Good trees bear good fruit

Matthew 12.33-37 says, “Either make the tree good and its fruit good, or make the tree bad and its fruit bad, for the tree is known by its fruit (i.e. its fruit is evidence of what kind of tree it is). You brood of vipers! How can you speak good, when you are ¹evil? For out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks. The ²good person out of his good treasure brings forth good, and the evil person out of his evil treasure brings forth evil - (i.e. whatever is in the heart, whether good or evil, flows out. This is not describing something we must do, it's simply telling us what happens based on the condition of our heart).

I tell you, on the day of judgment people will give account for every careless word they speak, for by your words you will be justified, and by your words you will be condemned.” (ESV)

The ERV also gives a helpful translation...

33 “If you want good fruit, you must make the tree good. If your tree is not good, it will have bad fruit. A tree is known by the kind of fruit it produces. 34 You snakes! You are so evil. How can you say anything good? What people say with their mouths comes from what fills their hearts. 35 Those who are good have good things saved in their hearts. That’s why they say good things. But those who are evil have hearts full of evil, and that’s why they say things that are evil. 36 I tell you that everyone will have to answer for all the careless things they have said. This will happen on the day of judgment. 37 Your words will be used to judge you. What you have said will show whether you are right or whether you are guilty.” ERV

Early in my Christian life, I found this passage confusing as I did many of the things Christ said. The reason is what Christ says sounds like salvation is the result of our efforts "...by your words you will be justified, and by your words you will be condemned.”  

If a man is condemned by his words, are not his words the cause of his condemnation? If you do bad things you get a bad result i.e. condemnation - and if you do good things you get a good result i.e. justification. The result is based on what you do or don't do; on good or bad words. So it sounds like salvation is based on saying good words i.e. Salvation is by works - good deeds. 

But is this what Christ is saying? No, not at all! At a closer look, He is actually saying just the opposite. He is saying evil words are evidence that we are already under condemnation i.e. We are not a child of God. In short, our hearts are evil and we are under the just judgment of God. This is also the point of the following passage. 

“For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him. Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only Son of God...” John 3:17-18. 

This passage doesn't cite any particular bad deed. The issue is what we have not done yet versus what we have done. It says we live under condemnation because of our alienation from God. 

But what did we do to cause this?  There wasn't anything we did in terms of a particular action, such as murder, stealing, or lying. It's what we do not "do." We refuse to receive the solution God offers to address our alienation i.e. unbelief. We do not believe we need God the way God says we do. And we do not believe in the solution God provided to address that unbelief.

Our words and deeds are simply the result/evidence /fruit of the state of our heart i.e. we have and are turned away from God and in rebellion to him. As a result, we are under condemnation. This is true our condition. If we are evil we produce evil words/fruit. If we are good, we produce good words/fruit. Our words and deeds are evidence of the state of our heart, so in this sense, they justify or condemn us i.e. they reveal the true condition of our heart - by their fruit you will know them. The state of our heart is why we are justified or condemned.

Once I got a better handle on this passage, I found it very exciting. Why? Because it indicates living the Christian life is not something we must or can do in our own power but only by God's power, spirit, love, etc. are we able to live for God. If we wish to bear much fruit we don't double down in our efforts to do good, we double down on our faith in God's offer of love. The more his love gets ahold of our hearts the more good fruit we bear. It is his love (our belief in it for us) that produces fruit, not our efforts. 

For a fuller discussion on this, the following posts should help. 

Empowered by what...

It all depends on God and you

Love is power

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¹So what exactly was the evil Christ was referring to? It was the evil of being in rebellion to God results in our disconnection from Him. The biggest evidence is our refusal of his offer of restoration. Note the passage says "you being evil" and does not say you doing evil. He talks about doing later - i.e. "bringing forth" good or evil things - as the fruit of being evil. Distrust of God is evidence of a rebellious/evil heart. 

If we are made to be in union with God and disconnected from that union, we are broken and are missing what we were designed to have - God in all His endless love. As a result, we break/hurt others. 

