“Do all things without murmurings/complaining and disputings/arguing.”
Let’s begin with “do all things.” This covers a lot territory and, frankly, it is a tall order. It means that no matter what is going on in our lives, we need to face it all without murmuring/complaining and disputing/arguing, (We are probably more at home with using “complaining and arguing.”) Frankly, some of the people we have to deal with make it difficult for us to stop complaining and arguing. But those people do not give us the permission to complain and argue. Dealing as Christians with difficult people is part of our spiritual growth. We might also think about the times that we might have been one of those difficult people. (just saying) “Do all things without murmurings/complaining…” Some things come to mind when I read this prohibition to stop complaining. One is that we stop complaining about what is going on in our churche. There are some things that happen to us about which we really feel a need to complain. ( As you might guess, I am writing about this from experience.) I used to complain about traffic, etc. My late wife, Mary, would tell me that the complaining was not doing any good. I would tell her that it makes me feel better to complain to get it off of my mind. She told me, “You might be getting rid of it, but you are giving it to me.” Another thing that comes to mind is self-pity. It can cause us to crawl inside of ourselves and complain instead of dealing with life’s frustrations by asking the Lord to help us deal with them. I must confess that it is awfully difficult not to complain at times, but the Bible tells us to “do all things without complaining.” I think that you get the point that I am making, i.e., instead of complaining we need to pray. “Do all things without…disputing/arguing…” There are some people who make it difficult not to argue. (I am confident that I have been one of those people at times.) This is a difficult order to follow. There are just some things that make us want to argue. What I try to do now is to stop and think whether or not an argument would solve the issue. You know as well as I, that an argument will only make the issue more difficult. I have never solved anything by arguing. This does not mean that we should never disagree, but that we should disagree like Christians without complaining and arguing. I have made a resolution not to argue about anything unless arguing might serve some good purpose. I have discovered that most of the time, arguing will not serve any good purpose. In verse 15 Paul gives us the reason not to complain and argue: “That you may be blameless and harmless, the sons of God without rebuke, in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation, among whom you shine as lights in the world.” This brings to mind what Jesus said about us being the lights of the world: “Let your light so shine among men that they may see your good works and glorify your Father which is in heaven.” This is not an easy order, but we do need to give serious thought to it. Bro. Joe
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“And (Abraham) believed in the Lord, and it was granted unto him as righteousness.”
Genesis 15:6 is famously referred to in Galatians 3:6. Abraham is a central Bible character, because he became the father of the Jews. In fact, the whole Old Testament after Genesis 12 is a history of the descendants of Abraham. In fact Jews, Christians and Muslim claim Abraham as their ancestral father. We can learn a lot from this man of God. What I love about the Bible is that when it shows us the “heroes of the faith” it shows warts and all. When we read the account of Abraham we discover that when he obeyed God and went into Canaan, when a famine came he went to Egypt out of the will of God. While there he lied and called Sarai his wife his sister. He was half right because she was his half sister. Another example is his relationship with his wife’s handmaiden, Hagar. He was given permission by Sarai, but he didn’t have to do it. All of this, and other things, point out that the father of our faith was a human being like we are. But even considering all of that, the Bible shows us that he was a great man of God. Despite our humanness, we can be servants of God. To be sure, Abraham was forgiven for his sins, as we can. Genesis 15:6 and Galatians 3:6 tell us that Abraham was a man of faith. In Genesis 12:1ff, Abraham was called by God to leave his home in Ur and go to Canaan, which he eventually did after his father’s death in Haran. It took faith for Abraham to leave everything that he knew in his homeland to take a trip to a country that he had never seen, and would never claim as his own country. In Hebrews 11:8-10, we read this about Abraham: “By faith Abraham, when he was called go out into a place which he should after receive for an inheritance, obeyed; and went out, not knowing where he went. 9. By faith he sojourned in the land of promise, as in a strange country; dwelling in tabernacles (tents) with Isaac and Jacob, the heirs with him of the same promise. 