August 24, 2013
“… In the… confirmation of the gospel, you all are partakers with me…” (Philippians 1:7)
When the Apostle Paul writes the confirmation of the gospel he is referring to a great experience he had in his preaching ministry. As a great scholar, (and because he could do it), Paul quoted Greek philosophers and poets while preaching in Athens. But as a result of that sermon very few believed; just a few individuals are named. There is no letter of Paul to a church in Athens found in the New Testament.
When he was called to preach the gospel in Corinth immediately after Athens, he was frightened. You would have been frightened too. Jesus Christ had never been preached there. The city of Corinth was exceedingly sinful. It was considered profanity to call someone a Corinthian. Corinth had many temples where temple prostitutes were offered to those who worshiped an erotic god by engaging in all kinds of sexual perversions. A worshiper would be offered little boys or little girls if that was their pleasure.
God appeared to Paul in Corinth and told him not to be afraid because He had many people in that city. God told Paul if he would simply preach that Christ died and was raised again for our sins he would find out who those people were. That is what he meant by the confirmation of the gospel. He preached the gospel in Corinth and many believed. He wrote to the Romans that he was eager to preach the gospel in Rome because everywhere he proclaimed the gospel he found out who God’s people were. He was sure that would happen in Rome also.
Do you have the faith to share the gospel – and find out who God’s people are?
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Uncategorized | Tagged: faith, Philippians 1:7, preaching the Word, salvation, the Apostle Paul, The Gospel | 
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Posted by Dick Woodward
August 21, 2013
“But I want you to know, brethren, that the things which happened to me have actually turned out for the furtherance of the gospel… ” (Philippians 1:12)
Paul is in prison as he writes to his favorite church. While he was free he preached the gospel with passion and great zeal, but when he was put in prison and could not preach other men in the Church at Philippi began preaching. That rejoiced the heart of the apostle.
In the New Testament when you study the letters of Paul and others you find that the early churches had pastors. Anytime the word pastor is found it is in the plural unless it is referring to Jesus Christ. He is the great Shepherd of the sheep; otherwise, churches have pastors. Strictly speaking you will not find a precedent for “Dr. Pete Bunny the pastor of the First Community Church of Chicago” in the New Testament.
I am convinced that the first churches also had a plurality of preachers. That’s why the fact that many men in the Church at Philippi were preaching rejoiced the heart of the apostle. Church is a team sport. Based on their cluster of spiritual gifts some are called and equipped to preach. They should preach. Some should heal, some should teach and some should evangelize. All of this should result in the furtherance of the gospel.
Our churches would be more effective in furthering the gospel and we would solve so very many problems if we took our blueprints from the New Testament. We would not need as many retreat centers for burned out pastors if we did.
When will we ever learn that when all else fails we should follow the directions?
4 Comments | Uncategorized | Tagged: church, faith, Jesus, Philippians 1:12, preaching, preaching the Word, religion, the Apostle Paul, The Gospel, theology | Permalink
Posted by Dick Woodward
August 19, 2013
“There is nothing that enters a man from outside which can defile him; but the things which come out of him, those are the things that defile a man.” (Mark 7:15)
When I was in college the popular thinking in academic circles was that until a child was born it was all about heredity and after a child was born all that mattered was environment. The political philosophy of people like Lynden Baines Johnson and his Great Society was that if we improve the environment of a person we will solve their problems.
As a social worker that didn’t work for me. For example, I once found a marvelous foster home for a 12 year old boy from the ghetto of a large city. An older couple had a very large farm and they wanted to share it with an adopted son. All the way to the farm I explained to him what an opportunity this was for him. By the time I arrived back to my office I had a message from the perspective foster mother telling me to pick up “this little thief.” He had stolen from the purses of ladies who had come to play bridge with her.
Changing the young man’s environment did not change him from the inside out or in his heart. In the passage from which the verse above is taken Jesus went on to explain that the issues of life that determine the character of a human being are not a matter of outside in influences. Rather they are the inside out influences of the heart.
That is why the prayers of discerning hearts are: “Search me Oh God and know my heart.” And “Create in me a clean heart, O God.” (Psalm 139: 23; Psalm 51: 10)
1 Comment | Uncategorized | Tagged: faith, Mark 7:16, Psalm 139, religion, spirituality, Teachings of Jesus, transformation | Permalink
Posted by Dick Woodward
August 16, 2013
“Humble yourselves therefore under the mighty hand of God, that He may exalt you in due time.” (1 Peter 5:6)
Humility is a standard Peter sets for leaders. He writes that leaders should lead as examples and not as lords over the flock they shepherd. Humility is a challenging concept. If we think we are humble we are probably not humble. You probably heard of the church that gave its pastor a medal for humility but had to take it back because he wore it every Sunday.
In Scotland a young seminary graduate was to give the sermon as a candidate for a church that had an elderly pastor about to retire. The pulpit was one of those old elevated ones that you had to climb many steps in order to preach. With a pride that bordered on arrogance the young man climbed up to preach. He had a disaster of a sermon. When he came down in tears the old retiring pastor said to him, “Lad if you had gone up the way you came down you would have come down the way you went up!”
