“God is no Respecter of Persons” – R. Nelson
BIBLE MEDITATION:
“Then Peter opened his mouth, and said, of a truth I perceive that God is no respecter of persons:” Acts 10:34
ENCOURAGING WORD:
The word “respect” is a word that has been taken out of its original context of what I believe it means. (Respect-expressions of high or special regard) That would explain the verse above and what it should mean to us. See, respect has to be earned, not forced upon one another because when it is forced upon us it is no longer respect, it is fear. When the verse above says that God is no respecter of persons, it is because in and of ourselves, we could never earn God’s respect in any way, shape or form. We know this by the following verse, Romans 3:12; “They have all turned aside; they have together become unprofitable; there is none who does good, no, not one.” In order to get Gods respect we would have to be perfect in every way possible, in other words, sinless! Anybody want to make that claim? Even Jesus Christ said to the rich young ruler in Matthew 19:17; “So He said to him, “Why do you call me good? No one is good but One, that is, God. But if you want to enter into life, keep the commandments.” Being that Jesus is God, He was asking the rich young ruler if that is why He was calling Jesus good. If He did not know that Jesus was God, then He should not have referred to Him as good teacher! But as it turns out, the rich young ruler was right because Jesus was God in the flesh!
We also need to understand the context of what it is being used in the verse above. To God, all are equal in every way. God has no special respect for anyone, whether it be color, religion, ethnic group or any other distinguishing fact of being! We are all the same in the eyes of God. God loves us all, which in my opinion is a much greater expression than respect! The love that God shows for us is “Agape”, which in the Greek language is the highest form of love available this side of heaven. I personally do not feel that this kind of love is prevalent in the days in which we live. When Jesus went willingly to the cross to suffer for our sins, that is called “Agape” love. John 15:13 tells us, “Greater love has no one than this, than to lay down one’s life for his friends.” Jesus died for the sins of the world, but only those that would receive His free gift of grace would benefit from His sacrifice.
When Jesus Christ walked the shores of the Galilee, He showed a unique kind love toward everybody that He came in contact with, with the exception of a few unruly leaders such as the Pharisee’s and Sadducee’s that He often found Himself in a debate with regarding who He was, but aside from that group, He showed love to everybody equally. This is the example of how we are to be to our fellow man. We are to show love for one another whether we approve of their life styles or not, God will deal with that. We seem to think that just because we do not approve of the way certain people live their every day’s lives, we have a right judge them accordingly. We do not always have respect for the things they do, but as a human beings made from the image of God, we are to love them. 2 Corinthians 6:14 gives us this bit of information regarding those that desire to live unmoral (lying outside the bounds of morals or ethics) life styles, but we still need to love them, “Do not be unequally yoked together with unbelievers. For what fellowship has righteousness with lawlessness? And what communion has light with darkness? We need to pray for the unbelievers and turn them over to God for salvation. There is a fine line between love and respect, they are both something that has to be earned to be true, but one is more of a feeling from the heart and a commitment to someone (love) and the other is an action (respect). We may hear someone say to us, I demand respect and I deserve respect. My answer to this kind of attitude is, show yourself to be respectful and show others respect and them you will receive respect! In the same way, if you show love to others, they will intern most likely love you back, but not always. I heard a quote from a very popular movie in which I am sure everybody has seen and the quote goes like this, “You are not judged by how much you love, but by how much you are loved by others.” In case you are wondering who said this, it was none other than the Wizard of Oz when He was awarding the Tin man a new heart! In the same way, you can tell how respectful a person is by how much respect he shows to others.
