The Righteousness of God

Posted on 05/01/2010 by Paul Pavao

I’ve named several posts the Righteousness of God (I think). How could I describe the righteousness of God in one post? In fact, how could I describe the righteousness of God at all?

In the end, the righteousness of God is displayed in the lives of spiritual people. What I am about to write is not just the product of reading Scripture. It is the product of reading the lives of the saints of God.

And their lives are every bit as much the Word of God as the Scriptures are.

This was originally an email; however, Jennie has been asking a question about my separating faith and works when I talk about the judgment and going to heaven. She’s concerned—rightly—about my doing so because for the Christian, good deeds are the product of walking with God. They’re not separated from faith.
I’m hoping this will adequately answer the question.

God’s righteousness

We don’t know very much about righteousness/doing good. Most of what we think is doing good isn’t.

Well … maybe not most, but a lot.

Part of the reason we abandon our own righteousness (Rom. 10:3-4; Php. 3:8-15) is so that God can create his.

His righteousness is undefinable.

The Scripture defines it in very general terms by saying the “the fruit of the Spirit is” and “against such things there is no law” (Gal. 5:22-23).

We don’t follow a law because if we do the law becomes our guide rather than the Spirit being our guide.

If the Spirit is our guide, he is able to begin working a righteousness in us that is the product both of changing us and showing us what to do. Each of those things produce different results. When he’s leading us, and we do what we feel from him, then we do acts of righteousness. When he’s changing us, we begin to do acts of righteousness we don’t even know about. We are simply kinder, easier to be around, more encouraging, and more convicting … mostly without our knowledge.

The result of a spiritual righteousness is that you never feel adequate in yourself. You always wonder why God has mercy on you, but you know he is having mercy on you because your relationship with him is peaceful, growing, and good.

No law could produce such a righteousness. When you obey the law, you know you’re righteous.

Well … you think you are. Paul said before he met Christ he was “blameless” according to the Law. After he met Christ he realized he was the chief of sinners, the ultimate example of someone undeserving of the mercy of God.

Big difference in how he saw himself, no?

When the Spirit produces righteousness, you live like that. Your confidence in facing the judgment is that you know him. The Spirit bears witness with your spirit that you are the child of God (Rom. 8:16). You know, deeply and fully, that when you sin you have an advocate with the Father (1 Jn. 2:1). You feel the love and mercy of God. Your gratefulness grows, your fear of displeasing him–and even of being judged by him for disobedience–grows, and your righteousness grows without pride.

This is the path. God doesn’t need you to be at the end of it. He’ll get you to the end of it. He just wants you to stay on it. You are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works that he has prepared beforehand to do (Eph. 2:10).

The Judgment and Previous Posts

Correcting the commonly held false beliefs about the judgment means reminding Christians that there is one (Rom. 14:10; 2 Cor. 5:10). It means telling them that it’s according to works and that they ought to fear (1 Pet. 1:17).

However, correcting false beliefs about the judgment is one narrow part of God’s plan. If it’s all you look at, then you will think you need to trust in yourself and your obedience for righteousness.

That will not work. That’s just a good way to find out Romans 7 is true.

You do need to obey. You do need to fear. But you need to await the hope of the righteousness which comes by faith (Gal. 5:5). That’s a real, lived-out righteousness (1 Jn. 3:7), but it nonetheless comes by faith, imparted by the grace of God (Rom. 6:14).

Stay on the path. That’s our biggest job, our ultimate work of righteousness (Jn. 15:1-5). It is God who is committed in Jesus Christ to getting you to the end of it (Php. 2:13; 1 Cor. 1:7-9; Jude 24).

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1 Corinthians 3 and Works Burned Up By Fire

Posted on 04/28/2010 by Paul Pavao

As long as we’re talking about works, I need to put one more myth to rest.

1 Corinthians 3:15 says, "If any man’s work is burned, he shall suffer loss, but he himself shall be saved, but so as through fire."

