A respected friend who does not yet know Christ or the Bible recently asked me what he was missing. These four gracEmails repeat what I shared with him in response. * * * Jesus invites every person to come to him, to believe on him, and to enjoy eternal life. "Eternal" life basically means life in fellowship with the Living God. It begins even now, when we believe on Jesus. But it goes beyond our present death, into the Age to Come for all eternity. It is "eternal" in a qualitative sense and also in a quantitative sense. The bottom line, however, is life in conscious fellowship with the … [Read more...]
Archives for February 2012
TO MY SEEKER FRIEND: 3 – God’s Saving Deeds
A respected friend who does not yet know Christ or the Bible recently asked me what he was missing. These four gracEmails repeat what I shared with him in response. * * * Unknown to the Jews or the Romans, or even to the Apostles, all this was being used by God to redeem the world and to forgive and to transform us sinners. Jesus had lived as a representative of all who will finally be saved -- his faithfulness and obedience counted for us. He also died as a representative of all who finally will be saved. God put our rebellion, our transgressions, trespasses, sins (different ways of saying … [Read more...]
TO MY SEEKER FRIEND: 2 – Jesus Christ the Key
A respected friend who does not yet know Christ or the Bible recently asked me what he was missing. These four gracEmails repeat what I shared with him in response. * * * God decisively accomplished this redemptive work about 2,000 years ago, through the representative, substitutionary life, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. Jesus was the physical son of a Jewish girl named Mary, who conceived him without human father by the power of God himself. In some mysterious sense, God was "in" Jesus in a unique way which has never been true of anyone else. Jesus is called … [Read more...]
TO MY SEEKER FRIEND: 1 – Our Broken World
A respected friend who does not yet know Christ or the Bible recently asked me what he was missing. These four gracEmails repeat what I shared with him in response. * * * I am humbled and honored at this privilege, and I commend you for your inquiry. This is the most important topic possible. It is foundational for abundant life now and for life eternal. I pray that God will give me clarity as I attempt to respond. We live in a broken world -- fractured relationships, inner turmoil, guilty consciences, civil and domestic strife, war, famine, natural disasters of flood, hurricane, drought. … [Read more...]
TO MY SEEKER FRIEND: 1 – Our Broken World
A respected friend who does not yet know Christ or the Bible recently asked me what he was missing. These four gracEmails repeat what I shared with him in response. * * * I am humbled and honored at this privilege, and I commend you for your inquiry. This is the most important topic possible. It is foundational for abundant life now and for life eternal. I pray that God will give me clarity as I attempt to respond. We live in a broken world -- fractured relationships, inner turmoil, guilty consciences, civil and domestic strife, war, famine, natural disasters of flood, hurricane, drought. … [Read more...]
ENCOURAGEMENT TO A SEEKER – 2
A friend who is not yet a Christian but who is joyfully seeking after God tells me of budding faith and of happy anticipation in the spiritual journey. Can I say anything to encourage?" * * * Jesus came to reconcile "all things" to God and to each other (Colossians 1:19-20). Part of the result of his atonement is the reuniting, reconciling, healing of the human creature as an individual -- first with the Creator through Jesus Christ, but also with other people, within himself or herself, and with the cosmos, the rest of God's created order. The Bible tells us that when Jesus returns, God … [Read more...]
ENCOURAGEMENT TO A SEEKER – 1
A friend who is not yet a Christian but who is joyfully seeking after God tells me of budding faith and of happy anticipation in the spiritual journey. Can I say anything to encourage?" * * * The Bible teaches that God is our heavenly Father who made us every one, hopefully for fellowship with himself. Unfortunately, from Adam on, all us humans have chosen to go our own way at some point and to disregard the relationship for which God made us. That is the meaning of the wonderful story of the two trees in the original garden paradise (Gen. 3). I understand that story to … [Read more...]
HEALING PRAYER & TRUSTING GOD
A gracEmail subscriber in the U.S. Southwest writes that he prays fervently for God to restore a loved one who is ill, believing that God will mercifully heal but humbly entrusting the matter to his sovereign will. * * * Like you, I urgently beseech God to heal the sick. For their sake and their family's, but also to advance his kingdom, to show his glory, to manifest his mercy, to build faith of others, to vindicate the faith of those who pray -- and of those who specifically express faith by praying and anointing with oil (James 5:15). Like Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego in the Fiery … [Read more...]
GRATITUDE AND PERSPECTIVE
I am writing this on Sunday afternoon, September 25, 2005 from our son Jeremy's home in Dallas where the four generations of our family in Houston came last Thursday to escape Hurricane Rita's expected arrival there on Friday/Saturday. We did not anticipate that three million other pilgrims would be travelling west and north from Houston that same day! The trip from our homes in Houston to Jeremy & Kristy's home in north Dallas normally takes about five hours. This time our daughter Melanie, son-in-law Michael and their two little ones left at 4:00 a.m. and got to Dallas 14 hours later. … [Read more...]
THE MESSAGE OF THE BIBLE
"How," someone asks, "would you summarize the Bible's message in a few paragraphs?" * * * There is one true God, who made all that exists. He made human beings in his image for fellowship with himself. We humans went astray, choosing to run our own lives without regard for God's will and purposes. Our sin separated us from God, divided our own hearts, alienated us from each other and threw creation into turmoil. God loves us despite our sin and set out to bring us back to himself. To that end, he chose Abraham and his Jewish descendants to become a model community of justice, mercy and love, … [Read more...]
