Check # 666

Scripture Reading:
Eph 1:12-13 That we should be to the praise of his glory, who first trusted in Christ.
In whom ye also trusted, [Christ] after that ye heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation: in whom also after that ye believed, ye were sealed with that holy Spirit of promise,

Whenever you hear the numerals in continuity "666" the mind of man goes in all directions. It actually proves the fact that there can be no denial of God in the mind of man. Mankind fears this unlucky number. They fear it with intense superstition. They will do strange things like never buy anything that amounts to $6.66, or write a check that has the number "666." They don't know why intrinsically, but the world does know it has some evil to it. To acknowledge that, they must acknowledge the Bible and its truths. And of course as we know perfectly well as believers, if the Bible is true in one point, then it is true in all points.

The number 666 is spoken of the in the book of Revelation as the number of a man, particularly the Anti-Christ, or, the man of sin. It is referenced by many theologians as the numeral portion of the condemning mark of the Beast. The number itself is shrouded in mystery to some, but for those of us who know Christ, there is not much mystery, and it is NOTHING we need to fear or side step in our Christian lives. We do not need to give in to superstitions regarding this number. Let me say that this number is Literal and is factual in the Scripture, but it has nothing to do with the believer in Christ or should superstition cause us to fear.

Superstition is a tool of the devil to further blind the minds of the blind and deafen their ears to the glorious hope of the Gospel of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. Superstition can also be used to prey on the Christian who has an at best shallow knowledge of the Scripture. The role superstition plays is that the evil world takes a true principal or idea and twists it to make the Christian fear. Now let me say that the Devil is a real person, with real power, and our most formidable enemy. He is nothing to be laughed at or make light of. It is only by the shear protection of Jesus Christ that we are not devoured of the Devil. However, when we know the Scripture, Jesus said in John 8:32, the TRUTH is what sets us free. Free from what? Free from fear of misunderstanding is one point. I see a lot of Christians who look at the number 666 as bad luck or something to withdraw from. I just shake my head. Not because I am judging them, its because they need not fear it. Here are some reasons why...

This number is not for us because we have a BETTER seal of Redemption.
Quite simply believer, when we receive Jesus Christ in our hearts, we get a "mark" if you will. The mark is not of a beast but of the Blessed One that will not take it away. The seal of Christ as Paul mentions is ours until the day of Redemption. The Devil cannot steal you away nor can you become somehow corrupted beyond forgiveness. Remember it is Christ's finished work on Calvary in which we have this surety. The Devil cannot have us unto condemnation, because his hand has no power over the Authority of Jesus Christ. When you are sealed with that kind of power, by the Person of the Son of God, moreover, by I AM, who can take it away? Take heart.

We have the Spirit of TRUTH living in us as our GUARANTEE.
There are times I get discouraged and even to the point of wondering if I am truly redeemed. Its because I forget the awesome power that binds me to Christ. Let me share with you one of the most powerful Truths and verses to back it up. Simply, the Lord does not speak to the heart of a unredeemed sinner with the exception of convicting them of their need of Him. Moreover He does not talk to them with encouragement, He does not reveal Scripture to them, He does not give understanding to a sinner until they repent and ask Him in their heart. He does this for me because I am redeemed by His Grace. The work I speak of is by the Holy Spirit and the verse He showed me is

2 Corinthians 1:22 (New King James Version)

²² who also has sealed us and given us the Spirit in our hearts as a guarantee.

The old King James Version uses the word "earnest." This word for the above reminds me that the presence of the Spirit in our lives is likened unto a the crowning jewel on a Royal seal. The seal is there, but the Spirit is that defining mark that takes precedence above ALL else.
If you have Christ in your heart, you have HIM!