That passage is talking about ministry. The works involved there are teaching and building the church. If a teacher builds the church poorly; if he builds wood, hay, and stubble, he won’t be sent to hell for being a bad teacher and bad church builder. He will be saved, yet so as through fire.

Read the chapter. That’s the context. It’s very clear.

The passage is not about works like feeding the hungry and clothing the naked. If you turn a deaf ear to the hungry, thirsty, naked, imprisoned, and sick, then you will go into the lake of fire (Matt. 25:31-46). You will not be saved so as through fire; you will be lost so as through fire.

If you practice drunkenness, adultery, division, envy, greed, selfish ambitions and such things, then you will not be saved so as through fire, you will be told by Christ that he does not know you, whether your ministry was successful or not, whether you cast out demons or not, and whether you worked miracles or not.

1 Corinthians 3 is about workers in the church and their teaching. Thank God that those of us who teach do not have our salvation on the line when we teach. Nonetheless, we do not wish to have all our work burned up, as we will lose all our rewards.

If, however, we live like the world, greedily pursuing our own gain, we will be judged like the world, and we will be condemned along with all liars, cowards, idolaters, and unbelievers (Rev. 21:8).

By the way, I don’t teach these things because they’re fun or I like them. I teach them because that’s what the Bible says, and it is inappropriate for us to dance around what the Bible says because we have a 500-year-old doctrine that we have elevated to divinely-inspired status.

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A Quick Overview of Salvation

Posted on 04/25/2010 by Paul Pavao

I’ve been needing to write something short like this for a long time …

Salvation comes in two steps.

  1. Deliverance from slavery to sin and the living death it produces: This comes by faith alone. We are born again, made new creatures, given the Spirit, and delivered from sin and empowered for holiness by grace.
  2. Entrance to Christ’s everlasting kingdom: This is a reward for good works and doing the will of the Father. Faith is not taken into account, only the works that you have done in obedience to God and conscience. If you are saved by faith, you will by greatly aided by God in that obedience.

There it is, short and simple. The fact is, the Scriptures line up neatly when you see salvation as two steps in this way.

Testing Those Steps Scripturally

Describing salvation in this way terrifies Evangelicals. I was going to say it stumbles them, but that’s not true. Their own doctrine stumbles them and causes the majority of them to be unsaved. That is, they do not have grace giving them power over sin, and they do not have grace teaching them to deny ungodliness and worldly lusts. Instead, most Evangelicals are still slaves to sin, and many of them aren’t even bothered by it.

Not all of them, just most.

If you don’t know the Scriptures well enough to compare them to those two steps, then you can go through my pages on salvation at the Rest of the Old Old Story.

If you do know the Scriptures well enough, just go through them on your own. The things Paul said and James said both fit neatly into the steps I gave above.

You’ll need a better description of the atonement than "Jesus paid the penalty for your sins," though. That’s coming soon. Suffice it to say that if you search for something in the Scriptures saying "Jesus paid the penalty," you’re in for a long search. Most passages fit much better into the ideas expressed in Romans 8:3-4.

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Judgment & Eternal Life

Posted on 04/25/2010 by Paul Pavao

A comment was left on my last post about the judgment. A decent answer is far too long to leave as a comment, so here’s my response.

Please note that rather than quote long sections of her comment and whole verses she quoted, I’m going to summarize to help keep this post a little shorter.

Your post on judgment made me think of two verses. John 5:24 says that if we believe we have eternal life and won’t come into judgment. 1 Thess. 4:15-18 says that believers are raptured. They are either not judged at all, or this is a judgment showing they are not condemned but belong to Christ.

I have to answer those two verses separately.

John 5:24

John writes much differently than Paul. In the end, the basic message is exactly the same, but the way of saying it is different. John always speaks of eternal life as a present possession. Paul always speaks of eternal life as a future reward (e.g., Rom. 6:22).

Only their terminology is different. The life we receive from Christ upon believing is just called life by Paul, while it is called eternal life by John.

