2017-11
2017-11
Sunday Nov 26, 2017
"The Living God Leads His People" (Exodus 13:17-22)
Sunday Nov 26, 2017
Sunday Nov 26, 2017
“The Living God Leads His People” (Exodus 13:17–22)Pastor Cameron JungelsEastside Baptist ChurchSunday PM, November 26, 2017
Exodus 13:17–22 (NIV)
17 When Pharaoh let the people go, God did not lead them on the road through the Philistine country, though that was shorter. For God said, “If they face war, they might change their minds and return to Egypt.” 18 So God led the people around by the desert road toward the Red Sea. The Israelites went up out of Egypt ready for battle.
19 Moses took the bones of Joseph with him because Joseph had made the Israelites swear an oath. He had said, “God will surely come to your aid, and then you must carry my bones up with you from this place.”
20 After leaving Sukkoth they camped at Etham on the edge of the desert. 21 By day the Lord went ahead of them in a pillar of cloud to guide them on their way and by night in a pillar of fire to give them light, so that they could travel by day or night. 22 Neither the pillar of cloud by day nor the pillar of fire by night left its place in front of the people.
1. God leads his people in his way, because God always knows which way is best (17–18).
2. God fulfilled his promises and demonstrates that he is always faithful to help his people (19).
3. God is always present to guide his people (20–22).
Sunday Nov 26, 2017
"Life under the Law" (Romans 7:13-25)
Sunday Nov 26, 2017
Sunday Nov 26, 2017
“Life under the Law” (Romans 7:13–25)Pastor Cameron JungelsEastside Baptist ChurchSunday AM, November 26, 2017
Romans 7:13–25 (NIV)
13 Did that which is good, then, become death to me? By no means! Nevertheless, in order that sin might be recognized as sin, it used what is good to bring about my death, so that through the commandment sin might become utterly sinful.
14 We know that the law is spiritual; but I am unspiritual, sold as a slave to sin. 15 I do not understand what I do. For what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do. 16 And if I do what I do not want to do, I agree that the law is good. 17 As it is, it is no longer I myself who do it, but it is sin living in me. 18 For I know that good itself does not dwell in me, that is, in my sinful nature. For I have the desire to do what is good, but I cannot carry it out. 19 For I do not do the good I want to do, but the evil I do not want to do—this I keep on doing. 20 Now if I do what I do not want to do, it is no longer I who do it, but it is sin living in me that does it.
21 So I find this law at work: Although I want to do good, evil is right there with me. 22 For in my inner being I delight in God’s law; 23 but I see another law at work in me, waging war against the law of my mind and making me a prisoner of the law of sin at work within me. 24 What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body that is subject to death? 25 Thanks be to God, who delivers me through Jesus Christ our Lord!
So then, I myself in my mind am a slave to God’s law, but in my sinful nature a slave to the law of sin.
Who is this passage referring to and what does it mean?
The two dominant views of the passage are that it is either referring to a mature believer in their struggle with sin (Paul in his present status as a mature believer) or to an unbeliever in their moral struggle to do right in an unregenerate state (Paul in his pre-conversion life).
I believe the passage is best understood as referring to a person’s struggle with sin under the law of Moses. Thus, it refers to Paul’s or Israel’s struggle to obey God’s law in the power of the flesh without the aid of the indwelling Holy Spirit. So, the debate is not properly framed around whether the person in question is a believer; the debate is better framed around the question of whether the person is operating under the administration of the old covenant (under law) or under the administration of the new covenant (in the Spirit). Chapter 7:7–25 describes the life of a person struggling to obey God under the old administration of the Mosaic law without the help of the indwelling Spirit who is the gift of God to those under the new covenant.
Below are some arguments put forward for the two different views:
1. Arguments for Romans 7 describing the experience of a believer in Christ (including a mature believer, such as Paul in his present experience).
a. The “I” is autobiographical and most naturally refers to Paul.
i. Response: the “I” does refer to Paul but not just to Paul. It also includes the experience of any Israelite under law and even to some degree the experience of Adam in the Garden of Eden when confronted with God’s good commandment.
b. The verb tenses shift in verse 14 to the present tense. While verses 7–12 are primarily in the past tense, the verbs from v. 14 on are in the present tense. Therefore, a transition must have occurred beginning in v. 14. In verses 7–12 Paul must be describing his past experience before conversion, and after v. 13 is describing his present experience as a believer.
i. Response: The switch to the present tense is not in itself conclusive. It is common in narrative descriptions to use a present tense verb to describe the scene from the perspective of the narrator. If Paul is employing a narrative framework to describe the personal struggle of someone (including himself) under the law of Moses, it would not be out of place to employ a present tense verb. It makes the description vivid and personal. So, the present tense can be understood in a literary, narrative way that fits in the passage with Paul’s purpose, but it does not necessarily prove that Paul is referring to his present state as a believer in Christ. The present tense of the verbs needs to be subservient to Paul’s overriding concern in the passage, and this concern is to show the powerlessness of the flesh to obey God while under the reign of the law of Moses.
