Month: November 2024

For it was fitting for Him, for whom are all things and by whom are all things, in bringing many
sons to glory, to make the captain of their salvation perfect through sufferings.
Hebrews 2:10

For those who are not into comic books, there are lots of superheroes out there. There is Captain America, but there are also Captain Britain, Captain Canuc, and Captain Universe. You can even find Captain Atom, Captain Comet, Captain Video, and Captain Marvel (a.k.a. Shazam). Calvin and Hobbs also had their own superhero (Captain Napalm). Now we add to the list one more: The Captain of Salvation. The only difference between this one and all the others is that this superhero is real and the rest are pretend.

The Lord Jesus is a superhero in His own right. He conquered the power of sin and death and hell by dying and then rising again from the dead. He defeated His arch villain, Lucifer, crushing his demonic army. The Captain of Salvation proclaimed His power before beginning His first adventure: “The Spirit of the LORD is upon Me, Because He has anointed Me To preach the gospel to the poor; He has sent Me to heal the brokenhearted, To proclaim liberty to the captives And recovery of sight to the blind, To set at liberty those who are oppressed” (Luke 4:18).  

No one else can do what the Savior has already done “Nor is there salvation in any other, for there is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved” (Acts 4:12). “Much more then, having now been justified by His blood, we shall be saved from wrath through Him. For if when we were enemies we were reconciled to God through the death of His Son, much more, having been reconciled, we shall be saved by His life.” (Romans 5:9,10).

Who is this guy who single-handedly rescues people from the penalty of sin? He is the Captain of Salvation!

July 22

And so we have the prophetic word confirmed, which you do well to heed as
a light that shines in a dark place, until the day dawns and the morning star rises in your hearts.
2 Peter 1:19

The rain forest is big on bugs. Actually, it’s big on big bugs. I have an insect collection from the jungle of Ecuador, and several of the specimens are over three inches long. However, the granddaddy of them all is the South American Cave spider that measures 16 inches from the end of its feelers to its back legs.

The critter is terrible to behold. It looks more like a space alien than something you’d find on Planet Earth. The spider itself with its long legs is about six inches long, but it has long antennae that help it to find its prey in total darkness. This specialized arachnid is totally blind, but then, it eats albino crickets that are also sightless. When an insect trips one of the feelers, the spider springs on it and catches it in big, bear-trap-like claws that contain long, sharp spines.

Normal people never see this species of spider because it is only found far from civilization and veiled in thick darkness. They won’t come to you, so you need to go down into a cave to find them and bring with you a light that shines in a dark place. Most of these cave-dwellers go through their whole lives without ever encountering light, because they are creatures of complete darkness.

The Savior came to a world that was enveloped in spiritual blackness. When the baby Jesus was born, the glory of the LORD turned the darkness of midnight into the brightness of noonday. The ministry of the Lord healed those who were physically blind and enlightened those who spiritually were unable to see. Christ was the Light that Shines in a Dark Place, and many demanded that He die because they did not want His light to reveal the blackness of their souls. “And this is the condemnation, that the light has come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil” (John 3:19).

August 31 

The next day John saw Jesus coming toward him, and said,
“Behold! The Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world!”
John 1:29*

Levitical law allowed that if any of the common people sinned unintentionally, he would be guilty. However, atonement could be made by sacrificing a spotless lamb as a sin offering. The sinner would lay his hand on the head of the animal and confess his sin before slaying it. He would then hand it over to the priest to be burnt outside the community. Since most families rarely had more than two or three dozen sheep, the economic impact of such an offering would be clearly felt.

The legal requirements varied according to who made the offering. A priest had to provide a young bull, a ruler a male goat. The very poor could substitute a pair of pigeons as their sacrifice. In every case, two principles always applied, no matter who brought the offering:

1. A sin offering without imperfections was necessary for all.
2. The cost would be significant for those who offered it.

If God was to provide the sin offering for fallen man, what could He give that would fulfill the law? He is not poor. He owns the universe. He could offer a million spotless lambs. If that were not enough, He could create an additional million sheep in an instant and never suffer loss.

