SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 4/5/2022 10:58 AM
My Worship Time Focus:
PT-1 “The Receptive Hearer”
Bible Reading & Meditation Reference: Matthew
13:23
Message of the verse: “23 "And the
one on whom seed was sown on the good soil, this is the man who hears the word
and understands it; who indeed bears fruit, and brings forth, some a hundredfold,
some sixty, and some thirty.’”
Today
we begin to look at the fourth patch of ground on whom seed was sown on the
good soil. The soil does not really have
a different basic composition than the other kinds of soil but it is because it
is rightly prepared which makes up the difference. Because the person’s heart is prepared by the
Holy Spirit and is receptive to God as seen in John 16:8-11, that the person
that this soil represents hears the word and understands it, which happens
before salvation, as the person who receives Christ has the same basic nature
as those who reject Him, as every person that is born into this world is born a
sinner having a sin nature, so we are all born wrong. I have a friend that heads up a ministry at
an abortion clinic every Wednesday and so I pray for her many days of each
week. The one thing that I pray about is
that the Holy Spirit will begin to work on the hearts of the ladies who go to
this facility to have their babies murdered so that their babies will be saved
and that eventually they would both come to Christ to be saved. This is the kind of work that has to happen
that is done by the Holy Spirit in order for anyone to be saved. I can look back a few months before the Lord
saved me, perhaps a year or so and as I look back I can now realize that the
Holy Spirit was doing a work in my life to prepare me for the effectual call
that He gave me on the 26th of January in 1974.
4/5/2022 12:06 PM
MacArthur writes:
“The only barrier to salvation is unbelief, and anyone who is willing to
accept Jesus Christ on His terms is good soil.
He hears the word of the gospel because God honors his humility and
opens his spiritual ears; and he understands the gospel because God honors his
faith and opens his spiritual mind and heart.”
As I have expressed how the Lord saved me I can see that from MacArthur’s
quote here that this was exactly what happened to me.
Jesus
tells this to His disciples in order to encourage them, and this will encourage
all other believers who desire to tell others about the way of salvation. Surely there will be many who do not desire
to hear the Word and be saved, but as long as we tell others the truth, pray
for them we are doing what we can, for it is always up to the Holy Spirit to
give an effectual call for a person to be saved. We cannot save anyone, but we can and should
give out the message of salvation to those willing to hear it. We don’t know who is of the good soil but God
does and will show us who to go to in order to tell them the good news.
Now
once we give out the message of salvation and a person tell us that they accept
it the next thing that has to be done in the life of this new believer is
fruit-bearing. He will not only hear and
understand but also indeed bear fruit.
Spiritual fruit is the inevitable product of spiritual life.
In
the book of Galatians Paul writes in the fifth chapter and verses 22-23 about
what is called “The Fruit of the Spirit.”
“22 But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness,
goodness, faithfulness, 23 gentleness,
self-control; against such things there is no law.” MacArthur adds “The genuine believer also
bears fruit of behavior, which Paul refers to as ‘the fruit of righteousness
which comes through Jesus Christ, to the glory and praise of God’ (Phil.
1:11). Fruit is the spiritual reality
that God produces in the lives of His children.
The Spirit-filled life of the believer ‘is constantly bearing fruit’
(Col. 1:6).”
4/5/2022 12:19 PM
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