This is the essence and heart of evil; to do things that harm others because we are not in union with our Creator as we were designed to be. We have chosen to be our own god versus having faith in the only true God. We live contrary to God's design of complete dependence/Union with Him. We are like a fish designed to live in pure life giving water, but living in water full of mud. We blindly thrash about harming others and ultimately ourselves and eventually die. 

When we are not in union with the perfectly loving God we cannot do the things God designed us to do. Out of the void of a broken and empty heart only comes broken actions and words - evil - not good loving actions and words. As a result, we are under a state of condemnation if we are not in Christ.

Christ is clearly saying it is impossible for good fruit to come from an evil heart. A thorn bush cannot bear apples or oranges no matter how hard it trys because it is a thorn Bush. 

If a heart is good it will bear good fruit. In other words, good fruit is evidence of a good heart, a heart that has been made righteous and set free from the requirement of perfect obedience in order to be approved and accepted by God. Good words do not cause one to be righteous but are evidence someone already is righteous by Christ's efforts.

Elsewhere Christ stated, "...Whoever abides in me and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit, for apart from me you can do nothing. - John 15:5 ESV

It is not possible to produce good fruit unless we - the branches - are connected to or in union with the vine - abiding in God.

²What does Christ mean by "good person"? He is simply describing someone whose heart has been changed through union with God and is now abiding in Him and His love. 

When we abide in him we produce good fruit i.e. do good deeds. It is the organic and inevitable outcome of that union because God is the source of life, love, and all things. To be "plugged in" to Him and His love makes us loving in the way God is and originally designed/created us to be i.e. The Father is the Vine keeper, Christ is the Vine through which life flows, and we are the branches through which life - God's very own life - is manifest in and through us as fruit i.e. loving acts - good deeds.

Thank you!

For those following my blog, thank you for your support! 

Thanks to you, we just past 37,000 reads of our posts and continue to see those reads steadily grow, averaging 1000 reads a month from around the world. At our present rate, we are on track to have over 50,000 reads by this time next year (i.e. *Dec 2021). Feel free to invite friends to join you and subscribe to this blog as we learn to honor God more together. 

!!!

Yours for advancing God's glory one step at a time. 

Jim Deal

p.s. If you are not already and wish to subscribe, click here - it's free! We post one new article a week on average. 

*UPDATE: We just passed 55k views since I posted this originally just 3 weeks ago. The vast majority of the reads are coming from Russia. I usually get visits from all around the world (the internet is an interesting place). At first, I thought it was some kind of distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attack but the hits are pretty evenly distributed over a few hours on my two recent posts a week apart. Time will tell, but it appears legit. If so, glad to see my site reaching as many as possible, around the world. At this rate, I will far exceed the originally projected 50k reads in 11 months. Again, thank you!! By the way, there is a site visit counter on the bottom left of my main page. 

UPDATE - 4/17/21: We just pasted 60000!! Thank you!

UPDATE - 10/8/21: We just pasted 76000!! Thank you!

Empowered by what

Are we empowered to live for God by faith, love, His Spirit, or God's promises? Yes - all the above. Though all of these might seem unique and separate, they are very much connected. 

By faith: No matter how much we are loved by God - and as his children, we are perfectly and infinitely loved - if we do not believe in this infinite love God ¹has for us - demonstrated in sending His Son - that love will never "land," take hold of, transform and empower us. Our faith is vital. God calls us to believe. The expression The just shall live by it is repeated several times in both the Old and New Testament for good reason.

Love: We are designed to be in union with God, who is the God of love as Father and Son gazing upon the beauty and majesty of the other in, by, and through the Spirit. Because we are like God, designed (and able) to take part in this love fest within our triune God, we must receive infinite love - in the same way the Father and Son receive it in and from each other - to operate as He designed us to. Without abiding in Him - who is love - we can do nothing (Jn 15:5); we can not love as God loves and truly honor God and put Him on display according to He greatness. When we receive his love we come to life and become loving. ¹His love empowers us to love others. We love him because he first loved us and empowers us to love others because of and by this very same love.

