Penal Substitution, Craft Beer, and some Happy Theology

Watch some thoughts on atonement, the Trinity, and the work of Christ here!

Some thoughts on Colossians, and a call to fast!

Colossians is, in my opinion, one of the most beautiful books in the New Testament. Colossians highlights the significance of the person of Christ- fully God and fully man – and juxtaposes authentic Christianity with the superstitious and legalistic doctrines that were finding footholds in the first century church.

Reading Colossians in 2011 as a new believer, I was compelled and inspired by the clear imperatives in the second half of the book: love one another, be honest, and work hard. The first half, on the other hand, seemed to be a lot more abstract – upholding the divinity of Christ and rejecting superstition. I dealt with this issue a lot when I would read anything by Paul; I struggled to make the connection when I read anything from Romans to 1 Thessalonians. I enjoyed reading the theology and found it interesting, but I could never quite understand why Paul seemed to think it related so directly to our day to day lives in Christ.

Then the Gospel happened.

I was working on a jobsite in the spring of 2016, surfing the internet on a coffee break. I was making a point of fasting weekly, both for my own spiritual benefit, and to press into the Lord for some content to teach my men’s group. On this particular fast day, I had the thoughts come to mind, “intimacy with Jesus and union with Christ,” and immediately recalled seeing a book on Amazon called “Mystical Union.” I looked up the author’s name, and scrolled his videos on YouTube. I was floored. As I soaked in the implications of God’s union with humanity in the person of Jesus, Paul began to make sense. A whole new world seemed to open up before me as I began to see the significance of Jesus’ incarnation, and started to see God, life, and myself through a “Christological lens.”

In the first two chapters of Colossians, Paul beautifully articulates the person and work of Christ. He alternates between describing who Jesus is in His person, and what He has done for us through His death, resurrection, and ascension. Paul describes the heart of the Gospel he preached as being “Christ in you, the hope of glory.” (Col 1:27) Not just Christ as an example to follow, but Christ in humanity as a man, indwelling humanity by His Spirit.

Paul’s specific moral imperatives in chapters three and four find their context in chapters one and two. Without the theological framework of chapters one and two, these instructions become just another form of legalism. By contrast, when we see these instructions in the context of the person and work of Christ, they describe what human life looks like when it is lived in the light of the reality of our inclusion in Jesus and of His union with us. The Gospel is not advice; it is, instead, the flat announcement of the victory of Jesus over sin, death, and every power of the enemy. The implications of this victory include (but are in no way limited to) our absolute freedom from sin, judgement, religious legalism, and superstition, no thanks to us or our own efforts.

Union with Christ changes everything. Every aspect of our lives finds its true meaning in this union, and every malfunction in our lives or characters stems from, I believe, our failure to live from a place of simple trust in who Jesus is in us. Union with Jesus drastically changes our motives; instead of living for Jesus, union means that we live in Jesus. We live, because Jesus lives, seated at the right hand of the Father in a physical, human body, and not only that, but in us through His Spirit. Instead of striving for a closer relationship with the Lord, this union allows us to participate and drink from Jesus’ own relationship with His Abba through the agency of Holy Spirit. Instead of striving to please God, we live lives of righteousness and love as a product of seeing what has become of us in Jesus. Instead of pressing in for “more of God” through our efforts and disciplines, this union allows us to rest in the reality that God has given us all of Himself, forever, in Jesus.

In  late December into early January, the corporate compulsion to make resolutions, sanctify ourselves, and rededicate our lives to the gym and to the Lord is tangibly thick, like the layer of frozen air laying across the our hemisphere, or like the glory cloud at Bethel. This intoxicating combination of some free time, extra calories, fresh winter air, and probably alcohol compels us to “think bigger” as we begin 2018.

I am not exempt from this.

I am calling a fast, and I want to invite you to join me. Along with countless believers around the world, I am echoing the call for a season of radical self-denial. Let’s make a resolution.

In light of what has become of my humanity in Jesus, I am committing to a season of living in absolute denial of my old, corrupt, sinless, joyless, religiously-sober self. For this fast, I am rejecting the identity I inherited through Adam- I am living in the light of the reality that this self has been circumcised away from me through the death of Jesus, and that I have been resurrected and co-seated with Christ in fellowship with His Father.

