I missed the first week, but glad I caught this one. Pastor Tim Matthews is teaching from the Sermon on the Mount in Matthew, and today was the first part of chapter 6. Here is the recording of the teaching and the discussion. Hope you are challenged by it like we were.
Boyd
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Philippians 2:5-8 (NASB)
Have this attitude in yourselves which was also in Christ Jesus, who, although He existed in the form of God, did not regard equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied Himself, taking the form of a bond-servant, and being made in the likeness of men. Being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.
As I read the New Testament, I sometimes find a passage that puzzles me. Many theologians believe that Jesus, in His divinity, retained His omniscience, knowing all things. And some of them explain that in the passages where He seems to not know something, that it means that He was self-limiting Himself at those times. Others think that He was limited by the incarnation itself to not know everything.
Here are some examples of passages that seem to show He did not know everything:
Those passages still puzzle me, but the one that has my present attention is the prayer of Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane, which He prayed three times: Luke 22:42: “Father, if you are willing, remove this cup from me. Nevertheless, not my will, but your, be done”.
This “cup” is explained very well by Pastor Michael Daily in the article: What is in the cup . I am wondering why Jesus prayed this prayer. Of course I understand in a very limited fashion the agony He was facing the next few hours, and was praying for strength to go through with it. But surely He knew that this was the only way that redemption could be granted to mankind, that this was the reason He came from heaven to earth.
Maybe this is one of the many mysteries that the Bible does not reveal at this time. After all, it says in 1 Peter 1:12: It was revealed to them that they were serving not themselves but you, in the things that have now been announced to you through those who preached the good news to you by the Holy Spirit sent from heaven, things into which angels long to look.” If the angels are longing to understand some things, then it should not be surprising that there are many things we too long to look into.
Speaking of longing, I am in hopes that some of you will respond in the comment section below or through email or Facebook with your thoughts about it. Thanks.
Posted in Christian meditations, Theology
From my journal:
16 December 2012
In re-reading I Dared to Call Him Father by Bilquis Sheikh I am reminded of how close she walked with God and could instantly sense when the pleasure of His presence would begin to fade. She would seek a reason for it and usually it was some decision she was about to enact, or something that she had done, that was not His will. She learned to quickly repent of the action or thought and would then experience a return of the warmth and comfort of His glorious presence.
I don’t know if I have ever had that closeness. I can remember a few times – the times that I call “mountain top experiences” but I never imagined that I could stay in that ethereal atmosphere by just yielding completely to His will, to abide there as a real resting place. And yet there are many scriptures that point to that very possibility. What else could Jesus mean, for example, in John 17 where He talks about our having His joy fulfilled in us. And “that they may be one as we are one.” And “I have revealed you to them and will continue to make you known in order that the love you have for me may be theirs and that I myself may be in them.”
So, by faith, I declare that this can be my reality also. I pray, Lord, that You would sharpen my sensitivity to leaving the narrow path that You have set before me, to hear that voice, “turn neither to the left or to the right”, even though the way seems dark and bewildering at that moment. Help me, Lord, to follow the guidance of this scripture. Amen
For this very reason, make every effort to supplement your faith with virtue, and virtue with knowledge, and knowledge with self-control, and self-control with steadfastness, and steadfastness with godliness, and godliness with brotherly affection, and brotherly affection with love. For if these qualities are yours and are increasing, they keep you from being ineffective or unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. For whoever lacks these qualities is so nearsighted that he is blind, having forgotten that he was cleansed from his former sins. 2 Peter 1:5-9
17 December 2012
It occurred to me today a possible answer to the above question. Is it possible that I too can learn to be sensitive to the Holy Spirit in the way that Bilquis Sheikh was? I think I may have have that sensitivity “meter” already – maybe the absence of the Lord is evident whenever I get that dark cloud over my soul which I get when I am depressed. Whether or not that is a true indicator, I think my tendency to “indulge” in those negative moods is certainly a sin for me.
I ask You, Lord, to remove whatever has caused my separation from You, and if it is some bad decision or a reaction to some irritation, I ask You to pinpoint what it was and that I repent of it. Amen
30 December 2012
Wow! The above prayers have been miraculously answered. I have been relatively “upbeat” ever since. I don’t think I have been critical, even in thoughts, of my wife the last 2 weeks. That is truly a miracle because I am constantly critical of everything about her. And I seem more sensitive and attuned to the feelings of the Spirit of the Lord in my heart.
Thank You and praise Your name, Lord! Amen.
