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Episodes
Monday Mar 12, 2018
Monday Mar 12, 2018
Think Spot - 12th March, 2018
God's love in the Bible is seen as unfailing, everlasting, intimate, sacrificial, unbreakable, all-conquering, personal, great, immeasurable and all-knowing. This is seen supremely in the Cross of Jesus Christ, when He died for the sins of the world. Supreme love overcoming all that is not love. Even when great acts of evil are committed in the world, such as the slaughter of innocents this past week in parts of the world where terrorism and genocide are rife, love is all around. Love continues despite such acts. How are Christians to respond to this love of God?
The apostle John writes in 1 John 4:15-16
"If anyone acknowledges that Jesus is the Son of God, God lives in them and they in God. And so we know and rely on the love God has for us. God is love. Whoever lives in love lives in God, and God in them."
Our motivation as Christians is to love and to be love. This is a love, which is sacrificial and self-less. It is tough love which is of service to other people. Loving and serving others, are the primary ways of showing you love God! It is easiest to love your friends. But Jesus commanded that his followers also love their enemies (Matthew 5:43-45)! Now that is very radical and can be difficult! We see constantly in the media and elsewhere, that regards our enemies, we are to be confrontational or at best to just ignore them!
How is it possible to love our enemies? It is only with the help of God and His abundant grace towards us! We depend on the Holy Spirit who lives inside all Christians to empower and guide! To only love those who love you is what is expected by people everywhere as normal behaviour. But as a Christian, you are to do more! You are to be seen to love more than other people. You don’t have to like others as friends, but you do have to love them as fellow human beings!
Go into this week, being prepared to show your love of Jesus Christ, remaining close to Him and serving other people generously with abundant grace-filled love! By loving and serving others, you become God’s arms and legs in a physical world. One of the greatest limitations you face in loving and serving other people is a severe lack of imagination!
So as you go into this week, ask God to expand your imagination to love and serve; as well as asking for the opportunities to do them. Loving and serving are hallmarks of an authentic Christian life. Love continues even amidst chaos and turmoil all around. Go and be part of the continuing of love.
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Saturday Mar 10, 2018
Saturday Mar 10, 2018
Part 135 - Revelation 5:1–8
The Lion/Lamb
John’s chapter 5 is one of the great chapters of the Bible. He has this wonderful picture of the lion that turns out to be a lamb. That says a great deal of what the whole work of Jesus was about. He was the lion of Judah prophesied and therefore promised in Genesis 49:9 in the final blessing of his sons by Jacob. The lion has always been considered the king of the beasts. Not only was he the top predator of that area, all of Africa, and much of Asia, he simply looked majestic. So, when they wanted someone sufficiently strong and majestic to open the great scroll that contained the plan of the future who was more appropriate than the king of the beasts? At one and the same time he was the Root of David, prophesied as the Root of Jesse, David’s father, by Isaiah in 11:10. It was widely accepted at that time that this was a reference to the Messiah, the greatly longed for one who was expected to deliver Israel from all the foreign powers, particularly Rome, who so reduced the nation treating it as a vassal state, little better than a kingdom of slaves.
And so, in his vision, John heard what was said and watched, prepared to be awestruck when he saw the lion. But, in place of a lion, he saw a ‘lamb, looking as if it had been slain’. If you have ever come across a dead lamb lying out on the ground you will know that it is the most pitiful of sights. Most dead animals look like the animals they are but just without life, but a dead lamb becomes just a scrap of wet wool (the ones I have seen have all been in the highlands of Scotland and so inevitably wet!) so the one who was equivalent to the most majestic of all creatures is the one who died on a cross the most abject and painful death. He had 7 horns and 7 eyes. He was all seeing and all powerful - though it was not the sort of power that this world delights in.
This was Jesus, Son of God, Saviour of mankind, king of all creation, lord of the kingdom of God. He set an example to all his followers that few have dared to follow in its entirety. ‘Take up your cross’ he told them. As this goes out to be read over all the world a few of you who hear and read will know that you face the possibility of following Jesus all the way; seeking to follow the lion you may be required to be literally a lamb and a dead one at that. Most of us do not expect that to be the way we shall have to go. If at the last it is demanded of us that we should face martyrdom for him we do not really know what our response will be. Will we boldly or tremblingly, be prepared for the ultimate sacrifice? We do not know. We can only conjecture. And there we must leave it. Making rash boasts is not helpful for us, or anybody. Please Lord in the final trial make us faithful.
