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Showing posts with label The Holy Spirit. Show all posts

Wednesday, May 31, 2023

First Things First – Purity 1056

Purity 1056 05/31/2023 Purity 1056 Podcast

Purity 1056 on YouTube:

Good morning,

Today’s photo of a cross at the peak of some high grass underneath a blazing sunset situated perfectly between the clouds comes to us from Brianne Kilmer who captured this scene presumably somewhere during her travels in Columbia County and shared it on social media back on May 24^th. Brianne appeared to have spotted this scene while driving as she shared several shots of this scene from various vantage points along the roadside and shared them all to encourage her friends on social media.

Just like Brianne, I hope to encourage my friends, that’s you, to keep your eyes open to the beauty in this world and to recognize that it has all been provided for us by a God who loves us so much that He sent His Son, Jesus Christ, to teach us the Truth, to pay for our sins, and to give us new and eternal lives when we put our faith in Him as Lord and Savior.

Well, It’s Wednesday and I thought Brianne’s picture was a beauty and while it doesn’t feature a “hump” per se, I thought that it’s cross and setting sun were centered enough to visually represent our arrival of the middle of the work week and that its unspoken message of hope in Christ, was a great representation for the hope and new life that I will be encouraging others to walk into at Celebrate Freedom tonight!

One of the missions of my blog and the reason that I highlight photos of God’s creation is to convey the truth that God is present in our world at all times and that we can know Him and interact with Him. In my walk of faith, I discovered just how real, present, available, loving, and powerful the Lord is when you decide to seek Him and follow where He leads.

Although, I resisted the Lord and fled from Him most of my life, He revealed the truth of Jesus Christ to me when I was least expecting it and I slowly answered His call to seek His truth, His presence, and to follow Him. When you know the love of God – that Christ died for me – for you – individually – to save us, it compels us to know more about God and the truth of His kingdom. But at that point, you still have free will, you can give as much or as little of yourself to your walk of faith. You can decide what you will do with your new life in Christ. You can decide just how far you want to take it.

As someone who was deceived by the world system – “the facts of life” - and a false religion, I thought I had “it all figured out” so when God interrupted my life to let me know I couldn’t have gotten it more wrong, I decided to “completely surrender” to His will and began to seek the truth of God’s word and tried to live out my new found faith and learned that for every step of faith I took towards God, I was rewarded.

Hebrews 11:6 (NKJV) reveals this truth. It says:
⁶ But without faith it is impossible to please Him, for he who comes to God must believe that He is, and that He is a rewarder of those who diligently seek Him.

I had faith. I stepped out in faith, believed that God was who He said He was –“that He is” and so I diligently sought Him and was continually rewarded with knowledge, blessings, His presence, and eventually a whole new life. But it didn’t happen all at once.

After I learned that God was loving and good enough to save a “wretch like me”, I followed and after I was rewarded – with the confirmation of the reasonableness of my faith, and with the joy of my salvation, I decided to keep following Him “come what may”.

I answered the call to find a Bible believing church where I could learn more and serve. And it was there that a Christian recovery group began and called me out of the darkness of my sins and into the ministry of overcoming and encouragement. I sought the Lord and was rewarded with victory and freedom over my addictions. But God has kept calling and I have kept following and now know that this journey of faith never ends, and it will go on through out eternity, as I will follow the Lord all the days of my life and encourage others as I go.

The latest chapter of the unfolding saga of my life in the Spirit is the Celebrate Freedom Growth Group at Starpoint Church and even though we will only be meeting for the fourth time this evening, I have already been rewarded and blessed by the opportunity to tell a little of my story and to bless other Christians with the good news that God not only loved them enough to save them from a Godless eternity, He loves them enough to save them from themselves and the lies they have believed that caused them to choose the world’s ways over His. I have received positive reports that this group has been a blessing to the people who have attended, and I will continue to encourage others to know the Lord and to follow Him into the life that only He can give them.

Tonight we will be singing “First Things First” by Consumed by Fire, and I pray that the chorus will be a proclamation of our intention to follow where the Lord would lead us.

The lyrics say:

“I don't wanna love what the world loves.

I don't wanna chase what the world does.

I only want You.

I only want You (Pre- Chorus)

First thing's first

I seek Your will, Not my own.

Surrender all my wants to You.

Keep the first thing first.

To live Your truth, Walk Your ways.

Set my eyes.

Lord, I fix my face on You.

All my desires reversed.

To keep the first thing first”

In Christ all our earthly desires can be reversed. We can choose to do what God would have us do to. To seek His will, not our own. To surrender all to God and to fix our eyes on Him. To follow and to walk and His ways and to live our lives for Him. And it only requires a simple decision to put “first things first” by following the Lord and His truth to the life of meaning and purpose that He wants us to know, continually, progressively, forever.

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For those who want more evidence for Christianity than my simple apologetic will provide, I offer apologist, Frank Turek’s website, https://crossexamined.org/ .

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Today’s Bible verse comes to us from “The NLT Bible Promise Book for Men”.

This morning’s meditation verses are:

Luke 12:6-7 (NKJV)
⁶ Are not five sparrows sold for two copper coins? And not one of them is forgotten before God.
⁷ But the very hairs of your head are all numbered. Do not fear therefore; you are of more value than many sparrows..

Today’s verses tell us that we matter to God. To God, we matter! He knows every detail about us, and we matter to the Lord so much that He showed us the truth of who Jesus is so we could be saved and set free from lies of this world to experience a new and eternal life.

This is one of those “too much” truths. As in this is so big Lord, this is just too much! Am I to believe that the God who made everything, and created countless living creatures, and who knows everything, KNOWS ME? And LOVES ME? And CARES ABOUT ME? IT’s JUST TOO MUCH, LORD!

But it’s true. God does know us. God does love us. God does care about us.

And God has called us to know His son, know His truth, to live it, and to share it with all the earth. It might seem too good to be true. It may seem to be “too much” – but it is all true and it is all good. Thank You, Lord!

