GOD IS MY HELP

GOD IS MY HELP     

                “Be anxious for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses all comprehension, shall guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.” Phil 4:6, 7

                One of the hardest lessons to learn in life is in understanding our partnership with God. It is a partnership in which I can do nothing and so He has to do everything. We as Christians should know this. We live, not under the covenant of Moses, which says, “If you do this, then I will do that.”

                No… we live in the covenant that God made with Abraham. (Gal. 3:29) It is a covenant in which God put Abraham to sleep because there was literally no way Abraham could do His part. Hebrews 6:13 explains this to us saying:

                “For when God made the promise to Abraham, since He could swear by no one greater, He swore by Himself. Saying, “I will surely bless you and I will surely multiply you.”

                This is precisely why the covenant of Moses is a temporary covenant while the covenant that God made with Abraham is eternal and irrevocable. The covenant God made with Moses serves as our tutor to lead us to Christ and once we have entered into Christ the Law has finished its work. Galatians Chapter 3 explains this in great detail. And Romans 11 explains why God is still working with Israel in spite of their rejection of Jesus. His patience with Israel is based upon promises previously ratified by God to Abraham which are based upon God’s name and not upon Man’s doing. Therefore as Romans 11:29: “… for the gifts and the calling of God are irrevocable.

                This, of course sounds like I have gotten off on a rabbit trail, but I have not. We live under the eternal covenant that God made with Abraham that came 430 years before the Law was given to Moses It is a partnership in which we can do nothing apart from Christ. Jesus is the covenant Partner and what did Jesus say concerning this partnership?

                “Abide in Me and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, unless it abides in the vine, so neither can you unless you abide in Me. I am the Vine and you are the branches; he who abides in Me and I in him, he bears much fruit; for apart from Me you can do NOTHING.” John 15:4-5.

                Jesus goes on to say in verse 10. “If you keep My commandments you will abide in My love; just as I have kept My Father’s commandments and abide in His love.” John 15:10

                Those who tend to live under the Law will use this as proof that the Ten commandments is still in power under the New Covenant, but rather the opposite is being said here. Jesus is in fact presenting a much higher standard, for the Law says, “Thou shalt not kill.” And so if we refrain from killing anyone we are keeping the Law of Moses, but Jesus is here introducing the New Covenant, the one He offered to Abraham by putting him to sleep, for indeed when it comes to loving with a true godly love, we are helpless.

                So Jesus goes on to say in John 15:12: “This is My commandment that you love one another just as I have loved you.” And in John 13:34 Jesus says, “A new commandment I will give to you that you love one another even as I have loved you, that you love one another.”

                This is the new Commandment that goes infinitely beyond our reach and it is the covenant in which we can do nothing without Christ. God’s love is hopelessly beyond our reach. Even our best love is somehow tainted with impure motives and weakness. .. Even selfishness. So if we are going to Keep Jesus’ commandments, we are going to have to partner with Him as if He has put us to sleep and sworn by His own name and that is exactly how it is.

                Commandment keepers tend to see themselves as superior somehow because they are the remnant people of God who keep His Commandments (meaning the Law of Moses) and yet they are selling themselves infinitely short of that which only Christ can do in and through us.

                So then, let us apply this to our opening text:

                “Be anxious for nothing, but in everything by prayers and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God which surpasses all comprehension shall guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.” Phil. 4:6, 7

                “For by grace you have been saved through faith and that not of yourselves. It is the gift of God, not as a result of works, that no one should boast. For we are His workmanship created in Christ Jesus for good works which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them.” Ephesians 2:8-10

                Notice that in this passage Paul says that it is not of works and then he turns right around and says that we were created in Christ Jesus for good works. Which way is it Paul? No see, we don’t understand. First He says that it is not of works, meaning that it is not of the works of the Law. But then he says that we have been created for good works that were prepared beforehand that we should walk in them. These then are not the works of the Law which we do in the flesh, but the works of grace that are carried out by God as we trust Him as the sleeping partners in an Abrahamic covenant.

                Do you want to fulfill your destiny? Then learn to live by divine appointment. Learn to do nothing without Christ and He will cause you to fulfill the thing that He had planned for you beforehand that you should walk in it.

                If we can remember that God put Abraham to sleep and then swore by Himself… and if we can apply this to our situations in life, we likewise live under that irrevocable covenant in which we can do nothing unless Jesus dwells in us. It is He that does the works, not us.

