The Good-O-Meter

An Encounter with Jesus

You might be a professing Christian with several years or decades of experience, a Pastor, a famous preacher, a church leader, a theologian, a theology student, a new believer or a skeptic - but are you sure that you have heard the pure Gospel (Good News) yet? Listen to these messages with an open heart and receive Jesus Christ (not your traditions/principles/works) as your only anchor, for only in the person Jesus (not in a religion that loves to put people in bondage and condemnation), in His perfectly completed works, will you find true literal liberty.

An Encounter with Jesus: Message by Bertie Brits. Translated to Malayalam by George Varghese.

Click here for more of Bertie Brits' messages, which can be downloaded free of charge.

The Do-Do Christianity - Part I

But be ye doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving your own selves. – James 1:22

We have interpreted this scripture as “be ye doers of the law”. And in an effort to “please God” and/or be justified by God, we zealously jump on the treadmill of law keeping; either Mosaic, traditional, cultural or a mixture of everything and hope that God would be pleased with our tenacity and sincerity.

Just a minor problem though – we cannot pick and choose from the Mosaic Law (the 10 commandments and the 613 laws). We have to keep all the laws; if not, we break all the laws; there is no middle ground. And the laws by the traditions vary from culture to culture. So then, which law must we adhere to?

The bigger question is, will we be justified by our attempts at keeping the law? The Scripture is crystal clear on this topic. We are not justified by the works of the law (Gal 3:11; 2:16). When people asked what they should “do” to do the works of God, Jesus answered, “This is the work of God, that you believe in him whom he has sent” (John 6:28-29 ESV). Jesus fulfilled the law on our behalf and through the crucifixion, He redeemed us from the curses of not keeping the law. Therefore, the assumption that we can be justified with our futile attempts in keeping the Law, stems from ignorance. The Galatians thought they could mix the law with the grace of God. Listen to how Paul responded, “O foolish Galatians, who has bewitched you,…  Are you so foolish? Having begun by the Spirit, are you now being perfected by the flesh?" (Gal 3:1-3 ESV). It is foolishness because we voluntarily invite the curse to our lives when we trust in the law, because it is impossible for us to keep all the laws. We fall from grace [the very gift that saves us from the curse of not keeping the law], when we have the audacity to think that we can be justified by our own works.

Let us ask the Holy Spirit to give the revelation knowledge of who we already are in Christ Jesus. Let us believe that we have been made righteous (right standing with God) apart from our works.

Just like we were made sinners without our effort, we have been made righteous by Jesus, without our effort (see Rom 5:19).

Read the previous paragraph, again and again and allow the truth to sink in to your soul. Let us believe that we are financially prosperous, not because we sow or tithe, but because Jesus became poor for us. Let us believe that we are healthy, not because we pray, fast, work out and eat organic food, but by His stripes only. Our new-creation reality is based on Jesus' finished work on the cross; not the current circumstances, which we perceive by carnal senses. We access this grace through faith. By faith we receive what is freely available to us through Christ Jesus. Faith is not something we manufacture. Faith comes by hearing and hearing by the word of Christ. It's about simply believing what the Cross accomplished. Let us rightly divide the scriptures and meditate on the scriptures which reveals what Jesus Christ has already done for us and who we already are in Him; and get ready to be exploded with the revelation that we do not have to (we can't, even if we tried to) earn our blessings. The Blessing (JESUS) in all His glory is in the believer and the believer in Him, right now.

Does this mean we are to stay idle? Paul says he labored more abundantly than everyone else, but the credit was given to the grace of God that was with him. We cannot bear his fruit without His life flowing in and through us. God can do exceeding abundantly above all that we can ask or think according to His power that is in us – if we let Him. All that we need to be is an yielded vessel who is sensitive to the promptings and guidance of the Holy Spirit. Let us be free from the Do-Do mindset and allow God to do his perfect will in and through us.

Read Part II of this series.

That's My King!

Let's not keep the common sense aside

by Bino Manjasseril, Branch of Vine - A journey from religion to Christ...

I have been listening to the 'growing in grace' podcasts a lot lately. In more than one episodes, I heard Mike Kapler saying, "let's not keep the common sense aside". He says that especially when it comes to obedience and keeping the law.I think, being honest to ourselves is all it takes to come to the conclusion that religion doesn't work. It doesn't matter which religion it is. Each has its own 'ways' to please their god. For some, their god is pleased when they follow certain set of rules, laws, regulations or a list of do's and don'ts. Some gods are pleased when we gather at particular place at a particular time of a week. Some are pleased when we chant some prayers or starve through fasting. Some are pleased when we put some dollar bills into an offering plate. Some are pleased when we confess all our sins.

I am not excluding Christian religion from this. Christians says their god is omnipotent, omnipresent, and omniscient. He is a perfectly holy god. He is self-sufficient. That being the case, isn't it a futile act attempting to please that god through our puny works? Who in their right mind can logically come to a conclusion that they can somehow please god through all these? Not just that, some people think that they can make god angry! As though god has an emotional imbalance or something- easily angered, easily provoked but somehow hard to please.

I feel stupid for believing such a lie for a long time in my life. I thought my god would be pleased when I achieve sinless perfection. I thought I was pleasing him when I did the works of evangelism. I thought, the more I studied the Bible, he is more pleased. The more I set apart a 'quiet time', I thought I can somehow tap into his presence. I thought I could manipulate god through 'effective' prayer (by quoting scriptures, for example). I thought god was a genie who comes out and bless me when I give my money. I kept doing all these for years and years even though I never felt contented nor reached a satisfying point in my life to boldly say that I pleased him. I tried to do all the right things and tried not to do any wrong things to keep god from getting angry at me. But I always felt that I fall short. So, I successfully hid my burned out heart from others.

For a long time in my life, I lived an illogical spiritual life. I kept my common sense aside and listened and followed other illogical spiritual leaders out there. I wasn't even honest to myself. I pretended as if my spirituality was working.

Then there came a time in my life that I had to take a step back and look at the foolishness of my belief system. Trying to achieve sinless perfection? Trying to earn forgiveness through confessing all my sins on a daily basis? Trying to keep the law? Trying to love my neighbors as myself? Trying to love the enemies? Are you kidding?

I didn't know that James said, "whoever keeps the whole law and yet stumbles at just one point is guilty of breaking all of it." Will I ever be accepted by this god? Will I ever be able to say that I confessed all my sins that I am now fully forgiven? Will I ever feel the security of god's love? Will I ever feel any kind of security, contentment or peace?

If you don't cheat in answering those questions, if you can be honest to yourself, the only thing you can do is - give up! That’s true - just give up!

That’s where my journey started. I first gave up, then God took over…