A Good Teacher - Illustrated by Paul & Peter

A teacher is not a person that just impart knowledge to his students. He teaches them how to think for themselves. He doesn't just tell them the conclusions but show them how he arrives at the conclusions. He doesn't tell them his only view but also the views of others so that his students can see from multiple viewpoints and find the supporting evidences for a particular view that they hold.

Good parents do the same thing. They teach their children to know how to decide what is right and wrong. Parents will not always be around the child to tell him what is right or wrong. Parents must implant the right values into their children so that they may grow up to be God fearing and independent people knowing the right and wrong.

Good Bible teachers tell their students that while Bible is true Word of God, not every verse is the command or the promise of God that they should follow. Bible is a historical book that accurately record the actions of people. Some actions  were bad and served as warning to us. Some actions were good and served as examples for us to follow. Some are straight forward commands - 'Do' or 'Don't do that' and they are not for us to decide whether to follow or not. We don't decide whether they are really good or bad.

Now we come to the incidence recorded in Galatians 2:11-14 involving Paul and Peter. There are two teachings here.

1. One, with regards to the truth of the gospel, is very clear - We are justified by faith in Christ and not by works of the Law. Jews and Gentiles are united in Christ. There should be no segregation. 
2. The other is the behavior of Paul towards Peter in exposing Peter's error. Should we follow Paul's example in the correction of others? On what basis?

How Should One Correct A Senior in Christ?
At that point of time, Peter, James and John were the pillars(Gal 2:9) of the Jerusalem Church - the center and highest authority of Christianity then. Issues were to be brought back to Jerusalem Council for final decisions (Act 15:6). Paul was just a 'upstart' relative to Peter. 
So Paul was actually correcting his senior. Can we say in the eye of God, in the defend of the truth, everyone is equal. We learn the 1st principle

1. It is the truth and not the seniority that matters.
   
   What was the error? Before the people came from James, Peter ate with the Gentiles but withdrew from them when they came. Peter's action influenced Barnabas and others creating a separation that should not be there in the 1st place. Their withdrawals implied a return to the Law is better.
   
   How did Paul correct this? He opposed Peter to his face. He said to Peter before all Gal 2:14. The details, the emotions in Paul's words were not recorded for us to know. We can only infer from what Paul has said. It appeared to me to be very strong. If it was not loud, it must have been very firm. Here we can learn two more principles.
   
2. Talk to the person involved directly.We should not talk to a third person about the person's sin. That is called gossiping. Jesus actually taught us how one should correct our brother in Mat 18:15-17. This is the key practice that we all should follow as it was given by Jesus explicitly.
   
   
3. Error committed publicly or have public impact should inform the public. An error involving only the person should be done in private with the person. Mat 18:15.

Did Paul do the right thing by recording Peter's error in this letter that got canonized into the Bible and so all through history we know of Peter's error? May be this is an important 'negative illustration' that we should know. There are no record of Peter's response to this incidence and we don't know how Peter felt. But Peter in 2 Pet 3:15-16 acknowledged Paul's God given wisdom.

Could the matter be better handled?
Could Paul meet Peter privately to discuss the matter? Or invite Barnabas to join and then issue a joint declaration on the matter? This will still satisfy the 3 principles highlighted above and achieve one thing more - Peter's endorsement. At present, we could only assume Peter's silence as admission of fault. Paul in Gal 6:1 said  Brethren, if a man be overtaken in a fault, ye which are spiritual, restore such a one in the spirit of meekness; considering thyself, lest thou also be tempted. Did Paul in his eager defense of the truth has been a little bit strong on Peter at the moment? Or Paul in emphasizing the key points, left out the details? On the other hand, we have Jesus cleaning the temple with force Mar 11:15

My point is that we should carefully study the Bible in context and in an integrated matter, supporting any view with cross-references from other parts of the Bible.

Priorities & Living the Meaningful Life

In the business of life, we often forget what are the truly valuable things in life. The world want us to put 3G of Gold(Money, Wealth, Possession - lust of flesh/eye), Glory(Popularity, Reputation, Position - pride of life), and Girls(Beauty, Attractiveness - lust of eye/flesh) as our priorities. We are some what corrupted by the world too when we get upset with God because our business was not doing as well as before, or we are missed in the promotion, or some thing not going our way. As we put them first, God becomes our means to obtain the 3Gs. It is good to take time to reflect on the real valuable things in our life and adjust our life accordingly.

1. Time - Go for Eternal Value rather than Temporal 
We first recognize that this life on earth is a short one. It is temporary. Temporary means it will go away. Opportunities will be missed and opportunities will come. Are will investing on things that last,  things of eternal values? Jesus tells us to store up treasures in heaven Mat 6:20. What are these treasures?

2 Foundation is God
The greatest thing is to know the Creator God revealed through Jesus Christ. It answers the basic questions and purpose of our existence and our destination. Most believers know this. But knowing God is not a one-off event. It is a eternal relationship of knowing and interacting and sharing of joy and pains and comfort and desires and .... 

Someone say the most valuable thing of life is that we can get to know God. It is not just about quiet time. It is about bringing God into our daily living- running the chores, 'stressing' out in work, serving of customers, socializing with friends. Thanks God for His presence whether you feel like He is there or not. He says He is always with you no matter what. Enjoy God in the midst of disappointments. Trust Him. These things happen to bring us to higher plane - painful though at this time. At least thank God we are still breathing and healthy. Focus on the future and the promises of God and see how your spirit can be lifted. Faith comes not by trying to believe but by reading the Bible and quietly hearing God speaking to you.


3 Relationship & Roles - From Self-Centric to Others-Centric.
We exists with God and with others. We comes first as a child with parents. We have brothers and sisters. Then we get marry and become husband or wife. Then we have children of our own and we become parents. But we will, till death do us apart, be husband or wife to someone. In the midst of all these relationships, be thankful that we have good relationships with them. We have no sour or bitterness in our lives. If we have any bitterness, be thankful that bitterness is something we can handle. It does not depend on anyone else but ourselves. We can decide and choose to forgive and live without bitterness.

Rom 12:18  If possible, so far as it depends on you, live in peace with all people.
We can't control and be responsible for others will. So live in peace with yourself and forgive others.

For those who don't have children, parents or friends, we can decide to adopt. We don't need to go through the legal process for adoptions. We adopt them through the way we treat them. We be nice to our 'adopted' parents  - we are not restricted to 2 or 4, we can have more according to our ability. We can adopt children as well. We don't need their approval too. We extend our love. We of course need to use wisdom in the way we treat others. Love is not forcing people to accept our love or insist on them doing things to our liking because we love them. Love is giving spaces and options for people to receive or reject. Be not upset when your love is not appreciated or even rejected. True love is unconditional.

Don't focus on what you don't have but focus on what you can do to make a difference in the life of others.

4 Wealth & Money
Wealth is a strange thing. Pursuing the right things in serving others will bring them to you. Chasing them alone will give you short-term success but long term liability. Watch out for the saying that money is a good servant but a terrible master. True wealth is not measured by amount we accumulated but in our giving them away to create influence and impact. At the bema judgement seat of awards ceremony, you will be rewarded according to how much and how you spent your wealth. The accumulated wealth not used become a bad testimony of our self-centric life. In the parable of the dishonest steward, the moral of the story is to using wealth for relationship -invest in people - relationship is more important than possessions.

