Word For The Week - by Zac Poonen

January 2005 1. Encouraging othersPaul and Barnabas strengthened the souls of the disciples in the churches they had established, “by encouraging them” - so the record reads (Acts 14:22). We too can strengthen others through a ministry of encouragement - not only through the preaching of the Word, but also by offering appreciation where it is due.Jesus was always quick to give a word of appreciation where due. He praised a centurion for his faith (Matt. 8:10), a repentant woman for her love (Luke 7:47) and Mary of Bethany for her devotion (Luke 10:42; Mark 4:8,9). To His failing disciples, He said, "You are those who have stood by Me in My trials" (Luke 22:28).Paul when writing to the churches - even to the most carnal ones - usually found something to appreciate in them. To the church in Corinth, riddled with factions, disputed and immorality, Paul began is letter thus: "I can never stop thanking God for all the wonderful gifts He has given you, now that you are Christ's. He has enriched your whole life. He has helped you speak out for Him and has given you a full understanding of the truth; what I told you Christ could do for you has happened! Now you have every grace and blessing; every spiritual gift and power for doing His will are yours during this time of waiting for the return of our Lord Jesus Christ. And He guarantees right up to the end that you will be counted free from all sin and guilt on that day when He returns. God will surely do this for you, for He always does just what He says, and He is the One Who invited you into this wonderful friendship with His Son, even Christ our Lord" (1 Cor. 1:4-9-TLB). Only then did he go on to say, "But, dear brothers, I beg you in the Name of the Lord Jesus Christ to stop arguing among yourselves' (verse 10).Paul tried to begin with something positive. So must we. This does not come naturally to all of us. Most of us tend to see the negative side of others first. But if we submit to the discipline of the Holy Spirit, we shall find Him showing us something to appreciate in everyone.A teacher once spread a large white sheet of paper with a small ink-spot in one corner, in front of his class and asked the children to write down what they saw. All of them described the small ink-spot and no-one mentioned the large area of un-spoilt paper. So too, in human relationships: We often tend to concentrate on people's minor defects and do not see the good in them. Altering one's outlook requires determination but it is worth the effort. Gradually the habit of noticing people's good qualities can be acquired. The next step is to tell them how much one appreciates those good qualities.

January 20052. There is Power in the name of JesusThe Bible says "Submit to God. Resist the devil and he will flee from you" (James 4:7). The Name of Jesus is the Name at which Satan will always flee. The picture that most Christians have in their minds is one of Satan chasing them and of their running for their lives from him. But that is exactly the opposite of what the Bible teaches. What do you think? Was Satan afraid of Jesus or not? We all know that Satan was scared to stand before our Saviour. Jesus is the Light of the world, and the prince of darkness had to disappear from before Him.Jesus told His disciples about how He had seen the fall of Satan in heaven. And there, Jesus said, that Satan's fall had been "like lightning" (Lk.10:18), when God cast him out. When Jesus told Satan in the wilderness, "Be gone, Satan", he disappeared from Jesus' presence too at the speed of lightning. And when we resist Satan in the Name of Jesus today, he will flee from before us too at the speed of light. The darkness flees before the light. Satan is afraid of the Name of Jesus. He is afraid to be reminded of the fact that Jesus is Lord. Demon-possessed people will not confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, neither will they confess that Satan was defeated on the cross. There is power in the Name of Jesus Christ to cast out any demon and to make any devil flee from you - at the speed of lightning. Never forget that. I want to tell you that anytime in your life if you are in a difficulty, or facing some insurmountable problem, when you are facing something for which there appears to be no human answer, call upon the Name of the Lord Jesus. Say to Him, "Lord Jesus, you are on my side against the devil. Help me now". And then turn to Satan and tell him, "In Jesus Name I resist you, Satan". I want to tell you that Satan will flee from you immediately, because Jesus defeated him on the cross. Satan is powerless against you, when you walk in the light of God and resist him in Jesus' Name. Satan obviously does not want you to know about his defeat and that is why he has prevented you from hearing about it for so long. That is why he has stopped most preachers from preaching about his defeat as well. I want you all to know this clearly that Satan was defeated once and for all by the Lord Jesus Christ on the cross. You need never again be afraid of Satan. He cannot trouble you. He cannot harm you. He may tempt you. He may attack you. But the grace of God in Christ will always make you victorious over him, if you humble yourself, submit to God and walk in His light at all times. There is tremendous power in the light. Satan, the prince of darkness, can never enter the realm of light. If Satan has power over many believers, it is because they walk in darkness, living in some secret sin, not forgiving others, or being jealous of someone, or pursuing some selfish ambition in their lives etc., Then Satan gets power over them. Otherwise he cannot touch them.But remember, that you will have no power over Satan if you don't walk in purity. Never allow the devil to pollute your minds in any way. If your mind is impure, you won't be able to use the Name of Jesus against Satan effectively. The Name of Jesus is not like some magic mantra that can be repeated to ward off evil. No. You have to submit to God first. Only then will the devil flee from you when you resist him.

January 20053. Four reasons for God blessing JacobAlone with God Jacob was blessed in the place where he was alone with God. He sent everyone else away and was alone (Gen. 32:24). 20th century believers find it difficult to spend much time alone with God. The spirit of the jet- age has got into most of us, and we are in a perpetual state of busyness. The trouble is not with our temperament or our culture. We just don't have our priorities right - that's all. Jesus once said that the one thing needful for a believer was to sit at His feet and listen to Him (Luke 10:42). But we don't believe that any longer and so suffer the disastrous consequences of disregarding Jesus' words. If we are always busy with our various activities and do not know what it is to get alone with God in fasting and prayer, we shall certainly not know God's power or blessing - His real power, I mean (not the cheap counterfeits that many are boasting of).Broken by God Jacob was blessed in the place where he was broken completely. At Peniel, a Man wrestled with Jacob. God had been wrestling with Jacob for twenty years, but Jacob had refused to yield. God had tried to show him how everything he had put his hand to had gone wrong, despite his cleverness and his planning. But Jacob was still stubborn. Finally God struck Jacob's hip-socket so that his thigh was dislocated (Gen 32: 25). The thigh is the strongest part of the body, and that was the part that God struck.Hungry for God Jacob was blessed in the place where he was earnest and hungry for God. "I will not leave you", he cries out, "until you bless me" (Gen 32: 26). How God had waited for twenty long years to hear those words from Jacob. He, who had spent his life grabbing the birthright, women, money and property, now lets go of them all and grabs hold of God. This was the point towards which God had been working in Jacob's life all along. It must have delighted God's heart when Jacob at last lost sight of the temporal things of earth and longed and thirsted for God Himself and for His blessing. We are told in Hosea 12:4, that Jacob wept and pleaded for a blessing that night at Peniel. What a different man he was that night compared with his earlier years when he desired only the things of this world. God's dealings with him at last bore fruit! Before God blessed Jacob fully, He tested Jacob's earnestness. He said to Jacob, "Let me go," testing whether Jacob would be satisfied with what he had got or whether he would yearn for more. God tests us too. He can never bless a man fully until the man is in dead earnest for God's best. We need to thirst like Jacob, saying, "Lord, there is more to the Christian life than I've experienced thus far. I'm not satisfied. I want all Thy fullness at any cost." When we come to that point, it is but a short step to the fullness of God's blessing. Notice in the incident at Peniel, that it was when Jacob was in a state of weakness (after his thigh had been dislocated), that he said, "I will not let you go, God." God could easily have left him and gone, but He didn't. For it is when a man is most weak in himself that he has greatest power with God.. It is when Jacob is defeated, broken and utterly weak, that God tells him, "You have now prevailed." One would think that God should have said, "You have at last been defeated." But no. The word is, "You have prevailed. You shall henceforth have power with God and with men" (Gen 32: 28). We prevail, when God has shattered us of our own strength and self- sufficiency.Honest with God Jacob was blessed in the place where he was honest with God. God asks him, "What is your name?" Twenty years earlier, when his father had asked him the same question, he had lied and said, "I am Esau" (Gen. 27:19). But now he is honest. He says, "Lord, I am Jacob" - or in other words, "Lord, I am a grabber, a deceiver and a bargainer." There was no guile in Jacob now. And so God could bless him. God blessed Jacob there - when he was honest, when he did not want to pretend any more, when he confessed, "Lord I'm a hypocrite. There is shame and pretense in my life." I tell you, it takes real brokenness for a man to acknowledge that from the depths of his heart. Many Christian leaders say words like that with false humility - to gain a reputation for being humble. I am not referring to that type of abomination. What I mean is an honesty that comes out of a truly broken and contrite heart. That is costly. There is so much guile in all of us. May God have mercy on us for pretending to be so sanctified when we are not. Let us covet sincerity and honesty and openness with all of our hearts, and then there will be no limit to God's blessing upon our lives.

January 20054. A warning from the examples of 5 messengers and churchesIn Revelation, Chapter 2 and 3, When we look at the five messengers and churches that are rebuked by the Lord, we see in them a definite downward trend.In Ephesus, we see the loss of first love for the Lord. When we lose our devotion for Christ, we have taken the first step downwards. In a little while, this leads on to our losing our love for our fellow-believers too.In Pergamum, we see that worldliness has crept in slyly through the teaching of Balaam. The Nicolaitans (who were kept out of the church at Ephesus) have now got power here. When devotion to Christ is lost, worldliness creeps in and the religious hierarchy takes over the church. Once a religious hierarchy has taken over the leadership of a church, Babylon is built easily.In Thyatira, the church has become thoroughly worldly, and as a result religious harlotry is rampant. A woman now has power to influence the church, and is proclaiming false grace and counterfeiting the gifts of the Spirit too (prophecy in particular).In Sardis, we see hypocrisy. Sin is covered up and man's opinion is valued more than God's. The messenger of the church is spiritually asleep (unaware of spiritual realities). The form of godliness however hides from the eyes of men the spiritual death that the Lord sees in him.In Laodicea, things have degenerated to such an extent that the body has not only died, but also begun to decay and stink. Lukewarmness and spiritual pride are the cause of the death. In the above four churches, there was something good that the Lord could still see in each of them. But here in Laodicea He could see nothing.None of the messengers of the above churches were aware of the true spiritual condition of their own lives or of their churches. All of them were complacent because of the high opinion they had of themselves. They could not hear what the Lord had to say to them personally, because they were all busy preparing sermons to preach to others. They were more interested in preaching than in seeing their own need.It is very easy, once a person has become the messenger of a church, to imagine that he himself is beyond the need for correction. The Bible speaks of "an old and foolish king who no longer knows how to receive instruction" (Eccl.4:13). The messengers of these five churches were all like that foolish king. Their word had been law for so long that they could not even imagine the possibility of their now being wrong in any matter!! Such was their deluded state. They imagined that they could never lose the anointing of God from their lives. Their proud attitude was what made them spiritually deaf.Paul told Timothy, "Pay close attention to yourself and to your teaching; persevere in these things; for as you do this you will insure salvation both for yourself and for those who hear you." (1 Tim.4:16). Timothy had to watch over his own life first of all. He would then be able to experience salvation from un-Christlikeness in his own life and thus be enabled to lead others to such a salvation as well. This is the way the Lord has appointed for all His messengers in every church. Paul told the elders of the church in Ephesus also to watch their own lives first of all and then the lives of their flock (Acts 20:28).This is the responsibility of every messenger of the Lord - to preserve his own life first of all in purity and under the constant anointing of the Spirit. "Let your clothes be white all the time, and let not oil be lacking on your head." (Eccl.9:8).The Lord had wanted to speak to these messengers directly. But they did not have listening ears. Finally He had to speak to them through an apostle. Thank God that there was at least a John who could hear the Lord's voice clearly. In spite of their failures however, the Lord had hope for all five messengers - for He still held them all in His right hand (Rev.2:1). If they repented, they could become glorious brothers once again. And their churches could radiate the glory of the Lord once more. If however they failed to heed this last warning, then the Lord would cast them off.

January 20055. Importance of fellowship with God & hearing His voiceAfter the Lord had given John a revelation of Himself in Chapter 1 of Revelation, He gave John an insight into the actual state of many of the churches in that part of the world - in Chapters 2 and 3 . Many of those churches were in a very backslidden state. Then the Lord said to John in Chapter 4:1: "Come up here!". What a lovely word that is! When we see the state of things around us, and encounter problems for which we do not have a solution, it is good to hear the Lord saying to us, "Come up higher! Come and see things from My standpoint - and not from the low earthly level from which you have been looking at these things". I believe this is a word that we need to hear constantly - "Come up higher!".Paul said, "One thing I do - forgetting what lies behind, and reaching forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus". He had heard the call to come up higher and he was never satisfied, no matter how high he had reached.The danger in Christian leadership is that we stand so much in front of people. We are acclaimed. We even have media coverage now. We have titles before our names and degrees after our names!! What more do we need! I'll tell you what we need : "We need to get closer to the heart of God! We need to go up higher!"God did not create Adam because He needed a servant. He did not create Adam because He wanted a scholar. And He did not create you and me because He needs servants or scholars. He already has enough servants in the millions of angels. He created Adam first of all that Adam might have fellowship with Him. That's why, for Adam, the law was NOT: "Six days you shall work and the seventh day you shall rest". No. That came through the Law of Moses later. Adam was created on the sixth day. And so his very FIRST day - the seventh day for God but the first for Adam - was a day of rest and fellowship with his Creator. It was from that day of fellowship with God that Adam was to go out into the garden and serve God for the next six days.And when we forget that order - when we forget that fellowship with God must always take precedence over our going out into His vineyard to serve Him - then we've missed the primary purpose of our creation and of our redemption.We can be so taken up with the need around us that we have no time for fellowship with God. We may feel that's a waste of time, when there is so much need around us. But what is the result of need-based work? Perhaps plenty of work - but the quality will be poor.Fellowship with God has now become the most precious thing for me - during the last several years. It has changed my life and taken away discouragement and depression from my life altogether. I have found the secret of walking with God. And that's made my service joyful! It is no longer dry!All your service depends on your personal walk with God. You remember when Jesus was in the house of Mary and Martha. He said to Martha, "You are worried and bothered about so many things". What was Martha worried about? There was a need there. And she was serving the Lord, unselfishly and sacrificially, sweating away in the kitchen - not cooking food for herself but for the Lord and His disciples. What greater service could she do than that? It was totally unselfish! And she didn't do it for money or for a salary, as many Christian workers serve today. No. It was totally unselfish! And yet the Lord told her, "You are bothered about so many things". She had thought that Mary was selfish, sitting there at the Lord's feet and not doing any work, but just listening. And Jesus said, "That's the important thing. That's the ONE THING needful".There is a beautiful paraphrase of 1 Corinthians 4:2 in The Living Bible that reads like this: "The most important thing about a servant is that he does just what his master tells him to."

February 20051. Listening to God’s VoiceLarge doors swing on small hinges. God tests us in many areas many times, before He commits any important ministry to us. He tests us to see if we are faithful in the little things before He commits greater things to us. As with Adam and Eve, God asks for obedience to His voice first of all.One of my earliest memories of obeying the voice of the Lord was when I was 15 years old, soon after I had joined the National Defence Academy at Khadakvasla (Pune) for training to be a Naval officer.The year was 1955 and I was on vacation (from the Academy), with my parents who lived in New Delhi. One Sunday evening, my younger brother and I had gone to attend a church service. After the service, at about 8 pm, both of us were waiting at the bus stand to catch the bus to return home. Suddenly a thought began to grow in my mind that I should witness to someone about Christ. I had heard the good news of the gospel again that evening and felt I must share it with someone, before going to bed that night. But I was not sure whether this was a prompting from the Lord or just my own thought. In any case it was getting late - and I needed to get back home soon.In the distance, I saw the lights of a bus coming towards us. I told the Lord silently, “If that is NOT the bus to my home, then I will take it as a sign from You that I should witness to someone before going home. If it IS the bus for my home, then I will take the bus and go home.” The bus drew near and I saw that it was NOT the bus I had to take. The sign I had asked for was fulfilled. So I told my younger brother that I had to go somewhere else before coming home and asked him to go home alone. I then walked to a nearby park hoping that I would meet someone there whom it would be easy to witness to – because this was the first time I was venturing out to witness for the Lord in a public place, alone.I saw an old man sitting on a bench in the park and went and sat next to him. I made casual conversation with him for a few minutes in Hindi and soon became bold enough to talk to him about eternal things. I told him about the love of God for man and how Christ died for our sins and the simple gospel message that I knew. He listened to me patiently. Since it was God Who had put an urge within me to witness that night, I assume that He must have had this man in mind to reach with the gospel. I hope I shall meet this man in heaven one day.That was my first venture at witnessing openly and all by myself in a public place. God tested me to see if I would obey the inner promptings of His Spirit.That was “the day of small beginnings” (Zech.4:10). Since then God has given me the opportunity to preach His Word to crowds of many thousands of people in many parts of the world. But it all began with a small act of obedience one Sunday evening in New Delhi.Be sensitive to the voice of the Holy Spirit. You will never know until you stand before the Lord how much you missed whenever you did NOT obey that voice.

February 20052. Called by GodA spiritual leader will first and foremost, have a calling from God. His work will not be his profession, but his calling. No-one can appoint himself as a spiritual leader. "He has to be called by God for this work" (Heb.5:4-Living). This is a principle that cannot be changed. The next verse goes on to say that even Jesus did not appoint Himself as our High Priest. The Father appointed Him. If that be the case, how much more this should be true of us, in our calling. The tragedy today is that the vast majority of "Christian workers" are working to earn their living. It is a profession for them. They have not been called by God.There is a lot of difference between "a profession" and "a calling". Let me explain what I mean. Suppose there's a sick child in a hospital and a nurse looks after it for 8 hours on her shift-duty. That nurse then goes home and forgets all about that child. Her concern for that child was only for 8 hours. Now she has other things to do, such as going to the movies and watching television. She doesn't have to think about that child again until the next day when she goes back to work. But the mother of that child doesn't work 8-hour shifts! She can't go to the movies when her child is sick. That's the difference between a profession and a calling.If you apply that illustration to the way you care for the believers in your church, you'll discover whether you're a nurse or a mother! Paul said, in 1 Thessalonians 2:7, "We proved to be gentle among you as a mother tenderly cares for her own children. Having thus a fond affection for you, we were well pleased to impart you not only the gospel but also our own lives because you've become very dear to us". Paul not only imparted the gospel of God to those Christians but his life as well. Any ministry that is not done in this way is not really Christian ministry. Paul served God like that because he had a calling to the ministry. He didn't take it up as a profession.It's wonderful to serve the Lord. It is the greatest thing in the world. Nothing on earth can be compared with it - but only if you're called. It cannot be reduced to a profession. God called me to serve Him (full-time) on May 6, 1964 when I was an officer in the Indian Navy. I handed in my resignation then to the naval authorities. But it was like Moses asking Pharaoh to let the Israelites go! The Indian Navy wouldn't release me. It took two years and repeated applications before they finally released me - miraculously - in God's perfect time. Being called of God has made all the difference in my life.First of all, it doesn't matter to me now, what people think about me or my ministry, because Someone Else is my Master and I have to answer only to Him. Secondly, I can trust God to stand by me and give me grace whenever I face any trial or opposition in my ministry - and that happens often. Thirdly, it doesn't matter to me whether I receive any money or not, and whether I get any food to eat or not. If I receive food and money, well and good. If I don't get any food or money, that's fine with me too. I cannot stop serving the Lord, just because I didn't get money or food - because God has called me. I can't get rid of my calling. I'm not a salaried employee who can stop working when I'm not paid or fed! It's like the case of the mother and her child. A nurse will stop working if her salary is not paid one month. But a mother can never stop. She doesn't get a salary in any case! And she'll look after her baby even if she doesn't get any food or money! That's how the apostles served the Lord.What a glorious thing it is to be called of God! You can never do the Lord's work, the way God wants you to do it, if you do it as a profession. It has to be a calling or nothing. Every other job in the world can be done as a profession. But not a mother's, or a father's, or that of a servant of the Lord! All these are the result of a calling. Paul told the Corinthian Christians that even if they had 10,000 teachers, they still had only one father (1 Cor.4:15). Paul was both a spiritual father and a mother to his flock. His was not a profession but a calling."Take this child and nurse him for me and I shall give you your wages" is what the Lord has said to me (Exod.2:9). He said that to me first of all concerning my own physical children. And then He said that to me concerning my spiritual children too. When we take care of God's children He's the One Who is responsible to give us our wages, not man. If we serve men, then let us look to men to pay us. But if we serve the Lord, then let us look to Him alone to provide us our needs, in whatever way He sees fit. And let Him also decide how much we should receive each month. There is a dignity about a true servant of the Lord.But it is possible that an elder feels no such sense of responsibility for the people in His church. He may content himself with teaching the Bible every Sunday. But He may get a surprise when Jesus comes again and evaluates his ministry and he may discover that his entire earthly ministry was only wood, hay and straw, fit only for being burnt (1 Cor.3:12,13). Think of the tragedy that will be! If you take this warning seriously now, it could reduce your regret at the judgment seat of Christ.

