Resisting temptation the Jesus way

By Fergus Ong

"I can resist anything but temptation" - Oscar Wilde

"Because he himself suffered when he was tempted, he is able to help those who are being tempted" - Hebrews 2:18

When you read the account of Jesus being tempted in the desert, what image of Jesus do you get? For me, he always comes out looking very unscathed. He retorts the devil with scripture and thrice puts him in his place. He's so calm and steady and brave. So assured of who he is.

Which is why Hebrews 2:18 feels so jarring. It's strange to now be told that Jesus suffered when he was tempted. Did he? The gospel writers sure didn't put it that way. But think about it: how couldn't he?

The image of a self-assured (or God-assured, which in Jesus' case exclusively means the same thing!) tempted Jesus and a suffering tempted Jesus don't really jive. At first, I thought that I liked the self-assured Jesus better. More man. More steady. Makes me feel more safe. And then, I changed my mind - I prefer the suffering Jesus of Hebrews. Easier to relate to. More real. But they still don't jive. They are so dissimilar, the only thing they seem to share is that neither Jesus looks like the tempted Oscar Wilde!

And then, I thought - maybe this is what resisting temptation really looks like. Assurance + Suffering. In equal parts. Suffering without assurance is doomed to failure - it's like pain without purpose; there's no point, so eventually you'll cave in. Assurance without suffering is dilute - how legitimate is the temptation if resisting it doesn't cause you pain?

Assurance and suffering - both must assault you when you truly resist a true temptation.

I'm glad I've read the Hebrews take on Jesus' temptation. It's naive to go on thinking that the temptations didn't make him suffer. The rest of Hebrews 2 speaks about how much Jesus is like one of us. How much we can lean on him because he has been there and done the seemingly impossible - resist. The suffering part I understand. Now what about the assurance?

Faith...

By Vernon Chua

Faith… is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen (Hebrews 11:1 NKJV).

Faith; this word has been the most difficult concept for me to practice in my walk with God and yet the most essential.

Hebrews 11:1 says to me that that my faith is the underlying basis of my hopes, which because of it I can be confident that even though I do not see certain realities they still hold true.

As an example, if I hope that one day I will own a nice bungalow what gives me the reason to have such a hope? Perhaps it’s because I believe that as I progress in my career my income will grow to a point where I can afford one. That belief becomes the basis for my hope. Even though I do not see the money now, I can remain confident that it will come to pass.

A more pastor-approved example, I hope that one day two of my closest friends will come to know Jesus. The underlying basis for this hope (i.e. my faith) is that I believe that God hears my prayers and since it is His desire that everyone should be saved He will bring it to pass.

Hence as a Christian my faith is that “God so loved the world He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life (John 3:16), and also that God will provide for everything I need (Luke 12:22-32). This faith drives my hopes.

It sounds very lovely and simple until I have to live by it.

In a world where I have been raised to prize rational thought - to depend on my five physical senses to derive reality and truth, faith as defined above presents itself an anomaly that often contradicts my understanding of how the world functions, and this greatly confuses me.

Even though I’ve been a Christian for a long time, the world is very good at challenging my faith. So often I find myself not daring to hold on to the hope that I believe God has given me because the picture I see is stark and bleak. My rational mind takes over and tells me to give up, to do something else because what I hope for has no chance, very much like the Israelites in the desert. I used to think they were pretty dumb but I realize now they were just being ‘rational’. Of course I’d lose hope if there were no water for me while I was in the desert (even though God brought me there). Of course I’d complain and think God is crazy if he asked me to go and conquer a land that is rich, has cities with high thick walls and the people are huge and scary. It’s irrational to do otherwise.

And that brings me to what I think is the worst and hardest thing about our Christian faith, the fact that God requires us to live this irrationality out.

Faith would be so much easier if it went something like this:-

David: God, this Goliath is huge, well-armoured and looks like he can eat me for dinner. But I trust You will defeat Him for me. Amen.

God: I will help you defeat Goliath.

Lighting strikes Goliath dead.

David: Hallelujah! Thank you God!

