relationships

Get in shape…spiritually.

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8“Physical training is good, but training for godliness is much better, promising benefits in this life and in the life to come.” 9This is a trustworthy saying, and everyone should accept it. 10This is why we work hard and continue to struggle, for our hope is in the living God, who is the Savior of all people and particularly of all believers.

11Teach these things and insist that everyone learn them. 12Don’t let anyone think less of you because you are young. Be an example to all believers in what you say, in the way you live, in your love, your faith, and your purity. 13Until I get there, focus on reading the Scriptures to the church, encouraging the believers, and teaching them.   1 Timothy 4:8-13

Training. Training requires a plan, discipline, and a vision of the goal. Recently I saw the picture of a friend of mine who competed in a body building contest. I was blown away! I hardly recognized him. He looks like a different man! He has been training.

To be a Gospel-Shaped disciple of Jesus is to enter into a relationship that does indeed require our active participation! The Christian requires training in godliness.

You need a vision of the goal: Paul points Timothy to be fully enjoying his relationship with Jesus and becoming like Him.

You need a plan:  Paul encourages Timothy to get into the Scripture; get into life with the Church and to share what he is learning with others.

You need discipline: Paul encourages Timothy to keep tabs on what he says, in the way he lives, in his love, his faith, and his purity.

What kind of spiritual shape are you in these days?
Are you enjoying Jesus and becoming like Him?

Are you connected with the Church and sharing what you are learning?

What’s happening in your speech, your lifestyle, your love, your faith, and your purity?

They lost the love.

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2 “‘I know your works, your toil and your patient endurance, and how you cannot bear with those who are evil, but have tested those who call themselves apostles and are not, and found them to be false. 3I know you are enduring patiently and bearing up for my name’s sake, and you have not grown weary. 4But I have this against you, that you have abandoned the love you had at first. 5Remember therefore from where you have fallen; repent, and do the works you did at first.  Revelation 2:2-4

I had a funny conversation this weekend. A group of us were talking about a popular chain restaurant close to the campus. One person said, “Oh that place is really missing stuff, its not that great; its terrible.” So I ask, “What is it missing?”

Now at that moment, I was wondering if its menu was deficient. Or if this was a nutrition complaint coming at me. But no.

She said, “They have lost the love.”

Me: “They lost the love?”

Her: “Yeah. They don’t show any love.”

Wow!

Franchises typically pride themselves in having all the same stuff. But love can’t be franchised or systemized. Love must be made fresh daily.

So it is in our relationship with Jesus. As the church, we can do all the common work of being church, but if we do not allow our hearts to be renewed by the Spirit and drawn again to the joy and delight of Jesus in the Gospel, we will have “lost the love!” Just going through the motions, while commendable, is far from the life Jesus has called us into. In fact Jesus notices both the quality of the work and the “add-ons” created by love. He calls to us just as he did with the church of Ephesus to enter again into the heights of a life inspired and fuelled by Him. “Remember therefore from where you have fallen; repent, and do the works you did at first.”

Now we live with great expectation.

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3All praise to God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. It is by his great mercy that we have been born again, because God raised Jesus Christ from the dead. Now we live with great expectation, 4and we have a priceless inheritance—an inheritance that is kept in heaven for you, pure and undefiled, beyond the reach of change and decay. 5And through your faith, God is protecting you by his power until you receive this salvation, which is ready to be revealed on the last day for all to see.

6So be truly glad. There is wonderful joy ahead, even though you must endure many trials for a little while.  1 Peter 1:3-6

Peter knew what it was to cave under pressure. He knew how weakness had given  way to dread. He knew how the shame of failure could have become a weight dragging him back from freedom in His relationship with Jesus and from leadership among Jesus’ people.

But Peter also knew the healing, restorative work of Jesus in His life. So Peter writes to the church celebrating God’s mercy that gives us new birth! He says, “Now we live with great expectation.” We look forward to our inheritance: the full unveiled experience of Jesus and His Kingdom. Even as we endure pressure and struggle, we are drawn forward by faith. “There is wonderful joy ahead!”

This is how faith works. Even when others don’t see who we are. Even when other do not share the hope we have in Christ. And even when they may even be puzzled by what Peter later calls “our good behaviour in Christ,” we persist because there is a day coming when what we are will be revealed “for all to see.”

“Now we live with great expectation.”

“There is wonderful joy ahead!”

Jesus creates defining moments.

