Seeing People as Trees – The COST of the Correction

Photo by Simon Speed. 18 February, 2010. Photo is in the Public Domain.

Then again He laid His hands on his eyes; and he looked intently and was restored, and began to see everything clearly. ²⁶ And He sent him to his home, saying, “Do not even enter the village.” (Mark 8:25-26 – NASB)

We must never forget that, while the benefits of the Gospel are free, they did not come to us cheap.

In a lot of instances our spiritual blindness has been deliberate. Jesus can’t just go around forgiving and healing and restoring simply because He wants to. That is not how the moral universe functions. Every sin and failure; every sin of commission and of omission must be paid for, or every act of mercy would be a violation of the righteous law of God. The law could not just simply be put aside; it had to be fulfilled, and every transgression punished before mercy could be made available.

So when we see in the Gospels that Jesus healed diseases, both physical and spiritual, we need to remember that He was even then carrying all our transgressions to the cross. The punishment due for our sins He was even then carrying. All the sin and failure he encountered He was putting to His own account till He could finally say, “It is finished!”

It Cost Him

© Sunday 25^th January 2015 – by Christopher Shennan

My Lord gave me a second touch;

I no longer saw men as trees –

The way I relate to them now,

Is to aim my dear Lord to please.

But I know this change still cost Him;

It wasn’t cheap by manner or means –

The blood that he shed was the price

That He paid to fulfil my dreams.

All that God gives His dear children

Is free, and not one can be earned;

There’s nothing at all to pay Him,

Yet still, friend, by some it is spurned.

When I receive some great mercy

From the hand of my God and King,

I remember what it cost Him,

To give me this glad song to sing.

It was free to me, for certain,

But what He paid was His all

To procure for me redemption,

And each miracle when I call.

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Free, but not Cheap

Free, but not Cheap

Picture credits at end of post

To those who have obtained like precious faith with us . . . (2 Peter 1:1b)

It is precious faith because of:

The PRICE Paid For it

There is a danger in thinking that just because all the gifts of God come to us free, that they are also cheap, and of little value. Faith is the gift of God but it didn’t come cheap. It cost… everything

Or do you not know that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit [who is] in you, whom you have from God, and you are not your own?

For you were bought with a price; therefore glorify God in your body and in your spirit, which are God’s. (1 Corinthians 6:19-20 – NKJV)

Not only does faith come from outside of ourselves, and we did not obtain it by our own ingenuity; it came to us at great cost to the Giver.

Therefore My Father loves Me, because I lay down My life that I may take it again.

No one takes it from Me, but I lay it down of Myself. I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it again. (John 10:17-18 – NKJV)

Think of what value Christ places on your soul.

A van Gogh painting sold for around $40 million. When you think about it, what is a van Gogh painting but a piece of canvass with a few splashes of paint on it. Yet someone was willing to pay $40 million for it. What is the value of any object of art? It is worth what someone is willing to pay for it.

What are you worth to God?

You are worth what Christ was willing to pay for your salvation. You are worth what God the Father was willing to pay: For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life. (John 3:16 – NKJV)

Greater love has no one than this, than to lay down one’s life for his friends.

You are my friends… (John 15:13-14a – NKJV)

Salvation by faith is free, but it is not cheap.

They Have no Idea

(© Friday 24^th October 2014 – by Christopher Shennan)

For you were bought with a price; therefore glorify God in your body and in your spirit, which are God’s. (1 Corinthians 6:20 – NKJV)

Some think because God’s salvation

Is free it must also be cheap;

They have no idea how precious

It is, just how wide – or how deep

They tread under foot – cast aside –

This Pearl of Great Price from above;

They know not how much it has cost

The Saviour in anguish and blood.

But I know how much Jesus paid –

With eyes of true Faith I now see –

There’s nothing He would not have done,

To save and to sanctify me.

So I call to those who, unknowing,

Have passed my dear Saviour by,

Just look again how He suffered,

Then ask yourself the question – “Why?

‘Christ on the Cross,’ by Eugène Delacroix. No changes have been made to the photograph. Used under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported License Creative Commons, Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported License (shown here: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/deed.en) and the GNU Free Documentation License, (shown here: http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/fdl.html).

