Tag Archives: Scripture

Taking time to prepare your heart.

Posted on by under Christianity, Faith, Jesus Christ, Jews & Gentiles, The Word

God declares the end from the beginning. The Bible as God’s book of love and personal instruction is sent to us and for us. It gives us the most important and captivating history lessons and spiritual lessons to learn from. It starts with the beginning of time and creation in Genesis, and goes onto what will be happening in the end times. Isaiah 46:9-10 says, ‘Remember the former things of old: for I am God, and there is none else; I am God, and there is none like me, Declaring the end from the beginning, and from ancient times the things that are not yet done, saying, My counsel shall stand, and I will do all my pleasure.’ God gives everyone his Word, the Bible, so we can be prepared ahead of time for what is coming and understand why his own inspired, inerrant words were written to and for us. Readying our heart, mind, and spirit to get to know him personally and hopefully that you might receive him. Jesus Christ urges us to be ready by reading and hearing his word. Understanding that he knows everything about us already since he’s made us. Knowing what he wants us to learn from it and that it is for our own best and that of our family’s. He wants us to be ready with our lamps burning and plenty of oil in waiting for his return. This is so exciting! Revelation 22:20 states, ‘He which testifieth these things saith,’ “Surely I come quickly.” ‘Amen. Even so, come, Lord Jesus.’ Prophecy is proof that the bible is from a truly loving and holy God. Prophecy comes from the prophets in the old testament and there is some in the new testament. Jesus loves us and wants us to read and take his Word, the Bible, very seriously. In fact there is no more important thing we can do for ourselves in heaven or on earth than to prepare ourselves to know Jesus Christ and read his words. Come just as you are to him and read. The new testament book of John is a wonderful place to start with inside the Bible because it gives us a lot of Jesus’s own words and explains to us who Jesus Christ really is, and about believing in him. There are some spectacular miracles written about here, and about his life. I love that it’s full of truth and light and love.

A good majority of God’s word is prophecy. By one account over 25% of both old and new testament scripture is prophecy. So prophecy is most important in the bible! 2 Peter 1:20-21 states, ‘Knowing this first, that no prophecy of the scripture is of any private interpretation. For the prophecy came not in old time by the will of man: but holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost.’ God’s message is clear; he exists and is in control of history! This is truly comforting. There are over 300 prophecies that Jesus Christ has fulfilled on the topic of his life, death, and resurrection.

Jesus also tells everyone in Luke 21 about remaining watchful for his return. We are living in the last days everyone! Hebrews 1:1-2 states, ‘God, who at sundry times and in divers manners spake in time past unto the fathers by the prophets, Hath in these last days spoken unto us by his Son, whom he hath appointed heir of all things, by whom also he made the worlds.’ His words say in Hebrew 2:1-4, ‘Therefore we ought to give the more earnest heed to the things which we have heard, lest at any time we should let them slip. For if the word spoken by angels was stedfast, and every transgression and disobedience received a just recompence of reward; How shall we escape, if we neglect so great salvation; which at the first began to be spoken by the Lord, and was confirmed unto us by them that heard him; God also bearing them witness, both with signs and wonders, and divers miracles, and gifts of the Holy Ghost, according to his own will?’ Christ wants us spiritually fit and ready because he is coming back. Don’t be lazy or careless about life – seek God – who he is, why he came, what he did, and what he will be doing. You don’t know what you don’t know. Ask God for his help in this. Ask him for what you need whether it’s knowledge, wisdom, or/and understanding and he will give it to you. Knock at his door! Read his Word. In Matthew 7:7,8 Jesus states, “Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you: For every one that asketh receiveth; and he that seeketh findeth; and to him that knocketh it shall be opened.” Get a good bible, I recommend the authorized KJV with the words of Jesus in red letters and the chapters indexed. Do not give up, stick with it, and see what happens! How is a person to know the signs of the times we are coming upon unless you start getting acquainted with what Jesus says in his word so you can understand and be ready?

If you knew something in the future was coming wouldn’t you act to prepare? No one likes to be left behind or left out of anything important, and in this case it is the most important thing of all. If we know our car needs fixing we don’t wait until it almost falls apart to get it looked at. Or if one of our children needs to go to the doctor suddenly, we just wouldn’t ignore them would we? That is what Jesus is trying to tell us, be ready! In Luke 12:40 Jesus states, “Be therefore ready also: for the Son of man cometh at an hour when ye think not.” A lot of prophecies left to be fulfilled have to do with him coming again one day. And he wants you prepared not only for yourself but for your family and friends as well.

