Greater Works Than He Does

Written by Dr. Bill Bright

Are you struggling to understand God’s word? Talk to a mentor.

“In solemn truth I tell you, anyone believing in Me shall do the same miracles I have done, and even greater ones, because I am going to be with the Father. You can ask Him for anything, using My name, and I will do it, for this will bring praise to the Father because of what I, the Son, will do for you.”(John 14:12,13)

For many years, during and after seminary, I asked leading theologians, pastors and students, “What does this passage mean? How can I and other believers do the same miracles that our Lord did when He was here in the flesh – and even greater ones?”

Surely there had to be some mistakes in the translation of this passage, for I saw little evidence of this supernatural power in the lives of the Christians around me or in my own life.

KING OF HEARTS

Mark 4:30, "And he said, Whereunto shall we liken the kingdom of God? or with what comparison shall we compare it?"

MARK 4:30-34

The word "kingdom" means "the realm over which a king rules." 

When applied to God, it could refer to all creation, since "his kingdom ruleth over all" (Ps. 103:19), but the kingdom more often applies to His rule in and through those who are submitted to Him. "The Kingdom of God" more specifically refers to Christ living and ruling in our hearts. 

So praying "thy kingdom come" is praying for the expansion and influence of God's rule in the hearts of men everywhere and, ultimately, the establishment of His physical Kingdom here on earth at His second coming (Rev. 11:15; 20:4).

Throughout Jesus' earthly ministry, the Jews kept looking for Jesus to establish a physical kingdom here on the earth and deliver them from the oppression of the Romans. 

Sex Symbols Who Speak in Tongues?

MICHAEL BROWN

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Megan Fox says she prays in tongues. Should we judge that utterance? (Facebook)

I was at the grocery store the other day when I was unexpectedly confronted with an adult-oriented magazine located right next to the vitamin section. I immediately had to look away from the front cover, which featured a scantily clad, seductively posed, sex symbol. Yet it was only a few weeks ago that I read an article about how this same sex symbol loves to speak in tongues and has to restrain herself from outbursts in tongues while attending church services. What?

This is actually a perfect illustration of American charismatic Christianity, where you can say you love Jesus (like the rapper “The Game” claims to do) and still frequent strip clubs (as “The Game” still does), or where you can flow in the gifts of the Spirit and become a made-for-TV preaching sensation, only to announce that God told you that you married the wrong woman, leading to a quick divorce and remarriage.

Understanding Postpartum Illness

WHAT IS POSTPARTUM ILLNESS? For those who have never been affected by Postpartum Illness, it is difficult to fully comprehend how the excitement and anticipation of a new birth can turn into depression. Why, when a new baby has miraculously been welcomed into a family, does an all-enveloping reaction sometimes set in and cause such devastation to the mother? Over 80% of new mothers experience a brief period of 'baby blues' immediately following the baby's arrival, a clinical depression that lasts several weeks or longer can signal a very real illness. In such cases, a birth can trigger a terrifying spectrum of symptoms which, if left untreated, can lead to tragic and even fatal consequences. Postpartum Illness can disable not only the woman, but her entire family as well. Families may fall apart, with stable homes being ripped apart in divorce; unfortunately, children often bear the brunt of this outcome. It is undisputed that if untreated, Postpartum Illness can lead to abuse, hospitalization, suicide and infanticide.

Receive Jesus as Your Savior

Choosing to receive Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior is the most important decision you’ll ever make!

God’s Word promises, “If thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved. For with the heart man believeth unto righteousness; and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation…. For whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved” (Rom. 10:9–10,13).

By His grace, God has already done everything to provide salvation. Your part is simply to believe and receive.

Pray out loud, Jesus, I confess that You are my Lord and Savior. I believe in my heart that God raised You from the dead. By faith in Your Word, I receive salvation now. Thank You for saving me!

The very moment you commit your life to Jesus Christ, the truth of His Word instantly comes to pass in your spirit. Now that you’re born again, there’s a brand-new you!

Please contact us and let us know that you’ve prayed to receive Jesus as your Savior. We would like to rejoice with you and help you understand more fully what has taken place in your life.


We have a Helpline staffed by mature Christians who will be glad to pray with you. Our Helpline is open from 4:00 A.M. to 9:30 P.M. (Mountain Time) each weekday. The number is (719) 635-1111.


Give us a call — we’re here to help you understand and grow in your new relationship with the Lord.

http://www.awmi.net/receive_jesus

Discover Purpose Is this the life for me?

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Take a look at your life. How would you describe it? Contented? Rushed? Exciting? Stressful? Moving forward? Holding back? For many of us it’s all of the above at times. There are things we dream of doing one day, and there are things we wish we could forget. In the Bible, it says that Jesus came to make all things new. What would your life look like if you could start over with a clean slate?

