God preserves all things through His providence. Without God continual care and activity the world or universe or earth would not exist. God also preserves His people through His providence. Therefore, the doctrine of providence affirms God's absolute lordship over His creature and confirms the dependence of all creation on the Creator.

It is the denial of the idea that the world or universe is governed by chance or fate or otherwise. In other words, nothing happens by chance and there is always a reason for everything. God is King of the universe who has given the Lord Jesus Christ all power and authority to reign. - Matt. 28:18 - "God gives Jesus the Spirit without reserve. The Father loves the Son and has entrusted everything to him." - John 3:35 -

'For this reason the whole House of Israel can be certain that God has made this Jesus whom you crucified both Lord and Christ.' - Acts 2:36 -

This you can tell from the strength of his power at work in Christ, which he used to raise him from the dead and to make him sit at his right hand, in heaven, far above every Sovereignty, Authority, Power, or Domination, or any other name that can be named, not only in this age but also in the age to come. He has put all things under his feet, and made him, as the ruler of everything, the head of the Church; which is his body, the fullness of him who fills the whole creation. - Eph. 1:20-23 -

Apparently, God permits sinful acts to occur but God does not cause man to sin or tempt or entice man to sin. If man chose to sin, do man think he and she will escape God's judgment? Be sure that, man stubborn refusal to repent is only adding to the anger of God and when His just judgment will be known, God will repay each one as his and her works deserve.

By divine power, he has given us all the things that we need for life and for true devotion, bringing us to know God himself, who has called us by his own glory and goodness. In making these gifts, he has given us the guarantee of something very great and wonderful to come: through them you will be able to share the divine nature and to escape corruption in a world that is sunk in vice. But to attain this, you will have to do your utmost yourselves, adding goodness to the faith that you have, understanding to your goodness, self-control to your understanding, patience to your self-control, true devotion to your patience, kindness towards your fellow men to your devotion, and, to this kindness, love.

If you have a generous supply of these, they will not leave you ineffectual of unproductive: they will bring you to a real knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. But without them a man is blind or else short-sighted; he has forgotten how his past sins were washed away. Brothers, you have been called and chosen: work all the harder to justify it. If you do all these things there is no danger that you will ever fall away. In this way you will be granted admittance into the eternal kingdom of our Lord and saviour Jesus Christ. - 2 Peter:1:3-11 -

However, man is not free to choose and act independently from God's will and God's plan. God chooses and acts in accordance with them. In His sovereignty, God controls man's choices and actions. "Then Joseph said to his brothers, 'Come closer to me.' When they had come closer to him he said, I am your brother Joseph whom you sold into Egypt. But now, do not grieve, do not reproach yourselves for having sold me here, since God sent me before you to preserve your lives." - Gen. 45:4-5 - God's actions, however, do not violate the reality of human choice or negate man's responsibility as a moral being.

For the first 27 years of my life I was an atheist or a pagan. I was born in 1962, and I have no knowledge and information about my infancy period until I was 6 years old. By then, through years of hard labours, I came to know, understand and greatly empathized what is abject poverty, humiliation, being abused, violent situation, notorious environment, hunger, that is, sometimes living without food for a day because in order to have food to eat I have to worked, waking up early in the morning, that is, from 7 a.m. to 11 a.m. on weekend and on weekday, after schooling. I was only 6 years old then, and its continued until I was 15 years old.

Incidentally, I was not living with my family but with my relative. I think this is one of my saddest reminiscence. This is just a small part of the summary because as scripture says: if anyone wants to boast, let him boast about the Lord. This is exactly what I must do. Thus, a brief account where I came from, indicating that God is presence in my life, and indeed, it is considered a blessing from God because I am still alive today. As a result, I believed God preserves all things through His providence.

As it is, I grew up without knowing much about so many things, for example, speaking properly and with mannerism, writing a message or a letter, even speaking in English language is a major obstacle, etc, etc. When I began to know how to think a little, question like, Does God know what it is to suffer? Does God know anything about being born and not knowing who is my father and mother? and many, many others, but now I called it stupid questions because of God, the Father, the Lord Jesus Christ, mercy and loving-kindness upon me. For "I am nothing and God make me into all things that is good." Amen!

