Category: Bible Knowledge

Marriage remains a significant aspect of Christian life but the way that it is valued has undergone a shift in wider society. Higher numbers of couples are moving in together and cohabiting for years before even considering walking down the aisle, if they contemplate it at all. For the couples that do decide to make their union official, many of them become caught up in the superficial elements of the wedding day – the dress, the venue, the decorations, the entertainment – and risk these distracting them from the central and most important part of the whole event. I love attending weddings and witnessing two people in love make their union official in the eyes of God as much as the next girl but I can’t help but wonder about the impact that the pressure to make the day perfect can have. When we look beyond the excitement of the big day and past the intense and meticulous planning that’s often required to bring it all together, what is marriage really about? These verses will help you to build up a picture of how this special union is described and alluded to in the Bible. Proverbs 18:22 – He who finds a wife finds what is good and receives favour from the Lord. Proverbs:19:14 – Houses and wealth are inherited from parents, but a prudent wife is from the Lord. Ecclesiastes 4:12 – Though one may be overpowered, two can defend themselves. A cord of three strands is not quickly broken. Mark 10:6-9 – ‘But at the beginning of creation God “made them male and female”. “For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united with his wife, and the two will become flesh.” So they are no longer two, but one flesh. Therefore what God has joined together, let no one separate.’ Ephesians 4:2-3 – Be completely humble and gentle; be patient, bearing with one another in love. Make every effort to keep the unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace. Ephesians 5:25 – Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her. 1 Peter 4:8 – Above all, love each other deeply, because love covers over a multitude of sins.

Whether you’ve been a Christian for one day or for one decade, you would still be in a position where you struggle with sin. And this could lead you to ask the question: “Why can’t God just erase sin from the world?” Skeptics will, of course, blame God because many perceive Him to be bigoted, self-centred, blood-thirsty and power-hungry. If you’re of this mindset then God bless you, but here’s a perspective that you may choose to ignore but one that seems more plausible. We all know that God is a God of justice and He desires justice, but we also know that God is a God of love who finds enjoyment in seeing His own people turn to him fully. As a parent, I know for a fact how much more fulfilling it is to see my 3-year-old daughter choose to obey my rules without me having to impose them compared to having to put her on a leash every single day of her life. In the same way, God desires for us to turn to Him fully of our accord. This is what we call free will. The reason why God put the tree that bore the fruit of the knowledge of good and evil in the garden was because He didn’t want Adam and Eve to ever feel that they had no other choice except to follow God. If He did not put that tree there, then He would have only proven that He was only hungry for power and control, which He is not. God is instead loving in nature and chose to create man with a choice. Sadly, many times, man has chosen his own way, which will lead only to sin and death. God did not create sin. He merely gave man the opportunity to make a choice for himself whether He would follow God or not. Would Adam have not sinned if the tree wasn’t there? I believe that he would have probably found another way to reject God if he really wanted to. Lucifer didn’t have to eat of a God-made tree to fall into sin, but he still found a way. So why can’t God just take away sin? Because if He had to remove it, He would have to remove our rights to make our own choices and that goes against His loving nature. It’s not God’s fault that we’re still sinning. It’s ours alone. Also, to remove sin would mean God would most likely have to remove good things that He created that we have used for the wrong reasons. For instance, we could ask God to remove our sexual desires so we can flee sexual immorality, but that would mean we would also be disqualified from the great gift that is sex in the context of His plan and will of marriage. But God, always gracious and loving, found a way to set us free from the bondage of sin even if we still existed in sinful and selfish ways. That is by sending Jesus to die on a cross for the forgiveness of our sins and so that we can continue to choose a life lived with Him today. God’s love and grace will surmount our stupidity and wrong choices, and we are blessed to have this opportunity to build a relationship with a God who did not force Himself upon us, but instead gave us a choice. I hope today, you can make the right choice of choosing God above all else.

