LivingTruth.com

(Original radio broadcast from April 3, 1998)

In our last message we focussed on the revolutionary aspects of Jesus and His message, the Gospel of the Kingdom. It is my conviction that Satan has successfully distracted the North American Church by promising to satisfy our desires for ease and comfort and predictability. He has fooled many of us into believing that God is pleased with our efforts to create wonderful plans and programs and religious activities that give us a false sense of security.

He knows that when we all truly find our ultimate peace, security and sense of belonging in the awesome Love of God, and in the embrace of His loving family, a radical, irreversible change in our every thought, feeling and action will take place!

THIS is Kingdom activity! It begins in the deep, hidden recesses of our hearts, to cleanse and transform us from within! It lifts us up into heavenly dimensions in Christ, where God, His Kingdom, and His throne become a reality unto us!

Away with myths and fables and endless discussions on philosophy — give us Christ!

Father, send us servants like Paul, who boldly admitted his weaknesses, while continually acknowledging the all-sufficiency of our Lord Jesus Christ!

2 Cor 4:3-6: But if our gospel be hid, it is hid to them that are lost: In whom the god of this world hath blinded the minds of them which believe not, lest the light of the glorious gospel of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine unto them.

For we preach not ourselves, but Christ Jesus the Lord; and ourselves your servants for Jesus’ sake. For God, who commanded the light to shine out of darkness, hath shined in our hearts, to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.

Lord give us preachers who are not afraid to proclaim the revelation of Jesus Christ and His Gospel! God is shining into your hearts TODAY! You are beginning to see The face of Jesus Christ our Lord — TODAY!

Herein is the beginning of a radical revolution! It begins as we surrender our lives to the power of His Word and the security of His Love! It frees us from forms, traditions, religious thinking, and the condemnation that our best will never be good enough!

My brother, my sister in Christ, you are accepted in the Beloved! You belong to Jesus! Now you must arise and walk in the reality of His Love!

The perfect Love of God can cast out your fears! The fear of failure. The fear of rejection. Even the fear of death!

Receive His Love today! This is the Good News of the wonderful, righteous reign of God! He is putting His enemies — your doubts, fears, disillusionments, your pain, despair and bitterness — under His feet! He is liberating your captive soul! Praise the Name of the Lord!

This brings us to another important Kingdom principle — Kingdom growth and expansion. The pleasure of our God is to increase the intensity of His righteousness, peace and joy in this earth, and the level of freedom that His Creation experiences in Him. He does this in two basic directions.

The first is on the personal level. The second is on the corporate or universal level. In other words, He expands His work in the earth as we individually grow unto spiritual maturity, and also as others are brought into His Kingdom by the hearing of the Good News!

How beautiful is the running of those who run with the Good News of the Grace of our God! How wonderful is the message — our God reigns!

This is where many of us can easily get out of balance. We either focus only on internal growth or only external growth. Regardless of your area of ministry, whether in the local church, or out on the mission field, we must always be mindful of both.

When any believer becomes focussed entirely on his or her own personal concerns, or even preoccupied with their own circle of Christian fellowship, death begins to set in. We then begin to lose our Kingdom vision, or at least an important element of it. This is crucial[...]

Many amazing things can be referred to as miracles, like the birth of a child, the colors of the rainbow, the coming of spring when the brilliant colors of nature return. All these events are even more pleasurable when the wonder of them is fully appreciated.

On the other hand, a miracle can be more strictly defined as something that defies the normal process of nature. In the Scriptures it often appears that miraculous events were common place. There were times when miracles were more common than others. Like when Moses challenged the authority of Pharaoh as God directed him to perform miracles and send plagues upon Egypt. At the same time, God’s people were expected to do many normal and practical things to get through the day.

For forty years in the wilderness their Lord God fed and clothed them through miraculous means, but upon settling in Canaan they had to plant crops and cultivate the land as the other nations. After they left Egypt and conquered the Promised Land, supernatural events continued, but were less common.

Two thousand years later Jesus of Nazareth appeared on the public scene. Before Him came John the Baptizer, whose supernatural powers consisted mainly of His prophetic words. Even though he was able to call thousands unto repentance, John saw himself unworthy to loosen the shoelaces of Jesus. Here was a man whose words could calm the stormy seas, who could bring the dead to life and feed thousands with a basket of fish and bread. Unlike Moses, no one died or even suffered because of His miracles. His work was filled with grace, mercy and healing.

