The word “therefore” appears 24 times in the book of Hebrews (hscb). That means 24 times in Hebrews the author was saying because of that you should ______. Here for example they are saying that because we have a high priest who can sympathize with our weakness we should boldly approach the throne of grace to receive mercy and find grace. I am not sure about you but I often need mercy and grace. The Bible tells me where and how to get it. It tells me that God has it for me because Jesus sympathizes with me. He gets me. He understands me and knows I am weak. He js not sitting there shaking His head at me. No instead, He is there saying it’s ok come to me I’ve got this. Come and rest. Enter my rest I have for you. What a friend, what a brother, what a God.
Therefore I will go to Him and get what He has for me.
I come to you today from the Magic Kingdom; well almost from the Magic Kingdom. I am down in Orlando for work and I am really close to Disney. I am not sure what all the sights are but I think I can see the giant golf ball looking thing. Like I said I am down here for work and will not be able to take in the sights but it is really cool that I am so close to everything. I mean I may not be “in” Disney but I am really close. I guess you could say I am practically in Disney because goodness if I was any closer I would be “in” Disney. Right?
No of course not! I am not in Disney anyone who has been to Disney will tell you that if I am not in the park then I might as well be in Kalamazoo. You can be close but if you are not “in” Disney then you are not “in” Disney. To be near is not the same as being in. I do not see the mouse, the duck, the dwarfs, or anyone else (save some cardboard cutouts in the lobby). Why because I am not “in” Disney. Close is not in no matter how close you are. If I was “in” Disney I would not be talking to you right now. I would be doing Disney things. Now I don’t really care that I am not in Disney because I am here for work and not with my family. But it does serve as an illustration.
God has something for you. He has a plan and a purpose for you to walk in. He has something that He wants for you. Something that has been set up for you. For starters, it is a relationship. Jesus died on a cross taking sin and shame to the grave so you could be in a relationship with Him. That is number 1 and really everything else comes from that thing. There is no getting to the other things until you get to that place. God loves you so much, and He has so much for you but you cannot get it by being close. You cannot get the relationship with Him by being near it no you need to be “in” it. You can go to church and not have. You can read the Bible and not have it. You can hang out with Christians and not have it. Like the old saying says “standing in a garage doesn’t make you a Cadillac.” If you want to have a relationship with God then you need to be “in” relationship with Him. Colossians 3:3 says “for you have died and your life is hidden with Christ in God.” When you come to Christ the old person you were is dead and you get a whole new life.This new life has its place “in” Christ. To have this new life, you just have to ask Jesus for it.
I don’t want to sound all prosperity gospel or anything but now that you have a new life in Christ you are meant to reign. This is probably the hardest part too. I know many Christians (myself included) who either sit or have sat on the sidelines and made themselves second class citizens. We believe we are forgiven and that God has accepted us but we should not receive anything more than that. But that is not what the Bible says. Actually, it says the exact opposite in Romans 5:18 when it says “how much more will those who receive the overflow of grace and the gift of righteousness reign in life through the one man, Jesus Christ.” Before this Paul is talking about how in Adam you sin and die but now in Christ, you reign.
That’s it you were meant to reign! But if you want to do that then you have to walk in it. Like I said I am not in Disney just because I am near it. No, if I want to experience Disney then I need to go be in it. I can sit up in my room for the next 30 years and still never be in Disney, and as Christian, you can sit there so close to victory and never be in it because you won’t leave the room. So please leave the room. Get up and get out. Go to what God has for you. Go into the things He has planned because there is nothing better than what He has for you. There is so much waiting for you. So much planned for you. Whatever it is that God has for you is amazing. He has something so great for you and when you get there you are going to wonder why it took you so long to leave the room.
Last through; God loves you enough to accept you where you are but He also loves you enough to not leave you there.
I was speaking with my wife the other day and I am afraid she is right but don’t tell her that.
If there is anything I am great at then relaxing is the exact opposite. I am terrible at relaxing, taking my time, or going slow. Lionel Richie said he was easy like a Sunday morning well I am difficult to a Monday morning. I don’t know why I am this way. Maybe it is conditioning, maybe I wired this way, or maybe it is a combination of these factors. All I know is when I have things to do I need to do them. The problem is there is always something to do.
