Continue in What You have Learned

2 Timothy 3:12-17
In fact, everyone who wants to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted, 13while evil men and impostors will go from bad to worse, deceiving and being deceived. 14But as for you, continue in what you have learned and have become convinced of, because you know those from whom you learned it, 15and how from infancy you have known the holy Scriptures, which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus. 16All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, 17so that the man of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work.
Continue in What You have Learned

If you want an easy road to travel then being a true disciple of Christ is not one you would probably choose. We like to focus on the blessings, but the reality is that this is also a road of sufferings and persecutions. Many like to wear the label of Christian when it benefits them, but if they really have to start enduring the cross, then they are out of here. In this day and age we are moving into that time when evil will become more forward and perverse, from bad to worse, just as the scripture says. We need to be aware and have come to the commitment, that though it cost us everything, we have decided to follow Jesus. When the Lord winnows and thrashes the wheat in His judgement. He is separating wheat from chaff and is judging who is really His and who is not. If our faith is just about God’s blessings then we might want to exit now. Romans 8 tells us “if we suffer with Him then will we be glorified with Him.” Jesus is the pattern Son; the prototype of what He is conforming us into. Certainly His life was not without suffering and persecution. He even told us that if we were of the world the world would love us, but because we are not of the world the world will hate you. This is why it is so incredibly important that you have a revelation of who you are in Christ. When the fire comes it will reveal what the house is made of. All that is wood, hay and stubble will be consumed and only that which of gold (God’s nature), silver (His redemption) and precious stones (His glorious truth) will remain. If our house is not built upon the rock it will perish. So it doesn’t matter how much we know or how often or long we have been going to church. If you don’t have the inward relationship of obedience and trust, you will not stand. Jesus didn’t tell us that if we love Him we would hear what He had to say, He said if we love Him we would keep His commandments. If Christianity is just churchianity and knowing the truth, but not living the truth, then that will not preserve you when persecution comes. The baptism of fire is purification; it brings to the surface the dross so that it can be purified. God is judging His own house today to allow us to see the dross in our own lives and deal with it, before we must truly be judged for it.
If you want to live “godly” in Christ Jesus then expect persecution and don’t be surprised when it comes upon you. Let us be as Paul exhorted Timothy, “But as for you, continue in what you have learned and have become convinced of, because you know those from whom you learned it, 15and how from infancy you have known the holy Scriptures, which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus.” The Lord has imparted Himself into us through His Word and through the Holy Spirit. We have all that we need to endure and make us wise unto salvation through faith in Christ Jesus. We know that Christ is synonymous and one with the Word of God, because, “ in the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning. (John 1:1-2)” Paul testifies of this truth as he states, “All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, 17so that the man of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work.” We are the Lord’s army in training, preparing for the day of battle. Our battle is not with flesh and blood, although it will most likely be manifested through them, it is with principalities, powers, rulers and dominions of darkness. But Revelations 12:11 reminds us, “And they overcame him by the blood of the Lamb, and by the word of their testimony; and they loved not their lives unto the death.” One of the things that is very difficult for us, especially in this western culture, is our love and affection for self and the flesh. For us everything is about survival and preservation of the natural man. God has simply given you this natural body as a cocoon and preparation to carry you into your eternal being. When and if we are ever faced with the choice of our faith or preserving our natural man, what could be more glorious and a greater opportunity than to offer ourselves up as a sweet –smelling sacrifice to our Lord. Walk with Him, obey Him, honor Him and “KNOW HIM” without doubt or reservation in your inter-most being.

Blessings,
#kentGod, go

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God Breathed

2 Timothy 3:16-17
All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, 17so that the man of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work.

