Our format is Welcome, Song, Prayer, Lesson and Closing.
Song: A kids song for us
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8RV8KerchW4Prayer: Father God thank you for each one here. Thank you for eye and for this place where we can meet around your Word. Thank you that we live in places where we have free access to the Bible. Please be with us, send your Spirit to move among us, in Jesus name amen.
IF/THEN
I was researching if….then verses and found this technical information that describes how even in building a computer program there are if…thens.
The author said:
When taking a computer programming course in BASIC language, several years ago, we were instructed regarding the IF/THEN Statements that were to be used in creating the program with which we were engaged.
That Statement creates options for the computer from which to make choices depending upon the circumstance of the item considered.
IF this is the condition, THEN do this; IF that is the situation, THEN do this.
I had never heard about IF/THEN statements before that time, or at the least I thought I had not.
Interestingly, that was not the truth. I have been reading The Holy Bible since the age of eight years old; the Bible is filled with IF/THEN statements which I had not noticed or discerned.
These statements are given to us so that we may be able to employ reasoning, producing understanding, and subsequently application, for proper choice making with our lifes activities. IF/THEN statements assist us in logically arriving at the stone of Truth.
Dodi Note: Isn’t that a NEAT way to look at Biblical truth?
In many of the texts THEN is literally written there or it is implied, as we understand our English language.
We are going to look at some more if…then statements tonight. This first one is GREAT!
II Chronicles 7: 14; IF My people, who are called by My name, will humble themselves, and pray, and seek My face, and turn from their wicked ways; THEN will I hear from Heaven and heal their Land.
Notice: If/when God’s own people…will turn from their wicked ways….which means repent…then God will hear from heaven and HEAL our land.
Could that mean that until we do so God will delayed from stepping in and healing our lands/countries?
Sometimes I wonder if part of what made the world as liberal and decadent as it has become, was silence on our part?
When we, as the children of God began agreeing that detestable practices such as abortion and same gender marriage were OK? Or if we did not agree, we also did not get out and vote for people who would uphold solid values. Just wondering.
But within this if…then clause there is no time limit specificied so we can begin tonight.
Let’s pray: Father God we join our hearts and minds and we ask forgiveness for all our countries and the people past present and future who have ignored the TRUTH of the Bible. Forgive us for not standing up for Biblical standards, for the times we and/or our ancestors remained silent and allowed You to be silenced. Father we repent on behalf of our people and ourselves for things unsaid, or even silent agreement by choices we made to follow the crowd instead of the Word. Help us to know when/how/if to do things different and especially help us be faithful to pray and to witness and to live by Christian standards as expressed in the Bible. We ask in Jesus name and for your glory. amen
The next if…then is also good. It is found in Matthew 17:20 Jesus said:
IF you have faith as a grain of mustard seed, (THEN) you may say to this mountain, Remove from here to over there; and it shall remove; and nothing shall be impossible unto you.
Dodi Note: Notice how much faith we need. Not a whole bunch. A mustard seed is a teeny tiny seed but it grows into a huge bush/tree when planted.
Another place we are told that to each is GIVEN a measure of faith. The context is not thinking more highly of ourself than we ought, but the fact is faith come from God. There are things we can do to augment it, but God gives it. Romans 12:3 says For by the grace given me I say to every one of you: Do not think of yourself more highly than you ought, but rather think of yourself with sober judgment, in accordance with the faith God has distributed to each of you.
See? We have a meansure of faith God has DISTRIBUTED to us.
The other verse I was thinking of defines faith but is also an action point. It is in Romans 10:17 and says: So faith comes from hearing, and hearing through the Word of Christ.
Maybe that is a kind of if….then. If we spend time in the Word of God, THEN our faith will grow and develop.
The next one is a sort of warning. It is found in Mark 8:36:
For what shall it profit a man, IF he shall gain the whole world, and (THEN) lose his own soul?
Dodi Note. Writing this kind of sends me back the first one about our countries/lands.
What a great question…we can spend our lives gathering “stuff” and lose our own souls. Or we can invest our time, talents and treasure doing things God’s way to grow the Kingdom and rescue hearts.
In fact, reading Mark 8:36 in context confirmed that. Let’s get the context. Jesus has just spoken of his coming death.
34 And calling the crowd to him with his disciples, he said to them, “If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me.
35 For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake and the gospel's will save it.
36 For what does it profit a man to gain the whole world and forfeit his soul? 37 For what can a man give in return for his soul?
38 For whoever is ashamed of me and of my words in this adulterous and sinful generation, of him will the Son of Man also be ashamed when he comes in the glory of his Father with the holy angels.”
Doesn’t that at least hint at part of the way our culture has gotten where it is? Fear of standing out for Jesus and going against the culture?
And if we look at some of the Muslim countries we can see that standing for God can result in death.
The next one is sobering and a topic we keep returning to over and over.
It is found in Mark 11:25-26
When ye stand praying, forgive, IF ye have anything against anyone, so that your Father also, which is in Heaven (THEN) may forgive you your trespasses. But IF you do not forgive others, (THEN) neither will your Father which is in heaven forgive your trespasses.
Dodi Note: Now this is SERIOUS personally, isn’t it?
We simply must choose forgiveness, even when we are feeling angry and hurt, even if we were abused as kids, even if someone we love was killed. No exceptions.
And when we feel like we can’t forgive then we simply ask God to help us.
Forgiveness is NOT the same as allowing someone to defame or abuse us. We can avoid them. But forgiveness means we cancel the very real debt they owed us (or sometimes a false one that feels real to us but is not really true) and begin to pray God will bless them. Maybe another time we will come back to this topic in more depth. But we have before.
