." Then he pushes Rory away.

Rory counters, "Hey, I want to make things right!"

"You can't just make things right. Things are just things. Do you understand? No matter how you try to martyr yourself."

Rory pleads with him, "Sir? Sir? Please!" but the old man walks away without offering forgiveness.

[The Words. Directed by Brian Klugman. 2012; Submitted by Greg Asimakoupoulos, Mercer Island, Washington]

Believe, trust and obey

Romans 10:9-10 New Living Translation (NLT)

9 If you openly declare that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. 10 For it is by believing in your heart that you are made right with God, and it is by openly declaring your faith that you are saved.

This is the command of The Gospel. Jesus died and was raised from the dead. It is by faith, believing in your heart that God gave up His only son so that you could be free from sin. For when you believe in the hope of Jesus Christ you are saved.

At the height of his worldwide fame, rock musician Alice Cooper drank a bottle of whiskey a day. But the bottle almost destroyed his marriage to Sheryl, his wife of 25 years. He started heading off to church with her and felt as if God was speaking to him every Sunday.

Now a believer, Cooper takes the opportunity to speak to curious fellow musicians about the reality of the Devil and the change in his life. "I have talked to some big stars about this, some really horrific characters, and you'd be surprised," he says. "The ones that you would think are the farthest gone are the ones that are the most apt to listen."

[Steve Beard, "The Way of Faith for Alice Cooper," Good News Magazine (May/June 2002) p. 29]

There is hope in Christ that cannot be found anywhere else. Believe, trust and obey.

The wrong side of life

Proverbs 17:9 New International Version (NIV)

⁹ Whoever would foster love covers over an offense,
  but whoever repeats the matter separates close friends.

God has told us to love one another and when we do the offenses we have committed are healed. However, if we fail to love we repeat the same mistake and separate ourselves from friends.

Flash of Genius is inspired by the true story of Dr. Robert Kearns (Greg Kinnear). After creating the intermittent windshield wiper, Kearns pitches his idea to General Motors, Ford, and Chrysler. All three companies turn him down, only to steal his idea and add them to all their automobiles. Dr. Kearns decides to take on the Ford Motor Company in a legal battle that no one believes he can win.

At this point in the film, Dr. Kearns has not yet invented his famous windshield wiper. He is currently working as a mechanical engineering professor at Wayne State University. As the scene begins, Dr. Kearns is writing the word "ethics" on a chalkboard. His students enter the classroom. He turns, and says, "Morning, everybody! I want to welcome you all to the first day of the quarter for Applied Electrical Engineering. My name is Dr. Robert Kearns, and I'd like to start by talking to you about ethics."

"I can't think of a job or a career where the understanding of ethics is more important than engineering," Dr. Kearns continues. "Who designed the artificial aortic heart valve? An engineer did that. Who designed the gas chambers at Auschwitz? An engineer did that, too. One man was responsible for helping save tens of thousands of lives. Another man helped kill millions."

"Now, I don't know what any of you are going to end up doing in your lives," Dr. Kearns says, "but I can guarantee you that there will come a day when you have a decision to make. And it won't be as easy as deciding between a heart valve and a gas chamber."

Flash of Genius (Universal Pictures, 2008), directed by Marc Abraham;

We so easily step into the wrong side of life when we should be on the right path to loving others.

Listening to advice

Proverbs 19:20-21 (NIV)

20 Listen to advice and accept discipline,

    and at the end you will be counted among the wise.

21 Many are the plans in a person’s heart,

    but it is the Lord’s purpose that prevails.

We all may think we know what is best. We may even argue with friends or spouse, the there is always the change we could be wrong. We are to listen to advice and when we know it to be trues we are to accept it as discipline. Then our own words will become wisdom for others. Remember it never hurts to listen to advice for the person giving it may always have seen the wisdom in their words.

Some years ago, Tim Keller had a relative who never would wear a seat belt. Every time he talked to him, he would get in the car, but wouldn't wear his seat belt. We all nagged him to no avail. Then one day he got in the car and put his seat belt on right away. We said, "What happened to you?" He said, "A couple weeks ago, I went to see a friend of mine in the hospital. He was in a car crash, and he went through the windshield. He had like 200 stitches in his face. For some strange reason, ever since then, I've been having no problem buckling up."

