Abandoned or Embraced?

Genesis 3:7, 8

Then the eyes of both were opened, and they knew that they were naked. And they sewed fig leaves together and made themselves loincloths. And they heard the sound of the LORD God walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and the man and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the LORD God among the trees of the garden.

The more that I try to live out this gospel, the more I have realized one thing:

The gospel isn't about our "doing". It's about our "undoing", all the way back to our original intention.

Let me elaborate....

Adam and Eve messed up. They did the very thing that God warned them about, they ate the fruit of the wrong tree. Bummer! Disobedience is never wise. But I want to suggest that another, "bummer", is their response to the situation. And more times than not, this is our big mistake as well. 

Instead of responding toward the loving Father that Adam had grown to know, sin had blurred his vision and as C. Baxter Kruger puts it, "he (Adam) projected his pain onto God, thereby creating an entirely mythological deity, a figment of his own baggage." Therefore, he ran and hid behind his fig leaves of shame and guilt, scared to death of "god".  Ever been there?

This same mythological deity that Adam created in his sin stained imagination was passed down to us. Think about it....How often has it taken you days, weeks, even months to get over failure? We make a mistake and wallow in our guilt and shame for weeks! After some time has passed and we feel like we have said enough "sorry's", we can finally approach "god" again.  I know that I've been involved in this pattern far more than I care to admit. 

Fast forward to Christ on the Cross....

 Matthew 27:46

"And about the ninth hour Jesus cried out with a loud voice, saying, "Eli, Eli, lema sabachtani?" that is, "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?""

What is happening here? Did the Father really abandon His Son on the cross? Did Jesus step out of the fellowship of the Trinity during this scene of history?

 Or is something totally different happening in this moment?

Jesus is quoting Psalm 22. If we take a closer look at this Psalm, I believe that it reveals what is truly occurring on the cross:

Psalm 22:24

For HE HAS NOT despised nor abhorred the affliction of the afflicted; NEITHER HAS HE HID his face from him; but when he cried unto him, he heard.

What's the point?

The point is this, "God was in Christ, reconciling the world to Himself."  

Abandonment is not in the language of God. Jesus came to embrace us in our fallen world. On the cross, He took on the very mindset we had inherited from Adam. He can identify with us all the way down to our very own misconceptions of God.  He took on our skewed perception of the Father and refused to be shaken by it. In unbroken fellowship with the Trinity, Jesus conquered our misconceptions. 

Christ is the victor!

No longer is there any reason for us to hide behind our fig leaves of shame and guilt. Guilt, shame and condemnation are anti-gospel, anti-finished work. Jesus has forever revealed the eternal embrace of the Father! We have been caught up into what C.S. Lewis calls, “The Divine Dance” of the Trinity.

He has made the way for true repentance! It's time we change the way we think about ourselves and about our Father. We've been reconciled! Baxter says it best in this quote from his book, "Across All World's":

"Reconciliation is the Father's forgiveness determined to become flesh, determined to incarnate itself into our fallen existence to undo our alienation. It is the relationship, the fellowship and communion of the Father, Son, and Spirit stepping into our blindness and mythology, into the cesspool of our trauma and wounds so that human perception can be thoroughly converted and the Father's love can be truly known and experienced. The purpose, the aim, the object of reconciliation is not to change God, but to bring us into communion with the Father, so that we could know Him and His lavish heart and live life in the freedom of His embrace."

-C. Baxter Kruger

May these truths permeate our entire being! We have been included into the very fellowship of the Trinity. When we live in the confidence and trust of our perfect, loving Father we will no longer be held back by fear. Never again should we be concerned with whether or not God loves us. Never again should we be concerned about God abandoning us. Never again should we be concerned about not being accepted. 

We are living from the place of victory. Our confidence rests in the finished work of the Cross. The days of climbing the ladder to attain our position with God are over. Our starting point is where Jesus finished!

Let His perfect love remove all unnecessary fears, and lets see this phenomenal good news spread across the earth!

Becoming Love

Have you ever been so moved by something that you can't help but tear up at the thought of it?

Maybe you have a film that is dear to your heart, and every time you watch it or think of a certain scene your heart becomes so full that the only suitable expression is to cry. Or maybe every time a lyric to a song comes into your mind, it triggers something in the deepest part of your soul.