Conclusions - The Valuables in Life
Be thankful of knowing a true and good God, having good relationships within and without, a healthy, adequate and comfortable life, ability to influence others for good, and so forth.... See, God is with you all the while and making sure we grow up to be a better person.

Lim Liat (c) updated 2 April 2013

Grace - Wrong Definition leading to Shameful Behavior

We have covered the biblical defintions of grace in past postings:

• "Grace is Unmerited Favor" - This Common Definition is Wrong
•  Grace - God's Loving Power for You to become Your Very Best

There have been much debates and even accusations about the grace-based preachings and churches that preach the message. The main issue is actually the wrong definition of grace.
Grace defined as "unmerited favor" or "receiving the blessings that we do not deserved". Mercy as "not getting the punishment that we deserved". They sound very good and as if full of depth but they are biblical wrong and misleading.

Grace defined above creates a bunch of lazy bums Christians wanting wealth and promotion without working for them. Of course they will not get them without hard work. So they take short-cut, exploit loop holes in systems, steps over others, and even take from others to get them and then they say it is God's favors and blessing. It is no wonder why they being criticized and condemned.

The Biblical definition of Grace is God's empowerment to do the things that God want and resulting in bringing glory to God. We do not need any grace when we don't want to do anything. We need grace to reach up the standards that God has set for us to show others. If it is a mediocre standard that anyone can achieve, we don't need grace. Our work should be so differentiated from others that show forth the salt and light and reveal the glory of God through us. To do that, we need to ask for grace.

Paul in Eph 2:8-9 stating that "we are saved by grace through faith" quickly followed it with v10 "we are created in Christ for good works which God had ordained and we should walk in them." James 2:17 emphasized that "faith without work is dead and valueless". Jesus said in Mat 5:16  Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father which is in heaven.

We are saved to glorify God with good works. Let's ask for the grace to enable us to do God glorifying works revealing the salt and light of the Christ in us.

A Taxonomy for Proverbs

Proverbs as a book of wisdom is divided into chapters and verses. Unlike I-Ching, the thoughts are not organized into major topics and keywords. With my work on knowledge management, cognitive learning and taxonomy, it makes good sense and a good exercise to develop a taxonomy on proverbs.

The tools I used to construct the taxonomy is Mindjet mindmanager software. It is a top range mind-mapping software. I use the Text-Marker feature to create a Categories to store the tags (or keywords like love, God, evil, lie etc). Unfortunately, the text-markers only allow a linear list. I have to create my own hierarchical list for the taxonomy tree manually.
Using e-sword, I can past the entire proverb text into the mind-map of mindmanager. For every verse, I assign tags.  So a verse like

• A fool despises his father's instruction, but whoever heeds reproof is prudent. Pro 15:5

can be assigned tags of ‘fool’, ‘instructions’ (using instruction for reproof as well), ‘wisdom’ (using wisdom for prudent) , and ‘despise’.

The software automatically consolidate the assigned tags into a list without duplicated keywords.

I use another mindmanager software add-on ‘ResultManager” to generate another mind-map with the tags as main branches and the relevant verses as sub-branches. Hence, a tag like fool, will have all the verses assigned as fool as sub-branches. I can then study the verses on ‘fool’ and reorganize them to gain a comprehensive understanding of fool from Proverbs.
With the list of unique tags (keywords), I need to construct a taxonomy. Where can I begin? We can follow the “Facets” method of Ranganathan – which classify into 5 facets of Personality (Main Topic), Matter (the What, things), Energy (actions), Space (locations), Time (periods). This system seems to be an overkill for this proverb exercise. It could be useful for future work especially for the study of the Bible. For the time being, I choose a simple tree structure that work well with the mind-mapping software. The result is as follows:
The main tree:

 
The ‘Good’ branch expanded to show greater details:

 The ‘Bad’ branch expanded to show more details:

 
And a study on ‘Fool’ is shown below:
Are we behaving like a fool? We can check the map below to see....

Here is the list of additional topic:

• Wisdom from Proverbs - The Righteous
• Wisdom of Proverbs - Cause and Effect
• Wisdom of Proverbs - Timing

Will post more on the details of other key words as I study them.

Worship: Can't Sing so what ....

Some of us are not musical and vocally inclined. We are a bit tone-deaf and sing out of tune. We are told by people to sing softer. But do nont let your lack of ability to sing stop you from truely worshipping God. True worship of God is found in your behaviour and not just our singing on Sunday Worship Service.

Avodah H5656 is a Hebrew word used in the Bible whose root has three distinct yet intertwined meanings: work, worship, and service. It the service in the Worship Service see Exo 12:25, The Passover Service. Exo 30:16 35:21 the Service in the Tabernacle.

See  Ephesians Chatper 5 Walk in the New Life Part 3 Roles in Life - Discussion
for how we should worship God in our behaviour.

This can be cleary seen in Jesus' statement in Mat 25:40  And the King shall answer and say to them, Truly I say to you, Inasmuch as you did it to one of the least of these My brothers, you have done it to Me.

The best worship we can give to our God is simply our behaviour - living out His life through us. Mat 5:16  Let your light so shine before men that they may see your good works and glorify your Father who is in Heaven.

Those who appeared to sing well during Sunday Worship Services and yet live out a different and non-biblical standard of life are just hypocrites. How are we behaving when our church members are not around, such as in our office and in our family?

Worship to God is more than our mouth. It is in our heart shown forth in our behaviour whether people are watching or not.

Mat 12:50  For whoever shall do the will of My Father in Heaven, the same is My brother and sister and mother.

Mat 21:31  Which of the two did the will of his father? They said to Him, The first. Jesus said to them, Truly I say to you that the tax-collectors and the harlots go into the kingdom of God before you.

Gospel in One Word

What is the Gospel? 

If you can only summarized it in one word, what word will it be?
Applying this one-word formula will force one to pick up the most important ingredient of the message.

So what is your one-word gospel?

For me, the one word will be Life (zoe).

Let's look at John 3:16

• Joh 3:16  For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.

The last 2 words "everlasting life" describe the type of life that God has given to those who believe in Him.

We have to go back to the original Greek to have a better understanding.

Everlasting is aionion G166 Thayer Definition:
1) without beginning and end, that which always has been and always will be
This means that time is no longer a restrictive dimension. It goes beyond the limitation of time. It transcent time. The speed of light is 300,000 km/sec. It is the fastest speed possible and is the constant in the E=mc^2. Our solar system belongs to the galaxy called Milky Way. It is 100,000 light years across. The universe has many galaxies. You can understand that the speed of light is indeed very slow. But now, with the new Zoe life, we transcend the limitation of time and can travel to any where in the large universe instantly! We can appear and disappear any where. Of course, not with this present body but with the glorified body as Jesus did. ( Jn. 20:27 As they were gathered in the house, behind closed doors, the risen Christ came and stood among them.2 Cor 5: 4b we want to slip into our new bodies so that these dying bodies will be swallowed up by everlasting life.)

Life is zoe G2222   Thayer Definition:
2a) of the absolute fullness of life, both essential and ethical, which belongs to God, and through him both to the hypostatic “logos” and to Christ in whom the “logos” put on human nature

Everlasting is not a good translation. Unsaved sinners also have everlasting life, except that they are suffering in hell. The Thayer's definition of without beginning and end is a much better translation. Only God is without beginning and end. God transcend time. So a better translation is 'timeless', to 'time-transcending', which is an attribute of God.

