Preach

Too many people who call themselves Christian do forget who Jesus really was and which tasks he had given to his followers. Today true Christians still should follow the teachings of Jesus Christ and should proclaim the hopeful message of the coming Kingdom.

Real Christians should be heralds of the Gospel, eager to tell the people about the Good News, of salvation and about the hope for mankind given by the Grace of God.

As forerunner or herald Christians should be portent or indicators of something important or calamitous about to occur, perhaps an omen in the eyes of many, but for others an insurmountable event to look forward even when it might bring lots of suffering and an incredible violence. therefore we should warn the people of that last and third world war which is insuperable.

By sharing the agape love and bringing more people to see that Jesus is the way to God and the way to life, the Christian herald shall be able to make many stronger and secured against the coming disaster. Out of love for others we should tell others about the love of God, about what Jesus has done, but also about the return of Jesus and what to expect of that time of his return.

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To remember

• Greek word most often translated as ‘preach’ is κηρύσσω – kérussó (Strong’s 2784) = Koine = ‘to be or act like a herald’ or ‘to proclaim’.
• role of a herald or Old French heraut from Frankish via herewald, literally ‘war-ruler’, > martial or commander > 3 distinct contemporary meanings:

1. A messenger
2. A harbinger
3. A steward (of heraldry -a rank/position at the College of Arms)

•  ‘preacher’ of the Gospel, = entrusted (stewardship) with a message of coming of the Kingdom of God.
• ‘to herald’ =  ‘sing the praises of’
• idea that a Christian should ‘preach the Gospel’= frowned upon. >  conjures images of street corner evangelists ranting at passing ‘sinners’
• Christian organisations involved in social action ministry > running night shelters, to discourage volunteers from speaking about Jesus – some even require a signed commitment to not proactively mention the Gospel.

What has gone wrong?  To paraphrase Peter (Acts 5:3), how has Satan so filled the hearts of Christians?  How is it that Christians feel confident enough to defy God and disobey the Great Commission?

Go into all the world and proclaim (kérussó) the gospel to the whole creation. (Mark 16:15)

‘preach’ is not:

• convicting people of their sin and telling them they are bound for hell
• talking down to people from a position of self-righteousness
• a slick presentation, a hectoring declamation or a well-honed argument.

Preaching = heralding = speaking joyfully of Jesus, singing his praises; telling people of how people are transformed in Christ, and how they can be also, through faith.

best witnesses to Christ = demonstrate love +  speak of its origin, which is Jesus; perhaps the Great Commission was given as command because Jesus knew that it would be challenging.

If witness speaks from love about hope + declares that Jesus = source of hope => herald will have done his work faithfully.

 

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Additional reading

1. Two new encyclopaedic articles
2. Breathing to teach
3. “I Die Daily”
4. To create a great journey

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Related

 

1. What is meant by awareness, or witnessing?
2. Witnessing the Destruction of Nature around the Planet.
3. Man I sure wish I would’ve had one of my witnessing cards just now to send with a man.
4. A witnessing prayer
5. Witnessing the Secret Creator
6. ” Witnessing “
7. As the clock strikes 12…
8. Hope is an anchor
9. Reject And Correct Christian propaganda
10. Families embrace their community for the gospel
11. Bold to Witness
12. Being a One Talent Church
13. Come and see…
14. Hold Up The Light
15. Are You An Ambassador For Christ?
16. Are You Ready for the Harvest?
17. First Things First
18. Talking About Jesus
19. You Are Ready To Go – By Laurence Torr
20. Christianity’s Most Essential Verse

God Breathed Words

Raphael’s depiction of Paul preaching in Athens

Surely you remember, brothers and sisters, our toil and hardship; we worked night and day in order not to be a burden to anyone while we preached the gospel of God to you.  (1 Thessalonians 2:9)

The Greek word that is most often translated as ‘preach’ is κηρύσσω – kérussó (Strong’s 2784).  The word in the Koine

View original post 648 more words

An uncovering book to explore

Now Summer has come to us we have more time to sit outdoors and relax. Ideal time to take up the Book of books to read in it. We have the whole of God’s Word to read and inspire us whenever we feel like doing so. Though many people like to postpone Bible reading. Some are also afraid to be confronted with the words which they might find inside. To prorogue reading the Bible shall keep a lot of wisdom from them. Holding off Bible reading will withhold us from useful help. Protracting a confrontation with the Word of God shall only make it more difficult for the person to find a satisfying life which shall be righteous in the eyes of the Most High Divine Creator.