There are many ways in which mankind is upsetting what might be the even tenor of the world. We shall come across some vivid pictures of some of these before we are finished with this wonderful book. But all the troubles of mankind are now downstream from the sacrifice of the Lamb. Where ever we are; whatever has been our lot in life; whether we have had it easy or life has been one long struggle, we can look back at the work of the Lamb of God. He has conquered in his strange upside down world where it is better to be a Lamb than a Lion. It is our great privilege to have been told this and, in part at least, to understand it. So it is our great privilege to live as the sons and daughters of the King.
The Lamb has taken the scroll and the plans of God continue to be realized. No wonder that all John sees next is praise and worship.
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Friday Mar 09, 2018
Friday Mar 09, 2018
Friday Prayers
9 March 2018
Order of Service!
Opening prayer
Praise time
Prayers for those grieving and lonely
Prayers for justice and peace
Prayers for those facing challenging situations
Prayers for churches and Christians worldwide
Prayers for healing
Time of silence for your own prayers
Benediction
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Monday Mar 05, 2018
Monday Mar 05, 2018
Think Spot - 5th March 2018
Matthew 11:28-30 records these words of Jesus Christ. "Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light."
Are not those amazing words? Not just anybody could say them. If the person who said them couldn't actually fulfil that promise, that would be one of the biggest hoaxes in all of history. But Jesus Christ is no hoax and he is able to fulfil those words and live up to the promises he makes. He is totally trustworthy.
We don't like to ask for help. We are trained as children to be independent and not to rely on anybody else for anything ever. But this is contrary to what Jesus is about. To rely fully on ourselves for all things is to walk by sight and commit the sin of pride. To rely on Jesus and ask Him for help in all things is to walk by faith and with humility. True independence and freedom comes from being dependent on Jesus Christ and not being held back by anything or anyone else, such as family and our own wealth and possessions.
How are you doing at the start of this new week? Maybe you are feeling desolation and regret caused by decisions made sometime in your past. Give them up willingly to Jesus and don't keep trying to take it back like a security blanket!
Are you feeling abandoned and lonely? Let Jesus encompass you in an embrace of compassion and let the Holy Spirit comfort and counsel you.. Or perhaps are you feeling tired, burnt out and burdened?. Let Jesus give you the strength to endure! Give the burden to Jesus and let Him take the weight for you. Maybe you need to make a major decision and don't know what to do. Seek the wisdom of Jesus in making that decision. He will help if you ask. That's all part of Jesus being Jesus.
It may well be that you are being overwhelmingly tempted to sin against God, another person or even yourself? You cant resist for too long if you do it in your own strength, because you will eventually succumb to it. But if you ask God to help you overcome the temptation, He will do it - if you allow Him control and use your own self-control! After all, self-control is one of the evidences of the Holy Spirit working in you!
We all get those feelings of regret, desolation, abandonment, loneliness, despair, burdened and temptation. Feelings are important, because they are part of the human experience and if we didn't have them, we would be merely mindless androids. But feelings can also be very misleading. As Christians, we have to take it by faith that Jesus is there for us through those times. Because you are lonely, doesn't mean you are alone. Because you are tempted, doesn't meant that you have already committed the sin. Take it by faith that Jesus is answering desperate cries for help and is helping you. Take a few seconds now in this short silence to hand over these things to Jesus and ask him to help you.
Or it may just be that you are starting the week and you are feeling great and enjoying your dynamic relationship with God! Then keep going and letting Jesus be your strength, your wisdom and your help. But don't keep it to yourself - that would be selfish! Go to others you know who are in need, helping them where you can with an encouraging word or helping to supply their need. Be the practical and imaginative answer to their prayers. Go into this new week, confident that Jesus is able to help you in every situation you face. Ask him to come to you, and He will - just as He has done for countless millions.
