There are two ways to be fooled. One is to believe what isn’t true; the other is to refuse to believe what is true. —Soren Kierkegaard. "…truth is true even if nobody believes it, and falsehood is false even if everybody believes it. That is why truth does not yield to opinion, fashion, numbers, office, or sincerity–it is simply true and that is the end of it" – Os Guinness, Time for Truth, pg.39. “He that takes truth for his guide, and duty for his end, may safely trust to God’s providence to lead him aright.” – Blaise Pascal. "There is but one straight course, and that is to seek truth and pursue it steadily" – George Washington letter to Edmund Randolph — 1795. We live in a “post-truth” world. According to the dictionary, “post-truth” means, “relating to or denoting circumstances in which objective facts are less influential in shaping public opinion than appeals to emotion and personal belief.” Simply put, we now live in a culture that seems to value experience and emotion more than truth. Truth will never go away no matter how hard one might wish. Going beyond the MSM idealogical opinion/bias and their low information tabloid reality show news with a distractional superficial focus on entertainment, sensationalism, emotionalism and activist reporting – this blogs goal is to, in some small way, put a plug in the broken dam of truth and save as many as possible from the consequences—temporal and eternal. "The further a society drifts from truth, the more it will hate those who speak it." – George Orwell “There are two ways to be fooled. One is to believe what isn’t true; the other is to refuse to believe what is true.” ― Soren Kierkegaard
7 The law of the Lord is perfect,
reviving the soul;
the testimony of the Lord is sure,
making wise the simple;
8 the precepts of the Lord are right,
rejoicing the heart;
the commandment of the Lord is pure,
enlightening the eyes;
9 the fear of the Lord is clean,
enduring forever;
the rules of the Lord are true,
and righteous altogether.
10 More to be desired are they than gold,
even much fine gold;
sweeter also than honey
and drippings of the honeycomb.
11 Moreover, by them is your servant warned;
in keeping them there is great reward.
COMMENTARY
7–11 The revelation of God’s law is clearer than the revelation in nature. Nature “declares,” “proclaims,” “pours forth,” and “displays” the revelation of God’s majesty, wisdom, and power. But the revelation of the law is greater. It is greater because it is given by the covenantal God, whose name is Yahweh (“Lord,” vv. 7, 8, 9), whereas nature reveals the glory of the Creator-God (El, v. 1; see Reflections, p. 250, Yahweh Is El). It is also greater because of the comprehensive nature of the revelation. This is brought out by the choice of the synonyms for God’s revelation—“law,” “statutes” (v. 7); “precepts,” “commands” (v. 8); and “fear,” “ordinances” (v. 9; see Reflections, p. 220, The Word of God). The synonyms are not to be studied in abstraction but give a comprehensive emphasis that all of the words of the Lord are beneficial. Although the benefits of natural revelation are with us on a daily basis (day, night, heat [vv. 2, 6]), how much greater are the comprehensive benefits of God’s revelation in the law! The list of four benefits (vv. 7–8) is given to encourage the godly to embrace the law of God as an expression of his wisdom. The rewards (v. 11) of responsiveness to the revelation of God are compared to gold (v. 10; cf. Pr 3:13–18; 8:19) and to honey (cf. Pr 16:24).
The benefits are set forth propositionally (vv. 7–9). First, God’s word “revives” (cf. v. 7). Its restorative quality gives healing to the whole person by assuring forgiveness and cleansing and by giving life to the godly. It unleashes the promises of God by his gracious redemptive acts (80:3, 7, 19). Second, God’s word is the source of “wisdom” to all who are ready to receive it (v. 7; cf. 119:130; Pr 21:11). Both the inexperienced (“the simple,” v. 7; cf. Pr 1:4) and the wise develop as they begin with “the fear of the Lord” (v. 9; cf. Dt 4:10; Pr 1:7) and embrace the will of God in all aspects of life (cf. Pr 1:2–6). Third, God’s word gives “joy” (v. 8a). The heartfelt joy is equivalent to inner peace and tranquillity as one loves God with all one’s heart, i.e., with one’s innermost being. Fourth, God’s word gives “light to the eyes” (v. 8b). The internal joy radiates through the eyes. It expresses the joy of being alive and of receiving God’s blessings (cf. 13:3). Thus Yahweh has made the sun for light in creation and has given his word for light in redemption.
The reason the revelation of God in his word is superior to natural revelation lies in its clarity and openness to all. God’s written revelation manifests a perfect internal harmony between God and his word. God’s word reflects God’s integrity, uprightness, and fidelity (cf. 18:25—NIV, “blameless”). It is “trustworthy” (v. 7b) in the sense that his statutes are true in principle and are verifiable in the situations of life (cf. 93:5; 111:7). It is “right” in the sense of straightforward and just. God’s word is not perverse or crooked but encourages the godly to be upright. The Bible is an “open” book; there is no hypocrisy in it. It is “radiant,” i.e., “pure,” and its purity effects the clean and upright way of those who are “pure” (cf. 18:26). It is “pure” or “flawless” (v. 9), being “refined” like silver (cf. 12:6). It is “enduring forever” (v. 9), as it does not change with the times and the incessant variations in fashion. God’s word is always “in.” It is “sure” (v. 9, “faithful,” “true”; cf. 119:151, 160), as it reflects the fidelity and loyalty of God (cf. Rev 16:7; 19:2). It is “righteous,” as it reflects God’s righteousness. It is sweet like the finest honey (v. 10). These metaphors refer to the great value of God’s word in terms of its effects on those who observe them. It causes integrity, loyalty, uprightness, purity, and growth in righteousness (vv. 7–9).
The efficacy of God’s revelation is set forth by the synonyms for law, the characteristics of the word, and the beneficial effects on the godly. The word of God in itself, in its revelatory qualities and its transforming effects in the godly, is, therefore, of greater value than the most valuable objects of man’s striving: money (= “gold”; cf. 119:72) and fine food (v. 10; cf. 119:103). It keeps the wise on the narrow path by forewarning them of possible pitfalls (v. 11a) and by guiding them on to the rewards of godliness—life, God-given joy, wisdom, and contentment (vv. 7–9; cf. Pr 22:4; 1 Ti 4:8; 6:6). The repetitious use of “your servant” (vv. 11, 13; cf. superscription, Ps 18) bears out the willingness of the psalmist in doing God’s will. The word “servant” (ʿebed) applies to one who either by appointment, office, or choice commits himself or herself to the execution of someone else’s will—in this context, the covenantal Lord.
By this My Father is glorified, that you bear much fruit; so you will be My disciples.
John 15:8
Most people probably think we should be saved for reasons other than to glorify God. Many Christians will usually give the following as the reasons they witness:
To keep people out of hell. They want them to avoid eternal punishment.
To manifest God’s love.
To obey Christ’s command. In Matthew 28:18–20 and Acts 1:8, Jesus tells us to evangelize.
Those are all valid, biblical reasons for evangelism, but the main reason we should preach the gospel is for the glory of God.[1]
February 5
God Is Three
“The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit, be with you all.”
2 Corinthians 13:14
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Though there is only one God, He exists in three Persons: God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit.
God is one, but He exists in three distinct Persons. We call this the Trinity, a contraction of “tri–unity,” meaning “three in one.” The word Trinity doesn’t appear in the Bible, but God’s existence as three Persons in one God is clear from Scripture.
Old Testament evidence of God’s plurality can be found in the very first verse: “In the beginning God …” (Gen. 1:1). The Hebrew word used for God is Elohim, which is a plural noun. Isaiah 42:1 speaks of the Messiah: “Behold, My Servant, whom I uphold; My chosen one in whom My soul delights. I have put My Spirit upon Him; He will bring forth justice to the nations.” The Messiah says in Isaiah 48:16, “The Lord God has sent Me, and His Spirit.”
The New Testament is more explicit about God’s triune nature. After Jesus’ baptism, the Spirit of God descended upon Him as a dove, and the Father said, “This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well–pleased” (Matt. 3:17). The Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are together in the same scene.
Jesus says, “And I will ask the Father, and He will give you another Helper, that He may be with you forever; that is the Spirit of truth” (John 14:16–17). Paul closes 2 Corinthians by saying, “The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit, be with you all” (13:14). Peter declares that believers are chosen “according to the foreknowledge of God the Father, by the sanctifying work of the Spirit, that you may obey Jesus Christ” (1 Peter 1:2).
So God is one, but God is three. This is a profound mystery that no human illustration can adequately describe and no scientific explanation can prove. The Trinity is something we have to take on faith, because God has taught it in Scripture.
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Suggestions for Prayer: Praise God that He is so far above our finite understanding, yet has chosen to reveal Himself to us.
For Further Study: Read John 14–16. What does Jesus teach about His relationship with the Father and the Spirit? ✧ What do you learn here about the different functions or ministries of each member of the Trinity?[2]
FEBRUARY 5
GOD SPEAKS TO MEN
God, who at sundry times and in divers manners spake in time past unto the fathers by the prophets, hath in these last days spoken unto us by his Son, whom he hath appointed heir of all things, by whom also he made the worlds.
—Hebrews 1:1-2
I think it may be accepted as axiomatic that God is constantly trying to speak to men. He desires to communicate Himself, to impart holy ideas to those of His creatures capable of receiving them.
This divine impulse toward self-expression may account for the creation, particularly for God’s having made intelligent and moral beings who could hear and understand truth. Among these beings man stands at the top, having been created in the image of God and so possessing purer and finer organs for the apprehension of whatever can be known of God. The Second Person of the Godhead is called the Word of God, that is, the mind of God in expression….
That the creative voice of God is constantly sounding throughout the creation is a truth forgotten by modern Christianity. Yet it was by His word that He called the world into being and it is by His word that all things are held together. It is the still voice of God in the heart of every human being that renders everyone culpable before the bar of God’s judgment and convicts of sin even those who have never been exposed to the written word. GTM007,009
Lord, may I make use of the intellect You have given me and open my ears to hear Your voice today. Amen.[3]
February 5
Kingdom Good News and Jesus’ Healings
Jesus was going throughout all Galilee, teaching in their synagogues and proclaiming the gospel of the kingdom, and healing every kind of disease and every kind of sickness among the people.—Matt. 4:23
Gospel means “good news,” and it was the good news of God’s kingdom—around which all of Jesus’ teaching revolved—that He preached throughout Galilee. His emphasis never veered off into politics, economics, social activism, or resolution of personal disputes, which is as it should be for any faithful gospel messenger.
Jesus’ primary teaching was always the divine good news—God’s gracious offer to deliver sinners “from the domain of darkness … to the kingdom of His beloved Son” where they are saved and forgiven of their sins (Col. 1:13–14).
Initially, synagogues were the places where Jesus proclaimed the good news, the places where sincere, God-fearing Jews came to worship and hear God’s Word. Essentially, it was in those facilities that Jesus expected to find receptive audiences to His words, but He did not restrict His outreach to the people of Israel. The basic message of entering the sphere of God’s rule by faith in the saving gospel was and always has been open to anyone who trusts Christ’s invitation.
Jesus’ powerful, eternal words were unlike the words any other teacher had ever proclaimed. Even His fellow residents of Nazareth knew this and “were speaking well of Him, and wondering at the gracious words which were falling from His lips” (Luke 4:22). People at Capernaum also “were amazed at His teaching, for His message was with authority” (v. 32). Jesus’ teaching on the kingdom of God and His subsequent healings were the surest credentials that the Father had sent Him.
ASK YOURSELF
Jesus’ priorities were plainly obvious by the way He conducted Himself and the activities He chose to involve Himself in on a typical day. How would you enumerate your own priorities? And what day-to-day actions of yours back this up?[4]
FEBRUARY 5
BOTH LORD AND CHRIST
God hath made the same Jesus…both Lord and Christ.
Acts 2:36
No Christian believer should ever forget what the Bible says about the Person and the offices of the eternal Son, the Christ of God.
“God hath made the same Jesus, whom ye have crucified, both Lord and Christ” (Acts 2:36). Jesus means Savior; Lord means Sovereign; Christ means Anointed One.
The Apostle Peter did not proclaim Jesus only as Savior—he preached to them Jesus as Lord and Christ and Savior, never dividing His Person or His offices.
Remember, also, the declaration of Paul: “If thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus…thou shalt be saved” (Romans 10:9).
Three times in the passage to the Roman Christians telling how to be saved, Paul calls Jesus “Lord.” He says that faith in the Lord Jesus plus confession of that faith to the world brings salvation to us!
Sovereign Lord, You are the One I choose to serve. Help me to meditate on this truth as I journey through some mundane tasks today.[5]
February 5
The Joy of Faithful Service
“Paul and Timothy, bond-servants of Christ Jesus . . .” (Phil. 1:1).
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A faithful slave fulfills the will of his master.
The metaphor of Christians as slaves to Christ is common in Paul’s writings. It is one his readers would have readily understood because of the prevalence of slavery in the Roman Empire.
Peter, James, John, and Jude used the same metaphor of their own ministries, as did Jesus in Mark 10:45—“The Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give His life a ransom for many.” In Philippians 2:7 Paul refers to Christ as a bond-servant who set aside the glory He was due and humbled Himself to the point of death.
The Greek word translated “bond-servant” in Philippians 1:1 was commonly used of those who, out of devotion to their masters, chose to remain as slaves though having the opportunity to be released. They were also known as love slaves because they served out of love, not compulsion.
That is a beautiful picture of the believer. We are God’s “bond-servants” (Rev. 1:1), “having been freed from sin and enslaved to God” (Rom. 6:22).
While slavery brings to mind deprivation and inhumane treatment of one’s fellowman, slaves in the Roman Empire usually were treated with dignity and respect. Although most had no personal possessions, their masters supplied everything they needed for life and health. Additionally, many were entrusted with significant responsibilities in their master’s home.
A disobedient or self-willed slave was of no use to his master, but faithful slaves who set aside their personal interests to accomplish their master’s will were valued highly.
Jesus said, “My food is to do the will of Him who sent Me, and to accomplish His work” (John 4:34). As God’s bond-servant, that should be your goal as well. Be faithful, so God can use you mightily.
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Suggestions for Prayer: Thank God for the privilege of serving Him. ✧ Seek wisdom to appropriate your spiritual resources as you perform the tasks God has entrusted to you.
For Further Study: The book of Philemon is a letter Paul wrote to accompany Onesimus, a runaway slave whom Paul had led to the Lord and was now returning to his master, Philemon. ✧ Read Philemon. ✧ What was Paul’s desire for Onesimus? ✧ What does this letter reveal about Philemon’s character?[6]
FEBRUARY 5
CHRIST’S VICTORY RIGHTFULLY BELONGS TO US
…In all things it behoved him to be made like unto his brethren….
HEBREWS 2:17
“Is it possible to be a true Christian and still suffer in the doldrums of discouragement?”
This is a question that we are hearing often. Frankly, I cannot assure you whether Christians should know discouragement or not: I can only tell you that they all do! Inwardly, they are often heavyhearted, defeated, unhappy and a little bit frightened—yet they are Christians!
What we need, brethren, is to get the true scriptural vision of our victorious Lord, our victorious human brother. Paul wrote to the Philippians about Jesus Christ humbling Himself and becoming obedient even unto the death of the cross, and then: “Wherefore, God also hath highly exalted him and given him a name which is above every name” and “every tongue shall confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God, the Father.”
Now, that is our victorious Lord, our victorious human brother.
Someone may say: “It is no great news to say that God is victorious.”
But what we read in the New Testament is that God has joined His nature to the nature of man and has made a Man victorious, so that men might be victorious and overcoming in that Man!
