Month: October 2013

With Life!

Iris Godfrey

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“…knowing that you were not redeemed with perishable things like silver or gold from your futile way of life inherited from your forefathers, but with precious blood, as of a lamb unblemished and spotless, the blood of Christ.” 1 Peter 1:18-19 NASB 

Our personal perceived value is often low due to the erroneous teaching on humility. True humility is thinking of ourselves as the Lord thinks of us. It is not trying to eliminate ourselves. If the Lord had wanted to eliminate us and simply live in our bodies, He would not have needed us at all. His desire is that we will receive the precious price paid and begin to live as one deeply and highly valued. 

 When we begin to understand this and begin to live in this light, our entire life-scape begins to change and we begin to be empowered to live in the trust/faith that is given in His redemption. (Romans 12:3) Since “…seeing that His divine power has granted to us everything pertaining to life and godliness, through the true knowledge of Him who called us by His own glory and excellence.”  (2 Peter 1:3) We would do well to open our minds and hearts to receive this calling and allow His thoughts to take first place in our mind and life. 

 Our own thoughts about ourselves are often warped by what we have experienced in relationship with others, or what we have spent time watching, listening to and reading. Our world is not conducive to holy and right thoughts. Distractions come from every direction. But, when we choose to receive, truly receive in our deepest levels of being, the truth of His love that is evident in His payment, then we begin to be able to really hear and “see” His Word and the movement of His Spirit in that Word, through that Word, and out of that Word! His thoughts, provisions and love for us begin to take a proper place and we begin to be able to stand in Him. 

 There are two “But…He said’s” that come to us when we begin to ponder these thoughts. The first is from John the Baptist, when he said in John 3:30 “He must increase, but I must decrease.” John was talking about his ministry, not his person. We cannot decrease our persons – just doesn’t happen regardless of how hard we try. Our person must begin to shine in Him and become more than we ever thought. This is what pleases Him and shows off our worth – Us with and in Him, the hope (expectation) of glory! Not just Him, but the two of us!

 The other “but” comes from Paul’s statement in 1 Corinthians 15:31 where he writes, “I die daily.” Once again the context of the statement is of ultimate importance. He is talking about facing physical death every day. He is not talking about dying inwardly, nor about sin at all. 

In each case the context of the text is completely overlooked and the text has been made to apply to something that is untrue. So as we begin to ponder just what His payment of life – eternal blood, says about our value in His heart, may that begin to dominate our thoughts about ourselves. Lots of stuff begins to change right about now!

Iris Godfrey

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“If you address as Father the One who impartially judges according to each one’s work, conduct yourselves in fear during the time of your stay on earth; knowing that you were not redeemed with perishable things like silver or gold from your futile way of life inherited from your forefathers, but withprecious blood, as of a lamb unblemished and spotless, the blood of Christ. 1 Peter 1:17-19 NASB

I promised yesterday to spend some time working with “the value of the price paid.” In my home I have an antique oak desk. Years ago I was gifted with a choice of a new desk costing a certain amount or an antique one. Well, I enjoy antiques as my home reflects, but it was not that enjoyment that drove me to purchase the antique oak one I found. I knew when the new desk would be placed in my home, it would have immediately lost most of its value – simply because it was a new one. The antique, however, would not loose its value but rather over the years it would increase in value. So I was concerned to make the purchase price a good investment, since it was generous. 

We value items according to their cost or according to our investment in them. So we can understand a bit of the thinking of our Father. He paid a price that in His mind was equivalent to the value. I tease in my classes that “He overpaid for each one of us,” but really He didn’t. He knew our value to Him – that was what drove Him. That abundant love and overflow that He had invested in humanity – we were worth the treasure of heaven – Jesus Christ our Lord – so the Father could have fellowship in us and with us. Our value was not only stated by that action, but stated eternally. 

So when we, as His children, begin to accept His value of our lives – in and over all the journeys, then the value is treasured and the fellowship and empowerment is deep. If, however, we choose not to receive our heritage and live our lives as if we were worth only what we can achieve – then we have discounted His love and His payment price. We have effectively said He did not know what He was doing, because we do not want to be as He is. (1 John 4:17)

So living in Him releases the value of our heritage for all to see. It is a spiritual worth that invades every fiber of our being to bring all that is His to us. 

