Going Once? Going Twice? Gone!

What price tag would you put on a Chinese vase? It’s only good for holding flowers at best right? What about a postage stamp? Not exactly a staple product. In this day and age, you can live without one. What are you willing to pay for a painting? Art is very tricky but how much would you actually cough up? What do you think you are worth?

‘For you were bought with a price…’ (1 Cor 6:20a)

An auction is a process of buying and selling goods by offering them up for bids and taking bids. The person who values a specific item the most (the highest bidder) receives it. All the participants would have assessed the item on sale and would decide how much they are willing to pay for it beforehand. The man who manages bids coming in is known as the auctioneer. Some interesting auction records include an 18^th Century Chinese vase sold for £53.1 million, a Ten Rupee Mahatma Gandhi postage stamp went for a minor $205 000 and a Picasso was sold for just $106.5 million. Picture the auctioneer, after the final bid comes in, saying ‘Going once? Going twice? Gone! Sold; to the gentleman in the electric pink shirt with lime green poker dots! Congratulations sir.’ 

With every experience in your life; every interaction; every event; you are involved in an auction. The item on sale is your life. Ironically, you are the auctioneer and every participant in your life is bidding after having evaluated how much you are worth. You have the hammer and decide each time who wins the sale. People might tell you that you are not worth much. They might say that you will never do anything significant with your life. Maybe some guy put a price tag written ‘sex’ for a girl. Your boss might have tagged you, ‘slave’. You may have been told you are ugly. Oddly, we accept most tags, slam the hammer and sell ourselves for the cheapest bids.

The highest bidder knows more about you than anyone else. He has carefully assessed your worth. He has already proved you are worth so much that He paid the price before you were born and before you even considered His bid. That bidder is God. He is Jesus Christ. He found you worthy of His life. He put in a bid that makes the ridiculous records above look less than pocket change. He did not have to, but he took your well-earned punishment.

Every day, people compete against His bid. It is up to you to decide who you will listen to in that moment. Will you value yourself as Christ values you or the man/woman with the sweet smile? Will you consider yourself worth the life of the Son of God or drunkard? Is your price tag written ‘Perfectly loved by God’ or ‘Good for nothing’? ‘Sinner saved by grace’ or ‘nobody’. If the former is true, then your only response is to “…Honour God in your body and in your spirit, which are God’s” (1 Cor 6:20b). You are not your own. You either belong to people and their perceptions of your value or you are God’s. Remember, when you slam the hammer on yourself, it will be too late. Going once? Going twice?

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Yours in the service of the King,

Yunam

A Little Grace

One of the most powerful gifts and integral parts of Christianity, centered right at the root of the faith is grace. We read of it in the bible, hear sermons on it and are encouraged to practice giving it to others just as the Lord gave and continually gives it to us. The sad thing is that a few of us actually practice it .God saves us regardless of our past sins; regardless of anything that we were before we met Him; and regardless of anything that we might become while in His kingdom. His grace is always offered to us. When I thought of this I was challenged to write this note and to explore how little we practice grace in our Christian community.

We hold on so much to self-growth and our individual relationships with God, never truly getting over the stage where the grace of God stops being only about us as individuals but also becomes about other people, both in the kingdom and out of the kingdom. It is so sad to think that after being set free by God and after such a high debt has been paid on our behalf we in turn cannot find it in us to do the same for our fellow brothers and sisters. We call ourselves Christian and proclaim God’s love and forgiveness through Christ yet we are the first people to speak soul destructing words when a sister falls pregnant, or when a brother starts drinking. We are the first ones to judge when we see a brother going into a club or anything that is a physically visible sin or ‘immoral in society’ so to say. Where is our grace?

The bible teaches, “So watch yourselves, If your brother sins, rebuke him, and if he repents, forgive him.” Luke 17:3. We have to ask these questions: are we really living up to this mandate? Do we encourage each other to rise up and stand firm in the Gospel after our failures or do we judge one another and condemn each other without grace? How many people actually reach out to a fellow brother or sister once they have fallen to sin? Better yet, when seeing that your fellow brother or sister struggles with a certain sin? Instead we sit alone behind our walls saying that we are praising God. Only concerned about our faith and nothing else. The situation is so bad that people hide themselves, struggling with sin due to fear of being judged, fear of what people at church might say and yet we are given this wonderful gift called grace.

But then Law came in, to expand and increase the trespass. But where sin increased and abounded, grace has surpassed it and increased the more and super abounded Romans 5: 20.

Why is it so hard to find a church or Christian environment where people are free to reveal their struggles, free to express and testify to the power and mercy of God through the struggles they have faced in life and/or free to receive God’s forgiveness in what they are still struggling with in their lives without the ooohs! and the aahs! of judgment, awe and pity? When will we finally embrace one another as the true community of God in understanding each other’s transgressions and helping each other to stay strong in the Lord?

Let us always remember that God gave us grace and continues to give us grace. We are not better than anyone but all sinners who have been cleansed by God through Christ. Let us embrace our identity both inside and outside our communities. This is the only way to help each other from falling: practicing grace. It may not be easy to admit that we lack this discipline, but the Lord is faithful and in prayer and in fully admitting our shortfalls he can help us to do what is right. So begin a new walk today, a walk that embraces the grace we are given in the kingdom. Let us start being a shoulder to lean on, someone to talk to, a praying partner, for both our Christian and non- Christian brothers and /or sisters. Think about the good that it could to, after all what do we have to lose? But believe me we have a lot to gain, freedom and unity in the kingdom and all because of practicing just a little grace.