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As always, I invite all to go to mt4christ.org where I always share insights from prominent Christian theologians and counselors to assist my brothers and sisters in Christ with their walk.

Today we continue sharing from The Holy Spirit By A.W. Pink.

As always, I share this information for educational purposes and encourage you all to purchase A.W. Pink’s books for your own private study and to support his work. This resource is available online for $0.99 (https://www.amazon.com/Holy-Spirit-Arthur-Pink-Collection-ebook/dp/B008CM5292/ref=sr_1_3?crid=AHKAQOM39CTN&keywords=a.w.+pink+the+holy+spirit&qid=1684376225&sprefix=a.w.+pink+the+holy+spirit+%2Caps%2C96&sr=8-3)

A.W. Pink’s The Holy Spirit

6 - The Holy Spirit During the Old Testament Ages

Much ignorance prevails today concerning this aspect of our subject. The crudest ideas are now entertained as to the relation between the Third Person of the Godhead and the Old Testament saints. Yet this is scarcely to be wondered at in view of the fearful confusion which obtains respecting their salvation, many supposing that they were saved in an entirely different way from what we are now. Nor need we be surprised at that, for this, in turn, is only another of the evil effects produced by the misguided efforts of those who have been so eager to draw as many contrasts as possible between the present dispensation and those which preceded it, to the disparaging of the earlier members of God’s family. The Old Testament saints had far more in common with the New Testament saints than is generally supposed.

A verse which has been grossly perverted by many of our moderns is John 7:39, “The Holy Spirit was not yet given, because that Jesus was not yet glorified.” It seems passing strange that with the Old Testament in their hands, some men should place the construction which they do upon those words. The words “was not yet given” can no more be understood absolutely than “Enoch was not” (Gen. 5:24); they simply mean that the Spirit had not yet been given in His full administrative authority. He was not yet publicly manifested here on earth. All believers, in every age, had been sanctified and comforted by Him, but the “ministration of the Spirit” (2 Cor. 3:8) was not at that time fully introduced; the outpouring of the Spirit, in the plentitude of His miraculous gifts, had not then taken place.^{^[1]}

---------------------------more tomorrow------------------------

Join our “Victory over the Darkness”, “The Bondage Breaker”, "Freedom in Christ" series of Discipleship Classes via the mt4christ247 podcast!

at https://mt4christ247.podbean.com, You can also find it on Apple podcasts

(https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-mt4christ247s-podcast/id1551615154). The mt4christ247 podcast is also available on Google Podcasts, Amazon Podcasts, Spotify, iHeartradio, and Audible.com.

These teachings are also available on the MT4Christ247 You Tube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/@MT4Christ247

Email me at mt4christ247@gmail.com to receive the class materials, share your progress, and to be encouraged.

My wife, TammyLyn, also offers Christian encouragement via her Ask Seek Knock blog (https://tammylynask.blogspot.com/ ), her Facebook Group: Ask, Seek, Knock (https://www.facebook.com/groups/529047851449098 ) and her podcast Ask, Seek, and Knock on Podbean (https://feed.podbean.com/tammalyn78/feed.xml)

For those who require the assistance of a Deeper Walk International Prayer Minister to experience healing or your freedom in Christ, I highly recommend Christy Edge’s Life on the Edge Freedom Prayer Ministry. You can schedule a session by going to : https://cedge216.wixsite.com/life-on-the-edge

“The views, opinions, and commentary of this publication are those of the author, M.T. Clark, only, and do not purport to reflect the opinions or views of any of the photographers, artists, ministries, or other authors of the other works that may be included in this publication, and do not necessarily reflect the views or positions of any entities the author may represent.”

Encouragement for the Path of Christian Discipleship

^{^[1]} Arthur Walkington Pink, The Holy Spirit (Bellingham, WA: Logos Bible Software, n.d.).

Tuesday, May 30, 2023

Step into New Things: I’ve Been to the Mountain Top! – Purity 1055

Purity 1055 05/30/2023 Purity 1055 Podcast

Purity 1055 on YouTube:

Good morning,

Today’s photo of the tree at the 2^nd lookout site of Mount Antone, overlooking great views of farmland and the southern Vermont Mountains comes to us from yours truly as my wife, TammyLyn, and I ascended the 2600 feet to the summit of the tallest peak on the Merck Forest & Farmland Center’s property in Rupert Vermont. Mount Antone is officially part of the Northern Taconic Mountain Range and although reaching its summit wasn’t too challenging, it was a definite high point of our Memorial Day Weekend backpacking adventure that had us away from many of the modern conveniences that we take for granted.

Our cabin was dead ended towards the rear end of the preserve’s property and didn’t have electricity or indoor plumbing and as no one was renting any of the nearest lean-tos or cabins, TammyLyn and I had at approximately ½ mile distance to our nearest neighbors. I didn’t hear a lawnmower, weed whacker, or even a chainsaw all weekend and it was only on our way to Mount Antone and Clark’s Clearing did we see any other living souls.

Seclusion can be a little unsettling at times but when you realize that you are relatively safe and secure in your accommodations, and that the Lord is with you wherever you go, you can really enjoy the peace and tranquility of God’s creation without fear and just bask in the goodness of just “being”.

Of course, just because we were “roughing it” didn’t mean that my wife and I decided to take a vacation from our faith. Even though we both enjoyed “getting away from it all”, we didn’t want to get away from God. We maintained our regular Bible study and enjoyed our own personal studies as TammyLyn revisited a book she had read years earlier, Made to Crave – By Lysa TerKeuest, et all – on satisfying our deepest desires with God, not food ( might have to check that out) – and I was able to complete Volume 1 – The Essentials of Dr. Karl Payne’s “Transferrable Cross Training” on Discipleship as well as get most of the way through “The True Works of the Holy Spirit”, a booklet by John MacArthur. So in many ways – probably just because of the decision we’ve made to keep God at the center of our lives and marriage – our vacation was a spiritual retreat as well. But please don’t imagine some hyper spiritual posturing on our part, we were just enjoying each other’s company and giving each other space to seek the Lord’s peace and guidance without getting in each other’s way. Our faith should never feel forced, demanding, or complicated and so it wasn’t.

