The call of God is not only that we would be saved from destruction; it’s that we would be holy. Maybe the most clear comes in 1 Thessalonians 4:7: “For God has not called us to impurity but to live in holiness.” This is what God has called us to – it’s not a life of ease and moral mediocrity, but of being set apart and pure. Christianity is about grace, but in that grace is a moral obligation and responsibility. God has called us to a life that is very different from the world around us.

Why are you a Christian?
You might answer that question in any number of ways. You might, if you have an intellectual bent to you, say that you are a Christian because you have examined the evidence for Christianity and found it to be so intellectually compelling that you had no choice but to believe. Or you might say you are a Christian because someone you respected shared the gospel with you, and you observed in that person’s life the kind of joy and hope you were lacking, and so you believed. Or you might say you are a Christian because your family is all Christians and you were raised in the admonition of the Lord from the day you were born. All of those things may be true, and all of them are appropriate answers to the question, even if they vary from one another. But another answer you could give to that question, regardless of how the details worked themselves out, is this:
You are a Christian because God called you. The Bible tells us this again and again:

Romans 1:6: you who are also called by Jesus Christ.
1 Corinthians 1:9: God is faithful; you were called by him into fellowship with his Son, Jesus Christ our Lord.
Galatians 1:6: I am amazed that you are so quickly turning away from him who called you by the grace of Christ and are turning to a different gospel

The list of references goes on and on. God called you out of darkness into light. He called you from death to life. He called you from blindness to sight.
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“In Christ alone, my hope is found…” So begins the hymn In Christ Alone which is by far one of the most sung songs of the faith in the last two decades. The hymn walks the singer through the story of the gospel and serves as a reminder that, because of His death and resurrection, the believer can have a sure and certain hope in Christ. And we should hope in Christ – as the song says, Christ is, ultimately, our only hope.
And yet we continue to place our hope elsewhere.
Sometimes, for example, we tend to place our hope in leaders. We come upon an election cycle and we tell ourselves that if so and so were elected, then things would be different. We would see policy change, betterment of society, and an affirmation of moral values. While some of those things may be true, ultimately, no political leader is worthy of our hope.
Or we might place our hope in a change of circumstances. We tell ourselves that if we just made a little more money, or just had a little more freedom, or just didn’t have to report to our current boss, then things would be so much better in life. And while there might be an element of truth in that, ultimately, we cannot place our hope in a chance of circumstance either.
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If we look deeper – beyond the circumstances – we might also find the true reason we get angry is because we feel like our rights have been violated. We should be treated better. We deserve more. Our anger stems from a deep held sense of entitlement that, when crossed, make us really, really mad. In other words, our anger is a reflection of our commitment to ourselves. And here, again, is an opportunity for us to grow, because every moment of anger precipitated by our own self-lordship is an opportunity to reaffirm what it means to follow Jesus.

We have an ugly, old shed in our backyard. I don’t know how long it’s been there; certainly longer than we have. The shed came with the house, and with the house it remains. Over the years it has accumulated its share of junk, which of course, was added to the junk that was already in there. But I don’t open it up very often.
Because it’s scary. There. I said it.
Every time I crack open those doors, I have the sense that something is in there waiting for me. A snake. A gopher. Or, as was the case yesterday, a fresh nest of wasps. I could hear them as soon as I opened the door. They were presumably just hanging out in their own little realm behind those doors, but then the light and the fresh air came in and they immediately sprang into action. And they were mad.
Anger is like that, I think – not anger in wasps, but anger in human beings. Some circumstance fires up our temper and we find ourselves getting angrier and angrier, and often, our level of anger reaches a disproportionate level. We might even think to ourselves in the moment, I really should not be as mad as I am about this, but most of the time it’s too late. The fuse has been lit.
That circumstance – whatever it was – was like opening the doors of that old, broken down shed in the backyard. The light and the air and the noise come in, and the anger fires up. Thing is, though, I didn’t let the wasps in the shed by opening the door – the nest was already there. They just needed something to set them off.
Likewise, if we find ourselves getting angry, chances are the anger was already in our hearts. The circumstance was just the thing that got us going.
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What is wisdom?
It’s a word most of us are familiar with, and yet might have trouble defining. It’s also a word we encounter more than a few places in Scripture, but probably most notably in the Book of Proverbs. That’s kind of what the whole book is about:
The proverbs of Solomon son of David, king of Israel:
for gaining wisdom and instruction;for understanding words of insight… (Prov. 1:1-2).
But what it is? I’ve always found J.I. Packer to be helpful in this respect, not only in understanding what wisdom is, but what wisdom is not:
According to Packer, wisdom is not “a deepened insight into the providential meaning and purpose of events going on around us, an ability to see why God has done what he has done in a particular case, and what he is going to do next.”
Rather, wisdom is like driving.
“What matters in driving is the speed and appropriateness of your reactions to things and the soundness of your judgment as to what scope a situation gives you… you simply try to see and do the right thing in the actual situation that presents itself. The effect of divine wisdom is to enable you and me to do just that in the actual situations of everyday life.”
Wisdom is about reality. It’s about real-life decision-making in real-life situations. And that is, indeed, a powerful thing.

