Esther Principle

Yesterday, was the day before payday at my house. It is always somewhat tense when the last paycheck is gone and you are waiting for the next one. It was also the day I picked up the APS bill (electric bill) from the mailbox. If you live in Arizona, you know that my two-week tension was on overdrive as I opened the electric bill.

I slid my finger along the slit of the envelope, and held my breath as I pulled the bill from its walls. I closed my eyes, whispered a prayer, and as my eyes focused on the black print, I gasped at the three-digit number that was staring me in the face. The kids all heard the gasp and came running toward me. My son ran off after hearing the frightening news to make sure every light and fan was off in the house. Then we all stood there staring at the number, not knowing what number would be on the paycheck we were waiting for.

My husband was at work, so he did not get to share in the “excitement” of the moment. Usually at these times of wonderful stress, I feel the need to share my concerns with my husband, or should I say share my panic-stricken cries. But yesterday I actually listened to the Lord. I waited, and I prayed.

Now the paycheck amount was already determined, it just had to be issued, but I prayed anyway. Then I started the “figuring” game. If this amount comes in, I will be able to tithe, I can pay these bills, set this amount aside for food and gas (a lot larger amount than I had to set aside a few months ago), and that is it. I looked at the figures on my paper and shook my head. I know things come up, things that need to be taken care of, and it was going to be tight with that enormous electric bill suspended over my head.

My husband called and visited with me for a while, and the upset feelings about the APS bill came flooding in, past my throat, over my tongue, and finally through my teeth, but my lips held fast. I didn’t blurt out $418. I knew I needed to tell him sometime, but not then, not until we saw what our check looked like. Then we could come up with a game plan together. When we hung up, I blew the air I had been holding in my lungs out, and went back to my coupons.

The next morning I checked our bank account, and cried. The Lord knew what our APS bill was going to be even before it was written. He knew our need and met it. I thanked Him for providing for me, and as soon as my husband was up, I thanked him for all his hard work. He just said, “It’s not me, it’s God.”

And I said, “Ya, I know. I already thanked Him, and wanted to thank you too.” Then I asked him, “Did you see the APS bill?”

He said, “Yes,” with a sigh but not anxiety or worry. Had I told him the night before he saw his paycheck, he would have been upset at work, thinking of ways to make more money, and he would not buy something he really needed for work. At that moment I saw a tangible reason as to why it is always good to wait and to pray.

That is where the Esther Principle comes in. Queen Esther needed to bring a tense issue to the King. She didn’t want to have to talk to him about it, because it had to do with his closest advisor. She was sure that he would side with this man over her, but finally realized that no matter what she had to do the right thing.

She didn’t run into the Kings chamber, crying, overcome with fear. Instead, she prayed. She took three days to fast, to deny herself, and make her body submit to her will, training herself to make her emotions submit in the same way. Following her time of fasting, Esther (endangering her life) asked the King to a banquet, along with his royal advisor. She served her King, met his needs and did not throw her problems before him.

Esther finally chose the right time to tell the King of her need and of the needs of a large group of his people. She invited him again to eat with her, and as he sat with her, he asked her if she needed anything (he had done the same things the night before and that is when she invited him to dine with her again), and at this point she handed her need to her husband. She told him of the evils his advisor was planning to carry out throughout his kingdom.

Esther no longer had to carry the burden of this wicked plan alone. Her husband was there to care for her in her time of need, but was not overwhelmed by her emotions in the process. Esther took time to gain God’s perspective on her need, and was then able to pass that same perspective to her husband, to her King. The King did not side with his royal advisor. He took up the cause of his wife and saved her life as well as the life of thousands of people.

Just like Esther, we can go to our husbands with issues that are of great concern to our families, or to us. We need to remember that we should first go to our Father. He will grant us the peace we need in those times, so that we can share our need without overwhelming everyone around us. . When we present hard things to others, with God’s perspective, those things won’t dominate our lives or our relationships.

We, like Esther, need to fast and pray so that we train our bodies as well as our emotions to submit to the peace and patience of God. We need to wait and pray, “then the peace of God which surpasses all understanding will guard our hearts and minds in Christ Jesus, our Lord.”
If you want to learn more about Esther and her amazing story, check out the book of Esther. It is a short read, but one that holds a powerful message of obedience as well as God’s provision for His people.

Lordship

Is there this sin that just seems to haunt you? No matter how hard you try you just can’t get away from it, can’t stop doing it, and pray constantly for the Lord to save you from it? You’re not alone. I am right there with you…praying, wrestling, hoping, failing and falling into discouragement, recovering and fighting again.

All of us sin. John said if someone doesn’t admit that they sin that they are a liar and that there is no truth in them. So the fact that you recognize your need to stop doing what you are doing is a good thing.

The other night, my son and I were talking. He was struggling with an issue that he just can’t seem to beat. He was feeling very ashamed, and condemned for something he did. I realized that I needed to help him out of the place of self-loathing he was in and lead him into forgiveness and healing. So, we started off in Romans 8, where Paul says that there is no condemnation in Christ. Meaning, no matter who you are, or what you have done, if you belong to Jesus, you have been set free from the judgment that comes with sin.


Of course, I had to explain to my son what condemnation means. I took him over to Romans 7:18-19. In those verses, Paul revealed his own weakness to the Romans. He told them that he wanted to do what was good, but he couldn’t, and he tried to stop doing what was wrong but he couldn’t seem to do that either. Even the greatest of apostles was human and had to deal with the reality of having a nature that was born to sin.


But the thing that made Paul so amazing was that he KNEW he was totally, absolutely forgiven for every sin he had committed and for everyone he would commit. He knew that he had been set free from the law of sin (that nature that was born to sin) and of death by Jesus. Paul could freely confess his weakness to the Romans, while at the same time telling them that he wasn’t condemned, because he knew that Jesus had defeated the sin in his life and he stood before God forgiven and clean. That is what no condemnation means…whole and clean before God. My son started to physically relax as I shared with him this truth. He was finding acceptance, love and rest in the forgiveness that can only be found in Jesus.


At the same time though, I told him that he still needed to confess his sin. He needed to talk to God and say he was sorry for what he had done. Trying to hide it and feeling ashamed only put up a wall that kept him from feeling safe with God, feeling forgiven. I remembered 1 John 1:9 and told him that as soon as we tell God our sin, He is faithful and just to forgive our sin and cleanse us from all unrighteousness (not meeting His standard of right). So we prayed. And as I prayed out loud for my son to repeat after me, I said something that really hit my heart. I said, “Dear Father, save us from our sin.”


