By Elder Enoch Ofori Jnr
(Sabbath, 21/01/2012)
It's the WORD or nothing!
In Part 1 of this sermon series which I preached last week we looked at how easily we can fall into the trap of paying more attention to the benefits of the Word than the Word itself. In our conclusion, we noted that the mission of the Word in our Life is to make us God-like--something far too important to be subordinated to any other interests even if they are derived from/ tied to the word.
Today, we turn our attention to the pedigree and indispensable role of the word as seen in the Gospel of John in general and of Jesus' words in John 6 in particular.
(Sabbath, 14th January, 2012)
The WORD, Secondary to None!
Is it possible, amid all the goodness shown you by God, to devalue or even miss His principal gift to you?
It looks and sounds strange on the surface. You are a churchgoer; you hear the Word of God, you even own and occasionally read a Bible. But it's still possible to be estranged from the Word of God. Short of a personal, living relationship with the “God-breathed” Word, the sad truth is that the vital power of the Word has been missed.
The Word is foremost in God's gifts to us. It's by the Word that He has revealed His will to us as well as His nature and plans for us. Indeed, it's by the Word that He does all things, including healing and delivering His people (Ps 107:20).
(Sabbath, 7th Jan., 2012)
The Man who would be King begs for his Life
David, the warrior-king, is approaching his end. Old age has caught up with him and with it, bouts of shivers. Uppermost in the minds of royalty and subjects alike is the question of the king's successor. Of course, the heir apparent had been Amnon, David's firstborn, whom Absalom slew in revenge for raping his full sister Tamar, while Absalom himself, 'the next in line', had been killed in a short-lived coup to occupy the throne even before David is dead!
So, of the remaining 16 sons of David (his second born having apparently died as a child), who will succeed the king? The palace is abuzz with gossip and conspiracies as David's imminent death is awaited.
(Sabbath, 24th December, 2011)
Be Thankful: All things are Yours!
Golden Text: "Therefore let no man glory in men. For all things are yours" (1 Cor. 3:21).
As the end of the year sees us alive and healthy, we have every reason to be thankful to God. The LORD has richly blessed us in uncountable ways, and it's only proper that we bless His holy name at all times and particularly at this time.
Over the course of the year, the arm of the LORD has brought us life and victory. We have scaled the mountain of problems, ascended the pit of depression, escaped death by a hair's breadth and crossed the sea of troubles.
(Sabbath, 17th December, 2011)
He Excels when We Fear Most
There is no time we feel the presence and saving strength of God most powerfully in our lives as believers than when trouble comes our way. But then, who wants trouble?
Dread it or look forward to it, it's at such times of trouble that Christ swiftly responds to the overwhelming problems we face as believers, even when we seem to have lost faith.
The incident where the disciples of Christ nearly got destroyed on the sea (lake) of Galilee because a ferocious windstorm filled their boat with so much water that they began to sink, although Christ was asleep with them in the boat, typifies our vulnerability to sudden trouble and possible slippage of faith at such critical moments. In the story, narrated in Matt. 8:23-27 (also Mark 4:35-41 and Luke 8:22-25), we see the disciples encounter sudden storms which fill the boat with water and threaten to overturn and drown them, but Christ intervenes and saves them when they cry out to Him for help.
By :Elder Enoch Ofori Jnr
(10th December, 2011)
He stood in dread of the redeemed people of Israel, and that fear turned into an implacable hatred of the Israelites. King Balak of Moab would go any length to 'invest' in the destruction of Israel. So he hired a 'spiritual hatchet man', a powerful sorcerer of renown, to curse the Israelites and reverse all their fortunes. The powerful sorcerer was Balaam from Midian.
Although warned by God against undertaking the enterprise, Balaam was a greedy soul—as all false prophets are (Isa. 56:10-11; 2 Pet. 2:3)—and went ahead with it (2 Pet. 2:15; Jude 1:11) but under a strict condition from God: He will only speak the words God put in his mouth! But at the same time, Balaam would try to do what Balak hired him to do—or at least go through the motions of it.
EIE: A Portal of Truth, Restoration and Salvation
"We are called in love, to love and be loved" (John 3:16; Rom. 5:8; John 14:15; Ro. 13:9-10; 1 John 4;7, 5:3;Rev. 7:15-17) by Eld E. Jr
"Likewise, my brothers, you also have died to the law through the body of Christ, so that you may belong to another, to Him who has been raised from the dead, in order that we may bear fruit for God" (Rom. 7:4 ESV).
Using the analogy of marriage, Paul argues that just as death releases a wife from being legally bound to her dead husband, so believers have died to the law so that we will be joined to Christ. The plain meaning, of course, is that believers are no longer under the power or control of the law, just as a spouse is not bound to her husband or wife upon the natural cessation of marriage by death.
