John 1:1-4 (Stephen Tong) - LOGOS

"In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God at the beginning. Through him all things were made, without him, nothing was made"

John was the 4th witness in the Gospel, after Matthew, Mark and Luke. Before John wrote the book, the others were already written for tens of years. At that time, Peter already died 22 years, and Paul died 20 years before John. 

The first witness was actually Mark. Peter thru Mark wrote this book. 

The second was Matthew.

The third was Luke, the Greek. And because of Luke's background, he has the most accurate chronology of Christ.

Matthew is the only one that mentions the Kingdom of Heaven; which is actually the same of the Kingdom of God. But Matthew wants to emphasize that the kingdom of Christ is different the all earthly kingdoms.

Mark mentioned that Christ was a slave who came to serve people.

Luke has the character of the Man of Sorrow.

John wrote the character of God who became man. It is Word who became flesh. It is the only book that didn't write the story of the birth and the death of Christ. Because the birth and death are the character of humans. But to John, Jesus is God who doesn't need to go thru the humanism to go to heaven. 

Jesus called his 12 disciples in Galilea, one of the most humble place in Judea. Because Jesus wants to choose the humble people who does not have arrogance in them. So that the influence, such as John and Peter overcome Socrates or Aristotle. For God can lift up the poorest one to the richest place.

Therefore, John didn't write like the others, who first wrote the story of  Jesus's birth.

In the Bible, only the book of Genesis and John, that starts with "In the beginning..."

Moses wrote "In the beginning..." of the creation.

John wrote "In the beginning..."means prior the creations of all things. It is the beginning of God, the creator; about the contingent and in-contingent. 

Humans are contingent, and survived by their children.

In our world the contingent of existence, there must be one in-cotingent existence forever and ever. (Thomas Aquinas), to keep the existence of the contingents.

(Five ways to prove the existence of God by Thomas Aquinas.)

The basic faith of Christians is there are differences between the Creator and the creations.

"In the beginning was the Word." It is "word" not "God". Why "word"? For it is about the Trinity. 

Above the contingent world, there is the in-contingent, which is "WORD" (firman), the most absolute axiom. For example. 2 + 2 = 4 starts from the beginning, that has no beginning.

So, in the beginning there is the "TRUTH" and the TRUTH was God.

Kong Hu Chu, Muhammad,  and other religion leaders never say that "I am the truth.". Only Jesus did.

When someone speaks, breaths, words come out. (Trinity) 

The spirit of God is the breath of God. The word of God is the son of God.

In China, Confucius asked for another 5 or 10 years to learn about the book of changes

Heraclitus, a western philosopher , "There is nothing permanent, except change."

Difference between human and animal, animals only think of what is seen, while human can think of something that can't been seen.

Stoicism is the ones who are hardest to convert to Christianity, as they think they have the highest value than everyone else.

The first important person of stoicism in the 1st century is Epictectus (a slave), Seneca (very loyal to the king that he committed suicide by jumping to the blast of fire in a mountain).

The 3rd famous stoic people is the Roman King, Marcus Aurelius.

In Chinese culture, the highest dream is the unity between men and the ski. (天人合一)

Logos - The Greek word logos (traditionally meaning word, thought, principle, or speech)

According to the Chinese philosophy, there are 5 most important relationship in the world:

First the relationship between the King and the governors.

First the relationship between parents and children.

First the relationship between husband and wife.

First the relationship between brothers and sisters.

First the relationship between friends.

Can a perfect God create an imperfect world? Can a perfect God create a perfect one?

If God can create a perfect one means that God can create god. So there is a substantial difference between the creator and the creation. Therefore, world cannot be perfect because it is a creation. Only God is perfect. ("All things were made thru Him, and without Him was not anything made that was made.")

The one that came from heaven will speak heavenly; the one who came from earth will speak earthly. ("... without Him was not any thing made that was made." (John 1:3)

Plato wrote that Demiurge was the creator of the world. 

-- (end ep. 4)

New Identity - The False Disciple (John 13:21-30)

New Identity - John 13:21-30 by Tim Keller

Forgiveness and Grace

1. Nature and Enormity of sin

            Jesus looks at His disciple who's about to betray Him to death. But how did Jesus look at him? He was troubled in spirit. He was torn up inside, because Judas has broken His heart. In Gen 6:5-6 also said that God's heart was filled with pain when humans sin. As an example is a poor widow who raised her son and managed to send him to collage. She always told her son to be honest, work hard, and help the poor. However, his son later on does not care much. All he does probably just sending a Christmas card every year to her. He would say about himself that he is a good person, for he is honest, hard working and always helping the poor. However, he never spends time with his mother who raised him. He is doing those things all for himself, though he owes her everything. And he is not giving her; the love relationship that she wants. This is just like that most people tend to say that they are good person but they don't believe in God. This is the nature and enormity of sin. We never give God what He really deserves.

2. The power of sin

            Sin, according to the Bible, is the soul curved in on itself. So once it deserves itself rather than God or other people, sin makes your own ego / need  the only real thing in the world, and everything else discardable. It is "me first".

            There are 3 things about the power of sin:

            a. Power of sin to remain - insects (e.g. cockroaches) can take 60000 to 70000 more time radiations than human being can. Just like Judas. Tho he had spent three years with Jesus, he never gave his heart to Jesus. Because the "cockroach" of his sin still remains.

           b. Power of sin to hide. - When John asked Jesus who was going to betray Jesus, tho Jesus already answered clearly, but they still didn't understand, because Judas is just like every other disciples. He is not indifferent than any of them. He was sent out to preach, to cast out demon, to heal people, and he did!!! 

For example people like to say,
            "I am not bitter, I just have a strong sense of justice." or
            "I am not a workaholic, I am just productive." or
            "I am not an alcoholic, I am just the life of the party." or
            "I am not abrasive or mean, I just have a high standard." or
            "I am not stingy, I am prudent." or
            "I am not races, I just can't trust those people."

