Angry at God
Introduction: Angry at God! Have you ever been angry at God? No one ever has the right to be angry with God, yet so many are. Even some Christians think that it is ok to be angry with God. They justify it saying things like ‘God is big enough to handle it.’ They think that the Psalmists cry of ‘How Long?’ is a criticism instead of an earnest plea for God to fulfil His promises. They think that Jonah’s and Job’s complaining against God is an example forgetting that Jonah was rebuked and Job repented. Anger against God can span...
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1 Kings 8:31-53: Praying about sin
Introduction: Ps. 103:8-14, ‘The LORD is merciful and gracious, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love. He will not always chide, nor will he keep his anger forever. He does not deal with us according to our sins, nor repay us according to our iniquities. For as high as the heavens are above the earth, so great is his steadfast love toward those who fear him; as far as the east is from the west, so far does he remove our transgressions from us. As a father shows compassion to his children, so the LORD shows compassion to...
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2 Samuel 24: David’s Census
INTRODUCTION: Different sins afflict different people at different times. In our youth we are tempted by everything that is new, by the lusts of the flesh and the world of experience on offer. When we are middle aged we are tempted by comfort and materialism as we settle down. What are the sins of old age? I cannot speak from experience but it appears as if we have one of those sins exhibited before us in 2 Samuel 24 when David counts the fighting men. Pride. When we come to the end of our lives and we look back...
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2 Samuel 12: A sinner restored
Outline Burden of sin Repentance for sin Forgiveness of sin Chastisement for sin Introduction If you know you’re a sinner; if you know the heavy weight of sin, if you have a deep desire for forgiveness and have agonised over how God sees a child who has sinned grievously against Him, then this is one of the most important chapters of the bible for you. David has committed adultery with Bathsheba, he could not trick Uriah into thinking the baby was his, so David conspired to have him killed. The last words of the last chapter are these, ‘But...
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1 Samuel 24: David spares Saul
Outline A misread providence A true vengeance A false repentance Introduction A heading we can write over the next three chapters is, ‘The Restraining Grace of God.’ In the next three chapters David doesn’t kill three times, Saul, Nabal and then Saul again. We have seen David learning to trust God when the tide is turned against him, when his chips are down, when he is the underdog and the persecuted one. But in this chapter we see a different sort of temptation. How do you react when you can fight back, when you can get the upper hand,...
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1 Samuel 7:5-17: ‘Ebenezer’
Outline Penitent prayer Deliverance prayer Answered prayer Introduction Living by faith and living by the flesh, these are the two themes of chapters 7 and 8. In chapter 7 we see Israel with a faithful judge and God blessing the nation with obedience as they follow the godly leadership of the judge; in the next chapter we have a dramatic contrast, Israel wants a king so that they can be ‘like all the nations,’ 8:5. Our attention is brought to God’s goodness to Israel as they live by faith by the repeated mention of prayer. A life of faith...
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1 Samuel 7:3: True Repentance
Outline God-directed obedience Wholehearted obedience Sacrificial obedience Inward obedience Loyal obedience Introduction The bible discusses two types of sorrow over sin. There is godly sorrow which leads to repentance, and there is worldly sorrow which ends in destruction, 2 Cor. 7:10, ‘ For godly grief produces a repentance that leads to salvation without regret, whereas worldly grief produces death.’ We can see these two different types of sorrow demonstrated in the denial of Christ by Peter and Judas. In the case of Peter we see a man who is sorrowful but who eventually returns in repentance to Christ, but...
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Judges 6:1-32: First things first
Outline Repentance Presence Idols Introduction The book of judges is anonymous, we don’t know who wrote it, and it is likely that more than one person did. The most popular theory is that Samuel had a large part to do with it and this is very likely. There is a small indication of the possible time of writing in 1:21, ‘But the people of Benjamin did not drive out the Jebusites who lived in Jerusalem, so the Jebusites have lived with the people of Benjamin in Jerusalem to this day.’ David drove out the Jebusites when he established the...
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Revelation 14:6-13: Messages from Heaven
Outline The first angel The second angel The third angel Introduction If God spoke three messages from heaven, what would they be? I believe that the portion we have before us gives us a possible answer to that question. This section deals with God sending three messenger angels to deliver three particular messages during the period where the dragon and his beasts are at war with the church. In other words, these three words from heaven are what God is saying to the earth during this age before Christ comes again. This section consists of three messages for the...
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Revelation 2:1-7: Ephesus: Part Two
Introduction: Gordon Macdonald was a successful and famous Christian writer and speaker who fell into adultery. After being restored he wrote a book and in it he gives an illustration of the Christian life. The Christian life is like a yacht, you can have a spotless yacht, new sails, fresh varnish, bright upholstery, polished brass fitting and still sink if you do not pay attention to the condition of the yacht under the water line where the eye does not see unless we deliberately go inspecting. Ephesus was like a yacht, to the casual observer it looked to be...
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Romans 10:10: Heart Faith
Introduction: As a young Christian my friend and I were always willing to learn from what we considered to be any zealous, consistent and effective Christian. One early example was a man called Don Leonard, we called him Oom Don. He was a converted actor and alcoholic who was turned into a raging evangelist. He was the boldest man I have ever met. He would drive a car around that said, ‘TURN OR BURN’, and ‘Hell has no fire escape.’ He would walk through the streets of Randburg preaching loudly in the shopping malls and squares. However, he was...
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Church Discipline 1: Matt. 18:15-20: When to administer
Introduction: When is church a true church? The doctrine of the church was something that was wrestled with at the time of the Reformation when Luther broke with Rome. It emerged at the end of the Reformation a doctrine of the church that had three marks. A church is a biblical church when it has these 3 basic ingredients, the proclamation of the true gospel, the faithful administration of the baptism and the Lord’s Supper, and the church discipline. If you had these 3 you were considered a church. Whether you met in a building or a home, whether...
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