Favorite Quotes
The whole point of the book is to engender an encounter with him. An encounter than then empowers us to follow him and his paradoxical way. (381)
It is time to bring in the long-awaited, redeeming and recreating rule of God. (382)
Do you see what this means? Jesus Christ is inescapable. (385)
If you and I can just see Jesus in our circumstances, we can keep going. (386)
My favorite quote is "if you and I can just see Jesus in our circumstances, we can keep going."
Dear Jesus, I really do want to be more like you and see you; however, you are so powerful and passionate and intense I think I hide from you while simultaneously seeking to approach you.
Your power and glory rattle my heart and skull to the extent that I flee your presence and call. I can totally relate to Moses when you turned the staff to a serpent. I see you work and think "that's unbelievable" and then I say to myself "get me out of here" for your power and beauty seems at times extremely peculiar and overwhelming.
Thank you for doing everything possible at all times to gently and patiently teach me by Revelation. I cannot tame you. I cannot master you. I can only submit to your Revelation which occurs moment by moment with every breath that you choose to give me.
Please God, when I encounter your Revelation, I pray that through your clever little seed of faith in me, you would grant me the trust to step into the mystery of a far greater and powerful story than my own which is your meaning, your truth, your life, and your love.
Push me to say with my lips and confess with my heart that Jesus Christ is Lord.
You are the fountain of hope, meaning, truth, beauty, life, light, and love my soul craves.
Give me the wisdom and trust to drink the terrifying and perfect meal you set for me each day - body broken, blood shed in sacrificial love.
Monday, May 23, 2011
Week 19 - Hatred by the Synagogue - The Consequence of Compassion
Week 19 - Meant to post this last week but got tangled up with family road trip so here it is now.
I may not know what the future holds but I do know who holds the future (358.)
In the new city the forces of chaos are gone. What Jesus shows John is that God’s dwelling place is no longer an identifiable separate space with the city. God’s dwelling place is the city itself – everywhere. It is all Temple. (365)"
I may not know what the future holds but I do know who holds the future (358.)
Our picture of the future automatically shapes the way we live in the present (360.)
The story that has creation for its first word, has creation for its last word (360.)"
The cities of man, he writes, have been built as part of our attempt to run from God.” Jacques Ellul (361.)
In the new city the forces of chaos are gone. What Jesus shows John is that God’s dwelling place is no longer an identifiable separate space with the city. God’s dwelling place is the city itself – everywhere. It is all Temple. (365)"
The whole city is sacred. (367)
Being Israel means giving one’s life away for the Gentiles. (368)
He stands at the very center of everything as the source of the glory of God (374).
The lamp is the lamb! (374)
My favorite quote (because it challenges my hard heart so completely) from the entire chapter (double mention here) - "Being Israel means giving one’s life away for the Gentiles. (368)"
This word of truth, compassion for the gentiles, literally got Jesus thrown out of the synagogue with the folks at the church seeking to kill him - Luke 4:28.
They loved him and accepted him until he preached on God's heart and compassion for gentiles and then they hated him. Like Jesus, love for those outside our synagogue (assembly) is what likely can and will bring the division and hatred that Christ promises those who walk His path. Incredible.
My favorite quote (because it challenges my hard heart so completely) from the entire chapter (double mention here) - "Being Israel means giving one’s life away for the Gentiles. (368)"
This word of truth, compassion for the gentiles, literally got Jesus thrown out of the synagogue with the folks at the church seeking to kill him - Luke 4:28.
They loved him and accepted him until he preached on God's heart and compassion for gentiles and then they hated him. Like Jesus, love for those outside our synagogue (assembly) is what likely can and will bring the division and hatred that Christ promises those who walk His path. Incredible.