10. For he looked for a city which has foundations, whose builder and maker is God.” This is the same Abraham that I wrote about in the first paragraph. I did not do that to put Abraham down; rather, I did it is to encourage you to see that no matter what you have done in the past, if you will turn to God and seek His forgiveness, He can use you. The only perfect person that ever lived on this earth was Jesus Christ – period. In Isaiah 41:8, Abraham was given a great compliment: “But you Israel, are my servant, Jacob whom I have chosen, the seed of Abraham, my friend.” If you go by that verse too quickly you will miss the compliment. God told His prophet, Isaiah, that Abraham was His friend. To be called anybody’s friend is a compliment, but when God calls you His friend that is more than a compliment, it is a cause for rejoicing. What made Abraham a friend of God? Among other things, when God called him to go to Canaan, He went. We call this obedience. It is important that we obey God in our lives. We need to obey Him in our daily lives in all of the little things that we do in life. We need to obey Him when He calls us to special service as He did Abraham. What if God called you to be a missionary in some foreign country? You might say, “Who me?” You are as qualified as Abraham was if God has called you to this special service. I hope you get my point here. God calls people to do what He knows they can do, and He qualifies them to do whatever it is that He has called them to do. The point is that even if Abraham had not been qualified to do as God told him to do, God would have qualified him to do it. Whatever service God calls us to, from the most menial service in the eyes of the world, to the most important, God qualifies us to do it and it is important because it is of God. Bro. Joe “Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust do not corrupt, and where thieves break through and steal. 20. But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where moth and rust do not corrupt and where thieves do not break through and steal. 21. For where your treasure is there will your heart be also.”
Whether we realize it or not, we are laying up treasures through our daily thoughts and actions. This is not just a reference to money, but where we store up treasures in our hearts and minds. What treasures are you storing up in your heart and mind? Are you storing up treasure only for yourself? There is a person who always gets in our way in our spiritual growth and that person is “self.” We need to stop and think sometimes about how many times we think of “self” in a day’s time. We might be surprised! This reminds me of a little ditty that I read several years ago and have used many times to illustrate “self thinking.” It is a prayer for blessing: “Lord bless me, my wife, my son John and his wife….Us four and no more.” We need to be aware of this bent for selfishness and remember to think beyond ourselves and our selfish interests. I have recently made a commitment to pray for people that I would never think of praying for. For example, I have been led to pray for someone who is on the other side of my political persuasion. How liberating this is! Try it. Remove your treasure from yourself. Are you storing up all of your treasure in this present world? Are our imaginations captured by “things of the world”? There is nothing intrinsically wrong in wanting the things of the world, but it is wrong if that is all that captures our hearts and imaginations. John dealt with this in 1 John 2:15-17: “Do not love the world or anything in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. 16. For everything in the world – the cravings of sinful man, the lust of the eyes and the boasting of what he has does not come from the Father, but from the world. 17. The world and its desires pass away, but the man/woman who does the will of God lives forever.” We need to consider these verses as we “lay up our treasures.” Are you “laying up your treasures” in the hands of Jesus? We need to consider the wisdom of verse 17 above: “The world and its desires pass away, but the man/woman who does the will of God lives forever.” What we place in the hands of Jesus is placed in eternity. We need to put our hearts and minds above the world. This does not mean that we are to live with our minds in the clouds, so to speak, but we are to live with our minds filled with the things of God. Where are you laying up treasure in your life? Bro. Joe “But I have trusted in thy mercy; my heart shall rejoice in thy salvation. 6. I will sing unto the Lord, because He hath dealt bountifully with me.”