Lord, we open, we receive the value you set on us. We choose to exchange our thoughts of our own worth from our heritage and our accomplishments (or lack thereof), and simply be in You – all the value you have within and upon us as those who are Yours. We call you “Father!” Awesome!

Living in Holy Fear

Iris Godfrey

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“If you address as Father the One who impartially judges according to each one’s work, conduct yourselves in fear during the time of your stay on earth; knowing that you were not redeemed with perishable things like silver or gold from your futile way of life inherited from your forefathers, but withprecious blood, as of a lamb unblemished and spotless, the blood of Christ.
1 Peter 1:17-19 NASB

In our understanding of the love and grace of the Lord, this first verse is a bit difficult on us. We do call our God, Father, recognizing that He is our source in all things, life, food, physical life, spiritual life, etc…. He clearly defines Himself throughout the entire Bible as the one who is impartial in every way. He is not granting favor to anyone on the basis of their humanity at all, but totally on the basis of the finished work of Christ (I consider the work of Christ finished after the outpouring of the Holy Spirit on Pentecost – not before).

So what is this encouragement addressing? We are told to conduct ourselves “in fear during our time on earth…”. The word used here for fear is “phobos” which means “to be put to flight, panic flight, fear, the causing of fear, terror, etc…”. Why does the Holy Spirit tell us to behave ourselves in “fear” or “terror?” I believe the answer is in the rest of the verse, “knowing that you were not redeemed with perishable things like silver or gold from your futile way of life inherited from your forefathers, but with the percious blood,as of a lamb unblemished andspotless, the blood of Christ.”

There was a very high price paid for us. The treasure of Heaven, Christ Himself and the precious blood which had remained sinless in His time here. This was God’s only blood and man’s only spotless blood, poured out on earth like a common thing to be disgarded and buried under soil. Because of this high price that we cost, for us to live in such a way that says that blood is of no value is an offense in the God-Head. It is to count our value is nothing.

Now our Lord has forgiven us, and placed in us the Holy Spirit. We are heaven bound. However, I suspect that when the blood is devalued in our earthly minds and then we live it out – counting it worthless, then we place ourselves in danger of not being fully able to comprehend spiritual realms available to every believer. The thinking then can become exceedingly warped, unable to live the holy life given as a gift, we simply live in shadows of our true identity. The life then becomes one of strife and weakness instead of peace and strength.

Now that is my opinion of what happens. You can take it and work with it, or simply disgard it. But whatever we do, let us not disregard the price paid. That is for the next post.

Preparing Minds

Iris Godfrey

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“Therefore, prepare your minds for action, keep sober in spirit, fix your hope completely on the grace to be brought to you at the revelation of Jesus Christ. As obedient children, do not be conformed to the former lusts which were yours in your ignorance, but like the Holy One who called you, be holy yourselves also in all your behavior; because it is written, ‘You shall be holy, for I am Holy.'” 1 Peter 1: 13-16

The Holy Spirit’s instruction and admonition to all is to prepare our minds for action. I know there is more in this scripture, but let’s “camp” here for a moment or two. My thoughts go to those of us who are in the autum years of our life here on planet earth. It is so easy at any age, and particularly as we age, to allow the mind to be entertained but not engaged. It is so easy to slip into our culture of media entertainment instead of meaningful reading or writing or study of some sort. 

Do not misunderstand, I believe in media and I use media in every way possible. It can be used to enrich or to engage and make us think. I read on my Kindle reader on my iPad most of the time I read. So I am not speaking here of trying to go backward “to a simpler time,” which really is a figment of someone’s imagination, but with an attitude of alert awareness that takes effort and training to accomplish. 

As we age, this gets harder to do and is less prominent than in our earlier, obvious learning years. But Peter (and the Holy Spirit) specifies no age on this – just an instruction to all of us. Our minds must be prepared for action in the Holy Spirit. 

How is that done? Well, the Lord may speak a word to you about it (probably about now) that has to do with how He in you would like to accomplish this. He is able and willing to do that for each one of us. For me, it is reading His word in massive amounts and listening then moving into dialogue for my day and for the season. For others it will be different, considering my assignment as a teacher of the Word. However we do it, Scripture, dialogue with the Lord, tongues, moving in the flow of the Spirit – all of the above. Let’s renew that “computer” in our head with and in the Word, then stay alert in our thinking to receive and flow in the remainder of the section of Scripture. 

We can dwell in “autumn” while we think like “spring.” A challenge, indeed – but in Him very do-able.