Christian Fellowship
“That I may publish with the voice of thanksgiving...” Psalm 26:7
Vol. 24 No. 3 March 2015
Do you ever wonder if your prayers are being heard by our Heavenly Father? Remember, God does not respond to your need, but to your faith. You must speak to the Lord from who you are, not from who you want to be. He doesn’t like flowery words or long exhortations of why you need this or that.
Remember Jesus’ words: Mat 6:7 (KJV) “But when ye pray, use not vain repetitions, as the heathen do: for they think that they shall be heard for their much speaking.”
I find most of the prayers of the Bible are very simple, even the ones that Jesus spoke to His Father. Get to the point, tell Him what you need, and be specific. Jesus said in John 16:23 (KJV), “And in that day ye shall ask me nothing. Verily, verily, I say unto you, ‘Whatsoever ye shall ask the Father in my name, he will give it you.’”
The great thing about being specific is whenever God answers, you will know it. The more explicit you are, the more alert you will be for answers; which means you can spend more time thanking the Lord for His great love toward you. Oh how He cares for you and me!
In Christ,
Pr. Steve
How to Stop Sinning
The number one problem with churches is that they do not believe we can get victory over sin; and that as a result, we have to keep sinning. But Jesus came to set us free, not only from the guilt, but also from the power of sin. Unfortunately, we don’t know how to appropriate what He has done for us.
Romans 6 tell us how to be delivered from sin. God does not expect us to be living and bound by a sinful nature. Most Christians believe that they have to sin while in this world. THAT IS NOT TRUE.
Rom 6:22 (NIV) “But now that you have been set free from sin and have become slaves to God, the benefit you reap leads to holiness, and the result is eternal life.”
The phrase “But now being made free from sin” is not talking about guilt, but behavior. The Lamb of God takes away the sin of the world. He sets us free from the power to sin. Eternal life is the result. When the Bible talks about “eternal life” it is talking about immortality because immortality is what was lost in Eden. That is why God put Adam and Eve out of the garden, so they would not eat of the tree and live forever physically. When we talk about someone dying today, we are not talking about that person dying spiritually. We are talking about him or her dying physically. That is what God was saying.
Jesus is our redeemer. Redemption means to buy back something that is lost. We did not lose heaven. In the garden we lost immortality. God did not say, “I’ll put them out lest they lose fellowship.” He said, “I’ll put them out lest they live forever,” thus meaning – in the flesh, for then God would have had on His hands a creature like a fallen angel.
So everybody talks about spiritual life when we all want physical life.
Joh 11:25 “Jesus said unto her, ‘I am the resurrection, and the life: he that believeth in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live:’”
The gift of God is eternal life. That means in the body. When Paul continues about sin in chapter 7, he groans: Rom 7:24 (KJV) “O wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me from the body of this death?”
In Romans 8 he talks about the redemption of his body. Then in Philippians he talks about being resurrected. In both instances he is talking about something physical. Resurrection does not mean “going up.” It never means “ascension.” It merely means passing from death to life. The goal of the Christian salvation is to restore what was lost in Eden – which is access to the tree of life. And the tree of Life is none other than the Lord Jesus Christ Who is still in the midst of the Paradise of God. But to get to eat from Him and gain immortality in the body, you have to overcome. What do we overcome? Sin and self-will! As we do, we are given to eat from the tree of life, and John 6 tells us this is the resurrection. Eating the body and drinking the blood of Christ is the resurrection.
Most Christians are not interested in this. They just want to go to heaven and live in a Disney land state. That is why they want a rapture to get them out of trouble.
In Paul’s day people were saying, “Let us do evil that good may come.” Today, they say, “We live by grace, so let us live the way we want.” People believe that God has written the Bible so that if your heart is wrong you will mess up. Remember that God tests the heart of man. He puts you in situations to see if you will do what is right, not so you will mess up.
Rom 6:1 (KJV) “What shall we say then? Shall we continue in sin, that grace may abound?”
