(This is a reprint. I thought it was time that I ran it again. It has a good message about the Bible. Read it!)
“When therefore (Jesus) was risen from the dead, His disciples remembered that He had said this unto them: And they believed the scripture, and the word which Jesus said.” After Jesus’ resurrection, His disciples believed what He had previously told them about it, and they believed the scriptures – the Bible. They realized afresh and anew that the Bible had a place in their lives. The Bible should have a place in the life of every Christian. It is our source book. There are many good Christian books on the market, but none should take the place of the Bible. Let me illustrate what I mean: The Bible has a place in the hands of a Christian. We need to take the Bible in our hands and read it every day. We should set aside a time each day to read and study the Bible. We should read it systematically. We should begin at chapter one of a book and read through to the end. Of course there are times when we will read a verse here and a verse there, but this should not be all that we do. The Bible has a message, and we can’t get the message by just skipping around in it. We should read it through. It is not too much to ask a Christian to at least read the New Testament through every year. There are 260 chapters in the New Testament; therefore, we can read it through in 260 days if we read just one chapter a day. Ideally, we should read through the whole Bible every year. The Bible has a place in the head of a Christian. We need to know what’s in the Bible and what the real message of the Bible is. It is a book of redemption ultimately through Jesus Christ. Mormons and Jehovah’s Witnesses tell us that most of their converts in the south are Southern Baptists. If those Southern Baptists knew the Bible, they would not believe those doctrines. We need an intellectual grasp of scripture. This does not mean that we have to be intellectual to understand it. It means that the message of the Bible should be part of our thought processes. We really need to think about what we read in the Bible. The Bible has a place in the heart of a Christian. We should internalize what we read in the Bible. Its message should be in our hearts, our emotions, indeed, in our souls. Just as the food that we eat becomes part of us, what we read becomes a part of us. If we never read the Bible, or only read it sporadically, it will not become part of whom and what we are. Life’s decisions are made from the head and the heart. If the Bible is to help us make decisions, it should be in our heads and hearts. We should take the Bible seriously enough that its message becomes a part of our decision making processes. If it is not in our hearts, we will not believe it or practice it. We should be emotional about the Bible. It should make us laugh and cry. It should make us stop and think about our lives and cause us to change what needs changing in our lives. We should be emotional enough about the Bible to share its message about Jesus with other people. After all, Jesus is the main focus of the Bible. I do not consider myself an expert on the Bible. I am a student of the Bible. I read it through every year and learn something new almost every day. I do not write this to brag, but to get you to see that if I can read it through, you can too. Pick up your Bible, read it, think about and believe it in your heart. Bro. Joe
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“(Abraham) staggered not at the promise of God through unbelief: but was strong in faith, giving glory to God.”
Abraham is an example of almost any good thing that I can think of because he was “strong in faith, and giving glory to God.” Building a strong faith is similar to building a strong body. Let me give you some examples of what I mean: First, to build a strong body, or strong faith, we have to exercise. We exercise our faith in Christ by using it. When Abraham was called to literally start a new people of God by going where God told him to go, he did it. Abraham took a step of faith, and after Genesis 12, the whole Old Testament is about what he started. Abraham could not have done the great things that he did if he had faint faith. We will never know what Christ can do with our faith until be obey Him, and do what he wills us to do. When is the last time you really exercised your faith? I’m not implying that you have not exercised your faith; I’m just asking you to think about. It. Your faith will not be strong until you exercise it. We grow strong bodies by eating right. We need to be careful what we put into our bodies if we want them to be stronger. Our faith is made stronger by our spiritual diet. For example, how much time do you spend reading and studying your Bible? I’m not implying that you have not spent time in your Bible, I am just asking you to think about it. Naturally, your diet of prayer will make a difference in the strength of your faith. Do you take advantage of all of the opportunities that you have to talk with Jesus, and listen with your heart to what He says? I have discovered that I can pray any time, or wherever I am. You can think a prayer, and Jesus will hear it and will answer. It is good to have a special time and place to pray, but we can pray any time at any place! Our bodies grow stronger when we take time to rest. To grow stronger in our faith, we need to obey Jesus and come to Him for rest. This is what He said in Matthew 11:28-30: “Come unto me all ye who labor and are heavy laden and I will give you rest. 29. Take my yoke upon you, and learn of me, for I am meek and lowly in heart, and ye shall find rest unto your souls. 30. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.” Our rest in Him is in our service for Him and letting Him minister to the world through us. We need to lean on Jesus each day, and depend on Him to rest our souls and strengthen our faith. Learn to lean on Jesus, talk to Him, read His word, and worship Him on a daily basis. You will find that His strength is adequate for successful service in His kingdom. Take Jesus’ invitation and go to Him for rest and strength. Exercise your faith through Bible study, prayer and worship. Get under His “yoke” and let Him use you and strengthen you in your service for Him. Bro. Joe "Open thou my eyes, that I may behold wondrous things out of thy law.”
