October 11, 2024

Romans 14.1 (NIV)

Accept him whose faith is weak, without passing judgment on disputable matters.

In . . . differences of opinion the natural reaction is to seek to bring about uniformity – to one’s own opinion!*

I have been a Christian for nearly 60 years. In that time, I have missed attending Sunday church services perhaps a total of ten times (until the COVID shut-down, and even then I watched the online service). I faithfully attended Sunday School, Vacation Bible School, and church camp, and I graduated from Bible college. I have taught Bible classes for children and for adults. I have a daily quiet time with the Lord which I have not skipped more than ten times in over 20 years. But guess what? I don’t know everything.

 

Recently, a young woman who is a new Christian came to me with a question about something she had read in the Bible. It turned out to be a passage that I have long wondered about so I couldn’t help her. It was not a matter of salvation but it could become an important issue in her life. My point is this: how could I pass judgment on her when I, the wise old woman of God, didn’t know any more than she did?

When our church leadership announced plans to start a Saturday night worship service, I had concerns. Rather than cause trouble – or ignore something that shouldn’t be ignored – I researched the book of Acts. There, I found nothing that proved to me that a service on Saturday was wrong, and nothing to indicate that a Sunday morning service was a commandment.

   

Ah, but do you agree with my assessment? If you believe that you are right and I am wrong, why would you even think of the matter as “disputable?” Which of us is the one whose faith is weak? What if I am wrong? What is your responsibility to me? Paul says to accept me without passing judgment. Can you manage that? 

Rather than viewing differences as right or wrong, learn to see them as alternative perspectives and stop passing judgment on one another.*

October 10, 2024

Romans 11.33, 34 (NIV)

How unsearchable his judgments, and his paths beyond tracing out! Who has known the mind of the Lord? 

God leaves no prints nor footsteps behind him.*

The Bible tells us a lot about God’s attributes: power, justice, mercy, wisdom, lovingkindness; but it doesn’t ever claim that he measures up to human expectations when it comes to logic. The Bible contains things that we find confusing and sometimes contradictory. But we aren’t required to understand everything - that’s what faith is for. Ephesians 1.9 says that God has made known to us the mystery of his will according to his good pleasure. All we know about God is what he chooses to reveal about himself.

Apparently, today's verses are part of a hymn. What is it that has caused Paul to burst into song? Most people would find a discussion of God’s character to be daunting. When we are intimidated by what we don’t understand, it puts us in a negative frame of mind. But Paul sees it differently. Perhaps he is overcome because he has realized that a God that we completely understand is not big enough to save us!

The total elimination of ambiguity means I must pull God down to my level in order to master him.*

October 9, 2024

Romans  8.32 (NIV)

He who did not spare his own Son . . . how will he not also . . . give us all things?

We sometimes think God is silent when he isn’t doing something we want him to do or telling us something we want to hear.*

I have heard of parents whose child needs a bone marrow transplant, or perhaps a kidney, and who purposely have another child in hopes that the new baby will be a donor match. The parents may love both children but the second one’s purpose in life is to save the first one. These situations do not involve one-of-a-kind organs, like a heart, but in essence, that is what God did for us. His Son was born to sacrifice his life in order to save ours.

Someone posed the question, "Has it ever occurred to you that the only person God ever really forsook was His own Son?" He has nothing that he values more than his Son and yet he turned his back on him. He wasn’t a prodigal or a trouble-maker or disobedient or ungrateful. But I am all these things. And yet God let his Son pay the price for my sins. He doesn’t resent me for it. He still loves me unconditionally. There is no power greater than the ability to love like that!

If God would do all that for me, how could I think that he would then turn around and reject me? The sacrifice would have been for nothing - a waste of blood, suffering, life. Are your dreams not coming true? Do you really think that means God has turned his back on you? Would God really withhold his blessings when he has gone to this much trouble on your behalf?  

Shall the Father not give us freely all that Christ purchased for us?*

October 8, 2024

Romans 8.26 (NIV)

We do not know what we ought to pray for, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us with groans that words cannot express.

So much of my prayer life is full of my words, just talking at God, that there’s no room for the Holy Spirit to work in my prayer life.*

It has been said that one of our weaknesses is that “we are not even aware of all our weaknesses.”* If this is true, how can we be expected to know what to pray for? Jesus told us to pray for our daily bread (Matthew 6.11); and workers for the harvest (Matthew 9.38). He also told how not to pray (Matthew 6.5) and where to pray (Matthew 6.6).

