1 Chronicles 16:34 (NIV) 34 Give thanks to the LORD, for he is good; his love endures forever.
Hello to my my WIFI Subscribers, family and friend’s all over the world…. Truly it is a blessing a privilege to be able to rise one more day and write and be able to share the goodness of Jesus with you all. When I think of the goodness of Jesus and all that he has done for me, my soul cries out hallelujah,
thank God for saving me….
The Sinner’s Prayer -“Heavenly Father, have mercy on me, a sinner. I believe in you and that your word is true. I believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of the living God and that he died on the cross so that I may now have forgiveness for my sins and eternal life. I know that without you in my heart my life is meaningless.
I believe in my heart that you, Lord God, raised Him from the dead. Please Jesus forgive me, for every sin I have ever committed or done in my heart, please Lord Jesus forgive me and come into my heart as my personal Lord and Savior today. I need you to be my Father and my friend.
I give you my life and ask you to take full control from this moment on; I pray this in the name of Jesus Christ.”
Amen.
The Mighty Clouds of Joy,”Sing And Shout”
I believe that Jesus died for us on Calvary, and he paid the ultimate price that I might have life…
He rose with power and victory that we might have life to the tree of life…
Oh Give Thanks unto the Lord for he is good – Judith McAllister
Psalm 86:11 says: “Teach me your way, O LORD, and I will walk in your truth; give me an undivided heart, that I may fear your name.”.
Sometimes in life as humans, we don’t like to be told what to do or how to do something…… I know as a child growing up, some of things my mother taught me still stand strong in my life today…. I believe when we began to look at teaching at home from Mom and Dad being your first educators to equip you for the real world called life….. It’s when we as people stop teaching what Momma, Daddy, Grandma and Grandpa taught us… I say if it was good enough for them, then it’s good enough for me….
My Mom has always been a firm believer in Jesus Christ…. I was born into this wonderful name of Jesus and I thank her… I was born into education, as I was the baby girl and watched my oldest sister which is 11-years-older than I go off to UCLA… The bar was set high in my family, and I’m grateful for such a foundation to know that I can be educated and still lovc Jesus and do it his way… It can be done, and is what I choose to do all the days of my life…
I’m the first to tell anyone that I’m not perfect, but the Jesus in me lets me know that If I do things his way, I can be as close to perfect as it gets in life…. I love the above scripture and it speaks directly to my heart….. It says: Teach me your way, O LORD, and I will walk in your truth; give me an undivided heart, that I may fear your name… God, today… I’m willing to learn how to listen more, how to love more, how to have more patience, how to share more in whatever area I can help another person in…. Oh God… Teach me, and know that you have my undivided heart… I give you my whole heart, my whole mind and my soul which my spirit is now like you spirit, and now my ways are like your ways…. In Isaiah 55:8-0 it says : “For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways,” declares the LORD. – As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts. – “Lord, as long as my thoughts are like your thoughts, I can see no way that I could go wrong” Your love is sufficient for me, and I’m so glad that I made it, and I’m thankful for my testimony….. It may not be like yours, but know that God has been good to me and he continues to see me through….
Posted by:
Min Evelyn
Inspired today by: Pastor Marvin Sapp’s motivational moment… He is such a blessing to the body of Christ…
In Ecclesiastes 3 NIV – It say that is “A Time for Everything – There is a time..” Well today, it’s time to spring forward and take back what the devil stole from me….. I give him no credit, but I do reasuure you that if God allowed it, he can replace whatever it is you lost with something better….
Some of us, it’s time for a spiritual renewal, and some of us it’s just time to surrender to God….. I say today, as long as you still have breath left in your body, you still have chance…. Giving your life over to God is not hard, it’s just a matter of opening up your heart and mind and letting him to be your love and Lord of your Life… Just accept him as your personal savior…. It’s simple and we will talk further on the Roman road later on….
