SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 12/28/2024 10:05 AM
My Worship Time Focus: PT-2 “Affirm
Your Doctrine”
Bible Reading & Meditation Reference:
2 Tim. 1:13-14
Message of the verses: “13 Retain the standard
of sound words which you have heard from me, in the faith and love which are in
Christ Jesus. 14 Guard, through the Holy Spirit who dwells in us, the treasure
which has been entrusted to you.”
I want to begin by quoting from John
MacArthur’s commentary as he explains “Standard translates hupotuposis, which
was used of a writers outline or an artist’s sketch, which set the
guidelines and standards for the finished work.
The Christian’s standard is God’s Word, which encompasses the sound
words which you have heard from me [Paul], an apostle of Jesus Christ. In Scripture we have God’s own truth and
standards, all we need or should want to have.
It is the own divinely inspired, divinely revealed, absolute, unique,
perfect, and sufficient truth. In it is
found everything necessary for salvation and for living out the saved
life. Later in this letter Paul commends
Timothy, saying, ‘From childhood you have known the sacred writings which are
able to give you the wisdom that leads to salvation through faith which is in
Christ Jesus. All Scripture is inspired
by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction for training in
righteousness; that the man of God may be adequate, equipped for every good
work’ (2 Tim. 3:15-17).”
I have mentioned in earlier SD’s from 2 Timothy that
I truly believe that it was God who lead me to the study of this very last
epistle that Paul wrote and one of the reasons is some of the things that
Timothy was dealing with that I am dealing with too, and courage is something
that I need to deal with. Now courage in
Christian ministry, as well as in Christian living in general, is not possible
apart from strong biblical convictions. MacArthur goes on to write “But Paul
gives necessary balance to his counsel.
Strong convictions are to be held and taught in faith and love which are
in Christ Jesus. When we defend God’s
Word in self-righteous, un-loving spirit, the resulting controversy and oppositition
are not caused wholly by the offense of the truth itself but also by the
offensive and unspiritual way in which we proclaim it. We are to defend God’s Word in the faith, that
is, with the right attitude of confidence toward God; and we are to defend it
in love and toward poorly taught and immature believers. ‘Speaking the truth in love, we are to grow
up in all aspects into Him, who is the head, even Christ’ (Eph. 4:15). Although we must not have doubting or a dead
orthodoxy, neither should we have a loveless, cold, and insensitive orthodoxy.” One of
the things that I have learned which has something to do with what I just
quoted from MacArthur’s commentary is that one of the keys to living the
Christian life is balance and I suppose that is a good rule to follow in all
aspects of life. If I allow that Holy
Spirit to give me balance in my walk with the Lord then that would mean that I
never get too high or too low. Yes
balance is very important in my walk with the Lord.
Now I suppose that most believers
know that the Holy Spirit’s indwelling of all believers is a cardinal New
Testament doctrine. Jesus promised this
shortly before He went to the cross to pay for our sins: “15 "If
you love Me, you will keep My commandments. 16 “I will ask the Father, and He
will give you another Helper, that He may be with you forever; 17 that is
the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it does not see Him
or know Him, but you know Him because He abides with you and will be in
you” (John 14:15-17). Then immediately before His ascension Jesus
promised once more this truth as seen in Acts 1:8 “but you will receive power
when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you shall be My witnesses both in
Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and even to the remotest part of the
earth.’” Paul wrote the following to the
Romans “You are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if indeed the Spirit of God
dwells in you, But if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he does not
belong to Him (Rom. 8:9). Paul asked the
Corinthians rhetorically “Do you know that you are a temple of God, and that
the Spirit of God dwells in you?” (1 Cor. 3:16; cf. 6:19).
MacArthur then writes “Therefore, just as God has
power to guard what we have entrusted to Him (v. 12), He also gives us power to
guard, through the Holy Spirit who dwells in us, the treasure which He has entrusted
to us. Theologians would say this
depicts both sides of our security, the keeping power of God and the
Spirit-energized perseverance of the saints.
At the close of the previous letter, Paul gave a similar command: ‘O Timothy, guard what has been entrusted to
you,’ specifically warning him to avoid ‘worldly and empty chatter and the
opposing arguments of what is falsely called ‘knowledge’’ (1 Tim. 6:20).”
One thing we can be sure of and be very thankful for
and that is that the deposit of our lives with God is secure. However the question is, How secure is His
deposit of truth with us? Now don’t be
fooled by what some Christian colleges, seminaries, pastors, and other church
leaders who deviate from Scripture, defecting to what Scripture calls a
different gospel’ and wanting ‘to distort the gospel of Christ’ (Gal.
1:6-7). They will face a dreadful day of
reckoning before God. MacArthur
concludes “The most solemn responsibility that any believer has, especially those
the Lord has called to be preachers and teachers, is to uphold and defend the
integrity of His Word.”
There
is one more means for guarding against being ashamed of Christ, which is “Choose
Your Associates” which, Lord willing I will begin tomorrow.
Spiritual
meaning for my life today: I find this section of not being ashamed of
Christ very helpful and informative, something that takes a great deal of
courage to be able to follow. Something the
I desire to do, and will surely need the help of the Holy Spirit to teach me
from His Word so that I will better understand how to live my life in a way so
that I won’t be ashamed of the Lord Jesus Christ.
My
Steps of Faith for Today: I trust that the Spirit of God will help me
to continue to understand His Word so that I can tell others who read the blogs
that I write.
12/28/2024 10:55 AM
No comments:
Post a Comment