promise – Page 19 – Cross Culture Church

Meditation: April 26, 2013

Posted by Cross Culture Church Categories: Meditations

“That I may know Him and the power of His resurrection, and the fellowship of His sufferings, being conformed to His death…” Phil 3:10

There is continuing aspects of Jesus Christ made available to us. Our spiritual hunger to fully identify with Him qualifies us to know what was unknown. We have come to know that He is our Savior and Lord through His Word. We believe on Him and apply faith in all of His promises. Yet the more we know of Him a fire is ignited within our hearts to experience Him. To share with Him in His experience of life is the grandest endeavor one could ever attain. The evidence that we know Him is that we recognize that there is much more to be known than what we have come to know. The height and depth of His love is to be explored throughout our lifetime. Oh the joy of knowing that it is Christ working in us and the sufficiency is not of us! We have been raised in newness of life. Now each experience whether it be painful or pleasurable, is ordered by our Master for a purpose far greater than any at this moment are able to see. “None of me, all of Thee; None of me, all unto Thee!” As portions of my self-life dies, I am attaining to the resurrection of the dead.

24 Apr 0Comments 0Likes

Meditation: April 24, 2013

Posted by Cross Culture Church Categories: Meditations

“He is not here; for He is risen, as He said. Come, see the place where the Lord lay.” Matthew 28:6

He is absent from the place to which He had been carried. His lifeless body lay in a tomb without the strength to either participate or resist. There He was carried and placed by others. But on Resurrection Sunday, the grave was robbed of its victory. The empty tomb served as a witness that He was no longer there. His was not the result of being carried away, for many are absent because they have been carried away by something or someone. “He is risen, as He said.” His Word was confirmed by action. His promise was fulfilled thus giving even greater validity to all that He ever said. The evidence was presented, thus allowing every skeptic and naysayer to see with their own eyes His power to defy death, hell, and the grave. The angel invited them to come inside and see the very place that He once laid. Where a body once laid, and empty tomb reminds us of our own destinies . As we are in Christ Jesus, we too shall be made alive by the same Spirit and power that raised Him from the dead. He is not where men placed Him. For He is risen from the dead!

23 Apr 0Comments 0Likes

Meditation: April 23, 2013

Posted by Cross Culture Church Categories: Meditations

“So when Jesus had received the sour wine, He said, “It is finished!” And bowing His head, He gave up His spirit.” John 19:30

Jesus came into the world for this very moment. He was on a mission to die for the sins of humanity. It required a sinless death and now the moment had arrived. The sufferings would come to an end. At least the bodily sufferings, but there awaited Him a degree of suffering of the soul that only one who loves deeply are able to experience. The purchased price for our redemption was completely paid. But there would be many who He loves that will yet reject all that He came into the world to provide. “He came into the world and the world rejected Him.” Those who did not understand rejected Him then, but now that it is finished, will there remain those who refuse to believe that what He gave was sufficient enough for them? His Spirit returned to the Father and the Holy Spirit has now been sent forth to give life to all who would receive Him. From the fall of Adam the promise was made for man’s reconciliation to God. The prophets spoke of this day, and now it had arrived. It is finished, but for us life had just begun!

09 Apr 0Comments 0Likes

Meditation: April 9, 2013

Posted by Cross Culture Church Categories: Meditations

“He is not here; for He is risen, as He said. Come, see the place where the Lord lay.” Matthew 28:6-7

His promises would have been mere empty words without power if the tomb had contained His Body without interruption. His Words would have faded off the scene as snowflakes in the heat of a warming sun if they were only good for the moment in which they were spoken. He said many things and made so many promises that built the faith of His followers and raised their hopes and dreams. They lived by His Word, but if the most dramatic and complex were false, then the least and the simplest were merely impressive conversation. The test would be the place where He was buried on the day on which He said He would rise from the dead. They arrived there with trepidation. But the tomb was empty validating the promise He made remembered. “He is not here.” If He is absent from this place, then where could He be? “As He said to us with Words to confirm all others spoken; now all that He has said can be trusted.” What else did He say? “Whatever He said I now believe because the empty tomb speaks of promises fulfilled.” Look at the place that now speaks loudly against all skeptics and critics. He is not here. The tomb is empty for all to see!

14 Mar 0Comments 0Likes

Meditation: March 14, 2013

Posted by Cross Culture Church Categories: Meditations

“For what if some did not believe? Will their unbelief make the faithfulness of God without effect? Romans 3:3

God is determined to fulfill every one of His promises. Too much is at stake for Him to fail. Yet there are many who doubt Him and question His authority and abandon their post defecting from the faith. Does unbelief negate God’s faithfulness? He allows the rain to fall on the unjust as well as the righteous. He provides for believers as well as unbelievers. Seasons of the year that change for all to receive the benefits of change. Yet God is determined to raise up a remnant among His people who will obey Him and receive the full benefit of His promises. They will hear His voice and heed to His call. If not the parents, He may reach some of their children. What is rejected by one generation may been embraced by their successors. God will provide future evidence of His truth. When all else is shaken and crumbles to the earth, His Word will remain. And what was once cast down and rejected will be raised by and through what God has already spoken.

