Ephesians (Program #45) – Living in Love and Light

Human beings are very good imitators.  We all tend to copy the behavior of the others that we esteem highly. We teach our children to imitate. And even society as a whole is all the time encouraging positive role models.

The apostle Paul tells us that we should imitate his pattern. But he goes further in Ephesians 5 where he commands us not just to imitate him or even other apostles but to imitate God. Ephesians 5:1 “Be therefore imitators of God.”

Well, much as we may want to as mortal man we simply cannot do it. Even as Christians is beyond our reach. But there must be a way or else the word of God would not command us to do it. The key lays in the second half of the verse. Listen carefully, “…Be therefore imitators of God, as beloved children.”

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Ephesians (Program #9) – To Head Up All Things in Christ (1)

The book of Ephesians presents the highest view in the entire New Testament. The apostle Paul identifies the focus of this book in the very first chapter when he says, “Making known to us the mystery of His will, according to His good pleasure which He purposed in Himself, Unto to 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;” (Ephesians 1:9-10) This is not a book about improved behavior, how to raise our children or even how to have a successful marriage; yet in one sense, it’s on all these things. But fundamentally this book is altogether dealing with God’s eternal purpose which is according to His good pleasure and on how He is working in the world situation without and more specifically on how He is working within us to bring this purpose into reality.

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Deuteronomy (Program #8) – The Rehearsal of the Law (1)

The word Deuteronomy means a second speaking or re-speaking . In Deuteronomy what is been re-spoken by Moses to the assembled nation of Israel was the commandments, the law, the ten commandments, the ordinances, statues and judgments. These were originally given to the people some 38 years prior at Mt Sinai.  The reason for this repeating of the word is that Moses was facing a new generation that had grown up after the law was originally given to their fathers. By now the fathers were all dead. And God’s purpose was with this new, young generation.

The words here of Moses, are the words of a loving, caring father’s speaking to his children. How much all of us as God’s children today needs to hear His word spoken again and again and how much even we ourselves shall speak this word to our own children again and again.

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Galatians (Program #24) – Two Covenants and Two Kinds of Children

When we get saved, Christ gets into us. Then as we learn to walk in Him, we experience Him living in us. But still, this is not the goal. In Galatians 4:19, Paul says, “My children, with whom I travail again in birth until Christ is formed in you”. It’s not until Christ is formed in us that we enter the full blessing of the Gospel. Don’t miss today’s life study of the Bible.

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Galatians (Program #19) – Faith Replacing Law

The coming of the Lord Jesus Christ brought in a complete change in the way God dealt with men. His desire today is to bring a rich and bountiful supply of His Spirit to all His children. But, how do we receive this supply? Galatians 3:5 says, “He therefore who bountifully supplies to you the Spirit and does works of power among you, does He do it out of the works of law or out of the hearing of faith?” Are we still struggling under the law or are we receiving the Spirit through faith? Stay tuned for today’s life study of the Bible.

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John (Program #7) – An Introduction to Life and Building (3)

The message we have covered tells us that Christ, as the Word, came as life and light for the purpose to produce many children. Keep this clear point within you deeply. John chapter 1:4 tells us that Christ as the Word, which was God Himself, came as life to us and as light shining with us for the purpose to produce, to bring forth many children of God, that God may have the enlargement, that God may have a corporate expression. This is revealed in the first 13 verses in chapter 1.

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Jonah (Program #1) – Jehovah’s Care and Salvation to the Most Evil City of the Gentiles

One of the most popular stories in the Old Testament and frequently the topic of children Sunday school lesson is the story of Jonah and the great fish. In case you had forgotten the story let me remind you by reading a few verses from the book of Jonah:

1 Now the word of Jehovah came to Jonah the son of Amittai, saying,

2 Arise, go to Nineveh, the great city, and cry out against it, for their evil has come up before Me. more…

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1 John (Program #23) – The Virtues of the Divine Birth to Practice the Divine Righteousness (1)

The book of 1 John though short in length is anything but short in its’ spiritual content.  This short epistle conveys some of the richest and deepest thought in all of the New Testament. Even its’ sequence is marvelous. Beginning with the divine life and the fellowship of the life which is our participation in God’s life. It then moves on to the teaching of the anointing. Which as we had already seen and is crucial to the experience and growth of every believer. Finally it come to the last main section that of the virtues of the divine life that we possess by the divine birth. And it is here that we see the progression brought to its’ consummation. That the children of God become His eternal expression and counterpart. All in this short book of 1 John.

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1 John (Program #19) – Experiencing the Teaching of the Anointing Concerning the Triune God

Let me post a question as we begin today to all of the spiritual matured ones. Let say you are with a new young believer, the question is how should you help to teach this one concerning the deep reality in truth of God?  Yes, the very Triune God, the God of the Bible.

Of course there are great theological issues that play in such a consideration, the mysterious aspects of God being simultaneously three and yet uniquely one. Should all the new believers then be required to complete a thorough seminary course on the Trinity before they can truly know God?   Well, the Bible addresses this very point in 1 John 2:20 & 27, “little children, …you have an anointing from the Holy One, and all of you know.….. And .., the anointing which you have received from Him abides in you, and you have no need that anyone teach you; but as His anointing teaches you concerning all things and is true and is not a lie, and even as it has taught you, abide in Him.“

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1 John (Program #16) – Conditions of the Divine Fellowship (9)

John first epistle as a continuation of his gospel stresses the eternal life. And specifically the fellowship or flow of this divine life that is available for all of us as His children to experience.

But though our salvation is unconditional there are conditions for us to stay in the fellowship of life experimentally. The first of this condition is found in chapter one and this is a basic requirement for every believer to maintain their enjoyment of Christ as life.

1 John 1:7, 9
7 “But if we walk in the light as He 1is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus His Son cleanses us from every sin.”

9 “If we confess our sins, He is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness.”

Keeping sure account by confessing our sins before God is vitally important. But John brings us another important condition for maintaining the fellowship of life and that is to love the brothers.

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