And He said, “I have already done that. I paid for them on the cross, and you were saved when you surrendered your life to Me. When you get tied to a sin, you don’t need to be saved from it. You have chosen to make it the focus of your life, and have replaced my Lordship with its. I am your Savior, I am also Lord of all creation, but when you are sinning over and over again, that proves that I am not Lord in your life.” I stopped praying with my son, and said, “WOW”. I am praying the wrong way. I am asking God to do for me what He has already done, and expecting Him to rescue me from something I have replaced Him with. Jesus never forces himself on us. If we chose to worship something or someone else, He lets us…with a broken heart He waits for us to return to Him. The confession John talks about in 1 John reestablishes Jesus as the head of our lives. When we admit we have a problem, when we admit we are sinning, when we come to Jesus and say we are sorry, we are taking whatever we were worshipping off its pedestal and focusing our attention on Jesus, who was never off of His.


All sin is derived from a self focus, when we love ourselves with all our heart, all our mind, all our soul and all our strength.


If you are struggling with a sin that seems to dominate your life, pray but don’t ask for God to save you from it. Instead surrender your heart, soul, mind and strength to Jesus, and He will set you free because you have allowed Him to be Lord as well as the Savior of your life.

Seeking

I was visiting with a friend of my mom’s today; well actually, she is also a friend of mine. She is recovering from surgery, and is headed home from rehab tomorrow. She is a great lady, who has been going through some really hard physical trials. While recovering from her latest test, she confessed that she wasn’t as “godly” as she wished she would have been will being in the hospital.

As she was sharing with Mom and me, she talked about different nurses coming in to check on her. How there were a few of them who would see her reading a devotion or her Bible and stop and ask her what she was reading. Those who were believers would get a chance to share a moment of fellowship openly with her, praising God or giving Jesus glory. I am sure others, who were not followers, still respected her devotion to her faith.

Our witness is to be real, and sometimes when we are real, we might be a bit testy, or upset, but that actually helps people see that we aren’t playing at our faith or putting on a show. The Jew in the Shakespeare play, “Merchant of Venice” says at one point, “if you cut me, do I not bleed.” Meaning, just because I am a Jew doesn’t mean that I am not human. So too, Christians hurt, they bleed, they laugh, they cry, they live as humans, yes fallen humans, that have the hope of one day living with Jesus without their sinful natures.

My friend might not always be the best patient, nor the kindest wife, nor the most gracious person, but what she always is, is a sincere follower of Christ. I know that even in her most trying times, when she is struggling with her attitude that she is still seeking Jesus. And when that moment of impatience passes , I know that she is openly confessing her attitude to the Lord; asking not only for His forgiveness, but for His strength to be more like Jesus the next time.

It is this seeking, this asking, this confessing that God is looking for. He knows that we are just dust, that we are never in this life going to be perfect, nor superhuman, nor little gods. It is not our trying, nor our working, nor our attempts at perfection that please God, but instead our seeking.

“Without faith it is IMPOSSIBLE to please God.

For we must believe that He exists

and that He rewards those who earnestly SEEK Him.”

(Heb. 11:3)

It isn’t the doing everything just right, that pleases Him, it is the believing in Him, that makes Him happy. And I have to say I am soooooo absolutely thankful for that, because I will never attain perfection in this world, and this causes me to look forward to eternity so much more than if I thought I could work things out here.

When I read faith, the kind of faith that pleases God, includes believing that He REWARDS those who seriously seek Him, so much of His Word, and the Christian life made sense. Often times we look at men like Abraham, Jacob, Moses, and David and wonder how they could be the best of the best. They carry such titles as “friend of God”; “Israel”; “most humble man”; and “a man after God’s own heart,” even though they all committed HUGE sins: lying, murder, manipulation, adultery and the list goes on and on. However, when seen in the light of Hebrews 11:3, their lives of faith, their titles, their place in the Hall of Faith found in Hebrews 11 makes total sense. They were human, they messed up, they fell short of God, but each and every one of them BELIEVED that God was real, that He REWARDS those who earnestly SEEK HIM.

Now some of you will say we are told in Scripture to be “perfect, as I am perfect.” This is true, as those who have surrendered their lives to Christ, we are called to live set apart lives, to be holy. The desire to be holy “set apart for a higher purpose” is there within each of us. That is why when we behave badly we run to the Lord in confession. It is the Holy Spirit of God pressing on our chest every time we break God’s moral law. It is that same Holy Spirit that seals us until the day of Christ and makes us holy. He does the perfecting so we don’t have to.

My friend is one of these seekers, just like my Mom, and countless other women I know, who please God because of their faith. They not only believe, but they live for Jesus. They fulfill Matthew 6:33, which says, “Seek first the Kingdom of God and His righteousness and all these things (needs as well as rewards) shall be added unto you.”

Do not expect human “perfection” from yourself, or from anyone else you know, just live out your life in faith, and trust our God with the perfecting.

Not the Nose, but the Heart

Well, what I have finally realized after 10 years of experience is that our kids are probably harder on us than anyone else. They learn tact, graciousness, self-control, and mercy all from us. We are, in the end, their test subjects.

The other day my son proceeded to tell me that I have a large nose. Now, this is not a new concept to me. I have my grandfather’s Italian genes and apparently the Italian nose is a stronger gene than any other. My Mom and Aunt both inherited it, so when I grew up it was the family joke to say that we had “The Nose”.

I thought that I had let my nose obsession go, what with being married and having three kids, but as I have been thinking about it, I realized it seems to always be just at the back of my mind. A couple of years ago, one of my friends was taking pictures at our women's retreat. I told her not to take any profile shots of me, only shots that were straight at my face. When she asked, “why?” I said, “The Nose”. So, when I say I let the nose issue go, what I mean is that I don’t think about getting a nose job as often as I once did. Well that is until two weeks ago.

About that time, my son leaned over in his bed to kiss me (he sleeps on the top bunk), and said, "Watch so the nose doesn’t poke me. You know your nose it pretty long." He has teased me about this for a while, but for some reason that one really hit the core of my self-esteem. I went to the bathroom, looked at myself from every angle and said, “Yep, he is right, it is pretty big.” Then when I took a shower I realized my breasts have shrunk over the years (they will be non-existent by the time I am 50), but that my nose is forever.