I am going to fast from self-righteousness and false humility. I am fasting from dark introspection. I am fasting from sin. I am fasting from the harassment and oppression of the enemy. I am fasting from religion in all of its forms. I am fasting from living outside the love of God, and from seeing others outside of the lens of God’s grace. I am fasting from seeing God’s character as being different than the character revealed in Jesus. I am fasting from seeing the Father, myself, or anyone else through any lens except for the revelation of Christ and Him crucified. By God’s grace, through the faith that  comes as a free gift, I am going to live joyfully aware of my inclusion in Christ. I am going to eat heartily of His broken body- I am feasting on the reality of our redemption from every effect of Adam’s fall. I am committed to drinking deeply from the cup of the New Covenant, to living daily in a state of intoxication with His goodness and mercy! In 2018, let’s resolve to keep the feast, for Christ, our Passover Lamb, has been sacrificed. 

Whether you are fasting from food or still finishing your Christmas leftovers and expired eggnog, I wish you the spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of Him, and His very own joy and bliss for 2018!

2017 testimonies, and your 2018 Prophetic Word!

2017 has come and gone, and what a year it was. Over the past three years, it has felt like each year brought exponential transformation and growth, and that has shown no signs of slowing down as we have begun the new year. Jessica and I are both deeply thankful for everyone who walked with us through the last three years, and for the amazing experiences and the resulting changes in perspective and lifestyle these experiences have brought.

A couple things that happened throughout the last year have stood out that I feel are worth sharing on this platform.

First, seemingly randomly I received a text from my brother about a downtown outreach ministry being started by a local contractor. The timing was nothing short of predominant; three days before that, I had stepped down from another ministry responsibility, and was asking the Holy Spirit where and how He wanted me to serve. This was obviously the answer. Once a week, we have brought food, clothes, hugs, Bibles, and the love Jesus to the poorest of the poor in Winnipeg. God has used every week’s ministry to reveal His goodness and His heart to me, and I have been so privileged to watch Him work as we rest in His ability to minister through us. One encounter I will never forget was a First Nations man who walked up to me in tears as I chatted with another girl in front of a pizza shop on Osborne. “Help me!” he begged, almost choking on his tears. I told him softly that I didn’t have any cash when he looked into my eyes, put his hand on my chest over my heart, and said “I don’t need money… I need what you have.” We looked into each others eyes for a second before he exclaimed “It’s Jesus, isn’t it?! I need your Jesus!” We had a beautiful time sharing the Gospel with him and praying for him. I haven’t seen Him since, but I am trusting that the Holy Spirit will weave that experience into the tapestry of God’s saving work in his life. 

A second experience, also in Winnipeg, occurred this summer, while I was out walking with another group that ministers downtown. A thirty-something man was pushing his girlfriend in front of him in a wheelchair towards us when a young man in our group boldly asked if she wanted to be able to walk again. Our group laid hands on her, and without any prompting (or warning) she climbed out of the wheelchair and started screaming, “I’m walking! I’m f***ing walking! I can walk!” Her boyfriend was so touched by the love of God that he asked for us to pray for his addictions. As we prayed for him, he slowly collapsed onto the sidewalk in tears, clearly overcome by the presence of Holy Spirit. The team ran into the couple again the week after- this time, without the wheelchair! I have lost count of the number of healings and miracles we have seen this year, but there are some, like this, that I could never forget. 

The highlight of our year was the opportunity we had to travel to Hong Kong, the Philippines, and Thailand to serve, minister, and explore. For almost two weeks, we sat under teaching of the unadulterated good news of God’s grace in Christ. On numerous occasions, as we took in the teaching, I felt like I was meeting Jesus again for the first time. During our stay in the Philippines, we quickly developed a friendship with the twenty five or so street kids who roamed the area around our group’s bed and breakfast. All between the ages of five and ten, these kids were left to their own devices, day in and day out. Each child absolutely basked in the love and affection we were able to give them- our days were filled with hugs, kisses, games, and children constantly climbing into our arms one after another and throwing their heads onto our chests. I pray for those kids every day; I pray for the opportunity to go back and sit in front of Jollibee’s and play Mister Shark with our new friends. I pray that they learn to receive from the Father the love and care they experienced with us, and I pray for the local church to walk in God’s heart towards these children who are otherwise invisible in their society.