John, however, is every bit as clear as Paul about works and about the judgment.

First, while John quotes Jesus as saying that the one who believes has eternal life, know for certain what John means by believing. John says that if a person claims to know God but doesn’t keep his commands, then that person is a liar (1 Jn. 2:3-4). He says that a righteous person is someone who practices righteousness, and he tells us not to be deceived about that (1 Jn. 3:7).

Second, John talks about judgment a lot, and he says the same things about judgment that he says about eternal life. The difference is what people do.

If we want to "assure our hearts before him," we must love (1 Jn. 3:18-19). If we want to have confidence at the judgment, we must love and we must walk as Christ walked (4:15-18).

So John’s very clear about what it means to be safe at the judgment. Your faith had better produce good works. If good works aren’t being produced, then John tells you repeatedly to assume you do not believe, you do not know God, and you are not his child.

That’s not because he wants to condemn you! That’s because he wants you to have real faith!

That’s nothing different than what James says in James 2.

1 Thess. 4:15-18

Like I said in my comment, this passage comes to my mind, too. Obviously, those who are caught up to be with Christ forever are already judged by God to be Christ’s. They have an eternal reward.

Of course, this isn’t really any different than Matthew 25 or Revelation 20. In both cases, everyone is gathered before Christ, but he already knows who has an eternal reward and who has condemnation. The sheep and goats are already divided when Christ sits down on his glorious throne in Matthew 25. The sheep are at his right, and the goats are on his left.

In Revelation 20, there’s a Book of Life. Whoever is not found written in it is cast into the lake of fire.

That book is not only in Revelation 20. It’s only in Revelation 3. Jesus warns the church of Sardis to repent, and he says that those who overcome will not have their name blotted out of the Book of Life. The tie to Revelation 20 is obvious.

So your point that God and Jesus know in advance who has eternal life and who does not is accurate. Jesus can return and catch up his own to be with him because he already knows who he is.

But those who are his are not all those who claim to be Christians. John himself makes that clear. He tells the church that some left and those who left never belonged to Christ (1 Jn. 2:19). While they were there, since they never belonged to him, had Christ returned, others would have been caught up to meet the Lord in the air, but those described in 1 Jn. 2:19 would not have been snatched up.

John 5:24 and John 5:28-29

Your point, about those who are in Christ avoiding judgment, seems to be backed up by the rest of John 5:24-29 as well.

This is an interesting passage. In v. 25, "the dead" hear the voice of Christ. In verse 28, those who are "in the graves" hear the voice of Christ. Ordinarily, these would seem to be the same people, but I think anyone who has read John can look at that passage and know they are different.

"The dead" are those who are dead in their sins. Those who are in the graves are those who died physically. The former, when they hear the voice of Christ and believe are given life, and they avoid judgment. The latter, when they hear the voice of Christ, are judged by their works.

I’m looking at that and thinking it would be very difficult to interpret those verses any other way.

That’s not really a problem for two reasons …

  • 1 John says repeatedly that the only true believers are those who are doing good works (see above).
  • All the passages on the judgment make it clear that each person’s judgment is known in advance.

So How Does All This Apply to Us?

Whether the judgment is discussed Jesus’ way, John’s way, Paul’s way, or Peter’s way, the answer is the same.

Jesus tells us that those who will enter his kingdom are those who do his Father’s will (Matt. 7:21). When he has to admonish the churches, he tells them to repent, do good works, and overcome (Rev. 2:1 – 3:22).

Peter tells us to fear the judgment (1 Pet. 1:17) and to be diligent to make our calling and election sure by adding to our faith virtue, knowledge, self-control, perseverance, godliness, brotherly kindness, and good works (2 Pet. 1:5-11).

Paul tells us to walk by the Spirit, saying that those who walk by the flesh will die (Rom. 8:12) and reap corruption (Gal. 6:8). He compares walking by the Spirit to doing good (Gal. 6:7-9). He also says that eternal life is the end of holiness, which is the product of freedom from sin and servitude to God (Rom. 6:22).

