Christianity Archives - Page 11 of 39

Be Still and Know I am God

The phrase “Be still and know that I am God” (Psalm 46:10, NKJV) is a powerful reminder of the sovereignty and majesty of God and the importance of finding rest and peace in Him. With as much focus as we place on war and fighting sin, we need to also be aware of the need for recovery and rest as well. We war against the flesh, and go to war for God, but we also need to be recuperated enough to return to that war ready to fight another day.

Through the technique “Be still”, we can recuperate the energy spent in war.

This verse encourages us to set aside our own fears, worries, and concerns, and to trust in God’s goodness, wisdom, and power. It can be easy to lose sight of God and to become overwhelmed by the demands of daily life, or to think of them as more important and demanding than they are. It can be very easy to become saturated in the daily ups and downs and the warfare “without and within” as the old church hymn says. However, this verse reminds us that we can find rest and peace in God by taking time to be still and to focus on Him.

There are several other verses in the Bible that speak to the importance of finding rest and peace in God.

For example, Psalm 62:5-6 (NKJV) states: “My soul, wait silently for God alone, for my expectation is from Him. He only is my rock and my salvation; He is my defense; I shall not be moved.”

This verse encourages us to trust in God and to find our strength and hope in Him, rather than in our own abilities or circumstances. Not that we should never exert effort and try to work to improve our circumstances, but that we place our strength in God first, and then take action second. God’s power never excuses us from action, but it gives us power and strength through this process of life.

Another verse that speaks to the importance of finding rest and peace in God is Matthew 11:28-30 (NKJV), which says: “Come to Me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For My yoke is easy and My burden is light.”

This verse reminds us that God is a loving and compassionate Savior who is willing to bear the burden of our troubles and is able to give us rest. He as the Commander of the army of God [Joshua 5:13-15] is both able to lead us to war and strengthen us when we need rest.

There are several practical tips for the application of Psalm 46:10 and other verses that speak to the importance of finding rest and peace in God. Some of these tips include:

I – Set aside time for quiet and solitude

One way to find rest and peace in God is to set aside time each day for quiet and solitude. This might involve setting aside a few minutes to sit in silence, to pray, or to meditate on God’s word. Silence is the key. Leave your distractions in another place. Go somewhere where you have no choice but to concentrate on God. Taking time to be still and to focus on God can help to calm the mind and to bring a sense of peace and clarity.

II – Practice gratitude

Another way to find rest and peace in God is to practice gratitude. This might involve taking time each day to reflect on the blessings and gifts that God has given us, and to express thankfulness for these things. Focusing on the positive aspects of our lives and thanking God for them can help to shift our perspective and to find peace and contentment in Him. As we have mentioned before, thankfulness is one of the key ingredients in the recipe for peace [Phil 4:6-7]

The phrase “Be still and know that I am God” is a powerful reminder of the importance of finding rest and peace in God. By setting aside time for quiet and solitude, and practicing gratitude, we can draw closer to God and find peace and rest in Him.

Christianity and Self-Discipline

Self-discipline is a virtue that is highly valued in many religious traditions, including Christianity. It involves the ability to control one’s thoughts, feelings, and actions in order to achieve a desired goal or to live in accordance with a set of values or beliefs.

In the Christian faith, self-discipline is seen as an important aspect of spiritual growth and maturity, as it helps believers to resist temptation, overcome sin, and live a life that is pleasing to God.

There are many biblical passages that speak to the importance of self-discipline in the Christian life. One such passage is 1 Timothy 4:7-8, which states:

“Train yourself for godliness; for while bodily training is of some value, godliness is of value in every way, as it holds promise for the present life and also for the life to come.”

This verse emphasizes the importance of cultivating self-discipline in order to live a godly life, both now and in the future.

Another biblical passage that highlights the importance of self-discipline is Romans 12:1-2, which says:

“I appeal to you, therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship. Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.”

This passage encourages believers to offer their bodies as a living sacrifice to God and to renew their minds in order to better understand and follow God’s will. This requires a significant amount of self-discipline, as it involves resisting the temptation to conform to the ways of the world and instead seeking to live in accordance with God’s will.

