AuthorRoger Boone One of the amazing things about the great and awesome God who created the Universe is that He has chosen to speak, to communicate, with mankind. Moses wrote to Israel in Deut. 4:12 "And the Lord spoke to you out of the midst of the fire. You heard the sound of the words,..." At the baptism of Jesus, (Matt. 3:17) it was the voice of God sounding from heaven saying, "This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased." Of course, God has also spoken through the act of creation (Psa. 19:1) "The heavens declare the glory of God; And the firmament shows His handiwork." Also the "invisible attributes" of God, such as power and glory are "understood by the things that are made," Rom. 1:20. Then God has also spoken to various prophets both in the Old Testament and in the New Testament. The prophet Jeremiah wrote; Jer. 1:4, "Then the word of the Lord came to me, saying ‘Before I formed you in the womb I knew you;...'" Yet concerning the gift of prophecy we read in I Cor. 13:8 "...But whether there are prophecies they will fail;..." We do not understand this to mean that a specific prophecy from God would fail to come to pass, but that the gift of prophecy itself would come to an end. Today we are not looking for new prophets with new messages from God. Yet the question remains; Does God speak to man today? In Hebrews 1:1, we read, "God , who at various times and in various ways spoke in time past to the fathers by the prophets, has in these last days spoken to us by His Son..." The writer Jude in vs. 3 wrote of, "the faith which was once for all delivered..." this is past tense. The faith was delivered. Today we are not expecting a new gospel or a new message from God. God has spoken to us by His Son, Jesus.
In John 1:18 we read, "...The only begotten Son who is in the bosom of the Father, He has declared Him." Jesus is God's declaration of Himself to mankind. Is God speaking to mankind today? The answer is Yes, through Jesus, and how do we learn from Jesus? Jesus said in John 12:47, 48, "And if anyone hears My words and does not believe, I do not judge him;..."He who rejects Me, and does not receive My words, ...the word that I have spoken will judge him in the last day." One of the things Jesus did while He was here on earth was speak with authority (Matt. 7:29, Matt. 28:18). His words are God's message to mankind, then, now and tomorrow. Paul, the apostle of Jesus to the Gentiles, wrote in I Cor. 14:37, "If anyone thinks himself to be a prophet or spiritual let him acknowledge that the things which I write to you are the commandments of the Lord." The things written in the New Testament are the commands of the Lord. When we read the New Testament, we are reading Jesus' words to us today. When we read the New Testament, we are hearing God speak to mankind today. The Bible was not just for the people of the past. The Bible is God's word for mankind today. The question is, Will we Listen? |
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January 2019
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