Monthly Archives: December 2020

LOVE IS THE KEY

Bible Study, ,

LOVE IS THE KEY

Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave Himself up for her to make her holy, cleansing her by the washing with water through the Word, and to present her to Himself as a radiant church without stain or wrinkle or any other blemish, but holy and blameless. In this same way, husbands ought to love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself (Eph. 5: 25-28).

Paul concluded his instructions to the church with a call to mutual submission. He also prefaced his picture of family harmony with the same call – to mutual submission. The Bible does not teach wives to submit to their husbands without the husbands’ reciprocal responsibility towards their wives.

However, nowhere does the Bible insist that wives serve their husbands. Now isn’t that strange? Why do many husbands, even within the church, equate submission with service – in fact, slavery? The moment he walks in the door, she is his servant, waiting on him hand and foot. While he is out at work, she still acts like his slave, picking up his clothes, tidying his cupboard, putting away the litter he has left around the house, preparing his favourite meals and generally ensuring his well-being in every part of his life. His home is his castle and in it he reigns supreme.

If believers are followers of Jesus, our role is to imitate Him, not the caricature of Jesus which many sections of the church present as the substitute for the real Jesus. Church leaders even lord it over their people, insisting on fancy titles and expecting to be treated like the pet lamb instead of being the shepherd.

Jesus insisted that He came, not to be served but to serve. The Old Testament prophecies present Him as the Ebed Yahweh – the Servant of the Lord. First of all, He submitted to and obeyed the Father. He served the Father by doing His will. It was the Father’s will that He serve His children in His earthly life and die in their place to pay their debt of sin. He directed every moment of His life to please the Father.

“For even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.” Mark 10:45

Jesus is the model of servant leadership for the husband. God intended marriage to be a visual aid of the oneness within the Trinity. The key to this unity is humility, and humility can only be fostered in the atmosphere of mutual submission – each person taking his or her place within the marriage, focussing on the well-being of the other without stubborn resistance, pride or rebellion towards one another.

It is pride and selfishness that ruin unity. It takes humility for a husband to serve his wife with sacrificial love and it takes the same humble submission for a wife to permit her husband to serve her without resistance or protest. God intended marriage to be, first of all, the union of two separate individuals producing, not uniformity but harmony in their relationship and fellowship with one another.

Children learn from their parents. They follow example before instruction. They will imitate what they see rather than what they are told. When they witness a continual power struggle between their parents, with each one attempting to control the other, with continual resistance and arguments, they will copy that kind of behaviour among themselves in the home and in their relationships outside the home.

Once again, divine wisdom paves the way for stable family life. Of course, human beings think they know better than God. They place the focus on what works (or doesn’t work) for them. Instead of following God’s pattern of protecting love, preserving unity and promoting contentment within the home by humility and mutual submission, they focus on what they believe to be the key to a happy marriage, their spouse. It is the other spouse’s responsibility to meet their need and make them happy.

The result? Discontented spouses, affairs and adultery, broken homes and rampaging divorce statistics. Men and women go from marriage to marriage to marriage in a desperate attempt to find happiness, only to have the same disappointment repeated over and over again. Their conclusion? Marriage does not work so let’s “shack up” instead so that we can go our separate ways if it doesn’t work out without having to go through the bother of a divorce.

Bending God’s rules or making our own is a recipe for disaster. God always gives His instructions and sets His boundaries to protect us from self-destruction. Within His prescriptions for living, we will find freedom and safety.

God’s pattern for a “successful” marriage is simple but not easy. Mutual submission and sacrificial service require “dying” to one’s own desires, needs and demands. We have both Jesus’ example to follow and the Holy Spirit within us to guide and empower us to do God’s will. In the doing, we will discover that, after all, God knows best. We will find peace and the harmony in the home which we desire and which is the outcome of doing life God’s way.

Scripture is taken from THE HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION®, NIV® Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.® Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.

Have you read my first book, Learning to be a Son – The Way to the Father’s Heart (Copyright © 2015, Partridge Publishing)? You’ll love it!

ISBN: Softcover – 978-1-4828-0512-3, eBook 978-4828-0511-6

STOP THE POWER STRUGGLE

Bible Study, ,

STOP THE POWER STRUGGLE

Wives, submit yourselves to your own husbands as you do to the Lord. For the husband is the head of the wife as Christ is the head of the church, His body, of which He is the Saviour. Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit to their husbands in everything (Eph. 5:22-24).

