Unreserved: How God’S Unreserved Love Calls Us to Unreserved Devotion to Him

By Bryan Thiessen

How the words and actions of Jesus effect, challenge, and guide us today.

• Language: English
• Publisher: WestBow Press
• Release date: May 27, 2015
• ISBN: 9781490875910

Bryan Thiessen

Bryan grew up on a cattle farm in the Midwest. Since 2011 he and his wife serve as the lead pastors of Grace Community Church in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. He has two master’s degrees in Christian Thought and Christian Leadership from Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary and a bachelor’s degree in Pastoral Ministries from Southwestern Assemblies of God University. Bryan serves as the president of the Bridgeville Minister’s Association, a member of the Evangelical Theological Society, and is an Associate Professor of New Testament Studies at Waynesburg University. He is also a member of the Pennsylvania Pro-Life Federation, Bridgeville Community Outreach Center, and Pennsylvania Faith & Freedom Coalition. He served on the advisory board for Faith Pittsburgh Magazine and was an assistant chaplain at the Allegheny County Jail and an assistant chaplain for the Washington Wild Things Professional Baseball Team and currently serves as a volunteer firefighter. On December 6, 2011 Bryan was asked to give the opening prayer of the U.S. Congress in Washington D.C. Bryan can be heard on his weekly radio ministry.

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Copyright © 2015 Bryan Thiessen.

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Scripture quotations are from The Holy Bible, English Standard Version® (ESV®), copyright © 2001 by Crossway, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

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ISBN: 978-1-4908-7592-7 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-4908-7593-4 (hc)

ISBN: 978-1-4908-7591-0 (e)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2015905489

WestBow Press rev. date: 5/26/2015

CONTENTS

Introduction: Why Unreserved

Chapter 1 The Beginnings

Chapter 2 UnReserved Words

Chapter 3 Unreserved Actions

Chapter 4 The Turning Point

Chapter 5 The Final Week

Chapter 6 His Unreserved Love

Chapter 7 The Greatest Day in History

Conclusion: What it all Means

Endnotes

Dedicated to CaRanda

Thank you for not only supporting my dreams, but also making them your own. You are an incredible woman of God, wonderful wife, amazing mother, and fantastic friend.

Special thanks to the amazingly wonderful body of Christians who make up Grace Community Church. You are every pastor’s dream.

INTRODUCTION

Why Unreserved

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If you had to describe the life and teachings of Jesus in one word, what would it be? Words like love, hope, peace, joy, or forgiveness? While these words accurately describe Jesus, they only portray half of his significance. They are only directed one way, towards us. This is great, except it gives us an incomplete picture. After careful study of the life and words of Jesus, the word I would choose is unreserved. Why, out of all the words that are perhaps more descriptive, unreserved?

Webster’s Dictionary defines unreserved as an adjective meaning, "not limited in any way. The Oxford Dictionary gives this definition: not restricted; without reservation; complete; full; entire; unqualified."¹ It seems as though this word was formed exclusively to help define the dichotomy of God’s love for us and our love for Him in return. God’s love for us, displayed through the words and actions of Jesus, are exactly that, not restricted, without reservation, complete, full, entire, and unqualified. Wow! Stop and think about this for a moment. No other word so richly or accurately describes how much God loves people! Yet, His love demands a response from us. In the same way that God’s love for us is, not restricted, without reservation, complete, full, entire, unqualified, so He wants our love and devotion to Him to be the same. This is the real challenge of what it means to love and follow Him. Jesus’ actions are the physical display of God’s unreserved love toward us, while his words challenge us to live and love him unreservedly in return.

In fact, the Bible says in Romans 8:32, He who did not spare his own Son but gave him up for us all, how will he not also with him graciously give us all things. In other words, God unreservedly gave Jesus, his greatest gift, out of his unreserved love for us. God holds nothing back from us. He has already given all he has and he did it without reservation! God didn’t say, Because I like you, I’ll give you something of importance to me. While it may be valuable, it’s not my most valued treasure. That’s a God of reservation. Instead, the Bible openly states that he withheld nothing out of his love for us. He gave the absolute best, most valued treasure, his only Son. That’s an unreserved God!