What is more, I consider everything a loss compared to the surpassing greatness of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whose sake I have lost all things. I consider them rubbish, that I may gain Christ. (Philippians 3:8)

Peggy S

CHECK YOUR SHOELACES

“For the wages of sin is death…” Rom 6:23 (NKJ)

What a way to kick things off don’t you think? No nice story or fun fact in this article. Fear might have struck your heart when you read that. Maybe even doubt. These are the kind of scriptures we wish we could avoid, but there it is. I dwell on this point because the same feeling might come over you when you’ve just messed up. Fear, doubt and guilt can take you prisoner in that post-sin moment.

In these times, we tend to forget what follows this verse. You know, the part that says, “… but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord”. We also forget the verse that precedes it which lets us know that we have, “been set free from sin”. Why do we forget? I think our focus is often shifted towards our faults. We do not feel this ‘freedom’, especially if we are trapped in habitual sin. Sin that we do over and over again often makes us feel unworthy; like we have gone too far; like there is no hope. The very cycle of sin puts us into a cycle of guilt, shame, anger and uselessness which is designed, ironically, to keep us in the cycle itself.

But you see; God’s grace is sufficient (2 Cor 12:9) and there is no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus (Rom8:1). He will never leave nor forsake us (Heb 13:5) and nothing can separate us from His Love (Rom 8:38-39). What is the problem then? Our eyes are always on the fall and we ignore what made us trip. It’s like we are in a race (pun intended) with the best running shoes; but our laces are untied. We run; we fall; we pick ourselves up and promise never to fall again; run; fall; and so it goes. It goes on until we just give up and expect to fall. Instead of taking the time to kneel down and check our shoelaces we focus on the pain, the injury, the ground. Check your shoelaces. What is making you trip?

"Woe to the world for temptations to sin! For it is necessary that temptations come, but woe to the one by whom the temptation comes! And if your hand or your foot causes you to sin, cut it off and throw it away. It is better for you to enter life crippled or lame than with two hands or two feet to be thrown into the eternal fire. And if your eye causes you to sin, tear it out and throw it away. It is better for you to enter life with one eye than with two eyes to be thrown into the hell of fire.” (Mat 18:7-9) (ESV)

When we suffer from habitual sins or addictions; the biblical starting point is repentance. This should be followed by a removal of everything that causes us to sin. In the above verse, Christ deliberately uses a hand, a foot and an eye to make His point. (Think about it, he could have said pinkie toe and ponytail). The hand, the foot and the eye are probably our most useful body parts. The illustration is meant to show you that you need to make some painful decisions and remove some important and useful things in your life for the sake of your relationship with God. Addicted to drinking? Get rid of the friends that you can’t say no to. Addicted to sex/masturbation/porn? Maybe it’s time to get a phone with no internet access.

Do not wallow in guilt. Start cutting out and tearing off. Kneel down and tie your shoelaces.

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Yours in Christ,

Yunam

Wired for Love

… God is Love. (1 John 4:8)

Recent studies in neuroscience have shown that when a person is attracted to another, the brain constantly releases a set of chemicals, including pheromones, dopamine, norepinephrine, and serotonin which stimulate the brains pleasure centre and lead to side effects such as an increased heart rate, loss of appetite, an intense feeling of excitement and loss of sleep. In other words, scientifically, it feels good to be in love. No wonder William Shakespeare made a killing with Romeo and Juliet (pun intended). People are wired for love.

There is a deep internal need in us to love and be loved. We were created in the image of God and God is love. But in this fallen world, love has certainly been distorted. We take advice on love from friends, romance novels and television. We let the need for a good dose of those pleasurable chemicals drive us towards the wrong places. We do everything for the image of love and reject the original love.

There is no greater love than to lay down one's life for one's friends. (John 15:13)

How do you measure love? John 15:13 tells us how Jesus measures it. The cross is the place where true, great and full love was demonstrated. The rest of it is an image. This is where God intended for us to get our fix of love and we, in turn are called to give him perfect love (Luke 10:27). He illustrated His love to us by dying on the cross (Rom 5:8) and we are called to illustrate ours to Him by walking in His commandments (John 14:15). This does not mean love between people does not happen, after all, ‘it is not good for a man to be alone’ (Gen 2:8). But even that love, is measured against the sacrifice of Christ (Eph 5:25).

Applying this is the tough part. Accept, supply and expect. First we need to accept the love that God has already given. Even when times seem rough and it seems that God does not love us any more. Remember He has already proven Himself and that His love is perfected and free. Take it. Next, we must be willing to supply this love to others. Actions speak louder than words as they say. Love is more about opposite party than it is about oneself. Be willing to sacrifice. Lastly, we need to expect nothing less from those who say they love us. Their actions must show it. However, if people do not give you perfect love, you should still strive to love them perfectly because God’s love is not conditional, neither should ours be.  

We are wired for love and we often take it and give it in its diluted form. My prayer is that we start going back to the original design.

 

With Love

Yunam