Category: Jesus

The Garden Covenant?

God is not chaos; He never has been. He is the one who put things in order. The Creator of this universe, the one who hung the stars and created man; how could that be chaos? The chaos and disease comes from man, starting when we listened to a serpent and ate from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. We broke the rules, we usurped authority and have been doing so ever since. We have polluted His divine order. Each generation has corrupted it more and more. A generation in the Bible is 40 years. When it says, “this generation shall not pass” then that portion it is referring to, has already occurred. Think about that when you read the Bible.

Look at the Abrahamic covenant which was between God and Abraham. The only requirement was for Abraham to love God. The Mosaic covenant was one that the Hebrew people asked for, many times referred to as ‘the rules on rocks’ or the Ten Commandments. The Hebrews had rejected the Abrahamic covenant and Moses was trying to rescue his people from their idol worship and sins. When Moses came down from the mountain with the commandments, he saw them worshipping the golden calf and many living in sin. Moses broke the commandments out of frustration. It was a covenant that Moses had asked for, not God, but God in his sovereignty, made a covenant with man as arbiter and punisher, not God’s desire. Other covenants followed this one.

broken-tablets

Erroneously, modern day man looks at the Mosaic covenant or ten commandments – a covenant between God and the Hebrews, as the law on how to live one’s life. God redeemed the Hebrews/Israelis and everyone from the law when he sent Jesus to rescue us from the Mosaic covenant. We don’t have a set of rules to follow, we have the Holy Spirit to guide us into all truth.

Luke 22:20 After supper he took another cup of wine and said, “This cup is the new covenant between God and his people-an agreement confirmed with my blood, which is poured out as a sacrifice for you.” John 16:7-9 “But in fact, it is best for you that I go away, because if I don’t, the Advocate won’t come. If I do go away, then I will send him to you. And when he comes, he will convict the world of its sin, and of God’s righteousness, and of the coming judgment. The world’s sin is that it refuses to believe in me.” John 14:17 “He is the Holy Spirit, who leads into all truth. The world cannot receive him, because it isn’t looking for him and doesn’t recognize him. But you know him, because he lives with you now and later will be in you.”

God made a New Covenant with man that was (simplified version) if we accepted Jesus Christ as our Savior we would live an eternal life. This returns us to God’s original purpose — for man to fellowship with God and love Him, very similar to the Abrahamic covenant, but more to the point, to the garden experience. We are joint heirs with Christ, born from above. Just as was said in the beginning, “let us create man in our own image.”

Hebrews 9:11-15 But when Christ appeared as a High Priest of the good things to come [that is, true spiritual worship], He entered through the greater and more perfect tabernacle, not made with hands, that is to say, not a part of this [material] creation. He went once for all into the Holy Place [the Holy of Holies of heaven, into the presence of God], and not through the blood of goats and calves, but through His own blood, having obtained and secured eternal redemption [that is, the salvation of all who personally believe in Him as Savior]. For if the sprinkling of [ceremonially] defiled persons with the blood of goats and bulls and the ashes of a [burnt] heifer is sufficient for the cleansing of the body, how much more will the blood of Christ, who through the eternal [Holy] Spirit willingly offered Himself unblemished [that is, without moral or spiritual imperfection as a sacrifice] to God, cleanse your conscience from dead works and lifeless observances to serve the ever living God?For this reason He is the Mediator and Negotiator of a new covenant [that is, an entirely new agreement uniting God and man], so that those who have been called [by God] may receive [the fulfillment of] the promised eternal inheritance, since a death has taken place [as the payment] which redeems them from the sins committed under the obsolete first covenant. 

Of course, we can look to the ten commandments as a guideline to follow, but the perfect guide is the Holy Spirit, who shows us how to lead our lives when we submit to him. How do we do this? By knowing his voice. By following that conviction we have when we feel that we shouldn’t do something. That conviction is the Holy Spirit telling us not to be involved, not to say certain things, and not to act in a particular way. The more we listen, the more ‘in tune’ we become with his urging and guidance. We walk in the garden covenant, we know when God is near, which is always. We know how to answer every man, we walk in communion with the Holy Spirit and we start to see and use the vision of Jesus, because we see with the eyes of God, because we have the mind of Christ. We have been transformed to our original purpose and the material things of this world matter less and less. 

1 Corinthians 2:13-16 When we tell you these things, we do not use words that come from human wisdom. Instead, we speak words given to us by the Spirit, using the Spirit’s words to explain spiritual truths. But people who aren’t spiritual can’t receive these truths from God’s Spirit. It all sounds foolish to them and they can’t understand it, for only those who are spiritual can understand what the Spirit means. Those who are spiritual can evaluate all things, but they themselves cannot be evaluated by others. For, “Who can know the Lord’s thoughts? Who knows enough to teach him?” But we understand these things, for we have the mind of Christ.

Is There a Seat for Jesus?

