HOW TO DEVELOP YOUR RELATIONSHIP SKILLS

 HOW TO DEVELOP YOUR RELATIONSHIP SKILLS

This year we have been laying a foundation for knowing God and then each Sunday building upon it. Throughout June we are focusing on how knowing God enables us to find our joy in Him and consequently to discover that He enables us to find joy in our relationships with others. But sadly, for many people who have vowed to love, serve, and follow Jesus, this has not always been easy to do. This is why the current sub-theme of humility is critically important if someone desires to truly experience joy in each of their various relationships with others. 

 

HOW WE DEFINE JOY AND HOW WE DEFINE HUMILITY:

WHY SOME PEOPLE HAVE A HARD TIME AT DOING RELATIONSHIPS:

HOW THESE LACKING RELATIONSHIP SKILLS CAN BE CORRECTED:

Over the next few weeks we continue build on the foundation of knowing God which leads to building more joyous relationships with others. If this is something that you want to improve, remember, it begins with humbling yourself.

Amen.

Your Pastor,

Andrew

Let me know what you think below in the comment section and feel free to share this someone who might benefit from this Pastor’s Desk.

IS THERE ANYTHING DIFFERENT ABOUT BEING UNIQUE?

 IS THERE ANYTHING DIFFERENT ABOUT BEING UNIQUE?

We live on a unique planet which is part of a unique solar system which is part of a unique galaxy which is part of a unique universe. Our unique planet hosts 8.7 million unique animal species and 7.5 billion unique people. There are many other aspects to our earth’s uniqueness, but there is one outstandingly unique trait about our planet that makes it uniquely unique. 

I praise you, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made.
Wonderful are your works;
my soul knows it very well.
Psalm 139:14

 

A UNIQUENESS LIKE NO OTHER

While we are all created unique; and, we are each unique together. We are each and uniquely created in the image of God which makes us each unique but also uniquely distinct from all other creatures and it also bonds us uniquely together. We are quite literally a human family of divine image bearers. 

What is man that you are mindful of him,
and the son of man that you care for him?
¶ Yet you have made him a little lower than the heavenly beings
and crowned him with glory and honor.
You have given him dominion over the works of Your hands;
You have put all things under his feet.
Psalm 8:4-6

The image of God that we each bear is not just that we each uniquely reflect Him to the rest of creation, it’s not just that we represent Him, it’s not just that we uniquely share several of His attributes (creativity, planning, conceptual communication, altruistic compassion, a spiritual essence enabling prayer and revelation), it is a unique status. The imago dei (“image of God”) is a unique status that only human beings are privileged with from the moment of their conception. When some heavenly (angelic) creatures rebelled, their Creator had provided no means to help them to ever be redeemed. Angels do not share the same privileged status of those who bear the status of the imago dei — as we each uniquely do.

For surely it is not angels that He helps, but He helps the offspring of Abraham.
Therefore He had to be made like His brothers in every respect,
so that He might become a merciful and faithful high priest in the service of God,
to make propitiation for the sins of the people. For because He Himself has
suffered when tempted, He is able to help those who are being tempted.
Hebrews 2:16-18

The day will come when time as we have known it will come to end. On that “last day” (John 6:39; 12:48) those among the imago dei family who have been redeemed by Christ by accepting His offer of grace, will be entrusted by the Almighty to judge those fallen heavenly creatures who had rebelled and wrought so much wickedness and evil in the world.

Or do you not know that the saints will judge the world?
And if the world is to be judged by you, are you incompetent to try trivial cases?
Do you not know that we are to judge angels?
How much more, then, matters pertaining to this life!
First Corinthians 6:2-3

 

OUR UNIQUENESS REQUIRED A UNIQUE SAVIOUR

As we enter into this Advent season we should reflect on the uniqueness of the Christ-child whose birth we celebrate each Christmas. It often crops up on the internet around Christmas time that Christians simply reinvented pagan myths of virgin-born saviours which may rock the fragile faith of newer Christians. But as Dr. Leon Morris points out in his commentary on the Gospel of Luke, no such myth has yet been found and certainly no ancient myth ever proposed that a virgin would conceive – let alone conceive a child supernaturally! Dr. Morris points out that there are several mythological accounts of ‘gods’ having relations with mortal women to sire a child – but this hardly could then be described as a virgin conceiving! Reflecting on Luke 1 and Matthew 1 we see that Jesus the Christ had a unique birth (Matt. 1:2-23, 25). It was also unique because it was prophesied (Isa. 7:14); accompanied by independent angelic visitations to Mary and her betrothed Joseph. Secondly, Christ bore and received unique divine titles (Isa. 9:6). Thirdly, Christ had a unique name – Jesus – that revealed His unique identity. Fourthly, He had a unique mission (to save people from the eternal consequences of their sin, Matt. 1:21) which He was aware of from a very early age (Luke 2:49). Fifthly, Jesus had a unique destiny to die an atoning death, rise from the dead, ascend by translation back to His heavenly throne, and will then sit in judgment of all people. And sixthly, Jesus the Christ made – and the offer still stands – to cleanse a person from the soul-stain of sin and mediate their adoption as a son or daughter of God the Father.