But the biblical version of faith is actually more like this:-

David: God, this Goliath is huge, well-armoured and looks like he can eat me for dinner. But I trust You will defeat Him for me. Amen.

God: I will help you defeat Goliath. Now YOU go and face him in one-on-one combat in front of everyone.

David: Will you give me a big powerful sword that will shoot fire?

God: No.

David: Armour that makes me invulnerable?

God: No.

David: Helmet….?

God: No. Just go.

David:……

I always wonder why faith has to be this hard. Why God allows the world to present such a bleak picture. Many of the disciples died for their faith, definitely not a ‘happily ever after’ image we come to expect. I’ve seen many a ‘David’ fall to their Goliaths, I certainly have experienced my own falls to my Goliaths.

Yet the Word of God declares victory. Imagine the faith I need to dare hold such a hope.

Is it reasonable for me to have that faith? How can I?

Hebrews 11 goes on to list the faithful personalities of the Bible. Enoch, Noah, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, David and so on. They all lived by faith and overcame by faith.

How did they come to have that faith?

I read up on Enoch, “So all the days of Enoch were three hundred and sixty-five years. And Enoch walked with God; and he was not, for God took him” (Genesis 5:23-24).

On Noah, “This is the genealogy of Noah. Noah was a just man, perfect in his generations. Noah walked with God” (Genesis 6:9).

Abraham, Isaac, Jacob and the rest of them we all know also journeyed with God, building a relationship with Him and learning to trust Him. They knew Him personally.

It dawns on me. Their faith and trust is based on a personal relationship with God. That’s why they were able to go through what they went through. God was a real Person to them, whom they could converse with, whom they could know and to whom they could ultimately trust their lives.

Another thought. To the question of why God allows the world to paint such a bleak picture, perhaps it’s because God knows the only way we would ever dare to hope is to have the essential faith to base it on. And that faith is only possible when we are in a personal relationship with Him. God wants me to walk with Him, to learn to trust Him. This is what separates our faith from the faith of others, a personal loving God who loves us personally.

Yea though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil; For you are with me; Your rod and Your staff, they comfort me. You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies; you anoint my head with oil; my cup runs over. Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life; And I will dwell in the house of the Lord forever. (Psalm 23:4-6)

Amen.

In search of the perfect replica

By Fergus Ong

My new hobby is going to pasar malams and checking out the World Cup replica jerseys.

The idea is to see who sells the best fake replicas. But boy, they do quite an amazing copycat job these days. So awesome, in fact, that I can't tell the difference just by looking at it on the rack. The crests and badges are immaculately woven in, the fabric is virtually the same as the original. It's got all the hi-tech bits, the little insignas woven under the collar, all the bells and whistles.

But it's still not it.

It's still a lie. An approximation. An extremely good approximation, but still, just that.

Counterfeit.

In Hebrews 1:3, the writer says that Jesus is the exact representation of the Father's being. There is no margin for difference. No room for differentiation. He is not kinda like the Father, or pretty much the same thing. That's not good enough.

We know that's not good enough because the world is full of kinda likes and pretty muches. Awesome deals that look every bit like the real thing. The serious ones involve swanky job offers, lifestyle choices and investment priorities. The less serious ones involve ... well ... fake football shirts in a pasar malam. The thing with these options - much like the fake shirts - is that when you turn them inside out, all the ugly stitching starts to show.

But as I dig deeper into the Bible, I realise more and more that you can turn this Jesus inside out, and outside in, and back around again, and there are no ugly stitches. None of it looks fake because none of it is.

He's not a replica. He's the exact representation of the original original.

Gentle Moves - ways to spiritual growth

By Stefanie Tan

Hi all! Thought I'd share this devotion which I found really good...especially for some of us YAs (or maybe most?) who are very much driven to perform in our every day work life. It's all about KPIs in an accounting firm!

"...In repentance and rest is your salvation, in quietness and trust is your strength..." - Isaiah 30:15

We can be too soft on ourselves and make excuses for our wrongdoing and sins. But we can also be too hard on ourselves, especially regarding spiritual growth and development. We somehow think that our spiritual growth should follow with our experience of other aspects of life. There we can see definite signs of progress which are clearly measurable. We complete courses, projects, work assignments. We are given more responsibility and receive greater remuneration. We can clearly track the development of our careers.

