Of God and Mankind

1 Samuel 30:6 (AMPC)  “ David was greatly distressed, for the men spoke of stoning him because the souls of them all were bitterly grieved, each man for his sons and daughters. But David encouraged  and strengthened himself in the Lord His God.”   Dear people of God, there are many issues in this world that cause distress for human beings. The most common one is money.   Another one is sickness. In today’s lead Holy Bible text, David and his men were distressed because their family were abducted by the Amalekites.   It is stated here that as part of the measures to resolve his problem, David encouraged and strengthened himself in the Lord His God.   David went further by enquiring of God what next to do and God told him to go after the Amalekites and that he would recover all he and his men had lost.   David did exactly what God told him and he recovered all as God had promised – 1 Samuel 30:7-19.   In today’s world unfortunately, many have a diff...

John 12:42-43 (AMPC) “ And yet [in spite of all this] many even of the leading men (the authorities and the nobles) believed  and trusted in Him (Jesus Christ). But because of the Pharisees they did not confess it, for fear that [if they should acknowledge Him] they would be expelled from the synagogue;   43 For they loved the approval  and the praise  and the glory that come from men [instead of and] more than the glory that comes from God. [They valued their credit with men more than their credit with God.]”   Dear people of God, whenever you are in the midst of non-Christians, are you able to openly declare that you are a Christian? Does your lifestyle prove that you are a Christian, a follower of Jesus Christ?   A number of us are like the leading men of the city in today’s lead Holy Bible text whose profession of Christ is only when they are in Church or the privacy of their home.   Once they step outside, they are shy or feel ashamed talking...

Luke 6:46-49 (AMPC) “Why do you call Me, Lord, Lord, and do not [practi s e] what I tell you?   47 For everyone who comes to Me and listens to My Words [in order to heed their teaching] and does them, I will show you what he is like:   48 He is like a man building a house, who dug and went down deep and laid a foundation upon the rock; and when a flood arose, the torrent broke against that house and could not shake  or move it, because it had been securely built  or founded on a rock .   49 But he who merely hears and does not practi s e doing My Words is like a man who built a house on the ground without a foundation, against which the torrent burst, and immediately it collapsed  and fell, and the breaking  and ruin of that house was great.”     Dear people of God, every Christian knows and agrees that Jesus Christ is his or her Saviour and rightly so. However, from today’s lead Holy Bible text, not every Christian has Jesus C...

Titus 1:16 (AMPC)  “ They profess to know God [to recognize, perceive, and be acquainted with Him], but deny  and disown  and renounce Him by what they do; they are detestable  and loathsome, unbelieving  and disobedient  and disloyal  and rebellious, and [they are] unfit  and worthless for good work (deed or enterprise) of any kind.”   Dear people of God, whenever I hear someone commending his character, one thing I tell him is that it is difficult for someone to OBJECTIVELY assess himself.   As a result of sycophancy as well, it is also difficult even these days to obtain an objective assessment of oneself from others.   However, if a number of people are complaining about the same person’s character and the person does not see anything wrong with his or her character, then something is definitely wrong.   Do others describe you as hostile? Unfriendly? Unkind? Untrustworthy? Unstable? Unreliable? Can you be trusted to handle...

1 Corinthians 2:9-13 (NKJV)    “ But as it is written: “Eye has not seen, nor ear heard, Nor have entered into the heart of man The things which God has prepared for those who love Him.”   10 But God has revealed  them  to us through His Spirit. For the Spirit searches all things, yes, the deep things of God.    11   For what man knows the things of a man except the spirit of the man which is in him? Even so no one knows the things of God except the Spirit of God.    12 Now we have received, not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit W ho is from God, that we might know the things that have been freely given to us by God.   13 These things we also speak, not in words which man’s wisdom teaches but which the Holy Spirit teaches, comparing spiritual things with spiritual.   Dear people of God, every human being born into this world is born into a spiritual experience that becomes part of him as he grows in ag...

1 Corinthians 14:33 (AMPC) “ For He [Who is the source of their prophesying] is not a God of confusion  and disorder but of peace  and order. As [is the practice] in all the churches of the saints (God's people),”   Dear people of God, Christianity as defined in Wikipedia is “ an Abrahamic monotheistic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus of Nazareth. Its adherents, known as  Christians , believe that Jesus is the Christ, whose coming as the Messiah was prophesied in the Hebrew Bible, called the Old Testament in  Christianity , and chronicled in the New Testament.”   What is common to all Christians is the Person of the Lord Christ Jesus.   However, amongst the Christians, we find denominations or distinct religious bodies within Christianity whose members hold on to ideas or teachings that are not accepted by other Church denominations.   For instance, whilst some say you can reach Jesus Christ through Mary His earthly mother, some s...

Luke 23:35 (AMPC)    “ Now the people stood by [calmly and leisurely] watching; but the rulers scoffed  and sneered (turned up their noses) at Him, saying, He rescued others [from death]; let Him now rescue Himself, if He is the Christ (the Messiah) of God, His Chosen One!”   Dear people of God, sometime in late October 2019, the news media was trending about a popular American Rap musician Kanye West becoming a “born again” Christian and claiming that he would no longer sing any other songs except the Gospel genre.   Kanye had just released an album entitled “Jesus is King”  with songs focusing on his relationship with God and his fight with the devil that features some rap and gospel songs.   I have not listened to the album because as a Christian, I am not supposed to listen to such rap songs.   The main point I am trying to bring out here is that while Kanye West had RIGHTLY stated that he would stop singing rap music because it is the devil’s...