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Saturday Mar 03, 2018
Saturday Mar 03, 2018
Part 134 - Revelation 4:1–11
The Creator God
John tells us he saw a door standing open in heaven (4:1). ‘Open’ is a key word in Revelation. John uses it to say that he is starting to tell us about a new vision he had. So it means something like ‘I am opening up a new vision, a new story. And a wonderful one this one is. In these next 2 chapters John is going to paint word pictures of Father God and Jesus Christ.
He has told us about the disturbing atmosphere in which the seven churches are living, their dangers and difficulties and also their opportunities. He is going to go on to talk about the terrible mess the human world has got itself into, and is still in today, because of the way the devil, Satan, is controlling so much of mankind. Only, finally, in his last two chapters, will he be able to talk about the wonderful positive things towards which it will eventually all come.
In this chapter particularly he is doing the impossible: he is describing the indescribable. To do so he uses much of the language of Ezekiel’s first chapter. Ezekiel ends up by saying that he is describing the ‘appearance of the likeness of the glory of the Lord’ thus shielding himself from any accusation that he was describing God. John might well do the same. Any attempt to make a painted or drawn picture out of his description would be foredoomed to disaster. Most of the attempts of the artists of former centuries do not portray Father-God but rather Grandfather-God or even Great Grandfather-God anyway! We cannot answer the question what does God look like, both because we are unable to and we are forbidden to do so (Exodus 33:20 – 23).
Yet we still have a wonderful picture in front of us. The things that surround the actual figure on the throne indicate how God is to be treated. The strange living creatures with the four different faces are the nearest things to the figure on the throne and they lead the praise and worship. They may be strange but they are a clear indication that it is not just human beings who worship the Lord God: all creation does. The twenty-four elders are usually reckoned to be indicating the twelve tribes of Israel and the people of Jesus represented by the twelve apostles, thus all the people of God. They have but one function - they are to worship. There is a double chorus of praise and worship going on continuously round the figure on the throne: the inner circle represents creation, the outer circle represents humanity. We are to praise because the creation rejoices in its creator as we rejoice in our saviour.
The elders represent us who are his people. We are to work to earn crowns we do not deserve (2 Timothy 4:8) but like the elders we shall only use them to throw down before the great glory of the Lord God. They represent a great challenge for us all; to strive to have the best possible crowns so that we throw the best possible gifts before the Lord God. Look forward to that day.
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Monday Feb 26, 2018
Monday Feb 26, 2018
Think Spot - 26 February 2018
Last Monday we looked at serving God where ever you are with a clear conscience. How did you get on with doing it?
Today we look at a follow on from that to meekness. What is meekness? Isn’t meekness, merely weakness? That’s what we are told often enough by people outside the church! Yet meekness is not weakness! Meekness is giving up our personal rights to God alone!
A meek person is one who claims no personal rights of their own, and who is willing to yield all possessions and personal rights to God. A meek person sees these things as being loaned by God for His work and glory. Being meek in all situations takes a strong character, for example Moses (Numbers 12:1-3).
Giving up your rights and all you own to God alone, is talked about often in the Bible. Some of the results of giving up your rights to God can be found in: - Psalm 22:26; Psalm 25:9; Psalm 37:8-11; Psalm 149:4 Isaiah 29:19; Matthew 11:28-30. (1.15)
As followers of Jesus you and I need to give up our own rights and possessions to Him because:
- You and I belong to God (1 Corinthians 6:19-20)#
- We are instructed to be meek by Jesus (Luke 9:23)
- It follows the example. of the New Testament church (Acts 5:32)
When we insist on our own personal rights and those rights are violated, the main consequences are anger and anxiety. They occur when we try to control or change something God never intended us to change or control. When we react and resist, we deny God His right to do what; He wants to do. When we get angry and when we worry, these are signs that there are rights God wants us to yield to Him.
How do you yield rights and possessions over to God?
Firstly, identify them! Check where in your life anger and or anxiety exist. Then ask the Holy Spirit to work on your heart, prayerfully considering each area, yielding all to Jesus. When you do that, God becomes responsible for those areas.
Secondly, expect God to test His rights. Having handed them to God, He may allow situations to occur which will deny you these rights, to see if that right was really given to Him. It may be necessary to once again yield that right to Jesus. As you respond to each test, meekness develops.
Go into this week, knowing that God is at work in you! You are to be His servants and you are not your own! You were bought at a price by God! Through the meekness of Jesus Christ’ work on the cross.
