The "Right" Interpretation

There are more than 33000 different Christian denominations. Each with their own specific interpretation of the bible and of what the truth is. This has obviously caused major splits in Christianity and divided and alienated many people, not to mention scar the image of Christianity.

Even as I grew in the faith, many contrasting  viewpoints were presented by different people, some I accepted and some I rejected and others and completely withstood and would fight against.

A while ago I came across a post where believers were arguing and discussing two opposing views on the cross. The one group were holding the view of penal substitution and the others were against that. Penal substitution is basically the doctrine where we believe that Jesus was punished by God for our sins, in a legal sense to get us off the hook. God had to punish someone for our sins, and in a sense required “blood” to be spilled to release forgiveness. And so Jesus took our place and was punished by God in our stead.

The other viewpoint is that it was not God that required blood to be spilled, but us as humanity. That the cross of Jesus was not God punishing Jesus on our behalf but rather Jesus going into the depths of our own sin, sickness, death and condemnation and taking it upon himself on our behalf. No punishment from God intended or needed.

While both of these points of view have merits and scriptural support, which one is right? The idea of penal substitution is a belief that has come a long way through history. A few centuries ago where justice and punishment for crimes were deeply ingrained into the consciousness of people, this idea would have made a lot of sense, would have been understood well and would set many people free from a sin consciousness. The idea of Jesus taking our death and sin upon himself without the punishment of God, would not have been understood or received as well by that same group of people, but would be much better received by people who did not have a background of liberation through justice per se.

I believe that the time of the law under Moses was a necessary pre-cursor to the cross. God had to meet sinful humanity where they were at, at a primitive spiritual understanding of the divine, and slowly walk with them through the ages of the law, and so doing, progressively reveal Himself to them until the fullness of Christ. The lamb of God was in fact slain before the foundation of the world but was only revealed at the right time…

What I’m trying to say is that what if the truth is both relative and absolute? What if God works with humanity’s understanding, albeit incomplete and obscured by our own sinfulness and blindness, to make the light of his love and ultimate truth still shine forth in a specific place and time in our lives? So what if both viewpoints earlier mentioned are correct. They are correct in the sense that God succeeded in liberating us from bondages through those doctrines. God hits a straight shot with a crooked club. He meets us were we are at and desires to liberate us from that which binds and blinds us at any cost! If you were liberated by the doctrine of penal substitution, wonderful! If you were liberated and given more freedom towards God by the other viewpoint, wonderful and hallelujah!

At the end of the day, God’s truth is not about which doctrine or interpretation of the scripture is the absolute correct one, but God’s truth is rather the unveiling of Himself as the personal liberator and as pure love and as The Truth. That is why 2 seeming opposing doctrines, both of which have their liberating qualities can both be true and bring us to this greater truth. The problem arises where we isolate our viewpoint or “smaller truth” and start to oppose everything that does not hold to that which liberated us, while not understanding that those you are opposing were liberated by their doctrine.

We have to see that truth is not a doctrine but a connection the giver of life himself, Jesus Christ. He himself is the final and authoritative Word of God. We must realise that doctrines taught to us, received by us unto liberation are not the final truth and will bring us step by step closer to the Word Himself. So after diving deep into the limited freedom that our doctrine has provided us with, we have to stand back and see that this journey doesn’t stop with an idea or a doctrine. The liberation doesn’t stop with one belief or understanding, our doctrines and we ourselves have to evolve and adapt as God progressively leads us to a better understanding of Himself through the Holy Spirit and scripture.

What if God deliberately included seeming contradictory points of view to capture the attention of as many possible, on both sides of the fence? (I am not referring here to selfish or deliberate evil interpretations.) What if we can also say of God, “I became all things to all men so that I might win some” as Paul said? God is love and desires to liberate us and show His love to us at the place and understanding we are at. Let’s fully receive what the Holy Spirit reveals in His time, while not holding too tightly, defending or opposing doctrines and ideas. Let us rather see them as stepping stones given in their time and place by God, to liberate us and bring us into a more spacious understanding of His nature with each new revelation.

