https://odb.org/MY/2022/06/14/deceived

John cautioned us to be aware and to beware of 3 things in life – lust of the flesh, lust of the eyes and the pride of life (1 John 2:16). All are equally bad but I think it is the last one that afflicts most of us and have the potential to deceive and destroy us.

I think it is to a certain extent understandable if we do not know God and thus attribute our success to our hardwork, talent and ingenuity. We worked hard to be where we are today, bending the rules whenever it is necessary to achieve our goals as the end justifies the means. No matter what, we want to achieve that position, accumulate that wealth, own that house, drive that car. We did that all on our own and thus it is difficult not to be proud of ourselves or our achievements. Even then, even if our success has nothing to do with God (as perceived by us) pride can make us overconfident and becoming too sure of ourselves that we might overestimate our own capabilites and take on more than we can chew.

But if we know God, there is really no excuse to only pride ourselves for our own successes. For surely Jesus was in the equation, carrying our burdens, rescuing us when we fall, protecting us from the pitfalls of life. And yet we do see Christians being so full of themselves that they forget that God was a major factor in who they are today. Sadly this affliction is not limited to believers who are successful in the world whether business or corporate but also those in ministry. A famous Christian personality can be proud because he believes that he is so special before God that he didn’t need God anymore. He feels he can function and do well in fulfilling God’s plans for him by just relying on the gifting and anointing God gave him when he actually should still be depending on God all the time.

I just saw this phrase in a movie – as extraordinary as everyone else. We may be special before God, so is everyone else. God gives us special talents, gifts and anointing – He also gives the same to others although in differebt measures. Whatever successes we have achieved, always remember that it is by the grace of God. He is the one who put us where we are today to achieve His plans for us. Always go back to the Lord for guidance so that we are able to hear His still small voice all the time. If we go wrong or have strayed, repent and admit it before God and change our ways. Don’t let our own pride come between us and Christ. Let’s be the most humble before God and man as pride of life deceives and destroys.

https://odb.org/MY/2022/06/13/divine-tenderness

We know that God lives within us by the Holy Spirit if we have accepted Jesus in our lives as our Lord and Saviour. Yet there are times when we feel that the LORD is far away in another dimension or in some far flung galaxy. We feel we are all alone going through crisis after crisis in life, tough and difficult situations as though our God is a fierce taskmaster seeking always to train us and make us a better person through the life situations that come our way, from work problems to family issues to children’s future, even to the cleanliness of our homes.

One solution as preached in yesterday’s Sunday service in my local church is to pray and communicate with God. Talk to Him and tell Him all that we are going through. Cast our burdens on Him even as we unload and share with different ones among us that we know like our spouse, our children, family members and pastor.

If you read today’s ODB on how the angel of the LORD woke up Elijah to eat after having prepared and cooked bread for him over burning coals, we know that God in His divine intervention in our lives is gentle and caring. Many believed that the angel of the LORD is the LORD Himself who took the trouble to care for His prophet in times of His prophet’s lowest point of life. Elijah was so afraid of Jezebel that he ran for his life after killing 200 of Jezebel’s prophets of Baal. Elijah had won a great victory demonstrating God’s power and yet when Jezebel vowed to take his life, he was overcome by fear and ran and ran. He was exhausted and told God that he is only one left that was true to God and asked God to take his life (of course Elijah was mistaken as the Lord had prepared and reserved 7,000 who had not bowed down to Baal).

Look to the Lord, look to Christ when we face life issues that appear overwhelming. Look to Jesus in prayer. Like in the case of Elijah the Lord will not abandon us but will come and take care of us. He will feed us to strengthen us so that like Elijah, we may continue with our journey, our walk with Him. God took the trouble to cook two meals for Elijah!

