Thursdays With Oswald—Unblameable In The Sight Of God

September 22, 2011 — Craig T. Owens

This is a weekly series with things I’m reading and pondering from Oswald Chambers. You can read the original seed thought here, or type “Thursdays With Oswald” in the search box to read more entries.

Unblameable In The Sight Of God

     If the ‘Oughts’ of the Old Testament were difficult to obey, Our Lord’s teaching is unfathomably more difficult. … Jesus Christ does not simply say, ‘Thou shalt not do certain things’; He demands that we have such a condition of the heart that we never even think of doing them, every thought and imagination of heart and mind is to be unblameable in the sight of God.

     …The purity God demands is impossible unless we can be re-made from within, and that is what Jesus Christ undertakes to do through the Atonement. … It is not a question of applying Jesus Christ’s principles to our actual life first of all, but of applying them to our relationship to Himself, then as we keep our souls open in relation to Him our conscience will decide how we are to act of that relationship.

From Biblical Ethics

I want every part of my life to be unblameable in the sight of God. I have to keep the eyes of my heart fixed on Jesus.

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. When Christ, Who is your life, appears, then you also will appear with Him in glory. (Colossians 3:1-4)

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Thursdays With Oswald—A Religious Poser

July 7, 2011 — Craig T. Owens

This is a weekly series with things I’m reading and pondering from Oswald Chambers. You can read the original seed thought here, or type “Thursdays With Oswald” in the search box to read more entries.

A Religious Poser

     It is difficult to evade pose in religious life. … If you have the idea that your duty is to catch other people, it puts you on a superior platform at once and your whole attitude takes on the guise of a prig….

     The religious pose is based, not on a personal relationship to God, but on adherence to a creed. Immediately we mistake God for a creed, or Jesus Christ for a form of belief, we begin to patronize what we do not understand. When anyone is in pain the thing that hurts more than anything else is pose….

From Baffled To Fight Better

How do I avoid religious posing?

  • Develop a deeply intimate, highly personalized relationship with Jesus Christ.
  • Allow everyone around me to have their own deeply intimate, highly personalized relationship with Jesus Christ.

I cannot fake it, nor can I ask someone to be just like me or believe just like me. I need to let God be as original with everyone else as He is with me.

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Buying Into It

February 8, 2011 — Craig T. Owens

But now you must be holy in everything you do, just as God who chose you is holy. For the Scriptures say, “You must be holy because I am holy.” (1 Peter 1:15-16)

There is something basically wrong with our Christianity and our spirituality if we can carelessly presume that if we do not like a Biblical doctrine and choose not to “buy” it, there is no harm done.

Commandments which we have received from our Lord or from the apostles cannot be overlooked and ignored by earnest and committed Christians. God has never instructed us that we should weigh His desires for us and His commandments to us in the balances of our own judgment and then decide what we want to do about them.

…Of course you can walk out on it! God has given every one of us the power to make our own choices. …We have the power within us to reject God’s instructions—but where else shall we go? If we refuse His words, which way will we turn? If we turn from the authority of God’s Word, to whose authority do we yield? Our mistake is that we generally turn to some other human—a man with breath in his nostrils. —A.W. Tozer

Notice that Peter tells us being holy comes before doing holy things: “Be holy in all you do.”

  • I cannot do holy things unless I am holy.
  • I cannot be holy unless I have the life of the Holy One in me.
  • I cannot have the life of the Holy One in me unless I totally buy in to His Lordship.

I’m buying in to holiness today. How about you?

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Thursdays With Oswald—Unbendingly Holy

January 13, 2011 — Craig T. Owens

This is a weekly series with things I’m reading and pondering from Oswald Chambers. You can read the original seed thought here, or type “Thursdays With Oswald” in the search box to read more entries.

Unbendingly Holy

       Holiness means every part of my life under scrutiny of God, knowing that the grace of God is sufficient for every detail. The temptation comes along the line of compromise, “Don’t be so unbendingly holy; so fiercely pure and uprightly chaste.” Never tolerate by sympathy with yourself or with others any practice that is not in keeping with a holy God.

 From Approved Unto God

My prayer: Scrutinize me, O God, and know my heart; test me and know my compromising thoughts. Point out ANYTHING in me that offends You, and lead me along the path of everlasting life. I want to be unbendingly holy in Your sight, O Holy God.

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Higher Standards For Greater Rewards

April 5, 2010 — Craig T. Owens

Most people think of the Ten Commandments as God’s law given through Moses. Actually the Ten Commandments are just the beginning of the laws, practices, and regulations that God gives to His people. The rest of the book of Exodus, the entire book of Leviticus, and the first ten chapters of Numbers compromise the bulk of the law.

For those of you keeping track, that’s nearly 60 chapters of rules and regulations.

Why so many? I think the answer is found in the lead-up to the Ten Commandments:

Now if you obey Me fully and keep My covenant, then out of all nations you will be My treasured possession. Although the whole earth is Mine, you will be for Me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation.

