Jesus

Easter 2014 Series: Why did Jesus have to die? (God is Fair)

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My brothers and sisters, since we have discussed the Old Testament prophesying about Jesus’ death and also God’s everlasting love, let’s talk about why God the Father had to do this to Jesus rather than just forgiving each other’s sins.

Our God is a fair God (Psalm 7:11, 2 Thessalonians 1:6) who cannot tolerate any type of sin. The diction Holy may be interpreted as set apart, meaning that our Holy God is set apart from all sinners. However, since we are sinners who inherited sin from Adam and Eve eating from the tree of knowledge (Genesis 3:6), we are subject to eternal damnation and separation from God due to us not following the Torah (the Law). However, God loved us so much that He wanted to save us from this eternal damnation.

Today, Pastor Werner Peters from my church preached a sermon on Easter. He gave the parable that if we go bankrupt, someone still has to pay for the debts we owe, and that is the creditors from whom we borrowed money from. For us, we don’t have anything to begin with but our sin is making us build a huge deficit in front of our Holy God and it is only through Jesus’ death where the price of our sin is paid in full. Now if we believe in Jesus being our personal Saviour, God will see our sins as being paid by Jesus and we shall become the righteousness of God (2 Corinthians 5:21)

Now that we have answered the question of why Jesus had to die on the cross for us in three different perspectives, I challenge you my brothers and sisters to reflect on this and if you haven’t, consider accepting Jesus as your personal saviour. If you have already, reflect on how fresh this is implanted into your mind and see if you need a reminder every now and then if you are experiencing spiritual dryness.

God Bless You All!! Happy Easter!!!

Easter 2014 Series: Why did Jesus have to die? (God’s Unconditional Love)

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What is God’s love? One of my sisters in Christ (in my Yumcha Fellowship) who recently decided to follow Him, solid in her faith, was trying to preach the good news to her parents when she was mocked and ridiculed. Her roommate who is a close friend of mine decided to tell me about it and see what I could say to her. Her parents mocked her, she was humiliated and her parents made false statements about Christ. She felt very discouraged and according to my friend, was crying throughout the night.

These cases are common in a Christian’s life, and this is the suffering that we Christians always talk about during our Christian lives. She later told me that she feels blessed with these friends who help her through her walk with Christ but she doesn’t feel God’s love at all. She doesn’t understand what this unconditional love is, that God has provided us with. As a brother in Christ, I stated the following:

First, this was exactly what happened to Jesus. It is very ironic in a sense that this whole chain of events happened just before Good Friday, which means that it is a really good reminder of what happened to Jesus as He was hung on that tree. The soldiers mocked and beat Jesus (Luke 22:63), which is really similar to her parents mocking her about her beliefs. Jesus’ ultimate humiliation was on the cross as it was only used on people who are guilty of a capital offence (Deuteronomy 21:22). Jesus was blameless yet people nailed Him to the cross, again inline with her parents making false statements about Christ. Yet Jesus asked God the Father to forgive these people when they were doing this to Him (Luke 23:34). That itself is unconditional love.

Next, I told her to meditate on Psalm 22, especially the first lines “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” She is probably feeling the same when she was trying to preach the good news to her parents, and we have to understand that our Lord God Jesus Himself said the same phrase in Matthew 27:46. This is the prime example of taking the cross and suffering for His name, and the Psalm itself is a wonderful prayer to meditate in terms of challenges as such.

I asked my sister in Christ in the meantime for advice and she mentioned that the Bible commands us to leave our families and follow Him (Luke 14:25-27). I was actually really confused about this passage until she explained it to me (and I will quote her word for word)

… just know that it may not be an easy path and it’s especially difficult coming from your loved ones but God calls us to follow Him and drop everything including family not that we forget or reject them but that we know that God is in control of the situation and that He will always be there with us and our family on our journey

Wow, never interpreted it this way but it is so true! Even when we haven’t turned to God, God already loves us and He will always be there.

