The Perfecting Church

The disciples spent more time with Jesus than anyone else. Time like they spent with Jesus allows you to observe the priorities of a person's life. Had Jesus been an author they may have asked Him to teach them to write. Had His occupation been a scholar, they may have asked Him to teach them to study. But because His most remarkable trait and life's occupation was following His Father, and establishing His will and Kingdom on the earth, they asked Him to teach them to pray. Prayer itself was a priority for Jesus, but the content of His prayers revealed His personal priorities. His highest priority was that His Father's name would be hallowed.

We became children of God when Jesus introduced us to the Father. Prior to that life-giving introduction we all had orphaned, Fatherless hearts. Our new heart and unhindered relationship with our Father, Jesus and the Holy Spirit are the greatest gifts we've ever been given and we'll ever receive. Prayer is where that heart is developed and that relationship is deepened. Apart from frequent, instant and persistent prayer our childlike heart is under assualt to become untrusting, cynical and hard, all over again. Prayer is where we protect and develop our childlike heart.

Jesus' life was so marked by passionate, private prayer that His disciples asked Him to teach them to pray. Paul the Apostle, who wrote 3/4's of the New Testament, taught that we should pray without ceasing and give God thanks in everything. Ask any Christian regardless of background, maturity or faithfulness and you will be hard pressed to find one that doesn't regard prayer as a central part of their faith. Yet even with Jesus' teachings, Paul's encouragement and our understanding of its importance, many of us lack a consistently confident prayer life. The reasons are many, but a few are heard more often than others: busyness, lack of results and a sense futility or hopelessness when praying. If our relationship with God our Father, His Son and the Holy Spirit is going to transform our lives and those around us, we must have our confidence in prayer restored and deepened. Let's go to our Father and ask Him -- Teach Us to Pray.

Few love and embrace change. In fact, most regard it with contempt, unless they can control it! The truth is, although uncomfortable, change is necessary, as it’s the difference between where we are right now and where God wants us to be. So often when being positioned for change, instead of looking ahead and simply following, we begin to look back, fooled into believing that where we were and what we had is better than where we’re going and who we will be. But this is exactly where personal transformation ends—where self-preservation begins. In order to experience lasting transformation, we must not only fully surrender what control we think we have to Him, but commit to be led completely by Him and allow God to take us from glory to glory.

The Transform 2014 panel discussion takes a practical look at the nature of conviction and repentance. It addresses common misconceptions about conviction and repentance, while explaining the role they play in our personal transformation.

Repentance is much more than a response to sin; it’s the lifestyle for us to walk out daily. While conviction locates us, repentance is the path we walk while holding God’s hand. This desire to embrace God’s love causes us to reject the things that undermine our relationship with our Father. To truly understand why God loves repentance we have to accept the Father’s love.

Conviction is not a warning of God’s wrath but rather God’s call to repentance. It allows us to locate ourselves and return to a full relationship with God. However our response to conviction will either draw us closer or further from Him. We tend to believe that our actions have separated us from Him. In actuality, it’s our “location” not our actions that have separated us from God. We need to consistently locate ourselves in relation to where God has placed us and embrace the sound of His voice when He calls “where are you”.

In far too many instances the church and the world have glorified marriage to the point of idolatry. It's true, the God ordained covenant of marriage can be a place of fulfillment and incredible joy. But if we’re looking down the wedding aisle expecting a husband or wife to finally make us whole, happy and fruitful, we’re looking in the wrong place. Removing the blurred lines means we realize getting on our knees and saying yes to an everlasting relationship with Jesus is a far bigger day than getting on our knees for someone else's hand in marriage, or having someone getting on one knee for us. Our culture has distorted things so thoroughly that the thought of not marrying makes most feel as though they will miss the opportunity for a full life. But properly understood, we are all preparing for the greatest wedding in all of creation and that wedding won't happen here with a man or a woman.

In modern culture the beautiful lines God drew around sex and sexuality have become blurred beyond recognition. Sex, and finding sexual fulfillment any way we choose, has increasingly become one of the bold idols of our day. A glance at any grocery store check-out news stand confirms we live in a sexually driven culture. We are faced with the reality of homosexuality or what I, among many, prefer to call Same Sex Attraction, on a daily basis. 1Peter 3:15 instructs us, "And if someone asks about your Christian hope, always be ready to explain it. But do this in a gentle and respectful way." Shrugging our shoulders and closing our eyes isn’t an option. The deep and pervasive social implications are all around us, in schools, in politics, among church denominations, and — most importantly — in determining how we, the church, live out our most significant responsibilty of being a faithful witness in the culture and times to which we've been called. Said differently, what is the role of the church in an increasingly vocal, pro-homosexual culture? Our no must mean yes to something.

