I am Christ’s Friend

“I no longer call you servants because a servant does not know his masters business.  Instead I call you friends for everything that I have learned from my Father I have made known to you.” John 15:15 (NIV)

For myself, I always thought I could not be a friend of Jesus because

  I was not from the right side of the tracks

  I did not wear the right clothes

  I did not know the right words

  I did not have the right friends

No, I couldn’t be a friend of Jesus because

  I am accused and guilty

  Guilty of lying, cheating, being selfish, hurting others, being cold, full of lust, getting high, drinking and cheating, losing money, stealing money and more

But Jesus says to me, “no longer are you disqualified

  I call you a friend and not a servant because I have introduced you to the family business. It is fully laid out before you. I have talked to you and demonstrated everything my father has taught me.”

  “The family business is about reconciling men to God.  My Father has the resources, power and authority in this business.  He has been committed to it for 6,000 years.”

  I heal to reconcile men to God

  I teach to reconcile men to God

  I enter homes to reconcile men to God

  I get into conversations, tell stories and demonstrate my Father’s love to reconcile men to God.”

“Its important everyone makes this connection. The family business is about reconciling men to God.”

“You are my friends. I have demonstrated that anyone I choose is accepted.

            Anyone I chose has an invitation

            Anyone I chose is invited to live out the family business

            The harvest is plentiful”

I, David have believed men’s lies. The lies that disqualified me. I have an invitation to come into the family business as a friend.  Old and broken, I have an invitation to step in with the disciples and grow into a man who reconciles men to God.

I am a child of God.

John 1:12 Yet to all who received him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God-- (NIV)

Even though I have grown up in the church and I am 56 years old, this is hard to believe in my heart.  There is a war within me that wants things to remain the same.   The darkness within me does not want to be displaced by light.

So I hear all these accusations:  Do you really look like a child of God? Do you think you act like a child of God?  Come on now, really, does a child of God have an imagination like yours? 

Whatever the accusations by believing in his name, I have become a child of God.

When the accusations fly and accurately describe my failures

      I am a child of God

When I do not cooperate with the Holy Spirit

      I am a child of God

When I am full of pride, anger and sharp words

      I am a child of God

When I believe Satan’s image of myself,

unworthy and unwelcome in the presence of God

      I am a child of God

He chose me

He appointed me

He purchased me

      I am a child of God

When I don’t see His kingdom victorious around me

      I am a child of God

“to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God”

Faith is the only requirement.

There is no requirement for scrubbing yourself clean or requirement to live up to a certain standard.

I am a child of God

I am a son of God

As my image of Him changes

from a God who finds joy in punishment

      to a God who has already forgiven

from a God who accuses me of my sin

      to one who want to remind me of the good work is doing in me

from a God who is impatient

      to one who waits for me daily

He waits, seeing the tempter and accuser pull the same speech and whispers out for every new believer.  He waits while those words play over and over.

He wants me to know Him

And know myself through His eyes

To be his ambassador

And use the gifts he has given me

I am a child of God and He is watching me grow.

I am accepted

As I was reading Victory over the Darkness by Neil T. Anderson I encountered a paragraph that took me by surprise. P 84

“The greatest tension in the New Testament is between the indicative (what God has already done and what is already true about us), and the imperative (what remains to be done as we respond to God by faith and obedience in the power of the Holy Spirit).  You have to know and believe positional truth to successfully progress in your sanctification or you are going to try doing for yourself what God has already done for you.

The balance between the indicative and the imperative is about equal in Scripture, but I have not observed that in our churches. Most preaching I have heard focuses on the imperatives.”

I was right there. That was a description of my culture, my motives and my conversations.  I was centered on change, change that comes from learning, discovery, knowledge and understanding.  I was not centered on change that comes from the power of the Holy Spirit. 

WOW, I was really trying to do for myself what God has already done for me.  While this hit me like a lightning, bolt I have not yet seen how far it reaches.

I was trying shape my life into Christ likeness by myself.  It is impossible.  Loving people with my own strength was frustrating.  Trying to conquer the power of the lust of the flesh, lust of the eyes and pride of life was a journey of self-discipline which had to be maintained.  I was tired and I didn’t even know how tired I was.

God had already done it. I was already a child of God, no daily or hourly performance test required.  I was already justified, forgiven and redeemed.  I was already in a place where I could not be condemned and much more. But I did not know it.  I had heard it, but I did not know it. It was not in balance in my life like red blood cells and white ones.  I needed the things God had already done in my life flowing through my life, thoughts and conversation in order to grow.  The things which God has already done for me were missing. I needed them as a foundation.

So I committed to quote this first list of things God has done for me, twice a day.  I also committed to look at each one and try to get a deep grip on it.

I AM ACCEPTED

John 1:12 I am a child of God.

John 15:15 I am Jesus’ chosen friend.

Rom. 5:1 I am holy and acceptable by God (justified).

1 Cor. 3:16 I am united to the Lord and am one in spirit with Him.

1 Cor. 6:19,20 I have been bought with a price, I belong to God.

1 Cor. 12:27 I am a part of Christ’s Body, part of His family.

Eph. 1:1 I am a saint, a holy one.

Eph. 1:5 I have been adopted as God’s child.

Col. 2:10 I am complete in Christ.

Col. 1:14 I have been bought back (redeemed) and forgiven of all my sins.

Reaching for the light

Everyday there is a cycle of light and darkness. Each morning the sun rises and brings new light to the earth.

The leaves, once dark and ominous, are now bright and green.  The stumps and trunks of trees once filled the night as fearful strangers. Now at mid-morning they are friends along the trail.

Without the sun there is no light and no color. When the sun returns, the water, the earth, moss and trees all reflect who they are. Colors of blues and turquoise shine up at me. Colors of green around the trail cry out to me. Overhead and all around the trees reach higher for the sun’s light.

All their structure: the roots, trunk, limbs and leaves reach for one goal. Get me closer to the sun.  Below them death, decay and excrement are carried by the rain to their root systems.  Every fiber of which is ready to absorb, transform and build the next leaf, limb or needle.  Roots, ready to build the next inch of limb or foot of trunk reaching for the sun.

I am like this. I am reaching for the Son.  In His light all the beauty He created in me is reflected in color, love and the creativity He has gifted to me.  And within me there is decay and excrement and as His word washes over me, it carries bits of my weakness away.

Then like the tree, the same water, minerals and enzymes fertilize my growth.  My roots grow deeper to extract every drop of moisture mixed with sin, manure, grief, sorrow and His Word.  Each new glimmer of understanding is carried by the Spirit to transform my life, strengthen my roots and expand my reach for the Son.

Refreshing rain covers all my leaves but the water that transforms dung into fertilizer is far more valuable on the ground.  When the Word is as rain, I am refreshed by its touch.  When it soaks into the foundation of my life I feed for days, weeks and months on its transforming power.