God has made Him to be Head of the Church and He meanwhile waits for the time of His returning, guiding and keeping and instructing His Church. This He does by the Holy Spirit through the Word of God![7]
[1] MacArthur, J. (2001). Truth for today : a daily touch of God’s grace (p. 48). Nashville, Tenn.: J. Countryman.
[2] MacArthur, J. (1997). Strength for today. Wheaton, IL: Crossway Books.
[3] Tozer, A. W., & Eggert, R. (2015). Tozer on the almighty god: a 365-day devotional. Chicago, IL: Moody Publishers.
[4] MacArthur, J. (2008). Daily readings from the life of Christ (p. 44). Chicago: Moody Publishers.
[5] Tozer, A. W. (2015). Mornings with tozer: daily devotional readings. Chicago, IL: Moody Publishers.
[6] MacArthur, J. F., Jr. (1993). Drawing Near—Daily Readings for a Deeper Faith (p. 48). Wheaton, IL: Crossway Books.
[7] Tozer, A. W., & Smith, G. B. (2015). Evenings with tozer: daily devotional readings. Chicago, IL: Moody Publishers.
Denny Burk, Professor of Biblical Studies at Boyce College, has a warning for people of faith:
There is a controversy brewing in the White House that religious voters had better start paying attention to. As I wrote yesterday, there is one faction that wants to keep President Obama’s 2014 LGBT executive order in place, and there is another faction that wants to oppose it with an executive order protecting religious liberty. Politico reports today about who is leading the factions and where this conflict is going:
Jared Kushner and Ivanka Trump helped lead the charge to scuttle a draft executive order that would have overturned Obama-era enforcements of LGBT rights in the workplace, multiple sources with knowledge of the situation told POLITICO.
A draft executive order on LGBT rights — which outlines how to roll back former president Barack Obama’s protections and expand legal exemptions based on religious beliefs — has been circulating among journalists and worried progressive groups this week.
But two sources close to Kushner and Ivanka Trump, who have in the past been supporters of gay rights, said the young couple were both in favor of putting out a clear statement from the president, promising to uphold the 2014 Obama executive order and stopping the momentum for the turnaround in its tracks.
This demonically inspired world agitator, who has manipulated the most vulnerable people in each free nation across the globe, has at last been outed by people who have had enough. I believe that the internet has much to do with bringing George Soros out of the shadows, and into the light.
“For everyone who does evil hates the Light, and does not come to the Light for fear that his deeds will be exposed. But he who practices the truth comes to the Light, so that his deeds may be manifested as having been wrought in God” (John 3:20-21). NASB
The “Light” is the the light of the truth of Jesus Christ. This is why atheists who claim there is no God, fight tooth and nail against anything “Christian” in our society. They hate the light because they love their sin and do not wish to…
More than 13,000 Americans registered to buy a home in New Zealand — 17 times the usual rate — in the week after Donald Trump was elected president.
You’re all set — your bags were packed long ago, there’s a dozen solid gold coins stashed inside your belt and a pistol strapped round your waist. There’s no need to say goodbye to the wife and children as they’re already waiting for you 6,000 miles away in New Zealand, having slipped off quietly at the first whiff of global catastrophe.
Now, they’re making themselves comfortable in that fortress home you’ve spent years preparing. They’ve got store-loads of food and enough guns and ammunition to start World War III – which might, anyway, have begun by the time you arrive.
The high-powered motorbike you’ve never used is waiting outside to whisk you to the private airport where your plane sits waiting. A helicopter-ride at the other end, pull up the drawbridge — yes, you have one — and you’re ready to wait, for years if necessary, for civilization to return.
Billionaire Peter Thiel’s New Zealand Citizenship Raises Questions
Never mind the warnings about stocking up on vegetables after awful weather has ravaged the Mediterranean farming belt. Some of America’s richest people are spending billions quietly preparing for a global Apocalypse.
The world of Doomsday survivalists or ‘Preppers’ — those preparing themselves for total social collapse — is usually associated with wild-eyed eco-beardies hiding in the woods. But the existence of a very different group of Preppers was laid bare by a political row in New Zealand this week.
Attracted by a remote First World country that has the potential to be self-sufficient and is on no one’s list of nuclear targets, the super-rich kings of Silicon Valley and Wall Street are buying up vast tracts of its land — in anticipation of the day when they may need to live there.
The controversy has revealed the extraordinary precautions being taken by the mega- rich to ensure that WTSHTF — a crude survivalist acronym for ‘when the **** hits the fan’ — they and their loved ones will be safe and comfortable.
What the catastrophe will precisely be remains unclear, but possibilities include a devastating asteroid impact, giant earthquake, nuclear war, civil war, pandemic, zombie invasion and the Second Coming.
Tellingly, the geeks of Silicon Valley appear to be most worried that it will be a struggle between rich and poor in a world economy turned upside down by new technology — with them as the main targets.
The row in New Zealand involves scores of mega-rich Americans but has specifically centered on Peter Thiel, the billionaire founder of the internet payment system PayPal and an early investor in Facebook.
Thiel, a libertarian supporter of Donald Trump, paid $10million for a 477-acre lakeside estate in the country’s beautiful but isolated Southern Alps, which provided much of the staggering landscape in the Lord Of the Rings and Hobbit films.
Amid a public outcry over the invasion of U.S. internet and finance billionaires, the New Zealand government has released papers detailing the ‘exceptional circumstances’ under which the American tycoon was quietly given a New Zealand passport.
It is difficult to understand how this complied with the rules, including one that insists foreigners must live there for three years beforehand. Mr Thiel has gushed about his ‘great pride’ in his new citizenship and how he has ‘found no other country that aligns more with my view of the future’.
Perhaps what he really meant was exposed, after one of his Silicon Valley chums, the venture capitalist Sam Altman, revealed that, at the first sign of global disaster, he and Thiel would fly to New Zealand.
Other uber-rich Americans who have recently bought homes there include the billionaire hedge-fund pioneer Julian Robertson and the Hollywood film director James Cameron.
Local estate agents say their U.S. clients rarely intend to live in New Zealand, but cite reasons for their purchases such as the toxic presidential election and the spate of mass shootings in America.
In the first ten months of last year, foreigners — mainly Australians and Americans — bought nearly 1,400 square miles of land there, more than four times what they bought in the same period the previous year.
When they’re not buying up land abroad (Chile is also popular as it has low taxes, a good climate and good air links), rich survivalists like to swap tips on private Facebook groups or at regular dinners.
Popular subjects range from buying internet currencies such as Bitcoin, as protection against a central banking meltdown, to which foreign countries are most likely to hand them a passport and so the chance to relocate there in a crisis.
Some have planned for every eventuality. Steve Huffman, the 33-year-old co-founder of the internet discussion forum Reddit, which is valued at $600 million, is one of several Silicon Valley barons who has had laser surgery to correct poor eyesight.
If society collapses, he reasons perversely, getting hold of new spectacles might be a challenge. Ammunition could run out, too. Marvin Liao, a former senior executive at web giant Yahoo, has taken classes in archery and has amassed a small arsenal of other non-firearm weapons to protect his wife and daughter.
Survivalists have their own set of acronyms, including WROL (Without Rule Of Law) and LIA (Little Ice Age). (Some of them worry that the latter has just started). They also have secret buzzphrases. ‘Saying you’re “buying a house in New Zealand” is kind of a wink, wink — say no more,’ Reid Hoffman, a venture capitalist told the New Yorker magazine.
‘Once you’ve done the Masonic handshake, they’ll be, like: “Oh, you know, I have a broker who sells old ICBM [intercontinental ballistic missile] silos, and they’re nuclear-hardened, and they kind of look like they would be interesting to live in.” ’
These brothers in paranoia don’t necessarily agree on how to survive the approaching cataclysm. Antonio Garcia Martinez, a former Facebook product manager, bought five wooded acres on an island off America’s north Pacific coast.
For this refuge, he brought in solar panels, power generators and thousands of rounds of ammunition.
He chose the spot because it’s far from cities — but not completely remote, as ‘one guy alone’ couldn’t hope to stand up to a ‘roving mob’. One would need to set up a ‘local militia’ with others, he says. And when you have your hundred or so acres of land, what do you put there?
Post-apocalypse design for the money-no-object brigade tends to involve creating a home with a huge bomb-proof basement. The home must be self-contained, not only ‘off the grid’ (with its own power and water supplies), but with tanks for raising tilapia — a hardy, fast-growing fish — to eat, and facilities in which to grow vegetables hydroponically without soil.
Naturally, property developers are eagerly capitalizing on such concerns. The Survival Condo Project, a former underground nuclear missile silo in Kansas, has been converted into a 15- storey luxury apartment complex with a pool, gym, classroom and a miniature hospital.
It also has ground-level security cameras, electric fences, an on-site armoury, a sniper post and even a prison cell in which to put unwanted visitors. Instead of windows, giant LED screens show live pictures of the prairie above.
Its creators, who’ve sold all 14 of the $3m homes and are developing a string of new sites, say it can sustain 70 people indefinitely. That is, as long as they can put up with living in what a visitor compared to a well-furnished submarine — silent and rather oppressive.
Project boss Larry Hall says he gets more phone inquiries every time North Korea tests a bomb.
His team promise to send a Pit-Bull VX armoured truck to collect a resident from within a 400-mile radius of the silo.
Others prefer to put their own plans in place. Reddit founder Huffman says he realised a motorbike would be a necessity after watching the disaster film Deep Impact, in which people try to flee a tsunami caused by a comet-strike, clogging the streets so cars are brought to a standstill.
All this panic among the super-rich begs an obvious question: what do they know that the rest of us don’t? Certainly, preparing for the Apocalypse has been a multi-billion dollar business for many years.
Polls have shown around 22 per cent of Americans believe the world will ‘end’ in their lifetime. Many right-wingers were convinced that Barack Obama would start a civil war by trying to seize citizens’ guns.
Now, there’s the unpredictable Donald Trump to disturb their dreams. More than 13,000 Americans registered to buy a home in New Zealand — 17 times the usual rate — in the week after he was elected president.
There are TV shows about so-called preppers, a survivalist radio network and disaster readiness conventions. There are estate agents dedicated to the task, scouting out easily defendable properties, and even ‘Doomsday dating’ sites such as Survivalist Singles (motto: ‘You don’t have to face the future alone’).
But why are the country’s most privileged people, protected by immense wealth, quite so in fear?
For it is believed that at least 50 per cent of Silicon Valley billionaires have taken out so-called ‘apocalypse insurance’ by finding a refuge at home or abroad. Reluctant to admit the truth, they often describe it as a holiday home, so it’s difficult to know whether or not Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg bought a 750-acre estate in Hawaii ‘just in case’.
Similarly, his fellow tech billionaire Larry Ellison, founder of Oracle, who has not only bought 98 per cent of Hawaii’s sixth largest island, Lanai, but — handily — its own airline.
Of course there is the possibility that these fretting tech wizards’ prescience is justified. For many have made their fortunes out of predicting mankind’s dependence on digital gadgets and so we should respect their Doomsday hunches. Survivalists say the first signs of crisis often appear on internet chat forums, as they reportedly did before the 2008 financial crash. source
Jesse Johnson of The Cripplegate discusses whether or not believers should have non-believers as close friends. Watch “Ask A Prof.”
Well there are two biblical concepts at play in this question—the first is the principle of purity and the second is the mandate for evangelism.
The Principle of Purity:
Christians are called to be pure. We are supposed to guard our hearts, our thoughts, and our ways. The danger of a friendship with a non-believer is that might bring the Christian down. It could bring a Christian down morally, intellectually, and spiritually.
The Bible says that “Bad company corrupts good morals” (1 Corinthians 15:33). Be spending time around those who don’t love Jesus or fear the Lord, we run the risk of negatively impacting our own morality, hampering our world-view, and compromising spiritually.
That is not a prohibition to Christians against these kind of friendships; but it is a warning—a warning that our friendships we guard our hearts, minds, and affections.
Two weeks ago, we brought you reports that the NFL had asked Lady Gaga to stay away from politics with her halftime performance at the Super Bowl. This week, we can report there’s a strong chance that Lady Gaga has every intention of getting political with her halftime performance at the Super Bowl.
“Giving thanks unto the Father, which hath made us meet to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in light: Who hath delivered us from the power of darkness, and hath translated us into the kingdom of his dear Son: In whom we have redemption through his blood, even the forgiveness of sins:”Colossians 1:12-14 (KJV)
EDITOR’S NOTE: The world’s single, largest platform is arguably the Super Bowl halftime show. This year like many of the years before, it will feature a singer who claims to be under demon possession, exhibit Illuminati symbolism, and talks in glowing terms of people connected to the Church of Satan. It hasn’t been about entertainment for a long time now, so pay attention tomorrow. The Devil will be center stage, using his ministers to sing their way into your heart.
Lady Gaga held a press conference on Thursday in Houston. During the Q&A session, a reporter asked Gaga, “I know you spoke about kinda taking this moment to unify America a little bit. Are you going to do that at all? Are you going to make any kind of statements during the performance?”
The pop star responded, “Well, I don’t know if I will succeed in unifying America. You’ll have to ask America when it’s over. But the only statements that I’ll be making during the halftime show are the ones that I’ve been consistently making throughout my career.
Lady Gaga, the Super Bowl, Satanic Spirit Cooking and Child Sacrifice:
GRAPHIC WARNING: While this video is not suitable for children, if your children listen to Lady Gaga then they need to watch this.
“I believe in a passion for inclusion. I believe in the spirit of equality, and the spirit of this country as one of love and compassion and kindness. So my performance will have both those philosophies.”
Sounds harmless, right? A celebrity performer using the platform of the single largest annual media event in America to dedicate a performance to “inclusion” and “equality.” What could go wrong?
A timely review of previous demonic activity in Super Bowl halftime shows:
This video is a recap of previous Illuminati symbolism represented in various Superbowl Halftime shows. Madonna, Beyonce, and Katy Perry’s performances are all re-examined as we approach the 2016 Halftime show featuring Coldplay, Beyonce, and Bruno Mars.
This, despite well-justified concerns many will have based on last year’s halftime performance, where the NFL allowed Beyoncé to perform the anti-police, pro Black Panther song “Formation,” during the Super Bowl halftime show.
Though, Lady Gaga insists her show will appeal to all, “This performance is for everyone. I want to, more than anything, create a moment that everyone that’s watching will never forget.”
But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law. (5:22–23)
Contrasted with the deeds of the flesh is the fruit of the Spirit. Deeds of the flesh are done by a person’s own efforts, whether he is saved or unsaved. The fruit of the Spirit, on the other hand, is produced by God’s own Spirit and only in the lives of those who belong to Him through faith in Jesus Christ.
The spiritual behavior of walking by the Spirit (v. 16) has the negative effect of causing the believer to put away the habitual, ongoing evil deeds of the flesh and positively causes him to bear the good fruit produced by the Spirit.
The first contrast between the deeds of the flesh and the fruit of the Spirit is that the products of the flesh are plural, whereas the product of the Spirit is singular. Although Paul does not mention the truth here, there is also a contrast between the degrees to which the deeds and the fruit are produced. A given person may habitually practice only one or two, or perhaps a half dozen, of the sins Paul mentions here. But it would be practically impossible for one person to be habitually active in all of them. The fruit of the Spirit, on the other hand, is always produced completely in every believer, no matter how faintly evidenced its various manifestations may be.