February 20053. Contrast between 'A True Spiritual Father' and 'A Teacher'Paul said that even if there were countless teachers, there were not many fathers, in his time (1 Cor.4:15). This is true even today. Every servant of God must strive to have the spirit of a father towards the brothers and sisters in the church. It is easy to BECOME a father, but it is difficult to BE a father. A man can produce ten children without any difficulty. But to bring up those children to mature manhood is quite another matter. It is the same in the church. To bring people to the new birth is relatively easy. But to present them perfect in Christ to the Father is far more difficult. Our ambition should not be to have a large church but a pure one. It is no use having many people in our church, if they are not growing up to maturity and perfection.Paul told the Corinthians, as a spiritual father, "I do not write these things to shame you" (1 Cor.4:14). Teachers seek to humiliate their failing students and put them to shame publicly. But fathers are different. They cover every sin that their stumbling children commit, and continuously encourage them to a higher life. It is far easier to be a teacher in an assembly than a father, for it costs a great deal of self-denial to carry the burdens of others on our hearts. Teachers can never build a family. They can only build classes. And many churches are schools, and not homes. Only a father can build a home and a family. If our church is not like a family, what is the reason? It must be that we are teachers and not fathers. Do we look at the brothers and sisters in the church as students who need to be taught? Then we have the wrong spirit. If we are fathers, we will look at them as those who have to be borne with, and supported in a loving, caring and understanding way. It is good for us to judge ourselves and see what we really are - fathers or teachers. It is no use blaming the brothers and sisters in the church saying that they are all carnal. Let us judge ourselves first. A true spiritual father will not seek his own gain in anything, but always the welfare and the good of his spiritual children. Paul says in 2 Cor 12:14,15 , "I will not be a burden to you. I do not seek what is yours but you. Children are not responsible to save up for their parents, but parents for their children. I will most gladly spend and be expended for your souls". Those are the words of a true father. It cost Paul everything to be a father. He considered all that he had gained in life as rubbish compared to gaining Christ. He also considered it worth sacrificing everything in order to be a father to those whom he had brought to Christ. A teacher works for pay. He does not seek the good of the students primarily, but his own gain. The gain we expect may not be money, but honour. Do we want to be respected and recognised as servants of God by others? Then we are seeking a salary - of honour - from them. Then we are teachers, not fathers. Fathers expect nothing in return for all that they do for their children. Paul did not expect respect or even submission from others. He only sought their spiritual growth.How does a father care for his children? In a poor home, the father and mother will not even eat, if there is not enough food for the children. They will gladly deny themselves, and they will not even let their children know that they have not eaten, lest the children feel bad about it. A father hides his self denial from his children. Do we have such a spirit - that denies itself for the good of the brothers and sisters, and will not even let them know about it. Another characteristic of a father is that he is eager to see his children advance beyond him in life - in education and in every other way. There are many fathers who have never studied beyond high school, who sacrifice so much to give a college-education to their children. They are happy to deny themselves the comforts of life for this purpose and they are delighted when their children graduate. No father is ever jealous to see his son advance beyond his status or his educational level in life. That is how a true servant of God will be too. He will be delighted when younger brothers are wholehearted and get revelation from the Scriptures and are used by the Lord to be a blessing to others. He will sincerely long that they should advance beyond him spiritually, and be more useful in the Lord's hands than he has ever been. When we see younger brothers growing up in the church, without any folly being manifested in their lives, because of good leadership that protects them, we should rejoice that they can have such a blessing as we never had when we were young. There will not be even a shade of jealousy in us, if we are fathers. On the contrary, we will be delighted. We will rejoice that it is going well with them. Only fathers can build the true church - the New Jerusalem. We may understand and proclaim all the truths of the new covenant, and yet if we do this with the spirit of a teacher we will still build Babylon. A teacher is very conscious of all the labour that he has invested in his students. He thinks of the honour he will receive if his students do well. He is always thinking of what he will gain, even when his students do well. A father however is quite different. He desires only the welfare of his children. He desires nothing for himself. A teacher will criticise his students. A father however will encourage his children. If we keep on criticizing the brothers and sisters, we will accomplish little, even if everything we say is true. A father will accomplish much more by encouraging his children. Only a father can continue to be kind to ungrateful and evil children. A teacher will give up on ungrateful students very quickly.

February 20054. Balanced by the body of ChristThe Body of Christ can be compared to a hospital. When a man is sick and goes to a hospital, the hospital has various departments to help him. Perhaps he needs an injection, or physiotherapy, or surgery. He may need to visit the eye doctor or the ear doctor. So the hospital has various departments. The eye doctor spends all his time just looking at people’s eyes and nothing else. That’s not because he feels that other parts of the human body are unimportant, but because his specialty is the eye. In the Body of Christ too, each believer has a different gift and calling. And each one is imbalanced by himself. The only perfectly balanced person Who ever walked on this earth was the Lord Jesus Christ. All the rest of us – even the best among us - are imbalanced. We can find our balance only as we work together with other brothers and sisters – with the other departments in the Lord’s hospital. So there’s no place for individualism in this hospital! A good hospital will have many departments to cater to the various needs of people. In the same way, the Body of Christ too has a variety of ministries and many spiritual gifts to help people. No church or group has all the gifts of the Spirit. But in the total body of Christ, they are all there. We must know what our own specific calling in the Body is.The world is full of spiritually sick people. And nobody’s case is hopeless. Everyone can be fully healed by the Lord. This is the good news of the gospel that we proclaim. The worst sinner and the most perverted person can find healing in the Lord’s hospital. A good hospital will never turn away a seriously sick person. Inferior hospitals do that because they are not equipped to handle serious cases. In the same way, a good church will never tell even the greatest sinner in the world that his case is hopeless! A good church will be able to change the worst of sinners into the greatest of saints - if the sinner is willing to take the treatment given. We can compare the church to a human body too. In the human body, each part has a function; and that part concentrates on fulfilling its own function alone. But it appreciates, values and cooperates with the other parts that have different functions. That’s how it must be when we work together with other ministries in the Body of Christ too.In 1 Corinthians 12, the Holy Spirit uses the example of eyes, ears, hands and feet to picture the way the gifts of the Spirit are exercised in the body of Christ.I emphasise certain things from the Bible over and over again. That’s because that is the burden the Lord has given me. I’ve stuck to the ministry the Lord has called me to, because I know that is the only ministry in which I can be useful to the Lord. I’ll frustrate the Lord’s plan for me if I try to do something else. But I’m not against other ministries. I value them highly. The stomach values the hand highly, but it never tries to do what the hand does. For example, it never tries to pick up food from a plate. It allows the hand to do that and then does its own job of digesting the food that the hand picks up and sends down to it! That’s a picture of how we complement each other in Christ’s Body.Most believers haven’t seen this truth of the variety of ministries in the Body. But if you don’t see this truth, you’ll never be able to fulfil all that God wants to accomplish. It’s good for all of us to be clear in our own minds as to what God has called us to. The burden the Lord gives us in our hearts is usually an indication of the ministry He has for us in His Body.You have a distinct and unique ministry in Christ’s Body that no- one else can fulfil. And that ministry will never be a balanced one. It will be imbalanced. You’ll have to find your balance by working in fellowship with others who have different ministries in the Body. That’s the way God keeps us humble – by making us dependent on others. Praise the Lord! All of us are strong in some areas of our life, but weak in other areas - just like a student may be good in English and weak in Maths. But we must know where we are weak and strengthen those areas. Your church may be strong in its emphasis on evangelism but weak in its emphasis on holiness. If so, then you know what type of ministry your church needs to expose itself to.

March 20051. The danger of being shortsightedPeter warned other Christians saying, "Don't ever forget how you yourself were once cleansed from your sins"(2 Peter 1:9). He warns them there that if they do forget that, they will become blind and short-sighted. I don't ever want to be blind or short-sighted. I want to have a long-range vision - of heavenly values and eternal values - at all times.Who are the short-sighted ones? Those who value earthly things - the pleasures of sin, material wealth and man's honour and approval. All such people are short-sighted. We need to feel sorry for such believers. If you see a man whose physical vision is so poor that he can't see anything more than 10 feet ahead of him, you don't get angry with him. You feel sorry for him. If you see a man who needs to keep a book 2 inches from his eyes in order to read it, you don't get angry with him. You feel sorry for him, don't you? If an eye- doctor asks a man wearing thick lenses whether he can read the "eye-chart" and the man replies that he can just about see the top letter but is not sure whether it is an "E or an "S", what does the doctor do? Does he get angry with him? No. He feels sorry for him. And when we see believers who are so short-sighted as to live for money and the pleasure of sin and the approval of man, it's no use rebuking them. We must feel sorry for them, because they are so terribly shortsighted. They are going to have tons of regret when they stand before the Lord one day.There are lots and lots of believers like that.And do you know how they became blind? They forgot "their purification from their former sins" (2 Pet.1:9). They forgot the pit from which God pulled them out. They became proud of the fact that God blessed them subsequently.I never want to forget the pit from which God pulled me out. I know that all my sins have been blotted out and that God does not remember even a single sin that I have ever committed. I stand before God today, just as if I had never sinned even once in my life - because I have "been justified by Christ's blood" (Rom.5:9). That's how God sees me. But I will never forget what I once was. God says to me "I will not remember your sins any more" (Heb.8:12). But I will always remember what I once was.Now, I don't remember my past in such a way as to allow Satan to condemn me or depress me with the thought of my sins. No. Never. "There is no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus" (Rom.8:1). When the devil accuses me I tell him straight to his face that "the blood of Jesus has cleansed me from ALL my sins". overcome Satan "by the blood of the Lamb" (Rev.12:11). But I'll never forget the pit in which I once was, when God met with me and filled me with His Holy Spirit. view previous issues

March 20052. The example of Apostle PaulWe have a very great responsibility to demonstrate to the next generation what Christlikeness really means. People who look at us – the way we live, preach and serve - should be able to see in us what it means to be a true servant of the Lord, in the style of the apostles and prophets of old, and not in the style of 20th-century film-star-like evangelists.Whether we realise it or not, we’re leaving behind us an image, wherever we go – an image that’s going to remain in people’s minds long after we’ve gone away and long after they have forgotten the messages that we preached to them.When Paul called the elders of the church in Ephesus to bid farewell to them, notice what he told them in Acts 20:17-35. He reminded them that he had been with them for three years (verse 31) and that he had preached to them night and day. Three years is more than 1000 days. And so if Paul actually preached twice every day, as it seems to imply here, he must have preached over 2000 sermons there.Ephesus was the place where they had once had a great revival and where Christians had burnt their old books of magic and witchcraft costing nearly half a million rupees. It was also the place where handkerchiefs that had touched Paul’s body were used to heal the sick and deliver the demon-possessed. God did some amazing miracles through Paul in Ephesus on a scale that hadn’t been seen anywhere else (See Acts 19:11,12,19).At the end of all this, what does Paul remind the elders of? Does he remind them of his sermons or the miracles? No. He tells them to remember the humble way he had lived among them, from the first day they had seen him (v.19). Even if they forgot his sermons, they could never forget how he lived among them. His life had made a permanent impact on them. They could never forget his compassion and his simplicity. They’d remember that he had worked hard with his own hands as a tentmaker to support himself and his coworkers – so that he would not be a burden to them and also to be an example to other Christian workers (v.34,35). They would never forget that during all those three years, Paul never desired money, or gifts, or even a new set of clothes, from any of them (verse 33)!Paul also reminded them how he had proclaimed the WHOLE counsel of God to them uncompromisingly (Acts 20:27). He hadn’t been a man-pleaser, seeking popularity for himself. He had preached repentance and every other unpopular subject, if it was profitable for his hearers, even if some got offended thereby (Acts 20:20, 21).

March 20053. Faithfulness at home and at workJesus is our Example in all things. The Father had arranged for Jesus to spend the first thirty years of His earthly life in two places basically - His home and His place of work (the carpentry shop). It was Jesus' faithfulness in these two places that brought forth the approval of the Father. This is a matter of great encouragement for us, for we all find ourselves in these two places constantly - our home and our place of work. And it is in these two places basically that God tests us.Jesus's home was a poor home. Joseph and Mary were so poor that they could not even afford to offer a lamb as a burnt offering. The Law had commanded that "if she cannot afford a lamb, then she shall take two turtledoves or two young pigeons......"(Lev.12:8). And Joseph and Mary took "according to what was said in the Law of the Lord, 'a pair of turtledoves, or two young pigeons'." (Lk.2:24). Jesus had at least four brothers and two sisters, younger to Him living in the same house. Mark 6:3 tells us that the people of his home-town remarked concerning Jesus, "Is not this the carpenter, the son of Mary, and brother of James and Joses, and Judas, and Simon? Are not His sisters here with us?" One can imagine the pressures and struggles that Jesus faced as He grew up in that poor home. To top it all, his younger brothers were unbelievers. It is written that, "not even His brothers were believing in Him." (Jn. 7:5). They must have taunted Him in many ways. He had no private room in his house to retreat to, when facing the pressure of temptation from others in the house. There must have been the fighting and the squabbling and the scolding and the selfishness (common to all homes) in that home too. And amid such circumstances, Jesus was tempted in all points as we are; and He never sinned even once in deed, word, thought, attitude or motive or in any other way.If Jesus had come in some different form than us, in some flesh that was incapable of being tempted, then there would have been no virtue in his living in purity in such circumstances. But He was made like us in all things. The Word of God says, "He HAD TO BE MADE like His brethren in all things, that He might become a merciful and faithful high priest in things pertaining to God" (Heb.2:17). He has undergone the pressure of every temptation that we can ever face. This is what gives us great encouragement in the moments when we are tempted, that we too can overcome. This is the hope that Satan seeks to rob us of, by trying to hide from us this glorious truth that Christ came in our flesh and was tempted exactly as we are.As a carpenter in Nazareth, Jesus must have faced the temptations that all who engage in any form of business face. But He would never deceive anyone to whom He sold anything. He would never demand too much for any article and He would never compromise on any point of righteousness, whatever the cost (or loss) to Him may have been. He was not in competition with the other carpenters in Nazareth. He only worked to earn His living. Thus, through buying and selling and the handling of money (as a carpenter), Jesus faced all the temptations that we face in the area of money. And He overcame.Jesus lived in submission to imperfect foster-parents for so many years. This must have exposed Him to various forms of inward temptations (in the realm of attitudes); and yet He never sinned. Joseph and Mary were still under the old covenant, and so they certainly did not have victory over sin. They must have raised their voices and argued with each other, just like all married couples who don't have victory do. Jesus, on the other hand, was living in perfect victory. Yet He never despised them. If He had, He would have sinned. He respected them, even though He was far purer than them. There we see the beauty of His humility.Thus we see, that far from living an uneventful life during those thirty years in Nazareth, Jesus was in the midst of a conflict against temptation all the time - a conflict that increased in intensity as each year went by - for the Father had to take the Captain of our salvation through the entire range of temptations possible to human beings, before He could become our Saviour and our High Priest. God's Word says, "It was fitting for Him, for whom are all things, and through whom are all things, in bringing many sons to glory, to perfect the author of their salvation through sufferings."(Heb. 2:10). There were still a few temptations (such as the ones that come through nation-wide fame etc.,) that Jesus would face in the last three and a half years of His earthly life. But the common temptations that we all face at home and in our place of work, He had encountered and overcome in the first thirty years. And the Father gave Jesus His certificate of approval at His baptism. I f only our eyes were opened to see the basis on which God gives us His approval, it would revolutionize our lives totally. No longer would any of us covet a worldwide ministry but rather faithfulness in the moments of temptation in daily life. We would stop admiring physical miracles and start admiring transformed lives. Thus our minds would be renewed to have our priorities right. What a tremendous encouragement this is, to know that God's greatest rewards and His highest commendations are reserved for those who face temptation with the same attitude that Jesus faced it - that is: "I would rather die than commit a sin or disobey My Father at even one point." This is the meaning of the exhortation in Philippians 2:5-8, which says, "Have this attitude in you which was in Christ Jesus...Who became obedient even to the point of death." Thus all of us have the same opportunity to be overcomers and to be among the called, chosen and faithful, irrespective of our gift or our minis try, and irrespective of our sex or our age.