John tells us that if we want to have confidence in the day of judgment, we must love and be as Christ is in the world (1 Jn 4:17-18). He tells us that the way we will be able to determine whether we know God or not is by whether we keep his commands (1 Jn. 2:3-4).

The Judgment for Christians

Paul says we shall all stand before the judgment seat of Christ to receive the deeds done in the body, whether good or bad. Peter says that if we address God as Father, the one who impartially judges according to each one’s work, then we should conduct ourselves throughout the time of our sojourning here in fear (1 Pet. 1:17).

They both seem to be suggesting very clearly that we should expect a judgment.

Perhaps the best answer to all of this is that whether we are judged right here on earth or judged at the same time as others at the end of time, we are nonetheless judged according to our works.

Again, take a look at Jesus’ letters to the churches in Rev. 2 & 3. There is little doubt that he is judging those churches according to their works. Those that he found lacking, he warns. And his warnings ring of eternal judgment, not temporal punishment. Every reward for the overcomers is something for the afterlife.

You mentioned the judgment of the sheep and the goats. I believe that passage is talking about a judgment of living people who are on earth when Christ returns. … I don’t believe those who were in the first resurrection before the millenium will be judged for salvation.

Those who are part of the first resurrection are those who are martyred for Christ. Martyrs are mentioned twice in Revelation as being in heaven before the judgment, once in Rev. 6:9-11 and once in Rev. 20:4-5. In chapter six they are told to wait for others to be martyred, which would be those mentioned in Rev. 20:4-5.

Anyone who has read the early Christian writings cannot miss the respect early Christians had for those who gave their lives for Christ. Although the early Christians believed that even Christians went to a paradise—the same place referred to as Abraham’s bosom in the story of Lazarus and the rich man—they did not believe martyrs went there. Martyrs got to bypass the judgment. They went straight to heaven.

Even Ignatius, who wrote his letters around A.D. 110, believed that. This is significant, since the apostle John appointed him to be the head elder of the apostle Paul’s home church.

It seems like a guy like that would have pretty reliable theology.

As far as Matthew 25 goes, there’s nothing to indicate that this is only those alive when Jesus returns. But even assuming that it is, it really doesn’t change anything.

The question I’m trying to address is, do the works of Christians matter?

Everything we read suggests they do. Thus, it is safe to say that our doctrine of salvation by faith alone—the doctrine as it is taught by most Evangelicals—is false.

We have misinterpreted Paul’s words on salvation by faith alone, and we have applied those words in ways that contradict Paul’s own teachings on the judgment. Our interpretation has caused us to dance jigs around passages like Galatians 6:7-10 and many, many other verses.

I have a couple long pages addressing that issue at Christian History for Everyman. One addresses faith alone, and the other addresses salvation more generally.

I have several articles addressing the various details of the doctrine of salvation on my Rest of the Old, Old Story web site.

However, I’m about to write a very short version of those pages for my next post.

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Judgment

Posted on 04/17/2010 by Paul Pavao

There are two subjects that are taught by Evangelicals without ever consulting the verses on those subjects: the Judgment and baptism.

For both these subjects we do not consult verses about judgment or baptism; we consult verses about faith. We then extrapolate from those verses on faith to arrive at a conclusion completely different than what the verses on the Judgment and baptism actually say.

And then we call ourselves Bible believers.

I’d like to just address one of those subjects today. That subject is the Judgment. Then maybe in the next post we can discuss why those verses so badly contradict what we Evangelicals teach about faith.

The verses on the Judgment:

Matt. 25:31-46: Here Jesus says he will be on the throne, and the nations will be judged based on whether they fed the hungry, gave drink to the thirsty, clothed the naked, and visited the imprisoned and sick. The sheep at his right hand did those things and inherit the kingdom. The goats on his left didn’t, and they are sent into the everlasting fire prepared for the devil and his angels.