Self-discipline is also closely related to the concept of self-control, which is one of the fruits of the Spirit listed in Galatians 5:22-23. According to this passage, the Spirit produces self-control in the lives of believers as they grow in their faith. This self-control enables believers to resist temptation and make choices that are in accordance with God’s will.

In addition to the biblical emphasis on self-discipline, there are also many practical ways in which self-discipline can benefit Christians in their daily lives.

For example, self-discipline can help us manage our time more effectively, allowing us to prioritize our responsibilities and make the most of our days. It can also help believers to develop healthy habits, such as regular exercise and a healthy diet, which can improve their physical and mental well-being.

Self-discipline can also help us to overcome bad habits or destructive behaviors that may be hindering our spiritual growth. For example, if a believer struggles with a particular sin, such as anger or gossip, self-discipline can help them to overcome this sin and to replace it with more positive behaviors. This can lead to greater spiritual growth and a deeper relationship with God.

One way that believers can cultivate self-discipline in their lives is through the practice of spiritual disciplines.

Spiritual disciplines are activities that believers engage in on a regular basis in order to grow closer to God and to cultivate spiritual maturity. Some common spiritual disciplines include prayer, Bible study, fasting, and worship. These practices can help believers to develop self-discipline by strengthening their spiritual muscles and helping them to resist temptation.

Matthew 28:18 – Lightning Study

All authority was given to Christ in Matthew 28:18. Not partial authority. Nor “most authority”, but every bit of authority.

This authority is one of the foundational building blocks of the church as well as the church government. The way the church is structured follows the outline and command given by Christ. We as Christ’s bride must follow this outline.

How many people in this world act as if Christ has no authority? Even people who claim to love Christ and follow what He has to say.

This is true when speaking about many denominations who build religion in their image rather than Chrsists. they decide that their traditions and teachings of men are more important than what Christ had to say about how His church was to be structured.

Matthew 28:18 is an all-inclusive statement outlining the authority of Christ.

What we need to constantly be aware of is the tendency to build religion in our own image. We often want to ignore what Christ has to say because we want to do it our way. This is not the way we were called to live. We have to submit to Christ’s law even when it is inconveneint or we would rather do something else.

We have to submit ourselves to His laws and precepts. And very importantly we have to submit to His strucutre of the church. It is His bride, He gets to create it how He wants.

When choosing a church to attend, make sure that the church follows Christ’s prescription. Does it mean the model provided in the New Testament or does it add a bunch of concepts that you don’t find in scripture? Or perhaps that church takes away multiple requirements of the church, such as regularly partaking of the Lord’s Supper or refusal of the essential nature of baptism.

Whatever you do, make sure you do it in the shadow of the cross. Respect the authority of Christ in all things.

Church Numbers Don’t Matter

Many churches today are hyper-focused on increasing their church numbers. Attendance is their only focus. While the goal of spreading the gospel is noble, we need to understand that many are not interested at all in the spreading of the gospel. Instead, they are focused only on the numbers. The primary goal of many churches is a simple increase in the number of members. I want to tell you not to worry about church numbers. In fact, church numbers do not matter.

When recruitment becomes the focus, by definition, God becomes removed from focus. When we try to simply inflate church numbers, we miss the point of religion.

Reverence is decreased when recruitment is increased. In fact, many churches learn the hard way that tight rigidity does not always lead to rapid growth. Even though more traditional churches are growing today, they are still growing at a mild to moderate rate.

What happens in large churches is that they grow quickly and then burst. Similar to the way an inflated economy grows and then bursts. People become disenchacted with what large mega churches have to offer. Very few people are content with the way a large church is. They typically go one of two main directions. They either search for more entertaining church and progress more and more towards liberalism, or they revert to conservatism.

Mild liberalism is never enough. We will almost always gravitate towards more extreme forms of whatever we are already participating in.

So by making church numbers the focus, the word of God is diluted. Churches reduce their standards and try to make church fun. The church was never meant to be fun, it was meant to be reverent. It was meant to be a place where people worshipped the almighty God.