March 20054. Example of Jesus in His speechJesus used His tongue to encourage and admonish others, thereby making His tongue an instrument of life in God's Hand. He used His tongue to speak soothing words to the weary (Isa. 50:4), and also as a sword to cut down the proud and the haughty (Isa. 49:2).How greatly encouraged the Roman centurion and the Syrophenician woman must have felt when they heard Jesus praise them for their faith, publicly (Mt. 8:10; 15:28). The sinful woman who was praised for her love (Lk. 7:47) and Mary of Bethany who was praised for her sacrificial offering (Mk. 14:6) would never have forgotten the words of Jesus.How strengthened Peter must have been through Jesus' assurance that He would pray for him (Lk. 22:32). Just a few words, but what strength and encouragement they conveyed.Many others must have heard words from Jesus' lips that lifted their weary spirits, for it says in Isaiah 50:4 that Jesus listened daily to His Father's voice so that He might have an appropriate word for the weary souls that came across His path each day.The righteousness of Jesus was not one that gave Him a gloomy appearance. No. He was anointed with the oil of gladness (Heb. 1:9). He had such overflowing joy on the eve of His crucifixion, that He could say to His apostles, ".....that my joy may be in you" (Jn. 15:11). He went everywhere spreading that joy to joyless, dreary souls.He was gentle with all men, never breaking a battered reed or quenching a dimly burning wick, (Mt. 12:20). He saw the good points in weak, sinful people and hoped for the best in everyone. He was the sort of person one longed to be with, for He was understanding, kind and gentle. Only the proud and those with secret sin avoided Him.The love of Jesus was not sentimental. It sought the highest good of others. And so He did not hesitate to give a word of admonition where He saw that there was need for such a word. He rebuked Peter for trying to turn Him away from the cross - and that too with such strong words as, "Get behind Me, Satan" (Mt. 16:23).He rebuked James and John for seeking places of honour and for wanting to take revenge on the Samaritans (Mt. 20:22,23; Lk. 9:55). And He rebuked His disciples seven times for their unbelief.Jesus was never afraid of speaking the truth, even if it hurt others, for His heart was filled with love for them. He was not concerned whether His reputation for kindness would be lost by speaking strong words. He loved others more than Himself and so He was willing to sacrifice His reputation in order to help them. Therefore He spoke the truth firmly, lest men be ruined eternally. The eternal welfare of men mattered far more to Him than their opinions of Him.It is the warmth of love in the words that we speak that produces fruit for the glory of God in others. Although there is plenty of light at the North and South Poles, nothing grows there, because of the lack of warmth.Jesus saw that people were far more important than things. He loved men so greatly that He identified completely with them, and made them feel wanted. He shared their burdens and had words of kindness for the downtrodden, and words of encouragement for those defeated in life's battles. Never would He consider any human being as worthless. They may be crude or coarse, but they were still people who needed to be redeemed.Jesus never belittled others or passed remarks or jokes about them that hurt them. He never made any subtle wounding statements. He never discussed the shortcomings of His disciples behind their backs. It is truly amazing that in three years, He never exposed Judas before the other eleven disciples - for even at the last supper, the eleven could not guess who was going to betray their Master.

April 20051. Living for the glory of GodIn the prayer that the Lord taught His disciples to pray, the very first request is, "Hallowed by Thy Name." This was the primary longing in the heart of the Lord Jesus. He prayed "Father, glorify Thy Name," and chose the way of the Cross since that was to the Father's glory (Jn. 12:27,28). One supreme passion governed the life of the Lord Jesus - the Father's glory.Everything He did was for the Father's glory. There were no separate sacred and secular compartments in His life. Everything was sacred. He made stools and benches for the glory of God as much as He preached and healed the sick for the glory of God. Every day was equally sacred to Him; and money spent on the necessities of daily living was as sacred as money given to God's work or to the poor.Jesus lived in perfect rest of heart at all times, because He sought only the Father's glory and cared only for His Father's approval. He lived before the face of His Father and did not care for the honour or praise of men. "He who speaks from himself seeks his own glory," said Jesus (Jn. 7:18). The soulish Christian, however much he may appear or pretend to be seeking the glory of God, is really, deep down, interested in his own honour. Jesus on the other hand, never sought any honour for Himself. That which originates in man's cleverness and is carried out through human ingenuity and talents, will always end in glorifying man. That which begins in the soul will only glorify the creature. But there will be nothing in heaven or in earth in the ages of eternity that will bring honour or glory to any man. Everything that survives time and enters the portals of eternity will be what was from God, through God and to God. It is the motive behind an action that gives value and merit to that action, as far as God is concerned. What we do is important, but why we do it is far more important.Jesus waited on His Father to receive His plan, and also waited on the Father for the power to carry out that plan, so that He did all the will of His Father in the power of God. But that was not all. Jesus went to prayer after some of His greatest achievements - to give the glory to His Father. He offered up the fruit of His labours as a sacrificial offering to His Father. He neither sought honour for Himself, nor received it when it was given Him (Jn. 5:41; 8:50). When His fame spread far and wide, He retired to the mountains to glorify His Father (Lk. 5:15,16). He was determined never to touch that glory Himself. The result of such an attitude consistently held, was that at the end of Jesus' life on earth, He could honestly say, "Father I have glorified You on earth" (Jn. 17:4).He had come to earth to glorify the Father as a man. He lived each day with that as His aim. He prayed earnestly that the Father alone would be glorified, whatever the cost to Him. And He finally died that the Father would be honoured and exalted and glorified on earth as He was in heaven.The ministry of Jesus was spiritual. The proof of that is seen in the fact that He left behind a number (small though it be) who also became spiritual, and not soulish. To manifest His glory, we must follow in His footsteps here. Jesus so sought the glory of God that He Himself was quite prepared to pave and prepare the way for His apostles to do something greater than He ever did, after Him (Jn. 14:12). This greater work was, no doubt, the building of the church, with the members therein becoming one as the Father and the Son are one (Jn. 17:21-23). During Jesus' lifetime on earth, not even two of His disciples had become one as the Father and the Son are one. They all sought their own. But after the day of Pentecost, many of His disciples have become one as He desired. This was the greater work. Jesus paved the way for others to do a greater work. He died and laid the foundation and His disciples built on that. There was no self-interest in Jesus. It did not matter to Him if someone else got the credit for what He did, provided the Father was glorified. It is this spirit that has to animate us, if we are to minister life to the church, the Body of Christ, today, and if we are to build it, to the fullness of the stature of Christ.

April 20052. OBEDIENCE & SUFFERING – Part of our syllabus in spiritual educationGod has always required obedience from man. Under the old covenant, the Israelites were given commandments to obey. But they discovered that they could not keep God’s laws perfectly. Under the new covenant, God promises to write His laws in our hearts and minds so that we will not only obey Him but love to obey Him. God’s promise is: “I will put My Spirit within you and cause you to walk in My statutes, and you will be careful to observe My ordinances.”(Ezek. 36:27) It is only through obeying His commandments that we can have fellowship with God.Obedience however is something that many believers have not understood. Most believers have so misunderstood ‘grace’ that they consider obedience to be an Old Covenant requirement. God’s commandments, as a result, are considered to be a heavy burden. This is a Satanic deception. It is the result of an ignorance of God’s love. All of God’s commandments are for our good and are meant to set us free. They all originate in the heart of a God Who loves us perfectly. Moses says (concerning God giving His laws to Israel at Sinai), “At God’s right hand there was a fiery law for His people - indeed (this proves that) He loves His people” (Deut.33:2,3 - margin). The fact that God gives us His laws is a proof of His intense love for us.Some of God’s commandments may require self- denial on our part. But in the long run we will discover that they are for our very best. A father doesn’t give commands to his children to burden them or harm them - but only to help them. This is how we need to see the commands that God gives us too. To have faith is to believe in a God Who is perfect in love. When we have such faith, we will delight to do God’s commandments, at any cost. Here lies the reason for so much of our defeat. The Devil has convinced people that God’s commandments are either unnecessary, or a burden. If we don’t understand why God calls us to do something, that only proves our own immaturity. One day, when we are a little more mature, we will understand. When children are compelled to go to school, they may not understand why their parents won’t allow them to stay at home and play. They may think their parents are being very hard towards them. But it is love that makes those parents compel their children to get an education. Like those little children, we too don’t often understand God’s ways. But if we believed in His love, we would obey all His Word and submit to all His dealings, without any question. Consider the matter of suffering. Why does a God of love allow us to go through suffering? That’s because suffering is a part of the syllabus in our spiritual education. It is through suffering that God leads us on to maturity. If you have not had much opportunity to suffer, you certainly could not have learnt much in life that has any spiritual value.Perhaps you grumbled and complained so much the last time you had a little suffering, that God now allows you to go your own way. That is sad, when God puts you on the shelf like that. I’d rather go through suffering every day of my life than be set aside by God on a shelf. It is foolish to compare ourselves with others, when God leads us through suffering. That would be like your children wondering why they have to go to school when the poor children in the slums can play in the mud all day. All of God’s dealings with us are in perfect love. He wants us to be happy - not with the superficial, frothy happiness of the world, but with that deep, everlasting happiness that comes through holiness of life. And there is just no way to be holy except through suffering. “He disciplines us for our good, that we may share His holiness.”(Heb.12:10).Jesus was the happiest man Who ever walked on this earth. Yet He was the One Who suffered the most. His happiness came out of doing the will of His Father - not by having an easy way through life. He knew His Father as perfect love and so He joyfully submitted to all that the Father sent His way. That was the secret of His life.

April 20053. A COVENANT RELATIONSHIPIn 1 Sam. 18:1-8, we read of Jonathan entering into a covenant with David. This is a beautiful picture of what the covenant relationship should be like in the body of Christ. It says there that Jonathan's soul was knit to the soul of David. The 'knit' used here is the same word used in Neh. 4:6 where it refers to the wall being built in such a way that there was no gap at all in it. So too was Jonathan's heart was knit with David's - there was no gap between their hearts for the enemy to come through. It says further that Jonathan loved David as himself. This is our calling in the body of Christ too - to be joined together as ONE, such that there is no gap between us (no gap of misunderstanding, jealousy, suspicion, etc) whereby the enemy can come through and bring a division.Jonathan should have been the one person in Israel who should have been most jealous of David, for he was a threat to Jonathan succeeding Saul as the next king of Israel. Yet he overcame jealousy and loved David as his own self. How Jonathan puts New Testament believers to shame!Jonathan then made a covenant with David; and as a symbol of the covenant, he took off his royal robe and put it on David. This was symbolic of Jonathan's desire to die to himself as the next king of Israel and to make David king. We are commanded in the body of Christ to "outdo one another in showing honour" (Rom. 12:10 margin). We are to so die to ourselves that we sincerely and earnestly long that our brothers will be greater and higher and more regarded than ourselves. And we take our robe, if necessary, to cover a brother's nakedness wherever it is seen. Thus we can make our brother glorious in the eyes of others. This is what it means to enter into a covenant relationship with the brothers in the body of Christ.It is impossible to enter into such a covenant without dying to self persistently. All the problems that riddle almost every assembly of believers arise because the believers therein have not entered into such a covenant relationship with one another. Everyone seeks his own. The net result of this is that Satan triumphs. But such assemblies are not the church that Jesus is building, for Jesus said that the gates of hell would not be able to prevail against the church that He builds (Matt. 16:18).Jesus is building His church in this world today. If we are to be a part of that church and to have a part in building that church, then we need to take to heart covenant relationships and should seek to learn with all our hearts what it means to make our brother glorious.Then we read that Jonathan also took his armour, his sword, his bow and his belt and gave them to David. Entering into a covenant with our brothers, we surrender every possible weapon with which we can harm them in any way. This is the meaning of Jonathan's action.The weapon with which the maximum damage has been done in Christendom is the tongue. Are we willing to lay down this weapon in a covenant relationship with our brothers in such a way that we will never again speak evil or backbite or gossip against another, even once.This surrender of our weapons also implies a trust in our brother such that we can afford to be defenceless before him, because we know that he will never harm us. It is through such trust and confidence that the brotherhood is built.In 1 Sam. 19,20, we see Jonathan's steadfast loyalty to David even at the cost of having to stand against his own father. Jonathan stood by his brother David in the presence of carnal relatives. Truly he is a worthy example for all of us to follow. We are to love the brotherhood more than our blood relatives.

April 20054. GOD'S PLAN IS THE BESTIt is the height of folly not to seek God's guidance. If you were alone in the middle of a thick forest on a pitch dark night, not knowing which way to turn, you would be glad to have with you someone who knew every inch of the forest and whom you could trust fully. You would gladly follow him without question whichever way he took. It would be foolish to ignore his advice and to move on your own into that dark and dense forest, full of hidden dangers. Yet many believers do just that sort of thing.The future that lies before us is darker than anything on earth could possibly be. We can see nothing ahead. Yet we have to move forward.We sometimes come to crossroads in our lives, where we have to make decisions with far-reaching consequences. Decisions such as the choice of a career and a life-partner affect our entire future. How are we to decide at such times? We know nothing of the dangers and the hidden pitfalls along each path. We know nothing of the snares Satan has laid for us. And yet - we have to decide which path to take.It would therefore be not only desirable but necessary for us to have someone beside us at such times whom we can trust fully, who knows the entire future. In the Lord Jesus Christ, we have just such a Person, and He is more than eager to guide us along the safest and best path.The Bible teaches that God has a specific plan for each of our lives (Eph. 2:10). He has planned a career for us, chosen a life-partner for us and even planned where we should live and what we should do each day. In every case, His choice must be the best, for He knows us so well and He takes every factor into consideration. It is wisest then to seek His will in all matters - major as well as minor.It is not only foolish, but dangerous also to follow the reasoning of our limited intellects and the dictates of our emotions alone. Unless we are gripped by the conviction that God's plan is indeed the best, we are not likely to be in earnest about seeking it.Many have made shipwreck of their lives by failing to seek the will of God right from their youth. It is indeed "good for a man that he bear the yoke in his youth" (Lam. 3:27). In Matthew 11:28-30, Jesus invites us to take His yoke upon us. What does it mean to take the yoke? When a pair of oxen are used to plough a field, they are kept together by a yoke upon their necks. When a new ox is to be trained to plough, it is yoked together with an experienced ox. The new one is thus compelled to walk in the same direction and at the same speed as the older ox.This is what it means to take the yoke of Jesus upon us. We shall have to walk with Jesus in the path that pleases Him, never rushing ahead to do anything without His leading, nor lagging behind when He calls to some new step of obedience. Few understand this meaning of the yoke. Fewer still are willing to accept it. The ox is forced by its owner to take the yoke upon its neck. But Jesus invites us. There is no compulsion here. How foolish we are to reject this invitation! We would rather take the heavy yoke of our own self-will with its accompanying frustrations, defeats, and regrets, than the light yoke of Jesus that brings true liberty and deep rest!"Come to Me and I will give you rest - all of you who work so hard beneath a heavy yoke. Wear My yoke.....and let Me teach you (as the older ox teaches the inexperienced one)....and you shall find rest for your souls; for I give you only light burdens" (Matt. 11:28-30- TLB).We read of Enoch that he "walked with God" (Gen. 5:22) - i.e., he did not rush ahead nor lag behind, but walked in God's appointed path as one under the yoke - for three hundred years. As a result, God testified that He was pleased with Enoch's life (Heb. 11:5). This is the only way that we can please God - by living and moving under His yoke, in His perfect will. Only thus shall we be able to stand before Him without regret when He comes again.

May 20051. Deliverance From IndecisionMany times we will have to take a step forward while still not perfectly sure about God's will. This too is a part of the discipline of walking by faith, for certainty can sometimes be the equivalent of walking by sight. God sometimes gives us clear assurances to encourage us lest we faint. But many times He expects us to move forward without visible evidences of His approval. Having ascertained the mind of the Holy Spirit to the best of our knowledge, we should move ahead without waiting indefinitely. The Bible says, "We should make plans - counting on God to direct us" (Prov. 16:9-TLB). Looking back over such decisions later, we will find that in spite of the dimness of our vision, God did not let us go astray. In other words, although there may have been much uncertainty in prospect, there will be much certainty and rejoicing in retrospect."The very dimness of my sight Makes me secure - For groping in my misty way I feel His hand, I hear Him say, 'My help is sure'".If when taking a step in uncertainty we miss the path of God's perfect will, He can be trusted to deliver us. The promise in Isaiah 30:21 (TLB) is, "If you leave God's paths and go astray, you will hear a Voice behind you say, `No, this is the way; walk here'". God can order circumstances to alter our course when we miss the road. But we should not remain in perpetual inaction waiting for spectacular guidance for every move. A ship can be turned around much quicker when moving that when stationary: so can we.In Acts 16:6-10, Paul and Silas tried to go into Asia not as a result of any clear leading from the Lord but yet desiring to do His will. They were hindered - perhaps by God-ordered circumstances. Next, they attempted to enter Bithynia. Again their way was blocked. But because they were actively seeking God's will, and not passively waiting for guidance, He led them finally to the place of His choice - Macedonia.In the smaller details of daily life, guidance is not necessarily a question of constant conscious enquiry. It is a matter of walking in the Spirit. Right relationship with the Lord will lead to right action. In such small details, the guidance of God is not something that we should be acutely aware of all the time. We may be unconscious of it. It is our basic relationship with the Lord that is the important factor, for guidance is a spiritual matter and not a mechanical technique.

May 20052. DELIVERANCE FROM REGRETSRegrets over past failures may torment the minds of some of us. We may have missed God's will in some issue and are now unable to correct it. But regret is futile, for it will only eat up our spiritual vitality and leave us totally unfit for any service for God. Failure should be confessed to God, Who is faithful to forgive us and to cleanse us immediately (1 John 1:7,9). He has also promised not to remember our past sins (Heb. 8:12). If God does not harp on our past there is no need for us to agonize over it. We should therefore turn our back once and for all on those failures. It may not be possible to rectify the blunders, but we can ask the Lord to use the rest of our life, for His glory.David fell very low when he sinned with Bathsheba and then had her husband, Uriah, killed. Yet instead of living the rest of his life in regret, he came back to God in brokenness and repentance. Accepting God's forgiveness, he lived thereafter for God's glory. The Holy Spirit recorded later that David pleased the Lord in all his life, except in the matter of Uriah (1 Kings 15:5). If David had allowed regret to plague his mind, he would only have grieved the Lord further. Those who live with the weight of regret perpetually on their minds only succeed in adding failure to failure. We must forget past failures and press forward to fulfil God's will (cf. Phil. 3:13,14). God can restore to us the years that have been lost (Joel 2:25).Another temptation is to worry over a past decision which at the time we felt convinced was in the will of God, but which we now doubt. Perhaps the decision has led us into trouble. Or maybe we are now aware of facts which had we known then, might have led us to a different decision. The principle we should always bear in mind is: Never doubt in the darkness what God has shown in the light. If we sincerely sought the will of God and decided according to the light we then had, there is no need to look back now in regret. God is not a cruel despot who delights in making fools of us. He is a loving Father and He will not give us a stone if we ask for bread. If we sought His will sincerely, we can be sure God overruled everything to let us decide rightly. Even the facts that we were ignorant of then, must have been withheld by God with a purpose.God gave Paul and Silas clear directions at Troas to go to Macedonia, and they went immediately. Yet soon after arrival, they were locked up in prison with their feet in stocks. They could have wondered then whether their sense of guidance was wrong. Had they known their fate in advance they might never have left Troas. But God gave them no warning. Though put in prison, Paul and Silas trusted God. Refusing to doubt in the darkness what God had shown them in the light, they continued to praise Him (Acts 16:8-26). Later events clearly showed they were indeed in the will of God. Getting into trouble is, by itself, no indication that we are out of God's will. If we trust God we shall praise Him in the thickest darkness without any regrets. view previous issues

May 20053. DELIVERANCE FROM FEARFear of men and of circumstances can make us miss the will of God. Many believers are governed by considerations of security and safety when seeking guidance. They feel that certain places and occupations are insecure and dangerous, and so rule them out of their minds altogether. But there is no place or occupation in this world totally free from danger. The safest place in all the world is always the centre of God's perfect will. We step into danger only when we step out of God's plan. The one who makes his decisions without seeking God's guidance will be vulnerable to Satan's attacks. But "the one who lives and works in the appointed place of the Most High will be protected by the shadow of the Almighty" (Psa. 91:1 - adapted).We need to be delivered too, from the fear of making mistakes. The only man who will never make a mistake is the man who never does anything. We are students in God's school and we shall doubtless go wrong occasionally. But the Lord is ever near, ready to put things right. Apart from the Lord Jesus Himself, no man ever learned to walk in God's perfect will without making many mistakes. The greatest saints learned to walk in the will of God just as a child learns to walk - through many falls. The child who is afraid of falling may never learn to walk! We must never let such fear keep us from moving forward. Walking in God's will may not be easy but it is a great adventure with Him and He has promised to hold us when we fall - "The steps of good men are directed by the Lord..... If they fall it isn't fatal, for the Lord holds them with His Hand" (Psa. 37:23,24- TLB).Finally, remember that guidance is essentially a personal matter between God and you. The way God led another person may never be the way He wishes to lead you. The broad principles are the same for all believers, but the exact mode varies from individual to individual. You will only be confused if you seek for the same type of guidance you heard someone else describe in his testimony. Leave it to God how He should guide you. Let your concern be, to be always available to Him, to do whatever He desires. He will make it His concern to ensure that you are made aware of His will, and that you are strengthened to fulfill it.