The Journey

As we as Christians continue in our walk with God we go through certain trials and tribulations. All Christians who seek God will inevitably go through times of testing, twisting and refining. At the end of the day, we want to be like Christ. As Paul said : “I will not continue to labour until Christ is formed in you”. Paul’s passion and heart was to see the Christ that is already within you and I come out to the surface.

But how does this process work, how do we grow and go from glory to glory? Many on this path have deviated much from the path, many have completely left the path because of disappointment, unanswered prayer or expectations not being fulfilled. Where are you in this journey of Christ-likeness?

Before we begin the expression of this journey, we have to clearly show and see what the objective of God is. At the end of the day, It’s God working in us, not we working something in ourselves… We have to make this distinction. As many of us begin this journey with God, we have the wrong ideas and expectations of where we are supposed to end up - this just ensures for some more setbacks and struggles. If you are one of those who have left the path, or have wondered off and are reading this, you are much closer than you think!

To put it simply, the process of this journey is death. Death of what cannot inherit the Kingdom of God and consequently life to that which can. My self-righteousness cannot express God, my stubbornness and pride cannot either - it has to die and make place for Christ to live his life through me. It’s not just my bad or sinful traits that have to die, but the whole of ME! Andre has to make place for Christ! In the end the angels won’t sing, “Worthy is the Lamb and Andre”, they only worship the perfectly slain and righteousness lamb of God. 

At the end of the day, my perceptions of God has to die, my expectations have to die, my sinful desires have to die, my self-righteousness and pride has has to die… Alas, the whole of “ME” has to die to make place for the christ-man that is already born again in me.

Don’t stop reading now, there is good news! The whole mystery and glorious truth of the gospel is that when Christ died, YOU already died with Him! And when he was resurrected, you were already resurrected with Him! The process of dying is the process of recognising what is already dead, and recognising what is at life now!

Many Christians set out to crucify themselves, their own sinful nature… But imagine yourself on a cross. With your right hand you can hit one nail in each foot and probably with much luck hit in the nail on your left hand. But you cannot smack the nail into your own right hand… No, we cannot crucify ourselves, if we were able to, What did Jesus die for? Just as an example for us? No, Christ died FOR, in place or AS you and I. That is why Paul says in 2 Cor 5 that when one died for all, all died.

You see, the process is not killing yourself, but the end result is realising that you have been killed already and that there is a glory-man and woman already on the inside of me that does not have it’s own goodness, its own righteousness, its own holiness or its own glory and power but that this glory man and woman on the inside of me and you is a partaker of the nature of God. The new you and I has and shares the very same nature of God…

The process is one of discovery. A process of discovering our true nature and so doing discover our false and sinful nature. I can only realise I have been prideful if I have spent time with a truly humble person. In the same way I can only let go and cling to the christ-man in me once the holy spirit reveals the christ-man to me through the gospel.

The process is wonderful, and carries with it an easy, liberating yoke but our own stubbornness, pride, ideas and expectations will cause us much hurt the more we cling to them.

May we realise that the dead and fleshly “ME” cannot share in the glory and the nature of God, because it is incapable of doing so, and at the same time may we realise that Christ has already crucified that sinful state and at the same time made me a partaker of his divine glory as a brand new creation.

The process is not hard, long and laborious. No, if you think it is supposed to be that, then you are trying to do what Christ has already done for you. The freedom and the good news of the Gospel is an announcement that Christ has taken the process of death upon himself and included you and I in the package. We are recipients of his death and resurrection, no effort on my part involved but to see and trust in the work of God through Jesus and in me.

The Gospel in Job

The gospel can be found everywhere in the old testament and not only in the new testament. As I was reading the book of Job the other day - one of the best literature pieces in the bible, and some are of the opinion one of the oldest books in the Bible, I came across the good news of Jesus - the Gospel!

Job was a righteous man and was abundantly blessed, and Job and his friends believed that righteousness = blessings. The more righteous you are, the more you will be blessed. So when disaster struck Job, his first reaction was - I am a righteous man, why is this happening to me?

