Category Archives: Bible Study

Topics and Themes from the Bible

Jesus Teaches Prayer in John 15

Jesus’ Instructions on Prayer in John 15

We come to the New Testament and we want to look at a verse in John 15.  John is one of four gospels—Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. Chapter 15 is actually part of a sequence of chapters. Chapter 15 is a kind of a conclusion to chapter 13ff.  In chapter 13, Jesus was telling His disciples some troubling things.  He was telling them how He was going to die on the cross. He was talking about how one of His disciples was going to betray Him, and He was telling them how one of His disciples was going to deny Him three times.

Then you come to chapters 14, 15, 16, and 17.  In those four chapters, Jesus was trying to comfort His disciples.  Right in the middle of that, in chapter 15, Jesus was talking about abiding. He was talking about how we need to be like branches on a vine. He was the true vine. Some people say this describes kind of an organic relationship between Jesus and us, or between us and the Father.  Without getting into the rest of the context, there, John 15:7 says, “If ye abide in me, and my words abide in you, ye shall ask what ye will, and it shall be done unto you.” That seems kind of like a blank check where you can expect God to do anything you ask of Him. Some people look at that verse and they wonder why God doesn’t answer when they pray for something. There is a condition in this verse, though. It says, “If you abide in Me and My words aide in you”.  Being a computer programmer, I am familiar with logic. There is a “condition and statement” in that verse. It requires the first condition or statement to be true and it requires a second condition to be true before the result can be true.

The first condition, there, is, “If you abide in Me… “ Without getting into the context, there, one way to abide is to stay in the Lord, to rest in the Lord, or to remain in the Lord.  I would even say it means to do the things God wants you to do, to obey the Lord.  He says, “If you abide in Me”.  Then He says, “And if My words abide in you”.  This passage in the book of John says, “If you abide in Me, and My words abide in you”, you can ask whatever you will and I will do it. What words is He talking about when Jesus says, “And My words abide in you”? I believe He is specifically talking about the word He is speaking. I believe it also has to include the words of the Bible from Genesis to Revelation.

The video this text is taken from is on  Drew’s YouTube channel.  This portion is at YouTube.

God Cares What We Do

The Children of Israel Disobey God and Suffer Discipline

Now, we want to look at the example of the children of Israel in the Old Testament. God had delivered them from slavery in Egypt and brought them into their own land, the land of Canaan. God told them that as long as they served Him, the true God, and kept the sacrifices, and did the things He commanded them to do, He would preserve them in that land. The people obeyed for a while, but eventually they decided to do their own thing. They began to worship other gods and do things God wasn’t happy with.  God sent several prophets to them during that time. One of the big prophets was Jeremiah. Another one was Ezekiel. God kept speaking to His people and warning them. He basically said to them, “If you continue in this unrighteous way and continue to disobey Me, I will allow an enemy to come in and capture you.”  Sure enough, that is what happened.  God allowed the enemy to come in and devastate His people. Did God send this enemy or allow it? God had warned His people over and over again through prophet after prophet, “If you don’t obey Me, and if you don’t do the things I proscribed for you to do through Moses, then I will allow the enemy to come in, and that enemy will devastate you. “ The people absolutely ignored the prophets. They ignored Jeremiah.  They ignored Ezekiel and other prophets.  God allowed Assyria to come in, the Egyptians and eventually the Babylonians to come in.  They burned a lot of the cities and did a lot of damage, and took many Israelites captive back to Babylon.  Why did God allow that to happen? Number one, His people were not doing the things He told them to do. Just like Jonah got himself into a lot of trouble because he didn’t go where God told him to go, so the children of Israel had problems with their enemies because they did not obey the voice of the Lord and do the things that He wanted them to do.

But check the end of the Bible,  God does not give up on His people. He still wanted Israel to fulfill the original intention, purpose, and burden that He had for Israel. God eventually gets His way for all of us.

What About The Beginning and the End

beautiful sunset

As I was considering what we should talk about on today’s blog.  Should we talk about the beginning of the Bible, the book of Genesis, or should we talk about the end of the Bible, the book of Revelation?  These are two favorite subjects, at least for me. Genesis is a book of beginnings, and talks about creation. Because I am a computer engineer, I am interested in intricate things. I like to know about how things started. How did God create the heavens and the earth?  How did God put all the laws of the universe into motion? How do you interpret Genesis chapter one?  Some people look at it as discussingoriginal creation while others understand it to be describing a restoration of the original creation. Which is it? There are many reasons and evidences for both sides. Interestingly, something totally different from the book of Genesis or the book of Revelation came to mind as I considered before God what the burden for this program should be.  What came to mind was an Old Testament story about someone named Jonah. Jonah is an Old Testament book comprised of only four chapters, and it teaches us a very basic lesson.  