It is such an amazing gift to go into the new year with so many amazing memories from the year past, and with such hope and anticipation for the year to come. While our circumstances fluctuate and vary over time, (they weren’t always bright in 2017, and probably won’t always be bright in 2018 either) the Gospel, the goodness of God, and the finished work of Jesus Christ do not. Whether we recognize it or not, we have a rock-solid foundation for joy and hope. We have a hope and a confident expectation that, in any circumstance, Jesus will make Himself known in and through us. We have assurance that the Father of Jesus does not look different from the Son- that there is no dark or angry God hidden behind Jesus’ back. We have confidence that we are who the Father has said we are: pure, holy, and righteous children of God in Christ Jesus. We have confidence that we can experience every circumstance with contentment and joy through Him who gives us strength.

My “prophetic word” for 2018 is the same Word that was with the Father in the beginning. It is the Word through whom all things were made. It is the Word through, in and by whom all things exist and hold together. His name represents our inclusion in His saving and redeeming work- that in Him our humanity has been cleansed from every contamination brought about by the fall of Adam. His name signifies that we have been freed from every definition of separation or distance between man and God- that He, in His very being, is our reconciliation with God. And it is in his name that I wish you wholeness, peace, and a year of hammered-drunk intoxication on the bliss of the New Covenant! May God bless you until we participate in His fellowship again face to face!

Effortless Christianity

It seems like a subtle twist occurs in lots of our conversations when we talk about our righteousness.

For the most part, we understand that our righteousness is completely established by the cross of Christ. We know that we can’t buy it, earn it, or otherwise deserve it. In light of our previous track records as sinners, this is pretty easy to believe. We know that we can’t be good enough to earn God’s favour. By grace we have been saved. That being said, we tend to live like the expression of righteousness in our daily lives depends on us. While we are saved by grace, I think that we generally live our Christian lives by the sweat of our brow until we return to the dust. Our experience usually seems to confirm this as we ride the “roller coaster” of highs and lows, which usually correlate with how much work we invest into our “relationship with God.”

What if Christianity is supposed to be effortless?

What if God isn’t calling us to “work on our relationship” with Him?

What if spirituality isn’t maintained with sweat equity?

When I first heard a friend talking this way, every fibre in me wanted to shout “baloney!” It seemed so obviously untrue. It was wishful thinking at best, and a damnable heresy at the worst. After all, we’re supposed to seek first the kingdom and its righteousness. We’re called to work out our salvation with fear and trembling. God calls us to obey Him. Jesus wants disciples and not fans, right?

My reasoning seemed sound enough at the time, but the difference between my friend’s lifestyle and my own suggested that I was missing something. Situations where I would crumble under the temptation to compromise just didn’t seem to shake him. He saw the best in people that I couldn’t even bring myself to talk to, and it seemed like he flowed easily in obedience to the Lord in areas where I had to grit my teeth to do the right thing. Either he lived in a state of complete denial, or this guy was actually on to something. I was confused and honestly offended when he insisted that there was nothing he did to produce what was obviously the fruit of the Spirit in his life. I was doing my best to “press in to God” and to “grow spiritually,” and it seemed to be of no avail. I knew that I needed to take a second look at what I was believing!

Scripture instructs us in Colossians 2:6, “Therefore, as you received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in him…”. Our life in Christ was initiated by grace through faith, and can only ever be sustained in the exact same way. I have learned through my own experience that I only bear genuine fruit when I depend solely on His initiative in me, and on His grace working through me. As Paul wrote in 1 Corinthians 15:10,

“But by the grace of God I am what I am, and his grace towards me was not in vain. On the contrary, I worked harder than any of them, though it was not I, but the grace of God that is with me.” (my emphasis)  

I cannot “position myself” to receive the love of God; God positioned His love to reach me when His Son died for me while I was still a sinner. I can never produce the love of God in my life; the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Spirit. I cannot work up obedience to prove my love for God; instead, His love for me and in me produces conformity in my life to His will and nature. The effort is all God’s, and the benefit is all mine. The only way I can experience genuine fruit in my life is to forget my dependence on my efforts, and believe that God is able and wants to see His own character realized in my own character and personality.