God never intended marriage to be a power struggle between husbands and wives. In fact, He gave the pattern for marriage at the beginning. He made a man and a woman – the man from the dust and the woman from the man so that they would have the same flesh and be equal in their person and worth before God. He brought the woman to the man, who recognised her as the completion of himself just as male and female creatures completed each other in the natural world.

God taught them that, through their physical union, they would represent and reflect the unity between God the Father. God the Son and God the Holy Spirit in the Godhead.

That is why a man leaves his father and mother and is united to his wife, and they become one flesh (Gen.2:24).

God intended that they live out a visual aid of unity in their permanent monogamous union. Before the fall and the intrusion of selfishness and sin, it was possible for these two perfect and sinless human beings to reflect the nature of God in their relationship with one another.

In every association of people there needs to be a leader – one who coordinates and shows the way for others to follow. Leadership is not about superiority but about function – creating cohesion and setting the example. God chose men to lead in the home. This is no way demeans or lowers the worth or dignity of any other member of the household. It puts the responsibility and accountability of the family to God, his Creator on the husband and father.

The role of leader in no way makes the husband a despot or the “boss”, like some sort of autocrat or dictator. Unfortunately, humankind in its worldly wisdom and rejection of God has set up a model which conflicts with God’s model of leadership and has turned many leaders into monsters who push people around at will.

God’s pattern for order in the home includes authority and submission – wives to husbands and children to fathers. However, order is much more than the wife kowtowing to the husband at the expense of her dignity and for the sake of peace. Husband and wife are equal partners in this union. The wife has a specific part to play, as does the husband.

The wife’s role is to submit to her husband as she submits to Christ as her head. She must trust him to hear, understand and interpret God’s will for their lives clearly and accurately. That does not mean that he makes arbitrary decisions but that he takes responsibility for the decisions they make together and leads the way in carrying them out in obedience to the Holy Spirit’s leading.

The wife also follows the husband’s lead in training their children in the ways of the Lord. She must uphold his authority in the home and stand with him in the day-to-day decisions he makes for his family, even if she does not agree with him. She must not contradict or undermine him in front of the children. She must not allow her children to manipulate her or her husband by playing the one off against the other.

Children are smart. They will quickly recognise the weak spots in their parents’ relationship and use them to their own advantage. Children can only learn their respective roles in life if their parents model what they are as male and female and what a husband and wife are in their relationship with and behaviour towards one another.

It is not the husband’s role or responsibility to demand submission from his wife. She will gladly submit to him, not if she is forced to but because she wants to obey the Lord and only if her husband fulfils his role as laid down in God’s Word. Harmony in the home only happens when each party falls in line with God’s pattern for marriage.

For the wife, God’s pattern is submission, reflecting His pattern for the church. There should never be confusion about the place of the church, or its leaders, in God’s plan. The church is the bride of Christ.  He is the head and she comes under His authority and protection as His beloved. He cares for her, provides for her, and protects her from the ravages of sin by setting the example and by leading the way to godly and holy living.

When the wife keeps her eyes on Jesus and follows His pattern of submission and obedience to the Father as a perfect son, she will set the tone, together with her husband of peace and togetherness in the family.

However, this is only half the story…

Scripture is taken from THE HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION®, NIV® Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.® Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.

Have you read my first book, Learning to be a Son – The Way to the Father’s Heart (Copyright © 2015, Partridge Publishing)? You’ll love it!

ISBN: Softcover – 978-1-4828-0512-3, eBook 978-4828-0511-6

Available on www.amazon.com in paperback, e-book or Kindle version, on www.takealot.com  or order directly from the publisher at www.partridgepublishing.com.

My second book, Learning to be a Disciple – The Way of the Master (Copyright © 2015, Partridge Publishing), a companion volume to Learning to be a Son – The Way to the Father’s Heart, has been released in paperback and digital format on www.amazon.com.

A DIFFERENT KIND OF INTOXICATION

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A DIFFERENT KIND OF INTOXICATION

Do not get drunk on wine which leads to debauchery. Instead, be filled with the Spirit, speaking to one another with psalms, hymns and songs from the Spirit. Sing and make music from your heart to the Lord, always giving thanks to God the Father for everything, in the name of the Lord Jesus. Submit to one another out of reverence for Christ (Eph. 5:18-21).

What an apt contrast between control by a spirit and control by the Spirit!