These are the sense of denial we have, which show the power of sins to hide.

            c. The power of sin to grow. - In John 13:2, Satan puts something into Judas' mind. And in John 13:27, Satan enters into Judas. That is progression! Sin has the power of gradual growth that eventually can take you over. Such as Cain and Abel. Abel was becoming successful, and Cain became displeased. Cain's identity was built over what others see him. He felt good about himself, because he was better than Abel. So when Able became more successful than Cain, he became bitter. So, he had 2 choices, either re-adjust his identity, or eliminate Abel. If you are indulging in bitter thoughts, and keep on grumbling, in the end, if you don't master your sin, you = grumbling. You won't realize it, but others will. The reason Cain killed Abel is not because he had insuppressible urge to kill people, but because he has an identity that based on "Mom and Dad like him better than Abel."            

3. Medicine for sin

            It  says that after dipping the bread, Jesus gave it to Judah. - it is a sign of honor, love, and friendship. Tho Jesus has seen everything to the bottom, He still loves him. When Judah grabs the bread, his heart was resolved. He was plunging into the spiritual darkness. Because God is perfectly loving and just, He was on the cross, though we are so unworthy, to offer us a new identity.

True Faith

I just finished listening to Dr. Stephen Tong's sermon in Indonesian about faith.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M5pByUs2jm4

He said that many people claim that they know what the true faith is. But the more we try to find out, the more confusing it gets. This leads to the topic of epistemology. 

So, he continuously told us about a very important thing Confucius, and Socrates both said.

Confucius:
"If you know, say that you know. If you don't know, say that you don't know. For that's the beginning of knowing."

Socrates:
"When you honestly admit you know nothing, that's the attitude you begin to know something."
He also said, "I know nothing, but only one thing that I know, which is that I know nothing."

And the Bible says:
"If there is someone who claims to know everything according to what should be known, s(he) has yet known nothing."

Prayer:
Lord, I want to learn more about you. I always claimed that I already know You, yet I don't know. Give me a humble heart to know that I don't know anything, so that I may know more of nothingness that I know, to know about You that I know nothing about.

Confused, huh?!?! Me too!!! *_*

What is then the true faith? It is in the Apostle's Creed.

Motivation to Read the Bible

Peace and wisdom of God I need to face every challenges in this fallen world. Wisdom comes from fear of the Lord. Fear of the Lord comes from knowing who He is, what His will, and His way.

It is not easy to understand God, or I would say to myself, not possible. Why? Because if God is the creator of in this universe and everything in it, nothing can be bigger than Him. Just like if someone created a robot. A robot could never understand its creator. It is only designed to obey the creator's commands. But God created human being in His image. We are created with mind and freewill, to wonder and follow our own hearts, or to obey and go with His way. But nowadays, the saying "Follow Your Heart..." is accepted more than "Trust and Obey". It seems that the word "obey"is only for little children. Moreover, many Christians, including myself, often twists the "trust God" part in our own ways knowingly or unknowingly, such that we just do what we WANT to do, and let God take care the rest, which is somehow against Jesus' teaching, "Do not put the Lord your God to the test." (Matthew 4:7)

Reading the Bible should not merely based on obedience. It is also  not just something you want. If it is a mere obedient, it would bring to self righteousness and pride, which then lead to self destruction. If it is just something based on want, it would lead to lack of understanding and appreciation. It is like food we eat everyday. We want and we need food to live, not too much and not too little.

Being obedient of something we don't understand yet is the hardest part. For the world has gone far in the opposite direction of the Bible. We get confused a lot of what we need and what we want. We focus more on physical needs, and neglected our soul. When we realize our souls are in hunger, we blame it on our body, activities kept us away from our spiritual need. It is true that when we are physically worn out, it is almost impossible to sit and pray. All we want to do is just to lay down and rest totally, our body and mind. Prayer sometimes requires me to think more, which I often fail to do when I am exhausted once I am back home from work. When I force myself to pray and read the Bible a little in the midst of my work and house chores, it doesn't give me any peace at all. Instead I am always burst out in anger afterwards. It is like I pour out my heart, read the Word to renew my heart, but does not have the ability to actually "chew" and "digest", and everything is "thrown up". Is it because I do my prayer and Bible reading out of obedience alone? Or my motive's probably just not right. To gain wisdom for my own pride to stand on my own understanding against others is indeed a sin. Reading Bible and prayer should be a way to worship God, not for our own benefits, but HIS. To lift up our happiness in HIM alone, to live according the Creator's purpose, to desire what HE desires. It is overall not about our own gains. Our looses might be HIS gains, and HIS gains are always our true gains. But Satan always tempts us with his lie that we could live happily without given up our own gains, just as how Satan tempted Jesus on the mountain. But Jesus answered him, "Away from me, Satan! For it is written: Worship the Lord, your God, and serve Him only." (Matthew 4:10)

The Great Promise - Rest for Your Soul (Matthew 11:25-30) - 9/14/2014

By: Tim Keller

                At that time Jesus said, "I praise you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because you have hidden these things from the wise and learned, and revealed them to little children. yes, Father, for this was your good pleasure.
                "All things have been committed to me by my Father. No one knows the Son except the Father, and no one knows the Father except the Son and those to whom the Son chooses to reveal him.
                "Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light."

This is a very famous passage, "Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest...rest for your souls." This passage takes to the heart of what Christianity is all about. It is to remind us of who it is we are serving, what we are about, who it is we are lifting up. It tells us a lot about Jesus and what he offers. So, it's about "rest for the soul". And we are going to learn 3 things about that rest, deep inner rest, not just rest of the body, it's rest of the soul. We are going to learn:
1. Why we need it - The need for it.
2.  What it is - the character of this rest.
3. How to get it.

