Text Box: weekly sermon 7-8-07 GRAB YOUR INHERITANCE The past few weeks our series has been things I find humorous in the Bible. Today I want to talk about something of a more serious nature. You that follow my page will learn a few things about me if you follow me closely. When I speak of something humorous, it is of course what I find humorous, but when I speak of something serious, I pull no punches, I speak what the Lord tells me and exactly what the Bible says. I do not try to sugar coat it to save your feelings. I tell it the way it is, harsh or not, to save your souls. Not that I have the ability to save your souls, that would be the work of our Lord Jesus Christ. If you want to follow along with me, we will be looking at 1 Corinthians 6:9-12. Here we are in the middle of a letter that Paul is writing to the church in Corinth around 59 A.D. The purpose of this letter was to ask the leaders of the church in Corinth of the condition of the members. Paul has heard word of wrong doings in the church and, for lack of a better description, wanted to nip it in the bud. For anyone that does not know the preaching style of Paul, he was first a martyr of Christians, who then was personally spoke to by God, and changed his life become one of the greatest ministers to date. Being that he went from basically one extreme to the other, he spoke boldly of the word of God. Some did not like the way Paul taught because he was one of the harsher ministers of God. Others loved it because he was simple at what he taught, and there was no gray area, it was either black or white, this or that, no in betweens. So anyway, Paul is writing this letter to basically find out information, to scold the church for its wrong doings, and to emphasize the Christian way of living, if they wanted gain their inheritance with God. Here Paul is telling the church who will NOT inherit the kingdom of God, and if you should happen to be one of these folks, what you should do about it. Starting in verse 9, "Know ye not that the unrighteous shall not inherit the kingdom of God? Be not deceived: neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor abusers of themselves with mankind, (10)nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners, shall inherit the kingdom of God. (11)And such were some of you: that ye are washed, but ye are sanctified, but ye are justified in the name of the Lord Jesus, and by the Spirit of our God. (12)All things are lawful unto me, but all things are not expedient: all things are lawful for me, but I will not be brought under the power of any." Now lets break this down. What Paul has said is that, all of these would not be able to get to Heaven. The sexual offenders, be it heterosexual or homosexual, the men that are more of the world than of God, thieves, alcoholics, those of abusive language, or those that use their powers to obtain things not theirs, Paul states will not be able to inherit the kingdom of God. Paul is telling the church that he knows that there were some of these folks in the church at one time and hopefully not now but if there are, then they can not, nor will not get to Heaven. But as you do when you reprimand someone, you tell them what they are doing wrong, then you give them some type of encouragement to tell them what to do to correct the problem. Paul does the same here. He tells them, look if you are one of these folks, you will not get to Heaven unless you do what the Lord has told you. So Paul gives them a hope of redemption in the 11th verse. Paul says there that, the folks mentioned above, some of them were, just as today, some of us were, or still may be, but that we are washed. That we are sanctified, and justified in the name of Jesus. So basically, the sins we see back in this time in Corinth, are still the same sins we see of our day. This tells me a few things. First, that as humans, we do not learn very easily, because we are still doing the things today that they were almost 2000 years ago. Secondly, that satan has no new things to tempt us with, As I said we are still doing the same things today, meaning satan is using the same sins, and we are still falling for them. And lastly, even though we are still committing the same sins, we have a God that is forgiving, loving, and redeeming. How many of us would forgive a friend for a wrong doing against us? How many of us would forgive if that same friend kept doing the same wrong to us over and over again? It takes more love than most can imagine to be able to forgive the way God forgives. We have all sinned and fallen short of the glory of God, just as it says, if a man says there is no sin in him, he is a liar, and the truth is not in him. Being that we have all sinned, and that as it says, no one sin is bigger or smaller than another, we would all fall in this category of not being able to inherit the kingdom. So, what do we do? We believe in verse 11. That the Lord Jesus Christ has washed, sanctified, and justified us in His name. That He will stand before His Father and say, he is forgiven. Also we must believe in verse 12 when it says that "all things are lawful for us", meaning that we could be tempted by any one of these or any other sins, "but that we will NOT be brought under the power of any". I will say a statement that I make often, it is either Heaven or hell, take your pick, decide where you want to go, fall in the ways of the sinner, or walk in the light of the Lord. This is strictly your choice, this is not a God thing or a Jesus thing, this is a everlasting thing. God does not demand we come to Him, He gives us a decision to make, a simple one, live or die. I choose to live. If you have never made the choice to live, if you know you are a sinner and you want to be forgiven, so that you can claim your inheritance, then say this simple prayer with me. Jesus, come into my life, forgive me of my sins that I may claim my inheritance in the Kingdom of Heaven. Amen. If you said this simple prayer, then we believe you have received the saving grace of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, and we would love to rejoice with you and send you a few things to help you understand this new gift you are to inherit. Praise our Lord and Saviour. With Love in Christ, Pastor Stone

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

               

                                             

The Christian Counter
The Christian Counter