Live Like a Champion – Week 16
The Promise of Transformation!
Romans 12:1-2 (NAS95)
In this sermon series, we are learning how to live like a champion by learning how to live according to the victory of the promises of God. Our guiding image for this series is being a member of an NFL team who wins the Superbowl. We live like champions so that others will come to know the One who gave us His Victory—Jesus Christ, crucified, risen, and coming again!
The play of the week is “The Promise of Transformation!” The memory verse for this promise is Romans 12:1-2, when Paul calls the church to respond to the gospel presentation of the first 11 chapters:
Therefore I urge you, brethren, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies a living and holy sacrifice, acceptable to God, which is your spiritual service of worship. And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, so that you may prove what the will of God is, that which is good and acceptable and perfect.
Today’s promise is directly connected to the Easter promise of John 11:25-26, “The Promise of Resurrection and Life!” and an essential follow up to last week’s promise from 2 Corinthians 5:17, “The Promise of a New Beginning!” As we walk through the Easter Season we are invited to not only believe our own message, but to live in the power of our hope! We are invited to live as the new creation of God, as the Holy Spirit transforms us through the renewal of our minds.
Last week we learned that as the “new creation” in Christ, we are to be compelled by God’s love—this is God’s “good and acceptable and perfect” will for our lives! Being made mature in God’s love—conformed to the image of Jesus—is the goal of the God-ordained transformation process, that you are compelled by love “so that you may prove what the will of God is, that which is good and acceptable and perfect.”
Paul emphasized in 1 Corinthians 2:12-16 that this can only happen through the Holy Spirit:
Now we have received, not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, so that we may know the things freely given to us by God, which things we also speak, not in words taught by human wisdom, but in those taught by the Spirit, combining spiritual thoughts with spiritual words. But a natural man does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him; and he cannot understand them, because they are spiritually appraised. But he who is spiritual appraises all things, yet he himself is appraised by no one. For who has known the mind of the Lord, that he will instruct Him? But we have the mind of Christ.
To be transformed by the renewal of your mind is to have “the mind of Christ” and to appraise spiritually all things—to not be conformed to the patterns of this world, but to pray heaven to earth and work towards this prayer being answered in and through you. Thy will be done! This is a person’s ability to discern God’s will, “that which is good and acceptable and perfect,” as promised in Romans 12:2.
Discernment is the fruit of a person’s spiritual formation; which is the Holy Spirit’s work to transform you by the renewal of your mind as you learn how to be like Jesus by spending time with Him and His people through the spiritual disciplines of Christian discipleship and the spiritual practices of Christian community.
With that said, we need to be very clear about a specific word in today’s promise: “Prove.” Prove is not an invitation to live your life in insecurity and fear; like one child on the playground saying to another, “prove it!” or like me saying to myself, “I have to prove to others (or to myself) that I belong to God, that I really am a Christian.” Prove, by this thought process, is opposed to grace and of the flesh!
That is not how Paul used the word “prove.” It’s not the pressure cooker of performance! Paul said in Romans 14:17, “For the kingdom of God is not [based on your religious performance], but righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit.” If you are a new creation, then the Kingdom of God has come upon you and where Jesus reigns, there is righteousness, peace, and joy!
Spiritual disciplines in your personal life and spiritual practices in our community life are not performance; they are the unforced rhythms of grace in the easy yoke of Jesus. They are us walking in the character of Jesus Christ—gentle and humble in heart (Matthew 11:29). The practices of faith, personally and in community, are the means by which we learn to work from grace and allow Him to carry our burdens.
“Prove” in Romans 12:2 means that God’s work of transformation in you will demonstrate who you are by your new life of love through your union with Jesus Christ, or as Paul said it, your giving of yourself to God as “a living and holy sacrifice” in response to His gospel invitation to Himself. Because of His mercy…
A new creation is obvious for all to see, like a light in a dark room, like spring flowers after winter, like a butterfly bursting forth as something completely new! New Creation makes the mystery of the resurrection visible for all to see that the Kingdom of God has come upon us.
Jesus is making all things new—can you see that in me?
The Greek word μεταμορφόω, translated “transformed” in Romans 12:2, is where we get the English word metamorphosis. Metamorphosis is “the process by which a caterpillar enters into the darkness of the cocoon in order to emerge, eventually, changed almost beyond recognition.”[1] This is the transformation—you become a new creature—from caterpillar to butterfly via the tomb!
