Category: Focus

Balanced Christianity

Writer: Annabelle Ang-Bok

Photo credit: Christopher Tan

The day before this issue was scheduled to go live online, I threw out the half-thought-through-half-scribbled article I had in the works and started writing this one. I had originally wanted to write about finding a harmonious balance in life based on Biblical principles, but somewhere in the past 36 hours I realised that the further we move into the endtimes, the more important it becomes for us to realign our concept of balance with that of the Lord’s.

Balance, you say? This sort of writerly whim is the antithesis of balance! Come back to earth, Annabelle!

I disagree.  Too many of us believers have been lulled into thinking that “all things in moderation” is a Christian concept—it isn’t. This notion of shunning black-and-white binary systems of understanding and encouraging plurality of all sorts is not found in Scripture. You really cannot get more extreme than Jesus, who made some truly radical statements which cannot be interpreted to occupy middle ground or grey areas:

  • He who loves father or mother more than Me is not worthy of Me. And he who loves son or daughter more than Me is not worthy of Me. And he who does not take up his cross and follow after me is not worthy of Me. He who finds his life will lose it, and he who loses his life for My sake will find it. (Matthew 10:37–39)
  • He who is not with Me is against Me, and he who does not gather with Me scatters abroad. (Matthew 12:30)
  • …whoever is ashamed of Me and My words in this adulterous and sinful generation, of him the Son of Man also will be ashamed when He comes in the glory of His Father with the holy angels. (Mark 8:38)
  • No servant can serve two masters; for either he will hate the one and love the other, or else he will be loyal to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon. (Luke 16:13)
  • …It has been given to you to know the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven, but to them it has not been given. For whoever has, to him more will be given, and he will have abundance; but whoever does not have, even what he has will be taken away from him. (Matthew 13:11–12)

You may be wondering what relevance these verses have with the idea of balance. Well, the main definitions of “balance” include “a state of equilibrium”, “a wheel that regulates the rate of movement in a machine”, “equivalent counterbalancing weight”, and “exact correspondence of form on opposite sides of a dividing line or plane”. Now consider the above quotations in the light of the following ones:

  • For behold, the darkness shall cover the earth, and deep darkness the people; but the Lord will arise over you, and His glory will be seen upon you. (Isaiah 60:2)
  • …God is light and in Him is no darkness at all… the darkness is passing away, and the true light is already shining. He who says he is in the light, and hates his brother, is in darkness until now. He who loves his brother abides in the light, and there is no cause for stumbling in him. (1 John 1:5, 2:8–10)
  • Go into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature. He who believes and is baptised will be saved, but he who does not believe will be condemned. (Mark 16:15–16)
  • …be watchful in all things, endure afflictions, do the work… fulfil your ministry. (2 Timothy 4:5)
  • You are the salt of the earth; but if the salt loses its flavour, how shall it be seasoned? It is then good for nothing but to be thrown out and trampled underfoot by men. (Matthew 5:13)

It is clear that as far as God is concerned, the only true balance is found in Him—Himself, His purpose, His call. There is no middle ground because He is the life source; as created beings, we are literally dead and non-existent apart from Him. And as the devil steps up his activity on this planet in view of the coming End, so too must we step up our efforts to know our God and do His will: As His representative body on the earth, His presence in and through us is the only thing keeping reality as we know it from simply unravelling… In a sense, we have been charged with keeping the balance of this universe.

Christ’s commands give us no room for meandering, especially in these perilous times. All around us we see evidence of the growing darkness that Isaiah prophesied, all around we see the necessity of our rising up to be everything that we are meant to be in Him. But the scales are seemingly tipped in the enemy’s favour—the Church is still far, far off from carrying out the “greater works” that Jesus declared she would do (John 14:10–14).

Friends, I believe it’s time to renew our minds and realign our thinking with that of the Holy Spirit. We the Church can ill afford to remain quiescent and passive. Pick up your Bibles and start arming yourself for war in earnest—there is much to be done, and if we would only get up and step out in faith, we would see the power of the Lord manifested in and through us just as He has promised. Arise and shine, for the glory of the Lord is risen upon you (Isaiah 60:1), and bring your world back into balance in preparation for the King’s imminent return!

 

Daily Renewal: Every Believer’s Responsibility


CLV-1006-Focus-Annabelle-Ang-Daily-Renewal-pix-by-Sharon-Huang-Wok.jpg

Photo credits: Image photographed by Sharon Huang-Wok

Writer: Annabelle Ang-Bok

“You must be born again!”

In the past year or so, I’ve found myself taking this command beyond literally, whether or not I meant to. It started with two simultaneous series of events, both of which completely overhauled my life in opposite directions, and the rollercoaster is now reaching a peak with the official launch of the new CLV—new website and all.

Still, why pick a seemingly trite theme like Rebirth for a magazine’s re-launch?

