New is From God

 

New is from God

 

In my years in the church, I have heard one idea expressed again & again: We have to return to the way it was back when. Sometimes that “back when” was weeks or months ago, but sometimes it was years & decades.

 

But when I read the Bible, God tells us more about the new than the old.

 

We are told six times in Psalm to sing a new song to the Lord. In Revelation 5:9 the four creatures & the twenty-four elders sing a new song to the Lamb. In Revelation 14:3 the one hundred forty-four thousand sing a new song to the Lamb.

 

We need to learn to sing new songs to Jesus. We have had conflict over new praise songs or hymns & that does not need to be an issue. We need to sing songs that enable us to truly worship Jesus, but we need to have new songs for a new generation that will come to be saved & enter God’s kingdom.

 

Raise the Roof & Remove the Walls is about singing new songs of worship to Jesus.

 

In Isaiah we are told that God is doing a new thing. We must allow God to reveal to us new truths from the Bible & we must allow God to do new things in our lives as disciples of Jesus & new things in the church which is the body of Christ. We must never be satisfied with what God has done in the past.

 

Raise the Roof & Remove the Walls is about surrendering our lives to Jesus to allow Him to do a new thing in our lives & in His church.

 

In Jeremiah 31:31 God tells His people that He will establish a new covenant with them & in Luke 22:20 Jesus tells His disciples that the new covenant will be established through His blood. Our covenant which was established by God through the shedding of Jesus’ blood is an everlasting covenant that is ours when we surrender our lives to Jesus as our Savior & Lord.

 

Raise the Roof & Remove the Walls is about entering into a new covenant with God through the blood of Jesus.

In Ezekiel 18:31 & 36:26 God promises to give us a new heart & a new spirit. He will replace our old heart which was hardened to God & will replace our old spirit which had been perverted by sin with a heart that is open to God & with the Holy Spirit. According to 2 Corinthians 5:17, this means that we are new creations in Jesus & the old is gone. And that leads, according to Ephesians 4:24, to putting on the new self which is created in the likeness of God in true righteousness & holiness. That empowers us to live in the new way of the Spirit & not according to the old way of the written code, according to Romans 7:6.

 

Raise the Roof & Remove the Walls is about entering into a new covenant with God through Jesus’ blood which enables to be new creations with the old gone.

 

In Matthew 9, when Jesus is confronted over why He & His disciples did not fast, Jesus tells them that you cannot put new wine, the gospel, into old wineskins, the old system of human based traditions. We have put the gospel, the power of salvation to all who believe, into structures that are based in human made traditions. We proclaim the gospel of Jesus Christ in new ways to reach a new generation & in new places in the world.

 

Raise the Roof & Remove the Walls is about proclaiming the gospel of Jesus in new ways to reach new people.

 

We are entering a new year. May you experience Jesus in new & fresh ways & make Jesus known to people so they may become new creations in Jesus.

 

Raise the Roof & Remove the Walls,

Joe

Joy to the World

 

Joy to the World

 

Luke 2:9-11

And an angel of the Lord appeared to them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were filled with great fear. And the angel said to them, “Fear not, for behold, I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all the people. For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, who is Christ the Lord.”

 

The coming of Jesus is good news. It is not just news & it is not bad news. It is good news.

 

Raise the Roof & Remove the Walls is about receiving good news because Jesus has come.

 

The coming of Jesus is great joy. It is not just happiness, it is joy. Joy is not based on happenings; joy is a sense of exceeding gladness & a restful delight. It comes through having Jesus as your Savior & Lord & the Holy Spirit indwelling you & forming joy in your life.

 

Raise the Roof & Remove the Walls is about experiencing the great joy of having a love relationship with Jesus.

 

Jesus came as the Savior. He came to save all people from the penalty & power & guilt & shame of sin.

 

Raise the Roof & Remove the Walls is about knowing Jesus as the Savior of your life.

 

Jesus came as the Lord. He is to be the sole ruling authority of our lives. Our lives are to be about doing His will, not our will & we are to be fully surrendered to His Lordship over every area of our lives.

 

Raise the Roof & Remove the Walls is about Jesus being the Lord, the sole ruling authority, of our lives.

 

As we celebrate Christmas this year may you experience the good news & great joy of Jesus being your Savior & Lord. May we celebrate that it is CHRISTmas.

 

Merry Christmas!

