What if, one day you where no where specific with your children and a person approached you with a gun and told you that he was going to kill your children; but if you chose, you could take the place of your children. As a father, would you allow this person to kill your children or would you take the place of your children? Why?
If you have been blessed with being a father with children of your own, then you would make the choice to take the place of your children and allow your children to live. Why? Because you love your children.
Any father who would allow his children to be killed instead of himself is selfish, self-centered, self-seeking, self-interested, egotistical and is a liar if he claims to love his children.
In John 15:13 Jesus said, "There is no greater love than to lay down one’s life for one’s friends (NLT).” This is what God did when Jesus died on the cross. God chose to take the place of his children. Why?
Because God loves you.
Thursday, July 30, 2009
Wednesday, July 29, 2009
Breaking the Law, Breaking the Habit
"If you tell a big enough lie and tell it frequently enough, it will be believed." ~ Adolph Hitler
The purpose of the Mosaic Law and the reason it was instituted "applies to those to whom it was given, for its purpose is to keep people from having excuses, and to show that the entire world is guilty (NLT, Romans 3:19)."
Teaching about the Law, Jesus said in Matthew 5:17-18 “Don’t misunderstand why I have come. I did not come to abolish the Law of Moses or the writings of the prophets. No, I came to accomplish their purpose. I tell you the truth, until heaven and earth disappear, not even the smallest detail of God’s law will disappear until its purpose is achieved (NLT)."
Did Jesus fufill or accomplish the purpose of the Mosaic Law? YES!!!
The Apostle Paul said:
Romans 10:4 "For Christ has already accomplished the purpose for which the law was given. As a result, all who believe in him are made right with God (NLT)."
Therefore, since Jesus accomplished and achieved the Laws purpose, why would we need to continue following it? We do not!
Some Christians have come to believe that somehow the Mosaic Law still exists and that we should still be following the teachings in the Mosaic Law. Why would we believe such a lie? What are these teachings in the Mosaic Law that I'm referring too?
Should we still be offering animal sacrifices to God to atone for our sins? How about we stone you if you tell a lie to your parents? Should we kill a woman if she is found to be a prostitute? Should we still be bringing a tenth of the increase of our crops to the Temple to support the Levite priests? Should we put you to death for working on the Sabbath? Where do you draw the line on Old Testment teachings?
Jesus drew the line in the sand on the Old Testament when He fulfilled it. There are multiple verses in the NT that say that we (Christians in this age of grace and truth, led by the Holy Spirit) should not place ourselves under the 600 plus laws, rules and regulations that are in the Mosaic Law.
*Acts 13:39 "Everyone who believes in him is declared right with God—something the Law of Moses could never do."
*Romans 3:20 "For no one can ever be made right with God by doing what the law commands. The law simply shows us how sinful we are."
*Romans 3:21 "But now God has shown us a way to be made right with him without keeping the requirements of the law, as was promised in the writings of Moses and the prophets long ago."
*Romans 3:28 "So we are made right with God through faith and not by obeying the law."
*Romans 4:13 "Clearly, God’s promise to give the whole earth to Abraham and his descendants was based not on his obedience to God’s law, but on a right relationship with God that comes by faith."
*Romans 6:14 "Sin is no longer your master, for you no longer live under the requirements of the law. Instead, you live under the freedom of God’s grace."
*Romans 9:31 "But the people of Israel, who tried so hard to get right with God by keeping the law, never succeeded."
*Romans 9:32 "Why not? Because they were trying to get right with God by keeping the law instead of by trusting in him. They stumbled over the great rock in their path."
*Romans 10:3 "For they don’t understand God’s way of making people right with himself. Refusing to accept God’s way, they cling to their own way of getting right with God by trying to keep the law."
*Romans 10:4 For Christ has already accomplished the purpose for which the law was given. As a result, all who believe in him are made right with God."
*Romans 13:8 Owe nothing to anyone—except for your obligation to love one another. If you love your neighbor, you will fulfill the requirements of God’s law.
*Galatians 2:16 "Yet we know that a person is made right with God by faith in Jesus Christ, not by obeying the law. And we have believed in Christ Jesus, so that we might be made right with God because of our faith in Christ, not because we have obeyed the law. For no one will ever be made right with God by obeying the law.”
*Galatians 2:21 "I do not treat the grace of God as meaningless. For if keeping the law could make us right with God, then there was no need for Christ to die."
*Galatians 3:10 "But those who depend on the law to make them right with God are under his curse, for the Scriptures say, “Cursed is everyone who does not observe and obey all the commands that are written in God’s Book of the Law.”
*Galatians 3:13 "But Christ has rescued us from the curse pronounced by the law. When he was hung on the cross, he took upon himself the curse for our wrongdoing. For it is written in the Scriptures, “Cursed is everyone who is hung on a tree.”
*Galatians 3:21 "Is there a conflict, then, between God’s law and God’s promises? Absolutely not! If the law could give us new life, we could be made right with God by obeying it."
*Galatians 3:24 "Let me put it another way. The law was our guardian until Christ came; it protected us until we could be made right with God through faith."