“Shall we continue in sin?” Is this talking about guilt or about behavior? The people were saying, “Let us do evil that good may come.” As Christians, we do not go on living to sin, for we died to sin.
Rom 6:2 (KJV) “God forbid. How shall we, that are dead to sin, live any longer therein?”
Some scholars believe that once you are sanctified, you can no longer sin. As a result, they are walking around sinning their lives away, all the while saying, “I can’t sin, because I have died with Christ.” This erroneous belief leads millions of people to deny reality.
Rom 6:3 (KJV) “Know ye not, that so many of us as were baptized into Jesus Christ were baptized into his death?”
This is a position that you take by faith. Because you have to assert your “in Christ” position, you say you are dead even though you are not dead. You confess this continually as you increasingly live your life from that basis. As a result, you don’t sin because sin is not compatible with your decision. If you say that you died with Christ and therefore died to sin, it is not logical to keep on sinning. Therefore, you ask the Father to make your position of death with Christ and life with Christ a reality. Daily, you pray, “Since I am set free, make Christ’s freedom a reality in my life.” The more you pray this, the more you will begin to believe it, to accept it, and to live it. It doesn’t matter how many people say, “As long as you are in this world you have to sin,” that statement is diametrically opposed to the Bible.
Water baptism is a dramatization that you have died with Christ on the cross. Well, obviously you didn’t, you weren’t there. So it is a position you take by faith. “I am dead, so I cannot expect to live like a person in the world because I died on the cross.”
Rom 6:4 (KJV) “Therefore we are buried with him by baptism into death: that like as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life.”
Again, this Scripture is not talking about guilt, but about behavior, about how we live.
Rom 6:5 (KJV) “For if we have been planted together in the likeness of his death, we shall be also in the likeness of his resurrection:”
That we may “walk in newness life” takes place on a daily basis. If we are not daily living in the resurrection, then we can forget about what happens when the Lord comes.
How do you attain to the resurrection each day? You get up every morning and you pray so when you are tempted to do something wrong, you have the strength from God because He has given you the body and blood of Christ and you have gained a little bit of resurrection life. And when the Lord comes, it will be a manifestation of what you have done throughout your life. You either will have died and lived with Christ, or you will have kept alive your own life so that when the resurrection comes, your inner life will not have the power to come forth. Many who have been living like a devil are deceived in believing that they are going up in a rapture.
Rom 6:6 (KJV) “Knowing this, that our old man is crucified with him, that the body of sin might be destroyed, that henceforth we should not serve sin.”
The old man is crucified with Christ – that is the old nature. We take this by faith. Next we come to this body of sin. What we are after is deliverance from this body of sin. How do we get delivered from this body of sin? By allowing Christ to crucify our first personality.
Depending on your upbringing and the way you have handled your life, your old man contains both a mixture of good and bad. Some people are natural-born liars. Some people are thieves, some are hateful, etc. Yet, others are noble, who are truthful, who are honest, and who are faithful. I am talking about the first personality. So what we naturally want to do is save the good in the person and get rid of the bad. But it doesn’t work like that. You have to get rid of the whole thing, the entire carnal or fleshly man, both good and bad. You may be the most lovable person, but if you get crossed hard enough, you will find that your natural love won’t stand. Only the love that is the fruit of the Spirit will withstand anything and endure forever. Therefore, the whole adamic nature or first personality has to be crucified.
Now how does God do that? He takes us by way of the wilderness. The purpose of the wilderness is to crucify the first man. So when you feel like you are dying and lost in the wilderness – you are!
Heb 9:27 “And as it is appointed unto men once to die, but after this the judgment:”
As soon as we say, “Yes, Lord, I accept the fact that my first personality is not going to be saved, but it is going to be crucified,” God counts that as a real death If you are in love with yourself, you will have a hard time. If you are one who is disgusted with yourself, you won’t have as hard a time. You have to be rough with your first personality because it loves itself.
