Sharing at Every Opportunity

Scripture: "When everything is ready, I will come and get you, so that you will always be with me where I am.” (John 14:3 ).

 

One of the greatest comforts of being a Christian is that we can trust God’s Word. Jesus has promised to return for His followers and that “His Kingdom will never end” (Luke 1:33 ). We can share God’s comfort with others, caring for them -- as Jesus cared for those around Him – and helping them prepare for His return. We can show we care by letting others know about Jesus, every chance we have, so they can share a joyful eternity with the Lord, too.

Never Alone

Although Jesus is not physically with us, we experience evidence of God’s hand in our lives. One reason is because Jesus promised His Holy Spirit would be with His followers, that He “will not abandon you as orphans — I will come to you” (John 14:18 ). With His promise, He instructed, “If you love Me, obey My commandments” (John 14:15 ). The Apostle John, also wrote about companionship and following Jesus’ commandments in his later writings: “if anyone does sin, we have an Advocate who pleads our case before the Father” (John 14:15 ), “and we can be sure that we know Him if we obey His commandments” (1 John 2:3)

We Should Care for Others

What happens if people don’t obey, not caring for others as He instructed us to? The Bible says that “All the nations will be gathered in His presence, and He will separate the people as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats” (Matthew 25:32). He will give blessed, loving words to the righteous “sheep,” who did care for others. But He will say, “Away with you, you cursed ones” (Matthew 25:41) to those who ignored the needs of others. Christians can care for non-Believers as though for a child, sharing God’s Good News. With the Holy Spirit guiding us, we can lead others, as Jesus taught: “Let the children come to me. Don’t stop them! For the Kingdom of God belongs to those who are like these children” (Luke 18:16).

Perpetual and Unalterable

Come, and let us join ourselves to the Lord, in a perpetual covenant that shall not be forgotten. Jer. 50: 5. 

A covenant is an agreement by which parties bind themselves and each other to the fulfillment of certain conditions. Thus the human agent enters into agreement with God to comply with the conditions specified in His Word. His conduct shows whether or not he respects these conditions. 

Man gains everything by obeying the covenant- keeping God. God's attributes are imparted to man, enabling him to exercise mercy and compassion. God's covenant assures us of His unchangeable character. . . . We must know for ourselves what His requirements and our obligations are. The terms of God's covenant are, "Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy strength, and with all thy mind; and thy neighbour as thyself." These are the conditions of life. "This do," Christ said, "and thou shalt live" (Luke 10: 27, 28).

The law of God was written with His own finger on tables of stone, thus showing that it could never be changed or abrogated. It is to be preserved through the eternal ages, immutable as the principles of His government. . . . Christ gave His life to make it possible for man to be restored to the image of God. It is the power of His grace that draws men together in obedience to the truth.

My brethren, bind up with the Lord God of hosts. Let Him be your fear, and let Him be your dread. . . . Troublous times are before us, but if we stand together in Christian fellowship, none striving for supremacy, God will work mightily for us. . . .

He knows our every necessity. He has all power. He can bestow upon His servants the measure of efficiency that their need demands. His infinite love and compassion never weary. With the majesty of omnipotence He unites the gentleness and care of a tender shepherd. We need have no fear that He will not fulfill His promises. He is eternal truth. Never will He change the covenant that He has made with those that love Him. His promises to His church stand fast forever. He will make her an eternal excellence, a joy of many generations.

The Covenant and the Sabbath

Wherefore the children of Israel shall keep the sabbath, to observe the sabbath throughout their generations, for a perpetual covenant. It is a sign between me and the children of Israel for ever. Ex. 31: 16, 17. 

When the Lord delivered His people Israel from Egypt and committed to them His law, He taught them that by the observance of the Sabbath they were to be distinguished from idolaters. . . . 

