SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 2/3/2019
4:53 PM
My Worship Time Focus: PT-3 “The
Spirits Power”
Bible Reading & Meditation Reference: Eph. 3:14-16
Message of the verses: “14 For this reason
I bow my knees before the Father, 15 from whom every family in heaven and on
earth derives its name, 16 that He would grant you, according to the riches of
His glory, to be strengthened with power through His Spirit in the inner man, 17
so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith; and that you,
being rooted and grounded in love,”
We
finished looking at verse fourteen in our last SD and want to begin to look at
verse fifteen today. When I look at
verse fifteen in the NLT it reads “the Creator of
everything in heaven and on earth.”
I think this makes it easier by looking at the NLT to see that Paul is
not teaching that God is the spiritual “Father” of every being in the universe. God created Adam and Eve and from them comes
all people who have ever been born, but that by no means that all people are
spiritual children of God, this teaches universal fatherhood of God when it is
stated that God is the spiritual father of all people, and that is not true. If that were true then why would Christ need
to come to pay for sins? The Bible
teaches that one must be born from above, and that is done by admitting that
you were born a sinner, and that you sin because you were born a sinner, and
that you can do nothing on your own to have your sins forgiven. Paul writes in Romans chapter one that “no
one seeks after God.” God has to seek
after us in order for us to be saved by grace through faith. In the eight chapter of the gospel of John,
Jesus told the unbelieving Pharisees “If you are Abraham’s children, doo the
deeds of Abraham. 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. You are doing the deeds of your father…If God
were your Father, you would love Me;…You are of your father the devil” (VV.
39-42, 44). John 3:10 states “By this the
children of God and the children of the devil are obvious: anyone who does not practice righteousness is
not of God, nor the one who does not love his brother’ (3:10). By these verses it reinforces that truth that
God is not the spiritual Father of everyone.
John
MacArthur writes “Every family in heaven and on earth’ refers to the saints of
every age—those now ‘in heaven and those still remaining on earth.’ They are the only ones who legitimately
derive their names from God the Father.
Christians are no more or less the children of God than were believing
Israelites, as well as believing Gentiles, before the coming of Christ. ‘Every family’ of believers is a part of the
one spiritual family of God, in which there are many members but only one ‘Father’
and on brotherhood.”
As
we look at verse sixteen we see the first request that Paul prays for these
believers, and not only those in Ephesus but those who are believers throughout
the church history. “16 that He would grant you, according to the riches of His
glory, to be strengthened with power through His Spirit in the inner man,”
Today’s Quote: “If I have seen farther than others, it is
because I have stood on the shoulders of Giants (Isaac Newton).”
2/3/2019 5:17 PM
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