When you talk about killing it, how does God do that? He keeps putting you in very difficult situations, but in order for you to get out of these, you will have to break God’s laws. If you force the issue, God may just leave you alone until the day of resurrection and you will have to deal with Him then.
Rom 6:11 (KJV) “Likewise reckon ye also yourselves to be dead indeed unto sin, but alive unto God through Jesus Christ our Lord.”
If you reckon yourself dead, i.e., by presenting your body a living sacrifice, then God will begin to show you the areas in your personality that are not in His image. And He does that by crucifying the first personality. If you react hatefully because of what you are experiencing, you are saving your soulish life. You are saying, “This situation isn’t right, and I don’t have to put up with it.”
What do you do when you are walking free of sin and something happens and you react by doing something terrible. Do you just give up and say, “What is the use?” No, you first remind yourself that God is concerned about you and your family; and even when something terrible happens, you are safe in the Lord’s keeping. You declare, “I am dead with Christ,” and God will then show you what to do. He has to because His Word cannot be changed. That is the problem: People say that this profession doesn’t work, but it will work if you stay with it. You can’t make one profession and suddenly have everything change. You keep confessing and professing what God’s Word says until you know it deep in your heart. God cannot lie.
If you keep sinning, let God show you what in your life is causing this. You have to get at the root first:
1Jn 1:9 “If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.”
And that word cannot be changed. Don’t quit, but rather count yourself dead. Continue to pray and ask, “Lord, help me!” Don’t confess, “The devil won’t go!” If you endure the trial, the devil will let go and he will take with him all his evil minions. Sometimes it is a long drawn-out deliverance, but it is genuine. It is faith that brings the deliverance, after which you testify, “God said it, I believed it. And that settled it.”
-Pr. Steve
I am going to be sharing with you thoughts from my journal over the past few years. This is to show you how the Lord has brought about His Word in my life to minister to you and to show you how real this walk can be. Please read and understand by the Spirit about ...
. . . My calling as a pastor
Pastor’s Journal 2014
Mar.04: The Holy Spirit clearly and emphatically affirms tribulations and suffering await us. But none of these things move me. I just want to finish my course with joy and the ministry faithfully. (Acts 20:23-24)
Mar.06: In all these things I am more than a conqueror.
Mar.07: The heavens declare His righteousness, and all the people see His glory!
Mar.08: The one who rests in the Lord hears His voice and recognizes it at once. Rest upon His character and His Word, rather than upon His manifestations. During this time be conformed to His likeness more than to His service. The past periods of rest have enabled the inward man to be rooted and grounded in love. The Beloved now calls to lead you to the Father.
Mar.09: He that departs from evil makes himself a prey! (Isa.59:15)
Mar.13: No man who believes in Him will ever be put to shame or be disappointed. (Rom.10:11)
Mar.14: All things are possible with God!
Mar.18: Be strong and of good courage, fear not nor be afraid, for the Lord thy God is with you. He will not fail you, nor forsake you. (Deut.31:6)
Mar.22: For God has not given us a spirit of fear, but love, power, and a sound mind. (2 Tim.1:7)
Mar.25: May the God of all comfort, comfort and encourage you in every trouble, calamity and affliction so that you may be able to comfort others who have trouble or distress.
Mar.26: Your life is hid in Christ. (Col.3:3)
Mar.27: “I dwell in the high and holy place AND with him who has a contrite and humble spirit.” (Isa.57:15)
Mar.30: Your soul must come to entire reliance and dependence upon Him. This is the “end of the Lord.” (Jms.5:11)
Maintain a Joyful State of Heart
(Neh 8:10) …. “for this day is holy unto our Lord: neither be ye sorry; for the joy of the LORD is your strength.”
Clarke’s Commentary on Neh 8:10 brings a down-to-earth understanding to help walk in the power of the wisdom in the Word of God even for us today: “Religious joy, properly tempered with continual dependence on the help of God, meekness of mind, and self-diffidence, is a powerful means of strengthening the soul. In such a state every duty is practicable, and every duty delightful. In such a frame of mind no man can ever fall, and in such a state of mind the general health of the body is much improved; a cheerful heart is not only a continual feast, but also a continual medicine.”
