Count on It (#1000) Good morning! Today we’re going to talk about things you can count on. We all have various people and situations; people make promises to us and offer to do things for us or do things with us; sometimes they come through and sometimes they don’t. And it doesn’t take long to figure out who you can count on and who you can’t. But people as we know, even the best intentioned ones, often fall short and can’t do everything they’d like to. But we can always count on God. That is why and that is the reason. Oh, by-the-way, I realize there was a slight double ontondra in that title because you know I’ve been numbering these teachings for quite a few years and today, we’ve it teaching number 1,000. So that is a good thing to count. So we can count on God. It is wonderful when we are around people we can count on, I love it. But, I’ve just found that a lot of people you can’t count on at all, and even those that are generally very reliable, often run into circumstances they can’t deal with and can’t quite come through like they wanted to. But that is OK, because we can count on God. We only get depressed and discouraged if we put our confidence in man. What’s say in Philippians 3:3? We are the circumcision and worship God in the Spirit, rejoicing in Christ Jesus and have no confidence in the flesh. We just don’t put our confidence or trust in things in the material world, whether it is people of other stuff. I mean we can enjoy it and we’ve got to work with it, but our ultimate confidence is in God. So we’re going to read some records, some pretty familiar some may be not as familiar, but let’s start in II Chronicles chapter 13…
As taught by Bruce Mahone 20200809. All rights reserved. Verse Listing and Notes
II Chronicles 13 The children of Judah prevailed, because they relied [Heb. Sha-an: to rest, rely, lean upon, support oneself] upon the LORD God (vs. 18)
II Chronicles 16 Thou hast relied on the king of Syria, and not relied [Heb. Sha-an] on the LORD thy God (vs. 7)
Psalms 34:22 None of them that trust [Heb. Chasa: seek refuge, flee for protection, put trust in, confide or hope in] in him shall be desolate
Psalms 118:5-9 It is better to trust [Heb. Chasa] in the Lord than to put confidence in man (vs. 8)
Proverbs 3:5 Lean [Heb. Sha-an] not unto thine own understanding
Daniel 3:28 God delivered his servants that trusted [Aram. rechats: set one’s trust on] in him
II Corinthians 1:8-10 We should trust in God which raiseth the dead
II Thessalonians 3:3 The Lord is faithful, who will stablish you and keep you from evil Teaching Count on It (#1000)
Synchronized Life (#999) Good morning. Today we’re going to talk about the synchronized life. The idea for this came to talking to Peter Lloyd several days ago. He told me he’d run into some teaching online about getting what you say inline with what you do and what you believe. And he was very excited about it, he had never heard anything like that. I told him that sounds like Dr. Wierwille’s teaching on the synchronized life, or he used to call it the synchronized confession. And it is something we’ve all known, he taught it many times, and it showed up in the blue book, The Bible Tells me So. But, he’d never heard it so I told him I would teach on it, and he is not with us today, but he said he would listen to the teaching on the website. So, I dug around my notes and usually I’ve taught on most of these topics and I have notes on them, but I couldn’t find any notes on when the last time I taught this was; so I pulled out Dr. Wierwille’s book on the topic and started looking through it and I realized it was so well said that that I’m actually going to read that chapter to you. I don’t usually do that, but why not? I realize I probably couldn’t say it any better that that Dr. Wierwille did, so I’ll read through that short chapter with you and then I’ll add a few other scriptures on the same topic to wrap up…
As taught by Bruce Mahone, 20200726. All rights reserved. Verse Listing and Notes
Psalms 18:33 Hinds’ feet
Romans 8:35-39 More than conquerors
Colossians 1:13 Delivered from the power of darkness
II Kings 4:8-37 The Shunammite confessed “It is well” (vs. 26)
Matthew 4:1-11 It is written Teaching Synchronized Life (#999)
Romans 12 – Enthusiastic Living (#998) Good morning! I was thinking this week about a variety of things, as we all do. And, I remembered the first time I went to the headquarters of the Way International in New Knoxville Ohio. I was just starting my junior year of high school. I’d been in the Word, as far as being involved with the Way, for about four months and there was a New Years advance. So a bunch of us in the New York subarbs rented a bus and went out there. And back then the whole Way International wasn’t that big, the crowd there I think was about the same or perhaps smaller that some of the Family Camps we’ve had here in Virginia through the years. So, you pretty much knew everybody. And it was really wonderful. And the theme of the advance was enthusiastic living. So, we had wonderful teachings about how great it is to be enthusiastic when we trust and believe God. And I thought we would talk about that. And the way we’re going to talk about it is we are going to read Romans 12:1, and about half-way through we’ll come across a term relating to being enthusiastic. So, here we are, we’ll spend the whole time in Romans 12 unless I diverge, which I might…