                This week at our worship practice Christie came in and I overheard her saying to Abishai something about not knowing how she would do since she was battling a crippling migraine. I was stowing my bass case at the time, and when I walked by her, I suddenly asked, “Can I pray? She said “yes” and I put my hand on her shoulder and prayed saying: Lord I pray that as Christie sings You will relieve her headache and set her free to worship You.” and then I went over and picked up my bass.  So we started to practice our first song and we hadn’t even gotten halfway through the song when Christie stopped us and said, “Guess what. My migraine is completely and totally gone. I have been sick with this thing for two days and it is completely gone.”

                Now I could hang out my shingle and advertise saying:  “Rick Lange… Faith healer.” But in fact I had nothing to do with it. I hadn’t planned it. I didn’t take authority over her headache. In fact I was momentarily filled with an emotion not my own and my prayer was more like crying than anything. I lasted what? 15 seconds and then I went about my business. It was a divine appointment and I just happened to be the one walking by and God used me to speak out what He wanted to do. I was the sleeping partner in this for indeed I cannot heal anyone ever.

                Bonnie and I have been on this process of learning how to live by divine appointment. We have learned not to have an agenda of doing for God or “working for the Lord.” We are His sleeping partners so to speak and as such God told us to move to Tennessee, He directed us to the church we now attend. HE plugged me into the worship team… He plugged me into being a Sunday school teacher for the summer. He pugged me into the church food distribution to the poor… He plugged me into a partnership with Abishai in which we are recording and producing music. In all of these things I was invited and I simply said yes. I am the sleeping partner in this marvelous covenant in which far more gets done than I could ever have planned.

                AS far as Christie’s migraine is concerned; I had nothing to do with it… but I know this, when it is a divine appointment things happen. We can run around all over the place praying for people and we don’t often see results, but when it happens quite apart from our planning… when God does it, then we are wonderfully surprised by what He does.

                Jesus lived by divine appointment. How many people were at the pool that day? And yet only one of them got healed. At other times He healed entire villages. Jesus did only those things that He saw the Father doing. He was not on His own agenda. In a very real sense He was the sleeping partner. Without His Father He could do nothing and so He did only what He saw the Father doing and said only what He heard the Father saying.

                We often get stressed out in life because we forget that we are the sleeping partner. We start working FOR God instead of trusting in His work in and through us. Our part is to say “Yes.” His part is to do the work.

                We may tend to think that this is some kind of “pie in the sky” fantasy of faith and yet Bonnie and I are discovering that it is the only way to get important things done. In this partnership with God we don’t sit on the couch eating chips and watching TV. Being the sleeping partner doesn’t mean that we are complacent, or lazy or careless. Hebrews 11 shows us the people in God’s faith hall of fame. They were the people who by faith in God changed the world. They were the history makers.

               

                By faith Abel… by faith Enoch… by faith Noah… by faith Abraham… Sarah… Isaac… Jacob… Moses… Rahab… Gideon… Barak… Samson… Jepthah… David and Samuel. They were all called and used of God to do something they could not do without Him.

                Likewise we have been called into a covenant that is entered into by death. We enter by His death and we come alive by His resurrection and we are empowered by His Spirit and we live by His Word. We are the sleeping partner that can do nothing without Christ.

                It is easy for us to get pulled out of that covenant… that secret place of the Most High. We are drawn out through circumstances to try to do in the flesh something that God never intended us to do. We are tempted to do “Something” when Jesus has said we can do “Nothing.” We step out into the cold wind of works, where we suddenly find ourselves fighting for our lives. We look away from Jesus and we begin to sink. We become overwhelmed by life situations, because we allow them to pull us out of covenant. WE look to our own flesh to get us out of it and we are suddenly overwhelmed.

                We need to remember that we are the sleeping partners in a covenant that is made possible by the infinite power and love of God. He doesn’t need working partners and so He put us to sleep and He swore by His own name and again I have to say it:

                “For all who are being led by the Spirit of God, these are the sons of God. For you have not received a spirit of slavery leading to fear again, but you have received a spirit of adoption as sons by which we cry out, “Abba Father.” The Spirit Himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God and if children, heirs also, heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ if indeed we suffer with Him in order that we may also be glorified with Him.” Romans 8:14-17

                Paul said in 1 Cor. 15:31 “I die daily.” In other words his day began with him realizing that he was the sleeping partner in this covenant of grace. And it wasn’t easy street. Paul worked tirelessly, went through imprisonment and beatings and stoning, and shipwrecks and eventually beheading… but in all of these things he was the sleeping partner and he knew that he could not have done any of it without Christ. And I guess this is why he was so adamantly opposed to the covenant of Law. The covenant of Law says that if you do this then God will do that, but we are not in that covenant. We are instead the sleeping partners in a covenant in which we routinely do the impossible. We love with the love of God. We heal by the power of God. We do all things through Christ which strengthens us. We take no credit because we know. We are the sleeping partners and God is working through us according to His great power and not ours.