No, the only thing that could serve as God’s lamb was His own spotless Son. The expense was so great that the banks of heaven would have broken if His life could indeed have been taken from them. The sacrifice was so sinless that it is superfluous to think that a sin offering would ever need to be made again.

When we behold Thee, Lamb of God,
Beneath our sin’s tremendous load;
Expiring on the accursed tree,
How great our guilt, with grief we see.

– Mary Walker (1878)

*see also John 1:36

June 30

Masters, give your bondservants what is just and
fair, knowing that you also have a Master in heaven.
Colossians 4:1

In this day and age, it is hard to imagine that there were ever slave owners who were true Christians. During the time of the Roman Empire, when slaves comprised 75% of the population, it would have been difficult to imagine that society could function without the practice. Christianity changes people, and from there, the civilization changes.

The Apostle Paul advocated for slaves, because many of the early believers were considered the property of others. He appealed to their Masters that they were Christ’s slaves and had a Master in Heaven. They needed to show mercy and respect to the men and women who served them, if they believed that Christ would give them mercy and forgiveness.

The applications of these verses are still valid today even though the socioeconomic structure of our culture is very different. In the modern church, there are business owners and administrators who still boss people around and can make or break those who work for them. They, too, need to be reminded that they have a Boss in Heaven who is also watching them to see how they handle their own human resources.

In the first century, sometimes slaves would be elders in the church and teach their owners spiritual truths. God wanted everyone treated with love and without partiality. The Christian boss in the last-century church needs to realize that God is more interested in just and fair treatment of employees than He is about the business’s bottom line. That employer needs to remember that he also has a Master in Heaven.

 February 1

To demonstrate at the present time His righteousness, that He
might be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus.
Romans 3:26

Many years ago, my family lived in a small Quichua village in Ecuador, South America. Our house was separated from a Christian school by a short path that ran about 500 feet through the jungle. I’d make the trip from home to school several times a day, and even our two year old son, Stephen, would often go back and forth.

Once as I was studying in my office, I heard my son give off a horrifying scream. I instantly knew what was happening. Ants!!

I ran as fast as I could and saw him standing in a swarm of army ants. I picked him up and immediately started ripping off his clothes as I ran back to the house. As soon as I touched my son, the ants started biting me too, but that didn’t matter. Those ants could kill a toddler, but I planned on hurting them more than they hurt me. We bathed my boy in cold water, and then he cried himself to sleep. That was good; he was safe.

The next day, I went out with a five-gallon can of gasoline and poured the liquid down every ant hill I could find around our house. When I lit one hill, I could hear the flames moving back and forth under the ground and then a plume of flame would shoot up from another entrance. I could hear the fire working its destruction under my feet. I know that I killed hundreds of thousands, if not millions of ants that day, but I felt no remorse and no pity. Those ants had attacked and could have killed my son! They tried to hurt me! They were not going to hurt my family again. What I did was just.

My justice protected my loved ones, but nearly wiped out the offending creatures. If I had love for the ants and could speak their language, maybe I could have warned them of the fiery judgment that was coming. If I could have saved them from their destruction, I would have been their justifier because I would have given them a way to escape. Of course, that part didn’t happen, but that doesn’t mean that what I did wasn’t just.

The Lord Jesus Christ is both Just and the Justifier of the believers. He not only has judged sin, but has also taken that judgment on Himself, so that His people can escape the wrath of God to come.

 January 31 

John, to the seven churches which are in Asia: Grace to you
and peace from Him who is and who was and who is to come,
and from the seven Spirits who are before His throne.
Revelation 1:4

I heard the angel of the waters saying: “You are righteous,
O Lord,The One who is and who was and who is to be,
Because You have judged these things”
Revelation 16:5

Jesus always was, always is, and always will be. That’s the main idea in these verses, but timelines are a little blurred when it comes to Him who is eternal. Christ existed before time was conceived and will be so even when every clock and calendar have melted away. Therefore, things past and things future are written in the present tense in the book of Revelation.