His Spirit: How does God's Spirit empower us? It is the Spirit - passion - love of God that flows out of God's love for Himself as Father and Son in, by and through the Spirit. The Spirit - who is the essence of God and is God - reveals God's love to us which move's us to love Him in return and then others.

God's promises: God says - i.e. promises - He loves us. He demonstrated this most clearly and loudly by sending his Son. His Son demonstrated this by giving up his life so we might be restored back to his Fathers love. God says when we are in Christ absolutely nothing can now separate us from this love. That all things - including the hard or even evil things we might go through - still work for our good. That "good" is not necessarily experiencing good circumstances but becoming more like Christ. 

Becoming like Christ is the best and highest good we can attain to. The more we do the more we partake of God's infinite love set upon us in the same way Christ does. This is what He promises and what we are called to believe. If we do not believe these things-promises, we will never tap into the love that is there and is always being poured out on us in unending abundance. 

And why is this important? To be like Christ is to be in perfect alignment with the Father and experience the perfect bliss of that union between the Father,  Son, and the Spirit who pours out His love in and on us, and out through us to others. Theses are the promises God makes to us.

What is the common connection between all of these? 

Love! And not just any love, but the infinite and perfect love of God between Father, Son, in, by and through the Spirit poured out on us, in us, and through us because of Christ. 

For a fuller discussion on the promises of God click here

For a fuller discussion of living by faith click here.

For a fuller discussion on being empowered by God's love click here.

For a fuller discussion on how God uses even our poor choices to achieve our highest good click here.

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¹Which he not only tells us repeatedly but showed us by sending His Son who willingly sacrificed Himself to restore us back to his Fathers love.

²If you look closely at the greatest commandment - particularly in Deuteronomy - where the quotes in all the gospels are taken from - it starts with "Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one." In order to Love God and our neighbor as we are designed and called to, it starts with God; recognizing he is perfect union (one), harmony, love - i.e. one God but also one being and one purpose among three persons. He is the source-Lord of all things.

For more on the union of God in being and purpose click here.

Friends

John 15:9 As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you. Abide in my love. 10 If you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love, just as I have kept my Father's commandments and abide in his love. 11 These things I have spoken to you, that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be full.

12 “This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. 13 Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends. 14 You are my friends if you do what I command you. 15 No longer do I call you servants,[a] for the servant does not know what his master is doing; but I have called you friends, for all that I have heard from my Father I have made known to you. 
12 “This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. 13 Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends. 14 You are my friends if you do what I command you. 15 No longer do I call you servants,[a] for the servant does not know what his master is doing; but I have called you friends, for all that I have heard from my Father I have made known to you. 

"As the Father has loved me, - Jesus - so have I loved you. Abide in my love." - Jesus

What is the nature of the Father's love for His Son? Is it not an infinite, unrelenting, boundless, and perfect love? Is it not eternal bliss, overflowing with joy? It is indeed! 

This is exactly the same love - indicated by "as...so" in the above verse - that the Son has for us.  Christ is telling - and promising - this same love (the Father's love for the Son) is his love for us. Do you believe!? Selah... ponder this for a moment. Read it over and over until it stirs and delights your heart... "faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the word" - i.e. promise - of God-Christ. Rom 10:17

If you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commandments and abide in his love.

In carrying out the will of another, we are aligning ourselves, our desires, and conduct with their wishes and desires. It is how we show our love, respect for, and delight in them. And when we do we more fully partake of - abide in - the love they have for us. This is what relationships are all about - the giving and receiving of love.

Our keeping the commandments of God the Son and Christ keeping the commandments of God the Father is how we both participate in the joy the Father has in the Son by the Spirit. This is a mutually shared interest we have with Christ - a key reason we are friends. We both desire to honor the Father we love, with our words and actions.

These things I have spoken to you, that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be full.