Zoe in Thayer's definition is clear in saying that it is God's kind or God's quality of life. This Zoe-life is higher than human-life, animal-life and plant-life.

So John 3:16 says that if we believe in Jesus as Son of God, we will have a new kind of life, the God's kind of life.

God's kind of life will have attribute that it is righteous, complete, full, sinless, holy, timeless, power, etc .... like God. If we don't have God's kind of life, we cannot be children of God and we cannot inherit His Kingdom.

The Common Gospel Message
Most of us heard the gospel as "Jesus came to paid for our sins and give us eternal life".

We ask the people to pray the sinner prayer so that they can be saved. A typical sinner prayer goes like this " Dear Father, I confessed that I am a sinner. I repent of my sins. I thank you for sending Jesus to die for my sins. I accept Jesus as my Lord and Saviour. Amen!". A better version will add "I am now a new born Child of God.".

What is wrong ? Compare this to John 3:16. With following verses...

• Rom 10:9  That if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved. Rom 10:10  For with the heart man believeth unto righteousness; and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation.
• Joh 5:24  Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that heareth my word, and believeth on him that sent me, hath everlasting life, and shall not come into condemnation; but is passed from death unto life. 
• Joh 6:40  And this is the will of him that sent me, that every one which seeth the Son, and believeth on him, may have everlasting life: and I will raise him up at the last day. 
• 2Ti 1:10  But is now made manifest by the appearing of our Savior Jesus Christ, who hath abolished death, and hath brought life and immortality to light through the gospel: 
• 1Jn 4:15  Whosoever shall confess that Jesus is the Son of God, God dwelleth in him, and he in God. 
• 1Jn 5:13  These things have I written unto you that believe on the name of the Son of God; that ye may know that ye have eternal life, and that ye may believe on the name of the Son of God.
• 1Jn 5:1  Whosoever believeth that Jesus is the Christ is born of God:

The criterion for receiving eternal life is simply "believe Jesus". It has no mention of sin! One can argue that "sin" is implied in the "believe Jesus" part. What is the meaning of "believing of Jesus". What to believe about Jesus?

• Jesus is the begotten Son of God (John 3:16, John 6:40)
• Jesus as Lord of all, including me (Rom 10:9)
• Jesus has resurrected (Rom 10:9, which also means Jesus came as man, and die for man for our sin on the cross. Here sin is mentioned. See 1 Cor 15).
• Jesus is sent from God that we believed (John 5:24)

 In 1 Cor 15, Paul gives a fuller explanation of the Gospel that he preached.

• 1 Co 15:3 ...how that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures; 
• 1Co 15:4  And that he was buried, and that he rose again the third day according to the Scriptures.
• 1Co 15:22  For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive.
• 1Co 15:34  Awake to righteousness, and sin not; for some have not the knowledge of God: I speak this to your shame.
• 1Co 15:45  And so it is written, The first man Adam was made a living soul; the last Adam was made a quickening spirit.

Emphasize New Life and We Will Sin Not
What is my point. My point is that we have placed too much emphasis on sins and not on the New Life. The only way to overcome sin is not be sin focus but be life focus. This is in 1Cor 15:34 awake to New Life of of righteousness and sin not.

When we shine the light of the New life, the ugliness of sins will reveal. The goodness of God will bring conversion rather than condemnation of sins (which most people will say they are not that sinful to receive such condemnation and curse God!). We don't know how bad we are until we see how good God is. The Law that was given was to show the goodness of God. It was the Law of Liberty (James) but was some what distorted to become the Law of Bondage! We seek books for secrets to happiness, how to be millionaires, how to be successful in life etc... But the secrets are in the Ten commandments all along! How corrupt one can be until we see the light.


I am not advocating that we ignore sin - Overcome sin with Life living.
We have not spend enough time and exposition on the New Life of, with, and in Jesus Christ. Spend more time living the healthy and victorious new life in Christ. Php 4:4  Rejoice in the Lord always: and again I say, Rejoice. Php 4:8  Finally, brethren, whatsoever things are true, whatsoever things are honest, whatsoever things are just, whatsoever things are pure, whatsoever things are lovely, whatsoever things are of good report; if there be any virtue, and if there be any praise, think on these things.

If we sometime do fall in sin, meet sin face on. Call a sin sin rather than give excuse. Bring the light of Christ, the power of Christ into our sin and see the deliverance. Get up and get going.

Here is a balanced view.

1. Unbelievers =  No Concept of Debt of Sin and No Provision of Life (by Christ)
2. Legalism = Know Debt of Sin and Not Seeing the Provision of Grace/Life of Christ.  Resulting in life of Fear, Pride, Judgmental, Burnt-out, Complains,
3. Easy Believers or Ultra Grace = No Understanding of Debt of Sin (See sin very lightly) and Seeing the Provision of Grace, result in unchanged life.  See grace as license to sin! Hell insurance bought.
4. True Believers = See Debt of Sin (treat sin seriously) and seeing the Grace/Life Provision of God and therefore living in Victory and Joy.

Victory comes from living in the new life in Christ. A life of light (as in 1John) and righteousness and empowered by grace. 

The Gospel is about Zoe-Life and not just forgiveness of sins.  It is a rebirth - Born Again into God's Life. The Cross has two sides. It proclaimed the death of sin. It is the beginning of New Life. Live on the new life and not on the past sins.

See also Demands of Eternal Life - Love God & Men.

Complete as No Lack

A very interesting and important question was asked in our Bible Study group meeting.

We have the following verses about complete and all.

• Col 2:10  And ye are complete in him...
• 2Pe 1:3  According as his divine power hath given unto us all things that pertain unto life and godliness,  

 If we are complete, why do we still sin, at least sometimes?

A brother said, "while we are complete, we are not perfect."

We use illustration of a seed. A water-melon seed is a complete while we have not seen the water-melon yet.  We have to plant the seed, water it, and give it time to grow and eventually we will see the water-melon. If the seed is incomplete, it may not grow at all.

A human fetus is complete as a human. It will grow up to be a human. It has the complete DNA of a human. A new born Christian has the complete life of God - Zoe life. Otherwise, we cannot be children of God. Because we are a complete Zoe Life, we can communicate with God and we can go to heaven where God is when our lives on earth is completed.

Seeing Complete as No Lack
Chinese has a saying that "while the sparrow is small, all five organs are complete". We cannot say sparrow is not complete because it is small. 

The need to grow does not mean one is incomplete. We don't say a child is not human because he/she needs to grow.

Growing up is a process that takes time, resources and learning.

We could perhaps see complete as "no lack". There is no lack of power to become what God want us to be. All we need to do is to draw from Him, follow Him, and given time, we slower become to be like Him. But the ability to become like Him is already present at the start else we will never be like Him. We are in this growth process of shedding our Adam's DNA through our body and mind with new DNA of God in the Spirit. We are to let the Spirit expands to take over our mind and body so that may think and act like Him.

Humility is Forceful Too

From my study of I Ching, I am discovering new perspectives on the key Christian values.

I have shared that 'waiting', as taught in the Bible, may not be just waiting idly. Waiting in the mean-time is full of activities, complains and even sabotages. We have to persevere through them all.

We now take a look at another virtue, humility.  It is the hexagram #15 謙 Humility.

