Category: Church Stream

Posted on

April 29

 

Romans 10-12

We are in the Church Stream today reading with the International Standard Version this week.

 

Lord, the issue today is salvation. We are grateful that you are mighty to save. Amen.

10 – Paul is continuing on the same thread of salvation and his longing for the Jews to understand the greater picture; that the salvation they have been hoping and “working” for for 1400 years and more is now here … and they are fighting it tooth and nail!  The middle of chapter 10 spells it out. We believe in our heart, and confess with our mouth and therein salvation is granted. This is what Abraham did and was counted righteous for. And Abraham (whom they revere) was “saved” 600 years before the Law was given to follow. This is proof positive that salvation comes by faith.  It’s strange, but this is all so obvious to the “old guard” within Judaism that it is staring them in the face – thus they can’t see it.  Paul’s quoting of Isaiah, and Moses, and David in Psalms, and the Prophet Joel is proof positive that what was going on now is what God has been planning for salvation to become and that be accessible to all nations. –> and It’s happening now – but the old school Jewish leadership is disturbed by it and vehemently against it.

 
11 –  Despite the Jews’ open rejection of the salvation that is now found in Jesus, God still loves his Chosen Ones. Granted, the Jewish rejection of Jesus was not universal. The original believers and converts were mostly Jews. The growing young church was majority Jewish is culture and its overtone.  It was the Jewish leadership that had rancor for the Christians, and their proselytes turned agitators were the ones who brought the most harassment to the burgeoning Church. But in this chapter [11], Paul talks of salvation for all the Jews.  The interplay of the Jewish and Gentile relationship has a tone of sibling rivalry as Paul describes it. The symbolism and illustrations of yeast and bread and the affect each has upon the other and the tree metaphor of the trunk and the branch gives such clarity to what Paul is so impassioned about. He REALLY wants these spiritual concepts to be understood. Paul closes by exclaiming the wonders of God’s processes by working out our salvation in a myriad of ways. It’s a marvelous and endless topic, isn’t it?
 
12 – This is a banner chapter about our life that is dedicated to God and transformed for living unto God and honoring Him with our service. This life is filled with grace and gifts and productive activity that blesses, spreads cheer, and love, and hope, and serves others so to spread that love.  The finale~ is exhortation that is vital for dealing with tension, deviance and deviant people. It is a paragraph that is unique to Christianity.  Interesting that the pagans and the other religions of the world refer to Christians as “the nice ones”, the “happy ones”, the “ones who share”.  My husband and I have been in over 70 countries and we’ve seen this first hand.  It is a marvel how Christians are everywhere and spreading Good News, even to those who currently despise Jesus and His followers.  And it is this ministry in the Holy Spirit that is resulting in millions of new Christians coming into the Kingdom of God each week!
 

The week walked us through much Preparation for Big Changes

~Moses relayed the plans for Passover, for leaving Egypt so to institute a new faith and how it would be lived.

~David is now king – this is a big change: he “farewells” Saul/Jonathan, though he is in Hebron, he names Jerusalem the new capitol and national worship will be instituted there. Worship will be done according to what David says – vibrant and energetic.

~In Psalms DAvid prays for deliverance [35] and then revels in his relationship with God. What better way to prepare for deliverance than to pray for deliverance?
~Isaiah is basically telling us to prepare for a whole new world and Jeremiah is told to prepare to follow the Call of God.
~in Hosea, we all wish he had something more pleasant to say but he, because of Israel’s behavior, he is saying, “you better prepare yourselves to be destroyed – the way you are carrying on…”
~Mark teaches, “here comes Jesus, prepare yourselves to be blessed.”
~Paul in Romans 10-12 is saying, “prepare to be saved. Jews first then Gentiles.  Wait, no Gentiles are more readily receiving him, so Gentiles more for now, then Jews will follow in because of envy.  Oh well, all of you are going to be saved!”
Posted on

April 22

 

Romans 7-9

We are in the Church Stream today reading from the Good News Translation.

 

Commentary by Dr. Drake Travis

7 – Why is there The Law? Whether nonChristian religions want to admit it or not, something is wrong.  It is not a perfect world and there is especially something wrong with us. The deficit created between what we are are and what we ought to be is not caused by diet, lack of inner essence-ness, poor wifi with our mobile device. And more/enough money isn’t going to take our sin away. The world descended into sin since Genesis 3 occurred and a Savior is needed. We violated God’s Law and only a solution from God will remedy the matter. Without Law humanity remains oblivious that a Savior is needed and that there is a vast gap between where we are spiritually and where we ought to be.   God doesn’t want our reaction to a Savior to be, “Savior? I don’t need a Savior. That merely proves human oblivion.  We are helpless to save ourselves and God’s Law proves this to us.