Focusing on mere numbers misses the point of the church altogether. The focus of bible study and worship is first and foremost about worshipping God. Secondly, it is about developing the individual faith. This development of faith does not come about by easiness and fun church events. Rather it comes through wrestling with the difficult questions of the bible and enduring difficulty with a positive mental attitude.

“How can we appeal to outsiders”. That is not the question we should be asking.

The worship assembly of God is not designed for the non-Christian individual. this is why inviting people to church is not a great evangelistic tool. If you invite someone to church and they come, they will have no idea what is going on. they will have no idea about the significance of any of the events or practices. And they will not have any of the background knowledge that would cause the worship assembly to make any sense.

No, the church should not be used as our primary evangelistic tool. We spread the gospel through individual relationship and study, not through mass church attendance. In fact, inviting people to church is another one of those passive modalities like influence that people recommended, but in reality, is a poor excuse to avoid active action.

“How can we spread the gospel of Christ?” This should be the question.

Then we are focused on growing the church the correct way. Not by chasing mere numbers, but by spreading the truth.

Worship is not about visitors, it is about God. It has always been that way and it must remain that way if worship is to be appropriate.

If you find yourself in a congregation that puts too much focus on merely “getting the numbers up”, call attention to this in a diplomatic way. Try to help people understand that the number isn’t the goal, but rather the true growth of the church is the goal. And though the two sound similar, they are not the same.

Acts of Worship

Our previous six-part series covered the process of salvation. We talked about how you can accept God’s gift of salvation and becomes a member of the church He built. The final step in the process of salvation is faithful living. And faithful living requires faithful attendance at the weekly church services. And faithful attendance to a church that engages in each of the acts of worship.

The Bible teaches us that if we are to maintain our Salvation one of the things we have to do is meet with the Saints regularly.

“Not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as is the manner of some, but exhorting one another, and so much the more as you see the Day approaching.”
Hebrews 10:25

And when we meet with them, it should be on the first day of the week. Many churches have additional days where they meet in the middle of the week or other times where church members will get together and spend time with one another. These are all fine and usually beneficial. But the primary day that we are concerned about is the first day of the week, which is Sunday.

When we study the Bible we find that the first century Christians also met on the first day of the week as was commanded.

When they met, they engaged in five specific acts of worship to God.

They sing songs of praise to God in acapella style.
They prayed to God.
Weekly, they partook of the Lord’s Supper.
They listen to preaching about the word of God.
They set their money aside for the work of the church.

Singing Verses

But at midnight Paul and Silas were praying and singing hymns to God, and the prisoners were listening to them.
Acts 16:25 ~ (not public worship, but singing nonetheless).

“Speaking to one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody in your heart to the Lord”
Ephesians 5:19

Prayer

“But you, when you pray, go into your room, and when you have shut your door, pray to your Father who is in the secret place; and your Father who sees in secret will reward you openly.”
Matthew 6:6

And He said to them, “It is written, ‘My house shall be called a house of prayer,’ but you have made it a ‘den of thieves.’ ”
Matthew 21:13

“And they continued steadfastly in the apostles’ doctrine and fellowship, in the breaking of bread, and in prayers.”
Acts 2:42

Lord’s Supper

²³“For I received from the Lord that which I also delivered to you: that the Lord Jesus on the same night in which He was betrayed took bread; ²⁴and when He had given thanks, He broke it and said, ^[d]“Take, eat; this is My body which is ^[e]broken for you; do this in remembrance of Me.” ²⁵In the same manner He also took the cup after supper, saying, “This cup is the new covenant in My blood. This do, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of Me.” ²⁶For as often as you eat this bread and drink this cup, you proclaim the Lord’s death till He comes.

²⁷Therefore whoever eats this bread or drinks this cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner will be guilty of the body and ^[f]blood of the Lord. ²⁸But let a man examine himself, and so let him eat of the bread and drink of the cup. ²⁹For he who eats and drinks ^[g]in an unworthy manner eats and drinks judgment to himself, not discerning the ^[h]Lord’s body. ³⁰For this reason many are weak and sick among you, and many ^[i]sleep. ³¹For if we would judge ourselves, we would not be judged.