As of late, this has been happening to me. It happens most when I am alone. Sometimes it happens in the midst of people, but usually it comes when I am sitting alone with Jesus pondering the endless depths of the Gospel.

The Gospel speaks to the very core of who I am, and the revelation of Jesus melts my heart.

I love to read. There are certain authors that have been gifted to so beautifully explain and describe the love of Jesus that I melt every time I read them. Two of which are Brennan Manning and Timothy Keller. You should check them out if you have never encountered their writing.

But lets get back to the Gospel. The life of Jesus is extremely astonishing to me. And the fact that we have been predestined to be conformed to His image, is even more astonishing. IT IS POSSIBLE.

Jesus Christ, the love of the Father, manifested in human form. A man who was rejected by those He came to save. 

A thief and murderer named Barabbas was chosen to be released over Jesus! Judah Smith's amazing teaching on this tells us that the people didn't choose Barabbas, it was the love of the Father that set him free. 

Scholars say that his full name was "Jesus Barabbas". Barabbas (bar abba) means "son of the father". Jesus takes the place of the least likely, that we may be brought back into our original design as a "son of the Father" once again.  

This is Outstanding. 

Judah goes on to say that, "God had to treat Jesus like Barabbas, so that He could treat Barabbas like Jesus." How great is this love of the Father?!

But the point I want to get across is this, Jesus maintained his inner life with God in the midst of so much rejection! When we get rejected or hurt by someone, it can sometimes take weeks, months or even years to get over! But Jesus was never moved to bitterness, or carried offense, by the actions of others towards Him. He laid down His life for those who rejected Him,  and hanging on the cross he utters these words, "Father forgive them, they know not what they do.".  

WOW!

He was so certain of His identity and of the Father's love for Him, that nothing could shake Him!

His love for us is not based on our response. And in turn, our love for others should be the same! I have been listening to a lot of teaching by a man named, Dan Mohler. His teaching and revelation of the life and love of Jesus is rather amazing. One of things the Lord has been speaking to me through his teaching, is how to truly become love. 

When we are able to live free from needing the approval or recognition of others, that is when we can freely love those around us (I am preaching to myself). If our day can be ruined by the lack of affirmation or acknowledgment from those around us, we need a fresh understanding of the love of Jesus. 

Tim Keller states it this way, "If we look to our spouses to fill up our tanks in a way that only God can do, we are demanding an impossibility." He wrote that in the context of marriage, but I believe the same is true in our day to day relationships with anyone. 

Being confident in His love for us, frees us from needing the approval of others.  From that place, we will truly be able to become love. 

Love that is without condition.

Love that doesn't waver in the midst of rejection.

Love that refuses to give up on people.

Love that stands strong when our emotions are worn out.

Love that lays down its life for those around us.

Love that doesn't shrink back when we are treated wrong.

Living a true life of love will manifest the fragrance of Christ to those around us. 

It is the only response to the love we have received from the Father.

Don't stop loving. 

WE WERE MADE FOR LOVE.

"No Flying Lessons Are Required When Truth Is Realized"

"A nature conservation officer told us of a fascinating incident when they released a black eagle a week prior that had been in the Pretoria Zoo for ten years. She told us how excited they were when the bird finally arrived in its wooden crate. This was the day for this eagle to be freed and return to the life of its design. But their excitement soon turned to frustration when, after opening the cage, the bird refused to fly! Ten years of caged life seemed to have trapped its mind in an invisible enclosure! How could they get the eagle to realize that it was indeed free? No amount of prompting and prodding seemed to help. Then, after some hours the bird suddenly looked up, and in the distance they heard the call of another eagle; this was the moment of true freedom! Immediately the zoo-eagle took off in flight! No flying lessons are required when truth is realized!”

The above story is an excerpt from Francois du Toit's Mirror Bible, he goes on to say, "If the Gospel is not the voice of the free eagle, it is not the Gospel". 

How long have we lived under the bondage of a religious system that cripples instead of heals? It causes us to view ourselves through the lens of failures rather than seeing with the eyes of the cross. We place ourselves under the law, only to nullify the Cross of Christ.

Brennan Manning makes this statement, "We judge ourselves unworthy servants, and that judgement becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy. We deem ourselves to inconsiderable to be used even by a God capable of miracles with no more than mud and spit. And thus our false humility shackles an otherwise omnipotent God."