“2 a time to be born and a time to die, a time to plant … 12 I know that there is nothing better for people than to be happy and to do good while they live. 13 That each of them may eat and drink, and find satisfaction in all their toil—this is the gift of God. .|
Ecclesiastes 3 New International Version (NIV)
Ecclesiastes 3 “A Time for Everything”
1 There is a time for everything,
and a season for every activity under the heavens: 2 a time to be born and a time to die,
a time to plant and a time to uproot, 3 a time to kill and a time to heal,
a time to tear down and a time to build, 4 a time to weep and a time to laugh,
a time to mourn and a time to dance, 5 a time to scatter stones and a time to gather them,
a time to embrace and a time to refrain from embracing, 6 a time to search and a time to give up,
a time to keep and a time to throw away, 7 a time to tear and a time to mend,
a time to be silent and a time to speak, 8 a time to love and a time to hate,
a time for war and a time for peace.
9 What do workers gain from their toil? 10 I have seen the burden God has laid on the human race. 11He has made everything beautiful in its time. He has also set eternity in the human heart; yet[a] no one can fathom what God has done from beginning to end. 12 I know that there is nothing better for people than to be happy and to do good while they live. 13 That each of them may eat and drink, and find satisfaction in all their toil—this is the gift of God. 14 I know that everything God does will endure forever; nothing can be added to it and nothing taken from it. God does it so that people will fear him.
15 Whatever is has already been,
and what will be has been before;
and God will call the past to account.[b]
16 And I saw something else under the sun:
In the place of judgment—wickedness was there,
in the place of justice—wickedness was there.
17 I said to myself,
“God will bring into judgment
both the righteous and the wicked,
for there will be a time for every activity ,a time to judge every deed.”
18 I also said to myself, “As for humans, God tests them so that they may see that they are like the animals. 19 Surely the fate of human beings is like that of the animals; the same fate awaits them both: As one dies, so dies the other. All have the same breath[c]; humans have no advantage over animals. Everything is meaningless. 20 All go to the same place; all come from dust, and to dust all return. 21 Who knows if the human spirit rises upward and if the spirit of the animal goes down into the earth?”
22 So I saw that there is nothing better for a person than to enjoy their work, because that is their lot. For who can bring them to see what will happen after them?
Posted by: Minister Evelyn Diane Thomas – April 16, 2012
Sunday April 15, 2012 – Empowerment Temple Church – Dr. Jamal H. Bryant, Pastor
I pray, what God has to say will be expressly what you need him to say.. .I pray it will Speak to your storm, and speak to your struggle…
God Is going to put you on fire…. Watch them burn until they catch on fire themselves…. The fire that God put in his belly today, I pray that it transfer….
Scripture Reading: Exodus 14:14-15 New International Version (NIV):14 The LORD will fight for you; you need only to be still.” 15 Then the LORD said to Moses, “Why are you crying out to me? Tell the Israelites to move on.
Sermon Title: You haven’t gone far enough….
I will insert the video sermon this week….
Notes:
Then Very End of Pastor Jamal’s sermon….
Where did you get satisfied? Where did you stop? Where did you get to the point to say I have more than enough?
Your season for being still is over… we got work to do and loads to lifts… Be strong…. You’ve got stuff you have to accomplish… If the enemy was going to get you, he would have gotten you on yesterday… Aint no stopping me now… I have to move on it today!!! I want to pray that you don’t get stuck or satisfied…
I don’t want you to let people convince you that you have enough stuff… I want you to get to the point where you don’t need the praise of other people…
Some of us are greedy and thankful know that there is more for me to aspire and achieve…
God I pray you block everything that have been chasing you… I pray that you know that complacency is not in their DNA…. I pray you wake up with your ideal heavy in your heart… Every time they lift up their hands, remove obstacle… God when you open up this next door, let their whole family become elevated……
I believe by faith that my entire family will be blessed and will walk in his anointing… If your faith is connected to my faith… Drive the devil crazy and give God some Glory…. Lift up your voice…. You are are going to disturb and nerve somebody and say ‘You have not gone far enough…”
I’m afraid we have not gone far enough to get more people saved…. .We have not gone far enough to get some atheist saved…..
You need to get saved…. If you want to go further than you ever thought possible.. I need you to join the church and get right with God…. If you don’t you will never get the full vision that God has for your… If you turn yourself in, God will give you that push to get you to that place…..Come on and meet me at this alter…
Proverbs 17:22 A joyful heart is good medicine,
But a broken spirit dries up the bones.
