{"id":525,"date":"2017-08-26T10:44:29","date_gmt":"2017-08-26T18:44:29","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.Bob4God.com\/?p=525"},"modified":"2017-08-26T10:44:29","modified_gmt":"2017-08-26T18:44:29","slug":"devotion-1-john-224-25-a-concrete-knowledge","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.Bob4God.com\/?p=525","title":{"rendered":"Devotion\u00a0\u00a0 1 John 2:24-25\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 A Concrete Knowledge"},"content":{"rendered":"

1 John 2:24-25 <\/strong>\u2013\u00a024\u00a0As for you, see that what you have heard from the beginning\u00a0remains in you. If it does, you also will remain in the Son and in the Father. 25\u00a0And this is what he promised us\u2014eternal life.<\/span><\/p>\n

As previously reviewed, we all have a free will. We have it before we come to the Lord and there is nothing in scripture that indicates we lose it after coming to the Lord. \u00a0This is within the fact that God is sovereign.\u00a0 God will do what God will do and He has no need to explain it to man.\u00a0 God is both sovereign and He has a free will.\u00a0 Man often challenges the free will of man because he cannot understand how God could carry out His will if man has free will. To us, in our limited ability, we think that man having a free will is a challenge to God like herding cats is a challenge to man.\u00a0 Sometimes men, not understanding how God could do something, imagine then it must not be.\u00a0 Family, God\u2019s will in no way denies His sovereignty.\u00a0 In fact, it glorifies it.\u00a0 Whatever God wills shall be done.\u00a0 If God, in His free will, decides that something will be a certain way, then it will be as the sovereign God wills.\u00a0 God has no need or reason to fully explain, or explain at all, the reasoning of what He wills or the how He will bring it about.\u00a0 It is not the duty of man to know why or how God will bring about His will.\u00a0 It is enough for man to know what His will is and to believe that it will happen because God is never wrong and God never lies.\u00a0 If God wills it, it is as good as done.\u00a0 Man believes what God reveals it because He personally knows God, and His attributes, and thus is convinced that all that God says is what God will do.\u00a0 Man\u2019s duty is to walk within the will of God, not to understand it or be able to explain it.\u00a0 Now, graciously, God allows us to understand many things about His will.\u00a0 This is part of the ministry of the Holy Spirit to us. But we must always remember that God has no duty to explain anything to us.\u00a0 Neither do we need Him to.\u00a0 We are satisfied to, and in joy do, walk in faith as He wills.\u00a0 As we do, faith takes up substance (Hebrews 11:1<\/strong>).\u00a0 As faith matures we no longer desire to one day see Jesus, we, with spiritual eyes, see Him now.\u00a0 As we walk in faith with God, as we see His footsteps before us and the manifestations of His blessings behind us, what once was a wonderful hope takes on form and substance and the reality of Him moves from a wondering, to a conviction, to the one thing that we are most sure of in all that we believe and know.\u00a0 The reality of God moves from concept to sure knowledge as dry concrete moves from a dusty material to a solid foundation when water is added to it.\u00a0 Fly ash is also added to concrete to improve the workability of concrete and to add to the strength and durability of it.\u00a0 Fly ash also has the purpose of helping the concrete settle more fully into all the tight crevices and small spaces.\u00a0 God the Holy Spirit (water) touches the Word of God (concrete), and brings it to alive to us, He brings it all together for us.\u00a0 The Holy Spirit uses the fly ash of experience to make the Word of God come alive as we walk with Him.\u00a0 The Holy Spirit first opens our understanding, then teaches us to apply it our lives.\u00a0 Thus the power, beauty and wonder of God fully fills our souls with the Word of God and then teaches us how to apply the Word of God to our life.\u00a0 Family, those who are not in the Family of God, who do not have Jesus and thus do not have the Holy Spirit, gain little or nothing from the Word of God.\u00a0 Because they shut out the Word of God the life of it cannot bring life and knowledge within them.\u00a0 But we, having the Holy Spirit within, have the Word of God quickened, brought together, applied to our lives and cured to a solid foundation.\u00a0 Praise our God who truly has thought it all out.\u00a0 He truly is The Answer!\u00a0 Oh glory to God!\u00a0 Let us fall on our faces and acknowledge that He is the only One who is truly Good and who is the originator of true love.\u00a0 Oh the wonders of God!\u00a0 Even His trinity, in and of itself is a wonder and perfect unity that in oneness and in uniqueness, perfectly saves and keeps us.\u00a0 Praise God!<\/p>\n

