“Join with me in suffering, like a good soldier of Jesus Christ. No one serving as a soldier gets entangled in civilian affairs, but rather tries to please his commanding officer.” 2 Timothy 2:3-4

“Finally, be strong in the Lord and in His mighty power. Put on the full armor of God so that you can take your stand against the devil’s schemes. For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual force of evil in the heavenly realms.” Ephesians 6:10-12

          All who belong to God and Jesus Christ are placed squarely in opposition to this world and the evil rulers of it, as our text above plainly says. In the days of old, the enemy could be seen, and warfare was waged with weapons that could be held and felt; instruments of battle that could bring death. But the battle a Christian is engaged in is a spiritual one; it is a battle for the mind, heart and soul of every living being.

          David was anointed to be king when he was just a boy, but God’s choice and calling was clear and irrevocable; and the devil knew it. The minute the prophet Samuel poured the anointing oil on David, he became a marked man. God watched over David all the days of his life. Israel was blessed with King David on the throne. But, while his days were filled with many victories, he met head on, the hatred of the devil through King Saul. He also knew the defeat of sin and the trouble it brought into his life. But, through it all, God was with him and David remained one of God’s chosen vessels.

          My brothers and sisters in Christ: you are engaged in a spiritual warfare today, whether you realize it or not; whether you want to be or not. If you confess Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior and coming King, you’re a soldier in the Lord’s army and you have been called to serve Him with all your heart, mind and soul. You have been appointed to keep on the firing line until the day Jesus comes or calls you home.

          Make no mistake about it: the enemy that used men to betray and crucify Jesus, has his sights set on you; the devil and his ministers are your enemy. In your lifetime, you will encounter his assaults on a daily basis, until you draw your last breath. They may appear as strife in your own family, or conflict with a co-worker or neighbor. Marital problems, your job or financial trouble, chronic illness, sorrow and death are all part of life, but they are also part of the battle and a trial of your faith.

          In these daily battles you feel the weakness of your flesh; it wells up within you in frustration and anxiety, and ofttimes tends to tempt you to anger. Daily you’re faced with situations, some requiring decisions on something you’ve never dealt with before. Sometimes you feel you’ve done well and sometimes you feel like you failed miserably. And quite often you find yourself looking back, thinking, “If only I had done this or that better”, or, “If only I hadn’t done that.”

          Take heart my brothers and sisters, you are weak, but our victory is in Jesus. God has called you to be His child; Christ dwells in you, and that is our hope. God chose to put the treasure of His Son in earthen vessels so that the glory would be of Him and not of you. You are on the battlefield; you are covered by the blood of Jesus and you are clothed in His righteousness; you are sealed by His Holy Spirit until the day He returns for you.

          Love one another as Christ has loved you, forgiving one another. Pray without ceasing and feed daily on God’s word. As you have opportunity, do good and be merciful and kind. Keep on the firing line—Jesus is coming!

Brother Bill is a Bible teacher and can be contacted at bboldham@sbcglobal.net

“He Does Whatever He Pleases“

“I know that the Lord is great, that our Lord is greater than all gods. The Lord does whatever pleases Him…” Psalm 135:5

          The whole Bible testifies to this great truth about the Lord God Almighty: He does whatever pleases Him. From His creating work to the final scene in Revelation, the Lord makes all things, good and bad, work together to accomplish His predetermined pleasure and purpose for His creation. Only the Sovereign Lord is able to declare the end from the beginning, and bring it to pass.

          The first two chapters of Genesis give a detailed account of God creating the heavens and the earth, and everything in them; no one advised or counseled the Lord—He made everything as it pleased Him. The scope and detail of His workings is far beyond man’s finite brain and imagination: the universe, the sun, moon and stars, and how the Lord put the earth into rotation in relation to them staggers the mind. All things to this day continue just as the Creator ordered them.

          From the beginning we see the Lord making sovereign judgments regarding His creation. When Adam sinned, He made clear what the consequences would be for his and Eve’s disobedience; but more importantly, the Lord foretold how He would bring, from a woman, a Seed that would destroy the Devil.

