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Is The Truth Of God At The Local Food Buffet?

05 Apr

I left off yesterday on earnestly seeking God.

Many people today are seeking, but are they seeking earnestly?

Today the people in the world seem to want what they want.  It’s like going through a buffet line and grabbing what works for them and leaving the stuff off their plate that doesn’t appeal to them.

It is part of our fallen nature to want to do this.  We have a void to fill spiritually and yet our sinful nature doesn’t match up to how we are really supposed to be, act, or believe.

God promises us that those who earnestly seek Him will find Him.

Proverbs 8:17 – 17 I love those who love me, and those who seek me find me.

Matthew 7:7-8- 7 “Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. 8 For everyone who asks receives; he who seeks finds; and to him who knocks, the door will be opened.

I see many different religions out there and their doctrine is easily flawed.  What I mean by that is it has nothing to do with taste or preference, but things don’t add up.  When you put these questions out there to the people who believe, they aren’t interested in rather it adds up or not.  That fact of the matter is they are comfortable where they are at.

I don’t know about you, but my normal sinful self doesn’t fit how Go’s Word wants me to act or believe at all.  I’ve had to come to the realization that it makes complete sense and now I have to conform to it.  It’s not naturally who I am.

In the last days we get a warning on this.

2 Timothy 4:2-5-    2 Preach the Word; be prepared in season and out of season; correct, rebuke and encourage—with great patience and careful instruction. 3 For the time will come when men will not put up with sound doctrine. Instead, to suit their own desires, they will gather around them a great number of teachers to say what their itching ears want to hear. 4 They will turn their ears away from the truth and turn aside to myths. 5 But you, keep your head in all situations, endure hardship, do the work of an evangelist, discharge all the duties of your ministry.  

If you want to get your truth from the Buffet line, you better be in the line with the Bible and be ready to eat it all up.  Otherwise picking and choosing while going over to other buffets will eventually lead to untruth.  As someone who has as interest in God, we don’t want it to lead to a lie.

 

Where Is The Wise Man?

04 Apr

1 Corinthians 3:18-20 – 18 For the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God. 19 For it is written:

“I will destroy the wisdom of the wise;
the intelligence of the intelligent I will frustrate.”

20 Where is the wise man? Where is the scholar? Where is the philosopher of this age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world?

When I read this the first thing that pops into my head is evolution.

Nothing x Nothing = Everything?

Some of your basic smaller items are impossible to explain except that the fact it took someone’s handiwork to make it.  Look at your watch.  You could take it apart all the pieces and start shaking them up in a bag.  How long would you have to shake it before it came together as that working watch?   Now remind you that evolution means you don’t even start with the pieces.  It never does come together because it takes someone to fit the pieces together.  We are much more complex than a watch and the wise would have you believe everything comes from nothing.

Why would the intelligent or wise believe this or find those foolish that don’t?  Because if you accept the argument that you start as ooze zapped in a pond and evolved through an ape into a man, then you don’t have to serve anyone.  You can be your own God with no one to answer to.  These people find the message of the cross foolishness.

Wisdom comes from the Lord.  He made the world and He created us.  If the devil can get you to believe you came from ooze, he knows you won’t be serving God, but instead yourself.

An intelligent person that comes to the conclusion that there has to be a Creator, now must choose to serve whoever they truly believe that is.  Otherwise that person is being rebellious and not intelligent.  Pride keeps the wise away from wisdom and our Lord.

Those who earnestly seek the Lord find Him every time.  The key word is earnestly.

 

Sons Of God

02 Apr

Galatians 3:26-29 – 26 You are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus, 27 for all of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ. 28 There is neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, male nor female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus. 29 If you belong to Christ, then you are Abraham’s seed, and heirs according to the promise.

Anyone who makes Jesus Lord is now born in the Spirit of our Lord.

Were we born to him when we came out of the womb?  No.  Adam and Eve were Sons and they fell away with their sin.  From that time forward we have been born into sin.  At the age of accountability we are responsible for a choice.  That choice is will we die in our sins, or accept Jesus death in the place of our own and make Him Lord?

What is that age of accountability?  God knows what it is.

Who is accountable considering some have lived and never received the message?  God will judge correctly.

What I do know is if those who have heard the Word and reject the Lord, their fate is not a good one.  We are expected to try and spread the Word of our Lord and we will be accountable on rather we tried to do that.

If you have accepted Jesus as your Lord and Savior, you are a Son of God.  Male or Female you are considered a son.  White, Black, Yellow, Brown, Pink or Orange skin color we are all considered Sons if we have been born again in our Spirit.