I asked him, "Well, did you get new information? What changed you? Did you not know that people go through the windshield?" Of course I knew the answer to those questions: What happened was that an abstract proposition became connected to an actual sensory experience that is something he saw. As Jonathan Edwards used to basically say over and over again, it's only when you attach to some truth—that's when real life change occurs. Something has to become real to your heart. Then you will be changed.

God the Father

1 Peter 1:3 (NIV)

3 Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! In his great mercy he has given us new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead,

Peter reminds us that we have been adopted into the family of God and that we have been given a new birth of resurrection. It is being a part of this family that God is our father, just as God is the father of Christ.

In his book Delighting in the Trinity, Michael Reeves compares two ways to look at God. First, there is the common view that God is the Supreme Ruler of the Universe. Reeves contends that if God is The Ruler and the problem is that I have broken the rules, the only salvation he can offer is to forgive me and treat me as if I had kept the rules. Then he gives the following analogy:

But if that is how God is (if he is primarily the Ruler), my relationship with him can be little better than my relationship with any traffic cop. Let me put it like this: if, as never happens, some fine cop were to catch me speeding and so breaking the rules, I would be punished; if, as never happens, he failed to spot me or I managed to shake him off after an exciting car chase, I would be relieved. But in neither case would I love him. And even if, like God, he chose to let me off the hook for my law-breaking, I still would not love him. I might feel grateful, and that gratitude might be deep, but that is not at all the same thing as love. And so it is with the divine policeman: if salvation simply means him letting me off and counting me as a law-abiding citizen, then gratitude (not love) is all I have. In other words, I can never really love the God who is essentially just The Ruler. And that, ironically, means I can never keep the greatest command: to love the Lord my God.

But then Reeves offers another way, the biblical way, to think about God—consider Jesus Christ, the Son of God, and the beauty of the Triune God. Reeves write again:

It is a lane that ends happily in a very different place, with a very different sort of God. How? Well, just the fact that Jesus is "the Son" really says it all. Being a Son means he has a Father. The God he reveals is, first and foremost, a Father. "I am the way and the truth and the life," he says. "No one comes to the Father except through me" (Jn 14:6). That is who God has revealed himself to be: not first and foremost Creator or Ruler, but Father.

[Michael Reeves, Delighting in the Trinity (IVP Academic, 2012), pages 20-21]

Hebrews 10:30-31 (NIV)

Hebrews 10:30-31 (NIV)

³⁰ For we know him who said, “It is mine to avenge; I will repay,”^] and again, “The Lord will judge his people.” ³¹ It is a dreadful thing to fall into the hands of the living God.

 

The terrors of the Lord are known both by revelation and reason. Vindictive justice is a glorious, though terrible attribute of God; it belongs to him, and he will use and execute it upon the heads of such sinners as despise his grace; he will avenge himself, and his Son, and Spirit, and covenant, upon apostates. And how dreadful then will their case be!

 

When you are in God’s hands you are at His mercy and His grace and His love.

 

 

 

Author and speaker Brennan Manning has an amazing story about how he got the name "Brennan." While growing up, his best friend was Ray. The two of them did everything together: bought a car together as teenagers, double-dated together, went to school together and so forth. They even enlisted in the Army together, went to boot camp together and fought on the frontlines together. One night while sitting in a foxhole, Brennan was reminiscing about the old days in Brooklyn while Ray listened and ate a chocolate bar. Suddenly a live grenade came into the foxhole. Ray looked at Brennan, smiled, dropped his chocolate bar and threw himself on the live grenade. It exploded, killing Ray, but Brennan's life was spared.

 

When Brennan became a priest he was instructed to take on the name of a saint. He thought of his friend, Ray Brennan. So he took on the name "Brennan." Years later he went to visit Ray's mother in Brooklyn. They sat up late one night having tea when Brennan asked her, "Do you think Ray loved me?" Mrs. Brennan got up off the couch, shook her finger in front of Brennan's face and shouted, "What more could he have done for you?" Brennan said that at that moment he experienced an epiphany. He imagined himself standing before the cross of Jesus wondering, Does God really love me? And Jesus' mother Mary pointing to her son, saying, "What more could he have done for you?"