Discipleship Network Forum

A friend was surprised by my reply when he said that he and his wife were incompatible.

“Of course you are!” I said. “Apart from a miracle by God, men and women are inherently incompatible.”

“Hmmm… a miracle from God?” he wondered aloud.

Then I told this friend the result of my informal study on the subject. “Based on personal observations and lots of statistics, there aren’t nearly enough couples who ever receive that miracle from God,” I opined.

I recounted a conversation I’d overheard between two men, one divorced and the other married.

The divorced man was complaining about his lonely lot in life, all caused by the fact that his wife had left him for another man. Although he apparently thought he would get some sympathy from his married friend, that’s not at all how the conversation went.

“Don’t you realize, there are MILLIONS of men who would gladly trade places with you?!” the married friend told him.

So sad, but so true. Not only are many people unhappily divorced, but there are also countless people who are unhappily married.

Remember what I said about needing a miracle from God in order to have a different outcome than this?

When I look at what the Bible says about this difficult subject, here’s what I conclude: God made men and women inherently different, but not inherently incompatible. The incompatibility didn’t begin until sin entered the equation in Genesis 3.

You know the story. Eve was deceived by the serpent into disobeying God and tasting the forbidden fruit, but Adam apparently did so quite intentionally. Why? My guess is that he didn’t want to be separated from Eve, the wife he dearly loved.

But here’s where the story gets quite ironic. By disobeying God in order to be with his wife, Adam created an ongoing state of friction (incompatibility) within the marital bond.

We see this when the Lord confronted Adam about his disobedience. Instead of immediately repenting and accepting responsibility, Adam chose to throw Eve under the bus, blaming her for his decision: “The woman whom You gave to be with me, she gave me of the tree, and I ate” (Genesis 3:12). And notice that Adam found a way to blame the Lord as well…

By choosing to embrace the woman instead of obeying God, Adam unwittingly created a barrier to his relationship with both. Apart from a miracle, there would never be harmony again between men and women, or between humankind and God.

But thank God for His miracles! Through the cross of His Son Jesus, He broke down the wall of separation and alienation, making it possible for us to freely enter His presence.

That same cross solves the incompatibility between men and women. You see, the only hope for marital bliss is for the partners to die to themselves. Like Jesus, they must set aside their own interests and lay down their lives for each other.

The good news is that God makes this miracle readily available to those who will embrace the cross. Yes, it ultimately takes TWO to have a happy marriage, but it always starts with ONE. Someone has to take the first step, trusting God to work His miracles in their partner’s heart as well.

Are you willing to go first? You never know whether a miracle might come, replacing incompatibility with harmony, and maybe even some bliss. 

The agony of Jesus' sacrifice is the basis of our ecstasy--forgiven and free, we joyfully celebrate life. Read my blog on this subject at http://GentleWhispersFromEternity-ScripturePersonalized.com/

I recently had an experience that forced me to die to myself. It was a “Who Moved My Cheese?” type of moment, when I made my wishes known on a matter but was overruled.

In the overall scope of things, this incident was clearly no big deal. But I hadn’t gotten my way, and it hurt. I felt disrespected…disregarded…undervalued.

Yet what hurt the most was realizing I had overreacted, blowing up the whole thing much bigger than it actually was.

Thankfully, God graciously showed me what had happened during this unusual emotional meltdown. The incident that triggered my flood of ugly emotions was relatively minor. But like the tip of an iceberg, it was meant to alert me to the fact that a much BIGGER hunk of the iceberg was still lurking beneath the surface.

You see, the small incident in question had a very strange effect, causing me to experience flashbacks of numerous other times in my life when I had felt rejected or unappreciated. I thought I had long since forgiven and been healed of these past experiences…but some of the wounds apparently remained.

Ouch. It was painful to see the ugly sense of pride and entitlement hiding deep within my heart. But I also was grateful to the Lord for exposing it. I saw that the real issue wasn’t the tip of the iceberg that was in view, but rather the hidden iceberg in my heart.

I surely don’t like dying to myself. None of us do. And in my case, I felt like I had already died to myself enough to last a lifetime! Why did I have to do so again?

At that point, I remembered a time in the 1990s when I was a senior pastor facing a horrific wave of rejection due to a massive church split. It was excruciating to be rejected and lied about by people I loved and had endeavored to pour my life into.

Finally, I reached my limit. I’d had enough.

So one day I told my pastor friend Duane Flemming of my decision to resign. “I don’t need this, Duane. It’s just not fair, and I don’t have to take it anymore.”

Duane is a man of great wisdom, and he listened intently as I went on and on about how I had been mistreated. Finally, he asked me a simple question that still haunts me today:

“So Jim, are you saying you’re enough like Jesus already?”