We don’t take it serious enough.  It’s a big reason why many of us lose focus.  It’s not real enough to us.  There is no bigger deal and we would do good to remember that and live it.

 

Don’t Be Afraid

30 Mar

Psalm 27:1-3 – 1 The LORD is my light and my salvation—
   whom shall I fear?
The LORD is the stronghold of my life—
   of whom shall I be afraid?
2 When evil men advance against me
   to devour my flesh,
when my enemies and my foes attack me,
   they will stumble and fall.
3 Though an army besiege me,
   my heart will not fear;
though war break out against me,
   even then will I be confident.

We need to be confident.  It’s easy to look at this scripture and say, well that’s David and he’s in a time of war.  Also he was really good in his faith in this area.

No, we need to understand we are in a war every day.  The war is for your heart.  God wants you back and strong.  The devil wants you to rebel and join the darkness team.

Does that sound wild?  Only because we have become so attached to believing what we can see.  What we can’t see is very obvious.  We do things that we know are wrong.  Others do things we know are wrong.  We do things that we know is right.  We see others doing things we know are right.  How do we know this?

God has built that in as part of the creation in man.  Now we can slip so far into darkness and away from the Lord that we can fool ourselves.  People can get numb to their selfish living, but it’s still very apparent to everyone else that doesn’t go that far off the deep end. 

David is confident, because he knows the One who has his back is the only One we need to be concentrating on.

I’m reminded of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego.  They were going to stay true to God’s command of not bowing down to idols.  King Nebuchadnezzar was furious and throw them into a fire that was heated 7 times hotter than normal.  What was their response?

Daniel 3:16-18 –   16 Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego replied to the king, “O Nebuchadnezzar, we do not need to defend ourselves before you in this matter. 17 If we are thrown into the blazing furnace, the God we serve is able to save us from it, and he will rescue us from your hand, O king. 18 But even if he does not, we want you to know, O king, that we will not serve your gods or worship the image of gold you have set up.”

Don’t be afraid.  As it turns out they were spared by God for His witness, but I love their attitude.  But even if He does not, we want you to know we won’t go against God or His decree.

We need to be ready to take this stand for our Lord and have no fear.

 

So How Bad Is Too Bad?

29 Mar

Humans are pretty amazing.  You ask them about people who are mass murders, Hitler, the guy who burns down his house with his children in it and boy those guys are worthy of hell.  However, when it comes to asking the standard of how we’re all doing and the bar is somewhere below each one of us.  I’m not that bad many will say.  Look at such and such, they live a lot worse than I do.  On the curve, I’m actually quite good.

What’s wrong with this thinking?

Our opinion in the grand scheme of things doesn’t matter.  The devil wants you to think that the most important thing in the world is your right to be your own little god and make your decisions.  That is what he sold Eve in the garden.  You’re an adult, you have free will, you have that right.  No one including God should have a right to tell you what to do.  Is that right?  That’s the way a lot of proud people think.

Jesus said he who is the least is the greatest.

Mark 9:35 – 35 Sitting down, Jesus called the Twelve and said, “If anyone wants to be first, he must be the very last, and the servant of all.”

He washed the feet of His disciples and died for all of us.  This was an example of God humbling Himself out of love to show us the way.

Will it always be that way?  Actually God wants us to repent and come back to be with Him forever.  He wants us to worship Him and follow Him like it was supposed to be in the beginning.

Throughout the Old Testament we see God’s judgments and wrath and we also see it coming in the book of Revelation.  God is loving and patient, not a pushover like many of those who mock Him.

The answer to the title is we are all too bad on our own.

Romans 3:9-12 –  What shall we conclude then? Are we any better? Not at all! We have already made the charge that Jews and Gentiles alike are all under sin. 10 As it is written:

“There is no one righteous, not even one;
11 there is no one who understands,
no one who seeks God.
12 All have turned away,
they have together become worthless;
there is no one who does good,
not even one.”

So we all qualify.  What’s the answer?  Where’s the hope?

Romans 6:23 – 23 For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.

We need to make Jesus our Lord.  If we are making Jesus our Lord then being the God of our own lives makes it too crowded.  We need to seek more Jesus and less of ourselves.

 

Mighty, Strong, Loving, And Just

28 Mar

Psalm 62:11-12 – 11 One thing God has spoken,
two things have I heard:
that you, O God, are strong,
12 and that you, O Lord, are loving. Surely you will reward each person
according to what he has done.

He is all those things.  I know I see God loving and he shows strength in His patience.  To see people blatantly thumb their noses at our mighty God and He continues to allow them to go about their business for now.  Slow to anger and abounding in love.  However, there is coming a time soon that those who don’t want God or anything to do with him will find themselves on the wrong side of the fence.  Their choice.

