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. 

He Healed Them All

Great multitudes followed Him, and He healed them all. Matt. 12:15

Great multitudes means exactly what it says... many, many people; a very, very large crowd. Some of us will conjure up various numbers and size of “crowd” but the point is well taken. Jesus is surrounded by more than a handful of people, as some of the more liberal, progressive transliterations imply. So, having established a number, consider and contemplate that “He healed them ALL!”

Examine Yourself- part 6 of 6

Let me tell you something else. The saved person does not ask "How close can I get to sin without falling?" They ask, "How close can I get to God?" They don't walk the line between light and darkness. They run from the edge and press into the throne. They want no part of the things that once held them in chains. They don't flirt with the grave they were raised out of. They dance in the freedom of new life, and yet we live in an age where sin is celebrated, where compromise is marketed as wisdom, where holiness is mocked, and truth is considered hate. But you, if you are truly saved, you must be different, you must be set apart, you must shine like stars in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation. You must walk the narrow road even when it is lonely, and yes, it will cost you. The narrow road is never crowded, it's never easy, but it is holy, and it leads to life.