Wednesday, May 18, 2011
Excitment
This has been on my heart since reading this chapter. I also have been deep into Esther this semester and I really have been impressed with how in tune she is with the Spirit, how she is ready at all times for the Lord. Anyways, I have been really just sitting in the glory of God...of His greatness, His grace, His love, His passion, and sitting just really reflecting upon how I need to just wait upon the Lord. Oh how I am so excited to meet Him face to face the day upon His arrival!I went to a wedding this past weekend and really got excited about the image of Jesus being the bridegroom and me just walking down the isle with pure excitement...and how wonderful it will be just having the church surrounding me daily, as they already do, with smiles and words of the Bible on their tongues! Anyways...I am excited to say the least...eager, waiting in anticipation! Our God is and awesome God.
(Hosea 6) Brooke Fraser 2007
Verse 1
I have decided I have resolved
To wait upon you Lord
My rock and redeemer shall not be moved
I?ll wait upon you Lord
Prechorus
As surely as the sun will rise
You?ll come to us
As certain as the dawn appears
Chorus
You'll come let your glory fall
As you respond to us
Spirit reign flood our hearts
With holy fire again
Verse 2
We are not shaken we are not moved
We wait upon you Lord
Our Mighty deliverer my triumph and truth
I'll wait upon you Lord
Bridge
Chains be broken
Lives be healed
Eyes be opened
Christ is revealed
Sunday, May 15, 2011
glory and freedom and the IOG
"Now the LORD is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the LORD is, there is freedom. And we, who with unveiled faces all reflect the LORD's glory, are being transformed into his likeness with ever-increasing glory, which comes from the LORD, who is the Spirit." (2 Cor 3:17-18) As I read Revelation 21 and DOTE ch 29, the above passage sat at the forefront of my mind. I'm going to try to articulate the gigantic and exciting cosmic circle that's in my head... I hope some part of it makes sense!
DJ talks about glory as "whatever it is that makes God be God." The Greek word is translated "the heaviness of God's self-manifestation" and the working translation I generally use is "the manifestation of the excellence of God's character, the display of his holiness and worth in beauty." God's glory is a pretty magnificent thing! Next, John discovers where the source of this glory, this heaviness of God's self-manifestation, comes from. Are we even surprised to learn that it comes from the Lamb who was slaughtered? No. TANATS.
But the discussion of glory came in the midst of the greater discussion about God making all things new, not making all new things. Big difference. Enter the IOG and the 2 Cor passage: You and I know we are made in the image of God. And those of you who have spent more than 10 minutes with me know how much God has rocked my worldview through the deepening of my understanding of the IOG. We are made in God's image, made to reflect who he is and what he is about. Made to reflect faithfulness, freedom, gentleness, grace, holiness, kindness, love, mercy, patience, righteousness, glory... the list goes on forever. Naturally, we display this image in extremely finite and broken ways, as compared to his infinite and perfect ways, and yet we display the image just the same. On good days and bad days, whether we want to or not.
And then here's the kicker. As you and I conform our lives to be more like Jesus, who is "the image of the invisible God," we live out 2 Cor 3:18! Our faces are unveiled and we are able to see what Moses could not. We see the face of God, we see his glory, and our unveiled faces are transformed into this same likeness with ever-increasing glory! It's just this gigantic explosion of God's glory as we experience him in his glory and reflect him in his glory and finally "get" more fully what it means to actually be made in his image. Some of this we experience now, yes, and some of it we will experience most fully when Revelation 21 becomes a reality. It's part of that "already but not yet" paradox.
And all this glory "comes from the LORD, who is the Spirit," who is also "the Lamb who was slain" (well hello Trinitarian language AGAIN). "And wherever this Spirit of the LORD is, there is freedom!"
Maybe this week I'll do a better job of living in the reality that the Spirit of the LORD is with me, that freedom is mine, that God's glory is to be experienced and increasingly reflected, and that in that process God is most fully glorified as I most fully live out who I was created to be: a beloved daughter created in the image of her Creator.
