Thursday, March 27, 2014

Digging For Treasure

How much value do you put on God's Word?



Psalms 19:7-11  The instructions of the LORD are perfect, reviving the soul. The decrees of the LORD are trustworthy, making wise the simple.

The commandments of the LORD are right, bringing joy to the heart. The commands of the LORD are clear, giving insight for living.  Reverence for the LORD is pure, lasting forever.

The laws of the LORD are true; each one is fair.  10  They are more desirable than gold, even the finest gold. They are sweeter than honey, even honey dripping from the comb.  11  They are a warning to Your servant, a great reward for those who obey them.

Psalms 119:72  Your instructions are more valuable to me than millions in gold and silver.

Psalms 119:162  I rejoice in Your word like one who discovers a great treasure.
The word's "Bible study" don't sound like very much fun to most people, mention the word "Bible" and they think of a big boring book, mention the word "study" and most of us think of doing something difficult like a final exam. Both of those words sound a lot like the word "work."

Work is what it will probably be for you if you are just beginning to develop the spiritual discipline of reading the Bible. If you view work as something that should be avoided then you will probably never dig in and discover the treasure in the Bible. Just because it takes some work doesn't mean that the Bible should sit on the shelf.

Most of us spend a lot of time working at something so that we will be successful. It could be a career or a hobby that motivates us to labor towards a goal. Those who desire to find the treasures in God's word must dig for them.

This is a long term commitment to digging, it is similar to a miner digging for treasure hidden in the earth, if you dig for a short time then you may not get any jewels. We need to decide for ourselves if the work that is involved is worth it.

Over and over again God's word proves that it is valuable, useful and beneficial. Here is a short list of some of the benefits that we can receive from Bible study:

✔  Revives the soul
✔  Makes us wise and gives us insight
✔  Brings joy to the heart
✔  Show us the glory of God

With benefits like that we shouldn't mind picking up the shovel and getting busy.
What excites you?
Matthew 13:44  "The Kingdom of Heaven is like a treasure that a man discovered hidden in a field. In his excitement, he hid it again and sold everything he owned to get enough money to buy the field.
The person that bought the field knew that he had found something that was valuable enough that he should get rid of everything else that he owned so that he could buy the land and obtain the rights to the treasure that was hidden from everybody else.

What do you consider valuable? Are the things of this world garbage to you? We pursue what we perceive as being valuable. The problem is that we tend to value the things that the world tells us to value and ignore the things that really matter.

Don't be fooled by the fact that you won't find heavenly treasure being traded in the financial markets. As followers of Jesus we need to be careful that we don't view the treasure that can be found in God's word the way that the rest of the world sees it. We need to have a different perspective and we need to upgrade the value of this investment. The world's "treasure" should be garbage to us. (Matthew 6:19-21, Philippians 3:8)

Wednesday, March 19, 2014

Confession Is Good

Confession brings forgiveness, cleansing and eternal life.



1 John 1:8-10  If we claim we have no sin, we are only fooling ourselves and not living in the truth.   

9 But if we confess our sins to Him, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all wickedness.   

10  If we claim we have not sinned, we are calling God a liar and showing that His word has no place in our hearts.

We have all heard that confession is good for the soul, even modern psychology believes that confession is valuable, the problem is they don't know why confession is so valuable and they definitely don't know who it is that you need to confess to.

Sin gets in the way of our ability to have fellowship with God and confession is the way to make the relationship right again. It sounds like a great idea to live in fellowship with God but too many of us are content to live without fellowship because we are not willing to give up our selfish ways and our pride.

We only have a small glimpse of what the Garden of Eden was like before God closed it so it is difficult to understand what the world was like before sin broke everything. We cannot fully comprehend how bad sin is, to us sin is our normal routine and not sinning is the thing that we struggle with, it is difficult for us to see sin as God sees it. God sees sin as being so bad and so evil that it cost Jesus his life, there wasn't a quick and easy fix for sin, it took something as drastic as God on a cross to undo it's effects on us.
Proverbs 28:13  People who conceal their sins will not prosper, but if they confess and turn from them, they will receive mercy.
Our attitude towards our sin determines whether we can enjoy fellowship with God. Some of the ways that we can deal with sin in our life:

✔  Pretend like you have never sinned
✔  Claim that you have stopped sinning
✔   Ignore your sin and refuse to deal with it
✔  Confess your sin

If we don't confess our sins then in essence we are disagreeing with God and telling him that he is wrong. It sounds pretty arrogant but sometimes we go to great lengths to avoid admitting that we blew it. The devil loves it when we behave like he does and exhibit the same characteristics that he has.

If we do confess then there is a promise from God that he will forgive. How much easier could God make it?  But don't think that you can keep it shallow and get any results, God wants us to be real, it's easy to say, "I am a sinner," but if confession is to be real it must mention exactly what you did wrong.
The first confession
Romans 10:9-10  If you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved.  10  For it is by believing in your heart that you are made right with God, and it is by confessing with your mouth that you are saved.
If Jesus is not your Savior then there isn't any forgiveness from God for you. Before we can expect to receive forgiveness there is another confession that must come first. We must confess that Jesus is God's son that was crucified to pay the penalty of sin for us, he was raised from the dead to offer a guarantee that we would be raised as well.

I want to have fellowship with God because of the incredible gift of salvation that he gave to me. I need to live for him so that the fellowship will not be broken.

