Summer Bible Reading: 1 Corinthians 4-6

Summer Bible Reading: 1 Corinthians 1-3

Summer Bible Reading: 14-16

This is a sermon by Albert Mohler.

Dr. R. Albert Mohler Jr. serves as president of The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary one of the largest seminaries in the world.

Dr. Mohler has been recognized by such influential publications as Time and Christianity Today as a leader among American evangelicals. In fact, Time.com called him the “reigning intellectual of the evangelical movement in the U.S.”

Here is his sermon on Romans 16:16-19

 http://www.albertmohler.com/2006/02/12/romans-1616-19/

Summer Bible Reading: Romans 10-12

Summer Bible Reading: Romans 7-9

Summer Bible Reading: Romans 4-6

Salvation belongs to our God 

Salvation belongs to our God 
Who sits upon the throne 
And unto the lamb 
Be praise and glory, wisdom and thanks 
Honor, and power, and strength 

Be to our God forever and ever 
Be to our God forever and ever 
Be to our God forever and ever 
AMEN 

We the redeemed shall be strong 
In purpose and unity 
Declaring aloud 
Be praise and glory, wisdom and thanks 
Honor, and power, and strength! 

Be to our God forever and ever 
Be to our God forever and ever 
Be to our God forever and ever 
AMEN

Summer Bible Reading: Romans 1-3

This is a sermon by Alister Begg from Truth for Life. May God bless the reading and hearing of His word. 

http://www.truthforlife.org/resources/sermon/power-gospel/

Summer Bible Reading: Acts 25-28

Summer Bible Reading: Acts 22-24

Summer Reading: Acts 19-21

Summer Bible Reading: Acts 16-18

In Acts 16 Paul encourages Timothy to be circumcised, then later condemns it. Was he being hypocritical?

I don’t think the apostle was being hypocritical at all. This is a very interesting historical situation that the New Testament records for us. It does say that Paul circumcised Timothy and then refused to circumcise Titus, and this became a major controversy in the early church. Paul’s reasoning behind it, I think, can be ferreted out through a study of Galatians, Corinthians, and Romans.

He talks about his concern for ethics and says that there are certain things God prohibits and certain things he commands. Then there are those things that are basically neutral in the ethical sense—those things that in and of themselves have no moral import or ethical significance. He is consistent in his approach to these things, as we read in correspondence to the Romans and Corinthians; these are areas in which Christians can exercise their liberty.

But the Judaizing party sprang up and threatened to destroy the infant Christian church by seeking to impose the absolute law of circumcision on every convert to Christianity. The counsel of Jerusalem in Acts 15 was one of those examples of the church having to respond to this. The counsel’s conclusion was that it pleased the Holy Spirit not to add all of these burdens upon Gentile converts that God had required of the Jewish nation in the Old Testament. What had happened in contemporary terms is this: Those who wanted to cling to some of the now antiquated practices were considered by Paul to be weaker brothers, and Paul said we don’t do anything to cause the weaker brother to stumble. We want to be sensitive to the weaker brother.

But suddenly the weaker brothers became so strong that they wanted to tyrannize the church and make their preferences the absolute law of God. Whenever people do that, it is a representation of legalism that destroys the essence of the gospel. Paul, by the time he wrote Galatians, saw the expansion of this group of Judaizers as being such a threat to the truth of the Christian gospel that he steadfastly refused to engage in circumcision as a religious act and used the strongest language to condemn those who were trying to make a matter of personal preference the absolute law of God.

You remember the earlier debate that Jesus had with the Pharisees. Jesus was very harsh with them because he said that they had taken the traditions of men and passed them off as if they were the laws of God, something we are not permitted to do. Jesus took the Pharisees to task for doing it, and Paul did the same thing; that is, in the earlier situation in which circumcision didn’t have this legal import to it, he went with the flow. He said if you want to be circumcised, fine; if you don’t want to, you don’t have to. So for those who wanted it, he did it. But when they tried to make it a law that he circumcise other people, he steadfastly refused to do it, in order to keep the integrity of the gospel intact.