As the Sabbath was the sign that distinguished Israel when they came out of Egypt to enter the earthly Canaan, so it is the sign that now distinguishes God's people as they come out from the world to enter the heavenly rest. The Sabbath is a sign of a relationship existing between God and His people, a sign that they honor His law. It distinguishes between His loyal subjects and transgressors. . . . The Sabbath given to the world as the sign of God as the Creator is also the sign of Him as the Sanctifier. The power that created all things is the power that recreates the soul in His own likeness. To those who keep holy the Sabbath day it is the sign of sanctification. True sanctification is harmony with God, oneness with Him in character. It is received through obedience to those principles that are the transcript of His character. And the Sabbath is the sign of obedience. He who from the heart obeys the fourth commandment will obey the whole law. He is sanctified through obedience. 

To us as to Israel the Sabbath is given "for a perpetual covenant." To those who reverence His holy day the Sabbath is a sign that God recognizes them as His chosen people. It is a pledge that He will fulfill to them His covenant. Every soul who accepts the sign of God's government places himself under the divine, everlasting covenant. He fastens himself to the golden chain of obedience, every link of which is a promise. 

The fourth commandment alone of all the ten contains the seal of the great Lawgiver, the Creator of the heavens and the earth. Those who obey this commandment take upon themselves His name, and all the blessings it involves are theirs. 

The Sabbath has lost none of its meaning. It is still a sign between God and His people, and it will be so forever.

Discovering Needs

Scripture: "You can pray for anything, and if you have faith, you will receive it.”(Matthew 21:22)

Having a child has taught me a lot of things about meeting the needs of another person. As an infant, my daughter, like all babies, was unable to supply anything for herself. As she aged and grew, we’ve taught her to do more and more for herself. Our ultimate goal, of course, is for her to learn enough to become a secure, intelligent, Christian adult.

What We Want

It’s difficult to know what little ones need, sometimes. One of my daughter’s frustrating habits is neglecting to say when she has a basic need – such as hunger, thirst, or a restroom break. Unlike God, the Father Who “knows exactly what you need even before you ask him” (Matthew 6:8), human parents can’t always “just know” what a child needs. As the Apostle James taught the early Christians about the Heavenly Father, “you don’t have what you want because you don’t ask God for it”(James 4:2). We encourage our daughter to talk about what she needs or wants. Then we can decide how to meet her needs; however, we won’t always get what she wants. And God won’t always give Christians what we want, either: “even when you ask, you don’t get it because your motives are all wrong” (James 4:3).

Not What We Expect

Jesus said, “ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you” (Luke 11:9). So why doesn’t God answer every Christian prayer with a “yes”? Sometimes our motives are wrong. And just as my daughter doesn’t know what’s best for herself from her young perspective, Christians don’t always know what’s best for ourselves from our earthly perspective. God knows what’s best for us, and He “causes everything to work together for the good of those who love [Him]” (Romans 8:28). Maybe the answer to our prayer doesn’t look like what we thought it would; sometimes God has a better plan! St. Paul trusted God’s provision and told his friends that “this same God who takes care of me will supply all your needs from His glorious riches”(Philippians 4:19). All God’s children can trust Him to meet their needs – in His way and in His time.

Ratified by Christ's Blood

For as often as ye eat this bread, and drink this cup, ye do shew forth the Lord's death till come. 1 Cor. 11: 26. 

In instituting the sacramental service to take the place of the Passover, Christ left for His church a memorial of His great sacrifice for man. "This do," He said, "in remembrance of me." This was the point of transition between two economies and their two great festivals. The one was to close forever; the other, which He had just established, was to take its place, and to continue through all time as the memorial of His death. . . . 

In this last act of Christ in partaking with His disciples of the bread and wine, He pledged Himself to them as their Redeemer by a new covenant, in which it was written and sealed that upon all who will receive Christ by faith will be bestowed all the blessings that heaven can supply, both in this life and in the future immortal life. This covenant deed was to be ratified by Christ's own blood, which it had been the office of the old sacrificial offerings to keep before the minds of His chosen people. Christ designed that this supper should be often commemorated in order to bring to our remembrance His sacrifice in giving His life for the remission of the sins of all who will believe on Him and receive Him. 

In the Saviour's death the powers of darkness seemed to prevail, and they exulted in their victory. But from the rent sepulcher of Joseph, Jesus came forth a conqueror. 