Happy Saturday to each of my WIFI subscribers, family and friends…..Bringing you greetings all the way from Irvine, California…. Today as I awake with a grateful heart, I realized that “A joyful heart is good medicince, But a broken spirit dries up the bones…. Let go, learn to forgive
and let God have his way in your life….
Psalm 37:25
I have been young and now I am old, Yet I have not seen the righteous forsaken Or his descendants begging bread.
King James Bible (Cambridge Ed.)I have been young, and now am old; yet have I not seen the righteous forsaken,
nor his seed begging bread.
Joel 3:10 (NIV) Let the weak say, “I am strong.”
Proverbs 17:22 A merry heart doeth good like a med icine: but a broken spirit drieth the bones.
Proverbs 4:22 (ESV) 22 For they are life to those who find them, and healing to all their flesh.
Exodus 16:23 – And he said unto them, This is that which the LORD hath said, To morrow is the rest of the holy sabbath unto the LORD: bake that which ye will bake to day, and seethe that ye will seethe; and that which remaineth over lay up for you to be kept until the morning.
Ephesians 4:32 – And be ye kind one to another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, even as God for Christ’s sake hath forgiven you.
Luke 7:47 – Wherefore I say unto thee, Her sins, which are many, are forgiven; for she loved much: but to whom little is forgiven, the same loveth little.
Genesis 33:4
“But Esau ran to meet him, and embraced him, and fell on his neck and kissed him, and they wept” (Gen 33:4)
Jacob is fervently praying. “Deliver me, I pray, from the hand of my brother, from the hand of Esau; for I fear him, lest he come and attack me and the mother with the children”(Gen 32:11). He dreads the next day when he will see his brother for the first time in twenty years. Like all brothers, Jacob and Esau had quite a history, but theirs included Jacob twice scheming to defraud his brother. Jacob’s fear is not unfounded. His brother had said, “The days of mourning for my father are at hand; then I will kill my brother Jacob”(Gen 27:41). Hearing that, Jacob had run for his life, and had prospered in a foreign land. Now he is returning, at the head of a huge caravan, with his four wives and many children. Word comes that Esau is coming to meet him with four hundred men! Jacob thinks quickly and divides the group into two companies in case of an attack. In a final desperate act to assuage his brother’s anger, he “bowed himself to the ground seven times, until he came near to his brother”(Gen 33:3). The moment is tense; what will Esau do? “But Esau ran to meet him, and embraced him, and fell on his neck and kissed him, and they wept”(Gen 33:4).
Finally, gloriously, the grudge was ended!
Posted by: Minister Evelyn Diane Thomas / April 14, 2012
Proverbs 14:1 The wise woman builds her house, but with her own hands the foolish one tears hers down.
New International Version (NIV)
Good morning to my WIFI Ministries Family and Friends all around the world… Truly I am happy on today… Just thanking God that I can feel his presence no matter where I am… I just pray right now in the name of Jesus, that he help us to hold out and help us defeat the things in our lives that distracts us from feeling close to God… I pray right now that every hindrance be used to strengthen and make us better as we rise above every obstacle and circumstance that may be placed in our way… God, just help us to hold out, because truly we know that our living is not in vain, and with your help and your help alone if we ask, you will help us in whatever area it is that we struggle… I claim it done right now!!!
I pray that each of you have a blessed day as I am as I celebrate all week long my life and beautiful birthday on tomorrow, April 11, 2012!!!! Praise him, and yes God is so good!!! I don’t have everything that I want, but I thank God for giving me everything that I need!!!!
– Keep fighting and just hold on!!!
“It aint over until God says it’s over!”
hold out – a. To have and keep in one’s grasp: held the reins tightly. b. To aim or direct; point: held a hose on the fire. c. To keep from falling or moving; support: a nail too …” Just hold on!!!”
Posted by: Minister Evelyn Diane Thomas April 10, 2012
1 Peter 1:13-16 “Wherefore gird up the loins of your mind, be ye sober, and hope to the end for the grace that is to be brought unto you at the revelation of Jesus Christ. As obedient children, not fashioning yourselves according to the former lust in your ignorance: But be ye holy in all manner of conversation; Because it is written, Be ye Holy; for I am holy.”
