Christian Faith Perspectives

As Christians we have a permanent relationship of peace with God. This is because Jesus Christ secured it when he gave his life on our behalf to reconcile us to God. We now have continual fellowship with the Father and His Son.

However, there will still be times when our feelings seem to tell us otherwise. But it is important to remember that these feelings do not affect our basic link with God. When we trusted the Lord Jesus, we entered the Kingdom of God, and we were at peace… no longer under condemnation; the barrier of sin removed.

So how do we deal with these inner feelings which seem to interfere? Firstly, we need to remind ourselves that our peace with God remains unaltered, it is only our inner feelings which lack calm. At these times we need to restore stillness.

My own experience is that when I fail to be completely open with God in prayer, confusion, turmoil and anxiety start to rule. We try to solve things ourselves, things we could share with God. So, if we acknowledge Him in ALL our ways He WILL direct our path; the stress will go, and peace will again rule our hearts.

In personal relationships we talk about the need to be open with one another. Perhaps this is the aspect of conversing with God that needs emphasis, where we share those personal areas of our life. God too has feelings and is able to respond to us. The Lord Jesus Christ walked this earth with our nature; he fully understands the way we feel so we can share those private areas. Fellowship with the Father and the Son has a purpose… to maintain our PEACE!

Prov.3:6, John 14:27, Roman 5:1, Col.3:15. NIV.

Have you ever considered that God actually purchases things. Well it’s true, and when He does He pays the purchase price. Of course you guessed it, I’m talking about God buying us back as His possession.

As a young man growing up I was fashion conscious and no different to the other guys. You had to look your best and to impress the girls of course. Now I recall buying an expensive trendy green suit and this is where the story gets interesting, for I had to pawn or sell my suit.

Guess I was that typical young person searching for identity. Part of that process was travelling, but you can’t travel for too long without working. Eventually I ran out of money and as I mentioned I had to sell the suit I loved so much. The cash in hand was but temporary help!

Because my resources were so low I had to stay with a relative. This person was very kind to me. When he found out about my pawned suit he wanted to get it back for me. Taking my pawn ticket he paid the price for getting back the suit, he was in affect redeeming my suit.

God sent Jesus into our world to redeem us. It is God’s way of buying us back to himself. He is a close relative to us all and he was willing to pay the price in order to save us. The price he paid was his own blood.

As we live our Christian lives it is reassuring to know that we are legally God’s property. Our Heavenly Father now owns us because Jesus Christ paid the purchase price when he gave his life on the cross. To be owned by our Heavenly Father means we have someone who loves us and will now look after as His own child. We are, HIS CHILDREN!

Ref. Heb. 9:12 NIV

When we become Christians there is that initial time of understanding our new found faith. But believe it or not we have immediately joined God’s work force and He has very important things for each of us to do. as we live our lives.

I clearly recall an incident when holidaying down the beach. As we walked along the waters edge one of our family group wrote in the sand with a stick. The message written, was ‘JESUS SAVES’. Now that might seem incidental, yet who knows, it may have been that one act that helped a person to find God.

When our Christian lives begin we all in a sense have that calling to go into all the world and preach the Gospel. In fact the first thing we want to do is actually tell others about our new experience. Everyone wants to share good news and it all starts with those words “have you heard ” When we find new life in Christ it is just the same, we want to tell the world the good news about Jesus Christ.

As we find a spiritual home in a local church of our choosing there will often be something we can do enabling us to be an active Christian serving the Lord. But the various froms of Christian service are numerous and diverse. The Holy Spirit is available to lead us to find if you like that niche of service that is right for us.

We are not all called to be a missionary or to be a church pastor. But we are all workers with God having an individual, essential, and important part to play.

1Cor. 12:4 NIV.

We all respond to a compliment, it makes us feel warm inside. It reminds me of those stamps we used to get at primary school. The teacher would have an array of pretty ones to put in our workbook; a sort of tick for well done!

As we live our Christian life there can be that inner question we ask ourselves… “I wonder how I’m doing and will God give me a tick?” So we think that if we try hard enough our good deeds will compensate for the bad ones. The reality is we will never be good enough! We may strive to live up to that golden rule of loving our neighbour but just one mistake will blot our copybook.

But God’s stamp of approval is still possible because Jesus Christ took the ultimate punishment of our moral failure. He now gives us a righteous standing before God because we reached out in faith… a justification by faith alone!

Now that we have received this free gift of righteousness, God can confirm or seal our new life as a believer. God’s way of signifying this is by giving us the Gift of the Holy Spirit. It is like a divine stamp that God has accepted us.