I have never been a wine bibber or a pub crawler, but I have seen and heard enough to know what alcohol does when it controls a human being. Inhibitions go and raw animal instincts take control. Whatever the drinker’s disposition, alcohol takes over and enhances. The more alcohol, the more the individual acts out who he or she is. Some become morose and retreat into themselves; others become loud and bawdy or angry and violent. The bottom line is that self-control gives way to alcohol’s control.

Unfortunately, alcohol does not leave the body quietly. It poisons the brain and leaves a trail of devastating consequences. The drinker suffers the aftermath of intoxication – “hangover”, headache, the stomach revolts and, over the long term, dignity and respect go, brain function deteriorates and the individual lives a lie rather than acknowledges the problem and calls for help.  Wives and families are dragged into the mix; embarrassment and shame drive them to hide the problem and shrink from society.

Paul warns against such a lifestyle – which was probably common among those who had turned from their old ways to embrace their new life in Christ. He indicated that excessive consumption of alcohol leads to debauchery. What is debauchery?

“Debauchery is the habitual and unrestrained indulgence of lust and sensuality. There are several places in Scripture where the word debauchery is used to indicate what we would, today, call “partying.” It encompasses several aspects of unholy living, including but not limited to sexual immorality, drunkenness, crude talk, and generally out-of-control behaviour.”

http://www.gotquestions.org/debauchery.html – retrieved January 2016.

The tragedy in modern western society is that many young people think that it is “adult” to drink. They do it with or without their parents’ knowledge, some even learning and practising the drinking habit in their own homes, not knowing or realising the consequences until it is too late. They kill someone by drunken driving or violent confrontation, they get young girls pregnant in their drunken state or they even begin the downward slide towards alcoholism with its accompanying crime and wasted lives.

This is no way for a child of God to live. We have a Spirit that resides in our hearts and desires to control us, just as alcohol controls those who imbibe, but with very different results. When the Holy Spirit controls, He does not take a person over with devastating consequences. In fact, the Holy Spirit never controls an individual’s will. The Holy Spirit guides and directs only by permission.

The Holy Spirit’s control leads to enhanced sensitivity and responsibility. His focus is always on the Father and the Son. He removes the inhibitions that impede our obedience to Him, but not the inhibitions that protect against immorality. He gives the boldness and confidence to trust the Father and to praise Him without hindrance. He removes the fear of man and enables us to overcome barriers between ourselves and our spiritual brothers and sisters to bring hope and encouragement and to build up one another’s faith in the Lord.

The Holy Spirit fills us with joy and loosens our tongues to praise God with every expression of music and song. He fills our hearts with thanksgiving and gratitude to the Lord for His goodness to us.

We never let go of our right to make decisions and choices but the Holy Spirit in us will influence us towards what is righteous and true when we submit to His leading and allow Him to empower or choices with action.

Paul used the Greek present continuous tense which infused his instruction with meaning. Being filled with the Spirit is not a once-off experience that gives us the right to classify ourselves or others as “Spirit-filled” believers, as though there are two classes of believers, Spirit-filled and not-Spirit-filled, depending on whether or not you have had the “baptism” of the Spirit.

Scripture makes no such distinction. Every believer has been given the Holy Spirit. He indwells all who believe in Jesus and acknowledge Him as Lord. It is every believer’s responsibility to give the Holy Spirit freedom to influence his choices and behaviour every moment of every day. The command is, “Be being filled,” or “Keep on being filled with the Spirit.” It is a moment-by-moment awareness of the Spirit’s presence and the need to allow Him to direct our decisions and choices according to His Word.

To be filled with the Spirit is not a label, it’s a lifestyle of obedience to His leading.

Scripture is taken from THE HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION®, NIV® Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.® Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.

Have you read my first book, Learning to be a Son – The Way to the Father’s Heart (Copyright © 2015, Partridge Publishing)? You’ll love it!

ISBN: Softcover – 978-1-4828-0512-3, eBook 978-4828-0511-6

Available on www.amazon.com in paperback, e-book or Kindle version, on www.takealot.com  or order directly from the publisher at www.partridgepublishing.com.

My second book, Learning to be a Disciple – The Way of the Master (Copyright © 2015, Partridge Publishing), a companion volume to Learning to be a Son – The Way to the Father’s Heart, has been released in paperback and digital format on www.amazon.com.

