Choose to Believe

“¹⁶For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.” – John 3:16 (ESV)

This morning I was taken to what is likely the most well known verse in God’s Word, John 3:16. It is so well known that it has been seen at all types of public events, sports games, concerts, and countless others. People will have it with them for all to see, but how many are clued into fully the weight of this verse.

In my study this morning, James MacDonald writes, “The key word that unlocks the door to John 3:16 is believe. And believe always includes choice.”

Isn’t that true. We have to choose in order to believe. I was reminded in my study that even being undecided is a choice. Choices are not binary but have additional options that are not really considered. For example, believe or not believe or just walk away from the idea altogether. There are three options, not just the two initially thought. So therefore, being undecided is a choice just as the other two.

Too often, we find something to carry as a badge. Whether a verse, a quote, a poem, a way of doing things, or any number of others. We have chosen to carry the badge and in a lot of cases, we believe in our heads that it is quite the good thing. And where that badge may be powerful in your head and impacts other when seen, is it in your heart as well as your head.

I choose God’s Love. I have seen in my study the value and impact of God’s Love. I have taken it to the point where it is firmly implanted in my head. I have believed in my head. Where that is a great place to start, I have to be honest with myself in applying my belief to my heart as well. I have to connect the two. I have to take the intellectual belief and infuse emotional belief to gain the full value and impact of God’s Love.

I am not saying that I have not done so. What I am saying is that I have to be conscious of my belief. I have to choose to connect my head and my heart through belief in God’s Love. I have to know that whether situations are good or hard, leaning on God’s Love is that which will get me through.

Let’s go back to John 3:16. Look closely at this verse. See that God’s Love is demonstrated in what He did for you and me. He gave His Son to die so we would not have to. Jesus, His only Son. And why did He send Jesus, because He loves us. He chooses to love us. He chose to save us from our sin. The sin that we brought upon ourselves and have no escape on our own. He chose to afford us eternal life with Him. God’s Love is for us and I choose to believe.

Where is your belief? Do you choose belief, unbelief, or are you walking away? What if you made the choice to believe with both your head and your heart to know that you can lean on God’s Love regardless of the situations you find yourself in?

Choose God’s Love

“⁸Anyone who does not love does not know God, because God is love.” – 1 John 4:8 (ESV)

If God is love, then how could He allow difficult things to happen to us. Well, that is a good question and one that burns up the airwaves when there is a tragedy. I am sure that everyone has thought it at some point, I know that I have which now sends me right to His word to understand.

Here’s the thing, James MacDonald says it well, “God’s love is a protecting love, but it’s not a preventing love. God doesn’t always keep hard things from happening. Here’s why. He has a higher purpose for our pain:” He is right. There is a purpose in God’s plan for us and He will stop at nothing to have that purpose fulfilled by us.

MacDonald lists three reasons God allows the hard things, to humble us, to restore us, and to refine us. We are God’s precious creation and He demonstrates it through His hard love for us.

God is in it for the relationship He has with us. That relationship is not there if/when we are not close to Him. Yes, He is still our Heavenly Father, but He wants to interact with us and not just be there. Sometimes He allows things to happen to bring us back to Him. When those hard things happen He is getting our attention and we should look straight at Him and let Him know that we hear Him and need His guidance and love in dealing with it. And then we should be asking Him about what else He wants from us.

Hard things happen to us and it is just that, hard and I am sorry for the difficulty we experience. I am human and will continue to be hurt when these things occur. In dealing with it, we have to remember to turn to God and jump in His loving arms. It is okay and expected to grieve. It is okay and expected to feel hurt. And, it is also expected that we turn to Him and allow Him to show us the way through it. Was He bringing us back to Him after some time of our drift away or was He strengthening our faith in Him to resolve.

God is love and that is it. He spreads that love to us in different ways. It may be comfort and guidance or it could be through restoration and refinement. Either way God loves us and wants the best for us. I choose God’s love.

What is your view of God’s love? Do you expect all comfort and grace? What if you see God’s love as His strengthening you in your relationship with Him through comfort and guidance and restoration and refinement?

But What About Those Who Pass From This World

God’s people and the promised land were prophesied to be united. But what about those who pass from this world before that realization. Well, they will, with the New Earth.

The question today in my study is “Where and When will our deliverance come?”. That is such a great question for us to consider, knowing that we are not long in this world. Where I am looking forward to Christ coming again, the reality is that I do not know when He returns and I could pass from this world before then. So the selfish man in me wonders if and when will I get to experience it. Have I been left out? NO.

I have to remember that this earth is just a temporary location for me. Whether I am here at the second coming of Christ or I pass from here beforehand, I am/will be waiting. I have not been forgotten. As a child of God, my destiny is the promised land.

The Israelite people were ushered into the promised land with Joshua leading them after years in the wilderness waiting. Where looking at this would seem that the promised land is or was already given over to God’s people, that was only the land of this earth before the restoration that comes with resurrection and redemption.

