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 →

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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 →

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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 →

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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 →

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“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 →

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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 →

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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 →

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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 →

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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 →

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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 →

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Faith and the Spirit’s Leading

Posted on August 5, 2014 by Steve Husting

What is faith?

A definition is in order. What is faith? If faith means to believe something without proof, as many claim, then how is it different from blind faith? What I find funny is that those who dislike faith because it believes without proof, believe in this definition of faith – without proof!

The word faith appears many times in the Bible in the New Testament, which was written in Greek. If we turn to a Greek scholar’s work, Vine’s Expository Dictionary of New Testament Words and look up faith, we find it is the word pistis, which means “primarily, firm persuasion (akin to peitho, to persuade), a conviction based upon hearing, is used in the N.T. always of faith in God or Christ, or things spiritual.”

To have faith means to have a firm conviction about something. How one comes to faith is not in the meaning of the word. One may have faith based on a wide variety of evidence, or not; the proof is not part of the semantic meaning of the word. The meaning of faith is centered on the persuasion you have, not on how you arrived by that persuasion, or even what you believe in.

Those who say that (true) faith is blind or that it means to believe something against all reason are wrong. Religious faith is based on a Greek word with a real definition found in a Greek dictionary which derives its meaning from the N.T. context in which it appears. Faith means to be persuaded of something. (The only biblically sound reason for faith to mean something different is when it’s said to be “the faith,” in which case it is talking about the Christian life and doctrine in general.)

If you strongly insist (have a firm conviction, have faith) that faith means to believe something in spite of the facts, then your personal faith is real, but based on false information.

A wrong meaning of faith will result in wrong practices and a wrong understanding of the Scriptures in which the word appears. Continue reading →

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Does the Holy Spirit still lead believers today?

Posted on July 14, 2014 by Steve Husting

The book of Acts relates several accounts of men who were directed by the Holy Spirit to say certain things, do something, or go somewhere. Is this direction of the Holy Spirit supposed to continue in today’s church? Or did it stop back in the days of the apostles in the first century? Continue reading →

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Evolution vs. Creation: Collision of Two Worldviews

Posted on June 20, 2014 by Steve Husting

Neither creation nor macro-evolution have physical proof for their positions. Rather, each party looks at the scientific data from their own perspective and looks for evidence to support it. For instance, the people who are convinced that macroevolution has occurred look at all the fossils unearthed over the centuries and concludes, “Well, since we all evolved, then these invertebrates probably evolved one after the other and the vertebrates branched off and evolved their own way. All these bird-like creatures evolved in order and the mammals branched off and evolved, splitting up more and more, based on the similarities among them.” The evidence is plain.

Those who believe God created each kind of creature by itself, seeing the same data the evolutionist sees, concludes, “All fossilize skeletons are full and complete. All parts needed to be a living creature are all accounted for. There are no in-betweens. These skeletons illustrate the biblical account, that God formed each animal according to its kind. They did not evolve but were created as is.” The evidence is plain.

Same data; same science; different viewpoints Continue reading →

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Book Review: When the Storm Hits

Posted on June 12, 2014 by Steve Husting

When the Storm Hits
by Chuck Smith
Copyright 2013 The Word for Today
http://www.twft.com

What do we do when the storm hits; how are we to react when the troubles come?
This book reminded me of several perspectives regarding our trials that I had forgotten. God has a purpose for our trials that Christless people cannot share in. Our trials will not overwhelm us when we see them through God’s eyes. Here are just a few thoughts that were prompted by the pages of this worthwhile book by the late Chuck Smith, who pastored the Calvary Chapel church in Costa Mesa, CA.

Continue reading →

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What is intimacy with Jesus?

Posted on June 9, 2014 by Steve Husting

What does it mean when Christians talk about having intimacy, or a deep relationship, with Jesus? There are many ways to describe it and experience it. I will talk about one way of entering into that intimacy or fellowship with Jesus and continuing in it all day. Continue reading →

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Do we need the power of the Holy Spirit?

Posted on June 3, 2014 by Steve Husting

Recently one of my prayer group regulars talked about our need of the Holy Spirit’s power upon us just as it was on the disciples in Acts. He seemed to think it was a matter of just asking for it and the power would be given.