In Revelation 22:7 Jesus tells us, “Behold, I come quickly: blessed is he that keepeth the sayings of the prophecy of this book.” In Revelation 22:13 Jesus says, “I am Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end, the first and the last.” John 1:1-5 says, ‘In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. The same was in the beginning with God. All things were made by him; and without him was not anything made that was made. In him was life; and the life was the light of men. And the light shineth in darkness; and the darkness comprehended it not.’ The Word is consistent, unchanging, and always points to Jesus Christ. Much prophecy was fulfilled in his first coming. And with Jesus’s second coming, he is coming to rule over all nations and this time as the one and only king of all. Revelation 19:15-16 states, ‘And out of his mouth goeth a sharp sword, that with it he should smite the nations: and he shall rule them with a rod of iron: and he treadeth the winepress of the fierceness and wrath of Almighty God. And he hath on his vesture and on his thigh a name written, KING OF KINGS, AND LORD OF LORDS.’ Let us make time to prepare our hearts, our minds, and our souls for him!

2 Peter 1:19 states, ‘We also have a more sure word of the prophecy; whereunto ye do well that ye take heed, as unto a light that shineth in a dark place, until the day dawn, and the day star arise in your hearts.’ The morning star is our Messiah.

Scripture/the Word/Jesus Christ is the only light for our feet. In John 14:6 it says, ‘Jesus saith unto him,’ “I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me.” In the bible we meet Jesus Christ who died for us and is our answer for everything in all of life and for eternity. Light shines to help us and guide us. Follow the light of the world who is Jesus Christ and you will never regret it, and your life will become more and more like his. Light draws us, warms us, staves off darkness, makes things visible, and sustains all life. As plants do not grow without enough light, the Lord is truly our light to help us see and learn that we wither without his light and grace to sustain us and keep us strong. In John 8:12 it says, ‘Then spake Jesus again unto them, saying,’ “I am the light of the world: he that followeth me shall not walk in darkness, but shall have the light of life.” This is a promise from Jesus Christ to you!

Whether you are a Jew or a Gentile, Jesus is coming back one day!

Israel and it’s past, present, and future.

Posted on by under Christianity, Faith, Jesus Christ, Jews & Gentiles, The Word

The Jews are God’s chosen people told to us from God’s Word. Deuteronomy 14:2 states, ‘For thou art an holy people unto the LORD thy God, and the LORD hath chosen thee to be a peculiar people unto himself, above all the nations that are upon the earth.’ There is a purpose in this. In the book of Genesis Seth is Adam and Eve’s third son, with most of the other descendants of Adam and Eve not being written about. This is because Jesus Christ can be traced from the line of Seth. Jesus Christ is what the whole bible talks to us about as people. The Bible is progressive which means as you read God’s Word it reveals over time what God is planning and how things will be changing in the future. From Seth down to Noah (think the flood), Noah to Abraham, to the twelve sons of Jacob (Jacob was Abraham’s grandson), to the kings of Judah and then to King David, until when we come to the world’s savior, Jesus Christ, the world’s Messiah; God had chosen and planned for the Jewish people to understand where Jesus, the Anointed One, was to be born into and what race he would be from. 1 Kings 8:53 states, “For thou didst separate them from among all the people of the earth, to be thine inheritance, as thou spakest by the hand of Moses thy servant, when thou broughtest our fathers out of Egypt, O Lord GOD.” Israel was to be the honored nation of priests, prophets, teachers, and preachers sent out to the Gentiles from God. Israel was to be the nation who pointed the world towards God, the Word, and the world’s prophesied about Messiah, Jesus Christ.

Isaiah 53 clearly prophesies about the Messiah coming to suffer for the whole human race. Isaiah 53:10-12 states, ‘Yet it pleased the LORD to bruise him; he had put him to grief: when thou shalt make his soul an offering for sin, he shall see his seed, he shall prolong his days, and the pleasure of the LORD shall prosper in his hand. He shall see the travail of his soul, and shall be satisfied: by his knowledge shall my righteous servant justify many; for he shall bear their iniquities. Therefore I will divide him a portion with the great, and he shall divide the spoil with the strong; because he hath poured out his soul unto death: and was numbered with the transgressors; and he bare the sin of many, and made intercession for the transgressors.’ The Jews instead of thinking of how Jesus, their sent Messiah, would suffer for them, only loose themselves in their thinking how soon ‘the Anointed One’ would bring them victory. Wasn’t he their prophesied king, one who was to set up his kingdom and rule? This of course was true but only wasn’t to happen then at that time. He will come to be King one day soon but he first came to die for the world and so came as the suffering servant for them. So when Jesus Christ comes into the world to live among those he created, to die on the cross and be resurrected three days later, they continue to reject him. Jesus had come to die for the Jewish people’s sins and the Gentiles’ sins. Israel’s heart was hardened; but surprisingly and ultimately this actually ends up leading to a way for both Jews and Gentiles alike to be able to get to know God in relationship through Jesus Christ who had come. This was in God’s progressive plan, to have Jesus his dearest one and only begotten son crucified, being made a ransom for all in the world, as his great gift given to us to restore our relationship with God the Father. Paul states in Romans 11:25, ‘For I would not, brethren, that ye should be ignorant of this mystery, lest ye should be wise in your own conceits; that blindness in part is happened to Israel, until the fulness of the Gentiles be come in.’