“For whoever wishes to save his life will lose it; but whoever loses his life for My sake will find it.”
“In Him, you also, after listening to the message of truth, the gospel of your salvation—having also believed, you were sealed in Him with the Holy Spirit of promise, who is given as a pledge of our inheritance, with a view to the redemption of God’s own possession, to the praise of His glory.”
We have no life of our own! We must be infused, like life flowing through the vine into the branches.
Just think of Jesus’ teaching from John 15, that He is the vine and we are the branches and any branch that abides in Him will bear much fruit, but apart from Him you can do nothing. Listen to Jesus’ words from John 15:8, “My Father is glorified by this, that you bear much fruit, and so prove to be My disciples.” You bear fruit because you abide in the Vine. That’s the Spirit flowing through the vine into you and forming you.
The fruit demonstrates your abiding in Jesus—your infused life! He proves His life through you! You are called to submit to Him and allow Him to do what He does best—He makes all things new!
Neither Jesus in John 15, nor Paul in Romans 12, are inviting you to live an insecure life of trying to earn God’s favor. Not all! Nothing like that! Rather, you are invited to rest in Him and trust that He will demonstrate His love in and through you.
God is in the process of transforming you from the inside out so don’t manage bad fruit; rather, get to the root and invite the Holy Spirit to renew your mind in the places you are not experiencing Christ’s righteousness, peace, or joy.
“Either make the tree good and its fruit good, or make the tree bad and its fruit bad; for the tree is known by its fruit.”
God’s will for each of us is to become a mature disciple of Jesus Christ—the transformation of our souls as yokefellows of Jesus Christ, through the work of the Holy Spirit, to the glory of the Father. This is our spiritual service of worship; our acceptable response to God’s mercy!
We participate in this process through our personal faith practices, called spiritual disciplines, and our community faith practices. It is in these unforced rhythms of grace that we are transformed by the renewing of our minds so that we represent Christ to the world as His Imager Bearers!
Donald Whitney states that the ultimate goal of these rhythms of grace is to transform us:
God has given us the Spiritual Disciplines as a means of receiving His grace and growing in Godliness. By them we place ourselves before God for Him to work in us. The Spiritual Disciplines are also like channels of God’s transforming grace. As we place ourselves in them to seek communion with Christ, His grace flows to us and we are changed.[2]
His grace flows to us and we are changed.
“In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet; for the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised imperishable, and we will be changed” (1 Corinthians 15:52).
The Kingdom has come and the Kingdom is coming! Hallelujah! Come Lord Jesus and receive your bride unto yourself, holy and blameless, sanctified by your great love and prepared for your glory (Ephesians 5:25-27).
You can listen to the message here:
You can watch the message by clicking HERE.
FOOTNOTES:
[1] Ruth Haley Barton, Sacred Rhythms, 12.
[2] Donald Whitney, Spiritual Disciplines for the Christian Life, 7.
Read more...
Seize the Moment – Day 396
Today’s hymn focus will be “Cleanse Me”
Romans 12:1-2 (NASB95)
“ Therefore I urge you, brethren, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies a living and holy sacrifice, acceptable to God, which is your spiritual service of worship. And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, so that you may prove what the will of God is, that which is good and acceptable and perfect.”
The attitude of total surrender is seen in each verse, beginning with a prayer for revival to start first in our own heart, and there must be a fresh surrender to allow the Holy Spirit to work in and through us if we want revival to truly begin. The third verse says:
Lord, take my life and make it wholly Thine; fill my poor heart with
Thy great love divine; Take all my will, my passion, self and pride
I now surrender Lord, in me abide.
We need to wake up and make this song our daily prayer if we truly desire to see God move and bring about a new world-wide spiritual awakening…for Revival comes from Him!
YOUTUBE:
Try me, O Savior, know my thoughts, I pray.
See if there be some wicked way in me;
Cleanse me from ev’ry sin and set me free.
Fulfill thy Word, and make me pure within.
Fill me with fire where once I burned with shame;
Grant my desire to magnify thy name.
Fill my poor heart with thy great love divine.
Take all my will, my passion, self, and pride;
I now surrender: Lord, in me abide.
Read more...
Seize the Moment – Day 395
Pure Motives!
Good morning! This is Pastor Jerry Ingalls from New Castle First Baptist Church and today is Friday, April 16.
Do you ever struggle with selfish motives when having to make difficult decisions?