How hard is it for an apple tree to produce apples?

It isn’t.

So how hard is it for a Christian’s life to produce Christ-likeness?

It isn't!

As believers, we reflect and manifest Jesus by default, by design!

Just like an apple tree naturally produces apples, Christians are designed and enabled to mirror the likeness of Jesus in every way. Scripture tells us in Romans 8:29,

 “For those whom he foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, in order that he might be the firstborn among many brothers.”

The destiny of every believer is for the expression of their life to look like Jesus.

I am convinced that unbelief is the stick in the wheel-spokes that keeps us “falling from grace” and dependant on our own efforts. When we don’t understand or rightly believe our inclusion in Christ’s finished work, we take over God’s responsibility for the production of fruit in our lives. This inevitably leads to comparison, doubt, envy, or even pride as we take our eyes off of the gardener and put them onto whatever “fruit” we feel like we are (or aren’t) producing. This is where the pleasure of tending the garden of Eden turns to a life of toil, frustration, hardship, and labour.

I’m not saying we are not responsible for our actions, because we absolutely are. My point is that when the expression of our lives falls short of the character of God, the answer is not to try harder or exert more effort, but to effortlessly return our trust to the cross of Christ and rediscover who we truly are because of His finished work.

I’m also not saying there is no role at all left for us as believers. In John 15:4-5, Jesus tells us the prerequisite for bearing fruit:

 “Abide in me and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit by itself, unless it abides in the vine, neither can you, unless you abide in me. I am the vine; you are the branches. Whoever abides in me and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit, for apart from me you can do nothing.”

Let’s be very clear about this: abiding is not work! To abide is to remain under the influence of who Jesus is and who we are in union with Him; to try to bear fruit through our own effort is to operate outside of that union relationship. It is Jesus who produces the fruit- we are just the branches! As we remain under the influence of this amazing truth, the Son sets us free to become living expressions of the character of God.

As I looked at my understanding of how I lived as a Christian, I experienced (and am still experiencing) an amazing season of repentance. There are still days when living and abiding in Christ feels difficult, and I still fall short and fail often. But, thank God, my failure does not negate or distract from the reality of what Jesus accomplished for me, or of who He is in me. Through experience, I have learned that the answer to the failure and frustration is always the same: 

“It is an agonising situation, and who on earth can set me free... ? I thank God there is a way out through Jesus Christ our Lord.” (Romans 7:24-25, Phillips)

As I have learned to live in that reality, I have experienced authentic love, and a freedom that I never thought was possible for me. More and more I have begun to see people, including myself, for their identity, created value and potential in Christ. Old temptations have by and large lost their draw and influence on me. My desire and capacity to serve others has grown. I have seen a dramatic increase in the supernatural manifestations of the Holy Spirit in my life as I reach out to show God’s love to others. Instead of being an anomaly, joy has become my daily bread! Every day, my life becomes a clearer expression of Jesus.

It is through exclusive dependence on the reality of Christ living in and us and through us that we walk in genuine liberty, free from pretence and free from natural effort. As we effortlessly behold Jesus, remaining under the influence of what we see in Him, we reflect Him as a mirror, and live as Christ-epistles to be known and read by all.

Believing "Contradictions"

It seems like there has been a massive influx of teaching on grace, identity, and the finished work of the cross within mainstream evangelical Christianity. Like all movements in the church, some of this teaching has been good, some has been bad, and some has been downright weird. I personally believe that this return to the basics of the cross of Christ is a legitimate move of God, and that it has been bringing many believers into a deeper revelation of the freedom that we have in Christ. While every movement has its fringe, I believe that the church has been and will continue to be blessed tremendously by the fresh revelation that has been circulating through the church on these topics.

A serious criticism levelled against of a lot of the popular identity teaching has been that it fails to address a lot of the Scriptures that seem to conflict many of the main premises of the teaching.