We are saved by His grace, and we are being transformed into the image of Jesus by His grace. There is, of course, much more to God’s grace, but at a minimum, these things are reason enough for praise.

The Greek word for grace is charis. It means favor. Acceptance. Giving. Grace is free in the sense that something done or given in grace is done so truly without expecting to receive anything in return. That means the origin of grace isn’t the object receiving it; the origin is entirely found in the giver’s goodness, love, and care. And this is our experience in Christ.
We didn’t earn this. We don’t deserve this. Nothing in our sinful and rebellious selves warrants this. Grace finds its root in the generosity of God who gives freely to us.
J.I. Packer wrote, “God is good to all in some ways but good to some in all ways.”
We’re the “some.” Every other religion in the world boils down to a sort of cosmic barter system. People bring their good stuff to their god, whether it’s good actions, good money, or good sacrifices, and in exchange their god gives them some of His good stuff. Christianity stands apart from this system as a grace-based belief system that is built squarely on the extravagant goodness of God. Nothing in us is motivational, and nothing we can do can pay Him back. The only part we have in grace is the receiving of it.
If you wondered about the importance of “grace” in biblical theology, it’s pretty revelatory to see the word appearing 116 times in the New Testament. But in particular, here are three verses that help us see the truth about grace:
1. “Grace and peace to you from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ” (Ephesians 1:2).
“Grace and peace.” That two-word salutation is how Paul began his letter to the Ephesian church. But not only that letter – much of the correspondence that’s recorded in the New Testament begins the same way. Much in the same way that we might write “Dear…” or “To Whom It May Concern,” “grace and peace” is Paul’s greeting to his audience. Why is that? Were they just convenient and poetic words, a way to say “Hey there!” with a little more class? Or is there something more?
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Every generation has had to reckon with those words and the subtle but terrible charge they bring against the Word–and therefore the character–of God. Those four words are much more than an innocent question; they strike at the core of our faith. This simple phrase, for all time since the garden, is an expression of whether God can be trusted. Is His Word true? And is His Word to us a loving Word?  

Every couple of years I need a refresher on language.
Most of the time this happens through our children. They will say something, some word or phrase, and I will not understand. I’ll ask for a clarification, a definition, and maybe even for another example in context… and I still won’t get it. Most of the time I still need the help of Urban Dictionary to know what I’m supposed to be talking about. But even then I’m not really allowed to use these phrases.
The kids cringe with I do, and I get that.
I did the same thing.
And I assume my parents did the same thing when their vernacular was discovered and tried to be put in use by the previous generation. And so it goes, one generation after another, being linguistically left behind. And yet through each and every generation of human history, there is a link. The link is not a particular language, but instead four words translated into a multitude of dialects. It’s these four words that bind all the generations of humanity together:
“Has God indeed said…”
Way back at the beginning – in the very first generation – everything was good. Very good, in fact. All creation existed in perfect harmony, and at the center piece of everything was the crown jewel of creation. The man and the woman lived in perfect fellowship with God, walking without guilt, shame, or any other hindrance with Him. And into this harmony slithered the cunning serpent armed with what must have seemed like a very innocent question and just a few short sentences that followed it:
Now the serpent was more cunning than any beast of the field which the Lord God had made. 
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Ecclesiastes 4:1 states a very simple truth: “Two are better than one…”
It’s not a new truth; in fact, it’s one of the first things we hear from the Lord in the Bible:
“It is not good for the man to be alone. I will make a helper suitable for him” (Gen. 2:18).
As human beings, we were not meant to live in isolation; we are meant for each other. That “each other” includes all kinds of relationships – marriages, church groups, and just basic friendships included. In all these cases, two are better than one.
While that seems obvious, it’s a truth that needs to be re-embraced today. After all, we live in a culture that has never been more connected and yet never more isolated. We might have hundreds or thousands of virtual connections without any of those connections ever moving into a genuine, deep relationship. Now, more than ever, we need to deeply believe and live out this reality of relationship.
Here, then, are three reasons why two are better than one:
1. Because we have different gifts.
Ecclesiastes 4 continues like this:
Two are better than one,
because they have a good return for their labor…
This is, of course true in most any general sense – two people working at the same time are most often going to produce more and better things than just one. But in the church, this truth takes on another meaning.
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 Proverbs 30 is so beautifully balanced. It recognizes the reality that we need money, and it recognizes the danger that money presents. And so the prayer is founded in a sober estimation of oneself – don’t give me too much, and don’t give me too little. Because I might be prone to sin in either case. In the end, this is the prayer of faith when it comes to money. It is a prayer that acknowledges that inasmuch as we don’t know ourselves, God does.

