Hurry, Open it, you'll never guess what's in there!!!

1 Corinthians 12 tells us about these gifts God wants to give us as a manifestation of his life that now dwells in us.  For some reason, lots of church folks seem to be afraid of these gifts.  Probably because no one has told them God’s not angry at them (or worse they have been explicitly told he is angry).  But he’s not, and he has only good and perfect gifts to give us.  Now, I know that some of us want those gifts to be health or wealth or power, which he does sometimes give, but Paul is pretty clear that he wants to give us these gifts; wisdom, knowledge, faith, miracles, healing, distinguishing spirits, prophecy, tongues, interpretation of those tongues.  It says to “each one is given a manifestation”.  That means you, and me, and every other one who believes in Jesus.  These are for the common good and they’re measures out according to his will.  That great! It’s means the pressure isn’t on us.  We don’t have to pretend or make it up or try really hard.  We just have let God give us whatever he wants to give us.  

Paul elsewhere says we should desire the gifts earnestly.  When I was a kid I would always snoop out the Christmas gifts my mom got me, I couldn’t wait.  I know, I know, it was wrong, but I think I was pretty good at pretending I was surprised on Christmas morning even though in some cases I had taken the toy out of the box, played with it, and put it back.  (my mom might disagree on my pretending abilities although she’s never called me out on it).  One year she bought my cousins old Sega Genesis from him to give me.  No kidding I actually took it out and set it up and played it for a whole day while she was at work.  I was so eager to get that gift that I couldn’t wait a week to try it out.

So why is it that no one told me that Jesus had these gifts he wanted to give me right after I met him.  And why do I usually forget to tell others.  Why do we keep them hidden under the bed like we’re waiting for this special day to break them out.  It’s weird.  It seems like somehow we have to earn these gifts, like when we meet Jesus we’re just interns and we don’t have full access to all the benefits until we’ve made it through the probation period.  Well, what if this person doesn’t decided he’s going to stay with the company, we can’t just start him out with access to health plan.  Lets teach him some theology first, maybe get him doing a little hands on service at the soup kitchen.  Maybe after he gets a few of these memory verse down about God’s wrath and he’s scared enough of his maker, we’ll tell him about the gifts.  We don’t want to unleash too much zeal and hope all at once.  

Weird.  

Not only weird, untrue.

We are adopted as sons and daughters and full citizenship in the Kingdom of Heaven, here and now.  And everyday is Christmas in the Kingdom.  There’s no waiting for special ceremonies.  Jesus sacrifice was the last act that ended all the religious requirements and law, all fulfilled by him for us.  Theres no test to pass.  Jesus was tested and found perfect and has covered us in his righteousness.  There are no magic words. The one who spoke everything into existence now speaks before the throne on your behalf.  The one who breathed life into your empty soul, has breathed his own life into you by the spirit and now breathes the life of the kingdom out of you through the gifts he’s measured out for you.  

I have a lot of friends who can’t wait for Christmas, some of them have been getting ready and decorating since November but I don’t want to wait, not for these gifts.  I want to see the life giving, life changing activity of the Kingdom of heaven daily, not just once a year.

So, I hope I didn’t ruin Christmas for you by telling you what’s in the box, but it’s ok, your father in Heaven said you could open it early. 

Second Chance Moses

Imagine you're hanging out on a mountain in the desert with God.  You've had a pretty good record of God rescuing you and chatting with you and encouraging you to just do what He tells you and you'll get to see things go pretty well - of course they might look like they're going badly at first, but there's always a surprise ending - sea's split, rocks spring water, every morning there's fresh food delivered out of nowhere, etc...  Of course you're human, and you're hanging out with a bunch of humans, so repeatedly you forget about what God says, make your own decisions, go the opposite way, and so on...  For some reason it seems like this God you're hanging out with is full of second chances, as if his plans are bigger than your failures, as if his mercy is greater than your weakness, as if his love is greater than your iniquity.  No wonder Moses liked hanging out with God.

