Walk By Faith Not By Sight
Faith compels you to act in ways that you never would have expected like building a boat to save yourself from a flood when it has never even rained, or fighting a giant that everyone is too scared to fight, or believing a promise that in the natural, just doesn’t make sense.
EFFECTIVE PRAYER: 5 WAYS TO SETTLE THE WORD IN YOUR HEART
Effective prayer requires you to settle God’s Word in your heart. You must believe the Bible more than you believe the news, your bank account, and the symptoms in your body. The Word of God must be more than head knowledge it must be heart knowledge. There are five keys to settling God’s Word in your heart. You must believe that the Bible is the inspired Word of God. All scripture is God-breathed (2 Timothy 3:16). Although penned by man, the Bible is inspired by God. Sometimes God told the writers precisely what to say; other times He used their minds, their vocabularies, and their life-experiences to reveal His true nature and character. If you don’t believe that the Bible is God speaking to you, then you will struggle to trust that the Bible’s promises are from God and not man and this unbelief will limit the power of the life-giving Word you breathe-in. You must believe that the Bible is true and not just made up stories to teach us valuable “life lessons”. You make your own reality. You limit God by how you see God. If you find it impossible to believe that God rescued the Israelites from their enemies by parting the Red Sea, then you will struggle to believe that He is your rescuer. If you find it hard to believe that Jesus fed 5,000 people with five loaves of bread and two fish, then you will struggle to believe that He is your provider. God is the God of creation; if He is powerful enough to speak the universe into existence, then He is powerful enough to part the seas and multiply food. Don’t limit God to what you see in the natural but instead choose to see Him through the lens of the supernatural. You must believe that God said what He meant and meant what He said. God is not a man; He will never lie. God is reliable; He does not change His mind. Therefore, His Word will always come to pass (Numbers 23:19). Unless you trust God, you won’t approach Him with confidence; you may not even approach Him at all. Choose to take God at His Word; let His Word take shape in your heart so that you will not be what James called double-minded, and waver back and forth in your belief. You must believe the Word of God is the final authority. Jesus has the ultimate victory. His Word, the truth wins. Nothing can shake His Kingdom; His Word is unmovable. (Matthew 24:35). No matter how hopeless your circumstances appear, no matter what others tell you to believe, you must consider the Bible as the final authority on the issue, and trust that what is written there will prevail. You must nourish yourself with God’s Word daily. God’s Word is like an all-day buffet laid out in front of you: whatever sustenance you need, you can find it there. Taste and see that the Lord is good (Psalm 34:8). What better way to savor His truth than through His life-giving Word! Settle God’s Word in your heart and see your prayers come to life. Don’t limit the power of God’s Word by limiting God. Choose to expand your reality to the supernatural. Resolve to trust God and to stand firm in His truth and you will begin to believe the Bible more than you believe the news, your bank account or the symptoms in your body. His Word will begin to gravitate from your head to your heart and your heart will cry out “all things are possible for those who believe and I believe!”
The Beatitudes: Happy are the Merciful
The Beatitudes, eight short teachings found at the beginning of the Sermon on the Mount, lay the foundation for the rest of Jesus’ teachings and are fundamental to understanding Jesus. The Beatitudes not only give us the spiritual roadmap to true happiness, but they set out the character traits of citizens of the Kingdom of Heaven. Character traits of the Kingdom of Heaven are set out in the first four Beatitudes and include being poor in spirit, mourning, hungering and thirsting for righteousness, and meekness. The fifth Beatitude flows naturally out of the first four. When a person recognizes their spiritual bankruptcy, mourns their sins, hunger and thirsts for God’s righteousness, and submits to the direction and control of God, then their character begins to change; it starts to reflect the nature of God. Mercy is an attribute of God’s character. The closer a person becomes to God, the more merciful towards others that person becomes. Mercy is the Greek word eleemon and means kind, compassionate, sympathetic, and merciful. Merciful people display compassion; they want to ease others’ suffering not just to appear “charitable” or to receive a benefit, but because they genuinely empathize with their plight. Like meekness, today’s world tends to view mercy as a weakness, as something undesirable. Our culture roots for the person who serves their enemies vengeance instead of serving them forgiveness. Our culture says, no mercy, you don’t deserve it, so you shouldn’t get it. Thankfully, the Lord is merciful. David said, “let us fall into the hands of the Lord, for his mercy is great. Do not let me fall into human hands.” 