“For the Son of God, Jesus Christ, who was preached among you by us, even by me and Silvanus and Timothy, was not yes and no, in Him was yes. 20.For all the promises of God in Him are yes, and in Him Amen, unto the glory of God by us.”
We can say that Jesus is God’s yes to the world. We know that God says no to a lot of things, but all of the good things from God, all of the blessings of God, are yes in Jesus. In other words, as we saw in the last article, there are times that we should say no. We should say no to Satan, and to the wrong things, at all times, but we should learn to say yes to Jesus in all of the right things, because He says yes to us in all of the blessings that He wants to give us. If we want to be Christ like in our lives, especially, in our dealings with people, we need to learn to say yes to the good things. We should say yes to God’s will in our lives. James warns us in James 4:13-15 that we should always consider God’s will: “Go to now, you that say, Today or tomorrow we will go into such a city, and continue there for a year, and buy and sell and get gain. 14. Whereas you know not what shall be on the morrow. For what is your life? It is even a vapor, that appears for a little time, and then vanishes away. 15. For that you ought to say, If the Lord will, we shall live, and do this or that.” Jesus set the example in Gethsemane when He said yes to God about going to the cross. Specifically, Jesus said, “Father if thou be willing, remove this cup from me, nevertheless not my will, but thine, be done.” If Jesus was willing to say yes to God’s will on our behalf, we should certainly be willing to say yes to God’s will for our lives. We should say yes to the Holy Spirit in decisions that we make each day. All of us know right from wrong. Even when I was doing Bible studies in prisons, I never had one prisoner say that he did not know right from wrong. But in some things we need the Spirit’s leadership to say and do the right thing. The Holy Spirit will keep us from seeking revenge. He will keep us from saying things to people that we should not say. When we want to say negative things to another person, we should listen to what the Holy Spirit is whispering to our hearts. We will be glad that we listened to the Holy Spirit when we get away from the situation and really think about it. The Holy Spirit will actually help us in knowing and doing God’s will in our lives. He will help us say yes to the things that we should say yes to and no to things that we should say no to. We should say yes to loving other people. We will certainly need the Holy Spirit for this. There are people who are easy to love and there are people who are difficult to love, but their being unlovable does not give us an excuse not to love them. It is a fact that the New Testament never gives us a reason for not loving another person. Almost every day we are given opportunities to show Christ’s love to the world, by having loving attitudes and acting in love toward people. Jesus allowed himself to be put on the cross because of His great love for us. We should remember this when we are confronted with unloving people. One of my great temptations to act unloving is when I encounter sour operators on the telephone. I don’t know why this is so irritating to me, but I have to listen to the Holy Spirit not to be sour to them as well. There are many other things that we should say yes to, but what we have dealt with here should help make long strides in learning to say yes to the right things. Bro. Joe
0 Comments
Between yes and no, we generally think of yes as the best answer. However, there are times when no is the best answer. When we say “yes” to Jesus, we say “no” to Satan –and vice-versa. There are some people in the Bible who are famous for saying “no.” We will take a look at them and maybe learn from them how to say “no.”