Commentary on the Hexagram #15 Humility: 

• “have it” - resources, ability. If don't have them, there is nothing to be humble about.
• “don’t show it” and
• “use it”. When the situation calls for it and if you have it, humility requires you to use it to help and not to hide it!
• It is not passive but quiet aggressive actions without drawing attention to self.

The Additional Wisdom from the 6 Stage-lines are:

        1. develop humility
        2. let your action do the talking
        3. accomplished and yet don’t claim credit but give credit
        4. do more good things
        5. do corrective actions to remove bad things
        6. expand humility by sharing it with others so that they may have it too

Humility, in I Ching's description, is indeed a very active one.

Humility is

1. have-it, yet 
2. don't-showoff-it, but 
3. must use-it. 

It is the ability, resources or authority that one possesses. Most of us understands the first 2, having it and yet not show off with it. The third is what is missing in most definitions of humility.

If one have the ability or resources, one is obliged to use it where the need arises. 

If you have money and there is a person without food, we are to buy food and give to the person who is in need of food. That is called love in action. We are to love not only in words but also in deeds.

Jesus cleansing of the Temple is an act of Humility
We can then understand why the most humble person of all, Jesus Christ, can clean out the corruptions occurring the temples.

In I-Ching, we are to use it in two ways - doing good and removing evils.  

Jesus had done both. He died for our sins and raise us up with new life that overcome sins.

Humility is not passive but active, quietly at least, in using one's ability, resources and authority to do good, and to chase away evils, making corrections and thereby establishing the kingdom of God on earth.

With the 'accomplishing worthwhile mission" in mind, we will fill the need for us to learn and stay humble rather than being boastful. Boastfulness is past oriented but humility is future oriented.

See also: Kingdom Principle: Law of Humility

Performance and Relationship

Performance by itself is good. We all want to do well in life. A healthy person will want to and will perform well. The motivation to do well is intrinsic. The problem comes when we perform to gain something else. A typical 'something else' is love or acceptance or relationship.


Performance Can Never Get True Love Relationship
We were indoctrinated since young. Children are told to behave well and get a good result in schools so that their parents will love them. We are told to do good work, attend church activities regularly, be holy so that God will be pleased and will accept us. We fail to see that if we perform to get a relationship, to get love, then the object of the relationship is not us, the person, but the performance. We are loved not because of us, but because of the benefits, such as money, service, a good name that we bring to the person we want to love from. With all the hard work and performance, we actually did not achieve the goal of true love from the people we want. Simply stated, performance cannot obtain a true lasting relationship for you as a person.

A true relationship, or true love, has to be built on something else besides performance. Rich people should understand this well. They are never sure if their spouses married them for themselves or for their money. A true relationship comes from something else, like a blood-line.

There is the quote from a famous Chinese author Bing Xin, 冰心《寄小读者》:

"有一次，幼小的我，忽然走到母亲面前，仰着脸问说： “妈妈，你到底为什么爱我？”母亲放下针线，用她的面颊，抵住我的前额，温柔地，不迟疑地说：“不为什么，只因你是我的女儿！”

Once, when I was very young, I suddenly went in front of my mother, lifted up my head and asked, "Mama, why do you love me?" Mother put down the needle and threads, put her face to my forehead, gently and without hesitation said, "Not because of anything, just because you are my daughter!"

Relationship Always Beats Performance
A true relationship, like blood-line, needs no performance, to be truly loved. Whenever performance comes against a true relationship, relationship wins. This explains the difficulties many daughters-in-law face with their mothers-in-law. No matter how hard the daughters-in-law perform to please her mothers-in-law, the mother-in-laws always put her own daughter first. She does not have to please her mother, unlike the daughters-in-law, and she will be favored!

There is another relationship that is independent of performance. That is Creation-Creatures relationship. The Creator creates and loves his creation unconditionally. God, the creator, is love. He loves unconditionally and truly. Mother's love is just an example for us to appreciate His love. Because of His love, He dies for us while we are still sinners. He extends his love of acceptance and new life to us. Because of love, he cannot force it on us. He can only try to draw us. After we accept His unconditional love and new life, I find it very strange that we often teach people to perform to get acceptance and love! After we are accepted, we need not perform to get acceptance again. Do we then need not perform? There is no need. But, we intrinsically want to perform. Not because we want to gain love, but because we are loved. We can and want to perform because we have a new life of love and health. We will perform well just as our heavenly Father, who is a great performer who created the whole universe.

Grace Based Performance - Performance not for Acceptance but for Glorification
So we now perform, not for acceptance, but for glorification, for us and God because God is glorified through us. They will see our good works and glorify God.  We are given the Grace to draw upon, in our performance. Our weakness is no excuse for lack of performance, because when we are weak, then we are strong in the Lord. We can do all things through Christ who strengthens us. People will be impressed when we do things, through His grace working in us, beyond their expectations. To go further when they would have stopped. To love when taking revenge is seems more pleasing to the flesh. To bear when striking back seems the more manly thing to do. But our trust and our strength are of the Lord, and we know God will be wise judge and will execute judgment and deliver the righteous. Continue to follow His Kingdom principles, be strengthened by His grace, no matter the times. Let His light shine forth through you.

What is better than "The Just Shall Live by Faith" ?

We have the famous saying of "The just shall live by faith" by Martin Luther. It was probably right for his times when the emphasis should be on faith and not the works of the law. But I find the statement could be misleading. The utmost keyword, "Jesus", is implied and not explicitly stated. Which is more important,  "Faith" or "Jesus"?

If we take a statement out of a context, then we should, as much as possible, keep the right keywords in place, so that we will not create misunderstandings and be easily distorted by others.

Let's go back to the original Bible text, Gal 2:16

In most translations, using ASV as an example, it is translated as:

Gal 2:16  yet knowing that a man is not justified by the works of the law but through faith in Jesus Christ, even we believed on Christ Jesus, that we might be justified by faith in Christ, and not by the works of the law: because by the works of the law shall no flesh be justified.

What are the minimum keywords that we need to keep so that the original meaning is not lost?

May I suggest "The just shall live by faith in Christ". (trying to keep as close the proposed quote by Luther).

Now, if we want to further shorten the quote, do we drop faith or drop Christ?

Compare:

1. The just shall live by faith
2. The just shall live in Christ

Which one is the true gospel?

I would suggest that 2 "The just shall live in Christ" as more accurate especially the context is not cited in the quote.

Faith alone does not save. Having faith is not the key at all. Having Christ is the key to a new life.

The KJV translation brings out another important point, not our faith but the faith of Christ:

Gal 2:16  Knowing that a man is not justified by the works of the law, but by the faith of Jesus Christ, even we have believed in Jesus Christ, that we might be justified by the faith of Christ, and not by the works of the law: for by the works of the law shall no flesh be justified.

The just shall live by faith overemphasized our faith - it is like trying to live the new life all over again by our effort. We exercise our faith in Christ. We try to believe and trust in Christ. We have the strange idea that by our 'harder effort' in prayer we can get God to answer us. This erroneous thinking is most likely the result of this 'by faith' alone quote.

We will be glad to know that it is not our faith but the faith of Christ given to us that really works. What are the keywords for New Creation living? The words are abiding, yielding, follow-after, resting, etc. It is not about us exerting but about us yielding to, resting on, following the leading, pulling, strength and accomplished works, walking out paths of Jesus Christ and in the Holy Spirit. Our job is to receive and then rest on and in Jesus Christ. It is less about us and more about Jesus.

