KNOWING HIM GIVES YOU ETERNAL PERSPECTIVE!

 EVERYDAY IN THE WORD!

THURSDAY JUNE 10, 2021.

SUBJECT : KNOWING HIM GIVES YOU ETERNAL PERSPECTIVE!

Memory verse: "And this is eternal life, that they may know You, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom You have sent.” (John 17 vs 3.)

READ: First John 5 vs 20: 

5:20: And we know that the Son of God has come and has given us an understanding, that we may know Him who is true; and we are in Him who is true, in His Son Jesus Christ. This is the true God and eternal life.

INTIMATION:

Knowing Him gives you eternal perspective, especially when you wholeheartedly understand the fact that you will spend eternity with Him! This simple yet deep revelation allows you to live every aspect of your life with an eternal mindset, giving way to your purpose. In our memory verse, Jesus tells us clearly here—by knowing God the Father Himself through His Son, Jesus Christ, you will get eternal life. It requires entering into a personal relationship with God in Jesus Christ. When we admit our sin and turn away from it, Christ’s love lives in us by the Holy Spirit.

How incredible it is to know that God weaves His purpose and tasks for us into the reality of eternity! These factors should motivate us to partner with Him in changing nations far more than anything else. No amount of money or fame can ever compare with the promise of eternity and the calling He has prepared for us to advance His eternal Kingdom.

In reality, this life is just the introduction to eternity. How we live this brief span determines our eternal state. What we accumulate on earth has no value in gaining eternal life. Even the highest social or civic honors cannot earn us entrance into heaven. When we don’t know Christ, we make decisions and choices as if there were no afterlife. Everyone should evaluate his or her life from eternal perspectives because not even the gain of the whole world can compare or equal the value placed on your soul and eternity with God.

Some people are repulsed by the idea of eternal life because their lives are miserable. But eternal life is not an extension of a person’s miserable, mortal life: eternal life is God’s life embodied in Christ given to all believers now as a guarantee that they will live forever. In eternal life there is no death, sickness, enemy, evil, or sin. Receive the new life in Christ by faith and begin to evaluate all that happens in life from eternal perspective. 

Always maintain an eternal perspective! Allow this to be an anchor for how you live your life and minister to others. Ask the Holy Spirit to help you keep the reality of eternity in your heart. Life is short no matter how many years we live. Don’t be deceived into thinking that you have lots of remaining time to live for Christ, to enjoy your loved ones, or to do what you know you should. Live for God today and everyday! Then, no matter when your life ends, you will have fulfilled God’s plan for you.

Jesus said, “He who finds his life will lose it, and he who loses his life for My sake will find it” (Matthew 10 vs 39). This verse is a positive and negative statement of the same truth: Clinging to this life may cause us to forfeit the best from Christ in this world and in the next. The more we love this life’s rewards (leisure, power, popularity, financial security), the more we will discover how empty they really are—“both the earth and the works that are in it will be burned up” (Second Peter 3 vs 10). Realizing that the earth and its works will be sometime useless, we should put our confidence in what is lasting and eternal and not be bound to earth and its treasures and pursuits. 

The best way to enjoy life, therefore, is to loosen our greedy grasp on earthly rewards so that we can be free to follow Christ; spending more time striving to develop Christ-like character rather than spending time piling up possessions. In doing so, we will inherit eternal life and begin at once to experience the benefits of following Him.

Prayer: Abba Father, thank You, most precious Father, for the privilege of sonship, and spiritual wisdom and revelation of the knowledge of You, the hope of Your calling, and the riches of the glory of Your inheritance in the believers.Give me the grace, O Lord, to live for You, that I may obtain the crown of glory—eternal life with You, in Jesus’ Name I have prayed, Amen.

PRAISE THE LORD!

GOD IS THE FOUNT OF THE RESOURCES OF THE BELIEVER!

 EVERYDAY IN THE WORD!

WEDNESDAY JUNE 9, 2021.

SUBJECT : GOD IS THE FOUNT OF THE RESOURCES OF THE BELIEVER!

Memory verse: "But of Him you are in Christ Jesus, who became for us wisdom from God—and righteousness and sanctification and redemption." (First Corinthians 1 vs 30.)

