G‘day! 🌟 Welcome to Partakers Christian Podcasts! Tune in for Bible Teaching, Bible Readings, Worship, Prayer, and Church History. Our mission on Podbean is to enable and encourage you on your faith journey. Come listen, interact, and be inspired!
Episodes
Friday Jul 15, 2016
Friday Jul 15, 2016
Partakers Friday Prayers
A prayer of Augustine
We pray together and when Christians pray together, from different nations, different churches and different denominations - that reveals Church unity! Come! Let us pray together!
that my thoughts may all be holy.
Act in me, O Holy Spirit,
that my work, too, may be holy.
Draw my heart, O Holy Spirit,
that I love but what is holy.
Strengthen me, O Holy Spirit,
to defend all that is holy.
Guard me, then, O Holy Spirit,
that I always may be holy.
Amen.
Click or Tap here to listen to or save this as an audio mp3 file
~You can now purchase our Partakers books! Please do click or tap here to visit our Amazon site!
Click or tap on the appropriate link below to subscribe, share or download our iPhone App!
Monday Jul 11, 2016
Monday Jul 11, 2016
Think Spot - 11th July 2016
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!
Right mouse click here to download as a MP3 audio file
You can now purchase our Partakers books! Please do click or tap here to visit our Amazon site!
Click or tap on the appropriate link below to subscribe, share or download our iPhone App!
Friday Jul 08, 2016
Friday Jul 08, 2016
Partakers Friday Prayers
We pray together and when Christians pray together, from different nations, different churches and different denominations - that reveals Church unity! Come! Let us pray together!
O Jesus, Bright Light, I turn to You;
O Jesus, Holy Love, I run to You;
With all the strength I have I worship You;
With all the love I have I cling to You;
With all my soul I long to be with You,
And fear no more to fail, or fall from You.
O Jesus, deathless love, Who seeks me,
You Who did die for longing love of me,
You King in all Your beauty come to me,
White-robed, blood-sprinkled Jesus, come to me,
And go no more, dear Lord, away from me.
Amen
Click or Tap here to listen to or save this as an audio mp3 file
~You can now purchase our Partakers books! Please do click or tap here to visit our Amazon site!
Click or tap on the appropriate link below to subscribe, share or download our iPhone App!
Monday Jul 04, 2016
Monday Jul 04, 2016
Think Spot - 4th July 2016
G'day and welcome to Partakers! We have the start of a new week! Its Monday!
Happy 4th of July to our USA readers, listeners and downloaders! God bless you this day and ever more! But I have a question for you - everyone of us... How and in what circumstances are you trusting God?
Let's look briefly at how Jesus Christ trusted in God the Father. Jesus knew that God the Father was going to bring Him back to life after Jesus' own death on the cross. Jesus trusted the Father, His Father, in this area of His life, just as he did in all aspects of his life. How are you doing? Do you have concerns and areas of your life where you need an assurance that God the Father will help you?
Here are some simple steps which may help you maintain a trust in God.
-
Pray, casting all anxiety on God. He cares for you because you are His personal concern (The great apostle Peter, one of Jesus' closest friends wrote this in 1 Peter 5:7 "Give all your worries and cares to God, for he cares about you.")
-
Accept and thank God that His peace has filled that area (Another great apostle, Paul, wrote this in Philippians 4:7 "Then you will experience God's peace, which exceeds anything we can understand. His peace will guard your hearts and minds as you live in Christ Jesus.")
-
Learn to be content whatever your circumstances are, resting in God (Paul goes on in Philippians 4:11-12 "Not that I was ever in need, for I have learned how to be content with whatever I have. I know how to live on almost nothing or with everything. I have learned the secret of living in every situation, whether it is with a full stomach or empty, with plenty or little.")
-
Allow the Spirit to control your mind for life and peace (and again from the pen of the apostle Paul, this time in Romans 8:6 "So letting your sinful nature control your mind leads to death. But letting the Spirit control your mind leads to life and peace.")
-
Trust God to fulfil your every need (Matthew records these words of Jesus in Matthew 6:32-33 "but your heavenly Father already knows all your needs. Seek the Kingdom of God above all else, and live righteously, and he will give you everything you need." )
-
Obey and follow God's commands to love God and love others (Jesus is recorded in Matthew 22:37-40 "You must love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, and all your mind.' This is the first and greatest commandment. A second is equally important: ‘Love your neighbour as yourself.' The entire law and all the demands of the prophets are based on these two commandments.")