“Which Book, Holy Bible” – NARA – 516150 (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

To understand past and evolution to the future, our position in life, our way to follow, we could use that what is brought to us in that old library of 66 books.

Many want others to believe that it is

dang hard. {J.S. Parks Five Primers On How To Study The Bible}

but it does not have to be so hard as they say. When you start with the right open mind and good attitude you should be able to trace back those old sayings and enjoy the different genres of literature the Bible presents. Like any book we come to read we do not have to expect to see clear (in everything) straight ahead. We do need time to reflect and to let the material come into our mind, having it come to grow, like a mustard seed.

Though those writings may be written long ago for people who lived ages ago, the words still are very useful and edifying for today. Whatever mood we are in those words can enlighten us and change our mood for the better. When we are willing to have those words come unto us they shall do.

Every time you open the Bible, believe that God has something for you. Believe it. At every moment, good and bad, up or down, in all seasons, the Bible will speak.  The Holy Spirit convicts you of all truth. Be ready for it to push against you, to disagree with you, to challenge what you always thought was true. The Word of God is a sword that will cut you to your soul, exposing all. {J.S. Parks Five Primers On How To Study The Bible}

The Bible is much more than just the message of Jesus. It is the message of God. Some might want you to believe that as an unbeliever you are nothing with the Bible. They say, like J.S.Park, that it is crazy to those without Jesus, and want us to believe that it only can be the saving truth to believers. but the Biblical message is a message of hope, peace and message of salvation for all.

We should know that all Scripture is breathed out of God, useful for everybody and for everything we do and who we are. No matter if you believe or to have faith, confidence, or trust in this or that or do not believe in this or that or trust what one has heard. Be sure not everything what so called believers belief is true. Many, not to say the majority in Christendom belief nonbilical things. The ones who try to keep to the Bible in Christianity are often fought against and shunned by so called ‘Christians‘. Therefore it is not bad to come to see what is really written in that book of books.

To come to a real good exploration of the Bible you should start with a fully open mind, undone from the traditional human doctrines and willing to read what is really written there on those uncovering pages.

Lots of people want to get as much gain as possible from everything what comes into their hands. They should know that we are not here to  hoard treasures down here where it gets eaten by moths and corroded by rust or—worse!—stolen by burglars. We are better to find more useful treasures by reading in the Bible.  From those words we can learn a lot and build up a stronger character. It shall also learn us how to stockpile treasures in heaven, where it’s safe from moth and rust and burglars.

Your eyes are windows into your body and you have to use them to see into yourself. The Bible is your looking glass and your best tool to get to know yourself and those around you. Perhaps you will not see it at first, but given time you will come to see. If you open your eyes wide in wonder and belief, your body fills up with light. If you live squinty-eyed in greed and distrust, your body is a dank cellar. If you pull the blinds on your windows, what a dark life you will have! Pulling up the blinds are the shutters you will come step by step to more insight and closer to the truth. You also shall start feeling how higher forces will come to guide you.

This doesn’t mean you’ll “feel something” every time you read Scripture. But meditate on even a tiny scrap of a verse and let it sit. The Bible has the very words of God pouring out His heart for you. He is big, but by His Word, He is so close. Hear it as a friend speaking, as a leader leading. Be encouraged and convicted. {J.S. Parks Five Primers On How To Study The Bible}

Quadruple combination opened to the Book of Isaiah – note the cross references between Biblical and Latter-day Saint scripture in the footnotes (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Those writings from the old times are still of use for us. It are the Words from God and from people God wanted us to hear their voices. Words from good and bad people are written down so that we can learn from what went right and what went wrong. They are words which we should embrace and believe. They do come from the One who brought Jesus to life when the conditions were equally hopeless as in our times. (Romans 4:23-24)  Even if it was written in Scripture long ago, you can be sure it’s written for us. God wants the combination of his steady, constant calling and warm, personal counsel in Scripture to come to characterize us, keeping us alert for whatever he will do next. (Romans 15:4)

In the knowledge that  every part of Scripture is God-breathed and useful one way or another — showing us truth, exposing our rebellion, correcting our mistakes, training us to live God’s way, it is a major manual to guide us through life in easy and in difficult times. Knowing also that some very difficult times soon may arrive, we are better to prepare ourselves for that great war which shall come over humankind. A forewarned is forearmed.