Abram demonstrated a resolve to defend his family in Genesis 14. In a rare moment, we see him put on the hat of a warrior-prince. Why? To rescue Lot, that nephew of his, the same one we saw Abram be so gracious and generous to in the previous chapter. Because Lot chose to live in Sodom he got caught up in a regional conflict and was captured. Abram rescued Lot and in the process he won a large and lucrative victory.
Would Abram’s motives remain pure when financial prosperity fell in his lap?
At this defining moment of Abram’s life, a new and important character is introduced in Genesis 14:18-20:
And Melchizedek king of Salem brought out bread and wine; now he was a priest of God Most High. He blessed him and said, “Blessed be Abram of God Most High, Possessor of heaven and earth; and blessed be God Most High, Who has delivered your enemies into your hand.” [Abram] gave him a tenth of all.
Abram willingly giving a tenth of all the plunder to Melchizedek, which means, “King of Righteousness.” This was a defining moment for Abram! It demonstrated that he did not rescue Lot or defeat this invading army for personal gain.
The victory belonged to God and Abram wanted to declare that with a sacrificial gift. Abram wanted God to get all the glory, not only from this military campaign, but in his life, and he did not let anything steal his heart—neither success nor prosperity.
Seize the moment and make sure your motives are pure and that you do all things for the glory of God! In the same way that gold is refined by fire, so often the motives of a person’s heart are refined by gold.
Let’s recite this week’s memory verse from 2 Corinthians 5:17, “Therefore if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creature; the old things passed away; behold, new things have come.”
YOUTUBE:
Read more...
Seize the Moment – Day 394
Blessed are the Peacemakers!
Good morning! This is Pastor Jerry Ingalls from New Castle First Baptist Church and today is Thursday, April 15.
Are you a peacemaker?
It is only possible to be a peacemaker when you dwell in the security of God’s promises. Genesis 13 is a wonderful example of being a peacemaker as we watch God’s chosen man graciously deal with a close family member.
Genesis 13:8-9 shows us how Abram dealt with his nephew Lot, who seems to be getting too big for his britches: “So Abram said to Lot, ‘Please let there be no strife between you and me, nor between my herdsmen and your herdsmen, for we are brothers. Is not the whole land before you? Please separate from me; if to the left, then I will go to the right; or if to the right, then I will go to the left.’”
We know that Abram was a powerful man, but instead of using his power of position and wealth to get his way, he made a way for his nephew to prosper and he cultivated peace through generosity and grace.
Are there situations in your life, today, where you can do the same thing?
Immediately afterwards, in Genesis 13:14-15, God gave Abram the assurance of His covenant faithfulness: “Now lift up your eyes and look from the place where you are, northward and southward and eastward and westward; for all the land which you see, I will give it to you and to your descendants forever.”
God honored Abram for being a peacemaker and, in doing so, assured Abram of His promise! Just as Jesus assures you and me in Matthew 5:9, “Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called sons of God.”
Seize the moment and be a peacemaker in your relationships and in the situations of our world, starting with those closest to you.
Let’s recite this week’s memory verse from 2 Corinthians 5:17, “Therefore if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creature; the old things passed away; behold, new things have come.”
YOUTUBE:
Read more...
Seize the Moment – Day 393
Real People!
Do you think that the characters in the Bible were perfect people who walked in their faith without fear or anxiety or disbelief or sin?
I want to quickly disabuse you of this notion. From the very beginning of the story, with the choosing of Abram, we see that God uses real people to carry out His purposes to bless the nations. Listen to Genesis 12:1-3,
Now the Lord said to Abram, “Go forth from your country, and from your relatives and from your father’s house, to the land which I will show you; and I will make you a great nation, and I will bless you, and make your name great; and so you shall be a blessing; and I will bless those who bless you, and the one who curses you I will curse. And in you all the families of the earth will be blessed.”
If you were in Abram’s shoes, sounds like a no-brainer, right? If God would so clearly talk with you and make this promise to you, then you would walk obediently, never wavering along the way. Right?
Abram certainly did waver along the way and you don’t have to wait long to see it. Genesis 12:13 records when he asks his wife to lie for him: “Please say that you are my sister so that it may go well with me because of you, and that I may live on account of you.”
I am so glad that the Bible never exalts human nature, but rather tells the true story of how God calls real people to Himself, with all of their imperfections, so that the families of world may be blessed through God’s grace!
