Category: John

Posted in 1Corinthians, John, Matthew

Knowing in Part

Posted on by Tom Flaherty

“Now I know in part, but then I will know fully just as I also have been fully known.” 1Corinthians 13:12b

I’ve seen a great evil in the body of Christ that has plagued the church throughout the ages. Those who know in part often presume they know fully and so divide themselves from other Christians who don’t see things exactly their way.

Jesus prayed in John 17:17 that we would be sanctified (set apart) by the truth and then defined truth for us: “Your word is truth.” The word of God was given to set us apart from the corrupt value system, perspective, and ungodliness of this present age, so that we would reflect God and His ways in the darkness of this world.

Christians have taken the word that was given to separate or divide us from the world’s system, and instead used it to divide the body of Christ. In the very chapter that Jesus prayed we would be sanctified, He also prays that the Father would make us one. The result of this oneness, He said, would be that the world would believe in Jesus.

Instead of accepting each other, the body of Christ is often found rejecting each other on things that aren’t essential to the gospel. Pride makes us “strain at gnats and swallow camels.” (Matthew 23:24) There are essential truths that unite us and divide us from the world and these need to be embraced with a passion we are willing to die for: the authority of Scripture; Jesus is the Son of God and Savior of the world; the gospel calls all people to repent and put their trust in Christ for salvation; Christians are called to love God and love people; everyone will stand before the judgment seat of Christ and go irreversibly to heaven or hell. Even these clear truths in the word of God are only known in part, yet Christians through all the ages have established these as essentials that define one as a Christian.

Matters like communion, baptism, how the second coming will unfold, how predestination is defined, spiritual gifts, the age of the earth, etc. are all examples of issues that sincere believers disagree as to how the Bible should be interpreted. You probably have an opinion on every one of these topics and you more than likely think you’re right. (If you didn’t it wouldn’t be your opinion) Yet, we need to hold these opinions with humility or our attitude can end up bringing division to the church instead of the unity that Jesus prayed for.

Posted in John, Psalms

Born Broken

Posted on by Tom Flaherty

“As He passed by, He saw a man blind from birth. And His disciples asked Him, ‘Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he would be born blind?’ Jesus answered, ‘ It was neither that this man sinned, nor his parents; but it was so that the works of God might be displayed in him.’” John 9:1-3

Many people become blind because of an accident or disease, but some are born blind. The disciples are troubled by this because they think bad things only happen to bad people and this doesn’t fit their formula. When they ask if it was this man’s sin you see how predisposed they were to this thinking. You can almost hear their thoughts: It absolutely has to be this man’s fault that he’s blind… but he was born blind… maybe he sinned in the womb!

Jesus says that it wasn’t his sin or his parents’ sin. He also says that the work of God is not his blindness, but him being healed and made whole. So why was he born blind? I think it’s just the brokenness that sin has caused to the human race passed down from generation to generation. It has affected everything, including our DNA, so much so that some people are born blind even though Adam and Eve weren’t created blind and no one will be blind in heaven.

We have spiritual DNA as well as physical and it too has been broken by sin. In fact, the Bible says that the effects of sin multiply over generations. The sin nature passed down will become worse and worse if given into by the previous generation, so much so that people can be born with strong tendencies toward addictions even though they themselves haven’t done anything wrong yet. It doesn’t seem fair, but the truth is all of us are born broken in some way.

Although God has allowed this, He has promised to be close to the broken (Psalm 34:18) and He sent Jesus to redeem us from our sins and to bind up our brokenness. He doesn’t judge us for being broken, but invites us to make our identity in Him instead of in how broken we are. The work of God is that we become whole. Although blind eyes can be instantly made whole, spiritual wholeness is a process that won’t be completed until heaven.

Posted in Genesis, John

Raising Hell – Part Two

Posted on by Tom Flaherty

“He must not be allowed to reach out his hand and take also from the tree of life and eat and live forever.” Genesis 3:22b

Part of becoming a Christian for me was accepting the Bible as the final authority on every area of life and doctrine. I was brought up in the Lord by people who believed that the Bible was clear on the nature of hell’s punishment, so I never even questioned it.

The argument went something like this: Because men and women are made in the image of God they are automatically eternal beings. The great tragedy of someone rejecting Christ, therefore, was that they would live in conscious torment for all eternity. No one chooses, whether they are eternal, I was taught, it is just a by-product of being in the image of God. Everyone is born with eternal life – they either spend it in heaven with Jesus or in the conscious torment of hell with Satan and his angels.

