1 & 2 Kings (Program #19) – The Reign of Jehoahaz, Jehoiakim, Jehoiachin, & Zedekiah over Judah and the Governing of Gedallia

In the final chapters of 2 Kings, the Lord was ultimately forced to give up His people Israel because of their continual degradation and the hardness of their hearts.  Even when He allowed the Syrians to conquer the northern kingdom of Israel and carried them away into captivity those in the southern kingdom of Judah refused to heed this warning and continue in their evil ways.  Eventually the great king of Babylon, Nebuchadnezzar invaded Jerusalem, destroyed the temple and the walls of the city and took the king Zedekiah to Babylon.  Soon the entire nation of Israel was taken in captivity.  But through the following several hundred years though the nation of Israel was never again fully restored, Jehovah maintained a linage of the descendant of King David until ultimately Christ, the promised seed of David could be brought forth in Israel.  This maintained God’s original intention and made possible both our redemption and our regeneration.

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1 & 2 Kings (Program #4) – The Reign of Solomon (3)

More than a thousand years before the birth of Christ, in 1012 B.C. that was 480 years after God had brought the children of Israel out of Egypt, Solomon began to build the temple, the House of Jehovah.  Today on the life study of 1 Kings, we are going to talk some aspects of the temple that I am pretty sure that you have never heard before.

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Exodus (Program #161) – The Workers of the Tabernacle, the Furniture and the Priestly Garment – Skillful Works, the Workmanship

God’s calling is a wonderful and mysterious thing.  He calls many people to many different works.  But the highest call to all of His people, regardless of our personal interests or desires is to be fully occupied in the building up of His habitation.  In the Old Testament it was first the tabernacle and later the temple.  But today this building work and our calling is related to the church.

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1 Corinthians (Program #19) – Growth in Life Needed (2)

In first Corinthians the apostle Paul confronts the difficult situation in the church there in a very wise way. He first identifies that their problems would due primarily to a shortage of the growth in the divine life. Although they had received the initial gifts of the divine life and the Holy Spirit they were still infants or babes in Christ.

He then unveils to them the marvelous progression of God’s economy. First they need to realize that they are all plants growing on God’s farms. Then the goal is to be built up together into a building and finally that this building is destined to become God’s dwelling place, His temple.

How about you and me? Have we received such a vision, such a revelation or are we like the Corinthians satisfied to remain in our spiritual infancy and hang on to personal preferences in our own traditions?

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1 Corinthians (Program #16) – The Church, God’s Farm, God’s Building (1)

The first two chapters of Paul’s first letter to the Corinthians are very rich in their presentation of Christ. Paul clearly was doing all he could to bring the troubled Corinthians to Christ in their experience.

But in Chapter three Paul turns his focus to the church. Though not in shallow or superficial language rather he speaks in marvelous profound expressions referring to the church in types.  First as a farm growing, producing a rich crop. Then as a building and ultimately as a temple, a divine dwelling place, build out of priceless materials such as gold, silver and precious stones. Of course these materials are not literally either but types of the transformation work that the Holy Spirit is engaged in with all of us, God’s redeemed.

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John (Program #24) – The Need of the Thirsty – Life’s Quenching (2)

Today the Lord does not expect a welcome in religion, but He surely appreciates His lovers, His seekers, those who enjoy Him, not in the temple but in their little house. That’s where He is.

The Gospel of John frequently uses the feasts as a background for the presentation of Christ, the Son of God as life to us. In chapter 6, the background was the feast of Passover, the first of the annual feasts. In chapter 7, the background is the feast of tabernacles: the last of the annual feasts, a time of celebration, and joy, and in a sense success in the harvest. The Lord uses this feast as a background to address the need of the thirsty, and to present life as the unique capacity to quench the thirst of human beings.

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Luke (Program #39) – The Ministry of the Man-Savior in His Human Virtues with His Divine Attributes from Galilee to Jerusalem (19)

Luke Chapter 18 presents us with a parable of two men going up to the temple to pray. One, a religious leader, a Pharisee, and the other a sinner even an evil extortioner. The contrast in their prayer gives us an interesting insight into why the Lord Jesus was drawn not to the so called righteous but to the unrighteous, those who knew they were in captivity and in need of the Jubilee.

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Zechariah (Program #9) – The Prophecies of Encouragement (1)

About 2500 years ago, the prophet Zechariah’s burden was to help the returned people of Israel to see God’s purpose. Today, God’s intention and His desire is that we will be one with Him. He’s brought us back to the very site, to the ground, even to the foundation of the temple typified by the recovery back to Jerusalem from Babylon in Zechariah’s day. Now God wants us to see that His interest, His desire and His burden are to finish the building of the temple, to build up the Body of Christ.

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Zechariah (Program #3) – The Visions of Consolation and Promise (2)

Zechariah chapter 2 is one of the mysterious chapters in the Bible and to be sure the book of Zechariah is considered quite mysterious by many, if not most believers. A man with a measuring line appears in verse 1 and this man is measuring Jerusalem. Then, Jehovah declares that He will be the glory within Jerusalem and the fire round about her protecting the city and His people and its inhabitants. All of this is against the backdrop of the previous seventy years of history where Jehovah seemingly was silent and inactive. What has caused the Lord to rise up and take such an active and vigorous stand on behalf of His people?  The answer is clear – His people has returned from captivity in Babylon and they are re-inhabiting Jerusalem and Jehovah is re-inhabiting His house, the temple.

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Haggai (Program #1) – The Building of the House of Jehovah in Relation to Israel’s Welfare and Messiah’s Coming

Some of the most penetrating words in all of Scriptures are found in the Old Testament Prophet, Haggai. They are penetrating because they have immediate relevant to every believer. And they touch us in some of the most carefully guarded places in our hearts.

“Is it time for you yourself to dwell in your paneled-up houses?” he writes, “while this house,” God’s House “lies waste?..Consider your ways, you sown much but you bring in little, you eat but there is no satisfaction.”

Haggai was a prophet raised up by the Lord to accompany His people on their return to Judah and Jerusalem following the 70 long years of captivity in Babylon. And when they returned they faced the temple, God’s house in ruin and in desperate need of rebuilding. But they like so many of us today have become completely preoccupied and engrossed with their own needs and situations. And the result as imply by Haggai probing questions is that, in spit of all of their effort and dedication without God’s hand of blessing in their lives, they and we would never be satisfied regardless of how much material wealth or possession we acquired. These are questions that must be asked again and again among God’s people.

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