          In time, the Lord chose a man to be the father of a nation that would become His chosen people, and in time, produce that promised Seed. From Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, down through the many generations ‘til Christ was born, God oversaw and providentially selected the people from which His only begotten Son would come. Jesus Christ was born of a virgin in Bethlehem, a Jew from the house of David, just as the Lord had foretold.

          From His birth, God watched over His Son, keeping Him safe and in obscurity until it was time for Jesus to come forth for the work prepared for Him by His Father. Six months before Jesus was conceived in Mary, God chose a couple who were old and had no children, to bear a son who would go before Jesus at a set time, and publicly introduce Him to the nation of Israel. The Lord filled him with the Holy Ghost while he was in his mother’s womb: he was John the Baptist.

          When Jesus’ day came, He came to the river Jordan and was baptized by John, according to the purpose and plan of God. It was God’s will to allow Jesus to be tempted of the Devil. God sent Jesus into this world to be a light and a Savior to those who were walking in darkness; who were dead in trespasses and sin. In the three years of His public ministry Jesus, chose the men who would be the foundation of His church, and He preached and taught the Word of God. He did many miraculous works, and sovereignly saved sinners who came to Him.

          Jesus’ final work on earth was to allow evil men to crucify Him. I use the word allow because He could have stopped them if He had chose to, but He didn’t. It was for this purpose Jesus came into the world. It was God’s purpose and plan for His Son to be crucified. Hear this:

“…It pleased the Lord to bruise Him; He has put Him to grief…” and the purpose of God? 

“He [Jesus] was wounded for our transgressions, He was bruised for our iniquities…by His stripes we are healed…the Lord has laid on Him the iniquity of us all.” Isaiah 53

          It is of the utmost importance to know and understand that God’s salvation does not come from the will of man, but from the will of God. It is His good pleasure to draw sinners to His Son: to save them and keep them until the day Jesus returns for them.

“…He predestined us to adoption as sons by Jesus Christ to Himself, according to the good pleasure of His will…” Ephesians 1:5

Brother Bill is a Bible teacher and can be contacted at bboldham@sbcglobal.net

by William Oldham

“…Looking unto Jesus, the Author and Finisher of our faith, who for the joy that was set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and has set down at the right hand of the throne of God.” Hebrews 12:2

          Christ came into this world to do the will of His Father, which was to bring salvation to fallen sinners; the Father’s will was perfectly accomplished by Jesus’ death and resurrection. In wholly giving Himself to His Father’s will, there was a great reward promised Jesus in doing so, and in this passage of Scripture it is referred to as, “The joy that was set before Him.”

          No doubt that there was great joy in Jesus being set down at the right hand of the throne of God and being given, “All authority in heaven and on earth.” But the joy given Jesus extends way beyond His position and His name as Lord. It embraces a race of people given to Him as an inheritance: a multitude which cannot be numbered; spirit-born from every nation, tribe and tongue on the face of this earth.

          These people were heathens and sinners, without God and without hope in this world; but God, in great mercy, sent His Son into this world to offer Himself as a perfect sacrifice for them, and transform them into a holy nation, a royal priesthood, a chosen people who would be a praise unto God. And God gave these people to Jesus as His inheritance—His family. And this joy was promised to Him long before He was born.

“…The Lord has said to me, You are My Son, Today I have begotten You. Ask of Me, and I will give You the nations for your inheritance, and the ends of the earth for your possession.” Psalm 2:7-8

          As for the people that have been given to Jesus as His inheritance, they too have a joy set before them. A hymn was published in 1900 that perfectly describes the joy that belongs to those who believe in Christ. It is called “Joy Unspeakable.” The song speaks of four things that fill up the joy of Christians: freedom, salvation, hope, and glory.

          The first stanza talks about freedom. Before Jesus came into my heart, I was bound up in sin. I always carried with me condemnation and a guilty conscience, and a fear of dying and going to hell. I was religious but lost. One night, Jesus came to me and set me free from all my guilt, condemnation, and fear of death. He replaced my fears with a freedom and a joy unspeakable.