When I read this text this morning I looked it up in my CouchPotatoRedux file, or archive, and to my surprise, I have never written an article about it. I am about to correct that mistake. The text gives us three thing that we need to remember that will make our relationship with Jesus and, consequently, with each other. Here it is: “But I have trusted in thy mercy…” Do we really believe that God is merciful toward us, loves us and wants the best for us? You believe this if you trust in His mercy, His “steadfast love.” Do you trust that this is true whether things are going good or bad in your life? People fall out with God because He doesn’t make everything good for them. He uses the bad and the good that happens to us in life to teach us about His love and care. This is a difficult thing to do, but if we really want to live an effective Christian life, we just have to trust that God is working in our lives for the best. I could give you personal illustration after illustration about this, but there is nothing that I can write that will convince you until you actually believe that God’s love for you is steadfast and that you can trust Him to be merciful. “My heart shall rejoice in your salvation…’ I have heard it said that some people get religion, but they get over it. That would be true if one got “religion” but when he, or she, gets saved, you do not get over that. Notice that David wrote: “My heart shall rejoice…” Real salvation is a matter of the heart and it causes rejoicing. We don’t go around shouting “glory, glory” all of the time, but our hearts are rejoicing because we have a dynamic and eternal relationship with Jesus Christ. This means that in our hearts we have accepted that God is merciful and that we can trust Him to take us through, around or over anything that we meet in life. Is your heart settled on the salvation that Jesus made possible at Calvary? If so, rejoice and be glad. (Why wouldn’t we?) “I will sing unto the Lord, because He hath dealt bountifully with me…” David trusted, rejoiced and sang because He knew that God had been good to him. This is not a “name it and claim it” claim. Just the fact that Jesus invites us into a relationship with Him should put a song on our hearts. A lot of the world’s Christians are poor, but they rejoice and sing because Jesus is enough. In our “land of plenty” this is sometimes difficult to understand, but even here it is true that Jesus is enough. Thankfully, God does not require that have a good singing voice because He hears the song on our hearts. Do you trust in God’s mercy? Do you rejoice in His salvation? Do you sing because of His goodness to you? Bro, Joe “I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service. 2. And be not conformed to this world: but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, that ye may prove, what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect, will of God.”
Paul wrote that when we have “presented (our) bodies a living sacrifice” some changes should take place in our lives. One thing that he wrote was that we should present ourselves holy. Holy does not mean self-righteous; rather, it means living a life that is “acceptable unto God.” Paul also writes that this is not asking too much of us: “which is your reasonable service." In verse 2 he points out how we can present our lives as acceptable to God in a holy manner. Now, you get the idea here that being a Christian is to be different from the world. Sometimes this makes us at odds with the world. He wrote:“And be not conformed to this world.” A.T. Robertson translated this: “Do not be poured into the world’s mold.” Keep in mind that the world system is under the control of Satan, and he is happy when we join the world in its schemes. Peter wrote in 1 Peter 2: 9-11: “But ye are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a peculiar people; that ye should show forth the praise of Him who called you out of darkness into His marvelous light. 10. Which in time past were not a people, but are now the people of God: which hath not obtained mercy, but now have received mercy. 11. Dearly beloved, I beseech you as strangers and pilgrims, abstain from fleshly lusts, which war against the soul…” This is definitely not a call to fit ourselves into Satan’s mold. Further, Paul wrote: “But be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind…” We are not only to refuse to conform to the world’s morality, but we are to be transformed – changed. We should not do those sinful things that we did before Christ came into our lives. This transformation does not turn us into modern day Pharisees; rather it turns us into Christians. This means that we will not turn up our noses at people who are not Christians, but that we will seek to help them, pray for them and love them. The New Testament does not allow us to hate anyone. Throughout the Gospels, Jesus told His disciples, and us, to love people like He did. We seek to influence them for good rather than allowing them to influence us for evil. I think that the world is crying out for people who are genuinely transformed by the Holy Spirit. These would not be people who smile on whatever people want to do, but who eschew evil, but at the same time love people. Being transformed does not mean that we become religious, legalistic, and holier than thou; rather it means that we seek to serve people in the name of Jesus. It means that our own behavior has changed, and that our behavior influences people for good. Like Jesus, we do not encourage people in their sin, for this gives them a false hope. But we demonstrate a lifestyle that brings praise to the Lord. Do not be self-righteous but do not let the world conform you to its mold. Bro. Joe “Thou wilt keep him in perfect peace, whose mind is stayed on thee: because he trusteth in thee. 4. Trust ye in the Lord forever: for in the Lord JEHOVAH is everlasting strength.”
