Tag Archives: Christianity

General Principles

Ministerial Qualifications

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This is taken from a blog I wrote back in 2012.

Of all the English translations I have read I have yet to come across one which brings out the distinctions in the Greek words for love in John 21:15-17. Knowing the differences significantly adds to the understanding of Jesus’ reinstatement of Peter and the qualifications for being a minister in God’s church.  Only the amplified version really brings it out but you can lose the significance in all the words.  Here is my version:

15 When they had eaten, Jesus said to Simon Peter, Simon, son of John, do you agape Me more than these? He said to Him, Yes, Lord, You know that I phileo You. He said to him, Feed My lambs.

16 Again He said to him the second time, Simon, son of John, do you agape Me? He said to Him, Yes, Lord, You know that I phileo You. He said to him, Shepherd My sheep.

17 He said to him the third time, Simon, son of John, do you phileo Me? Peter was grieved that He should ask him the third time, Do you phileo Me? And he said to Him, Lord, You know everything; You know that I phileo You! Jesus said to him, Feed My sheep.

Agape means love like Jesus’ love when He died for us on the Cross.  A supernatural love that comes straight from the Father.  Peter knew he didn’t love Jesus like that – not after his three denials on the night Jesus needed him most.  He wasn’t going to make the same mistake he had made before the crucifixion (John 13:37).

But he also knew that he had phileo –  a brotherly affection and natural love for Jesus.  So he had responded honestly.  He didn’t mind Jesus questioning his agape love but he was upset when he questioned even his phileo love.  He would have been devastated to discover that he didn’t even have that!

But actually Jesus was out to encourage him.  For each time He questioned Peter and each time Peter answered honestly and without pretense Jesus found in him someone He could trust.  Someone who could feed the young and tend to the needs of and even feed the more mature.

Some teachers would say that Pentecost (Acts 2: 1-4) added the agape to the phileo that Peter had.  And perhaps it did.  But for me I think I know what answer I would give to Jesus if I was asked the same questions, Pentecost or no Pentecost.

Only He knows really how qualified I am, or anyone is, to spiritually feed and tend His lambs or sheep.  But the qualifications are definitely not academic ones.  You don’t have to learn the Greek to love His people enough to feed them.

Family, General Principles

Jesus and His Dad

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Everyone has a father even if not everyone has known who that was or even if they were not always there for them.

My observation is that absent or dysfunctional fathers are the root cause of a lot of people’s issues with authority, other men and God.

For those who had a reasonably good, or at least present, father in their early years you probably remember a time when you idolised him. You would have compared him with others and boasted about his various attributes, how important his job was or how good he was at various things, like kicking a ball into the sky or jumping a gate. You might have been about 5 or 6.

There is a sense in which Jesus seems to have never lost that sense of awe about his dad. I guess, in one way, that is not surprising considering Who we are talking about:

“My father who has given them to me is greater than all and no one is able to snatch anyone out of the hand of the father. ” (John 10: 29)

The relationship between Jesus and his father was intense to say the least:

“Truly, truly I say to you that the son is able to do nothing from himself unless it is something he sees the father doing. For whatever he does the son also does in the same way.” (John 5:19)

“I am not able to do anything from myself. As I hear I judge and my judgement is righteous because I do not seek my own will but the will of the one who sent me.” (John 5:30)

“I and the father are one.” (John 10:30)

“I have come from the father and have come into the world. Now I leave the world and go to the father.” (John 16:28).

Most of the time we don’t hear the father’s side of the ongoing conversation between the father and son but there are a couple of examples which show just how much the father also loved the son:

And lo, a voice came from Heaven, saying, “This Is My Beloved Son, In Whom I Am Well Pleased.” (Matthew 3:17)

(Jesus said) Father, glorify your name. Then there came a voice from heaven saying: “I have both glorified it and will glorify it again.” (John 12:28).

From the above quotations and many others it is clear that Jesus depended heavily on the father for everything. We see this again coming up to the day of his crucifixion:

“Behold, an hour is coming and has come when each one of you will be scattered and I will be left alone. But I am not alone because the father is with me.” (John 17:32)

But then, when he needed him most, the father abandons him.