References to the “law” in Psalm 119 are about the scripture, or the Bible, that the psalmist had at that time. When I read this I thought about my own experience in Bible reading and Bible study. I have been reading the Bible word for word every weekday for the last thirty years, and I am always discovering things that I did not see in other trips through the Bible. That actually excites me. I want the Lord to open my eyes to see the things in His word that will make a difference in my life. It’s not that I just want to know the Bible; I want to know enough about it to live it. Following are some examples of what I mean: I want my Bible to open my eyes to the importance of humility. Pharisees in the New Testament could probably have made a hundred on a test about knowledge of the law, but it did not make them better people. It made them self-righteous. If one becomes self-righteous about his or her Bible knowledge he or she has frankly missed the point. The Bible is about the greatness of God and the humbleness of people. Peter made a salient point about humility in 1Peter 5:6: “Humble yourselves therefore under the mighty hand of God, that He might exalt you in due time.” I want the Bible to open my eyes to make me more loving toward my fellow human beings. I want to love like God loves as best I can. This means that I want to love and accept people, but that doesn’t mean that I will agree with everything that they do, or that they believe.. (I actually do not love what I do at times. You might as well admit it too!) The Bible teaches us that we should love each other. 1 John 4:20 reminds us: “If a man say I love God, and hate his brother, he is a liar: for he that loves not his brother whom he has seen, how can he love God whom he has not seen.” I want the Bible to open my eyes to the lesson in 2 Corinthians 12:9:”And (Jesus) said to me (Paul), My grace is sufficient for thee: for my strength is made perfect in weakness.” (This was Jesus’ answer to Paul when he asked to be healed of his “thorn in the flesh.”) I want to always depend on the sufficiency of Christ’s grace in every aspect of my life. I was saved by His grace, and I want to always be sustained by His grace. Of course this is not everything that I need to have “my eyes opened to” in Bible study, but I think they are three worthy goals. I hope you learned from my meanderings on reading the Bible. Bro. Joe “Wherewithal (how) shall a young man cleanse his way? By taking heed therein according to your word. 10. With my whole heart have I sought you: O let me not wander from your commandments. 11. Your word have I hid in my heart that I might not sin against you."
Living a clean life does not seem to be the goal of many people today, but it is certainly still possible to live that kind of life. Living a clean life makes sense spiritually, of course, but it also makes sense physically. Many ailments today stem from people living unwholesome lives. I don’t have to go into detail here, you know what I mean. These three verses from Psalm 119 tell us how we can live a clean life.. First, we can heed the word of God. To the psalmist the word of God was the Ten Commandments and other laws that were given to Moses on Mt. Sinai and written down for the enlightenment of the people of God. To us the word of God is both the Old and New Testaments, and also Jesus, who fulfilled the Old Testament and made possible the New Testament. John refers to Jesus as “the word,” and Hebrews 1:1-2 declare Jesus to be the ultimate word of God. In order for us to live clean lives, we need to heed what is in the Bible, for therein is moral law, and we need to heed our relationship with Jesus, for therein is our moral compass. Jesus has given us the Holy Spirit to guide us in the study of the Bible and in the way we live our lives. Second, we can obey the word of God. The psalmist declared that he sought the Lord with his whole heart. I think that a lot of our spiritual problems arise because of a half-hearted seeking of God in daily life. How do we seek God? One of the main ways we seek Him is by the reading and studying of God’s word. It is impossible to stay close to God and ignore His word. Furthermore, the psalmist pleaded: “O let me not wander from your commandments.” We are not saved by keeping commandments, but we are saved in order to be able to keep commandments. We can’t take straying from the word of God lightly. Third, we can internalize the word of God. The bottom line was that the psalmist did not just read and study God’s word; he digested it and made it an integral part of his life. This means that we need to read and study the word of God until it becomes part of us. We can memorize scripture, but I prefer to read it until it is stuck in my mind and heart. I do not call this memorizing; I call it internalizing. He hid God’s word in his heart so that he “might not sin against God.” In the scene of Jesus’ temptation in Matthew 4, Jesus defeated Satan by quoting scripture to him. Jesus wasn’t just quoting words he memorized, but words that were part of His life. Read these three verses again and ask God to help you to use them to live a clean life. Bro. Joe “Show me your faith without works, and I will show you my faith by my works.”