From: Ligonier Ministries the teaching fellowship of R. C. Sproul 

Summer Bible Reading: Acts 13-15

Summer Bible Reading: Acts 10-12

BEYOND YOUR WALLS

Posted by Margaret Manning from RZIM on June 13, 2011 

And you shall be my witnesses both in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and even to the remotest part of the earth…

The season of Pentecost is the birthday of the Christian community. For Christians who celebrate Pentecost Sunday, a celebration is the order of the day to commemorate the birth of the church and its growth in numbers and witness. The book of Acts records the events surrounding the momentous day: the violent wind from heaven, the appearance of tongues of fire, and the miraculous gift of languages that caused the Jews who had come to Jerusalem for the Feast of Harvest to wonder if the disciples were drunk.

The ancient feast of Pentecost celebrated by the nation of Israel, however, was a celebration of harvest. The weeks of sowing were completed and now it was time to reap the gifts of the land. That the Spirit would be poured out during this Hebrew festival is no coincidence. Jewish pilgrims from many different lands had gathered for this feast and were astounded as they heard their native dialects and languages being spoken by a small group of Jesus-followers. These were the languages representing every region of the known world. The harvest was not just of crops, but of peoples—peoples far beyond the boundaries of Jerusalem.

And this is exactly what Jesus had promised would happen with the coming of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost. The good news of the Messiah would go out beyond the walls of Israel to the “remotest parts of the earth.” What is often not realized—as modern people living in a pluralistic and multicultural world—is that taking the gospel to the remotest parts of the earth would have been bad news for those who believed the Messiah was only for Israel.

To understand why this mission of the Holy Spirit was so radical, we have to understand how religious Jews viewed Gentiles in the first century. Gentiles were unclean and Jews had no dealings with them. Jesus was often criticized for ministering to Gentiles or to Samaritans—half-breeds—who were also despised by the Jews. This background gives understanding for a conflict in the earliest Christian community in which the Hellenistic Jews (Jews from Greece) were angry at the native Hebrews for overlooking their widows in the serving of food.(1) Outsiders in general were treated with inferiority.

It also helps us understand the strange vision of the great sheet covered with unclean animals that appeared to the disciple Peter. In the vision, Peter is commanded to “kill and eat” what would have defiled him according to Jewish law. Peter cries out when he is told to kill and eat, “By no means, Lord, for I have never eaten anything unholy and unclean!” This was not merely a protest against a new dietary law; Peter could not conceive of bringing the gospel to those he would have considered unclean. The narrative tells the reader that at the same time of this vision, Cornelius, a Roman solider was praying—praying as it turned out for Peter, his reluctant evangelist.

As a result of this vision, Peter later declares about the Gentiles, “I most certainly understand now that God is not one to show partiality, but in every nation the one who fears God and does what is right is welcome to God. The word which God sent to the sons of Israel, preaching peace through Jesus Christ…of him all the prophets bear witness that through his name everyone who believes in him receives forgiveness of sins.”(2)

Peter ministered to those who were considered outside the bounds of God’s grace. And when he returned to Jerusalem, the Jews took issue with him over his “eating with the uncircumcised.” Peter explained the events and the Jews eventually declared, “God has granted to the Gentiles also the repentance that leads to life.” The gospel had pushed outward beyond the walls of Jerusalem! The words of the prophet Joel were being fulfilled: “In the last days, God says, I will pour forth my Spirit on all people. Your sons and daughters will prophesy, and your young men will see visions, and your old men will dream dreams” (Joel 2:28-32).

In this season of Pentecost, I marvel at the irony of God calling Peter, and later Paul (who was Saul of Tarsus a “Hebrew of Hebrews”) to be “apostles to the Gentiles.” God was calling them to reach out with the good news that God was saving those deemed unlikable, unworthy, and far outside the promises and plan of God. Whether or not we celebrate the season of Pentecost, we might wonder about the ones in our lives we might be tempted to consider “Judeans or Samarians” or those “who dwell in the remotest parts of the earth.” The same Spirit who changed the world by changing the minds of a handful of disciples beckons still, pushing us outward beyond our own walls.

Margaret Manning is a member of the writing and speaking team at Ravi Zacharias International Ministries in Seattle, Washington.

(1) See Acts 6:1.
(2) Acts 10:34-36, 43.

July 18 Bible Reading: Acts 7-9

July 17th Bible Reading: Acts 4-6

Acts 4:25b-26

Why did the gentile rage 

and the people plot tin vain?

