Tag: love
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For you tithe mint and dill and cumin, and have neglected the weightier matters of the law: justice and mercy and faithfulness. These you ought to have done, without neglecting the others. (Matthew 23:23) The church in America recently entered a new reality. The era of Roe is over, many say. Supporters and opponents blasted…
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“Truly, truly, I say to you, he who does not enter the sheepfold by the door but climbs in by another way, that man is a thief and a robber. But he who enters by the door is the shepherd of the sheep. To him the gatekeeper opens. The sheep hear his voice, and he…
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In the last two posts, we’ve been discussing the heart of fallen man and the New Covenant as the solution. When we look at the promises of the New Covenant against the needs of fallen humanity, we see that God has given the believer everything he or she needs to live in Christ (2 Peter…
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And I will give you a new heart, and a new spirit I will put within you. And I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. (Ezekiel 36:26) In the last post (An Incurable Diagnosis), we saw the condition of fallen humanity. It was a grim…
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“Shout loudly! Don’t be quiet! Yell as loud as a trumpet! Confront my people with their rebellious deeds; confront Jacob’s family with their sin! They seek me day after day; they want to know my requirements, like a nation that does what is right and does not reject the law of their God. They ask…
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[The LORD said], “I am the God of your father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob. . . . I have surely seen the affliction of my people who are in Egypt and have heard their cry because of their taskmasters. I know their sufferings, and I have…
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Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, rejoice. Let your reasonableness be known to everyone. The Lord is at hand; do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will…
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In January 2019, I wrote a post that was triggered by New York’s abortion law that legalizes abortion up to 24 weeks (see “The Slaughter of the Innocents: Then and Now”). A year and a half later, I find it necessary to revisit this issue–this time to talk about a law and its implications on…
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If you have watched the news recently, you likely have seen the stories of the United States’ withdrawal from Afghanistan after twenty years of conflict. The images that came from the airport at Kabul were as shocking as those from the Vietnam era–and even more so. Desperate people clung to airplanes as they sought to…
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Therefore, if there is any encouragement in Christ, any comfort provided by love, any fellowship in the Spirit, any affection or mercy, complete my joy and be of the same mind, by having the same love, being united in spirit, and having one purpose. Instead of being motivated by selfish ambition or vanity, each of…
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We’re continuing our journey with Jesus and His disciples in Luke’s gospel. In this post, we’ll look at what it cost some to follow Jesus. Now one of the Pharisees asked Jesus to have dinner with him, so he went into the Pharisee’s house and took his place at the table. Then when a woman…
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We’re continuing our journey with Jesus and His disciples in Luke’s gospel. Today, we’re going to look at what happens when one begin to lose hope. John’s disciples informed him about all these things. So John called two of his disciples and sent them to Jesus to ask, “Are you the one who is to…
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We’re continuing our journey with Jesus and His disciples in Luke’s gospel. Today, we’ll finish our discussion of Luke 6 by looking at the second half of Luke 6:17-49. There we read: [Jesus said,] “Do not judge, and you will not be judged; do not condemn, and you will not be condemned; forgive, and you…
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We’re continuing our journey with Jesus and His disciples in Luke’s gospel. Today, we’re going to look at the first half of Luke 6:17-49. There we read: Then [Jesus] came down with them and stood on a level place. And a large number of his disciples had gathered along with a vast multitude from all…
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We’ve seen so far that Jesus was not what the people of Israel expected in a Messiah. He talked about being sent to the Gentiles after all! Now, we’re going to see that Jesus wasn’t quite the “observant Jew” that the Pharisees thought He should be. On a Sabbath, while he was going through the…
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For if we go on sinning deliberately after receiving the knowledge of the truth, there no longer remains a sacrifice for sins, but a fearful expectation of judgment, and a fury of fire that will consume the adversaries. Anyone who has set aside the law of Moses dies without mercy on the evidence of two…
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Therefore, brothers, since we have confidence to enter the holy places by the blood of Jesus, by the new and living way that he opened for us through the curtain, that is, through his flesh, and since we have a great priest over the house of God, let us draw near with a true heart…
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In this post, our final post in this series, we are continuing our discussion of spiritual transformation and growth. Specifically, we are going to look at the real keys to our role in transformation. In the last post, we mentioned a passage that talks about these keys. Therefore I exhort you, brothers and sisters, by…
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In our last post, continuing our discussion of how we are to live in light of the New Covenant, we said that we are to cooperate with the Holy Spirit in transforming us into Christ’s image. To do that, we are to walk according to the Spirit, not according to the Spirit. We then fleshed…
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In our last post we talked a little about what it means to be holy and to grow in Christ. We said that holiness is a work of God with which we cooperate in His transforming us into the image of Christ (His image). It is primarily focused on the inner thoughts and attitudes, and…
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The New Covenant is what God uses to change and transform us, making us holy as He is holy. We are changed into Christ’s image.
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The promises of the New Covenant mean that there is no sin from which God cannot free us. Change and growth are possible for every believer in Christ.
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But as it is, Christ has obtained a ministry that is as much more excellent than the old as the covenant he mediates is better, since it is enacted on better promises. (Hebrews 8:6) So far in this series, we have seen that the New Covenant has a better High Priest (“Jesus, the Highest Priest“)…
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But when Christ appeared as a high priest of the good things that have come, then through the greater and more perfect tent (not made with hands, that is, not of this creation) he entered once for all into the holy places, not by means of the blood of goats and calves but by means…
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For it was indeed fitting that we should have such a high priest, holy, innocent, unstained, separated from sinners, and exalted above the heavens. (Hebrews 7:26) In our first post in this series (“A Better Word than Abel“), we talked about why a New Covenant was needed. Beginning with this post, we’re going to look…