MONEY!

 EVERYDAY IN THE WORD!

THURSDAY MAY 12, 2022.

SUBJECT: MONEY!

Memory verse: "For the love of money is the root of all kind of evil: for which some have strayed from the faith in their greediness, and pierced themselves through with many sorrows." (First Timothy 6 vs 10.)

READ: Matthew 6 vs 19 - 24:

6:19: Do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust doth corrupt, and where thieves break in and steal:

6:20: but lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys and where thieves do not break in and steal:

6:21: For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.

6:22: The light of the body is the eye. If therefore your eye is good, your whole body will be full of light.

6:23: But if your eye is bad, your whole body will be full of darkness. If therefore the light that is in you  is darkness, how great is that darkness!

6:24: No man can serve two masters; for either he will hate the one, and love the other; or else he will loyal to the one, and despise the other. Ye cannot serve God and mammon.

INTIMATION:

I know that money is a sore subject that a lot of people want to avoid, but in my considered opinion, learning how God views money is basic Christianity. The importance of this subject is reflected in how much the Bible teaches about it. The Bible has more to say about money than most Bible doctrines like heaven and hell or faith and prayer. The influence of money in our lives is very real, so it isn't surprising that Jesus taught more on the subject of money than any other single topic like prayer and faith. 

In the passage we read today. Jesus used money and people's attitude towards money to reveal their hearts. Our integrity often meets its match in money matters. We are to make wise use of the financial opportunities we have geared toward realizing our eternal inheritance in Christ. If we use our money to help those in need or to help others find Christ, our earthly investment will bring eternal benefit. Heaven's riches are far more valuable than earthly wealth. When we obey God’s will, the unselfish use of possessions will follow.

It's a common scenario in our present time to see those who love money take exception to the Lord's teaching on money. We are in an age that measures people's worth by how much money they make. God doesn't operate by this world's value system, and it's more important for us to understand how God's financial system works. 

Jesus says that we can have only one master. We live in a materialistic society where many people serve money. They spend all their lives collecting and storing it, only to die and leave it behind, and would not know what happens to all that wealth thereafter.  For many, their desire for money and what it can buy far outweigh their commitment to God and spiritual matters. 

Whatever you store up, you will spend much of your time and energy thinking about. If you store up your treasures in heaven, definitely your thoughts will be heavenly bound. Don’t fall into the materialistic trap of busy pursuing after money to acquire wealth because “the love of money is the root of all kinds of evil.” Many who chase after money, to be riche at all cost, fall into temptations, traps, and many foolish and hurtful lusts, which drown men in destruction and perdition; piercing themselves through with many sorrows. 

Scripture recognizes that money is necessary for survival, but it warns against the love of money. Money is not evil. What is evil is the materialistic heart that is obsessed with obtaining it. In some people’s desire to satisfy their thirst for wealth, they had marginalized their relationships with friends, family and others. The sorrows that they produced through their striving to be rich manifested the error of the greedy motives of their hearts. If one sacrifices his or her good works in relationships because he or she has no time for others as a result of running after riches, then his or her spiritual life is void of the very foundation of the community of God. 

Money is a hard master, a deceptive and dangerous one. It is dangerous because it deceives us into thinking that wealth is the easiest way to get everything we want. It is so deceptive that it can take God's place in your life. Most people will trust in money rather than God to solve their problems. This is sinful, and those who pursue its empty promises will one day discover that they have nothing because they are spiritually bankrupt. Wealth promises power and control, but often it cannot deliver. Great fortunes can be made, and lost, overnight, and no amount of money can provide health, happiness, or eternal life.

Jesus made it clear that having the wrong treasures leads to our hearts being in the wrong place. What we treasure the most controls us, whether we admit it or not. If possessions or money become too important to us, we must re-establish control or get rid of unnecessary acquisition of riches. Jesus calls for a decision that allows us to live contentedly with whatever we have because we have chosen eternal values over temporary, earthly treasures. Heaven’s riches are far more valuable than earthly wealth.

Always aspire to a spiritual vision of money, that is, visualizing it from God’s perspective. Spiritual vision is our capacity to see clearly what God wants us to do and to see the world from his point of view. But this spiritual insight can be easily clouded. Self-serving desires, interests, and goals block that vision. Serving God is the best way to restore it. A ‘good’ eye is one that is fixed on God.

Money can become your master. How can you tell if you are a slave to money? (1) Do you think or worry about it frequently? (2) Do you give up doing what you should do or would like to do in order to make more money? (3) Do you spend a great deal of your time caring for your possessions? (4) Is it hard for you to give money away? (5) Are you in debt?