Therefore this Summer do not hesitate to take up the Bible and let yourself be carried away by its stories. Through the Word you may be put together and shaped up for the tasks God has for you. (2 Timothy 3:16-17)

We couldn’t be more sure of what we saw and heard — God’s glory, God’s voice. The prophetic Word was confirmed to the apostles who took care like the other men of God that the messengers of God their words would be told to the next generations. We do well to keep focusing on those precious words. When you are feeling blue or are not happy, feeling tired, or when you feel pleased with what you have, come to see the one light you have in a dark time as you wait for daybreak and the rising of the Morning Star in your hearts. The main thing to keep in mind here is that no prophecy of Scripture is a matter of private opinion. And why? Because it’s not something concocted in the human heart. Prophecy resulted when the Holy Spirit prompted men and women to speak God’s Word. (2 Peter 1:19-21)

When reading it we should leave the human words, which tried us to belief certain things, for what they are, and go deeper in to study what is really written in the Bible.  We are convinced when you try to read the Bible, listening to the words like they are written there, it is not such a difficult book at all.

Good luck with it.

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Preceding articles:

Summerholiday season time to read the Bible

Holiday making and dreaming

Home-stayers and their to do lis

Genre – Playing by the Rules

The Need to Understand Genre

A Dutch version / Een Nederlandse versie: Zomertijd ideaal op met Bijbellezing aan te vangen

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Additional reading:

1. Catholicism, Anabaptism and Crisis of Christianity
2. A question to be posed
3. A way to look for Christ, the Bible, Word of God
4. Youth has difficulty Bible Reading
5. Some one or something to fear #3 Cases, folks and outing
6. The Right One to follow and to worship
7. People Seeking for God 1 Looking for answers
8. People Seeking for God 2 Human interpretations
9. People Seeking for God 3 Laws and directions
10. People Seeking for God 6 Strategy
11. Not able to make contact with God because to busy
12. The truth is very plain to see and God can be clearly seen
13. Relapse plan
14. Being Religious and Spiritual 6 Romantici, utopists and transcendentalists
15. Being Religious and Spiritual 7 Transcendence to become one
16. Being Religious and Spiritual 8 Spiritual, Mystic and not or well religious
17. Engagement in an actual two-way conversation with your deities
18. Creator and Blogger God 10 A Blog of a Book 4 Listening to the Blogger
19. Challenging claim 4 Inspired by God 3 Self-consistent Word of God
20. Statutes given unto us
21. Written down in God’s Name for righteousness
22. Unread bestseller
23. Do Christians need to read the Old Testament
24. We should use the Bible every day
25. Daily Spiritual Food To prepare ourselves for the Kingdom of God
26. Daily portion of heavenly food
27. Feed Your Faith Daily
28. The importance of Reading the Scriptures
29. Bible, best Book of books to get to know the truth
30. Necessity of a revelation of creation 9 Searching the Scriptures
31. Necessity of a revelation of creation 10 Instructions for insight and wisdom
32. The Almighty Lord God of gods King above all gods
33. God who knows the heart
34. Jehovah God Almighty greater than all gods
35. Glory of only One God Who gives His Word
36. Necessary to be known all over the earth
37. Hearing words to accept
38. Writers needed to preach to non-believers
39. Perishable non theologians daring to go out to preach
40. Appointed to be read
41. Bric-a-brac of the Bible
42. Absolute Basics to Reading the Bible
43. How to Choose a Bible for Preaching
44. The Third Word: Scripture twisting is blasphemy
45. Interpreting the Scriptures (Part 5)
46. The holy spirit will bring back to your minds all the things told
47. Building up the spirit of the soul
48. Be an Encourager
49. God’s never-ending stream of much-needed mercies
50. Displeasure of יהוה , Jehovah the God of gods, and His wrath against all the gentiles their divisions
51. Believing in the send one and understanding that one does not live by bread alone
52. Salvation, trust and action in Jesus #3 as a Christian
53. The manager and Word of God
54. Accuracy, Word-for-Word Translation Preferred by most Bible Readers
55. The Metaphorical language of the Bible
56. Scripture alone Sola Scriptora

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Related articles

• What need of these things?
• Are you still hearing parables?
• Have you been shaken?
• Old language to confirm the promises
• The holy spirit will bring back to your minds all the things told

The I Am to explore

When looking at the world man and animal can be seen moving around, sometimes men going about more than wild beasts.

In that universe where everybody in his worldly life is so busy with working and with earning money to be able to buy as many gadgets as they would like and to make their material dreams realised, lots of people consider those who have faith in a Supreme Being to be loosers or people who live in fantasy worlds. Lots of them do believe that when in faith you just have to accept everything blindly. For them and many faith is a mystery, where you need to ask any questions.