And what is the joy of the Son? It is the mutual joy of friendship - union - with the Father. The Son delights in the Father and the Father delights in the Son. They share a mutual delight in each other (a mutually shared interest is the essence of friendship). And it is this very same joy that we are invited to enter into, partake of, and share. This common interest that we share with Christ makes us friends.

“This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you.

As the Father has loved the Son and the Son has loved us so we are to love each other. The early verses spell out that love. This verse talks about how this love flows out from us to others. 

And how has the Father loved the Son and the Son loved us? Sacrificially. They both ¹gave up something they loved and valued greatly - a mutual, perfect, unobstructed union with each other - for the benefit of another i.e. us. They valued another's benefit and interests - ours - more than their own.  

The Father sent the Son - of his eternal union, infinite love, and unfettered communion - away from himself and down to earth to be with us. The Son left the Father of infinite love, became a man, took his body and the life it possessed, and laid it down for us so we might have the same love relationship with the Father of infinite love and delight. Christ wanted to share with us what he valued and delighted in most - the Father - and gave up something he valued, to do so i.e. his own life and unobscured fellowship with His Father, as the next verse confirms.

Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends.

You are my friends if you do what I command you.

The central component of friendship is mutually shared interests. Friends share the same values, interests, and desires. What is that mutual interest that we and Christ share? A desire to bring honor and pleasure to the Father by following His will, desire, and commandments.

No longer do I call you servants, for the servant does not know what his master is doing; but I have called you friends, for all that I have heard from my Father I have made known to you.

The father is not only the ²Sovereign head - the master/Lord - over all things, he is also our friend. The secret things that only the Son knows and hears from the Father are shared with us.

When someone lets you in on who they are, their most intimate personal joys, desires, and secrets they are opening up and sharing their heart with you. They are even making themselves vulnerable. This is what friends do and only what friends do. We do not share our secret dreams, joys, and desires with strangers. Nor does God.

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¹Ironically in so doing they experienced their own value and joy for each other more.

²To be friends with someone doesn't mean you are equals in skill or ability but in interests, values, and desires. You both have an interest in the same things. For us and Christ, that mutually shared value is love for the Father and a desire to honor Him. And how do we honor him?  How do we honor anyone we love? By doing what they ask us to do. We share this in common with Christ which makes us friends.

When God or Christ reveals something secret about themselves to us this is a gesture of friendship.

The key to friendship is mutual or common interests. In this sense the Father, Son and Spirit are friends and have been from all eternity past. We also are friends with God if we desire what he desires i.e. his honor and glory.  And when we do he reveals himself to us and shares himself with us.

Loneliness is not a characteristic of imperfection but of perfection. The Father and Son are not alone - and never were at any time - but they are friends and we are like him/them. We are not designed to be alone but to be in relationship just as the Father and Son are in a relationship of mutually shared interests. To participate in their friendship is to be like them; to be friends.

It all depends on God and you

You may have heard the following…

Pray as if it all depends on God and work as if ¹it all depends on you; because it does... both of them.

Is this true? If so, how do we reconcile this seemingly contradictory and paradoxical statement? Can we?

First, God is the cause - driving force behind all things. As Paul under the Spirit's inspiration said,

“...For from him and through him and to him are all things. To him be glory forever...” Amen. Rom 11:36

All that we are and have comes from God, is by Him, and points back to Him. Nothing exists or happens without God and outside His perfect rule.

This includes our obedience. It is God who works in us to will and do of his good pleasure... so work out your salvation (which is already ²fully ours in Christ... this means we are to bring forth in practice what God has already declared about us i.e. we are perfectly righteous in Christ, so live accordingly) with fear and trembling.

Why fear and trembling? Not because we are afraid we'll lose our salvation but because obedience matters and honoring God matters. There is significance to our conduct that has real consequences,  either positive or negative, for God, others and ourselves. 

Phil 2:12 Therefore, my beloved, as you have always obeyed, so now, not only as in my presence but much more in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling, 13 for it is God who works in you, both to will and to work for his good pleasure. 

