Monday June 4, 2012

Give to God from the first of your income this week. Don’t hold back on God.

 

Read Deuteronomy 21:1-9

 

There is a false & hideous teaching permeating the church at present. That teaching basically asserts that because I am in relationship with God I don’t need to do anything. Certain things like programs, spiritual disciplines, and rebuke are frowned upon. Everything is boiled away in the cauldron of relationship.  Many advocates quote Jesus’ words to the woman caught in adultery (John 8:11). Jesus they say was more interested in relationship and building the woman up because He said to her, ‘Neither do I condemn you.’ What they fail to mention is that His words immediately following were, ‘Go and leave your life of sin!’.

To the man healed at the pool of Bethesda He said a similar thing (John 5:14), ‘...stop sinning or something worse may happen to you’.

 

We must realise that the presence of rules, regulations and boundaries are not antagonistic or detrimental to relationship but rather are beneficial to them. A church might, for example, run a program so that non believers can bring friends and family along so that they have a chance to enter into relationship with God. Spiritual disciplines build our relationship with God. Rebuke, correction, admonition etc are enjoined upon us in Scripture and grow relationships as we push and urge each other towards holiness.

 

God’s laws and boundaries are designed to build effective, holy and fulfilling relationships. The best marriages, for example, have boundaries, structure and disciplines that build up the marriage. God designed His laws to benefit society so that all relationships can blossom and thrive. He wants parents and children to have a deep and meaningful relationship. Disobedience is therefore not tolerated. He wants husbands and wives to relate intimately. God was concerned that husbands with many wives treat each one with love and respect and instigated laws to that effect. God wanted each person in a village or town to live freely without fear of harm so murder was punishable by death and in the case of unsolved murder, atonement was still made for that town.

 

Thus God had laws for the benefit of relationship. Disobedience, not obedience, was the very factor that destroyed these relationships and caused instability in society. Disobedience and apathy caused the family unit, the town and the nation to fall under the punishment and discipline of God and thus brought a negation of relationships.

 

Let no one deceive you with fine sounding yet empty words that do not rely on Christ but rather rely on human wisdom and the teaching of mankind.

 

Prayer:

¥ Pray for the marriage relationships in your congregation. Pray that God would strengthen marriages and bring a depth of fulfilment to husbands and wives through each other. Pray that children and teenagers would grow in obedience and love for their parents.

¥ Pray that the singles in your congregation would be forming deep and intimate relationships with others so that they are supported and equipped to stand the strong temptations that singleness can bring.