Light is sown like seed for the righteous And gladness for the upright in heart. Ps 97:11 (NASB)
- Light-seeds are planted in the souls of God's people, Joy-seeds are planted in good heart-soil. Ps 97:11 (MSG)
When God created the trees and the flowers, He put seeds in them, so they could produce offspring.
And
he said, "Let the earth burst forth with every sort of grass and
seed-bearing plant, and fruit trees with seeds inside the fruit, so that
these seeds will produce the kinds of plants and fruits they came
from." Genesis 1:11 (TLB)
When
you received the New Life of Jesus, God changed your dead, dark spirit.
God turned on the lights inside you and you began life all over again.
- By God’s mercy, love and life giving power, you became a new person, a new creation.
This means that anyone who belongs to Christ has become a new person. The old life is gone; a new life has begun! 2 Cor 5:17 (NLT)
Sometimes this change is dramatic and obvious from the outside.
An
evangelist drives demons out of a dangerous and evil person and the
tormented soul believes in Jesus. The new believer is suddenly happy
and shines with the goodness of God.
Other times a person seems to change gradually.
A
prostitute came to church and believed in Jesus but returned to her old
life. She kept coming to church and started to be more gentle and kind
but still in the context of her life of prostitution.
Then she
began to give money to the church from her earnings. Finally she reached
the point where she had the courage to walk away from prostitution and
learn to live a normal life.
- Exactly when was she saved? God knows.
God uses believers to sow the seed of light and truth in the souls of men and women.
The faith, hope and love that come with the message of light are given to you as seed.
What will you do with the seeds of heavenly life?
- Will you cultivate the garden of your new heavenly life, so your life becomes like window with a view of heaven itself?
- Will
you sow the good seeds God gives you, so your life becomes a gateway to
the garden of God, so others can find blessing and truth?
Whatever seed you sow will be multiplied in your own life and in the lives of others around you.
Don’t be misled—you cannot mock the justice of God. You will always harvest what you plant. Gal 6:7 (NLT)
- If he sows to please his own wrong desires, he will be planting
seeds of evil and he will surely reap a harvest of spiritual decay and
death; Gal 6:8 (TLB)
- but if he plants the good things of the Spirit, he will reap the everlasting life that the Holy Spirit gives him.
I
am sure you would love to shine with the glory of God, so if your heart
is hungry for the glory of God, be like the insects that come to the
light.
The light of God will not burn and destroy you if you love Jesus.
Come into the wonderful presence of God and ask the Holy Spirit to speak to you through His life giving words.
When God Himself speaks, it changes the way you understand the Bible.
- We cannot be a blessing to others if we teach the Bible with a dry religious spirit.
He
has made us competent as ministers of a new covenant--not of the letter
but of the Spirit; for the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life. 2 Cor 3:6 (NIV)
When we receive the light and joy of Jesus, we know Him as the light of the world.
...
Jesus said to the people, "I am the Light of the world. So if you
follow me, you won’t be stumbling through the darkness, for living light
will flood your path." Jn 8:12 (TLB)
Then we ourselves can shine from the life of Jesus within us.
Arise, shine, for your light has come, and the glory of the LORD has risen upon you. Isa 60:1 (ESV)
The Father gave His only son Jesus for all mankind. In return, the Father wants to give all mankind to Jesus.
Why do not all come to Jesus?
All that the Father gives Me will come to Me, and the one who comes to Me I will by no means cast out. John 6:37 (NKJV)
Does God only draw some to Himself and to His Son?
Jesus said:
And I, when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all people to myself.” John 12:32 (ESV)
Jesus was
lifted up from the earth on the cross, when He willingly died to pay the
penalty for our sin, to receive the punishment for our rejection of our
loving God because we chose to live as though He did not love and care
for us.
Jesus died but He did not stay dead.
- After three days in the grave, He was bodily raised up from the grave by the Holy Spirit.
- He spent 40 days encouraging and teaching His followers before He was raised up from the earth again.
While he blessed them, he parted from them and was carried up into heaven. Luke 24:51 (ESV)
The heart of the Father is to save every one of His lost children.
- Without
Jesus in your life, you are separated from God by your own choice
because you have chosen not to live in the Father love of God.
- You have lost your right to be called a son or daughter of God.
