Jesus Came To Judge Us?

   For many years, no matter how much I read my Bible or prayed, I always came away with the nagging thoughts, "I should have read longer". "I should have prayed longer". I genuinely believed that God was judging me for not doing enough so, I felt condemned. Though I was a pastor, I did not completely realize that my condemnation was not coming from God but from my understanding of the gospel.

   Many Christians today also feel condemned much like I did. Our plight usually stems from being misinformed, uninformed or having unbelief regarding the complete gospel. Sadly, I had been personally bewitched by all three. (Galatians 3:1)

   Condemnation is being judged, found guilty and then sentenced. Every person is condemned before God in Adam. Romans 5:16 says, "Again, the gift of God is not like the result of the one man's sin: The judgment followed one sin and brought condemnation, but the gift followed many trespasses and brought justification". God's only solution for our condemnation was to remove us from Adam and place us in Christ. Through our faith in Christ, that is exactly what happens. When it does, our condemnation is removed and replaced by God justifying us. To be justified means to be forgiven and to be made righteous all at once. No wonder Romans 5:1 says, "Therefore being justified by faith we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ".

   God is never going to condemn anyone who is in Christ! Then why do we still feel condemned at times? I suspect it has to do with the other half of the gospel regarding our union with Christ in His death, burial and resurrection. We may be uninformed meaning we have never heard about our union with Christ. It may be that we are misinformed meaning we have been taught that the Bible's reference to our union with Christ is positional truth - something that God sees as true because it will only really be true of us in heaven, but not now. It could be that we have heard of our union with Christ but simply don't believe it is true or true for us personally.

   In John 3:17, Jesus says, "For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him." Do you see that? God the Father did not send Jesus into this world to condemn people! He sent Him to rescue us from the condemnation we already had! Let me put it another way. Jesus did not come to live in us as Christians to condemn us. He came to live in us to free us from condemnation so He could love us from the inside! No wonder one of the weapons we have against satan is the gospel of peace on our feet so we can stand firmly against his false condemnation of us! (Ephesians 6:15)

   Would you pause for a moment and ask God what He is saying to you right now? Then ask Him how He wants you to respond.

You are loved! Believe it. Receive it. Live in it.

Live Free In Christ,

Mark Maulding, President and Founder
www.GraceLifeInternational.com
All Content Copyright © 2012 Mark Maulding

A 3 Minute Dose of Grace from the My E-Newsletter

The Mauldings' February E- Newsletter by Mark Maulding

Live Free In Christ, Mark Maulding, President and Founder www.GraceLifeInternational.com All Content Copyright © 2012 Mark Maulding

The Underlying Reason for Marital Struggles

 
   If you read most articles about the top reasons for marital conflict, the following will often be listed. Problems with communication, money, sex, raising children, Biblical roles and disrespect. We see these same issues in our counseling offices at Grace Life International every week. They are legitimate. However, they fail to get to the underlying problem behind all of these issues. It is like weeds in your lawn. If you only kill what you see on the surface, the weed will eventually come back because you did not kill the root.

   In the same way, if we only help people communicate better, manage their money better, have a better sex life, learn better child raising techniques, live in their Biblical roles and try to show more respect to each other, those may help. But counseling hundreds of couples through the years has shown us that these changes only go so far and often don't last very long. When God makes changes in a person's life, they tend to last because these changes are supernatural rather than produced by self effort.

   The complete Gospel digs underneath the surface to reveal the real root of our marital problems and God's alternative. Let's see what we can learn from this.

   Every one of us has some God-given needs of the heart. At GLI, we use the acronym L.A.W.S. This stands for Love, Acceptance, Worth and Security. God's intent from the beginning of the human race was for Him to be the primary One who meets these needs apart from another human. Then, when our spouse also meets our needs, we can enjoy it even more. Since Adam and Eve sinned in the garden, this has been turned upside down. We expect our spouse to meet these deep needs of the heart or we may expect God to meet these needs through our spouse. When this does not happen, frustration and conflict become too familiar.

   But let's back up some. Since these deep needs of the heart were there long before we were married, is it possible that deep patterns were developed as we attempted to meet these needs. For example, prior to marriage, a spouse may have learned to yell at people to control them so they would do what they wanted. Or, a spouse may have learned to withdraw and shut down to try to prevent rejection. Other patterns develop over time as well. We call these ways of coping. God calls them "flesh". Some patterns of the flesh are listed in Galatians 5:19-21.

   It is obvious what kind of life develops out of trying to get your own way all the time: repetitive, loveless, cheap sex; a stinking accumulation of mental and emotional garbage; frenzied and joyless grabs for happiness; trinket gods; magic-show religion; paranoid loneliness; cutthroat competition; all-consuming-yet-never-satisfied wants; a brutal temper; an impotence to love or be loved; divided homes and divided lives; small-minded and lopsided pursuits; the vicious habit of depersonalizing everyone into a rival; uncontrolled and uncontrollable addictions; ugly parodies of community. I could go on."  The Message

   When we bring these "fleshy" patterns into our marriage, we are already headed for trouble from day one. And of course, we can develop new "flesh" patterns after we are married. Do you see why just trying to get people to change their behavior does not get to the underlying source of our marital struggles? Most of us cannot discover these on our own, but need help from someone to disciple and counsel us. Our staff at Grace Life International are highly skilled in God working through them to facilitate a person's understanding of these patterns. Then, they lovingly show each person or couple God's alternative in Christ.

