To Whom We Must Give Account

 "And there is no creature hidden from His sight, but all things are naked and open to the eyes of Him to whom we must give account." (Hebrews 4:13)

What does that verse really say to you?

What is that going to look like when we each stand before God and give an account of our life?

Our sins have been washed away by the blood of Jesus. We're under the covering of God's grace. We are eternally saved.

But we still have to give Jesus an account of our life.

I would be dishonest if I said I wasn't a little afraid of that day.

Because I know the things I've done since I became a Christian. Some things I'm not proud of. Things I'm even ashamed of. How can I stand before the God of grace who willingly hung on a cross and died a brutal death on my behalf so that all my sins could be forgiven forever and tell Him of all the ungodly things I did as a Christian? How will I be able to bring myself to utter those words? Confess to all the shameful things I did in His sight?

It gives me great pause to number my remaining days and consider my ways in the few years I have left in this present life.

What things do I spend the majority of my time and resources on? What issues am I most passionate about? What am I known for?

What will be my legacy?

What about you? 

What is the hill that you will die on? The things you're the most passionate and outspoken about? 

Now put all that in the context of the Day you stand before Jesus at the Judgment Seat of Christ for believers, where you will give an account to Him of every deed you did in the body, both good and bad.

"Therefore we make it our aim, whether present or absent, to be well pleasing to Him. For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, that each one may receive the things done in the body, according to what he has done, whether good or bad." (2 Corinthians 5:9-10)

Kind of puts things in a new perspective, does it not?

-God is Love and Love Never Fails.

And When You Pray

 "Now this is the confidence that we have in Him, that if we ask anything according to His will, He hears us." (1 John 5:14)

What is the right way to pray?

And how can I know that God will give me what I pray for?

You can't, really. 

I know that's probably not the answer you wanted to hear. But as we just read in the verse above from 1 John 5:14 God only gives us that which we ask of Him if it is "according to His will."

That verse is the sifter by which every other bible verse on prayer must first be poured through.

The opposite would be if we ask anything that is not according to God's will He does not hear us, or give it to us.

This truth must be settled in our hearts.

It doesn't matter how much you believe what you pray, or how loudly you claim it as yours. If it's not God's will, you're not getting it from Him.

Now that doesn't mean that God won't give you an answer when you pray. But the answers are going to typically be one of the following:

1. "No."

2. "Yes."

3. "Wait."

The fact is we rarely know what God's perfect will is when we ask Him for something. 

You might pray and ask Him for a new job because you aren't making as much money as you feel you're worth and because you cant stand your boss because he's an arrogant narcissist. But God's will may actually be for you to stay in that job until you learn to be content with your wages and you learn to submit to the authority you have been placed under, no matter how painful it is.

God begins His life-long process of sanctification in us from the moment we are born again: setting us apart for holiness and for His purposes in our life. Sanctification is a refining fire of sorts. God is getting us ready for Heaven. Shaping us into new people who are not earth bound by our lust and love for the things in it. Like it or not, He is helping us loose our grasp on the temporary things of earth that do not satisfy us. They only bog us down and hold us back.

When I pray, I pray from a position of relationship: God is my Father. He made me to be his son. And I ask my Father to help me, to heal me, to provide for me, whatever I need. To fix situations. And then I completely trust Him with the outcome.

For a sizeable portion of the modern Christian community I think they believe if they just want it bad enough, ask for it hard enough, and believe it strongly enough, that whatever they pray for the answer will always be "yes." But God says that His thoughts are not our thoughts, and our ways are not His ways. Sometimes we humans think that we know what God's perfect will is. But we don't. Not very often anyway.

Most of the time I don't know exactly how I should pray. So I'll usually say, "Father in Heaven I pray that Your good and perfect will be done in this situation, in the name of Jesus. Amen." You are never wrong when you pray that prayer.

Look at the Lord's Prayer by Jesus Himself. He didn't pray a lot of specifics. That prayer lasts only a few seconds. And He covers all the bases. That's a great model for how we should pray. But the part where He says, "Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven." (See Matthew 6:10) That pretty much covers everything and it's all about what God's will is. 

Even when Jesus prayed in the Garden of Gethsemane that the cup of suffering from the Cross would be taken from Him, He said; "Father, if it is Your will, take this cup away from Me; nevertheless not My will, but Yours, be done." (See Luke 22:42)

I actually think it's a great blessing that when I pray certain prayers and they don't get answered with a "yes." Because then I know it wasn't God's will for that specific prayer to get answered in the way I had hoped. 

