Thoughts on Christ and His Word

Everywhere in scripture God is moving us to do his will and motivates us by pointing to his love, power, and presence.  When the Israelites saw the power of God as they crossed the red sea and then saw the Egyptian army drown they proclaimed:   In your unfailing love you will lead the people you have redeemed. In your strength you will guide them to your holy dwelling. Exodus 15:13 Promising his love, power and presence to Joshua he commanded Joshua: Have I not commanded you? Be strong and courageous. Do not be terrified; do not be discouraged, for the Lord your God will be with you wherever you go. Joshua 1:9 God always motivates His people to act while promising His Love, Presence and Power. 

 God has a time for everything.  Although He lives outside of time, in this world He created, He has a time for everything according to His purposes. In speaking about the destruction of Babylon God said: "That country has many rivers and rich treasures, but i ts time is up , and its thread of life is cut." Jeremiah 51:13 GNTD God has a time-frame for our life that we will not surpass.  We get to choose to cooperate with God and his will for our life or not.  But we don't get to violate the time he decreed for us.  Let us use our time wisely fulfilling God's purpose for us so that we may be rewarded richly in Heaven where our time will never run out.

Henry Blackaby shares great insight into the reason God moved the Israelites into the Promise Land the way He did: "God’s primary concern was not giving His people land; it was developing a relationship. On Mount Sinai, God said, “You have seen what I did to the Egyptians, and how I bore you on eagles’ wings and brought you to Myself” (Ex. 19:4). The promised land was simply the means God used to establish a unique relationship of trust and obedience with His people". Many times God leads us to great things but only by taking us through a route of trials and tribulations.  The faith and character we learn through these is what God uses to make us more like Christ.

Why would the wrath of God be upon unbelievers especially in sending them to hell?   When we put our faith in Christ we immediately become identified with him. The blood of Christ is applied to us and cleanses us from all sin. We immediately become children of God just as Jesus is the Son of God. We get baptised into the body of Christ and therefore we are of Christ. We are identified with Christ and our identity is in Christ.  When a person rejects Christ they are identified with Adam in his sin who rejected God when it came to the forbidden fruit. But they also identify with all those who called for Jesus' crucifixion as he was being crucified. They are identified with the Roman soldiers who physically crucified Christ. But they are also identify with the religious Jews who called demanded the crucifixion of Christ. And so just as those who called for and crucified Christ will receive the wrath of God, so too all who have rejected Christ will receive the wrath of God at...

The key to a healthy spiritual and emotional life is healthy, wholesome thinking. Peter wrote: "Dear friends, this is now my second letter to you. I have written both of them as reminders to stimulate you to wholesome thinking."  2 Peter 3:1 So we are encouraged to engage in "wholesome thinking".  But what is the basis of wholesome thinking?  Peter tells us: "I want you to recall the words spoken in the past by the holy prophets and the command given by our Lord and Savior through your apostles." 2 Peter 3:2 So the foundation of healthy and wholesome thinking is meditating on the words of the O.T. prophets, the words of Jesus,  and the words of the apostles. In other words think Biblically.  When the foundation of our thoughts and belief systems are rooted in the Word of God, we will think more clearly and feel a whole lot better about the future. God's thoughts are the basis for Truth and Hope. 

"Today, if you hear his voice, do not harden your heart." Hebrews 3:8  This verse from psalms 95 is repeated 3 times in Hebrews, twice in chapter 3 and once in chapter 4. Throughout chapter 3 and 4 God puts the responsibility of faith and and a soft receptive heart on man.  Obviously the Holy Spirit convicts of sin and the Father draws our hearts to him. But at the end of the day man must choose to have a soft heart and believe the gospel.  

The Spirit clearly says that in later times some will abandon the faith and follow deceiving spirits and things taught by demons. 1 Timothy 4:1  20 years ago someone would jokingly say "I feel like a woman trapped in a man's body" and everyone would laugh.  Now they aren't kidding.  Not only do they feel like a woman, they can feel like whatever they want and expect everyone else to accept their "feelings" or "gender identity". This ideology has its roots in radical feminism and its end-goal is to eradicate the traditional concepts of male and female.  To make genitals irrelevant since one can decide one's own identity apart from biology.  Therefore, at its core it is a person recreating or re-imagining themselves - thus they put themselves in the position of God. That is why gender ideology is evil.  It replaces God with self, it replaces facts (male and female) with fiction, and allows people to live in a make-believe world.  And on top of th...