As taught by Bruce Mahone, 202007012. All rights reserved. Verse Listing and Notes
Rom 12:1 reasonable – logical
Rom 12:6 gifts – in the context, refers to ways of serving, whether by operating the manifestations of holy spirit, operating a gift ministry, or some other act of service
Rom 12:9 dissimulation – hypocrisy; abhor – hate; cleave – cling
Rom 12:11 not slothful in business – never be lazy in your work
fervent in spirit, serving the Lord – serve the Lord enthusiastically
Rom 12:12 instant – steadfastly, persevere
Rom 12:16 mind not high things – do not be haughty or proud Teaching Romans 12 – Enthusiastic Living (#998)
Radiant Every Day, Part 2 (#997) Good morning. Today we’re on part two of Being Radiant Everyday. Last time we looked at a wonderful study, which was done years ago we just adapted it a little bit to daily life today. The main points of that teaching were if you look to yourself and focus on your own life too much, you’ll get miserable because you’ll see faults and shortcomings. If you look to others and see what they’re doing, it is just a distraction, because they have to live their lives and you have to live yours. If you spend your time looking at somebody else and wonder if they’re doing well or poorly, it doesn’t help that much. But if you look to God you become peacefully radiant. It says in Psalm 34, they looked onto Him and they were radiant. We all know Isaiah 26:3, those that stay their minds on God have perfect peace. So, what a treat. And now we’re going to look at the conclusion of that study, and we can call it Radiant Every Day, Part 2. And the conclusion of not focusing on yourself, not focusing on others, but looking to God is that we should love God. We should simple focus on loving God and as we do that everything in our life works wonderfully. So, let’s start today in Joshua chapter 22.
As taught by Bruce Mahone, 20200628. All rights reserved. Verse Listing and Notes Conclusion: Love God
Joshua 22:1-5 Be diligent to love the Lord your God
Psalms 62:7-8 Trust in the rock of my strength, my refuge, pour out your hearts before him
Ecclesiastes 12:13 Whole duty of man: fear God and keep his commandments
Matthew 22:34-40 First and great commandment: love God
Romans 8:28 All things work together for good
Ephesians 1 So many blessings in Christ! Teaching Radiant Every Day, Part 2 (#997)
Radiant Every Day, Part 1 (#996) Today we’re going to talk about being radiant. This is something we talk about, but I checked my notes and we haven’t talked about this for a couple of years. So, it will be fun to get into to it today. We’ll start in Psalm 77… Verse Listing and Notes Look to yourself -> miserable
Psalm 77 I have considered the days of old; commune with mine own heart (vss 5-6)
Proverbs 18:2 A fool hath no delight in understanding, but that his heart discover itself Look to others -> distracted
Psalm 73 I was envious at the foolish, when I saw the prosperity of the wicked(vs 3)
II Corinthians 10:12 They measuring themselves by themselves are not wise Look to God -> peacefully radiant
Psalm 34 They looked unto him, and were radiant (vs 4 – ASV et al)
Isaiah 26:3 Perfect peace whose mind is stayed on thee
Hebrews 12:2,3 Looking unto Jesus…consider him who endured
Hebrews 3:1 Consider the apostle and high priest…Christ Jesus
II Corinthians 4:18 We look not at the things which are seen, but not seen
Colossians 3:1-2 Set your affection (mind/thoughts) on things above Teaching Radiant Every Day, Part 1 (#996)
The Cross, the Resurrection, and Spirit (#995) Good morning! Today is Pentecost 2020. As you may know I don’t pay much attention to the traditional church calendar for a number of reasons. For one thing, the chronology and dating has been sort of massaged through the years, and I’m not sure I trust it. And the other and main reason though is in Colossians, it says we’re not to be observers of days and times and hours, we’re just supposed to focus on God and the things of God. So, I don’t pay much attention to it, but there are certain things like Christmas and Easter and Pentecost; so many people remind me about it, it is a little hard to avoid. So today is the day celebrated on the Christian calendar as Pentecost. And of course Pentecost is the day, forty days after Jesus Christ’s resurrection or ascension, I can’t remember which, that the power of the holy spirit came on the day of Pentecost. And one of the things we’re going to do today is compare the relative importance of things like the cross, and the resurrection, and