Roots by the River

“For Ezra had set his heart to study the law of the Lord, and to do it, and to teach his statutes and ordinances in Israel” (Ezra 7:10). Notice three things: study, do, teach. In the Christian church, we have studiers and teachers. We can study and acquire information. We can teach and impart information. We can get As on our knowledge. The strong point of the three is the doing . Doing validates the studying and validates the teaching. Teaching biblically is not just imparting information. The neglected phrase in the Great Commission is the one on teaching: “teaching them to do all that I have commanded you" (Matthew 28:20). Jesus gave the commands. We do not command. We teach obedience to His commands. We are not to teach information without teaching obedience. If we are to follow Ezra's example, we are to study, obey, and teach to obey.   Written February 1989. This post coordinates with tomorrow's reading in the To the Word! Bible Reading Challenge . If you ...

Repentance is turning from evil and turning to God. “Turn now, each of you, from your evil ways and your evil practices, and you can stay in the land the LORD gave to you and your fathers for ever and ever” (Jeremiah 25:5). “When God saw what they did and how they turned from their evil ways, he had compassion and did not bring upon them the destruction he had threatened” (Jonah 3:10). “I preached that they should repent and turn to God and prove their repentance by their deeds” (Acts 26:20b). “Repent, then, and turn to God, so that your sins may be wiped out, that times of refreshing may come from the Lord” (Acts 3:19). “I have declared to both Jews and Greeks that they must turn to God in repentance and have faith in our Lord Jesus” (Acts 20:21). Repentance is caused by the kindness of God and godly sorrow. “Or do you show contempt for the riches of his kindness, tolerance and patience, not realizing that God’s kindness leads you toward repentance?” (Romans 2:4). “G...

Repent was a favorite word of the prophets. Preaching repentance was the major task of John the Baptist. “In those days John the Baptist came, preaching in the Desert of Judea and saying, ‘Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is near’” (Matthew 3:1-2). “From that time on Jesus began to preach, ‘Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is near’” (Matthew 4:17). The Apostle Paul also emphasized repentance: “In the past God overlooked such ignorance, but now he commands all people everywhere to repent” (Acts 17:30). “First to those in Damascus, then to those in Jerusalem and in all Judea, and to the Gentiles also, I preached that they should repent and turn to God and prove their repentance by their deeds” (Acts 26:20). In Revelation, the Apostle John stated that “the rest of mankind that were not killed by these plagues still did not repent of the work of their hands; they did not stop worshiping demons, and idols of gold, silver, bronze, stone and wood—idols that cannot see or hear or...

1 Chronicles 28 records David's charge to his son Solomon. It is great! “And you, my son Solomon, acknowledge the God of your father, and serve him with whole-hearted devotion and with a willing mind, for the Lord searches every heart and understands every motive behind the thoughts. If you seek Him, He will be found by you; but if you forsake Him, He will reject you forever” (v. 9). Notice that the reason for whole-hearted devotion is that the Lord searches every heart , and the reason for a willing mind is that the Lord understands every motive behind the thoughts .   Written March 1985. This post coordinates with tomorrow's reading in the To the Word! Bible Reading Challenge . If you are not in a daily reading plan, please join us at TotheWord.com . We would love to have you reading with us.

The Christian church as we know it started at Pentecost about two months after Jesus rose from the dead. There were three thousand new members that day. The last few words they heard before they passed from death to life were these: “Now when they heard this, they were cut to the heart, and said to Peter and the rest of the apostles, ‘Men and brethren, what shall we do?’ Then Peter said to them, ‘Repent, and let every one of you be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins; and you shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. For the promise is to you and to your children, and to all who are afar off, as many as the Lord our God will call.’ And with many other words he testified and exhorted them, saying, ‘Be saved from this perverse generation’” (Acts 2:37-40). The first of these final words was repent . One chapter later, another two thousand people were added to the church. A key sentence in that message was “Repent, then, and turn to God, so that your sins ma...

“He must hold firmly to the trustworthy message as it has been taught, so that he can encourage others by sound doctrine and refute those who oppose it ” (Titus 1:9). This sentence is a part of the qualifications of an elder in a church in a town in Crete. The elder is to encourage and refute. In order to do this properly, the elders must hold firmly to the message. We find other qualifications in 1 Timothy 3:2, like "gentle" and "not quarrelsome." The reason I bring this up is the requirement to refute the opposition and yet not be quarrelsome. We see a statement in 2 Timothy 2:4 which confirms this teaching: "and the Lord's servant must not quarrel; instead he must be kind to everyone, able to teach, not resentful. Those who oppose him, he must gently instruct.” There is increasing opposition today to sound doctrine and to Christians. Christians must refute those in opposition, but they must do it gently , kindly , and without quarreling .   ...

This is written for Christians who are perfectionists and have lost their joy. First, perfectionists are created. They do not get there by training. If they did, I should now be a perfectionist: I went to a college run by perfectionists, a military college—U.S. Naval Academy. The Academy had four years to make me a perfectionist and did not succeed. I was born something else. Second, it is a good thing that God made perfectionists and many of them. As a result, all man-made erected things from houses to airplanes are put together right. Third, problems occur. Students in university dorms are put together in the same room. One of them is a perfectionist. The other is a slob. Both of them were born that way. One of the two is unhappy. Which one? Fourth, perfectionist standards are not virtues. Unfortunately, some perfectionists think they are. Fifth, besides all of the good qualities of a perfectionist, there are difficulties that he is not aware of, or if he is he does not kn...

“‘The days are coming,’ declares the Sovereign Lord, ‘when I will send a famine through the land—not a famine of food or a thirst for water, but a famine of hearing the words of the Lord. Men will stagger from sea to sea and wander from north to east, searching for the word of the Lord, but they will not find it’” (Amos 8:11-12). I have no idea whether this prophecy has ever been fulfilled in any specific sense, i.e., time and place in history. It may have been fulfilled fifty years after Amos when the Northern Kingdom was destroyed. The Southern Kingdom had two revivals, both related to reading the Scriptures. One under Josiah (2 Chronicles 34:14-33) and the other under Ezra (Nehemiah 8). The famine today is not in the unavailability of Scripture. In Josiah’s day, there was only one copy, and it had not been looked at for several generations. We have the Scriptures, and we do not read them daily. There is spiritual decay in the land.   Written September 1988. This post c...