Even though “clairvoyant Christian” Troy Griffin uses his powers to talk to the dead in order to help the police solve “unsolvable cases where tracks had run cold,” Charisma News senior editor Jennifer LeClaire believes that what he is doing is wrong. “The trouble with this type of prophetic ministry is that it violates Scripture. I have no doubt Griffin is talking to spirits—familiar spirits who know everything about the deceased person,” she writes for Charisma News. “Why these familiar spirits would cooperate in solving crimes, I do not know. What I do know is necromancy—which Merriam-Webster defines as ‘conjuration of the spirits of the dead for purposes of magically revealing the future or influencing the course of events’—is an abomination to the Lord.” The Bible passage Deuteronomy 18:9-13 says that it is an “abomination to the Lord” for any person to use “divination, or use witchcraft,” or become “an interpreter of omens, or a sorcerer, or one who casts spells, or a spiritualist, or an occultist, or a necromancer.” Griffin argues that his “psychic calling” is a gift from God, so he uses Christian themes in his readings. “Many of the readings I do for private clients are for people who have lost children to suicide or to other tragic events, and this has caused them to lose or doubt their faith,” he said. “They’re looking to repair their faith and my religious background plays a role in helping them on that journey.” LeClaire says Griffin’s statements are a “tragic deception” because Christians are not supposed to turn to psychics or prophets to get in touch with dead loved ones when they feel down, since the only one they should turn to is God. “Prophets are not supposed to get prophetic words from any other source but God, yet in this hour we are clearly seeing these and other troubling trends emerge among those who call themselves prophetic,” she says. She then warned Christians to “beware” of psychics, mediums, familiar spirits, tarot card readers, crystal ball readers, palm readers, and the like. “They may claim to serve God, but they are tapping into the spirit realm illegally and offering false comfort and fearful predictions that probably won’t even come to pass,” she says.

One way to work on strengthening our spiritual lives is to meditate on the role that God has had in them. We can become so preoccupied with asking God to intervene in situations that we can can forget how far we’ve already come with his help and all of the growth that we’ve undergone as a result of his involvement. We can easily find ourselves fixated on chasing and obtaining the ‘next big thing’ that we think will bring us happiness if we don’t make time to give thanks and reflect on what we have. This same attitude can have a negative impact on our spiritual progress. The desire to build on our relationship with Jesus and to develop spiritually is understandable and should be encouraged but we should also accept that an important part of this is showing appreciation for what has already happened. Here are three questions which can help us to get thinking about the role God has had in our spiritual development. How have I changed? Reflecting on the practical changes that we’ve made can help us realise how differently we approach situations now to how we did in the past. Do you have a different attitude when you’re faced with a difficult personal or financial issue? How can this positive change be linked back to your faith? Maybe you make more time in your schedule for the people you care about than you did before as a result of reexamining how Jesus dealt with people. How have I grown spiritually? Are you praying more often and more deeply than before? Maybe you feel more peaceful during prayer or more comfortable during worship. From an experience of inner peace to better communication with Jesus, it’s important to recognise and give thanks for how we’ve grown spiritually in whatever form it presents itself. Realising the spiritual growth that we’ve experienced can encourage us to channel these gifts into outward expressions of Jesus’ love. How has my faith deepened? A greater trust in God is one way that we can see evidence of a deeper faith. One of the things that many of us do is worry unnecessarily. “Do not be anxious about anything, but in every situation, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God,” (Philippians 4:6). We’re probably opening up to God more if we’re worrying less than before. Taking stock of our deepened faith can help motivate us to respond positively to our calling when previously we would have been too worried to act.

I was once asked by a member of our church a very trivial question. It needed a lot of thinking and the leading of the Holy Spirit to answer, and by God’s grace I was able to shed some light that day. The question went something like this: “If I were to make a living from professional lottery betting and give a very significant portion to the poor and to the church, would gambling still then be a sin?” The Bible says nothing directly against gambling, betting and the lottery, but that’s not to say that the Bible is incomplete or that gambling just took a slide. Although the Bible does not give us a picture of how we are not to earn money, it is filled with stories of how we are supposed to earn money. God reminds us of two truths when it comes to earning money: that it comes solely because of the grace of God, and that the most natural way that God allows us to earn money is to work for it, not win it. The Bible has nothing against getting rich, that’s true, but it does warn us against getting rich too quickly, which is what most people really desire when they gamble or bet. Proverbs 13:11 tells us that “Wealth gained hastily will dwindle, but whoever gathers little by little will increase it.” When we gamble, we put ourselves in a spot where we set ourselves up for destruction. A Biblical example would be the prodigal son. Though he didn’t get his wealth through gambling, God wanted to tell us how quick money will often spell quick danger. There are also those who argue that gambling can be a form of leisure for those who have disposable wealth to squander, but isn’t that just wasteful and selfish? The Bible also speaks of the love of money, which comes easily when we have too much of it right away. I remember the time I started one of my most successful business ventures prior to becoming a full-time minster. I was 18 years old and earning a lot of money. Was I sinning by working hard? No, I wasn’t, but the true goal of my work was to honor my wallet, not God. That was sin, and I had to repent. Luke 16:11 tells us, “If then you have not been faithful in the unrighteous wealth, who will entrust to you the true riches?” Gambling is bad not because we earn money. It can be treacherous because it is often always a given that we try to earn money without the God-ordained purpose of working hard for it and trusting Him to bless us because of our labor. That’s not to say that we work hard and think it’s about our ability. At the end of the day, it’s about honoring God and doing things His way, trusting that He will make things work out for us.