FLEE DARKNESS – LIVE IN THE LIGHT

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FLEE DARKNESS – LIVE IN THE LIGHT

Have nothing to do with the fruitless deeds of darkness, but rather expose them. It is shameful even to mention what the disobedient do in secret. But everything exposed by the light becomes visible – and everything illuminated becomes a light. This is why it is said:

‘Wake up, sleeper, rise from the dead, and Christ will shine on you.’

Be very careful, then, how you live – not as unwise but as wise, making the most of every opportunity because the days are evil. Therefore, do not be foolish, but understand what the Lord’s will is (Eph. 5:11-17).

Bugs and creepy crawlies live the darkness. Kick over a stone and they scatter, scuttling off to find another dark spot where they can take shelter from the light. Bugs don’t hide from the light because they are evil; they hide under stones to stay out of sight because predators are continually hunting for a tasty morsel.

People hide in darkness for a very different reason.

Everyone who does evil hates the light, and will not come into the light for fear that their deeds will be exposed. But whoever lives by the truth comes into the light, so that it may be seen plainly that what they have done has been done in the sight of God (John 3:20-21).

What is darkness in this context? Ignorance or willful disobedience to the standards God has set for us leaves us in darkness. ‘Light’ and ‘darkness’ are common metaphors in Scripture. Light represents the truth about God and us that He has revealed in His Word, and the moral and upright living that flows from obeying God’s instructions. Darkness is the opposite – immoral living in contradiction to God’s Word.

King David understood the part that God’s Word plays in keeping our feet on the right path in life.

Your word is a lamp for my feet, a light on my path (Psa. 119:105).  

I have hidden your word in my heart that I might not sin against you (Psa. 119:11).

Obedience to the prescriptions and instructions in God’s Word enables us to navigate the pitfalls in life without damaging our consciences or our souls. First of all, God teaches us how to have harmonious relationships with one another – within the closest of all bonds in the family, and then with the people who radiate outwards from our inner circle, friends and acquaintances and those with whom we rub shoulders in the world.

God created an interactive universe as an expression of the unity within the Trinity. God is one – according to the daily confession of the Israelites:

Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one (Deut. 6:4).

The word for one – echad – can mean either a single unit or a compound unity, depending on its context. Jewish scholars argue that God is a single person while Christians believe that God is a compound unity – three persons in one Godhead.

However, both man and the universe bear witness to the amazingly complex unity that exists in every system which is an expression of the echad in God. Everything in the universe is interdependent and interactive.

No Man Is an Island is a famous line from Devotions upon Emergent Occasions, a 1624 work by the English poet John Donne – https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/No_Man_Is_an_Island – retrieved January 2016.

The Apostle Paul expressed the same thought:

For none of us lives for ourselves alone, and none of us dies for ourselves alone. If we live, we live for the Lord; and if we die, we die for the Lord (Rom. 14:7-8).

The point is that the human race is interconnected and interdependent, just as is the physical universe. Whether we live by the God’s Word or in defiance of God’s standards, what we do affects other people in a ripple effect. My sin and your sin contribute to the chaos around us and we cannot escape the consequences of our disobedience and the disobedience of others.

On this basis, Paul pleads with his readers to live in the light. Wisdom, in the simplest terms, means doing what works. God has told us in His Word what works. Sin in all its ramifications does not work because it creates chaos in relationships.

Our responsibility as believers is to maintain harmony in all our relationships by walking in the light with God and with one another.

Scripture is taken from THE HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION®, NIV® Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.® Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.

Have you read my first book, Learning to be a Son – The Way to the Father’s Heart (Copyright © 2015, Partridge Publishing)? You’ll love it!

ISBN: Softcover – 978-1-4828-0512-3, eBook 978-4828-0511-6

Available on www.amazon.com in paperback, e-book or Kindle version, on www.takealot.com  or order directly from the publisher at www.partridgepublishing.com.

My second book, Learning to be a Disciple – The Way of the Master (Copyright © 2015, Partridge Publishing), a companion volume to Learning to be a Son – The Way to the Father’s Heart, has been released in paperback and digital format on www.amazon.com.

ONCE DARKNESS – NOW LIGHT

Bible Study, ,

ONCE DARKNESS – NOW LIGHT

Let no one deceive you with empty words for, because of such things, God’s wrath comes on those who are disobedient. Therefore, do not be partners with them. For you were once darkness, but now you are light in the Lord. Live as children of light (for the fruit of the light consists in all goodness, righteousness and truth) and find out what pleases the Lord (Eph. 5:6-10).