Yes! God knows! For He is Omnipotence! Omnipresence! Omniscience! In accordance with the Sacred Scripture/Holy Bible, God transferred our transgressions, our sufferings, our poverty to Himself and bore them away as the Heavenly Scapegoat. More important still, God overcame them, and the Lord Jesus Christ triumphed by overcoming the pain by giving the earth the only serious wound it ever received - the wound of an empty tomb. ( the Passion, Death, Resurrection )

Brothers, I want to remind you of the gospel I preached to you, the gospel that you received and in which you are firmly established; because the gospel will save you only if you keep believing exactly what I preached to you - believing anything else will not lead to anything.

Well, then, in the first place, I taught you what I had been taught myself, namely that Christ Jesus died for our sins, in accordance with the scriptures; that he was buried; and that he was raised to life on the third day, in accordance with the scriptures; that he appeared first to Cephas and secondly to the Twelve. Next he appeared to more than five hundred of the brothers at the same time, most of whom are still alive, though some have died; then he appeared to James, and then to all the apostles; and last of all he appeared to me too; it was as though I was born when no one expected it.

I am the least of the apostles; in fact, since I persecuted the Church of God, I hardly deserve the name apostle; but by God's grace that is what I am, and the grace that he gave me has not been fruitless. On the contrary, I, or rather the grace of God that is with me, have worked harder than any of the others; but what matters is that I preach what they preach, and this is what you all believed.

Now if Christ raised from the dead is what has been preached, how can some of you be saying that there is no resurrection of the dead? If there is no resurrection of the dead, Christ himself cannot have been raised, and if Christ has not been raised then our preaching is useless and your believing it is useless; indeed, we are shown up as witnesses who have committed perjury before God, because we swore in evidence before God that he had raised Christ to life. For if the dead are not raised, Christ has not been raised, and if Christ has not been raised you are still in your sins. And what is more serious, all who have died in Christ have perished. If our hope in Christ has been for this life only, we are the most unfortunate of all people.

But Christ has in fact been raised from the dead, the first-fruits of all who have fallen asleep. Death came through one man and in the same way the resurrection of the dead has come through one man. Just as all men die in Adam, so all men will be brought to life in Christ; but all of them in their proper order: Christ as the first-fruits and then, after the coming of Christ, those who belong to him. After that will come the end, when he hands over the kingdom to God the Father, having done away with every sovereignty, authority and power. For he must be king until he has put all his enemies under his feet and the last of the enemies to be destroyed is death, for everything is to be put under his feet. - Though when it is said that everything is subjected, this clearly cannot include the One who subjected everything to him. And when everything is subjected to him, then the Son himself will be subject in his turn to the One who subjected to him, so that God may be all in all.

If this were not true, what do people hope to gain by being baptised for the dead? If the dead are not ever going to be raised, why be baptised on their behalf? What about ourselves? Why are we living under a constant threat? I face death everyday, brothers, and I can swear it by the pride that I take in you in Christ Jesus our Lord. If my motives were only human ones, what good would it do me to fight the wild animals at Ephesus? You say: Let us eat and drink today; tomorrow we shall be dead. You must stop being led astray: 'Bad friends ruin the noblest people', Come to your senses, behave properly, and leave sin alone; there are some of you who seem not to know God at all; you should be ashamed. - 1 Cor. 15:1-34 -

All around us, potential converts abound. The tragedy is not that they lack faith, but we seldom ask them to embrace it. A non-Catholic Christian lawyer was asked on his deathbed by his Catholic Christian partner of twenty years, "Now that you are nearing your end, how about coming into the Church?" The dying man raised his eyebrows. "If your faith meant so little to you during the twenty years you have known me", he replied, "it cannot make that much difference now."

Conversions are not more difficult in our times than before, but the approach must be different. Today, people are looking for God not because of the order they find in the universe but because of the disorder they find in themselves.

                                                                       Page 4
Faith . Hope . Love - Welcome donation. Thank You. God bless. 

By bank transfer/cheque deposit:
Name: Alex Chan Kok Wah
Bank: Public Bank Berhad account no: 4076577113
Country: Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.