1. Why we need it - The need for it.

                It starts by saying, "Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest" The question is, "Does he talking about a discreet group of people? the hurting people? Burned out people? And the rest of us, who are more normal, we don't need it? or is it something for everyone?" It's such a solemn statement that it seems like it's an offer to everyone. But how do we understand that then? Horace, a Roman poet, says, "No one lives content." It's hard particularly for younger people to believe that. Most younger people think, if I get a professional success, and I find somebody to love, and I do good in society, I would feel a deep satisfaction, and peace of my life; And I'll be happy with my life. I will be happy with myself. But when you get older, even if you get a professional success, love, and do good for the world, you come to realize that you are discontent, and it's a lot deeper than we think.
                Even though some of us have started to see that some people's lives go better, some are worse. But even though to some of whose lives are better, realize that as the years go by, I am still looking for something. So, Horace says that "No one lives content." While Stephen, who's a more modern writer, says, "Even in contentment, I still feel the need of some imperishable bliss." What it means is, as you get older, even if you are enjoying something, what tends to ruin the enjoyment is the thought that I'm gonna lose this. So, if I'm having a love relationship, the person is going to leave me, or they will die. And as you get older, everything just seems to go away, and life is constantly taking away from you. And he says, "the older I get, the more I can't be content with anything. Because if I am enjoying it, I can't help to think that this is going to perish. And it ruins my enjoyment of it." And if people say, Well, just live for the moment, enjoy it for now. And you are saying, No, no! That's just like an animal, who lives by instinct. I am a human being. I am thinking about things. And I want to think. And the more I think about it, and the older I get, the more I realize everything is going to be taken away from me. And the harder and harder for me to actually be content. Henrik Ibsen, a Norwegian playwright, says, "When you take away the life's lie of anyone, they lose all their happiness." What it means by the "life's lie" is that everyone spends their years being happy in anticipation. In other words, most of us can actually deal with life when we say someday I will be happy, but not now. But there is a possibility that I will be happy. And the "life's lie", according to Ibsen is, you say If I find Ms. or Mr. Right, if I get the professional success, if I can just get this done and I make enough money...you tend to say, If I can just get to 'this place', then things would be okay. And the life's lie is, if you think "this" or "this" or "this"... is going to make you happy. And you get there, and you find out, it doesn't. And when the life's lie is taken away, you lose all your happiness. 

                Jesus is saying, I am the only one that can give you the deep inner rest that you are looking for in all these other things. What does it mean by "rest"?? Does he just mean "fulfillment" in general? Probably not. Because when he says, "Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened..." Later on, in Matthew 23:4, he says, "The teachers of the law ... tie up heavy loads and put them on men's shoulders, but they themselves are not willing to lift a finger to move them." which means, they can't practice what they preach. He is talking about a kind of religion that the teachers of the law put on people and they're burdens. And the burdens were, "if you do all these commandments, regulations, then God would love you, and bless you, and take you to heaven, and favor you, and hear your prayers." And Jesus says, That's an incredible crushing burden. Because you have to lift up and everyday you will never be sure you are moral enough or religious enough, or good enough. And it's a terrible burden. And you says, Well, fine! But I'm not an orthodox Jew. I don't bound myself to all the mosaic ceremonial laws, and all that rules and regulations. But some years ago, Judith Shulevitz, wrote a great article on New York Times magazine, in 2003, which later turned into a book, called "Bring Back The Sabbath". And even though she's a Jew's woman, writing and trying to tell the workaholic Manhattanites taking time off is great, but she knows, the Christian, the Biblical idea of Sabbath goes beyond just taking a day off to get rest. This is what she says, "Most people believe, what you have to do to stop working, is to not work. But the machinery of self-sensorship must shut down too, stilling the eternal murmur of self reproach." Even if you are not an orthodox Jew, we all have inner self-sensorship....self reproach...the eternal murmur. What does it mean? Everybody is trying to live up to a standard, maybe your parents' expectations, or maybe you got a church background or some kind of a religious background that fills you with guilt even though you are trying to get over it, but you still feel guilty, because you are not living the way you were raised. Maybe the reason of a restless feeling that I am not good enough, is not because of your parents or your church background, but maybe it's because you just moved to New York City.  Do you know the history of the colony? Massachusetts was found as a place to live. People in Europe says  I want to find a place where we can live life and practice our religion and our way of living freely. So, people started with Virginia. They started to South Carolina to live. Do you realize why New York City was started? It was started as a trading post, a place to make money. People did not originally come here to live. They came here to work hard and make money. And guess what? We have not escaped our history. This is not a particular easy place to live. It is not a place that is not set-up to make it easy to live. It's a place set up basically for professional success. It is set up for work. And some years ago, in New York Times, by a writer, a young guy's trying to make it by coming to New York, trying to be a writer. The competition, expectations, the emphasis on success, on work, were driving him crazy. And he said, "...the quality of my work became the measure of my worth." He was being crushed under the need to live up. And Judith Shulevitz's saying, well you don't have to be an Orthodox Jew, to have a deep inner restlessness, a burden. We are all trying to live up. We are all trying to have the "eternal inner murmur" of self reproach. And Jesus says that I am the only one who can actually give the solution to that. The scientist tells you that if you sleep all night, but if you don't get REM sleep, you would wake up exhausted. And Jesus says, you are taking time off, taking breaks, going on trips, and you still can't get the deep spiritual inner rest, the REM of the soul. Only I can give you that. And he's saying that to everybody in the world, not just to the Jews at that time, not just religious people, but to everyone. I can give you, and only I can give you, a complete rest from the machinery of self-censorship, the eternal inner murmur self-reproach.

2.  What it is - the character of this rest.

Jesus is going to tell you that our culture is absolutely counter intuitive. You couldn't make it a more outrageous statement in our society than what He is about to say. So, let's ask Jesus, "What is this rest?"
And He says, "Take my yoke upon you and learn from me and you will find rest for your soul." See, come to me, and I will give you rest for your soul. "Take my yoke upon you" is a synonym. What is a yoke?