In the last few years I’ve questioned whether this is true Biblically or if it is only a tradition of man that was passed down. The context of the passage quoted above was God putting Cherubim with swords at the entrance to Eden because He wanted to ensure that Adam and Eve would not eat from the tree of life and live forever apart from Him.

Apparently being in the image of God didn’t mean Adam and Eve would automatically live forever, but only that they had the potential of being eternal. According to the text, to live forever they would have to eat of the tree of life.

Jesus said, “For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son that whoever believes in Him would not perish, but have eternal life.” (John 3:16) Eternal life is God’s gift to humanity in Christ; without it, I believe, you and I will eventually perish. It was never in God’s heart that we would be able to live forever apart from Him.

Posted in John, Matthew

Raising Hell – Part One

Posted on by Tom Flaherty

“Do not fear those who kill the body but are unable to kill the soul; but rather fear Him who is able to destroy both soul and body in hell.” Matthew 10:28

Two years ago I approached our elder board with a desire to present a position on the nature of hell that is different from what most of the traditional church believes. The elders asked me to wait on doing the talk publicly until they had a chance to study and discuss the topic with me. So I waited, and we went through Scripture together. Here are some of the points we were in full agreement about:

  1. Hell is a place of punishment where those who reject Christ will go.
  2. Hell is a place of conscious torment.
  3. Hell is a place of eternal, irreversible judgment or punishment. There isn’t a second chance nor is its punishment remedial.

What some respectfully disagreed with is the duration of conscious torment. I believe Scripture teaches ultimate annihilation after souls have paid a just penalty for their sins while others believe the traditional opinion that the torment of hell goes on forever. Of course, they would argue that in God’s economy, this too is a just penalty.

I was given the freedom to do the talk as long as I was clear that we were in agreement on the essentials and that the exact nature of hell’s punishment is a non-essential that Bible believing evangelicals can agree to disagree on. (I ended up writing an ebook on the topic called: Raising Hell: A closer look at the church’s darkest doctrine)

God wants us to behold His severity so that we will never experience it. He loves us and has made a way for all of us to be saved through Christ, so that all we ever need to know is His kindness. Yet we are to behold His severity, so that we never forget that He is a holy Judge. If we choose to turn our backs on Christ, Paul warns, we will experience His severity along with all those who have hardened their hearts to His love.

It is important that we believe in hell. There is a heaven, Jesus said so, and He even said that if it wasn’t so He would have told us. (See John 14:2) But the One who is the truth also said there is a hell. In fact, He warned us many times about hell urging us to make sure we didn’t end up there.

Posted in 2Chronicles, John, Romans

Let’s Talk about Politics

Posted on by Tom Flaherty

“My kingdom is not of this world. If it were, My servants would fight to prevent my arrest by the Jews. But now my kingdom is from another place.” John 18:36

“You would have no power over Me if it were not given to you from above. Therefore the one who handed me over to you is guilty of a greater sin.” John 19:11

In our texts above we see that there are two kingdoms – the kingdom of God and the kingdom of man. Jesus says that the kingdom of God is from another place and that it does not advance with physical force at the present time. The kingdom of God isn’t here to overthrow governments; it’s here to change hearts. “The kingdom of God is righteousness, peace, and joy in the Holy Spirit.” (Romans 14:17) Only the kingdom of God can bring real hope and change to a human being.

But God is also over the kingdom of man, so Pilate is assured that he would have no authority to judge if it wasn’t given to him from above. Paul says: “The authorities that exist have been established by God. Consequently he who rebels against authority is rebelling against what God has instituted, and those who do so will bring judgment on themselves. For rulers hold no terror for those who do right, but for those who do wrong…For he is God’s servant to do you good. But if you do wrong, be afraid, for he does not bear the sword for nothing. He is God’s servant, an agent of wrath to bring punishment on the wrongdoer.” (Romans 13:2-5) Because of the power and possibility of sin, God has appointed civil government to limit the evil man is able to do while on this earth.

The kingdom of God alone can redeem; the kingdom of man can only restrain. If we don’t believe in redemption, we tend to see government as the solution for all mankind’s problems. For Democrats the answer usually means more government involvement, and for the Republicans, less. When problems continue there is a lot of time spent blaming each other because “if there was only more”, or “if there was only less”, things would get better.

