Who Is Jesus To You?

Who Are You In Christ?

Are you walking in the victory that you deserve to walk in or is there something wrong in that you never seem to be able to achieve the spiritual high that you should be in.

One of the key reasons why you fail to reach the full blessings in your life is simply that you have been programmed to believe that you do not deserve them and so you have never sought them out or believed that you could ever attain them.

"What you believe in your heart and confess with your mouth will come to pass."

In most cases, people who are not able to succeed in their christian walk or who are unable to achieve the peace and walk in the love of Jesus, simply believe that they do not have a right to it or that they are not worthy of the love of Jesus in their lives. They are defeated and fail to comprehend that Jesus did it all for them.

Entering into a New Life in Jesus.

When you first give your life to Jesus, you become a new creation in Christ. All things are washed away by the blood of Jesus and you become a totally new person. As far as Jesus and God go, you did not exist before that day because you have just been made a totally new creation. It is only you and your friends and family that know that you even existed before the day that you gave your life to Jesus. At this exact point in time, nothing sets you apart or prevents you from being the greatest man/woman of God that ever existed.

If you became a new creation, then why do you still allow matters from the past to affect your life today? You are a new creation. What happened to you before has no right to affect what you are today. Your past has no right to determine your future.

However, from the very day that you hand your life over to God you start to determine your own future.

"But I thought Jesus was now in control and I did not need to do anything."

Jesus is in control and has already completed all the background work for you, but you need to now take what He has given to you and to start to use it. Jesus has given you all authority in His name. He has given you the keys to heaven and earth, but if you never take the keys and use them, then you can never expect to unlock the rewards in life that are yours through Christ Jesus.

A priest was one day called to go and pray with a old man who was busy dying. The old man was particularly poor and had led a miserable life of poverty. While the priest was in the small room where the old man lived, he noticed a single piece of paper on the wall. He asked the old man what it was. "Oh, it is a beautiful piece of paper that someone gave me once. I was not sure what to do with it so I stuck it up on the wall".

On closer inspection, the priest was shocked to find that the piece of paper was a cheque that had been made out to the old man for the sum of $1 000 000-00. The old man was rich and yet he never knew it.

You are also rich in what Jesus has already done for you, but unless you are prepared to accept the fact that Jesus has given you all the power and authority to use in His name, and unless you start to actually stand out in faith and use the name of Jesus, you will never be able to walk in the full blessings that He has set aside for you.

Isn't it time that you took the cheque off the wall and started to cash it!

I remember a statement that was once issued from the pulpit in the charismatic church that I attended.

"We want to start some communities in the church. A support group for gays and lesbians. Sorry, let me change that. A support group for ex gays and ex lesbians. Practising gays are not welcome."

I still remember thinking, " How can you ever become a ex gay without Jesus, through the church, to help you."

So many churches that I know of reject the gays, lesbians and other sinners right out of their close and select little communities. "They are sinners you know, and they are going straight to the pits of hell. I want nothing to do with them."

Years ago, in the same church mentioned above, a guest preacher was invited to preach at a yearly conference. The preacher, whose name I will not mention,  was one of the most down to earth and incredible preachers that I have ever heard preaching.

He spoke on how his own spirit filled church was filled with gays, lesbians, and sinners of every class, and how every single person was welcomed into his church without criticism or judgement and each and every soul was loved regardless of what they were involved in.

Now is that not how you would picture Jesus to be. Jesus rejected the upright and "righteous" people of the time and chose instead to spend his time in the company of tax collectors and other sinners.

Needless to say, that preacher was almost run out of town and every word that he preached was rejected by the church. Where was Jesus.

If you are expected to be washed and cleansed of all sin before you enter a church, how will anyone ever get to enter a church and meet with Jesus. If you expect a gay person to repent and give up his ways before he can come into your church to meet the living Jesus, then chances are he will never get to meet Jesus and accept Jesus into his life.

Were you free from all sin in your life before you first entered into your church and met Jesus? No  - I did not think so.

Are you free from all sin in your life now - even though you have already been a christian for a long time? Again No!

Well if you are not free from sin, why do you expect a Gay or Lesbian or any other sinner to be free from their sin before they can enter your community? Is it perhaps that you consider that their sin is worse than your sin? As far as I am concerned  sin is sin and there is no variation between sins. There is no single sin that is better than another sin. Sin is sin and in order to cleanse yourself of sin you have to go before Jesus, repent and be washed clean by His Blood.

Jesus does the changing .

Jesus loves you enough to accept you as you are, but loves you too much to leave you as you are.

When you come to Jesus and give your life to Him, crying Jesus help me please, Jesus opens his arms out to you and embraces you. He accepts you as you are, forgives you and washes you clean with His Blood. Slowly but surely He begins the process of changing you, your life and your passions. It is not an overnight or instant process. It takes time. He is the potter and you are the clay. Slowly you are molded into what He wants you to be.

In the case of gays and lesbians who are often some of the most hurting people in the world and who need the loving embrace of Jesus more than most, why do we reject them further and cast them out, expecting them to remove the sin from their lives immediately whilst we readily accept the fact that Jesus is still working in our own lives and has not yet completed the task of removing all the sin in our own life.

Take the log out of your own eye before you remove the splinter from your neighbours eye.

Before you judge and reject someone according to their "sin" and cast them out of your select community, simply ask yourself what Jesus would do if that person was standing in front of Him. Would He cast them out, or would He open His arms to them and love them. Sure I know that you are not Jesus, but then can you really claim to be a follower of Christ if you do not accept His ways and teachings.

Open your hearts and love someone today. Show them how the love of Jesus shines through you and help them to change their life simply by being accepted by someone like you. Your accepting someone for who they are could be the biggest thing that ever happened in their life and could make the real difference that will alter their lives forever.