A yoke is something that you put on a burden, or oxen in the old days, and they carried wagons, or they carried plows, they were piece of burden, because every yoke attach you to a burden. That is why He can say, All of you who are burdened, come to me, and take my yoke upon you. This is astounding. Because Jesus Christ does not just say, Come to me and believe in me... or Come to me and pray to me, and I will just take all your troubles away. He says, You must yoke yourself to me. In the old days, all teachers, when the disciples came to be with the teacher, when Jesus says take my yoke upon you... means be my disciples - which is not a new idea created by Jesus. In those days, when you decide to follow a teacher, you were said to be yoked to the teacher. Here is the reason why. If you are in NYC, you want take a couple of courses, you may show up, and you will to know the teacher, the teacher grades your papers, etc; But in those days, when you want to be a disciple of a teacher means, you want to live with the teacher; And you serve the teacher; And you live in a community with other disciples; And the teacher completely dominated your life. Jesus is saying I want you to come and let me be the complete master of your life. I want you to center all you entire life around me. I want you to let me dominate your life. And that is how you find rest for your soul. If He just said, "Come to me and I will give you rest." we all will imagine some kind of spiritual experience, right?! But then He says, what I mean is take my yoke upon you, become my disciple, let me dominate your life. Give up your right to self determination. Give up your right to live a life you want, and let me completely dominate your life, and then you will find rest for your soul. You understand why it is astounding for our culture. Because our culture says that You must not give authority of your life over to anyone. You must be the master of your own life. No one has the right to tell you how to live. No one has the right to tell you what is right and wrong. You have to decide for yourself. You have to stay in control. You need to be free, to be absolutely free! And you can't possibly get it and become a Christian and now you lost your ability to decide what is right and wrong for you. No way! So, it sounds crazy to Jesus when He says, If you want inner freedom, to no longer be proving yourself. To be a complete peace with yourself. To be happy with your life. To be satisfied with your life. That's inner freedom. And Jesus says You will never get that kind of freedom, unless you let me be the master, unless you completely make me Lord.  And we say It's crazy. The only way to be free, is to be free! Now, what is the answer to that? It is actually in there, but not that easy to see, unless you emphasize the word. If you see Jesus' saying, "Take my yoke upon you..." it sounds like it's saying Well, if you want to be free, you need to come and lose all your independent and let me be your Lord or your life, and we go Thanks! But no thanks! What is the implications there? What He is saying is, all of you are already burdened. Everybody is restless. And what does it mean? It means, you are already yoke to something. Jesus is not saying you are independent. Give up your independent and come to me.  What He's trying to say is Look! We need to be politically free. But nobody is spiritually free. You are already yoke to something. What do you decide to live for? Everybody has to live for something. And whatever you decide to live for, you are yoked to. You are not free anymore. You gotta have it! Let's just say, you are living for some kind of relationship, whether it is a love relationship, or a spouse or partner, the main joy of satisfaction of your life is that person. Do you realize that you are yoked to that person? Do you realize that you are being mastered by that person? Because if that person's love and happiness is the main thing in your life, first of all, you will be emotionally over dependent on them, you will not be able to take criticism from them, it will devastate you. You won't be able to give criticism to them or be honest with them, because you can't take their anger. If they have a problem, you can't take it. Then you say, Oh yeah! I heard that co-dependence is bad. So, let me live for my job, my career. I won't be emotionally dependent on anybody. I will be a self-sufficient person. If you are living for your career, you are not a self sufficient person. You are yoked to your career. You make the quality of your work the measure of your worth. That's burned out! That's terrible!!! Then you say, maybe I'll live for my children. Many people look at me right in the eye, saying Pastor, I live for my children. If I don't have my children, I really don't have any good reason to live. Well, you're destroying your children then. If you live for your children, either they do whatever they can to get away from you, because you are dominating their lives, or worst than that, maybe they are not trying to get away from you but you are dominating their lives; and you are living your lives thru them , and they never grow independent self-sufficient adults eventually. Then you say, Alright, I should depend on my children. I shouldn't live for love or romance, I shouldn't live for my spouse.  I shouldn't live for my career. I will be a good person. I am just going to be a great person. Maybe I'll be religious. I will come to church. I read the Bible and I'll pray. I clean up my life and I'll help  other people.  And you know what that means? if you decide to make the quality of your morality, whether liberal or conservative, the measure of your worth, so that you are feeling I am living a good life. I am living out my standard. I am better than most people, then you would become self-righteous, and people will hate you, and you deserve it. And if you are not living up to your standard, you will hate yourself, and you'll beat yourself up. In other words, your soul will be either shrunk or frozen. You are not independent!! You are not in control of your life! You are living for something. You are yoked to it! We should be politically free and independent, and self determination. They are very important. But spiritual self-determination is an illusion, and it's fatal if you are trying to get it.  Because you think you are in charge of your own life, but you are being driven by career, by pleasure, or by love/romance, or something. And Jesus says Take my yoke. I am the only master that if you yoke yourself to me, I will forgive you when you fail me. And I will satisfy you when you embrace me. I am the only one like that. The only way for you to be truly free is to let me be your master, because otherwise something else will be and you won't be free. That is so absolutely basic understanding what the Christian life is about; what is the Christian messages about. And if you say Boy! The idea of making Jesus Christ my Lord, my Master, so that I have to do only what is in the Bible, I can't live my own life. Suffocating! Horrible! I want to be free the way I want to live.  You are in the veil of illusion.  It is an illusion!! It is not true. And you need to see the truth.

