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Episodes
Monday Sep 11, 2023
Monday Sep 11, 2023
Romans 12: Living Life
Study 11: Gift of Giving
And now we have a gift which echoes that of God the gift-giver – the gift of giving! When we give to others, contributing to those in need, we are to give generously and liberally. I wonder if that describes your giving? Again, some people have this wonderful gift – they are able to give just like that – generously and liberally. Yet, all Christians are to give generously because that is how God gives good gifts – generously and abundantly.
Jesus said in Matthew 6:3-4 “But when you give to the needy, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing, so that your giving may be in secret. Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you.”
We are not to give to others in need in the hope of getting something in return for that help. Giving to others is for the benefit of the person being helped and not to be for our own benefit? Does that describe you when you give or when you are the receiver of somebody else’s generous giving to you? Too often we don’t give generously and use the excuse of it being poor stewardship of our money as the reason not to give generously to those in need.
If you are in need and somebody offers to help you generously, how do you react? Do you accept with humility and a grateful heart, giving thanks to God for His provision through other people? Or, in your hour of need, are you too proud to accept the help of God as He uses other people as His hands and feet? Too often we can hinder the work of God in our lives because we are too proud to accept help when it is offered.
Giving – go and give generously to somebody in need today and every day!
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Sunday Sep 10, 2023
Sunday Sep 10, 2023
Psalm 10
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10:1 Why do you stand far off, Yahweh?
Why do you hide yourself in times of trouble?
10:2 In arrogance, the wicked hunt down the weak.
They are caught in the schemes that they devise.
10:3 For the wicked boasts of his heart’s cravings.
He blesses the greedy, and condemns Yahweh.
10:4 The wicked, in the pride of his face,
has no room in his thoughts for God.
10:5 His ways are prosperous at all times.
He is haughty, and your laws are far from his sight.
As for all his adversaries, he sneers at them.
10:6 He says in his heart, “I shall not be shaken.
For generations I shall have no trouble.”
10:7 His mouth is full of cursing, deceit, and oppression.
Under his tongue is mischief and iniquity.
10:8 He lies in wait near the villages.
From ambushes, he murders the innocent.
His eyes are secretly set against the helpless.
10:9 He lurks in secret as a lion in his ambush.
He lies in wait to catch the helpless.
He catches the helpless, when he draws him in his net.
10:10 The helpless are crushed.
They collapse.
They fall under his strength.
10:11 He says in his heart, “God has forgotten.
He hides his face.
He will never see it.”
10:12 Arise, Yahweh!
God, lift up your hand!
Don’t forget the helpless.
10:13 Why does the wicked person condemn God,
and say in his heart, “God won’t call me into account?”
10:14 But you do see trouble and grief.
You consider it to take it into your hand.
You help the victim and the fatherless.
10:15 Break the arm of the wicked.
As for the evil man, seek out his wickedness until you find none.
10:16 Yahweh is King forever and ever!
The nations will perish out of his land.
10:17 Yahweh, you have heard the desire of the humble.
You will prepare their heart.
You will cause your ear to hear,
10:18 to judge the fatherless and the oppressed,
that man who is of the earth may terrify no more.
As read by Ian Wakeham
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Sunday Sep 10, 2023
Sunday Sep 10, 2023
Romans 12: Living Life
Study 10: Gift of Encouragement
Now we come to perhaps one of the most amazing gifts – encouraging! Why is it amazing? Because of the impact it can have on the receivers of encouragement! This could mean anything from encouraging to exhorting to comforting to counselling to rebuking gently. The encourager is to build people up in their faith and life with words of warning, comforting words or a sign or gift of appreciation. The gift of encouraging can be done in the gifts so far in this lift: prophecy, preaching, serving, or teaching as well as the gift in this list to come: giving!
Encouragement can be done from the platform to many people at the same time. However more often than not, it is as one person interacts with another person, individual to individual. Encouragers urge people to respond rightly to God. Encouragers strengthen the weak and comfort those who are in sorrow. Paul himself had a great encourager on his ministry team – Barnabus (Acts 4:36; Acts 9:26ff)! If you are a counsellor in your church, you are exhibiting your gift of encouragement. Are you aware of that? WOW!
Oh how the church needs encouragers! A quiet encouraging word to that teacher or preacher you just heard in your church, or the music leaders – anybody! Your pastor or church leader would appreciate a kind word or a gift from you.
I can tell you from personal experience, that I get more verbal encouragement from those who are not Christian than I do from those who are self-professed Christians. But it should not be that way! Again, every Christian can encourage somebody else – even without the specific gift of encouragement. As we looked at in verse 5, as Christians, we belong to each other, so let each of us be practical in our encouragement of each other! Perhaps the next person you speak to will need a word of encouragement! What will you do? Encourage that person or simply ignore them? Who are your encouragers? Have you made sure they know how much you appreciate their encouragement of you?