Yes and amen, it is true that as believers, we are the righteousness of God in Christ Jesus. (2 Corinthians 5:21) It is true that we are dead to sin and alive to God in Christ. (Romans 6:11) It is true that we have been translated from the kingdom of darkness into the Kingdom of His dear Son. (Colossians 1:13). It is true that we have crucified our flesh with its passions and desires. (Galatians 5:24) In my own experience in church, however, I have rarely heard these truths preached, much less heard them taught as being any more than “positional” or “judicial”. Personally, it brought supernatural freedom and joy to my life when I began to understand these verses not as positional statements that would one day be true in heaven, but as mystical realities to be believed on and experienced in my day to day life.

That being said, it is imperative that we deal responsibly with the whole council of Scripture. New Testament writers use language that most identity teachers (think Todd White, Dan Mohler, John Crowder and the likes) would see as being completely inappropriate for born again believers. James referred to his readers as sinners, and exhorted them to cleanse their hands and to be wretched, mourn, and weep. (James 4:8-9) Paul even referred to himself as the foremost of sinners. (1 Timothy 1:15) So the question remains, how do we deal with the tension that this use of this language brings to our interpretation of Scripture?

I believe Paul delivers a key to understanding this tension and accounting for statements that are apparently contradictory in his conversation with the Corinthians:

" Now we have received not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, that we             might understand the things freely given us by God. And we impart this in words not taught               by human wisdom but taught by the Spirit, interpreting spiritual truths to those who are                       spiritual. The natural person does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are                 folly to him, and he is not able to understand them because they are spiritually discerned."                 (1 Corinthians 3:12-14, ESV)

It appears that even in the New Testament, truths are conveyed to two different audiences using two different languages. Paul continues to the Corinthians:

"But I, brothers, could not address you as spiritual people, but as people of the flesh, as                     infants in Christ. I fed you with milk, not solid food, for you were not ready for it. And                         even now you are not yet ready, for you are still of the flesh." (1 Corinthians 3:1-3, ESV)

I hold that the New Testament writers address their audience from two different perspectives, depending on their level of understanding and maturity. One perspective is “according to the flesh.” The natural mind, or the mind set on the flesh, uses the five senses as its reference for thought and communication. The flesh is the only reference that makes sense to the natural human mind.

The second perspective is the viewpoint of being “in Christ.” This perspective sees life from Christ’s perspective, as it truly is. Letters such as Ephesians and Colossians are chock full of these “in Christ” references. Paul consistently appeals to the “in Christ” realities as the impelling, overarching truths to motivate and to enable believers to walk as saints.

One of the best instances of this is in Colossians 3, where Paul instructs the disciples: “Set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on earth. For you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God.” (Colossians 3:2-3, ESV) Paul expected mature believers to think, function, live, and operate by faith from the basis of what Jesus had accomplished in them by grace through his death and resurrection to redeem their humanity through His union with them.

A clear example of the difference between these two viewpoints is in second Corinthians five:

                

"For the love of Christ controls us, because we have concluded this: that one has died for all,   therefore all have died; and he died for all that those who live might no longer live for           themselves but for him who for their sake died and was raised. From now on, therefore, we   regard no one according to the flesh. Even though we once regarded Christ according to the flesh, we regard him thus no longer. Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come." (2 Corinthians 5:14-17, ESV)

For the sense-ruled or “carnal” mind, our natural human experience is the sole reference for understanding reality. For the believer, however, that reference becomes the revelation of God through the person and work of Jesus Christ. In a very real sense, the entire world becomes brand new to us as we begin to see reality as it is in Christ. I believe this is what Paul is referring to in Galatians 6:14-15: “But far be it from me to boast except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by which the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world. For neither circumcision counts for anything, nor uncircumcision, but a new creation.”  Paul’s entire perspective on reality had been reframed through the revelation of what God accomplished for us in Christ, and his behaviour and lifestyle became a reflection of that reality.

I believe strongly that God ordained for Scripture to be written in such a way that the mind of the unbeliever and the immature believer alike can be engaged, in order that he may be brought to faith in Christ, and that this accounts for the strong language directed to naturally minded believers and unbelievers. Paul, James, and the other writers “call it like they see it” to draw the naturally minded believer’s attention to areas where their behaviour or lifestyle fell short of their true identity in Christ. To other audiences, they would appeal to the unseen realities in Christ as the motivation and empowerment to live in communion with Jesus.