3. How to get it.

How do we get this peace? Interestingly enough, it's up here. You may not be looking at it. The center of gravity of this passages is obviously v. 28, 29, 30. It is so lovely, so soothing, so wonderful. And you tend to miss what is before. But look at v. 25, At that time, Jesus said, "I praise you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because you have hidden these things from the wise and learned, and revealed them to little children. Yes, Father, for this was your good pleasure. Now in v. 20-24, Jesus's warning a certain town that had rejected the messenger and the Gospel. He's warning them, then he turns to v. 25, says Who is it that does receive my salvation?? Not the wise and learned, not the self-sufficient, not the people who feel I've got it together, it's little children. These are the ones who understand the Gospel; who receive and get revealed to them; The truth of the Gospel and who actually enter into My rest. Now, what does it mean to become like a little children? You know that this is a very common way that Jesus talked about becoming a Christian. For example, in Matthew 18:3, "...unless you change and become like little children, you will ever enter the kingdom of heaven." To come to Jesus, to become a Christian, to be converted, and to become a little child, they are all synonyms. Why then, would He use 'become a little child' to be a synonym? You have to think about the metaphor, and of course if you go thru the rest of the Bible, you realize that it does not mean that to become childish. But there are at least two characteristics in little children for you to become a Christian, and how to receive this Rest. First of all, little children know that they are helpless. It means that you have to swallow your pride. You have to be somebody who knows you can't be like the wise and the learned. You can't say Well, I have done good things, but I've done bad things. So, I need a little help from God. NO!! A Christian is somebody who says, I've done bad things, and I have done good things. But the good things were done for bad motives in general. And therefore, I need a complete grace salvation. I need forgiveness. I can't save myself. I can't make good my debt. I can't earn my salvation. I can't pull myself together. I need grace. I am spiritually helpless!! That's an extraordinary hard things for modern people to say. But that's the first thing you have got to do - to become a little child, and admit the spiritual helplessness. Secondly, they are exceedingly confident that you love them. You know that you can be with a little child, a two year old, for example, and they are just a pain to be with. They are crying , and they want this, and they want that. Then you give them that, then they don't want that, and throw it away. And they are just incredibly difficult. They will outgrow this eventually. But no matter how big  of a pain and awful they've been, they are sure that you love them. It's astounding. That's the second aspect of being a Christian. I have seen plenty of people who come to admit that they are sinners, have screwed up, and done very, very badly, and need God, then you just have to believe that Jesus Christ loves you, that He forgives you. Then you  can rest in His love. A lot of people just can't go there. They just can't believe Jesus loves me.  Therefore,  you are not a little child yet. Then how do you get there? Jesus, himself, says, I want you to take my yoke upon you, I want you to be lord of  your life. And I won't abuse you. I know you are afraid if you give up your independence I will abuse you. But, I am gentle and humble in heart. That little addition, "I am gentle and humble in heart", is critical to understanding the salvation of Jesus Christ. In the beginning of Matthew 11, John the Baptist was offended by Jesus, because of his weakness. John the Baptist said, I thought the messiah is going to be a strong man, that he come together and put together, at least a political movement, or maybe an army, because the job of the messiah is to bring judgment on evil. And because you are supposed to bring judgment to evil, why, in the world, aren't you a strong person? Why are you gentle and humble? Why are you surrounded by weak people? Why do you hang out with the poor and oppressed? Why aren't you with the strong? He was offended, and Jesus turns to him and say, I didn't come as a Messiah to bring judgment. Because if I brought judgment on evil, nobody would be left. I came in weakness to bear your judgment, to bear you punishment. And if you want to become a little child, watch Jesus Christ going to the cross and you notice something - compare Him with other Christian martyr stories, such as Hugh Latimer and Nicholas Ridley who were burned at the stake for their faith at the monument in Oxford. As the flame were licking up, evidently, Latimer turned to Ridley and said something like this:  Don't worry, tonight we are going to have a merry supper with the Lord. (we shall this day light such a candle, by God's grace, in England, as I trust shall never be put out. - Wikipedia) There are lots of stories of Christians who went to their death in peace are filled with rest. Why? Because they knew God was with them. And they knew they were going to be with God. Jesus Christ did not go to the cross that way. Think about it! He was in the Garden of Gethsemane with bloody sweat, the agony; when He was on the cross, He was crying out My God, My God! Why have Thou forsaken me? He had no rest on the cross. He was cosmically restless, because God was not with Him. God abandoned Him, because He was taking the penalty that we deserved. He was getting a taste of the cosmic restlessness that we deserved. So that He can turn to us and say, Come now. I took your restlessness, and I can give you rest. It is not achieved. It is not something you earned. It is a gift! You become like a little child when you say Lord, Jesus, if you would do that for me, not just die on the cross, not just simply lose your physical peace, but Your spiritual peace; experienced that cosmic infinite restlessness and agony for me, I know You won't abuse me.  I can take on Your yoke, because of Your gentle way, and humble in heart. You died for me.  In that minute, you, not only, admit that you are helpless, but also you finally rest in His love, assured in His love. Once you realize that you do that, you take off the great burden - the burden falls off your back of having approved yourself. See, Jesus is saying If you try to rest in your own works in order to prove yourself, to God, or to your parents, or to whoever or whatever, you never have rest in your heart. But if you rest in My work, you have rest indeed - As the hymn goes,

                Lay your deadly doing down
                Down at Jesus' feet
                Stand in Hi, and in Him alone
                Gloriously complete.

You have a burden of guilt of something you did in the past? Here is another hymn,

                The terrors of law and of God,
                With me, have nothing to do
                My Savior's obedient and blood
                hides all my transgression from view.

As Paul says, in Philippians 3:9 ... I want to be found in Him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ - God, now, looks at you, and He sees you are righteous in Christ; He sees absolute beauty - no more proofing of yourself - that is how you receive this rest! That is how you destroy, for good, that internal self-censorship, constant internal murmur of self-reproach. Don't say You are not good enough! You are not good enough! But My Savior's obedient and blood hides all my transgression from view. Finally, you are free!! And don't forget this, to be a Christian is to receive this free of salvation. But then, you are supposed to be a disciple. Jesus wasn't just talking to people then. What does it mean to be a disciple? It means Now, I am learning the Bible, learning to pray, leaving with other disciples! I am accountable! If you just show up at church, and you are not seriously being instructed in the Bible; you are not seriously in any kind of accountable Christian community; if you are not a disciple, you are not having this piece of God work at every corner of your life. Come to me, all of you who are already weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take My yoke upon you, and learned of Me, for I am gentle and humble in heart ,and you will find rest for your soul. Because, only My yoke is easy, and only My burden is light.