Joseph Said no. Genesis 39:9: “There is none greater in this house than I; neither hath he kept back anything from me but thee, because thou art his wife: how then can I do this great wickedness and sin against God?” This was Joseph’s answer to Potiphar’s wife when she tried to seduce him. Evidently, she was a beautiful woman and was not accustomed to having men say no to her. Notice that Joseph said no because he did not want to betray Potiphar, but more importantly, he did not want to betray God. He saw adultery as a sin against God. If Joseph had said yes to this seductive woman, he would have been saying yes to Satan and no to God. In those times when we are sorely tempted to sin against God, we should learn to say no as Joseph did. We need to ask ourselves which is more important, to seek pleasure for a moment or seek to please God. Pleasure has become a way of life to us and we need to guard against those pleasures that betray ourselves, others and God. Shadrach Meshach and Abednego said no. In Daniel three we read about Nebuchadnezzar’s command that all of the people were to bow down to an image of gold. Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego answered in the negative. They told Nebuchadnezzar that God was able to deliver them, but if God chose not to deliver them, they would still not serve his god’s or worship his golden image. (Daniel 3:17-18) We too have to make a choice as to who and what we will worship. We can choose to worship money, property, family, etc. Like Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego, we need to say no to all that the world offers that would call us away from our commitment to the Lord Jesus Christ. Everything that the world offers is not evil, but sometimes Satan makes it difficult to tell the difference. We need to always say yes to what God offers. Keep in mind that they said no at peril of their lives. The stakes might not be as physically high to us, but they are spiritually high under any circumstances. Daniel said no. The jealous princes who served with Daniel in Nebuchadnezzar’s court, not being able to find anything else, concocted a scheme to get him killed. They talked Nebuchadnezzar into signing a law that anyone who asked petition of any god or man for thirty days should be thrown into a den of lions. Daniel knew about the law, but he still went three times a day to pray facing Jerusalem. He prayed to the God of Israel. He would not be coerced into substituting Nebuchadnezzar for God. Nothing could keep Daniel from praying. Can anything keep us from praying? Say no to Satan when he tempts you not to pray, because he knows that prayerlessness will rob you of spiritual power. Jesus said no. In Matthew 4 and Luke 4 Jesus was tempted by Satan. He had fasted forty days and forty nights and was very hungry. He was physically weak, so Satan sought to take advantage of it. You remember that each time Jesus said no to Satan that He quoted scripture to him. Satan is very much aware of our weaknesses and of our weak moments, and he will try to get us to do his bidding. Like Jesus, we should say no to him based on what the word of God says. Like the three examples above, learn to tell Satan no. It is important to do so. "For all have sinned and come short of the glory of God."
A young man heard a sermon by an old preacher on what we call “original sin.” (This means that we are all sinners because Adam and Eve sinned in the Garden of Eden.) He approached the older man and said to him that he could not swallow that old idea about original sin. The old preacher replied to him: “Young man, you don’t have to swallow it, it is already in you.” That is true. The Bible teaches that we are all sinners, i.e., that none of us can say that we have never sinned. 1 John 1:8 and 10 tells us this about sin: “8. if we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. 10. If we say that we have not sinned, we make him a liar, and his word is not in us.” It seems a hopeless case, but it is not hopeless. Why? The verse that gives us hope is 1 John 1:9: “If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.” In other words, we are not hopeless sinners, because God has provided the perfect sacrifice through His Son in order for us to receive forgiveness for sin. In telling other people about Jesus, we have to deal with the problem of sin. If we say to a person, “You are a sinner,” they will usually misunderstand what we mean. They think that we are saying, “Compared to me, you are a bad, bad person.” They think that we are looking down our noses at them. They accuse us of judging them. But wait, we understand that “all have sinned” means that we have sinned as well. We are not looking down our noses at them; rather we are trying to give them the good news that the same Savior who forgave and forgives us for our sins will forgive them as well. We are asking people to leave their status as “sinner lost in sin” to “sinner saved by grace.” 1 John, verses 8 and 10, cover the entire situation. Verse 8 tells us that we can never say that we have no sin in our lives. If nothing else, we have pride in the fact that we do not sin. Pride is one of the deadly sins, and the Bible tells us that it “comes before a fall.” Verse 10 tells us that we cannot say that we have never sinned, because we have. If we deny that we have to deal with sin in our lives, we are calling God a liar, because He tells us that we are sinners. Now, I want to be careful about calling anyone a liar, and that especially applies to calling God a liar. To live in this world is to encounter sin, and sin we will. We might not commit adultery or steal something, for example, but we will sin by omission if not by commission. In other words, we can sin by not doing what we should do as well doing what we should not do. The best thing to do with sin is to seek forgiveness from Jesus by confessing it. Allow me to give a little advice here. If you are witnessing to someone about Jesus, make sure that you qualify that when you say they have sinned, you do not mean that they are bad people and that you are better than they are. If they think this, your witness will fall on deaf ears. If you are being witnessed to and the witness tells you that you are a sinner, keep in mind that he or she is not belittling you, but telling you the first thing that you must do to become a Christian, i.e., confess that you are a sinner. The Bible is not kidding when it says that “all have sinned,” and it illustrates this fact all through the Old and New Testaments. We see the great King David sin with Bathsheba. We see Moses lose his temper and strike the rock. We see Peter, the great apostle, deny His Lord. Indeed, the Bible illustrates Roman 3:23 throughout. The only One to whom this does not apply is God, and the only perfect person who ever lived is Jesus. We just have to deal with sin and the only way to deal with it is given in 1 John 1:9, “If we confess our sins, He (Jesus) is faithful and just to forgive us our sins.” Believe it and practice it! Bro. Joe “And Moses said unto the people, Fear not, stand still, and see the salvation of the Lord, which He will show you today: for the Egyptians whom you have seen today, you shall see them again no more stand still, and see the salvation of the Lord, which He will show you today: for the Egyptians whom you have seen today, you shall see them again no more forever. 14. The Lord shall fight for you, and you shall hold your peace.”