The maturing often occurs in my own life when the “in Christ” truths seem to contradict what my senses tell me is obviously the case. For example, many of us have lived as believers with a chronic, subtle sense of guilt for shortcomings, or have viewed our relationships with God with some performance anxiety, as if God’s pleasure with us as His children depends on how well we obey on a day to day basis. God has clearly spoken the opposite in Christ! As believers, there is a calling for continual repentance, not just from sinful thoughts and actions, but from believing what our senses/flesh, experiences, or circumstances tell us to be true about God and about ourselves, to believing what God has said in Christ. It is in this repentance that we experience life, joy and peace, and where we experience the grace that enables us to abide in Jesus and to walk like Him. And this is where faith comes in. The success of my day to day walk, and the quality of the choices I make, is consistently determined by what I choose to believe in the moment in any given situation. If I believe it is my nature to sin, I will effectively empower sin to rule in my life through my own faith. On the other hand, if I believe that Jesus has made me new, pure, and righteous through His cross, and that He is willing and able to produce His own integrity and goodness in my life through His Spirit, my walk and my choices will reflect that truth.  The more I walk in that truth, the more I see that reality expressed and manifested in my own life, and the more my thinking and language reflects these realities.

The natural mind does not understand or respond to spiritual reality, and we do a disservice to unbelievers and immature believers alike when we expect them to. As we see in Scripture, there are circumstances that require us to appeal to sense-knowledge to make a point or express a truth. That being said, as believers, we walk by faith and not by sight/flesh/sense-knowledge. While “sight language” may be useful in certain situations to get a point across, we should never use it at the cost of the understanding of what Jesus accomplished. 

Identity, Sanctification and Transformation

I am going to go out on a bit of a limb, but it is on my heart to write a little bit about how we have typically understood sanctification. Many have spent their entire spiritual lives attempting to mortify the flesh and clean themselves up, all under the assumption that their regeneration is ultimately dependent on their own efforts.

I am not pointing any fingers here, because this was the first four years of my own Christian life. I wanted, more than anything else, to know the newness of life that Paul was talking about in Romans 6:4. I wanted a deep and lasting transformation in my character and personality, and I worked to effect it. Yet the struggle always seemed to be in vain. Condemnation would sweep back in as I tried and failed over and over again in my effort to stay sober, happy, and to not look at women the wrong way. I felt completely trapped by my inability to live the Christian life. I knew there were promises of love, joy, and peace, but I only experienced these as elusive and fleeting. My "growth" was a continual experience of discouragement.

The picture of this struggle to resist sin and to “crucify the flesh” has been captured clearly by the “Romans 7 Man.” Paul, in Romans 7, describes himself as a “wretch,” and as having “the desire to do what is right, but not the ability to carry it out.” Romans 7 is touted as a prime example of the issue of the believer’s “sin nature,” which necessitates the “sanctification process” in which we are constantly striving to be more loving, holy, and godly. We have consistently touted Mr. Romans 7 as our example of the standard Christian life of trying and falling short. We have so identified ourselves with this passage that to think the Christian life could be easy or fun seems delusional. Christian life has been described ad nauseum as a continual process of “taking up your cross” and “dying to yourself” to deal with Mr. Sin, the Romans 7 Man, and be sanctified. For probably every genuine believer, along with conversion to Christ came a deep seated awareness of shortcomings. (Note: this is not wrong in and of itself.) This has driven people into “troubleshooting mode,” where careful inventory is taken of past sins, generational curses, vows, etc. Great lengths are taken to find the “roots” of sins and negative patterns, which are usually then confessed and renounced. In most circles, it is common to hear the sin nature described as something that is still alive, and as being something that the believer is ultimately responsible to crucify so as to become more like Jesus.

I am not the Romans 7 man, and neither are you.

It is crucial to understand Romans 7 in the context of the surrounding chapters.