Did Jesus see this coming?

About three in the afternoon Jesus cried out in a loud voice, “Eli, Eli, lema sabachthani?” (which means “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”). (Matthew 27:46)

If your dad left your mother unexpectedly when you were young and or vulnerable it may have been the most, or one of the most, difficult days of your life.

Jesus knows what that was like. (Hebrews 4:15)

General Principles

Trusting Him

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This He was saying to test him, for He Himself knew what He was intending to do. John 6:6

Questions are God’s way of bringing us closer to him. A relationship develops during the outworking – the back and forth – of unanswered questions. Once the answer comes the relationship growth brought about by that interaction changes or ends. That is why Jesus spent most of his time on earth asking questions or being asked questions rather than answering them.

Most of us have unanswered questions in our lives. They can range from the global to the deeply personal, from the simply annoying to the existential.

“What will we do when we retire and our income is cut in half?”

“Where will I get a house to live in that I can make a home?”

“Where is my life partner that I can marry and form a family with?”

Or as in John 6: “Where are we going to get enough money to pay for the food to feed all these people in our lives?”

The thing is: Jesus knows what he is intending to do.

And it will probably be something unprecedented in our experience.

Our tendency is to judge future prospects by past experiences. History does repeat itself and as Solomon said in Ecclesiastes: There is nothing new under the sun. Even the feeding of the five thousand was not unprecedented. Elijah had done something similar back in the days of the kings of Israel.

However the disciples were not expecting the answer that Jesus brought and normally we don’t either. In our anxious going over of possible scenarios and calculations we usually never correctly predict what is going to happen.

For the really serious, heartfelt issues that we face about loved ones being sick or in trouble, or difficult changes ahead, or anything else that hits our heart’s desires, the answer will always be found when we find where Jesus is at rest in the midst of the storm, the answer he has to the cry of our hearts. “Rabbi,” (which is translated “Teacher”) “where are you abiding?” John 1:38.

He knows what he intends to do.

General Principles

The Sheepfold

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Jesus sums up a way of looking at His arrival into this world, and, actually, at the world itself in the opening verses of John 10:

Truly, truly I say to you, he who does not enter through the door into the sheepfold but climbs up some other way, that one is a thief and a robber.

But he who enters through the door is the Shepherd of the sheep.

To Him the Doorkeeper opens and the sheep hear His voice and He calls His own sheep by name and leads them out. And when he has put them all out, He goes before them and the sheep follow Him because they know His voice. And they will never follow a stranger but will flee from him because they do not know the voice of strangers.

John 10:1-5.

The Scripture does not make it clear how Satan got into the garden of Eden. For sure though, he didn’t enter through the door but went around some other way. Everyone who subtly insinuates their way into an oversight / shepherding role among Jesus’ sheep without express permission from the Doorkeeper, without going through the Door (who is Jesus v.9) is of that same nature.

But Jesus is the Good Shepherd. When He was coming into the world to redeem it by laying down His life, he came legitimately. The Doorkeeper – the Holy Spirit – was happy to open up the sheepfold to Him. The Doorkeeper only ever wants those filled with the Spirit of Jesus to minister to God’s flock, those who have express permission to enter the Sheepfold which is where the Church, His Bride is growing and abiding.

In the Sheepfold every sheep hears Jesus’ voice. Not everyone understands all they hear. However, they all know the sound of His voice, the tones He uses, the Spirit that inhabits those words He uses.

He also calls His own by name – He knows your name! This is not necessarily just that He knows you as Mary or John or Conor but that He knows what He has called you. You can spend a lifetime learning what God means when He calls your name. It’s your eternal name that has two clear components: the name that everyone else sees (Rev. 3:12) and the name only He sees (Rev. 2:17).

If you are His sheep, called by His name, you can guarantee that He will lead you out along with every other sheep into the battlefield, out of the safe confines of the sheepfold, that we may together be part of His plan and work with Him (Eph. 2:10) to see the world saved.