c. The very positive comments of the “I” in describing his desire to do good or obey the law seems to point to a regenerated person. It is hard to imagine an unbeliever saying that he delights in God’s law.
i. So, we have statements like this:
1. The law is holy, righteous, and good (12).2. The law is spiritual (14).3. What I want to do (obey the law) (15).4. I agree that the law is good (16).5. I have the desire to do what is good (17).6. I don’t do the good that I want to do (want to obey the law) (19).7. I want to do good (21).8. In my inner being, I delight in God’s law (22).9. Thanks be to God through our Lord Jesus Christ (24).10. In my mind, I am a slave to God’s law (25).
ii. However, we also have seemingly contrary statements that do not fit the perspective of a believer:
1. Sin sprang to life and I died (9).2. I am unspiritual (14).3. I am sold as a slave to sin (14). Compare with Romans 6:6–7, which says that we have been set free from sin and are no longer slaves to sin.4. What I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do – describes a conflicted, double-minded person (15).5. Good itself does not dwell in me, in my flesh (18).6. The good that I want to do I cannot carry it out (can’t do good) (18).7. Another law at work in my mind is making me a prisoner of the law of sin at work in me (23). Compare with Romans 8:2, which says that believers are set free from the law of sin and death. 8. In my flesh a slave to the law of sin (see 8:2).
iii. Response: The debate cannot be solved by comparing these statements, because they are in conflict. The good statements do not fit an unbeliever, but the bad statements do not fit a believer’s perspective either. The answer must come from the context and purpose of what Paul is doing. If we understand that Romans 7 is from the perspective of the law, then the positive statements can be understood as coming not from any unbeliever but from a God-fearing Jew under the law. Paul, the Pharisee, could agree with all of the positive statements about God’s law in chapter 7, but he did not have the power to carry it out in his flesh without the aid of the Holy Spirit. So, the struggle is chapter 7 is not descriptive of an unbeliever per se, but the struggle of someone under the law of Moses who has a desire to obey it but does not have the ability.
d. The passage seems to fit our personal experience as believers in our struggle against sin and the flesh.
i. Response: We want to be careful to not interpret Scripture in light of our own experience or our own perceived experience. We want to interpret the text with an understanding of the historical and literary contexts and then reading and interpreting the words themselves (lexical, grammatical) in a way that Paul and his original readers could agree with. Christians do have an ongoing battle with sin and our desires. Christians are not perfect, and diligent effort must be applied to grow in holiness. Paul himself said in Romans 6 that since we are free from the power and reign of sin we must offer our bodies to God and righteousness. This is an imperative that flows from the indicative reality of our new life in Christ. We find numerous exhortations in the Scriptures for believers to pursue diligently with great effort a life of holiness in the power of Christ through the Spirit. I agree that there is a struggle with sin in chapter 7, but it is a struggle that is being fought under law, and the law has been coopted by sin to multiply sin and transgressions to leave the sinner condemned to death. Chapter 7 describes a struggle with sin that cannot be won. The struggle is the flesh vs. sin under the reign of law, which is why the passage ends in defeat and despair (v. 24). The Christian’s struggle is vastly different. It is not a struggle that ends in despair and defeat. Why? Because it is a pursuit of righteousness away from sin in the power of the Holy Spirit not in the old way of the written code.
2. Arguments for Chapter 7 referring to Israel’s/Paul’s experience under the law of Moses.
a. The earlier references to the law in Romans:
i. The righteousness of God comes to believers apart from law (3:21).ii. A person is justified by faith apart from the works of the law (3:28).iii. The law brings wrath (4:15).iv. The law actually increases transgressions (5:20)v. The believer is no longer under the law, but under grace. Therefore, sin can no longer be the master of a believer (6:14).vi. Believers have died to the law and now belong to Christ (7:4). vii. Under the law, our sinful passions bore fruit for death (7:5). viii. Believers have been released from the law and now serve in the new way of the Spirit (7:6).
b. The structure of Romans.
i. Romans 6 and 7 are extended “asides” to deal with potential objections to Paul’s argument that we are no longer under law but under grace (5:20). ii. 7:7–25 is a defense against possible misunderstanding after Paul’s definitive statement in 7:1-6 that we are no longer married to the law and are now married to Christ.iii. 7:5–6 are key to understanding 7:7–8:17.iv. 7:5 is life under law – unregenerate experience described (7:5).v. 7:6 is life in the Spirit – regenerate experience described (7:6).vi. 7:7–25 is an elaboration of 7:5.vii. 8:1–17 is an elaboration of 7:6.
