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Month: July 2017

Be True Sons And Not Illegitimate Children

Deuteronomy 8:2,3,5

2 And you shall remember the whole way that the LORD your God has led you these forty years in the wilderness, that he might humble you, testing you to know what was in your heart, whether you would keep his commandments or not.
3 And he humbled you and let you hunger and fed you with manna, which you did not know, nor did your fathers know, that he might make you know that man does not live by bread alone, but man lives by every word that comes from the mouth of the LORD…Know then in your heart that, as a man disciplines his son, the LORD your God disciplines you.

We should know the blueprint of Christlikeness, the Law, is summarized into two commandments – to love God and to love your neighbor. That is the pre-destinating purpose of God to conform those whom He called to be like His Son. Rom 8:29.

So God ensures all things – both good and bad – to work for good as He disciplines us as true sons and not illegitimate children. Rom 8:28, Heb 12:3-11.

Like the Israelites going through the wilderness before going to the Promised Land, this life of ours is all about training in Christlikeness or Love.  Such is the training in my humble opinion:

1. Personal storms or suffering are to train us in Love, Peace and Joy.

2. Our neighbor’s storms and suffering are to train us in Gentleness, Kindness and Goodness.

3. Tests and temptation (which God allows) are to train us in Patience, Faithfulness and Self Control.

Because true sons will live by EVERY word that comes from the mouth of God, they will bear the WHOLE fruit of the Spirit.

Ministry In Phnom Penh, Cambodia

All praise and thanks be to God for the hospitality extended to us by Prison Fellowship Cambodia (PFC)  during our 4 days’ stay in Phnom Penh from 6 to 9 July 2017.   We were briefed on the organisation, governance and programs.

PFC conducts the following 6 programs :

  1. Vocational training.
  2. Health and nutrition provision.
  3. Visitation of foreign prisoners.
  4. Resiliency of spirit course.
  5. Reintegration support.
  6. Support for children of prisoners.

We also visited one of the largest churches in Phnom Penh, New Life Fellowship and her affiliated churches in other provinces who partner PFC in the above programs to better understand the support they may require.

PFC currently has 28 pastors in 28 provinces partnering them in the prison visitation ministry and conducting the resiliency of spirit course in the provincial prison, and a further 65 pastors partnering in the support program for the children of prisoners.

We will commit to prayer for the Lord’s blessing in the possible collaboration of helping the PFC volunteer pastors in establishing self sustaining enterprise.  The project of rearing chicken using the EM technology is one such possible enterprise in which we can provide training and funding.   Funding is also available through micro-finance in which we have good relationship with the micro finance companies operating in Cambodia.

 

My Resolve To Truly Love Christ

Once I had a dream….

My Lord Jesus said to me,”Do you love Me ?”

I answered,”Lord, I do. You know I gave up all to follow You.”   (Luke 14:26,27,33)

He said to me again,”Do you love Me?”

I answered,”Lord, I do. You know I will keep all Your word.”  (John 14:23,24)

He said to me again,”Do you love Me ?”

I answered yet again,”Lord, I do. You know I will feed Your lambs, and tend and feed Your sheep too.”   (John 21:15-17)

…I woke up.

I repented thereafter in deed and in truth by His grace over the years.

(Little children, let us not love in word or talk but in deed and in truth. – 1 John 3:18)

Chalcedonian Creed

The Chalcedonian Creed was adopted at the Council of Chalcedon in A.D. 451. Chalcedon was an early centre of Christianity located in Asia Minor. The Council was the fourth of the Ecumenical Councils that are accepted by Chalcedonian churches which include the Eastern Orthodox, Catholic, and most Protestant churches. – Wikipaedia.

Chalcedonian Creed

  1. Jesus has two natures — He is God and man.
  2. Each nature is full and complete — He is fully God and fully man.
  3. Each nature remains distinct.
  4. Christ is only one Person.
  5. Things that are true of only one nature are nonetheless true of the Person of Christ.
  • (copied from an article by John Piper).

Lord Jesus has always been God from eternity past to eternity future.  But He has not always been man.  He took on the human nature when He incarnated 2000 years ago.  He is not God minus some elements of His divine nature then, but fully God plus one new nature – the nature of man.

In the gospels, we read of His miracles and exploits which proved His omnipotence, omniscience and omnipresence.

Yet there was an attempt by the NAR prophets to twist the doctrine of Christology that He was just mere man without His divine attributes when He was on earth.  All His miracles and exploits were the result of the enabling power of the Holy Spirit dwelling in Him.  This false teaching was to make their followers believe that they could perform the same miracles as mere men with the enabling power of the Holy Spirit in them.

In John 2:18-22,  we read that He as fully God could raise Himself up in 3 days.

(Jesus answered and said to them, “Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up.” Then the Jews said, “It has taken forty-six years to build this temple, and will You raise it up in three days?” But He was speaking of the temple of His body.)

In Mark 2:1-12, we learned that He had the authority on earth as God to forgive sins.