Friday, September 24, 2010

Resist the Devil!

By: Rob Peralta

We as Christians, must try each day to walk uprightly and to do God's will. But many times we will face Satan and his angels' attacks and it will seem unrelenting. After all, scripture tells us this is indeed "Satan's" world and as such we are in enemy territory. But scripture also says "...greater is He who is in you than he that is in the world" (1 john 4:4) We have the "power" if we will only "use" it.

As "Commandment Keepers", we get the brunt of Satan and the devil's attacks. For it is very clear Satan is at war with the people of God who choose to obey His Holy Laws. In (Rev.12:17) we read "The dragon (Satan) was enraged with the woman(Church), and went off to make war with the rest of her offspring (true believers AND obeyers), who keep the Commandments of God and hold to the testimony of Jesus". Satan and his angels know scripture a lot better than any human, and therefore I believe they kind of "take it easy" on the Christians who continually "break" God's Commandments. They have them right where they want them! But the "Commandment keeper", they zero in on.

With all the above laying the groundwork, let's look to our Master and how "HE" dealt with Satan and His attacks. After being led into the wilderness Jesus was strongly tempted. In (Matt 4:3) it says "And when the devil came to Him, he said "If thou be the Son of God, command that these stones be made of bread". And Jesus' response was to USE SCRIPTURE! He said "It is WRITTEN 'Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God' " Here, we can learn that Jesus directly quoted scripture when He was tempted. He also quoted "relevant" scripture. Notice the word of God He used had to do with what the temptation was! He didn't respond with some unrelated scripture such as "You shall love the Lord you God with all your heart, mind and soul". We can take this great example to our "own" temptations.

For instance, you may be tempted to smoke cigarettes. The devils really use this one due to the POWERFUL effect on people. But we can quote scripture such as (Psalm 23:1) " The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not WANT" each and every time we have temptation. The Lord's word is POWER and if we BELIEVE as we quote them against our adversary IT WILL WORK!! Our desire should leave and we no longer "want"a cigarette. The KEY is to BELIEVE it will work against the devil when we say it. If we say it with doubt, the Lord's word is very weak against the attacks and we may fail. Jesus said "....ONLY BELIEVE"(Mark 5:36)

Another BIG temptation today is the "lust" of the flesh. With the onslaught of nudity on TV, movies, Internet, etc. Satan has created a vibrant adulterous and fornicating empire! But when we look AGAIN to scripture when we are tempted we can prevail. We can use (Eph 5:5) "For this we (I) know for sure, that no fornicator ....has any inheritance in the kingdom of God" Be gone from me devil! And again we can experience the same victory that our Lord had and have the devil flee!

Whatever we do against temptation we should NOT rely on our own power. We shouldn't say "Oh, I am strong, I can resist this". We are NO match for the devil. Scripture describes him as a "roaring lion" and we all know how powerful a lion is. We need help and the Lord has shown us the way out of these attacks, let us follow His example. So if you are facing a "specific" temptation, then find some specific scripture to help arm you, you'll find it is VERY powerful against the devils, and they MUST flee, when you say it and BELIEVE it will prevail. Amen.

Wednesday, September 15, 2010

Our Sword on YouTube!

Recently the Our Sword blog has posted some videos on YouTube to help spread the Gospel.

Currently there is a quick study of the "once saved always saved" doctrine done for a friend, as well as Bible readings in the Gospel of John, 2 John, 3 John and Jude. There is more to come. :-)

http://www.youtube.com/user/OurSword

Friday, September 10, 2010

Hermeneutics of Bible Study

By: Rob Peralta

In today's Christian society there is so much false interpretation of the Bible I thought it would be helpful to show the correct method of interpretation.

Recently I was studying (1 Cor.14-34-35) and I came across this most helpful instruction of the correct way to interpret the Bible. It states as follows " Bible verses are quite controversial and when we look at them in detail we must know that correct hermeneutical method is the correct way to interpret the Bible. Many Bible students nowdays seem to have picked up the idea that 'context is king' or, to put it another way, that there are three rules of Bible interpretation, context, context, context. These people , I submit, have got the spoon by the wrong end.

"As anybody who writes blogs needs to be reminded, context is king. The same rule applies to Biblical interpretation: text comes before context. That is, the text in question is what we wish to understand. It's words are of more importance than some other words elsewhere in the Bible. Ofcourse, the immediate context is often an invaluable help in making sure that we understand the words of our text alright, and even, on some occasions, we need to consider a more remote context. But what the Bible interpreter must NEVER DO is foist upon a text some idea that is NOT found in the actual text itself. The role of the Bible interpreter is to let the words speak for themselves, not ignore, sidestep, silence, or twist the meaning of the text, nor read into the text a meaning to further a belief and to advance their own theological or sociological agenda. Nevertheless text is king and context is it's chief minister. The closer the chief minister (context) is to the king(text), the more significant is it's effect and influence."

After understanding the above, it truly is amazing how so many "false" doctrines are believed. For example 1) immediate entrance into heaven or hell upon death 2) Sunday as the Lord's day 3) eternal hell fire. The believers in these false doctrines must face the fact that their beliefs are strongly contradicted in their own book(Bible) , which they profess to follow. The Bible CANNOT contradict, only concur truth upon truth.

Let us pray for the Holy Spirit to open their eyes to see the truth and understand God's word (John 14:26) " And the comforter, which is the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, He shall teach you all things, and bring all things to your memory, whatsoever I have said unto you".