c. The contrast between 7:14–25 and 8:1–17 is so dramatic that it is difficult to believe that the experience described is that of a Christian in both cases.d. Nowhere does 7:14–25 mention life in Christ or life in the Spirit. It is always in reference to law. Chapter 8 refers to the Holy Spirit 19 times. The “I” that attempts to but fails to keep God’s law lacks the resources of the Holy Spirit. This is vastly different than the experience of the believer with the Spirit in ch. 8.e. The description of the person in chapter 7 who delights in God’s law is not a believer in Christ in the Spirit, but a devout Jew or moral person who desires to do what is right but who lacks the resources to do it. Verse 22 – in my inner being I delight in God’s law – is the description of a pious/God-fearing Jew under law. So, the portrait in 7:14–25 is not true of all unbelievers; it depicts a person who delights in God’s law but cannot keep it. (Paul as a Pharisee; David; etc.).f. But doesn’t Paul say that he was blameless with regards to God’s law (Philippians 3)? Yes, but surely Paul didn’t consider himself as sinless. In terms of exterior performance, he was blameless in the eyes of other people. But they cannot see his coveting, which he describes in 7:7–12. Remember the rich man who came to Jesus who said that he had obeyed all the commands of God since his youth, but he could not part with his wealth. He was guilty of coveting just as Paul describes his coveting in ch. 7. Coveting is the perfect example command, because in many ways it encapsulates the whole law. A covetous person is not worshiping God and God alone with no other gods before him. Also, a person coveting is not truly obeying the commands to not steal, commit adultery, etc. So, coveting is a disobedience of the two great commands to love God and neighbor. Life in the flesh under the law without the Spirit is powerless to transform the heart and cure it of coveting and thus of breaking God’s law.g. The whole argument of the larger section of Romans is that Christians are no longer under law; we have been married to another (Christ). Thus, 7:7–25 cannot be describing a person in Christ in the Spirit because everything said is in relationship to law. But the NT believer in Christ has been set free from the law. The burden of this whole section is to show how believers are not under law but under grace, while at the same time not disparaging God’s good law. God’s law is good, but we are not. The problem is that we are powerless to obey it. This powerlessness leads to the desperate lament at the end of the passage (7:24). Our only hope from this desperate situation is Jesus Christ and his life-giving Spirit.
Main Idea: If you try to justify yourself by keeping the law, you will fail. If you try to sanctify yourself as a believer by keeping the law, you will fail. The only hope that we wretched, dead, miserable human beings have is the redeeming work of the Lord Jesus Christ who justifies us through faith and then gives us the indwelling Holy Spirit who makes us righteous in a way that the law could never achieve.
Sunday Nov 19, 2017
“Sin’s Use of the Law to Bring Death” (Romans 7:7–12)
Sunday Nov 19, 2017
Sunday Nov 19, 2017
“Sin’s Use of the Law to Bring Death” (Romans 7:7–12)
Pastor Cameron Jungels
Eastside Baptist Church
Sunday AM, November 19, 2017
Romans 7:7–12 (NIV)
7 What shall we say, then? Is the law sinful? Certainly not! Nevertheless, I would not have known what sin was had it not been for the law. For I would not have known what coveting really was if the law had not said, “You shall not covet.” 8 But sin, seizing the opportunity afforded by the commandment, produced in me every kind of coveting. For apart from the law, sin was dead. 9 Once I was alive apart from the law; but when the commandment came, sin sprang to life and I died. 10 I found that the very commandment that was intended to bring life actually brought death. 11 For sin, seizing the opportunity afforded by the commandment, deceived me, and through the commandment put me to death. 12 So then, the law is holy, and the commandment is holy, righteous and good.
19 Now we know that whatever the law says, it says to those who are under the law, so that every mouth may be silenced and the whole world held accountable to God. 20 Therefore no one will be declared righteous in God's sight by the works of the law; rather, through the law we become conscious of our sin. 21 But now apart from the law the righteousness of God has been made known, to which the Law and the Prophets testify. (Romans 3:19-21, NIV)
13 It was not through the law that Abraham and his offspring received the promise that he would be heir of the world, but through the righteousness that comes by faith. 14 For if those who depend on the law are heirs, faith means nothing and the promise is worthless, 15 because the law brings wrath. And where there is no law there is no transgression. (Romans 4:13-15, NIV)
13 To be sure, sin was in the world before the law was given, but sin is not charged against anyone's account where there is no law. 14 Nevertheless, death reigned from the time of Adam to the time of Moses, even over those who did not sin by breaking a command, as did Adam, who is a pattern of the one to come. (Romans 5:13-14, NIV)
20 The law was brought in so that the trespass might increase. But where sin increased, grace increased all the more, 21 so that, just as sin reigned in death, so also grace might reign through righteousness to bring eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord. (Romans 5:20-21, NIV)
14 For sin shall no longer be your master, because you are not under the law, but under grace. 15 What then? Shall we sin because we are not under the law but under grace? By no means! (Romans 6:14-15, NIV)
4 So, my brothers and sisters, you also died to the law through the body of Christ, that you might belong to another, to him who was raised from the dead, in order that we might bear fruit for God. 5 For when we were in the realm of the flesh, the sinful passions aroused by the law were at work in us, so that we bore fruit for death. 6 But now, by dying to what once bound us, we have been released from the law so that we serve in the new way of the Spirit, and not in the old way of the written code. (Romans 7:4-6, NIV)
The Law of Moses is holy, just, and good.
