In2Freedom: March 2019

Saturday, March 30, 2019

Home Church Video ~ "Love is..." ~ Part 2 ~ Longing For Love

In our second look at the “Love Chapter” of I Corinthians 13, we explore what it is like to not have this love and how we need to let our hearts long for whatever experience of this love we are missing.

Our main theme in this series is, “to experience and express the agape-love of our Triune God.” It is important to understand this, that God never requires us to express something he has not already given us in Jesus Christ.

This means that, whenever we see that we are unable to express agape-love to others, we turn to our heavenly Father in order to experience agape-love from him.

It is already true that, “God's love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us.”[1] This journey through I Corinthians 13 invites us to hunger and thirst for the righteousness of knowing God in his love more than we have ever known him this way before. This message should help.

Email: in2freedom@gmail.com

Unless otherwise noted, Scriptures are from the English Standard Version (The Holy Bible, English Standard Version. ESV® Text Edition: 2016. Copyright © 2001 by Crossway Bibles, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers.)

[1] Romans 5:5

Saturday, March 23, 2019

Home Church Video ~ The Disciples’ Prayer ~ Part 9 ~ Decision-making Prayer

Have you ever asked someone to pray for you about a decision you were facing? What do you think they prayed? What would you have prayed for them? How would either of you know if your prayer was answered?

As we have explored what Jesus taught us to pray in the Disciples’ prayer,[1] we are faced with what it would look like for us to join him in his work. What decisions would we make if what we wanted more than anything in the world was that our Father’s name was hallowed everywhere we went?

What choices might we make if we wanted to see God’s kingdom come into everything we did, or we wanted God’s will to be done all over our community?

How would it affect us to daily trust God to provide our daily bread, and to keep short accounts with him in the area of forgiveness for ourselves and others?

And how would we know which of our choices would answer our prayer that God lead us not into temptation but deliver us from evil?

In this concluding look at the Disciples’ prayer, our whole focus is on how praying as Jesus taught us affects our decisions. The more we put into practice Jesus’ instructions, the more we realize that some options would stand in the way of what we have prayed, while others seem to fall right into place with the will of God.

Join our home church as we explore the wonderful world of decisions based on praying as Jesus taught us. Perhaps it will help you know how to pray about something you are now facing, and what it will look like when God answers.

[1] Matthew 6:9-13

Friday, March 15, 2019

Home Church Video ~ "Love is..." Begins With God ~ Part 1

One morning in my time with God I was drawn to Paul’s description of how he was able to endure everything he went through.[1] It was clear that he had something going on in his life that enabled him to weather some of the fiercest storms we can imagine.

However, it wasn’t just that he was exemplary in facing one obstacle after another or keeping a good attitude in the face of exceptional injustices.

Rather, it was that he had something going on that enabled him to do things for the good of others despite how consistently he was mistreated for doing so.

This is explained in one simple description: “Love… endures all things.”[2]

As I considered my own propensity to complain about things I have had to endure, and even my lingering heartache over some of the more painful experiences of mistreatment, I realized I needed a fresh encounter with God’s love. I also knew immediately that I Corinthians 13 was where I would find what I was looking for.

The starting place of this love-adventure is God who is the source of the love we need. It is through his word that he calls us to himself in order that our own love-needs are met in Jesus Christ, and from the fullness of their love for us, we are free to show the same love to others.

Join our home church as we begin this journey in God’s word to immerse ourselves in the love our Father has already freely given us in his Son. Be assured that there is more than enough love from the Triune God to fully satisfy our own souls and have plenty to share with everyone we could ever meet in life.

And yes, that includes everything we may have to endure along the way.

[1] II Timothy 2:10

[2] I Corinthians 13:7

Saturday, March 9, 2019

Home Church Video ~ The Disciples’ Prayer ~ Part 8 ~ “Deliverance From Evil”

As we reach the last request of the Disciples’ prayer, “And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil,”[1] we find that the whole prayer covers everything in our lives, and this prayer request covers everything to do with our freedom in Jesus Christ.

It is to the praise of God’s glorious grace that Jesus wants us to learn to trust our Father to protect us from falling into temptation. It seems even more so that he would teach us how to talk to the Father when we have already fallen prey to the devil’s schemes.

In both cases, the fact that Jesus teaches us to pray to the Father means that he wants us always looking to God for deliverance whether it is protection from falling into sin in the first place, or deliverance once we have already succumbed. Our hope is calling out to our Father in the name of Jesus Christ our Lord and Savior.

Join our home church as we explore both sides of this prayer request and encourage each other to pray as Jesus taught us no matter how we are doing in the battle with sin.

[1] Matthew 6:13

Saturday, March 2, 2019

Home Church Video ~ The Disciples’ Prayer ~ Part 7 ~ “Forgive the Forgiving”

Over the years, I have come to take great delight in showing people that God never once requires us to forgive unrepentant people. He has much better things for us to do with them.

On the other hand, every call to forgiveness in his Book means to cancel someone’s debt when they come to us in repentance.[1] There are no exceptions to this. When someone repents to us, we are to forgive them just as our Father forgives us whenever we repent to him.

The question is, when Jesus teaches us to pray, “Father, forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors,”[2] can we legitimately say that this only refers to forgiving debtors who have repented to us of their indebtedness?

The good news is, absolutely yes!

Forgiveness only means cancelling the debts of repentant people, so even this lesson on prayer is directed at how we treat people when they repent towards us, and whether it is an imitation of how our Father forgives us when we repent to him.[3]

Are there lessons in this regarding all the people who never repent to us of anything they have done wrong? Absolutely, and it is right there in the way Jesus taught us to pray.

Join our home church in exploring this extremely liberating prayer request. Trusting all our forgiveness issues to God and praying for forgiveness for all believers (including all the ones who have never repented of what they have done wrong), leads us into the freedom of our Lord and Savior which is truly freedom indeed![4]

[1] Here are some other messages and blogposts where I cover this thoroughly enough to show that there is never once an exhortation to forgive an unrepentant person, and that the call to forgiveness only applies when someone has repented.

Home Church Video: Staking Our Claim on Freedom in Christ ~ Part 7 ~ Freedom From Bitterness; Freedom to Love https://in2freedom.blogspot.com/2018/03/home-church-video-staking-our-claim-on.html

Home Church Video: Staking our Claim on Freedom in Christ ~ Part 8 ~ The Freedom to Not Forgive https://in2freedom.blogspot.com/2018/03/staking-our-claim-on-freedom-in-christ.html

Home Church Video: Staking Our Claim on Freedom in Christ ~ Part 9 ~ The Freedom to Forgive https://in2freedom.blogspot.com/2018/03/home-church-video-staking-our-claim-on_21.html

[2] Matthew 6:12

[3] It is crucial that, when we think about forgiving the way our Father has forgiven us, everything to do with God’s forgiveness of his children follows him leading us to repentance (see Romans 2:4). The same is the case with every teaching that we are to forgive others. It is always and only a response to someone’s repentance.

[4] John 8:36

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