Posted by Gary on June 1, 2012
It’s funny what you think about while you wait for a medical procedure to start. As I waited for one the other day Harry Chapin’s, “Cats in the Cradle” started playing in my mind. Why? Who knows, but I am one who believes that as things come to mind, especially things that challenge it is wise to ponder.
Father’s Day is soon to be upon us. On that day millions of fathers will receive cards and gifts which is all very nice. I am always grateful for the homemade cards I receive from my children and my wife always gives me an encouraging card and nice present. Of course the purpose of Father’s Day is to recognize fathers and let them know we are grateful for them and we should be.
We all know how this works, everyone is told that they are a great father on father’s day. Every father is loving, every father is involved and every father has filled their wife’s and children’s lives with great memories. At least that’s what the greeting cards all say. But is it actually so with us?
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Posted by Gary on May 28, 2012
Luke 12:32 “Do not be afraid, little flock, for your Father has chosen gladly to give you the kingdom.”
I received a good question from my brother Bill regarding my post “Like Christ or Like the World?” which is in total, a quote from Martyn Lloyd-Jones about how the Church and the Christian must be different from the world. Here is Bill’s question:
“While I agree 100%…what is your view as to why the churches using these methods attract large numbers and true Biblical churches are seeing a reduction in numbers?”
Some thoughts…
First, the passage above from Luke tells us that Jesus had a “little flock” and if He did, I should not be surprised that I do also. There are a number of passages in Scripture that tell us that few, not many are saved:
Matthew 7:13-14 “Enter through the narrow gate; for the gate is wide and the way is broad that leads to destruction, and there are many who enter through it. “For the gate is small and the way is narrow that leads to life, and there are few who find it.”
Matthew 22:14 “For many are called, but few are chosen.”
Luke 18:8 “However, when the Son of Man comes, will He find faith on the earth?”
John 6:66 “As a result of this many of His disciples withdrew and were not walking with Him anymore.”
It is not a surprise that churches that are willing to be worldly are often larger for there is something in fallen man that wants to be religious for he wants to believe that he is good though the Bible tells him he is not (Romans 3:10). Many are willing to go to church and claim belief in God if in the end they can ultimately still have the world and their sins.
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Posted by Gary on May 26, 2012
There should be an utter difference between the Christian and the non-Christian….The New Testament regards that as something absolutely basic and fundamental; and, as I see things at the present time, the first need in the Church is a clear understanding of this essential difference… But it has become blurred; the world has come into the Church and the Church has become worldly.
We have been told that we have to make the Church attractive to the man outside, and the idea is to become as much like him as we can. There were certain popular priests during the first world war who mixed with their men, and smoked with them, and did this, that, and the other with them, in order to encourage them. Some people thought that, as a result, when the war was over, the ex-service men would be crowding into the churches. Yet it did not happen, and it never has happened that way.
… When the Church is absolutely different from the world, she invariably attracts it. It is then that the world is made to listen to her message, though it may hate it at first. That is how revival comes. That must also be true of us as individuals. It should not be our ambition to be as much like everybody else as we can, though we happen to be Christian, but rather to be as different from everybody who is not a Christian as we can possibly be. Our ambition should be to be like Christ, the more like Him the better, and the more like Him we become, the more we shall be unlike everybody who is not a Christian. (Martyn Lloyd-Jones: From the Introduction to “The Sermon on the Mount)
Posted by Gary on May 21, 2012
“Therefore, thought I, what God says is best, is indeed best, though all the men in the world are against it.”
On Christian’s journey to the Celestial City he finally finds a companion to travel with by the name of “Faithful”. As they first meet, they recount their individual journeys, the events and people they have met with.
Faithful mentions that while in the Valley of Humility (this being the process of God humbling a person so that they may be saved) he met a Mr. Shame. One might think in the Valley of Humility this Mr. Shame was a person who had come to know shame for his own life and actions but Faithful points out quickly that his shame is not in regard to himself but that he seeks to make Christians feel ashamed of their religion.