03 January 2013
It finally happened: I dreamed late this morning that I had lost it – that there was something wrong – that the glory of the Lord that I have been experiencing for several days had faded. And I awoke to the realization that I had drifted from gazing at the face of Jesus and had found something else to take pleasure in. And it came to me that last night at the men’s bible study, while we discussed the first chapter of Genesis, that I had climbed up on my platform to pontificate about why evolution was wrong – trying to use intellectual arguments to convince the other guys of my point of view. And as I examine my true motives, I was in reality trying to get them to acknowledge my wisdom and knowledge as a scientist – it was all about me.
While I was delivering my dogmatic opinions, I even had a check in my heart to stop, but I ran right through that road block (the Lord is always gentle), hurrying to get my ideas across before the other guys had a chance to interrupt me. My flesh is so ugly when the covering of the Holy Spirit is removed – and I was the one who cast off that covering.
I am so sorry, Lord. Please come back and immerse me again in your glorious self. I sinned and I ask for your forgiveness.
Thank you, Lord. Praise Your glorious Name. Your joy has returned. Amen.
16 January 2013 – “How Soon You Have Fallen”
Oh Lord, now the “normal” times seem to be returning when I lapse back into being used to Your absence. I have been aware of getting grumpy toward my wife and generally being unhappy. I know You are not surprised that I slip and yet You still love me. You even see ahead to the day when I will remain in Your presence full time.
I wonder where I turned off the ancient path this time? Well, I guess I can be encouraged that it was less than 13 days ago according to this journal. That is better than my recent history when I go on for weeks and weeks or maybe months without any intimacy with You. I think that this time it was my usual way of getting distracted, fixing my eyes on the “good” things around me, for example, good novels and good TV shows/movies. And I guess it started with my illness which I have suffered for those two weeks.
And it is by Your grace that “I hear You calling, ‘Come, come, come’ “
I Will Run by Freddy Rodriguez – YouTube
Only Your grace
Only Your grace
Only You can set me free
Only Your love
Has captured my heart
I hear You calling
Come, come, come
So I will run
Forever I will run
Unto You, oh God
Now You have my heart
So I will, I will run
Forever I will run
Run to You, oh God
Where else can I go
Forever I will run
Thank You for that song. Since I became aware of Your “absence” the last couple of days, I have been searching my mind to find what I can do to get back to You, what works can I do to reacquire the intimacy. And this song reminds me that there is nothing I can do – this too is all grace. It is a matter of surrender to Your love. Amen.
Why are you cast down, O my soul, and why are you in turmoil within me? Hope in God; for I shall again praise him, my salvation and my God. Psalm 43:5
Once again, Lord, I ask you to increase my sensing of Your absence.
Thank You, Lord. You have returned (I know that really means that I have returned). I feel Your presence and am full of joy once again. Amen.
15 January 2013 (written 16 Jan):
This was my birthday and I really enjoyed the attention that I received from many friends and my family. But I turned to Chambers for Jan. 15 and saw that it fit exactly what happened on Dec. 17 of last year. I think I finally attended my own “white funeral” as Chambers calls it:
My Upmost for His Highest by Oswald Chambers January 15
Do You Walk In White?
“We were buried with Him . . . that just as Christ was raised from the dead . . . even so we also should walk in newness of life” — Romans 6:4
No one experiences complete sanctification without going through a “white funeral”-the burial of the old life. If there has never been this crucial moment of change through death, sanctification will never be more than an elusive dream. There must be a “white funeral,” a death with only one resurrection-a resurrection into the life of Jesus Christ. Nothing can defeat a life like this. It has oneness with God for only one purpose— to be a witness for Him.
Have you really come to your last days? You have often come to them in your mind, but have you really experienced them? You cannot die or go to your funeral in a mood of excitement. Death means you stop being. You must agree with God and stop being the intensely striving kind of Christian you have been. We avoid the cemetery and continually refuse our own death. It will not happen by striving, but by yielding to death. It is dying— being “baptized into His death” (Romans 6:3).
Have you had your “white funeral,” or are you piously deceiving your own soul? Has there been a point in your life which you now mark as your last day? Is there a place in your life to which you go back in memory with humility and overwhelming gratitude, so that you can honestly proclaim, “Yes, it was then, at my ’white funeral,’ that I made an agreement with God.”
“This is the will of God, your sanctification . . .” (1 Thessalonians 4:3). Once you truly realize this is God’s will, you will enter into the process of sanctification as a natural response. Are you willing to experience that “white funeral” now? Will you agree with Him that this is your last day on earth? The moment of agreement depends on you.