Because I believe that sometimes, it’s the most clichéd things that are the most powerful—we’ve forgotten their power because we’re fatigued from their overuse. Because the twists my life has taken have opened my eyes to the fact that many believers today are allowing themselves to float idly along on a lazy river[1] built on clichés. This has to stop, somewhere, and soon.

I am not saying that there is one straight road and one way to be in “the perfect will of God”, but there are a few basic things that our Creator has set forth quite clearly in His Word, and if we aren’t even conscious of these statements and commands, then how can we possibly be in the right places at the right moments to do what He has called us each to do?

All Things New… Or Are They?

If 2 Corinthians 5:17 is to be taken seriously, then for the Christian, stagnation of any sort should be avoided at all cost. “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new.” But how many believers have a conscious knowledge of verses like this? And of those who do, how many are active practitioners?

In recent discussions with my fellowship groups and random friends, I’ve realised that many believers are so caught up in trying to live their lives according to their ideals that they have become almost completely unaware of what the Lord desires for them. Some are so comfortable with the way they have structured their own lives that they are almost unable to comprehend doing anything differently. Others are so devoted to their churches and/or church leaders that they cannot imagine how some common church practices might not actually be Biblical.

The list goes on, and I find it rather sad that when I run a Google search for quotes on the topics of rebirth and renewal, hardly any strong quotes come up that arise from a Christian or Biblical viewpoint. In fact, this was the quote that came up tops at nearly every site I browsed:

Each night, when I go to sleep, I die. And the next morning, when I wake up, I am reborn.
—Mahatma Gandhi

It is my belief that we are children of God should carry such an attitude, especially since His Word provides us with beautiful passages like Lamentations 3:22–24, which says, “Through the Lord’s mercies we are not consumed, because His compassions fail not. They are new every morning; great is Your faithfulness.”

No Excuse For Laziness

It has become a revelation to me in the past year that the new covenant (spoken of in Jeremiah 31:31, Matthew 26:28, Mark 14:24, Luke 22:20, 1 Corinthians 11:25, etc.) can very easily become a believer’s excuse to be lazy. After all, the old covenant based on the law has been done away with (Hebrews 8:13) and we have been called to a “new and living way” (Hebrews 10:20) in which our labour strives towards entering into rest (Hebrews 4:9–11). What can go wrong when the joyous “task” of beholding the Lord’s beauty and glory is the very thing that allows Him to change us from glory to glory (2 Corinthians 3:18)?

Well, it’s when we over-luxuriate in our knowledge of the above points and lose sight of what we’re called and instructed to do that the trouble starts: Anything that seems to require “effort” on our part begins to look like an insult to the finished work of Christ, and many Christians stop at that point—stagnating in their understanding of the fullness of God and the spiritual world.

Friends, we must not forget that God gives clear direction to us to put effort into effecting our own spiritual growth! First Timothy 4:13 and 15 tells us clearly to “give attention to reading, to exhortation, to doctrine. Meditate on these things; give yourself entirely to them, that your progress may be evident to all.”

We are also told explicitly, “do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God” (Romans 12:2). And as we all know, one’s mind is often the hardest thing to change! Quoting the likes of Psalm 51:10 and Ephesians 4:23–24 to argue that God is the one who enacts this mind change without our active participation is just a cop-out, really, because it’s clear throughout the Bible that God respects the free choice that He Himself gave us.

It’s best to take a practical approach to this because the Christian life is meant to be lived practically, and not experienced in the manner in which a couch potato experiences a television programme:

The way you think is… a habit as much as the way you brush your teeth in the morning. We can train our minds to be positive or we can train our minds to be negative. That is a fact. We can choose our thoughts. Satan may offer his realm of thoughts but we can choose our thoughts just as we can choose how we develop our habits.[2]
—Pastor Peter Tan

Moving Forward In Newness Of Life

These days, it’s so easy to find ways to turn our focus to Jesus that we really have no excuse not to do it. Bibles are easy to find and Christian devotional material can be found in most secular bookstores. Online, all it takes is a couple of clicks before a vast world of text, audio and video material is displayed for your choosing. The God we worship is also a loving Father who says, “[You] will seek Me and find Me, when you search for Me with all your heart. I will be found by you” (Jeremiah 19:13–14).

Make a firm decision to find time to refresh your soul in the Lord every day, and you will surely see a difference in the way you live, and in the clarity with which you perceive the future. Artists, you will definitely find your art taking on new depth and perspective as the Creator begins to play a bigger part in your thought life and impart new gifts to you. The Word does promise that “He who has begun a good work in you will complete it until the day of Jesus Christ” (Philippians 1:6).

This year—2010—may be half-over but it’s never too late to make a new start, especially in Christ. It’s up to you how fast and how far you want to progress in your knowledge of and relationship with Him, though, so take up this delightful pursuit and you will very soon be wonderfully surprised to find that your Pursued has really been your Pursuer from the beginning!

[1] <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lazy_river>, accessed 24 May 2010.


[2] Quoted from “Renewal of the Mind”, in the “Waiting on the Lord” series. < http://petertan.net/text/wg4mind.htm>, accessed 27 May 2010.