This text is one of greatest statements of faith in the Bible, and is a recurring theme in my preaching and writing. Moses led the children of Israel out of Egypt, now they have the Red Sea in front of them and Pharaoh’s army behind them. What do they do now? They can’t swim across with all of their animals and belongings. There are no boats to carry them across. There are no buckets big enough to bail all of the water. What can they do? They can do absolutely nothing. This situation is far beyond the ability of Moses, Aaron, and all of the Israelite people to do anything to help themselves. Here is the point: They needed for God to do what only God can do. This is a test of faith that we sometimes encounter in our lives. We come to some crisis that we can do nothing about. This is when real faith kicks in and waits for God to do what only He can do. These two verses hold the keys to what we should do in case this happens in our lives – and it will at some time or other. The first thing that Moses told the Israelites was to “fear not.” Moses knew that the Israelite people were afraid, and who wouldn’t be? After all, Pharaoh’s army was the greatest army in the world at that time in history. Moses told them to allay their fear because fear causes panic and panic erases clear thinking. The first thing that we need to realize when we face trying times in our lives is to not let fear rule our hearts and minds. Psalm 56:3 tells us what to do when we are afraid: “What time I am afraid, I will trust in thee.” The second thing that Moses told the Israelites to do was to “stand still.” Another translation of this is “stand firm.” In our fear we might try anything to try to get beyond the situation. When we face the crises of life, we need to stop in our tracks, stand still and stand firm. As we would say today, “stand till and don’t do anything stupid.” We need to remember that God knows what we are going through and He knows what the solution is. As result of our faith, we are to stand firm in the Lord and wait and see what He can do. Sometimes we do not stand firm in our faith and wait, and we make mistakes that only complicate the situation. Moses said: “Stand still and see the salvation of the Lord, which He will show you today…” They just needed to wait on the Lord, which is good advice for us as well. The third thing that Moses told the Israelites was: “For the Egyptians whom you have seen today, you shall see them no more forever.” In times like this, God says I will handle your enemies, you just stand still. In Romans 8:31, Paul wrote: “If God be for us, who can be against us.” That’s a good thing to remember when the devil is hard at work in our lives trying to defeat us. We need to always remember that our greatest enemy is the Devil and only God can handle him. Just as the Egyptian army was too strong for Israel to fight alone, the devil is too strong for us to fight alone. If God is for us, even the devil cannot bring his harm into our lives. The fourth thing that Moses told the Israelites was: “The Lord shall fight for you, and you shall hold your peace.” Basically, what Moses is telling the people is to “shut up and watch what God can do.” We should just stop complaining about the hard situations in life and realize that the Lord is fighting for us. He even fought for our salvation on the cross. He still fights for His people. We just need to trust Him, stand still, and realize that God is fighting for us. What a comfort! Don’t you agree? Bro. Joe “God forbid that I should glory except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world.”