 

Raise the Roof & Remove the Walls,

Joe

 

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The Power of God to Create

 

The Power of God to Create

 

The power of God is infinite, there are not limits to His power. But the most amazing aspect of God’s power is His power to create.

 

Genesis 1:1 says, “In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth.” The word create here means that God created out of nothing. There were no raw materials laying around that God used to create everything. There was nothing & He still created the heavens & the earth.

 

In Luke 1:26-38 Mary has an encounter with the angel Gabriel. He tells Mary that she will have a baby & that the baby will be the Messiah. Mary asks how this is possible since she is a virgin. In verse 35 Gabriel says, “The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you; therefore the child to be born will be called holy – the Son of God.” God again created a baby without the necessary human components.

 

So, what does God’s power to create mean for us in our daily lives?

 

Paul in Ephesians 1:21 says that Jesus is far above all rule & authority & power & dominion, & above every name that is named, not only in this age but also in the one to come.

 

Jesus is more powerful than any human ruler or any spiritual ruler. That means that He can provide us with security in this life & in our eternal life.

 

Raise the Roof & Remove the Walls is about experiencing God’s power that brings eternal security.

 

In 1 Corinthians 1:18 Paul says that the cross is the power of God to those who are being saved. God’s power means that He can turn what appears to be something bad into something good. God’s power makes it possible for the truly bad things that happen in my life to be, by God’s power, made good.

 

Raise the Roof & Remove the Walls is about the power of God turning the bad in our lives to good that benefits us & honors God.

 

Isaiah 40:29-31 says, “He gives power to the faint, and to him who has no might He increases strength. Even youths shall faint and be weary, and young men shall fall exhausted; but they who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings like eagles; they shall run and not be weary; they shall walk and not faint.”

 

God’s power gives us strength & perseverance to live daily in obedience to God in a fallen world. The world wears people down, even followers of Jesus, but by God’s power we can walk the journey of life without wearing out or giving up.

 

Raise the Roof & Remove the Walls is about having our strength & faith renewed by God’s power.

 

God’s power is unlimited & He uses it for our good. We can experience His power by surrendering our lives to Jesus as Savior & Lord of our lives.

 

In God’s Power Raise the Roof & Remove the Walls.

Joe

Change is a Good Thing?

 

Change is a Good Thing?

 

One of the statements I have heard in the church for years is, “We have never done it that way before!” I really believe this is how Saul viewed the Christian movement in his day until one day when he encountered the living Lord Jesus & then everything changed. We as disciples of Jesus cannot stay where we are & follow Jesus & the body of Christ cannot stay where we are & accomplish God’s will.

 

We see many examples of God changing people in Scripture:

David from shepherd to king

Jonah from disobedient to obedient

Matthew from tax collector to apostle

Onesimus from slave to free

 

So, how do we allow God to change us?

 

In Colossians 1:18 we are told that Jesus is the Head of the body, the church. For God to change us we must see life as about Him & not us. The focus of our lives as disciples of Jesus must be Jesus & the focus of the church must be Jesus not us.

 

Raise the Roof & Remove the Walls is about making our lives about Jesus not about ourselves.

 

Romans 12:1 says, “I appeal to you therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship.” We must remember our purpose which is worship & serve God. I can know my God given purpose by knowing Jesus & knowing His word.

 

Raise the Roof & Remove the Walls is about knowing your God given purpose & letting God fulfill in you.

 

In Genesis 12 God calls Abraham to leave his country, his kindred & his father’s house & go to a land that God will show him. We must remember that God has a right to change our lives. Jesus as our Creator created us & has a right to change our lives. Jesus as our Lord has authority over us & has a right to change our lives. Jesus as our Savior died for our sin & has a right to change our lives.

 

Raise the Roof & Remove the Walls is about accepting change because Jesus is our Creator & Lord & Savior.

 

Ecclesiastes 3:11 that God has put eternity into the hearts of all humans. We must remember that we were created for eternity not time. We focus on the here & now, God focuses on eternity. Jesus uses all the things that occur in our lives to prepare us for eternity with Him.

 

Raise the Roof & Remove the Walls is about focusing our lives on eternity & allowing God to use everything in our lives to prepare us for eternity with Him.

 

Everything in our lives must be yielded to God & our entire live adjusted to what He wants. The God who calls you is also the one who will empower you to change & do His will. The question is are we willing to allow God to change us?

