“And He charged them that they should tell no man: but the more He charged them, so much the more a great deal they published it. 37. And were beyond measure astonished, saying, He hath done all things well: He makes the deaf to hear and the dumb to speak.”
What astonished the people so much was that when Jesus was at Decapolis, He healed a man who was deaf and mute. Evidently, the people who brought the man to Jesus had known the man for a long time. They had probably heard of some of Jesus’ other works and wanted Him to do the same for their friend. Their statement, “He hath done all things well” is a good description of Jesus. He always does all things well. In fact, everything Jesus did was well done. Jesus did all things well in his life on earth. The Bible tells us that Jesus “was tempted in all points like as we are, yet without sin.” (Hebrews 4:15b) He lived a perfect life. This was something that no human being had ever done before, or since. In fact, the Bible always tells us the truth about human beings. Even the “heroes” of the Bible had feet of clay. David and Moses are two good examples of this. Both are portrayed well in the Bible, but we see their dark side as well. The wonderful thing is that Jesus did not have a dark side. When He told the people that He loved them, there was no pretense about it. He genuinely loved people and still does. Jesus did all things well in His death on the cross. When Jesus died He said, “It is finished.” The “it” in this sentence is God’s plan of salvation for the ages. Long before time began, God had it in His heart that Jesus would come to earth, live a perfect life, and die on the cross. What Jesus did on the cross is more than amazing. He became sin for us, i.e., He took all of the sins of all of the people in the world upon Himself. Because Jesus did this we are able to be saved and to have eternal life. If Jesus hadn’t done that no one could be saved. He did it in spite of the fact that no one could ever deserve it. Romans 3:23 tells us that “all have sinned and come short of the glory of God.” Romans 5:8 tells us that “while we were yet sinners Christ died for us.” If we aren’t careful, this wonderful truth will literally go over our heads. Perhaps we have heard it so much that we have been anesthetized to the wonder of it all. Do not be numb to the fact of the grace of God that brought Jesus and enabled us to be saved. As He lived well, Jesus died well. Jesus did all things well in his resurrection from the dead. When Jesus shed His blood on the cross, our salvation was made possible, and when He arose from the grave He made salvation inevitable for those who would put their faith and trust in Him. If Jesus had remained in the grave, we would have nothing to celebrate. In 1 Corinthians 15, Paul’s great chapter on Christ’s resurrection, Paul wrote about the necessity of the resurrection. The wonderful thing is that we can know that He lives. The old hymn says: “He lives, He lives, Christ Jesus lives today. He walks with me and talks with me along life’s narrow way. He lives, He lives salvation to impart. You ask me how I know He lives, He lives within my heart.” Jesus does all things well in our lives when He lives within our hearts. He still “walks with us and talks with us.” He still imparts His great salvation to us when by faith we receive Him. It is possible that you have not read anything that is new to you in this article. I want you to read and see it like you did when you first believed. Be astonished afresh and anew about Jesus– all that He did and all that He continues to do. I pray that He is doing it in your life. I hope that you truly know from personal experience that “Jesus doeth all things well.” He really does! Bro. Joe
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“When I consider thy heavens, the work of thy fingers, the moon and the stars, which thou hast ordained; 4. What is man, that thou art mindful of him and the son of man that thou visitest him?”
