All Work Out - April 22, 2014

Scripture: Romans 7-8

18 Yet what we suffer now is nothing compared to the glory he will reveal to us later. 19 For all creation is waiting eagerly for that future day when God will reveal who his children really are.20 Against its will, all creation was subjected to God’s curse. But with eager hope, 21 the creation looks forward to the day when it will join God’s children in glorious freedom from death and decay. 22 For we know that all creation has been groaning as in the pains of childbirth right up to the present time. 23 And we believers also groan, even though we have the Holy Spirit within us as a foretaste of future glory, for we long for our bodies to be released from sin and suffering. We, too, wait with eager hope for the day when God will give us our full rights as his adopted children, including the new bodies he has promised us.24 We were given this hope when we were saved. (If we already have something, we don’t need to hope for it. 25 But if we look forward to something we don’t yet have, we must wait patiently and confidently.) 

26 And the Holy Spirit helps us in our weakness. For example, we don’t know what God wants us to pray for. But the Holy Spirit prays for us with groanings that cannot be expressed in words.27 And the Father who knows all hearts knows what the Spirit is saying, for the Spirit pleads for us believers in harmony with God’s own will.28 And we know that God causes everything to work together for the good of those who love God and are called according to his purpose for them. - Romans 8

Message:

Our sufferings now can only remind us of our Hope for a glorious Future.

Observation/Promise:

We may have sufferings and troubles on earth, but they are only to mold us into better persons, shaping us to be a people of great character, one that GOD is working to be worthy of the paradise He has prepared for us. Yes we are all saved from our sins and condemnation when we accept the Lord Yeshua as our GOD but acceptance is not the end but only the start of our transformation. We can not stop pursuing GOD just because we are already sure of our salvation. The Word says we need to work out our salvation. When GOD saves us, He starts molding us into people with golden characters. And the process of molding and transformation may not be a pleasant experience because it is usually painful most of the time. 

Application/Command:

We need to only trust GOD in our troubles and suffering. When we trust GOD, we are letting go of our human ways of getting things done, we simply trust that the hardship and difficult circumstance is only making us hope more on the glorious future He has in store for us and that what we are going through now will bear into such a fruit that will make good use in the tasks and roles we will be responsible for in the future. And even in our failures, we can be confident that GOD will use our mistakes for His glory and our greater good. With GOD, no experience could ever be a waste, when we follow GOD, everything will all work out in the end and only GOD knows how. 

The Blessing from GOD - April 16, 2014

Scripture: Genesis 8-11Then God blessed Noah and his sons and told them, “Be fruitful and multiply. Fill the earth. 2 All the animals of the earth, all the birds of the sky, all the small animals that scurry along the ground, and all the fish in the sea will look on you with fear and terror. I have placed them in your power.3 I have given them to you for food, just as I have given you grain and vegetables. 4 But you must never eat any meat that still has the lifeblood in it.

8 Then God told Noah and his sons, 9 “I hereby confirm my covenant with you and your descendants, 10 and with all the animals that were on the boat with you—the birds, the livestock, and all the wild animals—every living creature on earth. 11 Yes, I am confirming my covenant with you. Never again will floodwaters kill all living creatures; never again will a flood destroy the earth.”

Message:

Be Fruitful and Multiply. 

Observation/Promise:

GOD has put power within us humans so that the animals of this world may fear us. HE has given different kinds of animals for food and the plants, grain and vegetables. He wants us to live by providing us the things that enable us to live. More than that, GOD has blessed us with a blessing to multiply and fill the earth to be fruitful with everything we do. We cannot be stagnant being idle, we need to do something which GOD has called us to do. GOD has confirmed His covenant with us to bless us and not to harm us with HIs raging flood of anger and judgement. How wonderful it is to hear and receive the blessing of GOD for humanity in the morning when you just woke up.
Application/Command:

Be Fruitful spiritually and physically, multiply your good works. 

Do not eat animals that still has blood on it. 

Eat your fill in the land which the Lord our GOD has given us.

Evergreen Fruitful

5 This is what the Lord says:
“Cursed are those who put their trust in mere humans,
who rely on human strength and turn their hearts away from the Lord.
6 They are like stunted shrubs in the desert, with no hope for the future.
They will live in the barren wilderness, in an uninhabited salty land.
7 “But blessed are those who trust in the Lord
and have made the Lord their hope and confidence.
8 They are like trees planted along a riverbank,
with roots that reach deep into the water.
Such trees are not bothered by the heat
or worried by long months of drought.
Their leaves stay green, and they never stop producing fruit.

- Jeremiah 17

People often hope in anything that is tangible, things or people that they can see and rely to for a better future. It could be a job, a company, an insurance even or a business, a loved one, parents and even more that they trust will keep their future safe. But this is a dangerous thing to do says GOD. Who describes such people who trust in any other things than HIM as stunted shrubs with no hope for the future. This sounds scary coming from GOD who knows the beginning to the end. Stunted shrubs are short trees that look so dry. To be a shrub in a dry dessert, living in barren wilderness that no one inhabits because it's too dry is a horrible thing to be. Would you really trust in anything that will cause you to be like a shrub only to find out disappointed in the future that all the that your have trusted in has failed?

On the other hand, if you chose to trust the unseen GOD, the invisible yet most powerful one, GOD Himself calls you blessed. The only thing tangible we can have with GOD is His word the Bible, the record of history of what He has done, testimonies of other people's lives who have trusted GOD. But this is the best way to be, to be trusting GOD, exercising our faith because we cannot see what we put our hope and trust into. But if you do take heart to what He says, you are compared to that like a tree whose roots go deep into the water, not bothered by any weather, calamity or seasons of drought because their roots are in the water, the Word of GOD, which sustains them making them evergreen and fruitful.

What Soil?

15 The seed that fell on the footpath represents those who hear the message, only to have Satan come at once and take it away. 16 The seed on the rocky soil represents those who hear the message and immediately receive it with joy. 17 But since they don’t have deep roots, they don’t last long. They fall away as soon as they have problems or are persecuted for believing God’s word. 18 The seed that fell among the thorns represents others who hear God’s word, 19 but all too quickly the message is crowded out by the worries of this life, the lure of wealth, and the desire for other things, so no fruit is produced. 20 And the seed that fell on good soil represents those who hear and accept God’s word and produce a harvest of thirty, sixty, or even a hundred times as much as had been planted!”

- Mark 4

Seed is the word of GOD that is being preached to different people. The soil is the heart of many that hears the word of GOD and receives them. Yeshua put it so clearly as to how He illustrated how people receive GOD's word in their hearts. Which soil are you? It is essential to know the conditions of our hearts. Is your heart a rocky soil? Are you seeking for GOD and His Kingdom? Or is this world all you ever care about and know? Is your heart a soil crowded with many other things in life? Is your ambition more than your desire for GOD?

These are tough questions and if the answers to them are yes then we just have to ask GOD the change the conditions of our hearts. Yes, when we are true to ourselves and understand which soil we have. When we are aware of our weakness, we can identify our problems and therefore be able to deal with it honestly and directly. No one is perfect, and that is why we have to regularly ask GOD to cultivate our hearts with fertilizers by asking Him to change our hearts and mold us by His grace that is ever sufficient for our needs. In this way we depend on Him not on our own efforts to be what He wants us to be: fruitful, productive and effective.