As Keith Green pointed out at the end of his song, “The Sheep and the Goats,” the only difference between the sheep and the goats, according to the Scripture, is what they did and didn’t do.

John 5:28-29: Those that are in the graves will resurrect to life or condemnation based on whether they have done evil or good.

Romans 2:2-7: The judgment of God is “against those who do such things.” A hard and unrepentant heart stores up wrath for the day of judgment, when God will “repay every man according to his deeds.” He will reward eternal life, says Paul, to those who seek immortality by “patient continuance in doing good.”

Romans 14:10: “We shall all stand before the judgment seat of Christ.” The verses on the Judgment apply to Christians as well as non-Christians.

2 Cor. 5:10-11: Again, we’ll all stand before the judgment seat of Christ, where we will “receive the deeds done in the body, whether good or bad.” Because of the fear inspired by this judgment, Paul persuades men.

Hebrews 10:26-31: This is the most horrifying of passages on the judgment. It is said to those who “have received the knowledge of the truth,” but continue sinning willfully. They should fearfully look for “judgment and fiery indignation, which will devour the adversaries.” This is just because if Israelites were put to death mercilessly for violating the Law of Moses, how much worse punishment is deserved by those who tread the Son of God underfoot, count the blood of the covenant an unholy thing, and despise the Spirit.

James 2:13: The person who shows no mercy shall be judged without mercy. Mercy triumphs over judgment. Thus we see that it is not believing in Christ that causes judgment to cease, but showing mercy, which is again something you do.

The very next verse says, ” What will it profit you, my brothers, if you say you have faith, but you have no works?” Apparently, James knew what Jesus and Paul said, which is that it’s only what you’ve done that will matter at the judgment.

1 Peter 1:17: This one speaks for itself very well: “If you address as Father the one who impartially judges according to each one’s work, then conduct yourself throughout the time of your sojourning here in fear.

There are not many of Evangelicals who believe the Bible, even though we say we do, so I get a lot of objections to these verses. A common objection is that if this were true, then it would cause Christians to fear.

Great! That’s what we’re commanded to do in 1 Peter 1:17!

Inheriting the Kingdom

Those are all the verses on the Judgment in the NT that actually give a description of the judgment. You may notice a consistent pattern. They all mention works, and none of them distinguishes at all between those who have faith and those who don’t.

There are other verses that warn us that this might be so.

Eph. 5:5: For this you know, that no immoral, unclean or covetous person—who is an idolater—has any inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and of God.

Actually, many Evangelicals don’t know this.

The Scriptures foresaw this as well. Look at the next verse.

Eph. 5:6: Let no one deceive you with empty words …

We really should have listened to that better!

Eph. 5:6 (cont.): … for because of these things the wrath of God comes upon the sons of disobedience.

I’ve been told many times that people don’t go to hell for sin—because, after all, those are paid for on the cross—they go to hell for not believing in Christ.

Fortunately, I did not let them deceive me with those empty words.

Eph. 5:7: Therefore do not be partakers with them.

Now why would he say that in this context?

We should all know the answer now that we’ve seen the Scriptures on the Judgment. You’re not judged any differently than they are, except that you may be judged more strictly because “to whom much is given, much will be required.”

So don’t act like them, or you, too, will experience the wrath of God.

Revelation 3:4-5

You have a few names, even in Sardis, who have not defiled their garments. They shall walk with me in white, for they are worthy. He that overcomes shall be clothed in white garments, and I will not blot his name out of the Book of Life, but I will confess his name before my Father and his angels.

It doesn’t get much more straightforward than this. There were only a few in Sardis who had not defiled their garments. They will walk in white, and their names will remain in the Book of Life.

The problem was their works. Jesus says so back in verse 2. Apparently their sins weren’t blotted out by Jesus’ death because their sins had defiled their garments.

