Meditate on it

God's account of the present condition of fallen man.  We'll learn and see: Satan's devices...God's heart toward sin and the sinner. Man's instinctive knowledge of what sin is and how he tries to hide it from God. God's power over all and His promises to save all. Contrary to popular belief, man is not evolving upward.  He has rather suffered a devastating fall. Because of it, His basic nature is not good, it's evil. His innermost being has been disoriented because of sin.  He's been cut off from God, man is born spiritually dead. Up till now, the most repeated phrase was "and God saw it was good" until it came to Eve and it was "very good."  Ideal marriage.  Could end it here, but it doesn't. Chapter 3 v 1:  Now, the serpent.... Where did he come from?  How did he get in here?  Who is he? Rev 12:7, speakers of a great war in Heaven, Michael and his angels fought against the dragon.  The great dragon was cast into the

3/21/2012 Jack Abeelen In The Beginning (Part 3) Genesis 2 Days 1-5 Wide Angle Day 6 Zoom Lens God introduces himself as Elohim, plural male  "Let God make us in our own imagine, our likeness." On the 7th day, God was finished not tired.  Then at this point, the decay cycle began.... Did the chicken or the egg come first?  The chicken. Tend garden.... tend means to serve you. at this point, joyful tending, secret trust I know I've heard people say, "Well,why put the tree in there? It was perfect until then." But you have to have choice.Love demands choice, right? Love is an action of the will. If you bought a toy, a doll with a string on the back and every time you pulled it the voice of the doll would say, "I love you so much!" I don't think that would satisfying you.  If it would, you need therapy.  Genuine freedom to choose brings always the possibility or the potential for sin. -JA  It's interesting to me and maybe you

3/14/2012 Jack Abeelen In The Beginning (Part 2) Genesis 1:14-31 Passage I found interesting: "So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them." Genesis 1:27 Man and woman, male and female are created in one verse. And God blessed them. And God said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it, and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over every living thing that moves on the earth.” And God said, “Behold, I have given you every plant yielding seed that is on the face of all the earth, and every tree with seed in its fruit. You shall have them for food. And to every beast of the earth and to every bird of the heavens and to everything that creeps on the earth, everything that has the breath of life, I have given every green plant for food.” And it was so. And God saw everything that he had made, and behold, it was very good. And there was evenin

3/7/2012 Jack Abeelen In The Beginning (Part 1) Genesis 1:1-13 Odds and Ends from this sermon on Genesis 1:1-13 6 billion copies, 2,300 dialects 31,000 verses 23,000 old 8,000 new But I don’t really have a complete Bible - I’ve got one Bible where the book of James is falling out and the other one where Exodus only has eleven pages of it. But it’s God’s Word to you, it’s His eternal plans for you, it’s His eternal thoughts towards you. You should be marking it up. Don’t worry about how pretty it is. Look how pretty it is! Wreck it, man, learn it! Eternity past and eternity present God writes with an agenda--to focus your attention upon one person and two events: Jesus Christ His first and second coming 5 Parts 1. Preparation--OT 2. Manifestation-gospels 3. Propitiation--Acts 4. Information (Epistles) 5. Consummation (Revelation) Briggs--pointed out rightly that 4 out of the 5 are NT even though the bulk in terms of volume is OT. OT usually divided into four

6/9/2013 Jack Abeelen Is That Your Final Answer? Ecclesiastes 12 aging dying preparing Aging a sobering process. Aging brings difficult days: Remember also your Creator in the days of your youth, before the evil days come and the years draw near of which you will say, “I have no pleasure in them” Ecclesiastes 12:1 It comes with fear. Loneliness. Uselessness.  Our Western Culture views aging negatively, but Eastern Culture does not.  Actually older people bring more knowledge and skill to the table. Michaegelo was 89 when he painted the Last Judgement. If you walk with the Lord, old age can be a blessing. If you remember your Creator in the days of your youth, your Creator will remember you in the days of your death.

"Guard steps when you go to the house of God. To draw near to listen is better than to offer the sacrifice of fools, for they do not know that they are doing evil." Ecclesiastes 5:1 Approach God and His house of worship with humility.  Drawing near to listen is key, for presumption blinds us to our own sin. "Be not rash with your mouth, nor let your heart be hasty to utter a word before God, for God is in heaven and you are on earth. Therefore let your words be few."   Ecclesiastes 5:2 Be careful with your words. "For a dream comes with much business, and a fool's voice with many words." Ecclesiastes 5:3 Again, the need to measure words.  Is a dream coming with "much business" saying that an over pressed life causes stress-filled dreams? BKC feels that it is more a comparison of the busyness of dreams and the utility of them with the futility of many words. "Solomon compared rash vows to futile or meaningless dreams. This is