Thursday, March 13, 2014

God Is Light

It's a dark world, do you know where you are walking?



1 John 1:5-10  This is the message we heard from Jesus and now declare to you: God is light, and there is no darkness in Him at all.   

So we are lying if we say we have fellowship with God but go on living in spiritual darkness; we are not practicing the truth.  But if we are living in the light, as God is in the light, then we have fellowship with each other, and the blood of Jesus, His Son, cleanses us from all sin.

If we claim we have no sin, we are only fooling ourselves and not living in the truth.  But if we confess our sins to Him, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all wickedness.  10  If we claim we have not sinned, we are calling God a liar and showing that His word has no place in our hearts.

In the previous post we started a study of the book of First John. In the first few verses we saw that John wanted us to know that Jesus is God (God With Us). In the next section our focus changes from who Jesus is to who God is and how that should affect the way we live.

First we are told that God is light. Most of the religions of the world disagree about who Jesus is and what he is like but most of them wouldn't have a problem describing God as light. God is one hundred percent pure light, he is holy, pure and righteous. Besides being light God also gives us light, he reveals the light of truth to us, and he gives us the light of salvation.
John 1:4-5  The Word gave life to everything that was created, and his life brought light to everyone. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness can never extinguish it.
Since we know that God is light and darkness cannot exist in the light then there are implications for us as we live the Christian life. Fellowship with God and living to please him is always characterized by walking in the light. We know that we have been saved for all of eternity but we can choose to step away from the light and stumble around in the dark because of sin.

Photosynthesis is the process of converting light energy into chemical energy that can be released later for the organism’s growth. In a manner similar to photosynthesis the light of the world shines on us and provides the nourishment that is necessary for our spiritual growth.

We shouldn't think that we can be free from sin and always do what is right. We should step up to the light and examine ourselves and admit that we have fallen short of God's perfect standard. If we confess our sins to him then he will forgive us. (Romans 3:23 / 1 John 1:8-9)

We shouldn't think that we can live as we please and still have fellowship with God, you have never seen light and dark in the same room, we cannot live in spiritual darkness and still be a friend of God and enjoy his company.

There is only one light, there isn't any other source, it came to our dark world but it didn't force us to be in the light. It is up to us to decide where we are going to walk, we cannot have fellowship with God and have one foot in the dark.

Sunday, March 09, 2014

God With Us

Have you ever checked out this man named Jesus?



1 John 1:1-4  We proclaim to you the One who existed from the beginning, whom we have heard and seen. We saw Him with our own eyes and touched Him with our own hands. He is the Word of life.   

This One who is life itself was revealed to us, and we have seen Him. And now we testify and proclaim to you that He is the One who is eternal life. He was with the Father, and then He was revealed to us.

We proclaim to you what we ourselves have actually seen and heard so that you may have fellowship with us. And our fellowship is with the Father and with His Son, Jesus Christ.  We are writing these things so that you may fully share our joy.

If you are not a Christ follower then maybe you don't know why some people are or maybe you don't understand why they or why they call themselves Christian. Could Jesus really be that big of a deal?

John was one of the guys that spent all of his time with Jesus every day for three years. John tells us that the reason that he wrote all of this information down was because he knew the truth about Jesus and he wanted to share it with us so that we could decide for ourselves. If you consider the facts then you will realize that Jesus was not an ordinary man, he wasn't a madman and he wasn't a big fake.
John 20:30-31  The disciples saw Jesus do many other miraculous signs in addition to the ones recorded in this book.  31  But these are written so that you may continue to believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and that by believing in Him you will have life by the power of His name.
John wants us to know that he was there and he had personal contact with Jesus, he saw what he did, he heard him teach and he touched a real physical body. John was there for the Sermon on the Mount, he was there when the demons obeying his command and be looked on as Peter walked on the water with Jesus. John believed and he wished that his readers might have the same experience that he had so they would have the same belief, the same hope, and the same joy that he had.
John 1:1-4  In the beginning the Word already existed. The Word was with God, and the Word was God.  2  He existed in the beginning with God.  God created everything through Him, and nothing was created except through Him.  The Word gave life to everything that was created, and His life brought light to everyone.
John's testimony tells us that Jesus is God and as God he has always existed, he took part in creation, he is the giver of our first life and he is the one that made eternal life possible. What an incredible thought to realize that Jesus was with God, he left heaven to get to know us better, he shared in our hurts and our struggles and he revealed himself to us so that we could know God better and secure our eternal destiny.
You Need To Decide
Matthew 16:15-17  Then He asked them, "But who do you say I am?"  16  Simon Peter answered, "You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God."  17  Jesus replied, "You are blessed, Simon son of John, because My Father in heaven has revealed this to you. You did not learn this from any human being
The people that really knew the truth about Jesus came to him from very different backgrounds. There were tough guys like the fishermen that dropped their nets to follow him, there was a zealot that was fighting to overthrow the oppressive Roman regime. There was ruthless tax collectors, scholarly Pharisees and oppressed women.

One day Jesus gave his disciples a pop quiz to see if they had come to the right conclusion about his identity. They had the advantage of direct access to the teacher, they could ask a question without raising their hand and they didn't have to wait for office hours yet they didn't always get what their teacher was telling them.

How will you answer Jesus pop quiz? Was God really with us?