Three Reminders For Every Church Member.

Hebrews 10:23 - 25 “Let us hold fast the profession of our faith without wavering; (for he is faithful that promised; (24) And let us consider one another to provoke unto love and to good works: (25) Not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as the manner of some is; but exhorting one another: and so much the more, as ye see the day approaching.”

Today I want to remind us all that as Believers in Jesus Christ there are things we need to keep reminding ourselves of. If we are going to “walk in the Spirit” as God said, then we need to walk according to the scriptures.

First, the Lord tells us “Let us hold fast the profession of our faith without wavering…” holding fast means – to be unmovable – our faith is a gift from God, whether it is the faith to be saved or the faith to believe and sustain the scriptures. It is easy for Christians to fall away from scriptural truth. Your spiritual stability depends on your “scriptural roots” the more faithful you are to the church and study of the word, the deeper your “spiritual roots” are. “They on the rock are they, which, when they hear, receive the word with joy; and these have no root, which for a while believe, and in time of temptation fall away.” Luke 8:13 It is so sad to see “weak believers” because they are so gullible for Satan and his teachers of error. The writer to the Hebrews went on to explain this statement “for he is faithful that promised;” God is faithful to us, and we must be faithful to God. Faithful in church attendance, study, love.

Secondly, the Lord said, “provoking one another to unto love and to good works”. Do you pray for your fellow church members to succeed in their spiritual walk, do you encourage them, we certainly ought too. The word “provoking” means -  the act of incitement – As church members we are “a body”, that is one single body and we ought to function like one. A body is not divided, nor does it go different ways. It works together with every part as needful as the other. We do not depreciate any part of our body, there is not one part of your body you do not love and want to keep. The church membership is the same as your body. Let us work to encourage one another to be at church, to study and learn, that the entire church will walk and grow together without weak membership. This is to love, God said to provoke each other unto love and to good works. If we learn the importance of our membership in the church, then we will learn how much we are needed.

And last, “Not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together” If we learn the first two then this one is a little easier to do. God put you in the local church because He wanted you to be a part of that body. No member is of no value, each and every member is needed. The commandment of God is, that we do not forsake our church attendance. There truly is nothing more important than your church membership. This is because, just like your salvation, your church membership is just as much by grace. God could have given your spot in the church to anyone in the world, but He chose it for you. Forsaking the assembling of ourselves together is forsaking the church, and the reason is, you are part of the church. How would you like it if you went to work and your arm stayed at home? We also need money to operate the church, and your membership includes your financial support of the church. Not putting money into church is also forsaking the church.

Folks, churches are small, and we need every single member. We need your attendance, money, support, opinions, love, and kindness. You are, as a member the strength of our church, our church is only as strong as our membership. Churches are hurting for members, strength, money, strong worship and love, because members are not all doing their part as a member. Do not depend on other to do what God has designated for you to do, if we all do our part we will have a very strong and good loving church until Jesus comes.           

What A Wonderful Father We Have.

Matthew 6:32 “…for your heavenly Father knoweth that ye have need of all these things.”

Today is “father’s day” and while we are celebrating and giving our earthly fathers a big thumbs-up let us not forget our other Father which is our Heavenly Father. Our Heavenly Father is greater than our earthly father. If God has saved your soul, then that means He chose you before the world began and sent His Beloved Son Jesus Christ to die for you. You are His child by adoption, but His child nonetheless. While your earthly father has most likely done so much for you, our Heavenly Father knows our every need and supplies those needs as He chooses best for us. This should straighten every child of God and encourage us to continually trust and look to Him for our every need. Your earthly father has so many limits, and while he wants to help you so much in life, he cannot. Therefore, we look to and depend on our Heavenly Father every moment of every day. The very fact that He knows our every need should keep our faith strong in Him. Whatever the need is, your Heavenly Father is there with you, no matter where life leads you, He is with you, and He had promised never to leave you and to never forsake you. “Let your conversation be without covetousness; and be content with such things as ye have: for he hath said, I will never leave thee, nor forsake thee.” Hebrews 13:5 The writer told us to be “content” because faith in your Heavenly Father is trusting Him, that what He has given to you is what He willed for you. See, life on this earth is temporal, it is also full of troubles and pain. Therefore, God has a greater place for us, where He will be our only Father throughout eternity. Just think for a moment, God is your Father if you are saved. He knows your every need and supplies them as He see fit to do so. Jesus told us this about our Father and He knows Him better than anyone. “Be not ye therefore like unto them: for your Father knoweth what things ye have need of, before ye ask him.” Matthew 6:8 Before you ever ask, God already knows your every need and already knows the solution. So, this Father’s Day treat your dad if you can, but do not forget that God is your Father and He deserves you praise everyday of your life. “Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father which is in heaven.” Matthew 5:16 

Who Knows The Work Of God?