Unbelievers have no idea why Paul would write such a thing. After all, the cross was the most inhumane method of capital punishment that man ever devised. They also wonder why we would glory in the cross. This point is that to glory in the cross, you have to believe biblical prophecy in the Old Testament and in the message of the New Testament. There are some very good reasons why all Christians can glory in the cross. I will list three of them. It was on the cross that salvation was made possible. Jesus is referred to as the “lamb slain from the foundation of the world.” (Revelation 13:8) Isaiah prophesied about the suffering servant in Isaiah 53:6-7: “All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned every one to his own way; and the Lord hath laid on Him the iniquity of us all. 7. He was oppressed, and He was afflicted, yet He opened not His mouth: He is brought as a lamb to the slaughter, and as sheep before her shearers is dumb, so openeth He not His mouth.” Paul wrote about this in Ephesians 2:15-19: “Having abolished in His flesh the enmity even the law of commandments contained in ordinances; for to make in Himself of two one new man, so making peace. 16. that He might reconcile both unto God in one body by the cross, having slain the enmity thereby: 17 and came and preached peace to you which were afar off, and to them that were near. 18. For through Him we both (Jew and Gentile) have access by one Spirit unto the Father. 19. Now therefore you are no more strangers and foreigners, but fellow cititzens with the saints, and of the household of God.” There is much more about the cross in the New Testament, but these should suffice to prove the point. It was on the cross that God’s great love for human beings was revealed in all of its glory. In John 3:16, Jesus told of the extent of the love of God for us: “For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life.” Jesus knew that the cross was in His future, even as He said these loving words. In His earthly ministry, Jesus revealed the love of the Father by His love for people. The New Testament portrays Jesus as One who loved everyone, the rich and the poor. He saved the wealthy Zacchaeus and bragged on the widow who gave all that she had at the temple. Matthew 9:36 reveals the great love and compassion of Jesus: “But when (Jesus) saw the multitudes, He was moved with compassion on them, because they fainted, and were scattered abroad, as sheep having no shepherd.” Jesus revealed great love when He healed the sick, raised the dead, calmed the sea and fed two multitudes of five thousand and four thousand with just a few loaves and fishes. Then when Jesus died on the cross, He gave proof of the love portrayed in John 3:16. I once heard Billy Graham say that Jesus was saying from the cross: “I love you! I love you! I love you!” It was on the cross that Satan’s eternal fate was sealed. He did everything that he could to keep Jesus from the cross. In the temptations given in the gospels, the devil tried to get Jesus to short-circuit his destiny on the cross by proving Himself without dying on the cross. Jesus would not succumb to this. I think that it was the devil who tempted the people to try to make Jesus a king. Jesus would not allow that to happen. 1 John 3:8 says: “He that commits sin is of the devil; for the devil sinned from the beginning. For this purpose the Son of God was manifested (revealed) that He might destroy the works of the devil.” John also pointed out in 1 John 1:9 that “if we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive our sins. and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness" That is why Paul could write that he gloried in the cross and that is why we do as well. Bro. Joe “Salvation belongs unto the Lord; thy blessing is upon thy people. “
In yesterday’s post we looked at how God is ready to bless us through His word and through prayer. In other words, we realize God’s blessings when we are in a good relationship with Him, and we can’t be in that relationship without Bible reading and prayer. It’s like we can’t keep going physically if we don’t eat and drink. God made us so that we need sustenance for our bodies, and He also made us so that we need sustenance for our souls. Let’s look at other ways God is ready to bless us – or is blessing us. God will bless us through fellowship with fellow Christians. This was one reason why God formed churches in the first place. We are saved individually, but we are not saved to stand alone. There is no such thing as “me and Jesus got our own thing going.” God made us so that we need each other. I think that it is time for us to begin to look at church as a blessing. Church is not made of wood and brick. It is made up of Christians in order for us to live in fellowship with each other. God intends to bless us through our fellowship with other Christians. There was a long period when I could not get out of the house except to go to the doctor. That meant that I had to miss church for a good while. I did not know how blessed I was to be a part of Christ’s church until I had to be away from it for awhile. I began to see that fellowship as something precious. I found that I could enjoy church fellowship when someone else was doing the preaching. Also, during that time of sickness, I was blessed by the prayers of my fellow Christians. God blessed me through His people. He wants to bless you through your fellowship with fellow Christians. We Christians need to stop “bouncing” off of each other and enjoy real good fellowship in the relationships that we have with each other. God will bless us through ministry to other people. I use the word “ministry” advisedly here, not meaning that one has to “be in the ministry” in order to be blessed by ministering to other people. Really folks, it is not rocket science. One does not have to have special training to minister to other people. It is just a matter of caring for other people enough to reach out a helping hand to them. You have probably heard me say that it is as simple as baking a cake and taking it to a lonely person in the name of Jesus. It is really that simple. You don’t have to talk in stilted “holy language” in order to minister. All you have to do is follow the example of Jesus, who spent His entire ministry meeting other people’s needs. It can also be as simple as visiting a lonely older person in a nursing home. When my mother was in a nursing home, I noticed that a lot of people never got a visit from family, church or anyone else. God wants to bless people by leading them to visit people like this. We need to get outside of ourselves and love and care for others. There are many other simple things that we can do to be blessed through ministry. God will bless us through praying for other people. I have found it to be a blessing for me to pray for other people. Every day I pray for missionaries, fellow Christians, leaders in our country and in the world, etc. A lot of people are turned off by keeping a list of people to pray for, but I find that such lists help me to remember to pray for certain people. I think that if we pray for others, we will also minister to others. I also know that our relationship with God will be more meaningful if we are in a good relationship with other people, especially our fellow Christians. If a name comes across your mind that might be God’s signal for us to pray for them. As you relate to fellow Christians, minister to people and pray for them, you will surely be blessed. God is ready to bless you through other people. Let Him do it! Bro. Joe “The Lord will give strength unto His people; the Lord will bless His people with peace.”