Just recently I had the privilege and honour to experience God’s tenderness and love. Like I shared yesterday, in the Acts of God in our lives, we will know for sure it is God when He intervenes in our lives. When we experience it, we will have the full assurance that He is right behind us watching our backs to make sure that if God us with us, who can be against us? We can then be like Joshua and Caleb, we can be strong and courageous and not be afraid and conquer our Promised Land. Cling on to Romans 8:28 – know that God will work all things good for those who love Him amd are called according to His purpose. Know that the LORD our God will make sure that we will be able to fulfil His plans and purposes for our lives. As we cling to Him, He will not let us go as He is forever in our lives, in all seasons! As we call upon His name, He will hear and answer us!

https://odb.org/MY/2022/06/12/gods-moves

In legal and corporate parlance, when we use the phrase acts of God, we mean Force Majeure which are unavoidable situations beyond the reasonable control of a party absolving the party from fulfilling its obligations under contract. Force Majeure is however broader and is not limited to only acts of God like natural disasters as it covers things like wars, labour strikes and nowadays pandemic and even trade wars as people begin to redefine the term for their contracts in light of contemporary events.

But in the case of the Feast of the Passover, it is celebrated by the Jews to commensurate the passover by the angel of death over the homes of the Israelites when they were Egyptian slaves. On that day, the angel of death took the life of every first born in every family in Egypt whether human or livestock if they didn’t have the blood of the unblemished lamb at their door posts. The significance of the Passover feast is that it was substitutory death, the unblemished lamb became the substitute for the first born’s life and many years later, Jesus Christ became our substitute Lamb of God in exchange for our eternal life in God. As Christians, we now observe the Holy Communion to remember Jesus’s sacrifice as the Lamb of God as Jesus Himself broke bread with the disciples on the Feast of the Passover and commanded us to do likewise in future to remember Him.

The message this morning is that there are acts of God in history that we celebrate and remember as believers in general but there could be past specific acts of God in our own lives that we want to also celebrate and remember. We want to give thanks to God for His grace and mercy in rescuing us in those times, for vindicating us and for standing up for us. We want to give all glory to God for His miraculous work in our lives, for His goodness. God moves and He moves in miraculous ways. Maybe some people will say those were just coincidences but we know deep within us that God was present amidst our situations. We know that Christ had planned it so meticulously so that all the steps just fell into place so perfectly that as we reflect upon it, we know that it was God’s love for us that made the difference, that made it all possible. We can see the Lord’s fingerprints all over the place! It was His handiwork. When God moves, He moves in a spectacular fashion that we will surely know it is Him and no one else!

When we face crossroads or tough or seemingly impossible situations, not only know that He is with us in all seasons (You are forever in our lives) but know that as we look back to the past acts of God in our lives, we stand assured that there will be more acts of God in future in our lives as we live our lives for Him and for His glory! God is good all the time!

https://odb.org/MY/2022/06/10/time-enough

If you read Ecclesiastes 3, you will see that there is a time for everything – whether it is to be born or die, to uproot or plant, to kill or heal, to teardown or build, to weep or laugh, to mourn or dance, to search or give up, to scatter or gather and many more. There is a time for everything and a season for every activity under the sun. But the clincher is that God will make everything beautiful in His time. As Paul declared in Romans 8:28, we know that God will work all things good for those who love Him and who are called according to His purpose and I have shared before from the pulpit that “good” there is that despite all that had happened, we will be able to remain true and faithful to Him and His plans and purposes for our lives. We can be like Job or Joseph or Paul or even Christ – we will remain true right to the very end!

God has set eternity in our hearts and thus besides focusing on the things that count for eternity, we should know that for God to make everything beautiful in His time could mean, for some of us, that we will only see the beauty for everything when eternity sets in. Like the parable of the beggar in Luke 16:19-31 who longed to eat off the crumbs that fell off the rich man’s table and who was at Abraham’s side after he died compared to the rich man who was at Hades who just wanted a drop of water to quench his thirst.