It is true that we mortals can not understand everything. We could even say that we should not even try to understand everything. Question is if you may look at faith on a rational way. Can you believe in a Higher Being Which or Who created everything. And do you have to approach all the saying about It/Him rationally?

Portrait of René Descartes, dubbed the “Father of Modern Philosophy”, after Frans Hals c. 1648 (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

The last few years focus has been on the rationale. René Descartes with many followers could say “I think, therefore, I am”, and we can only agree because when you are not in existence you can not “be“. When born and not able to think the being of that person is also like as if without life and can not do anything. To be able to do something a creature (animal or man) has to think or to use its/his/her brains. Without the use of the brain, without letting the ‘electricity’ go through the nerves, creature shall not be able to do much. It has to receive something, analyse it, act and react to it. But before it can go into action and reaction it has to have knowledge of the self. It has to have a working ‘I am‘ and has to feel as an ‘I am‘.

Though man faces some problems.
First there is the “I am”, the “Self” which it has to come to face and has to try to understand.
Secondly it has to come to see that the “I am” is only part of a bigger part of “I Am”. When it comes to know that it can go searching for that Bigger “I Am” and hopefully shall come to recognise the “I Am Who Is” without nothing can exist.
Thirdly each little “I am” has to recognise that manifesting the “I am” demands interaction, but that such interaction is never ending. One word only points to another word and never to reality itself. Having brains thinking, receiving interpretations and having to make interpretations itself, it shall have to come to the conclusion that no one interpretation can ever be regarded as final.

As in interpretation, so in life: everything becomes undecidable.

Now there is a difference between all who want to understand and try to approach the many “I ams” in this world. Into this decidedly undecided world, there are people who have opened their eyes and have come to see what is behind the ordinary “I am”. They have found The Bigger “I Am.” They might have found it by listening to their inner voice or by coming to read, see and hear the Word of God. For them the curtains have gone open and the biblical message as reasonable thinking person has come to them with common sense. They have come to see and understand that Faith and logic are not really opposites.

Genesis 1 tells us that man was created in God’s image (Genesis 1: 26-27).

“26  Then God said, “Let Us make man in Our image, according to Our likeness; and let them rule over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the sky and over the cattle and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.” 27 And God created man in His own image, in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them.” (Genesis 1:26-27 NAS)

Diagram from one of René Descartes’ works. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Being created in the image of God, means also each person we see around us has something which might be found also in God. Each person we do encounter can carry something from God with him or her and can share it with others. The person who has come into the faith, believing there is a Creator Deity, and who has seen the Works of that God (Source of knowledge) shall also come to the understanding of the importance of sharing the knowledge of that “I am” with others. For the one with faith it is like being with child, incredible exiting and giving lots of energy. It is as an extra breath given to you.

In the past many man of all sorts of professions have already felt the special awareness and consequences for them of having faith in the Elohim, Divine Creator of heaven and earth. The “I Am Who Is” or the “I Am that I am” is the Most Almighty God of gods, Who overshadows any other god or “I am”. He is also One God Who demands recognition for His important Pole Position. He does not like to see that His creatures do love other gods more than Him. Believers, man of faith, should recognise that and take it into account, worshipping only that One and Only One True God.

To help us to understand that Bigger “I Am” and our own “I am” This Eternal Being has given His Words and let it hem be notated by the many faithful men. All those writings about the “I Am” are bundled in the Book of books, the Bible, the infallible Word of God.

In the several books of the Bible we can find a.o. the Book of Psalms in which we can find the answers:

1. God gave us the Psalms and other Books of the Bible
2. as a prayer book for our lives.
3. to show the friends of God.
4. to learn through poetry and song.
5. to experience the transcendence and the imminence of God at once
6. to affirm the mystery of life
7. to educate and to exhort ourselves
8. to show us our sins
9. to remind us of the brevity of life
10. to remind us of the necessity to live the right way
11. to show us the way to a better and easier life
12. to express our heartfelt longings
13. to discover God His Character
14. to discover God His Will for our lives
15. to learn to direct ourselves to the utmost important things in life
16. to learn how to behave
17. to learn to pray aright
18. to reveal His sovereign grace to us
19. to show us the Way to Salvation
20. to show us and give comfort in finding the Way to the Kingdom of God