God Breathed

Have you ever thought that as you read the scripture and meditate upon it that you are in effect inhaling what God has breathed? The Holy Spirit that was breathed to inspire the writers of His Word is now inhaled through these words to become the breath of His Spirit within you. We know that without our air we would cease to be. It is necessary to sustain our natural life. God’s Spirit is the air that our spirit man breathes. It is what sustains him and upholds him. Whatever is Spirit purposed and God anointed has been breathed upon by the breath of God.
Have you ever walked down a back alley behind restaurants where food has been thrown out and become putrefied and rotten? It creates an atmosphere where there is a horrible stench in the air. It is not some place that you care to remain, because it is repulsive to your sense of smell. This is the atmosphere and stench that is created by sin and ungodliness. It should be repulsive to our spiritual man. He delights in the atmosphere of worship, praise, the word of God and the fellowship of the saints. This is the air that the spirit man loves to breathe, because in it he smells the sweet incense of the presence of God. It is like breathing in oxygen. It regenerates and empowers that spirit man.
Deuteronomy 9:5 tells us why the Lord brought His people into Canaan to drive out the inhabitants. It was because it had become a stench. Their sin rose up to the nostrils of God and He abhorred the smell of their sinfulness and wickedness. It says, “Not for thy righteousness, or for the uprightness of thine heart, dost thou go to possess their land: but for the wickedness of these nations the LORD thy God doth drive them out from before thee, and that he may perform the word which the LORD sware unto thy fathers, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.” It wasn’t because the people of Israel were so righteous or upright it was so that He might perform His Word which He had promised to their fathers Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. His Word would clear out the stench of sin and renew the atmosphere of His presence in this land of promise. It is His Word that clears the air of our soul. It teaches us, rebukes us, corrects us and trains us in His righteousness and His ways.
Perhaps a scripture that is so descriptive and exemplifies this principle of living and breathing in God’s Word is found in Deuteronomy 30 as Moses describes the blessings and curses of God. We choose the air that we breathe into our spirit man. As we conclude with this passage of scripture, be mindful of how it applies to our lives today and the choices that we make concerning the Word of God.
“When all these blessings and curses I have set before you come upon you and you take them to heart wherever the LORD your God disperses you among the nations, 2 and when you and your children return to the LORD your God and obey him with all your heart and with all your soul according to everything I command you today, 3 then the LORD your God will restore your fortunes and have compassion on you and gather you again from all the nations where he scattered you. 4 Even if you have been banished to the most distant land under the heavens, from there the LORD your God will gather you and bring you back. 5 He will bring you to the land that belonged to your fathers, and you will take possession of it. He will make you more prosperous and numerous than your fathers. 6 The LORD your God will circumcise your hearts and the hearts of your descendants, so that you may love him with all your heart and with all your soul, and live. 7 The LORD your God will put all these curses on your enemies who hate and persecute you. 8 You will again obey the LORD and follow all his commands I am giving you today. 9 Then the LORD your God will make you most prosperous in all the work of your hands and in the fruit of your womb, the young of your livestock and the crops of your land. The LORD will again delight in you and make you prosperous, just as he delighted in your fathers, 10 if you obey the LORD your God and keep his commands and decrees that are written in this Book of the Law and turn to the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul.
11 Now what I am commanding you today is not too difficult for you or beyond your reach. 12 It is not up in heaven, so that you have to ask, “Who will ascend into heaven to get it and proclaim it to us so we may obey it?” 13 Nor is it beyond the sea, so that you have to ask, “Who will cross the sea to get it and proclaim it to us so we may obey it?” 14 No, the word is very near you; it is in your mouth and in your heart so you may obey it.
15 See, I set before you today life and prosperity, death and destruction. 16 For I command you today to love the LORD your God, to walk in his ways, and to keep his commands, decrees and laws; then you will live and increase, and the LORD your God will bless you in the land you are entering to possess.
17 But if your heart turns away and you are not obedient, and if you are drawn away to bow down to other gods and worship them, 18 I declare to you this day that you will certainly be destroyed. You will not live long in the land you are crossing the Jordan to enter and possess.
19 This day I call heaven and earth as witnesses against you that I have set before you life and death, blessings and curses. Now choose life, so that you and your children may live and that you may love the LORD your God, listen to his voice, and hold fast to him. For the LORD is your life, and he will give you many years in the land he swore to give to your fathers, Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.” Deuteronomy 30

Blessings,
#kent

Power through the Word

 

Power through the Word

1 Corinthians 4:20

For the kingdom of God [is] not in word, but in power. 

