https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=djaJ6b_TOh0 ““Why do Your disciples break the tradition of the elders? For they do not wash their hands when they eat bread.” And He answered and said to them, “Why…
2 Kings 18.5-6 observes, Hezekiah put his whole trust in the God of Israel. There
was no king quite like him, either before or after. He held fast to God—never loosened his grip—and obeyed to the letter everything God had commanded Moses. And God, for His part, held fast to him through all his adventures. MSG
We should seek to be like Hezekiah: Holding fast to God, never loosening our grip on God, obedient to the letter of everything Jesus commands us. Then we will experience God holding us fast through all our adventures. What adventures are we taking for God? What are we doing that needs faith, trust, and earnest prayer?
Daniel 5.24-28 records, God sent the hand that wrote on the wall, and this is what
is written: mene, teqel, and peres. This is what the words mean: “Mene: God has numbered the days of your rule and they don’t add up. “Teqel: You have been weighed on the scales and you don’t weigh much. “Peres: Your kingdom has been divided up and handed over to the Medes and Persians. MSG
For every man there lies ahead the judgement of God. This is when we will all stand before Him to give account to Him for how we lived on this earth in obedience to His commands. Most men plan to enter that day hoping their lives were ‘good’ and acceptable to God not based upon what God has said but based upon their own creation of what pleases God. (more…)
Ephesians 6.13-18 commands, be prepared. You’re up against far more than you
can handle on your own. Take all the help you can get, every weapon God has issued, so that when it’s all over but the shouting you’ll still be on your feet. Truth, righteousness, peace, faith, and salvation are more than words. Learn how to apply them. You’ll need them throughout your life. God’s Word is an indispensable weapon. In the same way, prayer is essential in this ongoing warfare. Pray hard and long. Pray for your brothers and sisters. Keep your eyes open. Keep each other’s spirits up so that no one falls behind or drops out. MSG
Truth, righteousness, peace, faith, and salvation are more than words. Learn how to apply them. This is the command of God, how diligent are we to ‘apply’ these words? To apply them we must think about them, we must consider them, and we must pursue them with the Church for in the family of God is wisdom and accountability for not only knowing but for taking action upon these things God has commanded.
1 Corinthians 5.1-2 records, I also received a report of scandalous sex within
your church family, a kind that wouldn’t be tolerated even outside the church: One of your men is sleeping with his stepmother. And you’re so above it all that it doesn’t even faze you! Shouldn’t this break your hearts? Shouldn’t it bring you to your knees in tears? Shouldn’t this person and his conduct be confronted and dealt with? MSG
Why was this activity wrong? Where did the Lord Jesus condemn such actions? We have to turn to Paul’s Bible, what we call the Old Testament, to find this behavior of a man sleeping with his stepmother immoral. But we are under the New Covenant, why should this apply to us?
Acts 24.24-26 records, “A few days later Felix and his wife, Drusilla, who was
Jewish, sent for Paul and listened to him talk about a life of believing in Jesus Christ. As Paul continued to insist on right relations with God and his people, about a life of moral discipline and the coming Judgment, Felix felt things getting a little too close for comfort and dismissed him. “That’s enough for today. I’ll call you back when it’s convenient.” At the same time he was secretly hoping that Paul would offer him a substantial bribe. These conversations were repeated frequently.” MSG
In his sharing of the gospel, the Apostle Paul tells us a few key elements of what it means to believe in Jesus. First, is the insisting upon a right relationship with God and His people. A right relationship with God must come through Jesus the Savior. Reconciliation to God comes by faith in the life, death and resurrection of Jesus. Apart from faith in Him, there is no peace with God. (more…)
Deuteronomy 29.14-21,29 records, I’m not making this Covenant and its oath
with you alone. I am making it with you who are standing here today in the Presence of God, our God, yes, but also with those who are not here today. You know the conditions in which we lived in Egypt and how we crisscrossed through nations in our travels. You got an eyeful of their obscenities, their wood and stone, silver and gold junk-gods. Don’t let down your guard lest even now, today, someone—man or woman, clan or tribe—gets sidetracked from God, our God, and gets involved with the no-gods of the nations; lest some poisonous weed sprout and spread among you, a person who hears the words of the Covenant-oath but exempts himself, thinking, “I’ll live just the way I please, thank you,” and ends up ruining life for everybody. God won’t let him off the hook. God’s anger and jealousy will erupt like a volcano against that person. The curses written in this book will bury him. God will delete his name from the records. God will separate him out from all the tribes of Israel for special punishment, according to all the curses of the Covenant written in this Book of Revelation………God, our God, will take care of the hidden things but the revealed things are our business. It’s up to us and our children to attend to all the terms in this Revelation. MSG
The sign of our commitment to God is our obedience to the Word of God. Are we Christians? Then like Christ we seek to obey every word that comes from the mouth of our Father. His word is our bread, His will is our food, living His ways are the sign of the abundant, life giving, waters residing within us. (more…)
John 12.26 instructs, if any of you wants to serve Me, then follow Me. Then you’ll
be where I am, ready to serve at a moment’s notice. The Father will honor and reward anyone who serves Me. MSG
The invitation seems unconditional, optional, as though we are free to take it or ignore it. Indeed, we certainly live this way. Most ignore the invitation, like the people of Jesus’ day, they see Him when He comes to town, like the circus, otherwise they go about their own business each day.
Hebrews 5.11,13 laments, we have much to say about this, but it is hard to make
it clear to you because you no longer try to understand……..Anyone who lives on milk, being still an infant, is not acquainted with the teaching about righteousness.
Is this not our current problem in America in a nutshell? The people of God have little interest in the things of God? Why is it so hard, for so many, to spend anytime at all in the scriptures or prayer? So few have a daily habit of reading chapters of the Bible in order to know their God better so they can do His will better.
Ezekiel 21.3-4 records, this is what the Lord says: I am against you. I will draw
My sword from its sheath and cut off from you both the righteous and the wicked. Because I am going to cut off the righteous and the wicked, My sword will be unsheathed against everyone from south to north.
The sin of Israel was too much, too consistent, too long for God to overlook any longer. Though there were a few who obeyed God, the culture itself was rotten to the core. Judgement, punishment and disaster were the result of Israel’s persistent disobedience to God. Yet even in this promise to slay the righteous and the wicked, God also promised to save a few. (more…)
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