Christ and Fire

On September eleven much of the world remembers the suicidal burning of the Twin Towers in New York City. Many of us who watched on television, in horror, the fiery burning attack, will never forget the sullen moments spent in a daze and thoughts of the great death toll. While thousands got out and survived, several thousand died. We were reminded that fire means injury and death to the human body. The fire and smoke distinguished the stricken buildings. Yet, in the Bible (Daniel 3), we read of men who endured fire without injury and death.
Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon had ordered that those who did not fall down in worship of his image would be put to death in a fiery furnace. Three Hebrew men refused the king's command and were cast into the fiery furnace; only they did not die. They survived, totally unharmed by the command and presence of God/Jehovah with them. That was a fiery and real trial of their faith and trust in God.

Another example of fire in the Bible is when the young man Isaiah was called to be a prophet. This was not a "fire of testing" but a "fire of cleansing." In Isaiah 6:5f..."Then said I, Woe is me! for I am undone; because I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips,...Then flew one of the seraphims unto me, having a live coal in his hand, which he had taken wth the tongs from off the altar; And he laid it upon my mouth, and said: Lo, this hath touched thy lips; and thine iniquity is taken away, and thy sin purged"(KJV). Not only does fire test and cleanse it also separates (fire of separation) in a friction of truth and error, righteousness and unrighteousness, obedience and sin, faith/belief and disobedience or unbelief.

Jesus said to His hearers in Luke 12:49 "I am come to send "fire" on the earth; and what will I, if it be already kindled?"(KJV) Because of the fiery anger of the rulers of the Jews at Jesus whom they had called a blasphemer, WHO MADE HIMSELF TO BE THE SON OF GOD the Messiah, he was crucified in the heat of the friction of unbelief with TRUTH. But the fire of death's Hell (Geennan)could not hold Him. He arose in purity and holiness with a great victory. Jesus is the Son of God; victor over Satan, death and hell.

He, our Lord, endured the "fiery judgment" of our sins and by His stripes we are healed and saved through our faith in Him. We are secured from the coming purging of the disobedient/unbeliever from the saved ones who have passed the fiery test of faith in the saving power of the blood of Christ poured out in a holy sacrifice on the cross. We are set free by our faith, alone in Him, to save and purify us for Himself. We will never experience the "fiery pain" of torment and the "separation of fire" in the lake of fire which is the second death (Revelation 20:14,15).

FIRE SERMON
Our God is a consuming fire for it says in Deut. 4:24: "for the Lord your God is a consuming fire, a jealous God" NIV. The Lord Yehovah tolerates no other gods in our lives as His children and people. Truly, there are no other real gods but people make gods of many things that are material and not spiritual. Our Lord God is Spirit and life- giving.

Fire shows God's presence in His holiness and purity of being. It shows His nearness and knowledge of His people. Fire shows God's concern and protection of His people. He gave Israel a pillar of fire by night (Ex. 13:21). It shows that He will accept atonement for sin which must be forsaken in repentance and paid for (Lev.1f,2f; Jos. 13:14).

Finally there is strange fire which is not of the Lord's doing, presence and will (Lev. 10:1). This is sin's fire of disobedience to the Lord, and it defiles and destroys. It is not a blessed burning away of the effects of sin on the sinner, but it brings loss and death. The fire of God's Holy Spirit will take away/burn away our evil desires and give to us a new love and desire to please and praise our God and Lord (Acts 2:1f).

You need the mighty power of God's presence and fire of purging of sin's dross to make you a flame of His presence in your daily life, while giving the light of Christ to your community and neighborhood.

GALATIANS MESSAGES
THE GOSPEL

The Apostle Paul was not only an evangelist and church planter, but also an ongoing pastor to believers. Wherever he was, he would always remember those young churches of converts to Jesus Christ. Their needs and faithfulness to the Lordship of Jesus Christ were his daily concerns.
Jesus Christ, the anointed and risen Saviour, God's only eternal Son, solely paid the price of each believer's sin debt. Instead of, in our place and for our sins, Jesus died and arose. In Galatians, chapter one, verses one through five, the Apostle Paul summarized the basic history of what happened in Christ Jesus for the sins of the world.

First of all, Paul was specifically called to apostleship and the Gospel ministry by Jesus Christ , when he was not yet in full understanding of what his young life would all be about. We find this in Acts chapter nine. Other men, no high priest, no Jewish Pharisee or ruler, called and made Saul, the young aspiring pharisaical man to serve the cause of Christ. All of them were opposed to the Gospel of Jesus Christ. They did not want the Jewish people to become followers of Jesus of Nazareth. It was Jesus Christ Himself, according to the will of God the Father, who called Saul, the young man, to become Paul and to give his lifetime to preaching Jesus is the Christ.

The resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead by God the Father, was the miracle which Paul personally received witness of. This was the momentous great miracle that came to grip Paul's life. Paul says plainly and forthrightly God raised Jesus: "... whom the Father raised ("egeipantos" Gk. from "egeiro" to raise up) from the dead " ("nekon"Gk. from "nekros" meaning dead or without life) in verse one. Jesus had literally died physically, as each human being dies in physical death. Saul/Paul had no doubts to the fact of the death of Jesus on the cross at Calvary. However, he was met by Jesus Christ while on the road to Damascus to arrest Christians for teaching a resurrected Jesus.

Today many of us read and listen to words of the Scripture and neglect to fully consider the great effect the resurrected Jesus had on the believers in the early days of the Church. I think in America we don't appreciate the resurrection message of Christ Jesus to its fullest. Why don't more people go through a great change of life today, as the Apostle Paul did upon meeting Jesus, through the message of the Gospel? People are not getting the point of the message. And that point is: each one is truly a sinner deserving death and its hellish consequences. But, then Jesus has died an awful death in the sinner's stead, paying sin's penalty for each one who would call upon the name of Jesus as Savior and Lord. And, God the Holy Father raised His only begotten Son from the sinner's death grave, accepting Christ's full and justifing death in our stead. He gave His life's blood for us.

The only way our individual lives on earth can come to please God, is through Christ Jesus totally saving us from our sin debt and by His continuing to save us today to serve Him by His great presence and power. Each one must repent and turn to Jesus so that he will be blessed with the great peace of God, in this troubled world of sin and strife. It is glory and praise to God alone, through Christ, that we can be marvelously saved for today and forever.SAVED BY GRACE

People in the world religiously try in many ways through human effort or works to find favor with God as they have heard of Him. The Jewish people had received the Law of Moses about four hundred years after they had grown into a nation of people who had descended from Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. Although they had the law, they transgressed the Law and came under its curse.

The Law could not save or justify a sinner to make him/her pleasing in the sight of Jehovah God. Sin's penalty must be paid by a sinless one, who could bring the sinner before the Heavenly Father as redeemed.
Jehovah God had called and had made a holy promise/covenant with Abram/Abraham in Genesis 12, 15, 17 and 21. This covenant was fulfilled in Christ Jesus who through faith in Him saves everyone who believes/trusts in Him.

In Galatians one Paul affirms that this is the one true Gospel of Jesus Christ and God. Some false brethren had gone to the young believers, spoken of in Galatians one, and had told them they must practice the customs of the Jews including circumcision and certain aspects of the rites/ritual/laws of the Jews to be saved and to be part of the blessings of God upon the Jewish nation. Paul points out to his readers that even Peter and Barnabas were caught up in this false perversion of the Gospel when some Jewish preachers falsely and secretly came and made a distinction between Jewish believers and Gentile believers and would not share together with Gentiles in full fellowship and communion.

The Gospel of Christ which Paul received by revelation while alone in Arabia, is a message of grace and liberty/freedom to serve God in the power of the Holy Spirit's work in the hearts and lives of Christians. The Gospel of Christ Jesus is not a new Gospel or a sudden and late change but a true fulfillment of Jehovah's plan throughout the Old Testament, to bless and to save a people of God who in the faith of Abraham would become heirs of sonship/adoption into the family of God. Paul calls us the Israel of God. See Galatians 6:16.

The Jewish people were taught and had sought to live according to the Law and its practice/promises until the Christ/anointed savior, who would fulfill the requirements of the Law, came as promised in the Holy Scriptures. In the redeemed family of Christ and God, Gentiles (non Jews) are in Christ Jesus joint-heirs of the promises of God as given to the Old Testament saints. We Gentiles do not need in some way to become Jewish in order to be part of the family of promise/faith and the sons of God.

In Galatians chapter two verses sixteen through twenty-one Paul tells us that justification of sinners in found through faith in Jesus Christ and not in works of the Law. Justification ("dikaioutai"Gk. from "dikaiao" being declared righteous) is not of self but of God in Christ. The language here is passive voice meaning that the sinner does not actively save himself but in faith is saved by Jesus Christ. Paul says that in Christ's crucifixion he (Paul) died to and for the Law's penalty. He died in Christ and through Christ's resurrection he now lives ("zao" Gk. meaning to live) in Christ. Paul now lives and serves Christ in his fleshly ("sarki" Gk. fleshly body, which without regeneration would live a life prone to sin) body. See verse twenty.

It is the love found in Christ Jesus which brings salvation for the sinner about, in the holiness of the Holy Spirit, of Christ and God the Father, living in each believer. Our new life in Christ is a free gift of love ("agape" Gk. God's love as found in John 3:16).

There is one true people of God and they are individual people who repent of fleshly works and turn to a new life in Christ by their faith in Him as Savior and Lord. Have you received the witness of Christ living in you by your confession of faith/commitment in Him?