Our God is loving!  He wants you to have a loving relationship with Him.  You’re not a windup toy that He sets in motion and then forgets about you and runs off somewhere else because you bore Him.  He also didn’t make us to be independent from Him.  That’s the devils doing.  He wanted to do things his own way.  That philosophy comes from Satan, not God.

Strengthen your relationship with your Mighty, Strong, Just, and Loving God.  Seek Him and His Word.

 

Living Differently Than We Did In The Past

27 Mar

Titus 3:3-8 – 3 At one time we too were foolish, disobedient, deceived and enslaved by all kinds of passions and pleasures. We lived in malice and envy, being hated and hating one another. 4 But when the kindness and love of God our Savior appeared, 5 he saved us, not because of righteous things we had done, but because of his mercy. He saved us through the washing of rebirth and renewal by the Holy Spirit, 6 whom he poured out on us generously through Jesus Christ our Savior, 7 so that, having been justified by his grace, we might become heirs having the hope of eternal life. 8 This is a trustworthy saying. And I want you to stress these things, so that those who have trusted in God may be careful to devote themselves to doing what is good. These things are excellent and profitable for everyone.

Repentance is turning away from our old sinful nature.  If we don’t head into a new direction and focus on it, we’re heading back to the familiar digs.

We called to be a new creation.

2 Corinthians 5:17 – 17 Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has gone, the new has come!

We need to devote ourselves to our loving God and Savior.  When we are serving Him, some come closer in their relationship with Him and others find God for the first time.  This is profitable for everyone.

It’s even profitable for the atheist.

What’s amazing is the godless atheist enjoys living under the moral law, but doesn’t want God as a part of it.  When God is completely taken out, the moral society goes with Him and chaos and evil erupts.  Evil selfish men aren’t concerned about atheists who want to live by good moral standards without God.  When the Christian wants rules put on society of morality, we point to God as why.  If an atheist tries to do that, they would get the backlash we are receiving now, but have nothing to point to as a foundation.

When we devote ourselves to God, everyone profits from that.  Plus that’s what God has called us to do.

 

Truth And Light

26 Mar

1 John  1:5-10 –5 This is the message we have heard from him and declare to you: God is light; in him there is no darkness at all. 6 If we claim to have fellowship with him yet walk in the darkness, we lie and do not live by the truth. 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, his Son, purifies us from all sin.

8 If we claim to be without sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us. 9 If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness. 10 If we claim we have not sinned, we make him out to be a liar and his word has no place in our lives.

God and Jesus are Truth and Light.

Darkness is a place further from God.  The further you get the darker it gets.  Lies are the same way.  The further you get the worse the lies get.

I really enjoy how the above verses tell us we need to walk in Light, but we are not to kid ourselves into thinking we are without sin.  Still choosing to walk in darkness is a bad ploy.  We are not to abuse the grace on purpose.  The more we tread out in the darkness, the harder it is to understand the Truth.

 

We Need To Make The Most Of Every Opportunity

23 Mar

Colossians 4:2-6 –2 Devote yourselves to prayer, being watchful and thankful. 3 And pray for us, too, that God may open a door for our message, so that we may proclaim the mystery of Christ, for which I am in chains. 4 Pray that I may proclaim it clearly, as I should. 5 Be wise in the way you act toward outsiders; make the most of every opportunity. 6 Let your conversation be always full of grace, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how to answer everyone.

We need to pray for each other and ourselves that we will be able to clearly spread the Gospel the best we can possibly get it across to others.  If you could help pull someone out of a fire, would you help?  I believe you would.  We can’t let the world tell us that we are not so share with others.  We cannot be ashamed of the Gospel.  Pray that the Lord opens the door in a conversation that you may wisely share Jesus with them.

 

The Springs Of The Great Deep Burst Forth

22 Mar

Just a brainstorm for the day.

Genesis 7:11 – 11 In the six hundredth year of Noah’s life, on the seventeenth day of the second month—on that day all the springs of the great deep burst forth, and the floodgates of the heavens were opened

No doubt almost all of us miss that the first time we read through the story of Noah in the Bible.  We all remember as kids that it rained for forty days and forty nights, but the majority of the water came from underneath and came quickly.  How do we have much of our fossil record?  From mud and sediment covering things rapidly.  We look in our oceans and see mountain ranges.  I’ve heard it explained that those are the tears of where the springs burst forth.

They believe there was a canopy over the earth that help preserve life to almost a thousand years before the flood.  After all the rain, it has gone down to 120 since.

It’s a neat study and creation scientist have alot of stuff like this to look at.