Sunday, May 24, 2009

I have through years of reading, pondering, reflecting and contemplating, the 3 things that last; FAITH . HOPE . LOVE and I would like to made available my sharing from the many thinkers, authors, scholars and theologians whose ideas and thoughts I have borrowed. God be with them always. Amen!

I STILL HAVE MANY THINGS TO SAY TO YOU BUT THEY WOULD BE TOO MUCH FOR YOU NOW. BUT WHEN THE SPIRIT OF TRUTH COMES, HE WILL LEAD YOU TO THE COMPLETE TRUTH, SINCE HE WILL NOT BE SPEAKING AS FROM HIMSELF, BUT WILL SAY ONLY WHAT HE HAS LEARNT; AND HE WILL TELL YOU OF THE THINGS TO COME.

HE WILL GLORIFY ME, SINCE ALL HE TELLS YOU WILL BE TAKEN FROM WHAT IS MINE. EVERYTHING THE FATHER HAS IS MINE; THAT IS WHY I SAID: ALL HE TELLS YOU WILL BE TAKEN FROM WHAT IS MINE. - JOHN 16:12-15 -

Proper and sound teaching of the 'Gospel' or 'Good News' was a concept deeply engrained in God's chosen people since Old Testament times. Therefore, proper and sound teaching in the faith is essential to the spiritual growth of Christians, and to the development and betterment of the Church. As teaching in the Christian faith and Christian doctrine was validated by the Lord Jesus Christ, in the New Testament. Thus, the concept of teaching is to be distinguished from preaching and the proclamation of the 'Good News' or 'Gospel' especially to the non Christian world.

Indeed, it is for Christians to teach, proclaim, and to preach the behaviour which goes with proper and healthy doctrine. So, keep as our pattern the proper and sound teaching we have heard and learned from the apostles, prophets, disciples in the faith and love that are in the Lord Jesus Christ. Christians have been trusted to look after the 'Gospel' or 'Good News' something very precious. Thus, we must guard it with the help of the Holy Spirit who lives in us. What is this word? It is 'Good News' or 'Gospel' that has been brought to us, from the everlasting word of the living and eternal God.

Testimony of God existence and to be witnesses of the Good News or 'Gospel' to the world is represented the witness of the apostles, prophets, disciples, who are the Lord Jesus Christ, special witnesses. The zeal generated by "Pentecost" together with growing persecution of the apostles, prophets, disciples, and the Lord Jesus Christ faithful, led them to preach and proclaim the greater glory of God, the Father, and the Son of the living God, the Lord Jesus Christ everywhere in the known world. As a result, the Christians was nourished by preaching and proclaiming the Gospel or the Good News.

John has written down everything he saw and swears it is the word of God guaranteed by Jesus Christ. - Rev. 1:2 -

Then I knelt at his [angel] feet to worship him, but he said to me, 'Don't do that: I am a servant just like you and all your brothers who are witnesses to Jesus. It is God you must worship.' The witness Jesus gave is the same as the spirit of prophecy. - Rev. 19:10 -

And so the Lord Jesus, after he had spoken to them, was taken up into heaven: there at the right hand of God he took his place, while they, going out, preached everywhere, the Lord working with them and confirming the word by the signs that accompanied it. - Mark 16:19-20 -

Apostle Peter, and all the apostles, disciples, and the preacher's personal testimony to the Lord Jesus Christ power in his own life was featured in many sermons. As a consequence of such evangelistic passion, thousands was saved when apostle Peter preached and proclaimed God greater glory at Pentecost.

I [apostle Paul], the prisoner in the Lord, implore you therefore to lead a life worthy of your vocation. Bear with one another charitably, in complete selflessness, gentleness and patience. Do all you can to preserve the unity of the Spirit by the peace that binds you together. There is one Body, one Spirit, just as you were all called into one and the same hope when you were called. There is one Lord, one faith, one baptism, and one God who is Father of all, over all, through all and within all.

Each one of us, however, has been given his own share of grace, given as Christ allotted it. It was said that he would:
                                    When he ascended to the height, he captured prisoners,
                                    he gave gifts to men.