Although, we were “out there” in the woods, we weren’t too far gone and actually had enough cell reception to be able to receive and send messages from family. I don’t think I would have necessarily known this as I had assumed that we wouldn’t have had reception and only brought my three cell phones (1 work, 1 personal, and 1 old) as media devices for Bible Study (you have got to love Logos Bible Software) and for listening to a Christian audiobook or “soothing sounds” to sleep by. But TammyLyn tested the reception as soon as we got there and assured her children and both our mothers that we had arrived safely! You can take a mother of 5 into the woods but you can’t take the mother out of her, I guess.

Anyway, no matter how much I may have been a little disappointed in not being completely off the grid and unreachable when we arrived on Saturday, I was rejoicing over the fact we weren’t completely cut off on Sunday as we were able to “stream church” via Facebook. So even though we were in a cabin in Vermont with no electricity, we sang along with and listened to our church’s Sunday service live from Clifton Park! And although it was Sunday, the wife and I decided to worship the Lord by getting out in His creation with the trek to the top of Mount Antone and a hike to Clark’s Clearing (That’s my last name – we had to go there) before we returned to the cabin for a Sabbath’s rest.

Overall, it was a wonderful trip and it taught me to keep following where the Lord leads me and to try new things. Although we struggled mightily on the journey into the woods with our fully packed backpacks, yesterday’s excursion out took half the time as we were less burdened (without the weight of 2 days water supply) and were more experienced, wiser, and stronger from what we had learned and done just a day or two before.

And that’s a great analogy of our faith, we can get stronger in our faith when we step out into it and test ourselves. The growth that TammyLyn and I experienced as hikers and backpackers in a relatively short time would have never been realized if we had never “gone there”. Before this trip, neither one of us had any real backpacking experience and could have easily dismissed the idea altogether.

But after our previous visit to the Merck Forest Center’s Gallup Road – and it was a long rather challenging day of hiking - and with a few days off for Memorial Day, something inside me inspired me to step out in faith and “book it”. And TammyLyn, who had never backpacked – immediately – went about making sure that we were adequately equipped to go. I may have “set the course” but TammyLyn really made sure we could “make our way”. So not only did we learn and experience something new in backpacking, but we also used it to draw closer to God and one another. But none of this would have been known, if we didn’t choose to follow the “call” and support one another along the way.

Well, it’s Tuesday and even though TammyLyn is back to work, I have the day off and will use it to finish off that booklet on the true work of the Holy Spirit and to prepare for tomorrow evening’s meeting of Celebrate Freedom – the recovery/discipleship growth group at my local church – where I will be sure to do my best to encourage those gathered to step out in faith and to trust the Lord to move them into a deeper knowledge and experience of their freedom in Christ as they have decided to trust and follow the Lord to help them walk away from the “hurts, habits, and hang ups” they wish to leave behind as they pursue the meaning and purpose that God has for them.

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For those who want more evidence for Christianity than my simple apologetic will provide, I offer apologist, Frank Turek’s website, https://crossexamined.org/ .

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------

Today’s Bible verse comes to us from “The NLT Bible Promise Book for Men”.

This morning’s meditation verses are:

Romans 15:3-4 (NLT2)
³ For even Christ didn’t live to please himself. As the Scriptures say, “The insults of those who insult you, O God, have fallen on me.”
⁴ Such things were written in the Scriptures long ago to teach us. And the Scriptures give us hope and encouragement as we wait patiently for God’s promises to be fulfilled.

Today’s verses encourage us to wait patiently as the Lord fulfills His promises in our lives and to realize that this walk of faith isn’t necessarily just about pleasing ourselves.

Christ’s example shows us that just because you decided to follow and do the Lord’s will, it doesn’t mean that people will applaud you for it. In fact when you decide to follow the Lord, you can expect to be insulted as Jesus was insulted, and persecuted as He stated that the world would hate His disciples, just as it hated Him.

But today’s verses remind us that The Bible – the Scriptures – never promised us a rose garden – a life without suffering – but it does promise all those who put their faith in Jesus Christ a place in God’s family and kingdom in eternity. The word tells us of the true story of hardships that the prophets, apostles, and Jesus Himself suffered before us to encourage us that those who went before us faced trials and death secure in the knowledge that God was in control and would save us even when it looked like all was lost.

Christ’s death and resurrection proved that our worst case scenario was something that we would overcome. Worst case – we die – but when we are in Christ we have not lost hope because at moment of our earthly death we will go on and live with God in eternity, and then one day return with Jesus to rule and reign over earth, before the new heaven and earth!

So, wait for it! – God’s got a LOT MORE in STORE for us, and He is faithful to fulfill all of His promises – that assure us of place in His kingdom forever and a purpose that goes beyond this life.

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As always, I invite all to go to mt4christ.org where I always share insights from prominent Christian theologians and counselors to assist my brothers and sisters in Christ with their walk.

Today we continue sharing from The Holy Spirit By A.W. Pink.

A.W. Pink’s The Holy Spirit

5 - The Covenant-Offices of the Holy Spirit

The Spirit’s Covenant-Office: Sanctification

Now the “office-work” of the Holy Spirit in connection with this “everlasting Covenant, ordered in all things and sure” (2 Sam. 23:5), may be summed up in a single word, sanctification. The Third Person of the Holy Trinity agreed to sanctify, the objects of the Father’s eternal choice, and of the Son’s redemptive satisfaction. The Spirit’s work of sanctification was just as needful, yea, as indispensable for the church’s salvation, as was the obedience and blood-shedding of Christ. Adam’s fall plunged the church into immeasurable depths of woe and wretchedness. The image of God in which her members had been created was defaced. Sin, like a loathsome leprosy, infected them to the very heart’s core. Spiritual death spread itself with fatal effect over her every faculty. But the gracious Holy Spirit pledged Himself to sanctify such wretches, and frame and fit them to be partakers of holiness, and live forever in God’s spotless presence.