God Created

Why is the Bible so simple. It just acknowledges God. Then it says God created the heavens and earth.  There is just no opinion expressed in this simple statement in the first book of the Bible, Genesis. Just the facts of the way it is in the universe.

Creation shows God’s power and ability.  It is one thing to intelligently design something like a computer system, a communication system, or a transportation vehicle.  It is another to actually build it.  What if we had no raw materials and needed to design and build from nothing.

God created the universe from nothing. He is God and has this ability. So He is the source of all matter and energy.  He doesn’t just modify pre-existing matter but calls matter into being out of nothing.

Why did God Create Man?

Why did God Create Man

In the beginning there was the earth, plants, animals and there was man. What is all this for and why are we here?  These are some universal questions. In the beginning God had a purpose in mind for all things, but what is this purpose and what does this have to do with us? When we look at the beginning of the Bible, the first book of the Bible and the first chapter of the Bible the reason why God created man is laid out for us. It says, there, that God created man in His image and in His likeness, and He wanted man to have dominion over the fish, the cattle, the birds, over the whole earth and over the creeping things. In that passage the two key words are “image” and “dominion”. These two words describe the reason why God created you and created me—imagine and dominion.

Now what do these two words mean? An image is like a photograph. If I have a photograph of a tree, you see an image of the tree; you see the attributes of the tree. For instance, most trees are green, so you see green. You see the form of the branches, the shape of the leaves and so on. Well, in the same way, you and I were created in the image of God that we might express the attributes of God.  For instance, a tree is green, so a photograph of a tree expresses that attribute, the color green. You and I were created in the image of God. Now one attribute of God is love. Others include joy, peace, patience, honesty, telling the truth and so on.  These are all attributes of God.  When we express these attributes we express God’s nature, and this is why you and I were created.

Now let’s break this down a little bit.  You and I were made in the image of God to express God, to express what God is. One of God’s attributes is love. When you read the whole Bible, from beginning to end, you discover how God’s love is unconditional.  But yet, a lot of times our human love that we try to live with is conditional. It is fickle. One day we like people, and the next day we are grumpy. Some people we like; some people we don’t like. Yet God’s love is not this way. For instance, even we Christians (I am a born-again Christian) have a problem. Sometimes we only like people who are Christians but we don’t like people who are not Christians.  We think they need to join our club, so to speak, or be like exactly like us. But yet when you read the Bible you find out that God loves every single human being, even the ones who are not Christian. How do you like that?  Then, even among Christians there is a failure to love.  Brand X Christians don’t like Brand Y Christians?  Why?  Because they do not believe exactly like I do, or they don’t practice things exactly the way I do.  Of course the Brand X Christian have their Bible verses to prove that what they are doing is the best.  But you see that is not the expression of God.  We were created to express God, and we were created to represent God on this earth. When we express what God I s, which is love, unconditional love, which means we accept anybody, under any condition. When we do that, we express God Himself.

So let’s go back to why God created man. God created us in His image to express Him.  Secondly God created man to have dominion because God wanted man to represent Him on this earth. I hope you can remember those two words:  image and dominion, because these two words describe the reason why God created man.

Glory of God’s Inheritance in the Saints

Ephesian 1:17 that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give to you the spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of Him,   18 the eyes of your understanding being enlightened; that you may know what is the hope of His calling,  and what are the riches of the glory of His inheritance in the saints

What does all these words mean,  seems a little too heavenly for it to relate to me a sinner.  Don’t you know I’m just a sinner.  But think you and I a sinner, right, a dirty rotten sinner, no hope, only deserving of the fires of Hell, no eternal future, just NO HOPE.  God is holy, but I am a dirty sinner, so no contact no connection, and no hope.

BUT BUT God did something to make you rich, you and I sinners.  A Holy God whom we could not approach did something to make us rich, He sent his son,  The Son of God as a man, who lived on the  earth, Jesus who died on the cross for me a sinner so I could approach the Holy God.

The saints (all God’s redeemed regenerated believers who enjoy all that Christ did at the cross) are full of the riches of Christ. They have all had some experience of Christ they could share about what Christ did for them, even if just “He did it for me (a sinner) at the cross and removed all my sin. I (a sinner) can now approach the Holy God because of the perfect sacrifice of Jesus on the cross almost 2000 years ago”  What Christ did made us sinners rich with Christ.