Because Jesus tells us plainly that in His presence we have nothing to fear of condemnation. If you have never memorized Romans 8:1 which says, "There is no condemnation to those who are IN Christ Jesus," please do so. This is a freeing verse. Paul later goes on under inspiration to write that nothing, nothing, can separate us from the Love of God IN Christ Jesus. One day, all the world will stand before the Lord of Glory. Those who do not have Christ at this point forever will not have Him. They will stand in fear for He who wished to be their Saviour is now required by Holiness to be their Judge. But for the Christian whom the number 666 has no power He welcomes us with open arms when we meet Him. Recall in Revelation 1, the glorified Christ that John the Divine saw. What a awesome yet terribly fearful sight that caused Him to be so scared and afraid that John fell as though he were dead. Yet this awesome and terribly fearful Figure did something remarkable. Jesus Christ laid His right hand, don't miss that, the hand of Power and Authority. He laid His right hand on John's shoulder without harshness and said to John, "Do not be afraid." WOW! The literal fulfillment of Romans 8:1 that belongs to EVERY believer was made manifest in John and will be to us!

There are many fearful things in this world. However, do not let the ignorance of the Word of God fuel those fears, especially the contrast between being Christ's and being caught in the condemnation of the evil "666."

By the way, the title, "Check # 666" was the number in my Grandma's check ledger of her next check. She wrote that check to our local church, and guess what, that night we had a record offering from the people of God!!!

Thank You Lord for not allowing us to be eternally entangled in something that will play a role in condemning the unbelieving world. Help us not to place any fear but trust in YOUR seal of the Holy Spirit and point others to Christ for the same seal made available by Your most precious blood. Amen.

Divided We Fall

Scripture Reading:
1 Corinthians 1:10 "Now I beseech you, brethren, by the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that ye all speak the same thing, and that there be no divisions among you; but that ye be perfectly joined together in the same mind and in the same judgment."

In all the world, with its immense woes and tribulations, its shortcomings and uncertainties, one would think that the church of Jesus Christ would be a forever sure and stable place to be.

Well it isn't, at least not all the time and for some not much of the time. Notice I said "the church" not its Author and Leader! Make that abundantly clear before reading on.

I haven't been writing much lately because I have been busy with things that I should put aside and being tired a lot from the inside as well as out. A lot is on my mind. I am not very encouraged when I look at the American church today. What's happening is that when we get tired and sometimes very discouraged we form "cracks" in our lives that affect the lives of others. Small sins creep in that erode us.  Now for the speculative, I am not confessing to some great moral failure to the praise and grace of God it has not happened to me, and I pray it will not.  The problem is that the wearied stress marks of the things we think are negligible such as grumbling, disputing, mistrust, selfishness, murmurings, and a host of  others affect us all.  We as individuals affect the church because guess what, we as individuals make up the church. So when we get off track its like we begin to pull others down with us.

When we let ourselves become the objects of self rather than the heart committed servants of God we wreak inward turmoil in the body of Christ. This turmoil is like any on of us coming to church with a sharp two head woodsman axe. We pick a corner or wall of our nice building that took so very long and hard to build and start chopping away! We become unknowingly bent on self mutilation that our senses fail us. The literal thought of any of us doing such a thing would never occur to us, but spiritually that is what we do when we let someone, something, or some emotion that is not from God rule our hearts and divide our brethren.
Oh that we WAKE up and see that we are hurting each other to say nothing of how much we grieve the LORD and entertain Satan.

You know I enjoy a good cheeseburger, my favorite bought burger comes from Burger King, it can't be beat! Only thing is, Burger King came up with a slogan over two decades ago, "Have it Your Way." Now that is great when choosing a cheeseburger, but its disastrous when we apply that principle to our Christian life which eeks out into the corporate Christian church.
This church is the LORD"S CHURCH and all of our attitudes and self centered actions and anything you can think of that does not glorify Him, that does not put HIM FIRST says "Lord go and stand over in the corner while I have it my way." The concept of ME church must end in America. "Me Church" is that growth which we have brought in that has hushed the preaching of the penetrating Word of God for a feel good sermon. The same has reduced our once heart felt following of Christ to a bureaucracy of legalisms. Worst of all, "Me Church" divides a united body into factions.

