The universe is like a big clock unwinding.......
I'm back. Time flies so incredibly fast, I realize that I haven't written anything for some time; I thought 'everything is vain'; there is nothing new under the sun; life is vanity, nothing makes sense; the world has no appeal anymore, I only have two friends and I don't have any goals.
God is still very good to me, and He is verily in control of all things; that fact alone amazes me, God chose me, He predestined me and He called me, and now I eagerly wait for my redemption to be complete. One day I will wake up and I will awake in the likeness of Him. Philippians 3:20-21 For our conversation is in heaven; from whence also we look for the Saviour, the Lord Jesus Christ: Who shall change our vile body, that it may be fashioned like unto his glorious body, according to the working whereby he is able even to subdue all things unto himself.
The just shall live by faith; this is a very strange concept for those who are outside; it doesn't make any sense, live by faith? What is that? Faith, the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen; it makes something be real where there is no evidence of the thing being there; faith convinces me that something is true even when circumstances point to the contrary; faith is a very excellent gift; a treasure.
I have this faith that God gave me; the bible says that He gave it to me; and now I can't get rid of it; I believe no matter what happens, I go to bed at night and when I wake up in the morning I still believe. I have tried to not believe and I just can't stop believing; faith is there, everyday of every month, I believe.
It really does not matter what I do, or what happens in my life, I have faith; the most awesome thing about it is that I know that it is not my faith; it belongs to God in the first place and He gave it to me; it is the power of God by which He is keeping me until that day: 1Peter 1:3-5 Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, which according to his abundant mercy hath begotten us again unto a lively hope by the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, To an inheritance incorruptible, and undefiled, and that fadeth not away, reserved in heaven for you, Who are kept by the power of God through faith unto salvation ready to be revealed in the last time.
Peter says that God has begotten us again; that means that God caused me to be born again; that is what that means; how did He do it? By the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead; what for? To an inheritance reserved in heaven for me, who is being kept by the power of God through faith; I find this fascinating. It is all ultimately for the praise of the glory of His grace.
Paul says in Ephesians that God exerted in me the same power that He used to raise Jesus from the dead; and that is how He made me a faithful individual; God used His power; wow. God created the heavens and the earth by the power of His word; Jesus sustains the universe by the power of His word; Jesus raised Lazarus from the dead by the power of His word, He caused me to have faith by the power of His word; it blows my mind.
I was remembering the other day how it happened; I had heard the gospel probably a thousand times; and I hated it; it was foolishness to me, even though I was raised catholic, and I learned about Jesus when I was a child, I didn't want Him, I hated anything and everything related to religion and to the bible; in a long chain of events that started the moment I was born in this world; I ended face to face with a man who asked me if I wanted Jesus; I had just told him that I didn't, but he asked again, and then suddenly I wanted Jesus; just like that; I wanted Him. I thought I was tripping on some kind of a drug or something; I heard a whisper in my right ear: "say yes"; so I did. In my mind that was the only thing to do at that moment; surrender.
By the time I prayed "the prayer", I was already born again; I cannot pinpoint to the exact moment because I really don't know when it happened, all I know is that one moment I hated the gospel, and the next moment I didn't; it all made sense to me; that was the solution, I needed someone else to take away the burden; I was dying and then I was alive.
Something happened to me that day, October 13th 1989 at 3:11 PM.; something happened and I knew I was different; I looked at the sky and it was bluer than before; the clouds were whiter than before; the grass was greener than before; my mind was clear; I had no guilt, no anxiety, no fear, and for some strange reason I believed. That's the power of God.
One moment I was resisting, the next moment I was surrendering; who can resist Him? Dan 4:35 And all the inhabitants of the earth are reputed as nothing: and he doeth according to his will in the army of heaven, and among the inhabitants of the earth: and none can stay his hand, or say unto him, What doest thou?
God does what He does and no one can stay His hand; He is King and He is sovereign, and He chooses me and I can't resist Him; and He gives me this faith and I can't stop believing; I was predestined for glory, to Him, by Him and for Him, I have faith. Fascinatingly amazing.
Some people actually think that man is born with faith; they think that people just need to activate their faith on their own to believe the gospel and be saved; they think they are responsible for everybody around them; they have to go work for God; God needs help and they are the little helpers that do what God cannot do; as if the King of the universe was powerless or impotent to save whosoever He pleases. Nothing could be farther from the truth.
1Corinthians 1:18-21 For the preaching of the cross is to them that perish foolishness; but unto us which are saved it is the power of God. For it is written, I will destroy the wisdom of the wise, and will bring to nothing the understanding of the prudent.
Where is the wise? where is the scribe? where is the disputer of this world? hath not God made foolish the wisdom of this world? For after that in the wisdom of God the world by wisdom knew not God, it pleased God by the foolishness of preaching to save them that believe.
I was one of them who are perishing and who consider the gospel foolishness; I thought I was wise, I thought I was prudent and that I had understanding; I was a disputer of this world; but in the eyes of God I was a fool. I was dead in trespasses and sins and then He made me alive and raised me together with Christ and seated me with Him in the heavenly places; I think that's fascinatingly awesome.