And that is the testimony of the miraculous work that my Lord has wrought, or rather is in process of doing it. Amen.
Posted in Christian meditations, Here's Thinking, Theology
On our final day of studying Jude at the Chick-fil-A bible study, our dear 95 year old brother, Bob Worley, does a good job in challenging us with the message of Jude to present day believers. As brother Gene Mills commented at the end of the study, God asks us to “raise the bar” in our goal to “building up yourselves on your most holy faith” and “Keep yourselves in the love of God”.
Here is the recording, started shortly after Bro. Worley started speaking. Also, the notes from our brother are pasted in below.
Bob Worley Notes_ Jude 19-21 Nov 13 2012
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Posted in Pastor Bob Worley, Theology
Listen to our dear Brother Worley speak on Jude, verses 17 to 23, followed by Michael Daily talking about the plural “you” throughout this passage.
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Einstein said that nature’s speed limit is set at the speed of light which has been measured to be about 300,000,000 meters/sec. Only electromagnetic waves travel that fast; everything that has mass cannot travel that fast even if shot by the most powerful accelerator that has been made (or by a gigantic explosion, for example, of an exploding star or supernova).
Even though some scientists recently found evidence of particles breaking this speed limit, their evidence has since been discredited. To get an idea of how fast this is, the time for a radar signal to travel from the earth to the moon and back is a little over 2 seconds, compared to the time it took the astronauts to go to the moon and back in 7 days.
My son, David, measured the speed of light in 8th grade, I think it was, and won some recognition for it at the county science fair, if I remember correctly.
The method uses a portable TV with a rabbit-ear antenna (or any small antenna) set to pick up a weak TV station in a known direction. A large metal reflector (or cardboard covered with aluminium foil) of about 2 feet by 2 feet or so is held in line with the TV set and the TV station, with the reflector on the side of the TV away from the station (so that it will reflect the TV signal back toward the TV as explained below).
The easiest channels to measure are the higher VHF channels (7 through 13) because their wavelengths are convenient sizes for this measurement.
To measure the wavelength, the reflector is moved slowly back and forth along the line which starts at the station, passes through the TV set, and extends beyond the TV set. This is so that the signal will be reflected from the metal sheet back to the TV set and cause an interference which will make the TV program fade out at certain distances.
The more positions that can be found that cause the fading to occur, the more accurate the speed of light measurement will be. The example that follows will make these ideas clearer.
How is the speed of light determined from these measurements? First of all, the speed of light is the same as the speed of TV signals since light and TV signals are both electromagnetic waves. And the relationship between wavelenth, frequency, and the speed of light is given by the equation:
frequency multiplied by wavelength = speed of light
The average distance between positions of cancellations is equal to twice the wavelength of the TV station’s signal, and the frequency of that signal is given by the table found at this web site.
For example, if channel 12 is used, with a frequency (middle of its range) of 207 Megahertz, and, for example, the experimenter measures an average distance between minimum signals of 0.75 meters ( wavelength = 2 x 0.75 = 1.5 meters), then he or she would calculate that the speed of light to be:
1.5 meters x 207,000,000/sec = 313,000,000 meters/sec
where I rounded off to 3 significant digits in the answer according to best scientific practices. Since the accepted value for the speed of light is currently 299,792,458 meters/sec then the error in the student’s measurement is about 4%, which is considered good considering the simple apparatus used.
In my own son’s case, the impressive part of his science report was the large number of repeated measurements that he made (because his Dad kept insisting he do so!). This allowed him to use statistics to determine the standard deviation of his average measurement, so that he could quote an experimental error along with his speed of light measurement.
As experimental scientists well know, determining the error of the measurement is usually as hard or harder than the actual measurement itself. And having the student repeat the measurements so that he or she has, say, 10 values for each position, then the confidence in the result will be much higher than if the student only measures the positions once or twice each. And also, the statistical error will be an objective value rather than just a guess at the error.
I find it amazing that this universal constant, labeled “c” – the speed of light, and is the same c that is in Einsteins famous energy equation, E=mc2, can be so easily measured by a 13 year old student. Some of the laws with which the Lord created and sustains the universe are very simple. His word says in Deuteronomy 29:29, “The secret things belong to the Lord our God, but the things revealed belong to us and to our children forever, that we may follow all the words of this law.”
Every time we have a “revolutionary” breakthrough in science, it is because the Creator, our LORD (English Bibles use “LORD” in all caps for the Hebrew name YHWH whenever it appears), has given us the mental ability to discover what He has revealed. There is much that remains hidden, but it is exciting to continue searching for the revealed truths that have not yet been discovered.