Prayer: Abba Father, You are above all things and by You all things consist. All my aspiration is to love You and adore You above all things. I will serve You the Creator. Your creation can never take first place in my life, rather they will serve me as I serve You, in Jesus' Name I have prayed. Amen.

PRAISE THE LORD!

FULL SERMON] THE REALITY OF SPIRITUAL LAWS IN LIFE - Apostle Joshua Selman 2022

 

GOD’S GREATEST RULE IS LOVE!

 EVERYDAY IN THE WORD! 

WEDNESDAY MAY 11, 2022.

SUBJECT: GOD’S GREATEST RULE IS LOVE! 

Memory verse: "And now abide faith, hope, Love, these three; but the greatest of these is love.” (First Corinthians 13 vs 13.)

READ: Mark 12 vs 28 vs 31:

12:28: Then one of the scribes came, and having heard them reasoning together, perceiving that He had answered them well, asked Him, “Which is the first commandment of all?”

12:29: Jesus answered him, “The first of all the commandments is, ‘Hear, O Israel; the Lord our God, the Lord is one.

12:30: And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind, and with all your strength.’ This is the first commandment.

12:31: And the second, like it, is this, ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ There is no other commandment greater than these.

INTIMATION:

Love is having great affection for, feeling a passionate attraction to. Biblically, It is described as the basic first cause and ultimate expression of God and man, is the Christian gospel and church ethics; a fruit of the Spirit. Love describes God; “God is love” (First John 4 vs 8 & 16). Love as used of God, expresses the deep and constant love and interest of a perfect Being towards entirely unworthy objects, producing and fostering a reverential love in them towards the Giver, and a practical love towards those who are partakers of the same, and a desire to help others to seek the Giver.

Christian love has God as its primary object, and expresses itself first of all in implicit obedience to His commandments Self-will, that is, self-pleasing, is the negation of love to God. Christian love, whether exercised toward the brethren, or toward men generally, is not an impulse from the feelings, it does not always run with the natural inclinations, nor does it spend itself only upon those for whom some affinity is discovered. Love seeks the welfare of all, and works no ill to any; love seeks opportunity to do ‘good to all men, especially toward them that are of the household of the faith.’

The intent of God’s Law is to promote love to God and others. Consequently, the Christian faith involves many rules that are meant to be governed by love. This makes love the highest or greatest rule, but it also moves Christians toward personal sacrifice, discipline, and responsibility, which are scarce resources in today’s world. When confronted with rules of your own or others’ making, ask: (1) Does the rule serve God’s purpose? (2) Does the rule reveal God’s character? (3) Does the rule help people get into God’s family, or keep them out? (4) Does the rule have biblical roots that can be supported in the context of all Scripture? Good rules pass all four tests.

Everything concerning God is summed up in love. His laws can be reduced to two simple principles: Love God and love others. When you love God completely and care for others as you care for yourself, then you have fulfilled the intent of God’s Law.—the “Ten Commandments.” According to Jesus, these two commandments summarize all God’s laws. Let them rule your thoughts, decisions, and actions. When you are uncertain about what to do, ask yourself which course of action best demonstrates love for God and love for others.

Love can be known only from the actions it prompts. God’s love is seen in the gift of His Son: “In this the love of God was manifested toward us, that God has sent His only begotten Son into the world, that we might live through Him. In this is love, not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins” (First John 4 vs 9 - 10). 

It is Obvious that this is not the love of complacency, or affection, that is, it was not drawn out by any excellency in its object: “But God commends his love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us” (Romans 5 vs 8). It was an exercise of the divine will in deliberate choice, made without assignable cause save that which lies in the nature of God Himself.

Love explains: (1) why God creates—because He loves, He creates people to love; (2) why God cares—because He loves them, He cares for sinful people; (3) why we are free to choose—God wants a loving response from us; (4) why Christ died—His love for us caused Him to offer a solution to the problem of sin; and (5) why we receive eternal life—God’s love expresses itself to us forever.

Real love is an action, not a feeling. It produces selfless, sacrificial giving. The greatest act of love is giving oneself for others. The Scripture says, “By this we know love, because He laid down His life for us. And we also ought to lay down our lives for the brethren” (First John 3 vs 16). 

How can we “lay down our lives?” By serving others with no thought of receiving anything in return. Sometimes it is easier to say we’ll die for others than to truly live for them—this involves putting others’ desires first. Jesus taught this same principle of love, He said, “Greater love has no one than this, than to lay down one’s life for his friends.” (John 15 vs 13.) 