His friends argued that he must have done something wrong for God to punish him like this, while Job continued to defend himself. The majority of the book of Job is about this - Job defending his righteousness while not understanding why the bad stuff is happening, while his friends trying to show his unrighteousness. Both of them are assuming that righteousness = blessings and unrighteousness = curses. Does God play by those rules? In the old testament He indeed did as we are shown in Deuteronomy 28 and 29 - Your actions or obedience will determine your blessings or your curses. But this was for a specific purpose - to familiarise humanity very well with our own inability to earn through our own righteousness…

But here God takes a different approach to show Job that his own righteousness has nothing to do with why God is blessing or cursing him.

At the end of Job, God squashes Job’s pride with His majesty and Job’s self-righteousness is shown for what it is. Job answers : 

“I know that You can do everything, And that no purpose of Yours can be withheld from You. You asked, ‘Who is this who hides counsel without knowledge?’ Therefore I have uttered what I did not understand, Things too wonderful for me, which I did not know. Listen, please, and let me speak; You said, ‘I will question you, and you shall answer Me.’ “I have heard of You by the hearing of the ear, But now my eye sees You. Therefore I abhor myself, And repent in dust and ashes.” Job 42 : 2-6 

At this point Job realised that God does whatever he wants and that God is not bound by man’s righteousness or lack of it. God is God and he gives because he is Good and not because man is good. 

This is the gospel in essence. The gospel magnifies the goodness of God in spite of and not because of man’s goodness. God’s heart has always been from the very beginning to bring us out from the yoke of slavery (our own righteousness) and put us under the light and easy yoke of Christ’s own righteousness!

May you and I let go of our own righteousness, stop defending it or fighting for it, or try to measure God's approval of us by it, may we rather embrace the righteousness of Jesus Christ!

The Ocean

As I write, in front of me, not in the far distance but relatively close by I am presented with a glorious beach and ocean… From my vantage point, in the middle of this spectacular view lies an intricate rocky ridge that stretches into the blue abyss. The ocean amazes and attracts us because of its mystery and consistency. Beneath the blue surface lies a mysterious world, unknown to us. We can only imagine and fantasise what lies beneath and beyond the horizon.

When I first moved here, the ocean mesmerised me and I was very excited to live right next to it (for someone who has lived his whole life 7 hours from the ocean) but as time went by I realised that the ocean slowly started to lose its wonder. It was still mysterious and attractive but not in the same way anymore. I guess its like that with any new thing, a car, a new house, a marriage… What first amazed us slowly loses its appeal.

The ocean didn’t change, but I did, the wonder and mystery of it is still there but I have lost perception of it. My perception of it changed and it ceased to amaze me because it had somehow become common to me. Even though the ocean can never be “common” my thought patterns and ingrained brain connections have become used to its own perception of it. So what Im trying to say is - I have become used to my view of the ocean and not the ocean itself…

So the other night I was left without peace in myself while reflecting about certain things that happened in the past and I realised that continual introspection is not the way to solve certain internal dilemmas. Instead I believe the holy spirit lead me again to the ocean. I just lifted my eyes from where I was and tried to put my attention on it, the waves, the sounds and the constant cadence, but I just could not do it without being pulled back into my own thoughts and struggles. I tried again and again, realising that I would have to view these unresolvable issues from an external point of view, because my own efforts and perception of the problem or the way to resolve it just wasn’t enough… 

I tried again to rest my attention on the ocean… I closed my eyes and started listening… Then I realised that the roaring waves were much louder than they usually were and that It had probably been like this for the whole day - I just wasn't aware of it. I missed it because I was used to it. My attention started to focus more and more on the ocean, under the moonlight I could see the waves over the rocky ridge going in different directions as they break over the rocks and it seemed that the sound of the waves came all the more closer with each break.

I realised that the ocean had a life of its own… Its unaware of me… I realised that this ocean in front of me is much bigger and more majestic than I am… I am dwarfed in its presence.