-
Finally, be prepared to be obedient to the Father, in supplying the needs of others you meet and therefore showing you love God and other people!
One way to show you are trusting and loving God is to be the answer to the prayers of somebody else and showing that love to them! Ask God to show you, how you can help somebody else in need this week and showing your love.Go in peace this Monday, into this week, knowing God is worthy of your trust! God will take care of you, but not always in the way you expect! Expect Him to allow circumstances and situations to arise where you are to trust Him fully! He will help you if you ask! After all, He knows you better than anybody! And don't be afraid to help somebody else because by doing that, you show you are loving and trusting in God!
Father, I pray that You would help us to trust in You and that You would supply our needs, calm our concerns and help us to love You and others more fully. I ask this through the Prince of Peace, Jesus Christ and in the power of the Holy Spirit who lives inside all those who have peace with you. Amen
Click or Tap here to listen to or save this as an audio mp3 file
~You can now purchase our Partakers books! Please do click or tap here to visit our Amazon site!
Click or tap on the appropriate link below to subscribe, share or download our iPhone App!
Saturday Jul 02, 2016
Saturday Jul 02, 2016
Part 37 - John 8:32
Freedom in Christ
As we move on through this chapter things get very difficult. In verse 31 John refers to “the Jews who had believed Jesus”. That simple statement is very difficult because these same Jews seem to have been his discussion partners through the rest of the chapter and they are very antagonistic to Jesus to the point where they tried to stone him! Perhaps John means something like ‘Jews who had expressed some interest in what he was saying and doing’. After all there were probably people then, as there are now, who are keen to get alongside the latest celebrity, which Jesus will have been.
Then Jesus said, ““If you abide in my word, you are truly my disciples, and you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.” That is alright but their response wasn’t. They said “we have never been enslaved to anyone” which must be high in the list of the most untrue things in the Bible. They had been slaves, at one time or another, of the Egyptians, the Philistines, the Assyrians, the Babylonians, the Persians, the Greeks and the Romans. We might well wonder what they can possibly have meant by claiming they had never been slaves – which takes us straight into thinking about what is meant by freedom. Nelson Mandela, the famous South African politician, is the clue. He spent 27 years in two of South Africa’s most notorious prisons, which would seem to be a very definite for of slavery, but when he was finally released it was clear that his mind and spirit were unaffected. He became the countries president but he took no steps to hold anyone to account for his lone imprisonment. His mind and spirit had clearly remained free even when his body was held in dire slavery. He was an outstanding example of how some can rise above their immediate surroundings and remain free.
The other problem we all have is that of sin. Sin, which can so easily become a habit or even an addiction haunts all of us. Paul recognized that when he said. “all have sinned and come short of the glory of God”. He went on to compare sin to slavery and the life of the Christian living in acceptance by God to freedom just as Jesus does here.
Jesus tells us what the solution to this otherwise unsolvable human dilemma is. He says, “The slave does not remain in the house forever; the son remains forever. So if the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed.” The first bit is easy to understand: it is the age old difference between being a slave lacking all security in where you live and control over what you do and a son who is the heir to the house, the estate and the family riches. The second bit is much more difficult. We may well ask, ‘why should being set free by the son, even if the son is Jesus, set us free.’ The answer to that puzzle is in Romans chapter 6 where we read, “all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? We were buried therefore with him by baptism into death, in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life. For if we have been united with him in a death like his, we shall certainly be united with him in a resurrection like his. We know that our old self was crucified with him in order that the body of sin might be brought to nothing, so that we would no longer be enslaved to sin. For one who has died has been set free from sin. Now if we have died with Christ, we believe that we will also live with him. We know that Christ, being raised from the dead, will never die again; death no longer has dominion over him. For the death he died he died to sin, once for all, but the life he lives he lives to God. So you also must consider yourselves dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus.”
How difficult that is to understand depends on what culture you come from. If, like me, you come from a Western culture with its extreme individuality you will find it very difficult to understand how you can truly be involved in the life and death of another person even if that person is the Son of God. If, however, you come from a culture where individuality takes second place to a corporate group, be that family, work group, church, or anything else you will find it much easier to accept that because good things happen to the Lord, you are united with the Lord, and therefore the same good things happen to you.
Think that one over very carefully. If you have set out to follow Jesus, he is the Son, he has set you free, therefore – and what an enormous therefore that is – you are free indeed because you are in Him
Click or Tap here to listen to or save this as an audio mp3 file
~You can now purchase our Partakers books including Roger's latest - The Puzzle of Living - A fresh look at the story of Job!