Of course, God the Holy Spirit is also the great encourager – always urging us and encouraging us to live obedient lives worth of Jesus Christ whom we follow. Will you listen to His encouragement of you, as He urges you to go encourage somebody else? Or will you ignore His encouraging voice to do so?
Let each of us encourage at least one person a day.
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Saturday Sep 09, 2023
Saturday Sep 09, 2023
Romans 12: Living Life
Study 09: Gift of Teaching
How is your church doing at teaching the Gospel truths? How, if you are a teacher, going about it? Teaching is different from preaching. Are you aware of that? While preaching is expressing the mind of God to people, teaching is also training and taking a person or people on a journey from one point to another. That could be a teacher in Bible college, a Sunday School, a home group or other small group as well as one to one discipleship. Teaching is leading people into understanding God’s word.
Calvin describes a bible teacher somebody “who forms and builds the Church by the word of truth.” Does that signify your experience of teaching – by others you hear or even yourself?
Teaching is part of the Great Commission expressed by Jesus in Matthew 28:18-20. So everybody who is a Christian is at some point is to do some kind of teaching - as that is part of evangelism. Evangelism is for all Christians to do – of one kind or another.
Of course some preaching can also be teaching. Teaching is interpreting the Bible to make it understood to both the individual and a group of people. That is expository Bible teaching which is also preaching…
But just because somebody is a gifted teacher, or indeed also a preacher, we are to test the Bible for ourselves. Even if you think that Bible teacher is amazing, test what that person says. Analyse it for yourself and don’t be afraid to disagree with the teacher. Even the finest of Bible teachers would want you to be like that! If a teacher insists that they are right, and there is no discussion about it, then be very wary. In Romans 16:7, Paul writes this about teachers “I urge you, brothers and sisters, to watch out for those who cause divisions and put obstacles in your way that are contrary to the teaching you have learned. Keep away from them.”
Conversely, how about next time going up to a teacher, talking to them and giving them some encouragement. But more about encouragement in our next study!
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Friday Sep 08, 2023
Friday Sep 08, 2023
Psalm 108
108:1 My heart is steadfast, God.
I will sing and I will make music with my soul.
108:2 Wake up, harp and lyre! I will wake up the dawn.
108:3 I will give thanks to you, Yahweh, among the nations.
I will sing praises to you among the peoples.
108:4 For your loving kindness is great above the heavens.
Your faithfulness reaches to the skies.
108:5 Be exalted, God, above the heavens!
Let your glory be over all the earth.
108:6 That your beloved may be delivered, save with your right hand, and answer us.
108:7 God has spoken from his sanctuary:
"In triumph, I will divide Shechem, and measure out the valley of Succoth.
108:8 Gilead is mine. Manasseh is mine.
Ephraim also is my helmet. Judah is my scepter.
108:9 Moab is my wash pot. I will toss my sandal on Edom. I will shout over Philistia."
108:10 Who will bring me into the fortified city? Who has led me to Edom?
108:11 Haven't you rejected us, God?
You don't go forth, God, with our armies.
108:12 Give us help against the enemy, for the help of man is vain.
108:13 Through God, we will do valiantly.
For it is he who will tread down our enemies.
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Friday Sep 08, 2023
Friday Sep 08, 2023
Romans 12: Living Life
Study 08: Gift of Serving
Did you know serving is a gift? Wow! Is this serving only a gift for some people or for all people? Some people do have a gift of serving and are particularly adept at doing it! However, serving is for all Christians – whether they specifically have this gift or not!
This serving is by offering assistance to other and in that way, we also serve God. We are to serve wholeheartedly, not just other Christians, but all others including our enemies – those that despise and ridicule us. Serving others is a way of loving others. Serving is love in action. Serving is love getting it’s hands and feet dirty in service of others.
When we as Christians serve and help others, we are emulating of course the greatest servant of all, Jesus Christ. For it is through serving, that the Christian Disciple reflects the greatest servant of all - Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ came to serve and to give his life for others.
As Jesus said in Mark 10:45 For even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.
The Christian life is not to be static or inactive, but rather it is to be dynamic and active. The word ‘servant’ is used at least 500 times in its various derivations. Spiritual growth comes from serving, rather than being served. This is because what ever is given in service of God and others, faith grows and Jesus Christ gives back even more. Serving others is a sign that you, as a Christian Disciple, trust God and are having faith in Him.