If you will read Ephesians 2:10, you will see that James and Paul agreed on works. We are not saved by works, but we are saved to work. Are we really trying to do even the simplest works that would make us better witnesses for Jesus? The three things that I will mention are not things that you have never heard about. But are you really, really trying in these areas. Are you really taking the time to pray? Praying is not hard work, but it is great work. Jesus set aside time to pray, and that is an example for us. Even if it is only a few minutes, we should set aside time for private prayer. But we need to remember that the door to prayer is never closed, and we can pray anytime, anywhere. I remind myself to pray when I am reading the newspaper, watching television, etc. You will find plenty to pray for in these things. People need prayer and we need to pray, even for people with whom we disagree. Are you really taking time to pray? Are you really taking the time to read the Bible? This is a little more difficult than taking the time to pray, but for a Christian it is just as necessary. Make time!!! You might even decide which television program you will sacrifice to take the time to read your Bible. And when you read it, read it systematically. What I mean is that when you read the Bible start at the first chapter and read through the final chapter. In this technological age there are other ways to “read” the Bible. It is available on CD’s, or for “oldie goldies” like me who still have cassette players, you can find cassettes to listen to. (You might need to find them at Goodwill, but they are out there.) There are millions of people in the world who would love to have the freedom to own and read the word of God. We have the freedom, so let’s take advantage of it. Are you really taking the time stand up for Jesus? The name of Jesus has become toxic in today’s society. People will tolerate a generic “god,” or maybe even Allah, but “Jesus” is a no no. I am afraid that they are going to pass a law that it is against the law to say “Jesus” in a crowded theater. (There are some places that you could get your head severed for doing this.) The name “Jesus” is the new blasphemy in the unbelieving world. There are a couple of biblical verses that we need to read. The first is Mark 8:18: “Whosoever therefore shall be ashamed of me and my words in this adulterous and sinful generation; of him shall the Son of man be ashamed….” The second is Romans 1:16: “For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ….” Take the time to do these things in your life. Bro. Joe “Search the scriptures, for in them you think you have eternal life: for they are they which testify of me.”
If we are looking for answers to the puzzles, fears and worries of life, we need to look to the scriptures, “for they are they which testify of (Jesus.)” I want to share a few of the promises of scripture that can help us in coping with life’s difficult moments. The scriptures give us a promise of peace. We have the word of Jesus on this from John 14:27, in a promise that Jesus gave His disciples, and certainly applies to us: “Peace I leave with you, My peace I give unto you: not as the world gives, give I unto you: Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid.” Seek the peace of Jesus for your life today…He will give it! The scriptures give us a promise of strength – spiritual strength, which is the most important kind. Paul gave a promise in Philippians 4:13 that is a great prescription of biblical strength: “I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.” Jesus has the strength that we need to face whatever challenges life may bring. Go to Him today to find the strength that you need that the world cannot give you. How? You might try just asking and believing!!!! The scriptures give us a promise of forgiveness in Colossians 2:13: “And you. being dead in your sins and the uncircumcision of your flesh, has He quickened together with Him, having forgiven you all trespasses.” We have the promise of forgiveness for all of our sins and short comings through the blood of Jesus Christ, shed on the cross for our sins. This is a promise that you can claim now when you will honestly confess your sins, and ask for Christ’s forgiveness. The scriptures give us a promise of salvation by faith in Jesus today. This is a promise of Hebrews 6:2b: “Behold, now is the accepted time; behold, now is the day of salvation.” There is no better time than right now to accept the salvation that Jesus offers you. Confess your sins and invite Jesus into your life now. There are many more promises than this in the scriptures, but these should give you some encouragement for now. Bro. Joe “Blessed is the man who walks not in the counsel of the wicked, nor stands in the way of sinners, nor sits in the seat of scorners, 2. But his delight is in the law of the Lord, and in His law he meditates day and night.”
