Thursday, February 25, 2016

Impossible to Keep the Law

For whoever keeps the entire law, yet fails in one point, is guilty of breaking it all. (James 2:10 HCSB)
For no one will be justified in His sight by the works of the law, because the knowledge of sin comes through the law. (Romans 3:20 HCSB)
What should we say then? Is the law sin? Absolutely not! On the contrary, I would not have known sin if it were not for the law. For example, I would not have known what it is to covet if the law had not said, Do not covet. (Romans 7:7 HCSB)
For God has done what the law, weakened by the flesh, could not do. By sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, he condemned sin in the flesh, in order that the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not according to the flesh but according to the Spirit. (Romans 8:3-4 ESV)
Why then was the law given? It was added because of transgressions until the Seed to whom the promise was made would come. The law was put into effect through angels by means of a mediator. (Galatians 3:19 HCSB)
What does all this mean? Even though the Gentiles were not trying to follow God's standards, they were made right with God. And it was by faith that this took place. But the people of Israel, who tried so hard to get right with God by keeping the law, never succeeded. Why not? Because they were trying to get right with God by keeping the law instead of by trusting in him. They stumbled over the great rock in their path. (Romans 9:30-32 NLT)

The ten commandments are not for us to keep, because it is impossible for us to keep the law.

Israel saw the great power that the LORD used against the Egyptians, so the people feared the LORD, and they believed in the LORD and in his servant Moses. (Exodus 14:31 ESV)

The Torah consisted of 365 negative commands and 248 positive commands, giving a total of 613 commands.

Wednesday, February 24, 2016

Science and Technology in the Millennium

I always wonder what will happen to Science and Technology in the Millennium. Since we have the Creator Himself among us, do we still need to do research?

Then I recall the time of Moses and the Israelites in the wilderness. Moses spoke to God face to face and the Israelites were travelling by day guided by the pillar of cloud and by night by the pillar of fire. But did God told them about electricity or any advance technology? He did not even teach them about iron, which would have been very useful just a few centuries down the road, to defeat the Canaanites in the plains (Judges 1:19) and the Philistines (1 Samuel 13:19).

Tuesday, February 23, 2016

Christianity's 3G

We have 3G and 4G in mobile technology. Now we are going for 5G. But in God's eternal plan for salvation, there is only 3G, which will sum up the whole of Christianity.

Guilt. Grace. Gratitude.

Acknowledgement:
The terms "guilt, grace and gratitude" were taken from "The Good News We Almost Forgot" by Kevin DeYoung page 17.

The law revealed our guilt.
Why then was the law given? It was added because of transgressions until the Seed to whom the promise was made would come. The law was put into effect through angels by means of a mediator. (Galatians 3:19 HCSB)
For no one can ever be made right with God by doing what the law commands. The law simply shows us how sinful we are. (Romans 3:20 NLT)
So then, the law was our guardian until Christ came, in order that we might be justified by faith. (Galatians 3:24 ESV)

The penalty of the law was removed by grace.
But now we are released from the law, having died to that which held us captive, so that we serve in the new way of the Spirit and not in the old way of the written code. (Romans 7:6 ESV)
For sin will have no dominion over you, since you are not under law but under grace. (Romans 6:14 ESV)

We uphold the law out of gratitude.
Do we then nullify the Law through faith? May it never be! On the contrary, we establish the Law. (Romans 3:31 NASB)
For Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone who believes. (Romans 10:4 ESV, NASB, HCSB)

Thursday, February 18, 2016

God's Promise of Protection

Three times in the year shall all your males appear before the LORD God, the God of Israel. For I will cast out nations before you and enlarge your borders; no one shall covet your land, when you go up to appear before the LORD your God three times in the year. (Exodus 34:23-24 ESV)

Some miracles of God went unnoticed because they were not spectacular.

All the males of Israel has to go to Jerusalem three times a year. Yet we noted in history as well as in the Bible that during these period, Israel was not attacked by any foreign country. God had kept His promise to Israel.

Taken from this website:
QUOTE
Thomas Horne once noted that "it is a well known fact, that the Jews constantly attended the ceremonies without any fear of danger, and that their most vigilant enemies never invaded them or injured them during these sacred seasons" (Introduction to the Critical Study and Knowledge of the Holy Scriptures, Philadelphia: J. Whetham & Son, 1841, II, p. 121). He contended that this constituted a "manifest proof of the divine origin of their religion."
UNQUOTE

Who is like our God, the God of Abraham, Isaac and Israel, the true and living God?

Saturday, February 6, 2016

Sound Wisdom

Fear of the LORD is the foundation of wisdom. Knowledge of the Holy One results in good judgment. (Proverbs 9:10 NLT)

"Nearly all the wisdom we possess, that is to say, true and sound wisdom, consists of two parts: the knowledge of God and of ourselves. But while joined by many bonds, which one precedes and brings forth the other is not easy to discern." John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion (I:i.1)

one thing I know, that, whereas I was blind, now I see. (John 9:25b KJV)

Wednesday, February 3, 2016

Three Requests

And he said, Thy name shall be called no more Jacob, but Israel: for as a prince hast thou power with God and with men, and hast prevailed. (Genesis 32:28 KJV)

And when he had removed him, he raised up unto them David to be their king; to whom also he gave testimony, and said, I have found David the son of Jesse, a man after mine own heart, which shall fulfil all my will. (Acts 13:22 KJV)

Elias was a man subject to like passions as we are, and he prayed earnestly that it might not rain: and it rained not on the earth by the space of three years and six months. (James 5:17 KJV)

When I was young, way back in 1979, I made three prayer request. I asked for the perseverance of Jacob, the heart of David and the power of Elijah.