Above and Not Below // An Abundant Life in Jesus, Part 5
A Different Perspective Official Podcast
Release Date: 01/10/2025
Experiencing God's Deliverance // Taste and See That He Is Good, Part 5
A Different Perspective Official Podcast
We all end up in tight spots at sometimes. Big or small. Just annoying – or tragic. And if God’s God – well shouldn’t He show up on those days? If He loves us – wouldn’t He help? Every now and then, we find ourselves in a tight spot. Sometimes we've behaved our way into a problem; maybe a wrong diet or no exercise and we get diabetes. Or a neglected relationship and we end up with tension and strife. Or just a day-to-day thing, a difficult "what do I do?" kind of situation. Lots of people have lots of different spiritual beliefs and practices, meditation, yoga, crystals but when...
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Walking in God's Plan // Taste and See That He Is Good, Part 4
A Different Perspective Official Podcast
If any sense of spirituality that we have in our lives is going to be any good – well it has to be relevant. Useful. In day to day life. Jesus can’t be just a stained-glass window. He has to be a part of life…. I don't know about your life but mine's pretty hectic: ups and downs, joys, disappointments, stresses, and strains. In a way, all our lives are different. But in another sense, well, they're pretty much the same. And if we're going to consider any form of spiritual belief or experience, well, that spirituality has to be relevant, useful, (I mean), it has to help along the...
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The Path of Simplicity // Taste and See That He Is Good, Part 3
A Different Perspective Official Podcast
We all try to put our best foot forward in life. Fair enough. But eventually, we can find ourselves trying to impress people rather than being ourselves. So – should we try to impress God – or is it come as you are? One way or another, we all try and put our best foot forward. When we go for a job interview, we make sure that we’re dressed well and our hair is combed and we go in with a smile and we say the right things. When friends come over to visit, we tidy up the house. And in one sense, there’s nothing wrong with that. But we live in a world, well, it rewards us for how we look...
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The Spark of Desire // Taste and See That He Is Good, Part 2
A Different Perspective Official Podcast
Any relationship needs a spark of desire to make it fire. Friendships. Marriages. Families. Work. Desire is a key ingredient of a lasting relationship. Well – what about God? Relationships, they’re a funny thing – boy meets girl, courtship, romance, engagement, marriage, honeymoon – what an exciting time! This passion, this desire, they enjoy each other to the full. Then they have kids. Sleepless nights, there’s the mortgage, paying off the credit card, arguments, pressure and almost half, end in divorce. Of course, there are a lot of things that can go wrong. But somewhere along the...
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Tasting and Seeing // Taste and See That He Is Good, Part 1
A Different Perspective Official Podcast
We should eat more fruit. We know that…..but it’s not until we taste the banana and smell the mandarin – that we go – oh, that’s good. It’s the experience that seals the deal. But what about God – how do we know that He’s good? We’ve all heard that nutritionists say that we should eat more fruit. It’s good for us. There’s the fiber, the vitamins, the minerals and the colorful fruits have antioxidants in them that reduce the risk of cancer. The more fruit we eat, the lower the risk of heart disease and on it goes. We know all that stuff. But somehow it...
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Joy in His Presence // A Time of Refreshing in My Life, Part 5
A Different Perspective Official Podcast
You know how there are some people, when you hang around with them; they’re just such a joy to be with. Hmmm. Wonder if God’s like that? There are some people in life who can really get you down. And yet there are others you just love to get together with them. There is something about them. They get it. They understand us. They encourage us, they engage with us, you know the sort. You look forward to having a cup of coffee or catching up with them for lunch. There is a real joy to the encounter. Being in their presence fills us with something that well, there is probably just one word for...
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Soar Like An Eagle // A Time of Refreshing in My Life, Part 4
A Different Perspective Official Podcast
Some days, it feels as though everybody around you is cruising, but somehow we’re down in the trenches. Wouldn’t it be great to soar like an eagle? Have you ever been through a time in your life where, I don’t know, it seems like everyone around you is doing it easy and somehow you’re down in the trenches doing it tough? I remember when I was training to be an officer in the Australian Army. We’d be on exercise digging trenches, fighting pretend wars, in the rain, and the snow, sometimes in the heat in the drought. And often, in an area quite close to an airport. I used to see these...