Posted in Boyd's Science Equipment, Physics, Relativity
Our brother, Pastor Bob Worley, shares his heart at the Chick-fil-A Bible Study to encourage us to press into the Lord, to know Him in our hearts, not just our heads.Click here or below to listen to Worley11Sep2012 – right click to download
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Here is a link to all the messages of Pastor Bob Worley that are found on this site: Bob Worley Messages
Posted in Pastor Bob Worley, Theology
Click here to hear Bob Worley Our brother, Pastor Bob Worley, gives us wisdom from his view on his 95th birthday of what keeps him going and progressing in his joining our Elder, Paul the Apostle, in declaring “That I may know him, and the power of his resurrection, and the fellowship of his sufferings, being made conformable unto his death”
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Posted in Pastor Bob Worley
Pastor Bob continues emphasizing being born again, and points out what John meant by the declaration that real believers do not (habitually) sin.
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From Christiaanworldtraveler.wordpress.com
This, perhaps, is the most poignant question ever asked. Jesus asked it three times of Peter in John 21; some say the question is repeated the same number of times that Peter denied Jesus.
In my mind’s eye I picture Peter in a very downcast and sorrowful state because he failed his hero, his mentor, and thinks of himself as finished forever as a disciple. Surely what he has done is unforgivable and although he will always love the Lord, he will never be in the inner circle again.
And then … Jesus not only makes known that he is forgiven, but also that he wants Peter to be a leader, a person who will tend, feed, and guard the flock of new believers. The wonder of this moment, unforeseen by Peter is breathtaking. Not only by Peter but by the other disciples.
The men avoided talking about what had happened in the courtyard of the high priest, I would imagine. True, they had also abandoned the Lord at his arrest, but they had not gone as far off track as had Peter. And John, the beloved disciple, had even gone back to the courtyard and had witnessed the betrayal by Peter.
And then this group of men, who had lived for 3 years with the Son of Man who had been resurrected from the dead, witness this amazing scene when Jesus restores this previously boisterous, impulsive fisherman whose confidence had been shattered on the eve of Passover. And now his soul is not only being repaired, but he is being given the job of mentoring others. How could this be?
They think that Peter is permanently crippled because of his behavior on that awful night. It seems to them that all the strength of Peter had deserted him, and it was taking all of his effort to just get up to face the day; he could never forgive himself for what he had done, they are sure.
But Peter finally regains enough courage to turn to his nets in order to do something to lift the depression. So he declares, “I’m going fishing,” and a half-dozen disciples join in the effort to resume a normal life.
Something seems strangely familiar about this night of fishing without catching a fish. It reminds them of the time several years ago when they were washing their nets on the shore of Galilee after an unproductive night of fishing. They are lost in the memories of that morning and longing to see their beloved Lord again – they miss him so much – when suddenly a man on the shore calls out,
“Children, do you have any fish?”
They answer him, “No.”
He says to them, “Cast the net on the right side of the boat, and you will find some.”
And like before, they experience an incredible impact of fish rushing into the nets. And then they know. The man on the shore. It is the Lord! Peter jumps into the water to swim to Jesus, leaving the others to struggle to land the fish on the beach. They want to remember this miracle, so they count the fish: 153 large ones. A new record, they are sure.
What a wonderful, glorious morning. It is a confirmation that the new kingdom of God has indeed been inaugurated. They will be thrilled a few days later at Pentecost when the Spirit of God pours out upon them, and as John the Baptist had prophesied, they are baptized with the Spirit and fire. He is forever in them – He is Emmanuel, “God with us.” They no longer have to see him physically – they know he is with them.
And so, the seven men behold anew the glory of the Lord that morning as they enjoy a breakfast of fish and bread on the shore, baked over a small fire by our Lord. And as they see that glory, they are “being transformed into the same image, from one degree of glory to another”.
The questions and commands given to Peter are also directed to all of them, if they love the Lord, they are to serve others with the same love that He has loved them. He will empower them to die to self in living the resurrection life, “jars of clay” from which flow the rivers of life to bring healing and reconciliation to the many thirsty souls around them.
And the question still echos through the years, “Do you love me?” And our hearts respond each time, more and more earnestly, “Yea, Lord, you know I love you!” And we also say, “We believe. Help thou our unbelief”.
“And we all, with unveiled face, beholding the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another. For this comes from the Lord who is the Spirit.” (2 Corinthians 3:18 ESV)
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Mysteries So Bright 