Since, then, you have been raised with Christ, set your hearts on things above, where Christ is seated at the right hand of God. Set your minds on things above, not on earthly things. For you died, and your life is now hidden with Christ in God. - Colossians 3:1-3

When the Israelites were in the desert, grumbling and rebelling against God, an epidemic of sorts hit them and many were dieing. They repented, confessing their sin to God. At the direction of God, Moses fashioned a bronze serpent on a pole and held it up for all to see. Those who gazed on it were healed. This event is not only where we get that strange symbol that you see at every doctor's office signifying it is a place of healing, but it was also foreshadowing Christ being lifted up on a cross.

In our devotional reader, Mary Fletcher (whom you can read about on page 5 of the reader) says the following:

"When the soul that is dead in trespasses and sin awakes out of that death, and feels the pardoning blood applied, it begins to live. It is as a new born babe. It has senses it never had before. Its ear is open to hear the voice of God, its eye of faith, to behold the wonders of redemption. It feels the almighty arm; and tastes that the Lord is gracious. But there is the more abundant life, still to be sought after. When the soul by a strong faith has attained the fixed look on the saviour as the Israelite on the brazen serpent, then, and not till then, it feels the sanctifying influence, and experiences the full change, from nature to grace."

The forgiveness of our sins is a remarkable birth into new life. But just as babies are born and through care and proper nutrition grow into maturity, so our spirits must be properly nourished so that we may grow in a healthy manner toward "the more abundant life." This comes from focusing our hearts and minds, our ears and eyes, on the sanctifying influence of Jesus Christ as opposed to the spiritual-malnutrition of the world.

- Rob

Finally, brothers, we instructed you how to live in order to please God, as in fact you are living. Now we ask you and urge you in the Lord Jesus to do this more and more. For you know what instructions we gave you by the authority of the Lord Jesus.

It is God's will that you should be sanctified...

Now about brotherly love we do not need to write to you, for you yourselves have been taught by God to love each other. 10And in fact, you do love all the brothers throughout Macedonia. Yet we urge you, brothers, to do so more and more. - 1 Thessalonians 4:1-3a, 9-10

In Paul's letter to the church in Thessalonica, he is urging his congregation who are living a life pleasing to God and loving one another well, to do so "more and more." For it is God's will that they (and we) be sanctified, and that means reflecting more and more the image of Christ to the world. Sometimes when I see some fruit born in my life, I get kind of content with it - maybe I even think "I've got this love thing or this patience thing licked." (Okay, I've never thought I had patience down pat!) But Paul's encouragement is for us - do so more and more. Allow the Holy Spirit to shape us through obedience and abiding even more that we've been shaped to this point.

As I was reading this morning, this thought came to me: "Rob, loving more and more isn't just loving people you already love more deeply, passionately, or kindly. It is also loving more people who may not be all that easy to love." UGH! Guess that's sanctification for you. More and more.

- Rob

The word "friend" is used all through the Bible. God obviously created us to be in relationship with Himself and with each other.

So, as Dr. Phil would say, "How's that working for ya?" How are your friendships? More importantly, how good a friend are you?

Abraham was called God's friend simply by believing Him:

And the scripture was fulfilled that says, "Abraham believed God, and it was credited to him as righteousness," and he was called God's friend.
James 2:23

Jesus said that we can be his friend:

You are my friends if you do what I command.
John 15:14

So what does he command? That's what we dig through the Bible to figure out. Here are a few things we do know: He commands that we love each other well. He asks that we be his ambassadors, allowing him to make his appeal to the people around us through us.

Then he tells us what it really means to be a friend:

Greater love has no one than this, that he lay down his life for his friends.
John 15:13

Laying down my life may not mean dying for someone. It may mean laying down my right to be right in order to love someone well. It may mean going to someone who is lonely or hurting, instead of turning my head and being comfortable. It may mean doing whatever it takes to be a good neighbor, a good parent, a good son or daughter, a good employee or boss.