Tuesday, May 10, 2011
Week 18 - Rev 20, CH 26-27
Favorite Quotes
First, each of the three options has been developed by godly students of the Bible, by people who sincerely want to understand God’s word and who want to submit their lives to it. (335) Steve's comment "Sweet humility:
Where the three agree – the best is yet to come!, the future is not up for grabs. The future is not in our hands. (337)
“Keep your eyes on the one who causes us to come to life." (345)
“White is the color of purity and of justice.” (349)
“And I will fall at His feet, a puddle of gratitude and joy.” (357) - This is my favorite sentence in the chapter.
Well, Paul says that we are more than conquerers and that Christ has us seated in the heavenly places. I'm challenged by the reading, as I have been in many other chapters, to lead like Jesus which pushes me to:
1. Exhibit Joy in suffering for suffering reveals Faith (Christ and/or seed of Christ rising in us.) - I Peter and James.
2. Declare the praises of Him who called me out of darkness into His light (I Peter again - as a royal priest.)
3. Conquering through Christs' power as Christs' body broken and blood shed. In other words, drawing people to Christ by suffering for all in love.
First, each of the three options has been developed by godly students of the Bible, by people who sincerely want to understand God’s word and who want to submit their lives to it. (335) Steve's comment "Sweet humility:
Where the three agree – the best is yet to come!, the future is not up for grabs. The future is not in our hands. (337)
“Keep your eyes on the one who causes us to come to life." (345)
“White is the color of purity and of justice.” (349)
“And I will fall at His feet, a puddle of gratitude and joy.” (357) - This is my favorite sentence in the chapter.
Well, Paul says that we are more than conquerers and that Christ has us seated in the heavenly places. I'm challenged by the reading, as I have been in many other chapters, to lead like Jesus which pushes me to:
1. Exhibit Joy in suffering for suffering reveals Faith (Christ and/or seed of Christ rising in us.) - I Peter and James.
2. Declare the praises of Him who called me out of darkness into His light (I Peter again - as a royal priest.)
3. Conquering through Christs' power as Christs' body broken and blood shed. In other words, drawing people to Christ by suffering for all in love.
Monday, May 9, 2011
Option Number Two Please
Our God is so good!
In the past year of my life, I have felt the increased pressure from God to challenge my own identity and question what I believe. In this year, God has blessed me with people to push buttons and ask the questions that I was not strong enough, or didn't even know how to ask myself. These questions have been sharpening and pruning my faith and strengthening me like nothing I have even known. I am very thankful for those people because through them God has empowered me to start recognizing those challenges directly from Him. And today I have felt that challenge full force. In the midst of my day today I sat down and journaled about the topic of beauty and identity. I kept hearing the question again and again in my head, "where do you find your beauty Jennifer? In me? Or these worldly treasures?"
This question has been plaguing me for the past week because my IPhone sadly died last week. Yes, you may be laughing reading this (possibly on your own personal IPhone) but think about it...how much reliance and faith do we put on worldly things? Using a phone that functioned for text messages and calls made me realize how much importance the world today focuses on material possessions. As I walked into the AT&T store to shop for a new phone that could "do it all" I kept asking myself, "do you really need this?" It saddened me to think that so many people live through technological interactions such as texting or e-mails and lack the every so simple and so meaningful human face-to-face interaction. I know I am stretching this analogy pretty far in saying this but that is one of the ways people in this world create an identity outside of an identity in Christ. By finding earthly things to latch onto and claim to make them into something.
Finally, tonight while reading through chapter 27 with a group of loving friends, Darrel stated, "When you join "the great and the small" and stand before the great white throne, and God asks you, 'Why should I let you enter the new city, the new heaven and the new earth, and not cast you into the lake of fire?' what will you say?" (357) I pray and I hope that God continues to work out in me, and in all of you friends, and all of the world around us, how to take the second option and "take our stand on the basis of what Jesus Christ has done with his life" as our identity instead of taking "our stand in what we have done in with our lives."
