CP 261 Please Sir, could I have more?

CP 261 Please Sir, could I have more?

So, last Sunday we attended the big church. It tends to cop a whack of flack. However I was blessed to be there.  Standard procedure is to sing 3-4 worship songs, and the last two of these ‘really met me’ and spoke deep into my soul and spirit. It was like fresh air from a cool change. Below are some words from both songs:

Never forsaken

I know You won't shy away

I am never forsaken

In dark and sleepless nights

To You I'm holding tight

I will rest in the depths of Your mercy

You drench my weary soul

Your Spirit overflows

Here I soak in Your love

I'm covered by Your love

It's surging in my heart

Forever I am found in You my God

My feet had wandered far

But now I'm where You are

Forever I am found in You my God

Corner Stone

My hope is built on nothing less

Than Jesus blood and righteousness

I dare not trust the sweetest frame

But wholly trust in Jesus name

Christ alone; cornerstone

Weak made strong; in the Saviour's love

Through the storm, He is Lord

Lord of all

When darkness seems to hide His face

I rest on His unchanging grace

In every high and stormy gale

My anchor holds within the veil

My anchor holds within the veil

Christ alone; cornerstone

Weak made strong; in the Saviour's love

Through the storm, He is Lord

Lord of all

The message was based around the destructiveness of comparing yourself against others. This is a real issue for many of us because it can be a mechanism for building oneself up at the expense of another. Conversely, if I put myself down I am denying my Father’s work in me. It leads to ungodly competitiveness and blesses neither me nor the kingdom. It gives no honour to Jesus Christ.

The pastor / preacher used a number of scripture illustrations like David / Saul and the twelve arguing on the road as Jesus headed toward Jerusalem. My spirit jumped when he read the scripture which revealed when this sin came to humanity. It’s where the tempter lies to Eve and Adam and they fall for it: (Italics mine)

 Then the serpent said to the woman, “You will not surely die. ⁵ For God knows that in the day you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.” …she (and Adam) took of its fruit and ate… Genesis 3:4-6

Very appropriately, he followed up with the passage from old Isaiah which reveals that this was exactly Satan’s rebellion in the first place: (Italics mine)

¹² “How you are fallen from heaven,
O Lucifer,^[b] son of the morning!
How you are cut down to the ground,
You who weakened the nations!
¹³ For you have said in your heart:
‘I will ascend into heaven,
I will exalt my throne above the stars of God;
I will also sit on the mount of the congregation
On the farthest sides of the north;
¹⁴ I will ascend above the heights of the clouds,
I will be like the Most High.’ Isaiah 14

My spirit rejoices in this stuff. There is nothing like it when those who teach open up the true gutsy intent and understanding of scripture. My preacher went on to link my freedom to deal with this sin to Jesus and his Lordship. All good. All I wanted from him after that was that he would open Paul’s letter to the young Christians at Philippi and read the passage in which Paul describes, with a sense of awe, the manner of Jesus victory over Satan. (Again, italics mine)

Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, ⁶ who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, ⁷ but emptied himself, taking the form of a servant,^[a] being born in the likeness of men. ⁸ And being found in human form he humbled himself and became obedient unto death, even death on a cross. ⁹ Therefore God has highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name which is above every name, ¹⁰ that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, ¹¹ and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father. Phil 2:5-11

Great text. Best text. Declares to the heavens the victory over evil that Jesus obtained. Crucially, it tells us how he did it. While Satan aggressively grasped upwards toward equality with God, and successfully induced Adam and Eve to reach upwards, Jesus chose the reverse direction, chose voluntary humiliation, chose anti-power, stuck with that choice to the enth, to the cross and to death. And he did it for me, for us. Through that choice and the inevitable death which climaxed it, he emasculated and neutered the Evil one. Amen!

Such a liberating truth. It releases Christ’s Holy Spirit holy love in our lives. It is this Jesus who is both our freedom from Satan, and our model to living it out in victory, including over that business of comparing and competing. What’s he keep on saying to us? “Come follow me.”

‘Please Sir, could I have more?’ Please say that. Please proclaim it. Preach it preacher…