The Bible has much to say about fruit, which is mentioned some 106 times in the Old Testament and 70 times in the New. Even under the covenant of law, a believer produced good fruit only by God’s power, not his own. “From Me comes your fruit,” the Lord declared to ancient Israel (Hos. 14:8).
In the New Testament such things as praise of the Lord (Heb. 13:15), winning converts to Christ (1 Cor. 16:15), and godly work in general (Col. 1:10) are spoken of as spiritual fruit produced through believers. But such action fruit must come from attitude fruit, and that is the kind of fruit Paul focuses on in Galatians 5:22–23. If those attitudes are characteristic of a believer’s life, the fruit of active good works will inevitably follow.
The Spirit never fails to produce some fruit in a believer’s life, but the Lord desires “much fruit” (John 15:8). As an unredeemed person, possessing only a fallen, sinful nature will inevitably manifest that nature in “the deeds of the flesh” (v. 19), so a believer, possessing a redeemed new nature will inevitably manifest that new nature in the fruit of the Spirit. But it is always possible for the believer to bear and manifest more fruit if he is receptive to the Spirit.
The Spirit’s provision of fruit might be compared to a man standing on a ladder in an orchard, picking the fruit and dropping it into a basket held by a helper below. No matter how much fruit is picked and dropped, the helper will not receive any unless he is standing under the ladder with his basket ready.
The fruit of the Spirit is the outward indicator of salvation. A believer’s sonship to God and citizenship in His kingdom (cf. v. 21) are manifested by the fruit the Spirit produces in his life. “You will know [men] by their fruits,” Jesus said. “Grapes are not gathered from thorn bushes, nor figs from thistles, are they? Even so, every good tree bears good fruit; but the bad tree bears bad fruit. A good tree cannot produce bad fruit, nor can a bad tree produce good fruit” (Matt. 7:16–18).
In verses 22–23 Paul lists nine representative characteristics of the godly fruit produced by the Holy Spirit in a believer’s life. Although many attempts have been made to categorize these nine virtues in various groupings, most such schemes seem artificial and irrelevant. Whether or not satisfactory classifications of them can be made, it is important to remember that these are multiple characteristics of but one fruit and are therefore inextricably related to one another. They are not produced nor can they be manifested in isolation from each other.
Rather paradoxically, all of the nine manifestations of the fruit of the Spirit are also commanded of believers in the New Testament. Also in every case, Jesus can be seen to be the supreme example and the Holy Spirit to be the source.
Love. The first characteristic of spiritual fruit is love, the supreme virtue of Christian living (1 Cor. 13:13). Some commentators insist that in this context love is a synonym for fruit and therefore encompasses the other characteristics in the list. In any case, love is clearly dominant. As Paul has just declared, “the whole Law is fulfilled in one word, in the statement, ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself’” (Gal. 5:14; cf. Rom. 13:10).
Agapē love is the form of love that most reflects personal choice, referring not simply to pleasant emotions or good feelings but to willing, self-giving service. “God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us” (Rom. 5:8). In the same way, the most extreme sacrificial choice a loving person can make is to “lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13). The apostle John expresses those two truths together in his first letter: “We know love by this, that He laid down His life for us; and we ought to lay down our lives for the brethren” (1 John 3:16). But love is tested long before it is called on to offer that supreme sacrifice. As John goes on to say, “Whoever has the world’s goods, and beholds his brother in need and closes his heart against him, how does the love of God abide in him?” (v. 17). A person who thing his love is great enough to sacrifice his life for fellow believers but who fails to help them when they have less extreme needs is simply fooling himself.
True agapē love is a sure mark of salvation. “We know that we have passed out of death into life,” John says, “because we love the brethren … Everyone who loves is born of God and knows God” (1 John 3:14; 4:7). By the same token, as John repeatedly makes clear throughout the same letter, having a habitually unloving spirit toward fellow Christians is reason for a person to question his salvation (see e.g., 2:9, 11; 3:15; 4:8, 20).
Jesus Christ is the supreme example of this supreme virtue. It was not only the Father’s love but also His own love that led Jesus to lay down His life for us, demonstrating with His own self-sacrifice the love that gives its life for its friends. And before He made the ultimate sacrifice, He demonstrated the same self-giving love in many lesser ways. As Jesus saw Mary and the others weeping because of Lazarus’s death, He, too, wept (John 11:33–35). He did not grieve for the fact that Lazarus had died, because He purposely delayed coming to Bethany until His dear friend was dead, in order to demonstrate His power to raise him from the grave. Jesus wept because of the great evil, destruction, and human misery caused by sin, whose final wages is always death (Rom. 6:23).
For believers, love is not an option but a command. “Walk in love,” Paul declared, “just as Christ also loved you, and gave Himself up for us, an offering and a sacrifice to God as a fragrant aroma” (Eph. 5:2). Yet the command cannot be fulfilled apart from the Holy Spirit, the source of this and all the other manifestations of spiritual fruit. “The love of God has been poured out within our hearts through the Holy Spirit who was given to us,” Paul explained to Roman believers (Rom. 5:5), and it was for such “love in the Spirit” that he gave thanks for the believers in Colossae (Col. 1:8).
Joy. The second manifestation of the fruit of the Spirit is joy. Chara (joy) is used some 70 times in the New Testament, always to signify a feeling of happiness that is based on spiritual realities. Joy is the deep-down sense of well-being that abides in the heart of the person who knows all is well between himself and the Lord. It is not an experience that comes from favorable circumstances or even a human emotion that is divinely stimulated. It is God’s gift to believers. As Nehemiah declared, “The joy of the Lord is your strength” (Neh. 8:10). Joy is a part of God’s own nature and Spirit that He manifests in His children.
Speaking of how we feel about the Lord Jesus Christ, Peter wrote, “Though you have not seen Him, you love Him, and though you do not see Him now, but believe in Him, you greatly rejoice with joy inexpressible and full of glory” (1 Pet. 1:8). Joy is the inevitable overflow of receiving Jesus Christ as Savior and of the believer’s knowing His continuing presence.
Joy not only does not come from favorable human circumstances but is sometimes greatest when those circumstances are the most painful and severe. Shortly before His arrest and crucifixion, Jesus told His disciples, “Truly, truly, I say to you, that you will weep and lament, but the world will rejoice; you will be sorrowful, but your sorrow will be turned to joy” (John 16:20). To illustrate that truth Jesus compared divine joy to a woman in childbirth. “She has sorrow, because her hour has come; but when she gives birth to the child, she remembers the anguish no more, for joy that a child has been born into the world. Therefore you too now have sorrow; but I will see you again, and your heart will rejoice, and no one takes your joy away from you” (vv. 21–22).
God’s joy is full, complete in every way. Nothing human or circumstantial can add to it or detract from it. But it is not fulfilled in a believer’s life except through reliance on and obedience to the Lord. “Ask, and you will receive,” Jesus went on to explain, “that your joy may be made full” (John 16:24). One of John’s motivations in writing his first epistle was that his joy might “be made complete” (1 John 1:4).
Jesus Himself is again our supreme example. He was “a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief” (Isa. 53:3; cf. Luke 18:31–33), but, just as He had promised for His disciples, His sorrow was turned into joy. “For the joy set before Him [He] endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God” (Heb. 12:2). Despite the misunderstanding, the rejection, the hatred, and the pain He endured from men while incarnate among them, the Lord never lost His joy in the relationship He had with His Father. And that joy He gives to each of His followers.
Although joy is a gift of God through His Spirit to those who belong to Christ, it is also commanded of them “Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, rejoice!” Paul commands (Phil. 4:4; cf. 3:1). Because joy comes as a gift from Him, the command obviously is not for believers to manufacture or try to imitate it. The command is to gratefully accept and revel in this great blessing they already possess. “For the kingdom of God is not eating and drinking, but righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit” (Rom. 14:17).
Peace. If joy speaks of the exhilaration of heart that comes from being right with God, then peace (eirēnē) refers to the tranquility of mind that comes from that saving relationship. The verb form has to do with binding together and is reflected in the modern expression “having it all together.” Everything is in place and as it ought to be.
Like joy, peace has no relationship to circumstances. Christians know “that God causes all things to work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose” (Rom. 8:28). Because God is in control of all aspects of a believer’s life, how his circumstances may appear from a human perspective makes no ultimate difference. That is why Jesus could say without qualification to those who trust in Him, “Let not your heart be troubled” (John 14:1). There is absolutely no reason for a believer to be anxious or afraid.
Jesus was the Prince of Peace, both in the sense that He was supremely peaceful Himself and in the sense that He dispenses His peace to those who are His. Even when He confronted Satan face-to-face in the wilderness, Jesus had perfect peace, knowing His heavenly Father was continually with Him and would supply His every need (Matt. 4:1–11). It is His own peace that He bequeaths to His disciples: “Peace I leave with you; My peace I give to you; not as the world gives, do I give to you” (John 14:27).
“The things you have learned and received and heard and seen in me, practice these things,” Paul said; “and the God of peace shall be with you” (Phil. 4:9). Because they have the God of peace in their hearts, believers need “be anxious for nothing,” having “the peace of God, which surpasses all comprehension, [to] guard [their] hearts and [their] minds in Christ Jesus” (v. 6–7).
Patience. Makrothumia (patience) has to do with tolerance and long-suffering that endure injuries inflicted by others, the calm willingness to accept situations that are irritating or painful.
God Himself is “slow to anger” (Ps. 86:15) and expects His children to be the same. Just as believers should never “think lightly of the riches of [God’s own] kindness and forbearance and patience” (Rom. 2:4), they should themselves manifest those attributes of their heavenly Father.
In the last days, arrogant unbelievers will taunt Christians by asking, “Where is the promise of [Christ’s] coming? For ever since the fathers fell asleep, all continues just as it was from the beginning of creation” (2 Pet. 3:4). In their sin-darkened minds unbelievers will fail to see that, just as in the days of Noah, when God patiently delayed the Flood in order to give men more time to repent (1 Pet. 3:20), it is also because of His merciful patience that He forestalls Christ’s second coming and the accompanying judgment on unbelievers, “not wishing for any to perish but for all to come to repentance” (2 Pet. 3:9).
Paul confessed that, as the foremost of sinners, he found mercy in God’s sight “in order that in [him] as the foremost, Jesus Christ might demonstrate His perfect patience, as an example for those who would believe in Him for eternal life” (1 Tim. 1:15–16).
Believers are commanded to emulate their Lord’s patience. “As those who have been chosen of God, holy and beloved,” they are to “put on a heart of … patience” (Col. 3:12), especially with fellow believers, “showing forbearance to one another in love” (Eph. 4:2). Like Timothy, all Christian teachers and leaders are to minister “with great patience” (2 Tim. 4:2).
Kindness. Chrēstotēs (kindness) relates to tender concern for others. It has nothing to do with weakness or lack of conviction but is the genuine desire of a believer to treat others gently, just as the Lord treats him. Paul reminded the Thessalonians that, even though he was an apostle, he “proved to be gentle among [them], as a nursing mother tenderly cares for her own children” (1 Thess. 2:6–7).
Jesus’ kindness is the believer’s example. When “some children were brought to Him so that He might lay His hands on them and pray; and the disciples rebuked them … Jesus said, ‘Let the children alone, and do not hinder them from coming to Me; for the kingdom of heaven belongs to such as these’” (Matt. 19:13–14). On another occasion He said, “Come to Me, all who are weary and heavy-laden, and I will give you rest. Take My yoke upon you, and learn from Me, for I am gentle and humble in heart; and you shall find rest for your souls” (Matt. 11:28–29).
Just as their Lord is kind, His servants are commanded not to “be quarrelsome, but [to] be kind to all” (2 Tim. 2:24). And just as He does with all the other manifestations of His divine fruit, the Holy Spirit gives God’s children kindness (2 Cor. 6:6).
Goodness. Agathos (goodness) has to do with moral and spiritual excellence that is known by its sweetness and active kindness. Paul helped define this virtue when he observed that “one will hardly die for a righteous man; though perhaps for the good man someone would dare even to die” (Rom. 5:7). A Christian can be morally upright but still not manifest the grace of goodness. He may be admired and respected for his high moral standards and might even have a friend who would risk his life for him. But the upright person who also has goodness is much more likely to have serf-sacrificing friends.
Joseph was such a righteous and good man. When he learned that Mary was pregnant but did not yet know it was by the Holy Spirit, “being a righteous man” he could not bring himself to marry her, assuming she had been unfaithful. But being also a good man, he could not bear the thought of disgracing his beloved Mary and therefore “desired to put her away secretly” (Matt. 1:19).
David had a deep understanding of God’s goodness, as he repeatedly reveals in his psalms. “Surely goodness and loving-kindness will follow me all the days of my life, and I will dwell in the house of the Lord forever,” he rejoiced (Ps. 23:6). He confessed that he would, in fact, “have despaired unless [he] had believed that [he] would see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living” (Ps. 27:13).
As with every grace the Spirit provides, believers are, commanded to exemplify goodness. Later in the letter Paul exhorts, “While we have opportunity, let us do good to all men, and especially to those who are of the household of the faith” (Gal. 6:10). “To this end also we pray for you always,” he wrote to the Thessalonians, “that our God may count you worthy of your calling, and fulfill every desire for goodness and the word of faith with power” (2 Thess. 1:11).
Faithfulness. Pistis (faithfulness) is the manifestation of the fruit of the Spirit that pertains to loyalty and trustworthiness. Jeremiah declared that “the Lord’s loving-kindnesses indeed never cease, for His compassions never fail. They are new every morning; great is Thy faithfulness” (Lam. 3:22).
Because Jesus was faithful, He “emptied Himself, taking the form of a bond-servant, and being made in the likeness of men. And being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.” And because of the Son’s faithfulness, the Father “highly exalted Him, and bestowed on Him the name which is above every name” (Phil. 2:7–9).
And as He was faithful when He came to earth the first time, He will be faithful to come again “in just the same way as you have watched Him go into heaven” (Acts 1:11). “Faithful is He who calls you,” Paul said, “and He also will bring it to pass” (1 Thess. 5:24). In his great vision on Patmos, John saw Christ seated on “a white horse, and He who sat upon it is called Faithful and True” (Rev. 19:11).
The “servants of Christ, and stewards of the mysteries of God” are to be like their Lord in being “found trustworthy” (1 Cor. 4:1–2). “Be faithful unto death,” the Lord assures His followers, “and I will give you the crown of life” (Rev. 2:10).
Gentleness. Prautēs includes the idea of gentleness, but is usually better translated meekness. In his helpful volume Synonyms of the New Testament, R. C. Trench writes that prautēs does not consist in a person’s “outward behavior only; nor yet in his relations to his fellow-men; as little in his mere natural disposition. Rather it is an inwrought grace of the soul; and the exercises of it are first and chiefly towards God. It is that temper of spirit in which we accept His dealings with us as good, and therefore without disputing or resisting” (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1953). It is that humble and gentle attitude that is patiently submissive in every offense, while being free of any desire for revenge or retribution.
Of the nine characteristics of the fruit of the Spirit, this one and the one following do not apply to God as God. The Old Testament never refers to God as being meek, and in the New Testament only the Son is spoken of as meek, and that only in His incarnation.
In the New Testament prautēs is used to describe three attitudes: submissiveness to the will of God (Col. 3:12), teachableness (James 1:21), and consideration of others (Eph. 4:2).
Although He was God, while He lived on earth as the Son of Man, Jesus was “gentle [prautēs] and humble in heart” (Matt. 11:29; cf. 21:5; 2 Cor. 10:1). Like their Lord, believers are to actively pursue meekness and gentleness (1 Tim. 6:11) and to wear them like a garment (Col. 3:12).