It came to my mind after reading the above passages, that there is not much in God’s Word that would ever cause us to lose our joy; so it only comes to reason that our downheartedness, and our living in a sorrowful state, must be coming from our focusing upon our worldly state; and our participation in this current life. While writing this issue I remembered that I found out a long time ago, that it takes so much more effort and muscle movement to frown than it does to smile. We don’t just need to find joy, we need to find God: the author of true Joy. For when we find Him, we can find His Joy, that is Joy unspeakable and full! Of Glory!
1Ch 15:25-29 (KJV) “So David, and the elders of Israel, and the captains over thousands, went to bring up the ark of the covenant of the LORD out of the house of Obededom with joy. (26) And it came to pass, when God helped the Levites that bare the ark of the covenant of the LORD, that they offered seven bullocks and seven rams. (27) And David was clothed with a robe of fine linen, and all the Levites that bare the ark, and the singers, and Chenaniah the master of the song with the singers: David also had upon him an ephod of linen. (28) Thus all Israel brought up the ark of the covenant of the LORD with shouting, and with sound of the cornet, and with trumpets, and with cymbals, making a noise with psalteries and harps. (29) And it came to pass, as the ark of the covenant of the LORD came to the city of David, that Michal the daughter of Saul looking out at a window saw king David dancing and playing: and she despised him in her heart.”
We must not be moved by feelings of gloom and despair, and we must not stay inundated by the woes of the world, but rather we need to continually go forth with the Joy of the Lord. We must not stop singing God’s praises just because no one else feels like singing and praising out loud. But rather, we should take Joy in the Lord and continue to be filled with the Joy of the Lord. Yes, there are times we don’t feel all that joyful; but those are also the times that we need to press into the Lord even more than ever.
Isa 29:19 (KJV) “The meek also shall increase their joy in the LORD, and the poor among men shall rejoice in the Holy One of Israel.”
If we will just keep on keeping on with the Lord, nothing will be able to steal our joy!
Psa 27:6-8 (KJV) “And now shall mine head be lifted up above mine enemies round about me: therefore will I offer in his tabernacle sacrifices of joy; I will sing, yea, I will sing praises unto the LORD. (7) Hear, O LORD, when I cry with my voice: have mercy also upon me, and answer me. (8) When thou saidst, Seek ye my face; my heart said unto thee, Thy face, LORD, will I seek.”
-Pastor Kurt
Quotes:
Keep your steps from wavering.
Hebrews 12:13 (NEB)
Walk the path of uncompromising discipleship. Then your steps will not falter. You will be following a trail blazed by Jesus and leading to the goal. Whenever you are unsure which way to go and what to do, choose the path that Jesus trod before you -- one of lowliness, humility, forgiveness and love. Then your path will end in glory, as His did.
"The scribe tells us what he has read, and the prophet tells what he has seen.
The distinction is not an imaginary one. Between the scribe who has read and the prophet who has seen there is a difference as wide as the sea. We are overrun today with orthodox scribes, but the prophets, where are they? The hard voice of the scribe sounds over evangelicalism, but the church waits for the tender voice of the saint who has penetrated the veil and has gazed with inward eye upon the wonder that is God."
-A.W. Tozer
"The man who mobilizes the Christian church to pray will make the greatest contribution to world evangelization in history."
-Andrew Murray
Next course from Christian Life Educators Network - Richmond Center:
Stress Management by: Dr. Michael Ronsisvalle
This course is designed to provide an overview of how to minimize the effects
of stress in one’s life. Emphasis is given to a biblical understanding of stress and
to well researched strategies of stress management, including relaxation, cognitive
restructuring, stress reducing lifestyle choices and change. This course is highly
interactive and includes lecture as well as hands-on practice with new stress
management techniques.
April 9-11, 2015
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