Treasured Truth

Pastor Ford will remind us today that when things get out of control, Jesus is still in control.  That in this passage we will study today, Jesus will show His deity through His sovereignty, and His exercise of power over all of creation.

Intercessory prayer is prayer that’s concerned about the individuals with whom or for whom you are praying.  For example, in His intercessory prayer for His followers found in John 17, Jesus has their best interests at heart. He’s not praying to impress, He’s praying to express His care and concern.  He’s praying for their needs. And He’s still doing the same thing for us today.

The false teachers we are learning about in our study in Galatians 6 apparently wanted the admiration of people.  And false teachers today aren’t much different.  Often they teach what they teach so that people will like them.  They want to be popular and well accepted so they change the truth of scripture to make it more palatable and less convicting.

As we begin this study about false teachers and heresy, Pastor Ford will remind us that we have to know the truth in order to be able to live the truth.  And we live out the truth in direct proportion to the amount of it that we know.  And then he’ll ask this probing question—If we don’t know the truth, how in the world are we ever going to live it?

Did you know there are consequences that you will experience when you don’t forgive?  Today, Pastor Ford will continue to explain the 5 consequences of unforgiveness that can be seen in Acts chapter 15.

Pastor Ford will explain today that generally speaking, reconciliation takes time. That’s because God has to heal the person who’s been offended. And it often takes a lot of time for that to happen. So, if you’ve asked for forgiveness and are waiting for reconciliation to take place, then realize that it may be a while before the person can respond in a forgiving way.

Pastor Ford will encourage us today to put ourselves, and everything we have into the hands of God.  Because He takes it in His hands and He multiplies everything that we give Him. Maybe you don’t have what you need because it’s still in your hands and you haven’t put it in His hands.

Pastor Ford will ask us to consider this question—Why is it that when someone does something against us, we look at their actions, but when we do something against them, we look at our intentions? And we say we didn’t intend to do it.  Yet, we did it.  So, whether we intended to or not, we hurt them and we have to deal with that, seek their forgiveness and try to reconcile things with them.

The level of intimacy we experience in our relationship with God is in direct proportion to the level of forgiveness we show to others.  Pastor Ford will explain that God doesn’t want us to come to worship, thinking that we’re communicating with and worshipping Him, when we have something in our heart against the person sitting next to us.

Pastor Ford will remind us today that we should not let ourselves be impeded in our healing from past hurts because we want to know why someone would hurt us in the way they did.  We often ask why did they do it?  We have to realize that we may never find out why they did what they did.  And often people who do things to us and don’t even know why they did them. So, we shouldn’t let that question hold us back from getting past the hurt.