I think the message this morning is that although some things may only be beautiful to us when eternity sets in (God promised to make all things beautiful in His time), we must fiercely and fearfully guard our path to eternal life to make sure that we will be on Abraham’s side and not end up on the wrong side of eternity. God has set eternity in the hearts of man, so let’s set our eyes on the things that matter for eternity!

https://odb.org/MY/2022/06/09/driving-through-loopholes

I think there is a fine line between human traditions and divine instructions as a lot of our practices do end up as human traditions. For example, while praise and worship, and preaching from the pulpit are means for us believers to celebrate God’s goodness as a congregation – the sequence of the service and all the items in it like testimony time, announcements, time for tithes and offerings are all human traditions. Even the act of holy communion is a man-made ritual as Jesus broke bread as part of a proper passover meal and we have reduced it to only a piece of corn flake and a little sip of Ribena! That is why I personally think that churches that have a meal together after a Sunday service is closer to the breaking of bread that Christ instituted as that was also practiced during the days of the Acts of the Apostles. Even meeting on a Sunday is very much a human tradition that has pagan origins as the Sabbath or Shabbat is observed from Friday evening to Saturday evening.

Are human traditions wrong? Are church practices ungodly? Are we breaking God’s laws in the process. I think the moral of the story is that in whatever we do whether as a church or as individuals, our hearts must be right before God and we must have God’s heart as our true motivation. So if a shabbily dressed unkempt homeless man from the street wearing worn out slippers enters our church during Sunday worship, do we deny him entry on the basis that he is disrespecting God’s presence? Let’s take it further – what do we do if a gay couple or a gangster or a prostitute comes to church?

The message today is that we cannot avoid human traditions as we are humans and some practices are passed down for generations. The deeper message is that we must not rationalise away what God is speaking to us by hiding behind human traditions. So religious leaders of past devoted their money to God while neglecting their parents. Or we could be faithfully giving our tithes and offerings to our local church while neglecting to help those around us who are in need. My view is that we are not absolved from our responsibility to help others just because we have already given our portion to God via our tithes and offerings to our local church. I think similarly if a person is gay, a druggie, a gangster or a prostitute, we cannot exclude them from the people we are reaching out to just because they don’t fit into our usual profile of a churchgoer. We must always remember that God’s heart is always for those marginalised by society. In fact Jesus came and died for everyone, including and especially those who are weak and downtrodden. I thus think that while we cannot avoid human traditions, we must not allow such traditions to hinder or prevent us from fulfilling God’s desire and intent to reach out to everyone around us.

https://odb.org/MY/2022/06/08/generosity-and-joy

I think as researchers have pointed out, there are people who give because it gives them joy. It makes them happy to give and I think it is true because we are happy knowing that we have done something meaningful. We have helped someone in need. But at the end of the day, I think most Christians still give to meet a need and usually as prompted by the Holy Spirit, rather than using giving as a source of joy. We see a need, God speaks to our heart and we give on the basis that what we have is from God anyway. So we are just a vessel for the Lord to meet the needs of others and if we follow this principle, there is a good chance that the Lord will likewise bless us in order that we may continue to be His vessel to reach out to those in need.

However there is another subtle point we should note when it comes to giving and that is to give with joy. Not so much to get joy in return but to give willingly with gladness in our heart. We must not give grudgingly as though we are forced to. If we ourselves have more pressing needs, then we should not give until those needs are met properly. Like if we need the money to buy medication, we should buy medication first before giving away the money. If we are not healthy, we will not be able to work and earn and thus we will not be able to give anymore in the future. So we need to make sure that the goose that lay the eggs, that is us, is well and alive! A dead goose lays no eggs.

Learn to give with joy to meet the needs of others. In the process, we may derive joy just from the act of giving as we see how our giving may help transform lives. As believers we should give more for Kingdom purposes, to help missionaries, to help God’s work in our local church and elsewhere. Yet we should not limit our giving only to Christian work as the world at large also needs help. Christ came so that the sick, the fatherless, the poor may enter the Kingdom of Heaven. We should likewise help the poor, the needy and the underprivileged.