Without the Spirit’s sanctification the redemption of Christ would avail no man. True, a perfect atonement was made by Him and a perfect righteousness brought in, and so the persons of the elect are legally reconciled to God. But Jehovah is holy as well as just, and the employments and enjoyment of His dwelling-place are holy too. Holy angels there minister whose unceasing cry is, “Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts” (Isa. 6:3). How then could unholy, unregenerated, unsanctified sinners dwell in that ineffable place into which “there shall in no way enter anything that defileth, neither whatsoever worketh abomination, or maketh a lie” (Rev. 21:27)? But O the wonder of covenant grace and covenant love! The vilest of sinners, the worst of wretches, the basest of mortals, can and will enter through the gates into the Holy City: “And such were some of you, but ye are washed, but ye are sanctified, but ye are justified in the name of the Lord Jesus and by the Spirit of our God” (1 Cor. 6:11).

From what has been said in the last paragraph it should be clear that sanctification is as indispensable as justification. Now there are many phases presented in Scripture of this important Truth of sanctification, into which we cannot here enter. Suffice it to say that aspect of it which is now before us is the blessed work of the Spirit upon the soul, whereby He internally makes the saints meet for their inheritance in the light (Col. 1:12): without this miracle of grace none can enter Heaven. “That which is born of the flesh is flesh” (1 John 3:6): no matter how it be educated and refined, no matter how disguised by religious ornamentation, it remains still flesh. It is like everything else which earth produces: no manipulation of art can change the original nature of the raw material.

No process of manufacture can transmute cotton into wool, or flax into silk: draw, twist, spin or weave, bleach and surface all we may, its nature remains the same. So men-made preachers and the whole corps of creature religionists may toil night and day to change flesh into spirit, they may work from the cradle to the grave to fit people for Heaven, but after all their labors to wash the Ethiopian white and to rub the spots out of the leopard, flesh is flesh still and cannot by any possibility enter the kingdom of God. Nothing but the supernatural operations of the Holy Spirit will avail. Not only is man polluted to the very core by sin original and actual, but there is in him an absolute incapability to understand, embrace or enjoy spiritual things (1 Cor. 2:14).

The imperative necessity, then, of the Spirit’s work of sanctification lies not only in the sinfulness of man, but in the state of spiritual death whereby he is as unable to live, breathe, and act Godward as the corpse in the graveyard is unable to leave the silent tomb and move among the busy haunts of men. We indeed know little of the Word of God and little of our own hearts if we need proof of a fact which meets us at every turn; the vileness of our nature and the thorough deathliness of our carnal heart are so daily and hourly forced upon us that they are a such a matter of painful consciousness to the Christian, as if we should see the sickening sight of a slaughterhouse, or smell the death taint of a corpse.

Suppose a man is born blind: he has a natural incapacity of sight. No arguments, biddings, threats, or promises can make him see. But let the miracle be wrought: let the Lord touch the eyes with His Divine hand; he sees at once. Though he cannot explain how or why, he can say to all objectors, “One thing I know, that whereas I was blind, now I see” (John 9:25). And thus it is in the Spirit’s work of sanctification, begun at regeneration, when a new life is given, a new capacity imparted, a new desire awakened. It is carried forward in his daily renewing (2 Cor. 4:16) and is completed at glorification. What we would specially emphasize is that whether the Spirit is convicting us, working repentance in us, breathing upon us the spirit of prayer, or taking of the things of Christ and showing them unto our joyful hearts, He is discharging His covenant-offices. May we render unto Him the praise and worship which is His due.

For most of the above we are indebted to some articles by the late J. C. Philpot.^{^[1]}

---------------------------more tomorrow------------------------

Join our “Victory over the Darkness”, “The Bondage Breaker”, "Freedom in Christ" series of Discipleship Classes via the mt4christ247 podcast!

at https://mt4christ247.podbean.com, You can also find it on Apple podcasts

(https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-mt4christ247s-podcast/id1551615154). The mt4christ247 podcast is also available on Google Podcasts, Amazon Podcasts, Spotify, iHeartradio, and Audible.com.

These teachings are also available on the MT4Christ247 You Tube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/@MT4Christ247

Email me at mt4christ247@gmail.com to receive the class materials, share your progress, and to be encouraged.

Encouragement for the Path of Christian Discipleship

^{^[1]} Arthur Walkington Pink, The Holy Spirit (Bellingham, WA: Logos Bible Software, n.d.).

Friday, May 26, 2023

Rest and Reflect. Are You Ready for a Reset? – Purity 1053

Purity 1053 05/26/2023 Purity 1053 Podcast

Purity 1053 on YouTube:

Good morning,

Today’s photo a roaring campfire in the foreground of a nighttime view of Indian Lake comes to us from Katie Fisher MacVeigh as she captured this scene from a “perfect midweek reset” on social media back on May 11^th.

Well, It is Friday, it really is, thank God and I am looking forward to the end of my shift at work because I will be headed north tonight to be reunited with my wife at our countryside home before we embark on our own wilderness Memorial Weekend “reset”. Apparently, I was really looking forward to today because my wife informed me that I said it was Friday on the podcast yesterday. So I apologize to anyone I may have confused and fully realize, now, that yesterday was Thursday, and today is Friday and it is my prayer that all my friends who read or hear this message have a wonderful Memorial Day weekend.