May 20054. FULFILLING OUR CALLINGIn Colossians 1:23, 25, Paul says, "I am made a minister", and in 1 Timothy 2:7, "I am ordained an apostle". Paul had been ordained by the nail-pierced hands of his Savior, and not by any man. It was God Who had called Paul to be an apostle. This calling, he says in Colossians 1:25, was given to him. It was God's gift - not something that he had achieved or earned. He also says in the same verse that this calling was given to him to serve others. It was a stewardship entrusted to him by God for the work of building up the church.God has a specific calling for each of us. It is futile asking God to make us into something that He has not called us to be - for the Holy Spirit decides what gift each of us should have. Paul was called to be an apostle. But not everyone has such a calling. What we do need to seek God's face about is for power to do that which He has called us to do. “Take heed to the ministry which you have received in the Lord, that you fulfill it," was Paul's advice to Archippus (Col. 4:17).God does not put square pegs into round holes. He knows what His church needs at a particular time in a particular place, and He prepares each of us, (if we are submissive) for a specific task - which may be quite different from what we ourselves want to do. “Is everyone an apostle? Of course not. Is everyone a preacher? No. Are all teachers? Does everyone have the power to do miracles? Can everyone heal the sick? Of course not. Does God give all of us the ability to speak in languages we've never learned (tongues)?...No” (1 Cor. 12:29, 30-LB). But God has placed each of these gifts in the Body of Christ. The important thing is for us to recognize our gift and calling - and to exercise that gift and fulfill that calling. Spirit-filled service is service that fulfils that specific calling which God gives us.If there is one gift that the New Testament specifically encourages us to seek, it is the gift of prophecy (1 Cor. 14:39). This is perhaps the most needed gift in the church today. A prophetic ministry is one that edifies (strengthens and builds-up), exhorts (rebukes and challenges) and consoles (comforts and encourages) (1 Cor.14:3). We need to pray that God will give us prophets in our churches, who will speak the truth of God, without fear or favor - men of a different caliber from the professional religious scribes, who are more interested in their salary, status and popularity.May the Lord help each of us to seek His face earnestly to find out what our calling is.

May 20055. GOD LOVES A CHEERFUL GIVERThere were many under the old covenant who came to an exceptionally God-fearing life. One cannot imagine Elijah behaving in an improper way with the opposite sex or John the Baptist running after money or Moses seeking the honour of the world. So the mere fact that we have been freed from such matters does not mean that we have entered into New Covenant.If a weekly paper on the Scriptures had been published in old covenant times, many good things would have been found in such a paper. But the underlying note in it would have been, "Thou shalt ..." and "Thou shalt not..."Under the new covenant it is different. It is not just that the standard is higher. The spirit is also different. Consider the words of Jesus in Mathew 5,6 and 7. The old covenant had commanded "Thou shalt not kill... Thou shalt not commit adultery..." etc. But when Jesus spoke about the spirit behind these commandments in Mathew 5:21,22,27,28, he did not use the words "Thou shalt not..", but merely explained that in the Kingdom of God, anger was equivalent to murder and sexually dirty thoughts were equivalent to adultery. It is important to note this difference in spirit.Under the old covenant, it was compulsory to give 10% of one’s income to God. But under the new covenant, there is no command indicating what percentage is to be given to God. On the other hand, it says, "Let each one do just as he has purposed in his heart, not grudgingly or under compulsion; for God loves a cheerful giver" (2 Cor 9:7). This is to be the spirit of obedience under the new covenant, to all of God's commandments: NOT UNDER COMPULSION BUT CHEERFULLY.Under the new covenant, the spirit in which we obey is what God values - not just the obedience. There is difference between a slave who does what he is commanded, because he has no choice and a grown- up son who obeys his father cheerfully out of love. Galatians 4:7 states that, that is the difference between the old and the new covenants. Employees will work in an office, for 8 hours a day for a salary. A son however, will work in his father's office, if necessary for 16 hours a day, without any pay. God is looking for SONS now, not for employees (servant). The old covenant has been abolished (Heb 8:13)It is possible, for people to keep the new covenant commandments in the spirit of the old covenant. Such people usually develop into new covenant Pharisees. They can then hinder the building of the church, for their soulish zeal can come forth with many "Thou shalt"s that they seek to impose on others to conform to the outward form in the church.

June 20051. ENCOURAGEMENT IN TRIBULATION"I, John, your brother and fellow-partaker in the tribulation and kingdom and perseverance which are in Jesus, was on the island called Patmos, because of the word of God and the testimony of Jesus. I was in the Spirit on the Lord's day, and I heard behind me a loud voice like the sound of a trumpet." (Rev.1:9,10).John refers to himself as a "fellow-partaker in the tribulation which is in Jesus". Every wholehearted disciple of Jesus should be prepared to partake in the "tribulation which is in Jesus", as long as he is in this world. John did not get this unveiling while living in comfort. He received it, while experiencing tribulation at Patmos, because he had been faithful to "the word of God and the testimony of Jesus" (v.9). He had to experience tribulation himself in order to be able to write about the saints experiencing the great tribulation from the Antichrist in the last days. God takes us through trials and tribulations first before giving us a ministry to others who are facing tribulation.Paul said, "God encourages us in all our affliction so that we may be able to encourage those who are in any affliction with the (same) encouragement with which we ourselves are encouraged by God" (2 Cor.1:4 - Amplified). It is not surprising therefore that the doctrine that Jesus would come secretly and take (rapture) His church out of the world, before the great tribulation, arose for the first time in a country (England) where Christians were living in comfort, and at a time (mid-19th century) when they were not facing any persecution for their faith at all. Today this doctrine continues to be proclaimed and believed by Christians who live in ease and comfort, in countries where there is no persecution against Christians at all.Since the prayers of most Christians are basically of this order : "Lord make my life more comfortable on earth", it is not surprising that they have gladly accepted this teaching of a pre-tribulation rapture of the church. Thus Satan has succeeded in lulling multitudes of Christians with a false comfort, so that they will be unprepared for the great tribulation when it does come upon them.The words of Jesus are clear: "In the world YOU HAVE TRIBULATION. But take courage; I have overcome the world" (Jn.16:33). He never promised that we would escape tribulation - whether small tribulations or the great one. But He did say that we could overcome even as He overcame. He is far more interested in making us overcomers than in saving us out of tribulation, because He is far more interested in our character than in our comfort. Neither did Jesus ever say that escaping the great tribulation was a reward for faithfulness, as some teach. On the contrary, He said that those who forsook everything to follow Him would have even more tribulations than others who didn't follow Him (Mk.10:30).When He prayed to His Father for His disciples, He said, "I do not ask Thee to take them out of the world, but to keep them from the evil." (Jn.17:15). He did NOT want His disciples to be raptured out of the world at that time, just because they were going to face tribulation. In the 3rd-century when Christians were being thrown to the lions in the Roman amphitheatres and being burnt at the stake in different parts of the Roman empire, the Lord did not rescue them from such tribulations. The God Who shut the lions' mouths and took away the power of the fiery furnace in Daniel's day, did NOT do such miracles for these disciples of Jesus - for these were new-covenant Christians who were going to glorify God through death. Like Jesus their Master, they neither asked for, nor expected twelve legions of angels to come and protect them from their enemies.From heaven, God watched the Bride of His Son being torn to pieces by lions and being burnt to ashes; and He was glorified in their testimony - for they had "followed the Lamb, wherever He went", even unto a violent physical death (Rev.14:4). The only word that the Lord spoke to them was, "Be faithful until death and I will give you a crown of life." (Rev.2:10). Even today, when the disciples of Jesus are being tortured and persecuted for His Name in many lands, the Lord does not take them away from the earth. And He will not rapture us to heaven before the great tribulation either. He will do something far better. He will make us overcomers in the midst of the great tribulation. Jesus is far more interested in saving us from evil than in saving us from tribulation. He permits us to go through tribulation because He knows that that is the only way that we can become spiritually strong.Such a message is strange teaching indeed to a comfort-loving Christendom that has been coddled in their pews every Sunday for years by ear-tickling preachers. But this is the message that the apostles preached to the early churches. "They (the apostles Paul and Barnabas) strengthened the souls of the disciples, encouraging them to continue in the faith, saying, `Through many tribulations we must enter the kingdom of God.'" (Acts 14:22).The little trials that we face at home and at work now, are but a preparation for the greater ones that will come in the days to come. That is why it is essential that we are faithful now. For God says, "If you have run with footmen and they have tired you out, then how can you compete with horses?" (Jer.12:5).John speaks here about being a "fellow-partaker in the tribulation and kingdom and perseverance which are in Jesus" (v.9). We have to enter into fellowship with Jesus in tribulation first, before we can share His throne with Him in His kingdom. Perseverance is a great virtue that is emphasised throughout the New Testament. Jesus Himself said "They will deliver you to tribulation.....but the one who endures to the end shall be saved" (Mt.24:13).

June 20052. GOD CHOOSES THE WEAK AND THOSE WHO REALIZE THAT THEY ARE 'ZEROES'In 1 Corinthians 3:5, Paul asks the question “What then is Apollos and what is Paul?”. We would reply that Paul was a mighty apostle of the Lord, who had raised the dead, established many churches, and even written Scripture. But he says of himself, “What is Paul? A SERVANT”. That was his opinion of himself until the end of his life. No wonder Paul never fell by the wayside.The moment we begin to think of ourselves as anything other than servants of others, we have begun to backslide.Paul says further, “I planted, Apollos watered”. Which of the two is greater? The one who plants - who goes as a pioneer to an unreached area and does a work for God where nothing existed before? Or the one who comes along later and waters the plant through the teaching of God’s Word and encouragement, and builds the believers into a Body? The answer is “Neither”. Both are “nothing” - says Paul (v.7). Both are zeroes. Only God - Who caused the plant to grow - is everything.Paul considered himself a zero until the end of his life. And so God could use him till the end of his life. God was everything to Paul.The Lord needed a donkey once to speak to Balaam. He needed a donkey at another time to ride into Jerusalem. And He has need of donkeys even today for His purposes. Who are we then? Just donkeys whom the Lord has picked up, to speak through, or to ride on.Wherever brothers are willing to be nothing so that God might be everything there will never be any competition among them as to who is considered to be the most spiritual or the greatest etc.Whenever a person tries to project himself as the leader of a group, God will put him on the shelf. It is true that every church must have leaders. But the leader is someone whom God selects.And if God gives another brother the grace to be recognised by the others as their leader, we should be quick to humble ourselves and accept that fact. If however, we become jealous of his ministry, or covet his position, we will become agents of Satan who hinder the building of the Body of Christ in our locality.God in His sovereignty knows who is the best person to lead any church. And He doesn’t look for the clever and the intelligent. He chooses those who are weak and broken and those who realize that they are zeroes. Have we realized that?

June 20053. A CHURCH BECOMES LIKE ITS LEADERIf there is shallowness in the lives of most believers today, it is because the lives of their leaders are shallow. The people’s lives are carnal, because the leader’s life - his thought-life, his relationship with his wife, and children and fellow-workers - is carnal.A church invariably becomes like its leader. In Revelation 2 and 3, we see that in each of the seven cases, the Lord spoke the same message to the church as He did to its messenger. Each message concluded with the statement that the Spirit was saying the same thing to that church. Where five messengers (elders) were carnal, their churches were carnal. And where two messengers were spiritual, their churches were spiritual too. The messenger in Laodicea was lukewarm and so was his church. The messenger in Philadelphia was faithful and so was his church.In Genesis 1, a phrase that occurs frequently is ‘after their kind’. We read there of fruit trees bearing fruit after their kind, plants yielding seed after their kind, the fish and the birds after their kind, and beasts, creeping things and cattle after their kind (verses 11,12,21,25). In creation, everything produces after its own kind.God created Adam "in the likeness of God" (Gen.5:1). But Adam produced a son "according to his own image" (v.3). He could not produce a son in the likeness of God. He could produce one only after his own kind.Spiritually too, we will all produce children according to our own likeness and after our own kind. If we are the intellectual type, we will produce intellectually-minded people through our ministry. If we are misers, we will produce misers. And if we’re haughty and proud, we will produce haughty people through our ministry. On the other hand, if we have the spirit of a servant, our spiritual children will have a servant-spirit tooIt is possible however, that a rare brother may break out of his leader’s mould and seek God for himself and become spiritual, in spite of his leader’s carnality. But such a case is rare. Generally speaking, most believers are like sheep who blindly follow their leader, wherever he goes. Like preacher, like people! And when both sheep and leader are blind, they both fall into the ditch.In every church - in the best and in the worst - those sitting in the outer court will be of the same type - half- hearted, worldly, seeking their own, lovers of money and lovers of ease and pleasure.But a good church will have a strong inner core of leaders who are godly. This core determines which way the church is going to go.The central core will usually begin with two men who have become one with each other. God will be with them and the core will begin to grow in size and unity.

June 20054. GOD IS IMPRESSED ONLY BY OUR CHARACTERIn the New Testament, we read of One with Whom the Father was well-pleased, and also of a group of people with whom God was not well-pleased. A study of this contrast is most interesting.God Was Not Well-Pleased With ThemOf the 600,000 Israelites who perished in the wilderness in their unbelief, it is written that "God was not well-pleased with them" (1Cor. 10:5).Those Israelites had been redeemed out of Egypt by the blood of the lamb (symbolic of our redemption through Christ), they had been baptised in the Red Sea and in the cloud (symbolic of baptism in water and baptism in the Holy Spirit) (1 Cor.10:2). Yet God was not happy with them.God was nevertheless very good to them, in that He provided all their physical and material needs supernaturally. "Your clothing did not wear out on you, nor did your foot swell these forty years", Moses told them at the end of their forty years of wanderings (Deut. 8:4).God healed all their sicknesses too. The Bible says, that "there were no sick and feeble folk among them." (Psa.105:37 - Living).God did many miracles for them. In fact, no single group of people in the world's history has ever seen as many miracles as those unbelieving Israelites did, with whom "God was angry for forty years" (Heb. 3:17).This teaches us that God answers the prayers of carnal believers too - and that He provides them with their earthly needs, even supernaturally if necessary. The fact that God does a miracle for us proves nothing about our spirituality. It only proves that God is a good God Who makes His sun shine on the righteous and the unrighteous alike!Jesus also warned us that in the final day of judgment, many who had done miracles in His Name would be rejected and disqualified because they had lived in sin. He said, "Many will say to Me on that day, `Lord, Lord did we not prophesy in Your name, and in Your name cast out demons, and in Your name perform many miracles?' And then I will declare to them, `I never knew you; depart from Me, you who practise lawlessness.'"(Mt. 7:22,23).He was obviously referring to Christian preachers and healers who did genuine miracles in His Name. From the words of Jesus, it becomes clear that MANY of these men (not just a few and not all, but many) who have these miraculous ministries are not free from sin in their private lives and in their thoughts and attitudes. This will be exposed at the judgment- seat of Christ.This teaches us very clearly that the working of miracles, by itself, is no indication that a man is approved by God. Have we understood this thoroughly? If not, we will be deceived.God Was Well-Pleased With HimIn contrast to the Israelites in the Old Testament with whom God was not well-pleased, we read of Jesus in the New Testament that the Father was well-pleased with Him.When Jesus was thirty, the Father spoke these words about Him publicly from heaven, "This is my beloved Son in Whom I am well-pleased." (Mt. 3:17). And that was at a time when Jesus had not done a single miracle or even preached a single sermon!What then was the secret of His being approved by God? It was obviously not because of His ministry, for He had not even commenced His public ministry. It was because of the type of life that He had lived for thirty years.We are approved by God not on the basis of the success of our ministry but rather on the basis of our faithfulness in the temptations that we face in daily life.The only two things that we are told about the hidden thirty years of Jesus' life (apart from the incident in the temple) are - that "He was tempted in all points as we are and yet did not sin"(Heb. 4:15), and that "He never pleased Himself" (Rom. 15:3).He had faithfully resisted temptation at every point and He had never sought His own in any matter. This was what delighted the Father.Our external accomplishments may impress worldly people and carnal believers. But God is impressed only by our character. It is our character alone that can bring us God's approval. And so if we want to know what God's opinion of us is, we must deliberately erase from our minds what we have accomplished in our ministry, and evaluate ourselves purely by our attitude towards sin and self-centredness in our thought-life. That and that alone is the infallible gauge of our spiritual condition.Thus, the world-traveling healer/preacher and the busy mother who is never able to leave the confines of her home, have exactly the same opportunities to acquire God's approval.This is why we shall find at the judgment-seat of Christ that many who are first here in the Christian world will be last there and many who were considered last here on earth (because they did not have a well-recognised ministry) will be first there!