There is always a list that needs to be worked on. Always a chore that needs completing. Always an email that needs answering. Always a paper that needs writing. Always a thought that needs sharing. There is always an always. A little secret I learned was that the better you are at getting things done the more things there are that need to get done. People (including yourself) start to expect that level of production out of you. It becomes the norm and it also becomes exhausting. The worst part is even though I know I am running myself ragged I can’t seem to stop. I just keep pushing. To be honest it stinks. There are so many negatives to being so busy. There are health issues, fatigue, frustration, poor decision making, and so on. I know if I am going to fix it I need to work on it but how?
Well, I was thinking about Jesus and something He said. In Matthew 11:28-29 He said “”Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls.” It would seem to me then that if Jesus says I need to come to Him and rest then maybe I need to come to Him and rest. I know that sounds like a copout “Just rest in Jesus,” but it is true. I am not saying I know how to do it but I am going to try. I am going to try and just rest. How does that actually play out?
I think it is going to start with prayer. I think it is going to start with asking God to help me not be so busy, asking Him to give me strength, to give me peace, and to give me His yoke. Jesus goes on to say in verse 30 of that same chapter that His yoke is easy and His burden light. Well, my yoke is hard and my burden heavy so if I can trade I will. I would rather do His bidding than my own. I am not saying that today, tomorrow, or even next week I will have this down, but I am saying it is worth pursuing. Because to be honest I am tired. I am tired of doing so much and feeling like I have done nothing. So maybe I’ll take a minute and just chill.
Is the Bible reliable? Should we trust what it says? Should we even trust that the books that are in it should be? I have heard as I am sure you have different comments on the Bible such as it has been translated so many times we do not know it originally said, it has been edited so many times we cannot know what was originally said, or that the contents were cherry picked. Now, at first, these claims might seem to have some weight and make many people respond with “yeah that’s right”, but it is not right at least not in the way people mean it.
I want to start with by saying these are very good questions. I think they are important questions too. If we are going to base our lives off the teachings in this book called the Bible we should know it’s origins. We should know about the book and how it came to be. Who wrote it, and is it reliable are good and important questions. I know sometimes people ask these questions or make these statements as a way to be difficult but as Paul said in Philippians 1:18 “But what does it matter? The important thing is that in every way, whether from false motives or true, Christ is preached. And because of this I rejoice. Yes, and I will continue to rejoice.” So I am ok with questions as long as it gets the ball rolling.
So one claim laid against the Bible is that we don’t really know what was said right? Well, that is not exactly true. In fact, it is more like the opposite of that. We do not have the original writings (autographs) but we do have copies (manuscripts). Now I am sure at this point you might think great copies but let’s decide what the parameters for judgment are before we rush in. For Homer’s Iliad we do not have the originals but we do have 643 copies and they are about 95% in agreement with each other.That is a pretty good average. The writings of Aristotle, for example, only have about 49 copies, but most people though are ok that those are Aristotle’s words. Pliny and Plato only have 7 copies, so you can see copies are hard to come by. Where does the Bible come in then? Well, there are about 6,000 Greek copies of New Testament and 10,000 Latin copies. With that, they agree about 99% of the time on substantive issues. You might think I through that part to be tricky but we are all about transparency here at Freedom in Truth. There are actually some 200,000 – 300,000 variations and that sounds real bad, but in fairness the vast majority have no meaning. It is things like a scribe did not dot his I’s and so on. For real issues, there is only about a 1% variation. To be even more transparent most Bible translations will even tell you if there is an issue with a text. Look at John 8 for example. This just being a high-level overview we’ll stop there but we can see that what we have in our Bible today is about 99% accurate to what was written originally.
What about it being translated all the time? Good question and we need to address that in two parts. Part one Latin and Greek. The New Testament was written in Greek originally and then shortly later translated into Latin. If you are a Catholic then you more than likely have a Bible translated from Latin. Most Protestant Bibles are translated from Greek and are translated from either the Majority Text or the Textus Receptus (possibly a combo). These are two great bodies of text that make up what we have. So yes the Bible was translated but from that language into yours. Really the idea of “the Bible being translated all the time” is true but from the source language into another one not from one to another to another and so on.
Lastly and I know this a crowd favorite but no the Bible was not created by a church council in a dark room. Yes at one point the New Testament Canon was closed meaning that it was recognized that these are the books that belong; however, it was not a single meeting that made this happen but a long tradition of acceptance. It would help if we looked at a document called the Muratorian fragment (or Muratorian Canon) because this is a very old document and list at least 22 of the 27 New Testament books. How old is it you ask? Well accepted dating puts it at about 170 A.D. This means that before the church councils ever got together to “decide” what books belong in the Bible there was an accepted list that was a few hundred years older than them.