Picture this: God writes down on some rocks how you are to live in order to be acceptable to him based on your own merit, and before you even get down the hill to tell your buddies about it, they've already started asking a statue what they should do.  I'd be pretty upset, as Moses was.  I'd probably yell and tip the cow and throw things.  I don't know if I throw the rocks God just hand written for me though.  I bet Moses was like 'oh snap, that was a bad move'.  People get upset when they see bible on the floor that was printed in a factory on a machine.  God carved these words with his own finger.  Anyway, like I said, Moses had been hanging out with God enough at this point to know he was pretty merciful, and there always seems to be a contingency plan, so he gets up the courage to go back up the hill and asked God to forgive him and his stupid friends.  God being God, says, 'listen you guys are stubborn and stupid, but keep going, I have a something pretty sweet in store.'  After all the foolish things they did, God never moved from his bigger plan.  He kept hanging out with Moses, speaking to him "face to face, as a man speaks to his friend." (Exd. 33:11)  In spite of all the screw ups along the way, God continued to allow Moses and his buddies to experience His presence.  People who had broken the Law - literally, he smashed it on the ground - were somehow still permitted to experience God's presence and speak to him as a friend.  Moses is bold enough after all these things, all these people had "sinned a great sin", to ask God to show him His Glory, to keep going with them, to keep revealing his presence.  Man, Moses has guts, but even more God has Grace.  

What a picture of the Gospel.

I've often heard Old Testament characters like Moses taught as pictures of Jesus, and there's probably something to that, but Moses is really a picture of us, just maybe not in the way you've thought or been taught.  Usually Moses is made out to be some kind of hero, some kind of super spiritual leader and if we can somehow attain the faith he had and do the work he did, we can be bible heroes too.  He's just person like you and me, who without the Grace and Mercy of God couldn't do anything.  Check the stories again, Moses didn't do anything except respond to what God told him to do, it was all God.  Anything good that ever happened was because God said it would happen and then made it happen.  Moses was just along for the ride.  The funny part is Moses knew it and made it clear, "If your presence will not go with me, do not bring us up from here."  Without his presence they were toast, he was toast.  The broken tablets are the proof.  They had God's presence, God and Moses moved of just a little bit in the distance (still within earshot of the thunder on top of the hill) and they immediately turned away.  They couldn't even wait long enough to get the law, let along manage to keep it if they had it.  God's law was meant to show them their own brokenness, not to rescue them from sin.  That's why God didn't just zap Moses and the rest of them with a lightning bold when they broke the tablets.

Listen to the Gospel in how God treated them.

Even though they were broken hopeless failures on their own, God promised "my presence will go with you, and I will give your rest" (33:14).

Even though they were stiff-necked stubborn people He said "I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious, and will show mercy on whom I will show mercy" (33:19)

Even though Moses had broken the Law and failed on many occasions, He said, "Behold, there is a place by me where you shall stand on the rock, and while my glory passes by I will put you in a cleft of the rock, and I will cover you with my hand"

All these because of who God is.  "The Lord, the Lord, a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness, keeping steadfast love for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgressions and sin."  (34:6-7)

The Gospel is that God has a much better revelation of himself than words written on stones, he has written his law of love on our hearts.  He has a much greater revelation of his presence than pillars of cloud and hanging out in tents in the desert, he has breathed his own spirit into us making us his dwelling place.  He has a much better revelation of Himself that hiding in a rock in the desert, He has hidden us in the Rock and covered us and showed the hope of glory, Christ in us and we in him.

After all this fiasco, Moses has the nerve to ask for one more favor, "If now I have found favor in your sight, O Lord, please let the Lord go in the midst of us, for it is a stiff-necked people, and pardon our iniquity and our sin, take us for your inheritance." (Ex 34:9)

God hasn't changed, he's still Exodus 34:6-7, and we haven't changed, we're still like Moses and his gang.  But the good news is, God showed us again that the law written is stone had no power to rescue us.  For that he needed to show a greater revelation of Himself by sending Jesus to lay down his life, nailing our iniquity to the cross and making the Law obsolete.  It's glory has passed away and we've been given a new revelation, Jesus himself.  We still can't live up to that old law etched in stones and we were never really meant to, instead God has showed us that we have found favor in His sight (because of Jesus) and we are in fact, pardoned from our iniquity and taken as his inheritance (because of Jesus).

So go on, in his presence, "strengthened with all power, according to his glorious might, for all endurance and patience with joy, giving thanks to the Father, who has qualified you to share in the inheritance of the saints in light.  He has delivered us from the domain of darkness and transferred us to the kingdom of his beloved Son, in whom we have redemption and the forgiveness of sins. (Col 1:11-14)