How could I answer a question like that? Of course I wasn’t enough like Jesus yet. Jesus bore the cross all the way to His death on Calvary, yet I was ready to jettison my cross at the first sign of pain or injustice.

Forgive me, Lord. You’ve helped me see that I’m not entitled to bypass the cross today, just because I died to myself on some occasions in the past.

What about you, my friend? Are you able to relate to my story today? Is there some issue in your life where you are being forced to embrace the cross…die to yourself…and extend forgiveness to those who may not deserve it? Do you find yourself squealing like a pig, just because you aren’t getting your own way?

Amid the trials and disappointments of life, let me encourage you to fix your eyes on “Jesus, the author and perfecter of faith, who for the joy set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. For consider Him who has endured such hostility by sinners against Himself, so that you will not grow weary and lose heart” (Hebrews 12:2-3).

Yes, I know, you probably have already died to yourself a million times before. But the life a disciple requires dying daily (Luke 9:23, 1 Corinthians 15:31), not just in the distant past. That’s the only way to experience more of Jesus’ resurrection power, after all, and it’s a process that’s not going to change until He returns.

Several friends rebuked me last week when I posted a picture on Facebook of the bloody mass a surgeon removed from my back. Simply too gross and inappropriate, they said.

In my defense, I told them I posted the gory post-surgical picture while I was still heavily sedated. I had hoped all my Facebook friends would rejoice with me at how the fatty lymphoma was successfully removed. But, oh well…

Always looking for illustrations to use in my sermons and blogs, I learned some great lessons from my surgery. Even if you weren’t able to rejoice in my gory Facebook picture last week, I hope you’ll at least rejoice in some of the important spiritual principles I gleaned:

1. God’s blessings come not only through what He gives us, but also through what He removes. Actually, the two things are often just reverse sides of the same coin. My daughter Molly was in town for my surgery, and she helped me upgrade my wardrobe. This involved two distinct steps: She helped me go through the clothes in my closet to get rid of stuff I no longer needed; and she also took me to the store to purchase some new items. Both steps were important and necessary. Why? Because you can’t keep adding things to your life unless you’re willing to get rid of some other things.

 2. Sometimes our surgery is long overdue. The fatty lymphoma first appeared on my back nearly 30 years ago, and I probably should have had it removed decades ago. But the lump seemed mostly asymptomatic until the past few years, and I was just too cheap to spend money on surgery. The turning point came when the lump started causing back spasms, and I couldn’t procrastinate any longer. The experience made me wonder whether there might be some other toxic or unproductive elements in my life that I’ve tolerated far too long.

3. When the Master Surgeon gets out His knife, it’s not a good idea to protest or squirm. Resistance is futile, as the old saying goes. Squirming will just make the process longer and more painful. In the case of my surgery last week, the wise surgeon pumped me so full of Valium that I couldn’t help but be submissive.

4. Often God’s remedies are bloody rather than pretty. Can you imagine if Facebook and Twitter existed when Jesus died on the cross? Calvary was one of the bloodiest scenes in human history, but it was the necessary remedy for our sins. Today most of us have attempted to “sanitize” the gospel, removing all the blood and gore. We’ve created a bloodless Christianity—which, of course, is no longer the true gospel at all. The fact is this: You and I couldn’t have been saved without the shedding of Jesus’ blood. In contrast, our crosses today are mere ornaments of silver and gold, free of the blood and gore of Golgotha. We wear the cross, but seldom bear the cross. So it’s no surprise there’s such little transformation in our lives or impact on a watching world. 

5. The knife demonstrates God’s love, not His necessarily His judgment. Remember the knife Abraham wielded as if to sacrifice his beloved son Isaac? (Genesis 22) The result was a new revelation of God as Jehovah-Jireh, our faithful Provider. And Jesus assures us in John 15:1-5 that His gardener’s knife is not designed to destroy us, but rather to enable us to be more fruitful.

Can you see why I’m so happy I went “under the knife” last week? Yes, there was some momentary pain, but God meant it all for good (Genesis 50:20, Romans 8:28).

In the same way, I’m convinced He has a great plan to bless you today—both through the things He ADDS to your life and through the things He REMOVES. Don’t miss His blessings when they come!

“The cross is central. It is struck into the middle of the world, into the middle of time, into the middle of destiny. The cross is struck into the heart of God.” (Frederick Norwood)

Centuries of rivers of blood of numberless slaughtered animals never made amends for human sin. The sinless blood of Jesus is the only effective moral cleansing agent. His blood seals the new covenant between God and His children.

Old Testament sacrificial words foreshadow New Testament saving words. The flawless Lamb became the definitive sin offering, bringing us into speaking terms with God. Lovingkindness purchased our freedom from sin, so we could enjoy redemption. Without Christ’s blood, forgiveness would be impossible—so would joy.

