Tag: Holy scripture

Study God’s Word 

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Study God’s Word:

If someone would have told me years ago, that in the future I would spend a great deal of my time in and around God’s word, I probably would have thought that it was interesting but not overtly crazy. Growing up I was not in God’s word at all. I didn’t go to a Christian school, though I wish I had. I didn’t go to Christian summer camps, or even been a part of a vacation bible school, I also wish I had. I didn’t open my Bible at all, even on Sundays, I didn’t have my Bible. In fact, as I sit and ponder those days, the only Bible I remember having is a children’s Bible which had stories, but not actually a Bible. It was not till I was older and serving in the military I received my first actual Bible. The most involved in Bible study was when I attended a small prayer group in High School. I knew the name of God, and I had faith, and I prayed, but I didn’t understand who God was. 

One week during basic training at Fort Knox Kentucky, we were invited to a church for Thanksgiving dinner. While at the dinner the church handed out a fairly simple KJV Bible. I gladly accepted it, and at the first chance I got, I bought a highlighter and begun combing scripture for verses to remember. While I would not have called this Bible study, at least I was in the word. I would get a small Gideons Bible which is just the NT, Psalms and Proverbs; I was given this on my way to Kuwait to join the battle efforts in Iraq. I spent a lot of time reading verses, combing through scripture, again searching for things I thought would be helpful and comforting, but not actually knowing God. 

Fast forward many years later; it’s 2017, I’ve lost everything, and my life is in shambles. Teaching for a small bit of time at a local church, I had a decent understanding at this point how to study, but outside of preparing a lesson, and following along on Sunday’s, I still wasn’t studying yet. But, in early 2017 all that changed. With my life crumbling around me, and having lost everything, I dove into scripture. I dove into topical study, and while I wouldn’t exactly recommend that to anyone, it was a start, and everyone’s gotta start someplace. For me, I wrote a blog, this blog, and I wrote every day, sometimes 2-3 times a day. I was hooked on learning and writing, and sharing ideas, and I was growing in the Lord. To date I have posted 848 times. I will say, the vast majority were in 2017 (382), 2018 (340), and 2019 (41). Since then, I would say, spiritual warfare gripped me, and my desire to write was severely diminished. I studied but it was different. Let us fast forward again to 2024. While the numbers on the blog for 2024 are kinda small, a mere 18, I have also started doing a podcast. A transitional period for me. My focus is now divided into writing and speaking. The difference between 2023/24, and the last few years is while there are no numbers to show this, I study God’s word just about every day. As I am going through the book of John for the podcast (Vlog), and in my personal study Luke. 

So, why is any of this important to you? After being an understudy for the youth pastor at my church, I realized how important it was to know God’s word. Not just to know what it says, but to understand it, and have it stored up in my heart. The words of 2 Timothy jumped off the page, 2 Timothy 4:3-4 3 For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine, but according to their own desires, because they have itching ears, they will heap up for themselves teachers; and they will turn their ears away from the truth, and be turned aside to fables. If Covid taught me nothing, it was this, the number of false teachers is extreme. During Covid as most of us were stuck at home, I began to search for online preachers. Slowly, one by one I found in some way they were teaching heresy, or worse, blasphemy. How would I have been able to tell the difference of solid teaching, had I not studied the Bible myself. Many people today, fall within the category in which Paul is warning Timothy. They do not know the Bible so they fall into the web of a false teacher. 

Today, false teaching has grown, into what seems like a great falling away. Not only is the word being miss spoken, but a large portion has become apostate, and has compromised the Word of God to allow inclusivity, and has watered down the Gospel, more concerned with its own bottom line of brining in the world, and making the world feel more comfortable. Because of this however, it has changed what the Bible says, they corrupt it’s meaning, and in an attempt to be more inclusive, much like the slogan of Obama Care “If you like your old sin, you can keep your old sin.” Sadly, this leaves little room for the actual truth, God will condemn those who preach His word incorrectly, and those who listened are also condemned, even if they believe they are saved. The problem is, they don’t truly understand scripture, or the Holy Spirit. They were not born a new creation, have not killed the old sin with the grace and mercy of the Holy Spirit, and still live in the sin they so loved. When people come to Jesus, but do not know the cost, the giving up on yourself, your own desires, and the love of the world, picking up your cross daily to follow Him, they risk the dire consequences. When you follow Christ, there is a part of you that dies, and a new part is born. One cannot follow Christ without dying to themselves first. The faith in Christ is met with an action, and the action is dying to yourself. As Christ said, you cannot serve two masters. You cannot try to serve God, but love and be of the world. The world is under the control of Satan, and if you love the world, you live under your father Adam. 