Please do click or tap here to visit our Amazon site!
Click or tap on the appropriate link below to subscribe, share or download our iPhone App!
Friday Jul 01, 2016
Friday Jul 01, 2016
Partakers Friday Prayers
We pray together and when Christians pray together, from different nations, different churches and different denominations - that reveals Church unity! Come! Let us pray together!
God be in my eyes, and in my looking;
God be in my mouth, and in my speaking;
God be in my heart, and in my thinking;
God be at my beginning, and at my departing.
Amen
Click or Tap here to listen to or save this as an audio mp3 file
~You can now purchase our Partakers books! Please do click or tap here to visit our Amazon site!
Click or tap on the appropriate link below to subscribe, share or download our iPhone App!
Monday Jun 27, 2016
Monday Jun 27, 2016
Think Spot - 27th June 2016
Be Authentic
"Such as we are in word by letters when we are absent, such will we be also in deed when we are present." (2 Corinthians 10:11)
For those of us who engage in social media, writing letters or emails to people or as we talk to people on phones are we the same person then as when we are with people face to face? Is your behaviour with people when not physically with them the same as your behaviour when you are physically with them?
That is how the great Apostle Paul was with people - the same in their presence or away from them. That is what he urged his readers, the Corinth church, to be like... God wants the same from us - authenticity and relying on Him to help us be authentic Christians living in what is often an unauthentic world...
Click or Tap here to listen to or save this as an audio mp3 file
~You can now purchase our Partakers books! Please do click or tap here to visit our Amazon site!
Click or tap on the appropriate link below to subscribe, share or download our iPhone App!
Saturday Jun 25, 2016
Saturday Jun 25, 2016
Part 36 - John 8:23, 28 & 58
I AM… I AM… I AM…
No fewer than three times in this chapter John records that Jesus used the personal name of God, ‘ego eimi’ in Greek. John has them carefully lined up, two in rapid succession, then the third one later at the end of his discussion with the group of leading Jews he has been with for some time. In fact that third one brings the discussion to a rapid end.
Let me imagine something of what the reaction to what he said must have been of one of his hearers? It must have gone something like this: first he said to them, “You are from below; I am from above. You are of this world; I am not of this world. I told you that you would die in your sins, for unless you believe that I am he you will die in your sins.”
Our typical hearer will scarcely have noticed that his reply included the words I AM. As we noticed before the words he used could equally mean ‘It’s me’ or as they are translated in the NIV ‘I am he’. So all that happened was that they said to him, “Who are you?” Good question. It has been asked over and over again ever since. The answer is much the same as it has always been, I am who I have always told you I am but you are listening but not hearing.
So the conversation continues and Jesus said to them, “When you have lifted up the Son of Man, then you will know that I am he, and that I do nothing on my own authority, but speak just as the Father taught me.”
Again there is the phrase ‘I am he’ in the middle of that statement, a little more obviously this time. Whether our typical listener will have thought that an odd thing to say is hard to say. We might imagine him turning to his neighbour and saying something like: “did you hear what he said there? ‘lifted up’ sounds very like what Isaiah said about the servant ‘my servant shall act wisely; he shall be high and lifted up, and shall be exalted’. I find that a bit much to take. He is getting well above himself. He thinks he is going to be high – does that mean sitting on a throne? - and being exalted! And then he sneaked in the phrase I AM. I don’t like it – I don’t like him. Things are getting a bit much.”
The conversation goes on for some time, another 30 verses in our Bibles, with the crowd and Jesus getting more and more at cross purposes with each other. The crowd is clearly understanding less and less of what Jesus is telling them or, perhaps, accepting less and less of what he is saying. They say he is demon possessed; he says they belong to their father the devil. They probably argued more forcefully in those days than we are prepared to do these days, but that is strong stuff. Then we are told that Jesus said to them, “Truly, truly, I say to you, before Abraham was, I am.”
That does it. He has quite clearly said that he was around before Abraham and then uses the critical words ‘ego eimi’, I AM, of himself so he is saying both ‘It’s me’ and I have the name of God.
Our imaginary guy is likely to have said at this point something like ‘hand me that stone!’ with the distinct intention of throwing it at Jesus to knock him down and kill him. But such is the power of the personality of Jesus that he is able to disappear in the crowd and slip away.
