From the beginning of human history men have desired eternal life. Humans have gone about seeking it in their own way. Adam and Eve were looking for it when they sinned. Satan told them, “You will not surely die” (Genesis 3:4). Yet they, and all humans who have ever lived prior to our time, have died (Hebrews 9:27), because eternal life is of God. Continue reading
Tag Archives: God
Do You Have the Fear of God?
When God tested Abraham by commanding him to sacrifice to him his only son, Isaac, Abraham obeyed in faith. “By faith Abraham, when he was tested, offered up Isaac, and he who had received the promises offered up his only begotten son, of whom it was said, ‘In Isaac your seed shall be called,’ concluding that God was able to raise him up, even from the dead, from which he also received him in a figurative sense” (Hebrews 11:17-19).
It was not God’s intent that Abraham actually slay his son, but God sought to test the extent of Abraham’s faith and see if he indeed had in him the fear of the Eternal (Genesis 22:10-12). Abraham proved that his fear of God was genuine, because he obeyed (Genesis 22:15-18; 26:4-5).
To fear God means to regard him with awe and deep respect, to see him as exalted and holy, just and righteous, to love him without reservation. Such fear comes from the heart. Because God is righteous and just, the fear of God is to hate evil (Proverbs 8:13). As Christians, we must overcome sin and put it out of our lives. Having a genuine fear of God, as we’ve described, enables us with God’s help to do that. If you truly hate evil you will abhor it and want to put it away from you (Proverbs 16:6).
Do you have the fear of God? We will discuss how that can be determined. One way to test yourself is ask yourself, do I hate what God hates? Do I hate evil?
Continue readingSin Destroys Courage
Throughout our Christian lives God lets you and I make choices. God does not force us to follow His laws and commands. Rather He gives us the ability to exercise free will to go our own way. He will, however, point us in the right direction, and it has been that way from the very beginning, starting with our first parents, Adam and Eve.
God set before Adam and Eve blessings or cursing, life or death and then He instructed them to CHOOSE LIFE (Genesis 2:8-9, 16-17; cf. Deuteronomy 30:15-20), but ultimately the decision was theirs to make. God has the same approach today in regards to you and me.
After eating of the forbidden fruit Adam and Eve hid from the presence of the Lord as he walked through the Garden (Genesis 3:8-10). They hid because they were afraid; they felt as though they no longer could look their creator in the eyes. They felt flawed and weak because they knew they had directly disobeyed. This is what sin produces, it produces fear, uncertainty, lack of faith, and takes away courage because ultimately our only source of courage is God. Continue reading
What Is the Holy Spirit?
One of the important questions that we must face in order to understand God’s nature, and our own nature, is, “What is the Holy Spirit?”
In answering this question let’s first ask, what is spirit? In any good dictionary you’ll find several distinct but related definitions. And it’s important to understand that in the Bible, too, you’ll find the word “spirit” used in different senses. Continue reading
Why Did God Become Flesh?
Have you ever stopped to think why God – an eternal Being who existed before time began (as we count time) – would become flesh and blood? Does that not seem a bit peculiar, when you think about it, that the very Creator, the Being whose power sustains the entire vast Universe, would be changed into a mere human, infinitely weaker and limited by comparison? Continue reading