We are to love each other as Jesus loved us, and He loved us enough to give His life of inestimable value for ours that are completely worthless because of sin. We may not have to die for someone, but there are other ways to practice sacrificial love: listening, helping, encouraging, giving, caring. Evaluate your lifestyle, and measure your obedience to the highest rule! You can start right away: Think of someone in particular who needs this kind of love today. Give all the love you can, and then try to give a little more. Then make it a regular practice.

Prayer: Abba Father, You are love, and has poured out Your love in our hearts by the Holy Spirit who was given to us. Engrace, and empower me to love as You do, in Jesus’ Name I have prayed. Amen.

PRAISE THE LORD!

Go on to the Meal

Oh, taste and see that the Lord is good! (Psalm 34:8) To you who say you have never tasted the glory of God, I say, you have tasted many of its appetizers. Have you ever looked up at the sky? Have you ever been hugged? Have you ever sat in front of a warm fire? Have you ever walked in the woods, sat by a lake, lain in a summer hammock? Have you ever drunk your favorite drink on a hot day or eaten anything good? Every desire is either a devout or a distorted enticement to the glory of heaven. You say you haven’t tasted God’s glory. I say, you have tasted the appetizers. Go on to the meal. Go on to God himself. You have seen the shadows; look at the substance. You have walked in the warm rays of the day; turn and look at the sun itself — yes, through the protective and sharpening lens of the gospel. You have heard echoes of God’s glory everywhere; tune your heart to the original music. The best place to get your heart tuned is at the cross of Jesus Christ. “We have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth” (John 1:14). If you want the most concentrated display of the glory of God, look at Jesus in the Gospels, and look especially at the cross. This will focus your eyes and tune your heart and waken your taste buds so that you will see and hear and taste the glory of the true God everywhere. That is what you were made for. I plead with you: don’t throw your life away on shadows. God made you to see and savor his glory. Pursue that with all your heart and above all else. You have tasted the appetizers. Now go on to the full banquet.

A People for His Name

 “Simeon has related how God first visited the Gentiles, to take from them a people for his name.” (Acts 15:14)

It is scarcely possible to overemphasize the centrality of the name of God, that is, the fame of God, in motivating the mission of the church.

When Peter had his world turned upside down by the vision of unclean animals in Acts 10, and by the lesson from God that he should evangelize Gentiles as well as Jews, he came back to Jerusalem and told the apostles that it was all owing to God’s zeal for his name. We know this because James summed up Peter’s speech like this: “Brothers, listen to me. Simeon has related how God first visited the Gentiles, to take from them a people for his name” (Acts 15:13–14).

It’s not surprising that Peter would say that God’s purpose was to gather a people for his name; because the Lord Jesus had stung Peter some years earlier with an unforgettable lesson.

You recall that, after a rich young man turned away from Jesus and refused to follow him, Peter said to Jesus, “See, we have left everything and followed you [unlike this rich fellow]. What then will we have?” (Matthew 19:27). Jesus responded with a mild rebuke, which in effect said that there is no ultimate sacrifice when you live for the name of the Son of Man. He said, “Everyone who has left houses or brothers or sisters or father or mother or children or lands, for my name’s sake, will receive a hundredfold and will inherit eternal life” (Matthew 19:29).

The truth is plain: God is pursuing with omnipotent delight a worldwide purpose of gathering a people for his name from every tribe and language and nation (Revelation 5:9; 7:9). He has an inexhaustible enthusiasm for the fame of his name among the nations.

Therefore, when we bring our affections in line with his, and, for the sake of his name, renounce the quest for our own worldly fame and comforts, and join his global purpose, God’s omnipotent commitment to his name flies like a banner before us, and we cannot lose, even if we must walk through many tribulations (Acts 14:22; Romans 8:35–39).

TRUST IN GOD!

 EVERYDAY IN THE WORD!

TUESDAY MAY, 10, 2022.

SUBJECT : TRUST IN GOD!

Memory verse: "The Lord is my rock and my fortress and my deliverer; my God, my strength, in whom I trust; my shield and the horn of my salvation, my stronghold.” (Psalm 18 vs 2.)

READ: Habakkuk 3 vs 17 - 19:

3:17: Though the fig tree may not blossom, nor fruit be on the vines; though the labour of the olive may fail, and the fields shall yield no food; though the flock may be cut off from the fold, and there shall be no herd in the stalls—

3:18: Yet I will rejoice in the LORD, I will joy in the God of my salvation.