Following the shower, I started trying to talk myself down from the plastic surgery ledge. You know, “Lord thank you for my nose. I know you gave it to me for a reason. I am sure it is there to keep me humble, Lord. I got the short and petite gene from my grandma, I guess it was too much to ask to get her little, lovely nose too.” When my prayer wasn't working for me, I decided to do what any self-respecting woman, who is hoping to be a speaker/writer in the Christian world would do, I went and checked out the noses of other speakers/writers who have “made it”.

Of course, when I aim, I aim high, so I looked up Beth Moore’s picture and checked out her nose. You see she has the nose obsession too. I have heard her make fun of her nose often, so it was a comfort to think I might be in her same boat. I looked at a lot of her pictures though, and I am pretty convinced that she shouldn't be at all concerned about “The Nose”.

After reflecting on my own pride, and checking out the pictures, I started to be less concerned about my nose. Not because Beth has a nose like mine, but because I began to see her heart. She is a beautiful woman, but her true beauty rests in the Spirit of God that shines through her every word. You see, if you have ever listened to Beth teach, you know that she has a broken and contrite spirit which are pleasing to the Lord. I realized that is what I wanted, to please the Lord.

My nose, my eyes, my ears, even my breasts matter little to the spirit within me. I rest in the body my Father has given me, because my purpose is not to be beautiful, but to have a heart that earnestly seeks Him.

So if you struggle with body image, know that the Lord loves you, and "He does not see things the way you see them. People judge by outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart." 1 Samuel 16:7

Restoration

John Adams and Thomas Jefferson were two men that God used greatly to help in the creation of the United States. Their friendship was forged in the furnace of revolution and that friendship would last some 50 years.

Adams and Jefferson were in total agreement as to the wording and ideas that filled the Declaration of Independence. They moved from writing that great document, to working side by side in France to ensure solid diplomatic ties. Each then took a prominent role in the administration of President George Washington, but their friendship was tested as they moved in differing directions politically.

They disagreed as to the path the new nation should follow. Adams and Jefferson’s political differences tore their friendship apart. It took 20 years for the two of them to put aside their pride and reach out to one another in reconciliation.

Once they did, their friendship lasted until their deaths twenty years later. In an amazing moment of God's dynamic timing, John Adams and Thomas Jefferson both died on the same day. They died only hours apart on the 50th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence, July 4, 1829.

For 20 years, these two great men refused to put their personal feelings aside in order to rebuild a friendship that changed the world. To be honest, the fact that they did restore their relationship is a tribute to their greatness, but they did it in their own time, for their own purpose, and in their own strength, which is why it took them so long.

In the last chapter of the Gospel of John, our Lord showed what humility, forgiveness and true love in friendship really looks like. It took Jesus less than 40 days to restore His relationship with Peter. Jesus never holds a grudge. He is the very definition of restoration.

Pledge
Have you ever pledged to someone that no matter what happened you would love them, lay down everything for them, but when the rubber hit the road you failed to fulfill your promise?
I have done this more times than I can say, with my husband, kids, friends and especially my God. At the emotional height of a promise of loyalty and devotion, it is easy to say, of course, I will always be there for you, but in reality, it is often hard for us to lay aside ourselves for anyone else.

When we have failed at the greatest level we think possible, it is only the person that we have failed who can fully restore us. We can try to move ahead, we can choose not to think about what we did or did not do, but in the end it is always there hanging over our heads. We confess it, think we have put it behind us just to have it pop up when we least expect it.

Peter found himself in this exact position one spring morning. He failed Jesus in ways he never thought possible, and had no way to fix what he had done. He decided to get into his boat, and go fishing. He knew fishing, he was good at it, and it helped him take his mind off his failure. He threw the nets into the sea and waited, with no results.

In the early morning hours, just as he was about to give up, a man yelled out to him from the beach. The man instructed him to throw his net over the right side of the boat. Peter must have thought, why not, we have not caught anything tonight anyway. He followed the instruction the stranger gave him. Peter and the other disciples with him threw their nets on the other side of the boat, and right away, they caught 153 fish.

As soon as the fish filled the nets, John, the disciple Jesus loved, knew it was Jesus standing on the beach. Immediately upon hearing John say, "It is the Lord," Peter was in the water swimming toward Jesus for all he was worth. He wanted to be close to his friend. He missed Him and longed for that deep relationship so much so that he could not wait for the boat to get him back to the shore. He had to jump out of the boat and swim to the beach (see John 21:1-13).

Hurting
How many of you have ever had a close friendship that was hurt because of something you did? How many of you have mourned the loss of intimacy with someone you never intended to hurt, never thought you would be apart from? Is there someone that you miss because of something that happened between you? Is there a relationship in your life that you need to reconcile? If you know what I am talking about, you know how much Peter was hurting.

I have experience exactly what Peter was feeling many times in my life. I am not sure what that says about me other than that I am human. We as humans mess up. We hurt the people we love. One of the most recent examples of the need for reconciliation in my own life came several months ago.

I was speaking for the first time at a women’s retreat. One of my closest friends and ministry partners sat at the back of conference room running my Power Point slides. She and I had been disconnected the whole weekend. We worked together, but there was defiantly something going on between us. The night before I sat sobbing through worship and communion and she was not there to put her arm around me, not there to squeeze my hand, not even there to pray for me. She had always been there.

I knew something was going on between us, but could not put my finger on it. I thought she was moving on, finding others to love and walk with and no longer wanted our same level of friendship. Not until after I spoke to her did I discover she was thinking the same things about me.

The need to restore the relationship became very clear in the middle of my last session. I was speaking about the need to reconcile wounded relationships. I shared with the group a story of woman who had come back into my life after a time of deep division. I explained how that reconciliation had allowed me to understand the pain Peter must have experienced when he denied Jesus. As those words were coming out of my mouth, I looked up and saw her. My friend was fixing my lapel mic, getting batteries for it so I did not have to use the hand held. As she walked quickly out of the room, the Lord said, "When are you going to reconcile this one?"

Try putting yourself into my shoes for a minute. Imagine telling other women about their need to restore relationships with those who have hurt them or with those they have hurt, while the Lord is convicting you of the exact same thing. Not easy to say the least, I felt like a hypocrite. I thought to stop her in the middle of my talk and say, I am sorry and I love you, but it did not seem like the time or the place. I probably should have done it though, because my heart was soft at that point.

