SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 6/6/2016 8:09 PM
My Worship Time Focus: Intro. To John 8:22-30
Bible Reading &
Meditation Reference: John 8:22-30
Message of the verses: “22 So the Jews were saying, "Surely He
will not kill Himself, will He, since He says, ’Where I am going, you cannot
come’?" 23 And He was saying to them, "You are from below, I am from
above; you are of this world, I am not of this world. 24 “Therefore I said to
you that you will die in your sins; for unless you believe that I am He, you
will die in your sins." 25 So they were saying to Him, "Who are
You?" Jesus said to them, "What have I been saying to you from the
beginning? 26 “I have many things to speak and to judge concerning you, but He
who sent Me is true; and the things which I heard from Him, these I speak to
the world." 27 They did not realize that He had been speaking to them
about the Father. 28 So Jesus said, "When you lift up the Son of Man, then
you will know that I am He, and I do nothing on My own initiative, but I speak
these things as the Father taught Me. 29 “And He who sent Me is with Me; He has
not left Me alone, for I always do the things that are pleasing to Him." 30
As He spoke these things, many came to believe in Him.”
As we look
at this section from John’s gospel what we are seeing is a missed
opportunity. Think about the first
missed opportunity, that being Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden when they
fell to what Satan offered them. Needles
to say that was a very bad choice that has affected the entire human race. I have never thought of something that John
MacArthur wrote in his commentary: “By
eating the fruit that God had forbidden, Adam (and Eve) directly violated the
Lord’s command. Adam’s sin cost him (and
the entire human race) the privilege of continuing in uninterrupted fellowship
with God (Gen. 3:6-8). As a result, ‘the
Lord God sent him out from the garden of Eden, to cultivate the ground from
which he was taken.” I never thought of
it that way that man (Adam) was made from the dirt of the earth had to go and
make a living from the very dirt that he was taken from. Adam means red and I believe that this was
the color of the dirt that he was formed from.
We can go
through different portions of Scripture to see of others who had missed
opportunity and we will look at a couple more, the next from Numbers 20:7-12 “7
And the LORD spoke to Moses, saying, 8
"Take the rod; and you and your brother Aaron assemble the
congregation and speak to
the rock before their eyes, that it may yield its water. You shall thus
bring forth water for them out of the rock and let the congregation and their
beasts drink." 9 So Moses took the rod from before the LORD, just as He
had commanded him; 10 and Moses and Aaron gathered the assembly before the
rock. And he said to them, "Listen now, you rebels; shall we bring forth water for
you out of this rock?" 11 Then Moses lifted up his hand and struck
the rock twice with his rod; and water came forth abundantly, and the
congregation and their beasts drank. 12 But the LORD said to Moses and Aaron, "Because you
have not believed Me, to treat Me as holy in the sight of the sons of Israel,
therefore you shall not bring this assembly into the land which I have given
them."”
Judas
Iscariot is another one who had a missed opportunity, and perhaps we cans put
this one right on par with that of Adam for Judas had the opportunity of
walking with the very God who created him for three years but missed the
opportunity of realizing who he walked with.
We bring
missed opportunities up because that is what this section is all about, the
missed opportunity of these people that Jesus was talking to. John MacArthur writes “In light of the overwhelming
evidence, unbelief in Jesus is inexcusable.
Those who hear the gospel and reject it will be eternally punished—with no
one to blame but themselves. (It should
be noted that even those who have not heard the gospel are still culpable for
rejecting the truth that they have been given.
Such truth includes aspects of the existence and character of God, as
revealed through both the created order [Rom. 1:18-21] and the conscience [Rom.
2:14-15].) Thus all who reject Jesus
Christ are fully responsible for choosing to die in their sins (John 3:19).
“This
passage reveals four ways people can ensure such a tragic and eternal
death: by being self-righteous, worldly,
unbelieving, or willfully ignorant.” We
will be looking at this four ways in the next few Spiritual Diaries.
Spiritual meaning for my life today: I am thankful for not missing the opportunity
of receiving the Lord Jesus Christ as my Savior and my Lord, and have a desire
to tell those whom the Lord brings onto my path to tell them how they too can
receive Him as Savior and Lord.
My Steps of Faith for
Today: As I begin to lead a Sunday
school class this coming Lord’s day I trust that the Lord will prepare me to be
used by Him and through this class bring honor and glory to His name.
Memory verses for the week:
2 Corinthians 12:7-9 “7. Because of the surpassing greatness of the
revelations, for this reason, to keep me from exalting myself, there was given
me a thorn in the flesh, a messenger of Satan to torment me-to keep me from
exalting myself. 8. Concerning this I
implored the Lord three times that it might leave me. 9. And He said to me, ‘My grace is sufficient
for you, for power is perfected in weakness,’ most gladly, therefore, I will
rather boast about my weakness, so that the power of Christ may dwell in me.”
Answer to yesterday’s Bible question: “He has committed adultery in his heart”
(Matthew 5:28).
Today’s Bible question:
“Who said ‘I hid a hundred men of the Lord’s prophets by fifty in a
cave, and fed them with bread and water’?”
Answer in our next SD.
6/6/2016 8:46 PM
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