But we cannot do quite the same with the spiritual life. One reason is that much of that life is hidden deeply within us. Some of it remains a mystery. Most of it cannot be quantified. And the rules are so very different from the way we experience things at work.

For in the spiritual life, progress sometimes means going back. Maturity involves childlikeness. Having means letting go. We can safely say that the spiritual life operates on a different wisdom, and all the pushing and shoving that so characterises our workaday world will hardly serve us in our spiritual growth. We cannot push our spiritual growth and make it happen with quick-fix methods.

Instead, we need to begin to make gentle moves, moves born of a wisdom from above. In discovering that wisdom we will learn with Henri Nouwen that 'I do not have to move faster than I can'. My spiritual development won't result from driven behaviour. It will only come from careful listening, quiet surrender and active and purposeful engagement. It will come from what I do, but only from that which is done in harmony with God's wisdom. But most of all, it will come from what was given, not what was expected.

Pentecost & GDOP on the same day

By Ps Lee Choo

Pentecost this year is May 23, and it is an unusual one in that there is a convergence of the Eastern and Western traditions with the celebration being held on the same date as the Global Day of Prayer. This does happen, but rarely. The last Global Day of Prayer event (these prayer meetings have been going on for ten years and this is the last one) will be held on Pentecost Sunday in Cape Town, South Africa.

God wants His winds of Pentecost to blow at Pentecost.

The Lord says, "I want My people to pray in a new Pentecost that will sweep the face of the earth, for I am coming with divine visitation that will touch Heaven and earth. Many will be swept into the Kingdom of God and My glory will pour out with signs and wonders both in Heaven and the earth!"

What is the annointing?

By Ps Lee Choo

Question: What is the anointing? What does it mean to be anointed?

Answer: The origin of anointing was from a practice of shepherds. Lice and other insects would often get into the wool of sheep, and when they got near the sheep's head, they could burrow into the sheep's ears and kill the sheep. So, ancient shepherds poured oil on the sheep's head. This made the wool slippery, making it impossible for insects to get near the sheep's ears because they would just slide off. From this, anointing became symbolic of blessing, protection, and empowerment.


What a powerful understanding of anointing!! So we are God’s sheep and we need God’s anointing for His Blessing, His protection and His Empowerment!!!

Believing in Jesus = Disadvantage?

By Ps Lee Choo

A mother was making pancakes for her two young sons. As the aroma of her baking filled the kitchen, their two eager young mouths waited in eager anticipation of what was to come. Noticing that her sons were already beginning to squabble as to who should be the first to sample mum’s delicious pancakes, she thought this was a great occasion to do a little bible application lesson.

She turned to her two young sons and said, “Boys what do you think Jesus would have done if he was here this morning waiting for the pancakes?” Her well-tutored boys knew the answer only too well, so one of them remarked, “He would have refused to eat the first pancake but instead offered to let his brother have the it”. "Hmm...", remarked the other son and then added, “In that case why don’t you be Jesus!”

This little story reminds me how in real life, we actually suspect that being a Christian is akin to being at a disadvantage. It means always having to give in to others, to loose out on the best deals or to even to miss out on life - simply because we are Christians who practice Christian values.

This is where our dilemmas are - we may enjoy our Sunday sermons but not the Monday applications. How then can we grapple with this dilemma? Until we turn our Sunday sermons into Monday realities, Christianity is just religiosity and, frankly speaking, religion has no value at all to everyday life. Why? Because life is real but the good news is Jesus is also real – not some airy fairy bloke who never lived on earth and who never faced the conflicts we humans do!

That is why I am excited about the study of Book of Hebrews.

This is why I am excited we are having this blog – it will be where we can turn our Sunday sermons into Monday’s realities. So come participate in this, share your thoughts and let us discover that Jesus is indeed the Way, the Truth (the Greek word is “reality”) and the Life. This means he was not just postulating about some philosophical truth or teaching some thoughts about life but HE IS IT!!! Want to understand ultimate reality - find it in Jesus. Want to understand Life - Jesus.