Following the session, we all packed up our cars, and headed home. It was a cold car ride back. At one point, I reached out to touch her knee in order to thank her for all the hard work she had put into the retreat and the women who attended, and as I did so, she recoiled from my hand. That was when I really got it. My lack of concern for her devastated her heart. I could see it in her body language, her curt conversation, the pain in her eyes. She was deeply wounded.
The other people in the car were talkative and we pretended well enough, but you know how that is, right. There is this huge elephant in the car with you, but you cannot talk about it. All you really want to do is work through things, but the distance is so great you do not even know where to start.

I dropped her off at her house, gave her a polite hug and said goodbye. Her distance and hurt put a wet blanket on my excitement over successfully speaking at my first women's retreat. I drove home mad, not humbled. When I walked in the house, my husband was waiting for me to tell him all my wonderful news, but all I could do was rant about how my friend had played down what I felt the Lord had done that weekend.

After I had cooled down, I realized that my pride was hurt. I asked the Lord's forgiveness, and sat down to write an email. I have no idea what I said; all I know is that that email started a conversation between us that was long over do.

It has been about six months, but I think we are starting to heal, starting to understand each other, starting to see that we do love each other.

Funny, I think that whole retreat was less about what I shared with all those wonderful women, and was actually about God restoring my friendship. The message of restoration may have hit many hearts, but it was intended for mine most of all.

Peter pledged never to leave Jesus, to go with Him even to death. He failed to keep his promise. He was all talk and no action. Peter had to be broken. He experienced pruning so God could remake him into the image of His Son. Peter suffered failure and separation from his best friend. His time of testing helped him identify with the suffering Jesus endured.

Unconditional
I realized as I studied His life that Jesus lost a great deal even before He went to the cross. His closest friends abandoned Him at the point of His deepest need. He was tried, beaten, spit upon, slapped, made fun of, and finally nailed to a cross, without the comfort of the men He lived with for three years. Jesus’ disciples did not simply abandon Him, they denied Him and they disowned Him. Finally, His Father, whom He had never been apart from, had to turn His back on His own Son. The sin of humanity would separate Them for the first time, because a holy God cannot look upon sin.

Remember, Jesus knew in advance that they would not be there for Him. He understood that they would reject Him and still He comforted them. He spoke words to them to help them get past what they would do to Him. Jesus understood their humanity and He loved them even in their failure.

Peter’s experience clearly reveals the unconditional love only Jesus offers. We can fail and He will not discard us. Jesus is our dearest friend, and He loves us even when we reject, ignore, disappoint and disown Him.

We are to love like that.

Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this all men will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another. (John 13:34-35)

Restored
John 21:8 relates that Peter arrived on the beach to meet Jesus just a little before the boat with the other disciples reached shore. Jesus prepared breakfast for them all, and after eating, He went for a walk with Peter and John. As they walked along the sand covered beach Jesus asked Peter, "Simon son of John, do you love Me more than these?"

I am sure Peter was hit with all the shame he had endured since the night he turned his back on Jesus. He probably looked down at his feet and said, "Yes, Lord, You know that I love you.”
Instead of rebuking Peter, or berating him, Jesus commissioned him, "Feed My sheep" (John 21:15).

Again, Jesus asks Peter, "Simon son of John, do truly love Me?"

Peter responded in the same way he had the first time, "Yes, Lord you know that I love you."
Jesus then commanded, "Take care of My sheep” (16).

A third time Jesus asks Peter, "Do you love Me?"

Peter must have answered with pain in His voice, because Jesus doubted his love. He said, "Lord, You know all things; You know that I love you."

Then Jesus gave him His final commission, “Feed My sheep” (17).

That morning Jesus brought healing to Peter through forgiveness. He entrusted him with His greatest possession. Jesus gave Peter His sheep.

Peter should not have been hurt by Jesus' three questions. When He asked Peter three times if he loved Him, Jesus was not condemning him. He was giving Peter a way to reaffirm his love the same number of times he had denied it. In each moment of affirmation, Jesus rebuilt Peter. With each yes, Jesus placed His trust in Peter. He fully restored Peter in his own eyes as well as in the eyes of the other disciples.

The pruning process Peter endured fit perfectly with the healing Jesus provided on the beach. Through first being broken, Peter was then rebuilt into the image of Christ. In the three questions came forgiveness, healing and restoration.

Once Peter became more like Jesus, he was able to love others as Jesus loved. The complete fulfillment of Peter’s restoration took place when God chose him to share the gospel with the world on the day of Pentecost. In Acts 2, Peter preached his first sermon, not in his own strength and wisdom, but through the power of the Holy Spirit. On that day, Jews from all over the Roman Empire heard him present the gospel in their own languages. The church was born that day. Peter faithfully carried out his mission to feed Jesus’ sheep.

Follow
As Peter and Jesus walked down the beach talking, they were not alone. John, the same one who wrote the gospel we have been studying for the past few weeks, walked with them.
We have not talked a great deal about John, but he was one of the inner circle of three that Jesus shared even more of himself with. In the garden, He took Peter, James (John's brother) and John with Him to pray. We have a detailed description of his last hours on earth because John was right there with Him.

So, as they are all walking together, Jesus tells Peter, "I tell you the truth, when you were younger you dressed yourself and went where you wanted; but when you are old you will stretch out your hands, and someone else will dress you and lead you where you do not want to go." After telling Peter to take care of the sheep for the third time, Jesus then told Him that his life was no longer his own.

In classic Peter fashion, he looked over his shoulder and pointed to John. In the paraphrased version he might have said, “hold up Lord, what about him. Is he going to have to suffer anything, or did you just save that for me?”

Jesus answered, "If I want him to remain alive until I return, what is that to you? You must follow Me" (John 21:22).

That is exactly what Peter did. He followed Jesus to the cross. Peter finally kept the pledge he made to Jesus so many years before, “I will lay down my life for you” (John 13:37). He could not fulfill his word the night he gave it, but once he was humbled, rebuilt into the image of Jesus he chose martyrdom over denying Jesus’ name again. Peter chose to be crucified, but refused to be put to death in the same way His Lord died. He was crucified upside down.

