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What God Doesn’t Promise

Karon Stones

Don’t hold God to promises he never made. God is trustworthy to keep his promise, but it won’t be quick, easy, or fully explained. Will still you trust him?

  • We know God never promised an easy life, but then we wonder why he allows us to suffer?
  • We know God never promised to answer every prayer with an immediate, “Yes!” But we struggle with unanswered prayers.
  • And we know we were never promised perfect health or healing, but the physical pain we (and those we care about) seems more than we can bear.

I’ve seen a lot of people get derailed in life and in faith, because they were holding God to promises he never made… and then life got difficult and God didn’t just “fix” it, so they lost their faith. There’s this verse in the end of Joshua that I read a few months ago that’s been stuck in my head. At this point, Israel has come out from Egypt with Moses, and then Moses died and Joshua led Israel through the conquest where they conquered the people living in the Promised Land and the tribes have now all received their land.

“So the LORD gave Israel all the land he had sworn to give their fathers, and they took possession of it and settled there. The LORD gave them rest on every side according to all he had sworn to their fathers. None of their enemies were able to stand against them, for the LORD handed over all their enemies to them. None of the good promises the LORD had made to the house of Israel failed. Everything was fulfilled.”
Joshua 21:43–45 CSB

It’s a remarkable thing to think… “None of the good promises the LORD had made to the house of Israel failed. Everything was fulfilled.” This isn’t pointing back to God’s promise to free Israel from slavery in Egypt; it’s anchored in God’s promise to Abraham in Genesis 12:1-3.

Here are three reminders about God’s Promises.  Continue reading “What God Doesn’t Promise” →

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How Can I Know I’m Really Saved?

Hitchhiking

It was “cry night” at camp and I was the only kid in my cabin who wasn’t crying and who didn’t go forward for the altar call. Upon returning to our cabin for discussions and prayer all eyes turned to me, as if they were asking, “Mike, what’s wrong with you? Why didn’t you go up? Should we be concerned about you?” I simply explained that I’m already a Christian and didn’t feel the need to go forward and recommit my life to Christ since I’m already trying to live for him. I didn’t understand why my friends kept going forward every summer.

Since that time, I’ve realized that many struggle with security of their salvation. They question whether or not they have saving faith, or if they’ll be one of those to whom Jesus says, “depart from me, for I never knew you.”

Here are a few questions to consider if you (or someone you care about) struggle to have security of your salvation.  Continue reading “How Can I Know I’m Really Saved?” →

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The Christian & Social Media

Social Media Apps

We spend more time on social media than we want to admit. Because of that, it’s worth asking, “How does my faith in Christ influence what I post online?”

First, let me be clear: not everything in social media needs to be serious. Have fun. Post silly pictures. Share funny stories. But in the midst of the silliness, shouldn’t we still be thoughtful about how we are reflecting Christ online?

The following is a short set a questions that has been helpful for me based off Micah 6:8, which says, “He has told you, O man, what is good; and what does the Lord require of you but to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God?”

Does it promote justice and kindness?

  • Is this post honest about life, or is it an edited version that I want to show people in an effort to look awesome? Is this post reflecting the “American Dream” or the life of Christ?
  • Does this post reflect God’s Word and what He has said about mercy, justice, love and godliness? Or does this reflect false expectations about how the world talks about those things?
  • Am I genuinely seeking to make people aware of injustice, or am I hopping on the latest bandwagon? Is this a real case on injustice, or has someone simply been offended? There’s a difference between being offended and suffering injustice.
  • Is this post written in a way that is thoughtful and will not cause unnecessary offense? Sometimes in our efforts to raise awareness or add commentary, the way in which we say things is so thoughtless our actual point gets overshadowed.

Does it reflect humility?

  • Am I being self-promoting right now? As a blogger this one is tricky, because I want people to read what I write, but I need to be writing it in order to help people (not in order to make a name for myself).
  • Am I only thinking about people who are like me, or am I posting this with those who are different from me in mind? If someone voices disagreement (even if it’s over an issue I care deeply about), will I immediately get defensive or aggressive, or will I honestly consider their viewpoint?
  • If I’m posting something that may be offensive to some, am I sharing this because it is truly worth the possible offense or backlash?
  • Can you experience something great or something terrible without posting about it? If your first though is, “I need to share this,” then you may need to dig deeper into Christ-exalting humility.

Does it help people walk faithfully with God?

  • Does your post direct people towards the good news of Jesus Christ? If our lives should point to Christ, then shouldn’t our online profiles?
  • Is your social media filled with complaints, gripes, and rants? Or is it full of posts that highlight everything amazing about your life? Both of these extremes drive people away from worship (because either God is faithless to his children, or your life is so amazing you simply don’t need him). There is glorious hope in the daily grind of living for Christ.
  • Are you posting so frequently about controversial topics that you’ve become a “social justice warrior” rather than an evangelist? If you constantly blast people with certain political/justice issues then they will not listen when you speak about Jesus… you will be tuned out.
  • If someone scanned through your social media posts (Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, etc.), would they see someone whose life reflects Christ? This doesn’t mean you only and always share Christian-themed posts, but it does mean your profiles display the joys and trials (and the normalcy) of someone who is following Christ.

