Galatians 5:25 (KJV) Walk in the Spirit

Galatians 5:25 (KJV)
If we live in the Spirit, let us also walk in the Spirit.

One of the objections I have heard a lot from the Messianic Jews, and those Gentiles following their teaching, is that they do not claim to rely on the law for salvation. They are often adamant, at least some of them, that their soul rests solely upon Jesus. They claim that the O.T. law is for principles of righteousness, good works, and not of salvation. 

My problem with that runs in a few lines:
First, they lay a potential snare for others. 
Even if they, in fact, do trust Christ alone for salvation, they have left a door open for others to trust the works of the law, which they strongly believe should be practiced, for their justification. 

Second, I see a complete repudiation of those works (of the law) in the N.T. 
This is exactly what led to the dispute between Paul and Peter. When Peter, in a weak moment, slipped back into the O.T. thinking Peter rebuked Him. 

Third, this is clearly discouraged in our text verse. 
We are not justified by the law but by the Spirit. We are to live out our Christian life in the power of the Holy Spirit and not by the law. 

To my readers:
First of all, thank you! It is a great joy to me to know you read the thoughts and lessons God has given me in His word. Secondly, I would love to hear from you. Please feel free to leave comments.

For this and more than 4600 earlier Daily Visits with God visit https://mckenzie-visit-with-god.blogspot.com. There you will find daily visits going back to 2006.

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Galatians 5:25 (KJV) Walk in the Spirit

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Galatians 4:1-4 (KJV) Why Take Bondage Again?

Galatians 4:1-4 (KJV)
Now I say, That the heir, as long as he is a child, differeth nothing from a servant, though he be lord of all;
But is under tutors and governors until the time appointed of the father.
Even so we, when we were children, were in bondage under the elements of the world:
But when the fulness of the time was come, God sent forth his Son, made of a woman, made under the law,

Paul describes Old Testament Israel as children under tutors and governors. They were the apple of God’s eye, beloved of Him for no reason other than He chose to love them. But they were in bondage. 

They had tutors
Incapable of understanding the deeper things of God on their own, prophets and teachers were necessary to spoon feed them. That it turned out was just enough to keep them alive spiritually but not enough to make them flourish spiritually.

They had governors 
They were so prone to wander away from God that from time to time the Lord would send them some form of chastisement to discipline them and bring them back to God. 

In all of this they never quite found freedom. Their own system bound them down with burdens they were not able to bear. 

But then came Jesus. Through Christ, a man is made free of these burdens. He can come boldly to the throne of grace to obtain mercy and find grace to help in time of need. His spirit cries out to God as “Abba, Father.” 

Why would anyone with such liberty take up the chains of bondage again?

To my readers:
First of all, thank you! It is a great joy to me to know you read the thoughts and lessons God has given me in His word. Secondly, I would love to hear from you. Please feel free to leave comments.

For this and more than 4600 earlier Daily Visits with God visit https://mckenzie-visit-with-god.blogspot.com. There you will find daily visits going back to 2006.

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Galatians 4:1-4 (KJV) Why Take Bondage Again?

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Exodus 25:1-2 (KJV) Willingly With His Heart

Exodus 25:1-2 (KJV)
And the LORD spake unto Moses, saying,
Speak unto the children of Israel, that they bring me an offering: of every man that giveth it willingly with his heart ye shall take my offering.

It is interesting that God is definitely the one who gave the command to bring an offering and Moses was definitely commanded to tell the people to bring it. 

To bring an offering is the will of God. 

But, though, Moses was to tell the people to bring it, he was to accept only those offerings given ”willingly and with his heart.” The only way I know that this would be possible is that he spoke the command in such a way that only those who wanted to give “willingly and with his heart.” Felt compelled to give at all. I take it that Moses’ manner of speaking was not so forceful that an unwilling heartfelt coerced into participating. 

God loves a cheerful giver. This is a matter of the heart and not of obligation. Unless duty is personal rather than forced it is not of God. 

