lighthouse2014

John 1:9, Jesus is the True Light that gives light to everyone was coming into the world. Jn. 8:12, Jesus proclaimed " I am the light of the world". Jn. 1:4, in the sense "in Him was life, and that life was the Light of the world" Matthew 5:14a Jesus stated " you are the light of the world" :16 "In the same way, let your (our) light shine before others, that they may see your good deeds and glorify your Father in Heaven" People resist Jesus light because they love the darkness of the world better. They do not know or believe in him or his promise of eternal life. They love the world more because it promises the ways of fame and fortune. Who would want to live by a God who loves us rather than the things of material. The worlds light promises ways that most people prefer, unbridled immorality, riches, position in society and the ability to do as you wish. Jesus light gives us eternal life, a life of moral character, love, faith and the ability to know God Himself. Things that obstruct Jesus light are beliefs that a person doing good can earn eternal life. Others do not want to except the moral character of a God given light and eternal life. Our light can be obstructed not only by the culture of society today, but our own willingness to be a witness of the light of Jesus.

Hagar has name God, she calls him neither male or female, but El-Roi. She was astonished that God knew and heard her prayers. To a person who is discouraged or losing hope he must remember that God cares for us. We should not be forgetting that the God who cares for us, died for us. I have found that when I am depressed or see no results from prayers, God always has a way to lift my life back up and renew the hope I have in him.

Genesis 16:7-9, the angel ask Hagar things he already knows, perhaps to see if Hagar would answer truthfully. The angel sends Hagar back to Sarah, because Hagar and her baby will be part of God's will for them. Hagar's son will be the father of many nations. Perhaps in the past I have gotten myself out of God's reach, but always seems to get my attention and bring me back to him. However, where he wants me and his plan for me I do not fully know. Only through prayer and his guidance will I ever learn my place in his plan.

Genesis 16:1-6, Sarah takes out her anger on Abraham because Hagar is pregnant, now Sarah knows it is her problem that she has not become pregnant. Hagar is now prideful and this makes Sarah angry. Sarah takes out her anger on Hagar because she has become pregnant by Abraham. Hagar's child will now be heir to Abraham and not by any of Sarah's descendants. After all it was Sarah's idea for Abraham to sleep with Hagar. Sarah is trying to get rid of Hagar before her baby by Abraham is born. Hagar's pride is Abraham's fault because he does not deal with the situation between Sarah and Hagar, he passes it off as being Sarah's problem. Her affliction by Sarah has now become Abraham's fault, he does not try to defend her in any way. The situation of Hagar being pregnant and Sarah's anger has a relationship even in today's society. Families refuse to confront a problem and submit, instead they try to blame others or purely fuse to deal with it.

God went through the covenant ritual with Abraham and the divided carcasses because it was a unilateral promise, God bound himself to his promises with Abraham. God binds himself to a solemn promise because Abraham believed God and it was accounted to him as righteousness. God is righteous and his promise to Abraham was that he would give Abraham a land and his seed would be as numerous as the stars of heaven. Abraham believed God and his promises, by this faith God accounted it to him as righteousness. God's promises to us in the New Testament affects our future because those that believe in his Only Son will be redeemed and have eternal life with him. Blood has everything to do with these promises because as God stated "life is in the blood". In sacrifices blood had to be shed and God giving his Only Son's broken body and shedding his blood for our penalty of our sin. Through his sacrifice, love and grace we are forgiven of our sins.

I have never been frustrated with God's not fulfilling his promises to me. However, where I fit into his plan is a bit elusive at this time. God's delay in the fulfillment of his promises to a future time is that evil has not yet come it's fullness or the prayers of the saints may have held back his plan.

Jesus as the Great Physician does not resonate with the broken world of today. Jesus is mostly rejected by the governments of the world today they reject him as a healer. To me Jesus is the Great Healer for those that believe and have faith in him as the Son of God our redeemer. He came to reconcile us back to our Heavenly Father and to have eternal life with them. He has healed us of the curse of death and brought eternal life to our soul.