And there is salvation in no one else,
for there is no other name under heaven
given among men by which we must be saved.”
Acts 4:12

 

OUR UNIQUENESS MAKES US FAMILY

Loneliness has now reached epidemic proportions in many parts of the world. God’s solution to this has always been family. Our shared humanity should help us to appreciate that our nuclear family is designed by God to be a community of care, support and encouragement to each family member. But God has also designed us to be members of a local spiritual family called a church. It is in the community of the church that we grow together and learn how to care, support and encourage each other. And if my hunch about the growing pandemic of loneliness is close to being right this means that God’s concept of the family complemented by His establishment of the church family certainly makes our uniqueness as a community quite different and probably what most people are actually longing for.

Father of the fatherless and protector of widows is God in His holy habitation.
God settles the solitary in a home;
Psalm 68:5-6a 

Your pastor,

Andrew

Let me know what you think below in the comment section and feel free to share this someone who might benefit from this Pastor’s Desk.

WHO CARES?

 WHO CARES?

The world into which the Saviour of mankind entered as a baby was a very harsh place. Life was cheap. Might was right. The oppressed were abused and often mistreated by the Roman conquerors. Those expected to speak up for, and defend, the voiceless vulnerable — their religious leaders of the day — had become too easily corrupted in their pathetic attempts to win a crumb of their conqueror’s power. This corruption in the pursuit of financial gain and political leverage had blinded these supposed-to-be-shepherds to the true plight of those they should have served as guardians. Why on earth would God send His Son into our world at such a dark time?

¶ But when the time arrived that was set by God the Father, God sent His Son, born among us of a woman, born under the conditions of the law so that He might redeem those of us who have been kidnapped by the law.
Galatians 4:4 THE MESSAGE

WHERE IS THE GOD WHO CARES?

In what would have to be the greatest reply to the oft asked question – what has the all-powerful, all-good God done about evil and suffering in the world? – God the Eternal Father sent His Eternal Son into this world of evil and suffering as a zygote (the earliest stage of human development) as His answer. In one of Dr. F.W. Boreham’s essays on this topic he pointed out how often it has been throughout history that just at the darkest hours in human history, a baby has been sovereignly born who would grow into a courageous leader who would be a further divine reply to the question about what has done about evil and suffering in the world. The greatest example of this of course is the Christmas Child. At just the precise time of one of earth’s darkest hours, the Christ was born. Little wonder then that Dr. Boreham could say that God’s answer to the world’s problems is always a baby. And the baby that God the Father sent to the world was the One who created it and everything in it (Col. 1:17-18). Did He come reluctantly? Did He come in the same way that the mythological Greco-Roman members of the pantheon of gods would come feeling rather indifferent to the injustices besetting the world? Let the written Word of God be our answer-

When He saw the crowds, He had compassion for them,
because they were harassed and helpless,
like sheep without a shepherd.
Matthew 9:36

DOES JESUS?

Christ was moved with compassion for people. He felt their pain and saw their suffering. Did Jesus care? Asking this question sound utterly ridiculous even before I get the question mark! There is no doubt that Jesus cared. He demonstrated care for outcasts — such as lepers who shunned by society — but He didn’t care for them because they were a marginalised group or even because they were lepers. He cared for them because they were people created in the image of God. Jesus cared for the poor – but not because they were poor – but because they were people created in the image of God. Jesus cared for women – but not because they were women – but because they were people created in the image of God. And the same can be said of His care for those people with a different skin colour to His (which almost certainly was not ‘white’), or for those people of different ethnicity who could barely speak the language of the Hebrews without a tell-tale accent that brought scorn and even hatred among Israelites. He cared for these people despite these things because they too were created in the image of God. This reveals that Christ treated all people as sharing a common and unique bond: all people are created in the image of God and this common bond and shared privilege binds us each together as the ‘human race’ thus making all alternate adjectives of the word “race” superfluous and counter-productive to a biblical understanding of what it means to be human. Our initial question, who cares? is now forced to be adjusted to: Who should care? And the answer is immediately obvious. We should because we are the family of the divine image bearers. We are family.

For God, who said, “Let light shine out of darkness,”
has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge
of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.
Second Corinthians 4:6

 

BUT WHO CARES?

