Anything Can Happen
Jesus said unto him, If thou canst believe, all things are possible to him that believeth. Mark 9:22
And Jesus said, [You say to Me], If You can do anything? [Why,] all things can be (are possible) to him who believes! - Amp
Jesus said, If? There are no ifs among believers. Anything can happen. - Message
...If there is anything I can do! Everything is possible for one who has faith. - Gspd
...anything can be done for one - Mof
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Confession: I believe Jesus has the power to do all things, so all things are possible for me. I can do anything, all things, because I believe.
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Holiness
Jesus was the Prince of Peace. He sought peace with all men. But he never sought peace at the cost of obedience and submission to God. The apostle Paul makes it clear that through the obedience of the Son of Almighty God we will be made righteous (holy).
"For just as through the disobedience of the one man the many were made sinners, so also through the obedience of the one man the many will be made righteous." (Romans 5:19)
"For Messiah also hath once suffered for sins, the Just for the unjust that HE might bring us to God."(1 Peter 3:18).
These passages teach a two fold aspect of Jesus’ work on our behalf.
* Jesus’ obedience to His Father was His sinless life here on earth, perfect obedience and absolute holiness.
* His final act of obedience was demonstrated in His death on the cross through which He fully paid the penalty for sin and appeased or satisfied the wrath of God toward His Children.
"Wherefore when he cometh into the world, He said, Sacrifice and offering thou wouldest not, but a body hast thou prepared Me." Hebrews 10:7.
"Then said He, Lo, I come to do thy will, O Lord." 10:9a.
"By the which will we are sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all." 10:10
3. Our holiness before God depends entirely on the finished work of Jesus Christ for us, according to God's Divine and Perfect Will. "Make every effort...to be holy." And without this holiness, the writer says, no one will see God.
Scripture speaks of both a holiness, which we have in Christ Jesus before God and a holiness, which we are to seek after daily. True salvation brings with it a desire to be made holy.These two aspects of holiness complement one another, for our salvation is a salvation to holiness:
"For God did not call us to be impure, but to live a holy life, (1 Thes. 4:7).
To the Corinthians Paul wrote: "To the church of God in Corinth, To those sanctified in Jesus Christ and called to be holy. (1 Cor 1:2).
The word sanctified here means made holy. That is, we are through Messiah made holy in our standing before God and called to be holy in our daily lives. So the writer of Hebrews is telling us to take seriously the necessity of personal and practical holiness. When the Holy Spirit comes into our lives at salvation, He comes to make us holy in practice.
If there is not a yearning in our hearts to live a holy life pleasing to God, we need to seriously question our love and devotion to our heavenly Father. Those who love God with all their mind, heart, and soul desire to please Him. It is true that this desire for holiness may be only a spark in our beginning walk of faith, but that spark will grow as we learn more about Jesus and enter into a personal relationship with Him until it becomes a flame~ a desire to live a life wholly pleasing to God. God delivers not only from the penalty of sin, but also from its dominion.
For the child of God to continue practicing a particular sin once it is revealed by the Holy Spirit (notice we said "practice"… all of us sin and fall short) is to live contrary to the very purpose of God's saving grace. Paul said, for the grace of God that brings salvation has appeared to all men. It teaches us to say NO to unholy and worldly passions, and to live self-controlled; upright lives in this present age (Titus 2:11-12).
The same grace that brings salvation teaches us to renounce unholy living. We cannot receive half of God's grace. If we have experienced grace at all, we will experience not only forgiveness of our sins but also freedom from sin's dominion. This is the point James is making in his hard-to-understand passage on faith and works. (James 2:14-26.) He is teaching the Christian that a faith that does not result in works in a holy life, is not a living faith but a dead one. God who is Holy in nature demands holiness in the life of the Followers of Jesus Christ.
(Psalm 66:18). To regard wickedness is to cherish some sin, to love it to the extent that I am not willing to part with it. I know it is there, yet I justify it in some way like the child who says, well, he hit me first. When we are holding on to some sin, we are not pursuing holiness and we cannot have fellowship with God.
God does not require a perfect, sinless life to have fellowship with Him, but He does require that we be serious about holiness, that we grieve over sin in our lives instead of justifying it, and that we earnestly pursue holiness as a way of life.