John has been hammering away at just one point. I used to have a colleague who liked to say good lecturing was ‘tell ‘em what you are going to tell ‘em; tell ‘em; then tell them what you have told ‘em’. John clearly had the same philosophy.
Have you got it very firmly into your head JESUS was GOD. If not read it all again, and again …
Click or Tap here to listen to or save this as an audio mp3 file
~You can now purchase our Partakers books including Roger's latest - The Puzzle of Living - A fresh look at the story of Job!
Please do click or tap here to visit our Amazon site!
Click or tap on the appropriate link below to subscribe, share or download our iPhone App!
Monday Jun 20, 2016
Monday Jun 20, 2016
Think Spot - 20th June 2016
A similar picture to the love that God has for me - sacrificial and practical...
Christians are commanded to love others - all others and without exception... We are to love others as God loves - sacrifically and practically... As we love other people practically, God's love is shown and revealed...
Go into this new week, to love others. If you don't know how to love a particular person, ask God to show you and tell you - He will do so if you ask!
Click or Tap here to listen to or save this as an audio mp3 file
~You can now purchase our Partakers books! Please do click or tap here to visit our Amazon site!
Click or tap on the appropriate link below to subscribe, share or download our iPhone App!
Sunday Jun 19, 2016
Sunday Jun 19, 2016
A Prayer of Anger - Psalm 94
I believe that I would be right in saying that most of us here have prayed. Whether in joy and happiness; or in sadness and grief; in need or in want; in praise or in worship or in confessing sin, or in other ways we have prayed. But how many of us have prayed in anger, following the example of the writer of Psalm 94. Have any of us prayed out of anger to a God who is a judge? Have we cried out in anger to a God who punishes evil? By anger I do not mean that short burst of temper when something happens to us against our will. The kind of anger that rises when somebody does something against you, and you retaliate against them.
No, the type of anger I am talking about is the anger we should feel inside us that occurs when we see injustice being done; when we see sin being done to assist in the systematic abuse of other people. The sort of anger that the church should have felt in Germany during the 2nd World War when the creatures of the Nazi regime held mock trials of so-called criminals such people as Dietrich Bonhoeffer for opposing the ungodly views of the state.
The type of anger we should feel when we face today on our television screens when we see the pictures of the innocent victims of war in Sudan, Zimbabwe, Afghanistan, Iraq or any region where people abuse people for the sake of their own power and glory. The sort of anger that should make us cry tears of sadness and humility when faced with the utter poverty of the families living on the streets in the cities of the world such as New Delhi, Mexico City, Rio de Janeiro or Sao Paolo. George Bernard Shaw once described poverty as the greatest of crimes.
That deep seated anger that should be amongst us as Christians when we see the oppressed and the poor being used and abused by those who are in positions of power to help them. We are all quite comfortable with the God of Psalm 93, the God of majesty, strength and magnificence who is from everlasting to everlasting. The God who is mightier than the greatest seas! The God whose glorious holiness covers his house eternally!
Yet something, somehow, makes us uncomfortable about praying to God for justice. Perhaps our view of God is too small. For sure our God is a God of mercy but he is also a God of justice. Our God is a God of love, but He is also a God of wrath. His written word affirms all these things.
So the writer of the Psalm calls and prays to God for justice to be done. That He, the judging God might be glorified. Has the writer made this up? No, because God has described Himself as Judge and Avenger (Genesis 18:25; Deut 32:35). How many of us here, have prayed for justice to be done? Perhaps we should pray on occasion for burden of injustice to be lifted off the poor and oppressed peoples of this world. But, before we go any further on this thought, let us consider together 3 things about Psalm 94.
1. Whom is the writer praying to (Vs. 1-3)?
The obvious answer to this question is God. But what sort of God is He? Let's look at all the various descriptions given to us about God in this Psalm. A God who avenges (v. 1). To avenge is to seek revenge on behalf of somebody else. Here God is asked to avenge for the poor and innocent against the wicked and guilty people A God who judges (v. 2). To judge is to decide which is right and which is wrong.Here God is asked to judge the wicked and guilty people for their wrong doing. A God who created and creates (v. 9), disciplines (vs. 10, 12); teaches (vs. 10, 12). A God who knows all things (v. 11) through omniscience. A God who relieves (vs. 13), assists (vs. 14, 17, 18), loves (vs. 18) and supports (vs. 18). He is a God who consoles (vs. 19), and who is incorruptible (vs. 20). A God who is strong and dependable (vs. 22) and a God who is a refuge (vs. 22). But he is also a God who repays and destroys (vs. 23) evil men for their wickedness. Is your vision of God still too small?