God wants people who are treasured. A people who are priests. A people who are holy. In short: He wants pacesetting leaders.

Priests have intimate access to God, and they are people who set an example for others to follow. In order to enjoy these special privileges, priests must be held to higher standards.

These are not standards just for those of Jewish ancestry, but for anyone who is a follower of Jesus Christ. Look what John recorded in the last book of the Bible:

To Him who loves us and has freed us from our sins by His blood, and has made us to be a kingdom and priests to serve His God and Father—to Him be glory and power for ever and ever! Amen.

…With Your blood You purchased men for God from every tribe and language and people and nation. You have made them to be a kingdom and priests to serve our God, and they will reign on the earth.

Yes, the standards to be a priest—to be a holy leader—are higher. But the rewards are immeasurable!

Are you ready to bring greater glory to God? Do you want to be a pacesetting leader for the Kingdom of heaven? Then ask the Holy Spirit to sanctify you as you take on the discipline of greater responsibility. Live up to higher standards, and you won’t be disappointed by the rewards!

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Is My Church Worldly?

February 4, 2010 — Craig T. Owens

I read this quote this morning from David F. Wells. It’s very challenging. I believe my responsibility as a pastor is to always be wrestling with issues like this.

What do you think about this quote:

“. . . Where Christian faith is offered as a means of finding personal wholeness rather than holiness, the church has become worldly.

“There are many other forms of worldliness that are comfortably at home in the evangelical church today. Where it substitutes intuition and feelings for biblical truth, it is being worldly. Where its appetite for the Word has been lost in favor of light discourses and entertainment, it is being worldly. Where it has restructured what it is and what it offers around the rhythms of consumption, it is being worldly, for customers are actually sinners whose place in the church is not to be explained by a quest for self-satisfaction but by a need for repentance. Where it cares more about success than about faithfulness, more about size than spiritual health, it is being worldly. Where the centrality of God to worship is lost amidst the need to be distracted and to have fun, the church is being worldly because it is simply accommodating itself to the preeminent entertainment culture in the world.

“Is it not odd that in so many church services each Sunday, services that are ostensibly about worshiping God, those in attendance may not be obliged to think even once about His greatness, grace, and commands? Worship in such contexts often has little or nothing to do with God.” —David F. Wells

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Insert Your Name Here

January 20, 2010 — Craig T. Owens

I don’t think anyone would mind having his or her name inserted in any of the following compliments:

  • ___________ is a righteous person.
  • ___________ is blameless before God.
  • God looks favorably on ___________.
  • ___________ walks with God.

Pretty nice pedigree, huh?

This is the description of Noah in the Bible. I especially love the phrase “walks with God.” It’s only used of two people in the Bible: Noah and Enoch. But it’s even more encouraging to me when I read it about Noah’s life.

Noah is the first in Adam’s family line to be born after Adam died. That’s significant because all of his ancestors (including Enoch) would have been able to get a first-hand account from Adam himself about what it was like to be in the Garden of Eden. All of Noah’s ancestors could have heard right from Adam’s mouth what it was like to visit with God personally each evening, to talk to Him face-to-face. And they could have heard firsthand how devastatingly painful it was to lose that intimate fellowship because of sin.

Since Noah was the first person in this family tree to hear about this secondhand, he’s the first person to walk with God by faith. Which is the exact same way we walk with God today:

Faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see (Hebrews 11:1).

You too can insert your name in this blank: “___________ walks with God.”

How do you do this? Pray this:

“God, I want to walk with You. I know it’s impossible to please You except by faith. I want to get closer to You. So I believe that You exist and that You care enough to respond to me when I seek You and love You with all of my heart, soul, mind, and strength.”

Let’s enourage one another to walk in this way every single day.

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Just One

August 24, 2009 — Craig T. Owens

DSCN0821“If you can find but one person who deals honestly and seeks the truth, I will forgive this city” (Jeremiah 5:1).

Through just one person’s pursuit of righteousness, God will save an entire city! One person.

Just one.

Just one who decides to not give in to sin. Just one who is a radical counter-culturalist. Just one who fears God and is not afraid of man’s reaction. Just one who deals honestly. Just one who seeks God’s truth.

Just one.

“When I was young and free my imagination had no limits, I dreamed of changing the world. As I grew older and wiser, I discovered the world would not change, so I shortened my sights somewhat and decided to change only my country. But it, too, seemed immoveable. As I grew in my twilight years, in one last desperate attempt, I settled for changing only my family, those closest to me, but alas, they would have none of it. And now as I lie on my deathbed, I suddenly realized: If I had only changed myself first, then by example I would have changed my family. From their inspiration and encouragement, I would have been able to better my country and, who knows, I may have even changed my world.” —Written on the Westminster Abbey tomb of an eleventh-century Anglican bishop

God is looking for just one in your family. Will you be that one?

God is looking for just one in your city. Will you be that one?

God is looking for just one at your work. Will you be that one?

It takes just one for God to do something amazing—just one.

Please, be that just one.

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