Though the Law of Moses is holy, just, and good, it has had the effect of making the condition of sinful people even worse.
a. The Law reveals our sin.
b.The Law arouses sin and increases transgressions.
c.The Law condemns the sinner to death.
Our only hope for deliverance is through the grace of Jesus Christ.
Wednesday Nov 15, 2017
"A Praying Life" (chapters 30-31)
Wednesday Nov 15, 2017
Wednesday Nov 15, 2017
A Praying Life: Connecting with God in a Distracting WorldBy Paul E. Miller
“Prayer Work” - Chapter 30
How often do we pray for difficult people?
We do our best to “live at peace with all men” and be kind to them, but have we ever prayed that God would change them?
Do we believe that God is in the business of changing lives?
We could write up a prayer card with the name of a person that is particularly hard on us and pray the Scriptures over that person. Then we wait and see what God does!
If we pray for God to “soften” someone or give someone patience or to humble them, God may answer our prayer by bringing difficulty and suffering into that person’s life.
If Satan’s basic game plan is pride, seeking to draw us into his life of arrogance, then God’s basic game plan is humility, drawing us into the life of his Son.
The Father can’t think of anything better to give us than his Son.
Suffering invites us to join his Son’s life, death, and resurrection. Once you see that, suffering is no longer strange.
Working Your Prayers
If God does answer our prayers for that person by humbling them through suffering, are we ready to roll up our sleeves to serve them?
God will often provide opportunities for us to “work” our prayer request.
God may involve us personally in our own prayers, often in a physical and humbling way – teaching us to be a servant.
God told his disciples to pray that the Lord of the harvest would send out laborers, then he sent out the ones he just told to pray! (Matt. 9:37ff.)
In Jesus’ parable of the growing seed, there is a three-step pattern: Planting
Waiting
Working the harvest
It doesn’t occur to us that our prayers may follow the same pattern.
First, it doesn’t occur to us to plant the seed of thoughtful praying because we may think that difficult people don’t change.
Second, if we do pray, we don’t watch and wait. We want the answer now.
Third, we don’t recognize the harvest when it comes, and we forget that reaping the harvest involves our participation.
Too often we end up reversing the pattern and attack the problem first.
We confront the person over their behavior, then the relationship disintegrates, then we pray after nothing else has worked.
By then we’ve often concluded that the person can’t change, and prayer doesn’t work.
But what really doesn’t work is us.
Our “prayer doesn’t work” often means “you didn’t do my will, in my way, in my time.”
Only by praying and watching do we realize the unlikely connections God makes in the kingdom.
God may answer our prayers for another person by involving us in their lives as a humble servant in the midst of their suffering.
Suffering opens the door to love. Suffering reaps a harvest of real change.
“Listening to God” - Chapter 31
How do we discern the leading of God or the guidance of the Holy Spirit in our lives?
When we commune with God in prayer are we sensing God’s direction or just our own thoughts?
Two Dangers
“Word Only” – Not listening to the Spirit.If we focus exclusively on God’s written Word when looking for God’s activity in our lives but don’t watch and pray, we’ll miss the unfolding story of his work.
We’ll miss the patterns of the Divine Artist etching the character of his Son on our hearts.
The Spirit personalizes the Word.
If we believe Scripture only applies to people in general, then we can miss how God intimately personalizes his counsel to us as individuals.
We can become deists, removing God from our lives.
But everywhere in Scripture we see God speaking to us with a personal touch, prompting us to obey and love.
Seeing the finger of God in our circumstances, creation, other Christians, and the Word keeps us from elevating our thoughts to a unique status. God is continually speaking to each of us, but not just through our intuition.
Seeing God’s activity in the details of our lives enhances the application of God’s Word. We actually undermine the impact of God’s Word if we define God’s speaking too narrowly.
What is at stake here is developing an eye for the Shepherd.
We need to tune in to our Father’s voice above the noise of our own hearts and the surrounding world—what C. S. Lewis called “the Kingdom of Noise.”
“Watch and Pray.”
Don’t pray in a fog. Pray with your eyes open. Look for the patterns God is weaving in your life.
“Spirit Only” – Elevating Human IntuitionThere is a danger in thinking we hear God speak.
When people call their own thoughts or feelings “God’s voice,” it puts them in control of God and ultimately undermines God’s Word by elevating human intuition to the status of divine revelation.
Unless Scripture guards and directs our intuitions, we can easily run amok and baptize our selfish desires with religious language.
The danger is in elevating our own thoughts (what we can mistakenly think is the leading of the Spirit) to the level of biblical authority.
The problem is that the Holy Spirit comes in on the same channel as the world, the flesh, the Devil.
The Lord does lead—we just need to be careful that we aren’t using the Lord as a cover for our own desires. If we frequently interpret random thoughts and desires as “God speaking,” we can end up with some very unbiblical and immoral plans – not God’s will at all.