3:19: The LORD God is my strength, He will make my feet like deer's feet, and He will make me to walk on my high hills. 

INTIMATION:

“Trust” is firm belief in the reliability, truth, ability, or strength of someone or something. Trust in God is a belief in God’s truth, ability, and strength. To put it simply, trusting in God means believing what He says about Himself, about the world, and about you is true and unchangeable. Trusting is a choice, not a feeling. Having faith is having trust. You have to trust with your entire being that God has your back that He will help you and take care of you. He knows what is best, but to truly embrace what He has planned for you, you have to fully trust. Our trust is not foolish, for our God is both faithful and good.

Trust in God means that; No matter what happens, you will turn to Him instead of turning away from Him. Even if life hurts real bad and nothing you asked God for worked out the way you were hoping it would, in spite of your predicaments, trusting God means you continue to turn to Him, and away from the naysayers. You keep praying, even when those prayers seem to have absolutely no effect. You keep saying, like Job: “The Lord gives, and the Lord takes away. Blessed be the name of the Lord.”

Trusting God when nothing seems to happen is difficult. But it is harder still to live with the consequences of taking matters into our own hands. Resist the temptation to think God has forgotten you. Have patience and courage to wait for God to act. Your faith in God’s ability shall give you strength. When nothing makes sense, and when troubles seem more than you can bear, remember that God gives strength. Take your eyes off your difficulties and look to God.

God doesn’t need much from us to accomplish His plan for our lives. Focusing on our human predicament may paralyze us because the situation may appear humanly impossible. But concentrating on God and His power will help us see the way out. Right now you may feel unable to see through your troubles. Focus instead on God, and trust Him for the way out. That is all He needs to begin His work in you.

We must experience life as Job did—one day at a time and without complete answers to all life’s questions. Don’t give in to temptations to say that God doesn’t really car. Rather trust God no matter what. Failing to trust God often brings even greater problems than those we originally faced. When we run from God, we inevitably run into problems. Even in our sorrow and calamity, God can bring great blessings. Instead of asking, “How can God allow this to happen to me?” trust Him. He will be with you in the hard times.

The Scripture says, “Those who trust in the Lord are like Mount Zion, which cannot be moved, but abides forever. As the mountains surround Jerusalem, so the Lord surrounds His people from this time forth and forever.” (Psalm 125 vs 1 - 2.) The secret to stability is to trust in God, because He never changes. He cannot be shaken by the changes in our world, and He endures forever. The fads and ideas of our world, and our world itself will not.

“And those who know Your name will put their trust in You; for You, Lord, have not forsaken those who seek You.” (Psalm 9 vs 10.) God will never abandon those who seek Him. God’s promise does not mean that if we trust in Him we will escape loss or suffering; it means that God Himself will never leave us no matter what we face. The Bible tells us repeatedly that God loves us and always keeps His promises.

Prayer: Abba Father, in You I live and move and have my being! My absolute trust is in You. What You cannot do for me let it remain undone, and what You cannot give me may I never have it. For I know by You all things consist. My desire is never to a lead a life outside of You, in Jesus' Name I have prayed, Amen.

PRAISE THE LORD!

What It Means to Love God

 O God, you are my God; earnestly I seek you; my soul thirsts for you; my flesh faints for you, as in a dry and weary land where there is no water. So I have looked upon you in the sanctuary, beholding your power and glory. (Psalm 63:1–2)

Only God will satisfy a heart like David’s. And David was a man after God’s own heart. That’s the way we were created to be.

This is the essence of what it means to love God: to be satisfied in him. In him — not just his gifts, but God himself, as the glorious person that he is!

Loving God will include obeying all his commands; it will include believing all his word; it will include thanking him for all his gifts. But all that is overflow. The essence of loving God is admiring and enjoying all he is. And it is this enjoyment of God that makes all of our other responses truly glorifying to him.

We all know this intuitively as well as from Scripture. Do we feel most honored by the love of those who serve us from the constraints of duty, or from the delights of fellowship?

My wife is most honored when I say, “It makes me happy to spend time with you.” My happiness is the echo of her excellence. And so it is with God. He is most glorified in us when we are most satisfied in him.

None of us has arrived at perfect satisfaction in God. I grieve often over the murmuring of my heart when I lose some earthly comfort or convenience. But I have tasted that the Lord is good. By God’s grace I now know the fountain of everlasting joy.

And so I love to spend my days luring people into joy until they say with me, “One thing have I asked of the Lord, that will I seek after: that I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life, to gaze upon the beauty of the Lord and to inquire in his temple” (Psalm 27:4).