READ: Galatians 2 vs 20; Colossians 2 vs 9 - 10:

Galatians 2:20: I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for me.

Colossians 2:9: For in Him dwells all the fullness of the Godhead bodily; 

2:10: and you are complete in Him, who is the head of all principality and power. 

INTIMATION:

God is the fount of our resources as believers because He is the strength of our life. He is the source of, and the reason for our personal and living relationship with Christ. Our union and identification with Christ results in our having God's wisdom and knowledge (Colossians 2 vs 3), possessing right standing with God (righteousness, Second Corinthians 5 vs 21), being sanctified (First Thessalonians 3 vs 3 -7), and having the penalty of our sins paid by Jesus (redemption, Mark 10 vs 45).

God is our ability. He is the Author and Finisher of our faith. We are partakers of His divine nature. His wisdom is given to us in Christ without measure, so we can safely say He is our ability. Jesus told His disciples, to wait in the city of Jerusalem until they are endued with power from on high (Luke 24 vs 49). The word "power" comes from the Greek word "dunamis." Some translations call it "ability." They were to tarry in Jerusalem until they received the ability of God.

In the new birth, we have become one with Christ, and His experiences are ours. Christian life began when, in unity with Christ, we died to our old life (See Romans 6 vs 5 - 11). And yet the focus of Christianity is not on dying but on living. Because we have been crucified with Christ, we have also been raised with Him (Romans 6 vs 5). Legally, we have been reconciled with God (Second Corinthians 5 vs 19) and are free to grow in Christ’s likeness (Romans 8 vs 29). And in our daily life, we have Christ’s resurrection power as we continue to fight sin (Ephesians 1 vs 19 - 20). We are no longer alone, for Christ lives in us—He is our power for living and our hope for the future (Colossians 1 vs 27).

Christ has come into the believer in His fullness; with all His completeness. The limitless One has come into the believer to take over. He gave His ability, His completeness. Now, we can understand John 1 vs 16 that says, "Of His fullness we have all received, and grace upon grace." 

All that the believer requires is to be filled with the knowledge of God’s will in all wisdom and spiritual understanding. When we have spiritual wisdom and understanding, we will walk worthily of the Lord, fully pleasing Him, bearing fruit unto every good work and continually increasing in this exact, and perfect knowledge of God, strengthened with all might, according to His glorious power. (See Colossians 1 vs 9 - 13).

This new light has given me a new responsibility in the prayer life. I can understand now why He said, "Come boldly unto the Throne of Grace" into the Throne Room (Hebrews 4 vs 16), where He and the Father are seated together. I am not to come as a servant or a slave, but I am to come as a lover, a son. 

Now, prayer of course, is not going to be what it was before I knew who I am in Christ, and what my privileges are. Prayer is coming boldly in the Throne Room, in fellowship with our Father and the Son—our first born among many brethren, and putting Him into remembrance of His promises—His Word, contending together with Him, and stating my case clearly to obtain His promises (Isaiah 43 vs 26).

Now, the believer should boldly go to sit with Him in the Council room, call His attention to His or her needs, and also present the needs of the brethren who are sitting in the darkness of sense knowledge. While such brethren pray for faith and seek for power, as a believer you ought to know that you are a child, beloved; that you have your place in the Father's presence.

Prayer: Abba Father, I will ever remain grateful for the privilege of my sonship with You, I pray that You may endue me with spirit of wisdom and revelation of the knowledge of You, and my eyes of understanding being continually enlightened that I may know the hope of a Your calling, and the riches of the glory of Your inheritance in me, in Jesus’ Name I have prayed, Amen.

PRAISE THE LORD!

Prayer Is for Sinners

 

“Lord, teach us to pray.” (Luke 11:1)

God answers the prayers of sinners, not perfect people. And you can become perfectly paralyzed in your praying if you do not focus on the cross and realize this.

I could show it from numerous Old Testament texts where God hears the cry of his sinful people, whose very sins had gotten them into the trouble from which they are crying for deliverance (for example, Psalm 38:4, 15; 40:12–13; 107:11–13). But let me show it from Luke 11 — in two ways:

In this version of the Lord’s Prayer (Luke 11:2–4), Jesus says, “When you pray, say . . . ” and then in verse 4 he includes this petition, “and forgive us our sins.” So, if you connect the beginning of the prayer with the middle, what he says is, “Whenever you pray, say . . . forgive us our sins.”