Not only did Jesus perform miracles, but He also empowered others to do the same! Even those who were healed under His ministry were made to understand that their faith was the main reason they were healed!

After 3 years of marvelous signs and wonders, the greatest miracle of all took place. Jesus, The Lamb of God was slain for our sins on a Cross. But on the third day He rose from the dead and appeared to His followers. The season of miracles continued, but this time through those who were baptized by Him in the Holy Spirit and fire! We know from the New Testament writers that the many signs, wonders and miracles of that time were God’s way of confirming the words of His apostles, sent forth from Jesus Himself! By these others could know that Jesus did in fact rise from the dead and into the heavens, to rule over all!

As before, things began to settle down. The Christian faith eventually became the dominant faith of the Western world. The frequency of miracles decreased perhaps because they were no longer needed. A long tradition states that this is because the articles of the faith were established, having been canonized in the Scriptures and in the great church counsels.

Yet various times in history there have been accounts of Christian revivals, that is when the original fervor and enthusiasm of the Early Christians has returned. During these times large numbers of unbelievers have embraced Christ, and believers have received new-found joy and passion for Him. Along with these times have usually come demonstrations of divine power. People during times of revival tend to believe that God really does hear and answer prayer! They find themselves asking God for supernatural healings and other powerful signs that God is real, alive and active among them! Suddenly they resonate with the beliefs and events in the lives of the early Christians, realizing that Jesus Christ is the same, yesterday, today and forever!

We may never fully understand why revivals come when they do. Most certainly a genuine spiritual renewal comes from God. These times are usually preceded by a deep hunger for the power and presence of God in the hearts and lives of some individuals. Often they long for the exploits they have read about in the Bible, but are not so theologically biased against such things happening in their day.

Greedy and worldly men try to fake healings a[...]

Have you ever considered the difference between faith and thinking positive? Is faith the opposite of reason? Do we fully understand the meaning of the word?

Christians believe that none of us can earn forgiveness and deliverance from our sins and sorrows. We are taught that we can be saved only by faith. So faith is a very, very important subject. If we believe in God, we should desire to grow in our faith. If we have questions about God, I believe it would be worth our time to come to a basic, practical understanding of the kind of faith that is presented to us in the Bible.

At first glance, faith might seem like a vague, abstract subject. But in fact it is something we exercise every day. In our experience we become persuaded in varying degrees to certain beliefs. We stop at the red traffic light because we believe in the possibility that traffic will likely cross our path. We move forward when the green light comes on because we trust that the vehicles coming from another direction will be stopped by the red light in front of them.

These are not at all absolute certainties, even though we take them for granted every day. One might ask what this has to do with faith in an invisible God? Well, why is it that we expect an invisible force like electricity to energize the starter in a car or the lights in our homes by a simple switch? These things were invented by people who had faith in theories about electricity which are believed to be true, however mysterious.

Some people act upon what is called “blind faith.” This is not the kind of faith that saves anyone. Blind faith could lead someone to trust that a frog could make them wealthy, or that a snail is wiser than us all.

No, while all of our questions might not be answered, God has always provided evidence to His existence, and to His plan for us. Faith as revealed in the Bible is a persuasion based upon certain reasonable facts. We are not talking about the kind of hard evidence that would hold up in a court of law, but evidence that is easily seen by those who look for it!

In my case, the strongest evidence presented to me from childhood was my mother. Without government help, and with very little help from my father, she courageously cared for the three of us children, trusting only in that invisible God who made Himself known to us through her patience, love, guidance, and hard work. The wisdom she was taught from the scriptures imparted into us a stability that our friends in the neighborhood could not quite understand.

From this beginning, the evidence began to mount in my mind of the validity of her faith. Along with the godliness I saw in our friends at church, I also began to see the wonders of the universe and specifically of our own bodies. These only confirmed the words of the Bible that she so often quoted.

After a period of teen-age rebellion and the desire to follow along with the crowd, I eventually returned to the faith that comforted and encouraged me from childhood, and today I am highly motivated to share it with others!

Some today deny the part that the senses play in knowing and believing in God. Why then did He give us minds to reason with and bodies to relate to the world around us? Why then do we have the stories that preserve for us the testimony of eyewitnesses? Because we are His creation, in spirit, soul and body!