When it says, 'he ascended' what can it mean if not that he descended right down to the lower regions of the earth? The one who rose higher than all the heavens to fill all things is none other than the one who descended. And to some, his gift was that they should be apostles; to some, prophets; to some, evangelists; to some, pastors and teachers; so that the saints together make a unity in the work of service, building up the body of Christ. In this way we are all to come to unity in our faith and in our knowledge of the Son of God, until we become the perfect Man, fully mature with the fullness of Christ himself.

Then we shall not be children any longer, or tossed one way and another and carried along by every wind of doctrine, at the mercy of all the tricks men play and their cleverness in practising deceit. If we live by the truth and in love, we shall grow in all ways into Christ, who is the head by whom the whole body is fitted and joined together, every joint adding its own strength, for each separate part to work according to its function. So the body grows until it has built itself up, in love. - Eph. 4:1-16 -

Christians must always remembered that God's gift was not a spirit of timidity, but the Spirit of power, and love, and self-control. So we are never to be ashamed of witnessing to the Lord Jesus Christ.

When we start teaching, preaching of the 'Good News' and the proclamation of the Lord Jesus Christ. Most of us insist on the dignity of our qualification by quickly reprimanding those who show us disrespect or who disagree with us. In fact, most of us practices it, including the Church and it has became a norm. But truly, qualification cannot be apply to the Church and to practicing Christian, because the reason Christian missionary societies attract the young, unbelievers, pagans, and atheists, is that members give a living witness to their zeal for Christ Jesus, the Lord. The hardships they endure, the souls they convert, the complete trust in God despite poverty and even persecution, these make them love God.

Christian primary duty is to search out the lost sheep and stay with it once found. This is what distinguishes the true disciple from the hireling disciple, the intellectual from the intelligentsia. Both are learned and scholarly. The difference lies in their relation to the people. The intellectual never loses that compassion for the multitude which characterized the Word Incarnate. The intelligentsia, on the contrary, live apart from tears and hunger, poverty and ignorance. They lack the common touch. Only the cream of bookish learning, not the milk of human kindness, flows through their veins.

But Peter and John retorted, 'You must judge whether in God's eyes it is right to listen to you and not to God. We cannot promise to stop proclaiming what we have seen and heard.' - Acts 4:19-20 -

No one can come to me
unless he is drawn by the Father who sent me,
and I will raise him up at the last day.
It is written in the prophets:
They will all be taught by God,
and to hear the teaching of the Father,
and learn from it,
is to come to me. - John 6:44-45 -

'If you make my word your home
you will indeed be my disciples,
you will learn the truth
and the truth will make you free.' - John 8:31-32 -

Jesus said: 'I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life.
No one can come to the Father except through me. - John 14:6 -

Jesus answered his disciples:
I have told you all this
so that you may find peace in me.
In the world you will have trouble,
but be brave:
I have conquered the world. - John 16:33 -

                                                                        Page 3
Faith . Hope . Love - Welcome donation. Thank You. God bless. 

By bank transfer/cheque deposit:
Name: Alex Chan Kok Wah
Bank: Public Bank Berhad account no: 4076577113
Country: Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.

Sunday, May 24, 2009

I have through years of reading, pondering, reflecting and contemplating, the 3 things that last; FAITH . HOPE . LOVE and I would like to made available my sharing from the many thinkers, authors, scholars and theologians whose ideas and thoughts I have borrowed. God be with them always. Amen!

I STILL HAVE MANY THINGS TO SAY TO YOU BUT THEY WOULD BE TOO MUCH FOR YOU NOW. BUT WHEN THE SPIRIT OF TRUTH COMES, HE WILL LEAD YOU TO THE COMPLETE TRUTH, SINCE HE WILL NOT BE SPEAKING AS FROM HIMSELF, BUT WILL SAY ONLY WHAT HE HAS LEARNT; AND HE WILL TELL YOU OF THE THINGS TO COME.

HE WILL GLORIFY ME, SINCE ALL HE TELLS YOU WILL BE TAKEN FROM WHAT IS MINE. EVERYTHING THE FATHER HAS IS MINE; THAT IS WHY I SAID: ALL HE TELLS YOU WILL BE TAKEN FROM WHAT IS MINE. - JOHN 16:12-15 -