But didn’t they do some choosing? I think a better phrase would be did they have a test to know what belonged and that answer is yes. They looked at four things to see if the book was valid. 1) Apostolicity – Direct or indirect association of a given work with an apostle. Matthew, John, Peter, Paul, etc. direct. Mark, Luke indirect but worked with the apostles. 2) Orthodoxy – Did the book conform to apostolic teaching? 3) Antiquity – Was the writing produced during the apostolic era? 4) Ecclesiastical Usage – Was it widely used in the early church? So it was not a willy-nilly I don’t like what that book says, instead, what has already been accepted.
I do not find any reason to doubt that the books in the Bible were written when they were written or that they belong. Now I concede that there could be edits to some books for clarification purposes (John 8 again as an example), or that or occasion the authorship maybe should be attributed to different writers, but these things do not change the story, message, or relevancy of the Bible. It is an issue that at least for me has been put to rest. Maybe now that you know a little more about it, you can put the issue to rest and feel good that the Bible is indeed God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness (2 Tim 3:16).
I want to take a minute today to talk about something called the Babel Problem. The Babel Problem is got its name from the Tower of Babel incident in Genesis 11. If you’re not familiar with the story it goes like this. Nimrod decides that even though the people were supposed to spread out and fill the land they would stay where they were. The people wanted to build a great city and tower to touch heaven. But what was the tower? The tower was more than likely a ziggurat and at the top of it was a temple. Basically, it is a tower made out of mud bricks and the temple is like an apartment. Their assumption was that God needed things, and if they provided what God needed then He would bless them. Instead of blessing them though God confused their language so they would spread out like He said to do. With a name like Nimrod, what should we expect?
Walton and Hill in their book Old Testament Today define the Babel Problem this way “The problem is that people have corrupted the concept of God.” I think that is a pretty good definition. If I could simplify it anymore it would be to say we have made God into something we like. I say it that way because when they decided to build the tower the people included this statement “Let us make a name for ourselves otherwise we will be scattered” They wanted to reach God on their terms and in their way. They wanted to be the ones who decided what God was like and how He should act. God was clear in what He wanted; He told them to spread out over all the earth (Gen 9:7) but this group decided that they knew best. The figured they could coax God into blessing the work of their hands because they either did not take the time to get to know Him, or care what He had said. Although, I suppose it could also be a combination of the two.
Sometimes we have this idea that we cannot know God so we write Him off. We decide that because the idea of eternity is too big to understand there cannot be anything more after this life. Maybe we have decided that because we cannot measure God in a laboratory then He does not exist. Maybe we decide that because bad things happen there cannot be an ultimate love in the universe. That because of the pain we see God cannot be real; after all, if God was real why would there be so much hurting. Because we have corrupted the concept of God and therefore, do not really know Him we find ways to discredit Him altogether. We can find a thousand ways to do it but, in the end, it the same message “I know best, so I will make my name great.”
The other part of the problem was they wanted God to bless them on their terms. We still do this. We come up with ways to make God pleased with us. Ways to earn His favor, or to convince Him into blessing us. Then when our ideas fail we blame God because He didn’t conform to our image. But, the problem was not and is not God, instead, it’s us. We cannot make Him love us, we cannot earn His blessings, and we cannot earn His favor. These are gifts that He gives to us because He is good. Because of the peace we have through Jesus we get to enjoy Him. It is not a matter of being good enough because you can’t be. You will never be good enough. We just need to enjoy Him. Martin Luther in the shorter Catechism answers the question what is the chief end of man, and that is to glorify God and enjoy Him forever.
When we create the rules for how God should operate the only one bound to those rules is us and that is a problem. God is not going to change His nature to fit in our box just because we want to play God and that is a big part of the Babel problem. When we decide who God is and how He should act we doing two things; we are playing God and we are creating a false god. It is false because it is not the real thing it is a construct of our own imagination, and it can be done in a variety of ways. However we do it the outcome is the same; we walk away disappointed. We might say things like “how could God xxx”, “but I did xxx”, “why would God xxx” or add your own statement. We have all at times done it.
