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The Deceitfulness of Sin and the Slow Calcification of the Heart

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  * (Hebrews 3:12–15) * The writer of Hebrews does not treat hardness of heart as a sudden event. He treats it as a progressive danger that can overtake even those who have already tasted the goodness of God. After quoting Psalm 95, he presses the warning home: “Take heed, brethren, lest there be in any of you an evil heart of unbelief, in departing from the living God. But exhort one another daily, while it is called To day; lest any of you be hardened through the deceitfulness of sin. For we are made partakers of Christ, if we hold the beginning of our confidence stedfast unto the end; While it is said, To day if ye will hear his voice, harden not your hearts, as in the provocation.” (Hebrews 3:12–15) Notice the careful language. The danger is an “evil heart of unbelief.” The means by which it takes root is “the deceitfulness of sin.” The result is progressive hardening. And the only window of opportunity named is “To day.” Hardening rarely begins with open rebellion. It usually ...
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Behold, I Do a New Thing – Moving Forward Without Looking Back

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  The final word of biblical adaptation is not nostalgia for what was, but expectancy for what God is yet to do. Isaiah 43:18-19 declares, “Remember ye not the former things, neither consider the things of old. Behold, I will do a new thing; now it shall spring forth; shall ye not know it? I will even make a way in the wilderness, and rivers in the desert.” The temptation in every season of change is to keep looking backward—to the former health, the former ministry, the former security, the former relationships. The Lord commands the opposite. Stop remembering the former things as the measure of the present. Lift your eyes. God is not finished. He specializes in making ways in the wilderness and rivers in the desert. Paul lived this truth. Philippians 3:13-14 records his settled method: “Forgetting those things which are behind, and reaching forth unto those things which are before, I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus.” Luke 9:62 adds t...
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Location: Plymouth, IN 46563, USA
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Practical Anchors for the Changing Season – Seven Non-Negotiables

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  The biographical examples of Scripture are not given merely for inspiration. They establish non-negotiable principles that every believer must apply when life changes. From the whole counsel of God we draw seven anchors that must not be moved. First , anchor yourself in the unchanging Word. Psalm 119:89 declares that forever, O Lord, Thy word is settled in heaven. When everything else shifts, the believer returns to the settled Word. Do not adapt your doctrine to the new season. Force the new season to submit to the doctrine already revealed. Second , refuse the counsel of the ungodly. Psalm 1 stands as a perpetual warning. The world offers endless strategies for coping. The fundamentalist rejects them all. Our help comes from the Lord which made heaven and earth (Psalm 121:2). Third , maintain the fear of the Lord. Many adapt by growing casual with holy things. Scripture warns through Nadab and Abihu, Achan, and Ananias and Sapphira that God is not mocked. Seasons of personal up...
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Location: Plymouth, IN 46563, USA
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Paul: Content in Every State – The Secret of Godly Contentment

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  No New Testament figure endured more constant and varied change than the apostle Paul. He went from respected Pharisee to hunted Christian, from free preacher to chained prisoner, from successful church planter to shipwrecked castaway. Yet from a Roman prison he could write, “I have learned, in whatsoever state I am, therewith to be content. I know both how to be abased, and I know how to abound: every where and in all things I am instructed both to be full and to be hungry, both to abound and to suffer need. I can do all things through Christ which strengtheneth me” (Philippians 4:11-13). Contentment is not natural. Paul says he “learned” it. It is a grace cultivated through repeated experiences of both abundance and need, always in dependence upon the strengthening Christ. The fundamentalist Christian must reject the world’s counterfeit versions of contentment—positive thinking, gratitude journals divorced from the cross, or the pursuit of “balance.” Biblical contentment is the...
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Location: Plymouth, IN 46563, USA
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David: From Cave to Crown – Adaptation Through Waiting and Rejection

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  David was anointed king as a young man, yet he spent years living in caves, hunted like an animal by the very king he had served. The path from the sheepfold to the throne was not a straight line of promotion. It was a long, painful education in waiting upon God while every outward circumstance contradicted the promise. 1 Samuel 16 records the anointing. 1 Samuel 18 begins the jealousy of Saul. By chapter 22 David is in the cave of Adullam with every one that was in distress, in debt, or discontented. The man after God’s own heart adapted by refusing two clear opportunities to kill Saul and seize the kingdom by force. He would not stretch forth his hand against the Lord’s anointed. Adaptation for David meant protecting the integrity of his future throne by refusing to grasp it prematurely. The Psalms written during these years are the manual of godly waiting. Psalm 57, composed in the cave, begins, “Be merciful unto me, O God, be merciful unto me: for my soul trusteth in thee: ye...
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Location: Plymouth, IN 46563, USA
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