Those who know Christ! To worship is to adore, to behold, to praise, to reflect upon and reflect. Thus, we become like whatever we worship. When we reflect on Christ we marvel at His care for each individual in a crowd where each one probably thought that no-one saw them in the midst of a sea of faces – but Jesus did. They may have thought that when Jesus looked at the crowd He couldn’t have noticed them but He did. As they blended into the masses of people that often flocked to Christ they may have felt that non-one cared for them – but Jesus did. Consider how often Jesus spent time with one person: the woman at the well (John 4); Nicodemus the Scribe (John 3); the man at the Pool of Bethesda (John 5); the women condemned as an adulteress (John 8); the man born blind (John 9); Lazarus (John 11); and Pilate (John 19).  

And we all, with unveiled face, beholding the glory of the Lord,
are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another.
For this comes from the Lord who is the Spirit.
Second Corinthians 3:18`

Time and time again throughout the gospels we see Jesus taking time out for the individual – a woman with the issue of blood, the Syrophoenician woman with a demonise daughter, a blind man on the side of the road. Jesus’ care for people is a remarkable insight into the Father’s care for each member of His earthly family of divine image bearers. And just as Jesus conveyed the Father’s heart of care for each person, we too are called to also convey it (Luke 10:25-37).
 

Your pastor,

Andrew

Let me know what you think below in the comment section and feel free to share this someone who might benefit from this Pastor’s Desk.

LOVE, What and Why

LOVE, What and Why

¶ When they had finished breakfast, Jesus said to Simon Peter, “Simon, son of John, do you love Me more than these?” He said to Him, “Yes, Lord; You know that I love You.” He said to him, “Feed My lambs.”
John 21:15

 Jesus asked a question, that I’m pretty sure every wife frequently asks her husband, “Do you love Me?” But the question Jesus asked of Peter was not the same as the similar sounding question that wives ask their husbands. The kind of ‘love’ that Jesus was asking of His disciple was extremely odd. And while many a sermon down through the centuries has claimed that Peter’s answer to the Christ was not satisfactory, I think they may have missed the point of this profound exchange between the Saviour and one of His servants. It is from this exchange that we are gifted one of the greatest insights into what love really is and why it requires something in particular.   

He said to him a second time, “Simon, son of John, do you love Me?” He said to Him, “Yes, Lord; You know that I love You.” He said to him, “Tend My sheep.”
John 21:16

 How would you have answered Jesus? It seems that Christianity is the only religion that involves love in every aspect of its expression. Devotees of other religions often offer their forms of worship in the hope of appeasing their deity/ies. In these religions there is often a lot of fear on the part of the worshiper. The ancient Incas and Aztecs would offer thousands of human sacrifices to appease their concept of the Supreme Being—lest that Supreme Being smite them with some disastrous calamity. When the Conquistadors arrived in the land of the Aztecs in 1511 they discovered mounds of human remains which they came to realise were the result of their murderous worship practices. 

 While this might be an extreme example of how many religions are grounded in fear, it stands in stark contrast to the way Jesus revealed we can find mercy, peace and acceptance from GOD. The apostle John noted this contrast in First John 4:18-

There is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out fear. For fear has to do with punishment, and whoever fears has not been perfected in love.
First John 4:18

LOVE IS NOT LOVE

He said to him the third time, “Simon, son of John, do you love me?” Peter was grieved because He said to him the third time, “Do you love Me?” and he said to Him, “Lord, You know everything; You know that I love You.” Jesus said to him, “Feed My sheep.
John 21:17

 Nearly every sermon I have ever heard preached on this passage points out that Jesus used the word ‘agape’ in His question to Peter while in Peter’s response to Jesus he responded with another Greek word, ‘phileo’. In Biblical (Koiné) Greek, there are four words that can be translated into English as love. Both of these words are best translated into English as ‘love’. Most preachers I have heard preach on this text have pointed out that Christ used the Greek word for ‘supreme love’ (agapé) while Peter responded with the Greek word for ‘human love’ (phileo). Thus, they claim, Christ was asking something of Peter that Peter was not prepared to agree to. There are, however, two problems with this understanding of what was happening on this beach—and when we solve these problems we discover one of the most amazing insights into what real love is, and why we should make it our goal.   

 Here’s the first problem we need to resolve as we seek to understand what Jesus was actually asking, and how Peter responded. Of the three times that Jesus questioned Peter’s love for Him, only in the first two times did He use the Greek word ‘agapé’. The second problem is that the Greek word agapé at that time meant a cold, formal, theoretical love for another (often where there was no intimacy or relationship). No wonder then that Peter responded with the commonly used word phileowhich was the word people ordinarily used when they felt an emotional connection with another person. From Peter’s perspective he may have felt that he was expressing a higher love for Christ than what Jesus was asking for. But over time, Peter realised what Jesus was doing. Christ was taking the word used for a sense of loyalty to an authority (agapé) and redefining it as the word Christians would come to see was the kind of love that God shows His people and expects His people to show Him.