God has an eternal plan and design for all of humanity. He is the creator and architect of each and every one of our lives. In every way, He knows us better than we know ourselves. We haven't been given a High Priest who is distant, aloof, or doesn't know us, but one who has felt the painful disordering of our being that came with Adam's original sin and the fall of mankind. We're all disordered at birth in some measure and in different ways. Whether in our sexual attraction, our deepest thoughts or a thousand other ways, sin has polluted us and blurred the lines of God's orginal intent for our lives. Each and every one of us needs to be entirely born again and made new in Christ.

God takes sexual sin seriously. He takes all sin serioiusly, but sexual sin was among the few that were punishable by death in the law orginally given to Moses. Sex, by it's very nature, is different from other sins. Sex is spiritual -- it was designed as a relational activity for the glory of God. Sex involves your soul -- creating memories, emotions and images. Sex is physical -- our bodies become joined together and it is corporate in nature -- involving two people. We live in a time where popular culture tells us freedom is choosing whatever we want to believe about sex, doing whatever we want to do sexually, and having no one question our sexual expression. But God created sex and He defines it's framework. When He redeedmed mankind by His mercy and grace, He also redeedmed our sexuality. Although we've all been born entirely broken, we are called to be entirely born again in Christ. John 8: 1-11 (KJV) Ephesians 2:4-10 (KJV) 9.7.14 Takeaways 1. Sexual sin was one of the few sins punishable by death in the law given to Moses. 2. Love, mercy, and grace are not weak responses to sexual sin. They are the power tools that Christ has given us to restore sexuality that honors and glorifies God. 3. The same grace that saves us also empowers us to live daily in a way that brings glory to God.

Many might ask why we would dedicate ten weeks to biblically examine sexuality. Some will ask why we would commit five of those weeks to same sex attraction. The answer is simple: sex and sexuality is discussed everywhere and by nearly everyone -- except the church. However, a great deal of Jesus' earthly ministry was dedicated to restoring the proper relationship between manhood and womanhood. Jesus did not shy away from addressing the topic of sex. Jesus found eternal importance and Kingdom significance in how we relate sexually. Jesus, and the New Testament in general, is not nearly as obsessed with same sex attraction, homosexuality, lesbianism and bisexuality as our present culture. But there are clear and consistent lines addressing them throughout the context of scripture. In order to remain salt and light as a local church in our current context we must grow in understanding, empathy and biblical worldview, as it relates to sexuality and particularly same sex attraction.

The fall of manhood and womanhood blurred the lines between lust and love. Love is a selfless commitment to give oneself in a way that honors God and esteems others more highly than oneself. Lust is a self-centered commitment to take from others as a means of self-survival, disregarding God and exalting self over the well being of others. Much of what we call love today is lust. Relationships, and sadly even marriages, are often nothing more than formalized scavenger hunts -- two people coming together to get what they can from each other. When the other person is considered to no longer be meeting the need, they are discarded, the relationship is dissolved and another source is pursued. We must consider ourselves, restore the lines, and choose to love, or face the eternal consequences of living a life dominated by lust.

The fall of manhood and womanhood blurred the lines between lust and love. Love is a selfless commitment to give oneself in a way that honors God and esteems others more highly than oneself. Lust is a self-centered commitment to take from others as a means of self-survival, disregarding God and exalting self over the well being of others. Much of what we call love today is lust. Relationships, and sadly even marriages, are often nothing more than formalized scavenger hunts -- two people coming together to get what they can from each other. When the other person is considered to no longer be meeting the need, they are discarded, the relationship is dissolved and another source is pursued. We must consider ourselves, restore the lines, and choose to love, or face the eternal consequences of living a life dominated by lust.

God's plan from the beginning was that the earth would be filled with the knowledge of His glory. He spoke earth, and all of of its contents, into existence with the creative power of His words. God's intent was for all of creation to remain in harmonious submission to His words, thereby establishing the entirety of His will and counsel in the earth. But mankind departed from the life-giving power of God's words and gave entrance to sin and death. We must awaken to the fact that manhood and womanhood have fallen from glory. The lines of God's plan and intent for us have become blurred.