I don’t think God is looking at Democrats or Republicans to turn America around; He’s looking at His people, the church. “If My people, who are called by My name, will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then will I hear from heaven and will forgive their sin and will heal their land.” (2Chronicles 7:14)

Posted in Genesis, Isaiah, Jeremiah, John, Revelation

The Age of the Earth – Part Three

Posted on by Tom Flaherty

“You are of your father the devil, and you want to do the desires of your father. He was a murderer from the beginning…” John 8:44

Satan was already Satan at the beginning; not his beginning, but our beginning. Even though God called everything He made good, there was something evil left over from another time. The story of Satan’s fall is an untold story in Scripture even though we are repeatedly assured of the presence of an evil kingdom and given many instructions on how to stand against evil and how to exercise authority over demons.

So when did he fall? Genesis 1:2 says that after creation; “The earth was formless and void.” The greatest Hebrew scholars in the world say that the word “hayah” translated “was” in this text, can just as easily be translated, “became.” (See the footnote in the 1984 translation of the NIV Bible) In fact, the King James Bible translates “hayah” as “became” in 67 other places. Is it possible that God didn’t create the earth formless and void but that it became formless and void sometime after the creation?

The Hebrew words translated “formless and void” are “tohu va bohu.” The phrase “tohu va bohu” is only used in two other places in Scripture. One is in Jeremiah 4:23 where God is describing the result of His desolating judgment on Israel’s rebellion. Because they rebelled, God left Israel “tohu va bohu.” The other place this phrase is used is in Isaiah 34:11 where God is describing the result of His desolating judgment on Edom. Because Edom rebelled, God left the land “tohu va bohu.”

What if Genesis 1:2 is describing the result of God’s desolating judgment on the earth following Lucifer’s (Satan’s) rebellion? God created the early earth perfectly and it was inhabited by angels and animals but when Lucifer fell, God’s judgment followed. We don’t know when or how long until other angels followed him, we only know that a third did fall (Revelation 12:4, 7) and that judgment did come. The earth is covered with water and darkness in Genesis 1:2, not because God created it that way, but because it became that way after Satan’s rebellion.

Posted in John

Difficult Questions

Posted on by Tom Flaherty

“And His disciples asked Him, ‘Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he would be born blind?’” John 9:2

The disciples asked Jesus a difficult question and He answered them. I’m so glad they asked it, so that we could all hear the answer. The church can either welcome questions or see them as a threat to the established system. God is very secure in Himself, and I think He likes questions when they are accompanied by a heart that wants to know the truth. Asking often leads to study which can lead to deeper convictions than those who never bothered to ask.

There are some people, I am convinced, that want to not believe. They have another issue with God and may use difficult questions to hide the real problem. Sometimes people are mad at God because of unresolved pain, so their questions are really only accusations against God. Others seem to resent that they are not the ones who ultimately decide what is right and wrong. They question God to justify their own lifestyle.

But there are others who are genuinely open to believe, and some who actually want to believe, but they have honest questions that hinder them. God does not ask us to set aside our minds to believe in Him. In fact, He calls us to love Him with all of our minds. Faith does not contradict our minds, but it does transcend them. For these people, it can be very helpful to give the mind rational answers for troubling questions. Explanations for difficult questions will not give a person faith, but they can give a person’s mind permission to exercise the childlike faith it takes to connect with God. He is so much higher than us, and His ways so beyond us, that we must humble ourselves like children to experience the fullness of His love and salvation.

Posted in John, Luke, Mark

Destiny or Comparison?

Posted on by Tom Flaherty

“So Peter seeing him said to Jesus, ‘Lord, and what about this man?’ Jesus said to him, ‘If I want him to remain until I come, what is that to you? You follow Me!” John 21:21-22

My wife and I were at a pastor’s convention and one of the speakers preached from Psalm 29 on the voice of God. His point was that we are formed by whatever voice we regularly listen to. He asked if we were listening to the voice of destiny or comparison.

He said that when we stop listening to the voice of destiny, the voice of comparison will take over. The fruit of operating out of comparison will either be a competitiveness that wins by making sure others lose, or a complacency that comes from self pity because we don’t think we’re as good as someone else.