We should never spar about matters that have their roots in what WE want rather than what God wants. The Hymn writer reminds us that "we are not divided, all one body we, one in hope and brotherhood, one in charity." So often we say in our hearts, "I want this to be so, or, I think that 'our' way is best." We say we include God, but He is so eclipsed from our own voice we deceive ourselves and mock His Name.

But when God's people are divided, there is even a greater problem than the internal turmoil...we turn away the lost. Do you know the sinful world watches the church with a sharper eye than the hawk? They may not come out and say it, but I tell you most assuredly that the world wants fulfillment in life and they hear we have it, but want to see it for themselves in action from us. When they hear stories and see the church of Christ have divisions and disputes among us, all one remark is echoed in their hearts: "You see, the Christian has no better hope than we do, why should we give our lives over to this Jesus?"
The message of Eternal Hope cannot be effectively delivered if we are not living in it and applying it in this world.

Folks, the time is short. I know preachers have been saying that all your life, but its true nonetheless. Before our Lord comes we MUST endeavor to have unity in Christ and one another for our sakes, the lost sake (which is our commission to win them) but most of all for Christ's Sake.

The readers of this blog is wide based over the United States and in parts of Europe to the praise of My Lord, but I say this because the divisions are everywhere. They are in your church, they are in my church. To the smallest degree and to the largest degree, Satan wants us divided so our mission in the world will be stained.  What can we do when we see the Unity of the brotherhood in Christ begin to deteriorate????
1. Pray for peace and forgiveness, individually and corporately.

2. Pray that God would cause us to remember that the church is not to be run by factions, but by the Master.

3. Examine. We cannot be the church God intended if we skip our own problems. We must vitally and wholeheartedly look at our lives and see what does not add up to the Word of God and be willing to ADMIT it. Don't pretend to be innocent and everyone else wrong.

4. Surrender, a word by default we don't like. Surrender ourselves to a committed life that ONLY glorifies Christ and not us indirectly or directly.

5. Heal. If we have something against another or a group, ask forgiveness.

6. UNIFY. This simply means everyone get back in line and look towards Christ and not to ourselves, thereby we are helping ourselves and bring glory to Christ.


A divided church is likened unto cancer in the body. Don't let it overtake us as individuals or as a corporate body, there is too much at stake and so little time left in the world.

Lord, our lives, our work, our church is to be about you. Please help us to be unified in You and not placate the flesh as it is so easy. Help me to do my part in making the body of Christ a shining example of what You alone can do in the life of a person and a church. Help us Lord. Amen.

Through The Personal Knowledge

Scripture Reading: 2 Peter 1:1-2

It happens all the time. We take on reading a book or section of the Bible and we are so intense on getting to the meat of the passage that we often run through profound truths....usually contained in the opening of a book. Such is today's example passage. At first glance the greeting is the typical salutation made to the writer's audience. Notice though that Peter or any other writer of the Bible is not writing under their own influence. No word of Scripture is put in for filler or it was just something nice to say with no real meaning. Often times we speak verbosely about nothing with great swelling words, we talk much and say little. This is not the case here. Let's look a the whole passage here below, I have highlighted in blue the "important" parts.

1 ¶ Simon Peter, a servant and an apostle of Jesus Christ, to them that have obtained like precious faith with us through the righteousness of God and our Saviour Jesus Christ:
2 Grace and peace be multiplied unto you through the knowledge of God, and of Jesus our Lord,

Now the whole passage is important, but notice how Peter greets us. This we will look at this week and see how powerful God's Word is, though not always verbose and long winded.

The KEY to all this in the passage is the phrase Through the Knowledge of God. If it is not for our knowledge of Him we have no basis or hope in anything about Him, or about us in Him. Let's examine,

Through the Knowledge of God that ultimately brings about our redemption to those who trust in Christ, we have....Like Precious Faith.