The just shall live in/by Christ.

When we write a precise or come out with a quote or a tag-line, please make sure we don't drop the keywords and distort the meaning. People reading just the quote have no knowledge of the context. Will they misunderstand your quote?

====== 15 Sep 2025 =====

With the availability of Generative AI like ChatGPT, we can use it to get a better understanding and correction if needed. Here is ChatGPT's comments:

You’ve raised a very important point here — and I agree that the way we frame a “tagline” of the gospel makes a world of difference.

Martin Luther’s “The just shall live by faith” (Habakkuk 2:4; Romans 1:17; Galatians 3:11; Hebrews 10:38) was the right emphasis in his time, because the church was drowning in works-righteousness and needed the recovery of justification by faith apart from the law. But as you pointed out, if the phrase is taken in isolation today, it can sound like faith itself (our effort to believe harder) is the source of life, rather than Christ Himself.

Let’s unpack this carefully:

---

1. What the Bible Actually Says

• Habakkuk 2:4: “The righteous shall live by his faith(fulness).”
• Romans 1:17: “The just shall live by faith.”
• Galatians 2:16: We are justified through faith in Jesus Christ (or even “the faith of Christ,” as KJV has it).
• John 15:4-5: Jesus says, “Abide in Me… apart from Me you can do nothing.”

So biblically, faith is never abstract — its object is Christ. Faith is only saving because it unites us to Christ, the true source of life.

---

2. Faith vs. Christ — Which Is the Core?

• Faith is the channel.
• Christ is the substance.

To emphasize faith alone without Christ risks making “faith” into another form of self-effort (believing harder, praying longer, trying more).
To emphasize Christ alone keeps the focus on the Person who saves, sustains, and perfects us.

Think of it this way:

Faith is like the wire; Christ is the electricity. The wire is important, but without the power flowing through it, it’s useless.

---

3. What Is the Minimal Keyphrase That Preserves the Gospel?

If we are distilling into a phrase that must stand alone without full context, we cannot afford to drop Christ.

• “The just shall live by faith in Christ” keeps the balance (faith + Christ).
• “The just shall live in Christ” goes straight to the source.

Between the two shorter options:

• “The just shall live by faith” — risks misunderstanding.
• “The just shall live in Christ” — safer and more accurate, because eternal life is in Him (John 14:6; Col 3:4).

---

4. The KJV “Faith of Christ” Insight

You also highlighted an overlooked truth: it is not just our faith, but the faithfulness of Christ — His obedience, His perfect trust, His completed work — that justifies us. We simply receive and rest in it. This brings out the posture of yielding, abiding, resting rather than striving.

---

5. A Suggested “Better Tagline”

If we want a stand-alone phrase that keeps Christ central, avoids distortion, and still echoes Scripture’s authority, here are some possibilities:

• “The just shall live in Christ.” (short, Christ-centered, true to John 15, Gal 2:20)
• “The just shall live by Christ.” (shows Christ as source, not our effort)
• “The just shall live by faith in Christ.” (retains the biblical phrase while clarifying the object of faith)

---

✅ My conclusion:
If we have to shorten Luther’s phrase for today’s readers, “The just shall live in Christ” is the safest and clearest gospel-centered wording. It keeps the focus on the Person who is life itself (John 11:25, Col 3:4), not on our capacity to believe.

 

Joy in the Meantime- How to Really Wait

When we pray to God to ask for something and the thing seems to take some time to come, what is our common reaction? Here are some possibilities:

1. we get angry at God
2. we complained to God
3. we grudgingly wait and wait; not doing anything useful
4. we pray again to God thinking either God did not hear or we did not pray correctly at first.
5. we pray again thinking we should have more faith
6. we pray again thinking by our earnest desire, God will have to answer our request. We learned from Jesus' parable of the "Dishonest Judge" and "Demanding Neighbor" that persistent brings forth results (Actually, such a concept is a misunderstanding of the Parable. Jesus reminded us that His Father is much more loving than the Judge")
   
7. we have a debate with God, trying to convince God that if He answers according to our requests it will bring Him glory.
8. ....

If we truly believe that God will answer our request, the above practices just show everyone that we really don't have the faith and the trust that God will answer. What should be the right attitude in this time of waiting? What should one do at this time? Essentially, what does one do in waiting?

Interestingly, the answer was found when I was studying the Chinese Classics I-Ching and I made a posting Learning from I-Ching Part 10 5需 Needs – Wait for the Right Time. It teaches us to wait with work of preparation and with joy. With the heart of expectancy and gladness, we get ourselves ready, as the bride prepares herself for the wedding day. This is exactly what the Bible teaches and it is the true meaning of patience. Somehow, we have the strange concept that waiting is hard, painful, and frustrating that we need to quickly get it over.

If our faith is true, we should value this time of preparation while we await answers to our prayers and the 2nd coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. We work with gladness and joy and look forward to a great day. No complaints, please. There is no need to concentrate our efforts on praying and arm-twisting God to answer. Rest from our complaints and work happily and diligently for a great day.

When my wife reads the I-Ching post on waiting,  she said that the waiting time was not quiet at all. There were complaints, robberies, and attacks from the enemy resulting in a real bloody mess. Waiting is not as peaceful and quiet as we thought. It is a very busy, noisy and messy time. So, don't be discouraged when you find your waiting time rather challenging. The closer you get to the opportune time, the more challenges you will face. Be encouraged by the presence of greater resistance, it shows that you are very near! Cheer up and continue to move forward. Your breakthrough is at the door.

Please also read  Joy of Waiting - improving the process in the meantime.

Making a Judgement and Being Judgemental

We are not very sharp in our thinking and use of words. This problem is especially pronounced in the Christian community because we try to spiritualize things too much. So when we try to point out someone error for his awareness and correction we are told that Bible tell us not judge. My previous posts Judge Not yet Correcting, Judging Rightly hopefully shed some light on this. 

A better way of explaining the issue could be summarized as "we are to make correct judgement and not to be judgemental".  We are to make a judgement on the issues and actions and not on the person. We must finally conclude whether the action is biblically right or wrong. But we cannot condemn the person evil and unchangeable. Forever evil or evil forever is reserved for the devil.

This is best illustrated with the story of the woman caught in adultery (used in last posting on acceptance). Jesus made the judgement that it is sin (Go and sin no more) but withheld his condemnation on her, giving her a future and trusting her to change for the better. 1Co 13:7  Beareth all things, believeth all things, hopeth all things, endureth all things.

We have no record whether the woman in fact did change for the better and sin no more. We believe at least the inner-man was changed and that started the ball rolling for the new life. However, some people may need additional help in the process of breaking free from bad habits as taught in the AA 12-steps. Love requires us to help, endure the process, as Paul did in "Gal 4:19  My little children, of whom I travail in birth again until Christ be formed in you".

Hence, we are to make a right judgement but be not judgemental. We may be required, in some cases, to be involve in the correction process as labor of love. If we have love, perhaps we will be less judgemental after making a correct judgement.

What is the meaning of Yielding to the Spirit?