*Galatians 5:4 "For if you are trying to make yourselves right with God by keeping the law, you have been cut off from Christ! You have fallen away from God’s grace."
*Galatians 5:18 "But when you are directed by the Spirit, you are not under obligation to the Law of Moses."
*Hebrews 10:1 "The old system under the law of Moses was only a shadow, a dim preview of the good things to come, not the good things themselves. The sacrifices under that system were repeated again and again, year after year, but they were never able to provide perfect cleansing for those who came to worship."
*Romans 13:8 "Owe nothing to anyone—except for your obligation to love one another. If you love your neighbor, you will fulfill the requirements of God’s law."
*Romans 13:10 "Love does no wrong to others, so love fulfills the requirements of God’s law."
*Galatians 5:14 "For the whole law can be summed up in this one command: “Love your neighbor as yourself.”
For one thing, I know that should we NOT still be offering animal sacrifices to God? Why? Because Christ is our perfect sacrifice.
Hebrews 9:11 - "So Christ has now become the High Priest over all the good things that have come. He has entered that greater, more perfect Tabernacle in heaven, which was not made by human hands and is not part of this created world (NLT)."
Please, will you break the habit of trying to follow those old laws that put people in bondage.
Hebrews 8:6- 13 "But now Jesus, our High Priest, has been given a ministry that is far superior to the old priesthood, for he is the one who mediates for us a far better covenant with God, based on better promises.
If the first covenant had been faultless, there would have been no need for a second covenant to replace it. But when God found fault with the people, he said:
“The day is coming, says the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the people of Israel and Judah. This covenant will not be like the one I made with their ancestors when I took them by the hand and led them out of the land of Egypt.
They did not remain faithful to my covenant, so I turned my back on them, says the Lord. But this is the new covenant I will make with the people of Israel on that day, says the Lord:
I will put my laws in their minds, and I will write them on their hearts. I will be their God, and they will be my people. And they will not need to teach their neighbors, nor will they need to teach their relatives, saying, ‘You should know the Lord.’ For everyone, from the least to the greatest, will know me already. And I will forgive their wickedness, and I will never again remember their sins.”
When God speaks of a “new” covenant, it means he has made the first one obsolete (NLT)."
Tuesday, July 28, 2009
No Ears to Hear
One day last week, I was driving towards Lake McQueeny on FM725 and I saw a sign at Celebrate Life Church that said, "Hearing Produces Believing." I pondered on that for the rest of the day and thought to myself, "Why are there so many who do not believe?"
The intro to a dc Talk song named "What if I Stumble" came to mind, it says:
I thought about that as well, and came to the conclusion that it may be possible that some people will turn from God and refuse to believe in Him because they see Christians being hypocrites. However, as a Christian, I see hypocrites in Christianity all the time but that doesn’t sway me.
Why? Because my relationship with Jesus is not determined by other Christians mistakes or hypocritical actions. I personally think that denying Jesus or the lack of believing in God is not due to the hypocrisy in Christianity but is in fact an excuse to keep on living a life apart from God.
This brought me to the core issue. The core issue is not the actions of hypocrites in Christianity. The real core issue is the lack of faith. Well, how can a person, who does not believe in God, gain faith? Paul says that “faith comes from hearing, that is, hearing the Good News about Christ (Rom. 10:17).” On the other hand, does simply hearing the gospel message being preached allow a nonbeliever to gain faith?
No, not everyone will welcome the gospel message (Rom. 10:16). Why? I believe it is because they refuse to listen because their hearts are hardened. In other words, they blame God for things that go wrong in their lives. They may hear Billy Graham preach the good news, but it just goes in one ear and out the other, so to speak.
Why? There are many reasons. They may be angry at God, or angry at a Christian(s) who have done them wrong. Maybe they used to be in a church that the people there were cruel or demeaning to them. It’s possible that a pastor abused his authority and treated some people better than others. Maybe they grew up in a Christian home but were forced to go to church and didn’t like it and they are angry at their parents. Whatever the reason, people reject God or refuse to believe in Him in many ways.
Jesus said that many people will hear the gospel message but they will not listen to it. In Matthew 13, Jesus told the story of the farmer who sowed seeds. In verse 4, Jesus said, “As he [the farmer] scattered them across his field, some seeds fell on a footpath, and the birds came and ate them.”
The explanation of this is given in Matthew 13:19 which states, “The seed that fell on the footpath represents those who hear the message about the Kingdom and don’t understand it. Then the evil one comes and snatches away the seed that was planted in their hearts.” Well, my question is why do they not understand it?
I believe the reason that atheists do not understand, receive or believe in God is because they have been deceived by “the evil one.” They have believed the lie of evolution as their explanation of origins, thus God is not a necessity nor is he real to them.
I had an illustration came to my mind of an atheist standing next to a Christian on Judgment Day in front of God. There was nothing different about the atheist except that he doesn’t have any ears on his head and he was sad. The Christian however, does have ears and is very happy. In this case, the atheist did not have ears to hear, so to speak.
The parables Jesus used to describe, illustrate or explain what He was trying to convey were not understood by some people in His day. Why?