Due to the boredom and bondage of religion, many of our church pews are filled with believers who are operating from a sin-consciousness, striving to earn something they already possess. Failures begin to define life rather than truth.  Instead of empowering and liberating, religion intimidates and enslaves. Therefore, we become a powerless people, unable to recognize the voice of Abba because religion has made us to deaf. 

In the words of Francois, "The revelation of God's righteousness has to be far more effective than man's slavery to sin." We must  take hold of the reality that we are the righteousness of God in Christ Jesus. Not on the basis of our own doing, but on the basis of God's faith. 

"For what the Law could not do, weak as it was through the flesh, God did: sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and as an offering for sin, He condemned sin in the flesh" - Romans 8:3

WE as the body of Christ need a revelation of our true identity in Him. This revelation will ignite a fire in the church that will be unquenchable. Accusation will continue to come, but as we stand confidently and declare "I am the righteousness of God in Christ Jesus", demons will shudder. 

Do you know who you are?

The voice of the free eagle is calling, can you hear the echo of Abba within you? 

He calls you son.

He calls you daughter. 

You are free.

Love Is Who You Are!

LOVE IS WHO YOU ARE!

Speaking in tongues is not the point; love is. It is neither angelic eloquence, nor the mastery of human language that persuades. It doesn’t matter how poetic, prophetic, or profound I may sound; my conversation is reduced to the hollow noise of clanging brass cymbals if love’s echo is absent.

I could predict the future in detail and have a word of knowledge for everyone. I could possess amazing faith, and prove it by moving mountains! It doesn’t make me any more important than anyone else. Love is who you are! You are not defined by your gift or deeds.

Love is not about defending a point of view; even if I am prepared to give away everything I have and die a martyr’s death; love does not have to prove itself by acts of supreme devotion or self sacrifice! 

Love is large in being passionate about life and relentlessly patient in bearing the offenses and injuries of others with kindness. Love is completely content and strives for nothing. Love has no desire to make others feel inferior and has no need to sing its own praises.

Love is predictable and does not behave out of character. Love is not ambitious. Love is not spiteful and gets no mileage out of another’s mistakes. 

Love sees no joy in injustice. Love’s delight is in everything that truth celebrates. 

Love is a fortress where everyone feels protected rather than exposed! Love’s persuasion is persistent! Love believes. Love never loses hope and always remains constant in contradiction.

Love never loses it altitude! Prophecies will cease. Tongues will pause. The quest for knowledge will be inappropriate when perfection is grasped. 

What we perceived in prophetic glimpses is now concluded in completeness!

When I was an infant I spoke infant gibberish with the mind of an infant; my reasoning also was typical of an infant; how it all changed when i became a man! I am an infant no more!

There was a time of suspense, when everything we saw was merely mirrored in the prophetic word, like in an enigma; but then I gaze face-to-face; behold, I am in Him! Now I may know even as I have always been known!

Now persuasion and every pleasurable expectation is completed in agape. Agape is the superlative of everything faith and hope always knew to be true about me! Love defines my eternal moment!

-Mirror Bible

Risen and Active

Jesus is not a doctrine, a theology, or a good idea. He is a reality. In the midst of going deep in Kingdom revelation, Jesus whispers,"Don't forget the One who is the King of this kingdom."

It is important to understand doctrines and theologies, however,  I refuse to only know Him through a theological standpoint.

I must experience Him.

Brennan Manning states this in His book, Abba's Child...

"For me, the most radical demand of Christian faith lies in summoning the courage to say yes to the present risenness of Jesus Christ. I have been a Christian for more nearly 50 years, and I have seen the first fervor wear off in the long, undramatic routine of life. I have lived long enough to appreciate that Christianity is lived more in the valley than on the mountaintop, that faith is never doubt-free, and that although God has revealed Himself in creation and in history, the surest way to know God, is in the words of Thomas Aquinas, as tamquam ignotum, as utterly unknowable. No thought can contain Him, no word can express Him; He is beyond anything we can intellectualize or imagine."

The more we journey into Him, the more we see that there is still to go. In the words of Gregory of Nyssa,  "This is truly the vision of God: never to be satisfied in our desire to see him. But by looking at what we do see, we must always rekindle our desire to see more. So there can be no limit interrupting our growth in ascending to God, because there is no limit to the Good, and our desire for the Good is not ended by being satisfied.".