These verses teach us the value of trusting in the Lord. One value of trusting in God is that he keeps the person who trusts Him in “perfect peace.” The word that struck me here was “keeps.” This means that when we trust in God He holds onto us, and He makes sure that we have perfect peace. (It is “perfect” peace because it is given by Him.) I am reminded of what Jesus said to His disciples about His peace in John 16:33: “These things have I spoken unto you, that in Me ye might have peace. In the world ye shall have tribulation: but be of good cheer; I have overcome the world.” Jesus did not promise, and He still does not promise, that we would be in peaceful circumstances all of the time, but He did promise that we will have peace in all circumstances if we put our trust in Him. Another value of trusting in God is that we can have this peace when our minds are “stayed” on Him. One thing that the devil does not want is for our minds to be “stayed” on God. David Jeremiah wrote: “We battle against principalities and powers that would seek to take our minds off of God who is our salvation. Anything the devil can do to make us doubt God’s love, Christ’s sufficiency and the power of the Holy Spirit, he will do. Peace is kept by staying focused on what is true, on what God says.” I can only add a hearty “amen” to that. I personally know, and you probably do to, that the devil will do anything to keep me away from the Bible, from prayer, from Christian fellowship and from good Christian literature, because when he does that my mind is not “stayed” on the Lord. This reminds us that we are completely dependent on God for peace in our hearts. This peace is promised to those whose minds are “stayed” on God and on those who trust in Him. The last value of trust that I see in this text is that our trust is in one who has “everlasting strength.” Strength is one thing, but “everlasting strength” is another thing. There are all kinds of strong people out there. There are people who can lift vast amounts of weight. But there is no man on this earth who has everlasting strength. We can trust our lives, and the well-being of our families to God because His strength is above anything in this world that we can lean on. In the Old Testament, Jewish kings got in trouble when they trusted in the powerful nations of their day to deliver them instead of leaning on the strength of God. I know that when things are not going well, we can be tempted to look to the world for the strength that we need. And, yes, God has people out there who can help us, but we need to be sure that our ultimate trust in is in our great Lord. He alone has the everlasting strength that we need to get us through. It is my prayer that these two short verses from Isaiah have given you a lift and new vision of what trusting in God can do for your life. Bro. Joe “For by grace are you saved through faith: and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God.”
