Jesus IS Here

We were at U-Turn for Christ a couple of weeks ago, and during worship I noticed there were a couple of crosses by the fireplace.  There was something written on one of them, and while I couldn’t make out the entire thing in my head, I could see that it said “Jesus” on the crossbar.  I then started to think about Jesus as a vandal.  He hung there on the cross once.  He isn’t there anymore.  And I just imagined Him writing on the cross in His own blood, “Jesus was here.”  We see it done all the time in different places as people leave their marks on the world for some small bit of recognition, but Jesus dying on the cross left a huge mark on the world.  Whether you choose to believe in Him as the Son of God or not, there is no denying that Jesus changed the world.  There are some who say Jesus never existed at all, and well, quite frankly, they are ignorant fools.  

I continued to dive down the rabbit hole and think about Jesus leaving the same mark in the tomb, “Jesus was here.”  He isn’t there anymore.  Death could not hold Him.  He is alive!  He is not on the cross, and He is not in the grave.  We spend time and money researching these things from an archaeological standpoint.  We buy consumer goods like necklaces and wall art to show people that we are Christians.  But Jesus isn’t on the cross anymore!  Don’t get me wrong here.  I’m not downplaying what happened on the cross.  The cross is the place where Jesus' sacrifice brought salvation to the world.  There is nothing insignificant about that.  The tomb is the place where the power of God through Jesus was on full display.  But anyone can wear a cross, have a Bible on his shelf, and call himself a Christian.  You can have those things, call yourself a Christian, and not live a single moment for Christ.  

If Jesus isn’t in those places today, then where is He?  There is the obvious answer that He is found throughout the Bible and will speak to us as we press in there, but there is an even more prevalent place where He is today.  

“I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for me.” - Galatians 2:20

Christ is in us today.  Many Christians forsake the body of Christ. They either don’t come to church because it is "big money," or they come and go, just filling a seat that day.  Christians need fellowship with other Christians.  It is an amazing thing when like-minded and like-hearted (Jesus-filled) people come together.  

A few years ago, there was a Men's Breakfast that I was just stoked about as I drove home from it.  I was bumping some Jesus beats and just spending time with Him.  On the way home, I passed a dead raccoon on the side of the road.  I remember saying, “God, You are so awesome, You could bring that dead raccoon back to life!” Well, God promptly replied to me and said, “That is stupid; why would I do that?  I have already filled the church with people that have new life and with people who are dead needing new life.”  That day was sobering-- that sometimes we get focused on the wrong peripheral things instead of focusing on the things right in front of us.  The people around us in our lives-- at home, at work, at church-- they all need encouragement, and they all need to see the light from time to time.  If Christ is living in us, then we should be living in such a manner that people see that light.  

I love what it says in 1 John 3:16:

“By this we know love, because He laid down His life for us. And we also ought to lay down our lives for the brethren.”

If love is Jesus, and Jesus lives in us, then why aren’t we a perfect image of love?  We should stop acting like Jesus was here and start showing people that Jesus IS here!  The Bible says that God, the Holy Spirit, and Jesus Himself all raised Jesus from the grave.  John chapter 1 tells us that Jesus was the One who created the world.  That is some serious power.  That power lives in us, and we walk around weak in the flesh.  It’s time to take hold of the power of Jesus in our lives and start living for Him and living for those around us.  If He can create the world, He can take hold of any situation and see you through it.  But you have to let go.  We have to take ourselves off the throne and put Jesus back in His rightful seat in our lives.  That way, we can stop acting like Jesus was here and get back to Jesus IS here.

Break the Cycle

When I sat to write this, I had a topic of encouragement.  Be encouraged that God can use you to do miraculous things if you trust in Him.  Honestly, that message is still there, but God has unlocked a bigger theme through the scripture I was looking at.  

I have been going through 1 Samuel, and we see the nation of Israel no longer satisfied with being ruled by God.  They were a theocracy, ruled by God, and instead wanted to have a man as a king and become a monarchy.  We are shown throughout the Old Testament how Israel’s faith is up and down.  One minute God does great and miraculous things through them, and the next they act like they don’t even know Him.  This pattern is a reflection of our lives, that we can ride great spiritual highs and then be back in the world doing something stupid.  God shows us this pattern so that we might recognize it and change it.  

As we read through 1 Samuel, we get to chapter 13. Saul has been king now for two years, and he has this small little squad of three thousand people that they run around and attack some garrisons with.  They are starting a rebellion, and the Philistines don’t play that.  They come out with thirty thousand chariots, six thousand horsemen, and an uncountable number of people.  You have this little ragtag team of three thousand everyday people now facing this massive army.  It gets worse though. As we continue to read in chapter 13, we are told that only Jonathan and Saul have swords.  Everyone else had farm tools (e.g., axes, sickles, and goads).   The Philistines didn’t let the Israelites have weapons for the very reason that they didn’t want them to be able to fight.  The Israelites didn’t even have blacksmiths because it was forbidden by the Philistines.  So all of the Israelites had to come to the Philistines to get anything metal and have anything metal sharpened.