2 Peter 1:3-9: “His divine power has given us everything we need for life and godliness.” (2 Peter 1:3).
As I awake on today, I can hear the late Isaiah Bishop’s voice so clearly as he taught so profoundly over the years on “Holiness…” I will be celebrating my 46th birthday on this year, and I met him when I was 7-years-old, and he was preaching Holiness or hell way back then, and as I became an adult and began to walk on my own two feet, I understand more now that I’ve become a mature adult in Christ… I did not say perfect, and I make no excuses for random things I might say or do… Nevertheless, through Holiness, God is working on me and changing my life everyday so that I can become so close to God that I know he is more than just a friend, he is my Father…..
I know it seems rare that anyone tackles this subject anymore… However, there is a need for this subject to be preached to dyeing world and a new generation that really don’t know that heaven and hell are both real. I say that hoping that someone would take heed to know that we only get one life to live, and living it in holiness is the only way I know that fulfills every void….
Holiness definition: In the highest sense belongs to God (Isa. 6:3;Rev. 15:4), and to Christians as consecrated to God’s service, and in so far as they are conformed in all things to the will of God (Rom.6:19, 22; Eph. 1:4; Titus 1:8; 1 Pet. 1:15). Personal holiness is a work of gradualdevelopment. It is carried on under manyhindrances, hence the frequent admonitions to watchfulness, prayer, and perseverance (1 Cor.1:30; 2 Cor. 7:1; Eph. 4:23, 24). (SeeSANCTIFICATION.)
When we are born again by the Holy Spirit He, the Holy Spirit, begins to work in us the character of God. No, more than that! He plants in our spirits ‘the divine nature’ of God. We share in His divine nature. (2 Peter 1:3-4).
What is God’s nature? It is His righteousness, His holiness, His patience and comfort and strength. His nature is glorious and believers reflect it in the way they live (2 Cor 3:17-18).
How do we participate in these many aspects of God’s nature. Our fallen nature is exchanged for His nature. Under the Spirit’s direction and control, our fallen nature is reconstituted. Our nature takes on again the originalimage of God which was muddied and spoiled by sin. So Paul could say to the believers at Corinth, “you are new creations in Christ” (2 Cor 5:17).
Our journey through life gives God time and space to remake us “in His perfect image.”
David said, “He makes me lie down in green pastures, He leads me beside quiet waters,” (Psalm 23:2-3). We feast on Him; we drink deeply of His divine nature and we take on the characteristics of our Father in heaven.
Those who drink alcoholic beverages take on the nature of the beverages they drink. Those who drink of the Spirit, take on the nature or fruit of the Holy Spirit “love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self control.” (Gal 5:22-23).
Because our nature is changed to be like God’s nature, Jesus is not ashamed to call us brothers, saying, “Here am I, and the children God has given Me.” (Heb 2:11-13). The writer also said, “Both the One who makes men holy and those who are made holy are of the same family” God’s family. Holiness is the hallmark of God’s family.
The Holy Spirit by His very presence and nature works holiness of life in the believer. If a man or woman does not have the Spirit, he or she is not a Christian (Rom 8:9). By the power of the indwelling Spirit, believers can live holy lives, according to the Scriptures.
From the beginning, God demanded holiness. Holiness equals righteousness. God said men of faith were righteous (Gen 15:6). They lived holy lives and they “walked with God.” (Gen 6:9). He demanded holiness in the days of Moses (Ex 19:6). And He demands holiness of life for all who would enter His Kingdom.
When God created Adam and Eve in His image and likeness, I believe He clothed them with His glory and holiness (Eph 4:24). When they rebelled and broke God’s command, that glory fell away and they saw themselves naked, and they were ashamed (Gen 3:7).
God cannot walk and talk with sinners, so He put Adam and Eve out of the garden. Only in Christ can we gain the holiness we lost and have God’s likeness fully restored in our lives.
The Risen Christ told the apostle John, “Blessed are those who wash their robes, that they may have the right to the tree of life, and may go through the gates into the (Holy) city. Outside are those who practice magic arts, the sexually immoral, the murderers, the idolaters and everyone who loves and practices falsehood.” (Rev 22:15; 21:8). Because nothing impure will ever enter it (heaven), nor will anyone who is shameful or deceitful. (Rev 21:27).