“He hath made every thing beautiful in his time: also he hath set the world in their heart, so that no man can find out the work that God maketh from the beginning to the end.” Ecclesiastes 3:11 

People will never understand God until they understand the sovereignty of God. God is not God unless He is Sovereign! And here we have people that call themselves Christians, attending worship every time the doors are open, and men filling pulpits trying to teach as though they know God. They give God no credit for anything and say ignorant things like “God cannot change mans will.” They teach as though man has an option to be a believer or not, they treat salvation as though it can be had at will. People need to listen to the scriptures and hear what they say, because what you hear in most pulpits is not the bible doctrine. Solomon writes that “He hath made every thing beautiful in his time…” that is time of his choosing. Solomon also wrote in Ecclesiastes 7:29 “Lo, this only have I found, that God hath made man upright; but they have sought out many inventions.” God created man upright, that is in a holy way, but man polluted it when he ate of the forbidden fruit. Man (Adam) began to think for himself and everything he though or did was anti-God. Here in the Twenty-First Century man has totally eliminated God from everything. Forgetting God is sovereign and that He controls everything. However, everything will be beautiful when God has chosen for it to be. God has ordained the happenings of this world and when He is ready to fix mans sinful ways, He will make man beautiful again, holy again, and like unto His blessed image again, in God’s time. Listen to these wonderful words, “He is the Rock, his work is perfect: for all his ways are judgment: a God of truth and without iniquity, just and right is he.” Deuteronomy 32:4 The word “rock” is - a word that is expressive of power and stability – because of His Sovereignty. God is a God of truth and righteousness. He is eternity, never beginning and never ending. Since all things were created by Him, He has the right to use it as he pleases, God owes His creation nothing. God has a right to choose Jacob over Esau, He had a right to choose Israel as His chosen Nation over all other Nations, and He has a right to elect the saved in this world over the lost. Paul asked this question, “Hath not the potter power over the clay, of the same lump to make one vessel unto honour, and another unto dishonour?” Romans 9:21. Does He actually elect, the bible says He does, man has no right to force God to save them and make them His child. Deuteronomy said, “a God of truth and without iniquity, just and right is he.” Meaning that, what God elects to do, it is always right and without iniquity. Solomon told us in out text scripture “…that no man can find out the work that God maketh from the beginning to the end…” but God knows His work from eternity past to eternity future, because with God there is neither He is “I AM”. It is man that is wrong, their thinking is polluted with selfishness, therefore their thinking is “self”. Paul put it this way, “Who changed the truth of God into a lie, and worshipped and served the creature more than the Creator, who is blessed for ever. Amen.” Romans 1:25 Worship is designed to glory man and not God, only in a church of sovereign grace will you find God, not man worshiped and gloried. We are not going to do anything that God has not foreordained, or predestinated. We will never understand what God is doing until it is accomplished. Solomon wrote “…so that no man can find out the work that God maketh…” He also wrote “Then I beheld all the work of God, that a man cannot find out the work that is done under the sun: because though a man labour to seek it out, yet he shall not find it; yea further; though a wise man think to know it, yet shall he not be able to find it.” Ecclesiastes 8:17 Unless God reveals His doings we will not know what He has done unless we believe in a Sovereign God. Sometimes we fail to see that God judges the people and the actions of this world, and people fail to see it because they think “my God would never do such a thing”. How do you know what God would do? God destroyed this world and the population of it with a flood. God allowed Satan to destroy everything Job had and kill his children. Let us understand the example of Satan in Job is that, Satan nor any other being acts without God’s permission. Therefore, everything must be linked back to God or God’s will. In conclusion, read the first eight verses of Ecclesiastes 3 where it speaks of “A Season for Everything”. The word “season” means - an appointed occasion – which means God appointed it to be. God has appointed your birth and your death, “Seeing his days are determined, the number of his months are with thee, thou hast appointed his bounds that he cannot pass; Job 14:5. We were born and we will die as The Sovereign God of the universe has elected. Also, everything in between birth and death is of Gods choosing. Esau was born to for God to hate, Judas Iscariot was born to betray Jesus, Satan was created to be evil and to bring evil to the world, and so-forth-and-so-on. But in all of this you see God’s sovereignty, unless you are blind from seeing it. Everything really is for God’s glory and will, and His will shall be done, and it will be right, just and to His glory. “The glory of the LORD shall endure for ever: the LORD shall rejoice in his works…He looketh on the earth, and it trembleth: he toucheth the hills, and they smoke…I will sing unto the LORD as long as I live: I will sing praise to my God while I have my being.”  Psalms 104:31 - 33 