Self-control. Enkrateia (serf-control) has reference to restraining passions and appetites. As with meekness, however, this grace does not apply to God, who obviously does not need to restrain Himself. “For I, the Lord, do not change,” He informs us (Mal. 3:6). In His eternal being, the Lord “Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today, yes and forever” (Heb. 13:8). Perfect holiness possesses perfect control.
But in His incarnation Christ was the epitome of self-control. He was never tempted or tricked into doing or saying anything that was not consistent with His Father’s will and His own divine nature. Again like Jesus, believers should “exercise self-control in all things” (1 Cor. 9:25; cf. 7:9), “applying all diligence, in [their] faith [to] supply … self-control” (2 Pet. 1:5–6).
Against such things there is no law, Paul says. Even unbelievers do not make laws against such things as those which the fruit of the Spirit produces. The world does not make laws against such behavior, but generally prizes it. Even if some consider such things to be signs of weakness, they cannot escape recognizing that they are never harmful.
There is certainly no law of God against such things, because those are the very virtues He wants all men to have and that He gives to them when they put their trust in Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior. “For if these qualities are yours and are increasing,” Peter explains in regard to a similar list of virtues, “they render you neither useless nor unfruitful in the true knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ” (2 Pet. 1:8).
The believer who walks in the Spirit and manifests His fruit does not need a system of law to produce the right attitudes and behavior-hey rise from within him.
I write to you, fathers, because you have known Him who is from the beginning. I write to you, young men, because you have overcome the wicked one. I write to you, little children, because you have known the Father.
1 John 2:13
My own experience has taught me much about the different levels of spiritual growth described by the apostle John in today’s verse. When I was a spiritual babe, I was lost in the euphoria of loving the Lord and didn’t know much theology. At that time I was easily influenced by anyone’s teaching. Later, as I learned the Word of God, false doctrine no longer deceived me; it made me angry. And now, as I have grown in my knowledge of the Word, it’s my desire to know God more intimately, which is the final level of growth. Spiritual fathers not only know the Bible, but also know deeply the God who wrote it.
Spiritual growth progresses from knowing you are a Christian to knowing the Word of God to knowing God Himself. The way to know God is to spend your life focusing on His glory, thus learning to understand the fullness of His person. That focus becomes a magnet drawing you upward through the levels of maturity.[1]
February 4
God Is One
“Hear, O Israel! The Lord is our God, the Lord is one!”
Deuteronomy 6:4
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There is only one true God.
When God freed Israel to take her to the promised land, He said: “You shall have no other gods before Me” (Ex. 20:3). Later Moses told the Israelites, “The Lord, He is God; there is no other besides Him” (Deut. 4:35) and “The Lord is our God, the Lord is one!” (6:4). Israel was to believe in the one and only God.
But Jesus claimed to be God. Is He God number two? Not at all. In Mark 12:29–30, Jesus quoted Deuteronomy 6:4–5: “ ‘Hear, O Israel! The Lord our God is one Lord; and you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind, and with all your strength.’ ” If Jesus were another God He might have said, “Split your allegiance between the two of us.” But Jesus says we are to love God with undivided commitment. Therefore He agrees with Moses that there is only one God. However, He also says, “I and the Father are one” (John 10:30).
Paul also discusses the unity of God in 1 Corinthians 8. The pagan priests in Corinth would often sell the meat that had been sacrificed to idols. Some new Christians were offended when other Christians ate that meat. In response, Paul told them, “Concerning the eating of things sacrificed to idols, we know that there is no such thing as an idol in the world” (v. 4). Since an idol represented a nonexistent god, there was nothing wrong with eating the food. He continued, “There is no God but one. For even if there are so–called gods whether in heaven or on earth, as indeed there are many gods and many lords, yet for us there is but one God, the Father, from whom are all things, and we exist for Him; and one Lord, Jesus Christ, through whom are all things, and we exist through Him” (vv. 4–6). How can all things be from God the Father, for whom we exist, and by the Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we exist? Because they are one.
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Suggestions for Prayer: Praise God as David did: “For this reason Thou art great, O Lord God; for there is none like Thee, and there is no God besides Thee” (2 Sam. 7:22).
For Further Study: Read Ezekiel 6. What was God’s response to Israel’s idolatry? ✧ How does God feel about anything that might take first place in your heart instead of Him?[2]
FEBRUARY 4
A SENSE OF THE PRESENT GOD
And at midnight Paul and Silas prayed, and sang praises unto God: and the prisoners heard them.
—Acts 16:25
Wherever faith has been original, wherever it has proved itself to be real, it has invariably had upon it a sense of the presentGod. The holy Scriptures possess in marked degree this feeling of actual encounter with a real Person. The men and women of the Bible talked with God. They spoke to Him and heard Him speak in words they could understand. With Him they held person-to-person interaction, and a sense of shining reality is upon their words and deeds….
It was this that filled with abiding wonder the first members of the Church of Christ. The solemn delight which those early disciples knew sprang straight from the conviction that there was One in the midst of them. They knew that the Majesty in the heavens was confronting them on earth: They were in the very Presence of God. And the power of that conviction to arrest attention and hold it for a lifetime, to elevate, to transform, to fill with uncontrollable moral happiness, to send men singing to prison and to death, has been one of the wonders of history and a marvel of the world. POM007-008
Lord, may I respond like Paul and Silas to whatever I will face today, knowing that Your Presence is always with me. Amen.[3]
February 4
Jesus, the Model Soul-Winner
Now as Jesus was walking by the Sea of Galilee, He saw two brothers … and He said to them, “Follow Me.” … Going on from there He saw two other brothers … and He called them.—Matt. 4:18–19, 21
Every believer who would be a soul winner must emulate the key principles Jesus exemplified as the model evangelist—not only in this one occasion but throughout His earthly ministry. Think about the following six, and seek to implement them as you witness for Him.
First, Jesus was always available. He never refused a genuine request for help from penitent sinners or the downtrodden.
Second, Jesus showed no favoritism. Neither Jairus nor the Roman centurion had an advantage over the woman of Sychar or the woman caught in adultery.
Third, the Lord was completely sensitive to the needs around Him. He always could discern the open heart of someone ready to come to Him. In spite of the pressing crowd, He noticed and responded to the woman who touched the hem of His garment (Matt. 9:20–22).
Fourth, Christ usually secured a public profession or testimony from the sinner, even including a specific instruction (e.g., the man delivered from demons, Mark 5:19).
Fifth, Jesus showed love and tenderness to those He witnessed to. The Samaritan woman at the well was one such recipient. She was a religious outcast and an adulterer, yet He clearly and gently led her to saving faith.
Sixth, Jesus always had time to speak to others. Even while on the way to heal Jairus’s daughter, He stopped long enough to heal the woman who had a hemorrhage for twelve years.
ASK YOURSELF
We still live in a time of gracious evangelism, as so perfectly exemplified by our Lord and Savior. How obedient is your church being to this model? How obedient are you being to it as an individual?[4]
FEBRUARY 4
JESUS SAID HE WAS GOD
But unto the Son he saith, Thy throne, O God, is for ever and ever.
Hebrews 1:8
The more we study the words of our Lord Jesus Christ when He lived on earth among us, the more certain we are about who He is.
Some critics have scoffed: “Jesus did not claim to be God. He only said He was the Son of Man.”
It is true that Jesus used the term “Son of Man” frequently. But He testified boldly, even among those who were His sworn enemies, that He was God. He said with great forcefulness that He had come from the Father in heaven and that He was equal with the Father.
Bible-believing Christians stand together on this. They may differ about the mode of baptism, church polity or the return of the Lord. But they agree on the deity of the eternal Son. Jesus Christ is of one substance with the Father—begotten, not created (Nicene Creed).
In our defense of this truth, we must be very careful and bold—belligerent, if need be!
Christ is the brightness of God’s glory and the express image of God’s Person!
Lord Jesus, the only hope the world has is that You are One with the Father. You are God Almighty! You are our Messiah! I worship You today.[5]
February 4
The Joy of Kindred Spirits
“Paul and Timothy, bond-servants of Christ Jesus . . .” (Phil. 1:1).
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Despite their shortcomings, people of kindred spirit are precious gifts from the Lord.
Timothy was Paul’s trusted companion in the gospel. In Philippians 2:20 Paul describes him as a man “of kindred spirit.” That is, they were like-minded, sharing the same love for Christ and His church.
Elsewhere Paul described Timothy as his “beloved and faithful child in the Lord” (1 Cor. 4:17) and as a “fellow-worker in the gospel of Christ” (Rom. 16:21; 1 Thess. 3:2). Those are significant compliments coming from Paul, whose standard of ministry and personal integrity was very high.
However, as godly and useful as Timothy was, he apparently struggled with many of the same weaknesses we face. For example, 2 Timothy implies he might have been intimidated by the false teachers who challenged his leadership (1:7). He perhaps was somewhat ashamed of Christ (1:8) and was tempted to alter his theology to avoid offending those who disagreed with sound doctrine (1:13–14). He might have been neglecting his studies in the Word (2:15) and succumbing to ungodly opinions (2:16–17). Other struggles are implied as well.
Paul wrote to strengthen Timothy’s spiritual character and to encourage him to persevere in the face of severe trials.
Despite those apparent weaknesses, Paul valued Timothy highly and entrusted enormous ministerial responsibilities to him. In addition, Timothy’s friendship and ministry were sources of great joy and strength to Paul.
I pray that you have people of kindred spirit in your life—brothers and sisters in Christ who encourage you, pray for you, and hold you accountable to God’s truth. Like Timothy, they may not be all you want them to be, but they are precious gifts from God. Esteem them highly, and pray for them often. Do everything you can to reciprocate their ministry in your life.
If perhaps you lack such friends, seek the fellowship of a local church where Christ is exalted, His Word is taught, and holy living is encouraged. Build relationships with mature Christians who will stimulate you to love and good deeds (Heb. 10:24).
✧✧✧
Suggestions for Prayer: Identify three people who are of kindred spirit with you. Pray for them. Tell them how much you appreciate their examples and ministries.
For Further Study: Read 2 Timothy 1:1–14. ✧ What were Paul’s admonitions to Timothy? ✧ How might they apply to you?[6]
FEBRUARY 4
WE ARE LOVED OF GOD FOR JESUS’ SAKE
But God commendeth his love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.
ROMANS 5:8
Never while the stars burn in their silence can it be said that God loves the sin in the sinner. Never can it be said that the holy God loves an unholy thing—and yet God loves sinners!
God loves sinners for that which He sees in them of His lost and fallen image, for God can never love any thing but Himself, directly. He loves everything else for His own sake. So, you are loved of God—but you are loved of God for Jesus’ sake!
God loves lost men, not because He is careless or morally lax, but because He once stood and said: “Let us make man in our image.”
Man was made in the image of God, and while sin has ruined him and condemned him to death forever unless he be redeemed through the blood of Jesus Christ, mankind is a being only one degree removed from the angels.
But sin, God knows, is like a cancer in the very being of man. Although once made in the image of God, he is now a dying man, sick unto spiritual death, because of the poison of sin.
But extract and take out that sin and you have the image of God again! And Jesus Christ was the image of God because He was a man without sin.
God sees in Jesus Christ what you would have been! He sees that in His perfect humanity, not His deity—for you and I could never be divine in that sense. When Jesus Christ came to us, He was incarnated in the body of a man without embarrassment and without change, because man was an image of the God who made him.[7]
[1] MacArthur, J. (2001). Truth for today : a daily touch of God’s grace (p. 47). Nashville, Tenn.: J. Countryman.
[2] MacArthur, J. (1997). Strength for today. Wheaton, IL: Crossway Books.
[3] Tozer, A. W., & Eggert, R. (2015). Tozer on the almighty god: a 365-day devotional. Chicago, IL: Moody Publishers.
[4] MacArthur, J. (2008). Daily readings from the life of Christ (p. 43). Chicago: Moody Publishers.
[5] Tozer, A. W. (2015). Mornings with tozer: daily devotional readings. Chicago, IL: Moody Publishers.
[6] MacArthur, J. F., Jr. (1993). Drawing Near—Daily Readings for a Deeper Faith (p. 47). Wheaton, IL: Crossway Books.
[7] Tozer, A. W., & Smith, G. B. (2015). Evenings with tozer: daily devotional readings. Chicago, IL: Moody Publishers.
Our good friend and fellow polemicist Amy Spreeman, contributor to Pirate Christian Radio, presents the 7th in her series about those who found themselves in this dreadful bondage, and what happened when their eyes were opened.
“Everyone seemed to feel God’s love all the time and have crazy experiences, dreams, visions, prophesies. I was dissatisfied with just Bible study. I wanted more, and was constantly seeking more prophecies and visions and signs.”
Erin has allowed me to include her story in this series about a movement called the New Apostolic Reformation, or NAR for short. In this series, I want to take readers beyond the textbook What is the New Apostolic Reformation Movement explanation, into the personal experiences from those who have been there, and what happened when God opened their eyes to the truth.
(Washington, D.C.) — You absolutely have to watch this message.
All of it.
It is one of the most powerful, most compelling, most winsome and moving presentations of the Gospel of Jesus Christ I have ever heard delivered.
It was delivered at the National Prayer Breakfast on Thursday morning in Washington.
It was delivered by the Chaplain of the Senate to the President of the United States.
It was delivered to more than 4,000 government, business and religious leaders from all over the United States and from more than 160 countries around the world.
It was such an honor to be there, and it is something I will never forget.
Honestly, I’d never heard of retired U.S. Rear Admiral — who now serves as the Senate Chaplain — Barry Black before.
I’d heard of the Christian musical group, “Mercy Me,” and was so glad they were performing songs like, “I Can Only Imagine.” They were outstanding.
President Donald Trump will order a sweeping review of the Dodd-Frank Act rules enacted in response to the 2008 financial crisis, a White House official said, signing an executive action Friday designed to significantly scale back the regulatory system put in place in 2010.
An attack at Paris’s Louvre museum Friday ensured that terrorism and security will remain front and center of a roller coaster presidential election that has brought the populist National Front closer than ever to power in France.
Al-Qaeda has strengthened its power in Yemen, taking advantage of sectarian conflict in the Arab world’s poorest country, according to the International Crisis Group. Al-Qaeda “is stronger than it has ever been,” the Brussels-based group said.
Estonia, a nation of 1.3 million people that borders Russia and is home to NATO’s cyber-defense center, will host the exercise during its six-month presidency of the European Union, which starts July 1, Defense Minister Tsahkna said. The country is no stranger to electronic attacks, having significantly bolstered security measures after strikes on key websites during a spat with Russia.
Republicans in Congress began a process Thursday of rescinding a federal rule aimed at preventing people with serious mental-health problems from buying guns, one of the earliest targets in a long list of Obama administration regulations lawmakers plan to reverse.
U.S. workers have been getting a shrinking share of the American economic pie, and economists have been puzzled by the decline. A new paper says one factor is the rise of “superstar” companies that dominate their market sectors and don’t need a lot of workers to generate profits.
AP Top Stories
Declaring that religious freedom is “under threat,” President Donald Trump vowed Thursday to repeal a rarely enforced IRS rule that says pastors who endorse candidates from the pulpit risk losing their tax-exempt status. “I will get rid of and totally destroy the Johnson Amendment and allow our representatives of faith to speak freely and without fear of retribution.”