2. Why is the writer praying (Vs. 4-7)?
The writer js praying because he has seen the wickedness of mankind and has a deep inner anger against the brutality and evil deeds of the wicked. These people may not be foreigners, since many Jewish leaders were also brutal, for example the evil King Manasseh or the cynics of Isaiah (Is. 5: 18ff).What sort of things are these evil people doing, and what sort of people are they? Arrogant and boastful (vs. 4), crushing (vs, 5), oppressing (vs. 5), slaying widows and foreigners (vs. 6) murdering orphans (vs. 6). The people who do this sort of thing are the object of the writer's anger. They are not only content to do evil deeds, but also add hard speeches, boasting, threatening and insulting the saints of God. The insults are used so often that they become a natural part of the language.
That is the idea behind the phrase "pour out" in vs. 4. Words often wound more than swords, they are as hard to the heart as stones are to the flesh; and they are poured out by the ungodly against the godly. According to verse 4, they even talk to themselves, and of themselves, in spiritual arrogance, as if they were doing some good deed in crushing the poor and killing the widows, orphans and foreigners.
Their error is that they believe that God cannot see their doings, and even if He could see, He wouldn't do anything about it any way. These evil people, who grind the people of God with oppression, crush them with contempt claim that God cannot see them, and so therefore reason that there is nothing to stop them from doing their evil works.
There is no limit to the pride and arrogance of these wicked people, as they have lost their senses (vs. 8 ) and lost all common sense. It is natural for them to boast, just as it is natural for godly men to practice humility.
The God of Jacob heard him and led him throughout his life and said concerning Jacob "Touch not mine anointed, and do my prophets no harm", yet these proud and arrogant people proclaim boldly that God neither sees nor knows what we do. It is true that those whom God will destroy, He leaves to the madness of their corrupt hearts.
What is God going to do? In verse 14, is the answer to verse 5. The Lord has not rejected his own people. He has not forsaken those who are his. To do this, would go against God's very nature. As his inheritance, God has marked out all those who are his saints. God takes a peculiar interest in their well being and delights in them; He has an eternal covenant with them. I will be your God, and you will be my people. Will God not defend his people?
In verse 14, we have the answer!! The Lord will not withdraw His love or leave people totally on their own against the evil persecutors. For a little while, He may leave them with the design to benefit them, yet he will never utterly destroy them. He will discipline His people, but never destroy them.
In vs. 15, the great Judge will come, the reign of righteousness will begin, justice will be done and then all the godly will rejoice. The vehicle of right will be driven down the streets of evil, and all those upright in heart will follow it in joyous procession. Are we as the people of God today, following the path of righteousness or are we trampling somehow on the poor and oppressed? Are we keeping silent when we should be speaking out? Some governments of this world, have for sometime been using their power to oppress, but the cry of this prayer will bring back righteousness to the throne of government, and then every upright heart will proclaim loudly with joy!
3. What is the writer praying (vs.8-23)
a) Help!!!! (vs 16-19). The writer is praying for God to judge injustice, and avenge the oppressed (vs. 2). But not only that, as he is also crying out for help (vs. 16). Who is going to rise up against the evildoers? He obviously needs help, and his friends are not there for him, so he calls out to God for help, The soul is safest and at rest, after calling all others to assist and no one comes, when total trust for help is upon God. Today the church sees error and evil coming into her, and faithful godly leaders seem to be a minimum, and fewer still are bold enough to stand up and defy the enemies of truth. Our great hope is that the God of the Bible is with us, and He will call out his champions to defend Him. Are you one of God's champions? Is your foot slipping, are you feeling weak at this moment in time and need help? Take courage, we feel our weakness, and see our danger, and in fear and trembling we cry out. Our inbred sin is dragging us down and we need help. God, in His supreme mercy and love, helps us and our joy is that His mercy endures forever, and is always available to help us in times of danger to support us. From my sinful and proud thoughts, my thoughts of sorrow, my cares, my conflicts, I will hurry to the Lord. This is a cry of the writer, yet are we the same? The Lord alone is consoling, and yet not only consoling but delighting in me. How sweet are the comforts of God the Comforter, the Holy Spirit? Who without feeling joy, can think about eternal love, trustworthy promises, the coming to earth of the Redeemer in Jesus Christ, the risen Saviour and his next coming again. The little world within us, that is full of confusion and strife becomes calm when we rely upon Jesus to say "Peace be with you!" b) Can a corrupt throne be allied with you? God enters into no promises