I feel led to return to the basic importance of faith in our lives. We should never underestimate the power of faith. It is by faith that we are saved. This is what the text printed above tells us: “For by grace through faith are you saved…” Because of God’s grace, His unmerited favor, we can be saved. The root Greek word for faith is “pistis.” The meaning of this word is to believe. It is not a casual belief in Jesus; rather it is a life-changing belief that makes a difference in all aspects of our lives. It is by faith that we are sustained through all of life. What I mean by this is that faith in Jesus keeps us from giving in to the worries and depressions of life. I don’t need to tell you that life in this world is sometimes very difficult. I have discovered in my life that I can face anything that life brings because of my faith in Jesus Christ. But I do not mean to use myself as the epitome of sustaining faith. I think that the apostle Paul is a better example. 2 Corinthians 11:24-26 gives us an example of what I mean: “Of the Jews five times I received forty stripes save one. 25. Three times was I beaten with rods, once I was stoned; three times I suffered shipwreck, a night and a day I have been in the deep. 26. In journeying often, in perils of robbers, in perils by my own countrymen, in perils by the heathen, in perils in the city, in perils in the wilderness, in perils in the sea, in perils among false brethren.” Paul was sustained through life’s hardships by the same faith that we can put in Jesus as we face our hardships. Trust Jesus to carry you through the good and bad in life. Are you really moving out in faith in Jesus or are you holding back? I do not mean to make faith sound like a commodity, but faith is the resource that helps us to live what the Bible calls the victorious life. The old hymn says, “Faith is the victory that overcomes the world.” 1 John 5:4-5 states it this way: “For whatsoever is born of God overcomes the world: and this is the victory that overcomes the world, even our faith. 5. Who is he who overcomes the world, but he that believes that Jesus is the Son of God?” Faith in Jesus is not a magical formula. It is the releasing of our lives to Jesus and trust that He will get us through, over or around anything that we face in life. Place your faith in Christ and live by that faith in Him, and you can face anything that life brings. Just do it…….. Bro. Joe "And they shall recompense their lewdness upon you, and ye shall bear the sins of your idols: "and ye shall know that I am the Lord God." KJV
"You will suffer the penalty for your lewdness and bear the consequences of your sins of idolatry. Then you will know that I am the Sovereign Lord." NIV This verse is part of Ezekiel's warning to Judah about their impending doom. They were supposed to be God's people, but they were not acting like it. Judah had given herself over to idolatry and to all of the sins that this worship entailed. They had forgotten that they were to serve "the Lord God," or as the NIV translates it, "the Sovereign Lord." Ezekiel warned that Judah would be brought to judgment by the Babylonians because they had forgotten that God was the Sovereign Lord. After all of their years of existence as "God's people," Judah had forgotten that you do not toy with the Sovereign Lord. God had sent prophets to warn them from the time of Samuel. They could not say that they had not been warned. Now, in Ezekiel's time, judgment was about to fall. The Lord inspired Ezekiel to write that when judgment fell, then they would know that He is the Lord - the Sovereign Lord. What a pity that it took that to wake God's people up and remind them of His sovereignty. That brings me to the title of this article: "When will You Accept God's Sovereignty?" This text is not ancient history. The same principle applies today. The Lord still wants us to know that He is the Lord and that we are to take Him and His way seriously. We cannot escape God's sovereignty. That is a good thing!! I am glad to know to that someone is in charge of this vast universe. But the question still remains: When will you accept his sovereignty? O.K. I will tell you when you will accept His sovereignty. You will accept it when you trust Jesus Christ as your Savior, receive the Holy Spirit and begin to take His word, the Bible, seriously. God sent His Son into the world to save us from sin and to save us from the consequences of sin. Jesus came as our deliverer and until we know Him in an intimate and personal way, we will not be delivered from sin or from its consequences. I know what some think about a claim like this. They will think that I am "looking down my nose" at them. That is not true. As the song says, "I'm just an old sinner saved by grace." But that doesn't mean that I don't owe it to you to tell you about Jesus. It also gives me the responsibility to tell you that there are consequences for ignoring God's sovereignty and refusing to believe in His Son. As the hammer fell on Judah, it is going to fall on the world - then everyone will know that God is "the Sovereign Lord." Why wait until then to know it when you can know it right now - today? If you haven't trusted Jesus as your Savior do it now. If you have, pray that those who do not know Him will come to know Him today. Bro. Joe “The Lord is my light and my salvation; whom shall I fear? The Lord is the strength of my life; of whom shall I be afraid?”