I take this to mean that this should be as much a part of all our praying as, “Hallowed be your name.” Which means that Jesus assumes that we need to seek forgiveness virtually every time we pray.

In other words, we are always sinners. Nothing we do is perfect. As Martin Luther said, on his deathbed, “We are beggars. This is true.” Even if we have achieved some measure of obedience before we pray, we always come to the Lord as sinners — all of us. And God does not turn away the prayers of sinners when they pray like this.

The second place we can see this is in Luke 11:13: “If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will the heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him!”

Jesus calls his disciples “evil.” Pretty strong language. And he did not mean that they were out of fellowship with him. He did not mean that their prayers could not be answered.

He meant that as long as this fallen age lasts, even his own disciples will have an evil bent that pollutes everything they do, but doesn’t keep them from doing much good as they rely on his grace and power.

We are simultaneously evil and redeemed. We are gradually overcoming our evil by the power of the Holy Spirit. But our native corruption is not obliterated by conversion.

We are sinners and we are beggars. And if we recognize this sin, renounce it, fight it, and cling to the cross of Christ as our hope, then God will hear us and answer our prayers.

Glorify God in Your Body

 

You were bought with a price. So glorify God in your body. (1 Corinthians 6:20)

“Worship” is the term we use to cover all the acts of the heart and mind and body that intentionally express the infinite worth of God. This is what we were created for. It might be singing in church. It might be sweeping the kitchen floor.

Don’t just think about worship services when you think about worship. That is a huge limitation which is not in the Bible. All of life is supposed to be worship.

Take breakfast, for example, or midmorning snacks. First Corinthians 10:31 says, “Whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God.” Now eating and drinking are about as basic as you can get. What could be more real or more ordinarily human than eating and drinking? And Paul says, in effect, let all your eating and drinking be worship.

Or take sex. Paul says the alternative to fornication is worship.

Flee from sexual immorality. Every other sin a person commits is outside the body, but the sexually immoral person sins against his own body. Or do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, whom you have from God? You are not your own, for you were bought with a price. So glorify God in your body. (1 Corinthians 6:18–20)

That is, worship with your body by the way you handle your sexuality.

Or take death for a final example. We will experience death in our bodies. In fact, it will be the last act of the body on this earth. The body bids farewell. How shall we worship in that last act of the body? We see the answer in Philippians 1:20–21. Paul says that his hope is that Christ would be magnified — worshiped, shown to be worthy — in his body by death. Then he adds, “For to me . . . to die is gain.” We express the infinite worth of Christ in dying by counting death as gain.

You have a body. But it is not yours. “You were bought with a price. So glorify God in your body.”

You are always in a temple. Always worship.

FELLOWSHIP WITH THE GODHEAD!

 EVERYDAY IN THE WORD!

TUESDAY JUNE 8, 2021.

SUBJECT : FELLOWSHIP WITH THE GODHEAD!

Memory verse: "Then Jesus spoke to them again, saying, “I am the light of the world. He who follows me shall not walk in darkness, but have the light of life.” (John 8 vs 12.)

READ: First John 1 vs 3 - 7: 

1:3: That which we have seen and heard we declared to you, that you also may have fellowship with us; and truly our fellowship is with the Father and with His Son Jesus Christ. 

1:4: And these things we write to you that your joy may be full.

1:5: This is the message which we have heard from Him and declared to you, that God is light and in Him is no darkness at all.

1:6: If we say that we have fellowship with Him, and walk in darkness we lie and do not practice the truth.

1:7: But if we walk in the light as He is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus Christ His Son cleanses us from all sin.

INTIMATION:

The highest honor God has ever conferred upon us is to be joint-fellowshippers with Himself, with His Son, and with the Holy Spirit in carrying out His dream for redemption of the human race. Fellowship is the very mother of faith, the parent of joy, the source of victory; and He has called us individually into fellowship with His Son.

Jesus is the light of the world. He is the Creator of life, and His life brings light to humankind. In His light, we see ourselves as we really are (sinners in need of a Savior). If you have fellowship with Him—the true Light—you will have the light that helps you ovoid walking blindly and falling into sin. If you are walking in the light as He is in the light, He lights the path ahead of you so you can see how to live. 