with those governments who are corrupt, and He gives no help to unrighteous laws. No assistance does He give. They might legalize robbery and violence and then say in defense, it is the law of the land, yet it is still evil and wicked. No injustice is permanent, for God will not set His seal upon it, nor have any fellowship with it, and therefore one day it will fall. An example of this was the slaughter of the Jews during the 2nd World War. The German church in general, allied itself along with the laws and decrees of Hitler, and changed its theology to that of white supremacy. We all know that the plans of the Nazis failed. Or take for example South Africa, which up until recently had a policy of separating whites and others. For a long time the mainstream Church held as its theology that this was true. Since then, the walls of apartheid have fallen, and the church has confessed this sin to God. No evil regime lasts very long. The unrighteous join together, in order to attack the righteous. The guilty join each other to attack the innocent. No crime is too great for them. Yet there is good news. Let the ungodly join together, the Psalmist is not afraid, but sweetly sings that the rock upon which he stands his the Jehovah God, Yahweh who is his fortress and refuge. Firm is the rock of God's love, and in Him we go for shelter. He is indeed a tremendous lover. As if in answer to his own question of verse 16, "Who will rise up for me against the wicked and evildoers", the final verse gives us an answer. The natural result of oppression, against the innocent, the poor, or the righteous is the total destruction of the ungodly. The great God who is judge, will repay their sins, and destroy their wickedness. While the bread and food they have stolen is in their mouth, God's wrath will slay them. God himself, visibly and noticeably, visits them and reveals His own power to them. To go over what we have seen so far. Firstly we have seen that God can be and indeed is both a lover and judge. Secondly we have seen the type of people that the writer faced in his battle against evil. He constantly called upon them to wake up and see sense, and repent of their sins before God destroys them. Thirdly we have seen that we should by faith, read the present in the light of the future, and end the song with a powerfully strong note.So now what can we say in conclusion.
Firstly, our vision of God should not be too small. We need to acknowledge him as a great lover, but also as a terrifying Judge. Remember, it is a dreadful thing to fall into the hands of the living God (Hebrews 10:31). To quote John Stott - "God is not at odds with himself, however much it may appear to us that he is. He is 'the God of Peace', of inner tranquility not turmoil. True we may find it difficult to hold in our minds simultaneously the images of God as the Judge who must punish evil-doers and of the Lover who must find a way to forgive them. Yet he is both, and at the same time." Secondly, can we rightly pray, in the light of the New Testament, for the vengeance of God to come down against the ungodly? No, we cannot, for then we would be no better than those who do not know Him. The vengeance of God has already come down upon one man. One day his judgment will fall, and it is from this terrible event that this man is our deliverer. This man, the Lord Jesus Christ when He died on the cross, for you and me and all our enemies, took upon Himself the full vengeance of God. He took the anger of God upon himself, so that no-one may face the judgment of God without first having the opportunity to turn to Jesus in repentance of sins. We should be praying for the governments of this world that abuse the widows, orphans and innocents of today, that they will see their errors and turn away from them. And not only that, we should pray that the members of these governments will turn to God in awe and wonder to worship Him. One day all men and women will be called upon before God to give an account of themselves to Him. If they do not know this Jesus as their Saviour, then God will cast them from His holy presence. We should also pray that godly men and women will become members of the governments of the world to help protect the innocent and the righteous, that leaders will be raised up, who know God personally to stop the abuse of the innocent. Thirdly, even in the face of abuse and persecution, we should turn to the living God for comfort and help in our circumstances. Too often we rely on ourselves or others for strength in times of trouble. It is God alone who can help us, and it is God alone who will destroy the evil in the world. The judgment of evil, according to Psalms, is a time for universal rejoicing. Ps. 67:4; 96:12-13; Ps. 35:24. Let us rejoice together when good overcomes evil in this world.
Finally, let us pray and cry out in anger against the suffering and evil in this world. And not only pray about it, but do something about it. We, as Christians, should be as light and salt to the world of darkness and evil. What will you and I do about being light and salt to a world where the innocent suffer, the widows and orphans are abandoned and murdered?
Right mouse click to save this Podcast as a MP3.
You can now purchase our Partakers books! Please do click or tap here to visit our Amazon site!
Click or tap on the appropriate link below to subscribe, share or download our iPhone App!