³²But when we are judged, we are chastened by the Lord, that we may not be condemned with the world. ³³Therefore, my brethren, when you come together to eat, wait for one another. ³⁴But if anyone is hungry, let him eat at home, lest you come together for judgment. And the rest I will set in order when I come.”
1 Corinthians 1:23-33

Weekly Lord’s Supper + Preaching

“Now on the first day of the week, when the disciples came together to break bread, Paul, ready to depart the next day, spoke to them and continued his message until midnight.”
Acts 20:7

Setting Aside/Giving Money for the work of the church

“Now concerning the collection for the saints, as I have given orders to the churches of Galatia, so you must do also: ²On the first day of the week let each one of you lay something aside, storing up as he may prosper, that there be no collections when I come.”
1 Corinthians 16:1-2

These five elements are required for the weekly worship on the first day of the week. If one of these elements is missing, the worship lacks a basic scriptural Foundation.

Now many churches try to leave out various elements of worship. Most notably they will leave out the regular partaking of the Lord’s Supper. Stating something like “it makes it lose its specialness if we take it too often”. So these churches will then only partake of the Lord’s Supper on special occasions, such as Christmas or Easter.

But this is not what the Bible teaches, we learn that the disciples met each first day of the week and broke bread (Partook of the Lord’s Supper).

Every week the Lord’s Supper was being observed and partaken by first-century Christians. And whether or whether or not it loses its specialness is all in the mind of the partaker. That’s why an individual has a responsibility to remain focused and remember and direct his thoughts each week so that communion doesn’t lose its specialness.

Arguably, everything loses specialness to us over time. That’s why we occasionally have to refresh our minds, look at something with a different perspective, and regain that appreciation for it. Or some outside event will force us to appreciate it more.

Take your relationships for example. It can be very easy to take these relationships for granted. But then when your loved one has a health crisis, you certainly appreciate the brevity of life and how special they are in your life. And once again time spent with them regains the specialness that it once had.

What happened to your mind? Simply a change in perspective brought on by a change in outside events.

But thankfully for us, we do not have to wait for a change in outside events to change our perspective. We have the power to direct and control our thoughts, so we can change our perspectives whenever we want.

There’s an ancient stoic exercise called negative visualization. In this exercise, you picture the worst-case scenario, or a horrible thing happening to you, a loved one becoming sick and dying. As dark as it is, you imagine all these things so that you can be more thankful for those things that you do have.

This exercise helps you to realize that the present moment is not nearly as painful as you think it is. And by doing this exercise you can shift your perspective without having to literally go through those negative events of losing a loved one, watching them get sick, or becoming sick yourself.

Additionally, you can do the same exercise when it comes to the Lord’s supper or any of the other acts of worship. Find ways to shift and change your perspective so that it doesn’t lose its specialness. Ideas for that could be an article all of its own.

Regarding the other acts of worship, you’ll notice that these can also be done outside of the public worship assembly. There is scriptural evidence of people singing outside of the worship assembly. We are also encouraged to pray outside of the public worship assembly. We can listen to lessons and preach outside of the normal assembly during a gospel meeting or something like that. The only act of worship that cannot be partaken in outside of the public assembly is the Lord’s Supper, which is on the first day of the week.

But when we come together once weekly on the first day of the week to engage in public worship service, there’s a specific recipe of requirements for that worship. It is that same list of 5 items that we mentioned above, go back and look at those. But each of those elements must exist in the worship service for that service to be acceptable to God.

So if you followed the process of Salvation series, and become a member of the church, you now need to find a congregation that scripturally engages in each of the acts of worship on the first day of the week. I’d encourage you to visit a local Church of Christ. these are the congregation to try to do exactly what the Bible teaches, nothing more and nothing less. Church of Christ is the same church that was built 2000 years ago on the day of Pentecost. So I would highly encourage you to find your local church and start attending!

Category: Christianity