Crestwood Church Blog

“No one is righteous—not even one. No one is truly wise; no one is seeking God. All have turned away; all have become useless. No one does good, not a single one.” Romans 3:10-12

In the United and States and some of the large UK cities there has been a major push by the Humanist society. This latest push is a deliberate attack to bring down Christmas and more importantly to destroy the message of the church.

Their main advert is “Why believe in a god? Just be good for goodness sake”

Sadly those behind this type of message have not thought it through. It is often claimed that there are many super intelligent who have grasped Christianity, but it is equally true that there are many that also cling to Atheism. This kind of message devalues and undermines their intelligence. If there is no absolute authority, how do we measure good or bad. Isn’t good only a measure of something that is right and pure. And isn’t our understanding of what is bad only comparable with something that is good.

In the book of judges, there is a rejection of authority and constantly the phrase, “they only did what was right in their own eyes” occurs, and the country of Israel was in turmoil. Without laws, rules or authority, anarchy rules. Without God where would we get our authority from, who is to say that anyone is better than anyone else.

When God sat down and looked across his creation, he marvelled and declared this is “very good” man pleased him and brought him delight. Creation was good, but man was set apart as very good. Since man chose to listen to his own desires and the lies of the serpent, man has not only become separated from God, but instead of being very good has become useless...evil, fit for the fire. Useless because they are not able to be the person that they were created to be. If you buy an object for a particular task and it is unable to do the job, it is declared useless.

We have two can openers in our house, the other day the good one broke, that became useless, unusable, it would never in a month of Sunday’s open a can. The other opener when you try to use it mangles a can and you have to almost saw the can apart to open in, it is almost useless, but at least it does...eventually, what it is meant to do. We don’t even mangle our way to achievement, we have all failed our purpose of living out a relationship with God.

We can’t just be good unless God makes us new and rebirths in us the person of the Holy Spirit.

Labels: Authority, Bad, Good

So God created human beings in his own image. In the image of God he created them; male and female he created them. Genesis 1:27

The world has debated for centuries questions such as this and it is not my intension to expand this subject to its limits, but to look at a few things that, is God. God in his very nature is beyond our comprehension and the second we try to understand him, we end up seeing him through the eyes of a human and by doing this down size him into something that he is not. God cannot be measured, he can not be quantified, we will never describe him fully he was not created, he just is and has always been. This verse intrigues me, as it says that we are made in his image, both male and female he created them. We are both like God, man is not more and woman is not less. So what is God? Obviously all the scriptures in the bible refer to him as being male, He did this and He said that.

The early church struggled with the same question and the best answer found is that the Greek language uses the masculine as a default and therefore God is called a "he" since He is a Spirit and is genderless (just as the angels and other spiritual beings). It would have been improper to use the word "it" since God is a person, or "she " since it would have made God a female ( a Goddess). The personal pronoun "he" is the only one that can be used without creating theological problems. God is Lord, the alpha and omega, has always been and will be everlasting. Since God is our creator, creator of man, woman and all earthly creatures great and small, therefore void of being descriptive into being either man or woman. He is neither male nor female, but He is referred to as The Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. Through the identity of the first 2, He has the reference of a man, but our minds cannot comprehend who He is in His actuality. He is God, we are not. God chose to come into our world as a man and that is how he has been revealed to us. So if God is not limited to being male or female, but having attributes of his nature that include both, that brings us a different understanding of God. Male and female are different not just physically, but emotionally, physiologically and in their general being. The best and perfections of each of these are characteristics of God. He is Father, and a perfect one at that, but he has the tender hearted nature associated with a mother with her baby child at the same time. He can understand as a man in the same way as he can think as a woman may. This means there is no limit to God’s understanding. When we say that God doesn’t understand my situation the opposite is true. He understands far better than we can even imagine. No wonder the Holy Spirit is called counsellor it’s because he understands and has the power if we trust him to help us and deliver us from our limited understanding.