Republicans in Congress struggled on Thursday with their efforts to dismantle Obamacare, with conservatives urging haste while some lawmakers said the task had become more of a repair job than the repeal of the U.S. healthcare law promised by President Donald Trump’s administration.
A report in Defense News states China is making steady progress on its second aircraft carrier, the Shandong. Under construction near Shanghai, Shandong is set to be China’s first domestically produced aircraft carrier and the first to be combat-ready.
The University of California, Berkeley, canceled a speech by right-wing Internet troll Milo Yiannopoulos after thousands of students gathered in protest and a group of anti-fascist activists set off fireworks at the speech venue.
President Donald Trump is poised to impose new sanctions on multiple Iranian entities, seeking to ratchet up pressure on Tehran while crafting a broader strategy to counter what he sees as its destabilizing behavior.
Yemeni security officials said on Thursday that warships, which they believe to be American, have been firing cannons and rockets at al-Qaida militants in the country’s southern coastal areas. But the United States promptly denied the allegations.
The head of the Chicago Police Department said Wednesday that his officers are now using high-tech strategies and equipment to fight crime, an announcement that came as the city’s police released statistics showing no letup in the death toll that captured the nation’s attention last year and sparked a Twitter warning last week from President Donald Trump.
Space rocks appear to be taking aim at Earth. The fourth asteroid this year buzzed the Earth about midday Thursday, passing between the Earth and moon. Sunday’s visitor, which passed within 32,200 miles was just 19 feet wide, wasn’t spotted until a few hours before it flew past.
A California federal judge has issued a court order (temporary restraining order and preliminary injunction) barring the US government from preventing more than two dozen Yemenis with valid visas from flying to Los Angeles.
BBC
The Trump administration is imposing sanctions on Iran following its recent ballistic missile test. The US Treasury Department announced the measures against 13 people and a dozen companies on Friday.
Apple is to start making iPhones in the southern Indian state of Karnataka.
President Donald Trump is expected to take his first steps to scale back financial services regulations on Friday. He is due to sign an executive order to review the 2010 Dodd-Frank financial regulations, which some people on Wall Street say are overly-restrictive.
A former Royal Canadian Mint employee has been sentenced to 30 months in prison for stealing gold coins by concealing them in his rectum.
The US Defense Secretary James Mattis has said any use of nuclear weapons by North Korea would be met with an “effective and overwhelming” response. Mr Mattis spoke in South Korea, where he had been reaffirming US support, before flying to Tokyo.
Some supermarkets are rationing the number of iceberg lettuce and broccoli customers can buy – blaming poor growing conditions in southern Europe for a shortage in UK stores.
WND
In its last year in office, the Obama Administration showered at least some $9.2 billion on the United Nations and its sprawling array of organizations, according to a document recently posted on the State Department website.
Angered by the conversion of Muslims to Christian faith, as many as 90 Muslims broke into a Christian prayer meeting in a village in eastern Uganda, raped 15 women and kidnapped a pastor and eight other people, according to a Christian news source.
The Briefing 02-03-2017
Should we live with contradiction? Peter Singer’s immoral, incoherent worldview
CLIFF KINCAID — At the March for Life, Vice President Mike Pence said, “Life is winning through the steady advance of science that illuminates when life begins, more and more, every day.” White House Counselor to the President Kellyanne Conway said, “Science and medicine have joined religion and morality in causing many Americans to rethink just how fragile and how triumphant human life truly is.”… (more)
JOAN SWIRSKY — A day or two before the inauguration of President Donald J. Trump on January 20, 2017, I watched a reporter interviewing five attractive, intelligent, articulate women from California, who were all making the long cross-country trip to the Women’s March on Washington on January 21st. Amazingly, not one woman was able to express a persuasive or even rational reason for the trip, but instead resorted to time-worn platitudes, bromides, and leftist talking points about “unity” and “solidarity” and “getting the message out.” Um…what message?… (more)
GEORGE WILL — With an asperity born of exasperation, Justice Antonin Scalia once wrote, “If you want aspirations, you can read the Declaration of Independence,” but “there is no such philosophizing in our Constitution,” which is “a practical and pragmatic charter of government.”… (more)
NEWSMAX — President Donald Trump’s nomination of Judge Neil Gorsuch to the Supreme Court has “restored the faith of voters,” GOP political consultant Mary Matalin told Newsmax TV Wednesday…. (more)
NEWSMAX — Department of Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly has set a goal on completing President Donald Trump’s Mexican border wall in two years, he told Fox News…. (more)
WASHINGTON EXAMINER — When the House Subcommittee on Government Operations held a hearing in April 2015 titled “The Worst Places to Work in the Federal Government,” an agency manager at the Department of Homeland Security was called in to testify…. (more)
GREG COROMBOS — The woman behind recent videos that decimate Planned Parenthood’s claim that it needs to receive taxpayer dollars to meet vital prenatal needs says congressional Republicans are poised to remove funding from the nation’s largest abortion provider and Democrats will be powerless to stop it…. (more)
ANDREW C. MCCARTHY — If the Left is going to twist every bit of Trump administration news into fiction, who is going to believe them when, inevitably, there actually is something worth raising hell about? The question is worth asking – – for about the tenth time this week . . . and it’s only Tuesday! – – in light of the fuss Democrats and their media friends are making over a discussion between just-fired acting attorney general Sally Yates and Senator Jeff Sessions, President Trump’s attorney-general nominee, at a 2015 Judiciary Committee hearing…. (more)
WASHINGTON EXAMINER — Republicans in Congress plan to introduce legislation Wednesday that would prohibit workers nationwide from being forced to support a union. The national right-to-work legislation likely would be a major blow to organized labor because it would allow millions of workers to opt out of union membership for the first time…. (more)
THE HILL — The House on Thursday struck down an Obama-era regulation that could block some recipients of disability benefits from buying guns. The House voted 235-180 to roll back a rule that required the Social Security Administration to report people who receive disability benefits and have a mental health condition to the FBI’s background check system. The database is used to determine eligibility for buying a firearm. Critics said the rule stripped Second Amendment rights from people who are not dangerously mentally ill, such as those who have eating disorders…. (more)
WASHINGTON EXAMINER — In one fell swoop, President Trump has a unique opportunity to show his concern for forgotten Americans, create jobs (especially for coal miners), and defend the rule of law, separation of powers, and the Constitution. In the process, he will rob President Obama of his sole surviving legacy, a legacy that bedevils rural people in perpetuity to the utter delight of environmental groups, one of which cosponsored the Women’s March…. (more)
BRYAN FISCHER — As we feared, President Trump has chosen sides in the battle between homosexuality and religious liberty. And he has chosen poorly. From The Hill (emphasis mine): “The White House said early Tuesday that President Trump will continue to enforce an Obama-era executive order protecting the rights of the LGBTQ community in the workplace.”… (more)
CLIFF KINCAID — Donald Trump’s adviser Stephen K. Bannon told the truth, but not the whole truth, when he described the media as the main opposition to President Trump. He neglected to mention academia as another important bastion for anti-Trump organizing and action…. (more)
WASHINGTON TIMES — President Trump on Tuesday nominated Judge Neil Gorsuch to the empty seat on the Supreme Court, kicking off the biggest test of his young administration with Democratic senators already itching for a fight. Judge Gorsuch is a favorite of conservatives, who say his legal mind and clear writing are fitting for someone picked to fill the seat of the late Justice Antonin Scalia. The president dubbed him “the very best judge in the country.”… (more)
NATIONAL REVIEW — On the Saturday afternoon last February when he received word of Justice Scalia’s death, Neil M. Gorsuch “immediately lost [his] breath” and “couldn’t see . . . for the tears.”… (more)
NEWSMAX — Texas Sen. Ted Cruz called the pick of Judge Neil Gorsuch a “home run,” telling CNN just after President Donald Trump made the announcement in the White House East Room, the nomination was the “most important decision President Trump has made in the first two weeks serving in office.”… (more)
BYRON YORK — From Washington State to Washington DC, Democrats across the country are stepping up what some call “The Resistance” to President Trump, moving across political, legal, bureaucratic, legislative, and civil disobedience fronts to frustrate the newly elected president’s agenda…. (more)
CHARLES HURT — Look, global elites, nobody said self-governance would be easy. Or pretty. But it is what it is. Get over it. The full-bore freak-out hysteria over President Trump’s executive order directed at finally getting a grip on who exactly is coming into the United States from the Middle East has been amusing…. (more)
ANDREW C. MCCARTHY — President Trump’s temporary ban on entry into the U.S. by various categories of aliens has caused a firestorm. That owes in part to the rash implementation of perfectly legal restrictions, but the hysteria is out of proportion to the minimal harm actually done…. (more)
WESLEY PRUDEN — Once more, with feeling. There’s a president with the proper appreciation of “the special relationship” between the United States and Great Britain. Winston Churchill is back in the Oval Office, even if it’s only his head on a pedestal. Donald Trump and Theresa May struck it off better than expected. The Donald even took her for a stroll, holding her hand. A British journalist reminded the president not to try that with the queen when he goes to London for a state visit in the spring. The queen is look, don’t touch…. (more)
NEWSMAX — Heavy artillery and rockets hit residential areas in eastern Ukraine on Tuesday amid a new outburst of fighting between government troops and Russia-backed separatist rebels, killing at least eight people and injuring dozens…. (more)
ALAN KEYES — Since the Supreme Court’s blatantly anti-constitutional decision purporting to force “gay marriage” on all the United States, the GOP’s elitist faction leaders have repeatedly signaled their intention to accept the decisions as the “law of the land.”… (more)
USA TODAY — The Boy Scouts of America announced Monday that, effective immediately, it will accept and register transgender youth into its organization. The move marks a reversal of a policy in place for a century and is effective for the Boy Scouts and the Cub Scouts. The organization vowed to recognize the gender a youngster lists on an application…. (more)
ROBERT KNIGHT — As any reporter can tell you, it’s far more fun to cover zany people and events than those exuding decency and restraint. The news business, like much of the entertainment media, thrives on mayhem. In Disney’s animated classic “Fantasia,” the spectacular deviltry of “A Night on Bald Mountain” is followed by a peaceful march of candle-bearing believers after the morning sun dispatches the satanic hordes…. (more)
WASHINGTON TIMES — Despite confusion at airports and a judicial spanking, the White House said Sunday that President Trump’s “extreme vetting” executive order remains in effect and is working as the administration had hoped, halting almost all travelers from seven majority-Muslim countries with histories of terrorism…. (more)
NASA Scientist Studies Whether Solar Storms Cause Animal Beachings
“Theories as to the cause include magnetic anomalies and meteorological events, such as extreme tides during a new moon and coastal storms, which are thought to disorient the animals. It has been speculated that due to the possible magnetic-field sensing used by these animals to navigate, magnetic anomalies could be at least partially responsible.” Indeed, magnetic anomalies caused when the sun’s corona ejects gigantic bubbles of charged particles out into the solar system can cause problems for Earth-orbiting satellites and power grids when they slam into Earth’s protective magnetosphere. It’s possible they could affect animals, as well,
Iranian woman to be blinded in ‘eye-for-an-eye’ retribution punishment
An Iranian woman is to be blinded in one eye as punishment for an acid attack that left her victim without sight, the country’s Supreme Court has ruled, local Tasnim agency has reported, as cited by Reuters. The unidentified convicted woman allegedly threw acid in the face of her victim, Sima, in the city of Dehdasht two years ago. “The sentence to blindness in one eye, payment of blood money [compensation], and seven years [of] imprisonment have been confirmed by the highest court,”
Trump: Iran is playing with fire
“Iran is playing with fire – they don’t appreciate how “kind” [sic] President Obama was to them. Not me!” Trump tweeted.
The true face of liberalism I like to think I have a decent moral compass. I take no pleasure in disagreeing with the trend. A person is terrified to say he is not liberal. Universities and schools raised us to breathe the notion that non-liberals are racist, backwards, white, old, men, and bigots
Who Knew There Were So Many Homophobic, Racist Xenophobes at Berkeley
Hundreds of liberals rioted at the University of California Berkeley Wednesday night — burning stores, throwing Molotov cocktails and clashing with police. The rampaging mob forced the university to shut down an event featuring gay conservative firebrand and Breitbart editor Milo Yiannopoulos. “One thing we do know for sure: the Left is absolutely terrified of free speech and will do literally anything to shut it down,” he wrote on Facebook.
Central Italy shakes in new 4.4 magnitude earthquake According to Italy’s geology experts, Ingv, the first quake at 4:47am measured a magnitude of 4, and a second, bigger tremblor at 5:10am measured 4.4. The quake had its epicentre close to Monte Cavallo in the Macerata region, 12km away from Preci, Perugia.
Attacker at Paris’ Louvre cried out ‘Allahu Akbar,’ one man wounded
A French soldier on Friday shot and wounded a man armed with a knife after he tried to enter the Louvre museum in central Paris carrying a suitcase, police sources said. The individual cried out “Allahu Akbar” and police believe he wanted to carry out a terrorist attack, Michel Cadot, the head of the French capital’s police force, said on Friday.
Trump warns Israel: Stop announcing new settlements
The White House warned Israel on Thursday to cease settlement announcements that are “unilateral” and “undermining” of President Donald Trump’s effort to forge Middle East peace, a senior administration official told The Jerusalem Post. For the first time, the administration confirmed that Trump is committed to a comprehensive two-state solution to the Israeli- Palestinian conflict negotiated between the parties.
Ukrainian Jewish leader says community in danger of extinction
The future of Ukraine’s Jewish community “doesn’t look very bright” and is in danger of disappearing altogether, according to one of its leaders, who ended a four-day visit to Israel on Thursday. Eduard Dolinsky, executive director of the Kiev-based Ukrainian Jewish Committee, painted a bleak picture of a a struggling and scattered community to The Jerusalem Post on Tuesday afternoon.
Iran mocks Trump in response to White House threat
Iran responded on Thursday to a warning from the Trump administration over its continued ballistic missile testing by mocking the new US president as a ranting extremist that no one takes seriously. A senior adviser to Iran’s supreme leader said the Islamic Republic would proceed “vigorously” with its missile program, despite the threat from US National Security Adviser Michael Flynn that Iran was officially being put “on notice” over its recent activities.
Mattis warns North Korea of ‘overwhelming’ response to nuclear use
The US Defence Secretary James Mattis has said any use of nuclear weapons by North Korea would be met with an “effective and overwhelming” response. Mr Mattis spoke in South Korea, where he had been reaffirming US support, before flying to Tokyo. He also reconfirmed plans to deploy a US missile defence system in South Korea later this year.
Migrant crisis: EU summit seeks action plan with Libya
European Union leaders are meeting in Malta to discuss how to stem the influx of migrants from North Africa. Boosting the Libyan coastguard and tackling people smugglers are the main proposals. Hundreds of thousands of migrants try to reach Europe each year. Many of them drown while crossing the Mediterranean.
Illegals Urged to ‘Fight back’ Against Immigration Officials
An Austin, Texas, city council member is encouraging illegal immigrants not to comply with federal immigration officials. Addressing concerns over “potential raids of our communities by Immigration and Customs Enforcement” which are rumored to occur this week, district four city council representative Gregorio Casar released an infographic informing illegal aliens how to defy federal law enforcement.
Trump says ‘nothing off the table’ on Iran, as Republicans plan action
President Donald Trump said on Thursday that “nothing is off the table” in dealing with Iran following its test launch of a ballistic missile, and his fellow Republicans in Congress said they would back him up with new sanctions. Trump comment was in response to a question about whether he would consider military options to respond to Tehran, a day after his national security adviser, Michael Flynn, put Iran “on notice.”