Some people title this section:  Our Resources in Christ.  “Paul in this section sets forth the amazing and unlimited blessings believers have in Jesus Christ, blessings that amount to our personal inheritance of all that belongs to Him.”

Notice the verse says “His Inheritance”  So after we inherit all that Christ is and all He did on the cross, He inherits us.  After we have received Christ  we become his special possession.  This also secures our eternal inheritance.

… Paul prays for God to give believers true comprehension and appreciation of who they are in Jesus Christ, in order that they might begin to have some idea of how magnificent and unlimited are the blessings that already belonged to them in their Lord and Savior….

In essence Paul prayed that the Ephesians would be spared from frantically searching for what was already theirs, but rather would see that the great God who is their God is the source of all they need and has it ready for them if they are open to receive it. Such a receptive attitude requires that God Himself give to you a spirit of wisdom and of revelation in the knowledge of Him 

 It is tragic that many believers send their agents out looking for some priceless item and become entangled in a quest for something more in the Christian life, for something special, something extra that the “ordinary” Christian life does not possess. They talk of getting more of Jesus Christ, more of the Holy Spirit, more power, more blessings, a higher life, a deeper life—as if the resources of God were divinely doled out one at a time like so many prescriptions or were unlocked by some spiritual or software combination that only an initiated few can know.

Have you ever been away from home and lost your cell phone.  For me it always causes a panic, once I thought I lost it but turns out it was in my hand.  The point is something valuable is precious and when we don’t have it we eaisly panic.

Many christian panic, I have no power no feeling towards the Lord or the Bible, or Home group or Sunday Am and go weeks wondering what to do…

But Christ did it all on the cross and you possess him.  You are rich in Him.

Paul’s Prayer for the Church

Paul’s Prayer for the Church that the saints may see the hope of His calling

Ephesian 1:17  that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give to you the spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of Him,   18 the eyes of your understanding being enlightened; that you may know what is the hope of His calling, 

The big word here is “See the Hope”.  There is a lot of hope in His calling, we just need a spirit of wisdom and revelation to see it.    Revelation is something that has been covered up and now is revealed.

Even in Revelation 1:1  it says “The revelation of Jesus Christ..”  so revelation is needed to see Christ.  And here the Holy Spirit helps us to understand the Word of God.

1 Cor 2:9-10  9 But as it is written: “Eye has not seen, nor ear heard, Nor have entered into the heart of man The things which God has prepared for those who love Him.”   10 But God has revealed [them] to us through His Spirit. For the Spirit searches all things, yes, the deep things of God.     

The Holy Spirit illuminates us so we can get supernatural information.  Paul wants us to receive divine information and understanding by searching through the word of God and understanding the character of God.

Another powerful verse is Romans 8:16  The Spirit bears witness to our spirit that we are the children of God.

Faith, Love, Thanks and Prayer

Paul’s Thanks for the Church – faith, love, thanks and prayer

Ephesians 1:15  Therefore I also, after I heard of your faith in the Lord Jesus and your love for all the saints,   16 do not cease to give thanks for you, making mention of you in my prayers:   

Let’s get a little into the context of the book of Ephesians.  Paul wrote this letter to impart a high vision of what Christ has done and yet wants to do through the church.  The first 3 chapters are the vision with Christ in the heavens after accomplishing redemption for us on the cross.  Then the last 3 chapters are a lot of application about Marriage, family life and how we get along with other and ourselves.

Paul particularly was thankful for his readers’ faith and love. Faith finds its focus in Christ and expresses itself in love to others. Such love is the evidence of genuine faith.

In verse 15 Paul mentions 4 items:  faith, love, thanks and prayer.  Paul is thanking God for the Church composed of those in Ephesians who have faith in the Lord Jesus, and those who love the saints.

Its very interesting that Paul focuses on God and thanks God, rather than focusing on the problems that might have plagued the Ephesians.  Was Paul blind to the believers issues, or did he see something higher in what Christ accomplished that drove him to just thank the Lord for the saints who just loved each other in this city.  Sometimes a prayer meeting with just praises can do more than itemizing all the problems, but of course both are real prayer.

Notice also that Paul mentions first their faith, then their love and then thanks.  Why does he not mention sin, that the believers are just sinners saved by grace.  It seems in chapter 1 of Ephesians Paul does not even give a hint of sin, but he sure does in chapter 2 where he says “dead in trespasses and sins”.  So Paul in chapter 1 mentions faith, then love, but chapter 2 death and sin.