Glory to God in the Highest!

Two thousand years ago an angel stood in a field before shepherds and the glory of the Lord shone all around. He told them they would find a babe wrapped in swaddling clothes who was Messiah, the Lord. Then, a host of angels stood with the angel and called out “Glory to God in the highest, And on earth peace, goodwill toward men!”

This appearance of the glory of God had not taken place in over 600 years. In Ezekiel chapter ten, Ezekiel, is taken from the captives in Babylon to Jerusalem where he sees the glory of God leave the temple by way of the east gate then the Mount of Olives.

For hundreds of years the people of Israel had been serving God with their lips but their hearts were far from Him. They tolerated sin and compromise, they wanted to be like the world around them and were altogether carnal. There was no desire for purity or sincerity as they worshiped God, and the glory left.

Six hundred years later, the Glory returns and not only in that field where that angel announced the birth of the Messiah. John tells us, “In the beginning was the Word. and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.” And in John 1:14 we are told, “And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the father, full of grace and truth.”

The return of the Glory to Israel after 600 years was that Babe born in a barn and laid in a saliva streaked manger, showing that despite the glory revealed, God is not afraid to get close to mankind.

Have a blessed Christmas and may the Glory of God fill your lives and home as you stay close to the Living God!

The Importance of Worship

Ephesians 5:19 - "speaking to one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody in your heart to the Lord,"


The importance of worship is easy to overlook or replace with service. However, I believe real effective service comes out of a life that is in real worship of the Living God.

Let's start with a definition of worship. When we worship, we give adoration, devotion, affection, and love to the living God. We can do this by bowing before Him, singing to Him, being in quiet submission to Him, lifting our hands to Him, and telling Him all the things in our hearts.

Public worship is also important because it makes a statement that we have given our lives to Him. Our public worship should be an extension of our private lives. If it is not, then it is easy to start to do things in public worship for show instead of true Spirit-led worship.

Jesus told the woman at the well that the Father was looking for those who would worship Him in spirit and in truth. In our times it is not where we go to worship that matters, but that we are worshiping Him in spirit and truth. Paul and Silas began to worship in a Philippian jail. As they sang worship songs in the middle of the night, their chains fell off. Could this be a symbol that those things that bind us fall off as we put God in the right place in our lives?

The Bible also tells us God inhabits the praises of His people. We already know that God is everywhere. However, when we worship him, He is with us in a special way. This verse tells us to speak to one another as we worship the Lord. This is a command for public worship. As we worship together, we encourage each other to be worshipers.

Blessings,

Robert Furrow

Filled with the Spirit

Ephesians 5:18 - "And do not be drunk with wine, in which is dissipation; but be filled with the Spirit,"


Talk about a verse that has been misused. When I was younger I attended a church that believed you could get drunk in the Spirit. The Bible tells us we can be filled with the spirit, receive the Spirit, be anointed by the Spirit, led by the Spirit, and guided by the Spirit. There is a reference to being baptized with the Spirit. You can have the Spirit with you, in you, and upon you. You can walk by the Spirit, have the fruit of the Spirit, or grieve the Spirit. But the Bible never says you can
be drunk in the Spirit.

So why did my little church then and a few churches today have people stumbling around acting drunk in the middle of a worship service? I could say, "Because it takes all kinds." Some people just act weird. One of the fruits of the Spirit is self-control, so why would the Spirit fill you and take you out of control? The Bible also says, within the context of spiritual gifts and the Spirit moving in the church, that all things are to be done in an orderly fashion.

Ok, so why are they acting drunk? Because they use this verse as a comparison: "Do not be drunk with wine...but be filled with the spirit." They say this means you can get drunk in the Spirit because the passage compares the two - wine and the Spirit. However this is not a passage of
comparison but of contrast - wine vs. the Spirit.

What a great difference there is between being drunk with wine and being filled with the Spirit. You are never more out of control when you are drunk. And you are never in more control when you are anointed by the Holy Spirit. When you are drunk you are self-seeking. When you are filled with the Spirit you are sacrifice for other people because the fruit of the Spirit is love. When you are drunk you destroy brain cells, relationships, cars, etc. When you are filled with the Spirit you are mindful of the things of God and use your spiritual gifts to minister to other people.