“Just follow your heart.”
It’s the stuff that Disney movies are made of. It’s about actualizing yourself and your potential; it’s about living your dreams; it’s about living happily ever after. It’s also a terrible piece of advice. That’s because I can’t trust my own heart. And neither can you.
If it’s happened once, it’s happened a thousand times to me. I do something, something (dare I say) good for someone else, and then in retrospect find that I didn’t really do that thing for them, but for myself. It was so that others would see me doing it. It was to garner praise from the person I was helping. It was to impressively display my aptitude or compassion for another. It happens all the time. And every time it happens, I’m reminded of that same fact which is in equal parts true and disturbing:
I cannot trust my own heart.
The prophet Jeremiah knew that truth, experienced that truth, and summarized that truth like this:
“The heart is more deceitful than anything else, and incurable–who can understand it?” (Jeremiah 17:6).
Can we trust ourselves? Heavens no – we don’t even really know ourselves. And that lack of self-knowledge can go both ways. Sometimes we dramatically underestimate ourselves. We think too little of our faith, courage, resolve, or abilities and therefore never really take a chance or risk. And then sometimes we dramatically overestimate ourselves and end up underdelivering on those same qualities. Somehow, we have to stand in the middle of those things – to not think too highly or too lowly of ourselves. To see ourselves, as Paul tells us, with “sober judgment”:
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Christians understand that the true source of grief is not random events or diseases, but the condition of sin in which we and the rest of the world are in because of our rebellion. So when we grieve, we are acknowledging the entire broken state of the world which had led to all these occasions of loss, sadness, and pain. In this way, we mourn the loss of the right relationship the entire world had with God, and we are longing for it all to be put right again.

Like many of you, I watched the news of the escalating Middle Eastern conflict slack-jawed. Rockets. Gunfire. Invaders. Hostages. It went on and on, and I wondered how to respond to this. I wondered how to respond as a nation, and how to respond as an individual. While there are differing opinions all along the spectrum, including differences of opinion amongst believers in Jesus, surely at least there is one response we all have in common:
Grief.
I felt, as you likely did, a tremendous sense of grief at the violence, death, suffering, and promise of more to come. I did not know any of these people directly; I had no friends or family in Gaza at the time; I have never even set foot in that part of the world. But I felt it. Certainly not as acutely as many, but it was present nevertheless. This feeling of pain and loss and sadness and confusion all coming together in an amalgamation of grief.
One of the places in Scripture that embraces grief and then speaks clarity into it comes from Paul’s first letter to the Thessalonians:
We do not want you to be uninformed, brothers, concerning those who are asleep, so that you will not grieve like the rest, who have no hope. Since we believe that Jesus died and rose again, in the same way God will bring with Him those who have fallen asleep through Jesus. For we say this to you by a revelation from the Lord: We who are still alive at the Lord’s coming will certainly have no advantage over those who have fallen asleep. For the Lord Himself will descend from heaven with a shout, with the archangel’s voice, and with the trumpet of God, and the dead in Christ will rise first. Then we who are still alive will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air and so we will always be with the Lord. Therefore encourage one another with these words (1 Thess. 4:13-18).
This passage is encouraging first and foremost because it validates our grief. Sometimes, as Christians, we tend to push grief away as if it’s wrong to be sad about our present circumstances when we are confident about what is to come. But Paul knew  didn’t advise that – not at all. After all, the Lord Himself wept at the tomb of His friend Lazarus (Jn. 11:35-38).
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“What is your name?”
That’s the question Moses asked God when God told Moses that he was to go to Pharaoh and demand that he let the people of God go free:
“Moses said to God, “Suppose I go to the Israelites and say to them, ‘The God of your fathers has sent me to you,’ and they ask me, ‘What is his name?’ Then what shall I tell them?” (Ex. 3:13).
Up to this point in the Old Testament, we’ve seen the significance of names. God had already changed the names of Abram, Sarai, and Jacob after encounters with Him. When they encountered God, the fabric of their identities was altered and God signified this change by changing their name. And that’s what Moses was really asking.
In the Old Testament, a name was much more than the means by which you could address someone. A name was a description of a person’s character. Moses was asking God, “Who are you really? And who are you to tell me to go to Pharaoh and make such a demand?”
The Lord answered with his name: Yahweh.
There was good reason for Moses’ question. Though the Israelites were already familiar with the name Yahweh (Gen. 12:8; 26:25; 28:13), they had been enslaved for centuries without any word from this God.