“Great peace have they which love thy law: and nothing shall offend them.”
Peace is defined as freedom from agitation or disturbance by the passions, as from fear, terror, anger, anxiety or the like; quietness of mind; tranquillity; calmness; quiet of conscience(Webster 1828). When you look within your own life could you say that you have peace in all areas? Living in a sinful world and dealing with sinful people can be quite difficult, but look at your own life for a moment. Are you perfect? Is every thought and deed out of your mouth a true testimony of Jesus Christ? Probably not! There are many Christians that are so quick to be irritated at others for what they do, and they live as if they never irritate anyone. Looking at this scripture tells us that we should never be offended if we truly love the Word of God. Why do believers get so irritated with others? The main problem is because of the pride in their heart. Life is not about you, its about Jesus Christ. How many people do you think you have offended by your actions over the course of your life? Probably too many! Peace comes from living for Jesus Christ! Everyone is sinful, everyone makes mistakes, and everyone offends others. Some people say the Bible is just a book, but its different than any book you could ever read: it tells us about a man who willingly gave His life to save sinners from eternal punishment. It tells us to love our enemies, and suffer persecution for doing what is right. The law in this verse of scripture is referring to the Word of God. Most Christians don’t have peace in their life because their offended at situations that don’t go their way or how they might be treated. The only way to love the law is first to read it, but then apply it in your life! If your offended at what other people do, your not allowing the Word of God to guide you through this sin cursed world! Don’t be offended!
Memory Verse Week 4/30/18
Psalm 119:165
“Great peace have they which love thy law: and nothing shall offend them.”
Hatred is a terrible thing. Its unfortunate that many believers live their lives with hatred in their hearts toward others. There are situations that arise in the lives of believers and the truth is, they were done wrong; but what does it truly mean to be a Christian? Having the mentality of an eye for an eye and tooth for a tooth is typically how it goes, but that’s not how Jesus Christ commands us to live. We are to love our enemies! Psalm 119:165 “Great peace have they which love thy law: and nothing shall offend them.” Don’t allow hatred to build in your heart toward others. Its hard to overcome things when your done wrong, but God gave us His Word to overcome all sin. Do you have a daily walk with the Lord? Is your Bible reading and prayer life consistent? Sometimes believers are not even wronged, but they carry hatred with them every day of their life. Why is that? Jesus Christ was beaten beyond recognition by a people who hated him, but yet He still loved them. He never fought back with anyone because He was setting the example of how we should treat others. There are many that had a hand in the death of Christ. They were full of hatred. Today, many of those souls are burning in hell because of the hatred they had in their hearts. Look at Proverbs 26:27 again; “Whoso diggeth a pit shall fall therein: and he that rolleth a stone, it will return upon him.” These are the folks with hatred in their heart! Is God’s Word perfect? Yes it is! 100%(in the KJV) If you set out to hurt others just know that God will deal with you the way he deals with the hateful! Live for Him! “Great peace have they which love thy law: and nothing shall offend them.” If Jesus Christ is your Savior, you should not be acting like those that are lost in their sin. The Word of God will help you overcome, but you have to first, read it, and then apply it in your life!
Many people get the idea that serving God is a boring miserable life, but according to the Bible its not that way at all. One great thing about God is that He cant lie about anything! He is too perfect to be dishonest about anything He says. Numbers 23:19 “God is not a man, that he should lie; neither the son of man, that he should repent: hath he said, and shall he not do it? or hath he spoken, and shall he not make it good?” In Vs 19 there is a little four letter word that is used in the wrong way many times; “fear”. Is it wrong to have fear? God has told us that we should fear Him and not man. Proverbs 1:7 “The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge……” Proverbs 9:10 “The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom….” Proverbs 8:13 “The fear of the Lord is to hate evil: pride, arrogancy, and the evil way, and the froward mouth, do I hate.” The Bible teaches us that we are to fear God, but the devil takes this word and causes us to sin against God. Many times, fear keeps the Christian in the corner. To afraid to pass out gospel tracts, to afraid to walk separated, to afraid of rejection because of Jesus Christ. Proverbs 29:25 “The fear of man bringeth a snare: but whoso putteth his trust in the LORD shall be safe.” When fear is used in the right way, God will do great things in your life. Bad fear causes sin and emptiness, but when we look at this Psalm again we can see that fearing God brings blessings into our lives. Do you want God to hear your prayer? The Bible says that when we fear Him, He will fulfill our desires! Its a condition of the heart, yes, its easy to fail, but every morning you should set in your heart to do your best and not walk in the ways of the world. Read over the verses in Psalm 145 again. God is a great God! He loves His people! If you obey His Word, what will He do in your life? Remember, He cant lie!