In Romans 6, Paul issues us a death certificate. “Do you not know that all of us who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? We were buried therefore with him by baptism into death, in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life… For we know that our old man was crucified with him in order that the body of sin might be brought to nothing, so that we would no longer be enslaved to sin. For one who has died has been set free from sin.” (Romans 6:3-4, 6-7) The old nature that kept us locked up under sin and the law has died with Christ. Paul echoes this in Galatians 2:20: “I have been crucified with Christ.” (emphasis mine) Anything that could possibly hold us back from thinking, acting, talking, and relating to God and others the way Jesus does was slain with Jesus on Calvary. Read in the context of Romans 6 and Romans 8, it is apparent that in Romans 7 Paul is describing his life before his revelation of our righteousness in Christ. Paul is describing his life when he saw his identity, his righteousness, and his standing with God as a product of his own religious performance. Paul was recognizing his own helplessness to contribute anything at all to his standing with God, or to produce real or lasting change in his own heart and life. To identify in any way at all with Romans 7 Man is to backpedal right over the cross, ignoring the reality of what was accomplished in Romans 6, and stealing the context of our practical Christian living as taught in Romans 8. If you are a born again believer who is experiencing a Romans 7 Christianity, it is not because you are a Romans 7 Man; it is because you don’t understand that you have died. Could it be that our apparent propensity for sin after our conversion results not from some “sinful nature” that we drag around with us, but rather from a lack of understanding or belief about what was accomplished at Calvary? Could it be that when Paul admonished the Romans to “consider yourselves dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus,” it was because that was, in fact, the only accurate way to communicate the reality of what occurred at salvation? Transformation is not our job; it is the effortless result of faith recognizing the reality that you are already dead. If we had not truly died in Christ at His cross, then for us to “consider yourselves dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus” is an exercise of pure delusion.

Paul understood the mystery of the Gospel as being “Christ in you, the hope of glory.” (Colossians 1:27) He described his spiritual life in Galatians 2:20: “I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.” Paul told the Colossians, “For you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God. … Do not lie to one another, seeing that you have put off the old self, and have put on the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge after the image of its creator.” (Colossians 3:4, 9-10) In Romans 12:2, Paul describes the transformation of the believers life: “Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind…” And lest we look at the renewal of the mind as “our part,” Paul reminds us that we already have the mind of Christ. (1 Corinthians 1:16, Philippians 2:5) Even the renewal of our minds comes as the effortless by product of the revelation of our union with Christ in His death! Far from providing license to sin, this understanding of identity raises the bar for holiness in the believer's life, and then enables them to walk it out through simple trust in the finished work of the cross.

You and I have died, and more than that, you and I are now alive as new creations in Christ. Old things have passed away; behold, all things are new. We are holy and righteous, perfect and blameless in Jesus Christ. Let’s simply believe it, and watch as the Word of God bears the fruit the fruit of righteousness unto holiness in our lives.

Re-Thinking Prayer

When I began my Christian walk, I was (and still am) blessed to be a part of a church where prayer was (and still is) highly valued. Any minister at our church can attest to the role that prayer plays in our functioning as a church body. When the church has a decision to make, a challenge to face, or a paradigm shift to grow through, the church, and especially the leadership, will pray earnestly. The church prays, fasts, waits, and listens to the voice of the Holy Spirit in every major decision, and often the minor ones. It was in this environment that I learned to interact with God personally, and through discipleship as well as personal experience came to know the “friend we have in Jesus” in a way I didn’t know was possible for the “No Name Brand” believer.

What I was not prepared for, however, was the roller coaster effect prayer had on my life. I would enjoy a season of experiencing dramatic, immediate answers to prayer, full of spiritual highs, followed by seasons of apparent spiritual drought, with its accompanying feelings of disappointment and spiritual inadequacy. During the seasons where I saw God moving visibly, I felt unstoppable, and my faith rose on the swell of answered prayer and personal testimonies of God’s work. When my prayer life seemed dry, however, I would turn back into the “pre-encounter” Gideon, minding my own business and hoping the enemy would leave me alone.

Seasons of fervent prayer turned into seasons of faithless introspection as I tried to figure out where I had gone wrong. My alone time routinely became a time of self-diagnosis and navel-gazing, trying to get my engine to turn over so I could pretend my way through another work day. Conversational relationship with God became one sided as the desert swallowed up the oasis that had previously been my prayer life.