The Bible talks about the world beginning with the creation of a beautiful garden and two blameless people who walked and talked with God. They were truly innocent – they didn’t even know that they were naked. But it didn’t stay that way. They chose to turn away from God and sin entered the world, and with it guilt, shame, regret. Humankind was no longer blameless. But God still loved the world that he created and so he sent his Son to redeem it.

Jesus came, and died, and rose again to wipe the slate clean. He was scourged, tormented, and finally nailed on the cross for humankind’s sins – this was all part of God’s plan to bring you and I back into relationship with him. God wants to be a part of your life. Is this the life for you?

God is perfect, powerful, and yet personal. The Bible tells us: “He (God) is the Rock. His work is perfect. Everything He does is just and fair.” (Deuteronomy 32:4)

God created the world, which reflects His magnificence, balance, and beauty. “For God created the heavens and the earth and put everything in place, and he made the world to live in and not be an empty chaos.” (Isaiah 45:18)

Would you like to know God personally?.

God loves you and created you to know Him personally.
God’s Love: “God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish, but have eternal life” (John 3:16).

God’s Plan: “Now this is eternal life: that they may know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom you have sent” (John 10:7-10).

What prevents us from knowing God personally?

People are lost and separated from God, so we cannot know Him personally or experience His love.

People are Lost: “All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God” (Romans 3:23)

People were created to have fellowship with God; but, because of our own stubborn self- wills, we chose to go our own independent way and fellowship with God was broken. This self-will, characterized by an attitude of active rebellion or passive indifference, is an evidence of what the Bible calls sin.

People are Separated: “The wages of sin is death” [spiritual separation from God] (Romans 6:23).

This diagram illustrates that God is holy and people are lost. A great gulf separates the two. The arrows illustrate that people are continually trying to reach God and establish a personal relationship with Him through their own efforts, such as a good life, philosophy, or religion but we inevitably fail.

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The fourth step of your journey explains the only way to bridge this gulf.

Jesus Christ is God’s only provision for our sin. Through Him alone we can know God personally and experience His love.

He Died in Our Place: “God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us” (Romans 5:8).

He Rose from the Dead: “Christ died for our sins…He was buried…He was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures…He appeared to Peter, then to the twelve. After that He appeared to more than five hundred…” (1 Corinthians 15:3-6)

He is the Only Way to God: “Jesus said to him, `I am the way, and the truth, and the life; no one comes to the Father, but through Me’” (John 14:6).

The diagram above on the right illustrates that God has bridged the gulf that separates us from Him by sending His Son, Jesus Christ, to die on the cross in our place to pay the penalty for our sins.

It is not enough just to know these three truths…

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We must individually receive Jesus Christ as Savior and Lord; then we can know God personally and experience His love.

We must Receive Christ: “As many as received Him, to them He gave the right to become children of God, even to those who believe in His name” (John 1:12).

We Receive Christ through Faith: “By grace you have been saved through faith; and that not of yourselves, it is a gift of God; not as a result of works that no one should boast” (Ephesians 2:8,9).

When we Receive Christ, we Experience a New Birth: (Read John 3:1-8)

We Receive Christ by Personal Invitation: [Christ speaking] “Behold, I stand at the door and knock; if anyone hears My voice and opens the door, I will come in to him” (Revelation 3:20).

Receiving Christ involves turning to God from self (repentance) and trusting Christ to come into our lives to forgive us of our sins and to make us what He wants us to be. Just to agree intellectually that Jesus Christ is the Son of God and that He died on the cross for our sins is not enough. Nor is it enough to have an emotional experience. We receive Jesus Christ by faith, as an act of our will.

These two circles represent two kinds of lives:

Self-Directed Life

 Self is on the throne

Christ is outside the life

Interests are directed by self often resulting in discord and frustration

Christ-Directed Life

 Christ is in the life and on the throne

 Self is yielding to Christ

Interests are directed by Christ, resulting in harmony with God’s plan

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Which circle best represents your life?

Which circle would you like to have represent your life?

The following step explains how you can receive Christ…

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You can receive Christ right now by faith through prayer!

(Prayer is talking with God)

God knows your heart and is not so concerned with your words as He is with the attitude of your heart. The following is a suggested prayer:

Lord Jesus, I need you. Thank You for dying on the cross for my sins. I open the door of my life and receive You as my Savior and Lord. Thank You for forgiving my sins and giving me eternal life. Take control of the throne of my life. Make me the kind of person You want me to be.

Does this prayer express the desire of your heart? If it does, pray this prayer right now, and Christ will come into your life, just as He promised.

If you have a question first, click here.

gotquestions  http://powertochange.com/discover/faith/discoverpurpose/

Don’t Hold Your Breath

by Pastor Colin S. Smith


“No one who is born of God will continue to sin, because God's seed remains in him; he cannot go on sinning, because he has been born of God.” 1 John 3:9 (NIV)

The person born of God will not continue to sin. They cannot go on sinning. Really? How can this be? The reason why the Christian will not and cannot continue in sin is because he is born of God and God’s seed remains in him. The new birth makes continuing in sin impossible.

