The Plumbline

Those who belong to Christ Jesus have nailed the passions and desires of their sinful nature to his cross and crucified them there. Since we are living by the Spirit, let us follow the Spirit’s leading in every part of our lives. (Galatians 5:24-25) Hey, does your cross have a bunch of holes where the nails have been driven time and time again? I know I have a seen God drive a nail home when he convicts me of something he wants to change in my life, then after a while, there I am with the hammer trying to remove that nail! Nail and hammer in hand, I go about doing the very thing God asked me to allow him to nail to the cross! It is likely we all struggle with that from time to time, all because we want to control the course of our lives just a bit too much. The 'control thing' is really a combo of our pride and our lusts getting the best of us. We want what God says we should not have, then we struggle with the desire to possess it, before long giving into that desire instead o...

We must keep our eyes on Jesus, who leads us and makes our faith complete. He endured the shame of being nailed to a cross, because he knew that later on he would be glad he did. Now he is seated at the right side of God’s throne! (Hebrews 12:2) The twelfth chapter of Hebrews begins with the words, "...we must rid ourselves of everything that slows us down..."  Do you have things which slow you down in life? We sometimes have very "regular" things in life which slow us down - sometimes external to us, like another person, sometimes kind of internal, like raw emotions or fear. There is nothing which quite slows us down as much as the weight of sin in our lives, though. No person or other weight quite exerts the same pressure sin does - pulling us down, loading us with guilt, and holding us in miry links to our past. Maybe this is why the rest of the verse we started with today goes on to say, "...especially the sin that just won't let go..." Sin has a w...

You were dead because of your sins and because your sinful nature was not yet cut away. Then God made you alive with Christ, for he forgave all our sins. He canceled the record of the charges against us and took it away by nailing it to the cross. In this way, he disarmed the spiritual rulers and authorities. He shamed them publicly by his victory over them on the cross. (Colossians 2:13-15) We might use a phrase such as, "I am dead to this world", at the end of a busy day. We have hurried here and there, stood way longer than we anticipated, waited longer than we wanted, got involved in tasks we did not plan, and we are bordering on sheer exhaustion. To 'be dead to this world' has a different meaning in a spiritual sense, though. It means we actually take on 'new life'. The first way of thinking says we are about to get some rest for our weary bodies, while the second one anticipates a 'rest' of a whole different kind! Paul is speaking with the chur...

But the fact is, it was our pains he carried—our disfigurements, all the things wrong with us. We thought he brought it on himself, that God was punishing him for his own failures. But it was our sins that did that to him, that ripped and tore and crushed him—our sins! He took the punishment, and that made us whole. Through his bruises we get healed. We’re all like sheep who’ve wandered off and gotten lost. We’ve all done our own thing, gone our own way. And God has piled all our sins, everything we’ve done wrong, on him, on him. (Isaiah 53:4-6) As my pastor read this passage from the NIV yesterday, I was reading along in The Message translation and these words just popped out with such meaning. Read them a couple of times, if you will, and see if God doesn't just speak a bit louder to you about the tremendous gift of grace he has given each of us through the finished work of his Son, Jesus. A couple of things really spoke to me: - It was OUR pains he CARRIED. If the cross wasn...

Wash yourselves and be clean! Get your sins out of my sight. Give up your evil ways. Learn to do good. Seek justice. Help the oppressed. Defend the cause of orphans. Fight for the rights of widows.  “Come now, let’s settle this,” says the Lord. “Though your sins are like scarlet, I will make them as white as snow. Though they are red like crimson, I will make them as white as wool. (Isaiah 1:16-18) When something is settled, there is no further discussion. It is fixed - established - no change is forthcoming. The condition of relationship is to come - to lay down one's own agenda and to submit oneself to obedience to the Lord's will. We can try to wash ourselves up and be clean all on our own, but we still gonna stink! Until we are willing to give up and learn at his feet, we are still gonna stink. We can do all manner of good works, but we still gonna stink. Until we come, lay down our sins, and sit at the foot of the cros...