When you, as a disciple and partaker of Jesus Christ, serve in any capacity, then God’s honour is released. This is done because service shows the beauty and glory of Jesus Christ to those being served and to those watching. That is to be our motive for service. Serving is never about what you can get out of it. When that is the motive, God is patently not glorified. God’s glory and supremacy is the goal of all those who would call themselves a Christian Disciple.
So go … serve. As Christians, we are all commanded to serve God.
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Thursday Sep 07, 2023
Thursday Sep 07, 2023
Psalm 127
A Song of Ascents. By Solomon
1 Unless the LORD builds the house, its builders labor in vain.
Unless the LORD watches over the city, the watchmen stand guard in vain.
2 In vain you rise early and stay up late, toiling for food to eat
- for he grants sleep to those he loves.
3 Sons are a heritage from the LORD,
children a reward from him.
4 Like arrows in the hands of a warrior are sons born in one's youth.
5 Blessed is the man whose quiver is full of them.
They will not be put to shame when they contend with their enemies in the gate.
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Thursday Sep 07, 2023
Thursday Sep 07, 2023
Romans 12: Living Life
Study 07: Gift of Prophecy
Now Paul comes to the expression of the Roman Christians faith – their gifts! First of all we have prophecy! Much debate is made of what Paul means here by this word “prophecy!”
Calvin’s opinion is that Paul means any one skilfully and wisely performed the office of an interpreter in explaining the will & mind of God. For example, preaching. That is in his own words “hardly anything else than the right understanding of the Scripture, and the peculiar faculty of explaining it, inasmuch as all the ancient prophecies and all the oracles of God have been completed in Christ and in his gospel.”
Others insist that prophecy is the prediction of future events as pre-thought by the mind of God, such as occurred at the beginning of the church and recorded for us in the New Testament. Yet others, would insist that prophecy was only those writing what we have as the New Testament today, and that this gift of prophecy has expired and is no longer in use for today.
I am of the mind that it is both the correct explanation of God’s mind in preaching and the speaking of future events… Whether we preach or predict, we prophecy and Paul exhorts his readers, the original and also us today, to use our faith to speak God’s mind and will. That is what the prophets of the Old Testament did – revealed God’s mind and will to the people.
That is our job today too – revealing God’s mind and will to people – not just in preaching and in prophecy, but also in evangelism – telling others what Jesus, the Son of God, did in his birth, life, death, resurrection and ascension. Preaching and prophecy are gifts from God and are the outworks of faith of the believers who have those gifts.
Tomorrow – another gift - serving!!
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Wednesday Sep 06, 2023
Wednesday Sep 06, 2023
Psalm 6
neither discipline me in your wrath.
6:2 Have mercy on me, Yahweh, for I am faint.
Yahweh, heal me, for my bones are troubled.
6:3 My soul is also in great anguish.
But you, Yahweh-how long?
6:4 Return, Yahweh.
Deliver my soul, and save me for your loving kindness' sake.
6:5 For in death there is no memory of you.
In Sheol, who shall give you thanks?
6:6 I am weary with my groaning.
Every night I flood my bed. I drench my couch with my tears.
6:7 My eye wastes away because of grief.
It grows old because of all my adversaries.
6:8 Depart from me, all you workers of iniquity,
for Yahweh has heard the voice of my weeping.
6:9 Yahweh has heard my supplication.
Yahweh accepts my prayer.
6:10 May all my enemies be ashamed and dismayed.
They shall turn back, they shall be disgraced suddenly.
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Wednesday Sep 06, 2023
Wednesday Sep 06, 2023
Romans 12: Living Life
Study 06: Gifted Graciously!
As we saw in our previous study, part of the Christian life is that each of us has special abilities and gifts! Paul uses the illustration of the human body! Your body is made up of many parts, each with a distinct purpose and function! So it is with the Church – Christ’s body! We have these gifts, each of us, because of God’s amazing grace toward us!
All Christian Disciples have Spiritual Gifts, for “in his grace, God has given us different gifts for doing certain things well.” (Romans 12:6). God the Holy Spirit, through His infinite wisdom, mercy and grace bestows these gifts that belong to Him, upon Christian Disciples! What is the purpose of these gifts? These gifts are to be used primarily to bring glory to God and to extend His Kingdom here on earth! They are opportunities for Christian Disciples to serve other people. If these gifts are not being used for God’s purposes, then they are meaningless.
If each of us is serving as we ought, using the gifts and talents that God has given, then God is being praised and His kingdom here on earth being extended. We are one body – the Church! We belong to each other – even if we don’t particularly want to be! That is connected with our previous study about each person thinking of themselves appropriately – not too highly and not too lowly.
So each of us has gifts, given by God freely to those who are following Him. We have them due to His generous grace upon each of us. WOW!
We start looking at each of the gifts in this list in our next study! See you then!