My wife and I are hiking to a cabin in the Merck Forest and Farmland Center grounds in Rupert Vermont where, as of this writing, we believe it will just be the two of us for a weekend retreat – two nights of no electricity and just one another’s company in a rustic cabin’s accommodations. I have never gone backpacking before and my camping experience has been limited to overnights in the backyards or at RV campgrounds during my childhood and with my kids when they were growing up so although it is only a 2 ½ mile hike to the cabin, this will be a first for me in many ways and while I am a little weary of the lack of electricity and indoor plumbing, I am looking forward to “getting away from it all” and the relative silence and solitude I hope to find in the woods near Nenorod Cabin.

While I try to find moments of peace every day during my times of prayer and Bible study, I feel I really can use this rest. The beginning of 2023 has been very eventful thus far as I have had to travel for work, was trained in a new job function at work, got a new foreman, and have adapted to what seems to be an ever changing schedule as I have just surrendered to the fact that I don’t know what kind of work I will be doing from one day to the next. And that’s just work.

2023 will also be known as the year that I began, and prayerfully will finish the process of becoming educated, trained, and certified in Deeper Walk Prayer Ministry. Thus far I have found the program to be “as advertised” as it was described to be “an intensive, interactive, hands-on, heart-focused discipleship training program in practical ministry skills” where “you will gain the ministry tools needed to help hurting people experience freedom, understand their identity in Christ, walk in the Spirit, and live in heart-focused (hesed) community”. Last night was the final meeting of our cohort until August as we finished the second module of four, on Spiritual Warfare and I can testify that the program is “intensive” as the expectations is to not only learn the material that is presented but to also put it into practice each week with our colleagues in “break out rooms”. Although the course work keeps you busy, the material is so rich and rewarding that I feel my decision to get this education and certification was definitely “meant to be” as I have already incorporated some of the things I have learned to me personally and to the “recovery growth group” – Celebrate Freedom – that I am now leading at my local church.

Yup, 2023 has had even more in store! That was work and “school” but Let’s not forget about Ministry. As soon as I finished facilitating an 11 week online Freedom in Christ Discipleship Men’s group in early April, where I led six men through individual sessions of the Steps to Freedom in Christ, I was approached by my pastor with the request to begin a “recovery growth group” and on May 10^th, we dusted off our old Celebrate Freedom Lessons and the Lord blessed me with two dedicated and faithful volunteers to start the process of forming a community where Christians could overcome their “hurts, habits, and hang ups.” But even though I have done “recovery ministry” before, this Celebrate Freedom is a NEW creation as I am incorporating all that I have learned from my walk and my latest studies to put the emphasis of this group on “building joy”, “walking in the Spirit” and knowing who we are in Christ. And the results of my attempts seem well received as one of the participants thanked me this week for “my vision” and another shared on social media that this week’s meeting was “amazing” but before I go patting myself on the back let me assure you that I know that I am only sharing what others have taught me and that the “vision” is how the Lord see us and the amazing things we are experiencing is only because we are drawing close to Him.

So we have been busy, but we have been blessed and although it may be challenging to keep “in step with the Spirit” at times, I wouldn’t have it any other way.

But with that said, I am happy to have a “break” from school for a while, and that I get to kick it off with what I hope to be a peaceful weekend in the woods and with a few days off this week as I only have to work Wednesday, because although I had the vacation this week, I have made plans to go to Deeper Walk international’s 35^th Anniversary conference in Indiana in October and had to give up a day of what would have been a whole “week off”.

That’s right as we draw into the 6 month of the year next week, we will rejoice this weekend over where the Lord has brought us thus far, remember the servicemen who died to keep our country free, rest, and reset for what should be an eventful 2^nd half of another year of walking in the Spirit.

So, as we gear up for the end of the first half of 2023, it is my prayer that you take some time this weekend to rest, “reset” and reflect on the freedom we have in Christ and the freedom that we enjoy in this county because of the men and women in the armed forces that paid the ultimate sacrifice for what they believed was worth protecting and that they were willing to die to uphold. God bless you all.

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For those who want more evidence for Christianity than my simple apologetic will provide, I offer apologist, Frank Turek’s website, https://crossexamined.org/ .

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Today’s Bible verse comes to us from “The NLT Bible Promise Book for Men”.

This morning’s meditation verses are:

Psalm 103:1-5 (NLT2)
¹ Let all that I am praise the LORD; with my whole heart, I will praise his holy name.
² Let all that I am praise the LORD; may I never forget the good things he does for me.
³ He forgives all my sins and heals all my diseases.
⁴ He redeems me from death and crowns me with love and tender mercies.
⁵ He fills my life with good things. My youth is renewed like the eagle’s!

Today’s verses show us what a man with a heart set on God does – he praises the Lord continually and he never forgets the good things that the Lord does for Him. He remembers that the Lord has forgiven him of all his sins and has brought him through all the illnesses and trials he has suffered in life. He remembers how the Lord has blessed him with His presence, love, and all the tender mercies he has received in life recognizing that they all came through a sovereign God who is always in control. He looks at the good things in his life and knows they come from God and his spirit is renewed because he praises the Lord.

So give thanks to God. Sing his praises with all your0020heart. And do this: EVERY. DAY. and you too will know what it is like to be continually renewed.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

As always, I invite all to go to mt4christ.org where I always share insights from prominent Christian theologians and counselors to assist my brothers and sisters in Christ with their walk.

Today we continue sharing from The Holy Spirit By A.W. Pink.

A.W. Pink’s The Holy Spirit

4 - The Deities of the Holy Spirit

Concurrence in the Trinity

The Holy Spirit is designated by a great many names and titles in Scripture which clearly evince both His personality and Deity. Some of these are peculiar to Himself, others He has in common with the Father and the Son, in the undivided essence of the Divine nature. While in the wondrous scheme of redemption the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit are revealed unto us under distinct characters, by which we are taught to ascribe certain operations to one more immediately than to another, yet the agency of each is not to be considered as so detached but that They cooperate and concur. For this reason the Third Person of the Trinity is called the Spirit of the Father (John 14:26) and the Spirit of the Son (Gal. 4:6), because, acting in conjunction with the Father and the Son, the operations of the one are in effect the operations of the others—and altogether result from the indivisible essence of the Godhead.

