Thinking in the Big Picture

(here is an old post and I will have a new article tomorrow. Something I always used to look forward to Memorial Day weekend was the Ohio Grace Ministries Conference. The good news is the conference is back (after COVID cancellations) and it's only a couple of hours from me. The bad news is I can only attend this evening's message since no one was available to cover my shifts this weekend at work. I asked to have last weekend off for my nephew's graduation and was not permitted to ask for two weekends off in a row. This is very busy weekend for my retail position.)

Jeremiah 9:23 says, "Thus saith the LORD, Let not the wise man glory in his wisdom, neither let the mighty man glory in his might, let not the rich man glory in his riches."

“God says, 'You want to rejoice in something, rejoice in that you understand me and what I delight in! Come to the place where you’re as delighted about the things I’m delighted in; what I’m zealous about, you’re zealous about,' " explains Richard Jordan.

"God says, 'You think like I think in the Big Picture and it’s no longer, ‘I’m doing this because He said to do it and if I don’t do it . . . ’

"It’s, ‘I understand why it’s this way—I buy into the program and I don’t just buy into it, it’s a good thing that I delight in!’

“When Deuteronomy says a friend is as one who is as thine own soul, that means they’ve come to understand what’s in your heart. They’ve bought into it and they’ve come to delight in it the same way you delight in it.

“Jesus says to these apostles, ‘You are my friends.’ Do you know the first person in the Bible called a friend of God was Abraham?

James 2:23: [23] And the scripture was fulfilled which saith, Abraham believed God, and it was imputed unto him for righteousness: and he was called the Friend of God.

"Abraham was called this because he came to the place where he understood and bought into and lived out, delighted in what the Father delighted in.

“Likewise, the apostles, the night before Christ dies, He takes them aside to say: ‘I’m going to go die. I’m going to die for you. You’re my friends. You’re the ones who I’ve . . . '

“John 15: [12] This is my commandment, That ye love one another, as I have loved you.

[13] Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends.
[14] Ye are my friends, if ye do whatsoever I command you.
[15] Henceforth I call you not servants; for the servant knoweth not what his lord doeth: but I have called you friends; for all things that I have heard of my Father I have made known unto you.

“Christ is saying, 'Just like my Father has revealed all these things to me, I’ve revealed them to you. I’ve entrusted the deposit the Father gave me with you. Just as I’ve learned what the Father is doing and I’m delighting in it, I’m giving it to you to delight in! You’re my friends. You’re as mine own soul. So I’m not going to call you servants. I’m going to call you friends because I’ve made you my friends. You’ve not chosen me but I’ve chosen you and ordained you that you should go and bring forth fruit and that your fruit should remain.’

“That goes back to chapter 14 where it's talking about this permanent nature in the New Covenant that comes in, and now they’re going to have this permanent indwelling of the Holy Spirit--this permanent heart-writing of the law, this permanent working.

“It’s not going to be temporary anymore. It’s not going to be this David stuff back in Psalm 51 where he says, ‘Don’t take it away from me,’ afraid that it would be.

"Or Saul where he does lose it, or Samson where he loses it and gets it back. It’s not going to be all of that. Now there’s going to be this permanent thing. He’s going to finish the task with Israel.

“They’re going buy into the program so fully they’re going to know what’s in line with His will. They’re going to delight in it so fully that when they talk to the Father about it, it will be just like Christ talking to the Father and it will be done. This is high ground these guys are being put on.

*****

"In John 15, Jesus is talking to people who've entered into an understanding of what Christ's doing and did what they did because they were His friends.

“I don’t know how you would define a friend. I ask people, ‘When you talk about someone as your friend, exactly what does that mean?’

"Proverbs 18 says, [24] A man that hath friends must shew himself friendly: and there is a friend that sticketh closer than a brother.

“I think the greatest definition I know of is found in Deuteronomy 13:6: ‘If thy brother, the son of thy mother, or thy son, or thy daughter, or the wife of thy bosom, or thy friend, which is as thine own soul, entice thee secretly, saying, Let us go and serve other gods, which thou hast not known, thou, nor thy fathers.’

“This is one of these verses in the Bible where you find a definition where the verse isn’t focusing on doing that—it just kind of does it for you in that casual assumption kind of a way which shows more power to the definition because it’s not trying to press a point; it’s just, ‘This is the assumption of what a friend is in the Bible.’

“He puts a little appositive in there—that is, a statement that defines what a friend is. And that friend is described as ‘which is as thine own soul.’ People have taken that verse and we have a term we use in the culture for it called ‘soul mate.’

“Most people when they say that, we find out they’re talking about the person they want to get married to. Someone who is your friend is someone whose soul is in oneness with yours.

“When the Lord Jesus Christ said His joy was to do the will of His Father (‘My meat is to do the will of him who sent me’), He's saying, 'The thing that gives me strength and sustenance and makes my life work is to do the will of my Father.' "