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Posted by Gary on
Before you proceed to read this post please consider the following…I can honestly say that I do not have a greater fear than to be found saying something about God that isn’t true. By His grace, I take my privileged calling as a teacher about God very seriously. This being said, there are two dangers when it comes to saying things about God: The first is the obvious danger of saying things about God that are not true. The second danger is less obvious but just as wrong and that is a refusal to say things about God that are true. This generation of believers needs to be challenged in regard to their view of God. Do we believe in the God who is, whose being and ways often bewilder and astound us or are we insisting on a God who fits nicely in our little box? The God of the smiley face who conforms to our thinking and never does anything that defies our thinking? God is who He is. Let us as His creatures humble ourselves and worship and adore Him as He reveals Himself to us.
1 John 4:7-8 “Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God; and everyone who loves is born of God and knows God. The one who does not love does not know God, for God is love.”
Psalm 95:10-11 “For forty years I loathed that generation, and said they are a people who err in their heart, and they do not know My ways. “Therefore I swore in My anger, truly they shall not enter into My rest.”
Psalm 11:5 “The LORD tests the righteous and the wicked, and the one who loves violence His soul hates.”
Malachi 1:2-3 “I have loved you,” says the LORD. But you say, “How have You loved us?” “Was not Esau Jacob’s brother?” declares the LORD. “Yet I have loved Jacob; but I have hated Esau, and I have made his mountains a desolation and appointed his inheritance for the jackals of the wilderness.”
Let it be said at the outset that it is the Christian’s great joy and glory to proclaim that God is love. Note the verse from 1 John 4 above does not say that, “God loves” or “God is loving” it says that, “God is love”.
This means quite simply that God is the source and fountain of all love. If He is love then there is no love apart from Him. The love a husband has for his wife or that a mother has for her children comes from God. The love a child has for his puppy or the love between good friends is at its root, from God.
This is true not only for believers but even for atheists and agnostics. They may not believe it or accept it, but the love that the atheist has for his wife he has from God and it doesn’t need his acknowledgement to be so. God is love and there is no love without Him.
This being said, does the fact that God is love mean that He cannot and does not hate?
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Posted by Gary on May 19, 2012
1 John 5:14 “This is the confidence which we have before Him, that, if we ask anything according to His will, He hears us.
“There is a limit to the doctrine of the prayer of faith. We are not to expect that God will give us everything we choose to ask for. We know that we sometimes ask, and do not receive, because we ask amiss. If we ask for that which is not promised—if we run counter to the spirit which the Lord would have us cultivate—if we ask contrary to his will, or to the decrees of his providence—if we ask merely for the gratification of our own ease, and without an eye to his glory, we must not expect that we shall receive.” (Charles Spugeon: Morning and Evening May 19-Evening)
Posted by Gary on May 18, 2012
Psalm 115:3 “But our God is in the heavens; He does whatever He pleases.”
“God is that Being, for whose will no cause or reason is to be assigned, as a rule or standard by which it acts; seeing that, nothing is superior or equal to it, but it is itself the rule of all things. For if it acted by any rule or standard, or from any cause or reason, it would be no longer the will of GOD. Therefore, what God wills, is not therefore right, because He ought or ever was bound so to will; but on the contrary, what takes place is right, because He wills it.” (Martin Luther: The Bondage of the Will)
Posted by Gary on May 17, 2012
John 5:24 “Truly, truly, I say to you, he who hears My word, and believes Him who sent Me, has eternal life, and does not come into judgment, but has passed out of death into life.”
1 John 5:13 “These things I have written to you who believe in the name of the Son of God, so that you may know that you have eternal life.”
John 10:28 “and I give eternal life to them, and they will never perish; and no one will snatch them out of My hand.”
