Two teachings of the apostle Paul govern this series on Restoring the Reconciled World. The first teaching is that Jesus Christ – by His life, death, resurrection, and ascension – has reconciled the world and all things in it to God. Second, God has given to us, His people, a ministry of reconciliation, which takes the form of restoring the reconciled world’s freedom and goodness to the praise and glory of God.

Why are there so many psalms encouraging us to seek the Lord for revival? Obviously, because God wants us to do so. And He has provided the psalms to guide us in understanding what revival is, why it’s necessary, and how we may seek it from Him.

Jesus has called His followers disciples – learners. We are commanded to learn Him, that is, to increase in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ, which is eternal life.

Grace is one of those wonderful words that Christians embrace, use, and rejoice to know. But do we really know what grace is? Do we know what grace is for? How it operates? How to receive it, and what use to make of it?

Everyone has a worldview, and Christians especially should work hard to develop their worldview, keeping Jesus at the center and as the strength and goal of everything we do. We need to see Jesus and how the Christian worldview develops around Him, beginning in our thinking where Jesus did, with the Law of God.

The great tsunami of a few years back was one of the greatest ever recorded, even though it probably didn’t affect you at all.

And our salvation is great – so great that, as the Psalmist explained, “My mouth shall tell of Your righteousness and Your salvation all the day, for I do not know their limits (Ps. 71.15). So deep, so vast, so profound, so allencompassing, so all-transforming and all-renewing, so powerful, so glorious and joyous and fruitful and inspiring and world-uprighting is our great salvation, that we can never get to the bottom of its grandeur, comprehend the scope of its greatness, or exhaust the vastness of its power.

Christians cannot escape the responsibility for exercising sound judgment in every area of life. God intends to bring His shalom to the world through our judgments, so we need to make sure our judgments are in line with His.

In the Christian community, sometimes we give the impression that only the people with big responsibilities matter. They’re the ones that get things done, the ones everyone listens to and wants to learn from, the folks we look to for leadership in our churches and Christian organizations. We need leaders, and sometimes leaders play really important roles in the Kingdom. But more than that, we need energetic, everyday believers, men and women who understand that Kingdom progress is incremental and gradual, that it comes as we lay hold on the little things of life and make them something glorious.

Coming to faith in Jesus is not the end of the Christian life. It’s just the beginning. God delivered Israel out of Egypt, and that was just the start of a long process of their laying hold on the promises God had made to their forebears. To realize the fullness of all God had in store for them, Israel would have to make steady progress against considerable odds. The Christian faith is very much like this.

Here are two subjects that, at first glance, seem to have nothing to do with one another. Closer consideration, however, reveals that they are inextricably linked. Worship is about God – honoring Him, committing to Him, and serving Him in all aspects of life. Public policy is about life and the rules by which people live. God is Ruler of all things, and thus public policy is only valid to the extent that it lines up with God’s good and perfect rule.

People live toward whatever they value. When the values we cherish are Kingdom values, we’ll realize more of the full and abundant life Jesus offers.