In light of the worlds multitude of religions, Jesus is the way, the truth and the life. No one can come to the Father except through Him. This offends the world because they believe there are many ways - their own ways to heaven. Through their own works, they believe they can attain goodness. We can declare these truths to this generation by quoting scripture, by our own testimony and praying for them, that they come to the light of Christ.

The images of Christ as a rock is attractive to us today because for Christians he holds us together, he is our solid foundation for our faith. The images of Christ as a corner stone repels many people today because they don't want to live like a Christian. Their friends are not Christians and they want to be popular with them. Jesus is a rock in my life because he keeps me from going astray in my moral character. As a foundation because ha has provided for my redemption. as a stone in my life, by placing me in a grounded Christian Church, where preaching is the word of God!

In Colossians 1:18, the way we can assert Jesus as the head of the Church today is the same as it was in the beginning of the Church. Jesus died and rose from the dead for his Church. He established it and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it. In the book of Acts the Holy Spirit was given to the Apostles and believers. Jesus who was raised from the dead by the Heavenly Father is the first Adam for the living. In Colossians 1:18, Paul is speaking of the Church at it's beginning, Christ is the head both in the local and universal assemblies. Being Christ is the head of the Church, his Church, we should conduct ourselves as the first believers, to live a holy life as he is holy. The visible Church today represents Jesus as it's head and Him we follow. It should not be hard to follow Jesus leadership, Even as today's society is against the Church, we must and do follow Him.

The amazing thing about Genesis 15:6 is that Abraham believed God and it was credited to him as righteousness. Even today our faith in Christ is our righteousness. God accounts Abraham's righteousness in the fact that Abraham had believed and obeyed God. Our New Testament understanding of justification by faith comes to us because we believe in what Christ has done for us on the cross. He was our substitutionary sacrifice for our sins. G

To call God my shield, my fortress and my protector but most of all he is my counselor in times of trouble. God's promises to us as "an exceedingly great reward" is that he will and does bless us and is a shield for us. To call God our Suzerain or Sovereign is to mean he is our protector, our giver of rewards in much abundance. To God our Suzerain we are promised our reward of eternal life through his Son. He has provided for us his servants a new covenant, just as Abraham had promises from the Lord, we now have Christ as our Suzerain.

The characteristics of the Good Shepherd are he knows his sheep, protects them and calls them by name. The Good Shepherd lays down his life for his sleep. One who is hired to shepherd the sheep will not care for the sheep when danger comes. He will save himself but not the sheep he was hired to protect. We can be good shepherds to the flock as opposed to the hired hand by the fact we care for one another, we will lay down our lives for one another. As pastor we watch over the flock to ensure no one goes astray.

Jesus serves as kinsman redeemer for us because he knows man is so far in debt to sin that we can not free ourselves from it. God the Father sent his Only Son to become man as we are to redeem us back to the Father through his sacrifice on the cross, death and resurrection. Jesus became for us wisdom from God so that our righteousness, holiness and redemption comes from Jesus. The redemption price that God the Father paid for us was the sacrifice of his Son. God so loved the world that he gave his only Son that we may have eternal life with him.

m Abraham refuses to take spoils of war from the king of Sodom, because he knows the king is wicked and will not allow himself to be involved with him in anyway. Abraham knows that the king of Sodom could brag that because of his generosity Abraham became great. Abraham knows that the God Most High had been his strength and that there is no wickedness before him. This shows that Abraham has a most righteous character, he knows God is a righteous God and has nothing to do with wickedness. This teaches us that we should give back to the Lord a portion of our income we receive because God provides all our wealth and needs for our every day existence. Giving back to the Lord shows our worship for him and trust.

The significance of Abraham giving Melchizedek one tenth of the spoils is in honoring God for helping him to conquer the Mesopotamian kings and getting Lot and his belongings back. Tithing represents that we honor God for all we have and his blessings upon us. However, there is no mention of Gentiles to give ten percent of their earnings to the Lord. but to tithe what the Lord has put on our heart to give. We should tithe to God first before dividing up our income and paying bills. This shows honor to God and in return his blessings upon us for our faith.