Why Bible study matters. Lets take a look at Ephesians 4:31 KJV 31 Let all bitterness, and wrath, and anger, and clamour, and evil speaking, be put away from you, with all malice

NKJV 31 Let all bitterness, wrath, anger, clamor, and evil speaking be put away from you, with all malice.

ESV 31 Let all bitterness and wrath and anger and clamor and slander be put away from you, along with all malice.

NASB 31 All bitterness, wrath, anger, clamor, and slander must be removed from you, along with all malice.

CAN YOU SPOT THE DIFFERENCE? 

Here’s why biblical studies matter. It’s at the end, ‘be put away from you, with all malice’, or ‘along with all malice’. In English these mean two very different things. But the root word in the original language is “óúv: meaning association, fellowship and inclusion. Being rare in.” In each translation, the word for with, and the word along, are the same, just one removed the word along. When I first read it, I read it in the New King James, and someone preached it from the NASB, and I was confused. Which one is it? I interpreted it to mean you are to put away bitterness, wrath, anger, clamor, and evil speaking with malice, meaning to hate your own sin. But, while this can still be said as truth, the true nature of this verse is to do those things, and also, adding to it, put away malice: wickedness, depravity, malignity. 

Without true study of the Word of God, people have been getting the Bible to say whatever they want it to say. Without knowing it in your heart, you don’t know what is true, and not true. The other day I was watching a new show on Netflix, and I can’t really describe it as a documentary, because it’s littered with the world, and not Biblical truth. It’s supposed to be a documentary on a Biblical figure. In the show, they quoted Exodus 20:3 3 “You shall have no other gods before Me.” They took this to mean, you should have no other gods before me, that must mean there are ‘other’ gods. Sadly, thousands or millions of people will watch this new show, and think that they may have a choice, that there are other gods to choose from. Scripture here is not saying there are other gods, but rather, we create them ourselves, and we worship the created, and not the creator. I think Captain America said it best, “These guys come from legend, they’re basically gods” Captain America responds, “There’s only one God ma’am, and I’m pretty sure he doesn’t dress like that. (Avengers) Much like the golden calf on the side of Mount Sinai, or the 10 plagues God sent to show Egypt it’s made-up gods were nothing to the one true God. People have been making their own gods, and changing god into their own image since the serpents first lie to Eve. Genesis 3:4-The serpent said to the woman, “You surely will not die! 5 For God knows that in the day you eat from it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.” Eve found this enticing, she saw she could be like God, wanting that power for herself, in her pride, taking the fruit from the forbidden tree, and eating it. Without knowing the Bible, we take God and turn him into our own version of god, and we take ourselves and place ourselves into the bible, and we become the main character. Instead of seeing the Glory of God, the Power of God, the Worship to God, and the Word of God. Without knowing scripture, scripture can be taught any which way, and we believe it. We hear the snake oil salesman and we buy what he’s selling, just as eve bought the pitch from the Devil. There are no other gods before God, because there are no other Gods. What we do, is worship the created, rather than the creator. We worship trees, and turtles, and rare birds, but do not hold an unborn baby in the same regard. We worship pride, and place it on a pedestal because we worship the pretend marginalized. We either ignore Gods word willfully, or negligently in ignorance. We allow these things to take place and we attend churches where these things happen, but we remain, and we say nothing. Most don’t know the word, and are being led off a cliff, but because they think God loves them just the way they are, there’s no reason to change. God in their minds is an all-inclusive God, and he loves us just the way we are. 

God does love you just the way you are, but there is something that is called to happen; we are called to have faith, but then, to REPENT! Our faith in Christ which causes the change in our hearts, leads us to repentance. The Holy Spirit within us, forces change, it makes us come face to face with our sin, and we become repugnant to our sin. In being a new creation, we cannot be in love with our sin, for if we are in love with our sin, we are condemned by it. Scripture is clear about such things

1 Corinthians 6:9-11 

9 Do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived. Neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor homosexuals, nor sodomites, 10 nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners will inherit the kingdom of God. 11 And such were some of you. But you were washed, but you were sanctified, but you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus and by the Spirit of our God.