Something in me said - enough is enough, you’re wasting your time with this, get up and do something already… I looked away, thought of something to do, and just before I stood up, I gave one last look at the constant waves over the rocks and then within me I recognised it’s beauty again. The beauty that I saw when I first arrived here. I didn’t know what I saw, but the more stared at the constant rolling of waves under the moonlight the more I realised what the beauty was, that that I was feeling and seeing again…

The waves and the entire ocean, the sound each wave makes when it breaks over the rocks and breaks onto the beach - I realised that it was in full adoration and worship of God. As I realised this I realised that it had been worshipping God all along - with each and every wave and I was totally unaware of it. I was moping about some stuff while this majestic and unchartered ocean was worshipping the creator of all things all along. But now as I was recognising this, I was joining it in it’s worship of God. 

The ocean IS, it’s not trying to be. The ocean is reflecting the glory of God by just being what it was created to be. It is totally itself at it’s core and it is created as an instrument to worship God. The ocean cannot cease to worship God, it would have to cease to exist to stop. Everything it does is worship, there is nothing it can do that is not worship.

And as I was connecting through its worship I realised that I… and you too are instruments of worship. In our core and at a cellular level we are already magnificent worshippers of God. Every cell and every part of us reflects God and is in adoration towards Him. When you and I become aware of this we join in this bodily worship to God in our consciousness. We become aware of His magnificence, His presence his indescribable greatness, his imminence.

The ocean never lost its appeal, I lost sight of what it truly is. God has never left or withdrew His presence from me, I was merely dumbed down to the glory of it all.

The freedom of God

Have you ever stopped to think that God is truly free? If man desires to be free in any sense, free from what might control him, how much more God?

Freedom is indescribable. It is something we will even die for. We strive for freedom in all spheres of our lives, even subconsciously. Freedom from being controlled by others, financial freedom, free do do what is in your heart to do, free from destructive habits, free to love, free to be yourself. Many times we do not even realise that we are still being controlled by some unknown force only until it is revealed in some or the other way and we will always strive to be free from that.

Captivity is bondage and death, freedom is life, spontaneity and overflow.

If we are to look for a role model of freedom, someone to look up to with regards to being totally free we need to look no further than God.

Is God free, or is he bound by you? Is God free, or is He required to answer your every prayer. Is God free or is He indebted to you?

One might argue that what is mentioned above are not things that binds a person or God in any way, but that answering your prayers for example is something that is done out of love and not obligation. It is true that God loves you but does God saying that he loves you force him to do things for you when you need it? Or is it precisely his love that doesn't?

Have you ever felt angry or disappointed at God for not answering your prayers? Why do you feel like this? Is it because God is required to answer you and give you what you asked for? Is it because you did your part and now you deserve it?

No, God is not bound by your expectations of him. If He were, He would not be a model of freedom that we are all striving for.

God can come and go as he wishes. He can create 42 different universes and tell no-one about it if he feels like it. He does not worry about being misunderstood, hated, ridiculed or even told that He doesn’t exist. His joy is not put out by us. He can and do whatever is in His heart to do and he does not require anybody’s permission. He is creative, spontaneous, full of live and totally free. Is this not what is also in your heart?

The problem is that we are attempting to put God in our box of expectations and use our best religious manners to try and manipulate God to give us what we want. If God were to give us what we asked for because of anything we did, to make him do it, that is called manipulation, and is totally opposed to love and grace.

You see God burns to give us even more than what we can ask for. God doesn’t give because we ask, asking opens up our hearts to receive. God gives because He doesn’t have to, but wants to anyway. He gives out of grace and love and not out of obligation. 

It is precisely our conscious and subconscious attempts to get God to do something for us, that disqualifies us from receiving from him. You might be tempted to stop “trying to do things to get it from God” so that God will give it to you. But this is just still a misunderstanding of the heart of God.