The Apostle John had a vision of angels pouring out bowls of the wrath of God on planet Earth on the Day of Judgment and heard those same angels praising Him who is to be. This future event is so sure that it’s as if it already happened. It’s a done deal.

In the same way, the return of Christ is an absolute because He said it would happen. “He who testifies to these things says, “Surely I am coming quickly.” Amen. Even so, come, Lord Jesus!” (Revelation 22:20).

The imminent return of Christ was constantly on the minds of the Apostles and the New Testament church. The church in Thessalonica even thought that they blinked and missed it. During each of the ten major persecutions of the Roman Empire, Christians expected the Lord to come at any moment. Then, during the religious wars of the Reformation, and now with Christians tortured and killed for their faith in the Middle East, true believers expect the King of kings to return soon and very soon.

In C.S. Lewis’ The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, there is a dialogue between Aslan and Lucy: “Do not look sad. We shall soon meet again,” says Aslan. “Please, Aslan,” said Lucy, “What do you call soon?” “I call all times soon,” said Aslan; and instantly he vanished away.

The same Jesus Who is to Come is also The One Who is to Be.

 January 30 

John, to the seven churches which are in Asia: Grace to you
and peace …from Him who is and who was and who is to come,
and from the seven Spirits who are before His throne…
Revelation 1:4

Jesus was a historical figure. The fact that He existed and was crucified by Pontius Pilate is almost universally accepted by all serious historians. Flavius Josephus mentioned Him in his Antiquities of the Jews, written for the Emperor Domitian in AD 93, and the effect of Christ’s life and teachings on the Roman Empire and Western Civilization are undeniable. Obviously, Christ is Him Who Was.

Yet there is great debate on exactly who He was. Many refused to believe that the founder of one of world’s biggest religions was God incarnate, the Son of God, King of kings, or the High and Lofty One. So, beginning in the 1700s, scholars have pursued “quests for the historical Jesus.” They discounted the thousands of ancient manuscripts of the New Testament as biased and unreliable, instead embracing any piece of secular commentary to form their opinion. Views of who Jesus really was range from heretic to healer to charismatic teacher, but none of these extra-biblical searches concluded that He was anyone capable of changing the known world or someone worthy to die for.

Herein lies the fallacy of their conclusions. Christ did change the world, and millions of martyrs preferred death to denying their Lord of lords.

Those who reject who Jesus says He was reject Him Who Was. World scholars never undertook quests to find the historical Buddha or historical Muhammad. Why would they? The leaders of these religions also discount the deity of Christ, so they are basically in agreement.

The miraculous and supernatural aspects of the Lord Jesus can never be proved to someone who refuses to believe, and “historical facts” are really myths if they are written by critics of the Jewish Messiah or to counter the Christian faith.

The gospels declare the life and teachings of the Christ, Him Who was. Everyone eventually either accepts Him or rejects Him.

 January 29 

John, to the seven churches which are in Asia: Grace to you
and peace from Him who is and who was and who is to come,
and from the seven Spirits who are before His throne.
Revelation 1:4

In the introduction to the book of Revelation of Jesus Christ, the Apostle John begins with a benediction from Him Who Is, and who was, and who is to come. The blessing came from Jesus Christ who occupies all the aspects of the time-line.

The title “Him Who Is” is significant in two distinct ways. The first, in a very real sense, is a title of God. Yahweh told Moses that His name was “I am” (Exodus 3:14), and Jesus took this title for Himself on a number of occasions (John 8:24 and 58, 9:9, 18:5). Grammatically speaking, the term is given in the first-person singular. The same term, to be referred to in the third person, would be “He is,” or a more literary phrase, “He Who Is.” John starts his book of Revelation focusing on Jesus Christ the Divine.

The name communicates the same message as “I am,” which is that He is eternally present – always existing. His relationship with Abraham was as fresh and contemporary as it was with Moses or the Apostle Paul. Therefore, Christ’s role as HimWho Is means that He is also there for me. The Savior doesn’t grow old or get too busy.

The second aspect of the title is the reality of the Son of God. Jesus is. He exists. He is here and now. He is real.

