Acts 7:5 (KJV) The Unseen Influence of a Faithful Witness

Acts 7:5 (KJV)

And he gave him none inheritance in it, no, not so much as to set his foot on: yet he promised that he would give it to him for a possession, and to his seed after him, when as yet he had no child. 

No inheritance, no child—just a promise.

It is significant, I think, that Stephen was the one preaching this, making this observation about Abraham.

Stephen delivers one of the longest recorded messages in the Bible. It was obviously convicting, filled with the Holy Ghost, biblically sound, and heard by a large audience.

But for Stephen, it was “one and done.”

His message didn’t result in 3,000 souls being saved and baptized in one day. Instead, it ended in his death.

Yet, he could be satisfied with two significant accomplishments from that one powerful sermon:

• It is recorded in the eternal Word of God.
• It was heard by one named Saul of Tarsus.

Stephen reminds me of the story of a man named Kimball, who witnessed to a young shoe salesman named Moody. Almost no one remembers Kimball, but nearly everyone in the Christian world knows of D.L. Moody.

Each of us plays a different role in God’s eternal plan. We must be careful not to make one of two mistakes:

• Thinking we can refuse our role.
• Being dissatisfied with the results of our role.

No inheritance, no child—just a promise.

But what a promise!

#FaithfulWitness #GodsPromises #StephenTheMartyr #EternalImpact #TrustGodsPlan

The Unseen Influence of a Faithful Witness: Your Role, His Results

What role has God given you in His plan? Comment below! Share the Gospel with one person—your witness matters. 

🌎 Visit marvinmckenzie.org for more biblical insights and resources.

👉 Join our community in studying God’s Word and strengthening your faith.

To my readers:

Thank you! It is a great joy to me to know you read the thoughts and lessons God has given me in His word. I would love to hear from you. Please feel free to leave comments.

For this and, more than 6700 earlier Daily Visits with God, visit https://mckenzie-visit-with-god.blogspot.com. There you will find daily visits going back to 2005.

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

My books, and other resources, are available at:
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Join me at Daily Visits with God Podcast
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Merch at my Teespring store https://macz.creator-spring.com/
Be a witness with hats, mugs, t-shirts, sweat shirts, and more

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The link to Ko-fi  is an opportunity to support this effort to reach a world of souls with the Word of God. I would appreciate any gift you can give. 

Acts 7:5 (KJV) The Unseen Influence of a Faithful Witness

Acts 6:4 (KJV) Set the Pastor Free

Acts 6:4 (KJV)

But we will give ourselves continually to prayer, and to the ministry of the word.

Over the years of ministry, I’ve dealt extensively with the tension that often exists between pastors and deacons. I believe this tension primarily arises because many of us—even in Baptist churches—have been so thoroughly influenced by Protestantism that, without realizing it, we bring poor church polity into our congregations.

Early in my ministry, I was warned not to appoint deacons too quickly when planting a church. 

One pastor I knew even gave me a booklet he had written on how to protect the church from deacons. 

It detailed specific qualifications, interview techniques before appointing them, checks and balances during their terms in office, and strategies for their removal if necessary.

A senior pastor in the Pacific Northwest once told me, “You don’t need deacons until your church runs 50,000 people like the one in Acts.” 

Another simply said, “I don’t do deacons.”

Years ago, a family joined our church from a Conservative Baptist congregation. 

The husband had been a deacon but had grown disillusioned with the church’s liberal direction. He explained that their church polity positioned deacons as a kind of job steward, representing the concerns of the members before the pastor—almost as if they were management versus labor.

The solution in many churches has been, in my view, non-Baptistic: appointing trustees or a leadership team instead.

To each his own on this subject. However, regardless of how a church structures leadership, the goal should always be to free the pastor so that he may “give himself to prayer, and to the ministry of the Word.”

• Not organizing functions.
• Not running programs.
• Not handling maintenance.
• Not being burdened with administration.

The pastor is not the church groundskeeper. He is not the maintenance man. He is not the curator of the church’s history.

The pastor’s calling is to pray and preach the Word of God.

Preacher—do your duty!

Church—let him be free to do it!

#PastoralCalling #BiblicalChurchPolity #PrayerAndTheWord #FreeThePreacher #Acts64

Set the Pastor Free: The Biblical Role of a Preacher

Is your pastor free to focus on prayer and preaching, or is he weighed down with tasks that aren’t his calling? Drop a comment and share how your church supports its pastor! Find one practical way to lighten your pastor’s load this week—whether it’s handling a church task, organizing volunteers, or simply encouraging him to stay focused on the Word.