The problem is how deeply ingrained comparison is in our hearts. Jesus told the disciples at the last supper that one of them would betray Him. Luke 22:23 says that “they began to discuss among themselves which one of them it might be who was going to do this thing.” But the argument about who was the worst quickly gave way to another one about who was the best because the very next verse says, “And there arose also a dispute among them as to which one of them was regarded to be greatest.” (Luke 22:24) We know Peter thought he was on top from his statement to Jesus, “Even though all may fall away, yet I will not.” (Mark 14:29)

But the text above from John 21 finds Peter in a very different place. He has denied the Lord and has gone back to fishing. He used to think he was the best, but by now, we can imagine, he is convinced he is the worst. To bring him back to his destiny Jesus asks Peter if he loves Him. When he says he does, Jesus recalls him into the ministry; “…feed My sheep; …tend My flock; …shepherd my lambs.” It’s not about whether Peter thinks he’s as good at it as someone else, it’s only about loving Jesus and doing what Jesus told him to do. Denying Jesus didn’t change his destiny any more than our failures change God’s destiny for us. God has factored our weaknesses, mistakes, and even our sins into His plan.

After receiving his instructions Peter did what we usually do, he looked at the guy next to him and asked, “What about him?” Jesus said, “What’s that to you? You follow me.” Our job isn’t to keep track of anyone else’s destiny, that’s between them and God. Our job is to get our eyes off of people and on to Jesus. Let’s fight off the persistent voice of comparison, so we can fulfill God’s purpose for our lives.

Posted in 1John, John

Answered Prayer

Posted on by Tom Flaherty

“Until now you have asked for nothing in My name; ask and you will receive, so that your joy may be made full.” John 16:24

Oswald Chambers is convinced that prayer is more about coming into union with God than it is about getting things. The condition Jesus places on answered prayer is to ask “in My name.” What does that mean? Is it just a postscript at the end of a prayer, “…and we ask this in Jesus Name. Amen.”, or is it something more? Jesus makes another reference to answered prayer in the chapter before: “If you abide in Me, and My words abide in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be done for you.” (John 15:7) Two conditions: union with His presence, “if you abide in Me;” and with His word, “… and My words abide in you.” What if “in My name” means “in union with My nature and purpose to the degree that it is no longer your prayer but our prayer?” Jesus always gets His prayers answered and we always get ours answered when we are so in union with Him that two have become one, and our prayer is indistinguishable from His.

1John 5:14-15 would be in agreement with this thought: “This is the confidence which we have before Him, that if we ask anything according to His will, He hears us. And if we know that He hears us in whatever we ask, we know that we have the requests which we have asked from Him.” The key is being one with His will which means intimacy before asking. We shouldn’t be trying to get what we want from God, but rather, trying to get what He wants inside of us. Before His will is done on earth someone needs to voluntarily pray it from here but I don’t think we can do that unless we are intimate enough to really pray in His name. Prayer is vital, but for it to be effective our first goal must be union with God. Only then will our joy be full.

Posted in Colossians, John, Philippians, Romans

Living from Victory

Posted on by Tom Flaherty

“Very soon the God of peace will crush Satan under your feet.” Romans 16:20

From God’s perspective, darkness has already been defeated through Christ’s triumph on the cross. (Colossians 2:15)  Jesus is not at war with Satan; He’s already won the war and now, through the gospel, is inviting us to live from His victory.

The key is walking in peace. We must first acquire the peace of God, and then we must learn to walk in the peace of God. When we do this, we become like a thermostat in our environment. “Very soon . . .” the darkness around us is crushed as the kingdom of God and Christ’s victory permeate the atmosphere we bring Christ’s peace to. Notice from the text, Satan will be crushed – his work, his plans, his voice – under our feet. Jesus wants us to share His victory.

So how does one get the peace of God? It starts with salvation where God offers us peace with Him through the sacrifice of Jesus for our sins on the cross. (Romans 5:1)  Once we are saved, we have continual access to God through Christ and have peace available to us if we give our anxieties to God in prayer. “Be anxious for nothing but in everything make your requests known to God with thanksgiving, and the peace of God which transcends understanding will guard over your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus.” (Philippians 4:6-7)

Getting peace is easier than walking in peace. How does one stay in peace in a world that creates so much uncertainty, fear, and anxiety? I believe the key is in the verse before our text in Romans 16 and in the verse following the reference in Philippians. Notice how similar they are: “I want you to be wise about what is good, and innocent about what is evil.” (Romans 16:19) “Brothers and sisters, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable – if anything is excellent or praiseworthy – think about such things… And the God of peace will be with you.” (Philippians 4:8-9)

To stay in peace, we have to keep ourselves from focusing on evil and on what evil is doing.  When we focus on darkness we end up empowering it. Jesus focused on what the Father was doing and saying (John 5:19); to walk in peace we need to do the same.

If we lose our peace, all we have to do is bring our anxieties back to God and He will restore it again. Let’s practice living from victory until it becomes our lifestyle!