Sermon Scripture: Luke 23:46 (NIV) –46 Jesus called out with a loud voice, “Father, into your hands I commit my spirit.” When he had said this, he breathed his last.
Sermon Title: “A wireless connection”
“I’m connected!!!”
Opening Prayer:
Song Selection: The Holy Ghost keeps on moving down in my soul!
Song Selection: “How great is our God!”
I will insert the I tunes Video sermon…. ” A WIRELESS CONNECTION” …. No sermon notes..,.
Have to get out and go to church today!!! I Love me some Empowerment Temple Church!!!
Sermon Scripture: Luke 23:46 (NIV) –46 Jesus called out with a loud voice, “Father, into your hands I commit my spirit.” When he had said this, he breathed his last.
And what do you benefit if you gain the whole world but lose your own soul? … “For what does a person benefit if he gains the whole world and lacks his soul? … To gain the whole world means to possess it as our own – all its riches, its honors, …
And what do you benefit if you gain the whole world but lose your own soul? … For what does it profit a man to gain the whole world and forfeit his soul? … cause of Christ will appear as glorious, as some now think it mean and contemptible.
But what if your soul DOES live on forever after your death – either in heaven … You need to repent of your sinfulness – this means that you agree with God … For what shall it profit a man, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul?
Luke 9:25 What good is it for a man to gain the whole world, and yet lose or forfeit his very self?
Matthew 16:26 What good will it be for a man if he gains the whole world, yet forfeits his soul? Or what can a man give in exchange for his soul?
Hebrews 10:34 You sympathized with those in prison and joyfully accepted the confiscation of your property, because you knew that you yourselves had better and lasting possessions.
Luke 22:42″Father, if you are willing, take this cup from me; yet not my will, but yours be done.”
Isaiah 53:5 (NIV) 5 But he was pierced for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was on him, and by his wounds we are healed.
April 7, 2012 “Day 46 of Lent” Intercessory Prayer
This has been a beautiful journey these past 46 days… I feel like I’ve brought closure to a lot of situations in my life on this 40+ day journey…. As we embark upon bringing this Lenten season to a close on tomorrow, we will be praying and discussion “CLOSURE” on today.. When we define the word closure in the personal realm of our lives, some of us need closure on relationships, a passing of a love one, unsolved mysteries, murders and deaths… Some of us still stand and seek justice for people that had not say in their rights being violated… Sometimes bringing an individual to justice bring closure to a dyeing situation… “Closure is very important to go on!”
Whatever your case may be, please know that Jesus paid the ultimate price for us all… Jesus went to Calvary to save a wretch like you and me… That’s love and that’s as ultimate closure as it gets in my life….
“clo·sure” 1. the act of closing; the state of being closed.
2. a bringing to an end; conclusion.
3. something that closes or shuts.
4. an architectural screen or parapet, especially one standing free between
columns or piers.
5. Phonetics . an occlusion of the vocal tract as an articulatory feature of a
particular speech sound. Compare constriction.
6. Parliamentary Procedure. a cloture.
7. Surveying . completion of a closed traverse in such a way that the point of
origin and the endpoint coincide within an acceptably small margin of error.
Compare error of closure.
8. Mathematics
a. the property of being closed with respect to a particular operation.
b. the intersection of all closed sets that contain a given set.
9. Psychology
a.the tendency to see an entire figure even though the picture of it is
incomplete,based primarily on the viewer’s past experience.
b. a sense of psychological certainty or completeness: a need for closure.
10. Obsolete . something that encloses or shuts in; enclosure.
Paul, a servant of Christ Jesus, called to be an apostle, set apart for the gospel of God, which he promised beforehand through his prophets in the holy Scriptures, concerning his Son, who was descended from David according to the flesh and was declared to be the Son of God in power according to the Spirit of holiness by his resurrection from the dead, Jesus Christ our Lord, through whom we have received grace and apostleship to bring about the obedience of faith for the sake of his name among all the nations, …
Now there was a man of the Pharisees named Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews. This man came to Jesus by night and said to him, “Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher come from God, for no one can do these signs that you do unless God is with him.” Jesus answered him, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born again he cannot see the kingdom of God.” Nicodemus said to him, “How can a man be born when he is old? Can he enter a second time into his mother’s womb and be born?” Jesus answered, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God. …
James, a servant of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ, To the twelve tribes in the Dispersion: Greetings. Count it all joy, my brothers, when you meet trials of various kinds, for you know that the testing of your faith produces steadfastness. And let steadfastness have its full effect, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing. If any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask God, who gives generously to all without reproach, and it will be given him. …
I warn everyone who hears the words of the prophecy of this book: if anyone adds to them, God will add to him the plagues described in this book, and if anyone takes away from the words of the book of this prophecy, God will take away his share in the tree of life and in the holy city, which are described in this book.