First Peter 5:6 says, "Humble yourself, therefore, under God's mighty hand, that He may life you up in due time." Peter was humbled under the mighty hand of God, and in due time Jesus asked him, “Peter, do you love me?” Peter did not just answer Him with words, but with actions.

Jesus is the only one who can take our total failure, and restore our lives to newness again. Jesus’ forgiveness is free. He is waiting for you, just as He waited for Peter on the beach one morning. He wants to show you the same humility, forgiveness and true love in his friendship that He showed Peter. Jesus came to restore humanity to Himself. He wants to restore you as well.

Is there someone you need to reach out to, someone you need to restore to wholeness? It might take 20 years as it did Jefferson and Adams, it might be in 40 days as it was for Peter, or it might be in an instant. Jesus is the only one who can bring about that kind of restoration, because He is more than enough.

Study Guide

Read John 21:15-17. What do you gain from a closer look at these verses? Why did Jesus ask Peter three times if he loved Him?

If Jesus walked up next to you today, made breakfast for you and asked you, “Do you love me?” What would your response be?


What commission did Jesus place on Peter? Why was this significant?


What has Jesus entrusted to you? Have you been faithful to care for those He has placed into your life?


Is there a relationship that you need to restore? Is there someone you need to forgive you? Is there someone you need to forgive?


What character trait do you need to display in order to reach out to someone who has rejected you?

What steps can you take to move toward that reconciliation?



Pray and ask the Lord to speak to your heart as He spoke to mine that morning when I was teaching. Ask Him to reveal to you anyone in your life that you need to rebuild a relationship with. Humble yourself under His hand so that He can bring about newness in your life.

Live in the Vine

I am the true vine and My Father is the Gardener. He cuts off every branch in Me that doesn’t produce fruit, while every branch that does produce fruit, He prunes or in other words cleanses, so that it will be even more fruitful. You are already clean because of the word I have spoken to you. Make your home in Me and I will live in you. No branch will produce fruit by its self; it has to stay connected to the Vine. I Am the Vine; you are the branches. If you make your life Me and I live in you, you will produce so much fruit; but if you are not living in Me, you can’t do anything. If anyone does not make their home in Me, they will be like a branch that withers and is thrown away. Those branches are picked up and thrown into the fire and are burned. If you make Me your life and My words live in you, ask whatever you want and it will be given to you. When you show that you are My disciples by producing fruit, you bring glory to My Father. (paraphrase John 15:1-10)

The best illustration of what Jesus was explaining in this passage is actually found in the lives of two of His disciples. In the first three verses of John 15, two paths are laid out, those who do not belong to the vine and therefore do not produce fruit and those who are in Christ and live their lives according to the words that Jesus spoke.

Judas walked with Jesus for as long as the rest of the disciples, for about three years. He slept, ate, drank and walked daily with God. He held a position of great trust among the disciples, because he was the one Jesus had chosen to entrust their finances to, Judas acted as their treasure. He, however, was not faithful to that trust. He showed his heart one day when he became upset because Mary, the sister of Lazarus, poured expensive perfume all over Jesus’ feet. He said that the perfume was wasted, and instead of it being used on Jesus, they should have sold it in order to have money to feed the poor. John points out that Judas could have cared less about the poor. He wanted the money to be put in the treasury so he could pilfer it.

In verse three of John 15, Jesus said that the disciples were clean because of the word He had spoken to them. Funny thing is, when Jesus taught this chapter, Judas was already gone. He had been cut off because he had chosen not to make Jesus His life. Judas made a decision within himself not to accept all that Jesus was teaching. He chose to live for himself, reject the vine, produce no fruit, and be cut off to be thrown away forever.

Peter on the other hand, well he was producing fruit. He not only followed Jesus, but he began to live in relationship with Jesus. That relationship changed who Peter was and began when Peter first met the Lord. His name was changed as was his life from that point forward. Was Peter perfect? By no stretch of the imagination, but the difference between him and Judas was that he wanted Christ.

Remember after the crowd found out that Jesus wasn’t going to provide them physical bread, and started to tell them that He was the Bread of Life, how they all left Him. Jesus turned to His disciples at that point and asked them if they were going to leave Him as well. Peter gave the best answer any of us could have given. He said, “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life. We believe and know that you are the Holy One of God.” How that must have warmed Jesus’ heart. Even as others left Him, the ones He had chosen were starting to understand. They were beginning to live in Him, as they realized that His words were the source of life.

That said, Peter had some things in his life that needed to be cut back, that needed to be pruned in order for him to produce as much fruit as he was capable of producing. Peter was a proud man. A couple times he was brash enough to openly question Jesus. Several times Jesus had to put Peter back in his place.

Not ten hours before he would deny knowing Jesus three times, Peter declared to the Lord that he would lay down his very life for Him. Of course we know that Peter was unable to keep that promise. When faced with the power of the Roman army, the anger of the Jews and his own humanity, he turned his back on the Holy One of God, on his Master, on his Friend. He found out that night that apart from Jesus he could do nothing. (Jh. 15:5).

You see Jesus had tried to prepare him. He had tried to get Peter to remain closer to Him that Peter thought he needed to be.. Jesus took his disciples to pray with Him after the Lord’s Supper. He knew how he was going to suffer, and knew that He needed to be so connected to the Father that NOTHING could deter Him from the cross. He asked the three disciples who were closest to Him to come with Him a little bit deeper into the garden and sit and pray with Him. This is how we know the heart wrenching prayers Jesus offered that night, but we too know that Peter, James and John were unable to stay awake and pray with the Lord as He had asked them to do.

Jesus didn’t tell them to pray for His sake, no he told them to pray so they would not fall into temptation. He said to Peter, “Simon, could you not keep watch for one hour? Watch and pray so that you will not fall into temptation.” By telling them to pray, Jesus was showing them how to remain in the vine, how to draw strength against sin, doubt, fear and temptation, but just like us they did not understand how much they needed to dwell in the very heart of God in order to with stand the wiles of the devil.

Because in the end that is exactly what happened to Peter. He fell to the enemy. In Luke 22: 31 Jesus warned Peter, “Simon, Simon, Satan has asked to sift you as wheat. But I have prayed for you, Simon, that your faith many not fail. And when you have turned back, strengthen your brothers.” He knew that they would not be able to withstand the events of that night, and Jesus didn’t say that He would fight Satan for Peter, nor that He would stop Satan from coming to sift Peter. Instead He said, I have prayed for you. How powerful are those words? Simon, I have prayed for you. I think too often we take for granted the strength prayer can provide to us.

