Christianity

Thursday in Jerusalem

/ kmmccaleb / 1 Comment

Luke 22: 7-38: The Upper Room, Passover meal, the First Communion, Washing the Disciples’ Feet

walking the steps up to the place of the historical Upper Room

Luke 22:39-53: The Garden of Gethsemane

Matthew 26:36-46 (Gethsemane means “olive oil press”; He was crushed for our iniquities)

Luke 22:54-62: Peter denies Jesus in the courtyard of Caiaphas’

Caiaphas’ house (court)

Luke 22:63-65: Jesus is held overnight at the court of the High Priest and mocked and beaten

prisoners were lowered by rope into the dungeon

Jesus was kept down in this dungeon overnight after He was beaten and mocked

Fear God, not man

/ kmmccaleb / Leave a comment

Psalm 118:6-9

Matthew 10, particularly verses 26-33. Those verses are better understood against the backdrop of the entire chapter: tho man will do his worst to me, he ultimately has no power over me because he cannot touch my soul, the very center and worth of my being.

Only God has this power to give life and take it away:

The Son, who put himself on a cross, surrendering himself to that torture literally every step of the way, even giving up his last breath; who was willing to and broke the eternal fellowship with the Father and Spirit, in order to descend into Hell for several agonizing hours and days on our behalf;

The Father, who was willing to reject his Son as He cried in agony for Him to find another way; who called his Son out of Hell and back to life; who will send His Son back to earth to redeem his people and send the rest to their deserved judgment;

The Spirit, who is in us and with us, our Counselor and Advocate; who gives us words to say when needed; who gives us courage and love that we can never muster on our own; who ministers to us moment after moment with almost no recognition from the very ones he is ministering to;

Fear these Three. Don’t fear mere mortals who have forgotten that their lives are but a vapor and that their power is like fog that rolls in and out at a whim.

Fear God and pray compassionately for those who are blind to their own precarious and prideful position before the Maker of the Universe; pray that they will see themselves as His, not as their own.

He is not ours; we are His

/ kmmccaleb / 1 Comment

When you meet God, you cannot put the meeting into words, much less the God you meet. God cannot be an object of our concepts. Concepts shatter like broken eyeglasses, like broken eyes — in fact, like broken I’s. No longer am I I and God my Thou, my object; now God is I, and I am his thou, his object. The illusion that is destroyed is not the self itself but its usual standpoint in which I am I, the center, and God appears on my screen somewhere. This self is illusion, and God shatters it by reversing the standpoint: we appear on his screen. We are his object, not he ours.

~ Peter Kreeft from his book Three Philosophies of Life

This morning

/ kmmccaleb / Leave a comment

If a man or woman is called of God, it does not matter how untoward circumstances are, every force that has been at work will tell for God’s purpose in the end. If you agree with God’s purpose He will bring not only your conscious life, but all the deeper regions of your life which you cannot get at, into harmony.

~ Oswald Chambers, September 29

Followers of Christ

/ kmmccaleb / Leave a comment

Followers of Christ should feel a magnetic pull on their lives toward wartime simplicity so that they may be lavish in giving and alleviate as much suffering as they can — especially eternal suffering.

John Piper
from his book Think (p 202)
Oh Lord, help me. I am so far from this.

Confidence

/ kmmccaleb / 1 Comment

When you are deeply peaceful and confident that, because of Christ, God will bring you safely to his eternal kingdom and be the all-satisfying Treasure of your life forever, then you are free to see the truth, and love the truth, and speak the truth no matter what, and joyfully spread a passion for the truth whose name is Jesus.

John Piper, in the book Think (116)

Either It’s True or It’s Not

/ kmmccaleb / 1 Comment

If you believe the Bible is true, you need to live like it’s true. You need to live in the conviction that it’s true from Genesis to Revelation. It’s all on the table. No piece of can be discarded because it’s inconvenient or painful or awkward to explain to those who don’t understand.

If you are going to live like it’s true, there will be “God-moments” in your life and things will start to happen that can only be explained by the existence of a God. If you live like the Bible is true, your life will start to become a testimony to the truth of God and His Word.

But be consistent. If you say you believe in the Bible, live it. And if you don’t want to live it, then don’t say you believe it’s true. Let your actions be consistent with your beliefs.

For Our Sake, That We Might Become

/ kmmccaleb / Leave a comment

For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.  II Corinthians 5:21

This is the what and the why of our lives.
He became sin — so that we might become His righteousness.
He took on death — so that we might have life.
He took our place — so that our lives would take on glory and holiness and action that brings forth God’s Kingdom.

2 Corinthians 5:17-21

/ kmmccaleb / Leave a comment

Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come. All this is from God, who through Christ reconciled us to himself and gave us the ministry of reconciliation; that is, in Christ God was reconciling the world to himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and entrusting to us the message of reconciliation. Therefore, we are ambassadors for Christ, God making his appeal through us. We implore you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God. For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God. (ESV)