Being shrewd

The parable of the unjust steward always left me scratching my head. But it made sense experiencing the mentality I have when justifying my sins. For the audience is people who loved money, who also justified themselves.

There is a certain mentality when a person justifies themselves, we are unwilling to let go of the wrong things we love, yet we like to pretend we are not wrong. And one way to do this is to go hard against the exact same thing we love so much!

Perhaps this is one reason why Christ told the story the way he did, the protagonist is not a moral man(he cheated his master to prepare for his future in case he got fired, and was called unjust), yet Christ told the story to commend how he used money to make friends(for both him and his master!!! Christ did not commend the unjust aspect though) so that Pharisees learn from him. Perhaps this is also to rattle our self righteous feathers a bit.

He then built up on the theme of money handling and went on to the real issue, the love of money, and he does it graciously and truthfully, pointing to how giving away their idol(money in this case) would benefit them - they would have friends, and also pointing to the fact that they would be able to serve God, no longer being bound to money.

Not surprisingly, the Pharisees justified themselves and rebuked Jesus.

How do we be shrewd? Get to know Christ from the scriptures and imitate him, he is the most shrewd of them all. People were blown away after hearing him speak, or they were convicted because his words pierced their hearts.

Encouragement

Yesterday I went to play ball(basketball) with a friend from university. The original plan was to watch a movie with him over the weekend because his mom was supposed to use the car, but it turns out she didn't need it anymore.

My friend is Muslim, after meeting up with him and catching up for a bit he told me a lot of encouraging things. He says that a lot of bible verses seems pretty awesome to him, such as when Jesus says "Let him who has no sin cast the first stone" and "If God is for us, then who can be against us?", another thing is that he noticed the love and care between Christians, how "people at church seems to have got each other's backs" and how the atmosphere during basketball games(it was at a church, I dunno about this but maybe a lot of those who show up are members of that church) is different, people are relaxed and friendly and polite. That was such an awesome encouragement because when we love our brothers and sisters others notice.

On the way back we got to talk about sin and our need for Christ, I don't think I did a good job because I should've been more focused on Christ, but I hope God will make him see the truth one day that God indeed can become man, and He did it because He loves us. But overall yesterday was a good day.

A reason to love our neighbours - God's marvelous love for ungodly nations.

The Lord, Merciful and Just - Great cause for worship

In Exodus 34, it is written that when Moses heard God proclaiming that He is a God who abounds in mercy, forgiving iniquity, yet also by no means leaving the guilty unpunished, he bowed down and worshiped. These 2 great truths of who God is ought to cause us to worship as well, because they are great gospel truths.

First of all, if God was not merciful, we would all be dead. since Adam and Eve's first act of disobedience, they would've been destroyed for the satisfaction of justice, perhaps God would not even create them in the first place.

But if God was not just, at least the coming age would not be anything good to look forward to, one amazing thing about the new heaven and earth is that all that is wrong and perverse with this world will be made right.

Last but not least, these are the characteristics of God that compelled Him to create, despite knowing Adam and Eve would sin, it is what compelled Him to send Christ, so that both the sinner and God would be justified in reconciliation through the cross, that He would be just in showing mercy to all. This should cause all who believe to marvel and worship.

Numbers 11-14: Bitter pills of unblief

After numbering off the warriors and laying down more laws, the Israelites offer sacrifices to be used in the tabernacle, all seems good until the complaining begins.

People desired to return to Egypt because they were sick of eating mana, so they complained
People did not believe that God would give them the land so they did not obey God to go and fight, but spread fear of their enemies to others and wanted to go back to Egypt.

After their initial disobedience people did not believe that God is no longer giving them the land so they went up to fight and were defeated.

Here's a couple of things I noticed

• The root of disobedience is not believing in God's promises
• The result is not acting when you are supposed to and acting when you are not supposed to act, and an exaggeration of the goodness of the former things (they were slaves in Egypt, yet they remembered supposedly the abundance of fish, meat, melons, onions...)
• Even though sins are forgiven, there is still consequences of sin in this life
• Parallel with Lot's wife who longed after Sodom after leaving
• Parallel with the NT's warning of longing after this world and sin after coming to the knowledge of the gospel
• The remedy for unbelief is belief, holding unto God's promises, parallel with NT is believing the things unseen and are to come is better than what is seen now.
• What do I do after sinning? Is it to accept Lord's forgiveness and consequences or is it to try and make things better myself?

James does not contradict Paul, they did not contradict Jesus

Does James 2:24 and Romans 3:28 seem contradictory? The confusion can come from a misunderstood/badly explained "we are saved by faith alone."

Paul in Romans 3:28 is speaking against a specific type of mentality called works of the law. If a person relies on living up to the standards of the Law to be saved it won't be possible, because sin keeps him from even desiring to do what the Law says, therefore he will fail and lower the standards or give up eventually or live in perpetual misery, so the only option is to trust not in what he can do, but in the works of Christ on his behalf. That is what Paul is saying in Romans 3:28, but James is talking about a different issue, probably something close to cheap grace, where if a person just have a profession of faith he can go to heaven while living like a devil his whole life. James says this type of faith is no good. Even Paul demolishes this type of thinking in the end of Romans 3 when he says we do not demolish the Law through faith but establish the Law instead!

We can see the same mentality as the apostles in Jesus' parable of the good and bad fruit tree, where he says a good tree bears good fruit and a bad tree bears bad fruit, ending in a warning that those who practice lawlessness will not enter heaven(matt 7:15-23). An indication of true faith is that the person produces good fruit (fruit of the spirit),  he loves the law of God and keeps it...

So we see there are 2 ways to be deceived: Trusting in one's ability, and false confidence of salvation with no change of heart. Both are a result of man's own doing. The remedy is justification and regeneration, justification deals with man's guilty legal standing before God with the work Christ did on the cross, regeneration deals with man's sin nature in hating God and his law with the work of the Holy Spirit in making the person a new creature.

The implication/application of these truths are huge. It helps ministers and church leaders to see the congregation and minister to them better(dealing with believers and false converts more accurately), and it helps people in either gaining assurance of salvation or waking them up if they do not have saving faith so that they can have an opportunity to be made right with God.