Too many people today regard Jesus as a myth. There are even theologians who don’t literally believe the miracles and stories of the gospels, so are prone to mix fiction with these facts. Christ takes on the person of a folk hero who is famous and interesting, but not real.

The Lord was not only a historical figure who lived and breathed 2,000 years ago; He is alive and well today. Believers still walk and talk with Him and can testify that He is real. In fact, just today I had a conversation with Him Who Is.

 January 28 

Coming to Him as to a living stone, rejected indeed by men,
but chosen by God and precious.
1 Peter 2:4

How do you tell the difference between a living stone and a non-living stone? Ask it a question and if it doesn’t respond, assume it is dead.

Earth is a living sphere with organisms abounding on every square inch of the planet’s surface. Hundreds of millions of bacteria can live in a drop of water, and scores of dust mites can fit on the head of a pin. Yet, if you add the weight of every whale, elephant, insect, and all of the other living things in the world, it would still be less than 1/1000th of 1% of earth’s total mass.

Most everything around us is inert matter. Rock, sand, water, air, minerals, and magma are most of what this place is made of, and none of it is alive. Heaven is a different story. I imagine life to be everywhere, even in things that are quite dead down here. The old laws of physics and biology won’t apply in the New Jerusalem. After all, the Bible talks about living stones and living water.

Probably 99.999% of all preachers will tell you that the verse above is to be interpreted figuratively, meaning it’s an illustration to help us understand spiritual truth. Old Testament worship centered around the temple in Jerusalem, which was built with massive, beautiful, quarried stones. Under the new covenant, the church is not a building or even an organization, but an organism. Its believers are edified together as living stones on the foundation of Christ, who is the principal Living Stone. The idea is to compare and contrast how things were before Christ died on the cross and the change that happened afterwards. It’s really not supposed to be taken literally.

However, if you want to have a little fun with it, think outside the box. John the Baptist preached that “God is able to raise up children of Abraham from […] stones” (Matthew 3:9). If we’re supposed to take this power of God literally, why can’t I, with my wild imagination, do the same with the verse above. I can see Jesus in heaven somehow manifesting Himself as a real, honest to goodness Living Stone, with the beauty of a ruby, the luster of a diamond, and the intricacies of marble. Wow – that’s no ordinary stone!

 January 27 

“For even the Son of Man did not come to be served,
but to serve, and to give His life a ransom for many.”
Mark 10:45

As long as there have been villains who are willing to kill and hurt innocents for profit, there have been wealthy people willing to pay the bad guys off so that it doesn’t happen. Since there is no standard rate for a kidnapping, the size of the ransom doesn’t depend on the value of the victim as much as the bank account of the one paying the tab.

In 1932, Charles Lindbergh paid $50,000 to the kidnappers of his son, only to discover later that they murdered the boy even before the ransom was paid.

The ransom of Patty Hearst was $6 million in 1974. The enormity of the sum shocked many people, but 22 years later, Hong Kong tycoon Li Ku Shing, paid $134 million for the release of his son.

Historically, these prices are low. When Julius Caesar was 25 years old, he was captured by Sicilian pirates and ransomed for 8,522 pounds of silver. King Richard the Lion-Hearted was released by his captors after 65,000 pounds of silver was paid – the modern equivalent of $3.3 billion. Atahualpa, emperor of the Incan Empire, was strangled by Spanish Conquistadors after 13,000 pounds of gold and 26,000 pounds of silver were paid for his release (roughly $34 billion today).

But none of these compares to the ransom paid by Jesus Christ for the lost human race. There are no deeper pockets than those found on the Creator of the Stars. He could have made a solid gold planet or listed a galaxy on the real estate exchange, but none of these could “ransom mankind” (1 Peter 1:18-19).

In giving the only thing in heaven that couldn’t be recreated, God overpaid for the deliverance of sinful man. Jesus paid it all and for all. He’s not only the ransom for many; He’s the ransom for all (1 Timothy 2:6). Not everyone is saved, because not everyone responds in faith to the salvation that is already paid for. What a pity!

 January 26