There are a few concepts that are related, such as follows:

1. yield to the Spirit, led by the Spirit, Gal 5:18, live by the Spirit, Gal 5:25
   
2. be filled with the Spirit, Eph 5:18
   
3. abide in Christ, John 8:31
   
4. put on the new self, Col 3:10
5. Christ in us Col 1:27

The Christ in us enables us to be led by the Spirit within us and as we yield to the Spirit, putting on the New Self, this abiding and following His leading will bring forth fruit of the Spirit in Gal 5:22-23.

The key in this abiding or yielding or following is that it is a process of discipline over a period of time and not once off. Abiding is built up over time; a seeking and the decision to follow, one at a time and over and over again over time. 

This process will enable us to break bad habit, forgiving the 'jerks', and so forth.

But most of us blame God for not saving us at the time of need or temptation. The fact is that we actually have not been abiding in Him to build up the strength we need at the time of need. Chinese has a saying that "developing the army for a thousand days to be use at an hour".

If we think we are a failure, the problem is not with God. God has provided all the needs for us to be successful and victorious. We just need to put on trust and put His words into practice over time and not just once off or for only a few times.

Abiding and yielding is a process and is a building up over time. This is also call growth. See Christian Transformation & Growth -The Unified Model ...

Acceptance - The Best Christmas Gift

Worldly wisdom is about performance for acceptance. Show me your performance first then I will accept you. This is so ingrained in our thinking that even after we are accepted by God through faith in Jesus Christ's atonement for us, we still frequently regress to work for acceptance. This is easily seen in the Galatians as they were rebuked by Paul in the Book of Galatians. After salvation, they wanted to go back to the work of the Law for justification again.

Biblical wisdom called for the acceptance of the person first, though not the deeds of the person. Jesus died for us while we were yet sinners. Jesus loved us even when we were rebellious against Him. If we can be freed of sins, then we don't need Jesus at all. So we must be clear about the meaning of acceptance.


Definition of Acceptance of a Person
Acceptance means that we receive and love the person as he/she is, as a person, and does not necessarily mean approval of his/her deeds. We accept him/her first and then help him/her to change for the better. Grace is God's acceptance of us first and then enabling us to break free from the bondage of sins to live in freedom.

This concept is clearly seen in the story of the woman caught in adultery. Jesus accepted her first "Neither do I condemn thee" and also "Go and sin no more". The consequence of our sin is death and there is no more hope and no more desire to change. In fact, sin leads to more sin since there is no future. However, if someone can accept and believe for the better, then there arises a desire to break free.

So true acceptance is receiving a person and believing him/her for the better in his/her sins. This applies to our 'enemies' - people who hurt us, who gossip and spread lies about us, and who betray us. Could we ignore the hurts they caused us and accept them as a person ( very often, they are the very Christian brothers and sisters that you trusted in the first place!) and believe in them that they are and can be better. The hurts they caused us; they probably think that they are doing the right thing in the name of God. Could we believe that they were deceived by the devils or believed in the wrong rumor about us, and had a great misunderstanding. Could we start treating them not as an enemy but as brothers in Christ? Not to shunt them but to be able to face up to them with no anger and bitterness.
Can we trust God to settle the misunderstanding, wrong accusations, and attacks and give us justice? Could we understand that hurting people hurts people? Insecure people manipulate, lie, blame, and attack to try to control things. Can we see the stress and struggles inside? May God give us the grace to accept them.

Acceptance does not mean approval or endorsement of the evil deeds. At the appropriate time and in the right way, we must, or may God send others to tell them, show them that their deeds are evil and that they may repent. However, such will not come, until we can gain their confidence that we accept and believe that they are and can be a better person. How can they hear us if they don't believe we love them and their best interest in mind?

People may think they are saved or maybe actually saved, but they lack the growing phase of maturity into the true image of Christ.

Change begins with Acceptance - By Father and Us (His Channels)

So, if we want another person to change, we must first learn to accept them first, gain their trust, and earn the right to truly communicate the truth to them, and then they may change. The best acceptance is the acceptance by Jesus Christ who gave His life for us. May we be filled with such confidence of acceptance by our Heavenly Father that we may be channeled to bring His acceptance through us to help others change for the better. This may be the best present you can give to someone in this Christmas season.

Same Action but Different Result

The Same Initial Action
What do you call the sequence actions of digging a hole in the garden, followed by putting a thing inside and then covering it back with the earth ?

Do you call it burying or planting?
What's the difference?

It depends on your purpose or expectation and the thing you put inside.

We bury things that are death or want them to be dead.
We plant things to have a greater growth and harvest.

The result depends on the thing - a seed or a lifeless thing or body?
All born-again believers has a complete seed of Christ inside.
All it takes is for the seed of Christ to be planted inside the throne of our heart, in place of our own self-will. Let Christ rules in our heart and grows out through our mind and show forth in our behvaiour and lifestyles, bearing much fruit.


The Difference in Time
Burying and Planting while same in the initial action, they differs over time. Burying is a one-off exercise whereas planting takes place over a duration of time.


What are you doing with your efforts ? Burying or Planting?

What are you doing with your 'things'?
Are you planting seeds and burying the decays and hurts?
Or instead, are you planting the hurts and burying the seeds?

Burying is not accumulating. Burying is letting go forever. Accumulating is actually like planting. Taking care and adding ingredients for its growth.

Draw from Christ's love and forgiveness of us to let go, bury, all our bitterness and hurts. The ones that cause us the hurts are the one least able, if not least willing, to put right the hurts. Don't wait for them to say sorry and make good (they can't and won't). Be empowered by Christ who died for us while we yet rebellious sinners and forgive and bless us nonetheless that we might be converted to be His. Forgive the people who hurts us and go the extra-mile of loving our enemy that they may be converted to our friends. Christ has enabled us to do it.

Plant the new life of Christ in us. Follow His heart. Bury and let go of our hurts and bitterness. Be filled with the love of Christ. It is hard for us but already done for us in Christ. We are not doing the forgiving but the Christ in us.

Secret of Victorious Christian Living

We are studying Ephesians. Ephesian 3:16-20 is a very powerful passage. It gives us the secret for victorious Christian living. For a study on the chapter, see Bible Study on Ephesians - Chapter 3 Mystery Exposed & Abundant Life and for Q&A see Ephesians - Chapter 3 Mystery Exposed & Abundant Life Q&A. Below is a concept map that illustrate the secrets:

The target for any Christian is the "Fullness of God" revealed through them. To me, the "fullness of God" means Christ-likeness as in Rom 8:37. It is also about being "more than Conqueror' of Rom 8:37. It is about the "going the extra mile" of Mat 5:41 and the "joy in adversity" of John 16:33. It is the ability to go beyond worldly expectation of effort and behavior. It is about loving above taking revenge. It is trusting God and following God's ways instead of taking things into our own hands of fleshly reactions. It is about showing the character of God of the fruit of the Spirit of love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, gentleness, goodness, and self-control.

If anyone lack the ability or goodness of God, then he should trace back from the map to discover that he lack inner strength. Inner Strength begins with faith in Christ, to have Christ lives in our heart, and with the faith, acts in obedience to Christ, then we will be able to taste and experience the love of God resulting in greater faith in Christ for us to greater in Him. The key is faith and corresponding actions in the Christ's love within. 

Degree of Grace - From Grace-less to Ultra-Grace/Hyper-Grace

To help our understanding of a particular subject, say "Grace", we look at a range of it. As "Grace" is the most important of Christian belief, we need to study a degree of it. The Calvinist and Armenian Doctrines seat on different positions on a scale of "Grace" from "Grace-less" to "Ultra-Grace" (or Hyper-Grace). Calvinist seats closer to "True Grace" and Armenian seats closer to "Grace Plus X".