I want to share what I have learned through this, but I want to be completely clear: I am not claiming in any way to have easy ongoing success. What I am sharing are truths that have consistently set my prayer life straight in the midst of a “dry season.” These are the truths that I go back to and renew my mind with when I notice my mindset reverting to a faith-less perspective towards God and towards prayer. As I have practiced living in the continual recognition of these truths, my experience of God has become more consistent, and my belief in God’s faithfulness has become more resolute.

I have become convinced that the desert experience is not the will of God for the believer’s interaction with Him. In John 4, Jesus makes a comparison between wells and rivers. The woman at the well is interested in knowing if Jesus will endorse her “well” of choice, the Samaritan high place of Mount Gerazim, or if Jesus will insist on the Jewish “well” of spiritual experience, Mount Zion. This analogy can be applied just as easily today: unbelievers and believers alike have “wells” that they frequent when they experience spiritual or emotional fatigue. Some wells do, in fact, offer living water, and some offer imitations of different qualities. It seems that Jesus, however, has something completely different in mind. “Everyone who drinks of this water will be thirsty again, but whoever drinks of the water I give him will never be thirsty again. The water that I will give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life.” (John 4:14) Jesus undoubtedly has the same picture in mind in John 7:37-38: “On the last day of the feast, the great day, Jesus stood up and cried out, “If anyone thirsts, let him come to me and drink. Whoever believes in me, as the scripture has said, ‘Out of his heart will flow rivers of living water.’”” This talk of rivers is a far cry from the well-language used by the woman at the well. Jesus seems to be promising an experience that is a little more sustained and intense than can be contained in a half hour quiet time.

So what is the condition to experience this kind of personal revival? What pre requisites does Jesus set for us to “experience more of God?”  Jesus makes it clear that our continual, conscious saturation with the Holy Spirit comes to us by the exact same means of our salvation: by grace, through faith. “”Whoever believes in me, as the Scripture has said, ‘Out of his heart will flow rivers of living water’” Now this he said about the Spirit, whom those who believed in him were to receive…” (John 7:38-39)

Paul explains the same thing to the Galatians: “Let me ask you only this: Did you receive the Spirit by works of the law, or by hearing with faith?” (Galatians 3:2) “Does he who supplies the Spirit to you and works miracles among you do so by works of the law, or by hearing with faith?” (Galatians 3:5) We consciously experience God’s presence to the degree that we recognize He is in us! While God does choose to manifest Himself to us in special ways at different times, we are freed from a dependence on those “rainfalls” for our spiritual growth: God has put a river inside of every believer. To stay full of the presence of God, we don’t need to strive for more of God. Instead, we need to simply believe the specific promise of God that there is no more of God to have than God has already put inside of each of us. As we begin to believe this promise, our perception of lack will begin to fade as we experience the reality of the Holy Spirit’s presence in us.

As we understand this reality, our language towards God will begin to shift. Instead of praying from a perception of lack, we will begin to speak the language of gratitude, recognizing our endowment with every spiritual blessing in Christ. (Ephesians 1:3) Insecurity in God’s presence will be replaced by knowledge of our worth and acceptance in the Beloved as children of God. (1 John 3:1) A conscience stained by the past will be cleansed with the confidence of knowing Christ’s righteousness. (2 Cor 5:21) A plea for personal transformation will turn into praise because of the recognition that if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. (2 Corinthians 5:17) Instead of our spiritual disciplines, our exclusive boast will be in the cross of Christ, and instead of promoting self help products and seminars, we will become walking testimonies to the power of the message of Christ and Him crucified.

Prayer, at its heart, is our personal experience of the Gospel, day by day, moment by moment. It is a learning process. In prayer, we are learning to relate to God not on the basis of either our shortcomings or our successes, but on the success of the cross in securing God’s very real presence in us.  (Colossians 1:27) In learning prayer, we learn how to relate to every other area of our lives through a Gospel lens, and begin to live as the living epistles who God has made us to be.

If you are in a dry season and praying for spiritual rain, it is my prayer for you that you would discover (or re-discover) the river that God has already put inside you, and that you would learn to drink from the river whether the rain comes or not. As we collectively discover this river of life, a dramatic difference will emerge between the spiritually and the naturally minded people. As wells dry up, and as there is more and more time between rainfalls, there will be an increasing necessity and demand for spiritual life that is independent on any external source, and our rivers will become dramatic evidence of God’s presence in our lives.