What a sad state for Israel to be in, the nation that was governed by God.  They were the super power, and now they are nothing.  Nothing could stop them when they were coming out of Egypt, except themselves.  In Joshua we read about how the Gibeonites feared Israel because they had been commanded by God to destroy all the inhabitants of the land.  The Gibeonites speaking with Israel in Joshua 9 vs 24:

“So they answered Joshua and said, ‘Because your servants were clearly told that the Lord your God commanded His servant Moses to give you all the land, and to destroy all the inhabitants of the land from before you; therefore we were very much afraid for our lives because of you, and have done this thing.’”

They knew that nothing would stop Israel as they conquered the land, so they lied and deceived to ensure that they would live.  As we read on in Joshua, we get to the battle between Israel and the five kings of the Amorites (the king of Jerusalem, the king of Hebron, the king of Jarmuth, the king of Lachish, and the king of Eglon).  The king of Israel is afraid too.  In Joshua 10 vs 1-2:

“Now it came to pass when Adoni-Zedek king of Jerusalem heard how Joshua had taken Ai and had utterly destroyed it - as he had done to Jericho and its king, so he had done to Ai and its king - and how the inhabitants of Gibeon had made peace with Israel and were among them, that they feared greatly, because Gibeon was a great city, like of of the royal cities, and because it was greater than Ai, and all its men were mighty.”  

In all, Joshua leads the nation of Israel to conquer 31 kings in the promised land.  This is a nation that had just come out of slavery and bondage.  They wandered in the desert for forty years and still they have the military prowess to come and obliterate everyone they came into contact with.  

What happened Israel?  Why did you step so far backwards? This is what we do in our own lives though.  We get to a great place following God, and then we get complacent.  We stop pushing forward, and then we go backwards, allowing sin to creep into our lives.  It's something that we can teach our kids too.  Take Israel, for example.  There is about 300 years from Joshua to Saul.  For 300 years, this pattern is setup and carried out.  It doesn’t happen overnight but will slowly form.  Before you know it, you are in full bondage and not living in the freedom of the Lord.  You have taught your kids, your kids teach their kids, and so on.  

But we can break the chains of bondage.  We can break the cycles that our families might be in.  Going back to 1 Samuel 14 where we saw the massive Philistine army coming against the untrained and unarmed Israelites, we now see Jonathan taking action.  Jonathan tells his armor bearer one day that they should go over to the Philistines' garrison.  They go, trusting in the Lord, that if the Lord was with them He would give the Philistines over to them.  He says in verse 6:

“Come, let us go over to the garrison of these uncircumcised; it may be that the Lord will work for us. For nothing retrains the Lord from saving by many or by few.”

They go, trusting in the Lord, that He can do mighty things through many people or through just a few.  They set up a few tests for the Lord to show Himself, and then they know that the Lord has given the Philistines into their hands.  What we are told here is an amazing thing.  There is a cycle that has put the Israelites in a desperate position.  They have started to come around to knowing that they need to change, but they don’t have the tools to make this change.  They stand, three thousand normal people against a great, fully-trained, and fully-armed army.  The odds aren’t stacked at all in their favor, and they are basically defeated before the battle even begins.  

But the odds don't matter to God.  He makes the impossible things easy.  When Jonathan puts his faith and trust in the Lord, God uses him to make big changes.  God will do the same in your life.  If you find yourself in a position of being defeated before the battle begins-- if you find yourself caught up in the cycles of the flesh, trapped by your history, God can free you.  When you trust in Him and move out, following His lead, He will deliver you from those cycles.  He will break the chains that hold you down.  

For Israel, this is a turning point.  The nation will rise from this lowly position and quickly become one of the greatest nations in the world.  From this point gives rise to David and Solomon, the greatest kings that Israel would have.  The same faith that we see in Jonathan is the faith that we see in David as he stands against Goliath.  It’s time to break the cycles and break the chains, and rise to be the person that God would have you to be.  If Jonathan had gone up against the Philistines on his own without the Lord, we wouldn’t read about him again, because he would be dead.  But the Lord went before him and fought that battle with him, delivering the Philistines into his hands.  The same is true for our lives.  When we fight the battles against addictions or the flesh and sin on our own, we fail.  We can’t do it.  Given the opportunity to sin again, we will.  That is just our nature.  We can’t just stop it on our own.  We need God to fight the battles for us.  So put your trust in Him, and walk as He calls you to walk.  Seek Him in all things.  I love when people at church ask me for the Wi-Fi password.  It is “Matthew 7:7” which reads:

“Ask, and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you.”  

Do you see why I love it?! Ha!  And it continues in verse 8:

“For everyone who asks receives, and he who seeks finds, and to him who knocks it will be opened.”

If you truly are seeking after the Lord and look to Him to free you, He will.  I pray that we would all be set free from our chains and we would begin new cycles that bring glory and honor to the Lord.