Again, don’t allow these questions to lead you to think social media needs to be all serious. It doesn’t, and it shouldn’t be. And yet, I hope these three main questions help you evaluate whether or not your social media platforms need to be recalibrated.

If there are other guidelines you frequently use to determine whether or not to share something online, please leave them in the comments below. 

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Five Reasons Christians Don’t Evangelize

Christians overwhelmingly agree they have a personal responsibility to evangelize: to announce the good news that sinners can be forgiven and adopted as children of God because of the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ. LifeWay Research conducted a study regarding evangelism and reported,

“The study conducted by LifeWay Research found 80 percent of those who attend church one or more times a month, believe they have a personal responsibility to share their faith, but 61 percent have not told another person about how to become a Christian in the previous six months.”
LifeWay Research

This got me to ask the question: “Whynot? What is it that keeps us from sharing the gospel with nonChristians?” I could’ve come up with my own reasons, but I wondered if they would match up with the reasons your typical church-going Christian would give. So I asked my Facebook friends for their input and discovered some really great insights that I wouldn’t have considered on my own.

Here are a few of the general themes that emerged from their responses:

SONY DSC Continue reading “Five Reasons Christians Don’t Evangelize” →

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What’s Wrong With the World?

Acts of violence and hatred have become so common we’ve become numb. Whether it’s another act of terrorism, a school shooting, or an incident of domestic violence, it has become far too easy to read the story and then move on with our lives.

I doubt anyone can look around and think, “Yeah, this is the way things should be.” No. Instead, we hear people giving their solutions to fix the problem: More education, Better laws, Tolerance of differences. We need to understand the problem before we can offer any helpful solutions.

Christians turn to Scripture to understand the world, and we know this is not the way God created the world. Sin always brings death – not immediate physical death, but death of relationships, trust, intimacy, etc. Christians throughout history have called this event “the fall,” because sin made all creation fall from holiness and shalom/peace. Where there was unity and peace, now there is division and conflict. The opening chapters of Genesis unpack the multiple relationships that have lost shalom because of the curse of sin…

Broken Glass Continue reading “What’s Wrong With the World?” →

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How to Share Your Testimony

Talking

A gospel-centered testimony can be a powerful way to share the good news of Jesus Christ with your nonChristians friends (or with complete strangers, as opportunity arises). Over the last decade I’ve heard some people talk about testimony-sharing as “the key” to good evangelism while others decry testimonies as man-centered rather than God-centered.

What is a Testimony?
Your testimony isn’t your autobiography. It isn’t your life-story or an opportunity to talk about the details of your sinful life before Jesus in order to gain “street cred” with nonChristians.

The word “testimony” comes from the same root word as “martyr.” To be a martyr is to testify and tell about what God has done through Jesus Christ. It isn’t first about you, it is about God. When you share your testimony, you are talking about what God has done and what God has done for you. It is both objective (who God is and what He’s done) and subjective/personal (what he’s done for you). Unfortunately, I’ve heard many testimonies that only emphasize the subjective (what God has done for them).

A testimony that isn’t about Jesus, the cross, the resurrection, and the freedom that comes through confession of sin and repentance isn’t a gospel-centered testimony.

How to Share Your Testimony
Here are a few things I have noticed about gospel-centered testimonies that put God front-and-center.  Continue reading “How to Share Your Testimony” →

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The Proverbs 31 Woman is About Jesus

The description of the “wife of noble character” has always been a picture of biblical womanhood. She is a woman who provides for her family by fearing the Lord, shrewd business leadership, compassion, and tender care. On one hand, this woman is no push-over, and she isn’t a weak-willed subordinate. On the other hand, the “P31 woman” is not simply climbing a corporate ladder (note: this isn’t sexist, I also regularly caution men against ladder-climbing attitudes); she works hard for the sake of her husband and her children and she presses forward each day to provide for her family.

Proverbs 31:10-31 is King Lemuel’s advice to his son about what to look for in a godly wife. To be clear, this article is not written in an attempt to correct a perceived misunderstanding, but to fill out that she is noble and excellent because she is like Jesus. While it’s too far to say “Jesus is the Proverbs 31 woman,” it should be clear that we see Jesus through her description.

Holding Flowers Continue reading “The Proverbs 31 Woman is About Jesus” →

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Does God Have Feelings?

Glowing Tube

Would it be possible to hurt God’s feelings? Can we make God happy or sad? At first, it seems like there should be a quick and obvious answer.

If God is emotionless, then he would seem like a heartless monster. But if he is emotional, then he may be unstable and fickle. So how should we think about this in light of Scripture and the Church’s teaching over the last 2000 years?  Continue reading “Does God Have Feelings?” →

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Can I be Sure I’m Going to Heaven?

My youth group recently began a study on “The End: Hard Questions About Eternity.” In preparation for that series, I sent a survey to students asking for their questions about heaven, hell, along with other issues. The overwhelmingly most common question was this:

What if I don’t go to heaven?
What if I go to hell?

This isn’t a fear that only teenagers struggle with. I’ve talked with many Christians who struggle with assurance of their salvation and eternal destiny. Assurance is simply confidence that something will happen… so the question is this: Is there eternal assurance for the Christian?

Sitting on a Snowy Rock Wall Continue reading “Can I be Sure I’m Going to Heaven?” →

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