Father I pray that as we give our personal rights to you, that you give us strength to overcome with the help of the Holy Spirit who lives within us as your children. We ask this in the name of your Son, Jesus Christ! Amen!
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Saturday Feb 24, 2018
Saturday Feb 24, 2018
Part 133 - Revelation 3:21
Lukewarm
The ‘gem’ is in the promise that ends the letter following the words ‘to the one who is victorious’. Here is the rest of the letter :
4 “To the angel of the church in Laodicea write:
These are the words of the Amen, the faithful and true witness, the ruler of God’s creation. 15 I know your deeds, that you are neither cold nor hot. I wish you were either one or the other! 16 So, because you are lukewarm—neither hot nor cold—I am about to spit you out of my mouth. 17 You say, ‘I am rich; I have acquired wealth and do not need a thing.’ But you do not realize that you are wretched, pitiful, poor, blind and naked. 18 I counsel you to buy from me gold refined in the fire, so you can become rich; and white clothes to wear, so you can cover your shameful nakedness; and salve to put on your eyes, so you can see.
19 Those whom I love I rebuke and discipline. So be earnest and repent. 20 Here I am! I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in and eat with that person, and they with me.
21 To the one who is victorious, I will give the right to sit with me on my throne,just as I was victorious and sat down with my Father on his throne. 22 Whoever has ears, let them hear what the Spirit says to the churches.”
The last of the seven cities is probably the best known one. Laodicea was the most important and wealthiest of three cities relatively close together in the Lycus valley. Unfortunately, it did not have a good water supply of its own so it had to get water from the other two; from Hierapolis where the water came from hot springs and was heavily mineralised. By the time it reached Laodicea it was lukewarm and not really drinkable. Alternatively, the water from Colosse was cold mountain water but it had to come so far in the heat of the day that it was no longer cool but well warmed up. Hence the picture of the situation of the city as applied to the church - ‘neither cold nor hot’ and fit to spit out. The riches of the city were founded on banking, a medical school focused on ophthalmology (eye treatments), and a particular type of black sheep’s wool. All these facts are used in the description of the church as being ‘poor, blind and naked’.
It all adds up to the most remarkable description of any of the churches in terms of their surrounding situation. There is no mention of any sort of persecution or antagonism from neighbours, so we must conclude that their problem was apathy. There was simply nothing in their situation that excited any sort of positive reaction.
That is a situation all too familiar in much of the Western world. Because our culture says that everyone’s ideas are as good as those of the next person we encounter no real resistance to our beliefs except the sort of comment of ‘that’s what you think, that is fine for you, but I think differently’ we too can be described as lukewarm in our beliefs, and thinking we are doing fine as a society, a church or an individual when the reality is that we are spiritually ‘poor, blind and naked’.
The solutions offered are interesting. First there is the well-known ‘I stand at the door and knock … open the door ... and I will eat with that person’ statement. This is often used as a call to unbelievers to faith but, in context, it is a call to the lukewarm believer to let Jesus have a greater and complete role in their lives in the figure of having him sit down to a meal with the person.
Then there is the even more startling suggestion that the one who is a truly victorious believer will have a significant part in the final judgement ‘the right to sit with me on my throne’. The mind boggles at the very idea! It suggests that Messiah Jesus is so close to his believing people that he will share his sovereignty, his progress and even his justice with them. Yet it is in line with other statements in scripture: ‘Do you not know that the Lord’s people will judge the world’ (Paul in 1 Corinthians 6: 2). What a challenge it is to live in a way worthy of such trust and confidence!
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~You can now purchase our Partakers books including Roger's latest - The Puzzle of Living - A fresh look at the story of Job!
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Friday Feb 23, 2018
Friday Feb 23, 2018
Friday Prayers
23 February 2018
Order of Service!
Opening prayer
Praise time
Prayers for those grieving and lonely
Prayers for justice and peace
Prayers for those facing challenging situations
Prayers for churches and Christians worldwide
Prayers for healing
Time of silence for your own prayers
Benediction
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Monday Feb 19, 2018
Monday Feb 19, 2018
Think Spot - 19th February 2018
Charlotte Bronte - “Life appears to me to be too short to be spent in nursing animosity, or registering wrong.”