According the Baker’s Dictionary of the Bible, the word “delight” or implications of it, occurs 210 times in the Bible. What we take delight in, in a way, defines our lives. Our text gives an example of what we should delight in. Do we delight in the things of the Lord, or only in the things of the world? It is a good question and needs an answer. Do you delight in someone coming to the Lord? According to Luke 15:10, this causes angels to rejoice: “I say unto you, there is joy in the presence of the angels of God over one sinner that repents.” What the angels delight in should also delight us. The real question is, does it really matter to us whether a person is saved or lost? This mattered to Jesus and He wants it to matter to us. Here is what He said about it in Matthew 9:36-38: “But when He (Jesus) saw the multitudes, He was moved compassion on them because they fainted, and were scattered abroad, as sheep having no shepherd. 37. Then He said to His disciples, The harvest trulyA is plenteous, but the laborers are few 38. Pray ye therefore the Lord of the harvest that He will send laborers into His harvest.” Do you delight in discovering biblical truth? It is for sure that you will not delight in the Bible if you do not read and study it. Psalm 1:2 said that the blessed, or happy person, “delights in the law of the Lord.” The “law of the Lord” refers to the Bible that he had at that time. We have the whole Bible story at our disposal. We have the Old and New Testaments. There are all kinds of translations, and there are also all kinds of study Bibles at our disposal. We have so much more of the biblical story than the psalmist had, or for that matter, the disciples of Jesus. It is all there, from Genesis to Revelation, to read and study. Perhaps you will delight in biblical truth if you will read it prayerfully, meditating on it, and read it as though it is speaking to you about your life. The point is that we need to seriously consider what really delights us. What I have written are only two examples of what should delight us. There are many things that can cause delight in our lives, but we just need to be careful that what we delight in will be a witness to the world. Bro. Joe “All Scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness. 17. That the man of God may be throughly furnished unto all good works.”
I did a study of the the translation of the Greek word for “throughly equipped.” It can be translated “throughly," "thoroughly," or “fully equipped.” A Christian cannot be completely equipped without some knowledge of Scripture. This is what I brought out of my study of this word for “fully equipped.” It means that a Christian should know the Scriptures. That does not mean to just read the most recent “best sellers” about the Bible, but to read and know the Bible itself. That even means that we should read the “begets and begats.” I find the Bible to be a thoroughly. Interesting book, but some books in the Bible are more interesting than other books. But the entire Bible has a word from God for us. To be “fully equipped” we need to read and study our Bibles. It means that a Christian should live the Scriptures. I do not mean that we should become self-righteous, legalistic Pharisees. What I mean is that we should let what we read make a difference in our lives. (For example, there is a lot in the gospels about loving God and loving people.) We are taught throughout the Bible that there is a right way and a wrong way to live. We are given examples of both ways in the Bible. It is for sure that none of us live the Scriptures perfectly, but we need to absorb what we read into our hearts and let what we read become a part of our daily lives. Thankfully, God is revealed as a forgiving God in the pages of Scripture. It means that a Christian should share the Scriptures. The ultimate revelation of God in the Bible is in the person of Jesus Christ. Hebrews 1:1-2 is a good example of what I mean: “God who at sundry times and in diverse ways spoke in time past unto the fathers by the prophets, 2. Has in these last days spoken unto us by His Son, whom He has appointed heir of all things, by whom also he made the worlds.” In Matthew 5:16, Jesus told us: “Let your light so shine before men that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father which is in heaven.” We should not be ashamed to share Jesus through word and deed by letting our lights shine for Him. I know that I have chosen a big subject and tried to squeeze it into this short article; however, I trust that I have shared enough for you to the see the importance of Scripture in being “fully equipped.” Bro. Joe “Open thou mine eyes, that I may behold wondrous things out of thy law."
