Kim E.

Sometimes these questions seem easy to answer but really they are not. I find it hard to explain why my ability to rejoice is dependent upon my faith that God is in control. It just is. For me there is no other way. To live is to live out the life of Christ. To live out the life of Christ means living out the life Christ lived here on earth. We know we have the support of the Spirit of Jesus Christ and this support is central to our response to difficulties. We have been given our faith, it is from God, and we have support, in other words we are constantly supplied with the faith that God is in control which gives us the ability to rejoice. And we rejoice that Christ will be glorified in our life or death. God has freed me to rejoice through faith that He is in control of the situation, and my goals are His goals. I must believe that Christ lives in me to be able to rejoice and I believe that I will be delivered whether by life or death. I believe because I have lived it. I believe because God has opened my eyes to the truth of the Scripture and the Word has set me free.

We do not allow discouragement to rob us of our joy in the Lord. We remain joyful because the main thing is that the gospel is being proclaimed. The secret is having the right goal. If our only goal in life is popularity or winning, etc., then we can be disappointed. But if our goal is the companionship and the result is an opening to share the gospel then we have achieved our goal, whether we are doing poorly or not. Paul wasn

Paul prays for what God promises. Paul prays that the Philippians will grow as their love grows in knowledge and discernment. Love does not close its eyes to the truth, to reality, to sin. What a horrible thing it would be if love truly were blind. Christian love must operate according to truth. We are to

To present them to the Father complete in Christ. Salvation is always of God and when He does it He does it all. He always finishes what He begins. No one who has been brought by the Holy Spirit to a saving knowledge of Jesus Christ will ever be lost. The Holy Spirit is responsible for our sanctification and He is always making us discover how sinful we are and causes us to turn to Jesus for our forgiveness and cleansing. Salvation does not depend on us it depends on God. Jesus told His disciples,

Paul

Slaves are committed to their Master for life. We should look at our role as a servant as a place of honor. Americans find this almost impossible to fathom. We think in terms of entitlement. We assume that we deserve certain things: a particular standard of living, a certain level of education, happiness, and so on. A servant, on the other hand, thinks in terms of his duties. A servant is a debtor, so to speak, to his master; we Americans (and many others) think of ourselves as masters. No wonder Paul

Pastor Ralph & friends in Christ, I couldn't think of one thing to improve on the Bible Studies provided here. I've been in the position of examining myself during this study and find I fall dreadfully short. I thank God that He has led me here, to study and to examine myself. No matter what the question or the answer from all of you, I've gotten something out of it. Each answer gives new insight, each question gives me a searching will. God bless each and everyone of you and may He enrich your life. Love in Christ, always. Kim E.

The Bible Knowledge Commentary has a good summary of our responsibility as believers: Wandering ones need to be brought back to the fold. James referred here not to evangelism but to restoration. Revival, not redemption, is in view. The rescue action is of great significance. A lost sheep is saved from destruction and his sins (the sins of the restored one, not the restorer) are covered as if a veil were thrown over them. He can move ahead again on the path toward spiritual maturity. James has given clear instructions about how to achieve practical holiness and spiritual maturity. His pointed exhortations were designed to stab the consciences and stir the souls of his beloved Jewish brothers. Stand with confidence, serve with compassion, speak with care, submit with contrition, and share with concern. A believer should be what God wants him to be, do what God wants him to do, say what God wants him to say, sense what God wants him to sense, and share what God wants him to share. Spiritual maturity involves every aspect of life. God has granted to all believers the ministry of reconciling wandering souls to Himself. When the evidence indicates a professed believer

The role of the oil is symbolic of the restoration of the weary Christian by the Holy Spirit. Though the anointing may be a more common practice than ceremonial it is still important as refreshing, encouraging and uplifting. The anointing and prayer are to be used together. The restoration is spiritual, not physical. What is

The elders

The sick person is to take the initiative to ask the elders to pray. Seek the help of Christian friends and leaders in the church. MacArthur writes,

It says that we are playing into the devil

James admonishes, "Be patient. . . until the coming of the Lord". Realize that you do not have any power or authority to "get even" with anyone who has harmed you. Our responsibility is to forgive them. The Lord will deal with the matter in righteousness when He returns. Don't moan and groan silently against one another. The secret grudge that groans and murmurs will eventually act itself out verbally, or behaviorally. We must show the same long-suffering patience toward men as God has demonstrated toward us. The suffering Christian must not engage in tit-for-tat recrimination. The temptation to lose patience may lead to impatience which gives rise to vindictiveness and despair.

Self-indulgent life-styles leads to decay and destruction. The folly is placing our trust in wealth which will be worthless on the Day of Judgment. It is easy to condemn the rich, but we need to ask ourselves where we are putting our confidence and trust for the days ahead. Do we confidently place our trust in the Social Security and retirement programs of our country, or government agencies, or in the Lord? Yes, I agree, we should make reasonable plans for the future if God permits us to live that long. But as many can testify these treasures can vanish in a moment, and your life is only a breath away. The coming reversal of fortunes will take place when Christ returns. Enjoy your privileges, possessions, popularity and power now because a day is coming when God will judge. James is so confident that he speaks of it as if this day had already taken place. We should probably take a cue from James and consider it as such, also, so we don

Here the arrogance of the sinful heart is exposed. Such a person prefers the world to worship. These individuals were professing to be servants of God, but in daily practice they deny or ignore Him. They act as if God does not exist and are in reality practical pagans. Their presumptuous assumption is they own the future, not God. They ignore the fact that