I pray that we will be God's friend by believing all that He says. I pray that we will be a friend to Jesus by doing all that he commanded. And I pray that we will show the love of Christ everywhere we go as we lay down our lives for our friends!

-Angela

We are in the middle of a series about relationships. Personally I don't think we talk about anything that is more important than that. Jesus spent a lot of time teaching us how to love and care for one another. The Ten Commandments are basically God explaining to His people how to relate to Him and to each other.

This past week we talked about being selfish. I remember running across this verse a few years ago (actually I just really paid attention to it a few years ago, I certainly had read it before):

Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit, but in humility consider others better than yourselves. Each of you should look not only to your own interests, but also to the interests of others.
Your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus:
Who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, but made himself nothing, taking 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! Philippians 2:3-8

NOTHING?? I would much rather that verse say "Do most things without selfish ambition being the motive", but it says nothing. The truth is, you cannot be selfish if you are putting the needs of others before your own. That flies in the face of everything our culture tells us and all that our own human nature screams for! We are told to look out for ourselves, to put ourselves first, that the world and God and everyone in our lives owes us.

But God says something very different. He says, I came and died on a cross to set you free from your own selfish desires. I came and demonstrated for you how I want you to serve and love. His life was all about serving and his death was all about love!

I will never love to the point of dying on a cross. But I want to commit myself to loving more selflessly everyday. To pour out my life for others and to let Him continue to work selfishness out of my heart and motives.

I can only do that by keeping my heart fixed on the cross, where He gave the most selfless thing of all, Himself.

-Angela

Have you received any good gifts lately? You know, the kind that are both deeply from the heart of the giver and exactly what you wanted or needed. How about this one?

But when the kindness of God our Savior appeared, he saved us, not because of righteous things we had done, but because of his mercy. He saved us through the washing of rebirth and renewal by the Holy Spirit, whom he poured out on us generously through Jesus Christ our Savior, so that, having been justified by his grace, we might become heirs having the hope of eternal life. - Titus 3:4-7

- Rob

Therefore, putting aside all malice and all deceit and hypocrisy and envy and all slander, like newborn babies, long for the pure milk of the word, so that by it you may grow in respect to salvation, if you have tasted the kindness of the Lord. - 1 Peter 2:1-2

I have a good friend who has a newborn baby and let me tell you, when that little guy is longing for pure milk, you KNOW about it! Nothing else will satisfy him. Oh, a pacifier will do the trick for about 3 seconds, but then he spits that thing out and screams to high heaven.

I love this picture of longing for "the pure milk of the word." It is this longing and feeding on the Word of God that grows us up in terms of our salvation. Are you hungry?

- Rob

Wake up o sleeper and rise from the dead and Christ will shine on you! - Ephesians 5:14

Since, then, you have been raised with Christ, set your hearts on things above, where Christ is seated at the right hand of God. Set your minds on things above, not on earthly things. For you died, and your life is now hidden with Christ in God. - Colossians 3:1-3

If we are Christians, then we have died with Christ, and we have been raised with Christ. So what next? We are to surrender; to lay down our lives as living sacrifices. We are to set our minds and hearts on the things of God's kingdom and not on earthly kingdoms or our own kingdoms. We rise to lie down at the throne of Jesus.

This is a continual thing. We humble ourselves and in due time, God exalts us so that we can...humble ourselves again. This is love of God, and God asks that we love him with all of ourselves.

- Rob

Therefore, I urge you, brothers, in view of God's mercy, to offer your bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God—this is your spiritual act of worship. Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God's will is—his good, pleasing and perfect will. - Romans 12:1-2

The Apostle Paul does a lot of things with the first eleven chapters of Romans, but primarily he is conveying what God has done for us in Christ Jesus; the incredible expression of His love for us in the incarnation, death and resurrection. Then there is a shift at the very beginning of chapter twelve. Paul begins to speak of our response.