Prayer, the door to intimate fellowship with God, is one of the key ways He has provided for us to live in true relationship with Him, is one of the ways we remain in the Vine.
Jesus clearly explained to Peter that Satan was going to sift him or in other words test Him. God allowed Satan to do this in order to show Peter his own weakness, his own need for a Savior, his pride. You see sifting and pruning have the same results. The bad is removed and the good is left behind, thereby cleansing the plant or the wheat, causing it to become purified. To tell you the truth, I had no idea this passage, Luke 21:33 existed before a time of sifting or pruning took place in my own life.

Shon and I had been married for 13 years at the time. We had our ups and downs, but nothing big. God sent us somewhere cold, hard and lonely for 10 months, and in those ten months we had more thrown at us than we had had in our first 13 years of marriage. I was pretty proud that we were a healthy couple, that he was doing well in his career and that we were faithful to the church. By the time we were done with that period of sifting, we had both been seriously tempted to have affairs, our finances were in some major difficulties and the faithfulness to the church was replaced with a deeper, more real relationship with God. I confess, that was the most difficult period in my life, yet one of the most spiritually fruitful.

Too often we see Jesus and prayer as a genie in a bottle to rub so we can get three wishes and have an abundant life, free of pain and filled with prosperity. Well name it and claim it might work for some, but in my life it is the trial that actually produces the fruit. Why do we think that we should have it easy when Christ had to suffer the way He did? It is in His suffering we know Him most deeply, and apart from Him, apart from His suffering we can do nothing.

Just as this is true in our own lives, it was true for Peter. He did not just fail to keep His promise to Jesus, by not laying down His life for Jesus, he went above and beyond that to actually saying he didn’t even know who Jesus was. And when he heard that crow after his third denial, he looked into the eyes of Jesus, and was finally broken. The pride was stripped away. In its place came humility. It was then that Peter found He could not love the Lord in his own strength. It was through pain that He became even more dependent on the Vine.

So in order to remain fully in the Vine, God gave us His Word (Jesus), as Peter said, “You have the words of life”. Prayer then draws us even deeper into a relationship with the Vine, pruning gets rid of our desire to live on our own apart from the vine, and causes us to know that we are nothing without Him. The last way to remain in the vine is obedience and the fruit of that obedience is friendship with God.

Just as My Father has loved Me, I have loved you. Live in that love. I live in My Father’s love because I have done what He asked of Me, and that is how you can live in My love, by obeying what I have said to you. I say all of this to you so that you might be completely filled with joy. This is what I ask; Love each other just like I have loved you.

The greatest expression of love anyone can offer is to lay down his life for his friends. And as you love each other as I have asked you to do, you show that you are My friends. I no longer have to call you servants, because a servant doesn’t know the business affairs of his master. I now call you friends because everything I have learned from My Father I have made know to you.
You didn’t choose to follow Me, but I chose you. I selected you to produce fruit – fruit that will last, and as you produce fruit, the Father will give you whatever you ask in My name. This is the one thing I have asked of you; Love each other. (John 15: 9-17)

Philips, Craig and Dean have a song called, Friend of God. We sing it often at church, and yes, as we sing it we are thankful that God calls us His friend. But honestly, I think we have heard that we are His friend so often that we miss the utter amazement of being called a friend of God. I think within the church at least, we take the friendship of God for granted.

There were only two men in the entire Old Testament, which spans a greater length of time than the 2000 years that have passed since the birth of Christ, and in all that time only two men had the honor, no the blessing to be called friends of God. Those men were Abraham and Moses.
Yes, David was a man after God’s own heart, Joshua was obedient as he lead Israel, and Elijah was used to bring about some of the most amazing miracles in all history, but the title friend was not given to them.

That honor was reserved for two men that God spoke to as a man speaks to another man.…He, God Himself shared His heart with Abraham and Moses. If you think about it, there are no other people in the time before Christ whom God talked to in quite the same way He talked to them. For the sake of time, we are just going to look at the relationship God had with Abraham this evening.

The Lord promised Abraham that a nation would come from him, but as the years passed and no child was born to him and Sara, he began to wonder if he had not heard the Lord correctly. One night the Lord came to talk to him. “Do not be afraid Abraham, I am your shield, your very great reward.” Then the Lord took Abraham outside and said to him, “Look up at the heavens and count the stars – if indeed you can count them.” Then He said to Abraham, “So shall you offspring be.” And Abraham believed the Lord and in doing so was made righteous. Abraham chose that night to remain in the Vine, to live in the Lord and rest all his hopes, all of his future, his life in God’s hands.

Abraham showed that he was a friend of God, not just through his belief, but also through his actions. The son that God promised him finally came after 25 years of waiting. That son, the one Abraham must have adored and cherished, the Lord asked him to sacrifice. God asked Abraham to lay down his life, and Abraham obeyed. He didn’t argue, wrestle or hold back his beloved Son. He placed wood on Isaac’s back and walked him up to Mount Mariah. He prepared the wood on the altar, all the time knowing that his son was the sacrifice he would give. Isaac asked where the sacrificial lamb was and Abraham said the Lord would provide. Abraham believed that God would keep his promise through Isaac even if He had to raise Isaac from the dead. Isaac soon understood that he was the sacrificial lamb, and willingly gave himself to his father. Abraham raised his knife, and just as he was about to plunge it into His sons heart, the Lord said “Do not lay a hand on the boy. Do not do anything to him. Now I know that you fear God, because you have not withheld from me your son, your only son.” “There is no greater love than this, that a man is willing to lay down his life for his friends….Abraham was God’s friend…he laid down his life for Him.

STRANGER THAN FICTION
Harold Crick was a IRS Agent, who had no life. He counted the number of steps he took to get to the bus stop, how many times he moved his brush back and forth in his mouth each time he brushed his teeth, until the day he heard a voice in his head narrating his life, and then the narrator say that he was about to die….He took every step to find the narrator….tell rest of story.