Titles Used in Scripture

First, He is designated “The Spirit,” which expresses two things. First, His Divine nature, for “God is Spirit” (John 4:24); as the Thirty-Nine Articles of the Episcopal Church well express it, “without body, parts, or passions.” He is essentially pure, incorporeal Spirit, as distinct from any material or visible substance. Second, it expresses His mode of operation on the hearts of the people of God, which is compared in Scripture to a “breath,” or the movement of the “wind”—both of which adumbrate Him in this lower world; suitably so, inasmuch as they are invisible, and yet vitalizing elements. “Come from the four winds, O Breath, and breathe upon these slain, that they may live” (Ezek. 37:9). Therefore was it that in His public descent on the day of Pentecost, “suddenly there came a sound from Heaven of a rushing, mighty wind, and it filled all the house where they were sitting” (Acts 2:2).

Second, He is called by way of eminency “The Holy Spirit” which is His most usual appellation in the New Testament. Two things are included. First, respect is had unto His nature. As Jehovah is distinguished from all false gods thus, “Who is like unto thee, O LORD, among the gods; who is like thee, glorious in holiness” (Ex. 15:11); so is the Spirit called Holy to denote the holiness of His nature. This appears plainly in Mark 3:29, 30, “He that shall blaspheme against the Holy Spirit hath never forgiveness; because they said, he hath an unclean spirit”—thus opposition is made between His immaculate nature and that of the unclean or unholy spirit. Observe, too, how this verse also furnishes clear proof of His personality, for the “unclean spirit” is a person, and if the Spirit were not a Person, no comparative opposition could be made between them. So also we see here His absolute Deity, for only God could be “blasphemed!” Second, this title views His operations and that in respect of all His works, for every work of God is holy—in hardening and blinding, equally as in regenerating and sanctifying.

Third, He is called God’s “good Spirit” (Neh. 9:20). “Thy Spirit is good” (Ps. 143:10). He is so designated principally from His nature, which is essentially good for “there is none good but one, that is God” (Matthew 19:17); so also from His operations, for “the fruit of the Spirit is in all goodness, and righteousness, and truth” (Eph. 5:9).

Fourth, He is called the “free Spirit” (Ps. 51:12), so designated because He is a most munificent Giver, bestowing His favors severally as He pleases, literally, and upbraiding not; also because it is His special work to deliver God’s elect from the bondage of sin and Satan, and bring them into the glorious liberty of God’s children.

Fifth, He is called “the Spirit of Christ” (Rom. 8:9) because sent by Him (Acts 2:33), and as furthering His cause on earth (John 16:14).

Sixth, He is called “the Spirit of the Lord” (Acts 8:29) because He possesses Divine authority and requires unhesitating submission from us.

Seventh, He is called, “the Eternal Spirit” (Heb. 9:14). “Among the names and titles by which the Holy Spirit is known in Scripture, that of ‘the eternal Spirit’ is His peculiar appellation—a name, which in the very first face of things, accurately defines His nature, and carries with it the most convincing proof of Godhead. None but ‘the High and Holy One, inhabiteth eternity,’ can be called eternal. Of other beings, who possess a derivative immortality, it may be said that as they are created for eternity, they may enjoy, through the benignity of their Creator, a future eternal duration. But this differs as widely as the east is from the west, when applied to Him of whom we are speaking. He alone, who possesses an underived, independent, and necessary self-existence, ‘who was, and is, and is to come,’ can be said, in exclusion of all other beings, to be eternal” (Robert Hawker).

Eighth, He is called “the Paraclete” or “the Comforter” (John 14:16) than which no better translation can be given, providing the English meaning of the word be kept in mind. Comforter means more than Consoler. It is derived from two Latin words, com “along side of” and fortis “strength.” Thus a “comforter” is one who stands alongside of one in need, to strengthen. When Christ said He would ask the Father to give His people “another Comforter,” He signified that the Spirit would take His own place, doing for the disciples, what He had done for them while He was with them on earth. The Spirit strengthens in a variety of ways: consoling when cast down^{^[1]}

---------------------------more tomorrow------------------------

Join our “Victory over the Darkness”, “The Bondage Breaker”, "Freedom in Christ" series of Discipleship Classes via the mt4christ247 podcast!

at https://mt4christ247.podbean.com, You can also find it on Apple podcasts

(https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-mt4christ247s-podcast/id1551615154). The mt4christ247 podcast is also available on Google Podcasts, Amazon Podcasts, Spotify, iHeartradio, and Audible.com.

These teachings are also available on the MT4Christ247 You Tube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/@MT4Christ247

Email me at mt4christ247@gmail.com to receive the class materials, share your progress, and to be encouraged.

Encouragement for the Path of Christian Discipleship

^{^[1]} Arthur Walkington Pink, The Holy Spirit (Bellingham, WA: Logos Bible Software, n.d.).

Thursday, May 25, 2023

I Need “the One” to Complete Me!– Lies of the Enemy #40 – Purity 1052

Purity 1052 05/25/2023 Purity 1052 Podcast

Purity 1052 on YouTube: Coming Soon!

Good morning,

Today’s photo of a trio of people gathered near a tree on the shores of Lake Ontario to take in a magnificent sunset sky comes to us from Celestial Blue Photography as Rocco Saya captured this scene back on May 22^nd of 2020, commenting at the time that the people were “6 feet apart!”, albeit with a “winking emoji”.

Well, It’s Thursday and as my “ministry night” has shifted from Thursdays, to Tuesdays, to Wednesdays over the years, I’m not really sure which day of the week I should share a “pathway photo” to encourage my friends (that’s you) to get on or to stay on the path of Christian Discipleship but while I mostly shared this photo because of its epic beauty, it does have a shoreline walkway on display to visual represent the path that leads to amazing things and a life filled with the fruit of the Spirit.