The kings of the earth set themselves,

and the rulers were gathered together,

against the Lord and against his Anointed

July 16 Bible Reading: Acts 1-3

July 15th Bible Reading: John 19-21

John 20:31

But these things are written that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that by believing you might have life in His name.

July 14th Bible Reading: John 16-18

Here is a great message by Pastor Zach, from Calvary Chapel Petaluma on John 18: 28-40 entitle "What is Truth". (SM1230)

http://calvarypetalumasite.org/media.php?pageID=11

God Bless!

July 13 Bible Reading: John 13-15

July 12th Bible Reading: John 10-12

July 11th Bible Reading: John 7-9

John 7: 16-18

Jesus answered, "My teaching is not my own. It comes from Him who sent me. If anyone chooses to do Gods will, he will find out whether my teaching comes from God or whether I speak on my own. He who speaks on his own does so to gain honor for himself, but he who works for the honor of Him who sent him is a man of truth; there is nothing false about him.

July 10th Bible Reading: John 4-6

July 9th Bible Reading: John 1-3

July 8th Bible Reading: Luke 22-24

John Bunyan, author of the classic Pilgrim’s Progress, wrote in the cover of his Bible, 

“Either this book will keep you from sin, or sin will keep you from this book.” 

July 7th Bible Reading: Luke 19-21

Luke 19:41-42

And when He drew near and saw the city, He wept over it saying, "Would that even you, had known on this day the things that make for peace! But now they are hidden from your eyes!"

This passage really struck me because earlier today my pastor sermon on what we should we pray for. Though he was using verses from Ephesians, this verse references a similar idea, the idea of God hiding and reveling that which is unknown.

In his letter, Paul was praying that the Ephesian Christians would receive revelation in the knowledge of God. He was not only praying this for the unsaved, but the believers as well.

Spiritual truth is not perceived by the physical senses, though it may feel that way, but in the spiritual realm. We need to be diligently and fervently praying that the Lord continues to speak to us though His Word, because without Him giving us revelation we fall back into the motions of reading the Bible, and attempting to sanctify ourselves.

That is my prayer for you, my friends, as well as myself. That the Lord would continually open our eyes!

July 6th Bible Reading: Luke 16-18

July 5th Bible Reading: Luke 13-15

The first commandment is to love the Lord you God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your might.

And the second is to love your neighbor as yourself.
(Mark 12)

Luke 14:26

If anyone comes to me and does not hate his own father and mother and wife and children and brothers and sisters, yes, and even his own life, he cannot be my disciple. Whoever does not bear his cross and come after me cannot be my disciple.

Jesus is calling us to be willing to be willing to give up everything to follow Him. Look at the lives of the disciples. Most of them left their family's, devoted their lives to His service, and at the end, gave up their lives. God may not ask us to give up these things, or He may, but are we willing ?

July 4th Bible Reading: Luke 10-12

Prayer is such a privileged. It glorifies and pleases God, as well as brings us to a point of humility and a deeper relationship with Him. I encourage you not to forget to whom you are praying to, or to underestimate what He can do when it is within His will. 

Luke 11:13
If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will the heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask Him!

Today, being the 4th of July, I just want to ask you to take a few minutes out of your celebrating to pray for this country and its leaders, who God has put in authority. 

I was really blessed by this testimony to the power of prayer, and I pray you will be too:


President Lincoln's Prayer Before Gettysburg


"…oppressed by the gravity of our affairs, I went to my room one day and locked the door and got down on my knees before almighty God and prayed to Him mightily for victory at Gettysburg. I told Him that this war was His, and our cause His cause, but we could not stand another Fredricksburg or Chancellorsville. Then and there I made a solemn vow to almighty God that if He would stand by our boys at Gettysburg, I would stand by Him. And after that, I don't know how it was, and I cannot explain it, soon a sweet comfort crept into my soul. The feeling came that God had taken the whole business into His own hands, and that things would go right at Gettysburg…"

Gettysburg was won by the Union forces on July 3, 1863, and is often considered a major turning point in the war.

July 3rd Bible Reading: Luke 7-9

Luke 8:16-18

New International Version (NIV)

A Lamp on a Stand

16 “No one lights a lamp and hides it in a clay jar or puts it under a bed. Instead, they put it on a stand, so that those who come in can see the light. 17 For there is nothing hidden that will not be disclosed, and nothing concealed that will not be known or brought out into the open. 18 Therefore consider carefully how you listen. Whoever has will be given more; whoever does not have, even what they think they have will be taken from them.”

