Ascension Teaches

In the Bible, when you look at the Gospel of Luke 24 end verses, you see Jesus Christ preparing to ascent to heaven. But before that He called His disciples and told them about events happened in His life. He told all things happened in His life according to the will of God and what was written according to the Law of Moses.

This clearly explains the life of a servant of God. When you follow Christ, your life will never be easy because you are going to fight against the darkness of devil. But according to this verse, everything is known to God, or written about your life. Once you live a faithful life as Christ lived, you are going to be honoured by God as He did to Jesus. Jesus was telling the same to His disciples.

But Jesus told the disciples to stay in the city until they are anointed by the Holy Spirit. They stayed continually at the temple and praised God (Luke 24: 44-53). One day suddenly Spirit of God came upon them and they were anointed (Acts 1: 1-11). As Christ told them, once they received the Holy Spirit, they went witnessing all over the places.

Jesus Christ is telling everyone the same truth. Once you receive him as your personal savior, wait upon the Lord, praise him and worship Him. At the appointed time, you will be anointed with the Holy Spirit. Once you are anointed, even you cannot hold yourself quite. The Spirit motivates you and provides you the strength to be a witness for Christ Jesus.

Jesus is going to come back the same way He went up. The Spirit of God is given to you to know more about Him with the wisdom and knowledge (Ephesians 1: 15-23). You need to use the gifts and fruits of the Spirit to be a blessing to the ones around you. In this way of leading them to Christ, always keep yourself Holy and pure before God, so that the God who sees you in quite times will help you grow in Jesus name 

Faithfulness

Each New Year people take some resolutions, mostly with respect to their health. There is a funny saying that in January 1^st week most of the Gyms will be overcrowded and then after 1 month no crowd. Same things happens when people decides for going on a walk daily or running. It might go well for a week or two, but then it stops.

According to Wikipedia, Faithfulness is the concept of unfailingly remaining loyal to someone or something, and pulling that locality into consistent practice regardless of extenuating circumstances.

In 2 Timothy 2: 13, Christ’s faithfulness is mentioned. “If we are faithless, he remains faithful, for he cannot disown himself”. God is a faithful God and His faithfulness is consistent. God have given humans the power to think and take decisions. Every year people take decisions. Some take decisions to stop bad habits, some may try to take care of their physical health, or some may decide to walk close with God. The Bible tells us that if

we don’t do any of these things, still God will be faithful to us and He will keep His promises for us.

When the first man, Adam sinned, God promised a saviour Jesus Christ who will come and take the punishment for that sin and make the human’s sin free. As promised Christ came to the world and walked among men. At the garden of Gethsemane, Christ cried and asked God whether God can remove His death and suffering for mankind. But God, being faithful, did not spare His own son for the sake of mankind.

Christ died as an ultimate sacrifice for the sin of the world. Now there is no need to sacrifice anything for cleansing for ones sin. Christ has done it permanently. Only way to receive that salvation is to accept Christ as our saviour and sin no more. Even though we walk in sin, God being faithful died for our sins and made us free.

This New Year let this verse be inside you and motivate you to take decisions and be consistent with it. You are a child of God who is faithful and consistent.

Amazing Love of God - Hosea

God is Love and if you want to know more about him, and how he loves us, you need to read the book of Hosea. Brought up in a Lutheran Christian family, I was taught to preach short sermons as part of Sunday school competitions. At that age, I never understood the theology what I was speaking. I don’t think anybody understood the theology which was preached on Sundays. Most of the Sunday school and Youth competitions, I have got the topic “God’s Love” for preaching, and here are the things which they expect us to tell.

• All the commandments put together in one word is Love
•  God’s love to mankind is Jesus Christ.
• First in the fruits of the Holy Spirit is Love and so on…

I have heard and seen children preaching like professionals, even in other denominations and churches. I have seen the same people growing as adult, preaching with the same intensity, and not living by the word they preach, which means they don’t understand what they preach. Even other than the Bible students, I don’t think anyone will be able to concentrate hard to understand it. The Bible is given to us to study it and implement it in our lives and to get motivated with it.

The main character of this book, Hosea, is one of the greatest lovers in all literature. We find his love so strong that even the worst actions of an unfaithful wife could not kill it. We can see a bit of personal history of the prophet in Hosea 1:1. We hear God speaking his first words to Hosea himself (Hosea 1:2). We know little about Hosea other than that he had a very sad home life. The book pictures this man as gentle, frank and affectionate. He had a deep loving nature that made him attached to his home. Hosea was sent to the ten northern tribes called Israel. He prophesied in the reign of Jeroboam II of Israel. He lived in this Northern Kingdom when the splendours of Jeroboam’s brilliant reign of 41 years were beginning to fade into the black midnight of Israel’s captivity.

As chapter 1 opens, we see a young man marrying a girl unworthy of him. He loved her truly. God told him to do something that would have been very repulsive to him (Hosea 1:2, 3). It was a severe test. Hosea is told to marry a woman worthless in character, in fact, a harlot. God was using this for a sign to his people of how they remained the object of Jehovah’s love in spite of their sinfulness. This all seems very strange to us. But God was making this picture of his redeeming grace. Grace is unmerited favour.

Hosea obeyed God and married Gomer (Hosea 1:3). His name was hers. Home, reputation, God’s favour, comfort, was Gomer’s. All that he had he gave her. In return, Hosea’s name, domestic reputation, love, was all sacrificed on the altar of a shameful and worthless woman. How like our Lord Jesus this is! He not only came to us while we were yet in sin, but he also died the death of shame on Calvary for us that all he had might be ours (Titus 2:14).  Gomer ran away from home and left her young husband, Hosea, with 2 little sons and a daughter to care for. Lured away by the sin about her, she fell into the moral cesspool of the day and finally was carried off a slave. Through it all, Hosea was true to her. Still loving her, he tried everything to win her back to a happy family life. But she would not. What a sad picture of a person’s stubbornness! What a wonderful picture of God’s love!

Just as Hosea was married to an unfaithful bride, Gomer, so God was married to unfaithful Israel (New Testament Israel is the one who believes in Christ). This experience of Hosea helped him to understand God’s heart of love as he yearned over wayward Israel to come home to him. No doubt there were tears in his voice, for there was tragedy in his life. He had thrown himself worthy into his mission.

When you read Hosea 4 to 10 we see Hosea telling the people to return to the Lord as they went away from the Lord (Hosea 6:1). Hosea’s message was “Return to God and he will return to you”. We must understand God’s attitude towards sin. He says. “The wages of sin is death” (Romans 6:23). “Do not be deceived: God cannot be mocked. A man reaps what he sows” (Galatians 6:7).

Hosea 14 is one of the best chapters in the Bible for backsliders. Read the wonderful words of the Lord to backsliding Israel in Hosea 14:4. “I will heal their waywardness and love them freely”. God’s great heart is bursting with love, but our sins keep him from telling us all that is there. As with Israel, you may know the joy of barriers broken down and love poured out. “I will be like the dew to Israel: he will blossom like a lilly” Hosea 14:5. The dew speaks of the presence of the Holy Spirit. Just understand how God portrays his abiding joy in his people after they are healed.

This love of God for Israel is given to us through Christ Jesus. Like Hosea in this Book, Christ is perfect and he gave himself for us who are imperfect like Gomer. I pray that you will understand this great love story of God and leave the sinful life and be Holy in Christ and live a faithful life.