Dec 2010 Grace Nuggets (Think About His Love)

Grace is always supplying because love is always giving.

The best way to experience God’s blessings is to enjoy the Lord every moment. Never feel rushed, stressed or pressurised. Rest in God’s grace who is always supplying to us.

It doesn't matter how much theology we know. It's how much we are willing to believe and receive God's oversupplying love and grace and enjoy our blessedness in Christ.

You are our hiding place. You shall preserve us from trouble; You shall surround us with songs of deliverance. (Psalm 32:7)

God has made us masterpieces, created in His glorious image.

"I love my Master, my wife and my children. I will not go out free", for true freedom is found in a loving family relationship.

 It is His (and our) joy, pleasure and glory to overlook a transgression. (Proverbs 19:11)

We are a new creation in Christ, made in His glorious image, a masterpiece beloved and whole, blessed to be a blessing.

Remove condemnation and the outward symptoms will disappear.

Expect good because God's favour is on us in Christ.

It is the goodness and kindness of God that leads us to repentance (change our mind to believe the good news of grace). Keep expecting to experience His goodness!

Surely goodness and love shall chase us down all the days of our life and we will dwell in Christ (or Christ consciousness) forever!

Create a beautiful world and glorious future with positive words of faith.

God (our highest Self) sees us all holy, righteous, blameless and above reproach. We are beloved and valuable in Christ.

Experiencing the perfect love of God casts out every fear, and faith becomes operative.

"Think about His love, think about His goodness, think about His grace that brought us through."

"For as high as the heavens above, so great is the measure of our Father's love. Great is the measure of our Father's love."

The revelation of the gospel is the revelation of the fullness of Christ in every one of us.

 Love life and see good days, and speak positive words of faith and blessings.

The Spirit love of God perseveres and sustains soul love, as in the marriage between Christ and the church.

"In the light of the king's face is life, and his favour is like the latter rain."

It's all about Jesus (our true identity) and His finished work because He and us are One. He loves us so much.

See one another as finished and perfect workmanship in Christ. We are blooming wherever we are planted.

Expect the favour of God (cosmic consciousness) wherever we go. It is our Father's good pleasure to give us the kingdom (righteousness/innocence, peace and joy in the Holy Spirit within us) where all our needs are met.

Jesus is love in action. He came to serve and give His life for us. He (our true Self) continues to live in and through us.

We are believers in Christ who live by His indwelling life.

Every day is Today for us to enter into rest. Jesus is our today, our rest.

Jesus always sees us His bride without spot, wrinkle or any such thing because as He is, so are we in this world.

Life begins when we realise who we are in Christ.

Personal devotional thoughts (July 2010)

There is nothing more fulfilling than being preoccupied with the knowledge of Christ (who is our true identity) in all His fullness.

God (our highest self) is love and love keeps no records of wrongs, and love never fails.

Thank You Lord (our higher consciousness and our true self), for Your lovingkindness is better than life.

Faith is having a good opinion of God (who is our highest self, who takes care of even the minutest detail in our lives).

Give thanks in everything because of His grace and our worth (our original design and value).

Rest in the Lord (our higher consciousness) and wait patiently for Him.

Jesus (our true identity) is in the present (I Am). Peace and joy is found in encountering Him in the simplest things in life. :)

God's presence is found in the present.

Focus on living in the present, for He (our love consciousness) takes care of the future.

We experience life and victory when we focus on Jesus (our true identity) and meditate on His goodness and love.

The more we know Jesus (our true identity who is beloved and complete), the more grace and peace is multiplied in our lives.

Righteousness is not based on what we do. Righteousness (or innocence) is based on who we are because Christ (our true origin and identity) is our righteousness (and innocence).

We are all complete in Christ and the beloved of the Father (our highest self).

As Jesus is, so are we in this world. See eveyone through His eyes of love and wisdom.

A life of being under grace is a life of thanksgiving for God's constant supply (within us).

As Jesus is healthy and strong and favoured, so are we in this world, and the Holy Spirit (our inner witness in our heart) bears witness with the truth.

Every time we worship God (our true self - feeling good about who we are), we are redeeming the time.

As our days, so shall our strength and rest be. Every day, we are growing stronger, healthier and more youthful. :)

‘Hell’ is a Misunderstood Concept in Christianity

Someone asked in Yahoo Answers this question: “Do you believe in hell?” The following is a very good answer that is based on sound Biblical interpretation and historical research.
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‘Hell’ was a borrowed term from pagan tradition by Roman Catholic Church during the reign of Constantine.