July 2nd Bible Reading: Luke 4-6

July 1st Bible Reading: Luke 1-3

WHICH VIRGIN BIRTH?

By Vince Vitale from Ravi Zacharias International Ministries 

A while back I received an email from a friend of mine, a retired Princeton University professor, in which he detailed some of his objections to Christianity, and in his last line—as if to trump all other considerations—he wrote, “Nor can I believe in a virgin birth.” No further argument. As if to say, it would be crazy to believe in such a thing.

It did make me think, why is it so often the virgin birth that we have the hardest time accepting? Why not Jesus walking on water? Why not him multiplying the loaves?

Maybe it’s because we’re happy for God to do what he wants with his own body, and we’re happy for him to give us gifts, but we get offended at the thought of a miracle that inconveniences us, that has a claim on our lives, that requires us to respond “I am the Lord’s servant,” as Mary did (Luke 1:38).

I thought to write back to my friend with reasons why perhaps he could believe in a virgin birth. But then I realized, he already does. In fact, every person is committed to a virgin birth, whether they realize it or not.

We find one virgin birth in Chapter 1 of Luke’s Gospel:

“How will this be,” Mary asked the angel, “since I am a virgin?” The angel answered, “The Holy Spirit will come on you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you. So the holy one to be born will be called the Son of God” (Luke 1:38).

Admittedly, this is out of the realm of the ordinary. But what exactly is the alternative?

My colleague John Lennox recently debated another Princeton professor—Peter Singer—who is one of the world’s most influential atheists. John challenged him to answer this question: why are we here? And here’s how Peter responded:

“We can assume that somehow in the primeval soup we got collections of molecules that became self-replicating; and I don’t think we need any miraculous or mysterious [explanation].”(1)

And I remember thinking, How does us somehow getting self-replicating molecules in the primeval soup not count as a mysterious explanation? That sounds a lot like a virgin birth to me.

Or take the brilliant Cambridge physicist Stephen Hawking’s latest attempt to propose an atheistic explanation for our universe: “. . . the universe can and will create itself from nothing. Spontaneous creation is the reason there is something rather than nothing, why the universe exists, why we exist.”(2)

Is that any less miraculous of a birth than the account from Luke Chapter 1?

We live in a miraculous world. Regardless of whether you are a theist, an atheist, or an agnostic, there’s no getting around that fact. It’s not a matter of whether we believe in a virgin birth, it’s just a matter of which virgin birth we choose to accept.

We can believe in the virgin birth of an atheistic universe that is indifferent to us—a universe where “there is, at bottom, no design, no purpose, no evil and no good, nothing but blind pitiless indifference.”(3) Or we can believe in the virgin birth of a God who loves us so deeply that he came to be born among us and to live beside us, to call us “family” (Hebrews 2:11) and “friends” (John 15:15), and to give himself the name “God with us” (Matthew 1:23; Isaiah 7:14).

There is a depth of relationship that is only possible between people who have been through the worst together— those who have been there in each other’s suffering, those who have fought through disaster side by side, those who have sat beside one another in devastation with nothing left to say other than “I know exactly what you’ve been through, and I still love you and I still believe in you.” Because of Jesus, that depth of relationship is possible with God. That is what we celebrate at Christmas.

Growing up near New York City, one of my most vivid memories of Christmas is of homeless people begging on the street corners. And I would give some change if I had some. Imagine someone who offers to trade his home for a cold street corner, who instead of giving a few coins sat down on the street corner himself and handed over the key to his home.

At Christmas, Jesus literally comes and lives in our home—with all of its suffering, sin, and shame—and he shows us the home it will be, the home he is preparing—an eternal home where “[God] will wipe every tear from [our] eyes,” where there will be “no more death or mourning or crying or pain” (Revelation 21:4).

The way we accept this gift is with simple words: I’m sorry. Thank you.

I’m sorry for the times I’ve hid from you. I’m sorry for the times I’ve run from you. I’m thankful that you didn’t give up on me, but were willing to make even the greatest sacrifice in order to be with me. I want to be with you too, wherever that leads, not only this Christmas but always.