The Keeping Power of God

The Keeping Power of God

Picture credits: Prodigal Son CC-PD-Mark

1 John 5:5-12

Who are kept by the power of God through faith unto salvation ready to be revealed in the last time. (1 Peter 1:5 – KJV)

The Christian way is a supernatural undertaking from start to finish. No-one can hope to follow it in his own strength. If anyone is going to stay in the way of righteousness, they have to rely on something more than human strength. What is impossible with men is possible with God. God has made a way. Let us consider:

1. The Power of His Keeping

Who are kept by the power of God…”

No greater power exists, so no other power can shake us loose from His Way. Relying on our own strength is a sure prescription for failure. Depending on God’s power to keep us is a guarantee of victory against the world, the flesh, and the devil.

2. The Path of His Keeping

 …through faith…

God keeps us through faith. It is God’s way. It is the only way.

Faith is the victory that overcomes the world. Faith in God, and in the redemption Christ purchased for us on the cross of Calvary, is the pipe-line that connects us to all the riches of God’s Grace. The power of God’s keeping works through faith. Unbelief is the only thing preventing us from experiencing the mighty works of God. Jesus Himself could do no mighty works in the place where there was unbelief.

3. The Purpose of His Keeping

“…unto salvation ready to be revealed in the last time.”

God is keeping us so He can reveal the full extent of His salvation once we have passed victoriously through this old world of sin and rebellion. When He has taken us through, He will be able to show us, and the universe at large, just how great the salvation is that He has obtained for us.

While we trust God’s keeping power, there is no need for us to falter or fall from the Way. His hand will guide us, and His Hand will hold us.

A Thousand Times

© Monday 3rd September, 2012 by Christopher Shennan

A thousand times I’ve fallen;

A thousand times knocked out –

A thousand times regretted

The things I’ve thought about.

But,

A thousand times I’ve risen

By a strength that’s not my own;

A thousand times I’ve given

Praise to my God alone.

A thousand times the heat

Of battle seared my soul:

Hope waned, then rose,

When mercy…made it whole… again.

A thousand times the blood

Of Calvary came through

To overcome and vanquish

The enemy – ‘tis true.

God’s keeping power has always

Been there to bring me aid;

As I rest upon God’s promise,

I’ll never be afraid.

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A Miracle for Anje: Guest Writer

Anje Wynands gave this testimony in our church recently. It was a touching and powerful testimony to God’s Grace, and to the loving support of God’s people.I am sure it will do the same for you as it did to us

I used to hate myself. I hated everything about me. I am a perfectionist who is so far from perfect.   It makes me crazy when I can’t get it all right. And every time I looked at myself, I knew how far from perfect I was. And, I was getting further every moment.

One by one, I removed every mirror I could from my family’s home, because I did not want to see who I was. For more than a decade, I refused to have my picture taken. I hoped to erase all evidence of my own existence. I often felt that I wished that I could just start shrinking and never stop until I actually disappeared. It’s not that I didn’t believe all that I read about God’s grace and mercy.   For everyone else. Just not me. Never me.

I was so sure of God’s love and mercy that I became involved in a group here at Bethany called Stephen Ministry. It’s a group of people who ooze compassion, grace and mercy. Normally, one Stephen Minister comes alongside one care receiver to listen to them as they work through a dark time in their life, be it the breakdown of their marriage, grief over a lost loved one, their own worsening health, whatever their darkness entails. But God has blessed me more than I can ever tell, because I am surrounded by all the Stephen Ministers at once and what a difference their light has been to my darkness.  I think God knew that’s what it was going to take for me to change, that’s how dark I was on the inside.

At our Stephen Ministry meetings I have so often reminded the group of Hebrews 3:13:  encourage one another daily, as long as it is called “Today,” so that none of you may be hardened by sin’s deceitfulness.  And I have been so blessed that the Stephen Ministers have lived this out.

It wasn’t an immediate change. They loved me from the start, but it would take years of convincing. Over these years, they have spent endless hours listening to me tell about my imperfections. Miraculously they loved me anyway.   They have believed in me when I didn’t believe in myself. They trust me when I don’t trust myself. They build me up with words of encouragement and reassurance. When my mom died in Pennsylvania, they drove down there in a blizzard to comfort me. They loved me though I thought I was unloveable.

And then one day I finally believed it. Not just their love for me but God’s love for me too. God’s. Love. For. Me. I felt it for the first time. I will never forget that moment.

I wanted to share these pictures of me with you so you can see the difference it makes when you know someone loves you. Really loves you. Someone who doesn’t have to love you but chooses to out of the love God has put in their heart.

When I look at these pictures, I can’t help but smile. Not because of the physical changes, but the changes that I know happened on the inside. Now I know I’m still not perfect inside or out, but it’s okay. I am loved by God who is himself perfect and made me just the way he wanted.