The Bible says if we walk in the Spirit we will not fulfill the things of the flesh and that we overcome the flesh by the work of the Spirit. The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self control.

Father, empower us with Your Spirit that we may be filled with Your power to do Your work until You come.

Blessings,

Robert Furrow

Buying Back Time

Ephesians 5:16, 17 - "redeeming the time, because the days are evil. Therefore do not be unwise, but understand what the will of the Lord is."


Time keeps marching on. It never stops, it never takes a break. Time is a lesson in consistency. You can never get time back so you need to give forethought to how you spend it. Redeeming the time means to buy time back. The Bible teaches us elsewhere to make the most out of our time, but here we are instructed to buy some back.

Let's talk for a moment about the kind of things that waste our time. First there is stuff. For all the stuff we have, we need to spend time and energy keeping it up -- house, car, bike, boat, etc. The less stuff we have to maintain, the more time we have. It's not that we can't have these things,
just know that each new thing brings more time restraints. Our self-worth does not exist in the things we posses. It's not the car we drive or how big our house is. Our self-worth is in the things money cannot buy. Redeeming the time might just mean downsizing to get rid of some of those time eaters which will leave you more time to spend on what really matters.

Next, we need to be willing to say "No" to some people who put demands on our time. When I first started pastoring, I felt I needed to spend time with anyone who wanted to get together with me. This became very overwhelming. I sometimes spent 18-hour days in counseling, not to mention lunches, weddings and visitations. If I continued in such a way my family, my marriage, and my relationship with God would suffer because I was always giving out and never taking back in. It is still hard for me to say no when someone wants something from me, but I have learned to redeem my time by limiting some of these things. A wise man once told me, "For everything I say yes to, I am saying no to something else." Therefore I want to say yes to the important things.

One more area we must talk about is wasted time. Proverbs tells us, "There is a man so lazy he cannot bring his hand to his mouth from the bowl." Many other proverbs speak to us about laziness, too. We need to understand there is a time for us to "chill" as my twenty-two year old would say. We need to recharge the batteries as it were. Too much down time, however, can lead to us being involved in things that will bring us down. King David, at a time when kings go to war (he should have been about the king's business, the Bible says), looked over from his rooftop and saw Bathsheba taking a bath. His next steps led to a great personal crisis in his life. Another Proverb says, "A little rest and little folding of the hand and sudden destruction
comes upon you."

The text tells us what we should be doing with our time. "Do not be unwise, but understand what the will of the Lord is." There is nothing better for us to do with our time than to find out what the will of God is and then spend our time doing that.

Blessings

Robert Furrow

Walk Carefully

Ephesians 5:15 "See then that you walk circumspectly, not as fools but as wise,"

To walk circumspectly means to walk carefully and to not take risks. As we make our way through this world, there are many dangers a Christian can get caught up in. The Bible gives us several warnings about the way we walk. If we don't walk carefully, we can give place to the devil, grieve the Holy Spirit, or give in to sin, whether it's known or unknown.

A good example of this is a study of Peter before he denied Jesus in the courtyard where Jesus was being tried. Earlier that evening Peter was sitting around the table with Jesus and the other eleven disciples and declared, "Even if all these forsake you I will never forsake you."

How do you go from that kind of confidence to denying Jesus in the same night? The answer is by not walking circumspectly. Let's take a closer look.

First, Peter was overconfident. The Bible says to take heed when you think you stand, lest you fall. When he declared he would not deny Jesus, he had already been told that morning that he would deny Jesus not just once, but three times. Rather than walking carefully, he blew off the warning as ridiculous. This was his first step to denying Jesus.

Second, Peter was prayerless, or at least he was not driven to prayer. Jesus had taken Peter into the garden with Him to seek the Father in prayer. Jesus went about a stone's throw away and prayed. When he returned, He found Peter asleep and told him, "Pray, lest you enter into temptation." It was a risk to sleep and not pray -- a risk that would not pay off.

Third, when the guards came into the garden, Peter pulled a sword and fought to rescue Jesus. He relied on his flesh to try to accomplish the things of God. That's never a good idea. The end result was Jesus rebuking Peter and cleaning up his mess. Walking by the flesh instead of the spirit is not walking circumspectly.