Paul uses an illustration of marriage for us to help start the realization process. The fact of Law and what it reveals about us proves that we as humans come up short regardless. Our nature is divided. What we know, what we wish we did, and what we do, fails to line up again and again. We embody the conflict. We live the conflict. The conflict lives in us. Except for Jesus, and haleluia, we have Jesus…provided we let Jesus have us.
 
8 – In Jesus, we have Life abundant, full and free, in the Holy Spirit. Condemnation is overwith.  This Holy Spirit lives in us.  The Holy Spirit enables us to do and be and become all that God designed us for in this life. Our obligation now is not to an exhausting Law but to the Holy Spirit – to remain in Him and yielded to Him; to be listening to His promptings and not selfishness anymore. And Jesus, through the Holy Spirit in us, allows this to happen in us. What we truly crave in our soul is for Christ to reign in our lives and all that is explained in this chapter allows this to happen. The suffering that creation is under is universal suffering, but this hope in Christ carries us through to attach to the ultimate freedom that is coming. The Spirit is praying for us. We need never be in dismay or defeated for God can be trusted.  We have Christ. We will always have Christ. Christ Himself will not allow something to come between us. We are never separated from Him. Romans 8 is magnificent and has given comfort to Believers in the most bleak of settings for 19+ centuries.
 
9 – Paul, not one to duck from issues, brings up the pain he has over the fact that many of the Jewish people, for whom the promises of God were first granted, are not in the Covenant – and it is their rejecting God [not the vice versa] that is the problem. God did not reject the Jews so to discard them. God used the occasion of their smugness to Him and the New Covenant in Christ’s blood to open the invitation to the nations of the whole world. This all hinges on God’s mercy and grace. Remember that every false religion errs in the realm of grace. They mess it up. They do not understand it. This chapter is an exposition of another factor of God’s grace. He has opened the Kingdom of Himself to more people who do not deserve it.  He is just good.  That is the issue here.  It was foretold that the Kingdom of heaven and access to it would be opened to all people’s and not just “a door held open” for one race of people for all time.

The motif that came forward day after day this week was, “God is Sovereign. Will we accept this and trust Him?”

Pharaoh’s heart was hard as stone in the first 5 plagues.  God made sure Pharaoh remained so plagues 6ff. – so that all 10 plagues could be executed to testify to the world for all time.  God’s sovereignty is the only explanation for this.   David is going through a cauldron of events and stresses that could have shook His faith and had him question his destiny. He knew God enough to trust Him through it all.  Psalms this week was an alpine journey through frantic cries, through turbulence, thanksgiving, trust, and forgiveness. Trust in His Sovereignty is what sustains David – AGAIN. Isaiah prophesies of astounding things that are going to happen in Israel in the future. It is talk like this that will sustain Israel as they are going to walk through some painful things brought on by their rebellion. Understanding sovereignty is what helps us rise to see the big picture.  We see sovereignty in Hosea’s words, “I will abandon my people until they have suffered enough for their sins, and come looking for me …” God isn’t mean. He is sovereign and only He knows what is going to work.  We see God’s sovereignty in Jesus showing Lordship over the Sabbath, and demons, and illness and nature.  Paul describes a part of God’s sovereignty in His opening Himself to the world and the world to Him when, by default, Israel (especially leadership) rejects God.  This is enough different ways God has shown His graciousness and sovereignty for us to realize that His sovereignty will prove true in our lives as well.  For nothing can separate us from the love of God. Amen.
Posted on

April 15

 

Romans 3:22-6:23

We are in the Church Stream today as we continue reading from the Lexham English Bible.

 

Commentary by Dr. Drake Travis

3 – this is the finale~ of this chapter. Romans 3 is not just the heart of the power of the gospel chapter.  Chapter 3 of Romans is the main heart valve of the gospel. Bible smuggling was mentioned last week regarding Romans. I’ll conclude that comment this week by saying that when only a small piece of paper could be smuggled in; something the size of a 3X5 card, then the core of it all needed to be included, the content was Romans 3! It is a marvel what hinges on this chapter.  Christ expels our sin and appeases its effect upon our soul and destiny. The new bridge to the “Amazing Grace” song bursts upon the mind; “my chains are gone, I’ve been set free.”  Romans 3 is good news that makes sense to us. Paul makes the crucifixion make sense. It is intriguing that the disciples (and everyone else) didn’t understand what was happening as Jesus was dying. We do however thanks to Paul’s writing to us.