6/2/2013 Jack Abeelen Life Is A Gift For Us To Enjoy! Ecclesiastes 11:7-12:1 All notes from are this sermon. "I am come that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly. " -John 10:10 Solomon speaks of viewing life.... 1. realistically--every day will not be a good day--there will be darkness and light. If anything comes into my life, it has passed through His hands. God won't waste five minutes of your hurt. He has a plan, and I rest all that (keeps our tears in a bottle). Solomon wants you realistic not fatalistic. Brother Lawrence--Practicing the Presence, simple pleasures fill life with joy. There is great joy in being young. The feast days were designed for the people to go home with joy, so why do we always see the opposite in church? Beatitudes---blessed? really? Yes because of God's presence. Paul on death row, "The joy of the Lord is your strength." Anymore than you want your children to walk around long faced, God

Jack Abeelen The Value Of Diligence Ecclesiastes 11:1-6 All text from sermon by Jack Abeelen-- Book covers four issues: 1. Monotony of life 2. Emptiness of human wisdom 3. Frustration of gaining wealth in short term, doesn't last, can't secure it when gone 4. Certainty of death Overview: Need to be diligent in serving the Lord because we don't know what's coming. Our limit of involvement is to be diligent with what God gives us. Then watch and see what God will do.  Excuses keep us from God's best. Ecc 11:1  Cast your bread upon the waters, for you will find it after many days. Ecc 11:2  Give a portion to seven, or even to eight, for you know not what disaster may happen on earth. Ecc 11:3  If the clouds are full of rain, they empty themselves on the earth, and if a tree falls to the south or to the north, in the place where the tree falls, there it will lie. Ecc 11:4  He who observes the wind will not sow, and he who regards the clouds will not

5/19/2013 Jack Abeelen Some Foolish Things (Part 2) Ecclesiastes 10:11-20 Much about the dangers of gossip and loose speech, the destructive nature of speech/the tongue out of control. All text transcribed from above sermon: "So this morning, and to the end of chapter 10, Solomon speaks to us about the mouth of a fool and words that we want to pay attention to because we’re to be witnesses in the world; and certainly our greatest influence can often be in what we say and don’t say and how we say it. And boy, you can sure undermine the message you bring by your mouth." -Jack Abeelen "But may I suggest to you that the next time someone wants to share with you, “Just want you to pray, bro, just want to tell you, I trust you, got no one else to talk to but you,” to bring the latest gossip your way – let me suggest five questions you ask them. It’ll stop it. Because I get a lot of those people who come up, “Hey, Pastor, do you know about so-in-so?” “I don’t want t

5/12/2013 Jack Abeelen Some Foolish Things (Part 1) Ecclesiastes 10:1-10 All notes from this sermon: Solomon did well early on (Proverbs) but as he got older and political alliances came before him, he went astray.  He married many foreign women. Ecclesiastes--Greek word literally "gathered things," "church," those who have been called out from the world, gathered together. All of what we have looked at can be categorized under 4 main issues: 1. Monotony of life without a purpose 2. Emptiness/vanity to human wisdom--can't get from there to here apart from God 3. Futility in wealth, concerted effort it takes to get it terms of any long lasting rewards 4. The certainty of death All of these leave him crying out "vanity" over his worldly view Chapters 10-11 Comparison between the foolish man and the wise man Chapter 12  Conclusion Fool--200x in the Bible, always a reference to a spiritual condition where the fool is devoid of God

Jack Abeelen Wisdom Wins Out In The End Ecclesiastes 9:11-18 Recorded On:5/5/2013 Notes from this sermon: As we continue our look at life under the sun with Solomon who had certainly grown up knowing God, but  had in his later years walked away from God, all the wisdom God had gave him, set it aside and sought to find life in the world apart from God. And once in awhile, he'll come back to great revelations.  He will certainly turn back to his relationship with the Lord in the end of the book. But this morning, we want to address verses 11-18, as Solomon addresses the issue of wisdom. He does it in 3 sections: He says in v 11-12 that life is unpredictable, that we can't know the future, but that world makes a huge mistake in presuming things about God that they don't know, much like they presume some of the things that they put their hopes in, not aware of the fact that they are headed for judgement which will come suddenly. They should rather turn to the Lord

Jack Abeelen A Heavenly Citizen With An Earthly Address Ecclesiastes 8 Recorded On:4/7/2013 Study ID: 13ID1381 All quotations from this This chapter is about government oversight and how to view it. "Some Christians believe that it is best if they just separate from the world – period. That if they could somehow cloister themselves and hang out amongst only the saints and hide themselves, that any involvement in the world is a stumbling block to them, that that is the best way to serve, and so they live that way. Even in the 5th century, when monasticism was in vogue, there were folks who really believed that living in a cave in the desert all of your life was the best way to be holy. That fellow, Simon Stylites, who embraced the notion that somehow it was holier to remove yourself from the world rather than be involved with it, sat in the deserts of Egypt, and he began to live on top of various pillars, and they went higher as he got older. He spent thirty-seven years li