Based on the stories of the empowering of the apostles in Acts, I wonder if there is more to it than that. The apostles had a goal that was bigger than them, so they required God’s own power to make it happen. “Go ye into all the world and preach the gospel.” That’s a God-size task requiring God’s power.

I suspect that most of us have much smaller goals in mind and we pace ourselves so that we can accomplish them in our own strength. Our goals may be work-related, hobby-related, or something to do with home or school. But for the most part we won’t be asking for God’s empowering because our tasks are modest and doable on our own. Continue reading →

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Why macro-evolution doesn’t make sense

Posted on May 23, 2014 by Steve Husting

One major barrier against the gradual evolution of relatively simple organisms into complex ones rests on the organism’s inability to understand its environment and adapt to it.

For instance, how could a blind organism understand that color is produced by light waves reflected by or absorbed by objects, and correctly deduce that it must create an eye composed of rods and cones to capture these rays and correctly interpret them? How could a blind organism know that light could be too bright or too dark and create a pupil which dilates and contracts to monitor the correct amount of light?  It just doesn’t make sense that something blind and primitive could instinctively understand that color is seen according to an object reflecting certain invisible wavelengths of light. Continue reading →

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Why can’t we explain our faith to the skeptic?

Posted on May 11, 2014 by Steve Husting

I’ve had a hard time using logic to explain to skeptics why our Christian beliefs are true and defensible (and even logical). Why? Because some of the wisdom was gained through the logic of life experience, and no shortcuts exist.

When getting to know a stranger for the first time, we may start out with distrust or indifference. That’s normal. Respect or trust for the other comes with experience spent with that person or hearing of his or her admirable exploits. So it is with people who don’t know Jesus or the Father. Their questions are sometimes filled with mistrust, doubt, or anger. Jesus said to abide (remain) with Him, then we’ll bear much fruit (John 15:4-7). There are no shortcuts to being a fruitful Christian; but when the fruit is attained and God gets the glory, the Christian can look back and trace the work of God, and it all makes sense. It’s a logic born of experience. Continue reading →

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Aren’t Jesus’ words more authoritative than Paul’s?

Posted on April 26, 2014 by Steve Husting

Someone asked this question because they saw a verse where Paul seems to contradict Jesus. (In that instance, Jesus said the law will not pass away, yet Paul wrote it was passing away.) Also, since Jesus is God and Paul was a mortal, it makes it easier to prefer one over the other when these kinds of issues arise.

We must remember that Jesus Himself chose Paul, so we should not count Paul out too quickly. Jesus spoke directly to Paul in a vision in Acts 9:1-6. Then Jesus called an unnamed servant to lay hands on him, telling him that Paul was “a chosen vessel to me” in Acts 9:10-17. Paul was then filled with the Holy Spirit.

Paul testified of being taught by Christ and that He is the source of his wisdom (Galatians 1:10-17). Paul acted as an ambassador of Christ (2 Cor. 5:20) and was careful to represent His perspective in all his words and conduct. (Oh, that we would do the same!)

Much of his writings were derived from the Old Testament, which was written under the inspiration of God. In the end, Paul’s epistles were entered into the biblical canon as also inspired by God. In other words, his words are given equal weight as those in the OT. All his words, as well as Christ’s, were of God, so whatever they wrote will be in agreement when correctly understood. This is because God, being the author of the Bible, doesn’t contradict himself. So if you find a contradiction between Jesus and Paul, you need to search deeper.

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Through the sciences we have gained much knowledge about how the world works, so why do we need a god?

Posted on April 10, 2014 by Steve Husting

This kind of question is usually asked of those in the sciences who are personally pursuing knowledge. If they write a book, they’ll usually write about ancient man’s inability to explain the forces of nature, and so they invented a divine being and attributed all the unknown processes to that god.

Since the author himself is in the field of knowledge, it makes sense for him to view the whole world through his personal, narrow lens. If the person is in psychology, he will write about ancient man’s inability to understand himself, so he invented a god who gives him worth and understanding. But now that we have psychology, we don’t need religion anymore. You could go on and on with a variety of worldviews, each claiming to have the answer that ancient man did not have. Continue reading →

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If I do many good works, will I go to heaven?

Posted on April 8, 2014 by Steve Husting

Think about what the question implies. It assumes that because of doing many good works, we’ve put God on the spot; the Creator of the universe is in our debt! We’re saying that He owes us heaven because of all our hard work. The book of Romans addresses this way of thinking with these words: “Now to him who works, the wages are not counted as grace but as debt” (Romans 4:4).

