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By Derrick Bowman on April 23rd, 2010“How shall we escape,
if we neglect so great salvation?”
Hebrews 2:3
This is a question that you cannot ignore. Whether you know it or not, you are trapped. There is something from which you must escape.
When people realize that they are in trouble, they always try to escape. The truth is, you were born in an inescapable prison.
“How shall you escape, if you neglect so great salvation?” God is asking you this question to show you that you need to escape from something. It proves to you that you are really trapped.
“Ok, so what am I supposed to be escaping from,” you ask?
First of all, you must escape from the prison of your own sinfulness. Did you know that sin is a prison? I John 3:4 says that “sin is the transgression of the law.” The more you break God’s law the higher and higher the walls get. Like Alcatraz, sin is inescapable if you neglect the salvation God has provided.
Sin makes you trapped because one sin always leads to another. Sin will always take you farther than you want to go and keep you longer than you want to stay. James 2:14-15 says, “Every man is tempted, when he is drawn away of his own lust, and enticed. Then when lust hath conceived, it bringeth forth sin: and sin, when it is finished, bringeth forth death.” No one ever said, “I want to be an addict when I grow up.” But it is the first cigarette, that leads to the first joint, that leads to the first needle, that leads to the first overdose, that leads to death. Sounds similar to James 2:14-15, doesn’t it? If you neglect God’s salvation, you will never escape the cycle of sin.
Second, you must escape from the displeasure of God. The Bible says that God is angry with sin and He must punish it. God has said in Ezekiel 18:4, “The soul that sinneth, it shall die.” God will pour out His wrath on you and your sin.
“How shall you escape if you neglect so great salvation?” The question proves that you are trapped and that you must escape, but it also proves that the only way you can escape is if you accept God’s great salvation. There is no other way to escape.
So now you ask, “What is God’s great salvation?”
The Bible has a lot to say about the salvation God has provided through His Son, the Lord Jesus Christ. One aspect of salvation is the forgiveness of sins. Because Jesus Christ died on the cross and shed His own blood, you can have all of your sins forgiven. I John 1:7 tells you, “The blood of Jesus Christ His Son cleanseth us from all sin.” The only way you can have forgiveness and escape the prison of your own sins is to accept the great salvation provided in Jesus Christ.
Are you content to stay in your own prison of sin and be destroyed by God’s wrath, or do you feel as if you must escape? Accept God’s salvation today. Christ will receive you if you will simply come to Him in faith. Repent of your sins and accept God’s so great salvation.
By Derrick Bowman on March 18th, 2010John 20:19, "Then the same day at evening, being the first day of the week, when the doors were shut where the disciples were assembled for fear of the Jews, came Jesus and stood in the midst, and saith unto them, Peace be unto you.”
I want to focus your attention on that last phrase that Jesus said to his disciples, "Peace be unto you."
Those are the first words that Jesus Christ spoke to His disciples after His resurrection. What an amazing thing to read that Christ said “peace be unto you.” These were encouraging words for week believers. I say they were encouraging words for weak believers because just a few days earlier, a band of Romans soldiers came, led by the traitor Judas, and they arrested Christ. At that point the disciples fled. We know that Peter was off at a distance trying to watch Christ. He stopped to warm himself by a fire and a young maid girl accused him of being one of Jesus’ followers. Peter flatly denied the fact and even claimed that he didn’t even know who Jesus was. The rest of the disciples, except for John, were nowhere to be seen until we read in John 20 that they are all gathered together behind closed doors because they were afraid of the Jews.
They were indeed at this moment very week believers. Christ had told them several times what was going to happen to him. He even told them on numerous occasions that he was going to die. But thankfully, he also told them that He was going to rise again the third day. But we find the disciples here in unbelief. If they truly believed the Lord, our verse would say something totally different. Instead of saying that they were assembled for fear of the Jews, we would read that they were assembled waiting for the Lord’s resurrection.
But in this verse, we see the gentleness of our Savior. Instead of coming to his disciples with a word of rebuke, He comes to them with words of peace. Christ’s first words to His wayward disciples were, “peace be unto you.”
Often, we are no better than the disciples. How often do you forsake the Lord. Oh, maybe you don’t deny Him like Peter did, but you fail the Lord in other ways. Aren’t you thankful that the Lord does not come and rebuke you when you fail Him. Instead the Lord will come near to you and say the same thing to you that He did to His disciples: “Peace be unto you.”
If you are a true believer in Jesus Christ, He can say those words to you because Christ has made peace with God through the blood of His cross, and you have been justified by faith so that now you have peace with God. Because of what Christ has done for you in the Gospel, God’s wrath against your sin has all been dealt with. Christ took the full wrath of God that you deserved on Himself. Oh, what a wonderful salvation we have in Christ. May you know those sweet words of Christ in your own soul today: “Peace be unto you.”
By Derrick Bowman on March 11th, 2010Psalm 121:2. The Bible says, “My help cometh from the LORD, which made heaven and earth.”
The verse points our attention to the only source for help in the Christian life.
What do you trust in for help? So many today do not trust the Lord. Even some who profess to be Christians don’t trust the Lord as they should. In the New Testament, the Apostle Paul tells us about the Jews of his day. He said that they were going about trying to establish their own righteousness because there were ignorant of God’s righteousness. That is, they were not trusting in the righteousness that Christ had earned for them in the Gospel, but instead, they were trusting in their own righteousness.
I have had the opportunity to counsel people who were struggling with the assurance of their salvation. Many of them come with questions similar to this: I remember walking down the isle at church and saying a prayer, but I just can’t remember if I really meant it, or if I was really sincere. Or they might say that they just heard of a friend who had been recently saved and when their friend came to Christ the friend cried tears of joy and was overcome with emotion. They fear that because they did not cry similar tears or experience similar emotions that they must not really be saved. I submit to you that people in that condition are placing more trust in their experience of salvation than they are actually placing trust in Christ. If you need help with the assurance of your salvation, you won’t find help by looking back to your experience. The only place you will find help is from the Lord. The question you need to ask yourself is not, “did I believe in Christ,” but the right question is, “am I believing in Christ right now.” The only way you will find help for the assurance of your salvation is by looking to the Lord.
For that matter, this verse gives us a categorical statement. There are many other difficulties a believer faces other that assurance of his or her salvation. Maybe you need help in your marriage, or help raising your children, or help witnessing to a family member or a person at work, or help with a multitude of other things. Where are you looking for help in those circumstances? Are you looking to the advice of the latest book at the Christina bookstore, or are you looking to the Lord? If the Lord is able to create the heavens and the earth with just a word, do you not believe that He is able to help you with your problem? O Christian, believe what the Bible says, “My help cometh from the LORD, which made heaven and earth.”
If you don’t know Jesus Christ as your savior, you don’t know anything about the kind of help I have been talking about, but you can. If you sense your need for a Savior, the only place you will find help is in the Lord Jesus Christ. Believe on Him today and receive help from heaven. Nothing else will help you in eternity. Jesus Christ is who you need, and it is to Jesus Christ that you must flee.
By Derrick Bowman on March 6th, 2010For several years now, Dr. Kevin Bauder, President of Central Baptist Theological Seminary, has been a leading voice for the more "sane" segment of Fundamentalism. He has recently published an article that expresses the differences and similarities between today’s Gospel-focused Fundamentalist and the modern conservative Evangelicals.
I was very impressed by this article, so I am posting a link to it here for you to read. I am interested in hearing your comments about what Dr. Bauder has to say. Do you agree or disagree, and why?
Here is the link to the article:
www.centralseminary.edu/publications/Nick/Nick257.html
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