The word prepare simply means to make ready. Every hunter is very familiar with this term. Before hunting season opens there are many things to put in order before opening day arrives. Turkey calls, camo, vest, boots, turkey loads and a shotgun are some things most hunters prepare, before that opening day. There is one thing that many turkey or deer hunters refuse to prepare for: the hunting regulations! There are too many hunters that never read the hunting laws and then get upset when they get into trouble. Many hunters have an I don’t care attitude when it comes to abiding by the hunting laws. So many are relying on their knowledge from what they learned five years ago. Its no wonder people get into trouble! Read your game laws before every new season opens and prepare yourselves to keep out of trouble. We can look at this verse of scripture and see that the heart is the key element to success. Ezra had prepared his heart; God can see everything in our hearts! What does He see in yours? Jeremiah 17:9-10 “The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it? I the LORD search the heart, I try the reins, even to give every man according to his ways and according to the fruit of his doings.” If your a born again believer, how do you prepare your heart? Do you have a willingness to do right or wrong? Every believer needs to make a conscious decision that they want to cease from all sin in their life. James 4:17 “Therefore to him that knoweth to do good, and doeth it not, to him it is sin.” As you prepare your heart to serve the Lord you must say you want sin out of your life! The reason why hunters get into trouble is because they don’t care whether they do right or wrong, they don’t read the new laws, and finally when the day of the hunt arrives, there is a good chance they will make a bad decision. What is the law of the Lord? It is the Word of God. Most Christians don’t read their Bibles because they don’t desire to do right in every area of their life. Look at what Ezra did, he prepared his heart to know the Word of God, but he didn’t just stop there, he also did it. When we read our Bible’s we need to go the extra step and do what it tells us to do. Ezra was a spiritual leader and you too will become a spiritual leader in the lives of others as you study the Word and then apply it in your life!
Your driving down a back road and see two hunters dressed in camo or hunter orange, loading up a deer; do you think to yourself, are those guys hunters? Or maybe they don’t even have a deer, but just dressed for the field with gun or bow in hand! Let’s say you stop to have conversation with them! Do you ask them if they are hunters? Do they say to you we are hunters? No, that is obvious! Most of the time you can tell a hunter from a non hunter by how they act, how they talk, how they dress, or even a dead animal in the back of the truck! When you go hunting and bump into others you surely don’t have to tell them your a hunter, they can figure it out real quick. Where is Christianity today? What makes someone a Christian? Its sad to see religion across the country and the world, that quickly say, I am a Christian, but yet their deeds and lifestyle don’t add up to anything but sin. We can see in this passage of scripture that the first term of Christian came about at Antioch. Paul and Barnabas are two names mentioned in this passage of scripture. There are some important things to know about these two that would signify Christian: it appears that Barnabas may have received Jesus Christ as his Savior in Acts chapter four, it may have been prior, but it is certain he was saved. Paul, who is still called Saul at this point was saved in Acts chapter nine on the road to Damascus. When Paul and Barnabas was saved they were not called Christians even at that point, but we can draw the conclusion that as they lived Godly and holy lives they were identified as Christians. In these two verses of scripture we can see that they were preaching the gospel and assembling with the church! Are you a Christian? Do you tell yourself your a Christian, or do others see Jesus Christ living in you? Ephesians 2:10 “For we are his workmanship created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them.” Salvation must come before good works, but after we are saved the world should see Jesus Christ living in you! Are you at church faithfully? Are you preaching the gospel of Jesus Christ to others? If your not doing these two things, how does the world identify you to be a Christian? Remember its that camo and bow that makes things obvious! When your soul-winning, people will see that your a Christian and you wont have to tell them!