Finally, I told her to open her eyes to God’s love around her, but I really apologize to her (as I only thought of it later) that I missed out on a really important point. Firstly, God is showing His love through support. Her roommate telling me, me telling another sister, we all come up with suggestions to help her out and pray for her. This means that we all love her, and where does this love come from? Our Creator God has created us and obviously created the perfect unconditional love for us. The most important point that I missed out was her zeal to step up to her non-believing parents and preach the good news to them! That is amazing unconditional love that God sends the Holy Spirit to inspire you to go ahead and preach the good news. You yourself inherited God’s love.

I am proud of you sister. And I am so thankful for God to love me so much and provide me with these wonderful brothers and sisters in Christ that I walk with. God Bless you all and have a beloved Easter weekend.

Easter 2014 Series: Why did Jesus have to die? (Old Testament Scriptures)

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My fellow brothers and sisters, one of the most important days of our Lord is coming up, Good Friday and Easter. To those who are mature in their faith, we understand that these are the days that God reveals and exhibits his eternal love and compassion for those who dwell on the Earth. For those who are new in faith, some may question why Jesus had to die at all and why we have to celebrate this time in the year.

Since we are approaching the time of Easter, perhaps the mature and the new believer needs a refreshing and a reminder of why our King we serve, the one that deserves all the Glory took up the cross upon Himself. Since we are approaching Good Friday, this post will be discussing about Jesus’ death rather than the resurrection that will be discussed at a later date.

Let us directly dive into the question. Why did Jesus have to die?

1.   Old Testament Scripture Prophecizes it

The Old Testament is a common Scripture shared between Christians, Muslims and Jews. However, there are parts of the Old Testament that prophesy or reveal God’s Will of sending His Son to die for our sins.

Jesus’ death was at the exact time the Jewish feast of the Passover, where lambs would be sacrificed to God (Exodus 12:3). However, during the time of this Passover feast, other than the lambs being slaughtered, the Lamb of God, known as our Lord God Jesus (John 1:29) was sacrificed for our sins. Though Jesus lived a sinless life (2 Corinthians 5:21), he died on the cross for our sins (Romans 4:25). Deuteronomy 21:22-23 states that anyone being hung on a tree is under God’s curse, as we can see God is so fair and just that He has to satisfy his wrath. Moreover, the God loves us so much that if we believe in Him, we would not need to go to hell as the price for our sins is paid.

As we follow the Scriptures commanding the Jews about the Passover, it is clearly stated that none of the lamb’s bones were to be broken during that sacrifice (Exodus 12:46, Numbers 9:12, Psalm 34:20). This was fulfilled in the New Testament (John 19:36).

Now, let’s look back at the Bible verses that are mentioned here (there are many more) that prophesy Jesus’ death. It is clear that Exodus and Numbers is included in the Jewish Torah. This is clear evidence that Torah Scriptures support the existence of Jesus Christ and His death.

For all those who have doubts about the consistency of the Bible between the Old and New Testaments, I challenge you to look into the above Bible verses and see for yourself how our God poured out His everlasting love!

Bread of Life (Finding Purpose)

/ Henry Jiang / 1 Comment

We often approach pieces of Scripture in which there are so many different methods of interpreting it, where the majority will yield great fruits. Today, I would like to touch on a piece of Scripture that is usually used to preach about believing in Christ, but I will actually discuss it in another point of view (I will discuss the most common point of view in future posts).

“I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me will never go hungry, and whoever believes in me will never be thirsty. — John 6:35 (NIV 1984)

The usual approach to interpreting this passage is emphasizing on belief in Jesus and developing the zeal through “coming to Christ”. I would like to share my other perception of this, which is taking Jesus as bread. When we look at the diction bread, we notice that this is the common food people eat in western society. In other words, bread means food, and if we don’t have bread, we can’t survive. Same should go with the bread of life, but rather than talking about the necessity to survive, I would like to share how I take this bread.