To my readers:
First of all, thank you! It is a great joy to me to know you read the thoughts and lessons God has given me in His word. Secondly, I would love to hear from you. Please feel free to leave comments.

For this and more than 4600 earlier Daily Visits with God visit https://mckenzie-visit-with-god.blogspot.com. There you will find daily visits going back to 2006.

If you have been blessed by this blog, please subscribe to my feed and share it with others.

For more resources from Pastor Marvin McKenzie visit http://puyallupbaptistchurch.com.

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Exodus 25:1-2 (KJV) Willingly With His Heart

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Galatians 2:16-17 (KJV) What Is Legalism?

Galatians 2:16-17 (KJV)
Knowing that a man is not justified by the works of the law, but by the faith of Jesus Christ, even we have believed in Jesus Christ, that we might be justified by the faith of Christ, and not by the works of the law: for by the works of the law shall no flesh be justified.
But if, while we seek to be justified by Christ, we ourselves also are found sinners, is therefore Christ the minister of sin? God forbid.

The subject of legalism gets twisted in our day as, I suppose, it always has. When I first began in the ministry any preacher who taught a standard of righteousness might be accused of legalism. 

To preach separation from the world was considered legalism. 
To reject modern music, immodest dress or worldly entertainment was called legalism. 

This is nothing but using a word we have come to believe is ungodly to condemn those with whose faith we have a personal disagreement. (“I don’t like you, so you are a legalist.” “I don’t want to submit to that.” So, it is legalistic.)

While the terms legalist and legalistic are nowhere found in the Bible, the subject is clearly presented in the book of Galatians. Legalism is seeking to be justified through the works of the law. Legalism is an attempt to be pronounced righteous in the sight of God through obedience to religious duty, specifically, the Old Testament/Mosaic law. Legalism in its original form was the error of the Judaizers – what we would call today Messianic Jews. 

Many of the more modern Judaizers propose that they are saved through faith but that they are right with God and man through the law. This skirts the issue and avoids the teaching of the New Testament. We have a new law, vastly superior to the old. We are to love God with all our heart soul and mind and love our neighbor as our self. 

This in no way excuses the New Testament believer from standards, or separation, or godliness. Being justified by Christ compels us to live differently than sinners of the world. 

To my readers:
First of all, thank you! It is a great joy to me to know you read the thoughts and lessons God has given me in His word. Secondly, I would love to hear from you. Please feel free to leave comments.

For this and more than 4600 earlier Daily Visits with God visit https://mckenzie-visit-with-god.blogspot.com. There you will find daily visits going back to 2006.

If you have been blessed by this blog, please subscribe to my feed and share it with others.

For more resources from Pastor Marvin McKenzie visit http://puyallupbaptistchurch.com.

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Galatians 2:16-17 (KJV) What Is Legalism?

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Galatians 1:10 (KJV) Be Certain of your Message

Galatians 1:10 (KJV)
For do I now persuade men, or God? or do I seek to please men? for if I yet pleased men, I should not be the servant of Christ.

Here is one of the great challenges of ministry. Every honest preacher knows he is a servant of Christ. 

• He is taught of Christ
• He is moved by Christ
• He longs to live to please Christ

However, his ministry is toward men. Those men often:  

• Want to persuade him to teach things they want him to teach[1]
• They want to move him to serve them as they wish to be served
• They desire he lives to please them in the work of his ministry 

Paul confidently stuck to the course God set because he was certain his message was from God and not man. 

Be certain of your message and you can be strong in your direction. 

---

[1]Just recently I heard about a well-known Baptist pastor of a generation ago who, for years, pastored a large Baptist church whose doctrinal statement was not the same as the pastor’s own beliefs. They got along because he taught what the church statement taught.  I wonder how he justified himself in light of passages like this?

To my readers:
First of all, thank you! It is a great joy to me to know you read the thoughts and lessons God has given me in His word. Secondly, I would love to hear from you. Please feel free to leave comments.