I’m sure that there are people out there who do not want to be blessed, but I don’t know any of them. Personally, I have never heard anybody pray: “Lord do not bless me today.” Even if a person does not believe in God, he or she wants to be blessed. I don’t know what they would call “being blessed” if they didn’t believe in God, but they want life to go smooth for them just like all of us who believe. I can’t tell unbelievers how to be blessed, but I can tell believers in Jesus Christ how to be blessed. The premise of this article is that God really and truly wants to bless you. Now put this thought in your mind and heart: GOD WANTS TO BLESS YOU!!! What will be your part in knowing the blessings of God? If we want to realize the blessings of God, we need to stay close to Him. James 4:8a tells us to “draw near to God, and He will draw near to you.” It doesn’t do any good to ask for God’s blessings if we spend our days ignoring His presence in our lives. The problem with many people is that they feel that God has forsaken them. (Remember, I am writing to believers.) If you are a believer in Jesus Christ, God has not forsaken you. One of my favorite stories is about a man and his wife out for a drive. She was sitting on her side of the car, and he was on his side driving. She did not drive, so he had to do all of it. She said to him:“What is wrong with us? It used to be that when we drove down the road, people couldn’t tell if there was one or two people in the car. He glanced carefully over at her as he drove down the road and said: “I didn’t move.” Understand that God has not forsaken you. In fact, He has promised that He never will. Jesus sent the Holy Spirit to us to be in us all of the time. We need to stay consciously close to God. We can stay consciously close to God if we spend time in His word. If anyone thinks that he or she can be close to God and realize His great blessings without spending time reading and meditating on His word, they are wrong. The Bible is God’s love letter to us. It is from the Bible that we see God’s revelation of Himself. We come to know God by faith in Jesus Christ, but we grow in our faith by reading His word. The Bible is a perennial best seller, but I wonder if it is perennially the most read book. God will not bless us just because we read the Bible; rather, it is from His word that we are able to discern His blessings in our lives. The Holy Spirit, who inspired the Bible, is the same Holy Spirit who guides us as we read the Bible, and He can show us the blessings of God from the pages of Holy Writ. We can stay consciously close to God when we pray. I have heard people say that they do not have time to pray. Wait! Do they have time to breathe? Praying should be like breathing to us. We just do it because it is our nature as believers to pray. There are times when we need to get alone with God, get on our knees and cry out to Him, but we do not have to have a certain kind of posture to pray. We can talk to God any time that we wish. I have often said that if we can think, we can pray. If we want to be near to God and realize His blessings, we need to talk to Him as naturally as we would talk to a person sitting next to us. The prayer closet in heaven is never closed down. We are reminded in the Bible that God never “slumbers or sleeps.” (Psalm 121:4) He will hear you any time – day or night. Psalm 40:1 is always true: “I waited patiently for the Lord; and He inclined unto me, and heard my cry.” He will always hear your cry. You will notice that I wrote that we should do these things, which are the two most important things in my mind, if we want to realize the blessings of God. Pay attention to the word “realize.” That indicates that God is blessing you, and if you don’t feel blessed, it is because you are not staying in close contact with Him through Bible reading and prayer. Sing this little chorus: “Every time I turn around, God is blessing me…..” He is! Claim it believer! Bro. Joe Philippians 1:21: “For to me to live is Christ, and to die is gain.”
