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Tag: Bible

Do you really believe that? ONLY Scripture Sola Scriptura
ONLY Scripture – Sola Scriptura

The HOLY BIBLE IS: The written word of God from scripture.

  • Above the Golden Rule

    Above the Golden Rule

    Jesus said: “This is the great and first commandment.”

    Do you know what it is?

    You do not have to be a Christian to know the golden rule. We have heard it quoted by unbelievers as a standard of behavior that we should love one another.  But do not fall into the trap of the world in giving a commandment of God and an emphasis of Jesus a misplacement in your priorities.

    In fact, that is the trap the Pharisees and Sadducees often tried to bait with their questions to Jesus. Whatever His answer, they had a better one… or so they thought. In fact in this instance they probably had the Ten Commandments in mind.

    Matthew 22

    The Great Commandment

    34 But when the Pharisees heard that he had silenced the Sadducees, they gathered together. 35 And one of them, a lawyer, asked him a question to test him.

    36 “Teacher, which is the great commandment in the Law?”

    37 And he said to him, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. 38 This is the great and first commandment.

    39 And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. 40 On these two commandments depend all the Law and the Prophets.”

    What is Jesus saying here?

    In context of the Ten Commandments, the first four Commandments relate to our obedience to and worship of the Living God. These are the MOST important, yet even Christians have a tendency to overlook their importance.

     Deuteronomy 5:

    6“‘I am the Lord your God…

    7 “‘You shall have no other gods before me.

    8 “‘You shall not make for yourself a carved image, or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is on the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth. 9 You shall not bow down to them or serve them…

    11 “‘You shall not take the name of the Lord your God in vain, for the Lord will not hold him guiltless who takes his name in vain.

    12 “‘Observe the Sabbath day, to keep it holy, as the Lord your God commanded you. 13 Six days you shall labor and do all your work, 14 but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the Lord your God…

    The second is like it… The ‘golden rule’ is a summary of Commandments IV – X, which all relate to how as God’s family we must love one another; yet first: You shall love the Lord OUR GOD!

    Matthew  22:36 “Teacher, which is the great commandment in the Law?”

    37 And he said to him, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. 38 This is the great and first commandment.

    Worship God with ALL your heart, soul, and mind!

    What does this “greatest Commandment” mean to followers of Christ Jesus who have a personal relationship with the Living God?

    Understand what Jesus tells us about our worship of the Lord here:

    • Heart -‘ kardia’ – ‘denotes the centre of all physical and spiritual life’
    • Soul – ‘psychē’ – the breath of life; the seat of the feelings, desires, affections, aversions (our heart, soul etc.); the soul as an essence which differs from the body and is not dissolved by death (distinguished from other parts of the body)
    • Mind – ‘dianoia’ – the mind as a faculty of understanding, feeling, desiring; way of thinking and feeling; thoughts, either good or bad

    Does JESUS mean to say that GOD should be the center of our physical and spiritual life? Does our ‘lord’ mean to say that the seat of our feelings, desires, affections ought to focus on God? Does Christ imply that a Christian should think first about God and what God desires for our life?

    Yes. Yes. And yes.

    “You shall love the Lord your God

    with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.

    This is the great and first commandment.

     

     

  • A Love Letter from John

    A Love Letter from John

    1 John 2: My little children, I am writing these things to you so that you may not sin.

    But if anyone does sin,we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous.

    Beloved brother, beloved sister in Christ: you are going to sin. I do.

    We continue to need Christ as our advocate every day of our mortal lives.

    2 He is the propitiation [the means of appeasing the deserved wrath of God] for our sins, and not for ours only but also for the sins of the whole world.

    3 And by this we know that we have come to know him, if we keep his commandments.

    We know that we know Jesus: not only knowledge, but an intimate knowledge and personal relationship with Jesus as our Lord.

    4 Whoever says “I know him” but does not keep his commandments is a liar, and the truth is not in him, 5 but whoever keeps his word, in him truly the love of God is perfected.

    By this we may know that we are in him: 6 whoever says he abides in him ought to walk in the same way in which he walked.

    The New Commandment

    7 Beloved, I am writing you no new commandment, but an old commandment that you had from the beginning.

    The old commandment is the word that you have heard. 8 At the same time, it is a new commandment that I am writing to you, which is true in him and in you, because the darkness is passing away and the true light is already shining.

    Hear this now of God’s unfailing love for us.  Discern which brother and what sister now lives in the light. Understand who hides in the lies of the darkness and remains a slave of the sins of the world.

    9 Whoever says he is in the light and hates his brother is still in darkness.

    10 Whoever loves his brother abides in the light, and in him there is no cause for stumbling.

    11 But whoever hates his brother is in the darkness and walks in the darkness, and does not know where he is going, because the darkness has blinded his eyes…

    We may not hate another of the family of Christ Jesus. For all who are saved are filled with His light. In us can be NO darkness at all.

