Armor of God Series: the Belt of Truth

Posted on December 29, 2014 by Steve Husting

“Stand therefore, having fastened on the belt of truth, and having put on the breastplate of righteousness” (Eph. 6:14).

With the truth, we are seeing things as they really are. The truth is not just facts, but facts acted on.

A person may research what the Bible says about idolatry, which is putting something ahead of God or Jesus, and miss seeing his own idolatry. He has all the facts about the idolatry that drove Israel from God in the OT; he can list the idols the NT epistles condemn. But when it comes to his own idolatry – his life emphasis on hobbies and leisure, for example – he doesn’t yet have the truth of idolatry, that he needs to set Jesus first and foremost.

Through the Word, the Spirit impresses the truth of the spiritual state upon the child of God’s heart. Accepting the truth, he repents and puts his idols in their proper place. The truth makes a difference; facts are just the tools the Spirit uses to communicate life-changing light to us. Continue reading →

Posted in Encouragement | Tagged | Leave a comment

Does God care about the Christmas holiday?

Posted on December 22, 2014 by Steve Husting

Does God care about us displaying Christmas trees? Does He require that we put on happy faces for the holidays? Do we need to put up Christmas lights? Are we to be ashamed if we don’t have a scene of the nativity in our homes? Do our churches have to play Christmas music? Does He require that we give gifts? How much importance should we give to this post-Thanksgiving season? Since we are made in the image of God, we should see what God thinks about it, then conform ourselves to His outlook on the world and its customs. Continue reading →

Posted in Society and Culture | Tagged , | Leave a comment

The Faith to Endure Hardship

Posted on December 16, 2014 by Steve Husting

In Hebrews 11, we are introduced to a series of individuals who were known for their faith. Noah prepared an ark, expecting a flood. Abraham moved out of his country at the word of God, not knowing where he was going. Sarah believed God, and birthed a child in her old age. Moses left the pleasures of Egypt to journey with the people of God. They were not just known for faith – but an enduring faith; they were tested in hard circumstances and kept on trusting in God no matter what.

In Hebrews chapter 12, the spotlight swings to the readers of the epistle. “Surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses” (12:1), the witnesses of God’s faithfulness noted in chapter 11, what are we to do? Continue reading →

Posted in Encouragement | Tagged , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

A Clean Conscience At Last

Posted on November 15, 2014 by Steve Husting

At the coming of Jesus, God introduced something new. With the death, burial, and resurrection of the Christ, God creates a new covenant with believers that results in a clean conscience. The tenth chapter of Hebrews explains this feature of our salvation that many of us are unaware of, and so have let the shame of our past taint the present. We don’t have to let guilty thoughts from past wrongs paralyze us from moving forward. Let’s cover these verses in detail, because the words of Christ are still true: “the truth shall make you free.” Continue reading →

Posted in Encouragement | Tagged , , , , | Leave a comment

“Love your neighbor as yourself”

Posted on November 8, 2014 by Steve Husting

Jesus told us to love our neighbor as we love ourselves in Mark 12:31. Some people have said that they cannot love their neighbor as they ought because they do not love themselves. On the contrary, the Bible is clear that we love ourselves too much! In this article, I hope to reveal how we love ourselves, and armed with these thoughts, how we can love our neighbor as ourselves.

If we replace the word love with other words, the commandment becomes easier to comprehend. Replace “love yourself” with “pamper yourself,” “show mercy to yourself,” “take care of yourself,” “do good to yourself,” and then the ideas on how to love others begin to form. Let’s look at some examples of how we love ourselves. Continue reading →

Posted in Encouragement | Leave a comment

How does the Christian overcome?

Posted on November 6, 2014 by Steve Husting

The Bible tells us that Christians have the victory, or that they overcome. What does that mean? What does that victory look like? How can we know that we are overcoming?

First John 5:2-5 tell us that we have the victory and have overcome the world. Here is the passage, which we will cover in more detail later:

By this we know that we love the children of God, when we love God, and keep his commandments.
For this is the love of God, that we keep his commandments: and his commandments are not grievous.
For whatsoever is born of God overcometh the world: and this is the victory that overcometh the world, even our faith.
Who is he that overcometh the world, but he that believeth that Jesus is the Son of God? Continue reading →

Posted in Sin and Salvation | Tagged , , , , | Leave a comment

Why should we read the Old Testament?

Posted on October 25, 2014 by Steve Husting

Is the Old Testament (OT) of any value nowadays? Many people say that we no longer have to follow all those laws and rules anymore, so why bother reading it at all? I’ve read through the OT many times along with the NT. (I regularly read the Bible from front to back.) Here are some of the ways I’ve benefited from reading the whole Bible, and how you can be blessed by it too. Continue reading →

Posted in The Bible | Tagged , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

How do we Fight the Devil?

Posted on October 9, 2014 by Steve Husting

The Bible tells us how to address the one “who deceives the whole world” (Revelation 12:9) in several revealing passages in the New Testament. In none of them are we told to attack him directly. Rather, we remove the means for him to attack us. For instance, we would not want to go after a stronger opponent with a knife in our hand if he is a better fighter than ourselves, because he could take the knife away from us and use it to hurt us. The principle is the same here: by refusing to look to the flesh to save us, we deprive the devil of a weapon to use against us. Let’s see how the NT communicates this idea. Continue reading →

Posted in Demons, H e l l and Suffering | Tagged , , , , , | Leave a comment

The Salvation of the Soul

Posted on September 13, 2014 by Steve Husting

What is the salvation of the soul, and what does it look like? The first few verses of 1 Peter chapter one give us a strong sense of this salvation and then concludes with, “receiving the end of your faith – the salvation of your souls” (1 Peter 1:9). What is this salvation, and how can we know whether our spiritual growth is heading in the right direction? Continue reading →

Posted in Encouragement | Tagged , , , , , , | Leave a comment

The Neglected Deliverance

Posted on August 29, 2014 by Steve Husting

We tend to seek the Lord’s deliverance when we get into personal trouble. But there is a deliverance that keeps us out of the trouble in the first place. Which would you like – to fall into trouble and try to get out of it, or to avoid it in the first place?

For instance, the word tells us about deliverance from the snare of the fowler and from the perilous pestilence (Psalms 91:3). Our first impression of this deliverance is that we’ve fallen into a trap or are experiencing a spiritual plague and the Lord promises to rescue us from it. But that’s not the best way the Lord delivers us. For instance, Proverbs identifies the promiscuous woman and tells us to avoid her (Proverbs 5). Avoiding her, we avoid a terrible fate. Thus, by heeding the warnings of Scripture we identify and avoid the traps beforehand while the more simple-minded don’t pay attention – and fall right in (Proverbs 22:3). Continue reading →

Posted in Encouragement | Tagged , , , , , | Leave a comment