SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 6/9/2025 10:56 AM
My Worship Time Focus:
PT-4 “The Teaching Scripture”
Bible Reading & Meditation Reference: 2 Timothy 3:16b
Message of the verse: “for teaching”
I continue looking at what John MacArthur has written
as I begin this fourth part from the words “for teaching.” “We not only are to guard what we know but
sincerely seek to learn more of God’s inexhaustible truth. We should pray with Job, ‘Teach Thou me what
I do not see’ (Job. 34:32). That dauntless
man of God has lost his children, his servants, his flocks, his health, and
even his reputation. He was wholly
unable to see why God permitted those calamities to come upon him, and his
friend Elihu therefore wanted the Lord to teach Job whatever he needed to learn
in order to endure his painful existence and to profit from it spiritually.
I want to continue to quote and sometimes comment on what
John MacArthur wrote in this section from 2 Timothy.
“When the young but godly King Josiah heard read to him ‘the words of the book of the law,’ which had been discovered as the temple was being repaired, ‘he tore his clothes. Then the king commanded Hilikah the priest, Ahikam the son of Shaphan, Achbor the son of Miciah, Shaphan the scribe, and Asaih the kings’ servant saying, ‘Go inquire of the Lord for me and the people and all Judah concerning the words of this book that has been found, for great is the wrath of the Lord that burns against us, because our fathers have not listened to the words of this book, to do according to all that is written concerning us’ (2 Kings 22:11-13).”
Now the reason that this all happened that the Word
of God seemed to be lost was because the most wicked king Israel had ever had Manasseh, then after him his son Ammon, who only
ruled two years and then came the godly king Josiah who is the one ruling when
the Word of God was found in the Temple.
Hezekiah was a godly king who ruled before Manasseh, and he was about to
die, and ask the Lord to heal him which He did and then gave him so many more
years to live. I believe that it was
during this time that Manasseh was born, and I have always thought if Hezekiah
would have died from his illness then Manasseh would not have been able to
reign for around 50 years, 50 years of not knowing about God is Israel. The irony of this story is that Manasseh
became a believer near the end of his life, and so that must have been the
reason that he was born, for we do not always agree with what the Lord is
doing, but we can always trust Him in doing what He is doing.
“Although they did not believe their own words, the
unbelieving and hypocritical Pharisees were completely correct when they said
of Jesus, ‘You are truthful and teach the way of God in truth, and defer to no
one; for You are not partial to any’ (Matt. 22:16). It was because of His utter truthfulness and
righteousness and His refusal to defer to anyone that those men, and others
like them, put Jesus to death. Contrary
to their godly forefather Josiah, they would not accept the teaching of God.
“On a trip from Greece back to Jerusalem, Paul reminded the Ephesians elders, many of whom had ministered both with him and with Timothy, ‘You yourselves know, from the first day that I set foot in Asia,…how I did not shrink from declaring to you anything t hat was profitable, and teaching you publicly and from house to house, solemnly testifying to both Jews and Greeks of repentance toward God and faith in our Lord Jesus Christ…For I did not shrink from declaring to you the whole purpose of God’ (Acts 20:18, 20-21, 27).”
Paul
would warn these leaders that there was coming a problem with this church in Ephesus
that they would fall from the truth concerning the Lord Jesus Christ. We then read in the book of Revelation the
following which the resurrected Lord Jesus Christ said to them: 1 "To the
angel of the church in Ephesus write: The One who holds the seven stars in His
right hand, the One who walks among the seven golden lampstands, says this: 2
‘I know your deeds and your toil and perseverance, and that you cannot tolerate
evil men, and
you put to the test those who call themselves apostles, and
they are not, and you found them to be false; 3 and you have
perseverance and have endured for My name’s sake, and have not grown weary. 4 ‘But I have this
against you, that you have left your first love. 5
‘Therefore remember
from where you have fallen, and repent and do the deeds you did at first; or
else I am coming to you and will remove your lampstand out of its place — unless
you repent. 6 ‘Yet this you do have, that you
hate the deeds of the Nicolaitans, which
I also hate. 7 ‘He who has an ear, let him hear what the
Spirit says to the churches. To him who overcomes, I will grant to eat of the
tree of life which is in the Paradise of God.’”
History
tells us that Ephesus was destroyed and the remains of it can be seen even
today as they did not follow the teaching of the Lord and therefore left their
first love, which of course was the Lord Jesus Christ and His teachings which
come from the Word of God.
Spiritual
Meaning for My Life Today: Remember to keep afresh the love for the Lord
Jesus Christ, the One who paid the price for my salvation, and the One I owe
all to, so I do not end up like those in Ephesus whom the Lord told had left
their first love.
My Steps of
Faith for Today: I trust that the Lord will be with my wife
who is having some trouble after her cancer surgery which happened 5 weeks ago
tomorrow. May the Lord have mercy on her
to show her why she is having a persistent problem which actually began before
her surgery. God is Good, all the Time.
6/9/2025 11:27 AM
No comments:
Post a Comment