If you are His sheep you know His voice. You will never follow a strange voice but will flee from it. Really, you will know.

General Principles

Desire

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Watch over your heart with all diligence,
For from it are the springs of life.

Proverbs 4:23

It is a great secret to have the eyes of your heart opened so you know what is really going on down there. Paul prays that it might happen to us all: I pray that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened, (Ephesians 1:18).

It is so important to know what you really want in your heart. As I have written elsewhere, the first thing Jesus (the Incarnate Word) is recorded as saying in John’s gospel is “What are you seeking?” or loosely translated, what do you really want?

God has put eternity in our hearts (Eccles. 3:11) so therefore what we really want will always have an eternal component to it. Actually, the eternal reality is the basis of our earthly most heartfelt desires. We are all looking for something that will eternally satisfy.

Some people know in their hearts that renting a house is just not it, they must own it. What they are doing is agreeing with God’s desire to give them an eternal permanent place they can call their own (John 14:1-3). They are sharing in the same hope as those who were looking for an eternal city among the fathers of faith (Hebrews 11:13-16). The hope in God that He will give to each one of us this place of security and permanence is a heart’s desire that cannot be denied. For some this will be the assurance of it coming in the future. For others a lot of that satisfaction can be found in this age here on the earth. As David said: “I certainly believed that I would see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living.” (Psalm 27:13). It becomes a tree of life to those who find that desire satisfied (Proverbs 13:12).

The same applies to any desire of the heart. They are all rooted in eternally valid and appropriate fulfillments.

So let the Spirit search you out and let you know what it is you really want. And don’t be afraid of the answer your heart gives.

Because the heart is the seat of the emotions, intellect and will (according to the bible) there are always strong feelings, intense and oft repeated thoughts and actions that arise out of the desires of our heart.

For all of us it could not be more obvious what we spend most of our time thinking of and doing. What is your most commonly watched TV program (is it “a house in the sun” for example)? Or is it a program containing a lot of human forms and relationships (“Love Island” anyone)?

What do you do to relax? What are you thinking of in your unguarded moments?

One way of looking at the Christian walk is that of capturing all those thoughts and bringing them to the Christ dwelling with you in your heart (2 Cor. 10:5). For Christ dwells in our hearts through faith:

…you have heard Him and have been taught in Him, just as truth is in Jesus, 22 that, in reference to your former way of life, you are to rid yourselves of the old self, which is being corrupted in accordance with the lusts of deceit, 23 and that you are to be renewed in the spirit of your minds, 24 and to put on the new self, which in the likeness of God has been created in righteousness and holiness of the truth. Ephesians 4:22-24.

The process of being renewed in the spirit of our minds includes the taking of every thought of our hearts captive to Christ and asking him what he thinks about it. Sometimes you might be surprised at his answers. We are very often not like him at all in the way we think (Isaiah 55:8) but we do have the mind of Christ (1 Cor. 2:16) to call on at all times if we choose to do so. Putting on the new man is to continuously walk in submission to the thoughts of Christ over our own thoughts.

Keep a constant watch over what your heart is thinking. Let God show you how your desires correspond to his. He put those desires in the heart of every child of God. He hasn’t made a mistake when he lets you reap the consequences of that sowing.

You don’t really understand the heart of God if you think he wouldn’t want you to both eat the cake in this life and also have it in the next. However, he does also know whether having just the eternal version of those two or both the eternal and temporal would be best for you.

Delight yourself in the Lord and He will give you the desires of your heart. Psalms 37:4.

Autobiographical, General Principles

Comfort

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Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of compassion and the God of all comfort, 4 who comforts us in all our troubles, so that we can comfort those in any trouble with the comfort we ourselves receive from God. 5 For just as we share abundantly in the sufferings of Christ, so also our comfort abounds through Christ. 2 Cor. 1:3-5

Perhaps its because of my age or heart condition but I find that unless I feel, very tangibly, the internal comfort of the Holy Spirit and some ease of pain or discomfort, I’m pretty well good for nothing.

