I've moved!

Dear Readers and Friends,

I have migrated this blog to a new host. It's still called Finding Life and its new address is matthew1039.wordpress.com. In part, this move was because I wanted a new web address, and in part because I want to try out WordPress. I won't be deleting this blog, but I won't be posting here anymore. Do direct your "Favorites" tab to the new address. We hope that you keep reading Finding Life.

Thank-you and God bless!

He remains faithful

¹¹ The saying is trustworthy, for:

            If we have died with him, we will also live with him;

             ¹² if we endure, we will also reign with him;

            if we deny him, he also will deny us;

             ¹³ if we are faithless, he remains faithful—

            

for he cannot deny himself.

2 Timothy 2:11-13

If we persevere to the end Jesus promises us a new life with Him, sharing in His authority and enjoying Him forever (Revelation 2:9-11). If we are to reject Him, God allows us to remain in that spirit of defiance and resistance to His glory, and we will be judged for it (Matthew 11:20-22). Yet, no matter how unfaithful we are, God remains the same. He ever holds out the promise of redemption to us, for his nature is perpetual and changes not. For that reason, God in His covenant with Abraham, swore by Himself, for there was nothing greater that He could swear by (Genesis 22:15-18, Hebrews 6:13-15). God is unchanging: He is still the same God of both the Old and New Testaments, a God of love and a God of judgment.

May we all remember that God is faithful to keep His chosen ones till the final judgment (1 Thessalonians 5:23-24), and make every effort to be chosen by God.

A miraculous catch of fish

And when he had finished speaking, he said to Simon, “Put out into the deep and let down your nets for a catch.” And Simon answered, “Master, we toiled all night and took nothing! But at your word I will let down the nets.” And when they had done this, they enclosed a large number of fish, and their nets were breaking. They signaled to their partners in the other boat to come and help them. And they came and filled both the boats, so that they began to sink. But when Simon Peter saw it, he fell down at Jesus' knees, saying, “Depart from me, for I am a sinful man, O Lord.” For he and all who were with him were astonished at the catch of fish that they had taken, and so also were James and John, sons of Zebedee, who were partners with Simon. And Jesus said to Simon, “Do not be afraid; from now on you will be catching men.” And when they had brought their boats to land, they left everything and followed him.

Luke 5:4-11

I wanted to blog on this passage last week when, coincidentally, I taught on it in Sunday School and Pastor Dick preached on it as well. What stood out to me was Peter's response to this miracle. He saw something amazing and knew that God was working through Jesus, hence, his sudden awareness of his sin and unworthiness. He went from tired, grudging obedience to being awestruck. Did he know that Jesus was God? Maybe not yet, but there was certainly something about Jesus that commanded more than just his attention. For there and then, Peter, James and John left their family, their livelihoods as fishermen, and followed Jesus.

 

Does Jesus command your heart and will as He did theirs? Are you willing to call Jesus Lord, and LORD? When did God come into your life, when you knew, unmistakably and irretrievably, that the only thing you could do was follow Him?

To fight for joy

I'm naturally prone to be melancholic and intense. But I've been convicted recently that I am to call myself a child of God, how can I be anything but joyful? How can anything but the deeper, pervading, unshakeable joy of God shine in me? I can be faced with all sorts of things: a frustrating physical injury, an urgent deadline, anything at all, but the joy of the Lord is not to be lost. See what Romans 15:13 says:

May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, so that by the power of the Holy Spirit you may abound in hope.

Because we believe, we have joy, and we have hope! A hope that surpasses this life, a hope that lasts to all eternity.

If you're like me, often glum or depressive, you'll find this a convicting reminder that the joy of the Lord is to be a hallmark of our life: How Shall We Fight For Joy

The Girl In The Orange Dress

When I was in India, I had this startling, heart-wrenching experience.

We were in New Delhi, crossing the road to a McDonalds, when this little girl ran up to us. She couldn't have been more than seven or eight years old, and she was wearing a dirty orange dress with a patch of sweat at the front. She was selling beaded necklaces. "One for 10 rupees." She follows us as we cross the road and counts out eleven necklaces. "Eleven for 100 rupees." (10 rupees is about 30 cents.) We are standing at the road divider and she sticks out her small free arm in front of one of my friends. "Be careful," she says authoritatively.

Something about this girl strikes a chord in my heart. I buy one necklace from her. Later, I wish that I had bought more, but she is gone when we leave the McDonalds. Maybe it is her energy, her spirit, how she spoke. Maybe she reminds me of my little cousins. Anyway, I can't get her out of my mind.

She could be anywhere else. Were she born somewhere else in the world, she could be in school, playing in a playground or in a comfortable home. She could grow up to be a lawyer, a dancer, a sports star,anything she wants. Instead she's smart, pretty, spirited, but running about the streets of Delhi selling necklaces.

That day, I'm lost in thought. I realize that when we serve God, and our service comes out of faith and obedience to Him, He will always call us to serve another person in the course of it. God never calls us to be hermits in a mountain somewhere. He will always call us to help someone, be it physically, emotionally, but most importantly, spiritually. The best thing we can do for anyone is to bring her or him to life-saving faith in Jesus Christ. And perhaps, in the course of it, we will feed the hungry, give medicine to the sick, house the homeless, counsel a depressed person, speak up for the downtrodden, and so on. But the overarching motivation is always to serve God.

I realize that I must never, never live for myself. Whatever I do in the future, I want to live for Jesus. He gave everything for me, that I may give everything for Him and for all He calls me to do. Oh Lord, use me. Remind me to always live for you, and use me to bring love and peace to a world so in need of them.

Storehouses of the snow

 ²²"Have you entered the storehouses of the snow,
   or have you seen the storehouses of the hail,
²³which I have reserved for the time of trouble,
   for the day of battle and war?
²⁴What is the way to the place where the light is distributed,
   or where the east wind is scattered upon the earth?
 ²⁵"Who has cleft a channel for the torrents of rain
   and a way for the thunderbolt,
²⁶to bring rain on a land where no man is,
   on the desert in which there is no man,
²⁷to satisfy the waste and desolate land,
   and to make the ground sprout with grass?
 ²⁸"Has the rain a father,
   or who has begotten the drops of dew?
²⁹From whose womb did the ice come forth,
   and who has given birth to the frost of heaven?
³⁰The waters become hard like stone,
   and the face of the deep is frozen.


Job 38:22-30

Every knee shall bow and every tongue swear allegiance

I'm in Hampi, India now, the site of famous ancient ruins. These ruins are mainly Hindu temples and palaces. To many who come here to "find themselves", the country of India conjures images of the mystic and spiritual enlightenment. But it is a nation that has been bound in spiritual darkness for centuries now. This is a spiritually dark land, and travelling here, I am emboldened by 1 John 4:4: He who is in me is greater than he who is in the world.

When I see these crumbling buildings, I wonder about the thousands who wore out their lives labouring in the grip of the evil one to craft these vast complexes for false Gods. Please pray for India and for missions like Gospel for Asia, which are, by power of God, bringing the Gospel to unreached millions throughout the world. It is a comfort to remember Isaiah 45:23: that one day, every knee shall bow and every tongue swear allegiance to Jesus Christ.