God is not only confirming that we have become a new person in Christ but He is letting us know that we belong to Him. The Holy Spirit is His legal seal that we are now a member of His family… we have entered the Kingdom of God!

Ref. Isaiah 53:10-11, Gal. 3:11-14, Eph. 1:13-14. NIV.

Sometimes it’s time for a bit of cleaning because things do get a little dirty over time; things still function, but not as well. Just recently I cleaned our house windows inside and out, they were okay… they obviously still let in the light! But if I took an Instagram pic from inside the house the result was a blurry image..

So we are not talking here of a major clean up, but just regular maintenance that makes things function at their best. Like that silver cleaning we do to remove the build up of tarnish on the cutlery and other items. Just a little of that magic cleaner Brasso is all that’s needed to keep things looking at their best.

As we look at our individual Christian lives we have to admit that they do need a little polishing up from time to time. It doesn’t mean we are any less a Christian for the Lord Jesus has already done a perfect work in forgiving us as sinners. We are righteous in Him, but some spiritual housekeeping doesn’t go astray.

As we live our lives in this human body of ours there will be inevitable conflict between the Spirit and our old ways. God has created us to be a new person but old traits die hard and we find our spiritual life in Christ getting somewhat tarnished. Is there a solution to this problem? There most certainly is!

The simple answer is to live by the Spirit and we won’t find ourselves getting stained by those sinful failures of the flesh like anger, impatience and jealousy. When we live by the Spirit it is possible to replace those negative traits with the positive fruit of the Spirit which includes gentlenes, patience and love.

The key is to be daily drawing on the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ and the enabling of the Holy Spirit. Bible reading and fellowship are important, but to stay polished we must be commiting each day to our Saviour and Lord.

Ref. Galations 5:13-26. NIV.

The role of the Holy Spirit in our lives as Christians is important as breathing. Sometimes we are unaware of the Spirit’s functioning but it is never the less essential to our spiritual health. Wind is a symbol of the Holy Spirit and Jesus also spoke of the Spirit as rivers of living water. The Spirit is also expressed as fire. We discover that Jesus and the Holy Spirit are linked together as one.

The early church apparently had a simple understanding on this subject. They referred to the Holy Spirit as the Spirit of Christ and even said the prophets were speaking by the Spirit of Christ. The last Book in the Bible talks about the sevenfold Spirit of God burning as lamps before the throne of God. Our Lord and Saviour is inseperably linked to the flame of the Holy Spirit.

As Jesus comes to us in the Person of the Holy Spirit we enter into the dynamic unity of God. He says to us “On that day you will realize that I am in my Father, and you are in me, and I am in you”. The Spirit of Christ is a reality!

As we live our Christian lives the Spirit of Christ is constantly available, we could even say in a modern day idiom… He is available 24 7. God’s desire is that we might experience the continual and powerful flow of the Spirit of Christ.

Ref. John 14:20-21, Romans 8:9-11. NIV.

Most of us would have said amens at the end of church prayers. Also, it is not uncommon today to hear people saying an “Amen” to express agreement with what the preacher is saying. Historical research indicates that some churches would have actually had an Amen corner. This may have been a particular area of the pews near the pulpit where certain church goers would vocalise their “Amens” in support of the preacher… if you like, a sort of cheer squad!

Amen is not some incidental closure with no meaning. Rather, it is a sincere expression that we believe in what has been said, a conviction that something is true. We are actually giving our support, we are in affect, saying ‘YES’.

The word ‘Amen’ essentially means SO BE IT, in other words we are saying that something is true and we have faith in it. Interestingly, the Jewish meanings are:-
– let it be, -may it come to pass – praise the Lord. When we say ‘Amen’ we are aligning ourselves with what has been said. Our Amen response is to involve our selves with the God of truth. We are partnering with Him in what we want, what we believe or expect to happen. As we say “Amen” we are giving honour to God. It is really a form of praise, a very special expression of our faithfulness.

Let us continue to say our ‘Amens’ with a fresh understanding of their meaning. They are not empty words, but powerful and heard by our heavenly Father and his Son Jesus Christ. Our ‘Amens’ do reach the throne of God!!

Ref. Is. 65:16, Jer.11;5, 2 Cor. 1:20, Rev.3:14, 7:12, 19:4. NIV.
Carroll County Comet The Amen Corner
Tactical Christianity Five Things You May Not Know About Saying Amen

‘.