I spent some time today reading the sixth section of The Council of Trent, the Roman Catholic Church’s response to the Protestant Reformation. The sixth section outlines Rome’s position on “Justification” or what the layman might call, “forgiveness”. I was formerly a Catholic and have many family and friends who are. I love them and believe that some of them have a genuine faith in the Lord Jesus. But if they are saved it must be said that it is in spite of what Rome has taught them, not because of it.
The Bible teaches us that at the moment a person receives Christ as their Savior with genuine repentance and faith, their sins are forgiven and they have eternal life never to perish. Jesus has said it above in John 5:24, please notice the tense… “has eternal life” and “has passed out of death into life”. Not, “might have eternal life” or “can hope he has eternal life”. Notice also, not, “will have eternal life” or, “will pass out of death into life”. But, “has”, now!
On what does Jesus make these wonderful assurances contingent? Believing. “Truly, truly, I say to you, he who hears My word, and believes Him who sent Me”…But Rome says something different:
Section 6: Canon 12.
If anyone says that justifying faith is nothing else than confidence in divine mercy, which remits sins for Christ’s sake, or that it is this confidence alone that justifies us, let him be anathema.
Section 6: Canon 14.
If anyone says that man is absolved from his sins and justified because he firmly believes that he is absolved and justified, or that no one is truly justified except him who believes himself justified, and that by this faith alone absolution and justification are effected, let him be anathema.
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Posted by Gary on May 15, 2012
Genesis 1:27-28 “God created man in His own image, in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them. God blessed them; and God said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth…”
Well, at least he is finally being honest…we all knew that President Obama was a champion of sodomy but until now for the reason of political expedience, he has walked the wire. Finally, his political life and his real views serve each other.
This week the President has declared that, “Gay marriage doesn’t weaken families, it strengthens families”. We would ask the President, “How can gay marriage strengthen families when it cannot create families”? This is the marvel isn’t it? For there to be a “family” for a gay couple, they must pilfer from the union of a man and a woman for their “union” can produce nothing but disease and death.
Not only this, but if homosexuality were to be embraced wholesale (as we can advocate for male and female with no harm coming to humanity) there would be no more families for sodomy practiced wholesale by humanity would lead to extinction. Sodomy leads to extinction and would end families, yet it strengthens families! This must be the new math.
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Posted by Gary on March 29, 2012
Matthew 26:56 “Then all the disciples forsook him and fled.”
Peter’s three-time denial of Jesus is as well known as any event in the Bible save the crucifixion and resurrection itself. To be fair to Peter you will note from the passage above that all the disciples forsook Jesus and fled. We tend to rake Peter over the coals for his unfaithfulness and not without justification. Though all the disciples said they would die for Jesus, Peter did distinguish himself and say that even if the rest of them would cave in, he never would:
Matthew 26:33-35 “But Peter said to Him, “Even though all may fall away because of You, I will never fall away.” Jesus said to him, “Truly I say to you that this very night, before a rooster crows, you will deny Me three times.” Peter said to Him, “Even if I have to die with You, I will not deny You.” All the disciples said the same thing too.”
Christian, certainly you know that there are many times that you and I are like Peter right? There are times when you and I don’t want others to know that we are one His disciples right? Let me guess, you never do this right? Have there been times when you have had opportunity to speak about Jesus and for Him and you did not for fear of what someone would think about you? Have there been times when Christ’s truth needed to be declared and you kept silent because you were afraid of others? Are you as willing to have others know you are Christ’s as you are to have them know who your favorite sports team is or who your favorite singer is? Do you declare Him like you do the Yankees, Phillies, Bono or Elvis?
If we are honest we will acknowledge freely that there is much of Peter in us. Let us remember though, that after Pentecost and the indwelling of the Holy Spirit, Peter and the other Apostles were very different men, bold, brave and faithful. May God by His Spirit make us like them.
Please take a moment to read these thoughts from Charles Spurgeon’s “Morning and Evening” that I came across this week. They will humble you and challenge you: WAIT! There is more to read… read on »