🌎 Visit marvinmckenzie.org for more biblical insights and resources.

👉 Join our community in studying God’s Word and strengthening your faith.

To my readers:

Thank you! It is a great joy to me to know you read the thoughts and lessons God has given me in His word. I would love to hear from you. Please feel free to leave comments.

For this and, more than 6700 earlier Daily Visits with God, visit https://mckenzie-visit-with-god.blogspot.com. There you will find daily visits going back to 2005.

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

My books, and other resources, are available at:
https://marvinmckenzie.org

Join me at Daily Visits with God Podcast
https://marvinmckenzie.substack.com/

Merch at my Teespring store https://macz.creator-spring.com/
Be a witness with hats, mugs, t-shirts, sweat shirts, and more

Let’s have coffee?
The link to Ko-fi  is an opportunity to support this effort to reach a world of souls with the Word of God. I would appreciate any gift you can give. 

Acts 6:4 (KJV) Set the Pastor Free

Acts 5:15 (KJV) Miracles, Misunderstandings, and Misplaced Assumptions

Acts 5:15 (KJV)

Insomuch that they brought forth the sick into the streets, and laid them on beds and couches, that at the least the shadow of Peter passing by might overshadow some of them.

Did the Shadow of Peter Heal People?

An atheist recently asked me why Christians today don’t perform miracles like the early Christians did. He argued that if Christianity were real, believers should still be able to do things like heal the sick with their shadow.

However, his question was based on several inaccurate presuppositions:

He presupposed that what was true 2,000 years ago should still be true today.
God's Word clearly states that certain sign gifts would cease. While Christians may debate the exact timing, the fact remains that what happened in biblical times does not have to continue today for our faith to be real.

He presupposed that every Christian—or at least some Christians—should be able to perform the miracles Peter did.
The Bible teaches that the Spirit of God gives spiritual gifts “severally as He will.” It is not necessary for any other Christian to perform the same miracles Peter did for those miracles to be real.

He presupposed that people were actually healed when Peter’s shadow touched them.
But that’s not what the Bible says. It only implies that people hoped his shadow might help them. As Albert Barnes notes, "They were not able to approach him on account of the crowd, and they imagined that if they could anyhow come under his influence, they might be healed. The sacred writer does not say, however, that any were healed in this way, nor that they were commanded to do this. He simply states the impression that it might be so.”

Boy, our presuppositions can get us into a lot of trouble!

#ChristianFaith #BiblicalTruth #Acts515 #MiraclesOfGod #FaithNotPresumption

Miracles, Misunderstandings, and Misplaced Assumptions: Are We Expecting the Wrong Things?

Have you heard people misinterpret Acts 5:15 before? Drop your thoughts in the comments! Share this truth with someone who might be confused about miracles and Scripture. Don’t let false assumptions spread!

🌎 Visit marvinmckenzie.org for more biblical insights and resources.

👉 Join our community in studying God’s Word and strengthening your faith.

To my readers:

Thank you! It is a great joy to me to know you read the thoughts and lessons God has given me in His word. I would love to hear from you. Please feel free to leave comments.

For this and, more than 6700 earlier Daily Visits with God, visit https://mckenzie-visit-with-god.blogspot.com. There you will find daily visits going back to 2005.

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

My books, and other resources, are available at:
https://marvinmckenzie.org

Join me at Daily Visits with God Podcast
https://marvinmckenzie.substack.com/

Merch at my Teespring store https://macz.creator-spring.com/
Be a witness with hats, mugs, t-shirts, sweat shirts, and more

Let’s have coffee?
The link to Ko-fi  is an opportunity to support this effort to reach a world of souls with the Word of God. I would appreciate any gift you can give. 

Acts 5:15 (KJV) Miracles, Misunderstandings, and Misplaced Assumptions

Acts 4:4 (KJV) Preach the Word!

Acts 4:4 (KJV)

Howbeit many of them which heard the word believed; and the number of the men was about five thousand. 

The miracle of the healing of the crippled man was undeniable.

• It was performed in a public place.
• It was performed upon a well-known figure.
• Its results were witnessed and verified by an entire temple full of unbiased persons.
• The chief priests and rulers admitted it could not be denied (vs. 16).

That the miracle got the attention of the people is obvious. But what I want to point out is that what Peter spoke about—and what caused the people to believe—was not the miracle, but Jesus Christ and His Word.

