We got an email from our facilitator today telling us that we have an appointment....on July 4th!!!!  We were shocked, as we were expecting a late July or even early August appointment.  The SDA actually gave us our appointment when it would have been scheduled had we not run into our little problem.  I was expecting them to just give us the next available appointment, whenever they processed our request.  We are excited, and so very thankful for this awesome news.......now, lots to do.  We need to get plane tickets and many,many others items knocked off our to-do lists!

Before proceeding to the 3rd Beatitude, we must first lay some foundational understanding of Scripture. In laying this foundation, we will discover and recognize the theological drift away from His word and to our own interpretations. This foundational work may be new to you as it was to me years ago. If so, pray that God & His Holy Spirit will give you a heart prepared to receive these truths. If God hasn't prepared our soul for these truths, we will not be able to see it, understand it, and embrace it in our natural state.

 

Let us continue the journey!

 

Pride: A Biblical Interpretation 

Today, we often see or hear sayings such as the following:  I am proud of you!, American Pride!, Proud to be an American!, Proud Parent of an Honor Student!  The use of this word has become very common in our American society.  Many self-proclaimed Christian Americans often use it also without ever asking the question, what does the Bible say about man’s pride? Does God look favorably on those who are proud like our modern day society?

Before proceeding any further, we must define what pride really is.  Pride is an inordinate self-esteem or an unreasonable conceit of one’s own superiority in talents, beauty, wealth, accomplishments, or rank in office, which manifests itself in lofty airs, distance, reserve, and often in contempt of others. Pride typically excites boasting.  Biblically speaking, pride is that attribute which desires or enjoys that it, the object, be glorified.  Sayings that speak of American pride ultimately desire to bring glory to America as a nation.  Parents often speak of how proud they are of their children. This attitude seeks to glorify the parents.

What does the Bible say about pride? God resists the proud and gives grace to the humble (James 4:6, 1 Peter 5:5). In the mouth of the foolish is a rod of pride (Proverbs 14:3). The LORD will destroy the house of the proud (Proverbs 15:25). Every one that is proud in heart is an abomination to the LORD (Proverbs 16:5).  The pride of life is not of the Father, but is of the world (1 John 2:16).  The LORD shall cut off all flattering lips, and the tongue that speaketh proud things (Psalms 12:3). It is our duty to glorify God in all that we do (1 Corinthians 10:31). In Psalm 73:24-28, God teaches us how to glorify Him. Not only do we see that God despises the proud, we also see that God desires that we seek to glorify Him and Him only in all that we do, not ourselves nor our country. Did not Israel misinterpret God’s blessings such that they became proud and expected God’s blessings? Doesn’t America seem to have fallen into the same snare today?

The origination of pride can be traced back to before the creation of the world when Satan, a rebellious angel, and 1/3 of the angels (Revelation 12:4) were not satisfied with their estate and they wanted to exalt themselves above the Most High God.  For man, pride originated in Adam’s eating of the forbidden fruit thus, resulting in his being cast out of the Garden of Eden. Adam was not content with his place in God’s world so, he too tried to lift himself above God, but also fell. Pride now naturally resides in all our hearts by nature through Adam’s imputed sin on all of creation.

The Bible warns us in 1 Timothy 6:3-5 that false teachers and preachers will be proud among other things and commands us to withdraw ourselves from them. In 2 Timothy 3:1-5, the Apostle Paul warns Timothy that pride will be a key sign of the apostasy of the church in the days to come.  In Romans 1, we see that our disobedience to God’s word through our willful ignorance (i.e., not reading our Bible and following false doctrines and our fleshly desires) will ultimately result in divine abandonment.  Are we not seeing this in America today?  Further examples of pride can be seen in the prayer of the Pharisee (Luke 18:10), the rich young ruler (Mark 10:17), and the haughtiness of Pharaoh (Exodus 5:2).  All of these examples show that God despises the proud because they are attempting to rob Him of the glory that He rightfully deserves.

In closing, our society today needs to self-examine its pridefulness and like “the vine of life” (John 15) prune off this poisoned branch that left alone will result in destruction and judgement for ourselves and our country.  What do we really have to be proud of?  It is by His mercy that we haven’t already received the judgement and damnation that we deserve.  It is by His grace that we can be saved from our sins and receive an eternal salvation unworthily.  It is by His love we were made able to effectually hear His message and be given the ability to respond to it.  It is by the blood of His son that we have been cleansed of our sins.  It is by the righteousness of His son that we are justified and declared righteous before God the Father.  It is by His Spirit that we are filled which enables us live justly, love mercy, and walk humbly with Him.  Any spiritual goodness that we possess comes from the Father, through the Son, and by the Holy Spirit.  WE REALLY HAVE NOTHING TO BE PROUD OF!  How then shall we respond? We must pray that God, through His Holy Spirit, will awaken us to the sin of pride which has blinded our hearts until we humbly cry out for deliverance from ourselves so that we can walk righteously like our Savior and Lord, Jesus Christ.

 

 

We will continue the pride & meekness comparison as we uncover the deep things of Christ in the 3rd Beatitude.

 

GRACE BE UNTO YOU!

 

 

We received our letter from the SDA(State Department for Adoption) which states that we have been accepted & registered as prospective adoptive parents(i.e., we now have our registration number); however, we did not receive a travel date to Ukraine.

 

It seems that there was a misinterpretation of our dossier. Our facilitator quickly recognized the issue & addressed it immediately.

 

While we do not have any indications as to when our travel date will be granted, we are hopeful that it will only delay our travel date a couple of weeks based on our original submission date.

 

We thank everyone who has been praying earnestly for us and the orphans in Ukraine and the world.

 

We request that you continue fervently praying for God's will be done in our lives, in this process, and in your lives as we all walk in Christ.