There are things in the Bible that can be difficult to understand for anyone, especially for new Christians. For what it's worth, my advice to new Christians has been to read Matthew, Mark, Luke and John, and get Jesus down real good, then read Hebrews to get the New Testament perspective on the Old Testament. I think, for example, that Leviticus would be very difficult for a new Christian to understand without having the New Testament perspective. However, we need to remember that the Lord provided a good resource to help all Christians understand the Bible - namely, the Holy Spirit. I have read it through numerous times, at least once a year for the last thirty or so years, and without the Spirit's guidance the Bible would still be more of a mystery to me. I believe that a person who does not have a personal relationship with Jesus Christ, cannot fathom the great truths of the Bible. Why? They do not have the Holy Spirit to lead them to an understand of scripture. Years ago, I read that one of Madelyn Murray Ohair's sons read the Bible through in one night and rejected it outright. In the first place, if he read it through in one night, he could not have understood the Bible. In the second place, if he started reading the Bible from the perspective of an atheist, he had already rejected the Bible before he read one word of it. That's why there are so many misunderstandings among the unbelieving populace about us. They do not understand why we put so much emphasis on the Bible, and take its word over popular opinions. If you didn't know Jesus, you would be puzzled too. As Paul wrote to the Corinthian Church: "The man (or woman) without the Spirit does not accept the things that come from the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him, and he cannot understand them, because they are spiritually discerned." (1Corinthians 2:14, NIV) We should not read this in a spirit of self-righteousness. It should be humbling for us to realize that because of our belief in Jesus Christ and the indwelling of the Holy Spirit, we can understand God’s word. That answers the question about why the Bible is difficult to understand for an unbeliever. A believer, even a new one, has the Holy Spirit to help him or her understand the Bible. No one will ever intellectually understand the entire Bible, but everyone who believes can understand what they need to understand under the guidance of the Holy Spirit. Frankly, there are things in the Bible that I put question marks by, not because I doubt what is recorded, but because I just simply cannot understand that particular text. I remember that when I was a young preacher I would answer people’s questions about the Bible whether I knew what the text meant or not. As I have matured in age, and in faith, I confess that there some things in the Bible that I just do not understand. The good thing is that I do not have to understand a particular verse of scripture for it to be true. As the old hymn, “When the Morning Comes,” tells us: “We will understand it better by and by…” Meanwhile, just keep reading God’s word and rejoice in the truth that it reveals. Bro. Joe “Your word have I hid in my heart, that I might not sin against you." I was thinking last night about the word of God. An acrostic formed in my mind that helped me to describe what I think is the thrust of the word of God. (By “word of God” I mean the Bible.) I realize that Jesus is also referred to as the Word of God. Jesus is the personal Word of God, while the Bible is the written word of God.) At any rate, here is the acrostic: W – Witness The Bible is the ultimate witness about Jesus Christ. Both the Old and New Testaments are ultimately about Him. Jesus coming to earth is seen in the Old Testament in prophecy and in the New Testament in prospect. The Bible clearly reveals that the world will be judged by Jesus, but it reveals something else that is important for us to realize about Him. This message is in John 3:17: “For God sent not His Son into the world to condemn the world; but that the world through Him might be saved.” Because Jesus died on the cross for our sins, we can come to Him in faith and be saved. It is a word of hope for a lost and dying world. It is a word about the forgiveness of our sins. We are sinners, but, because of Jesus, we are not hopeless. Through Him we can be saved. That is the main witness of the Bible. O – Others The message of the Bible is that Jesus loved people and He expects us to love people as well – regardless! Jesus was always aware of other people. He was aware of the poor and the wealthy. He was aware of all people, even the “sinners and tax collectors.” We will have to come outside of ourselves and our little worlds, and love other people. As difficult as it is, we should love all people. (It ain’t easy.) This command is summed up in John 13:35: “By this shall all men know that you are my disciples, that you have love for one another.” R – Reality The word of God reveals the reality of God. It begins in Genesis 1:1: “In the beginning God….” Period! The Bible does not present an argument about the existence of God; rather it just assumes the existence of God. The word of God reveals God to us as a real Person, One Who created the world and is involved in the history of the world. He is revealed to us as “Father, Son and Holy Spirit.” We call this the “Trinity.” If you do not believe in the reality of God, you do not believe in the Bible. There are certainly principles given in the word of God that people could follow as unbelievers, but if they want to believe in the Bible as God’s word, they must accept the reality of God and His involvement in the history of the world, and, for that matter, His involvement in the lives of individuals. D – Doctrine There are people who overlook, or ignore, the doctrines of the Bible, but that does not mean that doctrine is not there. 2 Timothy 3:16 is one example of the importance of doctrine: “All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness.” I do not have the space to develop all of the Bible doctrines, but suffice it to say that the Bible teaches some definite things about God and about His expectations of us, and that is what we believe and attempt to practice; therefore, we have biblical doctrines that we live by. For better or for worse, that is my acrostic. I hope that it has been informative for you. Bro. Joe |
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