Our "work" is to believe God, what he says about himself and us. He says He is the almighty all-loving all wise God and his love is set upon us in Christ. It never stops no matter what we do or don't do and no matter what our circumstances. Nothing happens to us, in us, or through us without His complete care and rule. The more we believe this, the more his love and power are released in and through us to others. 

Make no mistake, it is only by God's love, which empowers us, that we are able to faithfully follow him. But we must believe God's love and His claims about his care and control and act accordingly, in order to partake of and participate in this power. We must receive His love - by faith - in order to give love i.e. for it to empower us...we play a major part in how God empowers us. We must believe Him and His promise, that nothing, no adversity, no challenge, no pain can or will ever separate us from God's loving care and will. To believe this, is our part in obedience. Without faith, we will not subjectively and consciously take part in what he freely extends to us in Christ… his full and perfect love, care, and guidance.

What is it exactly we must believe about God and ourselves that makes this work?

God - He is the all-wise, all-powerful, all-loving, and everywhere present God. He is working in all things, at all times to advance our greatest good and His greatest glory regardless of how it might appear to the contrary. All things are from, through, and to him. To him be the glory forever, Amen!! There are no exceptions. Full stop!

Us - We are his image-bearers, perfectly accepted, valued, and loved in Christ. Nothing we did, do, or don't do can change this. This is based on Christ and that we are in his image. This is who God made us be – first by creating us like Himself in key ways and second by restoring us by grace to Himself in and through Christ - and therefore it is a fixed reality. It is not based on anything we did, are doing, or will do; ever (other than simply believing it is true). He made us in His image and considers us worth his love, enough to send His Son to die in our place and restore us.  So much so that we were told by Christ Himself we are loved by God in the very same way he loves his Son 🤯. Christ's words, not mine!!!

To fully experience all God designed for us, and seeks to do in, and through us, we must believe all God says about us, to us, and for us, and about Himself regarding us. When we do, we will act (obey) accordingly, and the more we believe the more faithfully - full of faith - our pursuit of him will be i.e. we act/obey, regardless of how challenging it may be.

So while God is the driving force and cause and everything depends on Him, we are the means by and through which He works to bring about His good purposes and it is through our trust in this God, He works to accomplish this i.e. *it all depends on us...our trust in who he claims to be for us.

John 6:28 Then they said to him (Jesus), “What must we do, to be doing the works of God?” 29 Jesus answered them, “This is the work of God, that you believe in him whom he has sent.”

Related posts:

Faith is hard work

The necessity of faith in an infinite God

Obedience... the fruit of abiding

The strength for self-denial

The fight of faith

The necessity of choice 

The spiritual and our spirit

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¹This is why man is always fully accountable for all his actions. He may not possess the power to obey God but he does possess a will by which he can either choose to believe what God says about himself and us or refuse to believe. Which one we choose determines how we will live and how we live, we are fully accountable for. No one else is.

²His love is always there objectively if we are in Christ but we won't experience it subjectively until we believe, receive and act upon it.

Love is power

Love is power. To be more precise, it is God's love that empowers us to pursue and honor him.

So how exactly does this work?

We are created by and for God. For us to operate as we were designed we must be in perfect union with God, who is the source of love, life, and all things. Without being “plugged in” we only are operating on ¹temporary borrowed power.

Because we are ²finite in our love, life, and all things, it is not possible for us to love with sacrificial infinite love in our own strength. God ³alone is the source of endless love. If we are to love with God's love, we must have God's love flowing to, in, and through us.

And how does this occur? In and through Christ. It is because of Christ, God's love is freely and fully extended to us. If and when we choose to believe and receive it, it is poured out in us and out to others through us. But not without Christ. Without Christ, we are disconnected from God and therefore also from His perfect infinite love. 

For a further discussion on being empowered from within, click here. 

For a further discussion on the strength needed for self-denial, click here. 

Additional comments in footnotes below.