Matthew 6:11 states “Give us today our daily bread”. Waking up, praying and reading the Bible has become such a habit that it is a routine I do when I wake up. However, when we are talking about routine, we often fear the concerns of spiritual dryness as it becomes a habit or a custom and the meaning is lost. What is the purpose of eating if you don’t need food? There must be purpose when you pray and there also must be purpose when you are reading the Bible. If you are reading the Bible and you feel like there is spiritual dryness, you need to reflect on your method and lifestyle. Perhaps rather than reading for context, God wants to speak to you more intimately by meditating on His word (Psalm 119). Perhaps you need to look at your life, see if you are doing something purposeful and if not, find something purposeful to do, such as going out and making disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit (Matthew 28:19)? There must be purpose for reading God’s words and praying.

Are you thanking God for your food everyday? A common questions we expect from kids who see us pray is “Why do we pray before a meal?” It is to give thanks to the lord for providing the meal to us. In the meantime, if we feel like we are spiritually dry and perhaps not even finding a purpose in praying before a meal, maybe it’s time to take action, such as fasting.

In the same way, as we are taking the daily living bread, we should not forget to give thanks to the bread. We do so through prayer, worship and communion. Again, this is important, when we are worshiping, not only do we need to repent our sins in front of God before we do so but we need to understand the purpose of worship. Do you really mean it when you are singing the lyrics of worship music? If you’re not, you’re better off not singing as you are sinning by lying to God. If you really mean it, you would probably understand and have a purpose for worship.

Therefore, while we take our daily living bread, we need to find purpose in doing so, and I challenge you my brothers and sisters to do so. If you can’t find a purpose, it’s probably time to reflect on yourself and seek change in your life, as God has so much more to bless us with!

Putting God First in Exams

/ Henry Jiang / 4 Comments

Too often I feel like I am digging into the content that will be (or hopefully) tested in exams. The allnighters we pull, the stress we are being put through, sometimes I question myself, if I were concentrating and looking into God, will I be wasting some precious last minute studying time?

Quantum physics is definitely not my favourite, especially when the class has come to a consensus that the professor has done a horrible job teaching and also a horrible job administering the course. These horrible instructions has taken me to a point where I am honestly worrying about failing this course. As a Christian, what do I do?

Every time I took a break from studying, I took time to pray to God for His assistance. A song that comes to my mind when I am in trouble is R. Kelly’s “I look to you” sung by Whitney Houston.

I look to you.
I look to you.
After all my strength is gone,
In you I can be strong

Who else do I look to during these really harsh situations. The Bible tells us:

Even youths grow tired and weary, and young men stumble and fall; but those who hope in the Lord will renew their strength. They will soar on wings like eagles; they will run and not grow weary, they will walk and not be faint. — Isaiah 40:30-31 (NIV 1984)

I kept on praying and praising God, rejoicing at His challenge He provided me, though honestly I was completely exhausted and felt physically down, I kept in mind this is a great trial for my faith, and to testify that I put my faith in Him. Then the exam came. I opened the exam booklet. Cr**… SOOO hard…

I did the questions I knew off my mind and I kept on praying. Amazingly, I was able to derive two questions I was not expecting I could do perfectly, because I know what goal I have to reach at the end of the question. I put my faith in Him until the very end of the exam when the papers were collected. Something as simple as that, God will answer. Therefore, my beloved brothers and sisters, are you turning to Christ even in the process of a huge burden or trial? If you do, you may witness Him working in you and working with you on your struggles!

God Bless!