Scripture teaches that God disciplines those he loves and accepts as a son (no gender intended but applies to both the daughters and sons of Almighty God. (Hebrews 12:6). This statement presupposes our need of discipline, for God is not capricious in administering it. As our Heavenly Father He disciplines us because we need discipline. To persist in disobedience is to increase our necessity for discipline. When God speaks to us about some sin, we need to heed and take action. To fail to deal with that sin is to risk incurring His hand of discipline.
Holiness is also necessary for effective service to God.
Paul wrote to Timothy, If a man cleanses himself from (acts that are not noble and pure), he will be an instrument for noble purposes, made holy, useful to the Master and prepared to do any good work (2 Tim. 2:21).
Holiness and service are linked together.
We cannot bring our service to God in an unclean vessel. The One who makes our service effective and who empowers us for service is the Holy Spirit. Note well that He is called the HOLY Spirit, or the Spirit of Holiness. When we indulge our sinful nature, the Spirit of God is grieved (Eph. 4:30) And will not prosper us or our acts of service unto God. We speak not of those times when we fall into temptation and immediately seek God's forgiveness and cleansing, but constantly living unholy.
True faith will always show itself by its fruits.
The only safe evidence that we are in Messiah is a holy life. John said everyone who has within him the hope of eternal life purifies himself just as Messiah is pure (1 John 3:3). If we know nothing of holiness, we may flatter ourselves that we are Followers of Messiah, but we do not have the Holy Spirit dwelling within us. Everyone, then, who professes to be a Follower of Messiah should ask himself, "Is there evidence of practical holiness in my life?" Do I desire and strive after holiness? Do I grieve over my lack of it and earnestly seek the help of God to be holy?
It is not those who profess to know Messiah who will enter heaven, but those who obey God's Word in faith and holy living. Jesus said ~~~ not everyone who says to me, Master, Master, will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only he who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. Many will say to me on that day, Master, Master, did we not prophesy in your name, and in your name drive out demons, and perform many miracles? Then I will tell them plainly, I never knew you. Away from me, you evildoers! (Matthew 7:21-23).
"God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in Him we might become the righteousness of God." 2 Cor. 5:21
No better example of living holy unto God can be found than the perfect life Jesus lived. He is the Pattern Son from which every son/daughter is being cut and formed. As we study more fully the implications of "Be holy because I am holy," we will see more of our own sinfulness. We will see the wickedness and deceitfulness of our hearts, and how far we miss the mark of God's perfect holiness. As this happens, the true Follower of Messiah will in his heart flee for refuge in Messiah. It is important therefore that we understand the righteousness of Messiah, and the fact that His righteousness is credited to us.
Jesus the Pattern Son
that produce an attitude that acts in harmony with God’s Holy Word.
Whenever we seriously contemplate the holiness of the Father, our natural reaction is to say with Isaiah, "Woe is I, for I am ruined! Because I am a man of unclean lips, and I live among a people of unclean lips, and my eyes have seen the King, God Almighty" (Isaiah 6:5). A serious view of the holiness of God His own moral perfection and infinite hatred of sin will leave us, as it did Isaiah, seeing with utter dismay our own lack of holiness. His moral purity serves to magnify our impurity.
To the Corinthians Paul wrote: "To the church of God in Corinth, To those sanctified in Jesus Christ and called to be holy. (1 Cor 1:2).
The word sanctified here means made holy. That is, we are through Messiah made holy in our standing before God and called to be holy in our daily lives. So the writer of Hebrews is telling us to take seriously the necessity of personal and practical holiness. When the Holy Spirit comes into our lives at salvation, He comes to make us holy in practice.
The teachings that God's Law was nailed to the Cross are responsible for the continuing moral decay in Christianity. Without the teachings of the Commandments in the House of God there is no guideline (pattern) for Christians on how to live in the Kingdom of God. The Church of Jesus Christ must in these last days hold high the Standard (God's Law) before Yahweh's People. The call of every Pastor is to bring the Body of Christ into perfectness (holiness) and unity through teaching of the Word of God. (Ephesians 4). Failure to teach what Jesus taught regarding God's law will be to produce anti law advocates. the Divine Laws of Yahweh Most High were NOT nailed to the cross of Christ Jesus. Our Lord said "I came not to do away with the Law but to fulfill it". Jesus also taught that "all the law hangs on love." We must understand these words. They mean that we are to obey our Father's Law in love, not from legalism. In other words our Father's Commands are to be the life style of every Christian.; they are to flow out of our hearts.