Labels: Female, Gender, Male, understanding

Wise words bring many benefits, and hard work brings rewards. Proverbs 12:14

There are two major aspects to our Christian walk which are often belittled or neglected and they are found in this proverb.

The writer Solomon can speak with authority of this subject not just because scripture is inspired by God (which in itself is enough) but also because he has proved it to be true. Solomon chose wisdom over everything else when asked by God, what he wanted (1 Kings 3) as a result he became one of the wealthiest and most powerful of people this planet has ever known, (from a physical perspective). He established a system of work that made Jerusalem and its temple and the other cities to thrive and encouraged hard, but fair work. As a result these years produced a peace that Israel has not known since.

When Solomon turned away from wisdom and became lazy, indulging in parties, banqueting and foreign wives, his kingdom was snatched from him and divided into two, and still has not recovered to this day.

Dear brothers and sisters, there are two sides to our faith, there is the part which God does, which is the only part that brings salvation and heaven, the part that changes us for eternity (justification) and there is our part which builds the relationship with God now while we exist on earth. (Sanctification) This is the part that can be threatened, because it depends on us and not God.

This part is all about our walk, our appreciation, our dependency and our personal holiness with God. This is epitomized by what we say and what we do.

If we say we love Him, but never want to serve him, what does that say about our relationship. If we speak out and gossip about our brothers and sisters in Christ what does that say about the family that we are a part of?

The one single thing that in our society that we cherish most, even more than money, is our time. The past few weeks there has been a mountain of activity and giving of time by so many of the church and as this verse states, it brings its rewards. We had more children at holiday club this year, the toddler groups are flourishing, Crestwood has never seen so many families on one night as we did on Friday (over 200 people came) and our youth and kids works are doing well.

Lets keep working hard, not just for each other, but for our Saviour who gave all for our salvation. Let’s keep finding ways to build each other up with love and strength , speaking wise words over each other and we will see the benefits.

Labels: Hard work, Rewards, Service, Wisdom

Then he showed me another vision. I saw the Lord standing beside a wall that had been built using a plumb line. He was using a plumb line to see if it was still straight.And the Lord said to me, “Amos, what do you see?” I answered, “A plumb line.”
And the Lord replied, “I will test my people with this plumb line. I will no longer ignore all their sins. I wonder if God were to set a plumb line against your life, what results would he come back with? Amos 7:7-9

In verse 7, the prophet is describing a wall that was built with a plumb line. In other words it was built correctly.
(A plumb line has two purposes, 1– to test its depth and is usually used to measure depths of water, and 2– to test the straightness or trueness of a building or object. It is the latter that the Bible is referring to here. The cord with the bob on the end would be dangled down until it is stationary and the wall would be compared to the string or cord to measure its accuracy. Today we also use lasers or spirit levels, but plumb lines are still used in certain areas of engineering.)

Amos was writing directly about the Nation of Israel, he was commenting on the fact that they had wandered far from being true. The nation of Israel were formed correctly, they became a nation by the hand of God and he gave them a name by which to honour and serve– Jehovah. As time went on they drifted further and further away from their maker. Until the time when this prophecy was written when God was going to judge Israel for their lack of obedience and integrity.
Today we live in a fallen world, with people who were once made with a “plumb line” but as a people we have drifted away from God. If today was the day for God’s judgment where would we stand? The bible tells us that without Jesus in our lives, we are already condemned, because we have not believed in the Lord Jesus, the only man who is true.
Today is a day to recognise that individually we are sinners before the master architect. Compared to him God we are way out. In fact we are so far out of true that no distance imaginable, no matter where heaven is, could deceive God into believing that was are straight. The question is are we going to carry on, being way out of line, or are we going to seek God and ask him for his forgiveness. The wonder of being a Christian is not that we are perfect (far from it) but that God in his mercy, chooses to see us as being true, because we have believed on his Son, Jesus who was, is and will always be true. So when God gets his plumb line out you, does he measure you or does he see the trueness of Jesus.

Labels: Plumb Line, Straight, True