6 Responses to “March 20, 2009”

1. min.r.g.Askew
   March 21st, 2009 @ 6:01 pm

   The only suggestion that I can give him is to surrender his heart , mind and so to Jesus and let Him carry the load for him. Before I gave my life to Jesus I tried to clean myself up from drugs , alcohol, womanizing, cigarrets, etc. I was prolonging , recieving Jesus because I was afraid I would fail him in my many weaknesses. Well it seemed I kicked all the habits except those cigarrets. But I felt an urgency to be saved , I had put it off for so long trying to save myself but I couldnt , the very day I asked Jesus into my heart the cigarrets were gone and I testified to a lot of my friends who were still in the world of his power , grace and mercy. God knows our heart and he knows if we are really commited to walking in the confession we made , that He is our Lord and Savior. I must say when times got hard I really wanted a cigarret but I loved God more so when confronted with sin say to yourself do I love God more and the choice you make lets you know where you are with God. I dont believe it takes God a long time to deliver he created so much in just six days. When you have the faith or when you are really ready God will deliver.

2. min.r.g.Askew
   March 21st, 2009 @ 6:02 pm

   The only suggestion that I can give him is to surrender his heart , mind and soul to Jesus and let Him carry the load for him. Before I gave my life to Jesus I tried to clean myself up from drugs , alcohol, womanizing, cigarrets, etc. I was prolonging , recieving Jesus because I was afraid I would fail him in my many weaknesses. Well it seemed I kicked all the habits except those cigarrets. But I felt an urgency to be saved , I had put it off for so long trying to save myself but I couldnt , the very day I asked Jesus into my heart the cigarrets were gone and I testified to a lot of my friends who were still in the world of his power , grace and mercy. God knows our heart and he knows if we are really commited to walking in the confession we made , that He is our Lord and Savior. I must say when times got hard I really wanted a cigarret but I loved God more so when confronted with sin say to yourself do I love God more and the choice you make lets you know where you are with God. I dont believe it takes God a long time to deliver he created so much in just six days. When you have the faith or when you are really ready God will deliver.

3. Lewis
   March 23rd, 2009 @ 3:51 pm

   Dr. Brown;

   If the statistics you have given in the past related to pornography are true, then habitual sin is rampant in the church. It also seems to have a strong foothold in the clergy.

   Now clearly there are Pastors and clergy that are simply masquerading as
   such. I believe it was Ravi Zacharias who relates a story from his seminary
   days, when he met a non-believer in school with him. When he asked him why
   he was there, he responded that “there is a lot of money to be made in the
   God business”. But among the Pastor’s that struggle and fall in the face of
   temptation, surely many must truly believe and have dedicated their lives to
   the Lord.

   This then brings me to my question. Where is the power of the Lord in these
   Pastor’s lives enabling them to overcome temptation? According to
   1Corinthians 10:13, Christians will not be tested beyond what they can
   endure, yet these Pastors are in fact overwhelmed by their temptations.
   Does this mean that such Pastors are not true Christians and are not truly
   saved? It seems this can be restated as follows.

   1. The Word of God is always true
   2. The Word of God says Christians will not be tested beyond what they are able(i.e., they will overcome temptation)
   3. Studies show that Pastors have fallen.
   Conclusion: Such Pastors are not really Christians.

   As distasteful as the conclusion may be, it would seem that the only way to
   deny the conclusion is to refute one of the premises. Yet the premises all
   seem valid. And I don’t take premise 3 to say that Christians will overcome
   every temptation all the time. My understanding is that it refers to
   struggling and recurrently failing to overcome a given sin. That is, there
   is a pattern of failure in some area of one’s life. Surely some of these men truly love the Lord and desire freedom from their addictions. The very act of struggle seems to indicate spiritual life.

   If the shepherds are failing left and right, then how can the sheep
   succeed? Why is it that many tell of addictions that were cured
   instantaneously by the Lord, such that the very desire for drugs, alcohol
   etc. is gone, while others, including clergy are not set free of such
   desires, but are involved in life long struggles? Why is it that in some
   men’s lives the “old man” never really dies? Certainly, such a death cannot be
   achieved in the natural. The question then becomes, why is supernatural
   power available to some men, but not all men who come to God looking for it?

   In short, where is the Power of God in these lives? Experience seems to
   indicate that Jesus sets only some men free. What then is the difference
   between these two groups-those that God empowers to overcome and those who cry out to the Lord and yet struggle and continue to stumble?

4. Lewis
   March 23rd, 2009 @ 3:53 pm

   Sorry for the choppy text. Seems when I copied from my text editor, it inserted hard returns where they did not exist.

5. Joel Santiago
   March 23rd, 2009 @ 10:09 pm

   Numbers 15:27-28, 30-31

   If we go before the Lord with our hearts humbled he won’t let us in our sin, but if we continue to sin knowing that the Lord hate the sin we are not loving the Lord ’cause if we love him we’ll keep his commandments

   We have to ask ourself if we love more the Lord than the pleasure, we can not have two lords we live for the Lord or for the pleasures

   Lets pray that God free us from what is against his holiness!!!

6. Jabez H.
   April 3rd, 2009 @ 1:42 am

   Knowing the Lord seems to be connected, after having other experience, to purity of heart with a promise, as is stated in the Sermon on the Mount (so clarifying His new and living way as was uncloaked by Him in the time of His visitation. Heaven, as an abode of God, in a sense, cloaks God’s everpresent lifestyle from our vision. Now that vision is established by contempating the life and way of Jesus as it is recorded). That is, where such a knowledge means seeing Him and being “in” Him as He is–it is given for those who may be both hearers and doers of the word and desire connection with what was being offered the listening heart as such was first shared.

   This is found recorded in the Gospels. He presented heeding His new and living way through illustration and teaching which a hearer could long ponder in one’s heart afterwards as to such a considerate mindful life purpose and intention. The “being and doing” contemplative theologians seem to understand a knowledge of God being then apprehended, as well as accepted as was declared by the life and words of the Messiah in “the fullness of time.”

   Doing a read of the less often theologically addressed second half of Romans, such knowing seems to be connected with what was indeed called “following the Way” in Acts, prior to the movement among the Gentiles being later more inclusively called “Christians.” Both identifications are recorded by Luke there, as the expansive sharing from the Jerusalem sect grew, reached out around the trade world routes going to the Gentiles and became more than anyone could initially conceive or imagine (except Yeshua).

   Jesus name becoming “a byword among the nations,” and His Kingly title becoming a commonly thought of last name, if anything, shows the humility of the God who knew in advance He would become so identified in general reflective thought during the Age of the Gentiles, who used common trade language indicators of who He was claimed to be. The present mystery Kingdom, with present tolerance for its long season with the coexistence of the wheat and tares cohabiting this world, happens while the present incomplete state of His Kingdom has the present limits we have on seeing Him reign.

   Knowing the Lord then must have elements of a new birth and resulting renewal of the mind, trust and reliance on the gift of the Holy Spirit to believers, acceptance of the written accounts and instruction, and an ever increasing faith. Paul wrote of the Christ of the New Covenant, being “formed in you.” This seems to involve both an initial aquaintance by faith, and a transformation by its justification, sanctification, and becoming. “Christ in us, the hope of glory.”

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