Created in the image of God, the image of the Big “I Am” this is not just an outward likeness, for God is Spirit, and is only for our understanding presented in a description which is derived from that of a human. Upon further reading in the Book of books, the Bible, we can see that God’s Word reveals that humans, unlike animals, are provided with rational. Man can think and reason logically, but above all he is able to know God; and the latter goes. An animal has no sense of higher values, let alone God, a man does. But that is also exactly what sets him apart. A man who does not have these capabilities, or does not use them, is indeed no more than an animal:

“Man in [his] pomp, yet without understanding, Is like the beasts that perish.” (Psalms 49:20 NAS)

In fact, it is precisely this ability to abstract reasoning that,

according to the apostle Paul, makes the infidel shall not go unpunished because when he looks around himself he should be able to see the many things God provided. It might be true that the invisible things of God can not be seen, but even his eternal power and deity, has been clearly perceived since the creation of the world are working with the mind, so that they are without excuse.

“For since the creation of the world His invisible attributes, His eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly seen, being understood through what has been made, so that they are without excuse.” (Romans 1:20 NAS)

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Preceding articles:

There can only be hope when there is a will to be and say “I am”Find Inspiration and Follow Your Dreams

Believe in your greatness

Believe in yourself!

Be Kinder to Yourself

Be realistic, do not pretend

The world starts with yourself

Little i

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Additional readings:

1. What is life?
2. Looking at three “I am” s
3. Creator and Blogger God 2 Image and likeness
4. Self-development, self-control, meditation, beliefs and spirituality
5. Philosophy hand in hand with spirituality
6. Looking for True Spirituality 2 Not restricted to an elite
7. Being Religious and Spiritual 1 Immateriality and Spiritual experience
8. Being Religious and Spiritual 2 Religiosity and spiritual life
9. Being Religious and Spiritual 4 Philosophical, religious and spiritual people
10. Being Religious and Spiritual 5 Gnostic influences
11. Being Religious and Spiritual 6 Romantici, utopists and transcendentalists
12. Improving the world by improving the Faith
13. Are you religious, spiritual, or do you belong to a religion, having a faith or interfaith
14. Faith because of the questions
15. A Living Faith #9 Our Manner of Life
16. Fear of failure, and fear of the unknown
17. Looking for something or for the Truth and what it might be and self-awareness
18. Leaving behind the lives we have touched.
19. Only the contrite self, sick of its pretensions, can find salvation
20. God won’t ask
21. Pieces
22. There is no true and constant gentleness without humility
23. For those who make other choices
24. Do you believe in One god?
25. Revelation 1:8 – Who is Speaking?
26. Use of /Gebruik van Jehovah or/of Yahweh in Bible Translations/Bijbel vertalingen
27. Without God no purpose, no goal, no hope
28. Only worhsip Creator of all things
29. A great man does not lose his self-possession when he is afflicted

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• Love: Reuniting the objective and subjective… (thosecatholicmen.com)
  The modern world has fallen into a dualism of body and soul in many ways. Descartes, a founding father of modern philosophy described the soul as a “ghost in a machine.” It is only too easy to focus on the body in an animalistic fashion, focused on pleasure and gratification. The opposite extreme is to fall into emotionalism or even a spiritualism that sees no compelling connection to the body.
• Descartes and the Begining of Modern Philosophy (joshpcb.wordpress.com)

  n the 17^th and 18^th century Western philosophy was in strife – split between British empiricism (figures such as Locke and Bacon) and continental rationalism (such proponents as Leibniz and Spinoza), both camps disagreed with one another on the topic of epistemology and metaphysics.

  Important to add to the context is that in this time, scholasticism was the most prestigious method of education; it entailed Aristotelian values with a significant religion input. Scholasticism used logical methodology to deduce and then resolve contradictions. It was also qualitative, looking at objects and people and how they worked behaved, i.e., their qualities, and it was this manner in which Descartes was educated

• Last lecture of the semester: Foucault and Derrida on Madness (foucaultnews.com)
  We need a history of that other trick that madness plays—that other trick through which men, in the gesture of sovereign reason that locks up their neighbor, communicate and recognize each other in the merciless language of non-madness; we need to identify this moment of that expulsion before it was definitely established in the reign of truth, before it was brought back to life by the lyricism of protestation. To try to recapture, in history, this degree zero of the history of madness, when it was undifferentiated experience, the still undivided experience of the division [of madness and reason] itself. To describe…[what] allows Reason and Madness to fall away, like things henceforth foreign to each other, deaf to any exchange, almost dead to each other. (my emphases)