We happen live in a world where respect for others is a thing of the past. Oh sure, there are a handful of people that still have respect for others, but they are few and far in-between from what I see. Back in the days of the fifties and pretty much through the seventies, respect for others was still a common way of life, but when we reached the eighties, something changed on a grand scale. It seemed to be a time when divorces started to become a way of life and many of our children born around that time were from broken families where the mother and father were separated or divorced. What I noticed on a huge scale was how children that came from divorced parents learned quickly how to manipulate the situation to their benefit. They knew all too quickly how to get their parents to compete against one another for the love of their children and they figured out how to work it to their advantage. All of a sudden they had two birthdays, two Christmas’s and two of everything else that they could use to play their parents against each other. It was a situation that just about tore my heart out when I saw parents of these broken families throw away all their self-respect in Lu of winning their children to themselves. I cannot say that they were trying to earn their love, because that obviously didn’t exist in those situations. It was not a competition of love, but dominance over the other person. Discipline became a thing of the past, neither parent would discipline their child in fear of losing them to the other parent. We created a generation of loveless and disrespectful children on a grand scale and you can see how it has affected our society today. Now days they have become young adults and are currently in their twenties, thirties and forties. The disrespect they had toward their parents and the rest of the adult population in general has followed them into the world of business. I see more and more dysfunctional business relationships where people just cannot get along and as a result they go out of business or just simply close their doors. Now, just for the record, I do believe that here are a lot of good outstanding young people that have really grabbed the concept of respecting their peers and others that they may do business with and are very successful in what they have pursued.
Now, let’s look at this on a much larger scale. The world in general has become very hostile to each other and they all seem to be vying for supreme power over the rest of the world. The deception and disrespect for other nations is at an all-time high. There are nations that go as far as to say they want to wipe certain countries off the face of the map. We read these few verses in 2 Timothy 3:1-9; “But know this, that in the last days perilous times will come: For men will be lovers of themselves, lovers of money, boasters, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, unthankful, unholy, unloving, unforgiving, slanderers, without self-control, brutal, despisers of good, traitors, headstrong, haughty, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God, having a form of godliness but denying its power, And from such people turn away!” If there ever was a time of what this verse is describing, it is now. We also read in Matthew 24:7 where it gives us a few more signs on the days in which we live, “For nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom. And there will be famines, pestilences, and earthquakes in various places.” I believe all these things are all happening as a result of Gods displeasure of what has taken place in the last few decades.
Instead of trying to love one another, there is an all-out war of hatred toward each other which is just the opposite of what it used to be. Hate and disrespect have permeated our world on such a large scale that something major is bound to break. Psalm 103:9 tells us, “He (God) will not always strive with us, Nor will He keep His anger forever.” There is coming a day when God will say, “Enough is enough” and I believe that day is coming soon! We read in Matthew 24:37-39; “But as the days of Noah were, so also will the coming of the Son of Man be. For as in the days before the flood, they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day that Noah entered the ark, and did not know until the flood came and took them all away, so also will the coming of the Son of Man be.” The days of Noah? I can’t imagine the days of Noah being much worse than the days in which we are currently living. These are all signs that Jesus is at the door. When we see these things we are instructed to “look up for our redemption draws near”. Luke 21:28 tells us, “Now when these things begin to happen, look up and lift up your heads, because your redemption draws near.” Let me ask you a question, do you see these things happening? I sure do!
The disappearance of love and respect for our fellow man throughout our world has pretty much gone by the wayside to the point of no return. Respect for one another is non-existent in most parts of the world. Even here in America we have reached an all-time high in which hatred for our fellow man far out ways the love that we once had. We have all heard the old saying, “United we stand, divided we fall”. Well, my friends, we are divided and it is not so much political as it is Spiritual. We’ve heard it said, that we are in a battle with an invisible enemy. And that spiritual enemy is what we read about in the following verse, Ephesians 6:12; “For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms.” There is an evil force in our world that far exceeds anything that we could ever have imagined. It may appear as if the battle is between political parties, but it is a battle between good and evil. From the beginning of time, it has been Satan’s plan to thwart the plan of God. It has always been about good versus evil. We are now at a threshold, or should I say a crossroad as to where our country takes us from here. Do we stay with democracy or do we turn to socialism? But once again, it is God who will determine what becomes of our once great country. It is in His hands but we have a huge part in what He decides as we read in 2 Chronicles 7:14; “if My people who are called by My name will humble themselves, and pray and seek My face, and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin and heal their land.” If you want to see America become a socialistic country, pray accordingly, or if you want America to remain the home of the free and the brave with liberty and justice for all as we have been from the time of the founding fathers, pray accordingly. God will not invade our sovereignty, He will give us the desires of our hearts until He has had enough, then judgement will come at the appointed time.