Galatians 5:19-21

19 Now the works of the flesh are evident, which are: adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lewdness, 20 idolatry, sorcery, hatred, contentions, jealousies, outbursts of wrath, selfish ambitions, dissensions, heresies, 21 envy, murders, drunkenness, revelries, and the like; of which I tell you beforehand, just as I also told you in time past, that those who practice such things will not inherit the kingdom of God.

Voddie Baucham on the TWO tables of the Law. 

Don’t Murder- Don’t deprive your neighbor of his life. (Not kill- they are not the same) 

Adultery- Don’t deprive neighbor of his family

Theft – Don’t deprive neighbor of his goods

False Witness – Don’t deprive neighbor of his reputation

Coveting – Don’t despise what God has given you. 

Coveting- you are not satisfied with what God has given to you. 

We, much like Eve, think God is holding back from us, and we want what we want. We want that relationship no matter what God’s law says. We want that sexual attention, no matter what God says. We want that stuff from the store, though we can’t afford it, no matter what the law says. We want to preach in church, (if you’re a woman) no matter what God’s word says. We covet ourselves. We worship ourselves. We worship false gods. We don’t know God’s word because it sits on the shelf and we don’t ever take the time to read it, and study it. Now, here’s the rub. Some read but do not see. Some preach, but do not understand. How do we know who’s who, unless we know and understand scripture for ourselves? The Apostles did not see Judas sitting right in front of them. They did not see the impending danger, and could not tell Judas had a demon in him. He blended in, a chameleon, the enemy was in their midst and they couldn’t see. If we don’t study and know what God’s word says, adhere to God’s commands, take them into our hearts, how will we know the counterfeit from the real one? 

It is our jobs as Christians to not just know Jesus as our savior, but to know his commands. Our job is to know and rightfully discern His commandments of God. If we are to know God, we must know what He as spoken. If we are to follow Jesus, we must know what He wills for us, commands us, and expects of us. We cannot live our lives in the dark, and in order for us to live in the light, we must know His word. We must keep His word in our hearts so we might not sin against a righteous and holy God, Psalm 119:11. I have come to understand the dangers of getting my theology from the world. Trying to mix secular science, and my feeble understanding of scripture, left me with little or no understanding of who God is. I did not do my due diligence in study and when the going truly got hard, I had no appreciation, no knowledge of the nature of God. My foundation was that upon sand, and everything collapsed. My life should be a cautionary tale for those who believe they don’t need to know what scripture says to live a ‘good’ life. I assure you, there are none who live a good life, no one is righteous, and everyone falls short of the glory of God. But if we do not recognize our sins, how do we repent of them? We must know what He wishes of us, and why. Know what He expects of us, and why. Know who Jesus is, and what He actually said. Know what his Apostles said and taught and what they died for. No one goes to their death over a lie, and if anyone knew the truth, the 11 Apostles did, along with many others in the early church. They knew the truth, and died for it. IF they were willing to put down their lives for the truth, and in doing so, giving us the Holy Scriptures, the Word of God, why do we not have a desire to learn and grow closer to our Lord, and Creator? Don’t put off to tomorrow, what you can do today. 

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Do we Trust 

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Do we Trust 

Hardships are simply part of this world. Some things we bring upon ourselves. Some things we face are due to other sinful people. And some things are acts of nature allowed by God. When we choose the wrong partner, quit a job for dumb reasons, turn to a substance for comfort, acts of crime or just do something stupid, those things we bring upon ourselves. When your house is burgled, someone spreads rumor or lies about you, these are products of living around sinners. When the person at the grocery store is rude towards you, or your significant other cheats, these things are things from sinful people. Acts of nature are storms, flat tire, water heater going bad, illness, etc. We must understand where hardships come from and why. 

It’s been 7 years since I was broken to the bedrock of my existence. Where I experienced a nuclear bomb exploding, and I watched my life turn from what looked like a good life from the outside, and even appeared that way to myself, to a broken down, foundation cracking, life altering experience. 

I think back to Paul riding to Damascus with orders to bring those of the way to “Justice”. Paul, a man of prestige, wealth, power, notoriety, a zealous man, bringing forth his version of Justice to those who follow “the way”. He was a persecutor of the church. So why then would he become one of them? God has a tendency to uproot our lives and set us on a different path. What I didn’t know at that time in my life 7 years ago, was, what Satan meant for evil, the Lord used for good. 