However, it’s precisely his unreserved love for us that demands a response of unreserved love and devotion to him. Actually, this is the first of the Ten Commandments: You shall have no other Gods before me². This concept is nothing new. Why? The Bible says that God is a jealous God, simply meaning he alone deserves all of our devotion. He has already given us his best in the person of Jesus. How can we consciously hold back or reserve parts of our lives from him while knowing he gave everything for us, without reservation? As we will see, Jesus came as proof of God’s unreserved love for us, but calls us to give our lives for him, unreservedly, in return. This is the challenge. Living for him without reservation may not be as easy as it sounds, but it’s the best decision a person can make and its’ impact can be felt today and for eternity.

Throughout this book, we’ll be following the biographical account of Jesus’ life and words from an eyewitness account of one of his disciples, Matthew. While I wish we had the time and room to discuss every aspect of Jesus’ life as recorded by Matthew, we will only discuss a few key sections from each chapter. The goal is to observe Jesus’ life in his own setting, with his own words, while at the same time keeping a clear focus on how they impact us today.

CHAPTER 1

The Beginnings

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Royal Heritage?

The book of the genealogy of Jesus Christ, the son of David, the son of Abraham.

Matthew 1:1, English Standard Version

The entire world was on edge. Excitement was building by the day. News crews and cameras from around the world were anxiously waiting outside of St. Mary’s Hospital in London. Finally, on July 22, 2013, with great celebration, the royal prince arrived. His Royal Highness Prince George Alexander Louis of Cambridge was born. He is the first son of Prince William, Duke of Cambridge and Catherine, Duchess of Cambridge, and the grandson of Her Majesty, the Queen of England. Commemorative coins were issued by the Royal Mint, Royal Canadian Mint, and Royal Australian Mint. The first time a royal birth had been marked in this way. The customary formal bulletin announcing the royal birth was displayed on an easel outside Buckingham Palace. Gun salutes signaled the birth in Bermuda, London, New Zealand, and in Canada. The bells of Westminster Abbey rang out with great celebration. The royal family, to whom Prince George was born, can trace their family lineage nine generations. There has been royal blood in their veins for over nine generations. Prince George was not born King of England; a prince, yes, an official king with a kingdom, no. He will only become a king upon the death or abdication of the throne by his father.

The birth of Jesus, however, was opposite in nearly every regard. He was born king, and the entire cosmos his kingdom. Yet, he was born with very little earthly fanfare. Rather than gun salutes and bells ringing, angels from Heaven announced his birth. Not to empirical powers, but to a few poor shepherds in a field in the middle of the night. Rather than being born in a palace, as any rightful king should, he was born in a borrowed barn in the small town of Bethlehem. This king is able to trace his family lineage as far back as the creation of humankind itself. Back to the very first chapters of the Bible, in the Garden of Eden, to the very first human ever created, Adam. In fact, these are the very first words Matthew tells us about Jesus.

Matthew begins his biographical story of Jesus by emphatically proving that this baby was born not as a prince, but as a king, and has the historical family records to prove it. To many people genealogies may seem quite boring, unless perhaps it’s your own. The genealogy of Jesus, however, is so exceptional that it demands careful attention. Matthew lists all generations from Abraham and King David in the Old Testament, to the dawning of a new age, the birth of the rightful king and rightful heir to the throne of Israel, Jesus. What’s so significant about Abraham and King David that Matthew makes a special note of pointing them out? Abraham is the father of the Jewish faith. ³ If you want to be King of Israel, the best way to prove your pedigree is to be a direct descendant of Abraham. However, Abraham also represents God’s covenant with Israel as a chosen people and affirmed that the whole world would be blessed through his family line. This is why Matthew goes to great lengths to prove this point. While Abraham represents God’s promise with the people of Israel, King David represents the royal line of Jesus’ family tree. ⁴

