Haggai (Program #1) – The Building of the House of Jehovah in Relation to Israel’s Welfare and Messiah’s Coming

Some of the most penetrating words in all of Scriptures are found in the Old Testament Prophet, Haggai. They are penetrating because they have immediate relevant to every believer. And they touch us in some of the most carefully guarded places in our hearts.

“Is it time for you yourself to dwell in your paneled-up houses?” he writes, “while this house,” God’s House “lies waste?..Consider your ways, you sown much but you bring in little, you eat but there is no satisfaction.”

Haggai was a prophet raised up by the Lord to accompany His people on their return to Judah and Jerusalem following the 70 long years of captivity in Babylon. And when they returned they faced the temple, God’s house in ruin and in desperate need of rebuilding. But they like so many of us today have become completely preoccupied and engrossed with their own needs and situations. And the result as imply by Haggai probing questions is that, in spit of all of their effort and dedication without God’s hand of blessing in their lives, they and we would never be satisfied regardless of how much material wealth or possession we acquired. These are questions that must be asked again and again among God’s people.

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Mark (Program #30) – The Preparation of the Slave-Savior for His Redemptive Service (3) & (4)

The Lord Jesus enter into Jerusalem exactly six days prior to His crucifixion. During the first two of these days He was welcomed by the crowd who honored Him and exalted Him really for the first time in His earthly ministry.

The next four days were time of testing and examination by both the religious and the political leaders. These two groups who were natural enemies became united in their desire to defeat the Slave-Savior who had now won the hearts of the people. Various factions of these two groups plotted using the out most of their human cunning and reasoning to trap Him. But each attempt merely afforded the Lord another opportunity to display His marvelous wisdom confounding them on the one hand and inciting them on the other hand to do what they needed to so that He could do what He must do; and that is to be offer up a sacrifice at the hand of these very same leaders, a worldly religion and politics.

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1 Thessalonians (Program #18) – Our Heart to be Established Blameless in Holiness (2)

The Bible has a lot to say about man’s heart. And sometime it can seem confusing. For example, Jeremiah 17:9, “The heart is deceitful above all things, And it is incurable; Who can know it?”  But in Proverbs despite the incurable condition of our heart it becomes a door or a gate for the experience of the divine life.  Proverbs 4:23 “Keep your heart with all vigilance, For from it are the issues of life.”

So, our hear does at times seem confusing because it is not a simple thing and above all, man’s heart is prone to change like the wind. It is with this thought in view no doubt that Paul wrote to the new believers in Thessalonica telling them that he desire to come and see them face to face in order to perfect the things which are lacking in their faith and to establish their hearts.

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Ephesians (Program #66) – Christ in God’s Economy, Taking Christ as our Person

Many books in the New Testament speak of the mysteries of God. First of all, Colossians tells us that God is a mystery but that Christ is the mystery of God. But then Christ also is a mystery. And so Ephesians tells us that the mystery of Christ is the Church.  Well, you may say what’s so mysterious about the Church?  The Church in reality is where the immeasurable Christ far above all, can still be so small and so intimate that He can dwell within us. Even makes His home in our hearts. Now this is mysterious.  For as the apostle Paul himself put it, “this mystery is great, but I speak concerning Christ and the Church.“

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