Asking does not equal receiving. Jesus did well say, ask and you will receive, but that doesn’t mean that you receive only because you ask. God wants to give more than we could possibly ask for. Asking prepares our hearts to receive a gift that is more than we asked for. And that is precisely the soil which in which we receive from God. It comes in gift wrapping. Everything God gives is a gift, and if we stop seeing that and think it is because of something we did, then God doesn't give out of love and grace but out of control and manipulation.

My point is this : Unanswered prayer is a testimony to the glorious freedom of God. God reserves the right not to give you anything at all. Even if you are the most righteous and blameless person on the face of the earth.

Think of Job. Job was perfectly righteous and blameless before God. Then God allowed his life to be totally destroyed. Job was angry at God, because he could not understand why such a thing would befall him? He is righteous and didn't know of anything that he might have done wrong? Job’s friends on the other hand accused him that he must have done something wrong for God to punish him like this.

But then God speaks and cancels both arguments. Neither are right. Job didn’t deserve his blessings because he was righteous, nor did God smite him because he was not. No, God is God and is owned by no man. What Job had and what was given back to him is totally by grace. Even his righteousness was given to him by God. That was Job's lesson.

Losing perspective of this will cause us to resort to all sorts of “religious” methods and tricks or puff us up in pride or into shame on the other end of the spectrum. Christian Voodoo. I did my part God, now you have to do yours" or "I didn't do my part, and now God isn't going to do his".

When unanswered prayer, difficult times and disasters in our lives run their course and God seems aloof and disinterested, it is merely our false lens of perception. In our fleshly minds and hearts we view God from the “you owe me” perspective and God refuses to be put in that box. I believe he will not climb into our box for at least 2 reasons. Firstly because he is doing us a favour by staying true to his free nature. If we could manipulate God in any way, then God is susceptible to manipulation. And if He is found to be susceptible to manipulation then it means he can also manipulate. Manipulation is anti-love and anti-God. So to release us from manipulation and launch us into freedom, God refuses to be manipulated. He stays true to himself. 

Secondly, if God were to give because of our deeds or performance (another means of manipulation) then the giving would not be by grace but by law, or in other words, by our performance. Then we are back in the old contractual covenant of “this for that”. For us to experience the love of God, which is a burning fire in the heart of God we have to learn that God gives out of love and grace and not because of anything that we have done. Paul writes in Galatians that while we were “slaves” or “children” we were under the law (of “this for that”) which was a "schoolmaster" to bring us to full maturity, grace. 

I believe God will still answer us in our wrongful and lawful asking, but as we mature we might find some basic prayers and even deeply painful requests unanswered. I believe this is a maturing process to lead us away from our own love-less minds and hearts to the wonderful freedom, grace and love of God. As we start to see everything around us in gift wrapping, I'm convinced our lives will be transformed in unspeakable ways and we will receive immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine. (Eph 3:20).

God is free. and by staying true to that, we are lead into His glorious freedom.

Give your heart to Jesus?

Has anyone ever told you to give your heart to Jesus? "If you want to be saved, you must give your heart to Jesus".

While I can understand what people mean when they say this, I don't think they fully understand what they are saying. Am I to give my heart to Jesus, then he will save me? Is he waiting for my good intentions and then he will accept me?

Can I really give my whole heart this time? I still have this itch for playing playstation and I know that I sort of like it more than church, but I'll try to give my heart... I'll try and God should respect that at least...

2 weeks later after failing an exam : Oh God, please forgive me for my sin, I feel so far from you. I now give you my whole heart, I will give up playstation (you're just saying it to bargain with God so you can feel better), I promise. Here is my heart and my life again.

Oh no...

God has already given His heart to each and every person that has ever lived on the face of the earth. He was crucified naked, his heart pierced, humiliated and suffered a gruesome death. He gave you his heart all right...

All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation: that God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ, not counting people’s sins against them. And he has committed to us the message of reconciliation. -2 Cor 5:18


The challenge is not to give your heart to Jesus, but to hear and see that he has already given you His. He has already forgiven you of all sin. He has already forgiven you for sin that you are going to commit tomorrow and in 10 years. Your good intentions, repentance or giving of heart DOES NOT BUY SALVATION. Jesus bought it on the cross for you and now we experience this amazing gift by believing in the free act of grace. You experience freedom by knowing the truth of the glorious Gospel that God is not against you but that he is fully and 100% for you.