The disciples had been locked in prison because of their boldness in telling others about Jesus Christ. In the same chapter of scripture the Bible tells us that an angel had unlocked the prison doors and commanded them to go speak in the temple. In this passage of scripture we can see how the disciples responded as they were questioned by the high priest, “We ought to obey God rather than men.” Its unfortunate that many believers take this passage of scripture out of context. In Mark 16:15 “And he said unto them, Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel to every creature.” When God gives us direction in the Bible we must follow the commands of God rather than man. It is the will of God for everyone to be saved, we must not allow man to stop us from God’s command in preaching the gospel. The devil is at work and his desire is to keep everyone from heaven. We must tell others about Jesus Christ! So, where do people take this out of context? There was a hunter one time that was new into hunting, he decided to squeeze the release on a small buck. After retrieving the deer he decided to allow the land owner to tag the buck he killed so he could continue hunting. After confronting the hunter about his actions he quickly responded along the lines of God giving us the animals and there are times in the Bible when you don’t have to follow the law. He was very unlearned and ignorant to the Word of God. There have been many others that convince themselves that there is nothing wrong with bagging or tagging multiple animals that they don’t have tags for. If you put a tag on your buddies deer or turkey, that means you willingly put incorrect information on your game tag. The Bible still calls that lying, “thou shalt not bear false witness.” There is never a time that God leads you to break game laws. Read Romans chapter 13, God gives us very clear instruction to abide by the laws of the land; Vs 2 “Whosoever therefore resisteth the power, resisteth the ordinance of God: and they that resist shall receive to themselves damnation.” So when is it ok to break the law? When we look at the Bible the only exception we can find is for the will of God. What is the will of God? John 6:40 says its “to believe on the Son.” Peter had an exception in breaking the law, he was following the command of God in spreading the gospel. Don’t forget that hell is forever. If your a believer, don’t be a bad testimony when your chasing a wild animal! James 4:17 “Therefore to him that knoweth to do good, and doeth it not, to him it is sin.”
Amos 3:3 tells us: “Can two walk together, except they be agreed?” The answer is simply no. Do you get along well with those who disagree with you? Its hard to! Many times, almost impossible. In this context of scripture the children of Israel are going to be marching into the promise land and driving out all the wicked inhabitants. God gives very clear instructions that they must not allow any of these wicked people remain within their soon to be nation. Human nature says that if we hang around our sinful friends enough we can be an influence on them, but in reality, the believer is the one who begins to feel pain as their life is slowly turned into a world of iniquity. Don’t forget that Jesus sat and ate with publicans and sinners. We must tell this world about Jesus! Many more times in the Bible God gives us clear commands that we are not to walk with the sinful crowd. Sinful, meaning those that are unsaved or even those that are saved but live a backslidden life. Have you ever been poked in the eye? Have you ever walked through a brier patch trying to bust out a rabbit or track a wounded deer? Even in turkey hunting there are multiflora roses that latch on to you before you get set on that gobbling bird! Getting poked in the eye feels terrible and thorns tend to leave some pain and marks for a few days. Does it kill you? “No”, but it is painful. God tells Israel they must not allow these sinful people to remain among their nation. If they refuse to follow instructions they will bring some great pain to their life. The word vex means to irritate; to make angry by little provocation. God even goes on to say if you disobey Me, I will bring into your life what I was planning to do to the sinful God rejecting nations. Sometimes it seems easier to go with the flow, but remember the pain and suffering of poked out eyes and thorns in the side!