Peter was writing about a Common Faith, or, the same faith he has is the same that all his readers had. Truly there is only one Faith Ephesians 4:5) in the Lord and that is essential. Think how confusing it would be to follow and keep track of a whole string of gods for every detail of life. Pagans had to appease the god of harvest, fertility, hearth and home, the sun, the rain, the soil, the harvest, etc. We have ONE God who is over all. How comforting that is. Now, you may think that Christianity is a convoluted confusion of different sects and teachings. Some interpret one way while others another, so who is right? Those that hold truly to exactly what the Word teaches and not try to throw their own spin from traditionalism or modern thoughts into the mix. Peter not only describes it as the same faith we share but it is precious. In other words the Faith in Christ is to be valued as the rarest gemstone or the most expensive rare antique we can think of. It is precious to us because it is unique, for there is no salvation in any other. The faith is precious on the individual scale for it brings hope, relationship, freedom, and fellowship. The precious part is the benefits which we can have in Christ, freely. There has been no other anything that did so much and cost US nothing. We have never been benefacted so much at so great an expense like we have in Jesus Christ. This makes it precious. Yet the key again, is the knowledge of Christ. He puts within us to know Him personally and thus we find out more and more about Him and the Faith in Him we commit our lives to.

Then there is the second phrase, Grace and Peace, be multiplied unto you. This may sound at first like a nice compliment to make on writing a letter. In fact how many times do we carelessly say, God bless you? Again the words spoken have root and meaning. When Peter announced he wished Grace (unmerited favor of God to Hell bound sinners like me) PLUS peace knowing that through Christ the penalty of sin is taken away, he meant this to comfort them deeply in the soul as it is meant for us. Notice that this state of Grace AND Peace is found only by the knowledge of Christ and God. These two states are not something we can derive for ourselves on our own. These must come from God and none else. These two states are eternal, that is, if we know Christ as Saviour we will always posses these because He possesses us! Mankind can say these words over one another but they are empty unless there is the Spirit of God in the recipient working it in them. Another thing to notice is that we cannot have this Grace and Peace by simply knowing ABOUT God. Peter is not backing a supposition for head knowledge. No the language is intimate and of the heart. It is so dangerous for one to think himself a Christian because he or she has heard the stories in Sunday School or has been under preaching, or has read a book once long ago. To know about Christ is fine, but it should spur us on to know Christ in person and Lordship that makes the difference and the blessing bestowed here in the passage.

Lastly, the Knowledge of Christ is to be multiplied. This simply means it is a growing reproducing state within us. This Knowledge is foundational and builds us to be stronger and more resilient to the world's philosophy and to the evil temptations. Multiplying knowledge is growing us in our remembrance of Christ's atonement for us, lest we soon forget. Also multipying knowledge is to be contagious among its hearers. We need to share it with our brothers in Christ to edify and exhort them when they are going through the rough times. It is also to be shared with the unsaved in the hopes it will draw them to desire to know the Saviour. When something multiplies, it spreads out and covers. This is precisely what Peter hoped to do as his audience was being persecuted sorely.

Final thought: Does the knowledge of God and Christ impact or do anything specific for you? Knowing Christ liberates the soul. The whole sum of our relationship with Christ is based on our knowledge of Christ, NOT just knowing the facts, but knowing the PERSON. If we do not know the Person of Christ we cannot know anything of Christianity. Meaningless prayers, words, liturgies, events, without the proper relational knowledge these have no value.

"Through the personal knowledge," is our conduit or artery that allows us to be all of what a Christian is, without it, we have no faith or hope.

Take time this week to study the openers to books of the Bible, find these key statements that set the whole stage for what we know and who we are in Christ, "Through the Knowledge."

Help us Lord to bask in Your knowledge and to desire to know You better every day. Amen.

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