2nd Samuel 24:14 God’s Mercy The Old Testament describes God as merciful. Psalm 103:8 says, “The Lord is compassionate and merciful, slow to get angry and filled with unfailing love.” The faithful love of the Lord never ends! “His mercies never cease. Great is his faithfulness; his mercies begin afresh each morning. Lamentations 3:22-23 We all need God’s mercy. We are all sinners. (Romans 3:23). We all deserve punishment for our sins. But because God loves us, He gave us a way to be forgiven of our sins. He sent His son Jesus who took our punishment upon himself. (Romans 6:23) Because of what Jesus did for us, we receive God’s mercy. Paul sums God’s mercy up for us in Ephesians 2:4-10 NLT, “But God, being rich in mercy, because of His great love with which He loved us, even when we were dead in our transgressions, made us alive together with Christ (by grace you have been saved), and raised us up with Him, and seated us with Him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, so that in the ages to come He might show the surpassing riches of His grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus. For by grace you have been saved through faith; and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God; not as a result of works, so that no one may boast. For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand so that we would walk in them”. The more we understand our sinful condition, the more we appreciate the value of God’s mercy – mercy we do not deserve but that He gave us anyway because He loves us. His love lifts us from our sinful condition and seats us with “Him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus…” Mercy of Jesus Jesus being the image of the invisible God, was also merciful. He showed mercy to the poor, the outcast, the sick, the blind, the deaf, the dead, the tax collectors, and prostitutes. Matthew 9:36 tells us that when Jesus “saw the crowds, he had compassion on them because they were confused and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd.” Another verse says, “Jesus saw the huge crowd as he stepped from the boat, and he had compassion on them and healed their sick.” Matthew 14:14 Jesus also wants us to be merciful. Jesus twice quoted Hosea 6:6 “…show mercy, not offer sacrifices.” The first time was in response to the Pharisees questioning Jesus about him hanging out with “tax collectors and other disreputable sinners.” Jesus responded, “Healthy people don’t need a doctor—sick people do.” Then he added, “Now go and learn the meaning of this Scripture: ‘I want you to show mercy, not offer sacrifices.’ For I have come to call not those who think they are righteous, but those who know they are sinners.” Matthew 9:12-13 The second time was after the Pharisees protested Jesus’ disciples “harvesting grain on the Sabbath.” Jesus said, “Now go and learn the meaning of this Scripture: ‘I want you to show mercy, not offer sacrifices.’ Matthew 12:7 Jesus took notice of the Pharisees’ tendency to care more about looking like good Pharisees than focusing on the more important aspects of the law – justice, mercy, and faith.” Matthew 23:23 In the Parable of the Good Samaritan, Jesus shows us what mercy should look like in the lives of kingdom citizens. Jesus told an expert at religious law that he must “love your neighbor as yourself.” The expert asked, “and who is my neighbor?” ” Jesus replied with a story: “A Jewish man was traveling from Jerusalem down to Jericho, and he was attacked by bandits. They stripped him of his clothes, beat him up, and left him half dead beside the road. “By chance a priest came along. But when he saw the man lying there, he crossed to the other side of the road and passed him by. A Temple assistant walked over and looked at him lying there, but he also passed by on the other side. “Then a despised Samaritan came along, and when he saw the man, he felt compassion for him. Going over to him, the Samaritan soothed his wounds with olive oil and wine and bandaged them. Then he put the man on his own donkey and took him to an inn, where he took care of him. The next day he handed the innkeeper two silver coins, telling him, ‘Take care of this
The Beatitudes: 5 Ways to Be Meek Not Weak