An overly mystical view of God speaking to us can end up with us just listening to the darkness of our own hearts.
To correctly discern when God is speaking to us, we need to keep the Word and the Spirit together.
The Spirit personalizes and applies the written Word of God to our lives.
Without the written word, “being led by the Spirit of God” can turn into us doing what we want to do. What they “hear” from God might be masking their self-will.
Without the Spirit, the written Word can become dry and impersonal, with no personal application leading to a life of listening and repentance.
Listening to and obeying God are so intertwined in biblical thought that in the Hebrew they are one word, shamar.
Under the cover of being obedient to the Word, Word Only folks can be rigid.
We need to guard against rationalism as much as we need to guard against emotionalism.
The Word provides the structure, the vocabulary. The Spirit personalizes it to our life.
Keeping the Word and the Spirit together guards us from the danger of God-talk becoming a cover for our own desires and the danger of lives isolated from God.
Cultivate a Listening Heart
There is nothing secret about communion with God. If we live a holy life before God, broken of our pride and self-will, crying out for grace, then we will be in communion with God. It is really that simple.
You can’t listen to God if you are isolated from a life of surrender that draws you into his story for your life.
There is a tendency among Christians to get excited about “listening to God” as if they are discovering a hidden way of communicating with God that will revolutionize their prayer lives.
This subtly elevates an experience with God instead of God himself. Without realizing it, we can look at the windshield instead of through it.
The problem isn’t the activity of listening, but my listening heart. Am I attentive to God? Is my heart soft and teachable?
The means of communication is secondary to a surrendered heart. Our responsibility is to cultivate a listening heart in the midst of the noise from our own hearts and from the world, not to mention the Devil.
The interaction between the Divine Spirit and my own spirit is mysterious. David captures this mystery in Psalm 16:7—“I bless the LORD who gives me counsel; in the night also my heart instructs me.”
Is David’s heart talking to him, or is God giving him counsel? The two are impossible to separate.
Tuning in to your Father’s voice has a hard-to-pin-down-but-nevertheless-real quality.
We don’t have the capacity to analyze this interaction.
The counsel God gave David is inseparable from David’s active pursuit of God: “I have set the LORD always before me” (16:8).
The counsel from God doesn’t function like a fortune teller; it is inseparable from a humble seeking after God.
Sunday Nov 12, 2017
“Redemption and Remembrance” (Exodus 13:1–16)
Sunday Nov 12, 2017
Sunday Nov 12, 2017
“Redemption and Remembrance” (Exodus 13:1–16)
Pastor Cameron Jungels
Eastside Baptist Church
Sunday PM, November 12, 2017
Exodus 13:1–16 (NIV)
13 The Lord said to Moses, 2 “Consecrate to me every firstborn male. The first offspring of every womb among the Israelites belongs to me, whether human or animal.”
3 Then Moses said to the people, “Commemorate this day, the day you came out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery, because the Lord brought you out of it with a mighty hand. Eat nothing containing yeast. 4 Today, in the month of Aviv, you are leaving. 5 When the Lord brings you into the land of the Canaanites, Hittites, Amorites, Hivites and Jebusites—the land he swore to your ancestors to give you, a land flowing with milk and honey—you are to observe this ceremony in this month: 6 For seven days eat bread made without yeast and on the seventh day hold a festival to the Lord. 7 Eat unleavened bread during those seven days; nothing with yeast in it is to be seen among you, nor shall any yeast be seen anywhere within your borders. 8 On that day tell your son, ‘I do this because of what the Lord did for me when I came out of Egypt.’ 9 This observance will be for you like a sign on your hand and a reminder on your forehead that this law of the Lord is to be on your lips. For the Lord brought you out of Egypt with his mighty hand. 10 You must keep this ordinance at the appointed time year after year.
11 “After the Lord brings you into the land of the Canaanites and gives it to you, as he promised on oath to you and your ancestors, 12 you are to give over to the Lord the first offspring of every womb. All the firstborn males of your livestock belong to the Lord. 13 Redeem with a lamb every firstborn donkey, but if you do not redeem it, break its neck. Redeem every firstborn among your sons.
14 “In days to come, when your son asks you, ‘What does this mean?’ say to him, ‘With a mighty hand the Lord brought us out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery. 15 When Pharaoh stubbornly refused to let us go, the Lord killed the firstborn of both people and animals in Egypt. This is why I sacrifice to the Lord the first male offspring of every womb and redeem each of my firstborn sons.’ 16 And it will be like a sign on your hand and a symbol on your forehead that the Lord brought us out of Egypt with his mighty hand.”
Redemption: (vv. 1–2, 11–16): God has rights over his people and they are to be consecrated to him because he paid the price to redeem them.
Remembrance: (vv. 3–10): God’s mighty acts are to be remembered and celebrated by his covenant people.