After the death of Ahab, Moab rebelled against Israel. Now Ahaziah fell through the lattice in his upper chamber in Samaria, and lay sick; so he sent messengers, telling them, “Go, inquire of Baal-zebub, the god of Ekron, whether I shall recover from this sickness.” But the angel of the Lord said to Elijah the Tishbite, “Arise, go up to meet the messengers of the king of Samaria, and say to them, ‘Is it because there is no God in Israel that you are going to inquire of Baal-zebub, the god of Ekron? Now therefore thus says the Lord, You shall not come down from the bed to which you have gone up, but you shall surely die.’” So Elijah went. The messengers returned to the king, and he said to them, “Why have you returned?” …
After the death of Saul, when David had returned from striking down the Amalekites, David remained two days in Ziklag. And on the third day, behold, a man came from Saul’s camp, with his clothes torn and dirt on his head. And when he came to David, he fell to the ground and paid homage. David said to him, “Where do you come from?” And he said to him, “I have escaped from the camp of Israel.” And David said to him, “How did it go? Tell me.” And he answered, “The people fled from the battle, and also many of the people have fallen and are dead, and Saul and his son Jonathan are also dead.” Then David said to the young man who told him, “How do you know that Saul and his son Jonathan are dead?” …
My little children, I am writing these things to you so that you may not sin. But if anyone does sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous. He is the propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only but also for the sins of the whole world. And by this we know that we have come to know him, if we keep his commandments. Whoever says “I know him” but does not keep his commandments is a liar, and the truth is not in him, but whoever keeps his word, in him truly the love of God is perfected. By this we may know that we are in him: …
All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be competent, equipped for every good work.
Paul, Silvanus, and Timothy, To the church of the Thessalonians in God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ: Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. We ought always to give thanks to God for you, brothers, as is right, because your faith is growing abundantly, and the love of every one of you for one another is increasing. Therefore we ourselves boast about you in the churches of God for your steadfastness and faith in all your persecutions and in the afflictions that you are enduring. This is evidence of the righteous judgment of God, that you may be considered worthy of the kingdom of God, for which you are also suffering— …
Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God, and Timothy our brother, To the saints and faithful brothers in Christ at Colossae: Grace to you and peace from God our Father. We always thank God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, when we pray for you, since we heard of your faith in Christ Jesus and of the love that you have for all the saints, because of the hope laid up for you in heaven. Of this you have heard before in the word of the truth, the gospel, …
Or do you not know, brothers—for I am speaking to those who know the law—that the law is binding on a person only as long as he lives? For a married woman is bound by law to her husband while he lives, but if her husband dies she is released from the law of marriage. Accordingly, she will be called an adulteress if she lives with another man while her husband is alive. But if her husband dies, she is free from that law, and if she marries another man she is not an adulteress. Likewise, my brothers, you also have died to the law through the body of Christ, so that you may belong to another, to him who has been raised from the dead, in order that we may bear fruit for God. For while we were living in the flesh, our sinful passions, aroused by the law, were at work in our members to bear fruit for death. …
1 Thessalonians 2:4 “But as we have been approved by God to be entrusted with the gospel, even so we speak, not as pleasing men, but God who tests our hearts.”
Romans 1:1-32 (NIV)
Romans 1
1 Paul, a servant of Christ Jesus, called to be an apostle and set apart for the gospel of God— 2 the gospel he promised beforehand through his prophets in the Holy Scriptures 3 regarding his Son, who as to his earthly life was a descendant of David, 4 and who through the Spirit of holiness was appointed the Son of God in powerby his resurrection from the dead: Jesus Christ our Lord. 5Through him we received grace and apostleship to call all the Gentiles to the obedience that comes from faith for his name’s sake. 6 And you also are among those Gentiles who are called to belong to Jesus Christ. 7 To all in Rome who are loved by God and called to be his holy people: Grace and peace to you from God our Father and from the Lord Jesus Christ.