While we don’t have adequate time to fully discuss each of the nuances of Jesus’ genealogy, a few people on the list stand out. For example, Rahab is listed in Jesus’ royal family heritage. The Bible says that she was a prostitute, yet here she is listed in the family line of the King of the Cosmos. ⁵ Also listed in Jesus’ Jewish family heritage is a woman named Ruth. Ruth was not even Jewish, but a Moabite. ⁶ Could you imagine if Prince George had a prostitute and a non-Anglo/Brit in his family tree? It would be absurd to include such people in a royal family pedigree. However, included in the genealogy of Jesus, God’s only Son and the King of the Cosmos, are people who, by any outsider’s perspective, don’t belong. With Jesus it’s different. They are included proudly and openly. In fact, it’s these types of people for whom this king has come, not to rule over, but to serve and give his life for them.

The God of the Bible includes outcasts in his royal family! Maybe you have come from a horrific family. Maybe you feel like an outcast. The good news is the very being who created you loves you so incredibly much that he wants to include you in his family. He’s an unreserved God. Contrary to what many religious people think or say, you don’t have to look good, smell good, have a clean record, a lot of money, come from a good pedigree, be perfect, or be super religious. He places no reservations on people who want to belong to his family. Unfortunately, many people think the exact opposite. They think that before God will accept them or love them, they must have everything perfect, everything cleaned up and organized in their lives. You may think God could never love or forgive you because of something in your past. If the family tree of Jesus teaches us anything, it’s that nothing could be further from the truth! God is not a God who excludes people. He’s a God who is actively seeking to include people who feel like outcasts and outsiders. These are the ones God purposely includes in his family. This is the kind of unreserved love this king offers.

The Name

Now the birth of Jesus Christ took place in this way. When his mother Mary had been betrothed to Joseph, before they came together she was found to be with child from the Holy Spirit. And her husband Joseph, being a just man and unwilling to put her to shame, resolved to divorce her quietly. But as he considered these things, behold, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream, saying, Joseph, son of David, do not fear to take Mary as your wife, for that which is conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. She will bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins. All this took place to fulfill what the Lord had spoken by the prophet: Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and they shall call his name Immanuel (which means, God with us). When Joseph woke from sleep, he did as the angel of the Lord commanded him: he took his wife, but knew her not until she had given birth to a son. And he called his name Jesus.

Matthew 1:18-25

I had no name for the first three days of my life. Don’t ask me why. I can also tell you that my name, Bryan, has no significance whatsoever. It’s not a family name passed down from generation to generation. I wasn’t named after some famous person or Bible character. In fact, the selection of my name is about as random as pulling it out of a hat.

This was clearly not the case for Jesus. His name was given before the world was ever created.⁷ Not only was his name announced by the angels of Heaven, they articulated what it would mean: Immanuel (which means God with us). How incredible is that? God is with us! He’s not a God who is against you. No, in fact, it’s the opposite; he is with you! He’s not a God who is far away on some distant planet, or is busy with something else in your desperate time of need. This concept of Immanuel would have been revolutionary to the ancient Roman world. They believed that the mythical pagan gods were removed from their daily lives and had to be begged when people needed them. This God, Immanuel, is completely different in every way from the false Roman gods. This is not the type of god who requires people to come to him. On the contrary, he’s the only God who, out of pure unreserved love, came to us! He wants to be a part of our lives. He wants to save us. Not from political oppression, we could do that ourselves, but from our sin and eternal separation from him. Something that’s impossible for us to do on our own. He wants to give us hope, love, joy, and peace, both in this life and the life to come.

God is with us. In the middle of life’s messes, he stands by our side encouraging, helping, and guiding us. He’s