1Corinthinas 1:22-24 For the Jews require a sign, and the Greeks seek after wisdom: But we preach Christ crucified, unto the Jews a stumblingblock, and unto the Greeks foolishness; But unto them which are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God, and the wisdom of God.
I was called just as Lazarus was called, I had no choice but to come forth just as Lazarus came forth; I became alive just as Lazarus could not stay dead; I am a testimony to Jesus own words when He said that they wind comes and goes wherever it wants to and we can't see it.
John 3:5-8 Jesus answered, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God.
That which is born of the flesh is flesh; and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit.
Marvel not that I said unto thee, Ye must be born again.
The wind bloweth where it listeth, and thou hearest the sound thereof, but canst not tell whence it cometh, and whither it goeth: so is every one that is born of the Spirit.
Everywhere I go I hear the same old defense for the self-sufficiency of man, and I'm getting tired of it. Maybe that's why I hear it everywhere. I don't feel like writing anything anymore; maybe I will erase this blog from its pitiful existence; and then maybe I won't. Maybe somebody out there needs to read this, if at all to just think about it; man cannot do anything to be born again, God has to do that for him or her, or it.
If the bible says that there is only one way to be saved, and that is through Jesus; what happened to the millions, perhaps billions, of people who have never heard the gospel; or to those who were outside of the covenants of promise given to the children of Israel? Yeah, it has everything to do with being born again, so stop it....answer the question; what happened to all those people? They did not make it to heaven, and that is what the book says, I didn't make it up.
People usually try to get around this issue by stating that since there was no law they could not be held accountable for their sin, and so God being a God of love, would not send them to hell because they didn't know any better; "God just doesn't do that kind of thing"; they say.
But Paul deals with this in a very clever way without wresting the scriptures: Rom 9:20-24 Nay but, O man, who art thou that repliest against God? Shall the thing formed say to him that formed it, Why hast thou made me thus? Hath not the potter power over the clay, of the same lump to make one vessel unto honour, and another unto dishonour?
What if God, willing to shew his wrath, and to make his power known, endured with much longsuffering the vessels of wrath fitted to destruction: And that he might make known the riches of his glory on the vessels of mercy, which he had afore prepared unto glory, Even us, whom he hath called, not of the Jews only, but also of the Gentiles?
Paul doesn't try to save God from His own statements, or from defamatory statements or inquiries from the ungodly; he doesn't try to fit God's character into his own preconceptions of who He is like; he simply affirms the truth about God: He has the right to do whatever He pleases with His creatures; in fact God has already shown great patience with the vessels of wrath to demonstrate His power, making it the backdrop of His great mercy on the vessels of honor; this display of the riches His glory shuts the mouths of every single being in all realms. "Who are you who reply against God?".
So I don't reply against God anymore; I really don't think I ever have. Whatever happens in my infinitesimal world is under the absolute control of the One who made the stars; at the present moment I feel no fear, I have no anxiety, I have no burden and no guilt; exactly the same as the day I was born from above, but with the difference that the reason I believe is not strange anymore; everything makes sense right now; perhaps tomorrow I will be worried about the future in this planet, or about what I will wear or what I will eat, or how to pay the bills, then I will remember His word: "Who can stay His hand?".
Be anxious for nothing, but pray with thanksgiving and supplication, and the peace of God which surpasses all understanding will guard your heart and mind in Christ, Paul said; he didn't say that God would answer your prayer, but that His peace would guard your heart and your mind; it is up to God to answer, whether the answer is yes or no does not really matter, what matters is to have that peace of God which is above all imagination and thinking. The peace comes knowing that God reigns and that He is all love for His elect; He is for me no matter what happens.
I think that is why is important to know what happened when I got saved; if I assume that it was up to me to decide and that I made a choice; isn't it obvious that I must keep on deciding to remain in the faith? I think so. But if, as the bible says, God chose me, and He predestined me, and then He called me and His call created the faith necessary for me to believe; then the sanctifying and the glorifying belongs to Him alone.
If God is the One who does the work; He will complete it. He is able to make me stand; it doesn't depend on me. I cannot deny that human responsibility is real; I have the obligation to make choices in life; but then again, I affirm that even when I make the wrong choices, God turns them around for the good of those who love Him; all things work together for my good, and that includes my decisions whether good or bad.
God knows all my actions, all my choices, from the beginning to the end of my life; but He doesn't react to what I do; if God was reactionary, that would mean that nothing in the universe is stable, doesn't it? Think about it. If God was waiting for me to do something so that He could do something else, that would make Him a reactionary being; which He is not. There is no sovereignty in being reactionary; He would have to constantly adjust His plans for the universe based on the actions of His creatures as if He was in the dark as to what His creatures would do; but that is an idiotic thought; I think.
I have no idea of how much time I have on this earth, but right now I am very grateful that I know God; or rather that He knows me; He allows all these weird things to happen in my life for a reason; whether the reason is to change me or not, or whether the reason is so that He gets glorified, it's irrelevant to my present thinking right now; knowing that there is a reason, and a purpose behind my present state of affairs brings peace to my troubled heart; I have entered into His rest, I'm totally satisfied in Him.
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