Tuesday, July 28, 2009

Devotional - Seeing Is Not Believing

Good morning my friends. I hope it is a beautiful day in your area of the world. Some of you want sunshine, I pray you have sunshine. Some of you want rain, I pray you receive rain. We are moving on to 1 Corinthians 15.

Paul has dealt with a great variety of common problems in this letter to the Corinthians. I say common because they are problems that persist to this day in many churches. Not the least of which is straying from the truth of the Word of God. For some people the Word is not exciting enough, not foreign enough, dare I say not sexy enough. They look to supplement it with with other teachings to form their own tailor-made gospel. In this way they get to do what man has done for thousands of years; create a god in their own image. This way they can do what they want to do and not feel bad about it.

Paul writes to the Corinthians:

Now, brothers, I want to remind you of the gospel I preached to you, which you received and on which you have taken your stand. By this gospel you are saved, if you hold firmly to the word I preached to you. Otherwise, you have believed in vain. vv. 1-2

There is only one truth and it is found in the Word of God. You can believe whatever you want to believe, it is your freedom to do so, but it will not save you. Only in the Word of truth will you find salvation. If you are a Christian do not go adding to your beliefs because you will forfeit your salvation. If you claim Christ as your saviour and hold to the hope of salvation then you must only hold to the truth of the Word. It is a rather simple truth:

For what I received I passed on to you as of first importance: that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures. vv. 3-4

That is the foundation, there is no other.

1. Jesus Christ died for our sins.
2. He was buried.
3. He was raised from the dead on the third day.

There is no room for anything else here. You cannot deny his death nor his resurrection and still call yourself Christian. Our hope hangs on the work of the cross, for our forgiveness and salvation. Our hope hangs on the empty grave for our coming resurrection to new life. There is further revelation of this truth and what has resulted due to it but there is no other foundation.

In Paul's days there were witnesses to this physical truth:

And that he appeared to Peter, and then to the Twelve. After that, he appeared to more than five hundred of the brothers at the same time, most of whom are still living, though some have fallen asleep. Then he appeared to James, then to all the apostles, and last of all he appeared to me also, as to one abnormally born. vv. 5-8

No longer do we have those who had witnessed it first hand. Now we only have the witness of the written Word and the testimony of the Holy Spirit within us. But do you know what Jesus said about us?

"Because you have seen me, you have believed; blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed." John 20:29

Stick to what you have been taught from the Word. Do not stray from the foundation that has been laid down for you. There are a lot of demon teachings out there that have distracted many people who should have known better. Don't you be one of them.

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