Web Chapel

Author: MrSteveSlusser

  • Free Christmas Book

    One of the websites that I manage is devoted to providing resources for children’s ministry (GospelTalks.com).  Eikon Bible Art is a source of printable and projectable Bible story pictures.  For Christmas they have a free Christmas book (pdf).  I got mine so I thought I would pass this along to others.  The free link is good for a week, but the books are quite affordable anyway.  https://www.eikonbibleart.com/index.php?main_page=page&id=19

  • Follow Me

    Follow Me: The Man Who Missed The Boat

     But Jesus said unto him, Follow me; and let the dead bury their dead.  And when he was entered into a ship, his disciples followed him.  Matthew 8:22-23

    Matthew paints the scene: Disciples of Jesus approach him as he is about to enter a boat.  Jesus gives an invitation to follow Him.  They turn back toward home and miss one of the greatest displays of His power – the calming of the sea.  The disciples in the boat respond with “What manner of man is this, that even the winds and the sea obey him!” (8:27)

    The first psalm in the order of our Bibles is actually found in Exodus 15.  Israel sings of the deliverance by the Lord and in verse 10 “Thou didst blow with thy wind, the sea covered them“. They conclude with “Who is like unto thee, O LORD” (15:11).  How similar this response is to that of the disciples on the boat.  The One who spoke creation into existence and brought forth the dry ground out of the seas is able to send a wind to divide the waters as a path of escape for His people and to still a might story with the sound of His voice.

    Now back to the man who missed the boat.  He may never have learned what he missed  that day.  This experience changed the lives of the men on that boat but this man fades back into obscurity.  What if he had joined the disciples that day? Would we now know his name?  Would he have seen “greater things than these”?  As far as is known he was never called upon again.

    Do you feel the Lord calling upon you to follow? What holds you back? Do you think that if you wait until your education is complete or your house is paid off or your family is raised that you can answer the call then?  Sometimes things work that way, but most times they do not.  In general when we fail to follow when the Lord calls we can never replace what we missed.

    When you hear the call, don’t “miss the boat”.  Follow Him!

     

  • Lessons from Mothers in Scripture: Eve

    Eve: The Mother of All Living

    Gen 3:20 Now the man called his wife’s name Eve, because she was the mother of all the living.  (This is where the woman is first named Eve and the first use of “mother”).  God had made for man a helper to serve alongside of man.  The phrase “help meet” (KJV) implies companionship, equality, and perhaps a reference to strength, as one translates this “strong helper”.

    I will make him a help meet for him; עזר כנגדו  ezer kenegdo, a help, a counterpart of himself, one formed from him, and a perfect resemblance of his person. If the word be rendered scrupulously literally, it signifies one like, or as himself, standing opposite to or before him. And this implies that the woman was to be a perfect resemblance of the man, possessing neither inferiority nor superiority, but being in all things like and equal to himself. (Clarke)

    The failure of Adam and Eve resulted in a curse upon the earth and all the lives upon it. (Genesis  3:13-15).  Our loving Creator could not leave man with no hope and with the curse gave a promise of deliverance.  It would be the seed of the woman (a child born of a woman) that would bruise the serpent’s head.  Eve looked for the promise to be fulfilled in her lifetime.

    Lesson One: Expect greatness in your children.

    Eve Looks for the Promise of God in her Children

    Genesis 4:1 Now the man had relations with his wife Eve, and she conceived and gave birth to Cain, and she said, “I have gotten a manchild with the help of the LORD.”

    She named her first born Cain: (literally) I have gotten “a man – the LORD”. Her name for this firstborn son indicates her belief in the promise of The Lord and that she would see the promise in her lifetime.   She expected her son to be the promised one and likely told Cain about her audience with The Lord in the Garden.  She shared her faith in the promise to not only Cain but to Abel and again to Seth.

    Mothers, encourage your children to fully follow after The Lord.  Look to them to be the next missionaries and evangelists that will bring the world to Christ.  Tell them about the promises of God and that they have been fulfilled in Christ.  Pass your faith to the next generation.