True Grace

But first, let me cover my biased view of "Grace", or "True Grace". I have written quite a few posts on the definition of Grace, such as,

1. "Grace is Unmerited Favor" - This Common Definition is Wrong
2. Grace - God's Loving Power for You to become Your Very Best
3. Grace-Based Doctrines
4. Salvation of Tripartite Man - The Details 
5. Spirit Soul Confusion and 2 Types of Defeats

All will agree that Grace is a gift of God that we did not earn but merely received by faith. However, unlike God's mercy, which is given to all freely, Grace is given to the degree of our wanting or drawing from God. That is why Paul said God is glorified in his weakness as he leaned more on God that God may supply his greater grace for greater glory.

From the viewpoint of time, Grace covered our past sins by forgiveness and cleansing because of the price paid by our Lord Jesus Christ on the cross. But we should not just stay there; we should focus more on the present and future of Grace. This side of Grace is the Power of Grace. Grace is the empowerment from God to enable us to do the right things that glorify God. It enables us to become what God wants us to be before the foundation of the earth. Grace is here within us through Christ in us to power us to be like Christ. But we hold the control to decide how much grace we want to release from our inner being. We decide to walk according to the flesh (our old man's will ) or to walk according to the Spirit (within us).

The Bible uses two illustrations to show forth how, on one hand, we are complete in Christ and on the other hand, we need to grow up to conform to the image of Christ. The first illustration is a seed. A seed is complete in everything for life. There is no lack. How can we tell? We just need to plant it. When the seed dies, a tree grows out of it. The tree may bear no fruit, some fruit, or lots of fruit. If the seed is not complete, it will not grow, or it will grow into something strange and die. Everyone has the same Christ within; due to different callings, we become different members of Christ. But not all fully live up to the full potential of the initial calling of God. We have to bear the responsibility of how we respond and let Christ rule in and out of us.

Another illustration is the treasure in the earthen vessel, where Paul told us it is up to us to choose what type of vessel we become from the same treasure within. The process of growth comes from less and less of old selves, and the vessel becomes more and more transparent to allow the treasure of Christ within to show forth.

Ultra-Grace or Hyper-Grace

The important journey of growth is ignored in the Ultra-Grace people. They think they are already complete in Christ and therefore entitled to all the blessings, which usually means wealth and health for oneself. They are entitled to God's favours and need not work for anything. In fact, work is seen as work of the flesh. They believe more in the revelation by the Spirit instead of spending time doing an extensive Bible study. Hard work is not compatible with God's favors. Failure is not allowed in the world of "Blessings and Favors," and hence it is to be hidden if such a misfortune does happen. It is like we are out of the will of God. The concept of discipline and training does not tally well with the blessings and favors. Adversity is to be avoided rather than faced up to and accepted as part of growing up. Growing is not a concept acceptable in a world where we have arrived. Sin is taken lightly since all sins, past, present, and future, are already forgiven. Some people criticized this 'ultra grace' as a license to sin. Of course, no one is truly Ultra-Grace. It is a matter of degree in the scale of "Grace".

Grace Plus X

Grace Plus X people are grateful to God for His salvation. They thank God for His Grace of Salvation and then want to continue the growing-up process of sanctification by their own effort. God has done enough already; let me do the rest. To them, Grace is sufficient to start but insufficient to finish the race. It is Grace + Good Discipline, + Good Work, + Good Moral Living, or + good thing. Different people have different '+' requirements. Because it is '+', salvation is conditional on my keeping in close connection to God and is not eternally secure. Grace + people live a stressful life. It is we who are trying to hold on to God rather than trusting God to hold on to us as God has promised. Grace + people live a life of ups and downs, spiritual and emotional mood. They are on a high if they felt they read the Bible and on a low if they did not.

Grace-less

Grace-less is typical of most religions. We achieve salvation by our own effort in following some form of the Laws of Righteousness. I am not sure how they handle sin, though. It is very likely that they practice some form of accounting system, so that the amount of good work done can compensate for the amount of sins committed. Again, there is no security, and likely a lot of hypocrisy.

Table of Comparison

Summary

On the scale of "Grace", it is a matter of degree. It is a reflection of what we believe. Hopefully by knowing the truth, we can growup to greater maturity. Grace-less is not safe and not saved. Grace Plus X is missing the empowerment of Grace for our sanctification, and causing us needless stress and self-condemnation or self-pride. Ultra-Grace ignores the need for growth and our responsibility to respond to God's empowerment of Grace. Let us rest in the security of God's grace within to work out the Christ in us through relying and working with God to show God's glory through our good works made possible by His grace.

Grace in the New Testament is not merely God’s unearned pardon but God’s active power working within the believer to produce Christlike transformation. Christian error often arises when this biblical tension is distorted in one of three directions: a grace-less mindset that treats righteousness as primarily human achievement, a “grace-plus” approach that begins with God’s gift but functionally completes sanctification through self-effort, and an ultra-grace reaction that affirms positional completeness while neglecting the Spirit-empowered call to growth and obedience. A faithful theology of grace must therefore hold together both divine initiative and real human response: believers are already complete in Christ, yet are progressively transformed as they depend on and cooperate with the empowering grace of God.

Surrender

As a Christian, we are taught, at least very often in the past, to surrender to God. We spoke about dying to self and carry our cross daily. But these concepts may be too abstract or high sounding. On more practical terms, I think surrender involves the following concepts:

1. Begins with Acceptance.
   It begins with accepting our present realities - our talents (or someone may feel the lack of), our appearance, our circumstances, our families, and many of other limitations and lack of control over our lives.
   
2. Trusting God.
   Despite all the limitations and weaknesses, we are trusting God can make something good out of us through these challenging situations.
   
3. Thy Will be Done.
   Once we know and trust God - that God knows better and have a better way we can then agree to have God's will be done on our lives. The easiest way to say No to something is to have something better to say Yes to. Trusting also meanings listening and acting in obedience. Surrender is not about just giving up but accepting and following God's.
   
4. Checklist.
   If we trust God, then we should know how to let go. We should give up trying to manipulate, intimidate, deceive or even to flatter.
   
5. Exchange for Real Life.
   Surrender does not mean just dying. Jesus said a seed died to become a living tree that provides for the birds and the people. Dying to self and accept Jesus brings forth the life of love, joy, peace, health, and true self-control - a strong inner man that is not easily swayed by challenging circumstances - the very situations that caused us our frustration and stress. We learn to live above our circumstances - always joyful and grateful and hopeful.

Trust & Obey

The secret of happiness and victorious life is plainly stated in the beautiful song "Trust & Obey".
The song also begins with knowing His Word and walking in obedience that we will discover the light - the acceptable and good will of the Lord Rom 12:2.

In this uncertain and shaking times, it is of utmost important that we grow in the knowledge of His will, be sensitive to His Holy Spirit guidance and to just trust and obey.

In the story of the Ten commandments, the very last plague, the Passover, the Lord had given the instructions on sacrifice and putting the blood on the doorposts and the lintel to escape the death of 1st born. (Exo 12). The people then are given the option to follow or not. Those who don't will perish and those who did as instructed will be preserved. We see that in 'Exo 12:38 A mixed multitude also went up with them'.