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18 While walking by the Sea of Galilee, he saw two brothers, Simon (who is called Peter) and Andrew his brother, casting a net into the sea, for they were fishermen. 19And he said to them, “Follow me, and I will make you fishers of men.” 20Immediately they left their nets and followed him. 21And going on from there he saw two other brothers, James the son of Zebedee and John his brother, in the boat with Zebedee their father, mending their nets, and he called them. 22Immediately they left the boat and their father and followed him.

23 And he went throughout all Galilee, teaching in their synagogues and proclaiming the gospel of the kingdom and healing every disease and every affliction among the people. 24So his fame spread throughout all Syria, and they brought him all the sick, those afflicted with various diseases and pains, those oppressed by demons, epileptics, and paralytics, and he healed them. 25And great crowds followed him from Galilee and the Decapolis, and from Jerusalem and Judea, and from beyond the Jordan.  Matthew 4:18-25 ESV

Jesus creates defining moments. Defining moments change us. Its when we have an experience, make a decision, turn a certain direction, that sets a new trajectory for our lives. Peter had a defining moment. Our challenge with the text though is not really accepting that Jesus commands respect and obedience. Well perhaps that is a problem for us. But that’s a challenge in our relationship to Jesus as Lord.

However, our challenge with the text is to put it back into the context of the other Gospel writings and see events leading up to this defining moment. Jesus created the defining moment for Peter and Andrew, and James and John, through a series of encounters.

+ Teaching and public ministry around Galilee and in the
synagogues. Luke 4

+ John the Baptist prepares the way around the Jordan, declaring,
“Behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.”
John 1:29

+ Andrew tracks down Jesus and later tells his brother Simon,
“We have found the Messiah.”  John 1:41

+ Jesus arranges a miraculous catch of fish for Peter after a night
of failure. Luke 5:1-11

Here’s the deal, you may not realize now what Jesus is up to in your life. But, He does have a discipling vision for you if you are His follower. You have a contribution to make in the life and work of the church. “Come follow me, and I will make you fishers of people.”

Starting a Friendship with God.

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9“I have loved you even as the Father has loved me. Remain in my love. 10When you obey my commandments, you remain in my love, just as I obey my Father’s commandments and remain in his love. 11I have told you these things so that you will be filled with my joy. Yes, your joy will overflow!

12This is my commandment: Love each other in the same way I have loved you. 13There is no greater love than to lay down one’s life for one’s friends. 14You are my friends if you do what I command.

15I no longer call you slaves, because a master doesn’t confide in his slaves. Now you are my friends, since I have told you everything the Father told me. 16You didn’t choose me. I chose you. I appointed you to go and produce lasting fruit, so that the Father will give you whatever you ask for, using my name. 17This is my command: Love each other.  John 15:9-17

Jesus says, “You are my friends!”

Jesus envisions friendship with Him to have benefits.
…so… you will be filled with my joy.  vs. 11
…so… you will bear lasting fruit.  vs. 16
…so… the Father will give you what you ask for, using my name. vs. 16

Jesus sees days when these benefits of friendship are ours right on the surface of our experience. He also sees The Day when our faith becomes sight and these promises are fully experienced by His friends in the communion of God.

Joy.

Purposeful and fruitful results from our lives.

A dynamic connection with God, in which we actually realize answers to prayer.

I was nine years old when my Sunday school teacher, Molly McCraken read this Scripture and announced to us, “Jesus wants to be your friend.” In that moment God changed my life. With all that I understood at that moment of my life, I gave my life to Jesus and have lived in the grace of friendship with Him ever since.

Even as a nine year old I saw that Jesus had done for us the very thing He says friendship does. “There is no greater love than to lay down one’s life for one’s friends.” vs. 13  I love these verses from 1 John 4:9-16, where the John proclaims again the truth and grace of the Gospel:

9God showed how much he loved us by sending his one and only Son into the world so that we might have eternal life through him. 10This is real love—not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as a sacrifice to take away our sins.

11Dear friends, since God loved us that much, we surely ought to love each other. 12No one has ever seen God. But if we love each other, God lives in us, and his love is brought to full expression in us.
13And God has given us his Spirit as proof that we live in him and he in us. 14Furthermore, we have seen with our own eyes and now testify that the Father sent his Son to be the Savior of the world. 15All who declare that Jesus is the Son of God have God living in them, and they live in God. 16We know how much God loves us, and we have put our trust in his love.

Praise the Lord!