Sermons, Articles, and Other Things

John encourages his readers to remain loyal to Jesus Christ. Their congregations had been infiltrated by false teachers. The erroneous teaching had been connected to their opinion of Jesus as to who he really was and what he had done. Presumably the false teachers were still spreading their views in the public arena, which meant that the public would have been informed of at least two different opinions about Christ – there was the opinion of the Christian church and there was the opinion of the false teachers. Therefore, John proceeds to remind his readers who Jesus is and how they have come to have this knowledge. This is a reminder that is not enough to say that we are bearing witness to Jesus – we also have to make it clear concerning which Jesus we are bearing witness.  1. The crucified Christ   In describing Jesus Christ, John uses terminology that may appear unusual to us when he says that Jesus ‘came by water and blood’ (v. 6). What does John mean? First, we can...

The story of Samson has been popular because of his amazing strength and the ways that he used and misused it. Most people have a superficial awareness of his life, including his weakness for women of ill repute. Nevertheless, we have to remember that he is a judge whom God raised up to deliver his people from a captivity that was the outcome of their own sins. It is true to say that each of the Judges has his or her (in the case of Deborah) unique features. We may regard Samson ’ s uniqueness to be connected to his great physical strength. Yet an obvious unique feature in his story is that the preparation of his involvement as a judge began before he was born. We can see that this preparation is the theme of Judges 13. In this chapter we are told mainly about the parents of Samson. It is difficult to know if the incident described in the chapter happened after the fortieth year of the period of captivity or whether it took place during that period. If it occurred after the forty ...

The matter of Christian liberty is often used to give the impression that a believer can do what he or she likes, no matter what others think about their behaviour. Yet that is not an expression of brotherly love, so it cannot be what is meant by Christian liberty. As with other matters in this section of the Book of Romans, Paul here is describing an expression of what it means to be a living sacrifice, pleasing to God, a life of true discipleship. Paul states here that there are two kinds of Christians whenever some issues arise. In each of those issues, there will be weak and strong Christians. He does not mean that a Christian will be always strong on these matters or that he will always be weak. So what does he say about those issues? His response is that we should understand three important principles that will keep us safe in our decision making. Those three truths should be our guidelines when such issues are raised. The first is, remember the day of judgement (14:1-12); the...

One of the happiest experiences occurs when a child is born. Often the first question that will be asked concerns whether or not the baby is healthy and several medical tests will show that is the case. Similarly, one of the happiest experiences for a church occurs when individuals profess to be converted – great joy is expressed by all who know the individual. Yet it is important to check on the spiritual health of the person who claims conversion because he or she will soon indicate whether or not the conversion was genuine. The Bible warns us about the possibility of temporary disciples – even Jesus himself experienced interaction with such when he was here on earth. This possibility had been mentioned in his teaching – for example in the parable of the sower, several different responses to the gospel are described. John, in these five verses, mentions infallible evidences of the new birth. The significance of the term, born of God A birth indicates a new beginning. The true ...