Stop for a moment to consider the distance between here and there. If you are considering the distance between your forefinger and your nose, it is likely not further away than the end of your arm! If you are considering the distance between your home and a small island in the Pacific the distance may be two or three thousand miles. Consider the distance to Mars and your journey just got beyond what you have ever traveled before. Now, consider the distance between your guilt and your sin - it is likely a lot closer than you'd like it to be! When God's grace comes on the scene, though, that guilt and sin go through a separation far greater than any distance we are capable of understanding with our finite minds! Our sin is separated from us as far as the east is from the west. That includes the guilt associated with that sin - if we allow God to separate us from it at the same time he separates us from the sin. Too many times, we hold onto the guilt and go through some form of ...

"Who has a harder fight than he who is striving to overcome himself?" Thomas a Kempis There can be some pretty tough fights we go through in our lifetime, but I think this clergyman of an era gone by hit the nail square on the head! There is no harder fight hand the one we fight with ourselves - especially when there is some 'flaw' we see within ourselves we feel must be overcome. The more we strive to overcome it, the harder the battle gets, and the worse we feel when we find ourselves not 'doing well' in the fight. We are invited to live life to the fullest - in Christ Jesus. Attempting to find a 'full life' outside of that relationship is impossible and can yield some of the toughest fights we will ever have to fight in our lifetime. Our sins are dealt with once and for all. The freedom to live the right way and the desire to live as we should are both provided at the foot of the cross. This is the kind of life you’ve been invited into, the kin...

But he was wounded and bruised for  our  sins. He was beaten that we might have peace; he was lashed—and we were healed!  We— every one of us—have strayed away like sheep!  We,  who left God’s paths to follow our own. Yet God laid on  him  the guilt and sins of every one of us! ( Isaiah 53:5-6   TLB ) It wasn't for HIS sins, but OURS. What kind of a man would take upon himself the penalty of so many without consideration of his own pain? It was for us that he died - no sin of his own - for he was the perfect lamb sacrificed to all. In the Old Testament worship practices given down to Moses by God, God taught of the need for an "atonement sacrifice" - a perfect sacrifice whose shed blood would 'cover over' the imperfect sins of the many. Christ was that "atonement sacrifice" - his blood shed for the imperfect condition of each of our souls. Believe it or not - it is your choice. But...if you do choose to place your trust in that finished work, o...

In times long ago, God gave instruction to Moses to build a "traveling tabernacle", a sign of his presence with Israel as they journeyed through the wilderness and made their way into the Promised Land of Canaan.  The tabernacle was made in a particular manner, with specific instructions for its dimensions, materials for construction, and furnishings.  Each element of the instruction was with specific purpose and if you study this subject a little, you will see how each of the "things" which went into making up the tabernacle actually pointed to some aspect of God's character and/or what he would do through his Son's life given for many.  One such furnishing was the altar - a place of some pretty "gruesome" offerings.  I am kind of glad we don't offer the blood of bulls, turtle doves and the like today in our worship because this killing of the animals and consuming of their bodies on the altar is kind of gross at first glance.  It wouldn'...

Incapable:  Not having the necessary ability, qualifications, or strength to perform.  Some of us might even equate being "incapable" to being incompetent - lacking not only the strength, but also the knowledge behind the needed action.  If you asked me to fix the engine on my car, I'd admit I am incompetent - I don't have the strength to do some of the work anymore, and I sure don't have the knowledge to know how all those pieces fit together so they work exactly as they are designed.  I could go to school to learn the "how to", but it is not until I have practiced it a while that I develop some of the skill to actually say I am "good" at the task.  Yet something is still lacking  in the picture - I may know how it is supposed to all work, but I still am not as familiar with the engine as is the creator of the engine!  The creator has the most intimate knowledge because he envisioned it before it took form, designing each "mov...

Have you ever felt "stifled"?  You know what I mean - the feeling like every step you want to take is just held back, like every dream is crushed, or there is some force just standing in the way of you moving forward.  The feeling might be one of the walls "closing in" around you - like you just can feel the very space you occupy on this earth as getting smaller and smaller!  In the most literal sense, being stifled means something similar to being choked out, much like we'd "choke out" a campfire.  You smother it with something like dirt long enough and in sufficient quantities until it just has no way of receiving the very thing it needs to continue on - oxygen!  As a result, it is "choked out" - smothered or stifled. For my part, I am going to boast about nothing but the Cross of our Master, Jesus Christ. Because of that Cross, I have been crucified in relation to the world, set free from the stifling atmosphere of pleasing others and fi...