North Korea sacks head of secret police amid signs of ‘crack in elite’
North Korea has dismissed its minister of state security, a key aide to the reclusive state’s young leader, Kim Jong Un, South Korea said on Friday, in what a high-profile defector said would be another sign of a “crack in the elite” in Pyongyang if true. Kim Won Hong was removed from office as head of the feared “bowibu”, or secret police, in mid-January apparently on charges of corruption, abuse of power and human rights abuses…
Japan readies package for Trump to help create 700,000 U.S. jobs
Japan is putting together a package it says could generate 700,000 U.S. jobs and help create a $450-billion market, to present to U.S. President Donald Trump next week, government sources familiar with the plans said. The five-part package, to be unveiled when Prime Minister Shinzo Abe visits Trump on Feb. 10 in Washington, envisage investments in infrastructure projects such as high-speed trains and cybersecurity…
Ceasefire violations in Ukraine still too high despite lull in fighting: Germany
The German Foreign Ministry said on Friday that there had been a lull in fighting in eastern Ukraine in recent “hours” but ceasefire breaches were still happening too often. “In the last couple of hours we have seen a decline in military activities there but I want to say clearly that the number of ceasefire violations remains far too high,” a spokesman for the Foreign Ministry said.
Trump vows to end prohibition on church political activity
President Donald Trump on Thursday vowed to free churches and other tax-exempt institutions of a 1954 U.S. law banning political activity, drawing fire from critics who accused him of rewarding his evangelical Christian supporters and turning houses of worship into political machines. As Trump used a prayer breakfast to take aim at a long-standing statutory barrier between politics and religion called the Johnson Amendment…
Wyoming House passes bill that does away with gun-free zones in schools
On Wednesday, the Wyoming House of Representatives passed House Bill 194 in a landslide vote of 46-14. The nature of the bill, known as “The School Safety and Security Act,” is such that it would allow school districts decide whether or not they would allow their employees to carry on school grounds, provided they have a concealed carry permit.
Here Comes China’s First Home-Built Aircraft Carrier
A report in Defense News states China is making steady progress on its second aircraft carrier, the Shandong. Under construction near Shanghai, Shandong is set to be China’s first domestically produced aircraft carrier and the first to be combat-ready.
US planning additional sanctions on Iran following missile test
The White House is expected to impose additional sanctions on Iranian entities under existing executive orders that predate President Donald Trump, according to sources familiar with the move.
Mattis warns NKorea against any attack on US or its allies
In an explicit warning to North Korea, U.S. Defense Secretary Jim Mattis on Friday said any use of nuclear weapons by the North on the United States or its allies would be met with what he called an “effective and overwhelming” response.
Firestorm Coming: Draft Of Trump Executive Order May Deny Services To Gay, Transgender People
A draft executive order circulating the Trump administration would dramatically expand legal protections for individuals, organizations and employers on grounds of religious beliefs, and would potentially allow the denial of services to gay and transgender people, unleashing a firestorm of protests across the nation.
Berkeley Blowback: Milo Book Sales Soar 12,740% Overnight
Following the violent anti-free-speech protests in Berkeley, California last night – sparked by cal’s special snowflakes hurt feelings at the potential words that would come out of Milo Yiannopoulos’ mouth during a sold-out event – it appears America’s curiousity has been piqued.
Top Headlines – 2/3/2017
Trump Plans to Undo Dodd-Frank, Fiduciary Rule (Read More)
A Houston-area school district is investigating a series of photos that appear to show several of its high school students giving Nazi salutes. KPRC-TV reports…
The Trump administration imposed sanctions against 13 people and a dozen companies — the first punishment since the administration put Iran “on notice” after the…
The 45th president of the United States took part in his first-ever National Prayer Breakfast. “Today we continue a tradition begun by President Eisenhower some…
The U.S. imposed fresh sanctions on Iran as President Donald Trump seeks to punish Tehran for its ballistic missile program after warning that the Islamic…
Wildlife specialists have spent the last three days picking up more than 3,700 dead bird carcasses from the shore in the Yolo Bypass, California. Laurence…
Minister Billye Brim says a supernatural event occurred as she and other pro-Israel advocates gathered in the Capitol to lobby on behalf of the nation….
Fearing a loss of millions of dollars for defying immigration authorities, Miami-Dade Mayor Carlos Gimenez on Thursday ordered county jails to comply with federal immigration…
The new US ambassador to the United Nations used her inaugural statement to the international body to condemn Russian aggression in Ukraine. “I consider it…
The White House warned Israel on Thursday – in a surprising statement – to cease settlement announcements that are “unilateral” and “undermining” of President Donald…
The US is reportedly expected to impose sanctions on over two dozen Iranian entities following the Islamic Republic’s ballistic missile test this week, in a…
The Texas Board of Education has voted preliminarily to ease, but not completely get rid of, the state high school curriculum requirement that educators should…
On Thursday, President Donald Trump told thousands of faith leaders he would destroy a law that keeps pastors from speaking politically from the pulpit. “I…
Iran has tested a cruise missile called “Sumar” that is capable of carrying nuclear weapons in addition to test-firing a medium-range ballistic missile on Sunday,…
A top adviser to Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said on Thursday Iran will not yield to “useless” U.S. threats from “an inexperienced person” over…
God made everything out of nothing, including you and me. His main purpose in creation was to bring him pleasure.
The chief way in which we as humanity do this is through loving, obeying, and enjoying him perfectly.
Instead of this, we have sinned against our loving Creator and acted in high-handed rebellion.
God has vowed that he will righteously and lovingly judge sinners with eternal death.
But God, being merciful, loving, gracious, and just, sent his own son, Jesus Christ, in the likeness of man to live as a man; fulfilling his perfect requirements in the place of sinners; loving, obeying, and enjoying him perfectly.
And further, his son bore the eternal judgment of God upon the cross of Calvary, as he satisfied the eternal anger of God, standing in the place of sinners. God treated Jesus as a sinner, though he was perfectly sinless, that he might declare sinners as perfect.
This glorious transaction occurs as the sinner puts their faith (dependence, trust) in the Lord Jesus Christ as their substitute. God then charges Christ’s perfection to the sinner, and no longer views him as an enemy but instead an adopted son covered in the perfect righteousness of his son.
God furnished proof that this sacrifice was accepted by raising Jesus from the dead.
God will judge the world in righteousness and all of those who are not covered in the righteousness of Christ, depending on him for forgiveness, will be forced to stand on their own to bear the eternal anger of God.
Therefore, all must turn from sin and receive Christ Jesus as Lord.
There is no greater message to be heard than that which we call the gospel. But as important as that is, it is often given to massive distortions or over simplifications. People think they’re preaching the gospel to you when they tell you, ‘you can have a purpose to your life’, or that ‘you can have meaning to your life’, or that ‘you can have a personal relationship with Jesus.’ All of those things are true, and they’re all important, but they don’t get to the heart of the gospel.
The gospel is called the ‘good news’ because it addresses the most serious problem that you and I have as human beings, and that problem is simply this: God is holy and He is just, and I’m not. And at the end of my life, I’m going to stand before a just and holy God, and I’ll be judged. And I’ll be judged either on the basis of my own righteousness–or lack of it –or the righteousness of another. The good news of the gospel is that Jesus lived a life of perfect righteousness, of perfect obedience to God, not for His own well being but for His people. He has done for me what I couldn’t possibly do for myself. But not only has He lived that life of perfect obedience, He offered Himself as a perfect sacrifice to satisfy the justice and the righteousness of God.
The great misconception in our day is this: that God isn’t concerned to protect His own integrity. He’s a kind of wishy-washy deity, who just waves a wand of forgiveness over everybody. No. For God to forgive you is a very costly matter. It cost the sacrifice of His own Son. So valuable was that sacrifice that God pronounced it valuable by raising Him from the dead – so that Christ died for us, He was raised for our justification. So the gospel is something objective. It is the message of who Jesus is and what He did. And it also has a subjective dimension. How are the benefits of Jesus subjectively appropriated to us? How do I get it? The Bible makes it clear that we are justified not by our works, not by our efforts, not by our deeds, but by faith–and by faith alone. The only way you can receive the benefit of Christ’s life and death is by putting your trust in Him–and in Him alone. You do that, you’re declared just by God, you’re adopted into His family, you’re forgiven of all of your sins, and you have begun your pilgrimage for eternity.
The Gospel In A Nutshell
Now, with regard to this rule of faith—that we may from this point acknowledge what it is which we defend—it is, you must know, that which prescribes the belief that there is one only God, and that He is none other than the Creator of the world, who produced all things out of nothing through His own Word, first of all sent forth; that this Word is called His Son, and, under the name of God, was seen “in diverse manners” by the patriarchs, heard at all times in the prophets, at last brought down by the Spirit and Power of the Father into the Virgin Mary, was made flesh in her womb, and, being born of her, went forth as Jesus Christ; thenceforth He preached the new law and the new promise of the kingdom of heaven, worked miracles; having been crucified, He rose again the third day; (then) having ascended into the heavens, He sat at the right hand of the Father; sent instead of Himself the Power of the Holy Ghost to lead such as believe; will come with glory to take the saints to the enjoyment of everlasting life and of the heavenly promises, and to condemn the wicked to everlasting fire, after the resurrection of both these classes shall have happened, together with the restoration of their flesh. This rule, as it will be proved, was taught by Christ, and raises amongst ourselves no other questions than those which heresies introduce, and which make men heretics.
Tertullian, “On Prescription Against Heretics,” Chapter XIIl
What exactly do Christians mean when they talk about the “gospel of Jesus Christ”? Since the word “gospel” means “good news,” when Christians talk about the gospel, they’re simply telling the good news about Jesus! It’s a message from God saying, “Good news! Here is how you can be saved from my judgment!” That’s an announcement you can’t afford to ignore.
Why Is the Gospel Good News?
So, what is the good news about Jesus Christ?
Since the earliest Christians announced the good news about Jesus, it has been organized around these questions:
Who made us, and to whom are we accountable?
What is our problem?
What is God’s solution to our problem?
How can I be included in his solution?
Christians through the centuries since Christ have answered those questions with the same truth from the Bible.
We are accountable to God.
Our problem is our sin against him.
God’s solution is salvation through Jesus Christ.
We come to be included in that salvation by faith and repentance.
Let’s summarize those points like this: God, Mankind, Jesus Christ, and Our Response.
God
The first thing to know about the good news of Jesus is that “in the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth” (Gen. 1:1). Everything starts from that point, so if you get that point wrong then everything else that follows will be wrong. Because God created everything—including us—he has the right to tell us how to live. You have to understand that in order to understand the good news about Jesus. To understand just how glorious and life-giving the gospel of Jesus Christ is, we have to understand that God is also holy and righteous. He is determined never to ignore or tolerate sin. Including ours!
Mankind
When God created the first human beings, Adam and Eve, he intended for them to live under his righteous rule in perfect joy—obeying him and living in fellowship with him. When Adam disobeyed God, though, and ate the one fruit that God had told him not to eat, that fellowship with God was broken. Moreover, Adam and Eve had declared rebellion against God. They were denying his authority over their lives.
It’s not just Adam and Eve who are guilty of sin. The Bible says, “All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God” (Romans 3:23). Sin is the rejection of God himself and his authority over those to whom he gives life.
Once you understand sin in that light, you begin to understand why “the wages of sin is death” (Romans 6:23). That’s not just physical death, but spiritual death, a forceful separating of our sinful, rebellious selves from the presence of God forever. The Bible teaches that the final destiny for unbelieving sinners is eternal, active judgment in a place called “hell.”
But . . .
Jesus Christ
The word “Christ” means “anointed one,” referring to anointing a king with oil when he is crowned. So, when we say “Jesus Christ,” we’re saying that Jesus is a King!
When Jesus began his public ministry, he told the people, “The kingdom of God is at hand. Repent and believe the good news!” As Jesus died on a cross, the awful weight of all our sins fell on his shoulders. The sentence of death God had pronounced against rebellious sinners struck. And Jesus died. For you and me!
But the story doesn’t end there. Jesus the Crucified is no longer dead. The Bible tells us that he rose from the grave. Jesus’s rising from the grave was God’s way of saying, “What Jesus claimed about who he is and what he came to do is true!”
Our Response
What does God expect us to do with the information that Jesus died in our place so we can be saved from God’s righteous wrath against our sins? He expects us to respond with repentance and faith.
To repent of our sins means to turn away from our rebellion against God. Repentance doesn’t mean we’ll bring an immediate end to our sinning. It does mean, though, that we’ll never again live at peace with our sins.
Not only that, but we also turn to God in faith. Faith is reliance. It’s a promise-founded trust in the risen Jesus to save you from your sins. If God is ever to count us righteous, he’ll have to do it on the basis of someone else’s record, someone who’s qualified to stand in as our substitute. And that’s what happens when a person is saved by Jesus: All our sins are credited to Jesus who took the punishment for them, and the perfect righteousness of Jesus is then credited to us when we place our trust in what he has done for us! That’s what faith means—to rely on Jesus, to trust in him alone to stand in our place and win a righteous verdict from God!
Ravi Zacharias explains the gospel in two minutes:
The five main components of the gospel can be remembered on 5 fingers of one hand. Here they are:
1) Jesus’ birth 2) Jesus’ life 3) Jesus’ death 4) Jesus’ resurrection 5) Jesus’ ascension
Obviously each point can be elaborated on depending on how much time you have. Here’s the short version:
1) Jesus’ birth – Jesus, God himself, the creator of the universe, the Messiah, became a human being – took on flesh, and was born of a virgin.
2) Jesus’ life – Jesus lived a life of perfect obedience to his Father. Though he was tempted in every way as we are, he never once sinned.
3) Jesus’ death – on the cross, Jesus himself took all our sins and paid for them. God the father counted all our sins to Jesus as if he himself had personally committed them. Then Jesus bore God’s wrath towards sin – the punishment we deserved – as a substitute for us.
4) Jesus’ resurrection – within 3 days, Jesus rose physically from the dead, proving that his sacrifice for sins have been accepted by God, since the punishment for sin was death. Jesus was seen by numerous people after he rose including 500 at one time (1 Corinthians 15).
5) Jesus’ ascension – Jesus ascended physically into heaven where he reigns as King of kings and Lord of lords. And someday he will return to the earth.
That’s the gospel, the good news, and if we believe in Jesus Christ and this good news and call upon him he will save us from our sins and give us eternal life.
That’s a simple way to remember the gospel – five fingers. Even a child can do it. So ask God to give you opportunities to share his good news today.
Please take the time to watch this clip, so that you might understand the authentic Gospel
This is the Gospel:
Friend, God is holy. There is a God in heaven who has created you and me, and He is the authority over both of us. He is perfectly holy. “In Him is Light, and there is no darkness at all” (1 John 1:5). And the problem with that is that if we want to have fellowship with God, we have to be light and no darkness at all. And yet here’s the problem: we are darkness. We are sinful. We’ve all broken His law. We’ve all lied, stolen, we’ve all looked with lust, we’ve all been angry with our brothers in our hearts. We’ve all fallen short of the glorious standard of perfection that God requires (Rom 3:23). And there’s nothing we can do about it. No amount of works, no amount of contrition, no amount of bad feelings, no amount of church attendance, no amount of Bible reading, no amount of evangelism can earn forgiveness of our sins and the righteousness which God requires (Titus 3:5; cf. Isa 64:6).
