Our Sufficiency

By Gilbert Alexander

"Not that we are sufficient of ourselves to think of anything as being from ourselves, but our sufficiency is from God" (2 Cor. 3:5).

Sufficiency is the state of having all that one needs to live and to accomplish the tasks of life. We must acknowledge that, in all things, our sufficiency is from God. We do all that we do with materials provided to us by God. In this sense, the grace of God is everywhere.

"Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and comes down from the Father of lights..." (Jas. 1:17).

We are thus ultimately dependent upon God for our existence, our physical sustenance, our ability to think and to do, our direction into life's meaning and purpose, our healing in sickness and in sin, and our hope for ages to come.

We are surrounded by things that are greater and stronger than we are, by challenges that we of ourselves could not handle, by dangers that are held in check by powers beyond our control or even knowledge, and by choices and decisions that must be made even though we cannot see the end result of our choices and decisions. Yet we can be undaunted by these things because we are guided by the Word of God as to our right conduct and the assurance that He will be with us always to sustain us if we follow His direction and walk humbly in obedience to Him.

"In all your ways acknowledge Him, and He shall direct your paths" (Prov. 3:6).

God gave us iron ore and the intellect to learn how to extract it, refine it, shape it, make steel from it and use it either for good or for destruction. He gave us trees and the intellect to harvest them to shape and use them to build houses for all sorts of purposes. He gave us His Word to guide us, and He gave us the ability to use it rightly as He intended (2 Tim. 2:15). He gave us the physical capability to design and build, to get wealth, to use our gain for good, and to give Him thanks from grateful hearts for His providence.

To renounce God is the height of folly. To reject His counsel is to bring swift destruction upon ourselves. It is evident that God has given us ALL we can handle, WHAT we can handle, and the RESPONSIBILITY to handle His gifts properly. The troubles and human tragedies that often beset us result from our failure to use what He has given us, and from our misuse and abuse of His gifts, and sometimes from our deliberate rejection of His instructions concerning life, its physical blessings, and the spiritual insight into the purpose and duties of life. It is easy to see what terrible harm we can do to ourselves by rejecting God's Plan and trying to declare our independence (Gen. 6:5; Rom. 1:16-32).

Let us be thankful to God for life and for our sufficiency in Him, and let us be diligent in our use of His blessings and of His direction in holiness and obedience unto eternal salvation (Heb. 5:9). &

"Supplement Your Faith" #8

By Bob Myhan

In order to continue being "partakers of the divine nature" we must “make every effort to supplement…brotherly affection with love" (2 Peter 1:4-6, ESV).

The Greek word for “love” is used “to describe the attitude of God toward His Son, the human race, generally, and to such as believe on the Lord Jesus, particularly." It is also used "to express the essential nature of God." It “is not an impulse from the feelings, it does not always run with the natural inclinations, nor...spend itself only upon those for whom some affinity is discovered." Rather, it "seeks the welfare of all" (Vine).

Paul explains the essentiality of love in his first epistle to the Corinthian church,

If I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. If I give away all that I have, and if I deliver up my body to be burned, but have not love, I gain nothing (1 Cor. 13:1-3).

Thus, life without love is futile.

In this same chapter, Paul describes love.

“Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things” (1 Cor. 13:4-7).

Thus, love has a character of its own. It necessarily imparts this character to all who possess it. Thus, those who are characterized by love will never seek anything but the highest good of their fellow men, no matter what and who their fellow men are, what attitude their fellow men have toward them or how they are treated by their fellow men. This is the very essence of God’s love toward us (Rom. 5:8).

Paul also points out that, unlike miraculous, spiritual gifts which were temporary, love will never fail (1 Cor. 13:8-12).

The apostle then points out that love will outlive faith and hope (1 Cor. 13:13). Faith will eventually become sight (2 Cor. 5:5-10); hope will eventually become possession (1 Peter 1:3-5); love will never be replaced.

One is to love God (Mark 12:29, 30), his neighbor (Mark 12:31), his brethren (1 Peter 1:22) and his enemy (Matt. 5:43, 44). Husbands are also to love their wives (Eph. 5:25, 33). Notice that the proper objects of love are persons.

The love commanded in the above passages is not an emotional but a volitional love—a love of the will—to be seen, not merely felt. Love God by keeping His commandments (1 John 5:3); love your neighbor by striving to meet whatever need he might happen to have (Luke 10:25-37); love the brethren by laying down your life for them (1 John 3:16-18); love your enemy by seeing to his physical needs (Rom. 12:19-21); and love your wife by nourishing and cherishing her (Eph. 5:28,29). Love is the “acid test” [utmost proof] of knowing God (1 John 4:8).

Dear reader, do you know God? &

There Has Never Been But One Gospel

By Bob Myhan

The main promoter of the idea that the gospels are not part of the New Testament said, "There are four different ‘gospels’ mentioned in the Scriptures." He says this in an attempt to explain away the opening statement of Mark’s account.

The "gospel" God preached to Abraham is the same gospel the apostles preached in the book of Acts. There has never been but one gospel—the one which was first preached when God said to the serpent,

"And I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your seed and her Seed; He shall bruise your head, and you shall bruise His heel" (Gen. 3:15).

God has revealed His will in just such a way that will best facilitate our understanding it. If the Son of God had come into the world immediately after the first sin, there is no way that anyone could ever have appreciated the love of God. So God introduced the principle of sacrifice, and developed that principle incrementally [see Mark 4:28], until such time that His love—as fully demonstrated through the sacrifice of His Son—could be appreciated and reciprocated by man. Hundreds of years after preaching the gospel to the serpent, He preached it to Abraham (Gen. 12:3; Gal. 3:8). He later preached it to Israel through Moses (Deut. 18:15-19), all the OT prophets (Acts 3:19-26), John the immerser (Matt. 3:1, 2) Jesus (Matt. 4:17), the apostles (Matt. 10:7) and the seventy (Luke 10:8-10).

This was the same gospel preached by Peter on the first Day of Pentecost following the Lord's ascension to heaven. There is only a difference in tense. Before Pentecost the preaching of the gospel involved what God was going to do. After Pentecost the preaching of the gospel involved what God had done. But there was certainly no difference between "what God was going to do" prior to the cross and "what God had done" after the cross.

Regarding the opening statement of the gospel of Mark, “The beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ, the Son of God,” the main advocate of MMLJBC says that Mark was writing about the beginning of "the 'fulfillment' of all the teaching and prophecies which was the 'purpose' and 'mission' of John and Jesus to Israel (Matt. 5:17-18; Lk. 24:44)." This is certainly correct but the "good news" has always been about the fulfillment of God's eternal purpose. Prior to the cross, it would be accomplished; after the cross it had been accomplished.

Paul referred to himself as “a bondservant of Jesus Christ, called to be an apostle, separated to the gospel of God which He promised before through His prophets in the Holy Scriptures” (Rom. 1:1-2). So the gospel Paul preached was that which was “promised before” to Abraham and others.