ACTION POINT:
There is a huge movement as of the last few years in America that has been growing more and more hostile toward Christians. This is clear evidence as to where the world is headed. Once again the battle is against good and evil and evil may seem to be getting the upper hand, but let me assure you if you are a true believer in Jesus Christ and have been born-again into the Holy Spirit, know this, these things must happen as the Bible clearly states. We, as the Christian body need to stand out now more than ever before. Instead of declaring the doom and gloom that is being poured out on the world, we need to tell them about the blessed hope of the soon return of Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ is our hope and apart from Him, there is no hope. The Apostle Paul tells us in Colossians 3:2; “Set your mind on things above, not on things on the earth.” So, are you respecting the Word of God, or are you respecting the things of the world…where is your hope? Your actions will speak volumes, your heart will be exposed to the truth of where you are in regards to your love for our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ! “This is truly written to the glory of God, and Inspired by the Holy Spirit!” Amen!
Commentary from our Chaplin-R Fritz
God is no Respecter of Persons
Our God loves each and every one of us. Genesis 1:27, 31 says “So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he them. And God saw everything that he had made, and, behold, it was very good. And the evening and the morning were the sixth day. What this is saying is God made us like him by our nature and soul. God is a spirit. Our spiritual self is different than anybody else. We need to look at our own spirit to make sure we are lovers of all people. Love and respect go together. Look at people amongst us now that will never agree with us, (it’s their spirit) they are looking at themselves and do not care about what anybody else says or does if it does not line up with their thoughts. There are people in the world that their spirit does not agree with God’s spirit. The Holy Spirit is what teaches us all things.
We need to look deeper at our soul and spirit. The soul and spirit are who you really are by the things in life that changed you to who you are now. I retired last year, and the Holy Spirit wanted me to deal with some issues packed deep in my soul that I did not know existed. When we don’t deal with issues, they are packed deep in your soul. When God wants us to deal with them, he starts to bring them out into the open. In my case, I said to God “whoa,” what you trying to do, I’m 62 years old. I was looking at this from fleshly perspective, why bother at my age. A couple of days later, he reminded me of spiritual perspective that if we are “Born Again,” we will be always with the Lord. The Holy Spirit brought out issues that I thought were not issues at the time but were issues that I needed to deal with. It was hurt (things people said or said and did not do) from other people that I did not know hurt me. There were other issues that I worked through. When you help the Lord help you to get through your issues, it works out well. This is called “Trust.” Proverbs 3: 5-6 says “Trust in the Lord with all thine heart; and lean not unto thine own understanding. In all thy ways acknowledge him, and he shall direct thy paths. When you fight the Lord, this is where you go through a lengthy battle, not understanding what really is going on. This is something we all need to help the Lord help us to deal with! I went to a Warriors (Veterans)conference last year and found out about a “Soul injury.” It showed me how Veterans and Military people were trained and how they think. We pack our hurt away in our soul, if we do not deal with it at the time that it happens.
If we have the Holy Spirit, our spirit will let us know when something is wrong. With all the things going on in the world our weapons are “Prayer” and the “Word of God.” Hebrews 4:12 says “For the word of God is quick, and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart.” With the Holy Spirit, we should see spiritual things happening and be able to use God’s tools to get things in line with God’s word. The Holy Spirit shows us who we are fighting. Ephesians 6:12 says “For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places.” Therefore, we need to battle with our spiritual tools. 1 Thessalonians 5:23 says “And the very God of peace sanctify you wholly; and I pray God your whole spirit and soul and body be preserved blameless unto the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.” Let us make sure we are showing the light of Jesus Christ to whomever we see, or God puts in front of us.
Editor’s note: Check out this week’s podcast, “If I were the devil.” https://anchor.fm/faithinchristjesus.net