And yet God is gracious, and He loves us, and as His creatures He wants to display His glory in us by rescuing us from that. And so He sent His Son—God in the flesh, the Lord Jesus Christ—to be born as a helpless little baby (John 1:14; 3:16; Col 2:9). God of the universe, Sustainer of the universe, Himself being sustained in the womb of a teenage Hebrew girl, and upholding the world by the word of His power (Heb 1:3) while He is upheld by the nutrients from her own body! Unspeakable! And in great humility, He grows up with the growing pains of life in a fallen world, though He Himself never being with any sin—without sin entirely (2 Cor 5:21; Heb 4:15; 7:26). And He lives a perfectly righteous life. The way that you and I have failed to live before God—the way that we have failed in thought, word, and deed, and fallen short of God’s glory—Christ never did. Not even a thought. He loved God, His Father, perfectly. He always walked in perfect righteousness. He lived the life that you were commanded to live, that I was commanded to live, that we failed to live. He lived that perfect life that God is worthy of.
And not only did He live for us, He died for us. He went to the cross. Our sin demanded death. Our sin demanded eternal punishment. Our sin demanded wrath—just wrath exercised on us for eternity (Rom 6:23). But because of the infinite worth of Christ’s person, He was on that cross. And on that cross, God exercised upon Him the full fury of His own anger (Rom 3:24–26; 2 Cor 5:21; Gal 3:10–14), that was rightly due to me and rightly due to you, and that you will experience if you don’t turn from your sin and trust in this Messiah. Christ was born, lived, died, and was raised (1 Cor 15:3–4). And He rose from the grave after being dead, demonstrating His victory over sin and death.
And now God promises that if you turn from your sin, if you repudiate all that you are and all that you were and all that you love, and you turn away from a life of pursuing sin—and if you repudiate not only your bad works but your good works, if you turn from trying to earn your salvation by all the good deeds that you might want to do as a moral person—if you turn away from all of that (Acts 17:30–31), and you trust in Christ alone for righteousness (Phil 3:7–8; cf. Rom 3:28; 10:4), God promises that He will forgive you. He will have treated Christ on the cross as if Christ lived your life. And He will then treat you, justly and legally and righteously, as if you lived Christ’s perfect life of righteousness (2 Cor 5:21). And you can be saved to know the God you were created to love and enjoy. You can have the fullness of joy, the eternal pleasures that are at the Father’s right hand in heaven (Ps 16:11), and begin even now, because eternal life is to know God (John 17:3).
Friend, would you repent? Would you turn from your sin and trust in this perfect Savior to avail for you before God, to pay for your sin and to provide your righteousness?
A Gospel Presentation
God is Holy
The Bible teaches that the entire universe was created by God. And that God who has created everything has spoken to humanity in the Bible. And the Bible tells us that a fundamental characteristic of God is that He is holy. 1 John 1:5 says, “God is Light, and in Him there is no darkness at all.” That’s a way of saying that He’s entirely pure. God’s character is one of perfect moral uprightness. He is the essence of all that is good—so much so that, as the verse says, He can have absolutely no fellowship with “darkness”—no fellowship with that which is not perfectly holy, righteous, and pure.
God’s righteous character was expressed in the law He gave to Moses and the Israelites. You’ve heard of the Ten Commandments. They summarized the perfection of God’s character. These laws were directives for how people who were in a proper relationship with God must act.
We are Sinful
The problem is: all of us are sinful. We have all broken God’s law. All humanity has “gone astray like sheep, and each one of us has turned to his own way” (Isaiah 53:6). We’ve tried to live our lives without God, according to our own standards, in our own ways. Whether we’re drug addicts and murderers, or white collar, well-to-do, upstanding citizens, we do what we do because we want to do it, with no consideration for God and what He would have us to do. The Bible calls that sin. It is the missing of the mark, the falling short of God’s standard of righteousness.
And in your heart of hearts you know you’re a sinner. I don’t know anyone who would say that they are perfect, even by their own standards. Ecclesiastes 7:20 says, “There is not a righteous man on earth who continually does good and who never sins.” And if God is Light, and in Him there is no darkness at all, then in order to have fellowship with Him, we’d need to be perfectly holy like Him. But we’re not. Romans 3:23 says, “All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.” We are stained by the “darkness” of our sin. And this is a problem, because if darkness can’t dwell with light, and we’re darkness and God is light, we’re cut off from a relationship with Him. We become absolutely incapable of doing the very thing we were created and designed to do: to enjoy a relationship with our Creator.
There is a Penalty for Sin
But it’s not just that we and God can’t be friends. There’s a penalty to be paid for sin. The Bible tells us that that penalty is death, Romans 6:23: “The wages of sin is death.” But the death that Paul talks about there isn’t just physical death. It’s not like we pay for our sins by going out of existence. The death talked about in that verse is a spiritual death. This is hell: eternal conscious torment. Jesus Himself calls it “a furnace of fire,” where there will be “weeping and gnashing of teeth” (Matthew 13:50).
The idea of hell grates against the sensibilities of modern people, because nobody thinks they’re really bad enough to deserve something like eternal torment. They might admit that they’re not the greatest of people, but surely they don’t deserve that. But their reasoning is skewed. The punishment for sin isn’t merely measured by the sin itself. In other words, while there are qualitative differences in the experience of divine punishment, murder, lust, and lying all receive the sentence of an eternity in hell. That’s because punishment for sin is measured by the One sinned against. All sin is fundamentally a sin against God, and He is infinitely holy. Therefore, sin against an infinitely holy God demands an infinite punishment. That’s why the punishment is so serious: because God is actually that righteous.
And so the bad news is that we’re sinful, separated from God, and doomed to spend eternity in hell. There’s nothing we can do about it. We can’t simply tell God we’re sorry and we won’t do it again. What would you say about a judge who let a guilty, convicted criminal go free because he was sorry and said he wouldn’t do it again? You’d call him an unjust judge. But God is a perfectly just, perfectly righteous Judge. God’s justice demands that sin be punished, and the only payment is eternal spiritual death.
God Became Man
But the Good News is: God saw the miserable condition of humanity, and took pity on us. He knew that there was no way we could ever earn our way back to Him. We could never pay for our sins. But just when man was absolutely hopeless, when we were all doomed to spend eternity in hell with no way to pay our penalty, God the Father sent His Son to the earth on a mission. He was miraculously born to a virgin. The Bible says that the Holy Spirit miraculously conceived Jesus in Mary’s womb. And so being conceived by the Holy Spirit, Jesus was God. And being born to a human being, He was human. This is the greatest mystery in the universe. As finite human beings, we can’t entirely wrap our minds around this, but it’s true: Jesus was fully God and fully man.
He lived for 33 years on the earth. He grew up just like every other child. He became a carpenter like Joseph, His earthly father. The great difference, though, between Jesus and every other human being, was that He never sinned. Never once did He ever break God’s law. He always loved God with all His heart, soul, mind, and strength in everything He did. He never sought satisfaction outside of the Father Himself. He never disobeyed His parents, He was never selfish, He never spoke sinful words. In a word, He lived the life that you and I should have lived, but failed to live. He lived a life totally worthy of God, a life that was purely “Light,” like we said before, with no darkness at all.
Jesus Paid the Penalty
And because He was perfectly righteous, He was fit to be the substitute for sinners. The Bible records for us that the Jews plotted to kill Jesus because He preached a message that was very different to the religious establishment of His day. It was against the Jewish law to put people to death, so they sought help from the Romans, who were the governing body in Israel. Because the governor, Pontius Pilate, feared that the people would riot if he didn’t give them what they wanted, he agreed to crucify Jesus.
At the same time, Scripture also tells us that God sent His Son to die this way. It was all part of God’s plan. God used the sinful desires of the Jews and the Romans to accomplish something for His own good purpose. On the cross, Jesus suffered for sins. But He didn’t suffer for His own sins. He had no sins. He lived an entirely perfect life. No, on the cross, God “caused the iniquity of us all to fall on Him.”
The verse right before that, Isaiah 53:5, says, “He was pierced through for our transgressions, He was crushed for our iniquities; the chastening for our well-being fell upon Him, and by His scourging we are healed.” What was happening on the cross was: God was carrying out the punishment against my sins—i.e., the pouring out of His wrath—on His innocent Son. Jesus voluntarily laid down His life in order to pay the penalty for sins. On the cross, God treated Jesus if He lived my life. And because I believe in Him, He treats me as if I lived Jesus’ life. See, because God is perfectly righteous, the only way to get to heaven is to be perfectly righteous. But because Jesus was perfectly righteous, and traded places with me on the cross, the perfect righteousness I need to go to heaven is His righteousness applied to my account.
After Jesus died, God miraculously raised Him from the dead three days later in order to show that He was satisfied with His sacrifice. Jesus was dead, but then He came back to life! It was a miracle. The Bible says God did this to “furnish proof to all men” that this message is true (Acts 17:30-31).
Law or Gospel — Which comes first?
Sometimes in life, the question is posed to us, “Which do you want first — the bad news or the good news?”
In response to this question, some choose to hear the good news first. It appears they desire to be thoroughly overwhelmed with the positive before getting their dose of the negative.
Others choose differently. They would rather hear the bad news first, get it out of the way, and put behind them their wonder and worry. Then, after processing the ramifications of the bad news, they hope to soothe the pain an end the conversation on a good note with positive vibes.
Well, Scripture does not offer us options. The Bible makes the choice for us, and it chooses to present the negative before the positive. The Bible declares bad news before declaring good news. It first presents the holy, wise, beneficial and condemning Law, then it publishes the “good tidings of great joy” or the Gospel. (Is. 60:1-2)
Understanding God’s Law
God’s Law was first presented in the opening chapters of Genesis. Some of it was stated; all of it was written upon man’s heart. Adam and Eve were to be entirely holy and obedient. They were to worship God with all their heart, soul, mind, and strength, all the time. Whether they ate, or drank, or whatsoever they did, they were do to it all for the glory of God. As image-bearers, they were to keep up God’s image. As men and women created in his likeness, they were to be like God. Vocationally, they were to enjoy and steward the garden and all God’s creatures. Relationally, they were to love one another and populate the planet. Ceremonially, they were to enjoy and glorify the Lord by walking with him in the cool of the day and never eating from the forbidden tree. These were some of their obligations, and as long as they performed perfectly they were guaranteed life in the family and kingdom of God.
However, things soon went from glorious to ghastly. Outside of them, they experienced the testing of God and the temptation of Satan. Within them they chose to question God’s truth, wisdom, and affection. Then, drawn away by their own lusts and enticed, they followed their internal sinful inclinations and externally ate of the forbidden fruit. Therefore, the holy, wise, and beneficial Law became a harsh taskmaster. It showed them the standard, showed them their guilt, and plagued their consciences. It encouraged them to hide, fear, and religiously self-medicate. It declared them wicked, separated from God, at enmity with God, and deserving of death, and it promised this for both them and their children. Yes, the Law of God promised to give them that which they deserved. It promised to pay them based upon performance, and this proved to be very, very bad news.
Understanding God’s Gospel
God, through the Law declared to Adam and Eve who they were, what they had done, and what they had justly earned — condemnation. Then God mercifully, graciously, and lovingly went to work. He performed on their behalf and promised them an eternity of undeserved blessings:
He predetermined to love his enemies.
He sought out his enemies while they hid from him in fear.
He called to the man and woman who vainly had self-medicated themselves.
He promised to rescue them and their children; they would be removed from Satan’s family.
He promised to do so by means of a special Son – one to come who would be fiercely bitten yet ultimately victorious.
He promised to damn the Evil One.
He then covered or clothed Adam and Eve by means of his ceremonial sacrifice.
He perfectly performed for and made promises to them who had performed so wickedly for him.
Friends, are we seeing the difference? The Law presents our duty to perfectly perform, and it only results in bad news. For there is none who keep all the Law, all the time, both internally and externally. However, the Gospel is not like the Law. The Gospel presents not our duty to perform for God, but it presents God’s performance and promise for us. Through the Law we lose our credentials to be a part of God’s family and enjoy his kingdom. Through the Gospel we gain credentials that cannot be earned or lost.
A Great Illustration
Perhaps nowhere is the distinction better seen between Law and Gospel than on Calvary’s cross. On that day, the Law had placed a criminal beside Jesus. There he was guilty, vile, dying, hopeless, and still hurling insults at the Son of God. He was getting that which he earned and deserved. He was being treated justly and fairly. His payment was based upon his performance, and he had hell to pay. The Law had nothing good to say to the thief on the cross. But then God went to work; Jesus granted the Law-breaking criminal complete pardon, intimate communion, and never-ending paradise. These blessings were not based upon any labors of his own, but only based upon the performance and promise of God. These blessings were not earned; they were a gift. A divine swap occurred. Jesus (The Law Keeping Man) received that which he did not deserve so that the thief (The Law Breaking Man) might also receive that which he did not deserve. And this is a fantastic picture of the Gospel. Communion with God that was lost by man seeking to keep the Law, was granted to man as a gift of God.
Responding to the Gospel
Therefore, how should we respond to the Gospel? While believing in divine sovereignty, what is our human responsibility?
Let us make the Gospel our Gospel. Along with the Apostle Paul let us call it “mine.” The Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit offer this gift to you. They command you to receive it and enjoy it. If you find yourself with faith, willing to repent and receive, call out to Jesus in prayer right now. Call Jesus, “My Jesus.” Call Jesus’ righteousness, “My Righteousness.” Call Jesus’ Gospel, “My Gospel.” (Rom. 2:16; 2 Tim. 2:8) Draw near to God and he will draw near to you. As a matter of fact, if you draw near to God, it is only because he has already been drawing nearer to you.
Let us not water down the Gospel. This is always our tendency, to add human works to the sufficient work of Jesus Christ. Friends, re-read the letter to the Galatians. If we must perform, it is not Gospel. If we must labor, it is not Gospel. If it involves our works, it is not Gospel. If it is conditioned upon us in anyway, it is not Gospel. If it is a contract, it is not Gospel. If it can be lost, it is not Gospel. The Gospel represents the unilateral work of God on behalf of men. The Law ought never be divorced from the Gospel, but it must never be confused either.
Let us celebrate the Gospel. William Tyndall wrote of the Gospel, “It makes a man’s heart glad, and makes him sing, dance, and leap for joy.” It is the best of news. It means we can sabbath. It means we can boldly approach the throne of grace with confidence. It means we are seen as Christlike image-bearers. Give God the celebratory praise he deserves. He has labored perfectly on your behalf, give him reverent and radical praise and worship.
Let us not be ashamed of the Gospel. (Rom.1:16) Paul wrote, “Woe if I do not preach the Gospel. (1 Cor. 9:16) He wrote, “How beautiful are the feet of those who spread the Good News.” Friends, just as Adam and Eve were to physically reproduce, we are to spiritually reproduce around the world. This is our mission. This is our great mission. This is our Great Commission. Let us be humble, for we cannot make someone believe. Let us be zealous, for God has a tendency to honor those who labor hard. And let us become flexibly relevant in order to better spread the Gospel. (1 Cor. 9:22-23) As Gospel-lovers and Gospel-beneficiants, let us do that which is Lawful and bring in the Gospel-harvest.
Then, let us live Lawfully in accordance with the Gospel. Now that we have been saved from having to perform, let us perform. Yes, with Gospel-eyes, let us look at the Law and enjoy practicing that which is holy, wise, beneficial, and worshipful. Living in the power of the Gospel, let us enjoy becoming more and more like Jesus — the Author and Finisher of our Faith. And when we look at the Law, let us not get frustrated and despondent. Instead, let us glory in the Law, for there is the description of who we are in Christ today, and it also shows us all we will be in glory tomorrow when our old flesh is finally exterminated.