 

 

(Based on sermon by John Piper on June 20, 2004)

1. Adopt a child not for your own glory but for God’s glory.

God adopted us for the praise of the glory of his grace. Therefore, we should adopt for the praise of the glory of his grace. When considering adoption, do not question the feasibility or affordability of adoption. The questions that you must ask first are:

Is my heart fixed on glorifying the grace of God?

Is my aim in this to make the grace of God look glorious?

Is Christ the center and goal of this decision?

Are all the factors being weighed in relation to Christ?

We should adopt a child not for our own glory but for the glory of God’s grace.

2. In adopting and rearing a child, OUR GOAL MUST NOT BE TO MAKE MUCH OF THE CHILD, but rather TO LIVE AND TO TEACH AND LEAD IN SUCH A WAY THAT THE CHILD GROWS UP TO ENJOY LIVING THEIR LIFE WITH A FOCUS ON GOD.

Our aim should not be to take a child’s low views of self as an orphan and replace them with high views of self. Rather our aim should be to take a child’s low views of God and replace them with high views of God. Our aim should not be to take a child with little sense of worth and fill him with a great sense of worth. Rather our aim should be to take a child who by nature makes himself the center of the universe and show him that he was made to put God at the center of the universe and get joy not from seeing his own tiny worth, but from knowing Christ who is of infinite worth. We should adopt to lead a child to the everlasting joy of making much of the glory of the grace of God.

3. In adopting,  we exemplify the mercy and the justice of God for children and others.

We exemplify mercy in that we freely choose to love this child, no matter what. Many adoptions happen sight unseen. The child passes no test. He is loved freely without meeting conditions. We don’t base our choice on what we see. We love because we have been loved. This is mercy.

And when the child comes, chosen freely by mercy, we now mold that child into a pattern of firm and sweet discipline. We mold him into the mercy of justice. From the very beginning, within weeks, there are expectations and consequences when these expectations are not met. We raise the child in “the discipline and instruction of the Lord”. And we know from Hebrews 12 that the discipline of the Lord is often painful because without discipline there will be no “peaceful fruit of righteousness” (Hebrews 12:11). So we see in adoption the mercy and the justice of God mingled in wise and loving proportion based proper example of biblical parenting.

4. Adopting children will almost certainly bring heartache and stress and suffering, just like God's adoption of his children cost Him the life of his Son, Jesus Christ, on the cross.

We are adopted “through Jesus Christ”—through his suffering. Many adopting parents have endured through the agony of adoptions that didn’t work or almost didn’t work. Cases of mental illness and profound physical disability and bizarre and inexplicable behavior. Of course this is not unique to adoption. It can happen—it does happen—with our biological children. The implication is this: we adopt with our eyes wide open. This will bring pain. And this may bring tragedy and we embrace it. And, if we are faithful, in the end, it will certainly bring joy based on our firm faith in the all sufficiency of God's grace.

5. Seek only to adopt children if you have a firm faith in the all-sufficiency of God’s future grace.

The pain of adopting and rearing children is sure. It will come in one form or the other. Should that stop us from having children or adopting children? No. The self-centered world “cuts their losses” by having few or no children. (And there is way too much of that thinking in the church.) In one sense we may be very glad that such people don’t tend to have children or at least not many children. Because it means that breed of selfish person will die out more quickly since they don’t replace themselves. But on the other hand, we grieve, hoping that they will see that the grace of God is sufficient for every new day no matter how difficult, and that there is more true joy in walking with God through fire, than walking on beaches without him.

In the Bible, the Greek word that is translated as "adoption" is huiothesia (Strong's-5206). Huios means son and thesia means placement. Combining the two yields the meaning - placement or installation of a person as a son.

 

Ironically, the Greeks & the Romans at the time of Christ widely practiced adoptions which consisted of mostly males hence the derivation of the word itself. In these adoptions, the process canceled all the old debts of the adoptee while also granting a new start in life with new rights and privileges as the son of his new father.

 

Adoption today and almost always has been a legal or judicial act. The adopted child is granted full rights and privileges of sonship in a family in which he had no rights of his own previously. In the biblical times, adoption was an action based on gracious love or unmerited love. Generally, the adoptee did not earn the favor or love of the adopters. It was an intentional act that was previously decided. The adopting parents historically have always severed the previous parents rights to the adoptee (although today it seems parents are being allowed some rights).

 

This is all also true with God and salvation. It is a judicial act whereby we are called children of God. It is all the choosing of God based on His own good pleasure & will and his unconditional love. We have all our debts of sins cleared based on the righteousness of Christ. We are granted all the rights as an heir of the kingdom.

 

In Ephesians 1:5,  we read, "For he chose us in him before the creation of the world" - he is speaking about unconditional election of us by God from all eternity - "to be holy and blameless in his sight. In love, he predestined us to be adopted as his sons through Jesus Christ." God's predestination of us is for this specific blessing, that we be adopted as sons of God. It too is an act of grace or "unmerited favor" upon us who were previously children of wrath. This adoption is not of any good works seen in us lest any of us can boast in His choosing of us. In terms of the eternal age to come, our ties to our natural father & mother become severed as the primary parental focus and our obedience is redirected to Our Father in Heaven (albeit maintaining proper honor & obedience to our earthly parents).

 

Please continue to pray as we did not receive any news today on our dossier.

 

We do have an unspoken praise of God's graciousness in our life!!!

 

PRAY FOR ALL THE PEOPLE OF UKRAINE, INCLUDING THE ORPHANS.

PRAY FOR OUR FACILITATOR AS HE STRUGGLES TO SERVE HIS CLIENTS IN THE MIDST OF CONSTANT CHANGES.