July 20051. INSTANT OBEDIENCE TO GOD WHENEVER HE SPEAKS TO US IS ONE OF THE SECRETS OF GUIDANCE"In all your ways acknowledge Him, and He will direct your paths" (Prov. 3:6).We are sometimes eager to know God's guidance in one area of our lives, but not so keen on having His direction in other areas. For example, we may earnestly seek God's will in marriage, but may not do so when looking for a job. Or it could be vice-versa. Or perhaps we may seek God's guidance how and where to spend our month's annual leave, but may never ask Him how to spend our money.This is because we are inclined to want God's guidance only when it is convenient for us. Selfish motives often lurk, unknown to us, in our hearts. We seek God's will in some matters because we don't want to make mistakes that might cause us suffering or loss. The motive is not that we might please God but that we might be comfortable and prosperous. Hence we fail to receive God's guidance, for He has promised to guide only those who acknowledge Him in all their ways, those who gladly accept His direction in every area of their lives.There are many areas in which God's will is already revealed to us in the Scriptures. For instance, the Bible says that God wants us to be holy and thankful:"This is the will of God that you should be consecrated - separated and set apart for pure and holy living...."Thank God in everything - no matter what the circumstances may be, be thankful and give thanks; for this is the will of God for you (who are) in Christ Jesus" (1 Thess. 4:3; 5:18).Similarly, we are told that God expects us to love our neighbours as ourselves (Rom. 13:9). If we have received God's forgiveness and salvation, we should desire the same for our neighbours. God's will is clearly revealed in the New Testament: we are to be His witnesses (Acts 1:8).Loving our neighbours implies a concern primarily for their spiritual needs, but does not exclude their other needs. God has said, "I want you to share your food with the hungry…………………..clothe those who are cold………….If you do these things, God will shed His own glorious light upon you.....Then when you call, the Lord will answer. `Yes, I am here.' He will quickly reply. All you need to do is to stop oppressing the weak, and to stop making false accusations and spreading vicious rumours! Feed the hungry! Help those in trouble! Then your light will shine out from the darkness, and the darkness around you shall be as bright as day. And the Lord will guide you continually" (Isa. 58:7-11-TLB). God delights to reveal His mind to those who are unselfish and concerned about the needs of others.If we fail to obey the Lord in these areas where He has already revealed His will, then we cannot expect Him to guide us in other matters. It is a principle of Divine guidance that God never grants further light to one who ignores the light he already has. God will not show us the second step before we take the first. "As you go, step by step, I will open up the way before you", is His promise (Prov. 4:12 - Paraphrase). He is interested in our every step. "The steps of a (good) man are directed and established of the Lord. He delights in his way and He busies Himself with his every step" (Psa. 37:23).Here is another promise of guidance for the obedient: "I will instruct you (says the Lord) and guide you along the best pathway for your life; I will advise you and watch your progress, (but) don't be like a senseless horse or mule." (Psa. 32:8,9-TLB). The horse is characterized by impatience always wanting to rush ahead whereas the mule is characterized by stubbornness often refusing to move forward. We must avoid both these attitudes.God speaks to us through our conscience when we are disobedient. We should therefore be careful to heed the voice of conscience always. Jesus said, "Your eye is the lamp of your body; when your eye is sound and fulfilling its office, your whole body is full of light" (Luke 11:34). What did Jesus mean by the eye? In Matthew 5:8, He connected spiritual vision with purity of heart. So the eye must refer to the conscience which when obeyed constantly, leads us to purity of heart.By itself, conscience is not the voice of God, for it is educated and shaped by the principles on which a person bases his life. But if it is obeyed constantly and brought in line with the teaching of the Bible, it will reflect God's standard increasingly. The promise in Luke 11:34, then is, that if we keep our conscience clean we shall have God's light flooding our lives - and thus we shall know His will. If we fail to listen to the voice of conscience in our daily lives, we shall fail to hear the voice of the Spirit when seeking God's guidance. Instant obedience to God whenever He speaks to us is one of the secrets of guidance.Recently, I read of a fifteen-year-old boy, blind from birth, who flew and landed an aircraft safely. This remarkable feat was accomplished by his instantly obeying every order given by his instructor pilot. When facing life's manifold problems, we may feel like blind men trying to land a plane on an unknown and invisible runway. But if we develop the habit of instant obedience to God's commands, we shall find that we land safely.

July 20052. RECOGNIZING THE VOICE OF THE SPIRITThe Holy Spirit speaks to us through an inner pressure in our spirits rather than through an audible voice. He urges us inwardly either to take or not to take a certain course of action. Normally, this is the result of much time spent in prayer, weighing the advantages and disadvantages of the proposed course of action. However the Holy Spirit may also give us a sudden urge at times to go somewhere or to do something. But sudden impulses to do something ridiculous can come from the Devil or from ourselves. So we must be careful. The Holy Spirit will in any case never lead us contrary to the teaching of the Bible.We can distinguish the voice of the Holy Spirit by the increasing pressure He produces in our spirits and the growing peace He gives to our minds, as we pray over the matter. "The mind set on the Spirit is life and peace" (Rom.8:6-NASB). The Devil's voice is usually harassing and often accompanied by threats of judgment, if we do not obey instantly. God invariably gives us sufficient time to consider and be sure of His will.On some occasions the Spirit may lead us to do something our minds cannot fully understand. Stephen Grellet, an American preacher, was once led by the Spirit to a certain logging camp which he found deserted. But he was so sure of his guidance, that he went into the empty dining hall and preached his sermon. Many years later, a man approached Grellet in London. Reminding him of the incident, he said he had been the cook at that camp and had been the only man there that day. He had hidden outside a window and listened to Grellet's sermon. He was converted and had gone on to work for the Lord. Such guidance however is extremely rare.It is often not easy for us to distinguish between our own heart's voice and the voice of the Spirit, for our hearts are so deceitful. For instance, when considering a possible life-partner, we can easily mistake the emotional pressure and the "growing feeling of peace and joy at every contemplation of the proposed step", for the witness of the Holy Spirit. The chances of being deceived are, however, considerably lessened, if we examine our motives and make sure we desire the glory of God alone and are prepared to accept whatever He chooses for us. It is usually where such yieldedness is lacking or where motives are selfish that we go astray.God's will may sometimes be just what we like ourselves, but it can also be what we do not instinctively like. We should not think God's will is always the most difficult course of action that lies before us. Neither need it be the easiest course of action. When we are in a difficult situation or a tough job, we may be tempted to run away from the place. This can easily be mistaken for the leading of the Spirit. On such occasions, if we are in doubt, it is better to stay where we are and to trust God to give us grace to manifest Christ's victory in our situationOne practical step, when you have to decide on a course of action, could be to draw up a 'balance sheet'. Draw a line across a sheet of paper and write down all the reasons for doing a particular thing on one side, and all the reasons against it on the other. Pray over these reasons daily and revise the list as necessary. Be sincerely willing to accept either course of action. As you continue to pray, the Holy Spirit will give you a witness in your spirit as to what you are to do. If you experience a growing peace in your spirit about a particular course of action, this will usually be a clear indication of what God wants you to do. The Bible says, "Let the peace (which comes) from Christ (through the Holy Spirit), rule (act as umpire continually) in your hearts - deciding and settling with finality all questions that arise in your minds" (Col. 3:15-Amplified). As in a football game, where all play stops when the referee blows his whistle (to indicate a foul), so we should check ourselves when we lose our peace. We should proceed ahead only when we have perfect peace in our spirits.

July 20053. THE PATHWAY OF DISCIPLESHIPMatthew 28:20 says that the disciples must be taught to obey and practise every single command given by our Lord. This is the pathway of discipleship. One has only to read Matthew chapters 5, 6 and 7 to see some of the commands that Jesus gave - that most believers do not even bother to obey. A disciple is a learner and a follower.The need is for people who have been gripped by the calling to proclaim the whole counsel of God, who are themselves obedient themselves to all that Jesus commanded, and who eagerly desire to teach others too to obey all of Jesus’ commands - and thus build the body of Christ.Jesus said that all His disciples would be identified by one mark - their love for one another (Jn.13:35). Mark that! The disciples of Jesus Christ are identified, not by the quality of their preaching or their music, nor by their "speaking in tongues" nor by their carrying Bibles to the meetings, nor by the amount of noise they make in their meetings!! They are identified by their fervent love for one another.The evangelistic meeting that brings people to Christ must lead on to the establishment of a church in that locality, where the disciples love one another. Yet the sad thing is that in many places where repeated evangelistic meetings are held year after year, it is difficult to find even one church about which it can be said that the members therein do not fight with one another or backbite against one another, etc, but love one another.One can understand it, if new converts are unable to live such a victorious life immediately. But what shall we say if strife and immaturity characterise even the elders and Christian leaders in the churches of our land?This is the clearest proof that the second and most important part of the great commission (mentioned in Matt. 28:19,20) - discipleship and total obedience to the commandments of Jesus - has been totally ignored.The first part of the great commission (Mk. 16:15) alone is usually emphasised everywhere. There, the emphasis is on evangelism, the message being confirmed by signs and wonders done by the Lord.In Matthew 28:19,20, however, the emphasis is on discipleship - the disciple’s life being manifested by total obedience to Jesus’ commandments. Multitudes of Christians are taken up with the former, but very, very few with the latter. Yet the former without the latter is as incomplete and worthless as half a human body. But how many have seen this?In Jesus’ ministry, we read that great multitudes followed Him, because of His evangelistic, healing ministry. He always turned around and taught them about discipleship (See Luke 14:25,26). Would that today’s evangelists would do the same - either themselves, or in cooperation with apostles, prophets, teachers and shepherds who can complete the work that the evangelists have begun.Why are preachers hesitant to proclaim the message of discipleship? Because it will reduce the numbers in their congregations. But what they don’t realise is that the quality of their churches will become far better!!When Jesus preached discipleship to the multitudes, it soon dwindled down to a handful of only eleven disciples (Compare Jn. 6:2 with 6:70). The others found the message too hard, and left Him (See Jn. 6:60,66). But it was with those eleven disciples who stayed on with Him, that God accomplished His purposes in the world finally.As Christ’s Body on earth today, we are to carry on the same ministry that those eleven apostles commenced in the first century. After people are brought to Christ, they must be led to discipleship and obedience. Thus alone will the body of Christ be built.The way to life is narrow and few are those who find it.He who has ears to hear, let him hear.

July 20054. A VIRTUOUS WOMANProverbs 31:10-31 describes some of the characteristics of a virtuous woman.Her heart, hands and tongue are described as excellent. Nothing is mentioned about her physical beauty or her feminine charms, for these are declared to be worthless and deceptive (v. 30). It would be an excellent thing if all women and young girls, and especially young men considering marriage, realised this fact.The virtuous woman described here, has a heart that fears God (v. 30). This is the foundation for her whole life. She works with her hands, stitching clothes, cooking meals, planting trees and helping the poor (v. 13-22). She uses her tongue at all times with kindness and wisdom (v. 26). She is God-fearing, hard-working and kind - even if she is not beautiful. The glory of God is manifested through her pure heart, rough hands and soft tongue. (Worldly women, in contrast, have an impure heart, soft hands and a rough tongue!). It is in these areas that God looks for women today to manifest His glory.As a wife, this virtuous woman is a true helper to her husband. She does him good consistently till the end of her life - not in fits and starts (v. 12). In other words, she never loses her first love for him. She also adjusts herself to his profession and calling in life, supplementing his income with her own quiet labours at home, being thrifty and careful in expenditure, so that no money is wasted. She relieves her husband of home responsibilities, so that he can have a ministry in the land for the Lord (v. 23-27). No wonder her husband praises her saying that of all the women in the world (including women prime ministers and women preachers), she is the best of the lot (v. 29). Such a woman certainly deserves to be praised publicly too (v. 31), for she has understood the glory of her calling as a woman.The New Testament places great emphasis on 'serving the saints' in our homes. "Cheerfully share your home with those who need a meal or a place to stay in the night. ... and get into the habit of inviting guests home for dinner" (1 Pet. 4:9; Rom. 12:23 - LB). Hospitality is primarily the responsibility of the wife in the home. She can receive a prophet's reward, without ever being a prophet herself, merely by welcoming a prophet into her home (Matt. 10:41). She will be rewarded for hospitality shown to the least of Jesus' disciples as well (Matt. 10:41). To receive an apostle into our homes is equivalent to receiving Jesus Himself (Matt. 10:40). Likewise, to receive a child in Jesus' name is also equivalent to receiving Jesus (Matt. 18:5). What fantastic possibilities are opened up for sisters in the area of hospitality! The early Christians (to whom Paul and Peter wrote concerning hospitality), were by and large, very poor. Simple food and a place to sleep on the floor however, were all that they were asked to offer the saints. It is when believers seek the honour of men that they feel that they cannot be hospitable, until they are capable of offering rich food and grand accommodation. 1 Tim. 5:10 indicates that even poor widows in the first century, served the saints in their homes!

July 20055. UNITY IN DIVERSITYThe word 'fellowship' is a new covenant word. The fellowship spoken of in the new covenant is patterned after the fellowship that Jesus and the Father had with each other during Jesus' earthly days. Jesus' prayer was that the fellowship among His disciples would be of the same order.The new covenant leads the disciples of Jesus into an inward sanctification, that in turn leads to fellowship one with another. When we read of the great men of faith in Heb. 11, we see that they were all lonely individuals. This is how it was in Old Testament times. But as soon as we turn to the New Testament, we find Jesus sending out His disciples two by two. This was something new. Jesus came not only to lead us to an inward sanctification but also to fellowship.If a believer comes to a life of victory over sin inwardly, and yet does not come into fellowship with others, there is something drastically lacking in his sanctification. Sanctification without fellowship is a deception. Many are travelling around the world today, preaching holiness; but they themselves are lonely individuals like those in Old Testament times. Such preachers are still under the old covenant. Invariably it will be seen that they have not built any fellowship in the place that they reside.But it was not so with the apostles in the first century. Soon after the day of Pentecost, we read of Peter and John going out together. Peter told the lame man in the temple to look at both John and himself (Acts 3:4). Peter and John worked as a team. On the day of Pentecost, even though it was Peter who preached, yet we read that he stood up with the eleven (Acts 2:14). Fellowship is the one thing that stands out when we read Acts chapters 2 to 4.Peter and John were not men of similar temperament. They were vastly different as human beings. Peter was the quick and active type - quick to boast that he would never deny the Lord, quick to jump into the sea of Galilee, as soon as he saw the Lord by the shore (Jn. 21), etc., John, on the other hand, was the quiet meditative type who loved to be alone and to see visions of heavenly things (as at Patmos). God always brings together people who are dissimilar (humanly speaking), in the church - so that He can demonstrate a unity in diversity that is far more glorious than the unity of two similar people becoming one.In Acts 13:2, we read of the leaders of the church in Antioch fasting and worshipping the Lord, seeking His direction. The Holy Spirit then spoke to them to separate Saul and Barnabas for His service. Notice again, that unlike Old Testament times, the Spirit called two people and not one. This was the new covenant age and there was no place now for an individualistic ministry. There had to be an expression of Christ's body - and for this, a minimum of two people were required.Here again the Spirit called two people of dissimilar temperaments to work together. Paul was a strict, uncompromising man who would not tolerate any halfheartedness in anyone. In Acts 15:36-39, when Paul and Barnabas had a discussion concerning asking Mark to accompany them on their second journey. Paul would have none of it, because Mark had left them half way through their first journey. Barnabas, (who was given that name because he had such an outstanding ministry of encouragement - Acts 4:36) on the other hand, wanted to give Mark one more chance. Paul and Barnabas stuck so much to their own view points on this issue that they separated from each other. Obviously, they were both still very strong-willed and had not yet come (in their own spiritual development) to the place where they had acquired the wisdom from above that is 'willing to yield' (Jas. 3:17).The apostles were not ready-made saints. They too had to develop like all of us - and get light on their flesh, little by little. Later on Paul, Barnabas and Mark came into a glorious fellowship with each other (as is evident from 2 Tim. 4:11).Paul and Barnabas had dissimilar temperaments. The Holy Spirit had called them together. Yet they did not know how to get along with each other. This is the condition with many believers even today. Such a condition is tolerable among the immature. But what shall we say when we see such a condition existing even among those who have been believers for over ten years. That is pathetic, to say the least.Paul majored on 'truth'. Barnabas majored on 'grace'. If each had seen and appreciated the need for the other, the glory of God could have been seen in them, full of grace and truth (Jn. 1:14). Together they could have produced something that neither of them could have done individually. This is why the Holy Spirit called them together. If a church had only the ministry of a man like the young Paul, everyone would have been driven out, and only Paul would have been left! If, on the other hand, it had only the ministry of a man like the young Barnabas, it may have ended up as a jellyfish- like organisation without backbone, and full of halfhearted compromisers. But together, Paul and Barnabas could have built the true church. This is what Satan did not permit them to see in Acts 15. Thank God that they saw it later.When Barnabas left Paul, the Holy Spirit prepared another co-worker for Paul. We read of this person immediately after the Acts 15 incident, in Acts 16:1 - Timothy. The Spirit was not going to let Paul minister alone. He prepared a co- worker for him, who again, was temperamentally the exact opposite of Paul. Timothy was a shy, retiring, timid type of person - an introvert, in contrast to Paul the extrovert. They were both totally alike in their devotion to the Lord, in their wholeheartedness, and in their freedom from 'seeking their own' (Phil. 2:19-21). But they were poles apart temperamentally. Yet Paul grew to appreciate Timothy more than any of his other co-workers. They had glorious fellowship together, despite their different temperaments. At last the Holy Spirit was able to accomplish what He wanted to, in Paul.

August 20051. SPEAK LORD, YOUR SERVANT IS LISTENINGJesus once rebuked Martha for being busy with so much work instead of being like Mary who sat and listened to Him speak. Our Lord went on to say that what Mary did was the ONLY necessary thing in life (Lk.10:42).We must all have the attitude that Samuel had, who said, "Speak Lord, your servant is listening". I want to listen to a man who listens to God – because such a man can teach me more in five minutes than theologians (with long ‘tails’ of degrees), can teach me in hours. John the Baptist could teach people more about God than Professor Gamaliel or any member of the Jewish Sanhedrin! When you listen to God, you won’t preach what you’ve read in Christian books and magazines or heard from Christian tapes. The man who hears God speaks from revelation, not from academic knowledge or study. Such a man first experiences what he reads - and then speaks forth from his life. We must be especially careful to listen to God, when we have some important decision to make. God speaks to us through many ways.God speaks to us primarily through His Word. If something is clearly written in God’s Word, then we don’t need to pray to find God’s will, because it has already been revealed.God also speaks to us through our circumstances. Our Lord has the key to every door (Rev.1:18) and when He opens a door no-one can shut it and when He shuts a door, no-one can open it (Rev.3:8). So our circumstances are very often an indication of whether God wants us to go along a particular way or not. We don’t have to bang away at a door that God has not opened. We must of course pray, when we see a door shut. But if after repeated prayer, a door still remains shut, it may mean that God does not want us to go through that door. We must ask God to show us if this is so, or whether He wants us to continue in persistent prayer to open that door (Lk.11:5-9).God also speaks to us through the advice of mature, godly brothers. Such men have gone through many experiences and they can warn us of pitfalls that we are unaware of, ourselves. We don’t have to blindly obey them, but their godly counsel can help us.God often speaks to us, while we are fellowshipping with other believers. Thus He teaches us our dependence on other members of the Body of Christ, even for revelation on His Word.God always has something important to say to us, whenever we go through a trial or when we are sick.God also warns us through the failures of others. If, for example, we hear of some servant of God who has fallen into sin, it is good to ask God what lessons we can learn from that man’s failure (for we are all weak) and how we can preserve ourselves.God can also speak to us when we hear news of evils being done somewhere or of accidents that have taken place. Jesus told the people of His time to repent, when they heard of Pilate butchering some Jews and when they heard of the accident in Siloam where a tower fell and killed some people - because such things could happen to anyone (Lk.13:1-4).Let me add a word of warning however, against trying to hear what God is saying, by randomly opening the Bible and reading the first verse that you see! If you’re eager to marry a particular girl, you may open the Bible at random to find some confirmatory verse. And if you don’t find it, the chances are that you will keep opening the Bible until you find the verse that you want! That’s how you can deceive yourself.I heard a story of a man who was trying to find God’s will in this way, who opened the Bible at random and read, "He went away and hanged himself" (Matt.27:5)! He opened the Bible again and found, "Go and do the same" (Lk.10:37)! He opened the Bible a third time and read, "What you do, do quickly" (Jn.13:27)! That cured him forever of trying to find the will of God in this way!There may be times however, when we are under pressure, when the Lord may encourage us through a verse that we get, by opening the Bible at random. So this method is all right if you’re looking for encouragement but not if you’re looking for guidance. I want to encourage you to develop the habit of listening to God. This is the single most important habit that you can ever develop.

