Tag: Morning Musings

Morning Musing: Matthew 16:15-18

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“‘But you,’ he asked them, ‘who do you say that I am?’ Simon Peter answered, ‘You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God.’ Jesus responded, ‘Blessed are you, Simon son of Jonah, because flesh and blood did not reveal this to you, but my Father in heaven. And I also say to you that you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of Hades will not overpower it.” (CSB – Read the chapter)

I’ve been doing a lot of thinking about the church lately, what it is and how it was designed by God to work. I’ve been doing this as my own church has been going through a season of growth, especially with kids and young families. I’ve been doing that as more and more reports keep coming in from more and more different places about the growth of the church in parts of the world that have been deeply secular for a very long time. Through all of this, I’ve come away even more impressed with the profound uniqueness and goodness of the church. Let’s take some more time today to think about all of this together.

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Morning Musing: Romans 7:7-11

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“What should we say then? Is the law sin? Absolutely not! But I would not have known sin if it were not for the law. For example, I would not have known what it is to covet if the law had not said, ‘Do not covet.’ And sin, seizing an opportunity through the commandment, produced in me coveting of every kind. For apart from the law sin is dead. Once I was alive apart from the law, but when the commandment came, sin sprang to life again and I died. The commandment that was meant for life resulted in death for me. For sin, seizing an opportunity through the commandment, deceived me, and through it killed me.” (CSB – Read the chapter)

Some people are rule followers. If you give them a rule, they keep that rule. They may look for loopholes in the rule, but as far as the rule itself goes, they’ll toe the line. Others…aren’t. If you give them a rule, not only will they break it, they’ll make sure you are watching when they do so you can see them breaking it. In fact, with these folks, the quickest way to guarantee they do something other than what you want them to do is to tell them not to do it. They probably weren’t even considering doing whatever it is you don’t want them to do until you told them not to. Then the die was cast. They’re doing it. It was the rule itself that led to their breaking it. In this situation, we should ask an interesting question: What is the source of the problem here? The rule itself or something else?

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Morning Musing: Romans 6:23

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“For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.” (CSB – Read the chapter)

One of the classic approaches to sharing the Gospel from the last century was to take unbelievers along the Romans Road. This was a series of verses in this incredible letter that spell out the basic Gospel message, leading the listener to the point of making a decision to follow Jesus. This verse is one of the major stops on that road. Paul here spells out the result of sin. Let’s take a look at this and talk through just what it means.

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Morning Musing: Romans 6:21-22

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“So what fruit was produced then from the things you are now ashamed of? The outcome of those things is death. But now, since you have been set free from sin and have become enslaved to God, you have your fruit, which results in sanctification—and the outcome is eternal life!” (CSB – Read the chapter)

When Dr. Phil was doing his regular, daytime talk show, one of the lines he became famous for was a simple question: How’s that working for you? People would come to him with complaints about their lives, and he would lead them to tell him about the things they were doing. What were their patterns? What kind of choices were they making? Then he would ask his question: How’s that working for you? His point was that the outcomes we experience in life are the result of the choices we make. The path we are walking determines the destination to which we are heading. Paul would seem to agree. Let’s look at what he says next.

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Morning Musing: Romans 6:20

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“For when you were slaves of sin, you were free with regard to righteousness.” (CSB – Read the chapter)

One of the truth claims of the Christian worldview is that God is the only source of goodness in the universe. Everything that is good comes from God. Apart from Him, there is only evil. Moral evil is any word, thought, or action that does not flow out of the character of God. This idea can lead to confusion when we set it against our own experience of meeting and interacting with people from other religions or even unbelievers who seem to us to be not only good people, but people who share many of our moral convictions. Or, to put that another way, should all non-Christians be insufferable jerks? Of course not! Paul here gives us a reason why.

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