Date: 06/12/2023

Greetings in the name of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ and to Him be the Glory, Power, and Dominion forever and ever and to the Holy Ghost that is yet abiding in the body. This week’s phrase is “Faith in Focusing on Eternal Life.”

Faith comes from hearing God’s Word (Romans 10:17). If we don’t hear that Jesus came to bring us back into an intimate relationship with God, then we won’t have faith for that and we won’t experience it. There are many people who have come to the Lord and received the forgiveness of their sins, but they are saved and stuck. They are just waiting for heaven so they can really start living. They are missing the main point of salvation. If there was no afterlife, if there was no heaven or hell, John 3:16 reveals that Jesus would still have come and died for our sins so we could once again have an intimate relationship with Him and His Father, in this present evil world. Galatians 1:4 reads, “Who gave himself for our sins, that he might deliver us from this present evil world, according to the will of God and our Father…”.

This was one of the main differences between the first-century church and our modern church. Those people knew God intimately. They had a relationship with the Lord that wasn’t waiting to start in heaven, but was working in them while they were still in this world. They didn’t have the advantages of radio, television, internet, or any other modern means of communication. Yet, these believers turned the known world upside down with the truths of the Gospel in just thirty years. Acts 17:6 tells us, “And when they found them not, they drew Jason and certain brethren unto the rulers of the city, crying, These that have turned the world upside down are come hither also…”.  They impacted their world much more than we are impacting our world today. Why?

Because they had such a depth of relationship with a Living God that it was contagious. In Rome, Christians knew their God so intimately that they sang His praises as they were burned at the stake. There are historical accounts of Nero the emperor sticking his fingers in his ears and saying, “Why must these Christians sing?” They had much more than a doctrine and a hope, they had faith. Their faith gave them a present-tense relationship that allowed them to endure with joy, terrible atrocities. There are historical accounts of Romans, when witnessing the joy of these Christians who were being martyred, jumping out of the stands and rushing to them. They knew they would be doomed to the same fate, but they willingly accepted death so they could know God in the same close, intimate, and personal way as these Christians.

In closing, Let me ask this question. How many people do you know that would die  to have what you have? Do you know someone who is envious of your relationship with God? If there is no one, then you are not experiencing eternal life as the Bible describes it and as our Lord Jesus Christ died to give us.  In fact, if this isn’t  your experience, you are not really living. This is what drove the Apostle Paul and all the early Christians. “That I may know him, and the power of his resurrection, and the fellowship of his sufferings, being made conformable unto his death” Philippians 3:10. It’s all about having a personal, intimate relationship with the Lord. And the good news is that our Lord wants us to have this more than some of us do. Until next week let us remember, “… with God all things are possible” (Matthew 19:26).

In His Service,

Bishop Dr. Calvin Worthem

General Chief Overseer/Senior Bishop