- God is the source and giver of all life and goodness.
- If you die without Jesus, you will still exist and you will experience the darkness and emptiness of death for ever.
If
you are not enjoying the love and forgiveness of God but you are
reading these words, God is speaking to you calling you to come to
Jesus.
- God sent His son into the world to restore everyone to Himself but He was rejected and put to death.
- He was in the world, and the world was made through him, yet the world did not know him.
But to all who did receive him, who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God, John 1:10,12 (ESV)
Why did God do this? Because God is Love.
He who does not love does not know God, for God is love. 1 John 4:8 (NKJV)
God’s plan is that you would find His love in a church but sadly this sometimes does not happen.
- If you have not found the love of Jesus in a church, don’t give up on God.
- If churches have rejected you, Jesus has not stopped loving you.
All that the Father gives Me will come to Me, and the one who comes to Me I will by no means cast out. John 6:37 (NKJV)
If you come to Jesus by watching Christian TV or reading the Bible alone, God is loving you and not casting you out. If you are an isolated believer in Jesus, God wants something better for you.
And the LORD God said, "It is not good that man should be alone; I will make him a helper comparable to him." Genesis 2:18 (NKJV)
If
you are a man or woman who is following Jesus alone, God is proud of
you for not giving up on His Son but He wants you to have human
companionship.
Ask Him to lead you into Christian friendship.
- This is more important than marriage. Marriage can be a blessing or a curse.
- This is more important than going to church or joining an organisation.
- Churches can be loving or they can destroy love.
But one great truth remains.
Jesus
is with you if you love Him and He is very powerfully present when two
or three believers come together because they love Him.
- I pray that you will know the love of Jesus.
- I pray that you will find a loving church.
- I pray that you will enjoy loving family life.
- But even if you do not find a loving church or family, I pray that you will discover the blessing of believing friendship.
For where two or three are gathered together in My name, I am there in the midst of them." Matthew 18:20 (NKJV)
Matthew, Mark, Luke and John tell how the Son of God lived on this earth for 33 years.
In his last three years on earth, Jesus preached and taught the people of Israel.
One of the most prominent features of His teaching was the way He consistently performed miraculous healings.
And you know that God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the
Holy Spirit and with power. Then Jesus went around doing good and
healing all who were oppressed by the devil, for God was with him. Acts 10:38 (NLT)
This is how the Apostle Peter summarised the healing ministry of Jesus.
He makes no distinction between exorcisms and healing physical sickness.
Jesus saw demon possession, deafness, blindness and physical sickness as manifestations of evil.
When John
the Baptist was in prison, he was tempted to despair of his faith. He
sent his disciples to Jesus, seeking reassurance.
And Jesus answered them, “Go and tell John what you hear and see:
the
blind receive their sight and the lame walk, lepers are cleansed and
the deaf hear, and the dead are raised up, and the poor have good news
preached to them. Mt 11:4-5
Clearly Jesus also saw Healing as a central feature of His ministry.
When Jesus appointed His Apostles, the first thing He did was to give them authority to heal.
And he called to him his twelve disciples and gave them
authority over unclean spirits, to cast them out, and to heal every
disease and every affliction. Mt 10:1 (ESV)
If we look
at church history and examine the practices of many churches in the
Western World, we see only some churches emphasise healings and
miracles.
- Many other churches consider this unbalanced, and yet they read the same Bible that shows Jesus was a healing evangelist.
For Jesus and the early church, healing the sick was an essential part of the Good News of the Kingdom of God.
Where did the Western church go wrong?
Why have we strayed from the ways of Jesus so clearly presented in the New Testament?
After the fall of the Roman Empire in the Europe, most people were poor and illiterate.
Faith in the
Word of God was replaced with faith in religious traditions including
prayers to saints and bathing with holy water. Healing and miracles
became associated with very unbiblical practices.
When
Luther and Calvin restored the Bible as the only source of spiritual
authority, they rejected the papacy. They also condemned faith in
miracles obtained by prayers to saints or touching sacred objects. This
was idolatry.
However they made the mistake of rejecting all healing miracles.
Calvin taught that the miraculous ministry of Jesus and the Apostles were not a model to imitate.