Did God Die On Calvary’s Tree?

“And about the ninth hour Jesus cried with a loud voice, saying, Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani? that is to say, My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?” Matthew 27:46 

This is a very sensitive question, but I saw it asked on Facebook this week.  The actual question was “On the cross, Jesus clearly suffered as a man. But did he also suffer as God?” I want to look at this because I hear people say a lot “God died on the cross for your sins” but did God actually die? I believe it is impossible for God to die, in any shape form or fashion, Deity cannot change, nor can deity die. Now we know that Jesus Christ was incarnate, made from the seed of God and the seed of woman. We know that Jesus had a human mother but a heavenly Father. This makes Jesus an unusual person, because He was man and God in one body. Luke wrote in Luke 1:35 “And the angel answered and said unto her, The Holy Ghost shall come upon thee, and the power of the Highest shall overshadow thee: therefore also that holy thing which shall be born of thee shall be called the Son of God.” What exactly did the Holy Spirit do to Mary when “the power of the Highest shall overshadow thee” The word “overshadow” means - to envelop in a haze of brilliancy; figuratively to invest with preternatural influence – I believe the Holy Spirit planted a seed into Mary to cause her to become pregnant. This is done in a supernatural way because it is something only God can do. This made Jesus God/man which made the only human deity. Therefore, Jesus was known both “the Son of God and the Son of man”. I believe that on the cross that deity and humanity separated, and therefore Jesus cried on the cross, “…Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani? that is to say, My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?” Matthew 27:46 The word “forsaken” means - to leave behind in some place, that is, to desert someone. – Now I know some people will disagree with this, but think about it, can God die? The bible never said God died, it says the Son of Man died. It doesn’t even say the Son of God died. I must ask this question, why did the Holy Spirit have to resurrect Jesus from the grave? Paul wrote “But if the Spirit of him that raised up Jesus from the dead dwell in you, he that raised up Christ from the dead shall also quicken your mortal bodies by his Spirit that dwelleth in you.” Romans 8:11 Why was it necessary for the Holy Sprit to raise Jesus from the dead? I believe that Jesus died as a man on the cross and deity had forsaken Him of left Him. Matthew said in Matthew 20:28 “Even as the Son of man came not to be ministered unto, but to minister, and to give his life a ransom for many.” Not one place does the scripture conclude that God died. This is the reason the word “incarnate” means so much to us, while it is not in the bible it means that Jesus had two forms about Him, God and man. This made Jesus as much deity and human, therefore a separation at the crucifixion would not have been impossible. Now, I have heard the arguments and anger on the other side, God just turned his head, or God turned His back. But I must ask why, why would God turn His back on His own dear Son whom He sent to die for our sins. Some also ask, what would prevent Him from sinning after the separation. He is God’s Son not Adams, even void deity His Father is God. Now let’s look at the sin factor, can God sin, can God take our sin on Himself? Jesus took our sins on himself on the cross. That would have made him a sinner of sort, dying to pay for our sins. That is another reason they had to be a separation of humanity and deity on the cross. Now if you believe there were no separation on the cross of deity and humanity then explain this scripture, “But of that day and that hour knoweth no man, no, not the angels which are in heaven, neither the Son, but the Father. Mark 13:32 could it be possible that the Son does not know the time that the Father has elected to rapture His children from the earth? We know when Jesus was on the earth He knew everything because the scripture clearly makes that known like this scripture, “And he must needs go through Samaria”. John 4:4 how did He know that He needed to go through Samaria, because He is God. I know that there are some who disagree with me on this, however that is what the scriptures are all about, us figuring them out to find the truth. “Study to shew thyself approved unto God, a workman that needeth not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth.” 2 Timothy 2:15