What should the Bible teach us?

If the Bible is what it claims to be, then the Book should teach us about God and should teach us the things that God wants us to know. The Bible is says that it is the Word of God and therefore it must be truth or it is all a lie. A book cannot be a holy book and then tell us lies. That would make it an unholy book.
First of all, a holy book should teach us what we need to know about God. That is exactly what the Bible does. It reveals God to us starting with the creation and ending with God’s program throughout eternity. It begins with a simple declarative statement, “In the beginning God…” It would be logical to know that God has always existed and that He was here when all of this planet began. He is the Creator God who made it all happen. He is the only logical explanation for a creation that gives such definite evidence of there being a design.
We learn that God is a God of love. In fact the Bible teaches that God is love. He gives evidence of this by loving a special people, Israel, and then by loving all people and providing salvation for all who will believe in Him. God is seen as not only a God of love, but He embodies all the great characteristics that we would expect of the ruler of the universe.
In addition to revealing God to us, the Bible also shows us the provisions God has made for us and the plans He has for all of His children. Since man turned from God’s initial plan for fellowship with His creation in the Garden, the Bible reveals the great plan of redemption that God designed in eternity past before His creation even began. This all wise and all knowing God was able to look into the future knowing just what man would do and provide a plan of redemption for mankind who had turned their backs on their creator.
The Bible gives us the history of God’s dealings with His special people, Israel, and shows how that in all of His dealings with that special people He continually gave pictures of His eternal plan which would be carried out in the person of His Son, Jesus Christ. The Bible history spans a period of thousands of years and reflects the writings of more than 40 different authors writing 66 separate books with a clarity and harmony that can only be explained by what the Bible says is inspiration.
The amazing thing is that the Bible tells what is going to be true in the future. We can read the prophecies of the Old Testament and see them fulfilled in the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ. In a very real sense the fulfillment of those prophecies encourage our belief in the fact that what the Bible says is going to take place in the future really will take place and those who believe will spend eternity in the presence of this loving and compassionate God.
One can wonder if all of this is true. I believe that a life-changing belief in this God is the most reasonable thing a person can have. For me there is no better explanation for the origin of the universe. It is beyond reason to believe that all of this just fell into place randomly and by chance. The evident design found in every creature, every plant, and every function of the universe cries out that there is an intelligent hand that has been at work.
The change that the Gospel of God’s amazing grace brings in the lives of those who believe what the Bible says and what God is doing can only be explained by the supernatural being of God. Over and over again profligates become profitable, sinners become saints, and unbelievers become believers. This book then is a record of God’s amazing grace reaching out to man and giving hope where not having any at all seemed very reasonable.

Too Much or Two Little

A number of years ago I had the privilege of speaking in a small Mexican church that was only minutes from our southern border. I was shocked to find that the church had no running water and no electricity. The pastor lived next store to the church and with great pride he showed me his cinder block home. It also had no running water or electicity.
As I stood there that evening I asked myself, “What would you do if God called you to serve here?” I really was not happy with my answer. I guess I knew that it was so unlikely that I just put it out of my mind.
I have thought about that time on many occasions and I still do not like the answer to that question. The rich young ruler did not answer a similar question put to him. Jesus asked him to sell all that he had and follow the Lord. The Bible tells us that he walked away sorrowful, and, as far as we know, never changed his mind about that.
Think about it. That rich young ruler had no telephone, no TV, no electricity, no car, no indoor plumbing, and lacked a great number of other rather standard items that we have today. If he was rich, what are we?
There is no way that we can adequately identify with people who have so much less than we do. Believe me, that is a lot of the people of the world. I remember a man who walked a day and a half in Korea, and his journey was to ask me to come speak at his church. I was a corporal in the Army and was honored to speak in his church. The Sunday came that I was there and it was what they called “Harvest Sunday.’ The people all brought their produce in and put it at the front of the church. It was their annual tithe. I was impressed that they had so little, but they gave from what they had.
It seems that we should learn that lesson. We may be eligible for food stamps but we should give what we have. We can’t solve the inequities of the world, but we can do what we can do. That is what God wants from us. We need to remember that lesson that David learned in I Chronicles 29 when he saw the great gifts that the people had brought. He had the realization that they did not bring their gifts to God as a gift to Him, but they brought to God what was already His. We have nothing that does not belong to Him already. When we get to the place of thinking that what we have is ours then we have failed to understand that it all is His.
It is time to understand that we are His, what we have is His, and what we give to Him is already His. It is sad to think that there are people who do not have enough. It is sadder to understand that most of us have too much. We don’t have to give an account for what others have or do not have. We must give an account for what we have and what we did when we found out that it already belongs to Him.

FORGIVENESS

The ability to forgive is not just a nice character trait for a believer to have. It is at the essence of what God expects in our lives. The Lord made this plain when Peter asked Him how many times he should forgive someone who had sinned against him. The Lord’s amazing answer is found in Matthew 18:22:
Jesus said to him, "I do not say to you, up to seven times, but up to seventy times seven.”
One day a student at the school where I was came in and found a member of our college family committing adultery with the student’s wife. The student looked that adulterer in the eye and forgave him on the spot. I thought at the time that I would have probably decked the one who had sinned against him. The example of what that student did that day has been a constant reminder that this is what the Lord was saying.
Joseph had the chance to make his brothers pay for what they had done to him. When that day came, he forgave his brothers and indicated that what they had done was part of God’s plan to enable Joseph to do a much greater good for the world.
That kind of forgiveness is easy to talk about, but it is another matter when wrong is done to us and we feel we must right the wrong. Jesus does not ask us to right the wrong. He asks us to forgive. I think there must be a place for righteous anger, but it must be supplemented by righteous forgiveness. When people lie about us, we want the world to know that what was said was a lie. Jesus says that we should let the world know that we forgave the lie. We must let God take care of the lie.
The lesson that the world sees when we forgive is that Christ forgave us. It is our testimony to the world of what God has done and Who God is. Jesus told a parable to Peter that day when Petert asked this important question. In that lesson the servant failed to forgive another person after his master had forgiven him. The Lord then said to the servant:
"So My heavenly Father also will do to you if each of you, from his heart, does not forgive his brother his trespasses."
When the Lord taught His Disciples the Lord ’s Prayer, he spoke concerning the statement in the prayer on forgiveness. He said:
Mt 6:12 And forgive us our debts, As we forgive our debtors.
Mt 6:14 "For if you forgive men their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you.
Mt 6:15 "But if you do not forgive men their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses.
This is a hard lesson. Does it mean that our salvation is based on our forgiveness? No. The Lord is saying that we forgive because we have been forgiven. If we don’t forgive, then we don’t know what forgiveness is. Our salvation is based on our forgiveness by God. If we understand that, then we will be people who forgive. And, according to Jesus, we will be ready to forgive 490 times.
That number is used to show us that we will forgive more times than we can conceive. It really is expressing the fact that we will forgive as many times as it takes for the person to see the forgiveness of God that is available to all people.
A friend of mine was chagrinned and hurt by the adultery his father had committed. He could not forgive his father for the hurt that man had inflicted on his son. Years later this son stood at the grave of his father and told his father that he forgave him. That was not an easy thing to do, but the burden the son was carrying was lifted and for the first time in many years, he was free.