We need to save and provision for our old age and yet we must give as vessels of God to meet the needs of others. If we are instruments of God, will He not preserve and protect us and care for us in our old age? Trust in the Lord and lean not on our own understanding. God will find a way for us as He uses us as a way for others in need!

https://odb.org/MY/2022/06/07/jesus-is-here

Matthew 28:20 contains a significant promise from Jesus that He will be with us till the end of age. He will actually be with us for all eternity but when He said until the end of age, He meant being with us here on earth. This promise is significant because if the end of age ushers in and the great tribulation as revealed in Revelation occurs during our life time, we have the assurance and promise that Jesus will nevertheless be with us during those 7 years before He returns. Of course this presupposes that we will not be raptured first and will face the great tribulation as believers prior to the 2nd coming of Christ. In Christian eschatology (end times teaching) speak, this is called the post tribulation end times theory. In other words, it is believed that as believers we will only be raptured to be with Christ after going through the great tribulation of presumably 7 years where we will only be able to buy and sell with the mark of the beast and if we bow down to the anti-Christ. Our faith will really be tested and Christians preparing for this occurrence in this lifetime are looking at various means to Iive “off the grid” so that we could carry on living without compromising our faith and identity as a child of God.

The great tribulation is indeed a scary thought and it is scary as we are afraid that after coming so far in the faith, we may be tempted to compromise in order to live a “normal life”. It is not a question of taking a vaccine or using e-payment platforms but taking the mark of the beast is a wilful act of worshipping the anti-Christ. It is wilful and not accidental. If we were to comply, we will do it in defiance to Christ and would have clearly abandoned our faith. So will we risk losing our eternal inheritance in God so we could live like we used to for those expected 7 years of tribulation?

Matthew 28:20 however gives us the assurance that Christ will be with us till the very end, until the end of age. If we stand with Him and refuse to bow down to the anti-Christ, He will be with us, to support and help us through it all. Not a question of putting us to the test and seeing whether we are genuinely for Him or not. Not to see whether we deserve a place in eternity as our salvation is a gift from God, by grace through the blood of Christ and not by our works. That is why proponents who believe in the post tribulation rapture theory also believe that believers when facing the great tribulation will be blessed and empowered by a greater outpouring of the power of the Holy Spirit in our lives that we will see miracles and signs and wonders. In other words, as much as we need to learn and prepare to cope with living without the mark of the beast, we will have Jesus by our side fighting the battle with us. We will somehow be able to live even without the means to buy and sell as the miraculous power of God will be with us and we will live here on earth in His presence while waiting for Christ to return. Jesus promised that He will be with us till the end of age and that may ultimately be what matters most for us to be able to live through the great tribulation if it occurs in our lifetime!

https://odb.org/MY/2022/06/06/the-kindness-of-candor

I guess all of us would have faced this situation before. You know of someone who is a nice person, easy to hang out with and has pleasant personality, but he has a weakness. A very apparent one, in fact. Like he sometimes like to boast and exaggerate or he just speaks too much and dominates the conversation or he likes to put people down with a condescending tone and with a “I’m much better than you” attitude. Or he is someone that can’t keep any secret. What do we do?

I think most of us will just ignore the flaw and put up with him as he is. Or in product talk, we accept him on “as is where is” basis. In other words, we take him as he is. But some of us out of love for him will tell him his flaw. So maybe we drop hints that he needs to change his ways. Because it’s such a waste – he is near perfect except for this weakness.

Will we do it? Proverbs 27:6 says that wounds from a friend can never trusted but an enemy multiplies kisses, while Proverbs 27:9 teaches that the pleasantness from a friend springs from their heartfelt advice.

Most will not do it to avoid the unpleasantness and the awkwardness if the friend responds negatively. He or she may get offended and we may no more be friends. But as believers redeemed by the blood of Christ, I think we should and must. This is because our responsibility is to edify and encourage and to build up. We have an obligation to assist a friend to become a better person especially if he or she is also a believer. We must never allow a friend to continue in his flaw if that will not ensure the best outcome for him for his life. Our role as leaders and believers is always to guide those around us to become the best they can in the Lord if they are in the faith or even if they are not. Everyone should be encouraged to realise their fullest potential.