Some Evangelicals—some of the many who don’t believe the Bible among us—like to argue that while Jesus said that he wouldn’t blot out the names of the worthy, that does not mean he will blot out the names of the unworthy.

That’s too silly to answer. If you want to disbelieve the Bible that badly, go ahead. You can work it out with God at the Judgment.

One more thing to note in these verses. I’ve been told quite often that we can’t be worthy. Apparently, Jesus didn’t know that!

Concluding Thoughts

We can look in a future post at how these verses relate to the verses on faith. However, these verses say what they say, and they say it clearly. There are no verses contradicting these verses. All the verses on the Judgment say the same thing …

The Judgment will be according to works, not faith, and it will apply to Christians.

As I said, in the next post, we can straighten our ideas on faith so that we can go ahead and believe what these verses plainly say.

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Who Really Goes to Hell?

Posted on 04/14/2010 by Paul Pavao

I was stunned today to run across a book today called The Gospel You’ve Never Heard on a web site called Who Really Goes to Hell.

I was stunned because he wrote about things I have been teaching for 18 years.

Until today, I’d never heard anyone else teach them.

Admittedly, the writing is more complete, the research is deeper, and he solved an issue on the atonement—involving one word—that I’ve never been able to solve, but otherwise it’s exactly what I teach (and what’s been accepted and approved by the church here). I got it from the early Christians, he seems to have found it on his own.

You ought to read it.

Or at least read the short version!

Or better yet, check out the home page at Who Really Goes to Hell, the short version linked directly above, and then show some support and buy the print version, which is very inexpensive.

 

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Paul’s Letter to the Galatians in Christianity Today

Posted on 04/12/2010 by Paul Pavao

Okay, I have to pass this on.

Someone published a list of letters to the editor that they think would be printed if Paul’s letter to the Galatians were published in Christianity Today in modern times.

Very fascinating!

Here’s an excerpt:

How arrogant of Mr. Apostle to think he has the right to judge these people and label them accursed. Isn’t that God’s job? Regardless of this circumcision issue, these Galatians believe in Jesus just as much as he does, and it is very Pharisaical to condemn them just because they differ on such a secondary issue.

Do note, in case you don’t already know, that there wasn’t actually a Galatian church. Galatia was a province, so Paul wrote his letter to the “churches” of Galatia.

In the Scriptures it was one church per city or town.

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William T. Snead and the Welsh Revival

Posted on 04/08/2010 by Paul Pavao

I saw an article in World Magazine this morning. I’ve never heard of it—I guess I’m not as well read as I might have thought—but the people we’re staying with here in California subscribe to it.

It has an article on a man named William T. Snead, who died on the Titanic, his second shipwreck.

He was a Christian and a magazine editor. As an editor, he covered the Welsh revival of 1904 – 1906. I thought his comments about it, given in the April 10, 2010 issue of World, in an article called "Going on its own" (sic) were worth repeating.

He was asked, "But is it all emotion? Is there no teaching?"

Precious little. Do you think that teaching is what people want in a revival? These people, all the people in a land like ours, are taught to death, preached to insensibility. They all know the essential truths. They know they are not living as they ought to live, and no amount of teaching will add anything to that conviction. To hear some people talk you would imagine that the best way to get a sluggard out of bed is to send a tract on astronomy showing him that according to the fixed and eternal law the sun will rise at a certain hour in the morning.

It probably goes without saying, doesn’t it, that this applies with surgical precision to America today?

For those of you that might actually be reading this, maybe we can talk in the comment section about what we should be doing in the place of continuing to teach people to death.

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The Church and the Work

Posted on 03/30/2010 by Paul Pavao

I have little time here, but I need to get something on this blog. I’m so sorry, but technical difficulties—caused by me—made my blog go down for several days.

I wrote three letters today, one of which involved some research. I’m going to make blog posts out of at least that one (later) and this one (right now).

This one is an answer to an email I got from someone who got some help with her marriage from a young but wonderful church in another city. The email I received asked why it’s so hard for Christians to really share their lives with one another. She suggested that the problem is fear.

