“Judge not, and ye shall not be judged: condemn not, and ye shall not be condemned: forgive, and ye shall be forgiven: Give, and it shall be given unto you; good measure, pressed down, and shaken together, and running over, shall men give into your bosom. For with the same measure that ye mete withal it shall be measured to you again.”
“To open their eyes, and to turn them from darkness to light, and from the power of Satan unto God, that they may receive forgiveness of sins, and inheritance among them which are sanctified by faith that is in me.”
~~~Acts 26:18 (KJV)~~~
“And I will bring the blind by a way that they knew not; I will lead them in paths that they have not known: I will make darkness light before them, and crooked things straight. These things will I do unto them, and not forsake them.”
“And Jesus answered them, ‘Have faith in God. Truly, I say to you, whoever says to this mountain, ‘Be taken up and thrown into the sea,’ and does not doubt in his heart, but believes that what he says will come to pass, it will be done for him. Therefore I tell you, whatever you ask in prayer, believe that you have received it, and it will be yours. And whenever you stand praying, forgive, if you have anything against anyone, so that your Father also who is in heaven may forgive you your trespasses.’”
Terri Savelle Foy: “If you want to go beyond where you are today, you have to feed what you want to live and starve what you want to die. Feed what you want to live and starve what you want to die. In other words you gotta feed your FAITH and starve your FEARS. And how do you do that? Well the Bible says that faith comes by hearing, right? So when you’re hearing God’s Word like you are today, and you’re reading books and you’re just filling yourself up with the Word of God, you know what happens? Your faith gets stronger and your fear gets weaker”.
“So then faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the Word of God.”
I recall being in elementary school and one of our textbooks covering the concept of the theory of the evolution of man. Surely you too, have seen as I vaguely recall, the sketches of an ape as he gradually morphs into a human being. Whether I shook my head and chuckled out loud I can’t say for sure. What I do recall is how my instant and dismissive thought was just how ridiculous this sounded to me, even as a child. Yes, I grew up in a Christian home. Yes, I believed and still believe in creationism as taught in Genesis, the first book of the Bible.
“So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them.”
~~~Genesis 1:27 (ESV)~~~
A Matter of Faith is a well written movie, which entertains just this concept at the university level as a professor who teaches evolution is challenged by the father of one of his freshmen students. A debate is held for the purpose of creating dialogue, thus opening minds. During the debate the father hands his microphone over to a long ago fired professor who adamantly taught creationism only. “To me the most troubling aspect about this issue is that in our society today evolution is being taught in our schools and universities across this land as a matter of fact. But no one can scientifically prove evolution just as no one can scientifically prove that God created the world since none of us were present to witness it. Both these teachings then become a matter of faith. The evolutionist has nothing but vast periods of time, random chance events and the ever-changing ideas of man to base his world view upon, while the one who holds to creation has his beliefs firmly rooted in the truths contained in the Bible and a personal God who created everything….and my pride, I was the one who was at fault,….not in what I was teaching, but in how I went about it. I should have taught my students to look at both sides of the evidence, realizing that everyone, individually has to make their own choice. Either you are going to look at life through men’s ideas or God’s Word. So, if evolution, follow where that leads. If God, then serve the Lord. We can’t prove anything here tonight. We can only present theories. You can chance your eternity on the views of Freud and Darwin if you want. I’m putting my trust in Jesus Christ who died on the cross for my sin, was buried and rose again on the third day. I know some of you will call that stupidity. I am calling it humility. And I will trust and I will follow Christ and wait on the hope of eternal life that He offers. May you find that same hope.”
I recall being a young and very naïve college student attending a university where several of my professors most assuredly believed in the theory of evolution while openly dismissing my faith in God as being a bit foolish and simpleminded. And that’s okay. College should be a place where we are encouraged to develop our minds, to be challenged to think for ourselves. College should be a place where we are NOT taught what to think but HOW to think. So, by all means don’t allow pride to prevent the teaching of the theory of evolution, but also don’t allow pride to prevent the teaching of creationism.
Jesus Christ went to the cross for all of us, but it’s a choice each individual must make for themselves, whether to believe in creationism and ultimately choose to receive His forgiveness, or not. God doesn’t push Christ’s crucifixion, burial, and resurrection on anyone. It’s simply a matter of faith, which then becomes a matter of choice. Choose well.
“because, if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.”
“For I know the plans I have for you, declares the Lord, plans for welfare and not for evil, to give you a future and a hope. Then you will call upon me and come and pray to me, and I will hear you. You will seek me and find me, when you seek me with all your heart. I will be found by you, declares the Lord, and I will restore your fortunes and gather you from all the nations and all the places where I have driven you, declares the Lord, and I will bring you back to the place from which I sent you into exile.”
Too often we find ourselves unknowingly holding on to our sins at the sacrifice of our relationships with our spouse, family, friends, and most especially our relationship with God.
Why?
Because at the root of every single sin is PRIDE.
And PRIDE is all about me.
“Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves.”
“My son, be attentive to my words; incline your ear to my sayings. Let them not escape from your sight; keep them within your heart. For they are life to those who find them, and healing to all their flesh.”
“For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God: and the dead in Christ shall rise first: Then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air: and so shall we ever be with the Lord.”
