These five studies are from the 2015 International Seminar in Germany.
These studies explore the way in which Jesus combined teaching and healing in his ministry, as an example for us. The Sabbath is also considered, as a day on which Jesus did many of his recorded healings, and why it was so, and why it must be so again. 53p
Isaiah 58:13,14
13 If you turn away your foot from the sabbath, from doing your pleasure on my holy day; and call the sabbath a delight, the holy of the Lord, honourable; and shall honour him, not doing your own ways, nor finding your own pleasure, nor speaking your own words:
14 Then shall you delight yourself in the Lord; and I will cause you to ride upon the high places of the earth, and feed you with the heritage of Jacob your father: for the mouth of the Lord has spoken it.
Contents
- The Gospel of Healing
- Freedom in Health Work
- Teaching and Healing
- The Sabbath and Healing
- Self-Examination and Healing
How are you?.There are so many churches that are mashrooming.The common one is the church of T.B joshua,i dont want to personalise him.But maybe you can give guidance as to whether he is a heavenly sent messangers or not.
Hamakaye, you need to be able to decide for yourself, what is truth and error, and what is the true gospel, from the Scriptures. I can share with you a few principles that may help.
1. The Gospel of Jesus Christ means victory over sin. “The Gospel is the power of God unto salvation to every one that believes” (Romans 1:16). That “salvation” is salvation from sin. Therefore, the true gospel must explain what sin is, and how to be free from it.
There are many popular “gospels” that offer forgiveness for the actions of sin, but not freedom from the power of sin. But God’s purpose is to separate sin from His people, and put His life in its place. 1 John 1:9; Ezekiel 36:26; Romans 8:2.
Now many people do not actually want that. They want God’s power and blessing in their lives, but they would like to keep some sin, as it is pleasant to the flesh, and offers a kind of worldly security. They would like to retain some control over the management and planning of their lives, so they can have a nice, comfortable life on this earth. For them, faith in God is a way to add His power to their plans. This intention, which is actually based on self-justification (and therefore distrust of God), is the cause of so many churches and so many different gospels.
This attempt to have God’s blessing, but retain control of one’s own life, is pictured in the offering of Cain in the Old Testament, who brought an offering to God, but it was his own works, his own plans. He wanted God to bless that.
But Abel brought the correct offering, which was the offering of the Lamb that typified Christ, the Saviour who would remove sin by His death. Abel wanted the spiritual blessing of sins cleansed away, and knew that only the power of God could accomplish that. He was willing to sacrifice anything that God saw needful, in order to regain the character that man once had before he fell.
Miracles can be found in both of these ways, therefore they are not a foolproof sign of divine approval. We must be guided by the Bible. And that is point 2:
2. The Bible – the Word of God must be your guide in everything. You need to know it, it needs to be your daily companion. Man lost paradise by doubting the Word, and we can only gain it back by perfect faith in that perfect Word.
A large part of the Word is prophecy. Jesus knew from the Word the prophecies that surrounded His mission. We should also know from the Word, the prophecies that apply to our time. This will give you a sure foundation to place your feet on, when you know what God has foretold would be the work for this time, and the various traps that Satan would set to ensnare souls.
To this end, Revelation 14:6-20 along with Revelation 18:1-4 describe the final presentation of the Gospel to the world, before the outpouring of God’s wrath in the seven plagues. Jesus said, “And this gospel of the kingdom shall be preached in all the world for a witness unto all nations; and then shall the end come.” (Matthew 24:14). Revelation 14 presents that final Gospel work to all nations. Therefore, you should make it your task to find out what those prophecies mean, and how they are fulfilled.
As for this website, I can suggest a few publications that can help you with the Gospel message. Freedom from Sin and Living Righteously present the Gospel of deliverance from the enslaving power of sin. There are others as well, but those will give you a start.
Thank you so much,But please pray for me so that i can abhor sin in totality.One of the greatest weaknessesi have is the love for sin,it has really distanced me from GOD such that i always ask myself as to whether they shall be a time when i will return to save my LORD.It really pains me when i look at my level of sinfullness..I last went to church 6 years ago.I dont know whether iam former sabbath Rest church member,because i have even lost communication with my brethren.Please iam still pleading with you to consider me in your daily prayers.I olso want to be a serious candidate for heavenly kingdom.I shall grateful.
Of course I can and will pray for you, that your faith grows. But you have to realize that much of the responsibility lies in your hands. Faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the word of God. So in the end, you will have to gain and grow faith through reading the Bible for yourself, and then carrying out what God instructs you to do.
Now, you want to learn to hate sin, and we learn to hate sin by two things:
1. The consequences. Sure, sin can thrill the human feelings, but it comes at a cost. The extent to which the feelings were drawn on, will cause a corresponding depression after, when the senses are exhausted. There is also the damage to other people, if others are involved. However, just feeling the consequences is not enough. We become addicted to the good feelings, and therefore go back again and again, even though we regret it afterward. Therefore we also need a view of…
2. The goodness of God. You have to behold the beauty of holiness, the purity and moral power, the self-control, and selflessness that is in the life of Christ, and those who had Christ’s life in them (the believers in the Bible and history). You have to see that in contrast to the way of sin (which is also shown in the Bible).
In human movies and books, sin is glorified. It is portrayed in such a way as to make it look like the way to success and happiness. The Bible paints the true picture. There you see a temporary success with sin, but a complete break down and disaster in the end. The worldly kingdoms of prophecy, the house built on sand, the people who rejected Noah’s warning: all come to a horrible end.
