SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 8/1/2018
6:25 AM
My Worship Time Focus: Communion
Bible Reading & Meditation Reference: Acts
21:17-20a
Message of the verses: “17 After we arrived in Jerusalem, the brethren received us
gladly. 18 And the following day Paul went in with us to James, and all the
elders were present. 19 After he had greeted them, he began to relate
one by one the things which God had done among the Gentiles through his
ministry. 20 And when they heard it they began glorifying God;”
We have to
believe that Paul made it to Jerusalem by Pentecost, which of course was his
goal. We can see that the brethren in
Jerusalem were very happy to see Paul, and I suppose that because their trip
was tiring that they wanted to rest up before going into see James and the rest
of the elders the next day. One thing
for sure is that the brethren were pleased with the gift that Paul was bringing
to them that was collected from the Gentile churches. I have mentioned that in Paul’s letter to the
Romans that he asked for prayer that the believers in Jerusalem would accept
this generous gift provided by the Gentile believers, as his fear was that the
church would be divided over the fact that there were many Gentiles who had
accepted the Lord Jesus Christ as their Savior, and perhaps would continue to
show their disdain for the Gentiles.
Paul’s prayers were answered as the Jewish Church would have nothing to
say but to praise the Lord for what the Holy Spirit of God was doing through
Paul and his missionary team.
We see
some interesting things that have happened to the church at Jerusalem, changes from
the last time we talked about this church.
First of all we see that the church was being headed up by James and all
the elders which was different than before.
It was ruled by the Apostles before, and headed up by Peter, the apostle
to the Jews. Now it is headed up by
James who was the half brother of our Lord Jesus Christ. There are some “religions” that will not
believe that the Lord Jesus Christ had siblings, which would be half brothers
and sisters, but that is what the Bible teaches. They will teach that the James spoken of here
was the apostle James, but that could not be true in that he was killed as seen
earlier in the book of Acts, in fact he was the first Apostle to be killed for
his belief in Christ, but not the last.
John MacArthur
writes about the collection for the Jerusalem church: “Strangely, Luke does not mention the
presentation of the collection. In fact,
except for an allusion to it in 24:17, he does not refer to it at all in
Acts. We can assume, however, that it
was presented and gratefully accepted.” “Now
after many years I came to bring alms to my nation, and offerings (Acts 24:17).”
In verse
19 we see that Paul began to relate to James and the elders the many things
that the Spirit of God had done in building the Gentile churches through the
ministry of Paul. Paul for sure did not
boast of this but was humble in that the Lord was using him and his team to
bring many Gentiles to a saving knowledge in the Lord Jesus Christ.
When Paul
wrote to the Corinthians in 1 Corinthians 3:5-7 we see that he was surely
against any hero worship:
5 Who
then is Paul, and who is Apollos, but ministers by whom ye believed,
even as the Lord gave to every man? 6 I have planted, Apollos watered; but God
gave the increase. 7 So then neither is he that planteth any thing, neither he
that watereth; but God that giveth the increase (KJV).”
As we look
at the first half of verse 20 we read “And when they heard it they began
glorifying God;”
Spiritual meaning for my life today: Praising the Lord over a soul that is saved
is probably the greatest feeling that a believer can have. I have a friend, a rather new friend, a man
that I have the greatest respect for even before we became closer, and he knew
a man who is now in his mid 90’s for a long time and had witnessed to him on
many occasions. This man rejected the
gospel many, many times as he wanted nothing to do with Christ offer to save
him. He became very ill some time ago
and my friend continued to talk to him about the Lord, but still he wanted
nothing to do with Him. I received a
number of text messages from my friend who stated that the human will of this
man had been broken by the Spirit of God and he received Christ as his Savior
yesterday. My friend said he prayed all
by himself and afterwards went to sleep as he was unable to sleep because of
the restlessness of his heart, which not was at peace with the Lord. Our entire Sunday school class has been
praying for Charles, and now very soon he will be in the presence of his
Lord. I am reminded of this passage from
Jude’s letter: “And others save with
fear, pulling them out of the fire (Jude 1:23a). Charles was pulled out of the fire and will
soon be in the presence of the Lord.
My
Steps of Faith for Today: I trust that the Lord will use the words that
I spoke to a lady who checked my eyes yesterday, that He will convict her of
her sin and bring her to Himself to save her.
Answer to yesterday’s Bible question: “1 Chronicles.”
Today’s Bible question:
“Why did the Israelites want a king instead of a judge?”
Answer in our next SD.
8/1/2018 7:03 AM
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