Fellowship with the Godhead is in prayer, and meditation in His Word; in this, prayer becomes one of the sweetest privileges, and one of the greatest assets that we are heirs to in Christ. Consequently, your joy is guaranteed to be full. In fellowship with Him you are not alone. Romans 8 vs 26 then can be a reality;  "Likewise the Spirit also helps in our weaknesses. For we do not know what we should pray for as we ought, but the Spirit Himself makes intercession for us with groanings which cannot be uttered."

As a believer, you are not left to your own resources to cope with problems. Even when you don't know the right words to pray, the Holy Spirit prays with and for you, and God answers. If the Holy Sprint is voicing the desires of the Father through your lips, those desires will be met and granted. With God helping you to pray, you don't need to be afraid to come before Him.

Light represents what is good, pure, true, holy, and reliable. Darkness represents what is sinful, and evil. The statement “God is light” means that God is perfectly holy and true and that He alone can guide us out of the darkness of sin. Light is also related to truth, in that light exposes whatever exists, whether it is good or bad. In the dark, good and evil look alike; in the light, they can be clearly distinguished.

Just as darkness cannot exist in the presence of light, sin cannot exist in the presence of a holy God. Our fellowship with the Godhead is the very heart reason for redemption.  Fellowship means sharing, equally bearing the burden, sharing in the victories. In First Corinthians 1 vs 9 the Bible says, "God is faithful, by whom you were called into the fellowship of His Son, Jesus Christ our Lord." He has called us to share with His Son.  

Again a believer in fellowship with the Godhead, it is necessary for us to know the authority of the name of Jesus; not as a part of a creed or a doctrine, but to know it as an actual reality.  The Father has given us the power of attorney to use the name of Jesus, and that name has all authority in heaven and on earth. (Philippians 2 vs 9 - 10). That makes us absolute masters of Satanic forces:

"In my name they shall cast out demons; they shall speak with new tongues; they shall take up serpents; and if they drink any deadly thing, it shall not hurt them; they shall lay hands on the sick and they shall recover (Mark 16 vs 17 - 18); “If you ask anything in My name, I will do it (John 14 vs 14); “Whatever you shall ask of the Father in My name He will give it you." (John 15 vs 16; 16 vs 23).

This is limitless. It is the limitlessness of the prayer life and it belongs to every child of God. Therefore, fellowship with the Godhead—the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit—is the key of life that helps us walk in the light of the world. You will never stumble but have the best of life, and consequently, receive the crown of glory—eternal life with Him.

Prayer: Abba Father, You have called me into fellowship with You. In You there is no darkness but the light of life. Engrace me never to fall out of fellowship with You, fully pleasing You, being fruitful in every good work, and increasing in the knowledge of You, in Jesus’ Name I have prayed, Amen.

PRAISE THE LORD!

We Live by Faith

 

The life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me. (Galatians 2:20)

Faith is a perfect fit with God’s future grace. It corresponds to the freedom and all-sufficiency of grace. And it calls attention to the glorious trustworthiness of God.

One of the important implications of this conclusion is that the faith that justifies and the faith that sanctifies are not two different kinds of faith. “Sanctify” simply means to make holy or to transform into Christlikeness. It is all by grace.

Therefore, it must also be through faith. For faith is the act of the soul that connects with grace, and receives it, and channels it as the power of obedience, and guards grace from being nullified through human boasting.

Paul makes this connection between faith and sanctification explicit in Galatians 2:20 (“I live by faith”). Sanctification is by the Spirit and by faith. Which is another way of saying that it is by grace and by faith. The Spirit is “the Spirit of grace” (Hebrews 10:29). God’s way of making us holy is by the Spirit; but the Spirit works through faith in the gospel.

The simple reason why the faith that justifies is also the faith that sanctifies is that both justification and sanctification are the work of sovereign grace. And it’s faith that corresponds to grace. Justification and sanctification are not the same kind of work (justification is the imputation of righteousness; sanctification is the impartation of righteousness), but they are both works of grace. Sanctification and justification are “grace upon grace” (John 1:16).

The human corollary of God’s free grace is faith. If both justification and sanctification are works of grace, it is natural that they would both be by faith.