Jesus refused to receive the homage of His people until He had the assurance that His sacrifice was accepted by the Father. He ascended to the Heavenly courts, and from God Himself heard the assurance that His atonement for the sins of men had been ample, that through His blood all might gain eternal life. The Father ratified the covenant made with Christ, that He would receive repentant and obedient men, and would love them even as He loves His Son. Christ was to complete His work, and fulfill His pledge to "make a man more precious than fine gold; even a man than the golden wedge of Ophir" (Isa. 13: 12).

Give Them Their Daily Bread

Scripture: "The Holy Spirit helps us in our weakness. For example, we don’t know what God wants us to pray for. But the Holy Spirit prays for us with groanings that cannot be expressed in words.” (Romans 8:26)

More than once, I’ve been too upset or in too much pain to pray with words. However, I’ve never felt like God abandoned me; I never felt out of communion with Him. I felt like something in me was still calling to Him, even though I couldn’t even express what I needed. God knew what I needed, even if I didn’t know myself.

Daily Needs

One of the sentences Jesus taught His followers to pray was, “Give us today our daily bread” (Matthew 6:11) this can be a form of requesting that God meet all our needs. Of course, “bread” was not all Jesus ever asked the Father for; and we need more than just food. It’s so wonderful that the Bible gives us so many examples of Jesus praying, so we know that we, His followers, can also come to the Father with all our prayers.

Needing Salvation

Before He died, Jesus prayed, “for all who will ever believe in Me through [the Disciples’] message. … May they be in Us so that the world will believe You sent Me”(John 17:20-21). The most important thing every person needs is God’s salvation – the chance to know and live for Jesus. Many people do not know there is a God, let alone that they need the Lord.

Share Your Bread

When you share your faith with friends, they might not be able to tell you what they need. You can let them know that it’s okay not to know, that Jesus covered it in the Lord’s Prayer with “daily bread,” and that Jesus told His followers that the “Father knows exactly what you need even before you ask Him!”(Matthew 17:20-21) . Maybe your friends will let you pray over their needs – both spoken and unspoken – with them. What a great witness!

God's Appointment With You

Did you know that God set aside a special day so you can have meaningful, lasting contact with Him? Nearly 6,000 years ago our Creator declared the seventh-day Sabbath a day of rest and fellowship with Him. 

On any given week our fast-paced, modern lives may embrace several appointments, some of which we don't relish keeping. Few people look forward to a tooth-extraction date with the dentist or even a periodic medical checkup. There's no telling what our physician may discover.

Of course most health-care professionals seek to lengthen our lives and make them more pleasant. Yet no matter how capable and competent, they cannot deal effectively with the wide-ranging scope of our human anxieties and uncertainties, along with our financial, work and marital problems.

Only God has the inherent ability to deliver us from all our problems. Only His Word can tell us what our priorities ought to be.

Driving us far from God

Yet modern society is not designed to begin, build and enhance a proper relationship with our Creator. Instead, our society mostly widens the gap between God and ourselves—driving us far away from the divine help we all need to cope with life in an increasingly complex, fast-paced world.

Many today are in a state of perpetual confusion, being weighed down with various problems and anxieties. "Hurry sickness" is one symptom and has become the malaise of our Western world. Life in the fast lane is taking a tragic toll.

One journalist began a piece on the subject frankly confessing: "I am pathologically impatient and incapable of waiting for anything. I'm always stomping out of shops, bars or restaurants because the [line's] too long and I can't be bothered to wait" (India Knight, "The Can't Wait Society," The Sunday Times, March 26, 2006). Today we hear of road rage—and even supermarket-cart rage! As a result of our chronic impatience and always being in a hurry, some become miserable, lonely, stressed-out and sick.

Too many of us don't sleep all that well. Many continually gorge on fast foods, not taking the time to prepare healthy meals. We've allowed time to become an enemy rather than a friend. We are badly misusing one of our most valuable resources. Most of us have lost the knack for properly budgeting our time. We don't realize how important the biblical admonition on "redeeming the time" is to our whole well-being (see Ephesians 5:16
; Colossians 4:5
).

We always seem to have so much to do that we find virtually no time left for regular contact with our Creator. The world has largely cast aside the biblical keys that would unlock the door to God's presence and help in our lives.