Last night, I led the Celebrate Freedom Growth Group in a quieting and “affirming” exercise with the intention of leading my newest friends to find a moment of peace and to encourage them to embrace what their Heavenly Father says about them.

After the group’s initial prayer and “ice breaker”, I decided to step out in faith and tried to lead the group into an “experiential knowledge” of their identity in Christ. Instructed the group to relax and to let go of the stress of the day, to shake it off, and to release it by doing “box breathing” – to inhale and exhale with a 4 second count and holding the breath for 4 seconds in between. If you’d like to give it a try, inhale 1,2,3,4 – hold it 1, 2,3,4, exhale 1,2,3,4 – hold it 1,2,3, 4 – and repeat. For those who don’t like counting or that counting becomes a distraction, I advised to just take deep breaths in and out.

I then invited them to keep breathing, to relax, to close their eyes if they wished to, and to listen as I told them that I was going to read through the who I am in Christ list but that I was going to read through it as if addressing them personally by changing the verbiage to “You”. I told them that the Who I am in Christ list was based scripture and in essence it is what God wants us to know about ourselves as His adopted children. I wanted the group to listen to the list and invited them to embrace what the list had to say about who they are, personally. And so to repeat the exercise – if you’re listening – or reading this – breathe in and out – and try to receive – in your Spirit – what the Lord has to say about you.

Who You are in Christ.

You are ACCEPTED IN CHRIST

You are God’s Child (John 1:12)

You are Christ’s Friend (John 15:15)

You have been justified (Romans 5:1)

You are united with the Lord and one with Him in Spirit (1 Corinthians 6:17)

You have been bought with a price; You belong to God (1 Corinthians 6:20)

You are a member of Christ’s body (1 Corinthians 12:27)

You are a saint (Ephesians 1:1)

You have been adopted as God’s child (Ephesians 1:5)

You have direct access to God through the Holy Spirit (Ephesians 2:18)

You have been redeemed and forgiven of all your sins (Colossians 1:14)

You are complete in Christ (Colossians 2:10)

You are SECURE IN CHRIST

You are free forever from condemnation (Romans 8:1)

You are assured that all things work together for good (Romans 8:28)

You are free from the condemning charges against you (Romans 8:33-34)

You cannot be separated from the love of God (Romans 8:35, 38-39)

You have been established, anointed, and sealed by God (2 Corinthians 1:21-22)

You are a citizen of heaven (Philippians 3:20)

You are hidden with Christ in God (Colossians 3:3)

You can find grace and mercy to help you in time of need (Hebrews 4:16)

You are born of God, and the evil one cannot touch you (1 John 5:18)

You have not been given a spirit of fear, but of power, love, and a sound mind (2 Tim 1:7)

You are confident that the good work God has begun in you will be perfected (Phil 1:6)

You are SIGNIFICANT IN CHRIST

You are the salt and light of the earth (Matthew 5:13-14)

You are a branch of the true vine, a channel to Jesus’ life (John 15:1,5)

You have been chosen and appointed to bear fruit (John 15:16)

You are a personal witness of Christ (Acts 1:8)

You are God’s temple (1 Corinthians 3:16)

You are a minister of reconciliation (2 Corinthians 5:17-20)

You are God’s coworker (2 Corinthians 6:1)

You are seated with Christ in the heavenly realms (Ephesians 2:6)

You are God’s workmanship (Ephesians 2:10)

You may approach God with freedom and confidence (Ephesians 3:12)

You can do all things through Christ who gives you strength (Philippians 4:13)

If you have made Jesus your Lord and Savior, and you know in your heart if you have, every single one of these things are true about you. And I pray for the Holy Spirit to work in your heart and mind to embrace and accept who you are in Christ. Amen.

This is our new life in Christ, so believe it, receive it, and decide to live it.

I personally love the Who I am in Christ list and practice it daily. Some of the statements speak louder to me at different times but today I want to point to the last statement under the “I am Accept in Christ” section – I am complete in Christ.

If we have placed our faith in Jesus – we are complete. And while the world, the flesh, and the devil strive to tell us that we are lacking or that we need to do something to be complete – Christ says “It is finished” and we are made whole – made complete in Him.

And that brings us to our current series the “Lies of the Enemy”, which is an examination of some of the common lies, sometimes sneakily whispered into our minds as “first person” statements, that the enemy tells us to cause us to doubt our faith, lose our peace, cause division, or influence us to not follow the Lord with the way we live our lives.

We’ve decided to end this series as a 40 day devotional so today is the last day and I have decided to take on perhaps the biggest lie of the enemy – the one that tells you that there is something or some “ONE” out there that will “complete you” other than your relationship with God.

Sorry, Jerry Maguire, the idea that you “complete me” is a lie from the pit of hell because if I believe that and focus on finding my “ONE” or my “QUEST” or My “IDOL” or whatever to the exception of seeking the Lord, I will discover that my searching and worshipping one of God’s created things – or something I created or built up in my mind as “The IDEAL” – will eventually separate me from God and consign me to perdition as I rejected the only One who truly knows me and who will never leave or forsake me.

So today’s big and final lie, in this series is.

Lie #40: I Need “the One” to Complete Me!

Again, as we examine the enemy’s lies that would lead us astray we have to admit that the things he uses to ensnare us are often good or true in some ways but because he is evil, Satan will call what is evil good and will use good things for evil.

Our need for human companionship or fulfillment are good things but the enemy entices us to make us put our focus on those “good things” only and thus giving them “godlike” status in our lives because we rest our hearts and minds on them rather than God. With the “myth of the ONE”, Satan takes our desire to be loved and accepted and makes it the all consuming passion of our lives.