          The second stanza talks about salvation. After Jesus came into my heart, I began reading the Bible, and I couldn’t stop. The Bible told me everything I should have been told the first thirty years of my life. It told me of the love of God and Christ. It told me that I am His child now and forever; it told me Jesus is preparing a place for me and is coming after me one day. Saved! And I know that I am—O what joy fills my heart!

          The third stanza speaks of hope. I don’t see or hear Jesus. But the Bible is filled with His wonderful promises to those who believe in Jesus; and it is in those promises of God that I hope, and they fill me with a joy unspeakable!

          The fourth stanza speaks of glory. One day Jesus is coming for His inheritance; and when He does, He will clothe us in glorious new bodies that are immortal and incorruptible. Jesus will take us with Him to our new home where we will live with Him and the Father forever—O what joy!

The chorus says it all: “It is joy unspeakable and full of glory, full of glory, full of glory; it is joy unspeakable and full of glory. O, the half has never yet been told.”

Brother Bill is a Bible teacher and can be contacted at bboldham@sbcglobal.net

         I recently listened to an amazing true-life testimony. Two lawyers were getting ready to fly out of Anchorage, Alaska on a commercial flight when a man volunteered to fly them out in his private plane. At first they were reluctant, but he persuaded them to let him fly them out. The man who gave the testimony said, from the time they boarded, he began to pray.

         They taxied down the runway and ascended into the sky smoothly, reaching the desired flying altitude. Soon they were flying into heavy clouds. The pilot suddenly said to the man sitting beside him, “I can’t fly in clouds”, and passed out. One of the men got on the radio and said, “Help! Help!” A voice answered, asking what their problem was. It was a freighter plane close by. They told him their situation, and realized they were going to die.

         The pilot radioed back to the control tower in Anchorage about their situation. Immediately, the men heard a voice in the cabin say, “You can’t see me, but I can see you; I have you on my radar. If you will listen to my voice and do exactly what I say, I will bring you safely back to Anchorage. Starting right now listen to the voice, because in about four minutes you’re going to slam into a mountain and die.

         It began to storm and lightening was all around them. The voice said, “Don’t look out the windows, just listen to my voice. The air controller alerted all the other aircraft in the area and put them in a holding pattern. They had a wild and bumpy ride but soon they were approaching the runway. The controller told them, “I will get you down. As you approach the runway, you will see lights in the shape of a cross, keep your eyes on the cross and I will bring you in. He said they landed about six times (meaning it wasn’t exactly a smooth landing), but finally came to a stop safely.

         The point of his testimony and it will be my point also is this: if you desire to land in heaven, you had better listen to the only voice that can guide you safely there. We don’t have to look far to find Jesus saying the same thing to us, that the air controller said to the two doomed passengers: “listen to my voice.”

         Jesus said, “Most assuredly, I say to you, he who hears my word and believes in Him Who sent Me has everlasting life, and shall not come into judgment, but has passed from death unto life.” John 5:24 Those doomed to die, when they hear Jesus’ word and believe in the Father, are no longer on the path to destruction, but are made possessors of everlasting life, escaping the judgment to come.

         Jesus has something else important to say about listening to His voice. He says, “Therefore everyone who hears these words of mine and puts them into practice is like a wise man who built his house on the rock. The rain came down, the streams rose, and the winds blew and beat against that house; yet it did not fall, because it had its foundation on the rock. But everyone who hears these words of mine and does not put them into practice is like a foolish man who built his house on sand. The rain came down, the streams rose, and the winds blew and beat against that house, and it fell with a great crash.” Matthew 7:24-27

         How foolish and deadly it would have been for those two men had they listened but didn’t do what the voice said. There is a flood of voices screaming for our attention; but there is only one voice that will guide us safely home. That voice belongs to Jesus Christ and is found only in the Scriptures. We are assured of a safe landing if we keep our eyes on the cross and listen to His voice.

Brother Bill is a Bible teacher and can be contacted at bboldham@sbcglobal.net