¶ Love (Gr. agapé) is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. ¶ Love never ends.
First Corinthians 13:4-8a

 When Peter swam to shore to be with Christ, what was he expecting the One whom he had just betrayed days earlier to say to him? Remember Peter had just publicly denied even knowing Jesus three times. When Christ was taken and crucified, Peter had fled (only John, the author of this account, remained with Christ till His death). If you were in Christ’s place and the one you had just invested years of your life into had just denied knowing you in your hour of greatest trial, how would you have felt if you now sat alone with them on a beach? But Jesus did not speak to Peter in a way we might have expected. While I find this scene somewhat comical in the sense that the disciples had almost given up on Christ and had gone out fishing (returning to their old way of life) perhaps to find some breakfast, they find Jesus on the shores of Galilee cooking fish for breakfast. This itself was a subtle statement that they need not doubt how their needs would be met as long as they remained faithful to Him. It also reveals that God’s kind of love is a humble and forgiving love. The fact that Jesus, the Invincible-Omnipotent Creator of the Universe would stoop into the sands of Galilee and act as their servant is the second shocking insight we get into what God’s kind of love looks like: God’s kind of love is selfless serving kind of love. 

 Christ’s questioning of Peter’s love for Him reveals that God’s kind of love is a demonstrated-love that strives for the highest welfare of others. “Peter, if you really love Me, feed My lambs, tend My sheep, and feed My sheep.” While this might sound like the stuff of Renaissance religious oil painters, Christ’s injunction to Peter to get up close with lambs and sheep and pick them up; carry them; lead them; protect them from predators; and to feed them, would have conjured up all kinds of smells to a first century Jew (although I’m not sure who smelled better – a fisherman or a shepherd?). Loving others the God kind of way involves getting down and dirty, so to speak. But also notice that Christ starts His love challenge with lambs, and ends with sheep. Agapé love, God’s kind of love, involves commitment! Each of these aspects of love have enormous implications for marriages, families, and churches. There was one more lesson Peter received about God’s love on that beach. 

Truly, truly, I say to you, when you were young, you used to dress yourself and walk wherever you wanted, but when you are old, you will stretch out your hands, and another will dress you and carry you where you do not want to go.” (This He said to show by what kind of death he was to glorify God.) And after saying this He said to him, “Follow Me.”
John 21:18-19

 “Do you love Me?” Jesus asked Peter three times. Each time Peter replied that he did. “Then lay down your life for Me” Jesus tells him in John 21:18-19. Peter could hardly look Christ in the eye and say, “Now You’ve gone too far!” since everyone of Christ’s love-challenges to him, Jesus Himself had demonstrated. Just days before this beach exchange, Jesus had laid down His life for Peter (and for you, and for me). 

WHY DO YOU LOVE WHO YOU LOVE?

Loveable people are attractive. Spend time with Jesus and you will be attracted to Him. Isaiah the prophet tells us that there was nothing physically appealing about Jesus. While someone who presents themselves well is going to be initially ‘attractive’, being truly attractive is not merely skin-deep. What made Jesus attractive was how He spoke to people, who He spoke to, how He treated people, and the kind of people He associated with. I’ve often heard that the only people Jesus didn’t like were the ‘religious types’, but this is not true. Jesus had a problem with those people who used religion as a veil to deceive, oppress, or abuse people! There is a kind of religion that is sincere, kind, generous, and God-honouring (James 1:26-27). Religion is not the problem that Jesus called out. 

¶ “But woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you shut the kingdom of heaven in people’s faces. For you neither enter yourselves nor allow those who would enter to go in. Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you travel across sea and land to make a single proselyte, and when he becomes a proselyte, you make him twice as much a child of hell as yourselves.
Matthew 23:13-15

 If Jesus asked you “Do you love Me?” how would you respond? The reason we might give is not the same reason God loves us! God’s love for us is undeserved, lavish, extravagant, and gracious. But our love for God is grounded in gratitude and demonstrated by how we love others on His behalf.

¶ Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God, and whoever loves has been born of God and knows God. Anyone who does not love does not know God, because God is love.
First John 4:7-8 

This exchange on a Galilean beach between two Galileans has revealed to us what real, true, authentic love is. Love is not love! God’s love is love; and, it never rejoices in wrong-doing (1Cor. 13:6). God’s kind of love is humble, selfless, serving, others-focused, and sacrificial. It begins by loving God and then loving on behalf of God. This exchange between Peter and the Supreme-Being veiled in human flesh also why we should love God (and others). Put simply, it is out of deep gratitude for what God has done for us through Christ.

We love because He first loved us.
First John 4:19

Can you imagine how this revelation would transform singles, marriages, families, and churches? I pray that we would not merely have to imagine it, but that increasingly we will witness it.

Pastor Andrew