In this shaking times, please find a rock of eternity Jesus Christ, know Him and then trust and obey Him.

Walking in Financial Freedom

The original topic was "Get out of Debt". However, it we follow the strength-based thinking or appreciative inquiry or innovating thinking, it is always better to rephrase, by applying the 'invert' operator, a negative concept into a 'positive' one. By so doing, our minds are opened up to greater possibilities and options for transformational growth.

Two Basic Principles
How can one walk in financial freedom? We have a simple formula:

• Saving = Earning - Spending

This gives us two basic principles:

1. Spend less than we earn so that we will never get into the bondage of debt and have financial freedom.
   
   
2. Increase our Earning. If we want to spend more and still want to remain in freedom, then we must increase our earning. Our earning can be increased by working longer hours or to increase our value. It is quite obvious that it is better to increase our value rather than to work longer. To increase our value, we must either spend money and time to acquire new knowledge and skills, or to invent new things of value. Both involve temporary sacrifice of time and money in exchange for longer term larger earning and ability to spend. This is the exact opposite of EzCredit that encourages you to over-spent to enjoy now and then pay later.
   

The Bondage of Debts
Pro 22:7 The rich rule the poor, and the borrower is slave to the lender. It is obvious that debt has enslaving power. If we have any debt, it will take priority over our life decision. The creditors will hound you to pay off the debts off. Paying debt off will be our top priority in our living and decision making. Debt will enslave you to its power. I can't find a bible verse on this (let me know if you find one) but debts create more debts. Partily due to the multiplying effect of interest rates and partly due to the continued bad habits (like gambling) that continue to create more debts. There is only one way to get out of debt - repent. We will cover "How to Get out of Debt" later.

The Banking System of Loan & Interests Are OK
Because of the enslaving power of death, there are strong but erroneous teaching against the banking system of loan and interest charging. Let's go back to the Bible, the Parable of 10 Talents in Luk 19:23 or Mat 25:27 recorded for us, the Master judgment on the lazy steward, "Then you ought to have invested my money with the bankers, and at my coming I should have received what was my own with interest."

It is obvious me that making deposit in bank and collecting interest is a wise thing. By extension, the Bank making loans and charging interests for the loans are all valid and good things. If the Bank does not charge interests, how could the bank make money to pay interests to the depositors. Bible does not prohibit charging interest but is against charging exorbitant interests to exploit the poor. By further extension, if loan is OK then debt should be OK too.

The Restrictions on the Lenders
Because debts give the lenders enslaving power, the Bible has much to say about restricting lender behavior such us the use of collateral, the interests rate, the periodic payments etc. See Deu 15, Lev 25.
Deu 15 provides of release of payment at the 7th year, no interests to be charged for relatives (interests can be charged to outsider), the land lease must always be redeemed by owner or close relative etc. There is no condemnation for the borrowers that are poor. Leaders are encouraged to be generous in their lending, sometime to give away, to help the poor.

How can the Poor Break Free?
How can the poor get out of the vicious circle of poverty? Through the helping hands of the generous lenders who provide low interests loans with generous conditions for the loans. Please note that the Bible also teaches us to be wise as wolf even as harmless as doves. Making profit out of lending is endorsed by the Bible (how can one continue to lend and do good works if one cannot make some profit to survive the long run?). Bible is only against exploitative profits making.

The helping hands or loans or gifts

from others is only a kick start for the poor or needy to be put a path for growth so that they can take make a proper living to care for themselves. We have the famous saying of not just giving the fish but teaching them how to fish.




The Right Use of Debts
When an exceptional condition arises, such as a famine, an earthquake, a fire or a flood, the live-stocks or harvests of a farmer for the year could be destroyed. The farmer may not have the ability to buy seeds for the next season of harvest. How can he be helped? The Bible tells the rich to lend to the poor to help them. It would be better if there is a Bank where one can go for help. How can the poor becomes rich? By acquiring a new skills and knowledge that can create value of course. In trading business, one need to have money to buy the goods first and then re-sell at higher price to earn the margins. I think all these are valid reasons for borrowing.

So, I would proposed that it is the use of debt that decide whether it is OK or not OK. It is OK to use debt for financing investment or capital items - things that are used to produce things of higher value or things that appreciate in value over the long term such as your house or land. It is BAD to use debt to finance your consumption - things who value go to zero upon using or with time. I think study loan is fine. It is of course much better if one can get scholarship. But there are limited scholarships to go around. Studying is one way of increasing your value-add or earning power in the long run.

There is the wonderful story of a rich man who bought and developed a land into a housing estate and sell it, without deposit, but only periodic payments over a fixed period, to the poor so that they can hold their own home in the long run. He has the compulsory condition that his buyers must attend courses to upgrade their skills and be taught how to wisely use their earnings. He hired a pastor to help counsel the poor buyers. His method allowed him to make a fair profits on his development project and at the very same time, help many people break free from poverty.

There are the mission work of micro-enterprises. The mission work organization bought 10 piglets as an interest free loan for a poor family. They teach them how to take care of the pigs. When the pigs are fully grown, they can be sold at a higher price. It is enough for the family to pay back the 10 piglets, buy his own and continue his pig farming business. The money received back will be used to help another poor family.

How to Get out of Debts
The steps are: (follow the AA 12 rules is OK too)

1. Face the facts - Admit one has a Debts Problem
2. Repent - i.e. Change the Mind-set. Don't overspend on consumption goods.
3. Pray and Commit to God. Ask God for power and wisdom
4. Get an Mentor or a Group of Mentors and be accountable to he/them.
5. Make a list of all debts and interests charge.
6. Meet up with Creditors to work out a plan of periodic payment to pay them back. If by God's grace, the Creditors may reduce the debts to be paid. Do a restructuring in financing.
7. Decide and never over-spend again.... report to the mentors your plan and actual budgets on spending and repayment of debts.
8. Work hard and Upgrade to increase earning to pay off the debts. Get advises.
9. Ensure regular repayment of debts. Some advices to pay off the interests ones first. Some suggest pay off the smaller debts first so that you have sense of early victories that encourage you to carry on.
10. It could take 2, 3, 5 or even 10 years. But stay the course. Stay close to God and fellow Godly mentors for guidance and encouragement.

General Guidelines

1. Always Spend within your means. must includes tithes and savings first
2. Grow your Value by learning (getting degrees, diplomas, new skills), by experience in new areas
3. Grow your Savings by spending less than earnings and invest the savings wisely.
4. Don't go into debts for spending on consumers.
5. Can go into debts with caution for things that create value or whose value appreciate over time such as investment goods. e.g. House as a home, Study Loan. Even so, don't over-borrow to buy a house that you could not afford. The key is sustainability: if you loose your job, how long can you service your monthly payment?
6. Be generous in your lending; Be wise - don't lend to anyone who ask even they pressure in the name of God and love. Be sure if borrower can pay back. Get Collateral, Guarantee.
7. Loan amount should be the level you can still be friend if the friend could not pay back.
   Charge minimum interest; be sure of how it is used by the borrower; don't use good money for bad project, gambling, stocks & equivalent. It may be better to give or lend in kinds (such as school fees, books, foods etc).
8. Don't be guarantee of others debts. Pro 22:26

Above are general guidelines, but do stay in close touch with God and listen to His specific instructions for the specific situations. But also know that God will not violate His own Words as revealed in the Bible.