Episodes
Sunday Dec 13, 2015
GOD'S PLAN WILL BE DONE (Romans 16:21-27)
Sunday Dec 13, 2015
Sunday Dec 13, 2015
One of the great Biblical promises that we have as believers is that God’s plan will be done. No matter what man does to mess things up in this world, no matter what schemes and plots that Satan has for this world, God’s plan will be done. It will be done just like He set it up to be done before He created the universe and everything in it. Nothing has changed in this plan, and nothing will change. God’s plan will be done, period.
The fact that I know this promise of God to be true is comforting to me, and that is why God gave us this promise, so that we could be comforted knowing that God was in control. Paul closes out this epistle with a declaration of this promise. The almighty God of the Bible is the everlasting God, and His purposes and His goals are pursued by Him from age to age. Christians may be feeble and frail, but God is strong. The church may look like it is weak and divided, but it is the body of Christ and therefore it is linked to Omnipotence. Whatever else may fail, the work of God cannot.
Paul draws our thoughts to Him whose loving counsels foresaw the fall of man, provided for it before the foundation of the world, foreknew us, foreknew you and me, loved us into the kingdom, and who arranges for all things to work together for our good and His eternal glory. Paul also draws our thoughts to the Son of His love, our blessed and glorious Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ. And having filled our hearts and mind with these thoughts, Paul says a final Amen to this great epistle.
Sunday Dec 06, 2015
TO BE OBEDIENT TO GOD (Romans 16:19-21)
Sunday Dec 06, 2015
Sunday Dec 06, 2015
The word obedience is a great Biblical word in the life of the believer. It is at the very heart of our service, our salvation, and our sanctification. Many an invitation call has been made with these words.
Trust and obey,
For there is no other way
To be happy in Jesus,
But to trust and obey.
In our lesson today, we learn that to be obedient to the Word of God we must be skillful and intelligent in the truths and ways of God.
Matthew 10:16
16 Behold, I send you forth as sheep in the midst of wolves: be ye therefore wise as serpents, and harmless as doves.
KJV
We are to be wise in the Word of God so that we can determine that which is really good, from that which is counterfeit; wise so that we can distinguish things that are untrue, in order to improve our opportunities to serve. All the while knowing that we remain surrounded by those who would deceive us, and therefore take us away from God’s work.
Proverbs 14:8
8 The wisdom of the prudent is to understand his way: but the folly of fools is deceit.
KJV
We talked last week about how the believer is to recognize the truth among a sea of counterfeit. You learn to tell the difference by diligent study of the real thing. To rightly divide the word of truth requires meticulous, constant, study, an open heart to the words of the Holy Spirit, and simplicity in our faith in Christ.
We are to be wise enough not to be deceived, and yet so simple that we will not be deceivers. It is a Holy simplicity that Paul describes here. To have a holy simplicity means that you are someone who does not contrive, or have evil intentions. We are not to be sophisticated in the ways of evil, we are to be simply faithful in our knowledge of the Lord.
An obedient believer is to recognize wisdom, recognize evil, and recognize that both can be found in the church. To believe otherwise is to be naive and foolish. To be obedient to God requires that we know the truth of what God says so that we will not be deceived by the lies of Satan.
Monday Nov 30, 2015
DEALING WITH FALSE TEACHERS (Romans 16:17-18)
Monday Nov 30, 2015
Monday Nov 30, 2015
How do you deal with those who deliberately, not accidentally, teach a doctrine that is different from what is found in the Bible?
When a Jehovah’s Witness comes to your door, what do you do? Do you engage in a debate with them, or do you shut the door?
How do you identify what is true and what is false in the teachings of people who profess to be Bible believing Christians? They may even be in the leadership of the church as the pastor, or a deacon, or a Bible teacher. How do you know when they begin to teach something that is false?
Many of these people will use the same words that we use, but they use a different dictionary to define them. They say they believe in Jesus as the Christ, but they mean a Christ who was not the Son of God. They say they believe in the resurrection, but they mean a spiritual resurrection, not the physical, bodily resurrection that the Bible declares occurred.
The subtlety of these teachings is that they use a paraphrased truth from the Bible and then mix it with a lie, for the very best lies are based on a fragment of truth. Just enough truth to seduce you, but filled with the lies of a false religion.
Our lesson today is on how to deal with false teachers in the church and on your doorstep. Today, as Christians we have two weapons to combat Satan and his disciples which are sufficient for our victory in spiritual warfare: the Spirit of God and the Word of God. Filled with the Spirit, we can unsheath the Word of God to answer every devilish challenge that Satan and his demons can make. All the craft and subtlety that Satan can muster is useless if the believer can began every statement with the words “Thus saith the Lord”.
If there comes among you a teacher who knowingly and willfully does not teach the truth about Jesus Christ as He is defined in the Bible, then Paul says that we are to mark them, to shun them, and to avoid them. We are to correct them under the leading of the Holy Spirit, but if that fails, then they are to be removed from the body of believers just as you would a ravening wolf that was prowling among you.
Version: 20230822