We need to get back to what He said. We have to go back to what He has already told us about Himself. Read the Bible, and I mean the whole Bible. Don’t neglect the Old Testament because it was written before Christ. There is so much there that we need. Leviticus, for example, is a wonderful book when you look and see God is telling us about Himself. Over and over again God says something and then says “I am Holy” so we should read about why and how He is holy. That does not mean we need to follow the Mosaic Law but we should look at what God says about Himself. Read the whole Bible because God gave it to us so we could start to understand who He is. I guarantee you this one thing whatever you think you know about God is short of the full picture because God is so much bigger than you can ask, think, or imagine.
As these things happen I was thinking about Revelation 12:11 and I thought I would share.
They triumphed over him by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their testimony; they did not love their lives so much as to shrink from death.
I understand the people being addressed in this verse are those in Heaven who have been martyred for their faith. I also understand that by and large most of us will not have to die for our faith but the question I was thinking about was “what is the power of our testimony?” According to Revelation 12:11 those who were martyred understood that the blood of the lamb and their testimony had the power to triumph over the devil. You could think that maybe they did not triumph because they died but those who die in Christ are not harmed by the second death so all that was accomplished by the devil was the children of God went home. So what is the power of your testimony?
The power of your testimony is inherently linked to the power of the Gospel because it is a testimony that the Gospel is true. The power in your testimony comes not from your ability to save yourself but confessing that God saved you. Some might argue that Jesus did not exist, that God is a myth or anything else they want but what is hard to argue is how your life has been changed by the message and power of the Gospel. That is something that cannot be taken away, and you are the only one who has your testimony. You should embrace your testimony and the Gospel because Paul says in Romans 1:16 that it is power.
For I am not ashamed of the gospel, because it is God’s power for salvation to everyone who believes, first to the Jew, and also to the Greek.
Which brings me to my other point; don’t negate the power of your testimony. Your testimony whatever it might be is how God has worked in your life. If you were a crack addict, a murder, a cheat, a porn star, a self-hating self-abuser, or a faithful child of God who has not wandered far off the path that is your testimony of how God has called or kept you. Don’t think for a second that a testimony that is ripe with love towards God and how you have not ever had to deal with a lot of horrible things is a bad testimony. That is just as wonderful as the story of a drug addict who saw Jesus as they overdosed. It means you listened and obeyed which more people should. My prayer for our youngest child is that she will have that kind of testimony. That she would always walk with Him and not have to come running home to Him. I don’t want her to live the same life I lived before seeing Him as good, great, and loving. So share that testimony of faith.
We each have a story to tell about Jesus. Some are G, PG, R, and some X but that is your story. Share it proudly because it testifies of how good God is that He kept you or saved you from a life of misery. If people cannot accept your testimony about how God saved you after a failed marriage, drug use, self-injury, and attempted suicide then don’t worry about them. They might need to check their testimony.
When I first got saved I couldn’t stop myself from telling people about it. I wanted them to experience the same joy, life, and love I now had. My boss on the construction site used to call me a holy roller. I had no idea what that meant but he knew I loved Jesus, and that I wanted him to love Jesus. He could see the power of the Gospel in my life. I was a mess before Christ. I was on drugs, cutting, and tried to kill myself. My story is a little different than most but that is because it is my story. You have yours and sharing it should be done because you want others to feel the same awesome feeling you have. I’ll end with this thought. Jesus is worth it. Whatever it is…He is worth it.
Jesus the Amen, the faithful and true Witness, the Originator of God’s creation tells the church in Laodicea that He knows their works. They are neither hot nor cold and, therefore, useless. They think they are rich but in reality, they are wretched, pitiful, poor, and naked. If they really want to be well off then they should buy the gold He has. He is telling them this because he loves them. They need to repent and He will dine with them. He will give the victor the right to sit down with Him on His throne.
I know I say this each time but it is true there is just so much here. Knowing where to go on this one is a little hard for me because I love to explain the history of things and two parts of this letter have been abused or misused so often. Let’s deal with one real quick. The mentioning of hot, cold and lukewarm is not about being hot for Jesus or cold for Jesus. Instead, it was a reference the Laodiceans would understand. They had their water brought in via aqueducts so by the time it reached them it was not cold which is good for refreshment, or hot which is good for things hot water is good for. However, it was lukewarm which has no value.