The Fourth Wise Man Story

Yesterday, while my husband and I were having lunch, we were discussing about a question brought up by EY and her mother at the end of the last Friday Bible study. As far as I can remember, she asked something like this, "If someone is elected to be saved, will one lose one's salvation?" Nn, who was not the leader that time, offered her answer to EY's question, which is, "not necessarily, for Judas was chosen by Jesus, but he didn't receive salvation." The end answer "...he didn't receive salvation" was right, but her answer was wrong. Because Judas was never chosen to be saved, but only as a disciple, according to my husband's explaination, which I agree. This brought us to think of a situation where if someone is Christian, but then later on, (s)he switched to another belief, would (s)he still be saved? We both believed that (s)he would not receive salvation at the end. Why not?? Then my husband told me the story of "The Fourth Wise Man" by Henry van Dyke in 1895. Here is the short summary I got from wikipedia.org:

The story is an addition and expansion of the account of the Biblical Magi, recounted in the Gospel of Matthew in the New Testament.^[4] It tells about a "fourth" wise man (assuming the tradition that the Magi numbered three to be true), a priest of the Magi named Artaban, one of the Medes from Persia. Like the other Magi, he sees signs in the heavens proclaiming that a King had been born among the Jews. Like them, he sets out to see the newborn ruler, carrying treasures to give as gifts to the child - a sapphire, a ruby, and a pearl of great price. However, he stops along the way to help a dying man, which makes him late to meet with the caravan of the other three wise men (from the Bible). Since he missed the caravan, and he can't cross the desert with only a horse, he is forced to sell one of his treasures in order to buy the camels and supplies necessary for the trip. He then commences his journey but arrives in Bethlehem too late to see the child, whose parents have fled to Egypt. He saves the life of a child at the price of another of his treasures. He then travels to Egypt and to many other countries, searching for Jesus for many years and performing acts of charity along the way. After thirty-three years, Artaban is still a pilgrim, and a seeker after light. Artaban arrives in Jerusalem in time for the crucifixion of Jesus. He spends his last treasure, the pearl, to ransom a young woman from being sold into slavery. He is then struck in the temple by a falling roof tile, and is about to die, having failed in his quest, and yet he knew that all was well, because he had done the best he could. A voice tells him "Verily I say unto thee, Inasmuch as thou hast done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, thou hast done it unto me," and he dies in a calm radiance of wonder and joy. His treasures were accepted, and the Other Wise Man found his King.

After hearing that story, I did somehow agree with the ending...just for a few seconds...until my husband reminded me of the Truth in the Bible when Judas Iscariot suggested to sell the expansive parfume Mary was using to wash Jesus' feet and gave the money to the poor.  And Jesus responded, "You will always have the poor among you, but you will not always have me" (John 12:3-8) which is completely against the ending of the story of The Fourth Wise Man. 

Following Jesus - Our Birth: Cosmic (1 Peter 1:3-12) - 5/4/2014

By: Tim Keller

                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, and into an inheritance that can never perish, spoil or fade. This inheritance is kept in heaven for you, who through faith are shielded by God's power until the coming of the salvation that is ready to be revealed in the last time. In all this you greatly rejoice, though now for a little while you may have had to suffer grief in all kinds of trials. These have come so that the proven genuineness of your faith -- of greater worth than gold, which perishes even though refined by fire -- may result in praise, glory and honor when Jesus Christ is revealed. Though you have not seen him, you love him; and even though you do not see him now, you believe in him and are filled with an inexpressible and glorious joy, for you are receiving the end result of your faith, the salvation of your souls.
                Concerning this salvation, the prophets, who spoke of the grace that was to come to you, searched intently and with the greatest care trying to find out the time and circumstances to which the Spirit of Christ in them was pointing when he predicted the sufferings of the Messiah and the glories that would follow. It was revealed to them that they were not serving themselves but you, when they spoke of the things that have now been told you by those who have preached the gospel to you by the Holy Spirit sent from heaven. Even angels long to look into these things.

Jesus is risen! The Bible says when we connect with Him by faith,  we are not only raised physically at the end of time, but we also experience resurrection now. Eph 2 says we are already spiritually raised with him; In Philippians 3, Paul says, "I want to know Him in the power of His resurrection."

What does it mean to actually live a life now powered by Jesus' resurrection life?

Something happened when you believe in Jesus. In 1Peter tells us:

1. What happened to us.

1 Peter - Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! In His great mercy he has given us new birth - It tells us, when you are a Christian, you experience the new birth. And notice, it does not say that God gives some of us new birth; which typical for people to say Yes, I know people who got broken lives, they are probably alcoholic, or in prison, or drug addicts, and these people need this expression of "born again". People say, "born again Christianity" is a type of Christianity. The trouble is Peter says that "born again" is not a type of Christianity, it is Christianity. He's speaking to church and does not say that some of you have rough lives have to have a "born again" experience. He says "WE", means all of us we can assume. We are not Christian if we haven't experienced the new birth. It is, of course, a metaphor. Born again means like spiritually something happened to us, like being physically born. So it is a metaphor, for 2 things: a new vitality and a new identity.

First of all, to be born again means that you get the implantation of new kind of life, spiritual life. And we have to be careful here, because from the outside what that impartation looks like can be very, very varied. There are the sorts of ways in which the new birth happened. We have to be very careful not to create a template that everyone who experience the internal impartation of a new life has to have an external experience like this. It actually can come out from a whole lot different ways.

One is, Dr. David M. Jones was a preacher in Westminster Chapel in Buckingham Palace, London in the 20th century, there was a man who is on his way to the river at night in an attempt to kill himself, and went by the Westminster Chapel that had the window opened, and he heard the music that gives him a little bit of hope, then he walked in, sat down, and listened to the preaching of the Gospel, and eventually was converted. It is a dramatic story, which a lot of people think of "being born again" - dramatic.

Second is a well known person who just died in his 90's, a friend of Rev. Jeff White, a surgeon general of the US, a brilliant surgeon of a children hospital in Philadelphia. He remembered how he became converted that his wife dragged him to the evening service at downtown Philadelphia, the Tenth Presbyterian Church. He remembered at the beginning of particular year, almost everything the preacher said sounded stupid to him. And a little over a year later, he realized he believed it all. And he said, "Where I kind of crossed the line, I wasn't quite sure. I couldn't even give you a day or an hour, or even a week or a month."