So God is calling me to do something…or is he? I haven’t heard an audible voice but somehow I have the sense that God is saying something – just to me. I don’t want to be gullible – perhaps it is just wishful thinking or my own ideas formulating. On the other hand if it is God speaking to me I certainly don’t want to be disobedient. If only I knew for sure it was God’s voice… The problem is I have heard too many crazy claims. I’ve heard boys say to girls, “God has told me that you should be my girlfriend”. And I’ve heard a girl respond to this somewhat creepy chat-up line with an abrupt, “Well he hasn’t told me that so push off”. I’ve also read more sinister stories like the primary school teacher who recently physically attacked skateboarders because apparently Jesus told him to. On an almost daily basis we hear news of atrocities committed because somebody thought God was telling them to do it. But I have also seen people clearly led by God to do incredible things – adopt children, quit their jobs to help the vulnerable, become a a social worker or a politician or a scientist. I even met someone who felt God told him to give away a year’s wages. So how can we know if God really is speaking to us? Here are five pathways that may help: 1. Search your heart Sometimes saying we have heard from God is simply a means of justifying what we wanted to do anyway. The infatuated young man who seeks divine backing for asking the object of his affections out on a date is one obvious example. Many of the wars waged around the world involve egomaniacal leaders who put words in God’s mouth so that they hear him saying just what they want him to say. So if we think God is speaking to us, we must first check our hearts and our consciences to see if we are using God as a ventriloquist’s dummy for our own desires. One way we can respond to God’s voice is to pray with the Psalmist, “Search me, God, and know my heart; test me and know my anxious thoughts. See if there is any offensive way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting” (Psalm 139:23-24). 2. Search the Scriptures I have all sorts of strange thoughts that come into my head, often influenced by how much coffee I have imbibed or how much cheese I have eaten before I go to sleep. I can easily be moved by a movie or a news story. My priorities and ideas shift around depending on who I have spoken to, what I have read and how I feel. Having an external reference point to assess God’s voice and priorities for me is vital. For Christians the Scriptures provide the clearest revelation of what God wants of us. Scripture provides both clarity and authority when it comes to God’s direction in our lives. We get clarity through direct commands such as the Ten Commandments where God sets out what he considers normative for Christian obedience. We get authority from the fact that Jesus himself demonstrated how to use the Bible appropriately to remain obedient to God. I say ‘appropriately’ because even our use of Scripture can be biased, whether it is our love-struck young example pointing to “You shall go out with joy” (Isaiah 55:12), or those egomaniacal dictators pointing to genocides in the Old Testament. Sadly, Scripture has been used to justify many horrific things. We must make sure we have done our homework to understand the original intent and context of the Bible. If we are feeling led to do something that is contrary to the clear teaching of the Bible, however sincerely we may feel it, we are being misled. 3. Search out the counsel of friends Our consciences are slippery and our desires and hopes are too easily confused with God’s voice. Even our use of Scripture can easily become self-serving. But we can employ another way to test the guidance we think we have received from God by searching out the counsel of others. Having friends whom we can use as sounding boards when we think God might be leading us can be very helpful. It is often easier to justify something to ourselves than it is to convince others. Sharing the leading we have received can bring a sense of objectivity to our reasoning. Of course this is not an infallible measure either, as we could subconsciously choose friends who will tell us what we want to hear, or perhaps, as was the case with Job’s friends/comforters, all of our friends could be mistaken. But as part of the checks and balances of listening to God, involving others in our reflection is vitally important. Christian discipleship was never meant to be a solitary practice. It was always intended to take place as part of a church community. Not that this always makes it easier – as different friends add in their views, God’s voice sometimes becomes even less clear – but as we continue to pray and discern with praying and discerning friends, if God is trying to tell us something there will be clarification. 4. Search your wisdom and experience Some people treat divine guidance as intentionally irrational, but this runs counter to what the Bible actually says. The Proverbs describe the search for wisdom and discernment as one of the highest goals of human existence (Proverbs 2:1-11). The quest for wisdom comes with the promise that we will know how to make good decisions and choose the right paths. Being a Christian disciple means loving God with every part of our being: “heart, soul and mind”, as Jesus puts it, and deliberately choosing to ignore your mind is deficient discipleship. Of course our reasoning can be flawed and biased. Sometimes in the Bible God asks people to do things that didn’t seem wise at all…