And on the other side, you see the people of faith in the Bible: they suffer sometimes, it is true, but they are sustained and are victors. They have control over themselves, and do not resort to their own plans to escape, nor to feelings of revenge and wrath. You see a supernatural, unearthly and very noble element of Life working in them.
And sin blinds us to God’s character and His ways. We imagine that a religious life is boring, that God is a tyrant, that our full potential will be stifled, that we will be stunted. These are all lies. A true religious life will reach it’s full potential, even in this earth. This does not mean that a person will make millions of dollars, but it means their character will be fully developed; every grace will be in action; they will be people of principle who can be counted on, and who will never take advantage of others. Daniel and Joseph are two men who reached this potential and even the world leaders found them to be absolutely trustworthy.
So the main aim of a Christian life is to recover the lost character, so that we can be fit to rule the earth again. “The meek will inherit the earth.” All the other attainments, such as traveling the world (and the universe), developing all the talents (music, arts), unlocking the secrets of nature through science, etc.; this will all reach it’s fullness in the immortal eternal life, where we will have endless ages to do things that men here could not even dream of.
So our priorities are different from that of worldly people. For them, this life is all they have, and they have to fit in as much pleasure and experiences as they can in this short life. For us, character is the priority, and everything else is secondary; if we don’t get to do all the secondary things in this life, it is fine…we have eternity for that.
Now there are things that you have to do to cooperate with the Holy Spirit in the recovery of your true character, and to reach your full potential in God.
1. The Word. This includes the Bible, but also books by holy men and women, such as Ellen White, and the folks I put on my website (Waggoner, Jones, F. T. Wright, A. Dura, etc). Their writings can lead you to understand what the Bible is saying, since there is much darkness in this world, even in the religious world.
You will not be able to fully hate sin without God giving this hatred to you; and everything you get from God comes through His Word. So you must spend time in the Word. It doesn’t matter how much you fail in the struggle against sin, you must return to the Word. The more unworthy you feel, the more you need it. God is only interested in healing you, but He can’t do that if you won’t come to Him. So ignore the temptations of the devil to stay away, and insist on coming to God regardless. It is humiliating, but necessary. God will restore our dignity as we come to Him.
Particularly you need to become familiar with the Life of Jesus Christ. Ellen White’s “The Desire of Ages,” is very good. Also, “All About Jesus,” by E. J. Waggoner is excellent (Volume 1 is available, and Volume 2 will come soon).
And you need to understand the way of salvation: how it is that the power of God is to work in your life to overcome sin. “Steps to Christ” by Ellen White is useful, and also Fred Wright’s booklet “From Bondage to Freedom” (I re-titled it “Freedom from Sin” on the website). There are many others on the website, but I don’t want to overwhelm you.
2. Cutting off the avenues of sin. If there are certain sins that you fall into again and again, you have to do as much as possible to cut off those avenues of temptation. If the problems come from the opposite sex, then avoid meeting them. Find some useful employment or study to do instead. If the problems come through movies or social media, then you have to put them away. Get rid of your devices, or TV, or subscriptions, or whatever it is. Jesus told the rich young ruler to “sell all you have,” but he wouldn’t do it. No amount of prayer from Jesus would help that man if he wasn’t willing to do his part.
3. Put your life in order. Sin often attacks us when we are idle and (seemingly) have nothing to do. Therefore, you must look around you and see what is not in order in your life, and work on bringing that in order. This will fill your time with useful activity, and also have a good effect on your character. Start with your room, then your yard, then your workplace. Help those around you, instead of indulging your pleasurable sins.
Remind yourself that this is a battle for your eternal life, and that your earthly life could end at any time. You may be young now, but there is no guarantee that you will live for 40 more years…we live in a very uncertain world. The only certainty (other than the truth) is death. “The living know that they shall die.”
But even more importantly, God himself needs you to represent His character, and thereby bring an end to the rebellion. There is a battle going on between the character of God and that of Satan, and we are to be God’s witnesses. God cannot settle this conflict by superior power, because it is a contest over truth, right, and trust. God gains back the trust of people and wins them to His side, when His goodness is seen in contrast to Satan’s character, but for that He needs witnesses, and we ARE those witnesses. He relies upon us, if you can fathom that.
The first promise was that “the seed of the woman shall bruise the serpent’s head,” and the apostle Paul reminded us that “the God of peace shall bruise Satan under your feet shortly.” Romans 16:20. This is a prophecy of the victory that God will attain in the spiritual battle through the final generation (as portrayed in Revelation 14 and onward). This high destiny is outlined in books like “The Seven Angels,” by F. T. Wright. You should become familiar with those truths.
4. You mentioned having once been in the church. If there are believers near by, you should seek them out and meet with them again. Tell them what you told me, that you are bound to sin, but that you want to be free. They will surely encourage you, and you will gain strength by meeting with them, as they point you to God, and tell you what they know of His power and goodness.
Matthew 2:15 – “Out of Egypt have I called My son.” God calls all of us out of Egypt (unbelief). The Lord of the universe intends that you shall be His son again, fully restored and healed. Place yourselves in the avenues of grace, in the channels whereby the living truth comes, and you cannot fail of reaching the highest attainment that men can aspire to in this world: to be a son of God.