SOURCES OF THE HIGHEST TYPE OF FAITH!

 EVERYDAY IN THE WORD!

MONDAY JUNE 7, 2021.

SUBJECT : SOURCES OF THE HIGHEST TYPE OF FAITH!

Memory verse: "When Jesus heard it, He marveled and said to those who followed, “Assuredly, I say to you, I have not found such great faith, not even in Israel!” (Matthew 8 vs 10.)

READ: Matthew 21 vs 18 - 22:

21:18: Now in the morning as He returned to the city, He was hungry.

21:19: And seeing a fig tree by the road, He came to it and found nothing on it but leaves, and said to it, “Let no fruit grow on you again.” Immediately the fig tree withered away.

21:20: And when the disciples saw it, they marveled, saying, “How did the fig tree wither away so soon?” 

21:21: So Jesus answered and said to them, “Assuredly, I say to you, if you have faith and do not doubt, you will not only do what was done to the fig tree, but also if you say to this mountain, ‘Be removed and be cast into the sea,’ it will be done.

21:22: And whatever things you ask in prayer, believing, you will receive.”

INTIMATION:

The first thing that is necessary is to know the integrity of the Word; to know that this Word is actually what it declares itself to be—a revelation from God to us. We should know that it is God speaking to us; that the Bible is not only a Book of the past and future, but it is a Book of now; that it a God-breathed, a God-indwelt, a God-inspired message.

Secondly, it is necessary for us to know the actual reality of our redemption in Christ; not as a doctrine, not as a philosophy, but as an actual redemption out of the authority of Satan, and that we have been, by the New Birth, translated into the kingdom of the Son of His love; or in other words, into the very Family of God. Satan's dominion over us as a New Creation is ended. Jesus is the Lord and head of this new body. 

Thirdly, it is necessary for us to know the reality of the new creation; to know the legal side of it, that in the mind of justice we were created in Christ Jesus when He was recreated after He had been made sin as our substitute. We should know that vitally, the moment we accepted Jesus Christ as our Savior and confessed Him as our Lord,  We are the very sons and daughters of God Almighty.

fourthly, is that we should know the reality of our righteousness in Christ. There is no theory about this. We know that Romans 3 vs 26 is a reality; "To demonstrate at the present time His righteousness, that He might be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus." But the great revelation is in Second Corinthians 5 vs 21,; "Him who knew no sin God made to be sin; that we might become the righteousness of God in Him." 

Not only is Jesus our righteousness, and the Father our righteousness, but we have become "the righteousness of God in Him." This means our standing before the throne is a standing sponsored by God Himself and by His Son; by His own works wrought in us, and by the Holy Spirit, through the Word.

The fifth fact necessary for us to know is the reality of indwelling. Of all the mighty truths connected with redemption, this is the climax: that God Himself, after He has recreated us, made us His own, and is actually making our bodies His home. No longer does He dwell in earth-made holy of holies. Our bodies have become His temples. 

The apostle Paul made this clear in First Corinthians 6 vs 19 - 20 saying, "Or do you not know that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God, and you are not your own? For you were bought at a price; therefore glorify God in your body and in your spirit, which are God's."

When you becomes God-inside minded, when you take for granted that "greater is He that is in you than he that is in the world" (First John 4 vs 4), you go out and face life's problems with the sense of a conqueror. It is a rare practice amongst believers to say in every crisis of their life, "I am a conqueror; I am more than a victor, because the Creator dwells in me. He can put me over. He can make me a success. I can't fail." What effect will this knowledge, sincerely put into practice daily, have upon our prayer life? It will be awesome. 

The sixth fact is that it is necessary for us to know the reality of our fellowship with the Jesus and by extension, the Father. This is the very heart reason for redemption. In First Corinthians 1 vs 9 the Bible says, "God is faithful, by whom you were called into the fellowship of His Son, Jesus Christ our Lord." Fellowship means sharing, equally bearing the burden, sharing in the victories; and He has called us to share with His Son.

Prayer: Abba Father, my faith is exceedingly built in You; in You I live and move and have my being. O Lord, give me the spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of You, and open my eyes of understanding to know the hope of Your calling, and the riches of the glory of Your inheritance in me, in Jesus’ Name I have prayed, Amen.

PRAISE THE LORD!