Abraham;s military rescue of Lot from the Mesopotamian kings tells us he is a valiant person who is not afraid to attack an army and take back Lot and his possessions. His abilities were good, he had allies plus his own trained men for war including weapons. Abraham deals justly with his neighbors he has, overtime made allies who were willing to go to war with Abraham. Things here for us to emulate is that Abraham loves his nephew Lot and is willing to die to get him back. Abraham calls him a brother because they are from the same family. I know not whether Lot was a believer in the One true God like Abraham.

Abraham's material wealth seems to reflect God's blessings on him. The Lord had promised he would bless Abraham Genesis 13:2. Having material wealth does not always reflect God's blessings on us. Many unbelievers are blessed with riches, Lot also ha d been blessed with wealth. Physical poverty does not always reflect a curse on some people. God may bless them in other ways according to his will.

Being Christ disciples we are to try and help save the lost. This is our job, because Christ has loved us and saved us, we should always share his love with others. When we witness to others and they they feel we are pressuring them, we should back off for the time being. We never know when the Holy Spirit will convict them and the Spirit will again direct us to witness to them.

Jesus being a friend of sinners comforts me because I am definitely a sinner who needs Jesus to be my savior. This helps me to relate to other people, we are sinners who need a savior. I can share my experience of Jesus with them.

God's relationship and promises to Abraham in Genesis 12:2-3 is that Abraham had faith that God would do as he promised but in Genesis 20:11, Abraham realizes there is no fear of God at this place and they would kill him so the king could marry Sarah. After Sarah was released from king Abimelech, Abraham prayed for the king and God healed Abimelech and his household. Now his wives and slaves could have children again for the Lord had made them barren. The king gave money and silver to Abraham to cover offenses against Sarah.

It would seem that Abraham and Sarah"s ethics and faith were a bit shaky. Being sojourners in foreign where there was no protection from the king, these people were usually frowned upon, robbed and sexually abused. Abraham was in fear of his life because of Sarah's beauty, so they lied about their relationship. Though God promised Abraham a land of his own and that his offspring would be a blessing to all the people of the world, they did not rely on God to take care of them during times of famine as they sojourned. They probably were not ethically or morally wrong. It seems their culture at the time was to survive. Scripture shows that their actions, especially Abraham's, was a weak faith. They did not depend on God to care for them. But God is faithful, he did not allow Sarah to be defiled and rescued them both by judging the kings who had taken Sarah for wife. As disciples we should learn from these stories of Abraham and Sarah, that God will take care of us, we are his and he is faithful to his word. Abraham and Sarah did not depend on God but rather relied on their cultural up bringing to fend for themselves, which could have cost them their lives.

We are to follow Jesus example as a servant by humbling ourselves and being obedient to his will. Humility is difficult because one must not be proud or arrogant. He must be modest and have meekness of heart. In today's society we are taught to be just the opposite of humility. Obedience is hard for us in our faith, we can not always see the of God being fulfilled. We always want things now and with results. This is not what God wants, he desires patience with obedience to his will. For me to be obedient and humble is difficult. Raising a family with children takes one's mind off the things of the Lord. Taking on the challenges of society seems to always draw us away from Christ.

The purpose of the Lord's supper was to bring into remembrance his broken body and blood of the New Covenant. By celebrating the last supper we look back to the Lord's death and forward to his second coming. We partake of the last supper often to call into remembrance his atonement for our sins and eternal life with him. It is easy to forget what Jesus has done for us on the cross because present life and culture pressure us to live a life of accomplishment and elevation in society. Getting wrapped up in these present day activities keeps our mind off the Lord and on the world.

The stories of Pharaoh and Abimelech with the taking of Abraham's wife Sari teaches us that God takes adultery very seriously, having sexual intercourse with another man's wife. God can and will forgive a person who has committed adultery provided they are sincerely sorry and repent of the son. God is a holy, just God full of mercy and loving kindness.