 

Raise the Roof & Remove the Walls,

                         Joe  

 

 

Jesus is the Light

 

Jesus is the Light

 

In John 1, John says that Jesus was life & the life was the light of men. Jesus says in John 8:12 that He is the Light of the world. Light always overcomes darkness because darkness is simply the absence of light. Jesus as the light always overcomes the darkness of unbelief.

 

In John 3:2 Nicodemus comes to see Jesus at night. He came to sit & talk & learn & hide. We think that darkness can hide us & what we do, but Jesus is the Light & illuminates our lives & actions.

 

In John 3:19 Jesus says, “And this is the judgment; the Light has come into the world, and people love the darkness rather than the light because their works are evil.”

 

Raise the Roof & Remove the Walls is about recognizing that the Light, Jesus, has come into the world.

 

In John 19 Nicodemus comes with Joseph of Arimathea to go to Pilate to claim the body of Jesus. They had both been secret disciples of Jesus because of fear of the Jews, but now they come in public & in the light & acknowledge their commitment to Jesus. They had come into the Light.

 

Raise the Roof & Remove the Walls is about coming into the Light, Jesus, & living in that Light.

 

So, how do we, like Nicodemus, come out of the darkness into the Light?

 

1 John 1:5 says, “This is the message we have heard from Him and proclaim to you, that God is light, and in Him is no darkness at all.”

 

We must believe the message that God is light & in Him there is no darkness at all. God is light, meaning He is good & would never do anything to cause us harm. God is light, meaning He is truth & will always tell us the truth.

 

Raise the Roof & Remove the Walls is about trusting that, as the Light, Jesus will always speak to us the truth & lead us to do what is best for us.

 

1 John 1:6 says, “If we say we have fellowship with Him while we walk in darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth.”

 

We must practice what we proclaim. We cannot have fellowship with Jesus & live in ways that are not pleasing to Him. He will still love us no matter what, but we will not enjoy an intimate communion with Jesus if we continue to practice ways that are not what He wants for us.

 

Raise the Roof & Remove the Walls is about living out what we proclaim with our mouths.

 

1 John 1:7 says, “But if we walk in the light, as He is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus His Son cleanses us from all sin.”

 

We must walk in the light with Jesus. When we walk with Jesus in the light then we have fellowship with one another & we have cleansing from sin through Jesus’ blood. We get two awesome gifts. We get a family of brothers & sisters who share our love of Jesus & we get sin cleansed from our lives.

 

Raise the Roof & Remove the Walls is about walking in fellowship with Jesus & His family & being cleansed from the guilt & penalty of our sin.

 

In Luke 2:9 when the angels came to proclaim to the shepherds that the Messiah had come, it says that the glory of the Lord shone around them. Jesus came in the Light of God as the Light of God. We have the privilege to know & live in the Light.

 

Raise the Roof & Remove the Walls,

Joe

Knowing God by Name

 

Knowing God by Name

 

God has many names & titles. Each of those names & titles reveal to us who He is. We come to know God as the understanding of those names is revealed to us. In Matthew 11:27 Jesus says, “All things have been handed over to Me by My Father, and no ones knows the Father except the Son and anyone to whom the Son chooses to reveal Him.” Jesus came to show us who God is.

 

In the book of John, we are given seven names of Jesus that reveals who He is & thus who God is.

 

In John 6:35 Jesus says that He is the Bread of Life & that whoever comes to Him will never be hungry again & whoever believes in Him will never be thirsty. Jesus as our Bread of Life will satisfy our all our needs.

 

Raise the Roof & Remove the Walls is about trusting Jesus to meet all of our needs.

 

In John 8:12 Jesus says, “I am the Light of the world & that the person who follows Him will never live in darkness, He will have the light that gives light.” Light illumines & thus shows us the right path to take & show us the obstacles on that path. Light also purifies. Jesus as the Light of the world shows us the path we are to walk & lights up the obstacles that are there & He purifies us when we stubble & fall.

 

Raise the Roof & Remove the Walls is about Jesus being our Light of the world & shows us the path we are to walk & walking in that path.

 

In John 10:9 Jesus says that He is the Gate or the Door & all who come in through Him will be saved & that they will come & go & find pasture. Jesus as our Gate or Door is the only way to come into relationship with & experience salvation & He will also be our provision.

 

Raise the Roof & Remove the Walls is about trusting Jesus as our Gate or Door to through whom we receive salvation & provision.