When I work for a company for a week, then the company is in debt to me and owes me a week’s wage. But that is not the way it works between God and us. The Bible clearly teaches us that we are sinners who are fallen from God’s high standard of a holy, loving relationship with Him (Romans 3:23). Thus, as unbelieving sinners, we were already condemned and ready for everlasting punishment (John 3:18). Continue reading →

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How can you believe the church has the truth when there are so many conflicting denominations?

Posted on February 8, 2014 by Steve Husting

How can Christians say they know the truth about God when their theology and beliefs are fractured in so many ways? How can any one group be sure of themselves, that they got it right? The same way anyone else becomes sure: engage the mind and examine the knowledge for oneself. Normal life is like a supermarket, with an abundance of things and ideas to choose from. Continue reading →

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Why do people not change or grow in their faith?

Posted on January 4, 2014 by Steve Husting

Jesus made clear what is the greatest commandment: to love the Lord God with all our heart, soul, mind, and strength (Matthew 22:34-40). Here is God’s highest aspiration for His creation. Yet so many of us, religious and non-religious, fail to go in this direction. Why don’t more people grow spiritually? May I propose one significant reason, which was stated in Proverbs? “Every way of a man is right in his own eyes” (Proverbs 21:2a).

Sin tells me to put self first. So any thoughts that promote my self-comfort will sit well with me. Any ideas or acts that advance my self-interest will have my blessing. Every intent of the heart that boosts my self-righteousness (and puts down others) is right in my own eyes. Continue reading →

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I believe God can answer my prayers, but how can I believe he will answer them?

Posted on December 26, 2013 by Steve Husting

Some of you are praying for a loved one’s healing of a dreaded disease. Others are praying for someone’s salvation or that she will return to the Lord. However, it’s hard to believe God for the outcome if you don’t know what will happen. Counsel like “God answers our prayers with ‘yes,’ ’no,’ and ‘not right now’ ” are intellectually and emotionally unsatisfactory. Continue reading →

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Paralyzed When Making New Year’s Resolutions?

Posted on December 24, 2013 by Steve Husting

A centurion came to Jesus and told Him, “Lord, my servant is lying at home paralyzed, dreadfully tormented.” Have you felt paralyzed at home lately? You have decisions to make, but feel too frozen to move? You have things to do, but can’t get going? You are tormented by things nagging in your mind, but can’t find the energy or will to do them? It’s like a sickness in you that you can’t heal. Continue reading →

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How do we grow in Christ’s love?

Posted on December 14, 2013 by Steve Husting

The Bible expects us to grow in love. For instance, Philippians 1:9 tells us, “that your love may abound still more and more in knowledge and all discernment.” When we were saved, God did not limit our salvation to merely escape from judgment and enter heaven, but to change us that we become more like his son, Jesus. How, then, does this process occur? Continue reading →

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Is it fair for good people to end up in Hell just because they didn’t receive the salvation of Jesus?

Posted on December 5, 2013 by Steve Husting

Of course it is fair. Heaven is God’s home. If a person arrived at your doorstep saying they’re a good person, would you let him in to live with you as long as he wanted? Of course not! If you have a good excuse not to let that good person in, then give God the benefit of the doubt too. He has given us reasons in the Bible. Continue reading →

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Are people completely destroyed in Hell, or do they remain conscious?

Posted on December 1, 2013 by Steve Husting

I see two striking examples of people in Hell that give us an answer. Let’s look at the longest one first, found in Luke 16. Jesus told this story to the Pharisees: Continue reading →

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Modern Family: Talking to the Camera

Posted on November 28, 2013 by Steve Husting

The TV sit-com Modern Family integrates a technique used in reality shows such as Survivor and Master Chef in which the contestants talk candidly about themselves on camera away from the others. The Office also used this means to comedic effect, and it was a staple of the series. Continue reading →

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Is everything really working out for our good?

Posted on November 23, 2013 by Steve Husting

We see so many things going wrong in the world today that we wonder if God is really in control as much as people seem to believe. We suffer relationship problems, money issues, physical and mental anguish, and wonder whether God is really with us. Is God really working things together for good? Is God really for us? All our struggles seem to indicate the opposite! One verse in the Bible seems to imply that God is in full control of all that happens: Continue reading →

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