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¹What do I mean by borrowed power? Everything we are, have and use to sustain ourselves emotionally and physically comes from God, whether we acknowledge this or not. He gives us these things as an expression of his love for us. If we refuse to recognize - believe - this, we will go into eternity without all that we now have and are i.e. it's temporary and borrowed. If we do not recognize this we will eventually lose it. We will go into eternity with only the memory of the things that we had and were, but no longer have (we may still be who we are now with all our gifts and abilities but no way to utilize them to derive a sense of value). This will be the essence of hell - an ongoing memory and constant reminder of what we used to but no longer have use of. We will be in a perpetual state of unfulfilled longing and endless thirst with nothing to quench it. This is the natural outcome of enjoying the good gifts of God in creation now without rightfully acknowledging him as the Giver of these and all things. 

²Though within ourselves we are finite in giving love, we have the capacity to receive and experience infinite love - only because God is infinite and created us like himself so we might partake of him. Because we can receive endless love, we can give it also. 

But apart from God, we do not have within ourselves infinite love to give to others i.e. only God is the source of love, not us. To give infinite love, we must first receive and partake of infinite love. And that is only within and from God. He alone is perfect, none stop love. He alone is the great I AM, the Alpha and Omega, the cause and end (goal) for all things. Because we are finite we must be plugged into the infinite source to partake of infinite love and in turn pass it on to others. 

We are like the batteries in a cell phone or electric car.

They can hold power but are not the power source. Overtime they run down and must be recharged. But when fully charged, can accomplish amazing things. If not charged they are a paperweight at best. 

We were not designed to be the source of infinite love, only the container or conduit of it i.e. vessels of God. But, if we are plugged into the source, we can be the means by which infinite love - God's love - flows through us to others. The ⁴more plugged in we are - through believing and receiving God's infinite love - the more His love flows to and through us, and the greater we advance His reign of love - kingdom - and become all we were designed to be.

³God is - and has been throughout all eternity past - an infinite, overflowing fountain of endless love within and among the Father and Son in, by, and through the Spirit. This was most clearly displayed in and through Christ.

⁴The more we believe and receive God's infinite love the greater our capacity to contain infinite love, i.e. unlike regular batteries, the size of our battery (our capacity) can expand with increased use, allowing us to receive and contain more love. God is always seeking to increase our capacity to receive and give love... to stretch and grow our faith. This is often best accomplished through pain and suffering. This is the essence of spiritual formation, aka sanctification. 

God doesn't need us, He delights in us

God doesn't need us but he does want and enjoy us. So why would God want us and how can he enjoy us if he doesn't need us?

God is not like we are. He operates on a totally different - infinitely higher plane than we do. We operate ¹out of need as finite, dependent creatures but God operates out of fullness i.e. overflow as the infinite giver and sustainer of life, love, and all things.

God enjoys us because he is a being of perfect and unlimited joy who from all eternity past gives and receives love, honor, and delight among the Father, Son, and Spirit. He is perfect fullness and love. He is perfect community. He is perfect contentment, joy, and bliss. He is life and the Source of life for everything else.

God doesn't need us because he has ²himself. He is not just full but overflowing. 

But, because he is a community of overflowing love and delight - he desires others share in the glory and joy of who he is as a perpetual overflow of love, glory, joy, and delight. 

When someone else finds delight in Him and partakes of His delight in Himself, He is delighted for them, by them, and in them. He loves it when others partake of His love, joy, and glory. 

In short, both God's independence from us and desire for us is because he has himself i.e. He is not only complete as a being, he is overflowing because of His completeness/perfection. He is perfect in love, glory, and joy. And because He is, He desires we too partake of Him and the fullness of His joy - bliss. 

In summary:

God loves perfectly because he is perfect love as Father, Son, and Spirit. He wants us to partake in Him.

God is independent. He doesn't need us because he is interdependent, self-sufficient, and overflowing within the Godhead. But is also overflowing to others for the same reason.