For this and more than 4600 earlier Daily Visits with God visit https://mckenzie-visit-with-god.blogspot.com. There you will find daily visits going back to 2006.

If you have been blessed by this blog, please subscribe to my feed and share it with others.

For more resources from Pastor Marvin McKenzie visit http://puyallupbaptistchurch.com.

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Galatians 1:10 (KJV) Be Certain of your Message

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Exodus 20:2-3 (KJV) Keep His Commandments

Exodus 20:2-3 (KJV)
I am the LORD thy God, which have brought thee out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage.
Thou shalt have no other gods before me.

A popular method of presenting the gospel right now is to use the Ten Commandments to “get the sinner lost.” The idea is to go through the Commandments and ask them if they have ever broken any of them. 

• Have they ever lied?
• Have they ever taken the name of the Lord in vain?
• Have they ever taken something that did not belong to them?
• Etc. 

Using this information as a starting place then the soul winner can show them forgiveness is found in Christ. 

This is all well and good. I am not faulting it at all. I merely note that deliverance is the basis for the Commandments and not the other way around. It was not that they had broken these Commandments that God offered them deliverance or even that they cried out for deliverance that God offered them. In fact, it was because God had already delivered them that He expected them to keep these Commandments.

The order was this:

• The world was hostile to them
• They cried out to God for deliverance 
• God heard and saved them from Egypt 
• Then God gave His Commandments 

The same is true in the Christian life. Faithful obedience to the Word of God is an expectation of the Lord upon the redeemed. It is because we are saved that we are to do good works. 

To my readers:
First of all, thank you! It is a great joy to me to know you read the thoughts and lessons God has given me in His word. Secondly, I would love to hear from you. Please feel free to leave comments.

For this and more than 4600 earlier Daily Visits with God visit https://mckenzie-visit-with-god.blogspot.com. There you will find daily visits going back to 2006.

If you have been blessed by this blog, please subscribe to my feed and share it with others.

For more resources from Pastor Marvin McKenzie visit http://puyallupbaptistchurch.com.

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Exodus 20:2-3 (KJV) Keep His Commandments

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Exodus 18:8 (KJV) Areas of Attack

Exodus 18:8 (KJV)
And Moses told his father in law all that the LORD had done unto Pharaoh and to the Egyptians for Israel’s sake, and all the travail that had come upon them by the way, and how the LORD delivered them.

Israel barely got across the Red Sea before temptation after temptation fell upon them. These were the things of living free:

• The need for food
• The need for water
• The need for protection

And then, here, 

• The need for organized leadership – government.

The trend among Fundamentalist Bible students, I think, has been to accept Jethro’s counsel as wise. I am not so sure. Divided leadership provides for division. And divisions spring up among people easily enough on their own.

So I see the first three attacks of Satan after the Red Sea crossing as:

A physical attack 
Food and water

An outward attack
The Amalekites 

An inward attack
Jethro’s worldly counsel

These three seem to be the areas of attacks we face in everyday life. Whether we speak of: 

• The life of an individual,
• The life of a family or 
• The life of a church

Constant vigil must be had against allowing: 

• Physical necessities to pull us away from God
• Outside influences to pull us away from God or
• Ungodly counsel to pull us away from God

To my readers:
First of all, thank you! It is a great joy to me to know you read the thoughts and lessons God has given me in His word. Secondly, I would love to hear from you. Please feel free to leave comments.

For this and more than 4600 earlier Daily Visits with God visit https://mckenzie-visit-with-god.blogspot.com. There you will find daily visits going back to 2006.

If you have been blessed by this blog, please subscribe to my feed and share it with others.

For more resources from Pastor Marvin McKenzie visit http://puyallupbaptistchurch.com.

My books are available at:
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My author Page for Kindle/Amazon
http://www.amazon.com/author/marvinmckenzie

Exodus 18:8 (KJV) Areas of Attack

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Please consider helping our church’s teen department by signing up for cash back shopping at http://www.dubli.com/M04VB. This program has three levels of participation, the first being completely free.