    Lesson Two: Share your faith and leave the results with the LORD.

    Eve looked for Cain to represent the LORD and to fulfill the promise. However, Cain was not to be the one to break the curse and he failed to offer a sacrifice that was pleasing to The Lord. This was not the fault of his mother.   This is perhaps a reference back to the curse in 3:16 “In pain you will bring forth children”.

    The same mother bore Cain, Abel, and later Seth. Of these three, two were righteous and sought after the LORD but one rejected the LORD to the grief of his mother (see 3:16).  The Lord indicated that Cain knew better when He said, “If thou doest well, shalt thou not be accepted?” (4:7).  Cain’s failure was not the fault of his teacher-mother, but of his own rejection of the revelation of The Lord.

    It is common in households of believing parents to have some children follow after The Lord and others reject the gospel.  The godly mother may be consistent in her testimony of faith and in training up her children, yet get different results.  Eve looked for the promise, grieved when her son rejected The Lord, but continued to faithfully transmit the Word of God to the next generation of children.

     

    Summary
    Mother’s, look for God’s promise in your children. Perhaps it will be your child that changes the world and does great things for the Kingdom of Heaven, or perhaps they will quietly pass their faith on to the next generation.

    And if you have a child that departs from the way be encouraged that God sees your grief – as he did Eve’s and He will provide them an opportunity to turn back to Him.

     

  • Silent Prayer

    Also I heard the voice of the Lord, saying, …..  “Isaiah 6:8

    As our nation awakened to the National Day of Prayer I opened my Bible (actually my tablet app) and read this prayer of Isaiah.  The passage begins with “I saw  the Lord.”  We often focus on this chapter as the vision of Isaiah.  However, since my heart was focused on prayer I found a little “treasure hidden in the field” as the old brothers would say.

    We often pray privately just like we pray publicly.  It is how we are taught. By our example we teach this to our children.  We talk to the Lord. We give him a list of things to act upon. Then with the invocation of Jesus Name we conclude our prayer time with “amen” (let it be so).  Imagine if all of our interactions were done this way. Rather than converse, we just tell folks what is on our minds,  say “let it be so”, and walk away.  That sounds silly in the context of human interaction.

    Let’s take a look at this “vision” a little differently.  Read the opening of Isaiah 6 and think of the author sitting in his home meditating on the Word of God and seeking His face.  Suddenly and apparently unexpectedly he sees The Lord!  The first part of this “prayer” is not speaking words, but seeing a vision of the Glory of the Lord. In fact, it is a while before Isaiah speaks.

    This is the recipe for private prayer  that we may glean from Isaiah’s encounter with the Lord.

    1) GET A VISION OF THE LORD (6:1)
    I may not have had my own “vision”, but sitting there reading the Word of God I could see Isaiah’s vision and pictured in my mind what it must have looked like.  God has revealed Himself in His Word and in all that He has created.  Perhaps it could be in a flower “behold the     Lilly of the field“, or a creature of God “behold the ant” that He will show Himself to me on another morning with Him.  This phase of our prayer time is as important as the words that we speak. Get a vision of WHO GOD IS!

    2) TAKE A LOOK YOURSELF (6:5)
    When we see ourselves in light of the Glory of the Lord we should respond like Isaiah, “woe is me”.  We read that all our righteousness is as filthy rags (Isaiah 64:6) but until we compare all that we think is good in us to His Glory we fail to see just how unworthy we really are.  We need to get to the place of the publican who prayed “Lord be merciful to me, the sinner” (Luke 18:3). When we are humbled in His presence,  when words fail us,  we are finally ready to listen to Him.

    3) LISTEN FOR HIM TO SPEAK (6:8)
    I am not proposing that we pause in public prayer to hear the Lord speak.  However, in our private time of prayer, we need to insert times of “silent prayer” to allow God to speak to us.   We may not be blessed with the audible voice of God that the apostles heard at the Transfiguration (Luke 9:35), but we can hear Him.  Isaiah is recording a “vision” here. This is not a physical encounter, yet the voice of the Lord was clear to him.  “I heard the voice of the Lord”.   God has spoken through His prophets, and now through His Son (Hebrews 1:1ff). When we open His Word we can also hear Him speak if we will just listen.