Philippians 2:21: “For all seek their own, not the things which are Christ’s.” My younger brother did not know that he was giving me an idea for an article when he shared with me in an Email that a speaker that he heard pointed out the contrast between these two verses. I have read them many times, but I had never put them together like that speaker did. Needless to say, this got my imagination to whirling and I suggested to my brother that he would see this in a blog. What we have in these two verses is two opposing philosophies of life. Philippians 1:21 is a positive outlook and leads to victory in life over the demonic forces that are always at work. Philippians 2:21 seems to be the prevailing attitude of many people today. Let’s look at the difference between the two philosophies. I will begin with the negative philosophy: “For all seek their own, not the things which are Christ’s.” In the first place, this is a selfish way to live. There are many people who live each day only to satisfy their whims and fancies. When we do what comes naturally, we live by this philosophy. Go back to the Genesis account of the first sin. Adam and Eve were not to eat the fruit of the “tree of the knowledge of good and evil,” because if they did they would die. One day Eve was tempted to eat of the delicacy, or what she must have considered a delicacy, and she succumbed. Then she gave it to Adam and he also ate the forbidden fruit. This first sin was rebellion against God, because Adam and Eve decided to “seek their own” and satisfy their own desires. In the second place, this is a foolish way to live, because while people are “seeking their own,” they are not thinking of “the things which are Christ’s.” The NIV translates it: “For everyone looks out for his own interests, not those of Jesus Christ.” All he or she knows is to look out for his or her own interests. Some of those interests might not be altogether bad, but they are leaving Christ out of their lives. This is also the philosophy of a Christian who is going his or her own way and not considering the will of God for his or her life. Both are tragic, because in the first case, the person will have no relationship with God; in the second case, the person does not realize the abundant, victorious life that Jesus gives to those who put their trust in Him. Now we will turn to the positive philosophy: “For to me to live is Christ, and to die is gain.” This means that Christ was at the very center of Paul’s life, and can be the center of ours too. Paul wrote it in this way in Galatians 2:20: “I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live, yet not I, but Christ lives in me: and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave Himself for me.” Paul’s positive philosophy was the result of his faith in Christ, and of His appreciation for the fact that Christ “gave Himself for me” In the first place. This is a selfless way to live. This is not to say that people who live by this positive philosophy are always selfless, for no one is perfect. But it does mean that if we have this selfless philosophy, we will seek to follow God’s will for our lives. It also means that when we put Christ first, we will have better relationships with people. In the second place, this is a wise way to live. We are reminded about this in Proverbs 3:6-7: “In all thy ways acknowledge Him, and He shall direct thy paths. 7. Be not wise in thine own eyes: fear the Lord and depart from evil.” Paul advised in Ephesians 5:15-16: “See then that you walk circumspectly, not as fools, but as wise. 16. Redeeming the time, because the days are evil.” Living “circumspectly” means to live carefully. In other words, we need to watch our step lest we do something foolish. If Christ is at the center of our lives, we are more likely to live wisely. Make sure that you live by the philosophy of Philippians 1:21 and stay away from the philosophy of Philippians 2:21. Bro. Joe “But I rejoiced in the Lord greatly, that now at the last your care of me has flourished again; wherein you were also careful, but you lacked opportunity. 11. Not that I speak in respect of want: for I have learned, in whatsoever state I am, therewith to be content.”
When we think of contentment, we think of having everything in order in our lives and everything going our way –just as we want it. This is not what Paul meant when he wrote that he was content. The Philippian church sent him a monetary gift to help while he was imprisoned in Rome. Paul obviously needed help because he had no way of making money while he was in prison. He was glad to get the gift, and was grateful for it, but he wanted to make it clear that his contentment was not in at last having some physical help and means of support; rather, he wanted them to know that no matter what his circumstances in life at any particular time he was content. How did Paul arrive at that contentment, and how can we attain the same contentment? The first thing that we need to understand was that Paul’s contentment did not rest in circumstances but in the Lord. Paul believed the Lord’s promise that He would be with him no matter what his outward circumstances. We have the same Lord, who has given us His sufficiency so that we can be content. Paul wrote in 2 Corinthians 3:5: "Not that we are sufficient of ourselves to think anything as of ourselves; but our sufficiency is of God.” Again, he wrote in 2 Corinthians 9:8: “And God is able to make all grace abound toward you; that you always having all sufficiency in all things, may abound to every good work. “ I will agree that there are times when I forget that, and I imagine that you can make the same confession, but it is true. If we have the Lord in our lives, we live daily in His sufficiency and not our own. If you have the Lord in your