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Come to Me // A Time of Refreshing in My Life, Part 3
A Different Perspective Official Podcast
Have you ever noticed that people are busy racing around looking after Number One? Very few of them ever stop to give us a hand. In fact, when someone does, it can be so refreshing. In this clamorous, competitive world that we live in (you know what I’m talking about), this world where everybody seems to be looking after number one as their priority one, two and three in life. In that kind of world, it seems so rare that we meet someone who, I don’t know, who just comes out of the wood work out of nowhere to help us, to lighten our load, to open doors. Not because of what they...
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Be Still and Know // A Time of Refreshing in My Life, Part 2
A Different Perspective Official Podcast
The last thing that most of us suffer from is a lack of information – the whole world is screaming for our attention. Sometimes, the quiet assurance that comes from a bit of peace and quiet just eludes us. Sometimes, it feels like we live in our world where everything and everybody seems to be screaming for our attention. Take advertising – armies of creative people who think up new, (often), very clever ways of getting you and me to buy their client’s products. The supermarket where Jacqui and I go shopping has large advertising stickers glued to the floor in some of the shopping...
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Now's the Time // A Time of Refreshing in My Life, Part 1
A Different Perspective Official Podcast
Getting some balance back in our lives is a challenge for a lot of people. Either we’re doing too much or not enough and somehow, life’s out of kilter. What we need is some refreshment for our souls. I don't know about you but one of the things that many people struggle with is getting a sense of balance in their lives. Either life's just so crazy and hectic that we seem to be burning the candle at both ends and eventually we burn out or for other people life's really, really quiet, lonely perhaps. All lifestyle magazines push this whole "life balance" thing, great...
info_outlineLife can be a grind, and frankly life can get us down. We all know that. And so our view of what life is, and what it should be, becomes all twisted – inside out and upside down. So it’s time to get things right way up again. It’s time to discover what God has to say about the life He wants for you.
This week on the program we’ve kicked off a new series where we’ve been looking at the promise that Jesus made to give us an abundant life. Here it is again in case you missed it earlier in the week. John chapter 10, verse 10:
The thief comes only to steal, kill and destroy. I came that you may have life and have it abundantly.
It’s a beautiful promise and it’s one that’s always touched my heart. It’s a promise from Jesus that I take seriously. He came so that you and I could have life and not just have life but have it in all its abundance.
Now abundance is an amazing word isn’t it? It means plenty, overflow, a very large quantity of something. But what if I told you that the original Greek word used here for abundance literally means super abundance. More than abundant, over the top abundant, because that’s exactly what it means.
That’s Jesus’ promise and yet the promise is made here as a point of comparison and the promise is the second part of the verse, the first part is about something else, it’s about the thief he’s called here in the story:
The thief comes only to steal, kill and destroy.
And in fact as we’ve seen earlier this week on the program this whole story where Jesus teaches us that He is the good and true shepherd of us, the sheep, is about the authenticity of who Jesus is as that shepherd versus the sham of the impostors. Question is: why did Jesus make this beautiful promise in such a context?
Well of course the thief in the story is the devil and the original Greek word for the devil is diabolos which is the word from which we get our English word diabolical. It means a slanderer, a false accuser and elsewhere in the New Testament, in Revelations chapter 12 verse 9, the devil is also called the deceiver; someone who tricks people and leads them astray away from the right path or away from the truth into error.
That’s the devil here in this story, a thief who comes only to steal and kill and destroy. And so here Jesus presents us with an alternative, the thief or the true Shepherd, the hireling or the true Shepherd. The people who come into the sheepfold, climbing over the walls or the true Shepherd who comes to the front gate.
Now you might say to me, well there’s no real alternative, I don’t want the impostors, I don’t want a thief, I want the real thing, I don’t want someone who steals, kills and destroys, I want Jesus the good Shepherd. I will have the good Shepherd thank you very much, who came to give me a super abundant life.
Of course it’s an obvious choice in the light of Jesus’ parable of the good shepherd here. He means for it to be so obvious because it is obvious. When you stop and think about it the problem is we often don’t stop, we often don’t think about it because the devil doesn’t always come to us looking like a thief, you know with a little black beanie on. Quite to the contrary in fact; 2 Corinthians chapter 11, verse 14 says:
That satan disguises himself as an angel of light.