In Romans 9:23,24 Paul says, ‘And that he might make known the riches of his glory on the vessels of mercy, which he had afore prepared unto glory, Even us, whom he hath called, not of the Jews only, but also of the Gentiles?’ Romans 9:27 states, ‘Esaias also crieth concerning Israel, Though the number of the children of Israel be as the sand of the sea, a remnant shall be saved.’ Romans 9:30-33 says, “What shall we say then? That the Gentiles, which followed not after righteousness, have attained to righteousness, even the righteousness which is of faith. But Israel, which followed after the law of righteousness, hath not attained to the law of righteousness. Wherefore? Because they sought it not by faith, but as it were by works of the law. For they stumbled at the stumblingstone; As it is written, Behold, I lay in Sion a stumblingstone and rock of offence: and whosoever believeth on him shall not be ashamed.’ Paul goes on in Romans 10:1-4, ‘Brethren, my heart’s desire and prayer to God for Israel is, that they might be saved. For I bear them record that they have a zeal for God, but not according to knowledge. For they being ignorant of God’s righteousness, and going about to establish their own righteousness, have not submitted themselves unto the righteousness of God. For Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to every one that believeth.’ Romans 11:1-6 states, ‘I say then, Hath God cast away his people? God forbid. For I also am an Israelite, of the seed of Abraham, of the tribe of Benjamin. God hath not cast away his people which he foreknew. Wot ye not what the scripture saith of Elias? how he maketh intercession to God against Israel, saying, Lord, they have killed thy prophets, and digged down thine altars; and I am left alone, and they seek my life. But what saith the answer of God unto him? I have reserved to myself seven thousand men, who have not bowed the knee to the image of Baal. Even so then at this present time also there is a remnant according to the election of grace. And if by grace, then is it no more of works: otherwise grace is no more grace. But if it be of works, then is it no more grace: otherwise work is no more work.’ After this Jesus teaches about the vine and the branches: the tree’s natural but broken branches (any Jewish people) and the wild olive shoots (any Gentiles); that share from the olive root (Jesus Christ), the nourishing sap needed to grow healthy and stay strong. In John 15:1-2 Jesus Christ states, “I am the true vine, and my Father is the husbandman. Every branch in me that beareth not fruit he taketh away: and every branch that beareth fruit, he purgeth it, that it may bring forth more fruit.” Jesus is the living vine today for all who want to/should come to him. Be not afraid. Come read his Word. (I use the authorized KJV.) His words tell us there, without faith it is impossible to please him. We can not understand God or bear any bear fruit that counts in God’s eyes, or become more Christ-like, without knowing Jesus and becoming born again/saved. For he alone is the way, the truth, and the life.

God desires each of us and all to come to know him personally, Jewish people and Gentiles alike. This whole biblical account is for all of us, what he did and over time and through the ages. Dying as the Passover Lamb, being the true ‘Lamb of God’ who takes away the sins of the world… back then and today right now, and in the future, all the sins of those whom he calls and who will believe on him. What the Word says he did. What a gift! And what a mystery, and what love, light, and truth! He offers new life only by his grace, to any who in true sincerity will come repenting of (turning from) their sins to him, confessing them to him, asking for his forgiveness, and believing in Jesus Christ and that he died and rose again three days later for their sins and to forgive them. In Matthew 4:17 it states, ‘From that time Jesus began to preach, and to say,’ “Repent: for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.” For Jesus was there in the flesh with them being fully man and fully God right in front of them at that time.

Israel will be restored one day. Isaiah 11:11-12 says, ‘And it shall come to pass in that day, that the Lord shall set his hand again the second time to recover the remnant of his people, which shall be left, from Assyria, and from Egypt, and from Pathros, and from Cush, and from Elam, and from Shinar, and from Hamath, and from the islands of the sea. And he shall set up an ensign for the nations, and shall assemble the outcasts of Israel, and gather together the dispersed of Judah from the four corners of the earth.’ Praise God!