But think about it; God alone knows the end from the beginning, He knows all things, He created all things, He holds all things together by the word of his power, He knows the future, He has a perfect plan for humanity: for the world, for heaven, for eternity. So praise God that He doesn't give us everything we pray for. I know that if He gave me everything I've ever asked for my life would be a mess.

'Modern Christianity' has set many up to fail with this promise of a 'Happy Little Christian Life' where we get everything that we want and everything always goes smoothly. But that's a myth, not reality. In the Bible, God never promised us that. A lot of people who are in the 'name and claim it' camp like to quote the passage where Jesus says, "If you say to this mountain be removed and cast into the sea it will be given you." But how many people in the history of humanity since the days of Jesus have ever spoken to a mountain and it was recorded as being plucked up and cast into the sea? Not one that I know of. 

My faith (trust) is not in my faith. I have no faith in my ability to trust perfectly all of the time. All of my faith, all of my trust, is in God and His absolute ability to do His own will. 

So I can be confident and rest in Him whenever I pray. 

I don't have to worry about if He's going to bless my sales, my finances, or my job. He might. He might not. His will might be for me to fail again because I need humbling, and because like most people, too often I think I can trust in my own self dependence.

Even great man of faith the Apostle Paul prayed and got a response that he probably did not expect.

"And lest I should be exalted above measure by the abundance of the revelations, a thorn in the flesh was given to me, a messenger of Satan to buffet me, lest I be exalted above measure. Concerning this thing I pleaded with the Lord three times that it might depart from me. And He said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for My strength is made perfect in weakness.” (2 Corinthians 12:7-9)

He's a Good Father and He knows what's best. His grace is sufficient us.

Trust in God.


—God is Love and Love Never Fails.

Forgiveness and Unforgiveness

“Settle matters quickly with your adversary who is taking you to court. Do it while you are still together on the way, or your adversary may hand you over to the judge, and the judge may hand you over to the officer, and you may be thrown into prison. Truly I tell you, you will not get out until you have paid the last penny.” (Matthew 5:25-26)



I once heard unforgiveness described as,

"Drinking poison, hoping the other person will die."

The "matters" that Jesus is telling people to settle quickly in His Sermon on the Mount have to do with unforgiveness. Issues of the heart. It could certainly include legal matters, such as taking someone to court. But looking at the previous verses, the heart and its condition are what Jesus is addressing.

“Therefore, if you are offering your gift at the altar and there remember that your brother or sister has something against you, leave your gift there in front of the altar. First go and be reconciled to them; then come and offer your gift.” (Matthew 5:23-24)

Unforgiveness and the bitterness that accompany it, are a self-imposed prison, that you will never be freed from, until you choose to forgive someone who you feel has wronged you.

Jesus makes this principle of forgiveness clear by saying, "If you there remember that your brother or sister has something against you...Go and be reconciled to them."

You can go and seek to be reconciled to someone, but unless that other person chooses to forgive you, there will be no reconciliation. I have learned that over the last 60 years.

You can't make someone forgive you.

They have to choose to forgive you from the heart. It can't just be begrudging, obligatory lip service. Like when you and your little brother got into a fight and your mom told you, "Now tell your brother that you're sorry!" And you hesitantly, and in resentment say, "Sorry!" But inside you didn't really mean it. That was not a sincere apology. You only said it because your mom made you do it.

Reconciled means repairing something that has been torn in two—such as two pieces of fabric sewn back together by a tailor. Mending the breach.

Think back to a time in your life when you were really bitter toward someone who had hurt you. Eventually they came to you and apologized. Or tried to. But your heart was still so hard and bitter, you refused to forgive them. And it ate you up inside. It's like a slow, terminal cancer destroying you piece by piece, a little at a time, making your heart harder and more bitter.

Reconciliation takes two forgivers because it takes two to make any relationship work.

In a marriage it always takes two to make it work. Always. One person can't do all the giving and compromising and do all the work and do all the communicating and forgiving. That's not a marriage. That's a cold, lonely existence, that will only end in resentment and the death of the marriage.

A friendship is the same. It takes two. Same in a parent/child relationship.

Perhaps the most destructive thing in a relationship, or in an individuals life is the "blame game." For some people it seems easier to blame others for our own failures and unhappiness in life, rather than take responsibility for our own mistakes and choices. And one of those choices is choosing to forgive others for how they have wronged us, or our perception of how we feel we have been wronged.

People can go through practically an entire lifetime with a false narrative in their head blaming others that says, "It's your fault! You ruined my life!" But that's not true.

No one can ruin your life but you.