Because our God is good. SO good! "And look! A throne. With someone sitting on it. The throne is not vacant. The throne is not up for grabs. Many have tried to take it from the One who sits on it, but none have succeeded. None will succeed. None CAN succeed." (348)
In the past year of my life, I have felt the increased pressure from God to challenge my own identity and question what I believe. In this year, God has blessed me with people to push buttons and ask the questions that I was not strong enough, or didn't even know how to ask myself. These questions have been sharpening and pruning my faith and strengthening me like nothing I have even known. I am very thankful for those people because through them God has empowered me to start recognizing those challenges directly from Him. And today I have felt that challenge full force. In the midst of my day today I sat down and journaled about the topic of beauty and identity. I kept hearing the question again and again in my head, "where do you find your beauty Jennifer? In me? Or these worldly treasures?"
This question has been plaguing me for the past week because my IPhone sadly died last week. Yes, you may be laughing reading this (possibly on your own personal IPhone) but think about it...how much reliance and faith do we put on worldly things? Using a phone that functioned for text messages and calls made me realize how much importance the world today focuses on material possessions. As I walked into the AT&T store to shop for a new phone that could "do it all" I kept asking myself, "do you really need this?" It saddened me to think that so many people live through technological interactions such as texting or e-mails and lack the every so simple and so meaningful human face-to-face interaction. I know I am stretching this analogy pretty far in saying this but that is one of the ways people in this world create an identity outside of an identity in Christ. By finding earthly things to latch onto and claim to make them into something.
Finally, tonight while reading through chapter 27 with a group of loving friends, Darrel stated, "When you join "the great and the small" and stand before the great white throne, and God asks you, 'Why should I let you enter the new city, the new heaven and the new earth, and not cast you into the lake of fire?' what will you say?" (357) I pray and I hope that God continues to work out in me, and in all of you friends, and all of the world around us, how to take the second option and "take our stand on the basis of what Jesus Christ has done with his life" as our identity instead of taking "our stand in what we have done in with our lives."
Because our God is good. SO good! "And look! A throne. With someone sitting on it. The throne is not vacant. The throne is not up for grabs. Many have tried to take it from the One who sits on it, but none have succeeded. None will succeed. None CAN succeed." (348)
The Birds
I am glad God has called me to be a living sacrifice.
If Christ didn't incessantly (all the time, moment by moment)and patiently sacrifice my flesh and blood, I would surely not inherit the Kingdom of God.
(I COR. 15:50 - I declare to you, brothers, that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God, nor does the perishable inherit the imperishable.)
With this verse as a back drop, I repeat, if Christ didn't persistently and incessantly cut and devour my flesh and blood I would surely not inherit the kingdom of God.
If He didn't cut away my flesh with His word of truth I'd definitely miss out on this: Revelation 21:22-27 - I did not see a temple in the city, because the Lord God Almighty and the Lamb are its temple.The city does not need the sun or the moon to shine on it, for the glory of God gives it light, and the Lamb is its lamp. The nations will walk by its light, and the kings of the earth will bring their splendor into it. On no day will its gates ever be shut, for there will be no night there. The glory and honor of the nations will be brought into it. Nothing impure will ever enter it, nor will anyone who does what is shameful or deceitful, but only those whose names are written in the Lamb’s book of life.
Dear Jesus, as a lonely king, who still hides behind walls of virtue to boast about my strengths and hide my weaknesses, please send me to the "gory feast of the birds, who eat up the carcasses of God's enemies (Kings of the earth are thrown into this lot - Rev 19:19-21)" (Darrell Johnson 324)
Cut away my flesh and blood. Let the birds rip apart my kingliness so that this lonely king can humbly walk by your light and your splendor.
Amen.
I Peter - "You are royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people belonging to God. Once you were not a people. But now you are the people of God. Once you had not received mercy but now you have received mercy."
If Christ didn't incessantly (all the time, moment by moment)and patiently sacrifice my flesh and blood, I would surely not inherit the Kingdom of God.
(I COR. 15:50 - I declare to you, brothers, that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God, nor does the perishable inherit the imperishable.)
With this verse as a back drop, I repeat, if Christ didn't persistently and incessantly cut and devour my flesh and blood I would surely not inherit the kingdom of God.