The myth of the One can make us obsessive – to hold tightly to our “One” if we should find them – or to lead us to despair if “Mr. or Ms. Right” hasn’t come around yet. This myth can also lead us into sexual sin as we decide to try as many “ONE”’s as we can to make sure we haven’t overlooked anyone. The desperate search can make us depressed and even make us “addicted to love” as our search for true love is corrupted and compromised into sexual sin and striving to find meaning in one of God’s created beings rather than Him.

The myth of the One tells us that somewhere out there in this world there is a soulmate for each one of us who when we find them will completely fulfill us – making us “complete”. While scripture encourages marriage, it doesn’t really indicate that husbands and wives are the means to our fulfillment – Christ is – He completes us.

The myth of the ONE – can also be transferred to the realm of personal accomplishments or obtaining possessions. Being diligent in amassing wealth or prestige can make us feel powerful, wise, or important. But in the final accounting, all the possessions of this world or accomplishments of men will mean nothing when we are called into eternity. We can’t earn or buy our Salvation. Only faith in Jesus can do that.

I know I always tend to go to the “ultimate things” in my blog because frankly we need to be concerned with the “next thing” =what happens when its all been said and done. And while I will encourage people to seek after their dreams and to find happiness in their personal relationships and through accomplishing their goals or obtaining and enjoying their “stuff” – I feel compelled to make people aware that those things are temporary and the things that really matter are the unseen spiritual realities – God and His kingdom and that we need to seek Him and find our way – His way Jesus – to live.

So don’t believe that lie that “I need the ONE to complete me” unless you know that the One that completes us and gives us eternal life is Jesus Christ. In Christ, we have everything we need so seek Him and follow Him to see what good things come when you decide to answer His call and purpose for your life.

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For those who want more evidence for Christianity than my simple apologetic will provide, I offer apologist, Frank Turek’s website, https://crossexamined.org/ .

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------

Today’s Bible verse comes to us from “The NLT Bible Promise Book for Men”.

This morning’s meditation verse is:

Psalm 92:1 (NKJV)
¹ It is good to give thanks to the LORD, And to sing praises to Your name, O Most High;

Today’s verse tells us that it is good to give thanks to the Lord and to sing praises to His name!

This is our spiritual practice guys – to give thanks and to sing God’s praises. Gratitude – thanksgiving – keeps us grounded in the “good news” of all that the Lord has done for us. It leads to joy.

Singing likewise has been proven as a means to joy and I would say that singing worship songs to the Lord – with sincerity and feeling – can move our knowledge of God and His presence and love for us from our minds to our hearts.

So practice these things.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

As always, I invite all to go to mt4christ.org where I always share insights from prominent Christian theologians and counselors to assist my brothers and sisters in Christ with their walk.

Today we continue sharing from The Holy Spirit By A.W. Pink.

A.W. Pink’s The Holy Spirit

4 - The Deities of the Holy Spirit

Correct views of the Divine character lie at the foundation of all genuine and vital godliness. It should, then, be one of our chief quests to seek after the knowledge of God. Without the true knowledge of God, in His nature and attributes, we can neither worship Him acceptably nor serve Him aright.

“Names” Describe Character

Now the three Persons in the Godhead have graciously revealed Themselves through a variety of names and titles. The Nature of God we are utterly incapable of comprehending, but His person and character may be known. Each name or title that God has appropriated unto Himself is that whereby He reveals Himself unto us, and whereby He would have us know and own Him. Therefore whatever any name of God expresses Him to be, that He is, for He will not deceive us by giving Himself a wrong or false name. On this account He requires us to trust in His Name, because He will assuredly be found unto us all that His Name imports.

The names of God, then, are for the purpose of expressing Him unto us; they set forth His perfections and make known the different relations which He sustains unto the children of men and unto His own favored people. Names are given for this intent, that they might declare what the thing is to which the name belongs. Thus, when God created Adam and gave him dominion over this visible world, He caused the beasts of the field and the fowls of the air to pass before him, that they might receive names from him (Gen. 2:19). In like manner, we may learn of what God is through the names and titles He has taken. By means of them, God spells out Himself to us, sometimes by one of His perfections, sometimes by another. A very wide field of study is here introduced to us, yet we can now say no more than that the prayerful and diligent searcher will find it a highly profitable one to investigate.

What has been said above serves to indicate the importance of the present aspect of our subject. What the Holy Spirit is in His Divine Person and ineffable character is made known unto us by means of the many names and varied titles which are accorded to Him in Holy Writ. A whole volume, rather than a brief chapter, might well be devoted to their contemplation. May we be Divinely guided in using the limited space which is now at our disposal in writing that which will both magnify the Third Person in the blessed Trinity, and serve as a stimulus unto our readers to give more careful study and holy meditation to those titles of His which we cannot here consider. Possibly, we can help our friends most by devoting our attention to those which are more difficult to apprehend.^{^[1]}

---------------------------more tomorrow------------------------

Join our “Victory over the Darkness”, “The Bondage Breaker”, "Freedom in Christ" series of Discipleship Classes via the mt4christ247 podcast!

at https://mt4christ247.podbean.com, You can also find it on Apple podcasts

(https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-mt4christ247s-podcast/id1551615154). The mt4christ247 podcast is also available on Google Podcasts, Amazon Podcasts, Spotify, iHeartradio, and Audible.com.

These teachings are also available on the MT4Christ247 You Tube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/@MT4Christ247

Email me at mt4christ247@gmail.com to receive the class materials, share your progress, and to be encouraged.

Encouragement for the Path of Christian Discipleship

^{^[1]} Arthur Walkington Pink, The Holy Spirit (Bellingham, WA: Logos Bible Software, n.d.).

Labels

Wednesday, May 31, 2023

First Things First – Purity 1056

Tuesday, May 30, 2023

Step into New Things: I’ve Been to the Mountain Top! – Purity 1055

Friday, May 26, 2023

Rest and Reflect. Are You Ready for a Reset? – Purity 1053

Thursday, May 25, 2023

I Need “the One” to Complete Me!– Lies of the Enemy #40 – Purity 1052