The very instant I try to place Jesus in a theological box, He breaks it every time. I am not speaking about biblical truths of who He is. What I am talking about, is how I experience Him day in and day out. Do I live with the constant awareness that He is with me in the midst of my greatest struggle?

Manning goes on to expound on the present risenness of Jesus. He makes this statement, "The resurrection of Jesus must be experienced as more than a past historical event. Otherwise it is robbed of its impact on the present."

May we echo the heart cry of the Apostle Paul, "that I may know Him and the power of His resurrection".  That word "Know" is an experiential knowing.

In the midst of struggle, hardship, confusion, ambiguity, suffering, disappointment and tragedy, we must not lose sight of Him. "It may happen in these most desperate trials of our human existence that beyond any rational explanation, we may feel a nail-scarred hand clutching ours."

"Pessimism and defeatism are never the fruit of the life-giving Spirit but rather reveal our unawareness of present risenness."

Our hope lies in the finished work of the cross. But the power of the cross lies in the resurrection. And the hope we have rests in this phenomenal statement Jesus makes in Matthew 28:20, "I am with you always".  Our awareness of Him being with us, is the key to sustainable hope in the midst of chaos and confusion.

May we all come to an "experiential knowing" of His present risenness that usurps all other false mindsets we so easily fall into.

He is with you. Always. 

August Update

Friends,

My summer of Circuit Rider wildness has come to an end. Words will never do justice for all that happened across America this summer. We held four training schools in Fiji, LA, Pennsylvania, and Kansas City. In 14 hours of focused outreach in the streets, we saw 840 salvations! After doing the math, we realized that every minute of outreach a soul was saved! I believe that number is a bit low though, because everyone involved in these schools did not limit evangelism to the set apart times. They truly displayed a lifestyle of evangelism! I do not share those numbers to brag on how amazing our training schools are. That is not the case at all. Our training is very simple and super basic! I share those numbers to show that the harvest is ripe in America! People are longing to meet Jesus!

Every location we went to was historic! God moved and poured out His love in ways I had never experienced before. We saw the rumblings of revival, but God made it clear to us that this is not the pinnacle! He has plans for America far beyond what we are able to comprehend. However,I believe that our time in Lancaster, PA is a model of what is to come for cities across the nation. Each night our meetings grew by the hundreds! I believe our first night we had around 1400 people in attendance. By the last night we had close to 2000 people there! People were getting saved and healed in the streets during the day and then were bringing their families to the night meetings! Over 60 churches were represented in the sessions. The unity of believers was simply astonishing...

I am currently back in Pasadena preparing for our One Love gathering in LA on August 28th. Check out the event at OneLoveUS.org. I will spend the next month doing different things on college campuses as well as preparing for my trip to India in October. A small team of us will be spending the month of October in India, believing God for a breakthrough among the Hindu world. I will be sending out a more detailed email about the trip this week. If you would like to receive the email, please message me on Facebook, or email me at znash22@gmail.com. Thanks for all of your prayers and support this summer. It was fruitful beyond words!

Zach

July Update!

Our first Circuit Rider school has officially begun! We have between 60-70 students with us for the next week here in Los Angeles.

We are kicking off the weekend by partnering with many local ministries and churches for an event called "Love Santa Ana". Yesterday we had a full day of training for the event with Francis Chan, Dave Gibbons, Che Ahn, Jason Ma, Brian Brennt, and a few other amazing leaders in the body of Christ.

Today, the downtown streets of Santa Ana will be shut down. Vendors will hit the streets with tons of great food,  live music, and our Circuit Rider crew will bring the Love of Jesus!

Our only desire is to drop a love bomb on Santa Ana! We have no agenda other than extravagantly loving everyone we interact with. It's an exciting collaboration with many different streams of the body of Christ coming together in unity to see an entire city encounter the Love of Jesus.

Throughout the rest of the week we will be leading our training sessions in the mornings, followed by evening meetings and outreaches all across LA. We are excited to be partnering with different local churches and ministries during this school.  One of our days will be spent on Sunset Strip with the Radiance House of Prayer. We will spend the majority of the day on the streets believing God for a demonstration of the Gospel's power!

Please pray for our week of training and outreaches! We want to see a lasting effect through these schools.

After this week I will be traveling to Pennsylvania and then Kansas City for two other CR schools.

Looking forward to posting some amazing testimonies from the next few weeks!

Blessings,

           Zach


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