Freedom from Lawyers, Mystics, and Monks

July 6, 2021  David Murray  


Full and free! Fulness and freedom! Two great longings of the human spirit. We want to be full and we want to be free. We want to be full of goodness and free from evil. We want to be satisfied and we want to be safe.

That’s what Christianity offers the human spirit: Fullness in Christ and freedom in Christ. That’s why the devil attacks the Christian’s fullness and freedom. How do we get and keep fulness and freedom in Christ? Colossians 2:16-23 warns of three threats and trains us, not in self-defense, but in Christ-defense.

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A Love Song

July 4, 2021  David Murray  

 

Psalm 4-8

We all love to love. In one way or other, we all want more love in our lives.

A husband asks, “How can I love my wife more?” A mother asks, “How can I love my children more?” Americans may ask, especially on a day like today, “How can I love my country more?” The Christian asks, “How can I love God more?” or “How can I love the Bible more? or God’s people more?” The self-critical asks, “How can I love myself more?” That’s not always a bad question, because we are to love our neighbor as ourselves.

Which raises a question we may not often ask: “How can I love my neighbor better?” It’s a question we should ask because Jesus said this love is the second most important of all loves. That’s the question Psalm 4 helps us answer.

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Jesus is our Temple

July 4, 2021  David Murray  

John 2v12-21-6

What would you do if you came to church one Sunday and you saw it turned into an open-air marketplace for buying, selling, and changing money on the blackmarket? It was just one big garage sale or car boot sale?

Christ came to church one day and found the outer court was just like this. There were fourteen acres of stalls and booths, charging exorbitant prices for Passover animals, and making massive profits by changing currency to shekels for the Temple tax. It was a filthy, noisy, and smelly scene. Behind it all was the High Priest Annas who rented the stalls at excessive rates, sold franchises, and extorted money from the businessmen. Few if any protested. Most just accepted it as the price of doing business and didn’t want to cause any trouble

This exact situation is unlikely to occur here in at First Byron. But this specific situation of church corruption raises the more general question of: How do we respond to errors and failings in the Church’s faith and practice? Do we respond as most did in Jesus’ day? Hear/see/speak no evil? Indifferent, tolerant, and accepting?

That’s not how Jesus responded. When he went up to the temple he found those who were selling oxen and sheep and pigeons, and the money-changers sitting there (14), his reaction was zealous reformation. That’s a rare quality in Church today but it is approved and commended by God (Num. 25:13; Rev. 2:2).

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Spiritual Resurrection

July 2, 2021  David Murray  

Forgetfulness can be fatal. Sometimes, our forgetfulness has limited consequences (e.g. forgetting to wash our car). Other times, our forgetfulness has far greater consequences (e.g. forgetting to put gas in the car). But there’s a forgetfulness that has even more serious consequences. As Christians, we sometimes forget how spiritually dead we were before Christ gave us life.

Why is this so serious? When we forget how spiritually dead we were, we forget how desperate our condition was (which undermines humility), we forget how bad our future was (which undermines gratitude), and we forget how great God’s life-giving power was (which undermines worship).

How do cure spiritual amnesia? Paul helps the Colossians and us by reminding us that we need spiritual resurrection as much as Christ’s resurrection.

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You Died 2000 Years Ago

July 1, 2021  David Murray  


Do you sometimes feel a distance and detachment from Christ’s death and resurrection? What possible connection can the dusty streets of Jerusalem in AD 30 have with our high-tech lives in AD 2021? In the age of TikTok, how does a naked, bloodied, and bruised body, hanging on a wooden cross outside Jerusalem, have any connection with my life?

How can we close this distance and connect with Christ’s cross? The Apostle Paul provides a path in Colossians 2:11-12.

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Christless Christianity

June 30, 2021  David Murray  


Fill in this blank. I’m not …………. enough. What word did you insert? I’m not good enough? Clever enough? Tall enough? Thin enough? Popular enough? Rich enough? Happy enough? When our identity is defined by what we’re not, it’s no surprise if we feel empty. How do we find a full and fulfilling identity?

The theme of Colossians is Christ is enough, therefore I am enough. That’s why the devil is so focused on cultivating Christless Christianity and why Paul was so focused on cultivating Christ-full Christianity in Colossians 2:8-10. He starts by warning about the dangers of Christless Christianity.  

Listen here.