What are the ‘empty words’ of which Paul speaks? ‘Empty’ simply means that these words have nothing in them – no substance – which implies that they are lies. What kind of words are empty of truth? Words that man speaks in contradiction to God’s Word have no truth in them. Satan is their source because he wants to lure people away from God and from the truth.

Satan spoke empty words to Adam and Eve and, when they believed him and did what he tempted them to do, they discovered that it was God who had spoken the truth, not the devil. The outcome, just as Paul had written, was the wrath of God on them for their disobedience. Scientists and philosophers who deny the existence of God, speak empty words. Those who disregard God’s moral requirements, living impure and wicked lives, are under the dark cloud of Gods’ wrath because they have believed the ‘empty words’ with which the devil has deceived them.

Deception is one of the devil’s most potent weapons. He deceives through lies which contradict God’s truth and he deceives through fear – a powerful emotion that drives people to ignore or disregard the character and promises of God.

Paul counsels his readers not to partner with people who, under Satan’s influence, propagate his deception both by their words and by the way they live.  God has preserved in written form over thousands of years, His directions for living lives that please Him and that protect us from the effects of His wrath. God’s wrath is not capricious outbursts of anger but a settled disposition of displeasure. To be under God’s displeasure is to be subject to the consequences for choosing to disobey Him He clearly describes in His word.

There is no small print in God’s Word. He hides nothing from His people. He takes no pleasure in meting out punishment to those who are disobedient. The devil has spawned the lie that God is a hard taskmaster, waiting with His rod of punishment to catch anyone out who transgresses His laws. God has clearly warned everyone who cares to take notice, of the consequences of disobedience but He has endless mercy for those who repent and return to His way.

Why should His people not be partners with those who contradict and disobey His Word? Not only is such association detrimental to our wellbeing, but it also cuts across everything we are and have been taught as children of God and citizens of His kingdom. Loyal citizens of a country are bound by the constitution of that country. Should they step outside the boundaries of that constitution, they will be prosecuted. Our prisons are crammed with people who have transgressed the laws of our land.

Likewise, those who belong to God’s kingdom have voluntarily placed themselves under the constitution of His kingdom. They have committed themselves to loyalty to Jesus as the king and have placed themselves under His authority to obey His Word because His Word has substance – it is the truth.

Light and darkness cannot co-exist. Darkness disappears when a light is turned on. Darkness has no substance; it is merely the absence of light. Light exposes the furniture in a room which would be potential obstacles in the dark. Light enables us to see what is in our environment. In the light we are able to avoid tripping over things we cannot see in the dark. In the same way, the light of God’s Word enables us to avoid falling prey to devil’s lies and destroying ourselves by believing his deception.

It is our responsibility as children of the kingdom of light, to live out in our daily lives who we are. The fruit of our lives reveals the root. Paul insists that God’s children bear the fruit of lives that live in the light – for the fruit of the light consists in all goodness, righteousness and truth. It is impossible to live in the darkness of disobedience and, at the same time, bear the fruit of light. What we do reveals what we are.

And find out what pleases the Lord. What is it that pleases God? The Bible gives us the answer. God gave King David a title He gave to no one else. Preachers and theologians often make heavy weather of this one simply because they have ignored the context.

After removing Saul, He [God] made David their king. God testified concerning him: ‘I have found David son of Jesse, a man after my own heart; he will do everything I want him to do.’ (Acts 13: 22).

Did you get that? Obedience to His Word pleases God more than anything else. It is not our service or our sacrifice which pleases Him. It is our prompt and complete obedience. Obedience to God’s requirements is the one thing, above everything else, that indicates whether we fear Him or not.

Scripture is taken from THE HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION®, NIV® Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.® Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.

Have you read my first book, Learning to be a Son – The Way to the Father’s Heart (Copyright © 2015, Partridge Publishing)? You’ll love it!

ISBN: Softcover – 978-1-4828-0512-3, eBook 978-4828-0511-6

Available on www.amazon.com in paperback, e-book or Kindle version, on www.takealot.com  or order directly from the publisher at www.partridgepublishing.com.

My second book, Learning to be a Disciple – The Way of the Master (Copyright © 2015, Partridge Publishing), a companion volume to Learning to be a Son – The Way to the Father’s Heart, has been released in paperback and digital format on www.amazon.com.