The Holy Spirit

I do not hear much teaching on the Holy Spirit across the many venues of Christian exposition. Let me raise a theme of study... The Holy Spirit!

Luke 24:46-49 says, Then He said to them, “Thus it is written, and thus it was necessary for the Christ to suffer and to rise from the dead the third day, and that repentance and remission of sins should be preached in His name to all nations, beginning at Jerusalem. Behold, I send the Promise of My Father upon you; but tarry in the city of Jerusalem until you are endued with POWER from on high.”

I Am Disappointed

The “church” has failed a great many sincere believers of that Gospel we first heard, by which we are saved. The “church” is not that which saves us. It is faith, and nothing else, in the finished work of Jesus the Christ. As Paul wrote in 1 Cor. 15:1-4, Moreover, brethren, I declare to you THE gospel which I preached to you, which also you received and in which you stand, by which also you are saved... that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, and that He was buried, and that He rose again the third day according to the Scriptures.

Who Can Comprehend?

1 Cor. 2:6-7, We speak the wisdom of God in a MYSTERY among those who are spiritually mature, the hidden wisdom which God predetermined before the ages for OUR glory...
...verse 13 These things we also speak, not in words which man’s wisdom teaches but which the Holy Spirit teaches, comparing spiritual things with spiritual. 

Who can comprehend the width and length and depth and height of God's love and mercy, displayed in salvation in Christ Jesus! These are infinite considerations too remarkable for finite minds.

The Essential Bible Study

To be biblically illiterate is to be biblically incompetent. I’m not pointing fingers. This is a fact observed in scripture itself about people who didn’t know what they were doing when "handling" the Word of God! A great  admonishment for me  to study the Bible myself ! So I do. 

2 Tim. 3:16-17 says, “All Scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable  for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, thoroughly equipped for every good work.”

That passage alone is Bible study enough to know that we NEED  to study the Bible!

The Vast Nursery

In the "ward" called Christianity, there is a vast nursery of babes, which encompasses most of the domain. They are fed milk sporadically but it is of little nourishment. So the newborns come in, and they grow…ever so anemic.

Day Care is but one day a week. The rest of the time they are left to their own devices. Some mature to kindergarten. Few graduate beyond the elementary. The scholar is an unrecognizable mutant. This is the vast nursery of today's Christians. There are few attendants and even fewer doctors. The babes are sometimes left to lie in their own ineffectuality.

Art For God

Like everything else, ART was ordained, instituted, and established for God and for His purposes. And like everything else, it has been perverted and corrupted.
Both in Genesis 4 and here in Exodus 31:2-5 the LORD declares His will...
“I, the LORD, have chosen Bezalel son of Uri, and I have filled him with the Spirit of God in SKILL, in UNDERSTANDING, in KNOWLEDGE, and in all kinds of craftsmanship, to make artistic designs for work with gold, with silver, and with bronze, and with cutting and setting stone, and with cutting wood, to work in ALL KINDS of craftsmanship.”

This Do In Remembrance of Me

This whole book that we call the Word of God is, in fact, a testimony to CHRIST, Who is from everlasting. CHRIST is from Genesis to Revelation. But how many realize that CHRIST was ordained, called, established, appointed, predetermined, declared, confirmed in eternity before creation. We must understand that God, in His Omniscience, knew the beginning and the end of what He would do. That is, His Divine plan and purpose would require, by His own design, a creation of life, a corruption of that creation, a Law to condemn the corruption, an atonement for that corruption, a people called out of that corruption for His own possession, a sacrifice called out of His people that would overcome the corruption, so that He could bring about His New Creation. That is over-simplified I know. Each theme there is a Bible study of its own.