    4) RESPOND TO GOD’S WORDS (6:8)
    Isaiah responds spontaneously with “Hear am I, send me!”   From my earliest days in the faith I have been touched by missionary slide shows and stories.  I wanted to go and wrote to missionaries and went to nursing school, but He did not send me to the jungles of Africa.  Isaiah’s words went forth to the world through this prophetic book, but there is no record that he himself “went”.   Abraham took Isaac to the mountain and was prepared to sacrifice his own son, but God provided himself a sacrifice. (Genesis 22).  When we respond to the Word of God with willingness and eagerness it pleases Him.  We are thinking like He thinks and feeling like He feels. We now see the world as He sees it.  Our own insufficiency is somewhat forgotten as we gain strength in His presence.

    5) NOW YOU ARE READY TO “PRAY”

  • FILLED WITH THE SPIRIT

    And be not drunk with wine, wherein is excess; but be filled with the Spirit;
    – Ephesians 5:18

    Most folks think that they have control of themselves and their circumstances.  I am reminded of a scene from the movie The Devil Wears Prada.  Miranda, a powerful fashion editor, is explaining to her second assistant Andrea that the sweater she “chose” was actually chosen for her by professionals in rooms like the one that she found herself in at that moment.  I apologize if you missed the analogy, but the point is that world (in the Biblical sense) tells folks what to think, what to wear, and how to feel.

    Paul begins his admonition to be filled with the Spirit with the extreme contrast of being controlled by alcohol which is (results in) “excess”(KJV).  The Old English term excess confuses some folks into thinking that the verse is talking about too much alcohol.  Actually, this word is translated elsewhere as “riot” (1 Timothy 1:6 & 1 Peter 4:4), a behavior observed of unbelieving Gentiles. It is a term of violence to self and/or to others.

    Ephesians 5:17 provides the purpose of being filled with the Spirit: To understand the will of The Lord. The following verses provide the result of being filled with the Spirit.

    • Speaking to yourselves in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody in your heart to the Lord;  (Ephesians 5:19)
    • Giving thanks always for all things unto God and the Father in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ; (Ephesians 5:20)
    • Submitting yourselves one to another in the fear of God. (Ephesians 5:21)

    The confusion that folks make here is that some think that through religious practice like singing and listening to Christian music, saying prayers, and subjection to religious authority will lead them to the Spirit’s filling.  On the contrary, these are the results (not the means).

    What then is the filling of the Spirit?  One analogy often used is that of a glass filled with water, leaving no room for anything else.  This represents the view that the Spirit is the content of the filling. This view results from the misunderstanding of what this verse is saying.

    If Paul was indicating that the Spirit was the “content” one would expect to find what is known as a “genitive of content”.  The use of a dative to indicate content is rare. In fact, there are no examples in the Bible of a “dative of content” where the preposition “en” is used, as is the case here.

    Therefore, the grammar of the text argues for the agency of the Spirit rather than the content. Expanded this would read: Be filled with (that is by means of) the Holy Spirit.  The fact that this is in the present (be being) indicates that it is not like salvation or the Baptism of the Holy Spirit (a totally different subject), that occurs once for all.  Instead, it is a daily or moment by moment act of the will to allow the Spirit of The Lord to have control.  Namely, saying yes to what the Word of God says even when it conflicts with our own wisdom, intellect, and emotion.

    Finally, if the content is not the Spirit, what is?  The answer is found in Ephesians 3:19, that ye might be filled with all the fullness of God.  See then it is God working in us that results joy, contentment, singing, praying, and placing others above ourselves.

    Beware that you do not mistake religion, which may look much like this, for a true relationship with The Lord.  Only one who has believed on Christ can filled (controlled) by His Spirit, and enjoy the fullness of God’s indwelling Spirit.  Trust in Him today.