Have you ever looked up into the night sky and wondered in your heart why a great God who created all of that and keeps it working would pay attention to you? I surely have. When I consider the greatness of God, it just amazes me that this great God would care about my little mully-grubbing life. (Your's too! :)) On top of all that, He loved us enough to send His Son to die on the cross for us in order for us to be saved from sin. I just have to admit that all of this is beyond my intellectual ability to grasp and to understand. That’s why we have to accept Him by faith. The most amazing part of it is that He has given us enough revelation in scripture and in nature to see the enormity of what He has done for us. Who are we that all of this should be done for us? We are God’s unique creation. After God created everything else, He created Adam and Eve and “breathed into their nostrils the breath of life…” Our lives are the result of the breath of God. In Psalm 139:14 David wrote: “I will praise thee; for I am fearfully and wonderfully made: marvelous are thy works; and that my soul knoweth quite well.” The Holman translation of “fearfully” is “remarkably.” If we take a good look at this organism that God has made, that is called “us,” we will realize how remarkable it is. Just the mechanism of the eye that enables us to see is a remarkable work. Think of the human hand with a thumb that helps us grasp objects. It is all remarkable, and should make our minds and hearts soar with gratitude to God Who “fearfully and wonderfully” made us. Rejoice that you are a unique creation of the almighty God. We were created by God to worship and serve Him. Adam and Eve were placed in the Garden of Eden to serve Him through dressing and keeping the garden. They had a perfect relationship with God, but when Satan visited the garden, he took their eyes off of service to God and put their eyes on serving themselves for their own pleasure. This remains a human struggle to this day. We were created to serve God, but we get sidetracked in our service to self. When I say that we were created to serve God, I do not mean that we were all created to be preachers or missionaries. We were created to worship Him, consult Him by prayer and live lives that lift Him up. We can do this in any work that we do on this earth. The whole Bible is the story of God’s reestablishing humanity's relationship with Himself. Ultimately, He sent Jesus of Nazareth to bring us back together with Him. It is His will that all should come to Him. He is “not willing that any should perish." People perish because they refuse His great love and His great plan to save them. Get it down in your mind and heart that you are in this world to worship and serve God. What that service should be is between God and you, but you need to discover what it is and do it. That is why you were “fearfully and wonderfully made.” We were created to love God and people. When asked which was the greatest commandment, Jesus answer was: “….Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself.” When we cease to love God and people, we are not doing what God wants us to do. I have not scratched the surface of what this great text reveals to us, but perhaps what I have written can help you find your place in the grand scheme of Almighty God. Bro. Joe “For I said, Hear me, lest otherwise they should rejoice over me: when my foot stumbles they magnify themselves against me.” Psalm 38:16
“Yea, my own familiar friend, in whom I trusted, which did eat my bread, has lifted up his heel against me.” Psalm 41:9 We do not normally think of David as having relationship problems, but some of his psalms prove otherwise. The selections from Psalms give us two examples of relationship problems. In these two examples David was beset by people who wanted to humble or shame him and by a friend who betrayed him in some way. Just read on in the psalms and you will find other passages similar to these. David knew what we should know, i.e., one of our biggest problems in this world is "other people." Think about it, how many of your heartbreaking, or heartrending moments have been because of what other people said about you or did to you? If this has never happened to you consider yourself fortunate. (We might also consider the times that we mistreated someone else. Just Sayin’) Jesus spent a lot of time trying to help us love and relate to people, because He knew that they would not always be easy to love and would not always be our friends. Paul wrote about relationships with other people, because he knew that they would be the cause of a lot of our problems. This is why it is so important to practice loving people on a daily basis. If we are to ever "love the unloveables" we will have to be filled with God's Spirit of love and really apply it. I'm afraid that in our churches we too often fail the "other people" test. The New Testament tells us only to love them. Let’s take David’s example from Psalm 41:9. There was someone he had trusted who betrayed him in some way. I don’t think that there is anything more disappointing than to be betrayed by someone with whom we have been close. Proverbs 17:17a says that “A friend loveth at all times…” This means that a true friend will not betray that friendship. We can’t do anything about others who are not true friends, but we can be careful ourselves to always be true friends and “love at all times.” What should we do in adverse circumstances like these? I would think that the first thing we should do is to pray for the person. Ask God to help your friend, and ask Him to help you continue to love your errant brother. When I have prayed for people with whom I have had personal problems, I have found that I can’t dislike them. God knows what the situation is and He will answer our prayers. The second thing that we should do is to fight against the temptation to pay the person back. The Bible always tells us that vengeance belongs to God. It is difficult for us to not want to avenge ourselves when we feel that we have been offended in some way. But if we will look at Jesus, and how He reacted to such situations, we will see that we cannot really avenge ourselves. All that happens is that the strife continues on and on. Romans 12:17 tells us: “Recompense to no man evil for evil.” Evil can never stamp out evil; therefore, we do not return the evil done to us. The third thing that we should do is to seek to be reconciled with the person. I know that this is difficult, and it should not be done until we have prayed about the situation and have forgiven the person in our hearts. We want reconciliation to be sincere. In order for this to be the reality, we will have to forgive. You might be thinking: “Bro. Joe, you have lost your mind. I want to insist that they apologize." That would be good, but I don’t remember that anyone who crucified Jesus apologized to Him before He forgave them. If the other person will not reconcile with us, we should simply wish them well and move on with our lives. Life is too short to hold grudges against people. We will always have to deal with people in one way or the other. Let’s just make sure that we deal with them as Christians should. Bro. Joe "But without faith it is impossible to please (God): for he that comes to God must believe that He is, and that He is a rewarder of them that diligently seek Him."