Sunday Nov 12, 2017
“Free from the Law” (Romans 7:1–6)
Sunday Nov 12, 2017
Sunday Nov 12, 2017
“Free from the Law” (Romans 7:1–6)
Pastor Cameron Jungels
Eastside Baptist Church
Sunday AM, November 12, 2017
Romans 7:1–6 (NIV)
7 Do you not know, brothers and sisters—for I am speaking to those who know the law—that the law has authority over someone only as long as that person lives? 2 For example, by law a married woman is bound to her husband as long as he is alive, but if her husband dies, she is released from the law that binds her to him. 3 So then, if she has sexual relations with another man while her husband is still alive, she is called an adulteress. But if her husband dies, she is released from that law and is not an adulteress if she marries another man.
4 So, my brothers and sisters, you also died to the law through the body of Christ, that you might belong to another, to him who was raised from the dead, in order that we might bear fruit for God. 5 For when we were in the realm of the flesh, the sinful passions aroused by the law were at work in us, so that we bore fruit for death. 6 But now, by dying to what once bound us, we have been released from the law so that we serve in the new way of the Spirit, and not in the old way of the written code.
The Principle: Death releases a person from his obligation to legal demands (v. 1).
The Picture: The principle is illustrated by the analogy of marriage. Death releases a spouse from the marriage vow and its legal obligation (vv. 2–3).
The Point: We died through our union with Christ and his death on the cross and resurrection from the grave. Therefore, we are no longer bound to the Law and its demands and penalties. We now belong to Christ to live for God (v. 4).
The Practice (vv. 5–6)
a. Our Past Practice: In the past, while in unbelief, our practice was to be in the bondage of the Law, which magnified sin, which results in death (v. 5).
b. Our Present Practice: In Christ, in the present, we are free from the bondage of the Law and are now free not to serve ourselves but to serve God through the indwelling Holy Spirit. The indwelling Holy Spirit fulfills and replaces the Law’s function in our lives and accomplishes it more perfectly and effectively (v. 6).
Wednesday Nov 08, 2017
"A Praying Life" (chapters 28-29)
Wednesday Nov 08, 2017
Wednesday Nov 08, 2017
A Praying Life: Connecting with God in a Distracting WorldBy Paul E. Miller
Praying in Real Life: Part 5
“Using Prayer Tools” - Chapter 28
Why do most people write down their schedules, but most Christians do not write down prayer requests?
The bottom line is we don’t write down our prayer requests because we don’t take prayer seriously. We don’t think it works.
Paul prayed for many churches and individuals by name; he likely had an extensive prayer list.
Using a written system to pray for people helps us to connect to their lives and be genuinely interested.
Disabled by the Fall
We are not normal children learning how to pray; we are disabled by the Fall.
We have a disorder that hinders our ability to talk with God.
Written aides help us talk with God.
Some feel that using a written system makes prayer “less natural,” but this is based on a false romantic idea that if it doesn’t feel “natural” then it isn’t real.
We think spiritual things—if done right—should just flow. But if you have a disability, nothing flows in the beginning.
Prayer will not feel “natural” at first, but we must persist, especially during the learning stages.
Prayer journals and prayer cards are a couple of systems that can guide our prayer lives.
Be Careful of Systems
Systems can be useful, but if we are not careful they can also become rote and robotic, desensitizing us to God as a person.
We can easily become mindless or wooden as we pray.
The other side of the coin is to be suspicious of all systems, thinking that it quenches the Spirit.
But we all use systems with things that are important to us.
So, well designed systems have a place in our prayer lives, as long as we don’t allow them to make our prayer lives wooden or robotic. They need to be able to flex along with real life.
“Life is both holding hands and scrubbing floors. It is both being and doing. Prayer journals or prayer cards are on the ‘scrubbing floors’ side of life. Praying like a child is on the ‘holding hands’ side of life. We need both.”
“Keeping Track of the Story: Using Prayer Cards” - Chapter 29
Guidelines for Prayer Cards
The card functions like a prayer snapshot of a person’s life.
Linger over a prayer card for only a few seconds while praying.
Put the Word to work by writing a Scripture verse on the card that expresses the request for that particular person or situation.
The card doesn’t change much over time. Every once in a while, add another line.
It’s not necessary to write down answers to prayer. They will be obvious and remembered since the cards are seen almost every day.
Putting a date to the prayer card is optional.
Prayer Cards vs. List
A prayer card focuses on one person or area of your life.
It allows you to look at the person or situation from multiple perspectives.
Over time, it helps you to reflect on what God does in response to your prayers.
You begin to see patterns, and slowly a story unfolds that you find yourself drawn into.
A list tends to be more mechanical.
We can get overwhelmed with the number of things to pray for.
Because items on a list are so disconnected, it is hard to maintain the discipline to pray.
Having only one card in front of you at a time keeps you focused, and you can concentrate on that person or need.
Prayer Cards for Family
Have a separate card for each member of the family.
Have specific requests for various areas of his/her life – physical, spiritual, academic, career, etc.
Write Scripture for one ore more of the prayer areas to pray God’s Word for them.
Have “big” and “small” prayers.
See how God writes the story and answers your prayers over time.
