Nehemiah and Restoration

Nehemiah lived during a time when the people of God were attacked. They were taken as prisoners of war and their land was destroyed. Nehemiah went back to Judah to rebuild the wall of Jerusalem. The story of Nehemiah is an amazing story of restoration. It tells of the hardship he went through during the process and the provision and protection God provided.

Restoration takes time. God could have easily rebuilt His city overnight but instead He wanted His people to be part of the rebuilding process. Brick by brick they rebuilt. Their sweat and blood was in the wall of Jerusalem now. Their healing was not handed to them overnight but instead God wanted their DNA to be part of the story of restoration. They could now own their story of redemption. They could point at the restored wall and tell how they helped bring restoration. It was not just a story someone told about this thing that happened that one time. It was personal. There is something powerful about owning your story. 

Their past did not disqualify them from their future. Their sin did not disqualify them from restoration. Because they repented, God restored His city. Previously, Israel and Judah had turned from God. They sinned greatly and were even worse than some of the nations they displaced when they came to the Promised Land. They knew God’s laws and had stories of His provision yet they chose to ignore God. They were just distant stories bordering on fairy tales and myths. They did not own their history. God sent prophet after prophet to warn his people of the coming destruction if they did not repent. They did not listen and invading armies destroyed the two nations.

But God’s love is enduring, everlasting (Ps 100:5, Ps 136). His love does not end and does not change. Just as a loving father disciplines his children, so a loving Father disciplined His children. His children repented and God allowed them to rebuild their city walls in fifty-two days. “And when our enemies heard of it, all the nations around us were afraid and fell greatly in their own esteem for they perceived that this work had been accomplished with the help of our God” (Ne 6:16).

God longs to rebuild His people. This begins by spending time with Him. When we spend time with Him, He tells us who we are. He tells us who He is and how we are to respond out of that. Things change when they are restored. No longer is it weak and falling apart but whole.

Who is the Father? pt II

In the last post I talked about forgiveness and the role of the Father. Now, I want to talk a little about his roles. (Check out the 1 Peter series for more).

Jesus is talking about the Father in the Sermon on the Mount and is telling the audience the Father is a good provider. Look at creation and see how God provides for the animals. The birds don’t farm yet God feeds them. The flowers don’t make clothes yet Solomon wasn’t dressed as gloriously as any of them. These things weren’t made in His image. Imagine how well the Father takes care of those made in His image! We don’t need to worry about anything. We will be provided for. Then Jesus says this, “Do not be afraid, little flock, for your Father has been pleased to give you the kingdom” (Lk 12:32). I can worry about being provided for but the Father one ups me. He wants to give me the kingdom. In fact, He is pleased to give me the kingdom.

Our Father is also a king. A king has unlimited resources and reach beyond that of anyone else in the kingdom. He has authority to declare life and death, to imprison and set free, to bring peace and justice. He runs and is responsible for everything within that kingdom. He can give this authority to anyone he chooses as well. As the child of a king, we have access to the kingdom’s resources. It’s the concept of an ambassador. Never will you see a shabby consulate. Even the poorest countries have lavish consulates. The ambassador has the backing of that country and is a representative of that country.

But guess what, as a child of a king, we have access to his emotions as well. We can know not only the Father’s insight into a situation but we can also know his heart on it. Father God shares His emotions with us. Sometimes, all we have to do is ask.

As a child of the king we can spend time in the throne room anytime we want, not just in select times as a townsperson or even an ambassador can. He loves talking with us. There isn’t anything too small or too big that we cannot talk to him about. He loves talking with us. He has so many good things for us and longs to tell us how He sees us.

One of the things I love to ask Him is How do you see me right now? He sees all good things. There may be things I need to work on but it isn’t a negative thing. The Father isn’t disappointed in me if I doubt that He is faithful to fulfill His promises. He gets to prove himself faithful and through the process grows me in faith. Abraham is a good example of this. In the Old Testament, we see Abraham doubted all the time but in Hebrews it says he never wavered in his faith. God didn’t count the wavering. It was irrelevant. There was a time that Abraham believed God to be true and that is what God looked at. The times he missed it wasn’t what God focused on. It’s like a kid learning to walk. We don’t look down on them for falling down. It’s when they are walking that we count it and focus on it.

We don’t have lack in the Father. 2 Peter 1:3-4 says He has given us everything we need for life. He even gives us promises of what He wants to be for us and who He is making us into. We have the joy of getting to discover these. It’s like a treasure hunt. The promises are already there and our true identity is already there, we get to discover them.

Who is the Father?

If you know who God really is, trust is a non-issue. It is easier to take that step needed to turn a dream into a reality when you can trust the person who promised that dream. Corrie ten Boom tells a story of crossing a rickety bridge by car. By sight it did not look strong enough to hold a car. However, the driver inspected the bridge, not their faith in the bridge. The bridge was stronger than it looked, and they passed without trouble. “Very often, we tend to look at our faith, and we know our faith is big and strong, or weak and small. But we shouldn’t investigate our faith; we should investigate the Bridge.” (I stand at the door and knock, pg 38).