So the next time we face such a situation, be bold and speak out to correct and amend with love for the best interests and future of that person.

https://odb.org/MY/2022/06/05/confident-in-god

One of the direct benefits of our relationship with God after accepting Jesus is the restoration of the direct line of communication with Him. Adam and Eve had that close contact with God in Eden but sin scuppered it when Satan deceived Adam and Eve to eat the fruit, the only thing they were forbidden to do. Only one single thing they couldn’t do and they made a mess of it!

Now witg Christ in our life, we may reach out to God in prayer or just plainly by calling Him in the name of Jesus. Just say, Father and we will have His ears. He is God, He can communicate and hear millions all at once, simultaneously. That is why nothing man-made can ever come close to God. In fact nothing man-made can even come close to reproduce the intricacies and complexity of a human body, or for that matter, any living mammal or animal. That is why God is God and we are only His creation! We are nothing compared to Him.

But as humans redeemed by the blood of Jesus, we may go one step further. We have the confidence that when we pray God listens. Not just have the means and privilege to pray but to pray and communicate with God knowing He hears and will speak to us too. If we were to ask anything in accordance with His will, He will grant us our request. So if we were to tell Him that we want to serve Him more, He will open the doors for us to do so. Or if we ask to be given a greater sensitivity to the move of the Holy Spirit, God will hear and grant us as all those are examples of things that are in accordance with His will. Or if we were to ask Him to mould and shape us to be more and more conformed to the image of Christ that we can fulfil our potential in God and fulfil His plans and purposes He has for us, surely He will not deny us? How soon will He answer will depend on our response and His timing. He does everything in His wisdom and time.

Let’s all approach the throne of God in confidence and boldness today as there is no more condemnation in Christ. Reach out to Him in confidence, He hears and listens and will act in accordance with His will even as we pray – Father, may Your will be done here on earth as it is done is heaven. Thus, may Your will for our lives be done here on earth as it is in heaven. Amen!

https://odb.org/MY/2022/06/03/spotting-rainbows

I just attended a retreat last weekend where the very gifted and articulate speaker and facilitator used the song Walking With Jesus to teach and carry his teaching across. In essence, we may sometimes go through our life journeys without seeing Jesus as though He is in the shadows – to us He may be “No Where”. But ultimately we want to be able to see Jesus in all that we do and wherever we are – He is “Now Here”. From no where to now here. The Bible text is taken from Luke 24 where Jesus post resurrection walked alongside two followers for nearly an entire afternoon expounding the Scriptures to them but they were oblivious to who Jesus was. It was only later at dinner that Jesus revealed Himself to them. The point is as believers our eyes are already opened as the Spirit has revealed Jesus and the truth to us and thus we should not have issues seeing Jesus working and walking alongside us in the things we do at the places we live and work. However, the reality is that we do go through our life journeys with Jesus “no where to be seen” in our eyes.

That is why I think it’s good to find and see the rainbow in all situations that we face in life as expounded in today’s ODB. No matter how bad a situation may look in the natural and in the present, there must be a silver lining somewhere – if not immediatel then later. There ought to be a rainbow in the mix. God loves us. At the most basic level, it is for Him to achieve His plans and purposes for our lives as He is moulds us to be like Christ. Even then I believe as we search harder we will eventually find the rainbow, that wonder of nature that personifies the marvel and beauty of Jesus walking alongside us.

I think the reality is that Jesus is always there with us. Whether we see Him or not, whether we recognise His face or not, He is there. If we could see Him, then our faith and confidence is boosted but even if we can’t see Him, we should not lose heart as He is nevertheless still there, walking alongside us. He doesn’t and will never leave our side as we are His, the sheep of His pasture.

Find the rainbow, it is there. See Jesus as He is there walking alongside us. He is always by our side and there will also be times when He will lift and carry us through life like the only 2 and not 4 footsteps on the beach as He walks through life with us. Jesus is now and here, He is not nowhere!