Bulletin Edition January 2018

THEY ARE GONE!
I want every child of God to realize the fact that at this very moment
all of his sins are gone – effectually, completely, perfectly gone, -
through the great sacrifice of the Lord Jesus Christ. All of your sins,
from the cradle to the grave, sins before conversion and sins after
conversion, and sins of every kind are washed away in Immanuel’s
precious blood. Since Christ has died in our stead, under the sentence
of God’s law, we shall never be charged with sin. God has removed our
sins from his book, from his memory, and from us. In Christ we have been
freed from sin. “As far as the east is from the west, so far hath he
removed our transgressions from us” (Psa. 103:112). Stephen Charnock
said, “When sin is pardoned, it is never charged again; the guilt of it
can no more return than east can become west, or west become east.”
Spurgeon said, “Our sins are so effectually removed that we shall not
ultimately suffer any loss or damage through having sinned. That
detriment was laid on Christ. His was the loss: ours is the gain. His
was the suffering: ours is the unutterable joy.” And God himself says,
“I, even I am he that blotteth out thy transgressions, and will not
remember thy sins” (Isa. 43:25).
Did you hear what Jesus said to me?
They’re all taken away, away.
Your sins are pardoned and you are free,
They’re all taken away!
Don Fortner.


In all spiritual things all your temptations, all your darkness, all
your wanderings God will overrule. It shall be well with you. There
shall never be a night, but that morning shall come; there shall never
be a day of trouble, but a day of prosperity shall follow; there shall
never be an emptying, but there shall be a filling; there shall never be
a bringing down, but that He will raise you up again. Let it be either
darkness or light, sorrow or grief, night or day, life or death, time or
eternity, “It shall be well with the righteous.” - Scott Richardson


The Good Light
Genesis 1: 4-5
The Light God saw and called good from before the foundation of the
world, that Light which separates his children out of darkness into his
marvelous light, which makes his newly created children to be children
of the Day and no longer children of the night, is Christ Jesus the
Light. As the Word creates us anew in spirit, so the Lord shall create
our bodies anew when he returns (1 Corinthians 15: 5-57). So too, the
new heavens and new earth shall be his righteous creation (Revelation
21: 1-7).

Brethren, we spent the days of our darkness looking at creation (even
religious traditions) trying to understand God. But when God gives the
Light of Christ we look to God and then understand creation. “The sun
shall be no more thy light by day; neither for brightness shall the moon
give light unto thee: but the LORD shall be unto thee an everlasting
light, and thy God thy glory” (Is 60: 19).Clay Curtis.



The Great Darkness Of Light
Tommy Robbins
“But if thine eye be evil, thy whole body shall be full of darkness. If
therefore the light that is in thee be darkness, how great is that
darkness!” Matthew 6:23
The eye that cannot see is in bondage to that which is within. Someone
that has never had the gift of sight has no visual concept of anything
outside himself. Therefore there is nothing but darkness. This condition
is so natural and fixed that this is the way of life for him. There is
no hope for anything different except for a miracle. And even then this
must be wrought by a power other than his own.

This is the case of all mankind Spiritually. How great is that darkness?
Complete! No light at all! The Spiritual light that is in man by virtue
of our fallen nature is great and total darkness. Newton described it
this way - “I once was lost, but now am found; Was blind, but now I
see”. This great darkness can only be attributed to blindness. The only
way that this horrible condition can be reversed is by a miracle of
God’s grace - AMAZING GRACE! Those who live and remain in darkness
cannot see the light of the glorious gospel of Jesus Christ. They cannot
see the truth of God. They cannot see Christ crucified. They cannot see
themselves in the light of God’s Word.

Spiritual blindness is far greater and worse than physical blindness.
Those who are Spiritually blind would have it no other way. They love
it! - “This is the condemnation, that light is come into the world, and
men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil.”
John 3:19. A sight of the Lord Jesus Christ is the last thing they want.
But, thanks be unto God, if and when Christ reveals Himself to them, He
is all they want! A sight of HIM makes all the difference between great
darkness and great light. How great is THAT LIGHT? - “For God, who
commanded the light to shine out of darkness, hath shined in our hearts,
to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of
Jesus Christ.” 2Co 4:6 - GREATER THAN THE DARKNESS!



BELIEVE YE
Believe ye that I am able to do this?” (Matthew 9:28).