In Matthew 13:12-15 Jesus said:
I believe that today’s atheists are those people who do not believe because “the hearts of these people are hardened, and their ears cannot hear, and they have closed their eyes.” They ignore God and believe that everything is solved or understood by logical means such as science, evolution and majority opinion.
These people have closed their hearts to receive the love of God through the good news of Jesus Christ and have relied upon what they know instead of what God wants them to know about Him.
We cannot force people to believe in God, love does not force itself on anyone. We cannot intellectually persuade anyone that God is real, although we should try. However, we can tell them that God loves them and has a great plan for their lives.
I can only ask that if you are a Christian and you know a person who does not believe in God, pray on the behalf of that person and ask God to open up the opportunity to soften their heart in order to receive the good news of Christ so that they will understand the message of salvation (which is love and eternal life) and come to believe in God and who the person of Jesus Christ is.
The intro to a dc Talk song named "What if I Stumble" came to mind, it says:
"The greatest single cause of atheism in the world today is Christians, who acknowledge Jesus with their lips, then walk out the door and deny him by their lifestyle. That is what an unbelieving world simply finds unbelievable.”
I thought about that as well, and came to the conclusion that it may be possible that some people will turn from God and refuse to believe in Him because they see Christians being hypocrites. However, as a Christian, I see hypocrites in Christianity all the time but that doesn’t sway me.
Why? Because my relationship with Jesus is not determined by other Christians mistakes or hypocritical actions. I personally think that denying Jesus or the lack of believing in God is not due to the hypocrisy in Christianity but is in fact an excuse to keep on living a life apart from God.
This brought me to the core issue. The core issue is not the actions of hypocrites in Christianity. The real core issue is the lack of faith. Well, how can a person, who does not believe in God, gain faith? Paul says that “faith comes from hearing, that is, hearing the Good News about Christ (Rom. 10:17).” On the other hand, does simply hearing the gospel message being preached allow a nonbeliever to gain faith?
No, not everyone will welcome the gospel message (Rom. 10:16). Why? I believe it is because they refuse to listen because their hearts are hardened. In other words, they blame God for things that go wrong in their lives. They may hear Billy Graham preach the good news, but it just goes in one ear and out the other, so to speak.
Why? There are many reasons. They may be angry at God, or angry at a Christian(s) who have done them wrong. Maybe they used to be in a church that the people there were cruel or demeaning to them. It’s possible that a pastor abused his authority and treated some people better than others. Maybe they grew up in a Christian home but were forced to go to church and didn’t like it and they are angry at their parents. Whatever the reason, people reject God or refuse to believe in Him in many ways.
Jesus said that many people will hear the gospel message but they will not listen to it. In Matthew 13, Jesus told the story of the farmer who sowed seeds. In verse 4, Jesus said, “As he [the farmer] scattered them across his field, some seeds fell on a footpath, and the birds came and ate them.”
The explanation of this is given in Matthew 13:19 which states, “The seed that fell on the footpath represents those who hear the message about the Kingdom and don’t understand it. Then the evil one comes and snatches away the seed that was planted in their hearts.” Well, my question is why do they not understand it?
I believe the reason that atheists do not understand, receive or believe in God is because they have been deceived by “the evil one.” They have believed the lie of evolution as their explanation of origins, thus God is not a necessity nor is he real to them.
I had an illustration came to my mind of an atheist standing next to a Christian on Judgment Day in front of God. There was nothing different about the atheist except that he doesn’t have any ears on his head and he was sad. The Christian however, does have ears and is very happy. In this case, the atheist did not have ears to hear, so to speak.
The parables Jesus used to describe, illustrate or explain what He was trying to convey were not understood by some people in His day. Why?
In Matthew 13:12-15 Jesus said:
“To those who listen to my teaching, more understanding will be given, and they will have an abundance of knowledge. But for those who are not listening, even what little understanding they have will be taken away from them. That is why I use these parables, For they look, but they don’t really see. They hear, but they don’t really listen or understand. This fulfills the prophecy of Isaiah that says, ‘When you hear what I say, you will not understand. When you see what I do, you will not comprehend. For the hearts of these people are hardened, and their ears cannot hear, and they have closed their eyes— so their eyes cannot see, and their ears cannot hear, and their hearts cannot understand, and they cannot turn to me and let me heal them.’”
I believe that today’s atheists are those people who do not believe because “the hearts of these people are hardened, and their ears cannot hear, and they have closed their eyes.” They ignore God and believe that everything is solved or understood by logical means such as science, evolution and majority opinion.
These people have closed their hearts to receive the love of God through the good news of Jesus Christ and have relied upon what they know instead of what God wants them to know about Him.
We cannot force people to believe in God, love does not force itself on anyone. We cannot intellectually persuade anyone that God is real, although we should try. However, we can tell them that God loves them and has a great plan for their lives.
I can only ask that if you are a Christian and you know a person who does not believe in God, pray on the behalf of that person and ask God to open up the opportunity to soften their heart in order to receive the good news of Christ so that they will understand the message of salvation (which is love and eternal life) and come to believe in God and who the person of Jesus Christ is.
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