Seize the moment and answer God’s call. Don’t worry if you feel disqualified! God will use you if you let Him because God uses real people!
Let’s recite this week’s memory verse from 2 Corinthians 5:17, “Therefore if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creature; the old things passed away; behold, new things have come.”
YOUTUBE:
Read more...
Seize the Moment – Day 392
The Stage Has Been Set!
Good morning! This is Pastor Jerry Ingalls from New Castle First Baptist Church and today is Tuesday, April 13.
Have you ever jumped into a movie late? The big picture has been set and the main characters have been introduced. You can still enjoy the movie, but you don’t fully understand the story.
The same happens with the Bible. Genesis 11 is the end of the prologue and the setting of the stage for the choosing of Abram in Genesis 12. You most likely know him as the great patriarch, Father Abraham, the man who is considered the father of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam.
Understanding the story to which he is introduced is very important to understanding the whole!
The Table of Nations were described in Genesis 10, but it is Genesis 11 that explains why the descendants of Noah went from being a unified family tree to scattered branches across the land. Listen to Genesis 11:8-9 which gives you a summary of the Tower of Babel story:
So the Lord scattered them abroad from there over the face of the whole earth; and they stopped building the city. Therefore its name was called Babel, because there the Lord confused the language of the whole earth; and from there the Lord scattered them abroad over the face of the whole earth.
It was the pride and presumption of humanity that led to our disunity, but it would be in the humility of one man that would ultimately lead to our unification with God!
Pride and humility are both forces unto themselves—one divides and destroys; whereas the other unites and builds. Abram believed God whereas the rest wanted to be gods!
Seize the moment and believe God! The stage has been set and you are invited to join the story that unites you to God and builds up God’s people.
Let’s recite this week’s memory verse from 2 Corinthians 5:17, “Therefore if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creature; the old things passed away; behold, new things have come.”
YOUTUBE:
Read more...
Seize the Moment – Day 391
God Knows Your Name!
Good morning! This is Pastor Jerry Ingalls from New Castle First Baptist Church and today is Monday, April 12.
Do you believe that God knows you by name?
If you ever wonder if God cares about names, take notice of how many names are in the Bible. Genesis 10 & 11 are great examples of this as these chapters list the good fruit of Noah’s faith—name by name!
God keeps His word to Noah and preserves humanity through Noah’s three sons. Listen to the bookends of Genesis 10:1 & 32,
Now these are the records of the generations of Shem, Ham, and Japheth, the sons of Noah; and sons were born to them after the flood. . . . These are the families of the sons of Noah, according to their genealogies, by their nations; and out of these the nations were separated on the earth after the flood.
The timeline of all these generations and their separations and the events of the Tower of Babel in Genesis 11 can be unclear, but what is very clear is God’s faithfulness to keep His promise to Noah. Did you see how many people are listed in these chapters? Wow! God is faithful and He brings the increase!
God not only preserved a small remnant through the one man Noah, but he quickly multiplied them on the face of the earth and not as a nameless mass of people, but as individuals with names because each person represents the promise of God.
God loves you and knows your name. Jesus said in Luke 12:7, “Indeed, the very hairs of your head are all numbered. Do not fear; you are more valuable than many sparrows.”
Seize the moment and know that Jesus knows your name and He finds great value in you. You are precious in His sight. Find your worth in God today.
Let’s recite this week’s memory verse from 2 Corinthians 5:17, “Therefore if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creature; the old things passed away; behold, new things have come.”
YOUTUBE:
Read more...
Live Like a Champion – Week 15
The Promise of a New Beginning!
2 Corinthians 5:14-21 (NAS95)
In this sermon series, we are learning how to live like a champion by learning how to live according to the victory of the promises of God. Our guiding image for this series is being a member of an NFL team who wins the Superbowl. We live like champions so that others will come to know the One who gave us His Victory—Jesus Christ, crucified, risen, and coming again!
He is risen! My savior lives!
The play of the week is “The Promise of a New Beginning!” The memory verse for this promise is 2 Corinthians 5:17, when Paul victoriously proclaims,
“Therefore if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creature; the old things passed away; behold, new things have come.”
This is the promise of spring! Even after the worst of winters, the spring brings new life! As the saying goes, “April showers. May flowers.” The same is true for even the worst of sinners! When God’s grace rains down on you and your respond in faith, then the Lord Jesus Christ will reign in you and He will bring new life because Jesus’ kingdom is about resurrection power—making all things new (Revelation 21:5).