What I do know is that your conscience is the faculty which is sensitive to right and wrong, and judges your actions and attitudes. Everybody has a conscience and all are sensitive to spiritual truths, whether they are immediately aware of it or not.
According to the Bible, a clear conscience is essential for inner peace and joy, confidence in prayer, good health, effective service, .right relation-ships, effective witnessing, making right decisions, and victory in spiritual battle. A clear conscience is the inner joy and peace of spirit which results from having all personal wrongs made right with those whom a person had offended - either God or someone else.
However- many Christians carry around guilty consciences due mainly to unconfessed sins, affecting relationships with God, other people and themselves. If left unchecked, a conscience which is guilty, slowly grows 'dead', cold and silent. That is until such time that the guilt has been assuaged and put right.
If at the moment you are burdened by a guilty conscience, ask the Holy Spirit to show you clearly what is affecting your conscience. Then decide, at any cost, to clear it up in the power of the same Spirit. He will help you! Pray to the Father and ask forgiveness, (1 John 1:9), and fully accept His love and forgiveness. If there is anyone else involved, then you will also need to ask for their forgiveness (Matthew 5:23-24).
Ask the Father to help you go, and the Spirit will help you, because one of the hardest things in the world to say is: “I was wrong! Please forgive me." Your conscience can be cleansed because of what Jesus did on the cross!
Hebrews 9:14 “How much more, then, will the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered himself unblemished to God, cleanse our consciences from acts that lead to death, so that we may serve the living God!”
Go into this week, ready to serve the living God, being confident that the Holy Spirit living within you, empowers you, is transforming you and desires that your conscience be clear. He will help you overcome if you ask!
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Saturday Feb 17, 2018
Saturday Feb 17, 2018
Part 132 - Revelation 3:12
The city of the name
The ‘gem’ is in the promise that ends the letter following the words ‘to the one who is victorious’. Here is the rest of the letter :
To the angel of the church in Philadelphia write:
These are the words of him who is holy and true, who holds the key of David.What he opens no one can shut, and what he shuts no one can open. 8 I know your deeds. See, I have placed before you an open door that no one can shut. I know that you have little strength, yet you have kept my word and have not denied my name. 9 I will make those who are of the synagogue of Satan, who claim to be Jews though they are not, but are liars—I will make them come and fall down at your feet and acknowledge that I have loved you. 10 Since you have kept my command to endure patiently, I will also keep you from the hour of trial that is going to come on the whole world to test the inhabitants of the earth.
11 I am coming soon. Hold on to what you have, so that no one will take your crown. 12 The one who is victorious I will make a pillar in the temple of my God. Never again will they leave it. I will write on them the name of my God and the name of the city of my God, the new Jerusalem, which is coming down out of heaven from my God; and I will also write on them my new name. 13 Whoever has ears, let them hear what the Spirit says to the churches.
Names are important in the letter to Philadelphia. People are named for one of 3 reasons:
i) the parents liked the name, the way it sounds or some association it brings to their minds;
ii) it is a family name handed down through the generations - though that may be a trap as some names may go very out of fashion, for example someone who ought to be call Euphemia, a very old fashioned and clumsy name in our culture, may be called Effie for a generation or two and then that is boiled down to Fay, a much nicer sounding name;
iii) the name may be given to express the character and personality of the person.
All 3 can be found in the Bible but the important one for our purposes is the last, the name that expresses personality and character.
To start with the name of the city is significant, phila = love and delphia = brother, so brotherly love.
The small Christian community in the city did not enjoy brotherly relations with the Jewish community. The latter would have been a large and respected part of the city with many good buildings, big houses and a well understood part in the community including non-participation in some activities because of their belief in one god. The Christians would probably have been only a few dozen strong and from the poorer section of the society with no great respect shown to them.
As a result they are told they will be pillars in ‘the temple of my God’, bearing the names of the great city of the new heaven and the new earth, the name of God and the new name of Jesus. That is a promise that all the power and personality of the triune God will somehow be theirs. That is a tremendous promise to them - and to us. That makes it well worth persevering in our walk with Jesus even if we have but little strength. It is not necessary to be a member of some great and famous church. A little struggling church will do provided it has ‘kept my word and not denied my name’.
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