Category: Written Teaching Notes

These written notes are for those preferring to receive the teachings in written form.

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Saved From What? #6 Union and Glorification!

Romans 5:1-11; Romans 8:18-32

This is the last in a series called “Saved From What?” We’ve been looking at what it means to be saved, and what Jesus saved us from: the guilt of sin, and thus, the fear of wrath and judgment, the condemnation and hell we deserve, the destiny of the wicked and unsaved. Related to this is the fact that we’re saved from the law and the curse of it, so that now, we’re not condemned because of missing the mark, but we’re made righteous by faith in what Christ has done for us. We have been saved from spiritual death as well. God has raised us from the dead! We’ve experienced a spiritual resurrection, and that is just a foretaste of the coming physical resurrection when Jesus returns. We’ve been delivered from the power of the devil, our archenemy, the tyrant who had such power over us. Now we no longer have to serve him. We’re in God’s Kingdom now, not Satan’s. Last week, we saw how we’ve also been saved from the power of sin, we’ve been healed of the sickness and given a solution for the weakness of it. So these are all things we have been saved from. Now let’s look at  what we’ve been saved for, i.e., why God saved us, and what it’ll lead to. Continue reading “Saved From What? #6 Union and Glorification!”

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Saved From What? #5 The Weakness of Sin

Beyond a crime or a disease, sin is also a weakness. Anselm of Canterbury, in the 12th century, had an interesting illustration he used to explain the effects of sin. He said imagine if a landowner told one of his laborers to go to a certain area of his farm or ranch, and do some work there, build fences, dig trenches, or whatever, and in sending him, he also warned him of a pit in that area to beware of. If the worker didn’t pay attention, he could easily fall into that pit, and then he wouldn’t be able to get out of it and do the work his boss wanted him to do. The worker goes his way, doesn’t heed the warning, and falls into that pit. So now he has failed his boss in two ways. He can’t do the work his boss wanted him to do, and, even though he was forewarned, he’s carelessly fallen into a trap from which he cannot escape! He’s doubly useless!   Continue reading “Saved From What? #5 The Weakness of Sin”

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Saved From What? #4 The Sickness of Sin

1 Pet. 2:24; 1 Cor. 11:30

Various parts of the Christian Church have focused on various aspects of salvation over the centuries. Various metaphors have been used to describe sin and its effects, and what God has done to save us from it. Last time, we looked at the most typical Western view, that sin is a crime against God, and we are all like criminals facing judgment. What we need desperately is to be saved in a forensic sense, to be freed from our guilt, forgiven of a crime we’ve committed. That’s important, but it’s not enough. Because if we just look at salvation as a forensic thing, then once our record is expunged, we think that’s all there is to it. But being a forgiven criminal doesn’t tend to make us feel we’re in a personal relationship with the Judge, does it? And it doesn’t do much in terms of changing our behavior, our attitudes, feelings, our relationships with others. No, forensic salvation is good, but it’s only one aspect, one phase of what God has for us. There’s more to it, more that we need to understand.  Continue reading “Saved From What? #4 The Sickness of Sin”

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Saved From What? #3 The Domination of the Devil

We’ve been looking at salvation, different aspects of it, different metaphors that express what it is, different ways parts of the church have looked at it over the centuries. We started off looking at the predominant Western view, that sin is a crime against God, and what we need is to be forgiven of our guilt before Him, we need to have our records expunged. This is the forensic view of sin, and it’s completely right and legitimate. But there’s another aspect of sin and salvation we need to explore and know about. I’m talking about the fact that we need to not only be saved from our sins, our guilt, our separation from God, but we also need to be freed from the domination, the bullying, the oppression of our archenemy, Satan!  Continue reading “Saved From What? #3 The Domination of the Devil”

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Saved From What? #1 The Guilt of Sin

My study of Medieval Church History a couple of sessions ago really brought out some truths I hadn’t thought of before and stimulated my thinking. One thing I learned was that Western Christianity took a different direction or a different view regarding salvation than Eastern Christianity. I’ll be taking a course, Lord willing, on Eastern Christianity in the near future and I’m really looking forward to that, because I believe there’s a lot we can learn from that “branch” of the body of Christ. But one of the most important differences has to do with what salvation really consists of, or we could say, what it is that we’re really saved “from” or saved “for,” or, we might say, we’re saved “to be.”

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The Message on the Mountains, Ps. 121:1 & 2

My wife and I used to live in El Paso, Texas, where I was the pastor of a church called Jesus Chapel. Three different years, we called the church to prayer and fasting at the start of the new year. As we prayed over El Paso and its sister city in Mexico, Ciudad Juarez, we could see two prominent features that dominate this area –  a place called Mount Cristo Rey in El Paso, and the mountain in Juarez where it is written in white letters, “La Biblia es la verdad; Leela!” (The Bible is the truth – read it!) It occurred to me then that those two prominent features of that community tell us practically all we need to know for a successful life here on earth and hereafter! I preached a message about it back in 2011. But this week, one of the lectures I was listening to directed our attention to Ps. 1 & 2, and I saw that those psalms convey the same message! I just had to share it with those of you who check this website… Continue reading “The Message on the Mountains, Ps. 121:1 & 2”

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Elijah’s Big Crash

1 Kings 19 is such an interesting story! Have you read it lately? If not, I recommend you read it, and the chapter before it (1 Kings 18), before you read my comments. I call Chapter 19 “Elijah’s Big Crash,” because it’s about a time when this great hero of faith really stumbled, and demonstrated that he too was just a man, plagued by the same kinds of doubt, fear, and weakness with which we all struggle. We can all learn from Elijah’s story.

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God will get you through!

This week for my studies at Regent, I had to meditate on Psalms 42 and 43. Did you know that the ancient Hebrew scribes usually combined these two into one? I’ve been reading the Bible for forty years, but I never knew that. ¡Cada día se aprende algo! (You learn something every day!) If you haven’t read them recently, check ‘em out again soon. These psalms provide some very great and practical lessons regarding how to respond to adversity and how to successfully get through times of adversity and trial.

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