Those songs which we sang years ago can easily be laid aside, and we forget their powerful messages. Paul talked about “putting away childish things” (1 Cor. 13:11), but this has nothing to do with forgetting those vital truths we learned even before we went to school. Look at one of those songs. “This little light of mine…” or in another version,…

It is not wrong to make plans for tomorrow or even for months ahead. Paul’s letter to Rome shows just how far ahead he had planned his life. As he was collecting the funds from the Gentile churches, he reveals his plan. It involved: (1) finishing gathering the funds; (2) making sure they were safely delivered to the church in Jerusalem; (3)…

When one reads Paul’s words to the Gentile church in Colosse, he has a renewed appreciation for the work that Paul did and just how important it was that Gentiles become equal members with the Jews in the church Jesus established. Take time to read the closing verses of chapter one to see how Paul viewed his place in the kingdom. These…

Our world has totally changed the meaning of what it means to believe in Jesus. What is widely believed is that when I simply say a “sinner’s prayer,” I have become a child of Christ. Those who teach that also believe that when one says that prayer he can never be lost again. How does the Bible use the word “faith”? How…

There were several times in Paul’s letters that he had to defend his apostleship and authenticity. On one such occasion he wrote, “For am I now seeking the favor of men, or of God? Or am I striving to please men? If I were still trying to please men, I would not be a bondservant of Christ” (Gal. 1:10). This raises a…

The parallel between the demise of the Jewish nation as they headed for captivity and the demise in our land is so striking. We know specifically that God had chosen the nation of Israel and brought them into a land flowing with milk and honey. The remarkable history of America and its elevation to being a world power in it such a…

There is a story, the truthfulness of it cannot be confirmed, that illustrates a truth of God taught in both the Old Testament and the New Testament. The story tells of that time when Solomon was building the temple. The Bible says that there were 80,000 laborers in the mountains who quarried the stones for the temple (1 Kings 5:15), and these…

Who has not heard of the story of Jonah and his three days and nights in the belly of the big fish? It is one of the most amazing events in the scriptures and even many non-believers know about it. We sometimes focus on Jonah’s preaching as the only reason the men of Nineveh repented in sackcloth and ashes. What else caused…