We remain where we were last Sunday, in Caesarea Philippi, where Jesus took His disciples for a weeklong retreat. You may remember this city is the location of the famous Banias Waterfall, a double drop that deposits two streams into the Jordan River. It is here that two streams of revelation fell, as well.
Everybody I’ve ever know wants to go to Heaven and see God in all of His glory. Even unbelievers want to believe there is a Heaven. Believe me, there is! But heavenly glory is only for true believers who make a credible confession of faith while on earth.
Yes, doo-woppers, “the book of love” was indeed written by “someone from above.” His name is God and He has given us the book of love, life, liberty, and the pursuit of holiness. It is called the Bible, a collection of sixty-six works written over the span of two millennia by some forty or so human authors who were especially inspired by the Holy Spirit.
We are not saved by works, but we are saved for works. We are not saved by a moral gospel, but when we are saved we live by a gospel morality. 1 Corinthians 6 fleshes this out in full.
Sex education shall be taught in church today, using the pivotal fifth chapter of Paul’s first canonical letter to the Corinthians as our textbook. It addresses a singular subject with a double standard, one for Christians in Christ’s church, the other for non-Christians in a lost world.
In Matthew’s timely retelling, the miracle of the loaves and fishes is a love story about God and His people. It defines for us the love of God. It demonstrates some of the things God’s love can do. And, since every miracle of Jesus is a parable of the gospel, it declares to us the one thing, namely salvation, that only God’s love can bring.
Matthew’s Gospel presents the Lord Jesus Christ as King of “the kingdom.” Forty-four percent of the appearances of the word “kingdom” in the Gospels appear in the first one (56 out of 127), and thirty-five percent of the uses of the word “kingdom” in the New Testament are found in Matthew (56 out of 158).
These verses in Psalm 33 provide a map that reads and leads to the actual, exclusive location of “God’s Country.” To find it, you first have to have a proper relationship with the “God” who owns the “Country.”
Would Paul take “the rod” to us? I pray not. Still, we need to heed the warning of the Apostle’s epistle and keep our church chained to the Word of God. Otherwise, we may be asking what in the world is wrong with our church?
Watch as the earthly father in the story navigates his son’s rebellion and return. Then see, the hand of our Heavenly Father, as He writes the story of our salvation from beginning to never end. This is two stories in one, of the father on earth, and of our Father in Heaven.