And the 3rd story is Billy Graham's wife, Ruth. Billy Graham is the master of the dramatic of the "come to Jesus" moment, a dramatic conversion. But his own wife only remembers that as a child, as she's growing up as a child, every time she heard a new story about Jesus, she embraced Him, and she embraced about the new Christian faith, and eventually she didn't even remember at the time she believed it, and some where I crossed that line to a real faith, but do not know where.

On the one hand, you've got to say to yourself that the new birth can happen in such a variety of ways of external manifestation, which is extraordinary important. There is a moment where it happens, but we can't always discern where that moment is. But what comes in, whether dramatically or quietly, it's stupendous. Paul, in the book of Titus, says, "He saves us thru the washing of rebirth and regeneration." But one of the 2 words he uses there is a Greek word "palengenetia". In Matthew 19:28, Jesus is talking about the renewal of all things at the end of time when He comes back and sits on His throne, and makes everything right. And He says, "at the renewal of all things..." - using the word palengentia. Jesus is saying that at the end of time God will regenerate the whole world; He is going to wipe the world clean of everything defective or stain.  He is going to remove all death, suffering, wipe away every tear. He is going to make everything that is deform perfect. This world is going to be perfect. Imagine the power that is going to take to do that, that is the word palengenetia. And Paul is using the same word. And what this means is that when you become born again, you get the first and solemn on down payment of that very power in your life now. And that leads to another reason why becoming a Christian is having a new birth, because it is not only the new vitality, but essentially the new identity. The changes can be so drastic, though doesn't have to be drastic immediately. Even like a little child, who's first born grows in something considerably different than that little crying lump of flesh that you have there in the very beginning. Nonetheless, even though it can start very, very small, it changes you so much that you are essentially another person. That is the reason of being born again.

Do you see the necessity and the power of the new birth? That is Christianity. That is what happened to us.

2. Where it happens.

It happens to you when you are hopes. - 1Peter 1:3- In his great mercy he has given us new birth into a living hope...and into an inheritance that can never perish, spoil or fade...shielded by God's power until the coming of the salvation that is ready to be revealed in the last time."  To understand how does this, "to be born again" into the new vitality and to have your life change, happen? It is in your hopes, in your hearts, and spread the rest of your life. To understand this, we have to know what hope is.

Hope actually consists of a desire and an expectation. When you come to believe that X will fulfill your desire, you will set your hopes in X. To hope in something is to have faith that this will satisfy one of your desires. To say that you are born again into a new hope means that your whole heart is changed, because your heart is not the place of your emotion so much. When you are reading the Bible and see the word "heart", English speaker will immediately see it as the seed to the emotion vs seed to the thoughts. That is not what the Bible uses the word "heart". If anything, the "heart" is the seed of the hopes. The seed of the things that is your most fundamental commitments. Your heart is where you have decided in a sense where your most fundamental commitments are, what you most fully believe will satisfy your deepest desire in meaning of love, and significant, and security. See, every body's got to live on something. Everybody got to set their hopes on something. And when you do that, you set your heart on it; you set your whole life on it; and build your life on it. And therefore, that's what hope is. Hope is you get this deep desire, and you come to have faith at certain thing will satisfy this desire. And those things give you the structure of your heart, because those things could be work, career, money, or status, family or community, or love, romance or sex; they could be some kind of great noble cause; what is it will give you meaning in life. And that will bring structure of your heart and mind, bring your emotion, the things that scare you, things that move you. And therefore, the Bible says "hopes disappointed makes the heart sick” (Proverbs). Because all your well being is based on hope.  Study has shown, if you give the very same job with the very same circumstances, and you tell one that "I'll pay you $1000 to do that" and you tell the other one, "I'll pay you $100,000" (same job, and utterly different hopes),  they are going to experience radically in different ways. One will say "this is boring" but the other might say, "no, I don't find it boring", because one is doing it in light of $1,000, and the other one is in light of far more.  And that means that you interpret your presence completely in terms of where you set your hopes.

Another thing that you have to learn to understand to be born again into a living hope and imperishable hope, is that this is the only thing on which this is the only thing that will satisfy your heart according to the Bible. Only the imperishable hope will satisfy the human heart. You, especially when you are younger, you do not know just deep the desires of your heart are. When you are younger, you got a vision for a life. When you say, "If I can get into this school..." , "If I can have this kind of work... or meet this kind of person... everything will be fine." Your heart has infinitely deep hopes and desires. And if you think, which almost everybody does, especially in Western society, "If I achieve this "thing" in my life...I'll be happy... My life heart would be satisfy." You are WRONG! At some point in life, you begin to realize these perishable things are not going to give me what my heart is really hoping for. When you started to realize things are not happening as I thought,  you are actually more discontent than you thought; you are more unhappy that you thought. When you decide the thing that you thought that's going to make you happy, once you realize the thing you set your heart's hopes on are not really satisfying the deep desire. You will think, "I just need a new thing... a new spouse...another job... another life... move to another country... go to another place... " - so, you are restless driven person. The second possibility if you believe, "Well, it's still out there... But I haven't been able to get them...because this person gets in the way... or  this happened... or my family did this... "-prejudice happens, so you become a bitter angry person.  Thirdly, you can decide, it is not out there , that nothing in this world would satisfy you - then you will become an unbelievably cynical, disdainful, laugh at everyone... laugh at liberals... laugh at conservatives...becoming incredibly ironic, bored, and move to other places; or else you become despondent, medicating yourself, always depressed, always kind of suicidal, or you can go to get a "living hope". C.S. Lewis said in a radio talk, "...so, a ducking wants to swim, there is such a thing as water; a baby wants to suck, there is such a thing as milk; and if I find in myself longing with this world cannot meet, probably I was made for another world as well."