"Therefore be careful to observe them (God's Commandments)
The United States has been a great country, founded on the teachings of Christ Jesus and His Disciples. When a nation tears down the foundation upon which it was built it will no longer be a nation that is blessed by Yahweh Most High. We who are called Christian must in these times return to the foundation of Truth upon which we must stand firmly.... Jesus the ROCK of our Salvation and His Teachings. We must speak out against those in government and those in our local churches who seek to do away with God's Commandments. To be silent is to stand with those who oppose Yahweh Most High. If we love God we will keep His Commandments.
"He that hath my commandments, and keepeth them, he it is that loveth me; and he that loveth me shall be loved of my Father, and I will love him, and will manifest myself to him."If a man loves me, he will keep my words; and my Father will love him, and we will come unto him and make our abode with him. He that loveth me not keepeth not my sayings; and the words which ye year is not mine, but the Father's which sent me. These things have I spoken unto you, being yet present with you. But the Comforter, which is the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name he shall teach you all things, and bring all things to your remembrance, whatsoever I have said unto you." John 14:21-26. Read all of chapter 14.
Every Follower of Christ Jesus must understand that
Jesus became our sin offering.
"Be not carried about with divers and strange doctrines. For it is a good thing that the heart be established with grace; not with meats, which have not profited them that have been occupied therein. We have an altar, whereof they have no right to eat which serve the tabernacle. For the bodies of those beasts, whose blood is brought into the sanctuary by the high priest for sin, are burned without the camp. Wherefore, Jesus also, that he might sanctify the people with His own blood, suffered without the gate. Let us go forth therefore unto him without the camp, bearing his reproach." Hebrews 13:9-13 Seeking Daily to be a Living Epistle of the Master
These (and many other scriptures in the New Testament) make it clear that the Followers of Messiah are established in God's Grace by the One sacrifice--- God's Only Begotten SON, Jesus Christ. Today we have a different altar where these Old Testament Levitical priests no longer serve; an altar where the bodies of beasts and their blood are not brought into the sanctuary for sin offerings. Jesus became our sin offering. Jesus went outside the Old Testament tabernacle and shed his blood. We are called away from these old covenant practices and called to go forth unto Him outside this camp.
The New Covenant is indeed a new and better covenant than the Old Testament Covenant God made with Israel. God's Law is one of grace, mercy, and love, written not on tablets of stone, but on the hearts of every Follower of Christ Jesus. Daily as you read, study, and believe God's Word the Holy Spirit writes God's Word in your heart.
The scriptures make it clear that what was nailed to the Cross is our sin debt (Jesus became sin for us). They also make clear that the Levitical priesthood with the killing of animals as sacrifices for our sins are no longer necessary in the New Covenant. Jesus was the Supreme Blood Sacrifice.
Without a clear understanding of God's law we do not know what sin is... the law tells us what sin is and how we can live holy lives unto Almighty God. Laws are for law breakers and not for those who obey the law. We can see this in the laws of the land. The law against speeding is there but we are not aware of it until we break it. The same is true of God's laws ---God's Laws are given to help us understand what sin is.
You are a Living Epistle of the Living Savior.
Our lives are living epistles to others in the Body of Messiah. When it comes to lifting high the standard of daily living as sober/moderate/
The basic foundation for the Titus 2 ministry of Mentoring/Teaching younger women is found in chapter 1 of Titus. All that we are, how we live, and what we teach must first and foremost be founded on sound doctrine---the doctrine that Jesus taught His Disciples and that was passed down to the early Christians by those He commissioned to take His doctrine to the world. Until we know the doctrine of Jesus Christ, we are not equipped to teach others in the Body of Christ.
Dear Sisters, let's gain a clear understanding of Jesus' doctrinal teachings and announce these truths loud and unashamedly by the way we live and what we teach. When God provides opportunity for you to teach and encourage others in their roles as Proverbs 31/Titus 2 women don't shrink back from speaking what God's Word teaches about being modest, sober minded, and disciplined women, wives, and keepers of the home.
In closing this bible study, let me stress the importance of you understanding that God does not require a perfect, sinless life in order for us to have fellowship with him. God does, however, require that we grieve over sin in our lives instead of justifying it, and that we earnestly pursue holiness daily.
I pray that if you get nothing else out of these teachings you will have learned that God's Law was designed to show us how to live in harmony, peace, and love with other brethren. Jesus fulfilled His Father's Commandments by the way he lived. He was a living epistle of God's Law and if you are one of His Followers, you will seek daily to be a living epistle of God's Law.