Love Your Neighbor

Jesus said the second of the two greatest commandments is to “love your neighbor as yourself.” He also warned, “And because lawlessness will abound, the love of many will grow cold” (Matthew 24:12).

We’re living in an age where love is growing cold, and being replaced all too often by bitterness, aggression, hatred, violence and other evils, as God’s law is despised and rejected.

Regardless, God’s commandments still stand, and those who love their neighbors in accordance with God’s instructions will reap rewards now and in the ages to come. Who is your “neighbor”? And how are you to love your neighbor? Principles we can apply to this precept are found in Scripture, as we seek to apply God’s word in learning how God would have us love our neighbors.

“Love Your Neighbor” audio recording by Rod Reynolds, COGMessenger is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

Godly Leadership

Learn what it takes to be a godly leader, and consider some examples of godly leadership, including some often overlooked.

“Godly Leadership,” by Rod Reynolds, COGMessenger is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

Passover: The Meaning Behind Jesus’ Death

The Passover is about human destiny. It’s about why you exist. It’s about your future, and the future of mankind.

The Passover is also about God’s love. It is about God’s love toward us and about our love toward God, and about the love we may have toward one another through God’s Holy Spirit.

The Passover is the first of seven annual festivals God commands to be kept by his people. Like all of the commanded festivals, there are lessons pertaining to God and our relationship with God to be learned and reminded of in keeping the Passover. To learn the lessons intended by the Passover, it’s important that it be observed at the right time. And it’s even more important that it be observed in the right manner and spirit and with the proper understanding.

In this article I will discuss the Passover, what it means, and how it relates to God’s plan of salvation.

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God’s Answer to Ethnic Hatred and Violence

In a six month period just over a hundred years ago, from April to early October, in 1919, race riots bloodied the streets of at least twenty-five American cities and towns.

These were but some of the many riots involving ethnic hatreds between and among various groups that have occurred within the United States during its history. This in addition to various wars, including the French and Indian War (during the Colonial period), the Civil War, and other wars involving American Indians.

Conflict between ethnic groups, whether designated races, nationalities, or some other term, is a problem that has gone on among human beings the world over from the earliest times of human existence.

What is the origin of such hatreds, how are they propagated, and what can we as Christians do to make sure we are not drawn into such evils?

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How Will the World Be Different When Christ Returns? (Part 1)

For approximately the past 6000 years, since mankind rebelled in the Garden of Eden, the earth has been under the curse of Satan’s rule. Satan has not ruled without restraint. God has remained supreme over the universe, including the earth, but to a large extent he has allowed Satan to influence mankind. And Satan, within certain parameters, has remained, as referred to in 2 Corinthians 4:4, and other Scriptures, as the “god of this age,” or of this world.

The result of Satan’s influence has been a history of oppression, warfare, famines, widespread poverty, deception, ignorance, disease, crime, and other evils that have plagued mankind. What the world needs is a new kind of government, a government not of Satan, nor of men, but of God, the benevolent Creator, and author of every blessing, including life itself (James 1:17-25; Acts 17:24-25). The time when that new government appears may not be far off, although no one on earth knows for certain the exact time when it will happen (Matthew 24:30-36).

How that future world will be different is the exciting and greatly encouraging subject of a planned series of articles, of which this is the first.

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