Jesus tells us in the third Beatitude that those who are meek are happy, and they will inherit the earth. The world associates meekness with weakness and thinks that only the strong can be happy and inherit the earth. Once again, Jesus’ teaching turns the world’s views upside down. In Welcome to the Upside Down, we talked about the blueprint for happiness that Jesus set out for us in the Beatitudes. We learned that the first step to finding true happiness is to be “poor in spirit.” To be poor in spirit, we must forget our self-interests and crown Jesus the king of our hearts. In Happy are the Sad, we discovered the second step to finding true happiness is to mourn our sins and choose the path of godly sorrow, which leads to salvation and comfort. The third step to finding true happiness can only be taken after accomplishing steps one and two. Jesus calls us to meekness. The Greek word for meek is “praus” and means gentle. In Matthew 11:29, Jesus described himself as “humble and gentle at heart,” in other words, “meek.” Not only did Jesus describe himself as meek, but He constantly displayed His meekness by yielding His power to the control and purposes of God. Jesus had power but chose not to exercise it. Meekness is Not Weakness By studying Jesus, we see that meekness is not weakness; it is power under control. A wild horse is powerful but cannot be used to accomplish the purpose of its master until it submits to the master’s direction. Just because the horse submits doesn’t mean that it is weak, only that its power is under control and can be wielded to accomplish the purpose of its master. Jesus calls the citizens of His kingdom to meekness so that God can use them to accomplish His plans and purposes. When we follow our own plans and purposes without submitting to the direction of God, we won’t accomplish God’s plans and purposes, which always far exceed our own. Blueprint for Meekness We understand that Jesus calls us to meekness, but what does meekness look like for a kingdom citizen? Psalm 37 is most likely the Old Testament teaching that Jesus was referring to when he said the meek would inherit the earth. Psalm 37 describes character traits that a person must have to be meek. To be meek, you must: 1. Trust in the Lord Meek people do not worry about God coming through on their behalf but trust the Lord with all aspects of their life. Jesus tells us in John 14:1 “Don’t let your hearts be troubled. Trust in God, and trust also in me.” Jesus continued to encourage His disciples to trust God by teaching them to pray this way: “Give us today the food we need.” (Matthew 6:11). Notice Jesus didn’t pray for God’s provision for tomorrow, only for today. He wants us to trust God day by day and not worry about tomorrow. Jesus tells the disciples in Matthew 6:25-34 not to worry about what they eat or drink, or what they wear because God will provide for them just as he does the birds and the lilies in the field. He says that these worries “dominate the thoughts of unbelievers, but your heavenly Father already knows all your needs.” He goes on to say, “Seek the Kingdom of God above all else, and live righteously, and he will give you everything you need.” Finally, He says “don’t worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will bring its own worries…” 2. Delight in the Lord Meek people delight in the Lord above all else. To delight in someone means to take pleasure in them, to make them the most important thing in your life. If you delight in someone you want to please them. Paul tells us in Ephesians 5:10 to “Carefully determine what pleases the Lord.” God has set out all we need to know about pleasing Him in His Word. The Word tells us that without faith it is impossible to please God (Hebrews 11:6). It tells us that we please God when we are spiritually, not worldly-minded (Romans 8:6-8), and when we “do good” (Hebrews 13:16). Jesus delighted in God and God delighted in Jesus. In John 8:29 Jesus said of God, “For I always do what pleases him” and in Matthew 17:5, God said of Jesus, “This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.” The Father and Son delighted in each other. Jesus is our perfect example of delighting in the Lord. 3. Commit Your Ways to the Lord The Hebrew translates the verb commit as to roll or roll onto. Meek people roll their ways onto the Lord. Peter summed this up when he said, “Give all your worries and cares to God, for he cares about you” (1st Peter 5:7). The idea is that we should trust that God will take care of all of our worries and cares. 4. Still Yourself and Wait Patiently for the Lord Meek people are still before the Lord and wait patiently for him trusting that He will take care of them in His own time. Waiting on God means recognizing that He is God and that everything worth waiting for comes from Him. David understood this well. In Psalm 62 he said, “I wait quietly before God, for my victory comes from him. He alone is my rock and my salvation, my fortress where I will never be shaken…Let all that I am wait quietly before God, for my hope is in him.” God promises us that when we wait patiently on Him that he will “renew our strength” (Isaiah 40:31) and that we will be blessed (Isaiah 30:18). 5. Refrain from Anger and Turn from Wrath The last characteristic of a meek person is the ability to refrain from anger and turn from wrath even in the face of adversity, persecution, and injustice. The meek can do this
Zeal for Our Father’s House – John 2:13-21