But there are occasions when we really don’t know what to pray for. We’re afraid that we might ask for something that we shouldn’t. Maybe we aren’t comfortable enough in our relationship with God to express ourselves as openly as David did in the Psalms. Often, we are just too stressed for words. We need someone to help us understand God’s will for our prayer lives.

When Paul tells us in this verse that the Spirit intercedes for us, he is not speaking of Jesus’ role as our advocate, standing between us and the wrath of God. The Spirit’s intercession is specifically related to our prayer life.* The Spirit’s function, as described in this verse, is not just as a mediator who goes to God on my behalf and says, “This is what she means.” That is part of his job. But his job of intercession also involves coming to me and saying, “This is what you should say.”

The Spirit does not work apart from the Word so if the Word of God doesn’t dwell in me, then neither does his Spirit. When we are exposed to the Word of God, we allow the Spirit to do his work of “awakening right desires,”* and releasing us to express them. The Spirit is not moved by the eloquence of our prayers but by the sincerity of our faith. 

Praying in the Holy Spirit releases supernatural resources.*

October 7, 2024

Romans 8.18 (NIV)

For I consider the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory that is to be revealed to us.

We’ll never suffer more than Jesus suffered.*

Paul’s audience knew something about suffering for their faith – probably more than I will ever experience - but I have had some dark places in my life. In those times of suffering, I was very aware of the premise (and the promise) of this verse. Faith in the truth of these words helped to keep me going and to develop a more healthy and Christlike attitude. Now I look back at those days and know that I am living proof of how God works in our lives. If “good” and “bad” were equal units of weight, the good in my life would far outweigh the bad – and that’s nothing compared to the “glory that is to be revealed.” Glory is forever; suffering is temporary.

God doesn’t allow pain in our lives just to teach us about endurance. What we suffer enables us to turn our “infirmities into assets.”* Learn and grow from your experience and use it to bless others. 

Suffering coaxes us to throw away our immature ideas about God.*

October 6, 2024

Romans  6.1, 2 (NIV)

What shall we say, then? Shall we go on sinning so that grace may increase? By no means! We died to sin; how can we live in it any longer?

His Forgiveness is for the purpose of making us Hate our Sins.*

I once heard an unwed mother say that she planned to have more babies because the more children she had, the more money she got from Welfare. She didn’t understand that the more children she had, the more money she needed. That was not a very solid financial plan.

God’s grace is sort of the same as the foolish mother’s plan. The more we sin, the more grace we receive. But God’s grace isn’t like money in the bank that draws interest. God’s grace is sufficient for all our sins – there is no way to generate more than enough of it and we can’t stockpile it to cover future sins.

 

The wrong attitude toward God’s abundant grace could lead us to become like Paul’s audience who believed that as long as a Christian had faith it made no difference what kind of life he lived.* Being “dead to sin” means that we are “freed both from the guilt and from the power of it.”* As children of the King, how can we even consider returning to our old life of slavery to sin? 

Don’t confuse grace with indifference toward sin.*

October 5, 2024

Romans  4.21 (NIV)

. . . being fully persuaded that God had power to do what he had promised.

To be "fully persuaded" of the truth of God, is to be fully submissive to it.*

In this verse, Paul is referring to Abraham, so let’s refresh our memories: God promised Abraham that he would be the father of a great nation. I’m sure he believed God, but when he and his wife passed from old to ancient and still they were childless, he might have started to think he had misunderstood. At any rate, he did what most of us would do - he took matters into his own hands. Long story short: disastrous results; important lesson learned. 

A few years down the road, when God told Abraham to sacrifice the long-awaited son (“sacrifice” as in “kill”), Abraham’s obedience is clear evidence that his previous experience had taught him that God fulfills his promises, even when it seems impossible. Most of us will not have our faith tested in such a dramatic fashion but our experience can still leave us fully persuaded that God has the power to perform the impossible. We know that nothing is impossible with God.

 

But what about the improbable? Is it easier to believe in the impossible than in the improbable? If you were Abraham, you might believe that it is possible that you might become a father at the ripe old age of 100 but is it probable? Abraham’s faith was not just in God’s ability to do the impossible. His faith was in God’s power to do what he had promised.

 

This premise defines my faith. I believe that God has the power to do anything he chooses. If he promises to do it, he will. He is the God of power and kept promises.

Behind all promises lies the character of the person who makes them.*