From Jesus' words in His Sermon on the Mount, we see that we ourselves are the only ones that can truly ruin our own life, when we choose to forgive others. That self-imposed prison of our own bitterness and unforgiveness can indeed ruin our life. I know. I lived in that prison for many years.

I blamed my wife for years for not doing what I wanted her to do. For not agreeing with my way. Everything was her fault in my twisted, selfish way of thinking. I thought she was totally selfish and stubborn. But God showed me I was the problem. Eventually, at a men's retreat in the mountains, He clearly corrected me and said, "Why don't you stop praying that I will change her, and start praying that I will change you!" And I did. That day.

That was a pivotal moment in my marriage and in my walk with the Lord.

And as I humbled myself, and began loving my wife unconditionally, all the while praying that God would change my heart and make me the husband and man He called me to be, I did began to change. And our marriage improved. God gave me the love and grace to lead in love. To let Him work in my wife's heart and life. That is His job. Not mine. I couldn't make her do anything anyway. I've had to ask myself more than a few times, "Hey dumb ass, how's that workin' for ya?"

Seeking to make reconciliation with others sometimes takes many years of patience and grace. Someone can carry a bitter grudge and unforgiveness against you their entire life. You may have apologized to them several times and tried to show them love and kindness for years. And for the most part you thought that they had moved on and didn't still harbor that resentment. But one day all those years of built up bitterness and unforgiveness can explode and they lash out at you with a vengeance.

I have experienced this too.

All we can do is try.

We're not responsible for people's response. We're only responsible to be faithful.

Again, you can't change someone else's heart. You can try to be reconciled to them. But they have to choose to forgive you and be reconciled with you.

Forgiveness is a choice.

And it works both ways. Be faithful to love that person, even if it takes years, or an entire lifetime to bring about true forgiveness and reconciliation. The only true reconciliation is made possible by a person's heart changing by being born again by the Spirit of God.

Jesus is the true mender of the breach.

Pray for those in your life that they will hear the voice of Jesus calling them to repentance. To come home to His love and healing.

That's the only way my wife and I have forgiven each other and the people in our lives that have hurt us.

All of us are imperfect people, who have made lots of mistakes. We have failed many times. We have unintentionally hurt the ones we love the most. And try as we might, we let each other down constantly. We can't fix ourselves or make ourselves perfect people. We can't save ourselves. And that's the whole point...

That is why we need the Savior, Jesus.


—God is Love and Love Never Fails.

A Letter From My Father, Part 2

“For you see your calling, brethren, that not many wise according to the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble, are called. But God has chosen the foolish things of the world to put to shame the wise, and God has chosen the weak things of the world to put to shame the things which are mighty” (1 Corinthians 1:26-27)

For the past year or so I believe God has really been moving on my heart to prayerfully consider how He wants me to read and receive His Word.

And as I mentioned in my July 29, 2018 post entitled "A Letter From My Father" I don't believe God ever intended for His Word to be studied in the same way we would study a college text book. (See http://marriage-miracles.blogspot.com/2018/07/a-letter-from-my-father.html)

Along with the reasons I gave in my first post, the first thing I want to ponder today is this:

Look who God gave His Word to.

Besides Paul, the disciples of Jesus were fishermen and simple people.

They didn't have college level theological training or degrees. Along with that, they didn't have complete, leather bound bibles, concordances or endless bible commentaries available to them the way we do today. Much of what later became the scriptures that we have in our bible now, were initially spoken orally to the first followers of Jesus. They didn't have pocket sized New Testaments in their back pack or hip pocket. And the early disciples couldn't pack a heavy Old Testament Torah scroll around to quote from. Those were large, heavy and very costly.

Fast forward to the twenty first century. Most of the followers of Christ in our day are not bible scholars. We don't have a Doctorate in Divinity or a Masters in Theology. We didn't go to a seminary or even attend a bible college in our church. We're pretty simple people.

“For you see your calling, brethren, that not many wise according to the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble, are called. But God has chosen the foolish things of the world to put to shame the wise, and God has chosen the weak things of the world to put to shame the things which are mighty” (1 Corinthians 1:26-27) 

In the early first century a small group of Christ followers turned the world upside down with the Gospel. (See Acts 17:6). So how did they do it?

They couldn't quote any passage they wanted to out of the New Testament because most of it had not yet been written. 

They preached the Gospel of Jesus Christ, empowered by the Holy Spirit.

Jesus had previously commanded them:

“Behold, I send the Promise of My Father upon you; but tarry in the city of Jerusalem until you are endued with power from on high.” (Luke 24:49)

They were told by Jesus "You shall be witnesses to Me..."  They needed the empowerment of His Spirit to be effective witnesses of Jesus Christ. That's why Jesus told them to wait in Jerusalem until they received power from on high.