God has a Plan

/ Henry Jiang / 1 Comment

Let’s discuss a bit more about Matthew 7:7-8 as it is an important and quite often, misinterpreted passage commonly used in false doctrines. I have had to clear this confusion with a few family members China over a multiple phone calls since they have heard this verse and misinterpreted it. Misunderstanding this passage can lead to being deceived and also decrease of faith due to “not seeing God do what we prayed for”. Let us look at this passage again:

“Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives; the one who seeks finds; and to the one who knocks, the door will be opened. — Matthew 7:7-8 (NIV 1984)

Honestly, do you think that this will work for everything? Well, it can potentially work for everything as God is omnipotent; he has the power to do anything but this will not happen unless it is in God’s Will. For beginners, if God does not answer your prayer, it might not be a direct no, but rather God might be asking you to wait for His perfect timing. Moreover, why would God not answer some of our prayers? This is because we are asking God for the wrong motives (James 4:3). If our ultimate goal is to bring Glory to God and presenting ourselves as a living sacrifice (Romans 12:1-2), our prayers will be answered as we will be working hard to align our will with God’s will. This is the ultimate goal of prayer.

When you are praying to God, are you praying to God with confidence? The Holy Bible commands us to pray with confidence (Hebrews 4:16). How can we pray in confidence? We cannot do so unless we are aligning our will with God’s will and praying for God’s will to be done on us (Matthew 6:10).

Now, here are two misconception my family members had that I would like to share with you, my beloved brothers and sisters so that you may understand how prayer should be, and that God will bless you by answering your prayers.

Misinterpretation #1: We should have a goal, and pray for it.

Explanation: I agree that we should have a goal, and that goal is to glorify His name. One thing that I totally disagree about is that for decision making, we should make up our minds first and then ask God for it. What makes you think you have more wisdom than God? If it’s a decision such as a career after a university degree or something, you can never be absolutely sure that God’s will is for you to do that. You might even fail miserably! (I’m not saying you will or not.) Really, what does God want? You should ask God first to reveal His will to you (again Matthew 6:10) and you should always ask for wisdom as wisdom is promised to you (James 1:5). Always ask God first through prayer before coming to a decision, especially if it is some big life-changing decision. If you are trying to make a huge decision, and you’re just a child (we are children in God’s eyes), wouldn’t you ask your Father or at least consult Him before making a move?

Misinterpretation #2: If we ask like crazy, God can give us anything.

Explanation: This interpretation commonly comes from “The Parable of the Persistent Widow” (Luke 18:1-8) or The Parable of Friend who asks for Bread at Midnight (Luke 11:5-8). Let’s dig in on what is being misinterpreted in these two passages.

yet because this widow keeps bothering me, I will see that she gets justice, so that she won’t eventually come and attack me!’” —Luke 18:5 (NIV 1984)

Some claim that this means if we keep on bothering God, God will answer our prayers. They extend it to the point where they believe this can even cover our prayer requests. However, if we look deeply in Scripture, this is talking about justice. Asking for help when we are sure that we have been wronged. This passage only applies to asking for justice, and not for our own prayer requests that we ask God to fulfill. Moreover, the parable is about an unjust judge, our God is not an unjust judge so therefore, this passage is even more irrelevant to this issue.

Let’s now look at the Parable for Bread at Midnight:

I tell you, even though he will not get up and give you the bread because of friendship, yet because of your shameless audacity he will surely get up and give you as much as you need. —Luke 11:8 (NIV 1984)

Just taking this passage out of concept will yield the same results as the above parable. However, God is contrasting Himself from this friend. We need to read this passage in context, as God wants to say to us that he is not that kind of God, but a God that will answer when you ask, seek, and knock (Luke 11:9-10). Now why does God ask us to keep on praying for things? This is to overcome spiritual resistance. Pastor Keith Smith from Agincourt Pentecostal Church gave a parable in his sermon, stating that if he was trying to launch a canoe into a lake and he starts pulling on the canoe, which pull is the most important? The answer is all of them are important. Praying is just like pulling a canoe into water, sometimes you need to keep on pulling to overcome spiritual resistance so you become completely confident when you receive the answer.