What Harold realized was what Abraham lived out, The author’s will is far better than our own. If we remain in His love, we will produce fruit, and know what it means to be a friend of God.
The greatest example of one who remained perfectly in the Vine was the Vine Himself. Jesus, “Who being in the very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, but made himself nothing, taking on the very nature of a servant being made in human likeness. And being found in appearance as a man, He humbled himself and became obedient to death, even death on a cross. Jesus understood that the Author’s plan was the best one…no greater love has anyone than this, that he lays down His life for His friends, you are my friends if you do what I command…Remain in Me.

Study Guide

1. Ruminate on John 15. What does abiding/remain in the Vine mean. How do we abide in Him and how to we allow Him to abide in us?

2. Do you see the parallels of the lives of Judas and Peter? What can you learn from each one of their decisions?

3. Do you know that God calls you friend? What does that mean to you? Do you call God your friend, or do you see Him as a distant force that can’t really be known. Have you seen a new side of your relationship with God through this study?



4. Is God pruning a certain area of your life? Does he need to get rid of an area of pride or arrogance in your attitude toward Him or others. If you have been humbled, what have you learned, how painful was it, and what have you learned?


5. Will you decide to follow the will of the Author of all history, or will you have to be broken so you will listen to His call on your heart and your life.


6. Rewrite John 15:1-10 in your own words, through that you will find that you can and will be able to ABIDE IN THE VINE.

Father, Thank you for Jesus, our forever friend. Teach us through Your loving-kindness to remain in His love, to abide in the Vine. In Jesus Glorious Name Amen.

Lesson 5

As I was writing these lessons, I would sit around at night, searching for the right words to say, talking to myself, writing page after page only to delete most of what I had written and then five minutes later ask myself why I had done that. Let me tell you that, that is one big negative of the computer when it comes to the art of writing.

Once upon a time an author would wad up a page covered in handwritten script or play hoops with typed pages from an old manual typewriter, always able to retrieve the thoughts that at one moment seemed ridiculous when sanity returned. But when you select all and hit delete, well there is no retrieval, just the desire to pound your head against the keyboard. And it was at the head pounding stage that I began to realize I was in some deep trouble.

I stopped solemnly praying and just started talking to God. Father, what do you want me to say, I don’t know how to say that, what do you mean here, I have no idea how to convey this…you are going to have to talk through me because I’ve got nothing. Father we are in some serious trouble…we’ve got a week to go, and all this stuff I have written is really bad, what are we going to do….

One night as I was talking to Him, this guy popped into my head from Braveheart. He’s the one who ends up protecting William Wallice, but everyone thinks he’s nuts, because no one else prays like he does, like God was actually their Father, nobody but him. I realized as I was thinking of that movie, that that is how I should have been praying as I was writing.

But Mel Gibbson wasn’t the one who taught mankind about the Father. No, the one who did that was the only one who really knew Him up to that point, and He is the one who introduced the Father to the world. “I Am the Way, the Truth and the Life. No one comes to the Father except through Me.” Jesus taught us to pray to the Father. He is the one who led us into a love relationship with the Father and He is more than enough to meet our every need, even when we doubt that He is.

Father, as we seek to know Jesus as our everything, teach us through Your Word and this lesson what it means that Jesus is the Way, what it means that Jesus is the Truth, what it means that Jesus is the Life. In His name we pray, amen.

John 14:8-12; John 11:38-43

In John 14, we find Jesus in the upper room sharing the heart of His message as well as His own heart with the men He lived with for three years. He shared things with them He could never have shared with the crowds, and He teaches them how to love one another in the process.
In John 13, they were all together in the upper room. I picture it as a large enough room to handle thirteen men comfortably. They are all sitting around a large table.

No not like the image we have in our heads of DaVinci’s last supper, more the Roman style, called the triclinium.

In the tradition of the day, three men were usually on one large couch, with the highest ranking reclining at the top. Then the next ranking person angled in front of him with his head about at the chest of the first person. It was said that that person lay in the bosom of the first. So John and Peter were on the couch with Jesus, then the other disciples filled up the rest of the couches around the table making a rectangle.

I say all of this so you can get a mental picture of the level of intimacy, these men shared, and why they did some of the things they did. From this picture, it is really clear why they needed to have their feet washed. They were all sitting around with their feet in each other’s face trying to eat, so it was necessary to make sure those feet were clean.

In addition, on this night, Jesus did not just want everyone to have clean feet; He wanted to teach them that they needed to serve one another. He wanted them to know that none of them were any better than anyone else, and in so doing He was teaching them how to love each other.

Just as they finish up breaking bread together, Jesus told them some things that rocked their world. You see, they, just like the crowd who wanted to eat, thought that Jesus was a political leader. The disciples had been with Him a long time, but they still did not understand the reason He had come to earth. So, Jesus started to tell them some stuff that is extremely hard for them to grasp. He pointed things out to them about themselves that they just did not want to believe.

Read John 13:2, “I tell you the truth, one of you is going to betray Me.” Now check out the disciples response. They all start looking at each other. The fishermen were probably looking at Matthew the tax collector thinking, “I knew it, you can’t trust those people. He never worked hard a day in his life, and he wasn’t one of us from the beginning.”

Whatever they were thinking, I am sure they all started to doubt each other.

The disciples starting to feel threatened from within when Jesus hits them with this:
My children, I will be with you only a little longer. You will look for Me, and just as I said to the Jews, so I tell you now: Where I am going, you cannot come.

So, not only is Jesus going to be betrayed by one of them, now He is telling them that He is leaving them and they can’t even go with Him.

You need to know that they all thought that they would die for Him. Thomas said at one point when He knew the leaders in Judea were planning on killing Jesus that he would go back to Judea with Jesus and be killed with Him. Now Peter says the same thing, “Why can’t I follow you now? I will lay down my life for You?” None of them think that they will run in fear, none of them doubt that they will fight for Him, none of them ever dreamed they would abandon Him, but their unbelief on this night sets the stage for exactly that to happen.

Philip said, “Just show us the Father and that will be enough.”

Really, Philip, will that finally be enough for you? I mean I can understand, you want to meet the Father face to face, I get that, but you don’t seem to get that when I say I AM, that is exactly what I mean. You have been sitting with the Father for three years now, you get to talk to God face to face…you are talking to the great I AM right now, but I understand…you thought the Father would be a little more impressive. Well Philip, I don’t think that if the Father came down right here next to you that you would believe any more than you already do.

