SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 6/21/2016 9:56 AM
My Worship Time Focus: Freedom and Bondage
Bible Reading &
Meditation Reference: John 8:31-47
Message of the verses: “31 So
Jesus was saying to those Jews who had believed Him, "If you continue in
My word, then you are truly disciples of Mine; 32 and you will know the truth, and the truth will
make you free." 33 They answered Him, "We are Abraham’s descendants
and have never yet been enslaved to anyone; how is it that You say, ’You will
become free’?" 34 Jesus answered them, "Truly, truly, I say to you,
everyone who commits sin is the slave of sin. 35 “The slave does not remain in
the house forever; the son does remain forever. 36 “So if the Son makes you
free, you will be free indeed. 37 “I know that you are Abraham’s descendants;
yet you seek to kill Me, because My word has no place in you.
“38 "I speak
the things which I have seen with My Father; therefore you also do the things
which you heard from your father." 39 They answered and said to Him,
"Abraham is our father." Jesus *said to them, "If you are
Abraham’s children, do the deeds of Abraham. 40 “But as it is, you are seeking
to kill Me, a man who has told you the truth, which I heard from God; this
Abraham did not do. 41 “You are doing the deeds of your father." They said
to Him, "We were not born of fornication; we have one Father: God."
42 Jesus said to them, "If God were
your Father, you would love Me, for I proceeded forth and have come from God,
for I have not even come on My own initiative, but He sent Me. 43 "Why do you not understand what I am
saying? It is because you cannot hear My word. 44 “You are of your father the
devil, and you want to do the desires of your father. He was a murderer from
the beginning, and does not stand in the truth because there is no truth in
him. Whenever he speaks a lie, he speaks from his own nature, for he is a liar
and the father of lies. 45 “But because I speak the truth, you do not believe
Me. 46 "Which one of you convicts
Me of sin? If I speak truth, why do you not believe Me? 47 “He who is of God
hears the words of God; for this reason you do not hear them, because you are
not of God.’”
You may
have noticed a change in the way we have been looking at this eight chapter of
John’s Gospel, and it is because I believe that the Lord has been prompting me
to look at what Dr. Warren Wiersbe has to say about this section we have and
are looking at and so this morning I decided to look at what he has written
about these verses and quote it in this Spiritual Diary.
“Jesus
explained that the difference between spiritual freedom and bondage is a matter
of whether one is a son or a servant.
The servant may live in the house, but he is not a part of the family;
and he cannot be guaranteed a future.
(Jesus may have had Isaac and Ishmael in mind here; see Gen. 21). ‘Whosoever keeps on practicing sin [literal
translation] is the servant of sin.’
These religious leaders would not only die in their sins (John 8:21, 24), but they were right then living in bandage to sin!
“How can
slaves of sin be set free? Only by the
Son. How does He do it? Through the power of His Word. Note the emphasis on the Word in John 8:38-47,
and He had already told them, ‘The truth shall make you free’ (John 8:32). They would not ‘make room’ for HI Word in
their hearts.
“In the
rest of this section, you see the debate centering around the word father.
Jesus identified Himself with the Father in heaven, but He identified
them with the father from hell, Satan.
Of course, the Jews claimed Abraham as their father (Luke 3:8ff), but
Jesus made a careful distinction between ‘Abraham’s seed’ (physical
descendants) and ‘Abraham’s children’ (spiritual descendants because of
personal faith; Gal. 3:6-14).
“These
Jewish leaders, who claimed to belong to Abraham, were very unlike
Abraham. For one thing, they wanted to
kill Jesus; Abraham was the ‘friend of God’ and fellowshipped with Him in love
(Isa. 41:8). Abraham listened to God’s
truth and obeyed it, but these religious leaders rejected the truth.
“Nature is
determined by birth, and birth is determined by paternity. If God is your Father, then you share God’s
nature (2 Peter 1:1-4) ‘1 Simon Peter, a bond-servant and apostle of Jesus
Christ, To those who have
received a faith of the same kind as ours, by the righteousness of our God
and Savior, Jesus Christ: 2 Grace and peace be multiplied to you in the
knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord; 3 seeing that His divine power has
granted to us everything pertaining to life and godliness, through the true
knowledge of Him who called us by His own glory and excellence. 4 For by these
He has granted to us His precious and magnificent promises, so that by them you
may become partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that
is in the world by lust.’ But if Satan
is your father, then you share in his evil nature. Our Lord did not say that every lost sinner is certainly a child
of wrath and disobedience (Eph. 2:1-3).
Both here and in the Parable of the Tares (Matt. 13:24-32, 36-43), Jesus
said that the Pharisees and other ‘counterfeit’ believers were the children of
the devil. Satan is an imitator (2 Cor.
11:13-15), and he gives his children a false righteousness that can never gain
them entrance into heaven (Rom. 10:1-4).
‘1 Brethren, my heart’s desire and my prayer to God for them is for
their salvation. 2 For I testify about them that they have a zeal for God, but not in accordance
with knowledge. 3 For not knowing about God’s righteousness and seeking to
establish their own, they did not subject themselves to the righteousness of
God. 4 For Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone who
believes.’
“What were
the characteristics of these religious leaders who belonged to the devil? For one thing, they rejected the truth (John
8:40) and tried to kill Jesus because He spoke the truth. They did not love God (John 8:42) nor could
they understand what Jesus taught (John 8:43, 47). Satan’s children may be well versed in their
religious traditions, but they have no understanding of the Word of God.
“Satan is a
liar and a murderer. He lied to our
first parents (‘Yea, hath God said?’) and engineered their deaths. Cain was a child of the devil (1 John 3:12),
for he was both a liar and a murderer.
He killed his brother Abel and then lied about it (Gen. 4). Is it any wonder that these religious leaders
lied about Jesus, hired false witnesses, and then had Him killed?
“The worst
bondage is the kind that the prisoner himself does not recognize. He thinks he is free, yet he is really a slave. The Pharisees and other religious leaders
thought that they were free, but they were actually enslaved in terrible
spiritual bondage to sin and Satan. They
would not face the truth, and yet it was the truth alone that could set them
free.”
Spiritual meaning for my life today: It is always good to get the perspective of
Warren Wiersbe from any portion of Scripture as he always makes things
understandable.
My Steps of Faith for
Today: To listen to the prompting of
the Holy Spirit and obey it.
Memory verses for the week:
(2 Cor. 12 9-10; Psalm 119:27) “And He said to me ‘My grace is
sufficient for you, for power is perfected in weakness,’ Most gladly,
therefore, I will rather boast in my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ
may dwell in me. 10 Therefore I am well
content with weaknesses, with insults, with distresses, with persecutions, with
difficulties, for Christ’s sake; for when I am weak, then I am strong.” Psalm 119:27 “Make me understand the way of
Your precepts, so I will meditate on your wonders.”
Answer to yesterday’s Bible question: “Mother of James and John” (Matthew 20:21).
Today’s Bible question:
“Of what country was Hazel king?”
Answer in our next SD.
6/21/2016 10:54 AM
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