“Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, as it was the substance of things which have come to pass; and it is the evidence of things not seen.” Hebrews 11:1 Lamsa’s translation “The apostles said to our Lord, increase our faith.” The Lord’s reply: “If ye have faith even as a grain of mustard seed, ye could say unto this mulberry tree, be uprooted, and planted in the sea; and it would obey you.” Jesus tells a story then: Now, which of you has a servant who plows or feeds sheep, and if he should come from the field, would say to him, ‘enter in and sit down?’ But he would rather say to him, ‘prepare something that I may have my supper, and gird yourself and serve me until I eat and drink; and then you also can eat and drink. What! Will the servant receive…
Tag: <span>grace</span>
“Survival of the fittest” is a mantra of the extremely observant. But, is empirical evidence the same as truth? On two levels, no. First, it contradicts the Bible, “The kingdom of God comes without observation. (ocular evidence) Luke 17:20 But secondly, even the best observationist can only find seeming truth. Why? Because our observations are only as true as we abide in The Truth. In this inner abiding is where I can be aware of the world at a level outside of myself, or, unfortunately, I actually create my own world, unknowingly. Charles Darwin (biologist and evolution’s greatest contributor), saw a problem: ” if…men were reared under precisely the same conditions as hive-bees, there can hardly be a doubt that their unmarried females would, like the worker bees, think it a sacred duty to kill their brothers, and mothers would strive to kill your fertile daughters, and no one would…
2 Corinthians 5:19 speaks a great truth to us, “That is, in Messiah, God was reconciling the world to Himself, not counting their trespasses against them; and He has entrusted the message of reconciliation to us.” The Savior brought us a new consciousness, and in that conscience there is no ledgering of a person’s willful trespasses. 2 Corinthians 4:6 tells us why, “For God, who commanded the light to shine out of darkness, hath shined in our hearts, to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.” When this light enters a heart, then comes an immediate “knowing,” because Jesus is the Light of the World. Many use their eye-gate to evaluate the world, they answer for themselves the question of “how.” This means they can give a whole chart describing the function and content of the eye from scientific…
2 Thessalonians 2:3 teaches: “Let no man deceive you by any means: for that day shall not come, except there come a falling away first…” “On May 17, 1863, Paris saw the opening of the Salon des Refusés, an exhibition of artworks that were rejected by the jury of the prestigious Paris Salon. It was the very first time the term avant garde, or avant-garde, was used in relations to the arts, and it marked the beginning of a cultural revolution. Renowned painters like Gustave Courbet, Édouard Manet and Camille Pissaro, cast aside by the critics and the public for not being conservative to their taste, organized their own shows throughout the French capital, featuring now legendary paintings. Attracting thousands of visitors, these artists announced a certain kind of rebellion that would come to influence an entire century and a half of art movements and like-minded artists, despite the ongoing ridicule they received from…
We Must know that God keeps us — but from what? Jude 1:24 teaches “… to keep you from falling …to present you faultless before the presence of his glory with exceeding joy. Psalms tells us:: “The sun shall not strike you by day, nor the moon by night.” “The Lord will keep you from all evil.” “he will keep your life.” “The Lord will keep your going out and your coming in from this time forth and forevermore.” Psalm 121:6-8 “Our God … holds our soul in life, and suffers not our feet to be moved.” Psalm 66:9 Jabez, called on the God of Israel, Oh that thou would bless me indeed, and enlarge my coast, and that thine hand might be with me, and that thou would keep me from evil, that it may not grieve me! And God granted him that which he requested.” 1 Chronicles 4:1 Then…
“…we must also accept the reality of our incompleteness.” Gerald G. May M.D. From his book “Addiction and Grace.” He starts in, “We can and should do our very best to move in that direction, (to achieve the state of perfection.) struggling with every resource we have. but…”we need to recognize that the incompleteness in us, our personal insufficiency, does not make us unacceptable in God’s eyes.” “Far from it, our incompleteness is the empty side of our longing for God and for love. It is what draws us toward love and one another.” “if we do not fill our minds with guilt and self-recriminations, we will recognize our incompleteness as a kind of spaciousness into which we can welcome the flow of grace.” “We can think of our inadequacies as terrible defects, if we want, and hate ourselves. But we can also think of them affirmatively, as doorways…
“And an highway shall be there, and a way, and it shall be called The way of holiness; the unclean shall not pass over it; but it shall be for those: the wayfaring men, though fools, shall not err therein.” Isaiah 35:8 ‘The way of life is above to the wise, that he may depart from hell beneath.” Proverbs 15:24 “God completely heals the wounded who have failed completely (Psalm 147:3). He comes and binds up the transgression—called the “breach,” in Isaiah 30:26— and He heals the stroke of the wound. The stroke refers to the paralysis brought in by the demon armies in the unconscious mind and in the body. The demonic influence exerted in this process is to control the responses of the central nervous system.” Dr. Carl H. Stevens “Take the example of a man who committed adultery … He was sobbing, overwhelmed with sorrow,…
Like a River dam or lock, We must manage the flow of grace. This includes That flow coming into our house, and then the flow going out. This is our stewardship . This is spoken of in 1 Peter 4:10 “As every man hath received the gift, even so minister the same one to another, as good stewards of the manifold grace of God.” I must first learn how to receive grace, but not in vain. Grace “received” is accepting something which I do not deserve. Can you do it? `Pride can inhibit this action. Many, many speakers, leaders, church members, choir singers, administrators or faculty cannot receive grace. Unsaved folks balk at grace often. The reason? Grace is based never on the receiver, but rests in the open hand of the Giver, God Himself. It all depends on the vicarious atonement of Christ. Precious people look inward and discover…
“God just doesn’t throw a life preserver to a drowning person. He goes to the bottom of the sea and he pulls a corpse from the bottom of the sea, takes him up on the bank and breathes into him the breath of life and makes him alive.” R.C. Sproul “Men will never worship God with a sincere heart, or be roused to fear and obey him with sufficient zeal, until they properly understand how indebted they are to his mercy.” John Calvin “We shall never be clothed with the righteousness of Christ, except we first know assuredly that we have no righteousness of our own.” John Calvin “You contribute nothing to your Salvation except the sin that made it necessary.” Jonathan Edwards “The ultimate test of our spirituality, Is the measure of our amazement at the grace of God.” Martin Lloyd Jones “Faith, repentance and holiness are no less…
Charles Spurgeon speaks of The Holy Spirit from his sermon, “The Comforter.” “I am in distress, And I want consolation. Some passer-by hears of my sorrow, and steps within, sits down and assays to cheer me; he speaks soothing words but he loves me not; he is a stranger; he knows me not at all; he is only come in to try his skill. And what is the consequence? His words run over me like oil on a slab of marble. They are like the pattering rain upon the rock; they do not break my grief; It stands unmoved as adamant, because he has no love for me.” “But let someone who loves me dear as his own life come and plead with me, then truly his words are music, They taste like honey. He knows the password of the doors of my heart, and my ear is attentive…