    Do Not Love the World

    15 Do not love the world or the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. 16 For all that is in the world—the desires of the flesh and the desires of the eyes and pride of life—is not from the Father but is from the world. 17 And the world is passing away along with its desires [lust], but whoever does the will of God abides forever.

     

    1 John 3: See what kind of love the Father has given to us, that we should be called children of God; and so we are.

    The reason why the world does not know us is that it did not know him.

    2 Beloved, we are God’s children now, and what we will be has not yet appeared; but we know that when he appears we shall be like him, because we shall see him as he is. 3 And everyone who thus hopes in him purifies himself as he is pure.

    4 Everyone who makes a practice of sinning also practices lawlessness; sin is lawlessness.

    5 You know that he appeared in order to take away sins, and in him there is no sin.

    6 No one who abides in him keeps on sinning; no one who keeps on sinning has either seen him or known him.

    7 Little children, let no one deceive you. Whoever practices righteousness is righteous, as he is righteous. 8 Whoever makes a practice of sinning is of the devil, for the devil has been sinning from the beginning.

    The reason the Son of God appeared was to destroy the works of the devil. 9 No one born of God makes a practice of sinning, for God’s seed abides in him, and he cannot keep on sinning because he has been born of God.

    10 By this it is evident who are the children of God, and who are the children of the devil: whoever does not practice righteousness is not of God, nor is the one who does not love his brother.

    Love One Another

    11 For this is the message that you have heard from the beginning, that we should love one another...

    18 Little children, let us not love in word or talk but in deed and in truth.

    The Apostle John, who with the Holy Spirit is also author of the Gospel of John, writes to the church of the high importance of the love of Christ Jesus for us.

    Do you believe? Do you know how much God has loved us from the beginning?

    For God sacrificed His Only Son on a Cross for you and for me.

    Will you become His righteousness?

    Dearly beloved, our Bridegroom sends you His love.

     

  • Christians: Servants in Prison Singing

    Christians: Servants in Prison Singing

    What must I do?

    By the Power of the Holy Spirit, preach Christ crucified and praise Jesus as your risen Lord.

    Acts 16
    English Standard Version (ESV)

    Paul and Silas in Prison

    16 As we were going to the place of prayer, we were met by a slave girl who had a spirit of divination and brought her owners much gain by fortune-telling. 17 She followed Paul and us, crying out, “These men are servants of the Most High God, who proclaim to you the way of salvation.”

    18 And this she kept doing for many days. Paul, having become greatly annoyed, turned and said to the spirit, “I command you in the name of Jesus Christ to come out of her.” And it came out that very hour.

    Remarkable! Paul recognizes the power of a spirit of evil which lives in the body of this woman fortune-teller. A spirit has knowledge and power over her flesh. Yet the spirit subservient to Satan must respond to the command of Christ.

    19 But when her owners saw that their hope of gain was gone, they seized Paul and Silas and dragged them into the marketplace before the rulers…

    22 The crowd joined in attacking them, and the magistrates tore the garments off them and gave orders to beat them with rods.

    23 And when they had inflicted many blows upon them, they threw them into prison, ordering the jailer to keep them safely. 24 Having received this order, he put them into the inner prison and fastened their feet in the stocks.

    The light of Christ frees a woman from satanic sin. And the reward for these Christians?

    A brutal beating and imprisonment in a dark cell as punishment.

    The Philippian Jailer Converted

    25 About midnight Paul and Silas were praying and singing hymns to God, and the prisoners were listening to them, 26 and suddenly there was a great earthquake, so that the foundations of the prison were shaken. And immediately all the doors were opened, and everyone’s bonds were unfastened.

    Phillipi jailerYou and your Christian friend are beaten severely. You are both thrown in a dark prison cell unjustly. You sing praise to God! Answer? An EARTHQUAKE!

    Maybe God will just let you die now. Maybe God will bring the stones down on you and end your pain and misery.

    NO.

    The trembling earth and falling stones settle into something quite unexpected: a jailer, fearing for his life because you may have escaped and he, instead, could be executed.

    27 When the jailer woke and saw that the prison doors were open, he drew his sword and was about to kill himself, supposing that the prisoners had escaped.

    28 But Paul cried with a loud voice, “Do not harm yourself, for we are all here.”

    29 And the jailer called for lights and rushed in, and trembling with fear he fell down before Paul and Silas.

    Only GOD could do a work like this!

    30 Then he brought them out and said, “Sirs, what must I do to be saved?”

    31 And they said, “Believe in the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved, you and your household.”

    I believe in the Lord Jesus. May my wife and our household be in His hands. (This is my personal prayer & witness.)

    32 And they spoke the word of the Lord to him and to all who were in his house.

    33 And he took them the same hour of the night and washed their wounds; and he was baptized at once, he and all his family. 34 Then he brought them up into his house and set food before them. And he rejoiced along with his entire household that he had believed in God.

    I have witnessed the Power and mercy of Christ.

    What must I do to be saved?

    You with ears to hear, hear the voice of our Lord and Savior,  Christ Jesus.