“¹⁷For behold, I create new heavens and a new earth, and the former things shall not be remembered or come into mind. ¹⁸But be glad and rejoice forever in that which I create; for behold, I create Jerusalem to be a joy, and her people to be a gladness.” – Isaiah 65:17-18 (ESV)

At resurrection and the conclusion of the final battle, the New Heaven will come down to the New Earth and be opened for God’s people to enter. This is the promised land for us all and the fulfilled promise of God. We will be delivered into the promised land at the restoration of the Earth into the New Earth which will be as God created in the beginning.

What is your thought on your inheritance of the promised land? Do you feel as though you will miss or have missed out? What if you look to the New Earth instead, and know that this is the promise of God and we all will be restored into the restored New Earth as promised?

The Righteous Will be Separated

Yes, you read that right. When the time comes, the righteous will be separated out from the evil and the evil will be tossed to the fire.

“⁴⁹So it will be at the end of the age. The angels will come out and separate the evil from the righteous ⁵⁰and throw them into the fiery furnace. In that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.” – Matthew 13:49-50 (ESV)

We will ALL be gathered up when the time comes. We will be separated into the righteous and the evil. And then the evil will be cast into fires of hell. It seems so definitive, and it is. It seems so cold and callous, well, what did you expect based on the cold and callous actions taken by the evil. It seems so divisive and unfair, well, the world is not fair and there is a stark difference in the righteous and the evil. It seems not compassionate and without love, well, the LORD loves and gives every opportunity to the evil to accept Him into their heart and turn to Him and they still turn away.

I know there are those who look at the followers of Christ and their actions and claim there is no love there. To them I say, WRONG. Love takes many forms and one of those forms is truth. Truth is hard. When we are confronted with truth, it tends to sting, even for those following Christ. The truth of the matter is there is a difference in the righteous and the evil. The evil do not get to inherit the Kingdom of God where the righteous are heirs with Jesus. The evil will be separated from the righteous and be cast out where the righteous will find rest in the LORD.

The righteous have accepted Christ as their savior and thanks to the love of the LORD, they do the work assigned. The righteous do not do the work to get something and be rewarded, they do it out of love for the LORD and know that it is just a small payment for the sacrifice of Jesus taking on their sin. The work is not repayment, only a small payment toward repayment. The righteous know that there is not enough payment to repay the LORD, yet the payment is made anyway and the righteous will continue with the payments until the time is come.

By contrast, the evil pay and expect to receive. They do a little work to get something out of it, not to repay, but to buy. They feel as though they are owed and when it does not come, they are return to the evil. As they return, they lash out and call out the LORD for somehow being less than loving and against them when in reality it is they who are less than loving and against the LORD.

This is the reason for the separation of the evil from the righteous. The righteous are seeking to repay the debt owed (even as it cannot be repaid) and the evil are looking to pay for acceptance. The evil cannot buy the LORD (even as they try) and the righteous continue to receive from the LORD in the form of love, grace, and the Kingdom of God.

What is your view of the righteous and the evil? Are you somehow expectant that all are equal and will receive the same regardless of which they are? What if you understood that there is a significant difference and accept the love of the LORD and seek to repay Him as opposed to paying Him?

Saved by Grace Thanks to God’s Mercy

Each morning I approach God’s Word with an open mind and heart for Him to lead me in what it is He would have me. I only have a plan on where I will start and that is I continue with a word study from the concordance of my ESV Bible. Right now I am studying the word “mercy” and go one or two verses at a time in the day. The only expectation I have is that I will be impacted in some way by the word as used and meant in the verse, or from the passage as a whole. I do not force the study on a particular topic. This morning is no different as move to Ephesians and Paul’s passage titled “By Grace Through Faith”.

“⁴But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us,” — Ephesians 2:4 (ESV)

Above is the verse that started my study this morning. Simple enough. God is rich in mercy and love for us. But when I look only at the verse, I am still confused and need more. So, I read on, starting at the beginning of the passage and find why Paul installs this verse into his letter.

“¹And you were dead in the trespasses and sins ²in which you once walked, following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience— ³among whom we all once lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the body and the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, like the rest of mankind.” — Ephesians 2:1-3 (ESV)

Paul writes of the mercy and love of God to let know that we are in need of it. The Ephesians and we were enslaved by the evil one. We were following the destructive path. “But God” provided the way out through His mercy and love.

“⁵even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved— ⁶and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, ⁷so that in the coming ages he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus.” — Ephesians 2:5-7 (ESV)

When I read past verse four I find that there is so much more thanks to God’s mercy. I have been not only given mercy and love, but I have also been given grace and salvation and the eternal reward of heavenly citizenship.

Putting it all together gives me the context of just what has been done for me and what my reward is. I was dead in sin, “But God” had mercy on me and loved me, regardless of my past. Thanks to that mercy, God offered me salvation through His grace free of charge and all I have to do is continue to have faith in Him.

I am truly blessed to have Christ with whom I can trust. He provides for me thanks to His immeasurable mercy, love, and grace. Thank you LORD!

What are you looking at to be saved? Are you working to somehow earn salvation? What if you just accepted that God’s mercy, love, and grace are enough and all you have to do is put your faith in Him?