In the Bible, the term ‘hell’ was mistranslated by the translators. So yes, it is an invention of the Church empire for the purpose of controlling of masses.

As for ‘heaven’, the apostle Paul stated it in Ephesians 2:6 that the entire Human race has been raised to heavenly places IN Christ Jesus. As in Adam all die, so in Christ ALL and the entire human race will be made alive as they come to knowledge of Christ. And it is my conviction that hell or heaven is in one’s consciousness. When the apostle John mentioned heaven in Rev 21:1, “a new heaven and a new earth” is not referring to terrestrial or celestial bodies, etc. Rather he was talking about ‘covenantal transition’ – the ending of the Old Covenant Mosaic world of sin and sacrifice and the coming in of the endless New Covenant age of mercy and GRACE – the ages to come, a “world without end” Eph 3:21; Isa 9:7; Isa 54:17.

I encourage everyone (NOT ONLY YOU) to not buy into the popular Church idea that “If you believe in Jesus you will go to heaven, and if you don’t believe in Jesus you will go to hell” — it is the most ridiculous idea that has been sold to us by the man behind the Curtain. The Bible says that when we die, the body returns to the ground it came from, and the spirit returns to God who gave it (Ecclesiastes 12:7). We don’t go to heaven or hell. That is the most ridiculous thing I have ever heard in my life and there is nothing spiritual about it. It is all Pagan. The Christian religion set back history at least by 2000 years. We think the way people in Old Testament time thought because of the lie that we have been told all our lives.

You know what is the negative side of it all? Hell is nothing but ignorance or the absence of the love of God. Jesus said, “And I tell you that you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of HADES (most translations say ‘hell’) will not overcome it”. So, what is ‘hell’ in this context? Ignorance, living in the absence of love and grace and darkness is ‘hell”, so Jesus was telling Simon, “Son of Jonah, I tell you, you are Peter, son of God, upon this rock (UPON THIS UNDERSTANDING OF WHO YOU ARE IN CHRIST) I will build My church.” (petros = a portion of rock from petra = a mass of rock) A chip of the old block! The ekklesia is the expression of the fact that the son of man is the son of God, the fact that man began in God, and His image and likeness is redeemed in human form! So, hell is nothing but “Identity crisis”. In my opinion. Be Free!!=:)

(Adapted from Yahoo Answers)

Related links:
Hell is a Christian hoax
Has God been misrepresented by Christianity?
Bible Translations that Do Not Teach Eternal Torment

Some Reflections on a Trinitarian View of the Cross

The following is a very interesting article by Bill Nieporte, which refutes the penal substitution view of the cross in a positive way. I can relate to this article because like the author, I used to subscribe to the penal substitution view of the cross, and later realised that this view faces several problems. I think he summarised the main problems of that view well, such as the triune God – the Father, Son and Holy Spirit – is not separated from Himself or one another, and the fact that Jesus came as a revelation of God as our loving Father.

After all, in the past few years, I have listened to preachings like this: “Yes, God is love, but God is also just. God hates sin and has to punish sinners, so God punished His Son on our behalf at the cross.” Or “Yes, God is our Father, but God is also a Judge. As a Father, He wept for His Son, but as a Judge, He had to turn His back and forsake His Son at the cross – He was forsaken by the Father so that you and I will be accepted by the Father.” I have accepted this view without much questioning in the past, because the preachers sounded convincing in the way they presented this view of the cross. It was also a popular view, as it seemed to be widely accepted by people among the evangelical christian circles.

I guess the penal substitution view might even sound logical to most people because we tend to equate our human sense of justice with God’s idea of justice. In most (if not all) societies, the law court would impose on an offender some form of punishment, such as fine, jail or death penalty, depending on the severity of the crime. But this punishment is mainly retributive and serves as a deterrent for others – it is neither remedial nor restorative. The judge also gains nothing out of it. God, on the other hand, has a different view of justice – He judges on behalf of the poor, the downcast, the oppressed, and the sinners. God is love, and His justice must be viewed from the perspective that His nature is love — love wants the best for us.

So who did God judge at the cross? Not us. Not His Son. I believe God judged the devil, who is the accuser of the brethren, and he is none other than our guilty conscience, so that today, our conscience can no longer condemn us or make us think God is angry with us or out to punish us. God saves us from wrong thinking (which began in the garden of Eden), by sending His Son to open our eyes to the truth of the gospel – through His finished work at the cross, He has cleansed our conscience so that we can have the boldness and freedom to fellowship with God the Father, Son and Holy Spirit who is all the while with us and for us. We can boldly and freely enjoy the warm fellowship and love with the triune God in our daily life.