We live in a world full of philosophies and religions.   Some would say God is too big for any one religion.  It is man that has deviated from God’s way to invent his own.  God has always had a plan and “the Way” that brings us to Him.   I’ve heard it said that, “religion is merely man’s search for God.”  Many religions and cults, Islam being one of them, take the Word of God for their premise, but then twist and pervert it to be their own.  True Christianity isn’t just a religion made up of a lot men’s thought, ideas and dreams.  It is an inspired book, written by the Holy Spirit’s inspiration and direction.  It is not just a book about men of God who could do no wrong.  It is about ordinary, sinful men who often stepped out and believed the Word of God to them.  Because they dared to put their faith in this God of the Bible they often saw great and mighty things accomplished.  

If God was going to write a book about His people why would he put in this book their failures, their shortcomings and their sins?  You don’t read any of those things about Mohammed. The Bible isn’t a book about great men.  It is a book about a great God working through weak and ordinary men.  The Bible is not a great book because it is good reading or just has inspiring stories.  It is great book because its words are backed by the power of God.  You could burn all the Bibles you wanted, but you could never destroy the Word of God, because it is not just words on a page.  It is a living Word and Testament of a living and powerful God.  That is what sets it apart from any other book or religion in the world.  There may be a lot of truisms in other religions, but it is satan’s little bottle of poison in a lake of truth that brings death, that makes it null and void.  If it doesn’t line up a hundred percent with the Bible, it ain’t the real thing.  

Why does God tell us to study and meditate on the Word of God?  Joshua 1:8 says, “This book of the law shall not depart out of thy mouth; but thou shalt meditate therein day and night, that thou mayest observe to do according to all that is written therein: for then thou shalt make thy way prosperous, and then thou shalt have good success.”   Psalms 1:1-2 tells us, “Blessed [is] the man that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly, nor standeth in the way of sinners, nor sitteth in the seat of the scornful. But his delight [is] in the law of the LORD; and in his law doth he meditate day and night.” 2 Timothy 2:15 instructs us “Study to shew thyself approved unto God, a workman that needeth not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth.” 2 Timothy 3:16 also says, “All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness.”

These are but a few scriptures that encourage us not just to read the Word of God, but to get it down in our hearts and spirits.  Why, because it is life and power.  When we have a “revealed Word of God” plus “faith” to believe that word, it equals “Power” and the move of God.  This is why weak, ordinary men and women like you and me have the potential to do supernatural things.  It is a power, like dynamite, which resides in you, because, by faith, you asked Christ and His Holy Spirit to come into you.  When He did He brought the power of God into you.  You are a keg of dynamite and a potential explosion of the move and power of God.  There was an old saying back in the days of powdered fire rifles and guns.  It was “keep your powder dry.”  Wet powder was ineffective and lost its power.  It is the same with us when we let the world, compromise and unbelief come into our lives.  We become like wet powder, ineffective.  

Luke 17:21 tells us, “Neither shall they say, Lo here! or, lo there! for, behold, the kingdom of God is within you.”  As a believer in Christ, you are a loaded gun.  When you are primed with the Word of God within you and the Spirit of God moves upon you there are no limitation to what He can do through you.  That is because the kingdom of God is not in word, it is in power.  It is the living Word of God ignited by His Spirit.  It will move mountains; it will bring the high place low and the low places high.  It will bring down the kingdoms of this world and it will establish the kingdom of our God.  You are a part of that.  You are the rifle through which He fires that bullet.  We are corruptible old earthen vessels until the power of God gets inside of us that, as 2 Corinthians 4:7 says, “But we have this treasure in earthen vessels, that the excellency of the power may be of God, and not of us.”  It doesn’t matter about the circumstances of life that work around us; it is the power of God that is at work in us.  It is the very resurrection life that raised Christ from the dead that now dwells in you and gives life to your mortal bodies also (Romans 8:11).   We do not believe and put our trust in a dead and ineffective word, but in the ever living and ever powerful Word of God, that through faith becomes substance and power to us.  

 

Blessings,

kent