Risky ( Luke 12 v13 -21)

Gordon Bridger  tells  of a Bishop called Sandy Millar and an elderly lady aged 101 who had just become a Christian, she said to the Bishop,'Don't you think it's wonderful that I've come to Christ at my age'The Bishop  thought for a moment,and then said ,'It's wonderful- but risky'.Yes in a sense it was risky,going all those years without him,we can never presume on the mercy and grace of God,it is a dangerous thing to leave it so long.I remember working with an elderly man who used go and hear Ian Paisley speaking,and how moved he was with the message, even shedding tears,but he never made a decision for Christ.Again I remember a member of my church who had witnessed to someone and the person put it off,and she thought of the words of a hymn by D.W.Whittle,'Room for pleasure ,room for business,But for Christ the crucified, Not a place that he can enter,In your heart for which he died'.If you are not a Christian and you die without him that it is very serious,it is very risky thing to do, hell is real,don't put it off,trust him now.

Read. (Psalm 119 v33ff)

 Let us consider words from Psalm 119v 33ff ,the 119th Psalm has 176 verses ,the theme of it ,is the word of  God. Verse 33 begins ,'Teach me your decrees,O Lord;I will keep them to the end'.It is Spurgeon who writes,'Alas for those who will never taught', especially in relation to the word of God. Sad to say many Christians  do not read the word of God, even though the word of God tells us,'Man shall not live by bread alone, but on  every word that comes from the mouth of God' (Dt 8 v 3/Mt 4 v 4)King Henry V111, ordered that a Bible would be placed in every church,for the use of the people.After he died ,his daughter Queen Mary became  Queen,she was stern Roman Catholic,ordered that the Bible was not allowed to be read in English. A young man William Hunter was found reading the Bible,he said he was just reading for comfort,but he was thrown into prison,and later he was burnt at the stake.In many countries having or even reading a Bible, could end up with you being put in prison or even being put to death'.

                                                        'How much do you value God's word?'

Opinions ( Psalm 42 v 1-5)

 We are bombarded with all sorts of opinions daily especially on  You Tube, I  have a son who holds opinions on so many things,I try to avoid getting into a conversation with him on certain things.Just recently someone voiced an opinion that in ten years  AI will destroy the whole human race.Many are voiceing opinions  on AI  ,and then on a lighter level if you follow football everyone has an opinion.We have people say,'If you want my opinion',of course you may not,but  they will still give it.So many opinions can be very unsettling,as  Christians remember this vital truth, God is sovereign, He rules over all things,yes there will be wars and rumours of wars,there will be distasters,catastrophes, and mulitudes of other things.In peoples own personal lives,marriage breakdowns,deaths,I will stop there I don't want to depress you,and yet we cannot escape the fact that is the way life is.Frederick Langbridge wrote a poem with the following words in it,'Two men looked out through prison bars,one saw the mud the other saw the stars'.Which one are you?or which one am I?Where are you at this time ,what's going on in your life ?is it frightening? difficult,dangerous,overwhelming?,change your vocus,don't look at the mud,or even the stars. look to your God ,as the Psalmist reminds us,'God is our refuge and strength, an ever present help in trouble.' (Ps 46 v1 ) and v10 tells us ,'Be still,and know that I am God;'

                                                       'Replace your feelings ,with 

                                                        faith in the living God'

Perfection. ( Matthew 5 v 38-48)

 Always remember the best of men and womem are all imperfect,remember that preacher in the pulpit he is not perfect,I am not being cynical.But the fact is as long as we live none of us will be perfect,there are degrees of perfection,and there are degrees of evil.We should not despair ,but rise to the challenge  which our Saviour said ,'Be perfect, therefore,as your heavenly father is perfect'( Matthew 5 v 48) One writer says the word perfect,has the meaning,of complete,whole,or fully grown.These words spoken by Jesus, are a command,must be obeyed,even though we struggle and fail in our struggles,we must never give up,this quest to be perfect.Proverbs 24 v16 reads,'For though the righteous fall seven times,they arise  again'. Someone said the following,'Even good and godly people experience failure ,commit mistakes,and even sin,like David did ,and Peter.Jesus knew we would still sin that is why he taught us ,to pray,'forgive us our trespasses'. (Matthew 6 v 12) Praise God we can recover from our sins,when we repent and ask for forgiveness in Jesus name. We imperfect Christians must never give up by the grace of God in pressing on to perfection.