The book of John in the new testament is a wonderful place to start reading the Bible in coming to know who our Lord Jesus Christ is and what he says to us. I really love reading the book of John. God’s holy Word is divine and inspired from God. Did you know Jesus Christ is called the Word? Look with me at John 1:14. It states, ‘And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, (and we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father,) full of grace and truth.’ John 1:1 says, ‘In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.’ Isn’t this fascinating and all encompassing? Read it for yourself and see.

Are you ready? Jesus urges us to be ready. Jesus’s words in Luke 12:40 state, “Be ye therefore ready also: for the Son of man cometh at an hour when ye think not.”

Whether you are a Jew or a Gentile, Jesus is coming back one day!

Who is Jesus Christ?

Posted on by under Christianity, Faith, Jesus Christ, Jews & Gentiles, The Word

Jesus Christ is the one, appointed from God the Father, who came to this earth to save all the people from their sins. This was prophesied long ago by the prophets in the bible’s old testament, of one who would be coming into this world to suffer and die for us, and to be resurrected three days later. Isaiah 7:14 states, ‘Therefore the Lord himself shall give you a sign; Behold, a virgin shall conceive, and bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel.’ Jesus came into the world. Luke 9:56 tells us, “For the Son of man is not come to destroy men’s lives, but to save them.” Jesus Christ came for us because without him people would not be saved/born again and would spend eternity in hell without him because of the broken relationship created between man and God the Father, because of Adam and Eve. More than seven hundred years before Jesus was born, Isaiah 53 was written, and this book prophesied about Jesus and his suffering. He came to die and then rise again to defeat death and sin for each one of us. He desires to give each one of us a brand new life here on earth and to spend eternity with him after our death. A life for all eternity being with God!

God the Father sent his son Jesus Christ, God incarnate (embodied in flesh in human form), to come into the world for us. God has given us his holy and perfect Word (the Bible) because of his great love for us and so we would have his direction plan for our lives in this gravely fallen world. John 1:1 says, ‘In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.’ John 1:4 states, ‘In him was life; and the life was the light of men.’ God and his word are inseparable. The bible is powerful and full of truth!

Jesus’s resurrection is proof that Christ is who he said he was… the Son of God. Who else could die and rise again for us? In John 2:19 Jesus says, “Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up.” Jesus was speaking of his death and resurrection three days later. The resurrection tells us that we too, can have that hope that we will rise again after our death and be with him if we are born again/saved believers. In John 3:3 Jesus states, “Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.” Our souls are immortal, our bodies are not. 1 Cor. 15:22 says, ‘For as in Adam all die, so in Christ all will be made alive.’ 1 Cor. 15:44 in part states, ‘…it is sown a natural body; it is raised a spiritual body. There is a natural body, and there is a spiritual body.’ The Apostles being eyewitnesses, hid after Christ’s death, fearing for their lives. But after Jesus’s resurrection, he appears to them, and they boldly start proclaiming God’s Word. In Luke 24:39 Jesus states, “Behold my hands and my feet, that it is I myself: handle me, and see; for a spirit hath not flesh and bones, as ye see me have.” After Christ’s resurrection and his appearance to Paul on the road to Damascus, Paul has a conversion experience and does a total 180 degree turn around. Instead of killing Christians as he had been doing (he was then called Saul of Tarsus before Jesus got ahold of him and Jesus renames him Paul), he starts defending the very Gospel of Jesus Christ. The bible tells us of Jesus’s resurrection and his appearance to many after he is resurrected. He shows himself to Mary Magdalene, various other women, Peter, the Apostles (once without Thomas and later to them all), to over five hundred believers at once, James, and Paul (Saul of Tarsus).

Jesus Christ is the bridge between God and man given to all people from God the Father. What bridge? Listen, without him alone we as man have no opportunity to be connected to God again in a restored relationship. Sin in the world cut that off to us and sin must be atoned for. Jesus gives us this amazing and free gift, which is himself, so we can be reconnected in a real relationship with God. He gives us this free gift, that is alone your gift from him to you, absolutely free for the taking if you will believe all that he’s said he’s done for you. His birth, death, and resurrection all done for you.

Can you believe it, that Jesus gives us this gift of himself?! I am still amazed by all of this just as I was at the beginning of when I became a born again believer myself. Even after forty-five years of walking with him, it’s truly still as fresh and new as it was when I first believed. We can be truly thankful for him and his word. What happiness and what joy, knowing he did this for us. Since Jesus did this for you why don’t you come just as you are right now and believe/trust in what he did for you? Dying on the cross and rising again three days later, don’t you desire fullheartedly to repent (turn from) of all your sins, asking him to give you a brand new life and tell him how you feel?