Jesus said:

“But you shall receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you shall be witnesses to Me in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth.” (Acts 1:8)

We need that same Holy Spirit power from on high today to be effective witnesses for Jesus. Power from on high, from God Himself. Not Doctorates in Divinity from a seminary.

However, that does not mean we shouldn't read and study the bible. Paul wrote:

“Do your best to present yourself to God as one approved, a worker who does not need to be ashamed and who correctly handles the word of truth.” (2 Timothy 2:15)

"Correctly handles the Word of truth?" What does that mean? I don't believe it means to go right out and get a Masters in Theology from a seminary, majoring in Greek, Hebrew, church history, exegesis and hermeneutics. (Look those terms up in the dictionary for yourself).

First, to correctly handle the word of truth, we should pray and ask God for His understanding of a passage or chapter. Ask Him what His heart and purpose was in giving it. And ask Him how we are to apply it to our life and walk with Him.

And for those who preach and teach the Word, do so correctly, conveying the heart and purpose of the Lord who gave us His Word. Context is very important. But don't get so hung up on the context that you miss the forest for the trees.

No one understands the whole bible 100%. No one. Even the Apostle Peter said:

“As also our beloved brother Paul, according to the wisdom given to him, has written to you, as also in all his epistles, speaking in them of these things, in which are some things hard to understand.” (2 Peter 3:15-16)

I believe we should take the Bible at face value. Keep it as simple as possible. But always pray and ask God for understanding. Don't rely too heavily on the interpretations or commentaries of any one man or movement.You could put the top 100 bible scholars in the world in one room and it's unlikely that they would agree completely on any one thing.

The prophetic books of the bible such as Daniel, Ezekiel and The Book of Revelation contain some difficult symbolism, metaphor and poetic language. But most of the bible is not that difficult to understand if you take it at face value and, by faith, believe it. It is God's Word. It is true. It does not need to constantly be interpreted and re-interpreted by every denomination or religious group or scholar. The cults and enemies of Christ twist it and corrupt it, to their own destruction.

Read, believe, receive and apply to your life, the scriptures that you do understand. And always ask the Lord for His wisdom and understanding of what you are reading.

God saved us into His own eternal family. He is now our Father. We are His children. That is why I like to read the bible as a letter from my Father.

In that letter He tells me how much He loves me. He tells me His promises for me, now, and forever. He tells me who I am in Jesus Christ. He gives me examples of the many harmful mistakes man has made down through the ages so I don't make the same ones they did. He tells me how He wants me as His son, to behave. He tells me how He wants me as a witness of Jesus to represent Him to the world. He tells me that I can have absolute hope in Him because He is in control of all things. He tells me to trust in Him for all things because His is God. He comforts me when I am suffering, so I can comfort others when they are suffering in the same way. He tells me to patiently wait for His return to earth because He is coming back soon and I will one day be changed and will be like His Son. He tells me how much I have to look forward to in a place with Him where there will be no more tears, no suffering, or pain. He tells me in His letter what Heaven will be like, and that I will be with him there forever.

And He tells me that He wants me to invite others to come to Him and repent and believe so they can be saved and become part of His family too.

"That God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever will believe in Him shall not perish, but have everlasting life." (John 3:16)

All that and more, in a Letter from my Father.



—God is Love and Love Never Fails.

No Salvation Without Repentance

“God overlooked people’s ignorance about these things in earlier times, but now He commands everyone everywhere to repent of their sins and turn to Him. For He has set a day for judging the world with justice by the Man He has appointed, and He proved to everyone who this is by raising Him (Jesus Christ) from the dead.” (Acts 17:30-31)

No Repentance—No Salvation.

That's the cold hard truth.

Every person is at, or will soon come to, the fork in the road of making the choice to receive Christ, or reject Him.

Like the picture above of the fork in the road, you will have to choose one path or the other. This is often called the Valley of Decision. And if you are reading this right now, and have never received Jesus Christ, you are in that valley.

Choose Life.

It's not enough to just believe that Jesus existed. Or that He was a good man, or a great teacher. It does you absolutely no good to try to follow His teachings and strive to be a better person. Simply going to a church a few times a year accomplishes you nothing.

You must believe that He died on the cross for your sins personally, because you need saving. And then repent—think differently—and then turn and go a different direction. Receive Jesus Christ as your Savior and Lord.

If simply trying to be a good person could get us into Heaven, Jesus would not have had to die on that cross.

That is all.

—God is Love and Love Never Fails.