“The reason I am ‘hung up’ on this (as you put it) is that I am passionate about biblical theology. What is advocated by those who hold ‘penal substitution’ view of redemption is a hermeneutic that is imposed on the scripture from the outside. It does not rise up from the text. I once believed otherwise – but as I have more carefully studied the Bible – I am no longer able to accept the schizophrenic view of God that teaches that Father was dumping anger or wrath out on Jesus when he was on the cross. My foundation has been a renewed understanding and appreciation for the biblical doctrine of the Trinity.

The ‘penal substitution’ view is in error in that it divides God into parts differing personalities, rather than a Triune who share the same nature (LOVE). The early church fathers referred to this as perichoresis – a Greek term that means ‘cleaving together.’ It describes the fellowship (Baxter Kruger calls it ‘the Divine dance’) that exists between the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, as they embrace and infuse each other. This is more than just intimacy and self-sufficiency. It is also the understanding that the Father, Son, and Spirit are one in being. Karl Barth considers the  doctrine of the Trinity so important that it became the lynchpin of this entire theology. In fact, the doctrine of the Trinity (Barth referred to the ‘one in threeness’ and ‘three in oneness’ or God) was the prolegomena of his systematic theology.

Here is where the problem lies. The idea that one part of God could be angry at us and the other loving toward us is contrary to this core biblical doctrine of the Christian faith. The idea that Father could in any way pour out anger or wrath on Jesus in anathema to a good Trinitarian, as it cuts up the Godhead into separate entities, rather than affirming the unity of the Godhead. This is unbiblical.

Compounding this biblical error is that it serves as a basic denial of the doctrine of the Incarnation which teaches us that Jesus was the perfect expression of the Father in human form (see Hebrews 1:3). In Jesus, God is seen not as some wrathful God of vengeance who must be appeased. Rather God is full of compassion and mercy, as witnessed in Jesus.
What Trinitarians advocate is that the place from which to understand scripture and all doctrines of the Christian faith is by looking at the love and kindness of Jesus, who came to reveal what God was really like (as John 14:9 says, “Anyone who has seen me has seen the Father.”) Those who work from a ‘penal substitution’ view say that the discussion about the nature and identity of God begins with ‘the law’ and not with Jesus. In fact, ‘penal substitution’ draws the attention so much to ‘the law’ that even God must submit to its dictates. In this view, God is so uptight about sin (disobedience against the law) that God MUST punish lawbreakers. So, then, the two hermeneutical principles that inform my interpretation of scripture are the doctrine of the Trinity and the conviction that the nature (DNA, if you will) of God is LOVE. Both these principles rise up from the scripture, where as the ‘penal’ view does not. So, while you may disagree with me, please don’t see my objection as merely a visceral discomfort with the notion of God’s ‘anger’ or ‘wrath.’ Rather these ideas (as they are understood from a ‘penal substitution’ viewpoint) are simply inconsistent with biblical theology.

So, then, the logical question is this: “If God was NOT pouring out wrath on Jesus as a penal substitution for us, then what exactly was happening at the cross?” The answer is that the cross is a unified expression of LOVE from our Triune God. Texts that affirm this include 2 Corinthians 5:19 and Hebrews 9:14 which together place Father, Son, and Holy Spirit together, on the cross, bringing all humanity the gift of salvation. Beyond all else, salvation is an invitation to participate in ‘the Divine dance’ (perichoresis).

As I said earlier, God is not schizophrenic. He does not suffer from a multiple-personality disorder. There is not a good guy God in a white hat named Jesus, and a mean God in a black hat called the Father. There is one Triune God (Father, Son, and Holy Spirit) who loves without condition and has not only forgiven us, but has removed sin from us, and has made a way for full participation in the love relationship the Godhead shares. The word Paul uses is ‘adoption.’ God becomes one of us in Jesus. God takes up our cause. God draws us into relationship. (Ephesians 1:4-5)

Now with this picture in mind, how do we see this concept of God’s wrath? God’s wrath is God’s anger at sin because it hinders our ability to have intimacy with God. As a parent, I have often been angry at my children’s behavior. But I have never stopped loving them. I have never disowned them. Jesus makes this exact point in Matthew 7:9-11, when he says, “Which of you, if your son asks for bread, will give him a stone? Or if he asks for a fish, will give him a snake? If you, then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give good gifts to those who ask him!” The message of the cross under the ‘penal substitution’ view is that God is angry with you and poured out His wrath on Jesus. The message of the cross from a proper Trinitarian understanding of the scripture is that God loves you. That’s why we call it GOSPEL.”

- Bill Nieporte