Just a few weeks before Philip asked Jesus to show them the Father, Lazarus, a very close friend of Jesus, died. He was in the tomb four days before Jesus arrived in Bethany, and He had told His disciples even before they left to see Lazarus that the sickness that had over taken him wasn’t one that would end in death, but that it was for God’s glory.

When they reached Bethany everyone was wailing, and crying. Martha and Mary were mad at Jesus for not getting there sooner, and when Jesus told Martha to have the stone rolled away from the tomb that held Lazarus’ body, she freaked out. She was not to0 overwhelmed with grief to remind Jesus that a dead body smelled pretty bad by the fourth day.

Jesus cried for the hurt Mary and Martha felt, but He did not cry for Lazarus. He told those mourning that day that if they believed they would see the glory of God. Then Jesus prayed, “Father, I thank You that You have heard Me. I know that You always hear Me, but I said this for the benefit of the people standing here, that they may believe You sent Me.” Jesus didn’t pray publically because HE needed to, He prayed in front of all of those gathered there that day so that they would understand that He and the Father were one. At that point, Jesus called Lazarus back from the dead.

If that event wasn’t enough to prove to Philip and all the other disciples that Jesus was one with the Father, then nothing Jesus did on earth ever would. Belief is a choice; it isn’t based on signs, logic or anything other than a decision to trust.

How many of you are cynics and proud of it?

The cynics among us are not the most easy to teach. We tend to be the ones with our arms crossed, face serious as we listen intently to every word to make sure that no false teaching is taking place. We uncross our arms only to look through scripture to find the portion of the word that is being read. We take notes so we can read them later on, and test the truth of what the pastor or teacher or speaker said.

Now, I am thankful for the ones who hold those of us who teach accountable for the words we speak, especially since we say we are teaching the word of God. The only problem is that we skeptics tend to not know when to stop analyzing and start trusting.

From what Philip said to Jesus, I am pretty sure that Philip is one of us. He is a good guy, but not easily persuaded, and sometimes the cynic’s heart can keep them from a deep and fulfilling relationship because they are always looking for the worst in people…they are always looking for something better, and they end up missing the good that is standing right in front of them, because it didn’t meet their standard. Philip was looking for his idea of God and missed three years of knowing God instead of just thinking about Him.

It is because Jesus knows that they don’t yet understand who He is or what He has come for that He shares all He does with them from chapter 13-17. He does not want to leave them unprepared or afraid so He tells them, “Do not let your hearts be troubled, trust in God, trust also in Me. In my Father’s house are many rooms; if it were not so, I would have told you. I am going to prepare it for you, and if I go and prepare it, then I will come back and take you with me so that you are where I am. You know the way.”

Thomas, also a cynic, chimes in with Philip and says, “Lord, we don’t know where you are going, so how can we know the way?”

Have you ever tried to explain to someone something you know, but they have never experienced so there is a disconnect between the two of you? This happens a lot when I am trying to explain something to my kids. I know what I am talking about, and assume that they can grasp what I am saying simply because they know me, but they instead look at me with a blank stare.

This is usually the moment I start get upset with them, because usually the blank stare comes along with a request for them to do something. But they end up not being able to do what I want because they don’t have the life experience to know what I mean. That is where the disciples are at. They hear what Jesus is saying, but they don’t have the depth of knowledge or faith to understand.

This fact plays out most clearly over the next twenty four to forty-eight hours of Jesus’ life. It is not until after Jesus ascends into heaven, after His resurrection, that they start to grasp what He came to do, and not until the Holy Spirit filled them did they have the life experience (the Spirit of God within them) to fully understand that Jesus had come to die all along. That is why He told them in John 16, that the Holy Spirit would come when He left and that the Spirit would comfort them and lead them into all truth.

Jesus was trying to prepare them for the devastation of the cross, but more than that, because He knew they would fail Him, He was preparing them to come back to Him after the cross.
Don’t be afraid, even though you are going to know terror like you have never known it before. I have to leave you for a little while, but I will be back. “I am the Way, the Truth and the Life.”
He was telling them: you do know the way…I am the way…trust me, because I am not just a way of life, but I am the truth of all life, I am life.

And in our day, the idea of one way, one truth that leads to eternal life is something that we no longer accept. We like the crowd that followed Jesus and like the disciples have a hard time grasping that Jesus could be the answer to all of our questions, to the source of all of our beliefs and the ending place of all of our lives.

Many in the Christian community are moving away from teaching that Jesus is the answer, the source and the ending of life. They believe that that teaching is too hard for those in our culture seeking God. Instead there is a movement that says that John 14:6 should not be read to say that Jesus is the only way to God, but instead if you live the way of Jesus then you will find God. Now that might sound like the same thing, but it is not.

What they mean is that if you live as a peasant with nothing, helping the poor, then you will find God, even if it is through another “faith tradition”.

By this interpretation of John 14;6, Gandhi and Buddha, by the things they did are with the Father, even though they did not go through Jesus. But if it is enough to live with no earthly possessions, meet the needs of the sick and needy, then Jesus never needed to go to the cross, he could have simply continued to live as He was, showing His disciples to live that same way.

We should be doing all that Jesus did, but it should not be to get to the Father, it should instead be a by-product of knowing the Way to the Father.

Funny, it was Martha who understood this; she seemed to get it even before the disciples. She was crying, wailing, mourning her brother’s death, as Jesus sauntered in four days late. She walked up to Him and said, “Lord, if You had been here, my brother would not have died. But I know that even now God will give You whatever you ask.”

Jesus told her, “Your brother will rise again.”

“I know he will rise again one day,” Martha responded.

But Jesus didn’t leave it at that. He said, “I am the resurrection and the life. He who believes in Me will live even though he dies; whoever lives and believes in Me will never die. Martha, do you believe this?”

And Martha, the one we in the church dog all the time for not being as spiritual as her sister Mary, the same Martha who was too busy to sit at the feet of Jesus and be still, this Martha has more understanding, more faith than the twelve who walked with Him daily for three years. Martha said, “Yes Lord, I believe that you are the Christ, the Son of God who was to come into the world.”

Martha, a cynic if I ever saw one, at the moment of her deepest need believed that Jesus would raise Lazarus from the dead, even before He did it…it was enough for her to simply hear Him say that He would do it, even if it wasn’t enough yet for Philip to see Lazarus raised from the dead.

Martha chose to believe that Jesus was who He said He was, she knew that He was the only way to the Father, that He was and is the Way, the Truth and the Life.