What are we supposed to do with this letter? Well, this letter like Sardis does not have an “atta boy” instead, it is a letter of rebuke. Rebuke just means correction or disapproval; Jesus was correcting them because they thought themselves something they were not. The church thought it was all that and a bag of chips because they could afford all that and a bag of chips. They thought because they had money they were doing all right but the truth is they were in bad shape. Jesus does not rebuke them because they had money. He rebukes them because they lacked spiritual truth.
In general, we should not use our physical standing to judge our spiritual health. Just because you have money does not mean you are following God’s will, and just because you are broke does not mean you are being punished. This comes from a misunderstanding of the Deuteronomic formula which is the same problem Job’s friends had. They assumed that because Job suffered he was being punished but we need to get rid of that thinking. Maybe you have money because you are good with money, maybe you are poor because you make bad choices. Maybe society is just trying to keep you down I don’t know and I don’t really care. I want to make sure you are spiritually healthy.
Material possessions are fine. I have some, and I would like more but want I really want is Jesus. I want more Jesus in my life. I know I have access to all of Him but I still want more of Him. The closer I get to Him the more I want. The more I see Him for who He is the more I want. He is Lord, Saviour, Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace and I want more of Him in my life. Whether I have a lot so I am blessed in the physical and can bless others or am in need I want more Jesus. There is no greater treasure than Him, and that is what He is saying to the church in Laodicea and that is what He is saying to you; “You have stuff that’s fine but you need Me” get that and understand that. I have lived without Him, and I will never go back. Jesus is not a fad or a thing that is in style or out of style. He has been around since the beginning you and is not going anywhere. So get some good water and live a rich, full, and abundant life in Christ.
Jesus the Holy One who opens that which no one can close says to the church in Philadelphia that He knows their works. He knows that although they have limited strength they have kept His word and He has opened a door for them which no one can close. He knows they kept the command to endure and will He keep them from the hour of testing. He will write on them God’s name, the name of New Jerusalem, and His name.
As always there is a lot here. First off this is not Philadelphia in Pennsylvania. You have probably heard Philadelphia called the city of brotherly love and that is not so much a nickname but the meaning of the name. It is a two-part name that combines philos and adelphos. Philos means love, dearly loved, or friendship while adelphos means a brother or friend. Put them together and you get brotherly love or to love a brother. The church Jesus was speaking to was an ancient city but the meaning of the name is the same. The question we should be asking is what does this have to do with us and with the letter itself, and I think it has a lot to do with us and the letter.
Jesus tells the church that He knows they have little strength but that they have kept His word and not denied His name. So we should ask what was His word? Jesus spoke a lot of words but they usually had something to do with loving your neighbor, loving God, and going out to preach the Gospel. It would seem then that the church of brotherly love was doing just that even though they were weak and tired. They believed the best way to love your brother is to tell them about Jesus. That is a sure sign of love if you ask me.
If we love the world we tell them about Jesus because Jesus is the expression of the Father’s love. Remember John 3:16 tells us that God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son that whosoever should believe in Him would not perish but have everlasting life. Hebrews 1:3 helps by telling us that Jesus is the exact representation of His (God) being. So if we claim to love those who do not know Jesus then we tell them about Him because we believe He is love, and He has a better plan for their life then they do.
But what about when you are weak and tired? I know I get weak and tired sometimes. I know sometimes I barely feel like I can push on and just don’t feel like telling people. That happens, and it is not a good time. However, when I get like that I think back to Jesus at the well with the Samaritan woman. When asked by the disciples if He had already eaten something He told them He had food they did not know about. The food He spoke about was sharing God’s love and goodness with people. I know for me when I get focused on the thing Jesus told me to do I can go and go like the energizer bunny because I have tapped into something real and powerful.
So today I just have a little encouragement for you. If you are tired and feel like you cannot reach anyone just keep pushing. You are touching people and you might not even know it. You are making a difference just don’t give up. Jesus said He would place an open door and no one can close what God opens. If you are tired and don’t know Jesus but want to, then just ask Him to show you who He is. I am confident He will.
Jesus the one who has the seven spirits and seven stars tells the church in Sardis that while they have a reputation for being alive the truth is they are dead. If they do not strengthen what they do have He will come and remove them. They need to remember what they received, keep it, and repent. He also knows that not everyone in Sardis is like this and the victor will be dressed in white.