August 20052. A DANGEROUS SPIRITIn Ezekiel 28:12 Satan is called "the king of Tyre". There are demon powers behind the rulers of this world and at that time Satan himself was behind the ruler of Tyre. And the Lord spoke to Satan who indwelt that human ruler. The Lord reminded Satan of the time when he was in the garden of Eden (Ezek.28:13) This tells us that Lucifer was in Eden before Adam and Eve were there. And the Lord reminded Satan of how he had been "perfect in his ways from the day he was created until sin was found in him" (v.16,17).Lucifer's heart was lifted up primarily because of his beauty. Is your heart ever lifted up when you look into the mirror and see how good looking you are compared to others? Beware of that. Thank God for the good gifts he has given you. There's nothing wrong in having a good-looking face. But there is everything wrong in being proud of it. For then you open the door to Satan.Another reason for Lucifer's pride was his cleverness. Do you know that the most intelligent among all created being is Satan? There is nothing wrong with being intelligent. We can use our intelligence for the glory of God. But we have no right to be proud of it. We don't have to be stupid to serve the Lord. No. Thank God for your intelligence, and thank God for your beauty, but never be proud of either.The third reason for Lucifer's conceit was that he had the highest position among all created beings. He failed to recognise that all these three things that he was proud of - his beauty, his cleverness and his position - were all gifts of God. And that is what many human beings - and many Christians too - fail to recognise. And that's how Satan gets a foothold in their lives, and finally destroys them.So we see that all the sin in the world originated with pride. Not with murder or adultery but with pride. And that's why salvation came through Jesus humbling himself. The way of humility is the way of deliverance from all of Satan's schemes and wiles.In Lucifer, we also see the origin of the spirit of discontentment with one's appointed lot in life. If we could look at this world from God's point of view, we would see the world full of grumbling, complaining, murmuring people everywhere - a spirit that they have all imbibed from Satan.The spirit of rebellion against authority is yet another thing that originated with Lucifer. There was only one authority that Lucifer had above him - and that was God. And he rebelled against that authority. He wanted to be above that authority and to push God down. Do we find that spirit in the human race? The spirit of rebellion against authority is what has led to numerous revolutions in countries and what has caused strikes in factories. And in these days, we find that rebellious spirit even among students - not only among college students, but among school students as well, and even among small children in a home. All this is a sure sign that the world is deteriorating. Disrespect for teachers, and for parents and even for elder brothers in the church is rife everywhere. Never forget that it was this spirit that changed the best of the angels into a devil. And this spirit can change a good man or woman into a devil even today.God never makes anyone evil. It is when we open ourselves to the spirit of Satan that we make ourselves evil. And now notice one final characteristic about Lucifer. When he fell, he didn't fall alone. He had company. We read in Revelation 12:4 that he dragged down one-third of the other angels along with him. They too foolishly joined him in his spirit of pride, discontentment and rebellion. It is the same today. Where one person is evil, he is not content to remain evil by himself alone. He wants to drag others down with him into his misery and evil, as well. A root of bitterness in one person can infect many others, if those others are not watchful (See Heb.12:15).

August 20053. PROCLAIM THE VICTORY OF CHRIST OVER SATANThe greatest battle that ever took place on this earth is not written about in any of the world's history-books. It was on Calvary, when Jesus through His death defeated Satan, the prince of this world. One verse that you should never forget in your whole life is Hebrews 2:14,15. I am sure Satan would not like you to know this verse. No one likes to hear about his own defeat or failure, and Satan is no exception. Here is the verse: "Since then the children have partaken of flesh and blood, He (Jesus) Himself likewise shared in the same, that through death (His death on Calvary's cross), He might destroy him who had the power of death that is the devil, and release those who through fear of death were all their lifetime subject to bondage."When Jesus died he made the devil powerless. Why? So that we might be forever free of Satan and the bondage of fear that he had put on us throughout our lifetime. There are many types of fears that people in the world have - fear of sickness, fear of poverty, fear of failure, fear of people, fear of the future etc., The greatest of all fears however is the fear of death. Every other fear is inferior to the fear of death. The fear of death leads on to the fear of what will happen after death. The Bible teaches very clearly that those who live in sin will finally go to hell - the place that God has reserved for those who do not repent. The devil also will spend eternity in the lake of fire, along with those whom he deceived and led into sin on this earth. Jesus came to the earth to save us from that eternal hell, by taking the punishment from our sins. He also destroyed Satan's power over us so that he can never harm us again.I want all of you to remember this one truth all your lives GOD WILL ALWAYS BE ON YOUR SIDE AGAINST SATAN. That is such a glorious truth that has brought so much encouragement and comfort and victory to me, that I wish I could go everywhere and tell every believer in the world about it. The Bible says "Submit to God. Resist the devil and he will flee from you" (James 4:7). The Name of Jesus is the Name at which Satan will always flee. The picture that most Christians have in their minds is one of Satan chasing them and of their running for their lives from him. But that is exactly the opposite of what the Bible teaches. What do you think? Was Satan afraid of Jesus or not? We all know that Satan was scared to stand before our Saviour. Jesus is the Light of the world, and the prince of darkness had to disappear from before Him.Jesus told His disciples about how He had seen the fall of Satan in heaven. And there, Jesus said, that Satan's fall had been "like lightning" (Lk.10:18), when God cast him out. When Jesus told Satan in the wilderness, "Be gone, Satan", he disappeared from Jesus' presence too at the speed of lightning. And when we resist Satan in the Name of Jesus today, he will flee from before us too at the speed of light. The darkness flees before the light.Satan is afraid of the Name of Jesus. He is afraid to be reminded of the fact that Jesus is Lord. Demon-possessed people will not confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, neither will they confess that Satan was defeated on the cross. There is power in the Name of Jesus Christ to cast out any demon and to make any devil flee from you - at the speed of lightning. Never forget that.Anytime in your life if you are in a difficulty, or facing some insurmountable problem, when you are facing something for which there appears to be no human answer, call upon the Name of the Lord Jesus. Say to Him, "Lord Jesus, you are on my side against the devil. Help me now". And then turn to Satan and tell him, "In Jesus Name I resist you, Satan". I want to tell you that Satan will flee from you immediately, because Jesus defeated him on the cross. Satan is powerless against you, when you walk in the light of God and resist him in Jesus' Name.Satan obviously does not want you to know about his defeat and that is why he has prevented you from hearing about it for so long. That is why he has stopped most preachers from preaching about his defeat as well.I want you all to know this clearly that Satan was defeated once and for all by the Lord Jesus Christ on the cross. You need never again be afraid of Satan. He cannot trouble you. He cannot harm you. He may tempt you. He may attack you. But the grace of God in Christ will always make you victorious over him, if you humble yourself, submit to God and walk in His light at all times.

August 20054. OVERCOMING EVIL THOUGHTSEvery young person is sooner or later tempted by unclean thoughts. The sexual urge being stronger and more aggressive in men than in women, the former face this problem much more than the latter do.In Mark 7:21, Jesus listed evil thoughts as the first things that proceed from the heart of men. The hearts of all unconverted men are equally wicked and so the description Jesus gave is true of all. Unclean thoughts plague the mind of the morally upright man as much as they do the mind of the adulterer - even though lack of opportunity and fear of society may have prevented the former from committing adultery in the flesh.We need to distinguish however between temptation and sin. Even Jesus was tempted "in every respect as we are" (Heb. 4:15). But He never once yielded to temptation (even in His mind) and so never sinned. We too shall be tempted till the last day of our life on earth. But we need not sin. We sin only when the evil desire is permitted to conceive in our minds (James 1:15), i.e. when we accept the lustful thought flashed into our minds. If we reject the suggestion at once, we do not sin. As the old Puritan said, "While I cannot prevent the birds from flying over my head, I can prevent them from making a nest in my hair". When an evil thought presents itself to us, if we cherish it even for a moment in our minds, we allow it to "make a nest" there and so sin.Lustful thinking, once indulged in, will make a person more and more its slave. Deliverance becomes increasingly difficult with the passage of time. The sooner we seek for deliverance the easier it will be. Victory over evil thoughts (like victory over all other sin) comes through an honest confession of failure, a real longing for deliverance, an acceptance of the fact of our death with Christ, and an utter yieldedness of our bodies and minds to the Lord (Rom. 6.1-14).We must also "walk in the Spirit" and cooperate with Him in disciplining our lives, if we are to enjoy continuous victory (Gal. 5.16-19). If we fail to discipline our eyes and ears (cutting off all reading and seeing and hearing that is lustful), we shall not be able to discipline our thoughts either (this is the real implication of Matt.5: 28-30). Discipline of the body is essential for deliverance from lustful thoughts. The greatest of saints have confessed that they had to battle constantly with sexual temptations in their minds. They had to discipline their bodies severely in order to get victory.Job, though a married man with ten children, recognized that if he was to be delivered from lustful thinking, he had to control his eyes. He said, "I made a covenant with my eyes not to look with lust upon a girl" (Job 31:1-TLB). For men, the greatest temptations come through the eyes. If care is not exercised here and an unclean thought or picture is once allowed to enter our minds through the eye-gate, it becomes almost impossible to remove it from there.Disciplining our lives includes our having a daily devotional time with God each morning as soon as we awake and every night before we go to bed. If on awaking in the morning, we continue to loll in bed instead, we shall be leaving the door wide open for evil thoughts to flood our minds. We must fill our minds daily with the Word of God - for saturating our minds thus with God's Word is one of the surest safeguards against evil thinking. David said, "I have thought much about Your words, and stored them in my heart so that they would hold me back from sin" (Psa. 119:11-TLB).The Bible also says, "If you value the approval of God, fix your minds on the things which are holy and right and pure and beautiful and good" (Phil. 4:8 -JBP).Some may say that the prevailing standard of morals in the world around us is so low that it is difficult to be totally free from unclean thoughts. But this state of affairs is not peculiar to the twentieth century. Corinth in the first century was a centre of licentiousness and immorality, yet the Spirit of God urged the Christians there to lead their every thought captive into the obedience of Christ (2 Cor. 10:5). He tells us to do the same today. The way to life may be narrow and difficult, but the Holy Spirit can strengthen us to walk that way.To discipline our lives thus, does not mean that we should develop a repugnance for the opposite sex. Far from it! The fact that we find the opposite sex attractive is, in itself, not sinful. It is quite natural. It is not wrong for us to admire a pretty face as a part of God's beautiful creation. But being fallen creatures, if we are not careful, we shall soon begin to notice the beautiful form and then to lust. Thus the attractiveness of the opposite sex, though clean in itself, can become for us, an occasion for unclean thinking.Our safety lies in instantly obeying the voice of the Holy Spirit within us, when He checks us and tells us to turn our eyes and our thoughts in another direction. We should also frequently pray, "Lord, do not let me face temptation (in this realm) that I cannot overcome." Many young men have found victory through sincerely praying such a prayer.

September 20051. JERUSALEM AND BABYLON CONTRASTEDIn the closing pages of Scripture, we find the result of the Holy Spirit's work - the Bride of Christ. We also see there the result of Satan's counterfeit work - the Harlot church. John says, "I saw the HOLY CITY, THE NEW JERUSALEM, beautiful as a BRIDE, descending from God. It was FILLED WITH THE GLORY OF GOD and glowed like a precious gem, crystal clear like jasper" (Rev. 21:2,10,11-Living). Before seeing this vision of the Bride of Christ, John was given a vision of the Harlot .. John says, "I saw a woman, BABYLON THE GREAT, THE MOTHER OF HARLOTS, and a voice saying "Babylon the great is fallen. See THE SMOKE OF HER BURNING. Her smoke rose up forever and ever" (Rev. 17:3,5; 18:2,9; 19:3).Let us look at Babylon first. Babylon originated with the tower of Babel, which was built according to man's plan, in man's strength and for man's glory. "They said to one another (FROM MAN), 'Let us build for ourselves a city (THROUGH MAN) and make for ourselves a name (TO MAN)" (Gen. 11:3,4). Years later, King Nebuchadnezzar, having built the great city of Babylon, capital of his great world empire, looked out one day over the city and spoke in the same way: "Is this not Babylon the great, which I myself have built (FROM MAN)..... by the might of my power (THROUGH MAN)..... for the glory of my majesty (TO MAN)" (Dan. 4:30). The tower of Babel ended in judgment. Nebuchadnezzar's boast also brought down on him the immediate judgment of God (Dan. 4:31-33). The final end of all that has been produced by human wisdom and human power for man's glory will also be judgment by God. That which is done through human soul-power will perish, even if it is called 'Christian work'. "The wide walls of Babylon shall be leveled to the ground and her high gates shall be burned; THE BUILDERS ('Christian' workers?) FROM MANY LANDS HAVE WORKED IN VAIN - THEIR WORK SHALL BE DESTROYED BY FIRE" (Jer. 51:58-Living).Jerusalem, on the other hand, is the City of God (Heb. 12:22). In the Old Testament this was where the Temple of God was. Jerusalem, God's dwelling place, had her origin in the Tabernacle, built by Moses (Exod. 25:8). The Tabernacle was built exactly according to God's plan: ".....according to all that the Lord commanded" (Exod. 40:16) (FROM GOD). It was built by men endued with the power of God: "Bezalel...I have filled him with the Spirit of God..." (Exod. 31:1-5) (THROUGH GOD). It was built for the glory of God: "The glory of the Lord filled the tabernacle" (Exod. 40:34) (TO GOD). That which originates in God and is done through Divine power for the glory of God alone will remain forever. It will come through the fire, glowing like a gem, because it is built of gold, silver and jewels.The distinctive feature of Jerusalem is holiness. It is called "the HOLY City" (Rev. 21:2). Babylon however, stands out for its greatness. It is called "the GREAT city" (Rev. 18:10). It is called "great", eleven times in Revelation. Those who live in true holiness, in obedience to God and have partaken of the nature of Christ by grace through faith, are built together into Jerusalem; whereas those who are looking for greatness here on earth (the testimony and the honour of men) are built into Babylon. For nineteen hundred years, the call has been coming to God's people, "Come out of her (Babylon) MY PEOPLE; do not take part in her sins, or you will be punished with her" (Rev. 18:4-Living).The call is even more urgent today, as we approach the end of the age. It is truly unfortunate that even God's people can be mixed up with Babylon and thus share her punishment - if they do not take heed to this call of God which is so clear. Having held on to an evangelical doctrine, or having made a 'decision for Christ' will not help anyone in that day, if they have not lived a life that corresponds to the true doctrine, or brought forth works of obedience that are the identifying marks of a genuine faith.How intense was God's desire when He made man in His own image that man should partake of the divine nature and manifest His glory. And when man fell, how great a price God was willing to pay, "sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and as an offering for sin, condemning sin in the flesh" (Rom.8:3), so that a Way might be made whereby man might be restored and brought back to the place where he could once again fulfil the divine purpose. The Father, Son and Holy Spirit are all together involved in this work of redeeming man and transforming him. And although, many men and women in their foolishness will not respond to God, yet the divine purpose will be fulfilled in a remnant (the few who find the narrow way to life), who submit to God, like Jesus did, and through whom the glory of God will be manifested, not only here in time, but also in the ages of eternity, when God will show forth through them, the surpassing riches of His grace that they were made partakers of through Christ Jesus.

September 20052. IMPORTANCE OF GOD’S WORD AND PRAYERGod's Word.A child needs milk to start with, but he needs solid food later on. The Bible contains both milk and solid food. The milk is called "the elementary teaching about the Christ" (Heb. 6:1); and the solid food is called "the word of righteousness" (Heb. 5:13). How soon we move on to solid food, depends on how quickly we obey any light that God gives us. Our spiritual growth is dependent on faith and obedience. God has given us promises in His Word so that we can trust Him. He has also given us commands to obey. If we meditate on God's Word regularly and trust and obey Him we will find that we are deeply rooted in God, like an evergreen tree that never withers. God will then be able to bless us in such a way that we prosper in everything we do (Psa. 1:2,3). We can't understand God's Word by intellectual study alone. We need the revelation of the Holy Spirit. Jesus said that spiritual truths were hidden from the clever and the intelligent and revealed to babes (Mt. 11:25). What do babes have, that clever, intelligent people don't have? A pure heart! God looks at the heart and not at the head. He gives revelation to those who are humble and who tremble at His Word (Isa. 66:2). Jesus said that only those who were willing to do the will of God would understand God's Word (Jn.7:17).God's Word is also the weapon that we use in our warfare against Satan. It is called "the sword of the Spirit" in Ephesians 6:17. Jesus Himself used this weapon with great effect, during the last three temptations in the wilderness. Each time, he countered Satan's temptations with "It is written...." (Matt. 4:4,7,10). That's how He overcame; and that's how we can overcome too. Satan is the Accuser. We must distinguish between his accusations and the conviction of the Holy Spirit. Satan always seeks to harass us and make us feel condemned by his accusations. The Holy Spirit's conviction, on the other hand, is always gentle and full of hope. We can overcome the Accuser only by "the blood of the Lamb and the word of our testimony" (Rev. 12:11). His accusations concerning our past sins can be overcome only as we give him our testimony that the blood of Christ has cleansed us and justified us thoroughly. We have to use the same weapon that Jesus used : "It is written..." Confessing God's Word to Satan is the way to overcome not only Satan's accusations, but also discouragement and anxiety and a host of other temptations with which Satan assails our mind. That's why it is important to know God's Word well, so that the Holy Spirit can bring to our mind the right Scripture at the time of our need. It is good therefore to have a time every day when we meditate on God's Word asking Him to speak to us. As we hide God's Word in our heart, it will keep us from sinning against Him (Psa. 119:11).Prayer.Communication with God is a two-way matter. We hear God speaking to us through His Word first. And then we speak to Him. But prayer is not just making requests to God. A primary part of prayer should be having fellowship with God, like a bride with her bridegroom. There are no rules on how a bride should speak to her bridegroom. But as a discipline, it's good for our prayers to consist of:(i) praise to our Father for Who He is;(ii) confession of sin and failure;(iii) petitions concerning the kingdom of God;(iv) petitions concerning our own needs;(v) intercession for the needs of others;(vi) thanksgiving for what God has done; and(vii) thanksgiving for what God will do.Jesus told us to "pray at all times" (Lk. 18:1). A good habit to develop is to learn to speak to God about the little things of daily life - and thus to be in a spirit of prayer throughout the day. Thus, speaking to God will become a joy for us and not a ritual. We'll also find that God speaks to us in our hearts in surprising ways. But these are just the kindergarten-lessons in the school of prayer. We can progress further if we are faithful. In any case, prayer should never be allowed to degenerate into a dry, empty ritual. Prayer is like breathing. When our breathing becomes difficult for us, then we know that something is wrong! Prayer was never meant by God to be dry or boring. But as we progress, we will find that prayer becomes hard work. If we are faithful with the little burdens God lays on our heart to pray about, we'll find that God gives us more and more of His burdens. Thus we can become co-workers with God, in His work of blessing others. Jesus prayed 'with loud crying and tears' (Heb. 5:7). Once when He prayed in Gethsemane, His sweat became like great drops of blood (Lk. 22:44). His praying was so intense. Once He spent a whole night in prayer (Lk. 6:12). He had a habit of slipping off frequently into the wilderness to pray (Lk. 5:16). As someone has said "Like tourists look for sights to see, whenever they come to a new place, Jesus always looked for a quiet place to pray wherever He went." Jesus' example shows us how important prayer is. If He needed to pray so much, how much more you and I need to. Fight the battle against laziness then, and determine to be a man/woman of prayer at any cost.