I agree.

Here’s the response I wrote her:

We started helping a home church about 2 hours away from us. They were pretty scared of us and what we might say. We’re big for a Christian community, with over 250 people, and they know we have a lot of outspoken, strong men. (A sure sign that God is with us, or those strong men would have divided from each other over opinions long ago.)

What they found is that we brought in no doctrine except the call to serve God wholeheartedly and love one another.

But they already knew that mentally. What we helped them with was walking it out. For example …

At one meeting a young couple was having such marriage difficulties that the wife intended not even to go home with her husband. So many churches have no idea how to handle such a thing! Others just whisper to each other, “Gee, that’s too bad. I hope they work it out.”

We didn’t even have to tell that little home church what to do. They had gotten to know us. A couple of the older sisters pulled that young wife aside and talked to her. A couple of the older brothers checked on the young husband who was brokenhearted over the whole thing and wasn’t sure what he’d done. Then all of them sat down together, and the young couple went home with their marriage in better shape than it had ever been because both were much wiser and had their eyes on God.

That’s the church. That makes all the difference.

That is unimaginably hard.

No one who has ever tried to live that way has any idea how hard it is. In fact, without the help of God it’s impossible. If the church lives like that, power comes down from heaven. The Spirit of God establishes a unity that is so beautiful that no one can speak against it. The world will always criticize the church, but only from a distance. Up close, they’re speechless because no one can speak against the love of God when it descends from heaven.

The devil has no intentions of letting that be established in the earth. Give your lives to loving and serving one another–assuming that we’re talking about people willing to follow Jesus Christ anywhere and under any circumstances–and the devil will come running, weapons drawn.

On top of that, what you write is true. People are scared. What we have found is that the strongest men are filled with fear. Women tend to let down a little easier and trust faster, but men are very slow to let God deal with them to make them trust one another.

Protestants like to say, “I don’t trust men; I just trust God.”

Well, if that’s true, you’ll never be in the church, and you’ll never have the power the apostles and the early church had.

In America, the only way there’s going to be real church life is for someone to drop their fear, give themselves wholly to Christ to suffer whatever might come their way, and then begin to seek the will of God in their own life and in the lives of those around them with boldness, kindness, patience, and love …

… and a willingness to leave behind those that don’t really want to follow Christ.

You can’t build a church with children of the enemy, and Christ only receives disciples who are willing to leave everything behind and follow him. We can wish it were not so, but Jesus is very clear on a repeated basis that he wants everything. He let the rich, young ruler walk away even though the Scriptures say Jesus loved him, that he kept the commandments, and that he wanted to know how to be complete. When the test came, though–give up your possessions–he went away sad, and Jesus did not go running after him.

Don’t take that wrong. It’s the Lord who knows those who are his. Sometimes the ones most willing to follow Christ don’t look like devoted people willing to give everything up for him.

Well, at this point I’m going on too far. There’s no explaining the church. What you say is correct, though. The problem is fear. The problem is also the lack of a clear, crisp call to give up our lives and follow Christ; a real death to ourselves; a real embracing of the cross.

There can be no private areas where brothers and sisters can’t get in. We have to be one family, closer to each other in Christ than we are to our biological families.

I’ll just quit there. If you’ve been writing to B______, that’s a great start. Be in fellowship—wholehearted fellowship–with all those who devotedly serve Christ (2 Tim. 2:22). Every time you have problems in your marriage that you can’t handle, let brothers and sisters know so that they can help you. (You better pick ones that can help you.) Let people into your lives who are brave enough to tell you where you’re too impatient, too sharp-tongued or maybe even too patient and not sharp-tongued enough!

The best thing of all is that brothers and sisters who know you can also say, “No, that’s not a problem. Everyone’s got faults. You’re a wonderful person who’s really doing great. Relax. You can work on that fault ten years from now.”