Faith in Christ is the key to everything in the Christian life. The text written above shows that this is true. It says that without faith it is “impossible to please God.” The word“impossible” is emphatic here. We could paraphrase the text this way: “Without faith it is absolutely impossible to please (God).” It is also important to stress that the text is about faith in Christ, not faith in the idea of faith. A lot of people claim to live by faith in some life dream of theirs. That kind of faith might bring worldly success, but it will not succeed with God. Faith in Christ opens up a whole new dimension in the life of the believer. Things become possible which did not seem possible before, for Christ, through the Holy Spirit, goes to work in our lives, changing and enriching us . We are saved by grace through faith, and besides that we are sustained by faith. Hebrews 11:1 gives us the essence of faith: "Faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen." Faith makes possible that which seems impossible.It makes real that which seems unreal. Without faith we cannot see the need to be saved, nor can we understand the works of God. What I am about to share is very personal and perhaps a bit redundant, because you might have read it before, but it illustrates what I mean when I say that we are sustained by faith. I talked to my oldest brother (Maybe “big brother” would be better.) about our various illnesses. He said that when he was diagnosed with prostate cancer he did not wonder "Why me," but "Why not me?" I said, "that is exactly what I thought when I was diagnosed with lymphoma." It is also what I thought when I discovered that I had colon cancer as well. . You see, "Why me?" is not a statement of faith, rather it is a statement of selfishness and despair. I had to face the plain truth in faith, because without faith, I would have faced it in despair. As a child of God I am not to give way to despair or fear. I'm not that brave. I just have faith in a great big God, with Whom "all things are posslble." I have faith in a great God Who will be with me all of the way, and will work it all out according to His will. Do not understand me to be bragging about my faith. I am bragging about a great God Who made faith possible. He made it possible for you too. If you realize that, this blog has achieved its purpose. Traditionally, Hebrews 11 has been called “the hall of faith.” It reveals the faith of certain great Old Testament saints whose lives portrayed great faith. The chapter points out to us that salvation and sustenance has always been by faith in Christ. Hebrews 11:13 shows us that this is true: “These all died by faith, not having received the promise….” “Promise” here can only mean one thing, i.e., faith in Christ. Christ’s coming had been predicted in various prophecies and types throughout the Old Testament. In fact, these texts were used by New Testament Christians to witness to people since there was no New Testament at the time. The verse concludes: “But having seen them afar off, and were persuaded of them, and embraced them, and confessed that they were strangers and pilgrims on the earth.” This saving and sustaining faith has always been a reality since the beginning of time. In fact in Revelation 13:8, we discover the true meaning of this: “And all that dwelt upon the earth shall worship Him, whose names are not written in the book of life of the lamb slain from the foundation of the world.” The faith that we have in Christ is deeply rooted in biblical history.(It is also rooted in human history.) Rejoice that you are saved by your faith in Christ, and rejoice that your life is sustained by faith in Him. Praise Him! Bro. Joe “To everything there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven.”
Danny Thomas, our former music director at FBC Camilla, spoke at Prayer Meeting about two weeks ago. His message was about prayer. He gave an anonymous quote that I found interesting and it got the“creative juices” flowing in my mind. Quote: “Time means nothing to God…Timing means everything to God.” That is a profound statement and says what I have thought about a great deal lately: God is above time and He works in our lives according to His timing and not our wishes. Solomon stated this fact in our text, and the truth of it is found throughout the Bible. One example is that Jesus' whole life was lived within the timing of the Father. It is written of Jesus that such and such did not happen because the time was not right for it. First, “time means nothing to God” because He is eternal. The Bible begins in Genesis 1:1: “In the beginning God.” John began his gospel with these words: “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God and the Word was God…” Both verses tell us that God was there at the beginning. He is the One who started time for us, but He is not subject to time. One puzzling question that children ask their parents and Sunday School teachers is “where did God come from?” This is not really a difficult question. The best answer is “I don’t know” but if that doesn’t suffice, just tell them God/Jesus has always existed. Either answer would be right. God was serious when He told Isaiah: “For my thoughts are not your thoughts neither are your ways my ways, saith the Lord.” (Isaiah 55:8) God has revealed what we need to know about Him in His creation and mainly in His word– The Bible. God does not need a watch because He knows no restrictions of time. Second, “timing means everything to God.” One example of this is that Jesus’ whole life was lived within the timing of the Father. It is written of Jesus that certain things did not happen because the time was not right for it. Galatians 4:3-5 illustrates what I mean:“Even so we, when we were children, were in bondage under the elements of the world. 