Philippians (Program #13) – Holding Forth Christ

In Philippians 2:14 the apostle Paul says “do all things without murmurings and reasonings.”  This is a very small verse that many of us pass over or may be even take for granted. In today’s life study from the book of Philippians,  we are going to focus how it affects our obedience to work out our salvation to live Christ, to express Christ and to hold forth Christ.

Murmurings and reasonings that are mentioned in this verse are a big problem and frustrated our Christian life. These are two little annoying things always troubling us in our daily life to undermine the real experience and enjoyment of the Lord.  Many of us probably take not only this verse for granted but we probably take our murmuring and reasoning for granted.  We just consider this as normal path of our daily experience, but actually these are the main items that the apostle Paul is laboring not just to deliver the Philippians that we ourselves would be saved from these things. more…

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1 & 2 Chronicles (Program #6) – The Supplement to the History of the Kings of Judah (1)

Did you know that the entire books of 1 & 2 Chronicles do not talk about any of the kings of Israel but they only talk about the kings of Judah?  We got a special life study program for today, we hope you stay with us.

We have quite an enlightening message with us today to see even what is the difference between Judah and Israel…

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Philippians (Program #12) – Working Out Our Salvation

“Work out your own salvation with fear and trembling.”  This is the apostle Paul’s word to us in Philippians 2:12. It seems to be nearly a contradiction to the verses in Ephesians chapter 2 which tells us that salvation is the gift of God and not of works. Well, we will try to unravel the seeming paradox of today’s life study of the Bible. We are going to look at both aspects, both sides of God’s salvation today.

Let’s take a look back for a moment before we get into this topic specifically, yesterday we saw the verses 2:5 -11 Christ in our salvation is really our pattern and today we have the working out of this full salvation. What is the connection that we are going to see?

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1 & 2 Chronicles (Program #5) – Being Fundamental in the Full and Walking According to the All-Inclusive Spirit

The children of Israel were already in degradation when ten of the twelve tribes separated following the leadership of Jeroboam.  This act of division was further compounded when they established an alternate place of worship, far from Jerusalem in the northern region of Dan.  The result was two kingdoms under two kings, fully breaking the principle of oneness that the Lord has established for them in Deuteronomy 12 when He declared time after time that His choice was Jerusalem and all the children of Israel must come uniquely to Jerusalem to present their offerings and worship Jehovah.  But two of the tribes under the kingship of Rehoboam, Solomon’s son remained faithful to God’s command and kept Jerusalem and the temple as their center.  Thou this pleased Jehovah and preserved a measure of blessing upon them, still the Lord was strict and willing to discipline both the kings and the people whenever their hearts strayed from Him and the law of Moses that He had commanded them to keep.

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Philippians (Program #11) – The Exaltation of Christ

Philippians chapter 2 deals with the exaltation of Christ and Paul about that very topic has this to say in verses 9 through 11. “God highly exalted Him and bestowed on Him the name which is above every name, that in the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of those who are in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue should openly confess that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God the Father.”  That’s the inspirational portion in the New Testament.

A striking feature of our program today that the exaltation of Christ rather than something apart from us and far away from us that took place or will take place in the heavens, not so.  Actually there is the participation in an experiential aspect of that we are very much privilege to have a portion in and that’s our treat today.

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1 & 2 Chronicles (Program #4) – Learning from the Examples of the Kings of Judah to Have a God-Man Living in Our Daily Life

Not long after the death of King Solomon, David’s son, the nation of Israel separated and became two kingdoms.  Solomon’s son Rehoboam became king in Jerusalem and ruled on the throne.  But another one Jeroboam departed from Jerusalem and led ten of the twelve tribes away establishing the northern kingdom called Israel with a different center of worship in Dan far in the north.  In the book of Deuteronomy, Jehovah made it clear that He had chosen only one place on this entire earth to be the center for His worship.  To break this God ordained principle is an abomination in the eyes of Jehovah.  Listen to His word in Deuteronomy in 12 “but you shall seek the Lord at the place which the Lord your God shall choose from all your tribes to establish His name there for His dwelling and there you shall come.  You shall not do at all what we are doing here today, every man doing whatever is right in his own eyes.  Be careful that you do not offer your burnt offering in every place you see, but in the place which the Lord chose.”

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Philippians (Program #10) – Taking Christ as Our Pattern

The apostle Paul said for us to be an imitators of Christ in Philippians 2: 5-9 gives us a pattern to imitate. But how so we, fallen human beings, imitate the pattern of such an excellent Christ?

In the matter of taking Christ as our pattern, Philippians 2:5-9 says “Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus, Who, existing in the form of God, did not consider being equal with God a treasure to be grasped, but emptied Himself, taking the form of a slave, becoming in the likeness of men, and being found in the fashion as a man, He humbled himself, becoming obedient even unto death, and that the death of a cross. Therefore also God highly exalted Him and bestowed on Him the name which is above every name.”

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1 & 2 Chronicles (Program #3) – The Highest Point of God’s Gospel

It is clear from the first two chapters of the Bible that the center and focus of God’s creative work was man.  Genesis 1:26 “and God said let us make man in our image after our likeness.”  In Zechariah God focus is even more graphic, in chapter 12 verse 1 it says “the burden of the word of Jehovah concerning Israel thus said Jehovah who stretches forth the heavens and lays the foundation of the earth forms the spirit of man within him.”  God’s goal was with man.  His eternal purpose was with man.  But Old Testament declaration like these refer to man’s status before he fell.  So the question for us today is “did the focus, the center and the plan of God changed with the fall of man or is the original purpose still intact?”  The New Testament answer this question with crystal clarity.  Ephesians 1:9 “making known to us the mystery of His will according to His good pleasure which He purposed in Himself unto the economy of the fullness of the times to head up all things in Christ, the things in the heavens and the things on the earth in Him.”

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Philippians (Program #9) – The Believers’ Support to the Apostle

The book of Philippians is concern with the experience and the enjoyment of Christ and this issue in our joy and rejoicing yet among the Philippians believers there were much dissension in their thinking.  Dissension which troubled the apostle Paul, he even asked them to think the same thing, even think the same one thing that in this way they may make his joy full.  Paul had given them such positive fellowship in the first chapter now he desires them to return this fellowship to support him in his imprisonment. This mutual fellowship in the Body of Christ is what we are looking at in today’s life study of the Bible in the book of Philippians.

The apostle is not nearly as bothered as it seems by his imprisonment in this Roman jail as it was by the fact the Philippians believers were not of the same mind, were not thinking the same thing. more…

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1 & 2 Chronicles (Program #2) – The Reproduction of God

The books of 1 & 2 Chronicles are unique among the books of history in the Old Testament in that they traced the history of God’s move in man, all the way back to Adam.  We know the story, “in the beginning God created the universe”.  But one in that universe rebelled against God, corrupting and ruining His entire creation thereby.  So God came in and restored the spoiled situation and in the process, created man in His image and with His likeness.  This makes man unique in all of God’s creation.  For man’s destiny as revealed in God’s word is that “he is of God’s kind” with the capacity to contain God’s life and nature, making him not just a good man but making him through God’s full salvation, a duplication of Christ, the first God-man.

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