But is Christ against the law? Is His nature contrary to the law of God which forbids divorce as long as both spouses are alive? (See Matt. 5:17-19; Rom. 7:12). The analogy itself argues against such possibility. In Christ and in life, a wife is indeed bound to her husband as long as he lives (1 Cor. 7:39)--something the analogy, taken at face value, argues against, if we are to conclude from the text that the law of God is no longer binding on the Christian. Thus we see that the analogy only serves illustrative purposes and not a fact of life in Christ nor meant to advance a doctrinal position that believers are free to disobey God's law, including committing adultery. Read more
Indeed, right from verse 1, Paul takes it for granted that the brethren in Rome are familiar with the Law of God and that they know it to have "dominion over a man [or ‘person’ which they were] as long as he liveth" (KJV). He then goes on to cite the seventh commandment of God's Ten Commandment Law forbidding adultery as one example of how the Law is binding on a person as long as he or she lives (vv. 1-2). Far from being abolished, the breaking of this commandment still invites God's severe judgment and condemnation: "Marriage is honorable in all, and the bed undefiled, but fornicators and adulterers God will judge" (Heb. 13:4).
In fact, the Lord Jesus Christ, to whom the Father has committed all judgment (John 5:22), makes the very sensual desire (lust) leading to adultery equally condemnable: "Ye have heard that it was said, Thou shalt not commit adultery: but I say unto you, that every one that looketh on a woman to lust after her hath committed adultery with her already in his heart" (Matt. 5:27-28 RV).
So then, the whole point of Rom. 7:4 is that, instead of trying to be under the law in a vain attempt to keep it by our own efforts through the flesh (v. 5), we are to be controlled by Christ who used His body as a sin-offering to pay for our transgressions and also empowers us to obey the Law (8:3-4). This way, we are able to "serve" God (which is never through disobedience but through obedience to His law) "in the new way of the Spirit and not in the old way of the written code" (v. 6 ESV).
Left on our own, in the strength of our flesh (which is how all live before coming to Christ), it's simply impossible to fulfill the righteous requirement of the Law. This is because the Law, instead of stirring obedience, rather meets an uncooperative attitude in the flesh--indeed a stubborn opposition--provoking "sinful passions" in our bodies as a manifestation of the rebellion of the flesh against the Law of God (Rom. 8:7). That is why the Apostle notes in verse 5: "For while we were living in the flesh, our sinful passions, aroused by the law, were at work in our members to bear fruit for death" (ESV).
But then, we have been freed from the flesh as believers (8:8-9) and thence released from the condemnation of the Law arising from our inability to use our vain human (fleshly) strength to keep the Law. The result is that we now "serve in newness of the spirit, and not in oldness of the letter" (v. 6). Lest anyone mistakes him for condemning the Law, Paul states in verse 7, correcting any such impression: "What shall we say then? Is the law sin? God forbid. Nay, I had not known sin, but by the law: for I had not known lust, except the law had said, Thou shalt not covet".
Expressed differently, Paul says 'may it never be' that God's Law is evil worthy of condemnation. So then, it's the mode of keeping the Law that has been changed from one of keeping it by the flesh, which invariably results in disobedience and death, to one of keeping it by the Spirit, which results in obedience and life (see 2 Cor. 3:3-17). This is the salient theme the Apostle addresses in the rest of the chapter: the Law arousing in the flesh the negative reaction of gross disobedience leading to death (vv. 7-11, 13-15, 17-21) but in the "inner being" or spirit, willingness to obey (vv. 16, 18, 22, 25).
Thus, overall, "the Law [even under 'the Dispensation of Grace'] is holy and righteous and good" (v. 12) as well as "spiritual", but the problem is that man is of the flesh (carnal) enslaved to sin (v. 14; cp Gal. 5:16-17). The solution is to be born or led by the Spirit of God, which puts to death the deeds of the flesh (8:13-14; cp John 1:12-13) producing in us the God-like fruit of holiness and righteousness (Heb. 12:9-11; Rom. 6:5-13). It's at this point that the believer is said to be "dead to the Law" in the sense of its power to condemn, because he now serves God in the new way of the Spirit which ALWAYS produces obedience, not in the old way of the flesh which ALWAYS produces disobedience, even though one fully knows the demands of the written Law!
This understanding fits in with the general plan of Paul's Letter to the Romans which has "Justification by Faith" as its broad theme and divided as follows:
1. Chapters 1-2, the depravity of fallen man, Jew and Gentile alike.
2. Chapters 3-5, God by His grace makes justification available to all through faith
3. Chapters 6-8, Justification demands/leads to sanctification
4. Chapters 9-11, Israel, God's chosen people and their temporary fall and restoration
5. Chapter 12, Christian service
6. Chapter 13, Civil duty
7. Chapter 14, Christian 'modus vivendi' in the face of controversy and contrary opinions
8. Chapters 15-16, Epilogue.
Prepared for Leaders' Seminar Bible Class
Date: October 8, 2011
Seventh Day Pentecostal Assemblies, Esreso, Kumasi, Ghana, W/A
Using the analogy of marriage, Paul argues that just as death releases a wife from being legally bound to her dead husband, so believers have died to the law so that we will be joined to Christ. The plain meaning, of course, is that believers are no longer under the power or control of the law, just as a spouse is not bound to her husband or wife upon the natural cessation of marriage by death. Read more
Download camp meeting sermons Kumasi Camp Meeting 30 Jan 2011-1 Jan 2012 How to Live the Unconquerable Christian Life The Glory of God Shines in the Face of Jesus Going Higher in God
