The Inseparable Love of God (1) [ Romans 8:38-39 ] Why can nothing separate us from the love of God? 1. Because God’s love is eternal. Romans 8:29a says: “For those whom He foreknew…” The word “foreknew” refers to before eternity began —before the creation of heaven and earth . The phrase “those whom He foreknew” does not simply mean knowing about someone intellectually, but rather loving them. In other words, it refers to “those whom God loved from eternity past.” Amos 3:2a says: “You only have I known of all the families of the earth.” If “known” merely meant intellectual knowledge, that would imply that God only knew Israel and did not know the other nations—which cannot be true, because the all-knowing God lacks knowledge of nothing. Therefore, “I have known you only” means “I have loved you only.” God loved Israel among all the nations of the earth. Hosea 13:5 says: “I knew you in the wilderness , in the land of great drought.” The “wilderness” was where the Israelite...
Introduction
The church is crumbling right now.
The church is not only collapsing morally or ethically, but also biblically. In other words, the church now does not know
God (Isa. 45:4, 5). The reason is because
they rejected the knowledge of knowing God (Hos. 4:1). Not only the saints, but also the pastors rejected
the knowledge of God (v. 6). As a
result, the more we increase as we ignore the commandments of God (v. 6), the
more we sin against God (v. 7). Also,
the church is not preaching the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ, the head of
the church. Rather, the church now
preaches “a different gospel” (Gal. 1:6-9). And now the church is accepting that different
gospel well (2 Cor. 11:4). Also, the
church is not living a life worthy of the gospel of Christ (Phil. 1:27). In other words, the church does not stand
with one mind and cooperate for the faith of the gospel with one will (v. 27).
Although the whole church should
become a church that fulfills only the Lord's will with one heart, now each
church is doing things according to their own will and their own opinions (Deut.
12:8, Judg. 17:6, 21:25). If this is not
a broken church, what is it? Therefore,
the church must collapse. The church
must be thoroughly broken and destroyed.
A church that is not centered on the Lord must collapse. The church that rejected the knowledge of God
must collapse. The church preaching a
different gospel must be destroyed. The
church that does not live a life worthy of the gospel of Christ must be
completely destroyed. And as we see the
collapsed church, we must cry out to God who is full of mercy. We must tear our hearts and confess our great
sins to God and repent. And we must
return to God. Then God will forgive all
our sins. God will restore us. God will use us to rebuild the Lord's church.
With God's good hand helping us, we will
rise up and rebuild the Lord's church. The
Lord will raise up among us exemplary leaders like Nehemiah. The Lord will raise up the Lord's workers to
build His church. The Lord is with all
of us and will rebuild the Lord's church in the face of any crisis or
adversity. Therefore, we must rise up
and rebuild the Lord's church. We must
participate in the work of the Lord building His church (Mt. 16:18). Join us, but especially we must return to the
Word of God. And we must yearn for the
revival of the Word. Therefore, we must
experience the power of the Word. We
must experience the power of the gospel again. And the power of the gospel must be revealed
through our church.
As I began to serve Victory
Presbyterian Church by God's grace, I preached on the book of Nehemiah among
the 66 books of the Bible. The reason I
chose this book is the Lord's promise to my heart, “… I … will build my
church...” (Mt.16:18). The Lord brought
me back to Victory Presbyterian Church with this word of promise and started
the ministry. At that time, the Lord
gave me a desire to meditate on Nehemiah.
So, I preached it every Sunday and the Lord began to break me down
first. Also, the Lord began to show breach
in my heart and life (Neh. 4:3). In the
midst of this, the Lord gave me grace (5:19) and gave me the assurance that the
Lord is accomplishing the work of building His church (6:16). With the conviction that Victory Presbyterian
Church is the Lord's church, and that the Lord will build it (Mt. 16:18), I
have started to serve the church, which is the body of the Lord, and have come thus
far. I hope and pray that I will
continue to hold on to the word of promise of the Lord and serve the church
with faith.
Serving the Lord’s
church, Victory Presbyterian Church, which the Lord is building,
James
Kim
(August 2015, Thinking of Victory Community)
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