SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 1/17/2019 9:33 AM
My Worship Time Focus: PT-1 “The
Prisoner of the Mystery”
Bible Reading & Meditation Reference: Eph. 3:1-4
Message of the verses: “1 For this reason
I, Paul, the prisoner
of Christ Jesus for the sake of you Gentiles- 2 if indeed you have heard of the
stewardship of God’s grace which was given to me for you; 3 that by revelation
there was made known to me the mystery, as I wrote before in brief. 4 By
referring to this, when you read you can understand my insight into the mystery
of Christ,” “1 When I think of all this,
I, Paul, a prisoner of Christ Jesus for the benefit of you Gentiles …
2 assuming, by the way, that you know God gave me the special responsibility of
extending his grace to you Gentiles. 3 As I briefly wrote earlier, God himself
revealed his mysterious plan to me. 4 As you read what I have written, you will
understand my insight into this plan regarding Christ.”
As
I was going over Psalm 89 earlier this morning to repost it onto my other blog
I came across something that made me think of verse three of this 3rd
chapter of Ephesians, and that was the word mystery. The Psalmist was probably writing about what
happened after the Babylonians destroyed the Southern Kingdom and he was
stating that God was faithful, but was concerned about what was going to happen
to the Davidic line of kings which God promised would go on forever. In the New Testament this “mystery” is solved
as we learn that Jesus Christ, the son of David would be King forever. To me this was a good demonstration of
understanding this word “mystery” which we will probably talk more about once
we get to verse three.
We
mentioned that Paul was probably beginning his prayer for the Ephesians and all
others who would read this wonderful letter, but stopped himself at the end of
verse one to talk more about this mystery of unity. Verse 14 begins with the same words as verse
one “for this reason,” which is where Paul will pick up on his prayer again in that
verse (14).
The
following are some of the things that John MacArthur says Paul had discussed in
chapter two that Paul will once again go over in his prayer beginning in verse
14: “including the truths that the
person of Christ becomes new (v. 15); that all believers are in one body (v.
16); that the Gentiles, who were once far away, now become near when they
believe (v. 17); that all believers are equally citizens of God’s kingdom and
members of His family (v. 19); and that all believers are being built into
God’s temple and dwelling (vv. 21-22).”
The
things that we will be going over in the first 13 verses of Chapter are what
prompt Paul to pray the way that he will pray beginning in verse 14. I think that is true in many of Paul’s
letters as he will pray for who he is writing to and then at the end of the
letter he will ask prayer for himself on the things he wants them to pray about
for him.
One
of the things that I have heard about in John MacArthur’s preaching is that he
goes over things many times. This does
not bother me at all for I have always been a slow learner and have the need of
repetition, and I suppose that since Paul does this in his writings and the
fact that Paul seems to be the favorite writer in the NT for John MacArthur
that is why he does the same thing. For
fast learners this can be a problem, but for slow learners like me it is a
blessing.
The
things that Paul is teaching in this letter are new and non-traditional
doctrine, and I suppose that this is the reason he goes over it again and
again. God’s truths are deep and when we
first begin to learn about them it is better to go over them again and again
until we have a good grasp on them. I
have studied different Scripture verses for a long time and then later when I
look at them again the Holy Spirit will show me something that I had never seen
before. If it were not for the Spirit of
God who lives in me then I would probably be like those who John is speaking
about in John 6:60 “Therefore many of His disciples, when they heard this
said, "This is a difficult statement; who can listen to it?" Peter writes in 2 Peter 3:16 “as also in all his
letters, speaking in them of these things, in which are some things hard to
understand, which the untaught and unstable distort, as they do also the
rest of the Scriptures, to their own destruction.” Peter is actually speaking of Paul’s letters
in this verse. “And remember, the Lord’s
patience gives people time to be saved. This is what our beloved brother Paul
also wrote to you with the wisdom God gave him- (2 Peter 2:15 NLT).”
I
will quote again from John MacArthur’s commentary as I end this Spiritual
Diary: “The first truth Paul mentions is
about his own situation and God-given ministry.
Outside of the Lord Jesus Himself, Paul is by far the dominant figure in
the New Testament. He wrote at least
thirteen of its 27 books. He is also the
dominant human instrument of the Spirit in the book of Acts. And more than any other apostle he delineated
the mysteries of the gospel, the truths hidden even in the most faithful
believers of former ages but made known to the church of Jesus Christ.”
Spiritual meaning for my life today: I am thankful for the repetition of teachings
in the Word of God, for as I go over different truths the Spirit of God will
help me to learn new truths from His Word.
My Steps
of Faith for Today: I desire to know some of the hidden truths
from Romans 12:3, and as I realize these truths found there I will stand on
them even when my emotions tell me something different. Dr. Warren Wiersbe writes ““The Lord always has the last word, and it will not
be ‘darkness.’ We should never doubt in the darkness what God has
taught us in the light.”
Answer to yesterday’s Bible
question: “Felix” (Acts 24:25).
Today’s Bible
question: “In what country did Elymas
the sorcerer try to stop Paul’s work?”
Answer in our next SD.
1/17/2019 10:13 AM
No comments:
Post a Comment