Paul’s Longing to Visit Rome 8 First, I thank my God through Jesus Christ for all of you, because your faith is being reported all over the world. 9 God, whom I serve in my spirit in preaching the gospel of his Son, is my witness how constantly I remember you 10 in my prayers at all times; and I pray that now at last by God’s will the way may be opened for me to come to you. 11 I long to see you so that I may impart to you some spiritual gift to make you strong— 12 that is, that you and I may be mutually encouraged by each other’s faith. 13 I do not want you to be unaware, brothers and sisters, that I planned many times to come to you (but have been prevented from doing so until now) in order that I might have a harvest among you, just as I have had among the other Gentiles.
14 I am obligated both to Greeks and non-Greeks, both to the wise and the foolish. 15 That is why I am so eager to preach the gospel also to you who are in Rome.
16 For I am not ashamed of the gospel, because it is the power of God that brings salvation to everyone who believes: first to the Jew, then to the Gentile. 17 For in the gospel the righteousness of God is revealed—a righteousness that is by faith from first to last, just as it is written: “The righteous will live by faith.”
God’s Wrath Against Sinful Humanity
18 The wrath of God is being revealed from heaven against all the godlessness and wickedness of people, who suppress the truth by their wickedness, 19 since what may be known about God is plain to them, because God has made it plain to them. 20 For since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that people are without excuse. 21 For although they knew God, they neither glorified him as God nor gave thanks to him, but their thinking became futile and their foolish hearts were darkened. 22 Although they claimed to be wise, they became fools 23 and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images made to look like a mortal human being and birds and animals and reptiles.
24 Therefore God gave them over in the sinful desires of their hearts to sexual impurity for the degrading of their bodies with one another. 25 They exchanged the truth about God for a lie, and worshiped and served created things rather than the Creator—who is forever praised. Amen.
26 Because of this, God gave them over to shameful lusts. Even their women exchanged natural sexual relations for unnatural ones. 27 In the same way the men also abandoned natural relations with women and were inflamed with lust for one another. Men committed shameful acts with other men, and received in themselves the due penalty for their error.
28 Furthermore, just as they did not think it worthwhile to retain the knowledge of God, so God gave them over to a depraved mind, so that they do what ought not to be done. 29 They have become filled with every kind of wickedness, evil, greed and depravity. They are full of envy, murder, strife, deceit and malice. They are gossips, 30 slanderers, God-haters, insolent, arrogant and boastful; they invent ways of doing evil; they disobey their parents; 31 they have no understanding, no fidelity, no love, no mercy. 32 Although they know God’s righteous decree that those who do such things deserve death, they not only continue to do these very things but also approve of those who practice them.
“[W]hy have I chosen to direct your attention to that epistle of Paul’s which was sent originally to the Roman church? It is because the epistle to the Romans has the most complete diagnosis of the plague of man’s sin, and the most glorious setting forth of the simple remedy of justification by faith apart from the works of the law.” Thus begins Part One of Barnhouse’s massive commentary on Romans. Entitled Man’s Ruin, Part One covers Romans 1:1–32. With the deft eye of a master exegete, Barnhouse preaches on a number of issues in messages which include “The Trinity,” “The Communion of the Saints,” “God’s Righteousness” and 24 others.
Through a discussion of mankind’s fallenness may be difficult for many to stomach, Barnhouse’s meditation on man’s separation from God is a necessary component to any study of Romans. As Barnhouse expresses himself, “It is not pleasant to set forth these truths in the ears of men who do not wish to hear the truth, but it is in faithfulness to God that we thus speak.”
When I first became pastor of the Philadelphia church where I still serve, I began my ministry by preaching on the epistle to the Romans. My first Sunday in that pulpit found me giving an exposition of the first verse of the epistle. The second Sunday I started with the second verse; and, as I did not finish by the time it was necessary to pronounce the benediction, I said, as I had when I had been teaching history in the university, “We will suspend our study at this point, and will begin from here in our next meeting together.”