The story of Jonah is one of God using discomfort to direct and teach Jonah and other men. In chapter 1, the extreme discomfort of a storm leads men to do something they wouldn’t do if the discomfort wasn’t there. In Chapter 2 Jonah knows comfort in the extremity of being deep underwater in the belly of a fish. In Chapter 3, the people of Nineveh make themselves discomfited in response to the Prophet’s word. 

But in Chapter 4 the impact of personal discomfort on our actions, thoughts and responses to God is shown most clearly:

5 Jonah had gone out and sat down at a place east of the city. There he made himself a shelter, sat in its shade and waited to see what would happen to the city. 6 Then the Lord God provided a leafy plant and made it grow up over Jonah to give shade for his head to ease his discomfort, and Jonah was very happy about the plant. 7 But at dawn the next day God provided a worm, which chewed the plant so that it withered. 8 When the sun rose, God provided a scorching east wind, and the sun blazed on Jonah’s head so that he grew faint. He wanted to die, and said, ‘It would be better for me to die than to live.’

9 But God said to Jonah, ‘Is it right for you to be angry about the plant?’

‘It is,’ he said. ‘And I’m so angry I wish I were dead.’

10 But the Lord said, ‘You have been concerned about this plant, though you did not tend it or make it grow. It sprang up overnight and died overnight. 11 And should I not have concern for the great city of Nineveh, in which there are more than a hundred and twenty thousand people who cannot tell their right hand from their left – and also many animals?’

Jonah 4:5-10

It would be easy for us to judge Jonah but I for one can fully identify with his position. The sufferings of the people of Ukraine, Gaza or even those much closer to home are irrelevant to me when all I feel is pain or discomfort.

Which is why it is so good and important that God does comfort us. As Paul says: “Praise God.. who comforts us in all our troubles.”

It is clear that God wanted to teach Jonah and us all a lesson about the relative importance of things in this chapter. There can be no comparison between my sluggishness and tiredness in the morning and the appalling loss of home, possessions and loved ones that is happening everyday in Ukraine and Gaza.

But still He does actually comfort me. He cares so much about me that I am comforted internally and know regular relief from pain and tiredness as well. Why am I so blessed and others have to suffer so much?

I cannot tell. Grace I guess.

His Story

The Practice of Slavery in New Testament Times

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“Half the population of Rome, and a large proportion of the Empire, were slaves. Christians did not oppose slavery but taught slaves to work well for their masters, believing or unbelieving. Slavery eventually became eradicated by masters and slaves becoming brothers in Christ. The Roman army often took the brightest and best young men and women as slaves.” (Halley’s Bible Handbook Page 616)

“The punishment for runaway slaves could be death. Slaves were not generally ill-treated but they were considered the property of their masters. They could be seized and sent back by anyone if they were trying to escape.” (John Drane, 1998)

“As many as one third of those living in Mediterranean cities may have been slaves, with others having slave origins. In Rome and Italy the figures were higher, perhaps as many as 80 – 90% of the population. By the first century the main supply came from children born to slaves. Slavery was not thought of as immoral or as necessarily degrading. A slave was simply the bottom rank of the economic ladder, doing the jobs equivalent to those which, typically in the 19th and 20th centuries were undertaken by immigrant labour.” (Bowker, The Complete Bible Handbook, 1998, Page 440)

When I think of slaves I think of the worst excesses of exploitation of labour such as took place on Roman galleys or in the gladiatorial arenas. However the reality for most slaves was quite different. Slaves in the Roman Empire were often treated well, especially in the case of those whose masters were Christians. In our case we are redeemed and slaves of Christ – a wonderful master so we don’t have to have negative connotations when Paul says that we should offer ourselves as slaves to righteousness in Romans 6. As Bowker says: “The gospel brought freedom from one slavery, but human beings could only realize their full potential as God’s creatures in the relation of absolute dependence on God, which the image of slavery so powerfully expressed.” (ibid. page 441)

“…slaves are directly addressed in Paul’s letters as members of the churches written to. Paul clearly regarded them as full members of these churches.” (ibid. page 441)