September 20053. GOD USES EVEN THOSE WHO HAVE FAILEDPeter could become a compassionate apostle only after he had blundered and fallen into the sin of denying the Lord three times. It was certainly not God's perfect will for Peter to sin like that. But yet we see that God allowed it in order to do a work in Peter. It made him tender and sympathetic towards those who had failed in life.Jesus never sinned even once, and yet He was infinitely compassionate and merciful towards sinners. But with the rest of Adam's race, that has not been the case. Those who have never fallen into gross sin usually end up being hard and unmerciful and haughty towards sinners.When we look at the circumstances through which Peter fell into this gross sin, we see that God could have easily prevented him from even facing the temptation to deny the Lord. Yet God chose not to protect him from those moments of temptation.In John 18:15-18 we see that John and Peter followed Jesus to the court of the high-priest. Since John knew the high- priest, the doorkeeper let him in. But Peter could not go in. So John came and spoke to the doorkeeper and gained admission for Peter too. That looked like a good thing at that moment. But notice the fact that Peter would not have sinned that night, if John had not got Peter into that courtyard - for it was only inside there that Peter was questioned, and that he denied the Lord three times (See John 18:17,25,27).So we could ask the question, "Why did God allow that to happen? Why didn't He prevent Peter from gaining entry into the courtyard?" Was that a mistake on God's part? No. God in His sovereignty permitted John to get Peter inside, so that Peter could get an education through his failure. He could not have become the leader of the apostles and the leading evangelist of the early church without having completed this course in his education.Satan had his agents ready to tempt Peter, but he had to get God's permission to do that. But Jesus was praying for Peter that his faith would not fail in that moment of utter failure (Lk.22:31,32). And Jesus' prayer was answered. Peter came out of that experience a broken, compassionate man. Never again in his life would he be able to denounce sinners with harshness. Every time he was tempted to do that, he would remember his own failure and tone down his denunciations.God can make the very worst things that ever happened in your life to work for your very best, if you have faith. During the seven weeks before Pentecost, Peter may have wished many times that John had not gotten permission for him to enter the courtyard that fateful night, so that he would not have denied the Lord. But then he would not have been broken either, and he would have been unfit to preach the gospel to sinners on the day of Pentecost.We know that Peter still preached against sin, for he writes in his letter about following in Jesus' steps "who did no sin", and of "ceasing from sin" (1 Pet.2:2,22; 4:1,2). But now he preached with compassion. This was why he was given the privilege to open the door of the gospel to the Jews on the day of Pentecost, and also to the Gentiles in the house of Cornelius. God could have used James or John in either of those instances. But he didn't. He used Peter - the one who had failed miserably - for he could speak with greater compassion to wayward sinners than those others.David was another one like Peter. Once when he avoided going to the battlefield through laziness, he slipped up badly and fell into sin - a sin that became like a black mark against him for the rest of his life and for centuries thereafter (2 Sam.11:1-5). The Holy Spirit records, "David did what was right in the sight of the Lord, and had not turned aside from anything that He commanded him all the days of his life, except in the case of Uriah the Hittite." (1 Kings 15:5).Yet God used David's failure to break him and to make him write Psalm 51 - a portion of inspired Scripture that has blessed millions for many centuries, more than any other writing of David's. David could never have written that psalm if he had fallen into a lesser sin. His failure had to be great and deep and known publicly, so that he might be thoroughly humbled and broken. He was a broken man for the rest of his life.And Jesus even calls Himself the Son of David!!

September 20054. FEELING INFERIORScientists tell us that no two snowflakes anywhere in the world have the same patterns. Likewise, no two human beings anywhere in the world are completely alike.God has created infinite variety in the universe. This is what makes creation so wonderful and beautiful. How unimaginably boring life would have been if there had been no variety in the universe. Likewise, how uninteresting and prosaic life would have been if all human beings were exactly alike in temperament and personality.There is variety in the Body of Christ just as there is in the human body. At the same time, there is an organic unity among the various members. All the members are equally important and necessary, although their functions in the Body may be completely different. No member is more important than another. No one's ministry should exclude another's. When the Body operates with each member fulfilling his own special function, then alone will there be a powerful corporate presentation of Christ to the world.In Old Testament times, God often worked through individual prophets who were His representatives and mouthpieces. But not so now. Today, God works through the Body of Christ. God and Christ are to be represented to the world through the corporate working together of believers harmoniously in one Body. And for this purpose, no one believer is more important than another. Each member's gifts are necessary for the upbuilding of the Body and for its ministry to the world.A failure to recognize this as God's way can cause feelings of inferiority and superiority in the church. Paul speaks about these in 1 Corinthians 12.Paul speaks first to those who, feeling inferior, assume that their gift is not as necessary to the building up of the Body as another's."If the foot says, 'I am not a part of the body because I am not a hand', that does not make it any less a part of the body. And what would you think if you heard an ear say, 'I am not part of the body because I am only an ear, and not an eye'? Would that make it any less a part of the body? Suppose the whole body were an eye - then how would you hear? Or if your whole body were just one big ear, how could you smell anything? But that isn't the way God has made us. He has made many parts for our bodies and has put each part just where He wants it. What a strange thing a body would be if it had only one part! So He has made many parts, but still there is only one body" (1 Cor. 12:15-20-TLB).It is always harmful to compare ourselves with others in the Body of Christ - either favourably or unfavourably. Such comparisons can lead to pride - or discouragement and jealousy. When the foot begins to compare itself with the hand, it may say, "Well, I don't have as prominent a part in the body as the hand. I am usually covered over with socks and shoes, at the lowest end of the body, and hardly anyone ever notices my existence. The hand, however, is noticed by others every day. It is always busy doing something, whereas I am inactive most of the time." Once having compared itself thus, it is but a short step to discouragement and to the development of a spirit of complaining against God for having made it a foot instead of a hand. Such a spirit leads many a believer to bury his talent and do nothing what ever for the strengthening and good of the Body of Christ. The church of Jesus Christ suffers today because of multitudes of believers who wish they had some spectacular gift. Not having such a gift, they decide to do nothing.Having a grudge against God for not giving you the gift that you see someone else has, is only a short step away from jealousy; and jealousy kills fellowship. As the Bible says, "Wherever there is jealousy or selfish ambition, there will be disorder and every other kind of evil" (James. 3:16-TLB).If only we could see the Body of Christ, there would be absolutely no room for jealousy. In the human body, the foot has no problem being just a foot. It never desires to be anything other than a foot and it never dreams of becoming a hand. It is quite content to be a foot. It knows that God has made no mistake in making it a foot. It rejoices in being a foot; it rejoices equally in seeing what the hand can accomplish, even though it realizes that it can never accomplish anything similar.So will it be with all who have "seen" the Body of Christ. When you are envious of another, when you cannot rejoice wholeheartedly at seeing another member being greatly used of God, it is obvious that you have not understood this truth at all. Any member who lives in close communion with the Head will rejoice and be glad when another member of the Body is honoured (1 Cor. 12:26).There is no room for competition either, between one member and another in the Body of Christ. Co-operation, not competition, is the law of the Body.When you see another fulfilling some ministry ably, and you plan to show others that you can do just as good a job (if not better), then Self is obviously still in the centre of your life. If you were living in submission to the Head, you would never be competing with anyone in the Body. You would instead concentrate on doing your own specific job - and doing it well.If we believe in the perfect wisdom of God, we shall recognize that God knows best what gift to give each of us. There will then be no complaining, no discouragement and no jealous longing after another's gift.There is no need for anyone in the Body of Christ to feel inferior. All members of the Body may not be equal in terms of ability or talent, but all are equal in terms of usefulness to God in their own appointed place.We are called to be ourselves - radiating God's glory through the particular temperament, gift and talents that God has given us. There is much limitation in the church today, because believers do not bring into it their own special contribution. Vainly trying to imitate somebody else, they quench their own special gift, and as a result contribute nothing to the ministry of the Body.

October 20051. FEELING SUPERIORTo those who feel superior, Paul writes:"The eye can never say to the hand, 'I don't need you.' The head can't say to the feet, 'I don't need you.' And some of the parts that seem weakest and least important are really the most necessary......So God has put the body together in such a way that extra honour and care are given to those parts that might otherwise seem less important.....Now here is what I am trying to say: All of you together are the one body of Christ and each one of you is a separate and necessary part of it (1 Cor. 12:21-27-TLB).There are some conceited snobs in the church who feel they are more important than their fellow-believers. They consider their ministry to be more necessary to the Body than that of others. Of course they never express their feelings lest they be considered proud, but their actions and attitudes give them away. Such spiritual pride not only ruins them spiritually, but also rings the death-knell of true fellowship.The eye is a very important part of the human body and has a significant function to perform. But if (to continue the analogy) it despises the hand saying, "I don't need you", then it has misunderstood its function in the body altogether.So with anyone who considers his ministry more important than another's. Our hearts are so deceptive that we can easily fool ourselves into thinking that we are called to be spiritual leaders and prophets among God's people. Those who fall into this trap then covet to be elders in churches and leaders in Christian organizations. They feel superior to others and are like a cancer in the Body of Christ.No one is indispensable in God's work. When Elijah complained to God that he was the only one prophet standing true to God in the land of Israel, the Lord told him to go and anoint Elisha to replace him as prophet (1 Kings 19:14-16). Perhaps this was to teach Elijah that God would never be without men whom He could use. Even the great Elijah was not irreplaceable.No one is indispensable in Christ's Body.On the other hand, no one is dispensable either. The Bible says that all the members are necessary.But we have first to recognize that we are dispensable, before we can become truly indispensable. We are most needed in the Body of Christ when we have realised our nothingness. Whenever someone feels that God's work in a certain place will not carry on without him, the truth usually is that the work would be far better off without him!God's work is dependent on the corporate ministry of the Body of Christ - not on any one individual. In fact, the individual who tries to do everything himself is a positive hindrance to the work of God - for he leaves no room for others to function.The eye is an important organ, but if the whole body were just one big eye such a body would be quite useless. Thus, when a church or Christian organization centres around the ministry of one man (however gifted he may be), it ceases to be an expression of the Body of Christ. Such a group actually becomes a hindrance to the work of God. However impressive the statistics may be, churches that centre around one gifted leader or pastor, do not fulfill their God-ordained function. True Christian fellowship is impossible in such a situation.When one cell in the body grows into a size far beyond what God intended for it, it can only do so by crushing the life out of other cells in the process. This is cancer and, untreated it always kills the body.This, alas, is the situation in many Christian organizations and churches. The believers therein are not able to grow spiritually because of the overpowering personality of one man in their midst. They are like small mushrooms growing under the shade of a mighty oak tree, that seldom see the sunlight themselves.Let those who have an outstanding spiritual gift take note: You are more likely to hinder the growth of other believers than those with mediocre gifts. You are more likely to kill true fellowship than other less-talented brethren. Besides, you are in danger of making members of Christ's Body more dependent on yourself than on Christ the Head.If we do not allow others to fulfil their ministry, we violate one of the fundamental laws of the Body. The Bible exhorts everyone of us to regard others as more important than ourselves (Phil. 2:3). We may not be able, in all honesty, to consider everyone as more spiritual than ourselves, and the Bible does not urge false humility. What we are asked to do is to consider others as more important. Surely we can all do this - if we see our place and the place of others in the same body.This does not mean that all the gifts of the Spirit are of equal value to the upbuilding of the Body. The Bible itself tells us that some gifts are of greater value than others (1 Cor. 14) and we are told to "earnestly desire the greater gifts" (1 Cor. 12:31). All believers have a definite contribution to make to the ministry of the Body, but those who have been given a more useful gift by God (in His sovereignty) will naturally be able to make a more significant contribution. The fact that some have a more outstanding gift is not inconsistent with the fact of the equality of all believers - for equality does not mean uniformity.

October 20052. UNITY IN VARIETYThere is a God-ordained variety in the Body of Christ.God uses our different temperaments and gifts to present a balanced picture of Christ to the world. By ourselves, each of us can at best present only a distorted and unbalanced image of Christ. Any single person's ministry, by itself, can only produce unbalanced Christians. How thankful we have to be that there are others in the Body with different emphases and temperaments. For example, if two brethren are ministering the Word to the same group of believers, and one's emphasis is, "Don't be too sure that you are filled with the Holy Spirit, for you may be deceiving yourself", and the other brother's emphasis is, "Be sure you are filled with the Holy Spirit", on the surface they may appear to be contradicting each other. But both emphases are needed - so their ministries could be mutually complementary.In the Body of Christ, we can have the followers of Calvinistic and Arminian theology working together, each bringing their distinctive emphases - for both viewpoints are in the Bible. As Charles Simeon once said in this connection, "The truth is not in one extreme nor in the other. Much less is it in the middle. The truth is in both extremes held simultaneously." So, we need people presenting both extremes.Then again, there is room for 'outgoing' personalities as well as for shyer ones. Different temperaments can be mutually complementary. Some people may be over-cautious; never taking a step forward without much deliberation, weighing all the 'pros and cons', and wondering for a long time whether to move or not. Others are more carefree and tend to rush ahead enthusiastically, without thinking deeply about the consequences. Because both these (and other) kinds of personalities are found in the Body of Christ, there is a balance. If the Body consisted only of hesitant, deep- thinking personalities, progress might be too slow. Conversely, if the Body consisted only of impetuous enthusiasts, there might be too many unfinished projects.Each temperament has its strengths and weaknesses. A variety of people with a variety of temperaments, working together as Christians, can present a more complete and more accurate picture of Christ to the world. So we should not be wasting our time trying to make everyone in the Body like ourselves. We should allow each one to be himself. What we do need to concentrate on, is how our strengths could support another's weaknesses. His strengths could in turn support our weaknesses.By working together, Peter and John (men of different temperaments) brought more glory to God than they could ever have done independently. Paul and Timothy - strikingly different in their temperamental make-up - could yet labour together in the gospel and form a powerful team.There are brilliant intellectuals as well as those with mediocre minds in the church. Naturally, their presentations of the truth of God will vary. But neither category can despise or criticize the other, for both are equally needed in the Body, to present the gospel to a world consisting of intellectuals and non-intellectuals, philosophers and housewives, students and farmers, etc., God needed a genius and a scholar like Paul for His work as well as an unlearned fisherman like Peter. They had different styles of preaching the same good news, but each had a distinctive part to play, and neither could have done the work that God did through the other, just as ably.Conversion does not alter a man's intellectual capacities. Neither does it compel him to change his social status. The gospel does not eradicate the heterogeneous nature of society here on this earth, although social distinctions do become irrelevant in Christ. God had need for a wealthy man like Philemon as well as for Onesimus who was a servant in Philemon's house. Their social levels and standards of living remained unchanged, but each of them had a distinct contribution to make to the Body of Christ, that the other could never make; and so they could labour together in the gospel.God never intended the Body of Christ to be full of people who were exactly alike in every way - like motor cars turned out of a factory. No. The very ministry of the Body is dependent upon the variety of its members. There would have been stagnation and spiritual death if all were alike.Even our disagreements with one another can be used of God to deepen our fellowship and lead us on to spiritual maturity. Proverbs 27:17 says, " Iron sharpens iron. So one man sharpens another." Two "iron men" can sharpen each other instead of clashing with each other.Sometimes God places two people with different temperaments together in His work, and as they labour together, the sparks may fly between them, but this may be God's way of "sharpening" them. If one person is like iron and the other like clay, there will be no sparks and no sharpening either. Instead there will be the imprint of the iron on the clay - one strong-willed person's opinion forced on the weak-willed person. God's intention however is not that one person should force his views on another, but rather that both should learn from each other. We can disagree, but we can still be united, and still love one another. In fact, we can love one another more deeply in such cases.I believe God permits differences of opinion (on non- fundamental matters) between different members of the church so that there is greater opportunity for the exercise of Christian love. Loving one another would have been an easy matter if we all saw eye-to-eye on every matter. But when we disagree, our love is tested. So we need to thank God for disagreements that do not divide or disunite us.A Christian fellowship that boasts no differences of opinion is 'suspect'. The members of such a fellowship are either failing to think for themselves or being dominated by one strong-willed person.True Christian fellowship is forged and sharpened on the anvil of healthy, loving disagreements.

October 20053. FOUR GOLDEN RULES1. Receive all whom God has received"God has placed the members in the Body just as He desired...that there should be no division in the Body" (1 Cor.12:18, 25). God has raised up men at different times in different lands to restore a pure testimony for Him. But after those men of God died, their followers have made their groups exclusive and cultistic. But the body of Christ is larger than any group. And we must never forget that. The bride of Christ is found in many, many groups today. So we must seek for fellowship with all whom the Lord has accepted, even though we may not be able to work together with many of them, because of differences in interpretation of the Word of God.2. Treat every human being with dignity"With our tongue, we curse men, who have been made in the likeness of God. My brethren, these things ought not to be this way" (James 3:9, 10). Any word or action that degrades a human being is never from God. It is always from Satan who forever seeks to demean and degrade people. We are commanded to speak "with gentleness and respect" (1 Pet.3:15) to all people - whether they be our wives, our children, younger people, beggars or enemies. All men must be treated with dignity. For example, when giving a gift to a poorer brother, we must do so, without robbing him of his dignity as a human being. We must be his brother and not his benefactor.3. Be continually filled with the Holy Spirit"Be (being) filled with the Spirit" (Eph.5:18 - Literal). It is impossible to live the Christian life, as God wants us to, if we are not continually filled with the Holy Spirit. It is impossible to serve God as we should without being anointed with the Spirit and receiving His supernatural gifts. Jesus Himself needed to be anointed. The Holy Spirit has come to make us like Jesus in our personal lives as well as in our ministry (See 2 Cor.3:18). God fills us with the Spirit in order to conform us to the likeness of Christ in our character, and to equip us to serve as Jesus served. We do not have the same ministry that Jesus had, and so we won't be able to do what Jesus did in His ministry. But we can be as fully equipped to serve God as Jesus Himself was - to fulfill OUR OWN ministry. All that is required is an adequate thirst and faith, on our part, for rivers of living water to flow out through us (Jn.7:37-39). We must earnestly long for the gifts of the Spirit if we are to have them (1 Cor.14:1). Otherwise we will never have them. A church without the gifts of the Holy Spirit is like a man who may be living but who is deaf, blind, mute and lame - and therefore useless.4. Know God intimately"The people who know their God will be strong" (Dan.11:32) Today, God does not want us to know Him second-hand through others. He invites even the youngest believer to know Him personally (Heb.8:11). Jesus defined eternal life as knowing God and Jesus Christ personally (John 17:3). This was the greatest passion of Paul's life and must be our greatest passion too (Phil.3:10). One who desires to know God intimately, will have to listen to Him always. Jesus said that the only way man could keep himself spiritually alive was by listening to EVERY word that proceeded from God's mouth (Matt.4:4). He also said that to sit at His feet and listen to Him was the most important thing in the Christian life (Lk.10:42). We must develop the habit that Jesus had of listening to the Father from early morning every day (Isa.50:4), right through the day; and then to be in a listening attitude in the hours of night when we are asleep too - so that if we ever wake up from our sleep at night, we can say, "Speak, Lord, Your servant is listening" (1 Sam.3:10). Knowing God will make us overcomers in all situations - because God has a solution for every problem that we face - and if we listen to Him, He will tell us what that solution is.