People in Suffering
It is easy to get overwhelmed in praying for the needs of those in suffering, especially when the diagnosis isn’t clear or there is no end in sight.
Don’t just tell people that you are “praying for them” but add them to a card dedicated to people going through suffering.
You will be better connected with them and can follow up.
Non-Christians
Have at least one card for non-Christians that you are praying for.
Pray for specific areas of their life, or areas where they are struggling with the claims of the gospel.
Watch how God may draw them to himself over time, using a variety of different circumstances in their lives.
Friends
We won’t regularly pray for friends if we do not write them down and make it a part of our life of prayer.
Building a Deck of Cards
Some cards can be prayed through daily; others can be rotated one or two cards a day.
It doesn’t have to become overwhelming.
Use prayer time to write them out over a period of time. Slowly build your prayer cards.
Begin with a partial card and add items over time.
The hardest part of writing out prayer cards isn’t the time; it’s our unbelief.
We seldom feel unbelief directly—it lurks behind the feelings that will surface if we start to write prayer cards.
We might be skeptical at first or feel like it is unnatural.
In reality they will help us to be regular and personal in prayer.
Get Dirty
Prayer is asking God to incarnate, “to get dirty” in your life.
Take Jesus at his word; ask him; tell him what you want; get dirty – in the nitty gritty of life.
Don’t fall into the trap of busyness.
“If you try to seize the day, the day will eventually break you. Seize the corner of his garment and don’t let go until he blesses you. He will reshape the day.”
Sunday Nov 05, 2017
“The Lord’s Passover” (Exodus 12:43–51)
Sunday Nov 05, 2017
Sunday Nov 05, 2017
“The Lord’s Passover” (Exodus 12:43–51)
Pastor Cameron Jungels
Eastside Baptist Church
Sunday PM, November 5, 2017
Exodus 12:43–51 (NIV)
43 The Lord said to Moses and Aaron, “These are the regulations for the Passover meal:
“No foreigner may eat it. 44 Any slave you have bought may eat it after you have circumcised him, 45 but a temporary resident or a hired worker may not eat it.
46 “It must be eaten inside the house; take none of the meat outside the house. Do not break any of the bones. 47 The whole community of Israel must celebrate it.
48 “A foreigner residing among you who wants to celebrate the Lord’s Passover must have all the males in his household circumcised; then he may take part like one born in the land. No uncircumcised male may eat it. 49 The same law applies both to the native-born and to the foreigner residing among you.”
50 All the Israelites did just what the Lord had commanded Moses and Aaron. 51 And on that very day the Lord brought the Israelites out of Egypt by their divisions.
It is the Lord’s Passover.
The Lord is the covenant-maker and keeper.
The Lord is the deliverer-redeemer.
The Lord is the law-giver: It is the Lord who establishes the ordinances and traditions for the memorial of Passover.
The Passover was to serve as an opportunity for worship, for remembrance, and for thankfulness for the Lord’s deliverance of his people from slavery.
The Passover was reserved for members of the community of God’s people.
The Passover was to be observed in a particular way so as to set it apart as a holy and sacred rite for God’s people.
The entire community of God was to participate in the Passover meal.
Sunday Nov 05, 2017
“Free Slaves” (Romans 6:15–23)
Sunday Nov 05, 2017
Sunday Nov 05, 2017
“Free Slaves” (Romans 6:15–23)
Pastor Cameron Jungels
Eastside Baptist Church
Sunday AM, November 5, 2017
Romans 6:15–23 (NIV)
15 What then? Shall we sin because we are not under the law but under grace? By no means! 16 Don’t you know that when you offer yourselves to someone as obedient slaves, you are slaves of the one you obey—whether you are slaves to sin, which leads to death, or to obedience, which leads to righteousness? 17 But thanks be to God that, though you used to be slaves to sin, you have come to obey from your heart the pattern of teaching that has now claimed your allegiance. 18 You have been set free from sin and have become slaves to righteousness.
19 I am using an example from everyday life because of your human limitations. Just as you used to offer yourselves as slaves to impurity and to ever-increasing wickedness, so now offer yourselves as slaves to righteousness leading to holiness. 20 When you were slaves to sin, you were free from the control of righteousness. 21 What benefit did you reap at that time from the things you are now ashamed of? Those things result in death! 22 But now that you have been set free from sin and have become slaves of God, the benefit you reap leads to holiness, and the result is eternal life. 23 For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.
Christians are living in a new era and are citizens of a new kingdom.
The salvation-historical then/now.
The salvation-experiential then/now.
Then: You used to be slaves of sin and bound for death.
Now: You are now slaves of righteousness bound for eternal life.
Summary: We are now part of the era and kingdom of grace, but being under grace instead of Law doesn’t mean that we are free to sin or free to indulge in lawlessness. Being under grace means that we are now citizens of a new Kingdom with a new Lord. It is to this gracious and righteous King Jesus that we now owe our loyalty and obedience. Let us serve him as willing servants, because the benefits are joyous and eternal.