As 2 Corinthians 5:17 says, this promise is the good fruit of those who are “in Christ”!
Are you “in Christ”? Are you walking in a personal relationship with Him?
As you heard from the scripture reading this morning, this memory verse is a part of larger passage about how and why we have received the promise of a new beginning. Let’s find our answers from God’s Word.
“For the love of Christ compels us…”
“We know that we have passed out of death into life, because we love the brethren. He who does not love abides in death.”
Are you abiding in Christ or abiding in death? The simple test is always found in one word: LOVE!
Who or what directs your path? What compels you to act and constrains you to not act? What sets your agenda and what gives you the motivation to get it done? How do you make decisions?
“For the love of Christ controls us, having concluded this, that one died for all, therefore all died; and He died for all, so that they who live might no longer live for themselves, but for Him who died and rose again on their behalf.”
This is the mystery of the resurrection—life comes from death! As Jesus said in John 12:24-26,
Truly, truly, I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it bears much fruit. He who loves his life loses it, and he who hates his life in this world will keep it to life eternal. If anyone serves Me, he must follow Me; and where I am, there My servant will be also; if anyone serves Me, the Father will honor him.
We are unwilling to begin a new life when we remain codependent with the old man—you can’t keep the old man on life support just in case Jesus doesn’t work for you! Paul knew this intimately as a former religious leader. He had to die to religion in order to be born again to a relationship with God through Jesus Christ.
“I have been crucified with Christ; and it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself up for me. I do not nullify the grace of God, for if righteousness comes through the Law, then Christ died needlessly.”
You can’t live the old life and experience the promise of a new beginning at the same time. Beauty comes from ashes—that’s a promise!
Maybe you are hanging on to some hurt, habit, or hang up, an addiction or secret sin, or maybe you are not willing to die to religion in order to be born again through personal relationship…
Are you living a co-dependent life with your old self? You don’t need the old anymore. You can experience satisfaction and joy in your new life; you can feel accomplished and successful in Christ alone; you can know who you are and have a unique identity in your life.
What must you crucify so that you are living as the new creation Jesus Christ says you are?
“Therefore from now on we recognize no one according to the flesh; even though we have known Christ according to the flesh, yet now we know Him in this way no longer.”
“the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself up for me.”
We live by faith in the Son of God who loved me! This faith becomes our power source because of God’s Holy Spirit living in us—given to us by the Father and Son to fulfill God’s purposes for our lives.
“He made Him who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf, so that we might become the righteousness of God in Him.”
How do we become the righteousness of God in Christ?
You have been regenerated (born again!) by the indwelling of the Holy Spirit. God has given you the gift of His righteousness—His presence in you. Holiness is Christ in you! What comes out of you is determined by who lives in you. The tree is known by its fruit! You are already a new creation, a new person, as Paul says, the old has gone, behold, the new has come. This is the new beginning of being “in Christ”!
Jesus took your sin upon Himself and filled you with His right standing with God so you can live in Him. Listen to Romans 6:4-11 explains this as he teaches us about the ancient practice of baptism:
Therefore we have been buried with Him through baptism into death, so that as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, so we too might walk in newness of life. For if we have become united with Him in the likeness of His death, certainly we shall also be in the likeness of His resurrection, knowing this, that our old self was crucified with Him, in order that our body of sin might be done away with, so that we would no longer be slaves to sin; for he who has died is freed from sin. Now if we have died with Christ, we believe that we shall also live with Him, knowing that Christ, having been raised from the dead, is never to die again; death no longer is master over Him. For the death that He died, He died to sin once for all; but the life that He lives, He lives to God. Even so consider yourselves to be dead to sin, but alive to God in Christ Jesus.
Why has God done this?
There is a reason God has commanded us to walk in this way, in the promise of a new beginning!
For God’s glory, we are created in Christ Jesus to be signposts of His new creation! We are not yet in the New Heaven and New Earth, that is at the end of all things when Christs makes all things new (Revelation 21:5), but we are to point people to the new creation!
“For by these He has granted to us His precious and magnificent promises, so that by them you may become partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is in the world by lust.”
As a part of His new creation, Jesus has invited you into the mission of Jesus. Listen to our last two verses of our scripture lesson, 2 Corinthians 5:18-20,
Now all these things are from God, who reconciled us to Himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation, namely, that God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and He has committed to us the word of reconciliation. Therefore, we are ambassadors for Christ, as though God were making an appeal through us; we beg you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God.