It says in John 14:6 ‘Jesus saith unto him,’ “I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me.”

In John 15:13 Jesus tells us, “Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends.”

Jesus Christ is the new covenant where all people are given the opportunity to receive him. The new covenant was originally given to only Israel but after Christ’s death and resurrection God by his grace alone allows Gentiles (anyone not a Jew) to be able to have the new covenant as well. His sacrifice on the cross and his resurrection given for every single person’s sins in this world: past, present, and future, has replaced the old covenant. The old covenant was a sacrifial system that required strict obedience to the Mosaic Law, but only temporaily removed sins and the people continually broke it. Thus the continual blood sacrifices of animals had to be made. There could be no coming into God’s presence themselves in that time unless you were the high priest for the Jewish people or one that God chose to speak to and that we read about in the Bible like Adam and Eve, Noah, Moses, Abraham, etc. By his coming into the world, and by his death and resurrection, he provides grace for those who desire and will come to Christ. And he provides the purification and cleansing for their sins. Thus this new covenant spoken of in the old testament by different prophets tells us there will be true believers from the Gentiles along with some Jewish people now who will receive this new covenant, but at a future unknown time from now, Israel then will have the opportunity at Jesus’s coming in the future to receive him if they haven’t. But we who are living now need him before this life is done folks! Don’t wait for no one knows what tomorrow will bring. …Sins turned as white as snow from his forgiveness, and cleansed from guilt to have freedom and true life in Christ. And knowledge of an everlasting life with him? Nothing is better!

Whether you are a Jew or a Gentile, Jesus is coming back one day!

Sins cut us off from God.

Posted on by under Christianity, Faith, Jesus Christ, Jews & Gentiles, The Word

Isaiah 1:18 states, ‘Come now, and let us reason together, saith the Lord: though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool.’

The stain of sin is permanent, that is permanent without Jesus Christ. This means our sins cut us off from a relationship with God. How did this happen? Remember the story of ‘Adam and Eve’, the first man and woman to be made by God, that was written about in the bible? Sometime after the angels had been created by God and before Eve was tempted, Satan was cast out of heaven because of his pride. He was an angel, but his thinking got oversized and ungodly and he ended up desiring and trying to usurp God himself! Satan tempted Eve and she ate the apple from the forbidden tree (rule from God) and then Eve got Adam to eat as well and thereby he sinned as well. So sin began in the world and this sin nature is then passed onto all people when born and was passed onto us from Adam. God never intended for us to be separated from him in any way, but in the Bible God tells us how the serpent, Satan, got Eve to leave God out of her thinking by taking her eyes off of God and what he had told her, and that was when sin was conceived and happened.

But there is an answer for our sin and it is written about in the bible in the old and new testaments. His name is Jesus Christ. The bible says because God the Father loves us so much he made a plan that provided a way for our sins, like permanent stains, to be forgiven and atoned for. Hebrews 9:22 states, ‘And almost all things are by the law purged with blood; and without shedding of blood is no remission.’ In the old testament various animal sacrifices were made, only on a temporary basis, according to certain procedures stated plainly and explicitly from God. But in the new testament John 1:29 says, ‘The next day John seeth Jesus coming unto him, and saith, Behold the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world.’ 1 Timothy 2:5 states, ‘For there is one God, and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus.’ We all sin and need his forgiveness. God the Father sent his son, Jesus Christ, because he loves us so much and so sent him to die for each and every one of us on the cross. He then rose again from the dead three days later to show you and I that death and sin are defeated. And if we will believe that Jesus did this for us, truly repent and desire earnestly with all our heart to turn from our sins, he will then come into us and abide with us forever, sealed by his Holy Spirit. Jesus alone is the only one who can cover our sin debt, forgive us, renew us and give us a brand new life in/with him. With Jesus our relationship is restored with God the Father.

Only an infinite sacrifice, one holy and made of blood, would suffice for the sins of the world (past, present, and future). One from a truly loving father to each one of us, by God allowing his son’s life to be lain down, to make a way for the separation to be removed between every man and God. John 3:16,17 – “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. For God sent not his Son into the world to condemn the world; but that the world through him might be saved.” Jesus Christ died, rose again, and thereby restored that broken relationship between God and man that came, because of Adam’s sin and now is ours from so long ago. Are you ready for a new life in Jesus? Repent with your whole heart of all your sins to him and ask him to help you and come into your life now and to save you. Will you truly believe that he did all of this for you, repent and desire fully to turn from your sins and ask him to help you right now? It is only by his grace that we are saved/born again and that faith is given to you to live a new life for him!

Whether you are a Jew or a Gentile, Jesus is coming back one day!