                                                             

Escape from the wrath of God. ( John 3 v36 )

 In Psalm 89 v 48 we read these words,'Who can live and not see death,or who can escape the power of the grave?' In the Bible we read of two people who escaped death,Enoch and Elijah,two very godly men,we don't  why they escaped it,only God knows that.We read in Hebrews 9 v 27,'And it is appointed unto to men once to die,but after that the judgment'.We all have to bow to  the inevitable,no matter how much we protest it will not change anything,there is no cure for death.There is no human cure that stop us ,because we cannot  undo the pass ,A Pink wrote the following,'Death is something more that the result of physiological law; the same God who sustained  Methusalah for nigh on a thousand years, would have sustained Adam's body for all eternity,had he never fallen.Sinless angels are immortal. 'Adams sin brought death upon the whole human race,but it did not only bring death,for we read after death the judgment.True we cannot stop death,but we can escape the judgment of God. For we read,'So Christ was sacrificed once to take away the sins of many',(Heb 9 v 28) It is vital that we grasp the meaning of Christs death on the cross,it was a sacrifice for sin,not His sin,no  he was sinless.1Peter 2 v 24 tells us,'He himself bore our sins in his body on the cross',that means he bore the wrath of God for our sins,that all who believe in him may escape that awful judgement  which every unbeliever will experence when they die.We cannot escape death ,but we can escape judgment by seeking forgiveness by accepting Jesus as our Saviour.

Judgement ( Romans 1 v 18)

The book of  Zephaniah  is taken up with the theme of judgement,but not entirely,it commences with judgement on the whole earth, this will take place when Christ  comes back again (2 Peter 3 v 10 -12) It then is followed by naming  nations including Judah, Jerusalem and different Gentile nations.Let us remember God judges people for a reason,he does not rejoice in judging  nations .or individual people.If you read the book of  Zephaniah all those nations including Judah are involved in very sinful practices. They were all involved in worshiping other god's.and as we say Judah is included in those practices,there were those who said,'The Lord will do nothing, either good or bad'( Zep 1 v 12)the world is like that ,but they are wrong,even if they are children of God, Exodus 34 v 7 reads 'He does not leave the guilty unpunished'.  Gordon Bridges writes 'God is just,and he must act in a way that is consistent with his character,and then he adds,'Thank God we live in a moral universe ,where ultimately justice will be done and be seen to be done'.

A false god ( Psalm 23 v 1)

In the OT we have false gods mentioned,one of them was Baal,the meaning of their name is,'Master/Lord/,Possessor. Gordon Bridger writes that  Baalism was a prosperity religion,a  sexually  corrupt religion,a frenzied religion, and a cruel religion. The prosperity religion was a belief  based on the pleaseing and stimulate him,and if you did that you would have prosperity .This reminds us of the modern prosperity gospel people, to their shame,you gave and the greater prosperity you will have,the more you give the greater the prosperity.Sad to say it is preachers of this so called gospel are millionaires,and they glory in that.I have never heard any of those prosperity preachers, preach the true gospel.Jesus said 'Give,and it will be given to you.A good measure,pressed down,shaken together and running over,will be poured  into your lap. For with the measure you use, it will be measured to you'.GB  writes,'Such open-heartedness does not go unrewarded- but the essence of it is that  this must never be our motive for our giving.Paul wrote ,'I have known hunger and thirst and have often  gone without food; I have been cold and naked'  (2 Cor11 v 27) But he also wrote ' And my God will meet all your needs according to the riches of his glory in Christ Jesus'.that word 'needs' is important to remember.