For related discussions about God see the following:

The importance and necessity of the Trinity 

The essence of God's life 

Thoughts on the Trinity 

Overview of Jonathan Edwards theology.

Why do the Father and Son love each other?

How are love and life connected

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¹Because we operate out of need it is hard for us to comprehend and relate to someone that only and perpetually operates out of perfect fullness and overflow. We simply can not relate to this from our own experience i.e. it is not how we operate as dependent but broken image-bearers of God.

²To be loved by the most perfect being is to be loved perfectly. Christ is the perfect image of the Father and therefore most highly regarded and loved by the Father. In response, Christ adores the Father in whose perfect image he is. He also desires we know and experience the Father in the same way - to the same extent - he experiences Him. 

To be loved perfectly is to be in a state of complete fullness, bliss, and contentment. This results in God overflowing in love which moves Him to share Himself with others – as Father, Son, and Spirit - so we - His image-bearers - can also participate in this (His) state of blissful union.

What does it mean to be broken?

What does it mean to be broken and living in a broken world? It means we are no longer consciously, deliberately, or personally connected to the Source of life, love, and all things and, therefore, are no longer fully functional. It is like still having eyes or ears that no longer work as designed. 

It also means the rest of creation itself is "in bondage" (broken). 

We no longer function at our maximum capacity - nor does the rest of creation. We are like a highly efficient and beautifully designed catamaran with no wind or sea... or a powerful and precisely engineered flashlight with no batteries... or a gloriously decorated Christmas tree sitting unplugged in the dark. Each of these has great intrinsic value with the capacity to do far more, but their potential can never be realized without being coupled with the energy (love) they are designed to operate by.

When we do not operate according to our true design, we may still function, but at a very limited level, if at all. To use an overused but familiar word, we are dysfunctional - i.e. We are broken. 

You may put a catamaran up on stands, hook things up - not the sails - even lavishly decorate it, and live inside it, but you will never experience the full benefit of what it is designed to do, i.e., sail the world experiencing great adventure and beauty.

Without God, we can still function at some level, but nowhere near the capacity we were designed to. And no matter how well we fix up the outside or inside of our catamaran to make it more attractive and comfortable - even luxurious - we will always have a sense that there is far more to be engaged in than what we are experiencing.

As Augustine said, "You (God) have made us for yourself, and our hearts are restless until they can find rest in you."

For a discussion on how we are fully loved yet fully broken click here. 

For a discussion on how to be freed from our brokenness click here

For a discussion on how it's impossible to live for God in our own strength click here. 

For a discussion on how we are free yet bound click here

How to fix fake news

We have all heard the expression “fake news” in the last few years. Who makes the assertion doesn’t really matter. The fact that it’s made at all tells us things must change.  

If we are ever to return to sanity in the news, getting to the truth must be our goal, not ratings or doing a favor for someone. The following are some items I find overlooked or ignored regularly that prevent this from happening. A clear list of standards in determining truth is vital and must be established to assess the accuracy of any report and restore confidence that when we hear a report, it is fact, actual news.

The ultimate guideline is laid out for us in the Bible itself. Here are at least two expressions of that standard.

Exodus 20:16 “You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor” (which happens to be one of the 10 commandments). 

Matt 18:16 "But if he does not listen, take one or two others along with you, that every charge may be established by the evidence of two or three witnesses."

So what must be done to help us get to the truth in the news arena?

*First we must distinguish between reporting facts and an op-ed i.e. An opinion piece or opinion editorial. The is very little actual true reporting today on both sides of the political spectrum. What is usually promoted most are opinion pieces.

Though opinion pieces have their place and value they don't always get to the facts. They interpret the meaning of certain events. They can be good to stimulate discussion in a healthier environment but in today's climate, it usually results in disagreement and division. True reporting is simply giving facts regarding an event, not some of them, or most of them but all of them. A good reporter will even say, "this is what we know so far...As more comes in we'll bring it to you hear at XYZ News. Tune in tomorrow for the latest update..." This was common as recently as 30 years ago. Not so much today, if at all.