The problem I am going to have with this letter is as someone who loves to teach and preach a topic like this one floods the brain with possibilities. However, we are trying to be brief and keep these where we live so… Sardis, by and large, was dead spiritually, but what does that mean? Jesus says, “”Remember…what you have received and heard,” I think we could infer that they were forgetting what they had received and heard. If we go into the history of Sardis a little we see that the area had been conquered twice in the past because the people did not watch out for invaders. If we put these together we get a bigger picture that they got complacent and forgot what happened. Instead of letting the past (both good and bad) give them wisdom they just forgot all about it, and the truth is we can do that too.
It is pretty easy to forget about the past especially in our day. Here is an example I am sure most people can relate too. Have you ever seen something on Facebook and then went to scroll back to it only to not know who posted it? You search and search but you don’t remember enough about it to find it. Or how many times have you looked at your phone to see the time only to realize you didn’t even see the time (you probably did see your notifications though).
What if we go a little deeper. Why did your last relationship fail? Why did your last job not work out? What about that best friend from high school or worst enemy from high school? These things might be long gone for you but the lessons learned can still be used now. What about this, do you remember what it felt like to carry your own guilt and shame before you found out Jesus carried it to the cross for you? All of these things are important and some like the cross are extremely important. If we forget the important things and just become complacent in today then we run the risk of becoming dull and dead.
I have known spiritually dull Christians. Some are very good at pretending to be alive but they are not. They do a good job of looking the part but it is all an act. Jesus sees the heart and He knows what is for show and what is real. He cannot be fooled into thinking you are alive when you are not. Sometimes we have to go back to the basics and that is ok. We have to remember what we have received and heard to make sure we are on the track we should be on. It is easy to get off track but thankfully we serve a gracious and forgiving God who loves to get us back to where we should be. Whenever you get thrown off track just stop and ask God to remind you of what He gave you in the first place.
Jesus the one whose eye are like fire and has feet like bronze tells the church in Thyatira that He knows their works. That they have love, faithfulness, service, and endurance. More than that the works they do now are more than when they started. However, they are tolerating or allowing Jezebel to teach their people and she is leading them astray into sexual immorality and idol worship. He is giving her a chance to repent but she will not. He also knows that not all are following her and commends them for this.
There is again a lot going on here. The church in Thyatira is like the reverse of the church in Ephesus. Instead of being tight in theology and lacking in love they are big on love and lacking theology. They are devoted to love and serving those in need. The church is feeding the homeless, giving backpacks to kids for school, teaching skills to the underprivileged, and doing many other acts of love in Jesus name. Not only that they are doing more than they have ever done before. These people understood what it was to love like Jesus. They were committed to the cause of Christ. But there is a problem; they were severely lacking in doctrine.
The church in Thyatira for as good as they were had let in Jezebel and allowed her to lead them astray into sexual immorality and idol worship. If you have read the Bible at all then you might go oh no, and if you haven’t then you might not see the big deal. Jezebel is synonymous with total debauchery, corruption, or depravity. If you call someone a Jezebel then it is a high insult. That is the person the church had let in and was allowing to teach. Jesus said you get the love and that is great but I will not let you go on with this teaching.
We should really look at Thyatira and Ephesus together. We have some churches that are all about truth and some churches that are all about love. Jesus says you need both because I am both. Jesus says in John 8:32 you will know the truth and the truth will set you free. 1 John 4:8 says God is love. Romans 8:29 says we are to be transformed into the image of His (God’s) Son. God is truth, God is love, and God wants us to be like Jesus. That means being truth and love. We cannot be so dogmatic that we place demands on people that God never placed on them, but we cannot let people think it is OK to go on sinning and living like they are not saved. It is a balance just like raising children.
Some say, “people should be allowed to do what they feel is right.” Well no that is not true, and in fact, that is just flat out wrong. If that was the case we would not have laws. Like I said with children it is a balance. My daughter will have a much better relationship with her mother if she is respectful. They will laugh and play and have a grand ole time. However, if she is being disrespectful then they will have conflict so my part of my job is to make sure she is respectful so she can have joy in the relationship. That means boundaries and rules because I love her and want her to enjoy the fullness.
I bet if Ephesus and Thyatira got together they would have a dynamite church but they were too busy thinking their thing was the most important thing. Maybe we should listen to the Spirit and be the most loving caring people out there who are wise enough to know what is true and what is false regardless of personal preference but are careful to love everyone just like Jesus does.
Freedom in Truth 