The last post focused on Jesus, and this time we are going to look at Father God. This is where we often put a lot of false perspectives on God. When we are hurt or there is a lack of a father in our lives, we often portray this onto Father God because we haven’t experienced anything else. However, Father God wants to give us a true view of Himself. He wants us to see Him as He really is.

Our Father is gentle. He is a shepherd over his people. He watches out for us and cares for us. He fights for us and comforts us. He speaks our identity over us. It is up to us to accept His good gifts. He wants to bring healing to our past hurts and free us to see Him as He truly is and others as He sees. I’ve learned that if it sounds too good to be true about the Father, it is probably true.

I recently heard a good teaching on Matthew 18 and the Parable of the Unforgiving Servant. The king calls in one of his servants who has a monstrous debt of 10,000 talents. This was the largest number in Greek and the largest denomination of coin. Basically, the servant owed a billion zillion dollars. The first question is why did the king let it get this far. However, the king decides to forgive the servant.

Out of gratitude the servant goes out and tries to get his friend to pay him back. Instead of enjoying the gift he was just given, he decides to work his way out of it. He chokes his friend (a huge humiliation) to try to get him to pay. He humiliate his friend in an attempt to force him to pay back his debt. The servant knew that the debt does not go away. Someone has to take the hit. What he did not fully realize was the massive hit the king took on his behalf. He did not trust the king’s justice. Maybe he thought he would change his mind later. Because of this, the servant was handed over to the torturers. Jesus ends the story by saying this is what the Father will do if we don’t forgive from the heart. Wow.

So how do we forgive? The best way I have learned to do this is to imagine I’m in a court room. My Father is the judge, and Jesus is my lawyer.

Accuse the offender before my Father who is Judge. I accuse that person of everything my heart is screaming, no matter how illogical my brain says it is. When I have accused them of everything my heart screams, I choose to forgive that person. I ask Father to bring His perfect justice on my behalf and I give up my right to rehearse my lines against this person in this situation again. Then I walk out of the courtroom.

1. I ask for justice on my behalf and give up y right to accuse the offender of these things in this circumstance again.
2. I have to trust that the Father will bring justice on my behalf and that the justice will be enough. How do justice and forgiveness go together? Romans 12:19 says, “’It is mine to avenge; I will repay,’ says the LORD.” This is why I ask Father for justice.

If I choose not to forgive the person, I am tortured by it. That unforgiveness, that sense of injustice, eats at me. It affects me in ways I don’t realize until I’ve forgiven that person. I am speaking from experience on this.

3. After I’ve forgiven the person, I then get to confess my part in it. I ask for forgiveness and the Father always forgives. It does not matter what I’ve done. He always forgives. Jesus paid my debt in full. There is nothing that He did not pay for.

Ultimately, forgiveness comes down to a trust issue. How much do you trust your Father?  

This next part will take some time. Sit down with a journal (and coffee) and spend some time talking with the Father. Ask Father to show you who He really is. Ask Him if there is anything standing in the way of you seeing Him as He really is. If there is a particular memory and you are angry that the Father did not show up, ask Him where He is in that memory. You may need to grab a friend to help you walk through this. Know that the Father loves you so much. It is so easy to walk away because of hurt but what if there is more? He wants to talk with you, snuggle with you, tell you how much He loves you. We only need to take the time to sit with Him and listen.

Ramsomed from Darkness into Light

Pt IV

 

continuation of Promises of Restoration in the Prophets

We are now in the Kingdom of God. We were ransomed from the kingdom of darkness into the Kingdom of Light (Col 1:13).

And if you call on him as Father who judges impartially according to each one’s deeds, conduct yourselves with fear throughout the time of your exile, knowing that you were ransomed from the futile ways inherited from your forefathers, not with perishable things such as silver or gold, but with the precious blood of Christ, like that of a lamb without blemish or spot. He was foreknown before the foundation of the world but was made manifest in the last times for the sake of you who through him are believers in God who raised him from the dead and gave him glory, so that your faith and hope are in God (1 Peter 1:17-21).

 

The first thing Peter does is calls God Father. Our Father is our judge and he is impartial. We were ransomed from the kingdom of sin. To require ransoming means that we were stolen. We were taken from the Kingdom of God and enslaved in the kingdom of darkness. The highest price was paid for us, Jesus’ blood. Our worth was so high that Jesus’ blood was the cost for our ransom. That is how valuable the Father says we are.

If God sent Jesus to die for us while we were still sinners, imagine all that he has for us now that we are saints in his kingdom (Ro 5:8-10). That is what God did for us while we were enemies. We were in an opposing kingdom. Take some time and revel in that fact.

If you want more on this, see my previous posts Call on Him as Father, Impartial Judge, Ramsomed, The Precious Lamb We Did not Buy, to name a few.