Salt & Light in the 21st Century

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This week’s passage: Matthew 7:15-20 Cult leader David Koresh once told a reporter, “If the Bible is true, I’m Christ.”. That statement should have sent every one of his followers running for the hills, but honestly there were probably many smaller signs before that! Somehow this man was able to convince people that he was Christ, or at the very least a prophet. This incident had a very public and tragic end, but there are many other, less obvious situations that can cause believers to be deceived and non-believers to think they have been saved by Christ. Jesus explained the dangers of listening to others instead of being in the Word ourselves. He warned that there would be those whose agenda would be to keep us from His loving salvation. “Beware of false prophets, who come to you in sheep’s clothing, but inwardly they are ravenous wolves.” (Matthew 7:15) “And in his teaching he said, “Beware of the scribes, who like to walk around in lo

This week’s passage: Matthew 7:7-14 Ask In His Name Want to know more about God? Ask Him! Seek the scriptures because it is all there, knock on His door in prayer. The world tells us that scripture is too confusing, but this couldn’t be further from the truth for the believer. The more time we spend in scripture, the more we see that each book, chapter, verse, and word builds our understanding of God’s love and provision. “Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives, and the one who seeks finds, and to the one who knocks it will be opened.” (Matthew 7:7-8 ESV) Jesus tells us not to give up, even when the world is clouding our eyes and minds, we are to be persistent, keep praying for God to give us wisdom and discernment so that we may be confident in Him and He can show us how to forgive, love and encourage one another as He does us. “Or whi

This week’s passage: Matthew 7:1-6 Doesn’t the Bible Say We Should Not Judge Others? Just like the generations before us, we can see things happening which were once seen as immoral in our society that are quickly becoming acceptable. Parents are losing the right to choose how their children are raised, sexual promiscuity, including child pornography, are being extoled as “rights” and there is a push for laws to be removed or softened. Christians and other religious groups are beginning to speak up (as they should), spurring those pushing the agenda to proclaim that there is supposed to be a “separation of church and state” or accusing Christians of going against the Bible by “judging” them or their behavior as wrong. Without going too far down that rabbit hole (separation of church and state was intended to keep the government out of the churches, not the churches out of the government) let’s focus on what Jesus really meant when He said, “Jud

This week’s passage: Matthew 6:5-15 Why Pray? The world believes that Christians use prayer to get what they want in life. This viewpoint is spread by many “preachers” who profess to be teaching God’s Word, telling their congregations that all they must do is give to the church and ask God to return the favor. These evil deceivers will belittle congregants who are not healed from their cancer, or can’t afford food for their families, telling them they just are not faithful enough to earn God’s grace. This method coined the “Prosperity Gospel” does NOT follow God’s Word and prays on people’s vulnerabilities, often bringing riches to the ones running the so-called church and perpetuating the secular view that the church is self-centered and greedy. But the world is missing the point, prayer is not a way for us to get what we want, but a way to seek God’s will for us. As with children learning to talk – the prayer of new believers (or those who don’t pra

This week’s passage: Matthew 6:1-8, 16-34 What is Your Motivation? Matthew Chapter 6 provides clear guidance about our motives when we give, pray, and fast, our words when we pray, what we consider treasure, and why we need not worry about how we will make it through life on earth. Let’s take a look at the chapter, setting aside verses 9-15 for next week. In verses 6:1-18 Matthew records the words of Jesus as He addressed our motives for giving, prayer and fasting. “Beware of practicing your righteousness before other people in order to be seen by them, for then you will have no reward from your Father who is in heaven. Thus, when you give to the needy, sound no trumpet before you, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and in the streets, that they may be praised by others. Truly, I say to you, they have received their reward.” (Matthew 6:1-2 ESV) Are you volunteering at the soup kitchen so that others might see and think t

This week’s passage: Matthew 5 Now that we have read through and discussed Matthew chapter 5, I want to look at how we might apply this in our lives today. In verses 1-12 we learned that being grieved by the fact that in our own power we are sinners who should thirst for righteousness, and having an attitude of meekness, mercy, pureness of heart, and peace will bring us blessings from God. We also saw that believing in God’s righteousness would cause us to be persecuted by those who don’t, which should be a reason for us to rejoice because our reward in heaven will be great and our time on earth will be short. In verses 13-16 we learned our purpose here on earth (to preserve goodness through the work of the Holy Spirit and to glorify God), and in verses 17-48 we find out that contrary to the prosperity gospel movement, Jesus did not come to the earth as a man to tell us we were free to do whatever we please and that He was here to make us all rich and happy.