Next we learn that Peter followed Jesus at a distance. At least he was following Jesus, but it is always a mistake to not stay close to Him. To walk carefully, we must stay close to Him.

Finally, Peter found himself sitting with the enemies. It was a brisk night and Peter sought the warmth of a fire. The problem was the fire is where the enemies of Jesus were gathered. And this is where they asked one of the questions that led Peter to deny Jesus by saying, "I don't know the man." Peter was someplace he should not have been, and his carelessness cost him.

At that point Peter looked across the courtyard and made eye contact with Jesus. Peter's heart broke and he went outside and wept bitterly.

May we learn from the mistakes Peter made by not walking circumspectly. May we never find ourselves outside the gate with bitter tears running down our faces.

Blessings,

Robert Furrow

Called out of Darkness

Ephesians 5:11,13,14 - "And have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness, but rather expose them.....But all things that are exposed are made manifest by the light, for whatever makes manifest is light. Therefore He says. 'Awake, you who sleep, arise from the dead, and Christ will give you light.' "


There is no greater contrast than between light and dark. When we walk into a dark room from the sunny outdoors, we can't see a thing at first. But, after standing there a moment, our eyes adjust and we can move around. Or, when we move from a dark room to standing outside in the sun, the contrast can be unbearable. But again, our eyes adjust once we stand in the light a
while.

We as Christians have been called from the darkness into the light. We could say we have been rescued from the darkness into the light. The spiritual contrast between light and dark is striking. There is no doubt we left the darkness, but after a while, we peek back at our former lives and think, "Well, that's not so bad." And slowly, we creep back into the things of the darkness.

We don't always think, "I'm going back into that darkness." Sometimes it's a slow drifting process that takes us so slowly from the truth that we don't even notice the difference. Then one day God opens our eyes and we realize we've strayed far from the light into the dark. Now what?

First, we are to not have any fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness. Sometimes we think the things of the dark have something to offer, something we just can't live without. But the darkness is altogether unfruitful. Rather than make excuses as to why it's okay to participate in
the things of the darkness, we should expose the darkness.

Next these verses tell us, "Awake, you who sleep, arise from the dead, and Christ will give you light." It's easy to fall asleep in the dark. Maybe we have fallen asleep to spiritual things and we need Jesus to turn on the lights.

Lord, help us to come out of the unfruitful darkness and walk in the beauty of Your marvelous light!

Blessings,

Pastor Robert

Walk as Children of Light

Ephesians 5:7,8 - "Therefore do not be partakers with them. For you were once darkness, but now you are light in the Lord. Walk as children of light"

God said, "Call out to me and I will answer you." Romans tells us, "Anyone who calls out on the name of the Lord will be saved." And John wrote, "Whosoever would believe should not perish but have eternal life." What great promises! The Bible makes it clear God is ready to forgive us and give us a fresh start.

Along with that fresh start, He makes changes inside of us. Our sins are forgiven, meaning He does not hold us to account for the things we have done. This is an amazing truth only made possible by the work of the cross.

He also changes us by making all things new. The illustration of us becoming a new person is seen in baptism. Going under the water is a symbol of the burial of our old man, and coming out of the water is a symbol of the new man we are in Christ with the power of the Holy Spirit working in our life.

No wonder the Bible says, "We can do all things through Christ who strengthens us" and "If God is for us who can be against us." Along with a fresh start, a new man and a new work of the spirit, we are also given the Holy Spirit as a seal of the eternal work God is doing in us. Then we receive gifts of the Spirit, enabling us to do the work He has called us to do for Him.

Taking all of this into account, no wonder this passage tells us, "Do not be partakers with them" meaning those who are caught up in sinful acts. We need to know who we are and what we have been called to do. Holding onto things of the world only holds us back anyway, so giving them up is the reasonable thing to do.

You were once in darkness and have been brought into the light. Therefore no longer walk as children of darkness, but walk as children of the light. Allow God to work not only in your life, but also in the lives of those around you who you care so much about.

Blessings,

Pastor Robert