   If you know of someone who needs help in their marriage, please have them call us at 704-522-9026. We offer face to face counseling, intensive 3-5 day counseling for those who travel a long distance and Internet counseling through Skype, regardless of where you live geographically.

You are loved! Believe it. Receive it. Live in it.


Mark Maulding, President and Founder
www.GraceLifeInternational.com
All Content Copyright © 2012 Mark Maulding

Foundation4Transformation Conference This Week

I invite any of you who personally live or who knows someone who lives to my Conference this week.  It really can be life changing.

Live Free In Christ,
Mark Maulding, President and Founder www.GraceLifeInternational.com All Content Copyright © 2012 Mark Maulding

Men and Women Loved by Jesus on Valentine's Day

   Country singer Taylor Swift has a new song called "We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together". With a smile on my face, I was thinking today about how this relates to each of us as men and women on Valentine's Day. We once belonged to an abusive "lover" who promised us the world only to disappoint every time. This "lover" was biding his time, secretly strategizing how to steal the joy from us that we were created for; destroy us on every level and eventually kill us. Looking back, we recognize that we were "sleeping with the enemy". Because of our relationship with the true Lover of our souls, Jesus, we can now sing to Satan "We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together"!

   Our relationship with Jesus reminds me of another song I heard. I usually just enjoy them at face value but some of them do tend to pull me deeper into my relationship with God. Here are just a few of the words which provide a window in Jesus' heart for us. Where you see the word, "baby", just insert "your name" as if Jesus were singing to you as your friend.

   When you're down and troubled and you need a helping hand and nothing, whoa, nothing is going right. Close your eyes and think of me and soon I will be there to brighten up even your darkest nights.

   You just call out my name, and you know where ever I am, I'll come running, oh yeah baby, to see you again. Winter, spring, summer, or fall, all you have to do is call and I'll be there, yeah, yeah, you've got a friend.
(If you'd like to hear the entire song with lyrics, you can view and listen on YouTube at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v+AIS-RuoZxCl)

   I realize that Jesus is already in us and we don't have to wait for Him to come running when we call out to Him but this song speaks of the eagerness of this Friend to drop everything and to be with us, during good and bad times. That's the heart of our Jesus for us!

   I wonder if we understand that He is the One pursuing us? (Pause and think on this for a moment.) He desires that we enjoy the friendship and love He has already given us. We can tell Him anything that we are thinking whether it's our draining struggles or delightful aspirations. He longs to hear what is on our hearts because He loves us so. And sometimes, we will hear Him speak back to us in our spirit through mostly His Word or in other ways, such as the song lyrics I've shared with you.

   Jesus said it this way, "No longer do I call you servants, for the servant does not know what his master is doing; but I have called you friends, for all that I have heard from my Father, I have made known to you." John 15:15 Now, go back and read the scripture again substituting the word "you" with "your name" and see if it becomes more personal.
   This Valentine's Day, let's go deeper in the friendship and love of Jesus for us!

You are loved! Believe it. Receive it. Live in it.

Mark Maulding, President and Founder

www.GraceLifeInternational.com

All Content Copyright © 2012 Mark Maulding

Three Choices When Your Marriage Struggles

   Hundreds of couples have come to us at Grace Life International since our 1995 inception. It usually goes something like this. The wife shares all of the things that her husband has been doing that are hurting her and the marriage. The husband reciprocates and shares about all of his unmet needs and how she is hurting the marriage. In most cases, their marriage is a mess and they are tired of cycling back around to the same old arguments. They often begin to wonder if they love their spouse anymore and some will go so far as to believe that they may have married the wrong person. 

   When a couple comes to us struggling in their marriage, they have three choices. I call it LEAVE, CLEAVE OR WEAVE.

1. LEAVE - They can leave the marriage. At GLI, we trust God to work through us so this will not happen, but it is still a choice they have.

2. CLEAVE - They can continue doing the same things they have been doing and be miserable. They usually don't like this option very much or they wouldn't have come to us for counseling.

3. WEAVE - They can allow God to do for them what they have been unable to do for themselves, which is to heal their marriage.

   For God to heal a marriage, each spouse must be willing for God to reveal why they are miserable.  In the beginning, they believe that their spouse is the problem and if he or she would just change, everything would be fine. However, that is not the problem. The true underlying problem is that each person in the marriage is trying to get their spouse to meet the deepest needs of their heart, which they cannot do. He's only a man and she is only a woman. Those needs can only be met through a deep intimacy with God arising from an understanding of the complete Gospel.

   This is not to say that the other spouse is not hurting us. They probably are and it needs to be addressed, but that is still not the underlying problem. Attempting to meet our deep heart needs such as love, acceptance, worth and security, our way instead of God's way, is the real issue.   God calls this living according to the flesh.  Romans 8:6 tells us that "the mind set on the flesh is death".  Death includes conflict, frustration and being miserable.

   Whether single or married, our understanding of the Gospel should be leading us into an even deeper intimacy with God. Is it? If not, it's possible we need to be that the Gospel if better news than maybe we have understood so far.

   BTW, if your marriage is struggling and you want effective Christian counseling that actually helps, please call us at 704-522-9026. We offer local counseling in four locations, intensive 3-5 day counseling for those traveling a long distance and Skype counseling regardless of where you live geographically. There is always hope in Christ!

You are loved! Believe it. Receive it. Live in it,


Mark Maulding, President and Founder

www.GraceLifeInternational.com

All Content Copyright © 2012 Mark Maulding