Are you aware of your addiction to being “good” and not “evil?” Did you buy last week’s thesis that, yes, all of Adam’s descendants are addicted to the forbidden fruit from the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, and that includes you! Ask yourself two questions: 1.) “Do I really want to be ‘good’ (obedient to God’s law)?”, OR, 2.) “Do I want to receive credit with God for being ‘good’ (obedient to God’s law)?” There is a huge difference. We were…
Most of us don’t have a clue. How you interpret this verse will let you know, if you have eyes to see: “Be diligent to present yourself approved to God, a worker who does not need to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth” (2 Timothy 2:15). Upon first reading this verse, my natural, obvious interpretation of it is that I need to study the Bible and keep its commandments more diligently, and if I do so effectively, I will be able to…
Periodically, I think it vitally important to remind the regular readers of this blog of the foundation upon which the structure of our personal faith rests. It is the forest in which the trees of our individual lives are growing and the framework in which God is painting our personal histories. In this blog, there are continual references to this “big picture” vision of why we were created, which we find in the first chapter in the Bible: 1.) bear God’s image (i.e., to…
Last week I concluded the blog posting with this paragraph: “On the other hand, a full time homemaker can see her home as a destination stop, not a place to eat and sleep on the way to somewhere else. As she creates her “work-place” to be an expression of herself, rather than a house with furniture in it, it can become the hub of a potentially powerful, natural, spontaneous, unconscious ministry, first to her family and then to the world around her.” Today, I want…
One of the most controversial issues among Bible-believing churches today is the roles of men and women—not only in the church, but in the family and all of society as well. Are their roles in these areas interchangeable, or are men and women each given unique gifts that only allow those of their specific gender to fulfill their tasks with maximum success? In American culture the satanic attack on the family has never been as intense and successful in our 250 years as a…
Let’s assume you are in a church that takes seriously its “equipping of the saints for the work of ministry for the edifying of the body of Christ” (Ephesians 412). Your church actually relies on you as an eager participant when it meets, enthusiastically worshiping the Lord in a biblical fashion. It focuses on regularly and faithfully remembering our complete, permanent forgiveness at the cross, and has taught you to think as a little child who knows that his Daddy loves him, absolutely unconditionally.…
The church functions to “equip the saints for the work of the ministry” (Ephesian’s 4:11)—to naturally, spontaneously, and unconsciously (NSU minister to the others in their church and to the world around them, as we saw last week. What does “the Truth” (the law of God, proclaimed by one “walking by faith”) tell us about how “equip the saints” occurs? What is a New Testament church like? It may come in all shapes and sizes. A biblical wineskin that constitutes “the church” may vary…
They won the victory over him by the blood of the Lamb and by THE TRUTH WHICH THEY PROCLAIMED (Revelation 12:11). Be ready to SPEAK UP AND TELL ANYONE who asks why you’re living the way you are (1 Peter 3:15). As the church learns to walk by faith in the Truth of God, these verses introduce the second step the church will take, after Standing for the Truth: 2. At every opportunity, the church will PROCLAIM THAT TRUTH. As we saw last week,…
Last week we discussed the Truth—the law of God applied experientially by the Spirit of God in our lives. We could summarize last week’s posting with this statement: “The law of God, expressed by the Spirit of God in our lives as we walk by faith, is the Truth that sets us free; The law of God, expressed by our attempts to obey it, is the ‘law of sin and death’ that kills us.” As the church learns to walk by faith in the…
“And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth (John 1:14). From the time of Moses receiving the 10 Commandments on Mt. Sinai in about 1500 B.C., until 4 B.C. when Jesus came to earth as a baby in Bethlehem, the Law of God was objective. It was arm’s-length, intellectually knowable—Israel’s perfect standard of truth to follow in all matters of faith and conduct.…