God Bless

James refers to the law of liberty. What exactly is the law of liberty? We all understand that liberty is defined as the quality or state of being free. However a law is usually something that binds us or prevents us from doing something. Why then is there a contradiction in this statement of the "Law" of  "Liberty". You are being bound into freedom.

In order to fully understand the concept of this scripture, we have to start looking elsewhere in the bible. 2Corinthians 3:17, " Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is there is liberty." Wherever Jesus is, there is total freedom and people are set free from that which holds them captive. When we invite Jesus into our lives, we become bonded to Him in love, and we are therefore bound to Him in freedom.

Galations 5:1, " Stand fast therefore in the liberty by which Christ has made us free, and do not be entangled again with a yoke of bondage." Christ came and set us free both from the law of moses, and the works of darkness that were in our lives and which held us captive. We are to fully understand the freedom that we have attained through Christ and we are to stand and remain in that freedom, resisting the calling that sin offers to us.

So what then is the law of liberty? The law of liberty is the freedom that we obtain from sin and the works of darkness when we turn from the world and accept Jesus into our lives. At the moment that we accept Jesus as Lord and saviour, we are immediately set free from the laws that held us captive and are released from the jail of sin, and are able to walk in total freedom.

James says that we are to speak and do as those who will be judged by the law of liberty. This refers to the fact that although we are set free from the law of sin, many choose to cast aside the freedom that they received through the love of Jesus, and return to the captivity to which they are accustomed to being in, and to give their lives back over to sin. We are to accept that we have been set free totally and that sin has no power over us, or any authority over us. The law that Christ has made, is that we are to be free. The devil has to respect this law, and therefore has no rights over us, and he has to flee from before us.

If you have been set free, then you are to confess your freedom, walk in your freedom, and enjoy the freedom that Jesus has given to you. Above all walk in the perfect love of Jesus, remaining in relationship with Him.

"Blessed is he whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is covered." What is it to be blessed? The most accurate meaning of the word blessed that I have found, as it is used in the bible, is to be envied. People will be jealous of you and envy you. When your sins are forgiven of you by the Father and they are covered by the blood of Jesus, then you are blessed.

"Blessed is the man to whom the Lord does not impute iniquity, and in whose spirit there is no guile." Guille is defined as treacherous cunning or skillful deceit. If there is no deceit in your spirit, and the Lord can not charge (impute) you with sin because your sin is confessed and covered by the blood of Jesus, then you are to be envied by others.

"I said, I will confess my transgressions to the Lord, and you forgave the iniquity of my sin". An unconfessed sin that we harbour in our hearts, is like a wound in a limb that has not been cleaned. The wound will soon grow septic and then gangerene sets in and the limb has to be amputated. When we harbour unconfessed sin in our hearts, the sin eventually can result in spiritual death and us being cut off from the body of Christ. Confess your sins that all may be well in your life and that you may walk in the blessings of God.

" I will instruct you and teach you in the way you should go; I will guide you by my eye. Do not be like the horse or like the mule, which have no understanding." When you have confessed your sins before God and when there is no deceit found in your spirit, then God becomes like a personal GPS system that guides you through life to your final destiny in Christ. Do not be foolish and fail to follow the route that God is laying out for you, for He sees your life from above, and He is able to guide you and steer you easily through the hardships of life. If you try to navigate yourself, you may find that you get lost in places that you do not want to be.

"Many sorrows shall be to the wicked; But he who trusts in the Lord, mercy shall surround him". Do not envy the wicked and their prospering, but know that their days shall be short, and the mercy that God surrounds you with is far greater than any of the treasures of the world. Many of the wicked do prosper financially, and many a Christian questions this, but have a look at the lives of those wicked and you will see that they are filled with misery and sorrow. Which is better, the sorrows and riches,  or to be blessed by God and have his mercy?

"Be glad in the Lord and rejoice, you righteous; And shout for joy, all you upright in heart!" If I could add to this then I would add at the end - "For you are the blessed of the Lord." What can be better in life, than to know that the Lord your God has forgiven your sins and that you are found blameless before Him, and therefore you are blessed, which means that all around you envy you and are jealous of you! Amen.

The answer to all three questions above is ,"Yes, the old Testament is as relevant to us today as it was thousands of years ago." Although we have been excluded from certain consequences and certain rituals of the old testament, through the works of Jesus and the blood of Jesus, the foundation of the new testament and our very lives was in the old testament. A christian who does not bother to read or know the contents of the old testament is one who has no foundation or strength!

When Jesus went out into the wilderness and was tempted by Satan, He was weak from hunger for He had not eaten for forty days. Satan came to Him in His weakest moment, but yet Jesus was able to resist and overcome satan. How did Jesus do this?

Jesus quoted scripture from the old testament and more importantly the scripture that He quoted to satan all came from the book known as the book of law - Deuteronomy.

 The first scripture was Deut 8:3 "Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God".

The second scripture, Deut 6:16 "You shall not tempt the Lord your God".

The third scripture, Deut 6:13 " You shall worship the Lord your God, and Him only shall you serve."

Through the knowledge of these three scriptures from the old testament, Jesus overcame the tempter and he had to flee from before Him. Many of the old testament scriptures were used by the apostles in the book of Acts and in the letters thereafter.

The old testament is the foundation on which we stand, and therefore it is our strength. The foundation supplies strength to a building and a house built on a solid foundation will not fall. However a house that has no foundation is soon swept away when troubled times come. I have witnessed many a christian overcome and swept away as soon as a few hard times come, for there has been no solid foundation in their lives.

In order to build strength into your christian walk and to build a solid foundation into your life, one that will withstand all the wiles of satan, and against which no weapon shall prosper, entrench yourself in the knowledge of the old testament, for it is as relevant to you today as it was 2000 years ago.