A man was healed, and for that, we praise God. But the 5,000 souls who were saved that day came to faith not by the miracle, not by the power and influence of Peter and John, but through the preaching of the Word of God.

Preach the Word!

#PreachTheWord #FaithComesByHearing #JesusSaves #Acts44 #PowerOfTheGospel

Preach the Word: Faith Comes by Hearing, Not by Miracles

Are you sharing the Word of God boldly? Start today by telling someone about Jesus! Leave a comment below on how you’re spreading the Gospel.

🌎 Visit marvinmckenzie.org for more biblical insights and resources.

👉 Join our community in studying God’s Word and strengthening your faith.

To my readers:

Thank you! It is a great joy to me to know you read the thoughts and lessons God has given me in His word. I would love to hear from you. Please feel free to leave comments.

For this and, more than 6700 earlier Daily Visits with God, visit https://mckenzie-visit-with-god.blogspot.com. There you will find daily visits going back to 2005.

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

My books, and other resources, are available at:
https://marvinmckenzie.org

Join me at Daily Visits with God Podcast
https://marvinmckenzie.substack.com/

Merch at my Teespring store https://macz.creator-spring.com/
Be a witness with hats, mugs, t-shirts, sweat shirts, and more

Let’s have coffee?
The link to Ko-fi  is an opportunity to support this effort to reach a world of souls with the Word of God. I would appreciate any gift you can give. 

Acts 4:4 (KJV) Preach the Word!

Acts 3:10 (KJV) Miracles, Money, and the Message of Christ

Acts 3:10 (KJV)

And they knew that it was he which sat for alms at the Beautiful gate of the temple: and they were filled with wonder and amazement at that which had happened unto him.

I recently received a question from a man who is an avowed atheist. (I haven’t taken much time to research him, but apparently, he has written a popular grade school textbook to teach children the process of evolution.) He told me he had never asked a Christian this question before: "Why don’t Christians today do miracles like the early Christians did?"

He makes several assumptions in his question that I believe are incorrect. However, one thing he is right about is that those so-called Christians claiming to do miracles today are not doing anything close to what we see in the Bible.

I notice, first, that this miracle was performed in a common area—

not where a faith healer had “set up” to do miracles.

I notice, second, that the apostles received no money, no offerings for their “performance.” 

In fact, they explicitly said they had no silver or gold. I challenge the so-called faith healers of our age to match that!

I notice, third, that the message they preached had almost nothing to do with the “scripturalness” of charismatic gifts. 

They preached Christ and Him crucified.

I notice, finally, that the man they healed was no obscure cripple. 

The venue was so public, and he had been there for so long, that virtually everyone knew him to be a cripple—and now, they could see incontrovertible proof that he had been healed.

The Bible says this gift would cease. It was a sign gift, given to a small number of men to verify the message God had given them to preach. It has no purpose in today’s spiritual economy because we have a perfect and complete Word of God.

This gift did, in fact, cease. What so-called Christians perform as faith healing today is, in my opinion, a scam meant to bring recognition not to Jesus, but to themselves—and to line their pockets with money.

End of story.

#BiblicalTruth #FalseMiracles #ChristAloneSaves #ScriptureIsEnough #FaithNotFraud

Miracles, Money, and the Message of Christ: Understanding the Biblical Purpose

If you want to know more about biblical miracles and their true purpose, take a step today—challenge the false teachings you see and stand firm in the truth of God's Word. Let the Word guide you in understanding the truth behind healing today.

🌎 Visit marvinmckenzie.org for more biblical insights and resources.

👉 Join our community in studying God’s Word and strengthening your faith.

To my readers:

Thank you! It is a great joy to me to know you read the thoughts and lessons God has given me in His word. I would love to hear from you. Please feel free to leave comments.

For this and, more than 6700 earlier Daily Visits with God, visit https://mckenzie-visit-with-god.blogspot.com. There you will find daily visits going back to 2005.

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

My books, and other resources, are available at:
https://marvinmckenzie.org

Join me at Daily Visits with God Podcast
https://marvinmckenzie.substack.com/

Merch at my Teespring store https://macz.creator-spring.com/
Be a witness with hats, mugs, t-shirts, sweat shirts, and more

Let’s have coffee?
The link to Ko-fi  is an opportunity to support this effort to reach a world of souls with the Word of God. I would appreciate any gift you can give. 

Acts 3:10 (KJV) Miracles, Money, and the Message of Christ