If sin is your friend, God is your enemy. If God is your friend, sin is your enemy. James says“Anyone who chooses to be a friend of the world becomes an enemy of God”(James 4:4). But the Christian is never wholly free from sin in this life. Indeed anyone, [including any Christian], who says or even thinks he is without sin deceives himself (1 John 1:8).

You can’t live under water

When a child is in the womb, that life is surrounded by water. The child lives in the water, not in the air. As soon as the child’s first breath is taken, the nature of its life is changed. From that moment on, the child can no longer live in the water. The child has a new life that’s lived in the air.

The child can go in water, swim though water, and even go under the water. You can hold your breath and stay under water for 30 seconds or a minute, or more. But you cannot continue under the water.

What once was your life is no longer possible for you. You cannot go back to it. Being born has changed the nature of your life. What used to be natural has now become, not just difficult, but impossible.

You can’t live in sin

That’s what it is like when you are born again. When you are born again you cannot continue in sin. The sinner is comfortable with sin. It doesn’t bother him. But when you are born again, your conscience is activated. You can’t settle with something that you know is wrong in your life. Holding onto a sin for a Christian is like holding your breath under water. It takes a great effort and you can’t do it for long.

In the new birth God becomes your friend, and sin becomes your enemy. You can’t live with sin like you did when sin was your friend. You turn from it. And when you fall into sin you turn from it again.

Repentance is a life-long process. We learned before that repentance is: turning from as much as you know of your sin, to give as much as you know of yourself, to as much as you know of God. That’s a lifetime pursuit, and it begins with the new birth.


This LifeKey is based on the message “Signs of Life,” by Pastor Colin S. Smith on May 10, 2009, from the series “Regeneration: How Christ Changes Your Soul.”

http://www.lightsource.com/ministry/unlocking-the-bible/articles/dont-hold-your-breath-13257.html

The Door to Abundance

by: Alan Bullock

Although His birth brought no great fanfare or recognition from the institutions and governments of men, Jesus’ ministry of revealing the Father’s forgiveness of sin changed the course of men’s lives forever. Until Jesus, sin had an ugly permanency that gripped men’s souls like a black darkness without hope.Hope for the Journey
There is a garden provided for man,
A place of hope in God’s great plan,
Where your faith in Him will expand,
A refuge from storms in the Promised Land.
There is a light that glows from His lamp,
Giving power to battle the enemy’s camp,
With victory to conquer till the break of day,
Where the King of Kings makes grand His way.
There is a hope beyond a tempter’s scheme,
Where mighty billows of grace dost gleam,
Where the Balm of Gilead flows like a stream,
And the Day Spring of glory fulfills every dream.
There is a portal through the Door of Life,
Where grace is stronger than mortal strife.
A place where His sunlight will always rise,
The closest thing to Paradise.
There is a victory by a Broken Reed,
Where the Guide of Life meets thy need,
Where our feet flee from going astray,
And the Spring of Life makes its way.
There is a life beyond the Veil,
The wind, His spirit both fill my sail;
Beyond the valley where one travails,
Where the Rod of Jesse never fails.
There is a drink from the Master’s cup,
Where I, with love, shall drink it up;
That keeps me from the wilderness,
For the Savior’s love has power to bless. But with the Father’s forgiveness of sin, He brought relief from its clutches and a cure and hope to lost humanity. As Dr. Mark Rutland so eloquently stated in his book, The Finger of God, “…the reason common people gladly accepted Jesus was because He ministered to their needs. The two elements conspicuously absent from the tasseled robes and flowery public prayers of the Pharisees were reality and authority. Jesus’ ministry demonstrated the value of substance over image. Unlike the Pharisees, He understood and pitied their weaknesses and communicated with pure simplicity that He understood their pain and longed to bring the Prodigal Sons and Daughters home to the Father’s house.”Jesus then became the Door to Life and laid down the Welcome Mat of Grace to all that would follow Him. He drank of the cup in the Garden so we could drink of the cup of New Birth and share in His heavenly bounty. Of all the “I AM” statements of Jesus, of particular significance is the “I AM” found in John 10:9: “I AM the door. If anyone enters by Me, he will be saved, and will go in and out and find pasture.”

In Biblical times the door to the sheep’s pen was the shepherd himself as he would lie across the entry way to the pen to keep the sheep safe. Jesus is also the door or gateway to abundance and greener pastures. Walk through the door, dear friend. Come home to the Father who waits on the other side to keep you safe from all harm.

As the Door, Jesus is the one and only way of entrance into salvation. As the Good Shepherd He is the one who cares for the sheep and provides for their salvation at the cost of His life. He lays down His life for the sheep (John 10:1-11).

Hope is God’s sparrow that lites gently upon our soul and sings the tune of faithful
anticipation for a glorious future…

http://www.daystar.com/devotions/the-door-to-abundance/