Christian Ministries

At "The Promises of God" blog, you will find Bible reading notes on numbers , Psalms , john, Colossians, and Ephesians.

God restores the fallen. God gives a new beginning. These lessons are emphasized even more strongly when we turn our attention to Christ’s Journey to the Cross. Throughout Jesus’ ministry, there is the conflict between Jesus and the religious leaders of his day. These religious leaders were so proud of themselves, so proud of their religion, so proud of their morality. One instance of this conflict concerned “a woman caught in the very act of adultery” (John 8:3).”The scribes and the Pharisees” despised the poor woman. They were arrogant in their condemnation of her - “this woman has been caught in the very act of adultery” (John 8:4). They brought the woman to Jesus for one reason only. They brought her to Jesus for condemned. Jesus, however, did not condemn her. No condemnation! Forgiveness! This is the Good News of God’s grace. The scribes and the Pharisees saw the woman as a no-hoper. She was beyond hope - so they thought! They wanted to stone her. With one simple yet devastating sentence, Jesus exposed their hypocrisy: “Let him who is without sin among you be the first to throw a stone at her” (John 8:7). With the strikingly simple and devastatingly direct sentence, Jesus brought the proud accusers down to earth - “when they heard it, they went away, one by one” (John 8:9). Jesus was left alone with the woman. He did not condemn her, but He did say to her, “Do not sin again” (John 8:9-11). This conflict continued throughout Jesus’ life as He made His way to the Cross. The scribes and the pharisees sent Christ - the sinless Son of God - to the Cross. There Jesus prayed, “Father, forgive them … “.

The Spirit Of God
John 5:37 speaks of the divine witness, the witness of the Father to Jesus Christ. Scripture also speaks of the witness of the Holy Spirit to Jesus Christ. The Spirit takes the Word of God and uses it to speak to us of Jesus Christ, our need of Him and His power to meet that need. An important passage which speaks of this work of the Spirit is John 16:8-15.
John 16:13 - He is the Spirit of truth who guides us into all truth.
John 16:14 - He glorifies Jesus, taking the Gospel of Christ and declaring it to us.
In this work, He convicts us of sin, righteousness and judgment (John 16:8-11).
He shows us our sin, highlighting the sin of unbelief (John 16:9). He reveals Christ to us as "Christ our righteousness" (John 16:10; 1 Corinthians 1:30). He emphasizes to us that, without Christ as our righteousness, we remain in our sins and we remain under the judgment of God (John 16:11).
It is possible to be in the powerful presence of the Spirit and yet turn away without coming to Christ - "you refuse to come to Me that you may have life" (John 5:40).

The Scriptures of God (John 5:39-40).
There's a Rabbinical saying which tells us that "he who has acquired the words of the law has acquired eternal life." Jesus takes issue with this statement from the Jewish rabbis. He tells us that having the Scriptures does not mean that we have eternal life. We must go where the Scriptures leads us. We must go to Jesus.
You can have the Scriptures and never read them. You can read the Scriptures and grow in head-knowledge. You can be acquainted with the teaching of the Scriptures. You can be fully aware of the Bible's teaching concerning the way of salvation. Nevertheless, there is still a decision of faith in Christ, a decision which must be taken on the basis of what the Scriptures teach.