the spirit. Many people will tell you the most of important part of Christianity is Jesus Christ’s sacrifice on the cross. And that is very important. And other people will tell you the most important thing is that God raised Jesus Christ from the dead, which assures our eternal life and being raised from the dead as well. And that is very important. Yet in the book of Acts, which is the history of the first century church, the word that is emphasized the most is spirit. ‘Cause that is the end result. Because Jesus Christ gave his life on the cross, then God could raise him from the dead with the resurrection. But, because of the resurrection, God was then able to give the gift of holy spirit to his people, forty days later on the day of Pentecost. So that was the end result. It is like if you buy a car, fill it with gas, and then go and drive a birthday cake to somebody’s house. It is important you got the car, it is important you put gas in it, but the whole point of it is so you could take the whole birthday cake over there. So it is important Jesus Christ died on the cross, it is important that God raised him from the dead, but the whole point of it was that we could receive the gift of holy spirit. See the word cross is not even used in the book of Acts. Now the word tree is used three times and tree and cross are sort of used interchangeably; Jesus Christ was hung on a cross or hung on a tree; so three times it is there. The word, resurrection, however – focusing on Jesus Christ being raised from the dead, is used not three times, but it is used ten times. Now, do you know how many times spirit is used in the book of Acts? Seventy times. Seven times as much. So you have three times the word tree is used, ten times the word resurrection, and seventy times the word spirit. ‘Cause that was the whole point in the first century church, was to receive the spirit of God. Because as we know, God is spirit and to communication with Him directly have to have spirit. No God communicates with people indirectly in all kind of ways. He gives people dreams, He gives them visions, one time an Old Testament prophet wouldn’t listen and God made His donkey talk to him – Baalam. God communicates in all kind of ways, but to communicate directly on a regular basis, you have to have spirit. It is like if you have a cellphone and I have a cellphone, we can talk. If I have a radio from an old airplane cockpit and you have a cellphone, we really can’t communicate very well. Or you have a really high-powered walkie-talkie and I have a land-line phone, we really can’t communicate very well. But if we both have walkie-talkies on the same frequency, or we both have aeronautical radios on the same frequency, or we both have cellphones that connect to viable networks, then we can talk. Well, in the same way, God is spirit, and in order to communicate with His people, on a regular basis, people need to have the same holy spirit, the same spirit of God to be able to communicate. In Old Testament times, God would sort of lend spirit to people. He would put His spirit upon a man or a women, and that man or manor woman was often considered a prophet, because that means you can speak forth what God says. And that includes foretelling the future at times, but basically the word prophet means somebody who can speak for God. So, God could communicate directly with that prophet, but then if somebody walked away from God, like think about Saul, the King, God could remove the spirit and take it back. Because it was just on loan. It is sort of like you work somewhere and you have to do deliveries and they lend you the company truck. We’ve all had things like that at jobs, where they lend you a truck or a cellphone, or a computer, or a typewriter, or an adding machine, or whatever, and they say: “go do the job.” And we use the company equipment and we go do the job, but then they want the equipment back when the job is done or when you leave the company. It is sort of on loan to you. We’ve all had that kind of thing happen. And that is the way the spirit of God was; very few people had the spirit of God on them. Like when Moses was with a couple of million Israelites, he was the only one with the spirit of God. And his father-in-law, Jethro, the Priest of Midian, you’re going to die if you try to take care of all these people. Why don’t you talk to God and see if He will put the spirit on some more. I think He put the spirit on seventy people. And then those people all had the spirit of God and they could all go to God and ask for help to help God’s people. The same thing happened with Jesus Christ, he had twelve apostles, and then I think they anointed seventy more at some point. And that kind of thing happens, but it was still a small number of people, it was never everybody. I can’t think of a time anywhere in the Old Testament where there were more than about a hundred people with the spirit of God on them and it was usually much