We find ourselves on the back side of Easter. Lent - the season of our recognition that we desperately need a savior - is over and God has set us free. We, like Paul in Romans 12, now shift to our response. And it is an interesting one. We are to offer ourselves as living sacrifices; in other words, to lay our entire lives down so that we may no longer be conformed to the pattern of this world, but transformed. Notice, that we do not do the transforming - that verb is passive - but it is up to us to offer ourselves for the transforming. I'll say more about that tomorrow, but in the meantime, let's pray that God would bring to our minds the things that are not yet fully offered to him.

- Rob

One of the most touching words in the entire Bible to me is in the Easter story.

After Jesus was killed, Mary Magdalene (one whom Jesus had driven out 7 demons: Mark 16:9) went to the tomb. To say that Jesus had radically changed her life is surely an understatement. Can you imagine how she felt when He was killed, and all of her hope with Him. All she knew to do was to go to where He had been buried. I imagine she just needed to be close to Him.

She stood outside of his tomb crying when she realized that his body was not where it had been buried. Not only did she lose him, but she lost the ability to even grieve where his body had been laid. As she was crying, Jesus Himself came up and talked to her, but she didn't realize that it was Him.

She was carried away with grief, feeling hopeless and lost, until He said one word:

"Mary" John 20:16

When He said her name, she knew who He was, hope was restored and she ran to tell the disciples the very good news.

That one word changed everything for her; He called her by name. We can spend our lives knowing about Jesus, hearing about all He has done and all that He has done even for us. But life changes drastically when you hear Him call YOUR name.

As we live beyond Easter and the good news of "He is risen. He is alive." My prayer is that you would hear Him call you by name. I pray that, like Mary, you will experience all of the hope and life change that she did when she realized that He knew her and called her by name!

-Angela

At the crack of dawn on Sunday, the women came to the tomb carrying the burial spices they had prepared. They found the entrance stone rolled back from the tomb, so they walked in. But once inside, they couldn't find the body of the Master Jesus.

They were puzzled, wondering what to make of this. Then, out of nowhere it seemed, two men, light cascading over them, stood there. The women were awestruck and bowed down in worship. The men said, "Why are you looking for the Living One in a cemetery? He is not here, but raised up. Remember how he told you when you were still back in Galilee that he had to be handed over to sinners, be killed on a cross, and in three days rise up?" Then they remembered Jesus' words. - Luke 24:1-8

Jesus Christ is risen from the dead!
He is risen indeed!

Happy Easter...Easter in the truest sense can be no other way.

- Rob

Many of us have been reading the Lenten Reader as we prepare our hearts for Easter, the celebration of the resurrection of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. But before we get there, we have to pass through Good Friday, the day that He gave His life for our freedom and salvation.

Last week we briefly read about Mary, the mother of Jesus:

"Then there's Mary, standing there to the bitter end; the mother of God, who gave up her womb, her reputation and finally gives up the One for whom she gave it all."

This salvation is a free gift, but we cannot forget that is came at a very great cost. I will never be able to imagine the cost Mary paid in giving her life to God's cause at a young age, only to lose what she gave it all for. Standing at that cross, I'm sure Mary felt confused and bewildered and had to wonder about this great plan she was chosen for and blessed to be a part of.

And then there's Jesus, who loved us more than we can ever understand, even to the point of giving His life and taking on our sin.

"How shall we escape if we ignore such a great salvation? This salvation, which was first announced by the Lord, was confirmed to us by those who heard him." Hebrews 2:3

"It's crucial that we keep a firm grip on what we've heard so that we don't drift off. If the old message delivered by the angels was valid and nobody got away with anything, do you think we can risk neglecting this latest message, this magnificent salvation?"
Hebrews 2:3 (The Message Translation)

My prayer is that this Easter we will better understand how great this gift of salvation is, and that we would never ignore the price paid for us, truly a great and perfect salvation.

-Angela