God Bless you All!

What occasions do we pray?

/ Henry Jiang / 2 Comments

Now my brothers and sisters, since we have gone over how we should pray and what we should pray about, let’s talk about  what occasions do we pray more deeply. As stated in previous posts, self-reliance is a sin and we must bring everything to God, through prayer. A very good place to look for prayers to God is the Psalms, since God has commanded us to speak in Psalms (Ephesians 5:19). Psalm has a variety of prayers, anything ranging from lament (eg. Psalm 22), praise (eg. Psalm 30), confession (eg. Psalm 51), help and protection (eg. Psalm 60), etc. If you are all drained out and don’t know what to pray about, I would highly suggest meditating over one of these Psalms to see what God wants us to pray about.

However, let’s go back to the topic of what occasions do we pray. I would like to bring out a parable Dolas, my very good friend from Nigeria, who has trusted in the Lord for all her life and bore many fruits, told me. At the end of the parable, I would like to add a portion of the parable in which my brother in Christ, Jeremy Yeung came up with which in some way completes the picture. Let’s imagine that we are a car. If we want to know more about how to operate this car, we refer to its user manual, in which case we are pointing to the Holy Bible. But the car needs to be constantly maintained, before it breaks down, gets rusty, overheats, etc. This is when we take it back to its maker for maintenance (take it to the Lord in Prayer). It is vital that we constantly take our car back to maintenance as there are so many problems that occur, and we are 100% sure that the maker is omnipotent and that He can fix anything. This is how important prayer is.

Last but not least, what happens when we feel worn out and drained out. For example, in some cases when we have read the manual over and over again (for very mature Christians, I’d say more mature than me in Scripture), and feel dried out, what do we do? We take the car out for a drive! This means going out, making disciples of all nations and baptizing them in the name of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit (Matthew 28:19).

This is how Christian life should be in a nutshell. It’s that simple. No complications, no strings attached. What are we waiting for?

Your Will Be Done

/ Henry Jiang / Leave a comment

My lovely brothers and sisters, after meditating on The Lord’s Prayer (Matthew 6:9-13) from yesterday, have you learned anything new? Today, I would like to touch on a specific verse in the lord’s prayer, and talk about some misconceptions even some mature Christians have which lead to deception of Scripture. This is a very slippery slope as many have fallen into this trap, and this has generated false doctrines, such as the prosperity gospel. It is very upsetting that these brothers and sisters who begin with the will to follow Jesus but end up following worldly values, such as wealth or honour.

One of the most debated verses in the Bible is Matthew 7:7:

“Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you.

Christians have used this verse to argue against each other, some state that it should not be taken word for word as just stating this verse is taking it out of context as the audience of this passage has to be considered. This should not create any disunity in a church as it does not violate any primary doctrines. However, secondary doctrines may have different takes at this verse, in which I (I admit I am biased) believe that Scripture should be taken as is, and this verse is directed towards all of us. The condition that this verse must meet is that we are following how Jesus commanded us to pray in Matthew 6:9-13, especially Matthew 6:10

Your will be done

It is vital (and I cannot stress this any more further) that we are living to fulfill God’s will, and NOT our will. Any form of living for ourselves is self-idolatry and not bringing Glory to God, thus not living life to its sole purpose. Romans 4:7-8 states that

For none of us lives to himself alone and none of us dies to himself alone. If we live, we live to the Lord; and if we die, we die to the Lord. So, whether we live or die, we belong to the Lord.

Therefore, my brothers and sisters, be careful when you are praying for things. Always ask yourself if what you are praying lines up with Scripture, and if you are not sure, pray for wisdom as wisdom is promised to us through Scripture:

If any of you lacks wisdom, you should ask God, who gives generously to all without finding fault, and it will be given to you. James 1:5 (NIV 1984)

Only when we are praying for the right things (i.e. God’s Will), it will be given to you. This goes the same for passages such as Matthew 18:19. What we need to keep in mind is that God is always good (Psalm 136:1) and we must put our faith in Him as He knows the plans He has for you, plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future (Jeremiah 29:11). So my brothers and sisters, ask yourself what you are praying for, are you praying the right way? If not, do you know what you should pray for? If not, ask God for wisdom as it is promised to you through the Lord.