less. Remember when Jehoshaphat was all scared because he was attacked by three different armies at the same time? They got together and they prayed, and God put the spirit of God, His spirit, on a fellow in the crowd and God used that spirit like a radio, sort-of, to talk the fellow, tell him what to say, and then he got up an spoke to the crowd. So in the whole crowd, there in Jerusalem, God had to put His spirit purposely on one fellow so He could get a message to them. Whereas on the day of Pentecost, which we’re going to read about in the scriptures and which this is commemorated in the church calendar today, the spirit of God came on anybody that believes on Jesus Christ. Anybody. It says in Romans 10:9, all you have to do to receive the spirit of God is: accept Jesus Christ as Lord and believe God raised him from the dead. That is all it takes. And then because Jesus Christ paid for it, God offered it, you just have to do it. Just like sometimes those deals you see, most of them are scams, but they say: “do you realize we’re giving a thousand of these, call now you can get it for free?” And usually it is a scam, or usually they give you the first part for free, hoping you’ll buy more. It is sort-of like that, except it is not a scam and it is real. Jesus Christ paid with his blood for us getting born-again and receiving the gift of holy spirit. And now we can all receive holy spirit, on the day of Pentecost alone, what was it? Something like 5,000 people got born-again? We’ll read about it. A large number. And that was probably more than everybody in the Old Testament periods combined ever received the spirit of God on them. And that was just the first day. And that was over 2,000 years ago. How many millions and millions of people, perhaps billions of people have believed in the Lord Jesus Christ and received the spirit of God? It is wonderful. And then the next thing is learning how to operate it, like when we heard from God earlier during the fellowship: we had speaking in tongues with interpretation and a word of prophesy. That was God speaking directly to the people on this call with words of comfort and encouragement for us. And much of this ministry and the ministries that before that many of us were involved in and we learned from, much of the emphasis has been on learning how to operate the spirit of God. Because there are nine manifestations or evidences of it. We all know that you have a battery in your car. Sam just got a Tesla, so he has a really big battery in his car. But with that one battery, even in a regular car you can do a lot with the one battery, you can use it to power the starter, you can use the battery to power the windshield-wipers, you can use the battery to turn on the headlights, you can use it to turn on the interior lights, you can use it to power the radio, you can use it for the electric locks, the electric windows. One battery, but it does well over nine things. And if you have Sam’s car, the battery actually will drive it. So you can do a lot. And just like Sam can do so much with his battery, with a regular car you can do a lot with a battery, when you have the spirit of God, there are nine ways to operate it, nine manifestations or evidences of it. And two of them we had right here in the fellowship today: speaking in tongues with interpretation and prophesy. And if anybody wants to learn more about it, many of us have books and notes from other classes, and we even have classes on our website that talk in detail about all nine of those manifestations. But, you got to hear two of them today. So, this is a really big deal in church history. So let’s just read Acts one and two today…
As taught by Bruce Mahone, 20200531. All rights reserved. Verse Listing and Notes
Cross – not used in Acts (tree, three times)
Resurrection – ten times in Acts
Spirit – Seventy times in Acts
Acts 1 and 2 The beginning of the Christian Church Teaching The Cross, the Resurrection, and the Spirit (#995)
Always Rejoice (#994) Good morning! ‘Delighted to be with you all today. I’m at the lake with the door open, ’cause the weather is warm. And I think the neighbor’s dog’s are barking, but, we’re used to having dogs around so don’t let that bother you. Well, we’re going to talk about rejoicing today. That’s something we read from time to time usually once or twice a year, because is it is so important. Because we find that no matter what is going on in the world, God has things for us to rejoice about. There are some days where we’re very happy about the circumstances, the things we’re doing, the way our life is going, and we’re happy about that; that’s wonderful. There are other days where lots of things aren’t going the way we want, yet there is still much to rejoice in from God. And the more we learn to rely on the things from God and rejoice in that, the steadier our lives will be. But we all know people who are only happy when the sun is shining, everybody is nice to them, and every circumstance in their life is perfect; and when one, little thing goes wrong, they get all grumpy and frowny stay that way for months, until circumstances change. That would be a terrible way to live, you’d be grumpy half, or most of the time. But if we learn to rejoice in the goodness of God and all God does for us, then when days are wonderful, we rejoice; when days are OK, we rejoice; when days are terrible, when nothing is the way we want, we still rejoice, because we know that God is there to provide for us and take care of us, so we just don’t let anything get to us. So, let’s start in II Chronicles chapter twenty…
