You can't have the Father without the Son

        So I've had quite a few conversations with people who say that they believe in God, or a "higher power" but yet reject Jesus. Well it's one thing to believe in God, and  a completely different thing to know God. Let me tell you why I think that it is impossible to base a faith on God that rejects Jesus. I've already talked about the historical reliability of the New Testament (Historical Reliability of the New Testament) and so I trust that the people who wrote in it genuinely believed what they were writing (eye witness accounts of the life of Jesus and the things that he taught).

        In the New Testament we see things like Jesus was the radiance of the glory of God and the exact imprint of His (the Father's) nature, and that anything that was created was created by Jesus (Hebrews 1:2,3; John 1:3). But what did Jesus say about Himself? Well in John 14 we see one such instance. Jesus has been with his disciples for almost 3 years and they've grown quite fond of Him. Who wouldn't after seeing and benefiting from some of the miracles that He performed. Not only that but they were beginning to understand who Jesus was and what it was that he came to do (save people from their sin and reconcile sinful people to a holy and righteous God [John 3:16-18; 2 Corinthians 5:17; Romans 5:23-27]). But something that Jesus is saying here can be directly applied to people who say they believe in God but not Jesus. 1)Jesus is not discouraging people's faith in God, he is simply trying to point it in the right direction. Verse 1 says. "You believe in God; believe also in me." Don't get me wrong, it's good to believe in God, but I think that it's very important to be sure that what you believe is true. There are a lot of people out there saying some pretty crazy things about God and Jesus. 

         He then goes on to tell them that He is going to be leaving, referring to His ascension to heaven (Acts 1:9). Now Thomas who had placed his faith in this Messiah was confused. He didn't know where he was going and wether or not he could follow Him. 2) We see here the way to know the Father. Jesus tells Thomas that he is the way to the Father and that no one can come to the Father except through the door, that is Jesus. Jesus also says that if you know Him then you will know the Father. Well Thomas, like most people of every time and culture, wanted to see God but he is still confused. He asked Jesus, "Show us the Father and that is enough for us." Jesus' response to Thomas is one that all people need to let sink deep into their brains, He says, "Have I been among you all this time without you knowing Me, Philip? The one who has seen me has seen the Father."

        Here we see Jesus' equality with God. He says that if you see him you see the Father. You can't accept the Father and not accept Jesus and vise versa. You may accept a god that rejects Jesus but all you are doing is accepting your own idea of God, and not the true God. John, the author of this Gospel goes into greater detail in his epistle, 1 John. One of the reasons that John wrote this epistle is so that people could have fellowship with the Father and Jesus (1:3). He also wrote it to remind people that if you have placed your faith in the person and work of Jesus Christ, your sins are forgiven (2:1,2,12). But something that he makes very clear is that you cannot have the Father without Jesus Christ. In 2:21,22,23 John is writing to people who have placed their faith in the true God says, "I have not written to you because you do not know the truth, but because you do know it, and because no lie comes from the truth....No one who confesses the son has the Father; he who confesses the Son has the Father as well." Also 5:12 tells us that, "The one who has the Son has life. The one who doesn't have the Son of God does not have life."

        To the one that says they can believe in God without accepting Christ I leave these things to your conscience. But I can say what John says in 1 John 5:20, "...we know that the Son of God has come and has given us understanding so that we may know the true One. We are in the true One-that is, in His Son Jesus Christ. He is the true God and eternal life."

        Jesus is the true God and faith in Him leads to eternal life. Think about it!

Verbal salt shakers

        How often do we hurt people's feelings with out even realizing it? Sometimes I wonder if the filter between our brains and our mouths is working, or if some people even have one. 

        Colossians 4:6 says, "Let your speech always be gracious, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how you ought to answer each person." The immediate context for this verse is for people who have accepted Christ as their Savior.  So many times people are turned away from Jesus because of a poor representation of who Jesus is on the part of the Christian. I think that we forget who it is that we represent, Jesus. The way that we act towards unbelievers effects their view of who Christ is. 

        In bible times salt was used as a preservative. We dump it on our food now mostly to clog our artories, but back then it was used to preserve meat (they didn't have refridgeraters ). What Paul is saying to the believer in Christ is that if what you are about to say does not lead to the preservation of the individual listening, we should probably keep our mouths shut. All that we speak should point to Jesus, and be consistent with the new nature that He has given us (Ephesians 4:22-24). 

2 Corinthians 5:17 tells us that if anyone is in Christ he is a new creation, the old things have passed away, and new things have come. If we would live consistently with the fact that that has happened to us I think that we would be more prone to be verbal salt shakers, preserving the people that hear us speak.

Lastly we see in James 3:8-12 that the tongue of man next to impossible to tame. With it we bless our Lord and curse our brother. He tells us in verse 10 that it should not be this way. He gives a natural spring as an example, it can't produce spring water and salt water at the same time. You are either one or the other. The funny thing about salt water is that it is in no way refreshing, like spring water is. Jesus said that what comes out of a man stems from the heart (Matthew 15:18-20). What makes up the majority of your speech? How do you talk to people? I think that the heart of the issue is that we all have a problem with the heart, it is corrupted by sin and it needs to be transformed by the power of Jesus (2 Corinthians 5:15-21).