If He didn't cut away my flesh with His word of truth I'd definitely miss out on this: Revelation 21:22-27 - I did not see a temple in the city, because the Lord God Almighty and the Lamb are its temple.The city does not need the sun or the moon to shine on it, for the glory of God gives it light, and the Lamb is its lamp. The nations will walk by its light, and the kings of the earth will bring their splendor into it. On no day will its gates ever be shut, for there will be no night there. The glory and honor of the nations will be brought into it. Nothing impure will ever enter it, nor will anyone who does what is shameful or deceitful, but only those whose names are written in the Lamb’s book of life.
Dear Jesus, as a lonely king, who still hides behind walls of virtue to boast about my strengths and hide my weaknesses, please send me to the "gory feast of the birds, who eat up the carcasses of God's enemies (Kings of the earth are thrown into this lot - Rev 19:19-21)" (Darrell Johnson 324)
Cut away my flesh and blood. Let the birds rip apart my kingliness so that this lonely king can humbly walk by your light and your splendor.
Amen.
I Peter - "You are royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people belonging to God. Once you were not a people. But now you are the people of God. Once you had not received mercy but now you have received mercy."
It is finished? It is done?
Sorry to go for the double post on you guys (especially because this is going to be a nerdy one), but something's been at the back of my mind for a couple of chapters and I want your opinion on it.
I noticed that a few chapters ago, John writes "It is done." Now, mentally, we all instantly when to the cross and heard the "It is finished" parallel, but I got to thinking - why did they translate it differently in Revelation than in John's gospel?
So when "It is done" came up again this chapter, I decided to look up the original. Turns out the Greek has two different words too. So at first, I thought maybe I was just reading too much into it - so there's two different words, so what?
But the thing is, it's the same author. And not just any same author - John was an eyewitness to both events. Why would the man who stood AT THE CROSS and listened to the last words of his dying Savior and the man who heard the Word of YHWH from the throne write down anything other than exactly what he heard? Which, in turn, begs my second question: Why would God choose a different word each time? He knows our hearts, he knows specific words carry specific connotations for us - why did He make this distinction?
telew: finished, complete, perfected, paid for
This is the word used in John 19 and in a bunch of different places throughout the NT, like "His power is perfected in weakness" or "He who began a good work in you will bring it to completion."
gignomai: to be, become; to come to pass; to finish, perform
This is the word we find in both Revelation 16 and 21. It's commonly used... but not so much with this meaning. More often that not it has that first "be" or "become" connotation, not really the "finishing/completion" one.
Obviously there are subtle differences in the word meanings, but I think there are also subtle differences in what is being completed. Both events are cataclysmic and decisive. They provide such intense completion, perfection, and fullness, but somehow I feel like they are slightly different sides of the same coin, and I can't quite piece together exactly what it is. Or at least, I can't quite piece together how that slight distinction relates to the slight distinction between the words.
Thoughts?
I noticed that a few chapters ago, John writes "It is done." Now, mentally, we all instantly when to the cross and heard the "It is finished" parallel, but I got to thinking - why did they translate it differently in Revelation than in John's gospel?
So when "It is done" came up again this chapter, I decided to look up the original. Turns out the Greek has two different words too. So at first, I thought maybe I was just reading too much into it - so there's two different words, so what?
But the thing is, it's the same author. And not just any same author - John was an eyewitness to both events. Why would the man who stood AT THE CROSS and listened to the last words of his dying Savior and the man who heard the Word of YHWH from the throne write down anything other than exactly what he heard? Which, in turn, begs my second question: Why would God choose a different word each time? He knows our hearts, he knows specific words carry specific connotations for us - why did He make this distinction?
telew: finished, complete, perfected, paid for
This is the word used in John 19 and in a bunch of different places throughout the NT, like "His power is perfected in weakness" or "He who began a good work in you will bring it to completion."
gignomai: to be, become; to come to pass; to finish, perform
This is the word we find in both Revelation 16 and 21. It's commonly used... but not so much with this meaning. More often that not it has that first "be" or "become" connotation, not really the "finishing/completion" one.