As taught by Bruce Mahone 20200517. All rights reserved. Verse Listing and Notes
II Chronicles 20:27 They returned with joy, for the Lord had made them to rejoice
Nehemiah 8:10 The joy of the Lord is your strength
Psalms 5:11-12 Let those that trust thee rejoice, let them ever shout for joy
Psalms 16:11 In thy presence is fulness of joy
Psalms 43:4 God my exceeding joy (NLT: the source of all my joy; NIV: my joy and my delight; lit: gladness of my joy)
Romans 5:1-8 Rejoice in hope of the glory of God (vs. 2)
Romans 12:9-21 Rejoicing in hope (vs. 12)
Philippians 3:3 Rejoice in Christ Jesus, and have no confidence in the flesh
Colossians 1:11 Patience and longsuffering with joyfulness
Philippians 4:4-9 Rejoice in the Lord alway, and again I say, Rejoice (vs. 4)
I Thessalonians 5:16-18 Rejoice evermore (vs. 16)
I Timothy 6:17 Trust in the living God, who giveth us richly all things to enjoy
II Corinthians 4:1-9 Cast down, but not destroyed (apollumi)
We are pressed on every side by troubles, but we are not crushed and broken. We are perplexed, be we don’t give up and quit. We are hunted down, but God never abandons us. We get knocked down, but we get up again and keep going (NLT) Teaching Always Rejoice (#994)
Perseverance (#993) Good morning! Today, we’re going to talk about perseverance. There will be a little overlap between what we talked about last time, where we talked about God taking out of the pit, the need to be patient, and look to the Lord; so, part of this will be a review of that and part if it will be some different material. But I checked my notes, I haven’t actually taught this particular teaching in almost exactly ten years; so, I imagine it will be pretty new. Here we go, in Lamentations three…
As taught by Bruce Mahone, 20200503. All rights reserved. Verse Listing and Notes
Lamentations 3:22-26 Great is thy faithfulness (vs. 23); The Lord is good unto them that wait [qawah – with expectation] for him (vs. 25); good to quietly wait for the deliverance of the Lord (vs. 26)
Psalms 37:7 Rest in the Lord, and wait patiently for him
Psalms 40:1 I waited patiently for the Lord, and he inclined unto me, and heard my cry
Luke 8:4-15 Fruit with patience (steadfast perseverance) [by persevering] (vs. 15)
Luke 18:1-8 Men ought always to pray, and not to faint
Luke 21:19 In your patience possess ye your souls (NASB: by your endurance you will gain your lives)
Acts 1:14 These all continued [were continually devoting themselves]
– To persevere and not to faint
– To show one’s self courageous for
Acts 2:42 They continued steadfastly in the apostles’ doctrine [proskartareo – continually devoted themselves]
Romans 5:3-5 Knowing that tribulation worketh patience
This doesn’t mean, of course, that we have only a hope of future joys – we can be full of joy here and now even in our trials and troubles. Taken in the right spirit these very things will give us a patient endurance; this in turn will develop a mature character, and a character of this sort produces a steady hope, a hope that will never disappoint us. (JBP)
Romans 12:10-14 Patient in mental pressure [continuing steadfast, faithful] Continuing instant in prayer [to persevere and not to faint, to show one’s self courageous for]
Ephesians 6:18 Watching (be on the alert) with all perseverance (proskartaresis) Teaching Perseverance (#993)
Out of the Pit (#992) Good morning. With the situation we’re all in, some people think life is the pits. Well I don’t think it is. But the scriptures talk about how God took us out of the pit. And that will be one of the things we’ll look at, the other thing we’ll look at is the importance of being patient and waiting on the Lord. That is the thing that is going on now for many of us: that there is a lot of waiting around to see what happens. At least not as much activity as we would have if we could get out and be about. So, these are things we’ve read before and we’ll read them again. but we’re going to look at them today in light of our current situation. OK; Psalms 37…
As taught by Bruce Mahone, 20200419. All rights reserved. Verse Listing and Notes
Psalms 37:7 Rest in the Lord [be still, silent before the Lord]; Wait patiently for him
Psalms 40 I waited (qawah – vs. 1) patiently (intently – waiting I waited) for the Lord, and he heard
He brought me up also out of an horrible pit (vs. 2).