Isn’t that true? The whole point of temptation is that it’s seductive. Evil comes to us wrapped in a wrapper that cries out to us, “Open me, come follow me, take me I’m good, I’ll bless you.” The very first deception and temptation of Adam and Eve in the Garden was exactly that. Evil was dressed up as having a benefit, that’s why it’s so diabolical, that’s why the devil is a liar and a deceiver.
And so we’re seduced into his lies and all of a sudden we’re in the hands of the thief who comes only to steal, kill and destroy. To rob us of the super abundant life that Jesus came to give us because you know what? He came disguising himself as an angel of light.
Do you see the power of this parable? Do you see what’s going on here? God wants to bless us, God wants to heap His super abundant blessing into our lives but like any father when his children are rebelling He can’t bless us because the blessing would reward the rebellion.
When my children played up sometimes when they were young the tap of dad’s blessing turned off. Sometimes they were punished by removal of a privilege, no internet access for a few months. Why? Was I being mean? No, because I was teaching them right from wrong and the basis of that lesson is that blessing comes when you do right and you lose it when you do wrong. Parents do that because A) they love their children and B) we’re wired to be like that.
One of the very worst things we can do and you see it a lot these days is to continue to bless our children when they are doing wrong. I want you to have a listen to one of the best explanations of the link between obedience and blessing that I’ve found in God’s Word. It comes from Deuteronomy chapter 28 beginning at verse 1. Listen carefully to what God says to His people:
If you only obey the Lord your God by diligently observing all His commandments that I am commanding you today the Lord your God will set you high above all the nations of the earth.
All these blessings shall come upon you and overtake you if you obey the Lord. Blessed shall be your city and blessed shall be your field, blessed shall be the fruit of your womb, the fruit of your ground and the fruit of your livestock both the increase of your cattle and the issue of your flock.
Blessed shall be your basket and your kneading bowl. Blessed you will be when you come in and blessed you shall be when you go out. The Lord will cause the enemies who rise against you to be defeated before you. They shall come out against you one way and flee before you in seven ways. The Lord will command His blessing upon you in your barns and in all you undertake, He will bless you in the land that the Lord your God is giving you.
The Lord will establish you as His holy people as He has sworn to you if you keep the commandments of the Lord your God and walk in His ways. All the peoples of the earth shall see that you are called by the name of the Lord and they will be afraid of you. The Lord will make you abound in prosperity and the fruit of your womb, the fruit of your livestock, the fruit of your ground in the land that the Lord swore to your ancestors to give to you.
The Lord will open for you His rich storehouse, the heavens, to give the rain of your land in its season and to bless all your undertakings. You will lend to many nations but you will not borrow. The Lord will make you the head and not the tail. You shall be only at the top and not at the bottom.
If you obey the commandments of the Lord your God which I am commanding you today by diligently observing them and if you do not turn aside from any of the words that I am commanding you today either to the right or to the left following other God’s to serve them.
But if you will not obey the Lord your God by diligently observing all His commands and decrees which I am commanding you today then all these curses shall come upon you and overtake you. Cursed shall be the city. Cursed shall be your field.
And it goes on and lists a whole bunch of curses.
Do you see the causal link between obedience and blessing, disobedience and the removal of that blessing just as in any relationship between parent and child? But the thing that strikes me here is the magnitude of the blessing. Verse 2 of Deuteronomy 28:
All these blessings shall come upon you and overtake you if you obey the Lord.
Don’t you love how the blessings will overtake you? They will be super-abundant just as Jesus said. Verse 13:
The Lord will make you the head and not the tail. You shall only be at the top and not the bottom. If you obey the commandments of the Lord your God which I am commanding you today.
Friend, God wants to bless us, super abundantly so that the blessing chases us down the street and overtakes us. Do you get it? But that blessing happens when we are close to the good shepherd, safe in His care. Not when we follow the thief and let him plunder our lives through deception and temptation. Our Dad in heaven truly does want us to be the head and not the tail, to be above and not below. What father wouldn’t want that for his children?