July 13

“For in him dwelleth all the fulness of the Godhead bodily” Colossians 2:9

Having encouraged the Colossian church to walk in Christ as they have received Him, and warned them of the pitfalls and dangers of man’s traditions and philosophies, Paul now reinforces the pivotal concept of the deity of Christ. He teaches that In Jesus, dwells all the fullness of Deity, in a bodily form! Several concepts are to be noticed here. Our faith in Christ Jesus is predicated upon the fact of His deity, not merely on the divine origin of His doctrines, as some would have it, making Him merely another prophet or messenger from God. Jesus is God! He is the fullness of God in One being. The tense of the word ‘dwell’, is in the present. This means that Jesus remains God today, and was not God or Godlike merely as some stage in the past, but continues to be the true and full manifestation of Deity today. We note also that not a portion or a percentage of the Godhead dwells in Jesus, but the all the fullness of it. The import of this statement is paramount. Some have wrongly concluded that Jesus is but a third of some divine committee of three persons, but that would prevent Him from having ALL the fullness of deity residing in Him! Jesus must be the One and Only, Supreme deity, for this to remain a true fact of scripture. If all dwells in Christ, then there is no more to dwell in any other ‘person’! The ‘fullness’ here, must refer to all that the Godhead or deity is, the sum total of the power, and the completeness of the essence of what Deity is - all the attributes and all the fullness of them! Thus it is all in Jesus, and He is All in All! When we pray to Him, we are praying to the entirety of the Godhead. We are praying to the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit, for these titles merely reflect the various offices, which Jesus, the One God fulfils! That is why we are to pray and do all in the name of Jesus, for it is name in which the power and authority of God is summed up. There can only be ONE Almighty, and the fullness of that power cannot be divided, as some imagine among multiple divine persons! We have it on good biblical authority that it all dwells, abides, resides and remains in Christ Jesus! ‘Godhead’ here cannot be seen as some aspect of divinity alone, but a reference to the entirety of all that is God, the whole of Deity. Anything less, would make this statement irreconcilable and inane. It would be like saying that ‘in Jesus is the all the fullness of only a part of what God is’. That would make Him less than all of God, and therefore, not God at all! Almighty Deity requires an absolute singleness a numerical oneness, and is not something that can be shared, pooled or made communal! Yahwah Himself states that there is no other god beside Him. He knows all things, yet does not know of the existence of another Almighty person! This same, singular, Almighty God became flesh, the Logos incarnate, was born of the virgin Mary, and as the Son walked among men. In that bodily, human form, existed all the fullness, just as it did eternally prior to the incarnation! Jesus was always Almighty God, from eternity. The physical body died in offering and sacrifice for our sins, but was resurrected immortal. It continues to exist today, as the only visible, physical form that God has even begotten or taken for Himself. One day we shall see Him, as He is. We too will have immortal, eternal bodies like unto His glorious body, and will eternally live in heaven with the One in whom dwells, all the fullness of the Godhead bodily!

http://www.pentecostalfamilychurch.com.au/devotion

June 11

“Our inheritance is turned to strangers, our houses to aliens” Lamentations 5:2

God had given the land in which Israel lived to Abraham and his descendants for an inheritance. As such it was to be considered precious and valuable. The Israelites had turned from the One True God, lost their relationship with Him, forsaken His ways and disobeyed His commandments. Here they lament the result of their disregard for God, the loss of their inheritance and property. They had become enslaved by the heathen people they had chosen to imitate, and servants to the strangers they should have ruled over. The provisions and blessings which had come their way freely and plentifully from the hand of God, now were scant and they had to pay for them dearly! Life was miserable, costly and painful, and affliction marked their days. The events of their lives and how God dealt with them, is a constant reminder to us today, to pursue godliness and righteousness assiduously. The apostle Paul taught that if God cut off the olive tree (Israel) because of their disobedience, we Gentiles, who are grafted into the olive tree should walk carefully, lest we also be cut off! Like them, we too have an inheritance which we could forfeit if we do not walk according to the ways and purposes He has set for us. Some preach a gospel of unconditional salvation, stating that essentially once we are saved, we are always saved, regardless of how we live our lives, or whether we remain obedient to God. This however, is not the pattern or teaching of the Bible. Faithfulness and continuance in obedience, holiness and righteousness are upheld in scripture, as necessary measurements of our sincerity and stated belief in God. Staying on course with God and aligning our lives with His Word is as necessary as staying on course with north on the compass, given that was our destination! It would be foolish to think we would still get there, by selecting any other direction than the north marked by the faithful, tried and reliable position of the compass! The Israelites lost their physical land and homes, because of their choice to abandon the truth, take their own direction and ignore the warnings of God. As Christians today we stand to lose and great deal more, for we have been given much more again! Our inheritance is eternal not merely some country or property here on earth! Our final home in a heavenly country, a city built foursquare where God is the light and there is no darkness, sorrow or sin. Our inheritance includes eternal life, immortality and complete bliss with Jesus forever, in a place where no sin, sickness or death will ever again exist! Most of all we will be forever with Jesus, eternally at His side and recipients of His glory! There is far too much at stake for us to lose, and too long an eternity to lament our loss! How much better to be wise and walk prudently with the Lord each day, in His love and nurture, following His will and Word, sensing after His Spirit and in humility obeying His commands, that we may inherit all that He has prepared for us in heaven! 

http://www.pentecostalfamilychurch.com.au/devotion

Feb 22

“…Man shall not live by bread alone…” Matthew 4:4

Jesus had been fasting for forty days. When tempted to miraculously supply for Himself bread to sustain His physical life, His scriptural response to the tempter was taken from Deuteronomy. There we are reminded not to think that our survival depends upon bread alone, for that is at best only sufficient for the physical being, but that true life in a man, is produced by adherence to “every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God”. It is a common mistake among humans to judge and measure our sufficiency and success by physical, temporal and fiscal factors alone. We usually consider a person to be successful, when they have money, own property and are generally ‘well-off’ in physical, financial terms. God measures by a different yardstick, and clearly being economically well placed, does not amount to being spiritually successful or wealthy in God. Many are financially rich and socially well positioned, but are yet destitute in their soul, empty of godliness, impoverished in spirit and untouched by the grace of God! Having all that satisfies the physical needs and wants, does not preclude the necessity to seek that, which is essential for the health and wealth of our mind, heart, soul and spirit. ‘Man shall not live by bread alone’, as a divine principle, reaches into the deepest recesses of our human intuition, and tears out all our pre-conceived ideas and ideologies! It destroys the endless human pursuit of the tangible, material and temporal world only, and lifts our gaze to a higher plane. It is there we see the bigger picture. God made man to be more than just a physical being! His mind, soul and spirit require life giving sustenance also, and that ‘food’ can only come from the word of God! No other source will do, no spiritual life can result from the philosophies and thoughts of man. The human replacements of man’s wisdom to feed the mind, human experience to feed the emotions and pseudo spiritualism to reach the soul, cannot bring to man the spiritual and eternal life God had intended for him. Without the spiritual plane of life given by Yahwah, we have only a temporal physical existence and are brought face to face with the futility of our struggles and briefness of our earthly survival! We need divine, heavenly food, for true life on earth, for worship and service unto God, and for life eternal. That is what we were designed and created for, and nothing short of fulfilling our created purpose will satisfy. Man shall not live by bread alone, for that life will soon pass and an eternity of death will follow - unless during this brief passage on earth, we realise, accept and make ours the eternal life which comes from hearing and obeying every word that proceeds out of the mouth of God!

http://www.pentecostalfamilychurch.com.au/devotion