*The best facts are those that can be substantiated by an eyewitness i.e. those who have 1st hand knowledge of the facts or better yet confirmed by the source itself - though even a source is not always reliable e.g. They may be coerced to say something that is not true to avoid a greater consequence than their "report" or "confession" - such as torture, bribery or some other threat.

Nevertheless, the best source for accuracy comes from the party involved in the action, coercion aside. It doesn't matter if this is a willful admission or unintentional. Documentation of an event either in writing, audibly or visually, acquired or disseminated by a 3rd party - e.g. WikiLeaks, or OMG (O'Keefe Media Group, formally with Project Veritas) - is still an admission by the party committing the act even if an unintentional admission. 

*Reporting only some facts, not all of them - and often withholding other facts, totally changes the understanding of an event.  What they share may be true as far as it goes but it doesn't cover everything relevant to the issue. Partial reporting of facts may give the appearance of being truthful, but is often the most subtle form of lying. This is what we call a “half-truth.” These kinds of reports usually contain information taken totally out of context. When you tell only part of the story, you can claim someone said pretty much anything you want to.

*A witness that openly and willingly identifies themselves is always far more reliable than an anonymous "source" whose identity or motive cannot be confirmed. A witness who openly identifies themselves has "skin in the game" i.e. Their reputation is on the line - or sometimes far more - making it far more likely they are telling the truth. If they're not willing to put their neck on the line, their testimony should carry far less weight.

*Multiple witnesses are far better than a single one. But they still must produce evidence for their reports/claims e.g. 10 liars are still liars. One person with hard evidence trumps (no pun intended) an unlimited number of liars. More liars in agreement in their report doesn't make it more true. Just because several are making a claim, without hard evidence we can't assume it's true. But this is often the method used today to mislead us. 

*Facts are facts regardless of who reports them. Many good facts are being promoted by outlets or persons with opposing views, but are ignored simply because those outlets or persons have been discredited by their opposition or competition through false accusations. This results in others never considering the facts themselves. If all the facts are given, they stand on their own two feet regardless of who gives them. We should never be afraid of facts only cautious of the reporter.

*It helps to keep in mind that the "news" is also in the sales business. The more sensational the news the more viewers they draw which brings in more revenue from advertisement. I'm not saying advertisement in itself is necessarily bad as long as integrity is a priority. Strong advertisement revenues should be the fruit of doing a good job and not what drives the story.

In conclusion, I find it best to wait 48 hours after an initial report so it can be scrutinized more closely before I assess its accuracy. Those who rush to put out a story may be motivated to set and control the narrative. News stations wish to be the first out the gate with a story, but premature opinions on events, before all the facts are in and reviewed can have incredibly negative consequences and are highly irresponsible. When all the facts come out contrary to the early views pushed, it's too late. Misinformation that goes out first tends to stick as fact. The following clip of a police cam on the Floyd arrest is a recent example. Even if there is a retraction - which rarely happens - the damage has already been done. Worse yet the bad initial reports still circulate indefinitely even after the facts prove they were completely wrong. This happens way too often – especially with police-related matters - and is why many official news outlets have lost their credibility.

These are things I always look for when assessing any "news." These all may seem obvious and common sense but they are ignored regularly so I felt it was worth raising. Many things that are put forth today as facts do not pass a rigorous application of these tests, if they are applied at all.

Even the so-called fact-checkers often don't pass the "test" of this list. I have seen many reports by "official" news sources that turned out to be garbage after being scrutinized more closely. Long established outlets often depend on their "official” status as a reputable source or on self proclaimed "fact-checkers" instead of actual facts to persuade the public. As a result, they often do poor work… in many cases very harmful work.

Last, the above list should be something everyone agrees on regardless of your political bent. This is not a list that favors one side over another. It favors getting to the truth, which everyone should agree to and want. Truth is always better than lies.

For a discussion on the history behind fake news click here.