I’m going all over the map here, but when we get to talking about the church, there’s so much to be said that American Christians desperately need to know but don’t.

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A Gift from God

Posted on 03/15/2010 by Paul Pavao

I’ve had a really awesome last two hours.

I drove into the village around 5:45. Four little children were playing on the front porch of the house next door. Ethny—the 4-year-old daughter of a couple, both of whom I knew when they were pre-teens—saw me and waved with a huge smile on her face.

Then she ran out towards my car and ran the length of her yard next to my car. I slowed to 5 mph so she could keep up, then waved, smiled and parked. It was so sweet to see her beaming, laughing, and waving.

I came in, ate dinner with the twenty people who live in my house, and talked about some very interesting studies on the intelligence of crows. Our house is prone to being intellectual, so there was plenty of feedback when I told them about crows bending wire to fish food out of a bottle.

After dinner, I talked to a distraught teenage girl, daughter of a single mom, who’d had a rough day emotionally. Thanks to over a decade of God dealing with me in church life, I pushed past my natural timidity—my friends all laugh when I tell them I’m shy, but I’m pretty certain I was painfully shy as a young man—and talked to her even after she told me she didn’t need to talk.

We had a wonderful talk, and she assured me it helped. In fact, I hear her laughing loudly at something in the living room behind me.

I came out to the living room, where the 3-year-old daughter of the other family that lives here, the Briggs, was having trouble containing her energy. I had to deliver a check to another house, so I asked her if she wanted to walk up the hill with me.

She did, but on the way out my wife took the opportunity to spray me with a spray bottle that she’d confiscated from the little girl, who had been spraying its contents into a bottle of vitamin C she’d managed to get her hands on. My wife sprayed me not once, not twice, but three times.

She thought it was pretty funny, but as I walked out I noticed that the garden hose was turned on with a spray handle on the end of it. I pulled it to the front door, opened the door, and sprayed my wife back … with a full blast from the hose. Then I ran down the road with little Katie while my wife shouted assurances to me. She was assuring me I’d regret it.

At the corner, Katie twisted her ankle, so I put her on my shoulders, then ran up the hill to shouts of "run, run," and "faster, faster."

I’m 49. The "run, run" didn’t fall on deaf ears, but the "faster, faster" did.

After I delivered the check, Katie and I walked the long way back, though we stopped to pet the miniature donkey the village has. The llama came close enough to smell my hand, but it wouldn’t let us pet him.

Oh, did I say walk? She ran, I danced. I would have sang and danced, but I’m not in that kind of shape anymore. So I danced and gasped for breath instead.

Usually, this blog is about God and the Gospel.

Today, this blog is about God and the Gospel, too.

This is the life God has built for us. The Scriptures say that he the Spirit of God will shed the love of God abroad in our hearts.

We didn’t design Rose Creek Village. We just followed God. We met together from our separate houses like all other Americans. But we demanded wholeheartedness from each other, and we committed ourselves to whatever God would build, whatever the cost.

After years, this is what God has built.

It’s nothing like we could have imagined.

It turns out that God doesn’t have the priorities we thought he had. We used to be consumed with our personal holiness. He taught us to be so consumed with doing his will—walking in love and serving—that we didn’t have time to think about our personal holiness.

There’s a difference between those things.

The product is a fellowship that is deeply satisfying.

Every day, we have to learn to give that fellowship, not to demand it. We understand what it means to love without being loved back.

We also understand that it’s very difficult to love without being loved back.

Love is powerful.

Love is also not carnal. It comes from God.

God built this life for us, and I just want to express my gratefulness to him. On days like today, it’s easy to see the purpose of the way we live.

By the way, the way we live is not in community. That’s just a by-product, a symptom, if you will, of having the Spirit of God, even when we’re weak people prone to carnality.

The way we live is in subjection to God.

It takes faith. What is hard today, when all you see is denying yourself, will eventually yield the peaceable fruits of righteousness—and righteousness looks a lot like love, friendship, mercy, and joy.

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