Paul wrote in his letter to the Romans 10: 17: “So faith comes from hearing, and hearing by the word of Christ.” (NASB)

For 2,000 years the story of Christ’s teachings, His death, burial, resurrection and ascension has been told, and strangely enough, millions have believed! Perhaps some have simply accepted the church and the doctrines about Christ, but no doubt many have trusted in Him to save them, and have come to know Him personally. This is the faith we are talking about today!

The smallest conviction for the truth about Jesus Christ has the potential to grow into a powerful and living faith. Ou[...]

Paul, the early church apostle is probably the most famous Christian who ever lived. His missionary efforts and his powerful literary presentation of the Gospel and of the person of Jesus Christ are generally recognized as combining to become the most influential force in Christian history, after Jesus of course.

And yet Paul himself admitted to serious failures and sins in his past. For many of us, our past experiences have the power to cripple our testimony to the greatness of our God. Paul, however, had a singular focus. There must have been something about his original encounter with Jesus. Christ appeared to Paul in His glorified state, when he was on the road to Damascus to arrest Christians there. This experience definitely changed the course of his life! (Acts chapter 9)

While in prison for his outspoken testimony to the Lordship of Jesus Christ, he wrote these words in his letter to the church at Philippi:

Phil 3:12-14:

“Not that I have already obtained it or have already become perfect, but I press on so that I may lay hold of that for which also I was laid hold of by Christ Jesus. Brethren, I do not regard myself as having laid hold of it yet; but one thing I do: forgetting what lies behind and reaching forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus.”

NASU

Paul also had much to say of God’s plan of the ages. This plan is alluded to in the scriptures from Genesis to Revelation. However, Paul noted that it had been enshrouded in mystery until the coming of Christ into the world. He also explained that the apostles of Christ had been entrusted with this now unveiled mystery.

When observing the intensity of Paul’s passion for His Lord and the message of Good News that burned within his heart, I can’t help but believe that his understanding of God’s plan was another motivating factor in his life and ministry. Furthermore, I must confess that however small the portion of that mystery has been revealed to me personally, it definitely continues to be a powerfully motivating force in my own life!

There is a proverb stating the importance of having a vision. (Proverbs 29:18). The ability to see God’s purpose for His creation and our part in that purpose is empowering. The Word of God is described as a lamp and a light that reveals where we are and where we are going. Christians have long valued the holy scriptures as God’s message to us, and as a means to understanding His will, but how often do we miss the bigger picture? Is it really just about having our good deeds outweigh the bad ones? Is there something like a heavenly score card that determines who wins in the end?

Paul and other New Testament teachers took the time to show us the bigger picture. He narrowed his focus down to one thing, to press forward toward the goal of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus! The apostle John saw this also, but cautioned to not speculate too much. We only know, he said, that our destiny is to be like Jesus! (1 John 3:1-3)

This fact is clear even from the opening verses of the Bible. God originally made man in His own image and likeness, to rule the earth in His stead. (Genesis 1:26) However something was lost when Adam and Eve disobeyed God. Even though they would continue to bear His image in a sense, they lost the relationship with Him which made it possible for His purpose to be completely fulfilled in them.

The rest of history is about recovering our destiny in God through Christ. The Old Testament laws and prophecies all pointed toward what God would do in Christ, Who Himself fully revealed the image and nature of the invisible God. (Colossians 1:15, Hebrews 1:1-3).

The Westminster Shorter Catechism of 1647 states that the chief purpose of humanity is “to glorify God and to enjoy Him forever.” From the scriptures we learn that Jesus is the first man to fully glorify God, since our history is one o[...]

The people at The Bible Project.com have presented a short and entertaining video that should encourage many.

Here is a podcast from a previous year. Hope you will enjoy it!

Is love really all we need? Here are some thoughts from a previous podcast.

We are excited to present to our friends a Christmas song recently produced in Higher Ground Studio in Columbus, Ohio. It is entitled, “Night to Day.” The words were written by Dana Berry, music and arrangement by Larry Hakala. Lead vocal is by Dana Berry, backup by Larry Berry, with Larry Hakala on vocals, guitars, and keyboards, Dan Beaty on bass and drums. Mixed and mastered by Dan Beaty.

Merry Christmas everyone!