October 20054. GOD LOOKS FOR A MAN OF CHARACTERJob was one of God's choice servants. God could point him out to Satan, as one man on earth who feared God in all his ways. "The Lord said to Satan, 'Have you considered My servant Job? For there is no one like him on the earth, a blameless and upright man, fearing God and turning away from evil.'" (Job 1:8). God says nothing about Job's intelligence or his talents or his wealth - for these have no value to God. He only points out his purity and his uprightness. As in the case of Jesus, it was Job's character and not his accomplishments or his ministry that delighted the heart of God. Even Satan has supernatural gifts and intelligence. He has Bible-knowledge too!! What God looks for however, is character. When God tests us, He tests our character - not our knowledge of the Bible. When God looks for a man whom He can boast in, whom He can point out to Satan, He looks for a man of character - a blameless and an upright man, one who fears God and hates evil. We may have a reputation among other believers for our spirituality. But can God, Who knows us through and through, point us out to Satan? Such a certificate as God gave Job is greater than any earthly honour that we can ever get. All the empty honour of Christendom too is as useless rubbish compared to that. So the most important question is not "What opinion do others have of my spirituality?" but rather "Can God point me out to Satan as one Whom He can boast in?"When God told Satan about Job, Satan said that Job was serving God because he had benefited and profited thereby. "Satan answered the Lord, 'Does Job fear God for nothing? Hast Thou not made a hedge about him and his house and all that he has, on every side? Thou hast blessed the work of his hands, and his possessions have increased in the land. But put forth Thy hand now and touch all that he has; he will surely curse Thee to Thy face.'" (Job 1:9-11). God refuted that charge and allowed Satan to test Job to find out for himself that his charge was not true. God did that because He knew Job's integrity. How about us? Do we serve God for material profit? Would God have to acknowledge that Satan was right, if Satan pointed to any of us as one who served God for personal gain? God had such confidence in Job that he could permit Satan to test him. Even though Job lost all his children and his property in one day, yet he continued to worship and serve God. He said, "Naked I came from my mother's womb, and naked I shall return there. The Lord gave and the Lord has taken away. Blessed be the name of the Lord." (Job 1:20-22). He knew that all that he had - children and property and even health itself - were God's free gifts to him and that God had every right to take these away when He so desired. One cannot truly worship God until one has forsaken all - that is, given up the right to possess anything as one's own.God then allowed Satan to go one step further and to afflict Job with boils from head to foot. Sickness is from Satan. But even that can be used by God to sanctify and perfect His servants.Satan's third step was to afflict Job through his wife. "Then Job's wife said to him, "Do you still hold fast your integrity? Curse God and die!" (Job 2:9). It can be quite a test of your sanctification, when your own wife turns against you and accuses you. If you have a difficult wife, instead of complaining of your lot in life and envying others who have godly wives, you could look at your circumstances as a means to your own sanctification. God tests you under those very circumstances to see if you qualify to get His certificate of approval. He tests you, when your wife shouts at you and taunts you, to see whether you qualify to be a true representative of Jesus Who was even called insane by His own relatives. The gospel record says, "Jesus' own people......went out to take custody of Him; for they were saying, 'He has lost His senses.'" (Mk.3:21). Jesus bore that insult with patience. We are called to follow Him and to represent Him.Satan's fourth step was to accuse Job through his preacher- friends (Job chapters 4 to 25). This was the hardest blow for Job to bear - because those preachers came to him and acted like prophets of God telling him that all his sicknesses were due to his secret sins. Little did those preachers realise that they were unconsciously acting as agents for the 'Accuser of the brethren' (Rev.12:10). But God permitted them to do that in order to purify Job.

October 20055. TRUE WORSHIP INVOLVES OBEDIENCE AND SACRIFICEIn Genesis 22 the paragraph begins with the phrase, "After these things.... ." As we look at the circumstances that immediately precede this hour of testing, we find Abraham in a triumphant position. The heathen had come to him and said, "Abraham, we've been watching your life and we know that God is with you in all that you do" (Gen. 21:22). No doubt they had heard of the miraculous way in which Sarah conceived, and were convinced that God was with this family. Ishmael had been sent away. Isaac was now the darling of Abraham's heart. Abraham stood in grave danger, at this time, of losing his first love and devotion for God. And so God tested him again, and told him to offer up Isaac as a sacrifice.But Abraham had ears to hear, and a heart that was willing to obey anything that God commanded. He rose up early the next morning and went forth to obey God (v. 3). The record does not tell us what the old patriarch went through, during the previous night, after God had spoken to him. I am sure he did not sleep that night. He must have kept awake and gone and looked at his beloved son again and again; and the tears must have rolled down his eyes as he thought of what he had to do to him. How difficult it must have been for Abraham to offer up the son of his old age. But he was willing to obey God at any cost. Fifty years or so, earlier, he had put his hand to the plough when God called him in Ur; and he would not now look back.There was no limit to his obedience and no end to his willingness to sacrifice for his God. No wonder he became the friend of God.There was faith in Abraham's heart as he went up to sacrifice Isaac, that God would somehow raise his son from the dead. Hebrews 11:19 tells us that. God had already given Abraham a foretaste of resurrection-power in his own body and in Sarah's, through the birth of Isaac. Surely it would be no problem for such a God to bring back to life an Isaac who was slain on the altar. And so Abraham tells his servants when leaving them at the foot of Mount Moriah, "I and the lad will go yonder and worship and (we will both) come (back) again to you" (v. 5). That was a word of faith. He believed that Isaac would come back with him. Notice too that he tells his servants, "We are going to worship God." He is not complaining that God is requiring too much from him, neither is he boasting about the marvelous sacrifice that he is about to make for God. No. Abraham did not belong to the category of those who subtly inform others about the sacrifices they make for God. Abraham said he was going to worship his God. And there we understand something of the real meaning of worship. Remember how Jesus once said, "Abraham rejoiced to see My day; and he saw it and was glad" (John 8:56). Surely it must have been here on Mount Moriah that Abraham saw the day of Christ. In prophetic vision, the aged patriarch saw in his own action, a picture (faint though it be) of that day when God the Father Himself would lead His only begotten Son up Calvary's hill and offer Him up as a sacrifice for the sins of mankind. And that day on Mount Moriah, Abraham knew something of what it would cost the heart of God to save a wayward world. He came to a place of intimate fellowship with the heart of God that morning. Yes, he worshipped God - not just with beautiful words and hymns, but through costly obedience and sacrifice.A deep and intimate knowledge of God can come only through such obedience. We may accumulate plenty of accurate theological information in our minds; but real spiritual knowledge can come only when we give up everything to God. There is no other way. Abraham was being tested here as to whether he would love the Giver or His gifts more. Isaac was undoubtedly the gift of God, but Abraham was in danger of having an inordinate affection for his son. Isaac was becoming an idol who would cloud Abraham's spiritual vision. And so God intervened to save Abraham from such a tragedy.God was teaching Abraham on Mount Moriah the blessedness of being emptied of everything and possessing nothing. Before that day, Abraham had held Isaac with a possessive spirit. But after he laid his son on that altar and gave him up to God, he never possessed Isaac again. Yes, it is true that, God gave Isaac back to Abraham, and Abraham had him at home. But he never possessed Isaac as his own again. Isaac, thenceforth, was God's. And Abraham held Isaac as a steward holds the property of his master. In other words, he had Isaac, but he never again possessed him.This is to be our attitude to the things of this world. We can have them and use them. But we are never to cling to any one of them. Everything we own should have been placed on the altar and given completely to God. We must possess nothing. We can then keep only that which God gives back to us from the altar - and we are to keep even such things only as stewards. Only then can we truly worship God.This principle does not apply to material things alone. It applies to spiritual gifts as well. It is possible for us to hold even the gifts of the Holy Spirit in a possessive way. Was not Isaac the gift of God? Why couldn't Abraham hold on to him then? To have to send away Ishmael was understandable, because he was not the promised seed. But Isaac's case was different. He was God's gift, produced in God's strength. Why should Abraham have to give him up as well?And so we may argue too. We can understand the need to give up our attachment to the things of the world. But surely, we feel, we can hold on to the gifts that God Himself has given us. But God says, "No. Lay even your spiritual gifts (which I have given you) on the altar and give them back to me, lest they fill your life and cloud your vision of Me, the Giver." God would have us delivered from any inordinate attachment to even the most sacred gifts of the Spirit that He has given us. He wants us to sacrifice even the "Isaacs" that we have received from Him and not cling to any one of them. Isn’t it this that many believers have not seen? They have given up their Ishmaels but not their Isaacs. They have given up sinful things. But the gifts that God gave them they are now using to glorify themselves - like the prodigal son, who took his father's gifts and spent them on himself.What is it that fills our vision - our gifts and our ministry, or the Giver Himself? This is what we need to ask ourselves constantly. We are most in danger when God has blessed us much and used us greatly. It is so easy at such times to lose the vision of God. We need to go back to the altar on Mount Moriah again and again and give our all to God repeatedly. True worship begins when the Giver Himself fills our hearts and our vision. Only then can we safely use His gifts. Otherwise we shall abuse God's gifts and prostitute them to selfish uses. Isn’t this the reason why there is so much misuse of the gifts of the Holy Spirit in our day?

November 20052. WATCH YOUR DECISIONSEvery day we make decisions concerning various matters. We make decisions in relation to how we are going to spend our money or our spare time, or how to speak to, or about someone, or how to write a particular letter, or how to react to another's behaviour, or how much time to spend in studying the Word or in prayer or in serving the church etc., We react to the actions and words and behaviour of people around us from morning till night. We may not be realising it, but we make at least a hundred decisions every day - and in each of those decisions we decide either to please ourselves or to please God. Many of our actions are not the result of conscious decisions. But even then, we do them in one of these two ways - either seeking to please ourselves or to glorify God. Our unconscious actions are determined by the way we make our conscious decisions. Finally, it is the sum total of these decisions that determine whether we become spiritual or carnal. Think of the millions of decisions that we have made ever since we were first converted. Those who have consciously and consistently chosen to deny their self-will many times each day and to do the will of God, have become spiritual. On the other hand, those who have rejoiced merely in the forgiveness of their sins, and who therefore chose to please themselves most of the time have remained carnal. Each person's decisions have determined what he has finally become. You are today as humble and as holy and as loving as you yourself have chosen to be, through the thousands of decisions that you have made in the various situations of life in past years. Spirituality is not something that comes through one encounter with God. It is the result of choosing the way of self-denial and of doing God's will CONSISTENTLY day after day, week after week, and year after year.Consider the spiritual state of two brothers (both converted to Christ on the same day), ten years after their conversion. One is now a mature brother with spiritual discernment, to whom God can commit much responsibility in the church. The other is still a child, without discernment, and needing to be fed and encouraged by others constantly. What is it that has made such a difference between the two? The answer is: The little decisions that they took during each day of the ten years of their Christian life. If they continue on in the same way, in another 10 years, the difference between them will be even more pronounced. And in eternity, their differing degrees of glory will be as different as the light emitted by a 2000-watt bulb and a 5- watt bulb!! "One star differs from another star in glory" (1 Cor.15:41).If you determine to be faithful from now on, you will have no regrets in eternity, no matter how much you may have failed in your past life up until now. Take life seriously then. Think of how Jesus lived in the days of His flesh in Nazareth, and follow His example. Say to yourself, "I have been born on this earth, to DENY my own will, and to DO the will of my Heavenly Father". Let Jesus alone be your Example. You have a calling over your life and you cannot afford to lose that, no matter what else you may lose on this earth. Think often of the day when you will have to give an account of your life at the judgment-seat of Christ. So forget the blunders that you have made in life. Repent radically of your sins and be wholehearted in the days to come. God forgives you and blots out your past. Don't mope over your failures now, or you will be a drifter in the future too. The memory of your failures will help you to recognise that you are what you are only by the grace of God. It will also enable you to keep your face in the dust at all times before God. Determine that you will become a true man/woman of God.

November 2005 3. REST AND FELLOWSHIPThe Old Testament sabbath was a picture of rest for God's people in the new covenant (Heb. 4:9,10). It is rest in God that has to come first before we can do anything of eternal value.When God made Adam on the sixth day, He sanctified the very next day as a day of rest. Though it was chronologically the seventh day, yet for Adam, it was his very first day. The law, which came 2500 years later, stated "Six days shalt thou work and the seventh day thou shalt rest". But for Adam God instituted first a day of rest and fellowship and then six days of work. That is grace. Under grace, the "day of rest" comes first. We have to enter into rest before we can serve the Lord. Then every day of our earthly life can be a sabbath. And that is God's intention for us.When the Pharisees asked Jesus why Moses permitted divorce under the law, He replied that it was a temporary provision made for man as long as his heart was hard (Matt. 19:8). But, Jesus said that it was not God's perfect will from the beginning. Many things in the law were part of God's permissive will - not His perfect will. But now that the new covenant has been established, God desires that we live in His perfect will - as He intended man to live "from the beginning" (Matt. 19:8). And so for us, as for Adam, it is this rest that must come first. Life must be a perpetual sabbath of rest in God.Only when we enter into rest can we joyfully testify that God's commandments are not burdensome (1 Jn. 5:3). Where God's commandments are considered to be a burden, and the message of denying oneself and obedience to all the commandments is considered to be bondage, it is evident that such a person has not yet come under the yoke of Jesus. He is still labouring under his own yoke, under the law.In the Outer Court of the tabernacle and even in the Holy Place, there is plenty of activity. But in the Most Holy Place, inside the veil, there is no activity - only fellowship. Even service for God flows out of that fellowship. That is the difference between Old Testament service and New Testament ministry. This is clearly illustrated by Martha and Mary, in the incident described in Lk. 10:38-42. Mary was (symbolically speaking), in the Most Holy Place - at rest, fellowshipping with the Lord. Martha was in unrestful service ("for the Lord") in the Outer Court. Jesus said that what Mary had chosen was the one thing everyone needed.The veil has now been rent by Jesus and we can boldly enter and dwell in the Most Holy Place - of fellowship with the Father and His Son Jesus Christ, all our days. If only we could see this: That what God desires from man first of all, is not service, not Bible-reading, not fasting and prayer, etc., but fellowship.Adam was created by God in His image - not because God wanted a gardener for Eden, but because He wanted someone with whom He could have fellowship. God did not save us out of the pit of sin in order that we might serve Him, but rather in order that we might have fellowship with Him. It is due to a lack of understanding of this, that multitudes of believers are weary and heavy laden today, just like Martha.At the age of 95, having walked with God for over 65 years, the apostle John decided to write a letter - inspired by the Holy Spirit. The theme of his letter was 'fellowship' (1 Jn. 1:3). Having seen churches and leaders who had left their first love (Rev. 2:4) and who now had a name that they were alive (with all their varied Christian activities) but who were in fact dead in God's sight (Rev. 3:1), John certainly saw that the great need was to lead Christians into the joy of fellowship with the Father and His Son Jesus Christ, inside the rent veil.There may be joy found in several fields of activity. Some find it in sport, some in music, some in their profession, and some even in Christian work. But the purest joy in the universe is to be found only in fellowship with the Father (1 Jn. 1:4). The psalmist says, "In Thy presence is fullness of joy" (Psa. 16:11). This was the "joy set before Him" that made Jesus willing to endure the cross daily (Heb. 12:2). The fellowship with the Father was Jesus' most prized possession. He did not value anything else in the universe in comparison with that. This fellowship was what Jesus knew would be broken on Calvary, when for three hours He would have to endure the agonies of an eternal hell for lost humanity (Matt. 27:45). Then the Father would have to forsake Him and the fellowship that He enjoyed with the Father from all eternity would be broken for three hours. He dreaded that break of fellowship so greatly that He sweated great drops of blood in Gethsemane. The cup that He prayed to be removed from Him was just this: A break of fellowship with His Father.If only we could see this and be gripped by it! How lightly we speak and sing about following Jesus! To follow Jesus means to value fellowship with the Father like He did. Sin would then become exceedingly sinful to us, for it breaks our fellowship with the Father. An unloving attitude towards another human being would not even be tolerated, for it would break our fellowship with the Father, etc.May the Lord give us revelation so that we see clearly that true Christianity is nothing less than a life of unbroken fellowship with a loving Father in heaven.

November 2005 4. Three Levels Of Spiritual DevelopmentIn John's gospel, Jesus used the symbol of water to describe three levels of spiritual development possible through the Holy Spirit:Level 1: In John 3:5, He spoke of being "born of water and the Spirit". This is "the cup of salvation" (Psa.116:13), with which we begin our Christian lives. With this cup of water, we are cleansed and brought into God's kingdom as his children.Level 2: In John 4:14, Jesus went further and spoke of that cup becoming "a well (spring) of water". This is a deeper experience of the Holy Spirit, where all our inner longings are met by Him, so that we live in perpetual victory and joy, lacking nothing. A man who has a well in his own compound is not dependent on the city corporation's water supply. No outsider can turn off his water supply, for he has the source of water within his own compound. This is how it is with the Christian who has found the secret of perpetual abundance in Christ. No-one outside of him can cut off his supply of joy or peace or victory (Jn.16:22).Level 3: In John 7:38, Jesus went still further and said that the well would now become a river, and many rivers, flowing out of the believer. This is a picture of overflowing abundance. Such a believer is able to quench the thirst of many needy people around him. Whereas a well satisfies only our own longings, rivers of living water make us a blessing to many people, wherever we go.The blessing with which God blessed Abraham was, "I will bless you....and in you ALL THE FAMILIES of the earth shall be blessed" (Gen.12:2,3). This is the blessing that can now be ours through the Holy Spirit (Gal.3:14).When God blesses us to the point of rivers flowing out of us, many families in many parts of the country and even in the whole world can be blessed through us.Only a cursed person hurts and injures other people wherever he goes. This is how most of the children of Adam live. They only know how to wish evil for others, hurt them with their rude remarks and defile them with their backbiting. Unfortunately even many "believers" live like this, proving thereby, either that their conversion was false or that they have backslidden to the point of having lost their salvation.The good news of the gospel is that we can be saved from such a miserable existence. We can now have rivers of living water flowing out through us constantly, and be a blessing to every family that we meet.We can be merciful to others just as God has been merciful to us.We can release others just as God has released us.We can bless others just as God has blessed us.We can give freely to others just as God has freely given to us.We can be large-hearted to others just as God has been to us.It will be a good thing if all of us make that decision today - never to pass on anything about another that will hurt him or his reputation - and keep that decision, for the rest of our lives.