I have spoken about the specificity of what happened to me before, and debated whether to talk about it again, or not. I was angry, and lost, and couldn’t imagine why a loving God would bring me to the point I was at in my life. Why would he allow the sinful nature of someone else bring me to where I was. Why would he allow me to be hurt like that? The fact is, Sinful people hurt sinful people. We do not live our ‘best life now’, because God saves that for Heaven. We as Christians will face the bumpy road, the road of toil and troubles. Satan often tries to show us the easy, straight path, and in our nature, we want the path of ease, comfort, and peace. Sadly the kind of peace most seek is not the same peace scripture tells us to aspire to live in. We often take what Satan offers to us. We take the first step, we give in to the first temptation, and before we know it, we are neck deep in sinful thoughts, decisions, and despair. 

But God, will often use what we go through to help others. God will often use our past, post salvation, to help others walk the path. Our testimony is a powerful tool for sharing or providing an opening for the Gospel, but feelings do not equate to truth, so be careful not to confuse the two. While my testimony is a very emotional one, I would not want anyone to confuse my emotional testimony as proof the gospel is real. My testimony does not need to prove anything, except what the gospel and my Lord and Savior Jesus Christ has done for me. The gospel and holy scripture speaks for itself. There is proof in scripture, and evidence can be found in extra biblical sources if one truly seeks to find the truth. We as people often don’t want to know the truth. “The truth…All it did was anger those who preferred lies and confusion and backspinning in the hope of making themselves look better.” (Eli, pg. 288, Thrawn) We see the Pharisees in scripture look at truth in the face, and rejected it. The truth however can be powerful, as the saying goes, ‘no one knowingly dies for a lie.’ 

I would die for my faith if I had too, or at least I say I would. We never truly know what we would do until we are put in that situation. I’ve also heard, and as fitting as today is, ‘terrorists die for the faith they believe in all the time.’ And while yes this is also true, it is what they believe. Consider this however, if the conspiracy theory is actually true, that the apostles made up the Jesus story, why then, would they, who would have beyond a doubt known the truth, give up their lives for a lie? Scripture airs out the dirty laundry of the characters in the book. The highs and lows of every character is put out there for the world to see. The truth has remained the test of time because it is the truth. As I have posted before, women were chosen to be the first eye witnesses of the empty tomb. https://thearrowpreacher.com/2018/08/13/women-why-women/ The men in scripture who’s mistakes were written to show their imperfection, and the contrast, Jesus who became sin so those who believe and look upon Him in faith, may be saved from our sentence of eternal torment in Hell. There were so many eye witnesses to the risen Jesus, the Roman empire could not silence the movement. 

Risen For You

“When the Apostils watched in horror as their Lord was nailed to a cross after being brutally beaten, they were crushed in spirit. They were utterly without hope, but after 3 days the blood debt was paid, the victory lap had been made, and Christ would rise and make himself seen fulfilling the prophesy and destroying deaths hold over the sinner for all eternity.” (Arrow Preacher, ‘Peace’, https://thearrowpreacher.com/2018/04/06/peace/)

In 2018 I wrote and shared a paper about truth. 

Fighting Terrorism

Bad things happen all the time, and at the heart of all this is, do we trust God’s plan? As we look at today being the 9/11 anniversary, do we trust in God’s plan? When you hurt, do you trust God’s plan? When someone you care about is take from you, do you trust in God’s plan?

We don’t always get the answers to why, but we do have answers to why in a broad scope. We live in a fallen world, and sin runs abound. We look at the life of Job, Joseph, Jeremiah, Paul, and the martyrs that came after. Why did they suffer for their faith? God had a plan, and all we can do is trust in that plan. 

Why God?

Trusting in the plan may be one of the hardest things we do, perhaps even harder than accepting God as savior. I have seen so many walk away from the faith when things get hard, or when they lose family members. The hardships will come and keep coming. Hardships as I spoke of recently are sometimes thrust upon us, sometimes we bring these things upon ourselves. Our choices matters and we should live a cautious tale of blaming God for hardships we face. We are not the only ones that face hardships of our own making. The Israelites complained and sinned before a Holy God just days after being freed from the bondage of servitude in Egypt. Their complaints and actions caused the forty-year exodus. An entire generation doomed themselves to live out their days in the desert. 