Family, one of the mysteries, and sure knowledge, of our salvation is the mixture God has of our free will and His sovereign will for our salvation.\u00a0 Men struggle to know the chemistry and physics of it.\u00a0 We know it to be true, but men have found it difficult and elusive to fully grasp.\u00a0 Yet we know it to be true.\u00a0 Even many who would say man has no free will (indefensible) are likely to grasp that not accepting the leading and testimony of the Holy Spirit, that rejecting the calling of the Holy Spirit, is blasphemy of the Holy Spirit.\u00a0 They would agree that one who rejects the calling from the Holy Spirit, is one who does not accept Jesus as their Lord and Savior.\u00a0 Therefore they remain in their sins and are lost.\u00a0 Herein the part of our free will is revealed.\u00a0 So it is at this point, in the effort of some men, lacking the explanation of the mechanics of how God can do such things, they attempt to bring in their explanation, contrary to the Word of God, that God, by His sovereign will, condemns some men to go to hell and assigns some to go to heaven.\u00a0 They say, in order to explain what they cannot, that God creates some of mankind, most of mankind, to not be able to do what they must do to be saved.\u00a0 Then, though God created them unable to do what they must, God having made them that way, He curses and punishes them for not doing what they cannot do because He made them unable.\u00a0 Family, is that the kind, loving merciful God you know?\u00a0 Why not simply believe God\u2019s word that clearly states that He died for the whole world (John 3:16, 1 John 2:2<\/strong>).\u00a0 Again, it is not for us to fully understand how God does what He does, what we are called to is to believe what He reveals as His Word.\u00a0 Family, we were born with a free will, had it before the day of coming to Christ, and have it still.\u00a0 It is not God\u2019s will that we sin, yet we still do.\u00a0 So we, who are saved by Jesus, who belong to God, still sin contrary to the Word of God.\u00a0 So by whose will do we sin?\u00a0 By our own, of course.\u00a0 Not by God\u2019s will who never tempts us to sin (James 1:13<\/strong>).\u00a0 Therefore we must simply never reject the work of the Holy Spirit and that what we have believed will remain. In that, our free will is at play.\u00a0 How God works that out, well, I just trust, and know that He does.<\/p>\n

What is it that we have known, that we have believed.\u00a0 It is the Gospel.\u00a0 If we continue in the Gospel, then we have what God has promised, eternal life through Jesus our Savior and Lord.\u00a0 Praise God!\u00a0 Family, the Holy Spirit, not ourselves, redeems us.\u00a0 Our great duty is to hold fast to the Gospel and give the Holy Spirit free reign to work through our lives that Jesus may be glorified.\u00a0 The Holy Spirit leads us to Jesus.\u00a0 Jesus leads us to the Father.\u00a0 The Father has glorified the Son.\u00a0 Our God, three in one in complete unity, working in unison and individually (though they are united in all) saves and leads us home. God does that for all who are His.\u00a0 Now that is eternal security!\u00a0 Who is the fool but he who has \u201cbeen enlightened,\u00a0who have tasted the heavenly gift,\u00a0who have shared in the Holy Spirit,\u00a05\u00a0<\/sup><\/strong>who have tasted the goodness\u00a0of the word of God\u00a0and the powers of the coming age<\/span>\u201d(Hebrews 6:4-5<\/strong>) and then rejects God?\u00a0 I have that answer, it is not us!\u00a0 We who know, love and cherish He who first loved us He will keep.\u00a0 Praise our God!\u00a0 Praise Him for who He is!\u00a0 Praise Him who has revealed Himself to us.\u00a0 Praise God!<\/p>\n

Psalm 150:6<\/strong>\u00a0–\u00a0Let everything that has breath praise the Lord.\u00a0 Praise the Lord!\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Micah 7:7<\/strong>\u00a0– But as for me, I watch\u00a0in hope\u00a0for the\u00a0Lord, I wait for God my Savior; my God will hear\u00a0me.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Micah 6:8<\/strong>\u00a0–\u00a0He has shown You, O man, what\u00a0is\u00a0good; And what does the\u00a0Lord\u00a0require of You but to do justly, to love mercy, And to walk humbly with Your God.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

1 John 2:24-25 \u2013\u00a024\u00a0As for you, see that what you have heard from the beginning\u00a0remains in you. If it does, you also will remain in the Son and in the Father. 25\u00a0And this is what he promised us\u2014eternal life. As previously reviewed, we all have a free will. We have it before we come to…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1192],"tags":[2297,2272,2294,1094,23,2295,2177,7,104,2293,62,1700,8,100,275,1019,94,785,17,126,138,24,2292,2296,169,2132],"class_list":["post-525","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-devotion","tag-chemistry-and-physics","tag-concrete","tag-conviction","tag-elusive","tag-father","tag-fly-ash","tag-free-will","tag-god","tag-hebrews","tag-herding-cats","tag-holy-spirit","tag-james","tag-jesus","tag-john","tag-knowledge","tag-lord","tag-micah","tag-promised","tag-psalm","tag-salvation","tag-scripture","tag-son","tag-sovereign","tag-understanding","tag-water","tag-word-of-god"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.Bob4God.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/525","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.Bob4God.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.Bob4God.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.Bob4God.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.Bob4God.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=525"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/www.Bob4God.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/525\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":526,"href":"http:\/\/www.Bob4God.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/525\/revisions\/526"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.Bob4God.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=525"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.Bob4God.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=525"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.Bob4God.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=525"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}