Shortly after Jesus’ first miracle at the wedding in Cana, Jesus and His disciples traveled to Jerusalem for the Jewish Passover celebration. Once in Jerusalem, Jesus and thousands of other Jewish people made their way to the Temple, the holiest place in the Jewish world. Upon entering the temple courts, Jesus “found men selling cattle, sheep and doves, and others sitting at tables exchanging money.” As a convenience to those traveling far, sacrificial animals were sold in the temple courts. However, to purchase these animals and pay the required temple tax, visitors needed to present an acceptable currency. Money changers stationed themselves outside the Temple to offer currency exchange services for a premium. Jesus, when seeing this, “made a whip out of cords, and drove all from the temple area, both sheep and cattle; he scattered the coins of the money changers and overturned their tables. To those who sold doves he said, “Get these out of here! How dare you turn my father’s house into a market.” John 2:13-16 The temple courts had become a place of buying and selling instead of a place of worship. Jesus Caused A Stir in the Temple Courts Imagine the disciples’ surprise when Jesus made the whip and began driving out thousands of cattle and sheep from the temple court, scattering coins and overturning tables. The disciples had not been with Jesus very long. Now Jesus was causing a stir in the temple courts and publicly declaring that He was the Son of God. John 2:17 says that Jesus’ actions reminded the disciples of the Messianic Psalm, which says, “for zeal for your house consumes me, and the insults of those who insult you fall on me.” Psalm 69:9 Jesus’ actions made it very clear that selling sacrificial animals and changing money in the temple courts was insulting to God and, therefore, insulting to Him. He certainly showed His zeal for His Father’s house, the Temple. The Temple was to be a holy place, a place of worship, yet the men selling the cattle and sheep were there to make money, not to worship God. When Jesus began driving out and scattering their profit, why didn’t they resist? Why didn’t the temple guard or nearby Roman soldiers stop Jesus? Sacrifices Are To Be Valuable One possible reason that Jesus was not stopped in the Temple is that when those in the Temple heard His words, “How dare you turn my Father’s House into a market,” they felt convicted. They knew what they were doing was wrong. They knew that the Temple was a place for worship, not profit. They knew that selling sacrifices was not keeping with God’s purpose behind requiring sacrifice. A sacrifice was to be valuable to the person offering it: that is why God required the sacrifices to be the best of a person’s flock or his field, not something that a person would feel no “sacrifice” in giving. It wasn’t until after Jesus drove out the animals, scattered coins, and overturned tables that the Jews questioned His authority: They “demanded of him, ‘What miraculous sign can you show us to prove your authority to do all this?’” John 2:18 Jesus answered them in a parable of sorts: “Destroy this temple, and I will raise it again in three days.” The Jew’s response was one of disbelief: “It has taken forty-six years to build this temple, and you are going to raise it in three days?” John 2:19-20 Jesus often used parables to explain spiritual things using earthly ideas. This time was no different. These words were prophetic to what would happen to Jesus. The Temple he spoke of was His body, which would be destroyed by death and then raised again in three days. Our Bodies Are God’s Temple Our bodies are also God’s Temple: although destroyed by sin, when we believe in Jesus, we are raised to a new life in Christ Jesus. Before Jesus’ death, God’s presence resided in the Temple behind a curtain and could only be approached by priests. But when Jesus died on the cross for our sins, this curtain was torn in two, from top to bottom, and God’s presence became available to all through Jesus Christ. Matthew 27:51 Instead of a temple in Jerusalem, God now resides in all who believe in His Son. “Do you not know that you are God’s temple and that God’s Spirit dwells in you? If anyone destroys God’s temple, God will destroy him. For God’s temple is holy, and you are that temple.” 1st Corinthians 3:16-17 We are God’s house, His Temple! Zeal for Our Father’s House When Jesus began driving out the cattle and sheep from the Temple court, scattering coins, and overturning tables, His actions were meant to “cleanse” His Father’s house, the Temple. Like Jesus, we should have zeal for our Father’s house. Instead of being complacent and allowing those things to corrupt us which do not honor God and do not accomplish His purpose, we should speak up and take action. God’s house is meant to be a place of worship and sacrifice, a holy place, a place that honors God. “Therefore, I urge you, brothers and sisters, in view of God’s mercy, to offer your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God—this is your true and proper worship.” Romans 12:1 Stop and ask yourself today: Does zeal for my Father’s house consume me? Am I offering my body as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God? I urge you not to be afraid to cleanse yourself of anything which distracts you or keeps you from focusing on your true and proper worship of the one who gave it all for us, Jesus!
The Bible: Is it Really Accurate and Reliable?