heart, you have the sufficiency to meet whatever might come into your life. I know that I need to be reminded of this often and you probably do too. Real contentment rests in the Lord and in our daily walk with Him. The second thing that gave Paul contentment in all circumstances was written in verses 12-13: “I know both how to be abased (do without) and how to abound: everywhere and in all things I am instructed to be full and to be hungry, both to abound and to suffer need. 13. I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.” Like his sufficiency, Paul’s strength lay in Christ. Paul had the strength to go on serving Christ, even though he was stymied by his Jewish enemies and the Romans at every point. He could do this because His strength was eternal strength, furnished by the Lord Jesus Christ. Our strength comes from the same source; therefore, we, too, can be content. The third thing that gave Paul contentment was written in verse 19: “But my God shall supply all your need according to his riches in glory by Christ Jesus.” Paul was reminding the Philippians that their supply was from God’s riches which He pours out abundantly on His people. This means that Paul also knew his supply did not come from purely human resources, but from God’s heavenly riches. Do you remember the Hymn: “My Father is rich in houses and lands, he holdeth the wealth of the world in his hands, of rubies and diamonds of silver and gold, His coffers are full, He has riches untold. I’m a child of the king, a child of the king, with Jesus my Savior; I’m a child of the king.” Paul knew that he was a child of the king, and that the eternal king would supply him with his needs. We can find the same contentment in the Lord. We can know that He will meet all of our needs in one way or the other. Find your contentment in “God’s riches in Christ Jesus.” If Paul could have it, we can have it too. Believe it! Bro. Joe Ecclesiastes 10:1: “Dead flies cause the ointment of the apothecary to send forth a stinking savour (odor): so does a little folly him that is in reputation for wisdom and honor."
Matthew 13:33: “Another parable spoke He unto them; The kingdom of heaven is like unto leaven, which a woman took, and hid in three measures of meal, till the whole was leavened.” I do not mean to change the word of God, but I want to propose that one dead fly in the ointment would make it stink. I know that if I found a dead fly in anything that I was going to apply to myself, or eat, it would be time to throw whatever it was away. In the same way, it takes only a little leaven, or yeast, to cause the dough to rise. The same is true of events in the world, our churches and our lives. Sometimes it just takes just one bad influence to ruin everything. As the old saying goes: “One rotten apple can spoil the whole barrel.” This has been true in history. There are plenty of historical examples, but one comes to my mind – Adolph Hitler. I am a student, not a scholar, of WWII, and one can’t study that war and not study about Hitler. He was one man who had twisted ideas about human nature, and about Jews, and that one man stirred a whole nation to follow him into the folly of his ideas. Let us say that Hitler was a “fly in the ointment of history.” One thinks of Joseph Stalin, who took the idea of communism and turned it into a murderous weapon against his own people. Both Hitler and Stalin had people who influenced their lives, but they sure muddled things when they were in charge. This has been true in churches. It doesn’t take a whole lot of people to “stir up a mess” in a church. Most of the time it is one person who has an ax to grind, and they grind it for all that they are worth. The problem is that they can usually get other people in cahoots with them, and can stir up trouble for everybody. Sometimes it begins in a Sunday School class, or some other organization in the church, and it permeates the whole church. This is bad but it happens and it happens when a little leaven is put in the dough, or a dead fly gets in the ointment. Now that I have you depressed about the human situation (lol) let me go in a more positive direction. This principle also applies to the good that can be done in the world and in the church. Dwight L. Moody, the great 19th Century evangelist, when asked about how revival starts said: “Every great movement of God began with a kneeling figure.” Great revivals have started because one person caught on fire for the Lord and “leavened the whole lump.” When one thinks of the “Great Awakening” he thinks of Jonathan Edwards, whose sermon “Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God,” helped to stir a nation to revival. Edwards didn’t do it by himself, but his influence was felt throughout the movement. Now I will go to the source –the Bible – God’s word. Of course, we think of Jesus who was one God/man who changed the world, but I want to illustrate this point with a man. This man’s name was Saul of Tarsus. He caused havoc for the followers of Jesus Christ. He was bent on destroying the churches, and his influence was felt throughout the church. But when Saul of Tarsus met Christ on the Damascus Road, and became Paul the Apostle, he was influential in the spread of the gospel of Jesus Christ throughout the area, beginning at Damascus and reaching all the way to Rome. Paul didn’t do it by himself, but he was the “leaven” that made a difference in his time for the Lord’s work. I will conclude by asking you about yourself. What difference are you making where you are? Are you a “fly in the ointment” or are you an influence for good in your family, your community, your church and etc. Something to think about isn’t it? Bro. Joe |
AuthorDr. Joe Beauchamp is the author of this blog and website. Categories
All
Archives
September 2021
|