Psalm

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

/ Henry Jiang / Leave a comment

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)

/ Henry Jiang / Leave a comment

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)

/ Henry Jiang / Leave a comment

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!

Testimony of Joseph M. Scriven

/ Henry Jiang / Leave a comment

My dear brothers and sisters, since this is the fourth post on the hymn “What a Friend We Have in Jesus”, let’s take a look behind this powerful testimony of a person who lived out his life as a Christian.

A picture is worth a thousand words, how about a video? Look at this simple, yet touching testimony. Are you turning to God for all of your struggles? Even though these two tragedies happened, Scriven still turned to God. Looking back at the Bible, read just the first chapter of Job. What did Job do when all those tragedies happened to him?

During the tragedies, Scriven turned to God in prayer. Job actually worshipped God and did not charge God with wrongdoing (Job 1:22). However, did these individuals have times where they thought that God has forsaken them? Though it is not recorded in Scripture nor in any accounts of Scriven, I would deduce yes, since God knows that we will feel that way. That is why the majority of the Psalms exhibit lament, in which Ephesians 1:19 commands us to speak to each other in Psalms. Even Jesus Christ spoke in Psalms, with “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” (Psalm 22:1, Matthew 27:46). If you are feeling the same at the moment, I suggest you to meditate on Psalm 22 and maybe even other Psalms as God expects us to feel those emotions. However, the conclusion is that God does not forsake us, and we have to turn to God in prayer as Matthew 11:29-30 states that God will take our yoke for us, if we come to Him.

So as a food for thought, reflect on yourself if there are any struggles that you have not taken to the God in prayer, and pray about them. He will not forsake you, as He is a faithful, loving and amazing God, King and friend.

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!

Blindness

/ Henry Jiang / Leave a comment

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I usually don’t call myself blind, until I have to go searching for my glasses. -3.25 and -3.50, my vision is not that bad compared to some of my friends but I can hardly see anything without my glasses. I realized that more when it took me around 15 minutes to search for my glasses. However, even if you had perfect 20/20 vision, how much can you see? How far can you see?

Right after I found my glasses, I was thinking to myself about my limited vision. However, God Almighty can see anything, the Holy Spirit is present everywhere in the world he and he can see everywhere, even inside you (Psalm 139). Moreover, He can do anything He wishes to.

Now if this was a person on earth, what do you think he would do? He can rob all your money, mess around with your life, make you his slave, mess around with your life. Now don’t worry, my brothers and sisters because our God is nothing like that. Although our sole purpose of our lives is to bring Glory to His name (Isaiah 43:7), He is a good God and He loves us. He is a fair God too and cannot tolerate any sin (wrongdoings) in our lives and every wrongdoing we commit is subject to punishment and eternal damnation. However, He loves us so much that keeping His fairness, God the Father sent His Son Jesus to die for our sins so that we do not need to suffer eternal damnation as that has been already taken care of. What more can you ask for?

Looking back at myself on a note I posted 2 years ago during Christmas, I see that I am not as blind as before. Through the journey God is leading me through, I can see more and more with my growing faith and cultivated heart through Scripture, Prayer and Worship. If you open your eyes and heart to God, He will provide you with more and more to see and admire in awe.

Therefore, I challenge you brothers and sisters to look into yourself. What can you see? How much can you see? And what are things that you could see but probably missed out on?