4. But when the fullness of the time was come, God sent forth His Son, made of a woman, made under the law. 5. To redeem them that were under the law, that we might receive the adoption of sons.” God acted to save the world from sin when His time was right. In Luke 9:51 it is written: “And it came to pass when the time was come that (Jesus) should be received up, He steadfastly set His face to go to Jerusalem.” This means that in the timing of God it was time for Jesus to be crucified and subsequently to rise from the dead and ascend to the Father. I could give other examples, but I want to apply what all of this means to our lives. What this means to us is that we are under the authority of an eternal God, who lives above time as we know it. The eternal Word (Jesus) dipped into time and did what needed to be done to save us. What God’s timing means to us is that when we pray we shouldn’t get impatient because the eternal God will answer according to His timing not ours. Psalm 27:14 gives us good advice about this: “Wait on the Lord: be of good courage, and He shall strengthen thine heart: wait, I say on the Lord.” Only God knows when the time is right for our prayers to be answered. While we wait on the fulfillment of God’s timing in our lives, He is strengthening our hearts. It is while we wait on the timing of God that we grow spiritually. God knows when we are ready to receive the answer that He has for us. In the light of the eternal power of God, I don't believe that would we want it any other way? I think that you will agree. Bro. Joe “Casting all your care upon Him, for He cares for you….”
The content of this article is mine but the idea came from today’s devotional in David Jeremiah’s devotional book entitled Discovery. David Jeremiah wrote something that really caught my imagination: “Entrusting ourselves and our troubles to God is our singular defense against worry.” It made me wonder what defense people have when they are not trusting in Christ for salvation and for daily sustenance. Corrie Ten Boom wrote this about worry, quoted in David Jeremiah’s article: “Worry is an old man with bended head, carrying a load of feathers which he thinks are lead.” When we look back on all that we have worried about in the past, we can see the truth in what Corrie Ten Boom wrote. Just think about it for a second: What were the real outcomes of all of your past worries? I can’t speak for you, but I can say for myself that I need not have worried, because it all worked out in the end. Some solutions might have taken longer than others, but they were solutions. What I saw in this text will be the body of what I want to share with you about overcoming worry. Peter wrote: “casting all your care upon Him.” When you consider that the “Him” mentioned here is the eternal God, creator and ruler of the universe, we have a great advocate in overcoming worry. Notice that Peter advised us to cast “all your care upon Him.” This means that we are to take every worry that we have, from the greatest to the least, to God. There is no worry too small for God to consider, and there is no worry so large that He cannot help us overcome it. He might let us go through some hardships over some of the worries that we have. In other words, what we worry about might come to pass, but in the midst of it, Jesus shows us that we need not have worried. It seemed terrible at the time, but Jesus was at work in it, growing us in Himself and showing us the way through it. Let’s get personal, for I believe that I am writing specifically for some of you. What is your biggest worry right now? Is that worry bigger than God? Do you really believe that He can’t deliver you from it or through it? I look back at the terrible times in my life and realize that God had my back at all times. Even the times that I made my own trouble, He has guided me through. To be sure, He disciplined me in the process, but I was stronger for it. Cast your worries upon the Almighty. As I have written above, I can’t guarantee you that you won’t have to go through whatever your worry is about, but I can guarantee you that you will come out better for it. That we can cast our cares upon the Lord is wonderful, but what comes next is even more wonderful: “for He cares for you.” Let me put it another way: “He loves you!!!" You can cast all of your worries upon Him because He is big enough to take them, but at the same time you can do it because He loves you. One of my favorite verses in the Bible is Deuteronomy 33:27a: “The eternal God is thy refuge, and underneath are the everlasting arms….” This promise was made to Israel by Moses as he was preparing them to go into the promised land. He wanted them to know that no matter what they faced in the process of claiming their homeland, the "everlasting arms” of God would be there to catch them. At times, Israel forgot this, and we will too, but that doesn’t mean that the loving arms of God are not ready at all times to catch us. The rest of that promise is: “and He shall thrust out the enemy from before you; and shall say, Destroy them.” Consider that your worries are your enemies, and realize that they can be destroyed by the great God who loves you. Isn’t that good news? Bro. Joe |
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