For three and one half years I never took a text outside of the epistle to the Romans. I saw the church transformed; the audience filled the pews and then the galleries; and the work went on with great blessing. But just as important as the transformation of the church, there was the transformation of the preacher. The disciplined necessity of treating every verse in an entire epistle formed habits of study that organized the mind of the preacher for the whole of his task.
After more than twenty years, there came a renewed opportunity for a widespread radio ministry. I decided to begin expository studies in the epistle to the Romans. In this series, I have never used even a page of the notes which had served me twenty years before. And where I had then taken approximately 140 Sunday periods for the epistle, I soon discovered that it was going to take much more this time. In fact, it will be noted that the present volume contains twenty-seven studies on the first chapter of Romans alone.
This fact leads me to make an observation on the method of study which I am using. I believe that the only way to understand any given passage in the Word of God is to take the whole Bible and place the point of it, like an inverted pyramid on that passage, so that the weight of the entire Word rests upon a single verse, or, indeed, a single word. Thus I have not called this volume and the ones to follow a commentary, but rather expositions of the Word of God; expositions which take as their point of departure the book of Romans and range through the whole of the Bible in order to bring all of the correlated truth of the Word to bear on each line and word of the epistle. Thus, it will be discovered in later volumes that I have spent five or six chapters on a single word in order to bring the whole teaching of the Bible to bear on a particular doctrine which may be mentioned in Romans in no more than a single word or phrase.
It should be realized also that these studies have been prepared for immediate delivery, and that I was never more than eight or ten studies in advance of the actual moment of broadcast. And, even as I write this preface to the first of several …
Hope in Christ
We have a hymn that expresses the true Christian attitude toward these, as toward all who are in the bonds of deep sin:
Rescue the perishing, care for the dying,
Snatch them, in pity, from sin and the grave;
Weep o’er the erring ones, lift up the fallen,
Tell them of Jesus, the mighty to save.
Down in the human heart, crushed by the tempter,
Feelings lie buried that grace can restore,
Touched by a loving hand, wakened with kindness,
Chords that were broken will vibrate once more.
Rescue the perishing, care for the dying,
Jesus is merciful, Jesus will save.
Rescue the perishing, duty demands it;
Strength for thy labors the Lord will provide;
Back to the narrow way, patiently win them,
Tell them of Jesus, the Saviour, who died.
For there is hope for them in the Lord Jesus Christ, and there is no hope for them anywhere else in this world. There is salvation from the penalty of sin and there is salvation from the power of sin. The Lord Jesus Christ is able to save and to keep, and He is able to give you love for the unlovely and zeal for the rescue of the lost. And if some people are inclined to ask, “Why hath God made me thus?” the answer is that God has merely made divine laws, and that the natural consequences of those laws are coming out in specimens of the human race. The physical is nothing more than an illustration of the spiritual. God made man to turn outward and upward toward the Creator. A man who lives in the right relationship with God is able to live in right relationship toward his one wife whom the Lord has given him. If the man turns away from God, he turns toward himself and his kind, and begins to worship the creature rather than the Creator.
The immediate result is that his physical loves are thrown out of their proper channel. He fails to live within the divine-human trinity of the husband, the wife and the Lord who are, in no small sense, one; he breaks down the barriers of sex and, as he has turned toward himself, he ultimately is reaping in his own body the rotten fruit of that inbreeding sin, and is in the midst of all perversion. Newell adds a sentence in his commentary, “And it is significant, that, as originally woman took the lead in sin, so here!” But he adds, “And if God has ‘made you to differ,’ thank Him only! It will not do to hold up your hands in self-righteous dismay, and say, ‘These verses do not in any particular describe me.’ For God will show you and me that this is exactly the race as we were born into it, and out of which the only rescue is being born again. All these things pertain to lost, fallen man.”
Love Manifested
The mere recital of the abyss of iniquity into which the human race has plunged is an amazing enlargement of the love of God. For it was into the race of fallen man that God condescended to come. Like every member of the human race, the Virgin Mary was born in sin and shapen in iniquity. She is in Heaven today not because of any stainlessness of her own but because Jesus Christ died. …