It's all by grace. None of your internal or external works were ever required. Jesus took all the effort upon himself 2000 years ago.

Now after realising this and connecting the dots that God has in fact done me this indescribable favour... Something so amazing... Bigger than my mind and understanding... It is at this point of coming to an understanding of the goodness of God that our hearts change.

It is now no longer us giving up our hearts, but we realising that this indescribable God's heart was fully given to me. He loved me before I even knew it... While I was still a gross sinner. (Rom 5:10) Now without any effort I cling to His heart. That beautiful and most loving heart has now found its permanent residence in me.

It is at this point that my own heart becomes insignificant and worthless. All I want is his love, his grace and his goodness.

So next time someone asks you if you have given your heart to Jesus, you can answer with the good news of the Gospel : God has without restraint already given his heart to me, and my own heart was totally transformed by beholding his goodness and grace.

The way, the Truth and the Life

Jesus answered, "I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. (John 14:6)

This scripture has been used to exclude certain people from "entering heaven" as it were, as to say that Jesus is the exclusive saviour, and if you don't follow him you're going to burn in hell.

I think there is a deeper reading to this where one does not get a "negative" impression but instead read it as to let the word of God provide us with life - which is what the word of God does. It gives life.

Meditating on Jesus as "the way, truth and life" you will come to the conclusion as Paul says :

Rom 11:36 For from him and through him and for him are all things. To him be the glory forever!

and

Col 1:15-20
The Son is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation. 16For in him all things were created: things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or powers or rulers or authorities; all things have been created through him and for him. 17He is before all things, and in him all things hold together. 18And he is the head of the body, the church; he is the beginning and the firstborn from among the dead, so that in everything he might have the supremacy. 19For God was pleased to have all his fullness dwell in him, 20and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether things on earth or things in heaven, by making peace through his blood, shed on the cross.
Jesus is also the Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end.

Jesus is what the old testament is really all about. For it finds it's fulfilment in Him. Jesus is the exact image of God (the father) and he is our peace. He is also our Righteousness, wisdom and sanctification not to mention that he died our death and was resurrected and now we find our life "in Him".

What John 14:6 is to say is that if you are looking for God, as many spiritual seekers, new age followers, Buddhists, catholic priests and charismatics are doing, then the way to find God is by looking to Jesus.

If you have somehow found "God" and he does not look like Jesus, you have not found the true beautiful God. The God who saturates your life with His life. The God who is in love with you and lets His spirit permeate through you. You might have found a lesser version of God.

Our western mindsets have taught us to think of Christianity as being all about heaven and hell. How do I get to heaven and how do I avoid hell and who is going there. That seems to have become the bottom line of it all. It seems as if fear is the driving factor for seeking God. Fear of hell.

Paul writes in Romans that it is the kindness of God that brings us to salvation, not a fear of hell directly. It is the grace of God that opens our eyes to a salvation already bought for us, we just have to hear it and naturally receive it. A fear of hell might push you in the right direction, especially if you are already in hell on the earth, but if you "accept Jesus" because of fear, you have accepted a fake version of God in the making of your own thoughts.

At the end of the day, Jesus is what your life, my life and everything in all of creation is all about. Jesus is my response to God. Jesus is my life. Jesus is my obedience. Jesus is my healing. Jesus is God in a man's body and Jesus is what God sees when he looks at the world. Jesus is what you really look like and your true self.

Stop looking to yourself. Stop seeking to get closer to God. Stop trying to find fulfillment in life, but start to look to the cross, to Jesus in the flesh representing you and I. Then you will find that this Jesus who is totally unlike you, who is perfectly holy, righteous, full of life joy and love, pristinely innocent and fearfully mighty is already living inside of you. You and "This" Jesus have become one and His life is now yours...