 

In John 10:11 Jesus says that He is the Good Shepherd who sacrifices His life for the sheep. The Good Shepherd protects the sheep & he is even willing to lay down his life for the sheep. Jesus as our Good Shepherd laid down His life for sin so that we could have eternal life.

 

Raise the Roof & Remove the Walls is about trusting Jesus as our Good Shepherd who became our Savior by dying on the cross for our sin.

 

In John 11:25-26 Jesus says that He is the Resurrection & the Life. Jesus is the One who gives us life both physical & spiritual life & He is the One who at the end of this age will raise us from the dead. So, Jesus as the Resurrection & the Life is the source of our earthly life & our eternal life.

 

Raise the Roof & Remove the Walls is about acknowledging Jesus as the Resurrection & the Life as our life here on earth & trusting Him for life with Him in eternity.

 

In John 14:6 Jesus says that He is Way & the Truth, & the Life & that no one came to the Father except through Him. Jesus is the only way to have a relationship with the Father. He is the truth & anything that disagrees with or opposes Him is wrong & a lie. He is the life & His life is the life to be lived out through us as the Holy Spirit fills us.

 

Raise the Roof & Remove the Walls is about Jesus as the Way, the Truth, & the Life living His life in through us by the holy Spirit to show the world who He is.

 

In John 15:1 Jesus says that He is the Real Vine. Jesus as our Real Vine makes us the branches & as the branches, we draw life from Him. Jesus as our Real vine & we as the branches stay connected to Him & thus produce good spiritual fruit.

 

Raise the Roof & Remove the Walls is about us as the branches staying connected to Jesus as our Real Vine & producing good spiritual fruit.

 

If we really want to know God, we study His word to understand His names & as who is become clearer, we obey Him & we get to know Him in a deeper way.

 

Raise the Roof & Remove the Walls,

                        Joe

 

 

God Is All

 

God is All

 

Psalm 139:4 says, “Even before a word is on my tongue, behold, O Lord, you know it altogether.”

 

The Bible without any doubt affirms the truth that God is all-knowing, there is nothing beyond His knowledge. That contrasts with us as humans who are not all-knowing. God’s knowledge is infinite & our is finite.

 

God is all-knowing because He created all things, so nothing is outside of His knowledge. God being all-knowing means that His directions are always right. So, we can have complete confidence that when God tells us to do something it is the right course of action. We need to depend upon God’s wisdom & knowledge when we make decisions.

 

Raise the Roof & Remove the Walls is about believing that God is all-knowing, that His directions are always right & we can know that when we seek His direction, those directions will always be right.

 

Genesis 17:1 says, “When Abram was ninety-nine years old the Lord appeared to Abram and said to him, ‘I am God Almighty; walk before Me, and be blameless.”

 

The Bible without any doubt affirms the truth that God is all-powerful. God created the universe out of nothing. He breathed life into creatures of dust. He can accomplish anything He purposes to do. When God asks you to do something He will work through you to do it. We need to trust Him for the power, insight, skill, & resources required to accomplish His will. We need to remember it is one thing to mentally acknowledge that God is all-powerful & another to obediently respond to an all-powerful God.

 

Raise the Roof & Remove the Walls is about believing that God is all-powerful & living daily trusting God to enable us to accomplish His will.

 

God in Hebrews 13:5 says, “I will never leave you or forsake you.”

 

The Bible without any doubt affirms the truth that God is ever-present. God is always with us. He as our Father never leaves us as His children alone, He is always present with us. God is always with us as His children & He always provides for us as His children.

Raise the Roof & Remove the Walls is about experiencing God’s presence with us all the time.

 

1 John 4:16 says, “So we have come to know and to believe the love God has for us. God is love, and whoever abides in loves abides in God, and God abides in us.”

 

The Bible without any doubt affirms God is love. He loves us with a perfect & unconditional love. God is not a God of love or a God who just loves, God’s essential nature is love. The truth that God is love means that His will is always the best because He always seeks the best for each person. We must believe God is love so that we can trust God & we must trust God to be willing to obey God.

 

Raise the Roof & Remove the Walls is about knowing God is love & living every day abiding in His love & trusting that what He tells us is always right.

 

God will never act contrary to His will. So, God will always act in His power, in His knowledge, by being always with us, & always in love. So, we can live with complete faith in Him & be willing to obey Him fully.

 

Raise the Roof & Remove the Walls,

Joe