Main Idea: Jesus sets us free to serve God in righteousness and holiness.
Wednesday Nov 01, 2017
"A Praying Life" (chapters 26-27)
Wednesday Nov 01, 2017
Wednesday Nov 01, 2017
A Praying Life: Connecting with God in a Distracting WorldBy Paul E. Miller
“Hope: The End of the Story” - Chapter 26
Hope is a new idea in history, a uniquely Christian vision.
The gospel is Good News. Because God broke the power of evil at the cross, we can, along with Sarah, look at our cynicism and laugh.
Tragedy doesn’t have the last word. God saves the best for last.
The infinite God touches us personally. We can dream big because God is big.
Dreaming Big
I have prayed for humility, and it dawned on me that God was answering my prayer.
I would have preferred humility to come over me like magic. Instead, God teaches humility in humble places.
What I thought was a stone was really a loaf of bread.
Our prayers didn’t float above life. Our family was focused on both the reality line and the hope line.
Praying was inseparable from working, planning, and good old-fashioned begging.
Willing to Be Enchanted
As we wait and pray, God weaves his story and creates a wonder.
Instead of drifting between comedy (denial) and tragedy (reality), we have a relationship with the living God, who is intimately involved with the details of our worlds.
We are learning to watch for the story to unfold, to wait for the wonder.
If you wait, your heavenly Father will pick you up, carry you out into the night, and make your life sparkle. He wants to dazzle you with the wonder of his love.
To see the marvel of the stories that our Father is telling, we need to become like little children.
C. S. Lewis was characterized by a willingness to be enchanted—his delight in laughter, his willingness to accept a world made by a good and loving God, and his willingness to submit to the charms of a wonderful story.
God delights in turning our tragedies into comedies.
“Living in Gospel Stories” - Chapter 27
What we think are mistakes and frustrating situations are opportunities for the kingdom of God to show up in our lives. It is always that way with the kingdom. It is so strange, so low; it is seldom recognized.
It looks like a mistake, but later we realize that we were in the middle of God’s story.
The downward journey is a gospel story. Humility comes before exaltation.
Gospel Stories
My trip with Kim was a gospel story. I gave up a piece of my life for Jill. In the gospel, Jesus took my sin, and I got his righteousness. That is how gospel stories work. Jill gets a restful weekend, and I get a stressful one. Whenever you love, you reenact Jesus’ death.
Gospel stories always have suffering in them. American Christianity has an allergic reaction to this part of the gospel. We’d love to hear about God’s love for us, but suffering doesn’t mesh with our right to “the pursuit of happiness.” So we pray to escape a gospel story, when that is the best gift the Father can give us. When I was sitting on the plane thinking, Everything has gone wrong, that was the point when everything was going right. That’s how love works.
The Father wants to draw us into the story of his Son. He doesn’t have a better story to tell, so he keeps retelling it in our lives. As we reenact the gospel, we are drawn into a strange kind of fellowship. The taste of Christ is so good that the apostle Paul told the Philippians that he wanted to know “the fellowship of sharing in [Jesus’] sufferings” (Philippians 3:10, NIV).
Living in a gospel story exposes our idols, our false sources of love.
When our idols are exposed, we often give up in despair― overwhelmed by both the other person’s sin and our own.
But by simply staying in the story, continuing to show up for life, even if it seems pointless, the kingdom comes. Poverty of spirit is no longer a belief. We own it. It describes us.
Repentance, in a strange way, is refreshing.
When we remove our false selves, repentance creates integrity. We return to the real source of love―our heavenly Father. We become authentic.
Enjoying God’s Story
If we stop fighting and embrace the gospel story God is weaving in our lives, we discover joy.
If we pursue joy directly, it slips from our grasp. But if we begin with Jesus and learn to love, we end up with joy.
Meaning to Suffering
Gospel stories give meaning to suffering.
Looking at suffering and tragedy through the lens of the gospel helps us to see the redemptive value of suffering.
God brings grace and freedom through suffering.
This view of life requires a firm confidence in the sovereignty of God. God is the weaver of stories.
Unseen Connections
We should be on the lookout for unseen connections.
To see a gospel story, we need to reflect on how seemingly disparate pieces are connected.
The best place to pick up the unseen connections of our designer God is in disappointment and tension.
Unseen means that there are no visible, causal links. As we bring God’s mind to our stories, we can see his hand crafting connections behind the scenes.
Nothing in the modern mind encourages us to see the invisible links binding together all of life. We have no sense that we live in the presence of a loving Father and are accountable for all we do.
We need to remember by faith that this is My Father’s World.
Everything you do is connected to who you are as a person and, in turn, creates the person you are becoming.
Everything you do affects those you love.
All of life is covenant.
Imbedded in the idea of prayer is a richly textured view of the world where all of life is organized around invisible bonds or covenants that knit us together.
Instead of a fixed world, we live in our Father’s world, a world built for divine relationships between people where, because of the Good News, tragedies become comedies and hope is born.