A God-like view of time

A psalm attributed to Moses gives us some much-needed perspective. "Lord," it begins, "You have been our dwelling place in all generations . . . Even from everlasting to everlasting, You are God" (Psalm 90:1-2

). When God takes center stage in our minds, we start to think differently—to mirror His thoughts rather than our own.

But all of us grow older every day, and the clock is ticking. Our physical lives are composed of just so much time. Many today are already past the 70 years the psalm mentions and are wondering just how much time is left to them.

As the psalm states: "We finish our lives like a sigh. The days of our lives are seventy years; and if by reason of strength they are eighty years, yet their boast is only labor and sorrow; for it is soon cut off, and we fly away" (Psalm 90:9-10

).

Our Creator wants us to grasp the implications of the fact that we won't live forever in the flesh. We all need to learn to use our time properly: "So teach us to number our days, that we may gain a heart of wisdom" (Psalm 90:12
, emphasis added throughout).

Our visionary thoughts should extend to a future time beyond our physical lives. God offers the gift of eternal life to those who meet His conditions and surrender their will to His. But we have to take sufficient time now to think about our real future in the age to come.

Enter God's seventh-day Sabbath!

A day devoted to God

Leviticus 23 is one of the great chapters of the Bible. When we truly understand its implications, it becomes a divinely revealed map of God's plan and purpose for humankind.

It begins: "And the Lord spoke to Moses, saying, 'Speak to the children of Israel, and say to them: "The feasts of the Lord, which you shall proclaim to be holy convocations [sacred assemblies, NIV], these are My feasts"'" (Leviticus 23:1-2

). God is the Revealer of truth, and Moses is the agent speaking directly with the people on His behalf. These are God's festivals, and He has exclusive rights to them. They belong to Him and not to any person or group of people.

The Hebrew word translated "feasts" here is mo'edim, which means "appointed times" (Leviticus 23:4
), or "appointments" as we would say today.

The first one mentioned is the weekly Sabbath—to be observed from Friday sunset to Saturday sunset. "Six days shall work be done, but the seventh day is a Sabbath of solemn rest, a holy convocation. You shall do no work on it; it is the Sabbath of the Lord in all your dwellings" (Leviticus 23:3
).

The rest of the chapter is devoted exclusively to seven yearly festivals containing seven Holy Days (annual Sabbaths). As verse 4 states, "These are the feasts of the Lord, holy convocations which you shall proclaim at their appointed times." The intriguing explanation of their significance is beyond the scope of this article.

Observing the Sabbath day

We all need rest from our general labor and occupational work. So the Creator commands us to rest every seventh day (Exodus 20:8-11



; Deuteronomy 5:12-15



). The Sabbath commandment actually dates from creation since God Himself rested on that first seventh day and sanctified it—set it apart—as an example for all mankind, beginning with Adam and Eve (Genesis 2:1-3


).

Spiritual fellowship with others of like mind is one of the most beneficial tonics to the human psyche. We all need it! Of course, this can succeed only in and through our fellowship with God the Father and His Son Jesus Christ (1 John 1:3
). Successful relationships, whether with God or other people, all require quality time.

 

A weekly day of rest enables us to use the other six days much more profitably. People who work seven days a week generally burn out sooner rather than later. As well as physical and mental rest, we need sufficient time to meditate, thinking about those matters that bring us special meaning and divine purpose.

The Sabbath provides time and space for families, couples and friends to draw closer together. This seventh-day rest provides precious time for prayer and to read and study the Bible, the book that tells us how to live in ways that are infinitely rewarding, purposeful and fulfilling. It is also a time for assembling with others for collective worship, as the term "convocation" in Leviticus 23:3
denotes a commanded assembly (compare Hebrews 10:24-25

).

Observing the Sabbath is an integral part of the Ten Commandments. It is no less valid a commandment than those six specifically designed to cover our relationships with other human beings—do not murder, do not steal, do not commit adultery, etc. It is one of the vital first four that help us to express love to our Creator, worshipping Him in a proper and respectful manner.

All too many in mainstream Christendom are either dismissive or ignorant of this weekly get-together with their Creator and are missing out on the spiritual edification that observing the seventh-day Sabbath provides. Why not start keeping your weekly appointment with God?