He taught they did miracles to prove that Jesus was the Son of God and to confirm the truth of the Gospel of salvation.
Once
the church and the gospel were established, they considered miracles
were no longer necessary but were counterfeit miracles associated with
Roman Catholic idolatry.
Once
the miraculous element was banished from much of Western Christianity,
faith in scientific materialism was blended with biblical belief.
Faith in human reason began to supplement and then replace faith in the Word of God.
This is
why many Christians in Britain, Europe, North America, Australia and New
Zealand find it difficult to receive divine healing or to exercise
faith for miracles.
Our whole culture has been corrupted by systematic unbelief in God’s supernatural power.
Faith is a personal matter but it is also corporate. Faith is contagious but unbelief is also contagious.
Conservative Protestant tradition and academic theology have made unbelief respectable in in Europe and North America.
The
result has been a catastrophic decline of faith amongst professing
Christians and the abandonment of Christianity by the majority of
Europeans.
But God has not changed and the Bible has not changed.
God loves you.
He knows you are broken and wounded in many ways. We all are.
We all have emotional issues that cause us pain and prevent us from being all we could be.
We all get sick from time to time and many of us have bodily functions that don’t operate as they should.
God wants to heal you, to change your life, to set you free of the painful limitations that stop you fulfilling your potential.
Fear not,
for I am with you; Be not dismayed, for I am your God. I will strengthen
you, Yes, I will help you, I will uphold you with My righteous right
hand.' Isaiah 41:10 (NKJV)
Many times in the Bible, God says to His people: “Fear not” or “Do not be afraid.”
In some texts, God is telling His people their fears are imaginary, that there is nothing to be afraid of at all.
In Matthew 14, the disciples were in a
boat in rough weather. When they saw Jesus walking on the water, they
thought He was a ghost.
But immediately Jesus spoke to them, saying, "Be of good cheer! It is I; do not be afraid." Mt 14:27 (NKJV)
When the angel Gabriel came to Mary, he reassured her.
Then the angel said to her, "Do not be afraid, Mary, for you have found favour with God. Lk 1:30 (NKJV)
God’s people have nothing to fear from supernatural manifestations of heavenly glory.
On the other hand, there are situations where we have real reasons to be afraid but God calls us not to be afraid anyway.
And do not
fear those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul. But rather fear
Him who is able to destroy both soul and body in hell. Mt 10:28 (NKJV)
Here Jesus is saying Do Not Fear even though you face savage persecution and possible martyrdom. It is a call to courage and faith in God’s salvation.
- It is also a warning to remember God’s punishment for cowardice.
God Is Love
As we read the Bible, we see again and again, that there are two essential aspects to the love of God.
These are comfort and challenge.
And Jesus,
walking by the Sea of Galilee, saw two brothers, Simon called Peter,
and Andrew his brother, casting a net into the sea; for they were
fishermen.
Then He said to them, "Follow Me, and I will make you fishers of men." Mt 4:18-19 (NKJV)
What a blessing, to be invited to live
full time with Jesus and to be given the power to get men and women
saved, to rescue them from damnation!
But what a challenge to leave the
security of a successful family fishing business and to live by faith in
God’s daily provision!
I have a friend who was once a committed Muslim in Saudi Arabia.
Muslims have no assurance of salvation. They live in the hope that they might be good enough to escape hell fire.
When George came to know Jesus, he had the comfort of knowing the God who really loved him as His dear son.
Some Muslims desire such a personal relationship with God but their sacred writings offer no hope for such a fulfilment.
But it was a challenge to be rejected and persecuted in his own country. It was a challenge to flee to Australia as a refugee.
God called him to study for a doctorate
at an Australian university where there are a lot of Arab Muslim
students. Not one of them escapes Georges personally targeted preaching
of Jesus.
Once George spoke to an Arab Muslim
missionary on campus, one of many militant Muslim missionaries sent
around the world financed by oil rich Arabs.
“Why do you preach Islam?” asked my friend.
“Because I want to go to heaven,” replied the Muslim missionary.
“That
is very selfish!” said George. “I know I have a home in heaven. I
preach Jesus because I want OTHER PEOPLE to go to heaven.”
We have the comfort of knowing God has prepared a home for us in heaven.
We have the challenge or reaching others with the Good News of God’s kindness.