Is the Bible historically accurate? For a skeptic like me, this question demanded an answer. After all, I was being asked to base my entire life on a book written over 2,000 years ago. It is not like I could find eye witnesses to Jesus’ death and resurrection and ask them to give me an account of what they saw and heard and then compare notes. Somehow, I needed to determine whether the Bible was historically accurate and not just made-up stories. The only thing I had to rely on was what was written in the Bible, and I was not yet convinced that the Bible was a reliable source of truth. I needed to understand why so many people were convinced that the Bible was historically accurate and reliable. So I began searching and here is what I found: THE BIBLE, AN ANCIENT TEXT The Bible is an ancient, historical collection of books. The first book was written around 3,400 years ago and the last book around 1,900 years ago. Historians who study ancient texts like those written by Homer, Plato and Aristotle use certain criteria to determine their reliability. This same criteria can also be (and has been) applied to the Bible. There are three tests that historians commonly use to test the reliability and accuracy of ancient documents: 1. The bibliographical test2. The internal evidence test 3. The external evidence test When these tests are applied to the Bible, there is no doubt that the Bible is an accurate and historical document. BIBLIOGRAPHICAL TEST HAS THE BIBLE BEEN TRANSMITTED ACCURATELY? The bibliographical test helps one determine whether the Bible has been transmitted accurately. This test compares the date the original text was written to the date of the earliest copies found of that same text. The closer these two dates, the more reliable the copies. The New Testament was written between A.D. 50 and A.D. 100. So far, the earliest copy of the New Testament found is dated A.D 130. This means that there is less than 100 years between the original manuscript and the first copy that was found! Compare this to Plato, where the time span between the original and the first copy was 1,200 years and to Homer (Iliad) where there is a 500 year difference. Historians consider Plato and Homer to have been transmitted accurately. Using this same test, the accuracy of the Bible far exceeds the accuracy of these other ancient texts, a fact historians cannot deny. Dead Sea Scroll Before the discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls, the earliest copy of the Old Testament was dated around 90 A.D., which means there was a time gap of around 1,300 years between the first book written and the earliest copy discovered. This is about the same as Plato, who is considered reliable by an overwhelming majority of historians. In addition to the length of time between the original text and the earliest copy, Historians relied on how the Old Testament was transmitted to bolster its accuracy. The Old Testament was transcribed by Hebrew scribes who were bound to strict laws on how they transcribed the text, meaning mistakes in transmission were very unlikely. But until the discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls, no one knew exactly how accurate these transcriptions were. The Dead Sea Scrolls were discovered in 1947 in a cave in Qumran. The scrolls contained fragments of every book of the Bible except Esther and were dated anywhere between 250 B.C. and 50 A.D. The entire book of Isaiah, dated 75 B.C., was part of the Dead Sea discovery. This discovery closed the gap between the original text of Isaiah and the earliest copy found. In addition, when scholars compared the previous oldest copy of the book of Isaiah to the Dead Sea Isaiah, they found 95% consistency. Of the 5% variation, most variations involved omitted letters and misspellings. Scholars can confidently assert that the scribal process resulted in a very accurate transmission of the Old Testament. Another facet of the test involves the number of copies found. The more copies found, the more accurate the text is. Seven copies of Plato and 1,757 of Homer (the Iliad) have been found, whereas over 5,500 copies of the New Testament written in Greek have been found. When you add versions written in other languages to those written in Greek, there are over 24,000 copies of the New Testament. Even more impressive is that after comparing these copies, the New Testament was found to be 99.5% accurate! Only 40 lines of the New Testament are in doubt. Historians consider Plato and Homer reliable texts. The bibliographical test shows the Bible to be much more reliable than both Homer and Plato. If Homer and Plato’s authenticity has not been questioned, then why should we question the historical authenticity of the Bible? Internal Evidence Test ARE THE BIBLICAL AUTHORS CREDIBLE? The internal evidence test helps us determine whether the authors of the Bible are credible. An author’s credibility is directly related to their proximity to the reported events and the time between the event and their report. In the case of the New Testament, the authors were either eyewitnesses to the event or relaying the testimony of an eyewitness to the event. John, a disciple of Jesus, was an eyewitness to all he wrote in the Gospel of John. He said in John 21:24, “This is the disciple who testifies to these things and who wrote them down. We know that his testimony is true.” Other authors of the New Testament wrote based on eyewitness accounts. John Mark, the author of Mark, was Peter’s translator. Mark’s gospel records the teachings of Peter, who, as Jesus’s disciple, had first-hand knowledge of Jesus, his teachings, and his life. Another way to determine an author’s credibility is to examine whether he had any motivation to lie. Early Christians were persecuted and killed for proclaiming Jesus. Their enemies were numerous. Why would the New Testament authors risk their lives