Bottom line, the Law shows us how to perform for God, but the Gospel shows us how God performs for us. This is radical. This is crazy. This is beautiful. This is truth.
Our Response
And now, God promises that…
if you acknowledge that you are a sinner—that you have broken His law,
and if you admit that there is no way that you could earn His favor and His forgiveness,
and if you purpose to turn away from your life of sin and commit your life to Him,
and if you trust in Jesus’ righteousness alone for your acceptance before this holy God,
…then He will have treated Jesus as if He lived your life, and will treat you as if you lived Jesus’ life. You will be saved from the penalty of your sin, and will be able to enjoy fellowship with God forever in heaven, and even fellowship with Him starting now.
In other words, if you believe that you’re a sinner and deserve God’s punishment because of your sin, but you also believe that God sent Jesus to endure that punishment in your place, and that His sacrifice is the only way you can be forgiven, then God promises that He will forgive you and you will be saved. You’ll know the God who created you.
Don’t Waste Your Life
God designed your soul. And He designed you so that, just as a car engine is designed to run on gasoline, you’re designed to run on Him. He is what life is about. All of the disappointments, discouragements, and uncertainties of your life find their resolution in Him. And all of the satisfactions, fun experiences, and joys of life find their consummation in Him. Everything good in our lives is like a trail of breadcrumbs that leads us to the feast of God Himself. And everything bad in our lives is a reminder that life lived apart from knowing God in Christ is not the way it was meant to be.
And I also don’t want to see you waste your life. God created us for the purpose of rightly knowing and worshiping Him. That’s the meaning of life. That’s where true happiness and satisfaction are found. When you don’t live your life for that purpose, you waste it. So many people go through life seeking that happiness, but never find it because they don’t know what life is really about. I don’t want that for you. I don’t want you to suffer God’s wrath eternally for your sin. I want to spend eternity in heaven worshiping God with you, praising Him for how gracious He was to forgive our sins because of Christ’s sacrifice.
Receive Forgiveness
So would you receive Christ? Would you acknowledge your sinfulness before God and admit you can’t do a thing about it? Would you turn from your sin, and seek to live your life in submission to Jesus Christ? Would you trust in Jesus alone for your righteousness before God? Would you join me in worshiping the God we were created to know?
With that brief question Jesus Christ confronted His followers with the most important issue they would ever face. He had spent much time with them and made some bold claims about His identity and authority. Now the time had come for them either to believe or deny His teachings.
Who do you say Jesus is? Your response to Him will determine not only your values and lifestyle, but your eternal destiny as well.
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It is not just a handful of texts that teach the perseverance of the saints: the entire gospel sustains and confirms it. The Father has chosen them before the foundation of the world (Eph. 1:4), ordained them to eternal life (Acts 13:48), to be conformed to the image of his Son (Rom. 8:29). This election stands (Rom. 9:11; Heb. 6:17) and in due time carries with it the calling and justification and glorification (Rom. 8:30). Christ, in whom all the promises of God are Yes and Amen (2 Cor. 1:20), died for those who were given him by the Father (John 17:6, 12) in order that he might give them eternal life and not lose a single one of them (6:40; 17:2); he therefore gives them eternal life and they will never be lost in all eternity; no one will snatch them out of his hand (6:39; 10:28).
The Holy Spirit who regenerates them remains eternally with them (14:16) and seals them for the day of redemption (Eph. 1:13; 4:30). The covenant of grace is firm and confirmed with an oath (Heb. 6:16–18; 13:20), unbreakable like a marriage (Eph. 5:31–32), like a testament (Heb. 9:17), and by virtue of that covenant, God calls his elect. He inscribes the law upon their inmost being, puts his fear in their heart (Heb. 8:10; 10:14ff.), will not let them be tempted beyond their strength (1 Cor. 10:13), confirms and completes the good work he has begun in them (1 Cor. 1:9; Phil. 1:6), and keeps them for the return of Christ to receive the heavenly inheritance (1 Thess. 5:23; 2 Thess. 3:3; 1 Pet. 1:4–5).
In his intercession before the Father, Christ acts in such a way that their faith may not fail (Luke 22:32), that in the world they may be kept from the evil one (John 17:11, 20), that they may be saved for all times (Heb. 7:20), that their sins will be forgiven them (1 John 2:1), and that they may all be where he is to behold his glory (John 17:24). The benefits of Christ, which the Holy Spirit imparts to them, are all irrevocable (Rom. 11:29). Those who are called are also glorified (8:30). Those who are adopted as children are heirs of eternal life (8:17; Gal. 4:7). Those who believe have eternal life already here and now (John 3:16). That life itself, being eternal, cannot be lost. It cannot die since it cannot sin (1 John 3:9). Faith is a firm ground (Heb. 11:1), hope is an anchor (6:19) and does not disappoint us (Rom. 5:5), and love never ends (1 Cor. 13:8).
(Alternative News, Apologetics, Current Events, Commentary, Opinion, Theology, Discernment Blog, Devotionals, Christian Internet Evangelism & Missions Activist).
“A simple layman armed with Scripture is to be believed above a pope or a council without it…” – Martin Luther
“In essentials, unity; in non-essentials, liberty; in all things, charity.”
— Augustine
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At yesterday’s National Prayer Breakfast, President Donald Trump said, “I will get rid of and totally destroy the Johnson Amendment and allow our representatives of faith to speak freely and without fear of retribution. I will do that. Remember.”
The 1954 amendment introduced by former Senator and President Lyndon B. Johnson bans all 501(c)(3) non-profit organizations—which includes churches and parachurch ministries—from endorsing candidates or participating in political campaigns as an institution or risk losing their tax exempt status.
Members of Congress have already moved to introduce legislation reversing the Johnson Amendment. The Free Speech Fairness Act is thought by many conservative lawmakers and Evangelical leaders to be a fair remedy the to free speech infringements imposed by the Johnson Amendment.
“I am grateful to President Trump for raising this issue to prominence over the last year,” responded Dr. Jerry Johnson, president of the National Religious Broadcasters, in a press statement. “For too long the infamous Johnson Amendment has dangled like a sword above the heads of pastors and ministry leaders, chilling their constitutional free speech rights.”
Hernan Castano pastors a minority church affected by a 2014 subpoena by the city of Houston demanding sermons dealing with homosexuality be turned over for review. As the Christian Post reports, Castano also lends his support to President Trump’s promise to “totally destroy” the Johnson Amendment.
“We need to repeal the Johnson Amendment because I have seen the faces of pastors, not only the pastors of big congregations but the pastors of smaller congregations,” Costano said. “I have seen the fear of their heart holding them back from speaking truth and I have seen them hold back from what will make a difference for their own people because they do not want the doors of their church buildings closed or their 501(c)(3) removed.”
Richard Land, president of Southern Evangelical Seminary, has previously denounced the Johnson Amendment as a political tool used by secular organizations like the ACLU to “intimidate and silence pastors and churches in addressing the political issues, which often have deeply moral components that face our nation.”
However, Land is cautious in his approach. “I personally don’t believe that churches should be endorsing candidates for office. Instead, we should be looking for candidates that endorse us, our values, our beliefs, our convictions.”
The constitutionality of the Johnson Amendment is debated as a violation of the First Amendment’s Free Speech and Exercise clauses as well as the Religious Freedom Restoration Act. As such, Dr. Land believes decisions of political engagement should be “made by the church and the pastor” and “not one that is coerced or mandated by the government.”
Russell Moore, president of the Southern Baptist Convention’s Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission, has argued along the same lines as Land. “While I don’t think a church normally should endorse candidates for office from the pulpit,” stated Moore previously, “Such decisions shouldn’t be dictated by bureaucrats at the IRS or anywhere else. That’s why I support the freedom of speech for churches and pastors, even when they say more or less than what I would say from the pulpit.”
Indeed, I too do not want to see my pastor or church collectively endorse candidates or support particular political campaigns. But yesterday my Methodist colleague Mark Tooley offered historical warnings for why Evangelicals should err on the side of caution in this debate.
Tooley, president of the Institute on Religion and Democracy and a life-long Methodist, offered a fresh reminder that neither American democracy nor American Christianity would be served by politicized churches regularly wading into partisan policy debates. “The institutional church has no historic mandate for routinely engaging in political specifics such as candidate endorsements or backing legislation,” wrote Tooley in an email.
Christian citizens might be called to work in specific areas of politics, that’s true. But if the institutional Church becomes politicized and partisan, Tooley explained it will lose its effectiveness for spreading the Gospel. We need only look at the history of the Mainline Protestant denominations to learn such a vital lesson.
“The sad history of the once predominant Mainline Protestant establishment,” wrote Tooley, “whose fall is partly due to its exchanging the Gospel for politic zeal, should be a warning to us all.”
This Sunday is “Racial Reconciliation Sunday,” as bequeathed by the Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission. As a part of that effort, they have released free bulletin inserts to advertise the theme-day and promote the ERLC.
The insert begins with a quotation from Martin Luther King, who they said “famously spoke of the ‘fierce urgency of now’ in the pursuit of racial justice.”
Matthew Hall, the author of the ERLC piece, writes, “While his critics seemed to assume that the ‘wheels of inevitability’ would bring about progress, King recognized that the call to direct action was one deeply rooted in a realistic and biblical vision of the world and God’s purposes.” Research into the doctrines and beliefs of King might reveal a less-than-adequate “biblical vision,” but we can’t really blame the ERLC for invoking King’s name and that’s not the point of this update. The point, rather, is to apprise you of the term “racial justice” as repeatedly used by the ERLC, its origins and meaning.
Whereas racial equality is a Biblical and God-honoring mandate for Christian cultures, “racial justice” is a term steeped in, born out of, saturated with and irrevocably linked to marxist social progressivism.
“Racial Justice” is defined as “a proactive reinforcement of policies, practices, attitudes and actions that produce equitable power, access, opportunities, treatment, impacts and outcomes for all” (source link). And “racial justice” is repeatedly written of as a godly goal of the ERLC in their insert they’ve designed for this Sunday (pictured below). Frankly, the insert looks like something that one could expect to see in a American Baptist or United Church of Christ bulletin.
A Biblical worldview aims to declare the equality of people from all races and inherent equality in their design before God and their legal standing under the civil magistrate. The concept of “racial justice” demands the equitable “power” and “outcome” for all people. Conservatives think of equality in terms of opportunities and social progressives think of equality in terms of outcomes. This is why those who incite racial disunity like Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson will never meet their desired end; the end does not come until all individuals have an equal share of the economic pie.
Pivotal to the promotion of “racial justice” is the notion of institutionalized and systemic racism, and the diminishing of individual responsibility. The ERLC has regularly promoted the idea that institutionalized and systemic racism exists in America over the course Russell Moore’s tenure (source link). This systemic and institutionalized racism can be proven, Moore and other progressives argue, because there are demographic “inequities” that make certain ethnicities “disadvantaged.” This class and race warfare, ironically enough, leads to the exact opposite of racial harmony and reconciliation.
The fact is, conservative organizations simply do not talk about “racial justice” because they recognize that it is a Marxist catchword that prevents racial harmony and promotes social progressive political theory designed to “level the playing field,” but ends up perpetuating mass poverty and government dependency. Russell Moore’s ERLC continues to use the term racial justice frequently nonetheless. However, the ACLU, United Methodist Women, Bernie Sanders and other progressivist outfits do use the term racial justice with frequency because it is from their lexicon.
So-called “racial justice” is fundamentally opposed to a Biblical worldview, and is a part of the field of Marxist “social justice” (read here to understand the link between social justice and Marxism). And simply put, the SBC’s new Moore-led ERLC has absolutely no problem with social justice.
Moore and his defenders, no doubt, will probably argue that he’s just slyly adopting the terminology of the left, that he means the term differently than the way everyone else uses it, and that its his way of “engaging the culture.”
Either that, or the former Democratic staffer is exactly who we’ve been warning you he is…a social progressive trojan horse in the SBC.
We discuss the continuing meltdown of the Left, their reaction to Donald Trump’s election, his early policies, and Supreme Court Justice nominee, Neil Gorsuch. Also, last night, hate filled riots broke out at California Berkeley, making Saul Alinsky, Barack Obama, Jim Wallis, the liberal media, and Hillary Clinton (to name a few) proud. Plus, Mike’s commentary.
Daily podcast, relevant articles on issues pertaining to Christians and more can be found on Stand Up For The Truth.
Controversy Within The Southern Baptist Convention
Today, we cover a controversy within The Southern Baptist Convention over the building of a Muslim mosque in New Jersey. A city has not approved the building of this mosque, but the Southern Baptist Convention’s International Mission Board has filed an amicus brief with the court supporting a lawsuit against the city on behalf of Muslims. One pastor has resigned from the Mission Board citing a contradiction between the Board’s action and its mission of spreading the gospel.
In our first segment, we check in with Tina Griffin of Counter Culture Mom. Tina will point out some good role models for young people to look up to, and we’ll also talk about the need for Christians to make a statement to Hollywood by boycotting much of what they offer at the box office.
Daily podcast, relevant articles on issues pertaining to Christians and more can be found on Stand Up For The Truth.
Nancy Pelosi: We’re Doing God’s Work
There are many professing Christians who selectively reference the Bible to justify their personal beliefs and worldview; yet they completely ignore the Bible when it contradicts other personal beliefs. This is one form of hypocrisy creeping into the professing church that needs to be addressed.
Daily podcast, relevant articles on issues pertaining to Christians and more can be found on Stand Up For The Truth.
The Bible warns of a coming one world government and religion so deceptive that if possible, even the elect would be deceived. There are many speculations on what this one world religion will look like. Mike LeMay has written a new book The Death of Christian Thought where he identifies Humanism, self-worship, as this coming one world religion. He also explains that we are being slowly indoctrinated into it every day. In Matthew 7, Jesus warns that many who think they will be going to heaven will instead be cast into eternal separation from God. One reason Mike wrote his book is to address professing Christians to heed Jesus’ words.
Ha also asks some challenging questions about how culture is shaping our thoughts and worldview:
How are we being indoctrinated and who is behind this devious plot?
How can we reject Humanism and stay faithful to God and His Word in these increasingly dangerous times?
Why are a growing number of church fellowships ineffective in sharing the gospel and equipping believers for the work of His kingdom?
And why are an increasing number of Christian couples not enjoying the fruit of strong, healthy marriages such as f love, joy , good communication, mutual submission and peace? These are a few of the questions Mike tackles in his book and we discuss during today’s program.
Daily podcast, relevant articles on issues pertaining to Christians and more can be found on Stand Up For The Truth.
For a long time now, conservative speakers have been being blocked by left-wing students and protestors. At UC Berkeley, a leftist seminary, things have spilled over into fascism and violence.
You can review some photos of the violence, vandalism and rioting in this post from the Daily Signal.
Here’s one:
Rioters smash windows at a T-Mobile store during a protest against campus speaker
A female Donald Trump supporter was pepper-sprayed on Wednesday night by an anti-Trump protester while she was giving an on-camera interview at the University of California, Berkeley.
“I’m looking to make a statement by just being here, and I think the protesters are doing the same,” Kiara Robles told KGO-TV. “Props to the ones who are doing it non-violently, but I think that’s a very rare thing indeed.”
(Washington, D.C.) — You absolutely have to watch 
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