05 Mar 0Comments 0Likes

Meditation: March 5, 2013

Posted by Cross Culture Church Categories: Meditations

“But from this day I will bless you.'” Haggai 2:19

Forward looking or the outlook is much brighter than the past for the children of the Most High God. Even though many of the things promised have not yet come to past, God is still true to every one of them. The seed is still in the barn. The seed that is to be planted must be scattered before the vine, the fig tree, the pomegranate, the olives tree is able to yield its fruit. The laborers must sow in the time of sowing before the reapers can come and reap in the harvest. There is a future ahead of us that only God is able to bring to past. Yet each of us must diligently work in the season that is to be rightly occupied by those who are fully aware of times and seasons. While we may be waiting on God, God is waiting on us!

04 Mar 0Comments 0Likes

Meditation: March 4, 2013

Posted by Cross Culture Church Categories: Meditations

“Daily expect the Day of God, eager for its arrival. The galaxies will burn up and the elements melt down that day — but we’ll hardly notice. We’ll be looking the other way, ready for the promised new heavens and the promised new earth, all landscaped with righteousness.” 2 Peter 3: 12-13 (MSG)

The coming of the Lord will attract the attention of those who are eagerly awaiting His return. While all things around us are being shaken, and nothing appears to have any degree of stability, there remains a constant focus in an upward direction in spite of all other things that would otherwise be disturbing. God has promised that He would send His Son again to the earth. If the earth could not receive the words of the prophets and the world rejects His standard, it is not the world on which His kingdom will be established. He will descend, but above the earth while the heavens and the earth is burned with fire. Then He will establish new heavens and a new earth where righteous will reign. But then it will be under the rule of those who are kept by His power and anticipate His return. They will hardly notice the destruction of the old because they so eagerly await what God has to replace it. Sin is now running it course, but do not be discouraged. God will restore all that is now being destroyed by sin and those who have given their souls over to it. When those things are completely removed, His Day would have fully come!

01 Feb 0Comments 0Likes

February 2013 Article: “From Whence We Came”

Posted by wwalker Categories: Articles

We can learn much from our past. When used rightly, it can either become the stepping stone to a bright and glorious future or an inescapable prison void of any windows and doors. When the history of a people is rehearsed, it is not a matter of stirring up old wounds, but if the wound has not completely healed, it may lead to an infection. Infections have the tendency of affecting other parts of the body rather than remaining confined to the area that once experienced pain. To remember the past is not to relive the trauma that our ancestors had to endure, but to revisit it with an eye on the divine providence of God while working to bring us to His expected end.

The infectious sin of discrimination has led to an out of control pursuit of rights that crosses ethical lines established by God. When humanity is not respected, disrespect erupts towards God through the guise of a vigilant but misinformed Church not knowing what or how to defend, protect, destroy or eliminate. The presentation of a schizophrenic God who defends a select group of people at the expense of others who are considered less than human feeds the backlash that eventually leads to the construct of another god to replace the confused and obsolete God of the Bible. God has not changed or lost His effectiveness; rather it is the responsibility of this our generation to set the record straight. We are the generation that must call every misinterpretation and misrepresentation what it is; a travesty of truth leading to a travesty of justice.

How can a minister be honest with himself and not address the most pertinent issues of our day? What good is preaching a salvation message unless the message leads the way into embracing the promised wholeness clearly addressed in the Holy Scriptures? As a minister, I am fed up with the psychobabble of so many who either raise the message beyond the reach of the common people or lower the message to mere entertainment. God is not a comedian, nor is He aloof of the circumstances that the world is facing today. We need prophets who have an understanding of the times and can speak in regards to the future leading the people in the direction of God’s intentions.

Anything short of this does a disservice to the cause regardless of whatever good intentions may be on the part of the herald from which the wrong message emanates. As Martin Luther once said,

“If I profess, with the loudest voice and the clearest exposition, every portion of the truth of God except precisely that little point which the world and the devil are at that moment attacking, I am not confessing Christ, however boldly I may be professing Christianity. Where the battle rages the loyalty of the soldier is proved; and to be steady on all the battle-field besides is mere flight and disgrace to him if he flinches at that one point.”

The prophets of old addressed the issues at hand. There as a direct correlation between the Word of God and the conditions of the people. It was not reduced to a mere rehashing of information to impress others or appease the conscience.

There is the need for authenticity today that will lift the hearts of people above the old time religion of passivity to a new expression of active love. Yet the new is not really new at all. It is really a return to the original plan and not setting our tents and establishing residence in a place that was not intended to be our destination. True freedom is found in the quality of love that established truth as its basis. The movements of the past were leading us somewhere. The Church has to become the demonstration of the Kingdom of God. We will only experience freedom when the hearts of the children are restored to the Father. Then the people are in the right position to hear what He has to say and interpret His message rightly. Remember from whence we came, but do not lose sight on where we ought to be going.