a weekly devotional from Ed Underwood

There are a few places Judy and I go to that inspire, comfort, encourage, and heal our souls when life is hard. This is one of our favorites: Cannon Beach, Oregon.

We’ve walked that beach during some of life’s darkest days. Hand in hand we’ve cried, rejoiced, begged God for relief as we processed my diagnosis with this chronic disease, some of our children’s worst challenges and hurts, our son’s two tours in the war zone, and the many, many tests and trials of ministry.

The breathtaking landscape of that beautiful place helps in ways that I can’t really explain.

In the same way, the Apostle Peter begins his first letter with a breathtaking landscape to inspire, encourage, comfort, and heal the hearts of his readers.

First Peter is a hard book full of hard words written to Christians going through hard times.

His first paragraph takes believers to a place with a breathtaking view—a scenic theological landscape. It’s a place of hope, the first hope that came to our heart when we received God’s love by believing in Jesus—a hope of deliverance, hope for the future, hope of heaven and all we will share with God in eternity.

The hope of our so great salvation.

I don’t know what’s hard about your life today. But I do know that if you let Jesus take you by the hand and lead you to the spectacular view of what He did for you, it will comfort your heart.

Open your Bible to 1 Peter 1:3-12, and imagine Jesus saying, “There it is. Take it all in. It’s all for you. I did this just for you. On your worst day, this is still true of you. I love you. I may not fix what hurts in your life right now, but even if I don’t, all of this is yours. My Father is preserving it in heaven for you right now.”

Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who according to His abundant mercy has begotten us again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead (1 Peter 1:3).

Get in Step!

Every soldier remembers that command. It looked so easy in the movies you saw as a kid. Files of soldiers marching along side by side, stride for stride.

Left, right.

Left, right.

Really it takes weeks of practice to learn how to walk in step with a lot of other human beings.

Unless…

But for the serious Christian, the man or woman who wants to follow Christ as His devoted disciple, being in step with the Lord Jesus means being out of step with just about everyone else.

If you’re following Jesus, you’re out of step with this pagan world.

If you’re following Jesus, you’re also out of step with most other Christians.

Pagans are all about the things you know aren’t important.

But so are most Christians.

Stay in Step

If your devotion to Jesus means that you’re feeling out of step with just about everyone else in your world, that’s a good thing.

When you’re staying in step with Jesus, you’re out of step with this wicked world and the irrelevant religiosity that most Christians settle for.

We’re studying a book right now at Church of the Open Door written specifically to those sold-out Christians who know they don’t fit in with just about everyone else, those who feel their status as aliens in a hostile world most acutely.

First Peter—you should read it. Or join our study online through our podcasts.

It will assure you that not fitting in with everyone who is out of step with the Lord Jesus is a good thing.

“Peter, an apostle of Jesus Christ, to those scattered as aliens…may grace and peace be yours in the fullest measure” (1 Peter 1:1-2).

Are  you a victim of “Bargain Theology”?

Bargain theology is that heretical teaching that God is waiting to fix your life if you just get it right.

You know, serve a little in church, do your quiet time, memorize Scripture some, pray a little, or give some of your money to Christian work.

The problem with bargain theology is that God isn’t bargaining.

He doesn’t want to fix your life; He wants to give you a new life–eternal life.

He doesn’t want the stuff you do for Him; He wants you.

He wants to change you on the inside and launch you into a messed up and hurtful world.

It’s called grace, and it’s not a bargain.

It’s free.

But it’s not to make you a little better, a little happier, a little more Republican.

It’s to give you what you need to overcome the evil and broken places in your heart and to stand against the evil broken places in this world.

I can’t understand why more Christians in churches don’t get it.

I got it from the very beginning.

Oh yeah, maybe that’s because I didn’t meet Jesus in the stained glass confines of safe religious platitudes.

I met Jesus on the street during a revival.

We called it the Jesus Movement.

Do your remember it?

Gary Larson’s classic Far Side cartoon of the gifted young knucklehead trying to push through a door marked “Pull” is how I picture the theologians telling people they need to be more committed, more repentant, more…you fill in the blanks, to earn God’s love so that they can receive eternal life.

I was just reading a book written by one of these theological “geniuses.” Explaining his view of the so-called “lukewarm Christian” in Revelation 3, he claims to believe 100% in grace while maintaining that there  will not be any lukewarm Christians in heaven. He just thinks they should have some “fruit.”

Apart from the obvious possibility that this is a warning to churches rather than individual Christians, I wonder about his definition of “lukewarm.”

I bet I know.

Just a few degrees cooler than the “heat” of  his own personal commitment to the Lord Jesus.

I bet I know his definition of convincing fruit: About the same amount he has.

If it weren’t so tragic, it would be as funny as Larsen’s Far Side scene.

The tragedy of it all is that while he’s convinced himself that his lukewarmness is just above the lukewarmness the grace of God covers, thousands of sincere Christians are compelled to keep pushing through a door grace already pulled open the day they believed in Christ.

Someone asked me why I’m always writing about grace.

The answer is twofold:

1) Grace defines New Testament Christianity.

2) There are plenty of “Christian” writers talking about works.

I will simply never get over it, grace, that is.

And neither should you.

My deepest convictions on the state of the church today are that most of our problems are because we don’t understand grace.

Religious people don’t like it that God loves people so much that He gives eternal life freely to all who believe . . . with no strings attached. The reality that He gives this gift regardless of the strings attached to lives.

Strings like . . .

. . . overeating

. . . gossip

. . . materialism

. . . addictions –even coffee can be an addiction (OUCH!)

We need to be careful with the strings we attach to grace.

In our honest moments, we know deep down, that those same strings are attached to our lives.

And so does God.

That’s why He sent His Son to die for us, with no strings attached.

Being justified freely by His grace through redemption that is in Christ Jesus (Romans 3:23).