29 August 2021
Two-Minute Features | 05 September 2021 | 22 August 2021

Becoming a New Creation in Jesus (TMF:1690)

Friday, September 03, 2021
Peace to Live By: Becoming a New Creation in Jesus (TMF:1690) - Daniel Litton
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       Galatians 4:1-7: “I mean that the heir, as long as he is a child, is no different from a slave, though he is the owner of everything, but he is under guardians and managers until the date set by his father. In the same way we also, when we were children, were enslaved to the elementary principles of the world. But when the fullness of time had come, God sent forth his Son, born of woman, born under the law, to redeem those who were under the law, so that we might receive adoption as sons. And because you are sons, God has sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, crying, “Abba! Father!” So you are no longer a slave, but a son, and if a son, then an heir through God” (ESV). Anyone today can become a new creation in Jesus; anyone can be adopted as God’s son or daughter. By believing in what Jesus has accomplished on the cross on your behalf, the old can be gone for you and you can have new life in Christ today. Go to God right now in prayer and tell him you believe.

We Still Have to Deal with the Sin-Nature (TMF:1689)

Thursday, September 02, 2021
Peace to Live By: We Still Have to Deal with the Sin-Nature (TMF:1689) - Daniel Litton
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       Back in Romans 7, Paul asks, “Who will deliver me from this body of death? Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, I myself serve the law of God with my mind, but with my flesh I serve the law of sin” (Romans 7:24-25, ESV). Notice how Paul says, “Who will deliver me from this body of death?” He doesn’t say, “Yes, praise the Lord. I have been delivered from my body of death!” That’s because it hasn’t happened yet. It hadn’t happened yet for him at the time he wrote this, and it hasn’t happened yet for us. Again, we still have to deal with the sin-nature in our lives. We have not been freed from any effect whatsoever of dealing with the sin-nature. We are not like Adam in the Garden, where originally he didn’t have a sin-nature. No, Christian, we still, even after our conversion, have, and have to deal with, the sin-nature. Otherwise, if we were like Adam in the Garden before he sinned, we could always, one hundred percent of the time, choose not to sin.

Fellowshipping with God is the Key (TMF:1688)

Wednesday, September 01, 2021
Peace to Live By: Fellowshipping with God is the Key (TMF:1688) - Daniel Litton
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       Having said all this, don’t misunderstand me; rules can be good in our lives, as Christians. They definitely are good. But they will not stop the indulgence of the flesh. In other words, creating rules won’t make us less sinful, or less sin-filled. The only way we move away from sin, or keep our sin-nature at bay, if you will, is by fellowshipping with God in our lives, abiding in Jesus, by spending regular time with him, growing closer to him, which lets his life flow out through us by the Spirit. And guess what? We don’t have to gone through our day perfectly for God to hear us. He still wants to hear from us. Even if we have struggled with sin all day, he still wants us to come to him and spend time with him. God doesn’t base our prayer time on how good or not good we have been performing lately. We still need to confess sin, but he wants to spend time with us no matter what.

What are Some Church-Going Sins? (TMF:1687)

Tuesday, August 31, 2021
Peace to Live By: What are Some Church-Going Sins? (TMF:1687) - Daniel Litton
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       Creating rules against these things only increases our desire to do them. And notice from Paul’s list this is just not the common unbeliever’s sins. But it also includes a lot of, shall we say, church-going sins, which are often accepted in church dare I say. Note them, the middle ones on the list: “enmity, strife, jealousy, fits of anger, rivalries, dissensions, divisions, envy.” A lot of these sins we see just as much in church as we see among unbelievers. Paul told us last week, earlier in this chapter, “But now we are released from the law, having died to that which held us captive, so that we serve in the new way of the Spirit and not in the old way of the written code” (Romans 7:6, ESV). Having said all this, don’t misunderstand me; rules can be good in our lives, as Christians. They definitely are good. But they will not stop the indulgence of the flesh. In other words, creating rules won’t make us less sinful, or less sin-filled.

What Walking by the Flesh Looks Life (TMF:1686)

Monday, August 30, 2021
Peace to Live By: What Walking by the Flesh Looks Life (TMF:1686) - Daniel Litton
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       Paul’s point in both Romans chapter 7 and Galatians chapter 5 is that we are to choose not to walk by the flesh, to walk by our sin-natures, to live following a Christian life without God’s ‘real’ input, but instead we are to choose to be led by the Spirit. Walking by the flesh, as we’ve already stated, will manifest itself in sin, in doing the things that are against what God wants, and really against what we want in our new minds as Christians. For Paul says, continuing on in Galatians: “Now the works of the flesh are evident: sexual immorality, impurity, sensuality, idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, fits of anger, rivalries, dissensions, divisions, envy, drunkenness, orgies, and things like these” (Galatians 5:19-21, ESV). Even if we try to create rules to prevent these things in our lives, as Christians, it won’t work. That is a common misunderstanding. Creating rules against these things only increases our desire to do them.