This is an unusual title. When you read this article perhaps you will see my reasoning for it. It came to me that there are three words that start with “f” that we all need to deal with in our lives. Here they are: First, we have to deal with fear. There is no one who has ever lived who did not have to deal with fear. I read once of a great general who wrote about how he had to deal with fear. He wrote that before he entered into battle if his soldiers saw his knees shaking, they would know that he was also afraid. There are some things of which we should be afraid. Fear keeps us from doing foolish things that we should not do. Actually, being afraid is not the problem; the problem is when we let fear rule our lives. There are people who will not do anything because they are so ruled by their fears. It is one thing to be afraid, it is another to let fear rule the day. Fear can keep us from doing foolish and dangerous things, but it can also keep us from doing the things that we should do. Second we have to deal with is what the King James Version of the Bible calls “fainting.” This is the old word for giving up. We read about this in Galatians 6:9: “And let us not be weary in well doing: for in due season we shall reap if we faint not.” I hate to think about the things that I missed in this life because I gave up instead of going on. Conversely, I can think of a number of things that I accomplished because I did not faint. What is it that you are failing to do in your life because you are afraid? Every successful person could tell you of the fears that they had to go beyond in order to succeed. There are also some pitiful stories by people who did let their rules fear their decisions and they stopped short of the goal. The advice in Galatians 6:9 is to keep on keeping on instead of fainting short of the goal. Third, there is one word that we will have to remember if we would not be ruled by fear, that is, faith. I think of the number of hurdles that the apostle Paul cleared because his faith in Christ kept him from fainting. This is true of the great servants of Christ in the Bible and in Christian history. I know that there have been times in my life that I wanted to faint, but by faith in Christ, I was able to keep going. Christ will give us the courage to go on instead of giving up. Peter Forsythe caught the spirit of this when he wrote: “Unless there is within us that which is above us, we shall soon yield to that which is about us.” 1 John 5:4 reminds us of this truth: “For whatsoever is born of God overcomes the world; and this is the victory that overcomes the world, even our faith.” Faith in Christ can lift you above your fears and keep you from fainting. Trust Him and move on….. Bro. Joe “For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places.”
This text is Paul’s declaration of war for followers of Jesus Christ. We should not forget that we are in a battle, and that Satan wants to ruin our lives and our witness. Here are my thoughts about this battle. It is a personal battle. We cannot choose whether or not to fight this battle; we are in it until we die. The battle begins in our hearts and minds. As Satan tempted Jesus, so he tempts us. There are days that I feel the battle raging in my heart and mind. Satan is always trying to call me away from my commitment to Jesus. He is also trying to call you away from your commitment to Jesus. Satan cannot have us, but he can ruin our witness and the quality of our lives. We need to cover our lives with prayer and with the scriptures, and the process sic Jesus on him. He can handle us, but he cannot handle Jesus. (Pause here and praise Jesus.) It is a spiritual battle. We are fighting an enemy that we cannot see, but we can see the result of his evil work all around us. Satan wants to kill our spirits. He wants to hamper our enthusiasm, and keep us on the sidelines. Paul wrote that “We wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the ruler of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places." We do not need to let the battle defeat us; rather, we need to meet the enemy in the power of Jesus. We need to pay attention to the urging of the Holy Spirit instead of the urging of the enemy. Keep in mind that Jesus defeated Satan on the cross and in His resurrection, and He is our hope and our shield. And we always need to keep in mind that He loves us, disciplines us and forgives us. I don’t mean for this reminder of the battle to make you afraid, but to remind you that you are not in this battle by yourself. It is a vital battle. We are the Lord’s soldiers until we die, or until Jesus comes again. We need to live each day with the understanding that Satan wants to trip us up. I think that I might be an expert on this, because he has tricked me and made sin appear to be appealing to me. Satan is good (or bad) at making his demons appear as “angels of light.” This reminds me of the country song: “It don’t feel like sinning to me.” Sin doesn’t feel like sinning, but the aftermath of it feels every bit like sinning. (Come on, you know what I mean.) It is vital that we join the battle each day in faith in Jesus, and in prayer and scripture. Take 1 John 4-5 to heart: “For whosoever is born of God, overcomes the world, and this is the victory that overcomes the world, even our faith. 5. Who is he that overcomes the world but he that believes that Jesus is the Son of God.” Rejoice if you believe, and repent if you do not believe! Bro. Joe |
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