GOD's Next

Image fro Youtube. Why God? Last night I and my wife watched "Kapuso Mo, Jessica Soho" which featured three brothers who died of liver cancer one after another. It broke our hearts to see young, happy, promising good guys die just like that and leave their mom alone in life. I can just imagine how painful it was to be watching your sons suffer and die and then find yourself all alone. Then I looked afar and tried to ponder. What's the meaning in all these? It all seemed pointless, even cruel. Why let sweet people like them suffer and die? And it seemed God just watched them die there, doing nothing. And to think that these young men were born again Christians who asked God for healing, the youngest and last of them even believed strongly for a miraculous healing as he was fighting for his life. But his prayers seemed to have fallen on deaf ears. He died, too. I had mixed feelings last night, pity for these brothers and their mom and frustrations on why God kept silent. I ...

Image from Twitter. Confused religious people who try to look spiritual always say, "Don't judge." They also tell you not to be "judgmental." And then they quote that verse where Jesus said, "Judge not that you may not be judged." And then they stop there without any idea about what the whole context is. Then they think they have said something smart. But if you study the whole bible and be honest about what you read, you'd see how judging is a must. Yup, we must judge. Even the context of the verse,  "Judge not that you may not be judged,"  is really about judging your brother. Jesus didn't mean to say judging your fellow per se is bad. He meant judging your fellow without first cleaning your own backyard is wrong. Before you try to remove the speck of dust from your brother's eye, first take out the log or plank of wood from your own eyes. That's easy enough to understand, right? After cleaning your own eyes, "then you ...

Image from DepositPhotos. GOD is the only God there is. Among gods worshiped on earth throughout history, our God is unique. He's the only true God. I guess there's no debate over this among believers. But the agreement among them ends when it comes to what God would do. You'd be shocked how some believers seem to think God was only joking when he spoke about his promises. Some can even belittle what God can do. They talk of God as Sennacherib, king of Assyria, and his officers did about their gods and the gods of other peoples. They spoke about the God of Jerusalem as they did about the gods of the other peoples of the world—the work of human hands. [2 Chronicle 32.19] "God cannot break the law of nature. He does things that aren't contrary to nature's laws," they reason. How many times have I heard Christians say that? Can laws really confine God's capability to a limit? Or, "God didn't mean it literally. You don't really believe he woul...

God's Next move is restoring sonship authority in Christ. The law is for lawbreakers and the rebellious. It's not for the righteous. But we have to uphold the law [Rom.3.31]. Christ did not come to abolish the law but to fulfill it. Because Christ is in us, we should do the same, fulfill the law, not through works of the law, but by having Jesus Christ as our LIFE, letting him fulfill it in us. Because Christ is the end of the law. Photo by Kelli McClintock on Unsplash . We uphold the law and yet we're exempt. One day some tax collectors asked Peter if Jesus was paying the two-drachma temple tax. Jesus asked Peter, "What do you think, Simon? From whom do the kings of the earth collect duty and taxes—from their own sons or from others?” “From others,” Peter answered. “Then sons are exempt,” Jesus told him. [Matt.17] Sons (and daughters) are exempt. Yet, they obey. These are the marks of the true sons and daughters of God. They uphold the law and yet are exempt. Jesus o...

Image from Integrated Data Management Services. Tithes is returning to God 10 percent of whatever our land produces, says Leviticus 27, although Abram gave "a tenth of everything" to Melchizedek in Genesis 14. Now, Christians have adopted this practice today by giving a tenth of their income to the church. Some people see something inconsistent here because they say that tithes is all about giving a tenth of whatever the land produces. It's about farming. We're wage earners and some of us make money from trading non-agricultural products. But tithes is not the real issue on giving as born-again believers. Sometimes, we prefer giving tithes when we want to skirt or evade the real issue on giving. Lots of churches, especially landed denominations, prefer tithes than what the Lord really requires of them. If you asked Jesus, he'd tell you something else and nothing on tithes. Well, he did mention about tithing mint, dill and cumin and hinted that continually doing t...