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Doers of the Word

  This post was written by Matt Meyer, CCM board member and director emeritus. “Those who forsake the law praise the wicked, but those who keep the law plead against them” (Proverbs 28:4). After a number of weeks of coming for counseling, a young Chinese woman recently* called on God to forgive her sins. For several weeks before that, she was sure that God was real and good and that she was a sinner, but she was having a hard time connecting her sin with the death of Christ on the cross. When she was asked to describe what she meant by “being a sinner,” it was clear that her focus was horizontal instead of vertical. She thought she was sinning against her husband, her family, and herself. When she finally understood that our sin (or lawlessness as John describes it) is first against God, the lights came on. “I’ve broken God’s laws,” she repeated numerous times as the realization finally hit home. Do we have the same sense that we are breaking God’s laws when we avoid Bible passag...
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A Holy Estate

“‘Haven’t you read,’ he replied, ‘that at the beginning the Creator “made them male and female,” and said, “For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh”? So they are no longer two, but one. Therefore what God has joined together, let man not separate’” (Matthew 19:4-6). The marriage service says that marriage is a “holy estate.” Christian marriage is more than physical, economic cohabitating and child-bearing and rearing. It is a spiritual fellowship; it is an earthly picture of Christ and His body, the Church.   “Wives, submit to your husbands as to the Lord. For the husband is the head of the wife as Christ is the head of the church, his body, of which he is the Savior. Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit to their husbands in everything. Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her to make her holy, cleansing her by the washing with wa...

There Is No Other

“Dear children, keep yourselves from idols” (1 John 5:21). You would think this should not be a difficult piece of advice to follow. The voice of God thundered from Sinai in the second command: “You shall not make for yourself an idol in the form of anything in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the waters below. You shall not bow down to them or worship them; for I, the LORD your God, am a jealous God, punishing the children for the sin of the fathers to the third and fourth generation of those who hate me, but showing love to a thousand generations of those who love me and keep my commandments” (Exodus 20:4-6). Within the month, the people of Israel were busily building an idol, a golden calf. It did not last long. Rachel, Jacob’s wife, stole her father’s household gods. All of the sons of Jacob had idols. “So Jacob said to his household and to all who were with him, ‘Get rid of the foreign gods you have with you, and purify yourselves and change your clothes.’ … So...

The Greatest Gift

“My little children, I am writing these things to you so that you may not sin. But if anyone does sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous. He is the propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only but also for the sins of the whole world” (1 John 2:1-2). God commands us to obey Him. If we do not keep His commands, He has the ability to forgive us. It is either obey or confess, and He has made provision for both. Christmas is coming up soon. We can think of it as a time of giving or as a time of getting. The basic expression of love is giving . The basic expression of selfishness is getting . If you think of everyone according to God’s commands, we are to love the Father, we are to love our neighbors, we are to love the brothers, we are to love our enemies—and the conclusion is that we are to give to these people we love. We are to give for whatever is the highest good of the person we are giving to. We are not to give in order to get; we give because t...

Struggling

I would like to draw attention to a few scriptures about our enemy and our relationship to him. “For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms” (Ephesians 6:12). “I pray also that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened in order that you may know the hope to which he has called you, the riches of his glorious inheritance in the saints, and his incomparably great power for us who believe. That power is like the working of his mighty strength, which he exerted in Christ when he raised him from the dead and seated him at his right hand in the heavenly realms, far above all rule and authority, power and dominion, and every title that can be given, not only in the present age but also in the one to come” (Ephesians 1:18-21). “As for you, you were dead in your transgressions and sins, in which you used to live when you followed the ...

Trustworthy

“Whoever can be trusted with very little can also be trusted with much, and whoever is dishonest with very little will also be dishonest with much. So if you have not been trustworthy in handling worldly wealth, who will trust you with true riches? And if you have not been trustworthy with someone else’s property, who will give you property of your own?” (Luke 16:10-12). Stealing is a common characteristic of the natural man. It is sin (Exodus 20:15), and in most states and nations it is also a crime. When we think of it as crime, then we are grateful that we have not been caught. When we think of it as sin, we know that we are always caught. Most stealing is not through burglary or hold-ups or shoplifting. It is being dishonest in very little and being dishonest in much. Crime is measured in petty larceny and grand larceny. Petty larceny is a misdemeanor, and grand larceny is a felony. The penalties are proportionate to the crimes. Sin is also measured in size; however, the size...

Glory to God in the Highest

Merry Christmas! When Jesus came to this earth, He did not come alone. He was attended by a multitude of the heavenly host. How many this is we do not know. It was a lot. “And suddenly there appeared with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God and saying [not singing], ‘Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace among men with whom He is pleased’” (Luke 2:13-14). There was a similar event recorded in Revelation, also about the Lord Jesus, the Lamb of God. “Then I looked and heard the voice of many angels, numbering thousands upon thousands, and ten thousand times ten thousand. They encircled the throne and the living creatures and the elders. In a loud voice they were saying: ‘Worthy is the Lamb, who was slain, to receive power and wealth and wisdom and strength and honor and glory and praise!’ Then I heard every creature in heaven and on earth and under the earth and on the sea, and all that is in them, saying: ‘To him who sits on the throne and to the Lamb b...