Recently, I spoke with a friend who, upon moving to a new town, visited the local church she had grown up in. She said all the heads turned when she walked in, and they weren’t just looks of curiosity. As she found a seat, she had a feeling that she was sitting in someone else’s seat. She sat through the service, feeling uncomfortable. She continued to try to visit the church, picking different pews and different spaces within them for several Sundays. Each Sunday, she was met with the same reaction, that she was occupying a seat that belonged to someone else or that she was unwelcome. She even waited one Sunday until the last minute, after the church bells rang, giving everyone a chance to sit in their regular places. She still was met with turned heads and eyes looking down their noses. The minister never payed her a visit and she finally quit going. Why go where you don’t feel accepted or wanted? I’ve thought about our conversation a few times since and it strikes me how their reception is so unlike my friend’s personality. She embodies the same opening arms towards others as Jesus, not judging, but loving people exactly as they are. Others from all walks of life are welcome in her world.

Jesus in church

I wonder what those church people could have had in their minds to be so cold to such a warm and caring person? Were there rumors or gossip they had spread and believed, which are usually lies? Or did they feel they were too good for her? Or were they so cliquish, that they didn’t accept others who hadn’t been in their fold for years? Greater still, would they recognize Jesus if he came through their doors and sat in one of the pews or would he have been met with the same huffs and looks of derision? I can tell you they did encounter Jesus, and they didn’t recognize him, because we carry Jesus with us, when we are believers. (Galatians 2:20 “My old self has been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me. So I live in this earthly body by trusting in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.“) We are the light and perhaps that is what they didn’t like. Her light was dispelling their darkness and their sins of piety and holier-than-thou attitude.

I think of how opposite their attitude was to Jesus’ attitude towards others. The first one that comes to mind is the Samaritan woman. He hadn’t heard rumors about her, he Knew her life story, but that didn’t keep him from talking with her and offering her the living water. 

John 4:7, 9-10, 13-15 When a Samaritan woman came to draw water, Jesus said to her, “Will you give me a drink? The Samaritan woman said to him, “You are a Jew and I am a Samaritan woman. How can you ask me for a drink?” (For Jews do not associate with Samaritans.) Jesus answered her, “If you knew the gift of God and who it is that asks you for a drink, you would have asked him and he would have given you living water.” Jesus answered, “Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again, but whoever drinks the water I give them will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give them will become in them a spring of water welling up to eternal life.” The woman said to him, “Sir, give me this water so that I won’t get thirsty and have to keep coming here to draw water.”

He went on to ask her to call her husband and she said she didn’t have one and he told her she was right, she’d had five. But that didn’t stop Jesus from conversing with her or offering her salvation, because he didn’t look at her sins or what people said about her, he looked at her as redeemed. 

Another story that comes to mind is when Jesus ate with Levi, a tax collector and sinners. It was then that the pious teachers of the law had a fit! They couldn’t figure out why Jesus would eat with tax collectors and sinners. But how would he reach them, if he didn’t fellowship with them? They welcomed Jesus at their table and many turned their lives to follow him. 

Mark 2: 15-17 While Jesus was having dinner at Levi’s house, many tax collectors and sinners were eating with him and his disciples, for there were many who followed him. When the teachers of the law who were Pharisees saw him eating with the sinners and tax collectors, they asked his disciples: “Why does he eat with tax collectors and sinners?” On hearing this, Jesus said to them, “It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners.”

So these were people that were not accepted in the community, but what about those who were? What about the leaders, how did they treat Jesus when he dined with them?
Let’s look at one Sabbath at a prominent Pharisee’s house, (maybe a deacon or bishop in today’s standards). 

Luke 14:1-4, 7-11 One Sabbath, when Jesus went to eat in the house of a prominent Pharisee, he was being carefully watched. There in front of him was a man suffering from abnormal swelling of his body. Jesus asked the Pharisees and experts in the law,“Is it lawful to heal on the Sabbath or not?” But they remained silent. So taking hold of the man, he healed him and sent him on his way. When he noticed how the guests picked the places of honor at the table, he told them this parable: “When someone invites you to a wedding feast, do not take the place of honor, for a person more distinguished than you may have been invited. If so, the host who invited both of you will come and say to you, ‘Give this person your seat.’ Then, humiliated, you will have to take the least important place. But when you are invited, take the lowest place, so that when your host comes, he will say to you, ‘Friend, move up to a better place.’ Then you will be honored in the presence of all the other guests. For all those who exalt themselves will be humbled, and those who humble themselves will be exalted.”

Jesus didn’t allow the circumstances of those around him to stop him from doing what his father had sent him to do, to heal the sick and save the lost. He also didn’t miss an opportunity to teach them how ill-behaved they were in choosing their seats and jockeying for position. So, to me, my friend was in good company, because her lifestyle was the same as Jesus, going again and again where she wasn’t wanted and continuing to love those who are rejected by society as she had been. I wonder, is there a seat for others in your life? Is there a seat for Jesus?