Obviously there are subtle differences in the word meanings, but I think there are also subtle differences in what is being completed. Both events are cataclysmic and decisive. They provide such intense completion, perfection, and fullness, but somehow I feel like they are slightly different sides of the same coin, and I can't quite piece together exactly what it is. Or at least, I can't quite piece together how that slight distinction relates to the slight distinction between the words.
Thoughts?
Saturday, May 7, 2011
I felt super convicted this week by this little tid-bit from the millennium chapter:
"The question is not merely theoretical - as though the issues were disconnected from the concrete issues of our daily lives. The way we answer the question affects the way we live. It especially affects the way we pray. The answer expects what we think can happen as a result of our little acts of witness.
"Thankfully, the reality packed into the word 'millennium' is not tied to our understanding of the word millennium. That is, no matter where we come out, if we are in Jesus Christ, we participate in the millennium reality - whatever it is!" (pg 336)
I think my tendency with highly debated issues like this is to just ignore them for the most part. I get sick of the division they can bring, and so I just avoid it. My stock answer would be to say that I believe God is big enough to work in any of those cases, and someday, when we get to heaven, we'll figure all that out.
But this chapter reminded me how much of a cop out that can be. It's not just some disconnected theoretical issue - it's a reflection of the way I see my God because they ways we expect Him to act reflect the ways we view His character. Granted, I still don't want to get caught up in messy philosophical debates about the millennium topic (or any other "hot topic" like creation vs. evolution, etc.), but I want to at least give myself license to wrestle with the issue and seek to know who He is through that issue.
"What I want to shout from the mountain tops is that what we agree on is so much greater than what we disagree on! If only we were to simply live what we agree on and live what we should agree on!" (pg 339)
"The question is not merely theoretical - as though the issues were disconnected from the concrete issues of our daily lives. The way we answer the question affects the way we live. It especially affects the way we pray. The answer expects what we think can happen as a result of our little acts of witness.
"Thankfully, the reality packed into the word 'millennium' is not tied to our understanding of the word millennium. That is, no matter where we come out, if we are in Jesus Christ, we participate in the millennium reality - whatever it is!" (pg 336)
I think my tendency with highly debated issues like this is to just ignore them for the most part. I get sick of the division they can bring, and so I just avoid it. My stock answer would be to say that I believe God is big enough to work in any of those cases, and someday, when we get to heaven, we'll figure all that out.
But this chapter reminded me how much of a cop out that can be. It's not just some disconnected theoretical issue - it's a reflection of the way I see my God because they ways we expect Him to act reflect the ways we view His character. Granted, I still don't want to get caught up in messy philosophical debates about the millennium topic (or any other "hot topic" like creation vs. evolution, etc.), but I want to at least give myself license to wrestle with the issue and seek to know who He is through that issue.
"What I want to shout from the mountain tops is that what we agree on is so much greater than what we disagree on! If only we were to simply live what we agree on and live what we should agree on!" (pg 339)
Wednesday, May 4, 2011
A, B, or C?
My take on Chapter 26 - I remember when I interviewed for a Youth Pastor position one time and the senior pastor of the church really wanted to know what my "Eschatology" was. At the time I was 24 years old and all I knew for sure, 100%, was that Jesus was coming back and I needed to be ready. So that was my answer 11 years ago. Now after reading more books than I can count and listening to countless sermons my answer is this.......Jesus is coming back and I need to be ready!
My take on Chapter 27 - My faith informs my actions. Look at my actions and I will discover where or in what I place my faith. In the cross of Christ alone I place my faith and by that act all my actions are radically affected! This has been a killer study. I really appreciate all the blogging and reading everyone has done! 2 more weeks!
My take on Chapter 27 - My faith informs my actions. Look at my actions and I will discover where or in what I place my faith. In the cross of Christ alone I place my faith and by that act all my actions are radically affected! This has been a killer study. I really appreciate all the blogging and reading everyone has done! 2 more weeks!
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