Beginning and the End

Kay and I were silently and intently focused on Doc Ryan’s message yesterday as we were adding more miles to our lifelong adventures in faith. It was evidently and undeniably important how many times and places the Kingdom reality of discipleship continues to surface in our culture from any and every messaging portal.

Something that has been very strong in my heart and mind for many weeks now is the divine virtue of, “finishing right.” You have heard me and others say repeatedly, “It is not about how well you start, it is about how well you finish.” I am fully convinced the two enduring character traits embraced by those who actually accomplish this Godly goal are allegiance and endurance.

I often reflect on the story of Saul versus David for examples of how these things were done, done right, done wrong, and not done. Here are just a few footnotes for you to consider and study out on your own later:

• Saul was hand-picked by God as the first king in His theocratic government, given the enormously valuable honor of being the most highly exalted person in the entire nation, AND… being the first to embody the unique role of interceding between the nation and the Most High God.
  God intended for Saul’s lineage to be the royal bloodline, but rejected him (in deep regret) because Saul could not (or would not) maintain his sole allegiance to Yahweh. “Then the word of the LORD came to Samuel, saying, ‘I regret that I have made Saul king, for he has turned away from following Me and has not carried out My instructions.’” (1 Samuel 15:10-11 BSB)
• Saul’s beginning was filled with humility and divine election, and it ended in a miserable death for him and many innocent people including his Godly son Jonathan the covenant friend of David. Saul started well but finished terribly because he did not endure the pressures of life and did not maintain his allegiance.
• David was hand-picked by God as the successor of the publicly failed dynasty of Saul. David was chosen because his heart was fully allegiant towards Yahweh throughout his entire life. “After removing Saul, He raised up David as their king and testified about him: ‘I have found David son of Jesse a man after My own heart; he will carry out My will in its entirety.’” (Acts 13:22 BSB)
• David never did trade his loyalty in God for any other god’s temptations… BUT failed in the endurance category. David was lulled into sexual and moral failures, which eventually led to unique wickedness, deception, and the premeditated murder of one of his closest friends. This precipitously led to rape and incest among his children (possibly in his own palace) and with his own wives as targeted victims as well. Sadly, multiple civil wars were initiated by estranged sons leading political coups that cost the lives of nearly a hundred thousand Jews during the sad ending of David’s sordid political career.
• David started well… a renowned giant slayer supernaturally empowered by covenant allegiance and loving humility, a story told by billions of people for thousands of years. BUT, David did not end well.
• “King David was very old; even when they covered him with blankets, he could not get warm.” (1 Kings 1:1 NET) In his youth, he slayed a giant with a single stone because his heart was all-in for Yahweh, but at the end of his turbulent life, he could not even defeat the cool air and needed help from a teenage girl (verse 2).

My desire for all of you: Undying and complete allegiance in all areas of your heart and life. Additionally, to be that way until the very last breath and so endure through every storm and temptation.

How does one get there?

The historical accounts of the Biblical figures enumerate and highlight the very low percentage of believers who accomplished both allegiance and endurance. But something changed all that after the New Birth and Pentecost transition was graciously and gloriously initiated by the selfless sacrifice of Jesus our Savior who was resurrected as Jesus our High King. The numbers flip, it seems. In the story of the first ekklesia and the spread of the Gospel, it seemed that the “new normal” in those days was for believers to be fully allegiant and to endure until the very end… even in torturous martyrdom.

What was the difference between the folks in the Old Covenant generally failing and/or falling into apostasy and these ragamuffin low-brow outcasts of the New Covenant seemingly rocking it?

Spirit-filled discipleship.

I have lived in and around the church world since 1980 and my peepers have seen more than I want to admit, especially when it comes to the number of those who abandon or badly misrepresent the authentic Faith of Christ or (painfully) both. I am in the minority of bible college graduates from my two years ending in 1999 who are actively (and passionately) advancing the Kingdom. Being born again by itself does not produce divine results until the end. Being Spirit-filled does not “magically” do it either. The Biblical and experiential truth is that one MUST be sincerely born again with a loyal profession of lifelong allegiance to the LORD (Lord means Lord) Jesus. AND then be humble and submitted enough to give their soul (mind, emotions, will, personality) over to the “infilling” of the precious and powerful Holy Spirit. AND THEN be submitted, for life, to transformative, invasive, accountable, corrective, intimate, and comforting discipleship under the stability of true covenant commitment.

Here is an excerpt from Craig Keener in The Bible in its Context:

But in Matthew’s Gospel, we do not make disciples the way most Jewish teachers in his day made disciples. We make disciples not for ourselves but for our Lord Jesus Christ (23:8)… Does the promise that Jesus will be with us “till the end of the age” (28:20) imply that once the age ends he will no longer be with us? Such an idea would miss entirely the point of the text. Jesus is promising to be with us in carrying out his commission (28:19); that must be accomplished before the age ends (24:14), so the nations can be judged according to how they have responded to this message (25:31-32).

We deeply and rightly desire there to be justice for ourselves and our world because of the intrusive evils that seem to darken the sunrise and sunset of most days under the clouds of deception, especially when we see the devastating and destructive targeting of our youth and children by the minions (and useful idiots) of satan, the adversary, masquerading as a pretty angel of light. But, the solution is making disciples, not making people mad.

Jesus’ overly-used and out-of-context promise to, “never (God-word) leave us or forsake us,” was specifically spoken to the disciples who were commissioned to make disciples. I am convinced that Jesus’ proximity in one’s life is the culmination of having the new birth, being filled with the Spirit (and Word), and making disciples. Jesus’ close proximity will naturally produce the fruits of allegiance and endurance just like it did in Him. An “elder” is one who has walked closely with the Lord for so long that Jesus rubbed off on them…

Shepherds who shepherd shepherds that are shepherding shepherds with and for the Great Shepherd. Do I sound like Doc Ryan?

Then Jesus came to them and said, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to Me. Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey all that I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, even to the end of the age.”

Matthew 28:18-20 BSB

In Great Love,
Steve