At Calvary, God transferred all our sins to the innocent body of Jesus and transferred all His purity to our heart. This seems too good to be true, and it was certainly not a far trade. Nevertheless, Jesus swapped with us. He died in our place, suffering in disgrace so we could sing in His grace. Now we can confidently journey toward heaven—unwaveringly trusting God to brighten the future by keeping His promises.

We can only be made acceptable in the Father’s eyes by trusting in His Son. We can only be at peace with our Creator by relying on what Christ has done on our behalf on the cross. Without a spiritual blood transfusion, we would die in our sins. Forgiveness is God’s gift, not a reward for our virtue. Pardon is not a certificate of achievement for moral accomplishment, so boasting is out of the question.

Mysteriously and miraculously, the blood of Jesus washes away our sins. Heaven help us live like children of the King!

“I have given you the blood so you can make atonement for your sins. It is the blood, representing life, that brings you atonement.” (Leviticus 17:11 NLT)

Johnny R. Almond

Author, Gentle Whispers from Eternity

[This devotion based on Day 67 of Gentle Whispers]

Interim Pastor, Nomini Baptist Church; Montross, Virginia

Blog http://GentleWhispersFromEternity-ScripturePersonalized.com/

Seventy years ago today, 33-year-old Associated Press photographer Joe Rosenthal, having being rejected from serving in the Army due to poor eyesight, took a photograph that would become widely recognized and reproduced. The image records U.S. Marines and a Navy corpsman raising an American flag atop Mount Suribachi, Iwo Jima, site of the only Marine battle where the American casualties, 26,000, exceeded the Japanese. Not surprisingly, today’s USA Today headline describes this war photo as “iconic.”

“Iconic” is one of the most overused words in the English vocabulary, perhaps more overworked than “wonderful” ever was. Sports heroes, movie stars, political leaders, buildings, and landmarks are all candidates for this tired adjective.

Computer users refer to symbols appearing on their monitor to represent a command as icons. In the Eastern Orthodox Church, icons are representations of some sacred personage, as Christ or a saint or angel, painted on a wood surface and venerated itself as sacred. The core meaning of icon is a picture or image.

The greatest image maker throughout human history has been the church. Long before literacy, theology, or philosophy, there were images—symbols that taught lessons about God, stained-glass windows that preached messages to people who couldn’t read, icons that spoke volumes without words.

The ultimate icon is the cross—site of the fierce battle between heaven and hell won by Light beyond light, the apparent defeat of goodness transformed by the triumph of vicarious Love, and the bloody sacrifice of the flawless Lamb who saves all who kneel before him in repentance. The serpent sunk his poisonous fangs into Christ’s heel, but the Son of God crushed the head of the snake. Victory over death—our greatest enemy, and victory over sin—our lifelong problem, were both accomplished at the cross.

After seventy years, Joe Rosenthal’s picture of the flag-raising on Iwo Jima still stirs the hearts of patriotic Americans. After more than two thousand years, the raising of the cross on Skull Hill and Christ’s words, “Father, forgive them” still echoes in the hearts of Christ-followers. The image of the cross burned into our consciousness is powerful enough to change our everyday demeanor and eternal destiny.

“God made Christ, who never sinned, to be the offering for our sin, so that we could be made right with God through Christ.” (2 Corinthians 5:21 NLT)

Johnny R. Almond

Author, Gentle Whispers from Eternity

Interim Pastor, Nomini Baptist Church; Montross, Virginia

http://GentleWhispersFromEternity-ScripturePersonalized.com/

I’m currently reading an excellent book by Matthew Aaron Perman entitled What’s Best Next: How the Gospel Transforms the Way You Get Things Done.  I highly recommend you get a copy.  So, today I want to share a couple of paragraphs from the book. 

“Teaching morals alone will not result in morality. You cannot get moral and ethical behavior by urging people to try harder, for it is the affections that lead to transformed lives, and these affections are driven by the doctrines of Christianity. If you take the doctrine away, you destroy the foundation.

Thus, when doctrine goes, the ethical teachings of Christianity eventually go as well, because the ethical teachings grow out of Christian doctrine. Doctrine is the soil in which the ethical teaching of Christianity grows, and which gives it life and nourishment and energy. Thus, when emphasis on doctrine declines, emphasis on the practical eventually declines as well.“

Perman goes on…

“One implication of these things is that the way to change society – to change the nation and the world – is, interestingly, not primarily to preach on politics or ethics or ten steps to a healthy marriage, but to preach on doctrine.”

What you do flows out of who you are.  If you are united to Christ then Christian love and good deeds and true morality will flow out of you. And then God will be glorified.

All for Jesus,

Fletch