 
4 – Abraham is the illustration employed here. All to whom Paul is addressing here have top regard for Abraham. The old school Jewish crew that Paul is addressing specifically need to understand God’s role in salvation by remembering that Abraham was justified by faith and completely so.  He believed and was justified. Done. Circumcision was a ritual done later by Abraham and his son Isaac. Yes, it was the first next thing Abraham was required to do, but it was done after Abraham was justified. To become “children of Abraham”, if that is how they were to perceive it, then one needed to simply believe God – like Abraham did. And believing God (like Abraham did) was to now follow Jesus v.s. follow Abraham in circumcision. Abraham’s faith in God is what guided him, not his circumcision – that was only incidental.  This is vital to put it lightly. New Believers needed to be welcomed by the older believers and welcomed in faith like Abraham was. The issue is not that God made the Jews and the Devil made the Gentiles. This two-leveled stigmatism could become so severe that it would morph into a mental template of Jews circumcised and Gentiles uncircumcised (thus the Gentiles don’t really even deserve to be here) that it would become a problem that would hobble the church forever.  Paul needed to explain what we find in ch. 4.
 
5 – is a “wow” chapter.  It is loaded with the verses we memorized in Sunday School and Vacation Bible School. It’s one of those ‘gold mine’ chapters with no many good finds and discoveries that it needs to be gone over slowly and repeatedly. The theological backdrop is that we find ourselves enswirled in a world of sin living a life of sin. We didn’t ask to be born. We simply realize that we are here and it was not our choice. Invariably we opt to sin somewhere along the way and then cannot undo what we have chosen. Adam, much the same way, had to have a horribly sobering moments (perhaps many) during his centuries of life when he slumped onto a rock or chair and groaned, “I just ate a piece of fruit … I didn’t know it would lead to all this mess. I didn’t know it would ruin everything for everyone. Is there no remedy? Will it be this way forever?!”  Adam’s choice cements our choice to disobey.  Now, since Christ’s righteousness is offered on behalf of all, choosing Him remedies the fact that Adam’s choice brought death. Adam chose death and it extends to us. We can choose Christ for His righteousness also extends to us to cancel death.
 
6 – Life and grace and gratitude and Christ’s covering for us are to be our motives in living. To think, “hey, I’m eternally forgiven, no matter what. I’m free, therefore, to keep living in sin for God will redeem me” is wrong thinking. It is desperately immature and a smack in the face who gave His Son for us at a costly price.  Someone who is thinking this way, [and there have been many] is oriented completely wrong.  It’s s reckless to think this way. It’s as wrong headed as a rich brat continuing to meddle in crime and saying, “it’s fine, my old man will keep paying bail and the attorney fees. I can get out of any mess. No need for me to reform my ways.” … really?  A net under a high elevation work site is there in case we fall. It’s not installed to be moronically played on all day like a trampoline.  Sin has wages that must be paid. Yet greater than death is God’s gift of eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord, and He must be received by us.  We didn’t choose to be born. We didn’t realize that our sin would lead to such a death. But it’s all true and it engulfs us. We do have the ability to choose Christ, and we must do so to cancel our eternal death.
 
The Thread through the Streams for this week – “Take it to God”

– Moses is thrust into a terrible face-off with the world’s most powerful man at the time.  Moses has some serious questions and he takes it to God.  We see a Moses who is coming to God and coming against a Pharaoh who is fighting against the God who is about to make a move.

-David (in I Sam.) is running for his life and takes each day and each event and each step in his heart to God.  This scenario v.s. a Saul who doesn’t come to God for anything.
-The Psalms this week are such a celebration as David is rejoicing in His Lord. He takes his joy to God who gives him joy. And when feeling forsaken, David goes straight to God with it.
-Isaiah tells all who are thirsty, hungry, broken, unsatisfied, seeking righteousness to do what? … to come to God. For His salvation is near. The wicked also are called out for their wickedness.
-Hosea is calling for his wife to come back to him just as Israel is called to come back to the LORD: “afterward the children of Israel will return and seek Yahweh their God and David their King.”
Mark – tells of disciples who are called to Jesus, others are coming to Jesus, craving to get to Jesus, longing to be touched and healed and saved by Jesus. It’s beautiful pictures; one after another.
Paul’s letter to Romans explains the thinking of God and the intricacies involved, the theory of what it is and what allows for us to be able to get to God.  It’s mind bending and inspiring. Very motivating writing that the world must know