If you are in Christ, you are on mission!
No additional call to ministry required because you are immediately a “minister of reconciliation.” When God calls you to Himself, He calls you to His plans and purposes for creating you (Ephesians 2:10).
You are a signpost of the New Heaven and New Earth! You are already a new creation, reconciled to God through the crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus Christ! This is the reality of your baptism of the Holy Spirit—you are infused with the Light of God, His Holy Spirit, immersed in God for the world to see!
“But one thing I do: forgetting what lies behind and reaching forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus.”
Now, as a new creation, chosen by God, reconciled by the Son and empowered by the Holy Spirit, compelled by His love go in grace as ambassadors for Christ—signposts of the new creation!
You can listen to the message here:
You can watch the message by clicking HERE.
Read more...
Seize the Moment – Day 389
Today’s hymn focus will be “The Old Rugged Cross”
1 Peter 2:24 (ESV)
“He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree, that we might die to sin and live
to righteousness. By his wounds you have been healed.
Eight years after beginning his Christian ministry in the ranks of the Salvation Army, George Bennard was ordained by the Methodist Episcopal Church and was highly esteemed as an evangelist.
He began writing the hymn in 1912 after returning home following a revival. His favorite verse was John 3:16, and he said he felt the words leave the printed page and act out the meaning of redemption, realizing that the cross was more than just a religious symbol, but rather the very heart of the gospel.
The words and the melody began to flow from his heart. He sent the manuscript to Charles Gabriel who finished composing the rest of the harmonies, and it was sang as a duet on January 12, 1913 with Bennard and his revival partner, Ed E. Mieras, to close out the revival services.
So I’ll cherish the old rugged cross, till my trophies as last I lay down
I will cling to the old rugged cross, and exchange it some day for a crown
Wake up and realize the significance of the cross and what it means in not only cleansing us of our sins, but also providing the promise of healing through His sacrifice.
YOUTUBE:
The Old Rugged Cross
the emblem of suffering and shame;
and I love that old cross where the dearest and best
for a world of lost sinners was slain.
So I’ll cherish the old rugged cross,
till my trophies at last I lay down;
I will cling to the old rugged cross,
and exchange it some day for a crown.
has a wondrous attraction for me;
for the dear Lamb of God left his glory above
to bear it to dark Calvary. [Refrain]
a wondrous beauty I see,
for ’twas on that old cross Jesus suffered and died,
to pardon and sanctify me. [Refrain]
its shame and reproach gladly bear;
then he’ll call me some day to my home far away,
where his glory forever I’ll share. [Refrain]
Read more...
Seize the Moment – Day 388
The Promise of Covenant!
Good morning! This is Pastor Jerry Ingalls from New Castle First Baptist Church and today is Friday, April 9.
After the flood receded and Noah had worshipped God, God did something unexpected. He established an unconditional covenant with Noah. God not only started over with Noah, but God promised to persevere with Noah’s descendants! That’s us!
Genesis 9:9-13 emphasizes the promise of the unconditional covenant that God gave Noah and all living creatures:
“Now behold, I Myself do establish My covenant with you, and with your descendants after you; and with every living creature that is with you, the birds, the cattle, and every beast of the earth with you; of all that comes out of the ark, even every beast of the earth. I establish My covenant with you; and all flesh shall never again be cut off by the water of the flood, neither shall there again be a flood to destroy the earth.” God said, “This is the sign of the covenant which I am making between Me and you and every living creature that is with you, for all successive generations; I set My bow in the cloud, and it shall be for a sign of a covenant between Me and the earth.”
This unconditional covenant to not flood the earth again doesn’t mean there isn’t a judgment of sin! There must be because God is righteous and just!
This is the importance of Jesus Christ! We all deserve the same fate as those who lived in the days of Noah; therefore, we each are in need of a savior.
Paul said in Romans 6:23, “For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.” Amen! Praise God for the promise of covenant!
Seize the moment and receive the free gift of God by putting your faith in Jesus Christ for forgiveness and life.
Let’s recite this week’s memory verse from John 11:25-26, when Jesus proclaims, “I am the resurrection and the life; he who believes in Me will live even if he dies, and everyone who lives and believes in Me will never die. Do you believe this?”
YOUTUBE:
Read more...