The verse quoted describes a covenant with God’s part and our part. Our part is to humble ourselves. It is God’s part to exalt us. C. S. Lewis wrote that pride is the mother of all sins. “To live above with the saints we have loved Oh that will be glory. But to live below with those we know that’s another story.” As a veteran pastor I can tell you that when there is a sharp dispute among two disciples a pastor will often find somebody’s pride at the bottom of the dispute.
Humble yourself. That’s your business. Exalting you is God’s business.
1 Comment | Uncategorized | Tagged: church, faith, Faith-based leadership, humility, I Peter 5:6, pride, religion, spiritual leadership, theology | Permalink
Posted by Dick Woodward
August 9, 2013
“Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works and glorify your Father in heaven.” (Matthew 5:16)
The applications of our Lord’s metaphors are almost endless. One application to the metaphor above is that for our candle to give light it must be consumed. Unlighted candles are not consumed, but the candles that shine are the candles that burn. There is no shining without burning.
In another great metaphor Jesus told us there is no such thing as a fruitless disciple of His. We are like branches and He is the Vine. As branches, if we are properly intersected with Him, we can draw from Him the life force to be fruitful. He promised if we are plugged into Him and are fruitful we will be cut back and pruned to be made more fruitful. Cutbacks and pruning can really hurt. They can come in the form of suffering but they improve the quality and the quantity of our fruit.
In light of these very clear teachings we should not be surprised when we find ourselves burning through suffering that our brightest light for Christ yields the best fruit.
Like many others I thought my most fruitful years were when I was able bodied and active. But I have been joyfully surprised to discover that my most fruitful service for Christ has been as a bed fast quadriplegic. Using voice activated computer software from my bed, 782 Bible studies have been produced and are being heard in 31 languages in 60 countries. Worldwide more than 45,000 small groups are listening to our studies on solar powered digital audio players I call “God pods.”
Have you discovered there is no shining without burning?
2 Comments | Uncategorized | Tagged: faith, faith & suffering, fruitful disciples, fruitful ministry, Jesus, John 15, Matthew 5, religion, sermon on the mount, spirituality, theology | Permalink
Posted by Dick Woodward
August 6, 2013
“Throw yourselves into the work of the Master, confident that nothing you do for Him is a waste of time or effort.” (1 Corinthians 15:58, The Message)
We are exhorted by the Apostle John to confess Jesus Christ (1 John 4). That is a compound Greek word that means to speak the same thing or to agree with the values of Jesus. I challenge you to clarify your value system and apply these eternal values I have focused for you. The eighth and final eternal value is: the work of God is a greater value than the works of man.
In his two swan songs (Psalm 127 and the book of Ecclesiastes) Solomon told us it is possible to work very hard in vain our entire lives when we work for the wrong things.
Many years ago a Methodist missionary, who had labored in India for fifty years, was saying farewell to the people of India, whom he loved very much. He had won the respect of many of the large gathering of influential, high-caste Indian political and professional leaders who gathered for his farewell address. After he proclaimed the Gospel that night in the mighty energizing power of the Holy Spirit, his concluding words to them were: “If what I have told you tonight and for the past fifty years isn’t true, it doesn’t matter; but, if what I have told you is true, then nothing else matters!”
I want to conclude my perspective on these eternal values the same way that missionary concluded his message to those leaders in India. If what I have written about the meaning of these eternal values isn’t true, then what I have written here doesn’t matter. But, if what I have written here is true, then nothing else matters!
2 Comments | Uncategorized | Tagged: book of ecclesiastes, eternal life, eternal values, faith, King Solomon, religion, theology, Wisdom | Permalink
Posted by Dick Woodward
August 2, 2013
“I passed on to you what was most important and what had also been passed on to me — that Christ died for our sins, just as the Scriptures said. He was buried, and he was raised from the dead on the third day, as the Scriptures said.” (1 Corinthians 15: 3-4)
I have now shared with you six eternal values that are the hallmark of people who live life in Christ at its deepest level of meaning and then “graduate” into eternal life. There is another value I must share with you because it is the supreme and absolute value, the “door” that must be opened if we are to find all these eternal values. This seventh value is the value we place on the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. Let me explain.
Suppose I asked you to write your answer to this question: “What is the Gospel?” Imagine that I asked you to accompany your answer with Scripture verse references. How would you answer my question?
As you search the Scriptures, you will discover the seventh eternal value: Easter is far more important than Christmas. When the Apostle John wrote his Gospel, he devoted approximately half his twenty-one chapters to the thirty-three years Jesus lived on earth and half his chapters to just the last week Jesus lived. Of the eighty-nine combined chapters of the four Gospels, four chapters cover the birth and first thirty years Jesus lived, while twenty-seven chapters cover the last week Jesus lived. Why is the last week of the life of Jesus so very important, and why is Easter far more important than Christmas?