What interesting is, if you decide what I've been looking for in parents, I'll get it the end of time when I fall in the arms of the real Father of my heart; or what I've been looking for in romance and love, but never really found completely, I will get it at the end of time when I fall into the arms of my real Spouse; when I am trying to accomplish something in this world and make this world a better place, but I realize the only thing that will last, the only thing that I've done for HIM, and then I'm looking for in that time when He says to me, "Well done, good and faithful servant." When that happens, there's going to be a kind of significant come upon me that will never ever fade. And what this all means is that, even though at the end of time I can begin to have a foretaste of it now is so powerful. 1John 3 "When we hope in Him and seeing Him that day, that hope is so powerful that it begins to transform us now." - It is satisfying now. Even the foretaste of that is better than the reality that simply getting the job / family you wanted. The heart is completely based on what your hopes are in. If you change your hopes, you change your heart, you change your life, you are not the same! It's not me. The same things don't define me; the same things don't drive me.

3. How it continues to happens.

How the new life that comes in through the new birth, how does it develop? How does it grow? Babies are beautiful when they are born, but you don't want them to stay as babies, you want them to grow as adults. So how does the new life develop? There are many, many ways. But 1Peter is about one particular way. It says that one of the main ways that we grow into something radiant, beautiful; the main way we turn into something a lot like pure gold is through suffering. And look carefully, this is a brief point, but very important, "In this you greatly rejoice, though now for a little while you may have had to suffer grief in all kinds of trials. These have come so that your faith - of greater worth than gold, which perishes even though refined by fire - may be proved genuine and may result in praise, glory ad honor when Jesus Christ is revealed." (1 Peter 1:6-7) The word, "suffer grief" means to agonize. In here, "...you greatly rejoice..." is using present tense, even though right now you are in agonizing pain - and that is a present tense. It does not say that you used to rejoice in it, and now as you are in agonizing pain, you are not rejoicing for awhile, hopefully you will get back to rejoicing later. It does not say that! It actually says, it's also not being stoic (def: seeming unaffected by pleasure or pain). No! You are crying out from agonizing pain, you are feeling you feelings, not repressing / denying them. You are feeling the agony and you are crying out, and the same time you are able to be rejoicing. What does it mean? Most of us, if we are honest, even after we are born again, don't really detach our hearts from these other hopes, not completely. We say, now we hope in Jesus Christ, but basically I am still hoping if I am living a good Christian life, God will give me the things that I really hope in, which is prosperity, status, and success. That's what I really want. The trouble is, if you build your life on anything in this world, and suffering comes, it destroys your life. But if you build your life on God, and suffering comes, the suffering just drives you deeper into your joy.  The fact is that we rejoice not as much as we ought to in these things - the new birth, the imperishable hopes. But during suffering, suffering drives you more into that - drives you to prayer, worship, fellowship with other believers more deeply into your joy. You look at what has He given you, and you say Yes! I've got this! This is imperishable. I need to think about this, and you do. It is almost like when it's getting hotter outside, it kicks the furnace on. It is that when bad things happened to you, if you are a believer, have been born again into a living hope, the suffering, as hard as it is, drives you more into the living hope; it moves you more into the living hope. Again, if you build your life on to anything but God, suffering will just destroy your life, because it will take the things away that you build your life on. But if you build your life on God, He is your ultimate hope, then suffering just drives you more into your joy, and in a long run makes you more a joyful, poise person, because what it does is it moves your hearts off these other hopes more into God that you actually have to put your hope on principle, but not so much in actuality. And therefore, when you are born again into a living hope, then even suffering just turn you into gold.

4. Why.

Why is it all possible? It is talking about the facts of the Old Testament prophets talked about the suffering of the Messiah and the glory that would follow. Isaiah 53, the New Testament apostle knew and preached what they saw what OT prophets had prophesied. And when they preached, then that's the Gospel - which is the suffering of the Messiah, and the glory that would follow. "Concerning this salvation, the prophets, who spoke of the grace that was to come to you, searched intently and with the greatest care, trying to find out the time and circumstances to which the Spirit of Christ in them was pointing when he predicted the sufferings of Christ and the glories that would follow...Even angels long to look into these things. " (1 Peter 1:10-12) First of all, there is the answer to why you can have an imperishable hope. How can you and I stand here now knowing that we have failed God, we have failed to love God and our neighbors. We have failed, and we will fail. How in the world that Peter say that is imperishable hope? It is guaranteed. It's kept in heaven for you. It is absolutely assured. How can they say that? Because Jesus went to the cross and perished - suffering of the Messiah, the heart of the Gospel. You and I can be sure of the future glory and even get a foretaste of it now because Jesus emptied Himself of His glory. But the most amazing thing is the entire chapter, even angels long to look into these things - the Gospel! Think about this for a second. First of all, the word "long to look..." is the word epithomio, which basically means to lust. They are hungry. Their tongues were hanging out. They love looking at the Gospel. Secondly, maybe that just means they are looking forward to Jesus' coming. That's present tense. Even angels right now, presently, intensely, never get tired into looking at the Gospel. Angels!! What in the world can be so astounding that it would not bore angels? Angels have been told about this for billions of  billions of years. How in the world they still can be interested in it? And if you think of the Gospel as the minimum doctrine requirement for getting converted, then this makes no sense. What we are talking about here is the infinitely rich story what Jesus Christ did to save us. There are infinite implications, applications, infinite number of excellence of the glories of the Gospel, and even the angels never get tired to looking into it. Now, if you want to heal your heart, with the fact because our heart's hopes are so deep and they're always kind of been disappointed, our hearts are always sick, always feeling that we don't have what our hearts want. Even in this world, because we are not in the end of time yet. We have not got there yet. Even here, we are still experiencing sickness and death. Hope differed makes the heart sick. Hopes disappointed makes the heart sick. If you want to heal your heart, do what the angels do. Look into the Gospel! Every great story that you've ever heard that temporarily makes you feel good, stories about heroic self sacrifice, the great stories that beyond all hope that anything good happening, somehow somebody comes through, and there is a joy, and there is a happy ending. All of those stories are true. Look at what Jesus Christ did. Look at that story as the angels do, and that way, it will heal your heart.