Numbers 21:4-7

4 Then they journeyed from Mount Hor by the Way of the Red Sea, to go around the land of Edom; and the soul of the people became very discouraged on the way. 5 And the people spoke against God and against Moses: “Why have you brought us up out of Egypt to die in the wilderness? For there is no food and no water, and our soul loathes this worthless bread.” 6 So the Lord sent fiery serpents among the people, and they bit the people; and many of the people of Israel died.

7 Therefore the people came to Moses, and said, “We have sinned, for we have spoken against the Lord and against you; pray to the Lord that He take away the serpents from us.” So Moses prayed for the people.

To this point, the Lord God has taken care of His people, delivering them from Egypt, enemies, hunger, and thirst, yet they complain at the first sign of trouble. But God, sends a sign, 

Numbers 21:8-

8 Then the Lord said to Moses, “Make a fiery serpent, and set it on a pole; and it shall be that everyone who is bitten, when he looks at it, shall live.” 9 So Moses made a bronze serpent, and put it on a pole; and so it was, if a serpent had bitten anyone, when he looked at the bronze serpent, he lived.

Do we look upon the cross and have faith? We are told through scripture; we are saved by faith and faith alone. Mirroring Numbers, we look upon the cross and have faith because Jesus had to die for us. We are wretched sinners, who bring most of our troubles upon ourselves, and we must repent of those sins and trust in Jesus. The Father’s will is sovereign and we must trust his plan. I heard this recently, “Why y’all blamin’ God for your problems? Most of y’all’s problems came from not listening to Him to begin with.” (Unknown) 

When we choose not to live in God’s will, we cannot complain when things go badly. When we are out having unprotected sex with anyone we want, why do we blame God for getting pregnant, or sick? When we choose drugs instead of church, why do we blame God for our families falling apart? When we lie, cheat, steal, and live in our sexual immorality, knowing God cannot bless those things, why are we surprised when hardships come to our door? 

Years ago I wrote this “If we are to live our lives on our path, we need to focus on what kind of character in God’s game we want to be. We have our option to how we behave.” (Arrow Preacher, https://thearrowpreacher.com/2018/03/27/god-the-ultimate-dungeon-master/) While my understanding of God has changed since the writing of this post, and I have grown, I do still maintain, some things we bring on ourselves because of our actions, and some things are going to come our way no matter what we do. We must understand that troubles build character, and in all things, good and bad we must turn to the Lord. 

Romans 5:3-5

3 And not only that, but we also glory in tribulations, knowing that tribulation produces perseverance; 4 and perseverance, character; and character, hope. 5 Now hope does not disappoint, because the love of God has been poured out in our hearts by the Holy Spirit who was given to us.

On this anniversary of 9/11, have faith in the Lord. In the midst of troubles, in a sinful, and fallen world, we must turn our face to the Father, and trust no matter what comes our way, we are soldiers on the front lines, and we fight the good fight every day. We must trust in the Father, and know that Jesus is at the right hand of the father moderating for you and I. We must trust that the Holy Spirit is with us daily, and we are never alone in the fight. We must continue to grow in our faith, and in our knowledge of God’s Holy Word. Continue to learn, get off of the milk and onto the meat of scripture. 

Today, the seventh of anniversary that I gave my life to the Lord. I succumbed to my own sin, and having realized I cannot do anything without the Lord with me, I gave my life to Him, and finally listened to the call, God put upon my heart. I began to serve, and continue to serve. Since then, while my life is full of hardships, I have hope. I struggle with money, with food, with my living situation, with my health, and in no way did choosing to follow God, make my life easy. It did not. My problems did not magically disappear. Money did not begin flowing my way. I was not miraculously healed of my major infirmities. Choosing to follow and trust in Jesus does not mean everything will be easy. On the contrary, choosing Jesus is like grabbing a Kevlar, and joining the front lines of the war. Being a soldier on the front line is never easy, but knowing what the cost of not knowing Jesus is, there is no argument to not trust in Jesus. Jesus is “the way the truth and the life, no one gets to the father except through ‘me’.” Put your hope in him as I have. Sometimes life is still hard and full of pain, but through the pain, hope and peace are multiplied to you. It’s never too late to choose Jesus. It’s never too late to see the truth that scripture is real, it is truth, and we are wretched sinners in need of a savior.