This was a question the Lord asked two blind men regarding His ability
to give them sight. Their answer was, “Yea, Lord.” Here we are given an
illustration of what faith really is.

Faith is not believing you are saved, or believing that God loves you
and Christ died for you, or believing all of your sins are forgiven, or
believing you are perfect in God’s sight. These things belong to the
realm of assurance. Faith is neither more nor less than believing that
He is able to save you. Paul said in II Timothy 1:12, “I am persuaded
that He is able….” Assurance that you are saved and all of your sins are
forgiven will come out of that, but the actual act of faith is believing
He is able. If you lack assurance, perhaps you have never really
believed that “He is able.” Believing He is able will lead to the
assurance of these things, because you are relying upon His ability, and
not your own.
Todd Nibert



Faith
It is a blessing to experience those times when all seems well and faith
comes easily, when it seems the very air is filled with the presence of
the Lord. Such times are a blessing, but they are no proof of true
faith. Faith is proven when it endures the HARD times. When the heart is
broken, the mind confused, and the body weak, then is faith put to the
test and proven whether it be genuine. When faith survives those times
when there is NO FEELING to verify it, NO EVIDENCE to confirm it, and NO
FLESHY ENERGY to sustain it, then and only then can we discover that we
have that faith that is “the gift of God," God’s gifts are "without
repentance,” and this is as true of faith as any of His other gifts. We
know we have believed when we never repent of our faith, but believe in
the very face at all that is opposed to faith. This is the trial and
proof of faith. --
Joe Terrell


A child of God is like a person in a beautiful palace; if there is light
in it, he sees the splendid objects around him, and enjoys them; but if
the light is removed, he is nevertheless in the palace still, and
surrounded with the same splendid objects as before, though he cannot
see them. So, though the believer’s frames and sensible comforts may
have their ebbs and flows, his state, Godward, is invariably the same.
–Augustus Toplady


Brethren, catch this one phrase, God “commanded the light to shine out
of darkness.” Child of God, are you suffering in some dark trial? Has
some dark sickness taken its toll on your body? Is there some dark
calamity fallen over you and your family? God commands the light to
shine out of darkness.
All we have to do is remember what we were when Christ sent the gospel
to us. We were total darkness. As the world fell from how God originally
created it, so that it was without and form and void, so we fell from
how God created Adam so that the nature we received from Adam was only a
lifeless, formless, void. Our minds were darkness; our hearts were
darkness; our affections were darkness. But God, who commanded the light
to shine out of darkness in the beginning of this world, shined in our
hearts. Doing so, he gave us the light of the knowledge of the glory of
God in the face of Jesus Christ. For the first time, we saw God’s glory
shining as the noon day sun. We saw it when, by faith, we saw the face
of the Lord Jesus Christ.
When we think what God did in giving us light to behold Christ, may it
remind us in whatever darkness has befallen us that God turns the water
of affliction into the wine of heavenly consolation. He makes poverty
riches and sickness health. Sometimes darkness is good in that it blinds
us from everything that is unnecessary. His light makes us focus on the
one thing needful. May God once again command the light to shine out of
darkness; may he shine in our hearts and give us light to behold that if
we have the Lord Jesus Christ then all is Light.
Clay Curtis.



BELIEVING IS NO SMALL THING!
Henry Mahan
To believe God is no small thing! It is the evidence of a heart
reconciled unto God; it is the proof of our being weaned from our own
works and deeds; it is a clear sign of the true conviction of sin; it is
honoring to Christ, our only Redeemer; it is the essence of true
worship; and it is the root of sincere obedience.

The person who believes God in spite of his sin and infirmities, who
believes God in spite of fleshly wisdom and opposition, who believes God
come what may, gives the Lord God more honor and glory than the cherubim
and seraphim in their continual adoration.

DO YOU THINK FAITH A SMALL THING? How is it then that our Lord said, "He
that believeth on the Son hath eternal life?" How is it that a whole
nation perished in the wilderness because of UNBELIEF? How is it that we
are said to be "justified by faith," and "He that believeth not shall be
damned?" Faith is the parent grace. Whatever you put in second place,
faith must have the first consideration; for it is not a small thing - -
IT IS YOUR LIFE! "If you can believe, all things are possible to him
that believeth." John Flavel said, "The soul is the life of the body.
Faith is the life of the soul. Christ is the life of faith."

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