Easter is when Jesus died and rose again for our salvation. The cry of the church all over the world on Resurrection Sunday is:
He is risen, indeed.
1 Comment | Uncategorized | Tagged: Easter, eternal values, faith, Gospel of Jesus Christ, I Corinthians 15, Jesus Christ, religion, resurrection of jesus christ, Scripture study, theology | Permalink
Posted by Dick Woodward
July 30, 2013
“…flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God.” . (1Corinthians 15:50)
Another arresting statement made by Paul in his great resurrection chapter is that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God, because corruption cannot inherit incorruption. What Paul means by this statement is that we cannot go to heaven with a physical body. When God decides that He wants us in heaven, He must perform a metamorphosis on us that prepares us to spend eternity with Him in heaven. God works that miracle metamorphosis through our death and resurrection.
As Paul describes the resurrection of believers at the time of the second coming of Jesus Christ he also tells us that those who are living when Jesus returns will be changed. They must be changed because they cannot enter into heaven with their physical bodies. They, too, must experience a miracle metamorphosis to prepare them for heaven.
Here Paul is declaring a sixth eternal value: our heavenly bodies will be so much greater than our physical bodies we must experience a metamorphosis to live forever in heaven. This is just one more way the Scripture consistently tells us that heaven is greater than earth and the best things in life for believers await them in the eternal dimension of life.
The Shepherd Psalm of David tells us that God makes us lie down to discover the green pastures and still waters of life. But, then we get up again and the green pastures turn brown and the still waters become disturbed. Many see a metaphor of the believer’s death as the Great Shepherd coming into our life making us lie down in death that He might give us the green pastures that never turn brown and the still waters that never become disturbed in heaven.
2 Comments | Uncategorized | Tagged: christianity, eternal values, faith, Heaven, I Corinthians 15:50, religion, Resurrection, Saint Paul, Shepherd Psalm, theology | Permalink
Posted by Dick Woodward
July 27, 2013
“And forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors.” (Matthew 6:12)
Years ago I heard an Anglican Canon from Australia coin a new word when he said, “The greatest obstacle to inner healing is unforgiveness. We may be experiencing unforgiveness because we lack the assurance of God’s forgiveness, or the forgiveness of people against whom we have sinned. The source of our unforgiveness may also be that we will not forgive people who have sinned against us.”
Canon Glennon then gave many examples of people who had been brutally abused and told how their rage and hunger for revenge had retarded their own inner healing. Consider the perfect wisdom of our Lord Who prescribed that we should pray, as some translations have it, “Forgive us our sins as we have already forgiven those who sin against us.”
Forgiveness declares a fifth eternal value: Inner healing is a greater value than physical healing.
When we confess our sins we need to forget what God forgets and remember what God remembers. God forgives and God forgets our sins. We have God’s Word for that. In the New Testament we are promised that, “If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness” (1 John 1:9). In the Old Testament, God clearly tells us, “Their sins I will remember no more” (Jeremiah 31:34). However, God remembers that we are sinners. We forget we are sinners. (That is at least one reason why we fall into sin again and again.)
When we confess our sins but keep remembering them after God has forgiven us, our guilt baggage shows that our faith is flawed after God has long forgotten our sins.
2 Comments | Uncategorized | Tagged: Disciples Prayer, etneral values, faith, Forgiveness, inner healing, Matthew 6:12, the Our Father | Permalink
Posted by Dick Woodward
July 24, 2013
“Even though our outward man is perishing, yet the inward man is being renewed day by day.” (2 Corinthians 4: 16)
Many years ago when John Quincy Adams began crossing a street, he was in such poor health it took him five minutes to approach the other side. A friend who was passing that way asked, “How is John Quincy Adams this morning?” He replied, “John Quincy Adams is doing just fine. The house he lives in is in sad disrepair. In fact, it is so dilapidated, John Quincy Adams may have to move out soon, but John Quincy Adams is doing just fine, thank you!”
John Quincy Adams was no doubt acquainted with the verse of Scripture I have quoted. Paul writes that we have an outward man and an inward man. In two of my favorite translations the outward man, or our body, is referred to as a common earthenware jar and a little clay pot (JB Phillips and the Living Bible Paraphrased.)
Paul declares a fourth eternal value: Our inward man is a greater value than our outward man. These verses Paul wrote to console those who were persecuted at that time are also a consolation for persecuted believers today or those who may be in the final stages of cancer that is causing their physical bodies to perish. When they have prayed for healing and it appears that God is taking them home, their inward man can be renewed while their outward man is wasting away.
As some believers study the resurrection chapter they want to believe they will hold on to their physical body. The great news is God is going to replace our little clay pots with spiritual bodies.
5 Comments | Uncategorized | Tagged: 2 Corinthians 4, christianity, eternal values, faith, Heaven, John Quincy Adams, religion, Saint Paul, spiritual bodies, the Resurrection of Christ, theology | Permalink
Posted by Dick Woodward
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