Suffice it to say that forgiving is NOT a choice. It is and if….then clause. If we want to be forgiven….then we must choose to forgive.
Next we will look in 1 John.
1 John 1:5-10
This is the message we have heard from him and proclaim to you, that God (Jesus) is light, and in him is no darkness at all. If we say we have fellowship with him while we walk in darkness, (THEN) we lie and do not practice the truth.
But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, (THEN) we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus his Son cleanses us from all sin.
If we say we have no sin, (THEN) we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.
If we confess our sins, (THEN) he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.
If we say we have not sinned, (THEN) we make him a liar, and his word is not in us.
1 John 2:1-6
My little children, I am writing these things to you so that you may not sin. But if anyone does sin, (THEN) we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous.
He is the propitiation (atoning sacrifice) for our sins, and not for ours only but also for the sins of the whole world.
And by this (THEN) we know that we have come to know him, if we keep his commandments.
Whoever says “I know him” but does not keep his commandments is (THEN) a liar, and the truth is not in him,
but whoever keeps his word, in him (THEN) truly the love of God is perfected.
By this (THEN) we may know that we are in him:
whoever says he abides in him ought (THEN) to walk in the same way in which he walked.
Dodi Note: Ok now THAT is a LOT of if….thens. We are going to go back and ponder them bit by bit.
1 John 1:5-10
This is the message we have heard from him and proclaim to you, that God (Jesus) is light, and in him is no darkness at all. If we say we have fellowship with him while we walk in darkness, (THEN) we lie and do not practice the truth.
Dodi Note: We like this reminder. Jesus IS LIGHT and in him there is not darkness at all and since we know perfect light sends darkness fleeing. If you don’t believe go in a windowless room and then strike a tiny match.
Now God is Light and Jesus is God and Jesus is the Light of the world…right? And God is LOVE too. So Jesus is love.
As an aside 1 John 4:18 says: There is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out fear. For fear has to do with punishment, and whoever fears has not been perfected in love.
If we are in Christ…. born again… we in “Love” and in “Light” right? Therefore if we are born again then…we do not need to live in fear. Not fear of punishment nor fear of people.
The Hebrew concept of “perfect” is vastly different than our Western concept. To a Hebrew, to GOD, “perfect” means whole and mature. So the more we grow and are healed the more we realize the truth of “perfect love” cast out fear. Do you see how this relates?
Because we then can face our own sin without expectation of punishment from the hand of God. Consequences maybe but not punishment. In fact we can expect forgiveness and healing.
Continuing with 1 John from earlier:
But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, (THEN) we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus his Son cleanses us from all sin.
Dodi Note: If we walk in light. If we freely admit our sin and remember usually sin is us meeting a legitimate need in an illegitimate way, then we will not just be forgiven. We will also be CLEANSED.
If we say we have no sin, (THEN) we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.
Dodi Note: But if we deny owning our own sin we are deceiving ourselves and kind of being controlled by the one whose name is “deceiver”.
If we confess our sins, (THEN) he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.
If we say we have not sinned, (THEN) we make him a liar, and his word is not in us.
Dodi Note: I think we covered these two, but catch the strongness of if we do not admit our sin, we are calling God a LIAR. Which God is not.
1 John 2:1-6
My little children, I am writing these things to you so that you may not sin. But if anyone does sin, (THEN) we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous.
Dodi Note: Advocate is like a lawyer. One who stands between us and The Judge asking for mercy and grace.
He is the propitiation (atoning sacrifice) for our sins, and not for ours only but also for the sins of the whole world.
Dodi Note: Not only is Jesus our advocate, asking mercy and grace, he also took our deserved punishment. Wow! Right?
And by this (THEN) we know that we have come to know him, if we keep his commandments.
Dodi Note: If we keep his commandmenst then we show we know him. The more time we spend with Jesus, the more we will know him. The more we know him, the more we will want to know him. The more we know him and spend time with him, the more we will become LIKE him. Pretty cool.
Whoever says “I know him” but does not keep his commandments is (THEN) a liar, and the truth is not in him,
Dodi Note: Sad.
but whoever keeps his word, in him (THEN) truly the love of God is perfected.
Dodi Note: Remember what “perfected” means in Hebrew/Bible culture? It means maturing, being healed. It is a process.
By this (THEN) we may know that we are in him:
whoever says he abides in him ought (THEN) to walk in the same way in which he walked.
Dodi Note: Apart from Shalom, Abide is one of my favorite words. The more we abide….live and move and have our very being in awareness of God With Us, Emmanuel, the the more our lives will reflect who he is.
We are going to do only one more tonight. I think this is a lot to take in and remember, so I will post it in the forum.
John 14:23
Jesus answered and said, IF a man loves me he will keep my words: (THEN) My Father will love him, and We will come to him, and make Our living place with him.
Dodi Note: What a great one to end on. If we LOVE God, then we WILL KEEP his words and IF we do that, THEN we will have the indwelling Holy Spirit.
Personally I do not think this takes a whole lot of effort. Once we are truly born again. Once we have realized that yes, we are (or were) sinners who NEED forgiveness from God, then just like a natural child imitates his/her parents, we will naturally become more and more like our Heavenly Father, the One who LOVES each of us unconditionally.
Let’s pray: Father God, thank you for loving us. Thank you for these beautiful reminders from your Word. Help us to trust you more, to become perfected in your love and help us to abide in You this week. Bless each one here in the area of our deepest needs. In Jesus name amen.
Have a blessed week.