5 You have multiplied, O LORD my God, your wondrous deeds and your thoughts toward us; none can compare with you. Were I to proclaim and tell of them, they would be more than can be counted. (NRSV)
Ecclesiastes 7:8-10 Better is the patient than the proud in spirit (disposition). [patience is better than pride]
Luke 8:15 Fruit with patience (steadfast perseverance) [by persevering]
(Luke 21:5-19 In your patience possess ye your souls)
Romans 5:2-5 Patience leads to [brings about, produces] hope, which maketh not ashamed
Romans 12:10-14 Patient in mental pressure [continuing steadfast, faithful, persevering in prayer]
Romans 15:1-6 Patience and comfort of the scriptures [through patient endurance and the encouragement drawn from the scriptures]; the God of patience.
II Corinthians 6:1-10 In MUCH patience
II Corinthians 12:11-13 In ALL patience
Colossians 1:9-11 Strengthened unto all patience with joyfulness
I Thessalonians 1:3 Patience of (proceeding from) hope Teaching Out of the Pit (#992)
Resurrection Victory (#991) Good morning, here we are on Resurrection Sunday, also called Easter, a day when we celebrate the resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ. We’re going to read a lot of scriptures today, about not only about his resurrection, but what led up to it. The fact that he shed his blood and his body was broken and what that means for us and that that ultimately led to the resurrection. And, of course the coming of the holy spirit on the day of Pentecost and the life we can now enjoy as God’s children, walking with the power of God. So, let’s start in I Corinthians chapter eleven…
As taught by Bruce Mahone, 20200412. All rights reserved. Verse Listing and Notes
I Corinthians 11:23-26 This do in remembrance of me
I Peter 2:24 By whose stripes ye were healed
Hebrews 9:12 By his own blood he obtained eternal redemption for us
Galatians 3:13 Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law
Luke 24:1-8 Why seek ye the living among the dead?
Acts 1:22 A witness of his resurrection
Acts 4:1-4 Being grieved that they preached the resurrection
Acts 4:33 And with great power gave the apostles witness of the resurrection of the Lord Jesus and great grace was upon them all
Acts 17:16-21 He preached unto them Jesus and the resurrection
Acts 17:31-32 He hath given assurance unto all men, in that he hath raised him from the dead. And when they heard of the resurrection of the dead, some mocked
I Thessalonians 4:13-18 Wherefore comfort one another with these words
Job 19:25-27: 25 But as for me I know that my Redeemer lives, and he will stand upon the earth at last:
26 And after my body has decayed, yet in my body I will see God!
27 I will see him for myself Yes, I will see him with my own eyes. I am overwhelmed at the thought! (NLT)
I Peter 1:13 Wherefore gird up the loins of your mind and be strong
13 Therefore, prepare your minds for action; be self-controlled; set your hope fully on the grace to be given you when Jesus Christ is revealed. (NIV) Teaching Resurrection Victory (#991)