God Bless You All! Amen!

P.S. Don’t get me started on the discussion of Jeremiah 29:11 taken out of context. I understand I am biased but again, I hold the point of view that Scripture is written for everyone and honestly, if someone was to use that portion of Scripture for means of prosperity gospel (stating that God has plans for us to prosper in this world), they honestly lack foresight. I am not saying that this will not happen, but it is not guaranteed. However, God will keep His promise and we are guaranteed to prosper in Heaven if we follow Him.

How do we pray?

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A common question I get asked from brothers and sisters who are new to their faith is: how do you pray? Some believe prayer is an every meal thing and people say prayers right before meals. Some people may believe prayer is a way to ask for things and receive blessings from God. Most of the answers actually lie right in the Bible, within a few verses.

“This, then, is how you should pray:  ‘Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name, your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. Give us today our daily bread. And forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one.’ — Matthew 6:9-11 (NIV 1984)

Now let us look closely at this passage. Should we read out this passage and only pray this passage word by word in our prayer? No! We need to be able to bring to God all things in our minds through prayer. However, we should keep in mind this passage during our prayers, and it doesn’t hurt to bring this passage out every now and then. However, if we are just uttering these blind words without knowing what they mean, that is a sin because we are lying to God.

My brothers and sisters, I challenge you to meditate on God’s way of prayer and see if you understand anything. Shoot me any questions again with the contact form below. I will attempt to explain this passage line by line as it is one of the most important passages in Scripture. See if this changes your perspective on prayer.

Stay Blessed!

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Most-Faithful Friend

/ Henry Jiang / Leave a comment

Are you struggling with something? Do you ever feel discouraged by the events that happen in your life? Do you feel like you need someone to talk to about your struggles? Well, look no more! As a continuation of the hymn “What a Friend We Have in Jesus”, let’s dig deep into the second verse of this wonderful hymn.

Have we trials and temptations?
Is there trouble anywhere?
We should never be discouraged—
Take it to the Lord in prayer.
Can we find a friend so faithful,
Who will all our sorrows share?
Jesus knows our every weakness;
Take it to the Lord in prayer.

As written in the Bible, trials and temptations are used to develop our perseverance so that perseverance can complete its job to make us mature, complete and not lacking anything (James 1:2-4). But sometimes during our trials and temptations, we feel like it is too hard for us to continue on with the challenges ahead of us, and we are stressed out. From a Homeostatic/Medical approach, Walter Cannon was the to describe that stress is an “emergency response” as an animal’s response to a threat. Our body will naturally transform from a neutral posture to an offensive posture when stress is induced (ORGB Canadian Edition, Nelson Quick Armstrong Condie, 2012). Once our body takes this offensive posture, we naturally deceive our foresight of the Kingdom to come.

The best way to deal with any trouble is through prayer. We should never be discouraged or stressed out as God will not tempt us beyond what we can bear (1 Corinthians 10:13). Some may argue against using this Bible verse as it is taken out of context but if we consider how faithful our Lord God Jesus is, He will not forsake us and we can overcome anything in our earthly lives, just as Jesus has overcome the cross. The only thing is that we must do so through prayer. We should fear God but also treat God as a friend as he knows us the most (Psalm 139:1) and he is always faithful (Deuteronomy 7:9). That is the perfect quality as a friend so my brothers and sisters, have you been consulting your most-faithful friend during times of trouble and temptation? Have you ever been discouraged about earthly struggles? Maybe it is time to share it with your most-faithful friend by taking it to the Lord in prayer!

God Bless you all!