Bible Sermons Online

Archive for September, 2009

There’s a secret to enjoying worship services. Some folk know the key, and they leave church uplifted and comforted. Others are indifferent. The difference is that the 1st group knows a technique to hear what they are hearing. We should enthusiastically predict listening to Scripture. It is hard to be excited if we’re of the opinion a sermon is targeted at a general crowd. God does not work that way. Each time you hear from the Bible, God has something particular and personal to identify to you. Essentially the once-captive Israelites thought that or they would not have gathered with such anticipation to hear Ezra read. ( verses 5-6 ) additionally, the people listened attentively. With no writing tools, they needed to commit as much as is possible to memory. We frequently sit thru a service, contemplating the time and what’s for lunch, when all of the while God is showing Himself thru the Scriptures. Our attention span is set by our real interest in the topic. Why is it some people can watch a three-hour flick with rapt attention and yet fidget after only 5 mins of Bible reading? We expect a film will be entertaining, but we constantly approach church with no expectancy in any way. If God needs to chat to everyone thru His Word, then we should be with bated breath listening. He has got a note of support, strength, or comfort. It is the great puzzle of evangelizing a person can give a message about one truth from Scripture and everybody in the place hears something else – the exact point God knows each person wishes. About Rodney Howard Browne priest Rodney Howard Brownebrings you closer to God. Learn more about his mission and hear about the thousands whose lives were he touched and change. The internet site also has many of the teachings of Christ that are heavy for everyday Christian living. .

Tithes and The Prosperity Gospel – Christianity’s Deception

Joseph Ho, February 18th, 2009.

The world has never seen such great commercial profiteering in the body of Christ until the turn of this century. What is going on? Jesus has already said a long time ago that his Father’s house shall be a house of prayer, in the book of Matthew, Matthew 21:13, “
And said unto them, It is written, My house shall be called the house of prayer; but ye have made it a den of thieves.” The people in God’s temple of old were selling sacrifices of animals for a price and that has turned a Holy Site into a market place. Does this resemble what is happening to the Church today? Now people are selling the Material Prosperity blessings for a price, they say, give and it shall be given onto you. So if you give money you get money. Strangely enough, in Asia, we call it the 4D, Toto and the Big Sweep. That’s what one gets when you buy a $3 dollar ticket and then you may get the big price on the date of draw.

“4 So all the elders of Israel gathered together and came to Samuel at Ramah. 5 They said to him, “You are old, and your sons do not walk in your ways; now appoint a king to lead [a] us, such as all the other nations have.”

6 But when they said, “Give us a king to lead us,” this displeased Samuel; so he prayed to the LORD. 7 And the LORD told him: “Listen to all that the people are saying to you; it is not you they have rejected, but they have rejected me as their king. 8 As they have done from the day I brought them up out of Egypt until this day, forsaking me and serving other gods, so they are doing to you. 9 Now listen to them; but warn them solemnly and let them know what the king who will reign over them will do.”

10 Samuel told all the words of the LORD to the people who were asking him for a king. 11 He said, “This is what the king who will reign over you will do: He will take your sons and make them serve with his chariots and horses, and they will run in front of his chariots. 12 Some he will assign to be commanders of thousands and commanders of fifties, and others to plow his ground and reap his harvest, and still others to make weapons of war and equipment for his chariots. 13 He will take your daughters to be perfumers and cooks and bakers. 14 He will take the best of your fields and vineyards and olive groves and give them to his attendants. 15 He will take a tenth of your grain and of your vintage and give it to his officials and attendants. 16 Your menservants and maidservants and the best of your cattle [b] and donkeys he will take for his own use. 17 He will take a tenth of your flocks, and you yourselves will become his slaves. 18 When that day comes, you will cry out for relief from the king you have chosen, and the LORD will not answer you in that day.”

19 But the people refused to listen to Samuel. “No!” they said. “We want a king over us. 20 Then we will be like all the other nations, with a king to lead us and to go out before us and fight our battles.”

21 When Samuel heard all that the people said, he repeated it before the LORD. 22 The LORD answered, “Listen to them and give them a king.””

The ten percent Tithe which was given to the High Priests is now given unto the king. Now who are the kings of the world today, they are now called Governments and Monarchs. And where is the Tithe now being paid? It’s to the Government of each country that every citizen has to pay this Tithe.

So what is this Government Tithe?

It’s called the INCOME TAX guys. Simple as that, we do not need to burden ourselves by paying another tax to the church. Now the Pastors of the modern church calls this “PROTECTION MONEY”, since if you pay this Tithe, you will never get your money stolen nor loose your Job which gives you income nor will you loose your possession to scams and conmen. When you paid this Tithe as preached, it’s an INSURANCE against the devourer, and God will ensure this devourer will not steal from you ever again. It’s a promise as preached.

Isn’t this Pay Back Time?

In time of wealth and prosperous economy this Principle of Tithe works. But when the entire world is under severe economy recession and crisis, I would love to see how these pastors and preachers of prosperity are going to ensure this devourer never affect the Tither’s piggy bank. Now its time to test this principle as preached. For God will bring every works to the Test of FIRE. The “HOLY INSURANCE” sales guy must now prove that their product is going to work for all Christians. They did not say if you Tithe and Sin God will not bless. No, they say if you Tithe God have to bless. If you don’t mean what you say don’t say it, for we all have to give an account of all our words before the Lord God on the day of Judgment, as mentioned in Matthew,

Matthew 12:36, “But I say unto you, That every idle word that men shall speak, they shall give account thereof in the day of judgment.”

As far as I know, everyone will be affected by this Economy Crisis in 2009; even the Christian who Tithes. Because the pagan are also bosses of the Christian so if God will not bless them since they do not Tithe, their business will suffer and then it will affect their Christian employees. Jesus says do not remove the weed from the wheat until the time of Judgment, so I don’t think this will work as well. Pagans and Christians coexist and prosper materially in this world because money is not a Spiritual Fruit.

Imagine if you tithe constantly and monthly yet you bear false witness against your brother, yet you steal, yet you rape, yet you beat your wives, will God still bless you when you Tithe? If not, the Tithe can not be a blanket guarantee of you not loosing your materials possessions and even your money during times of crisis. What is you best hope then? The Lord is our Shepherd and Provider, Psalms 23:1-3.

So should you Tithe or not Tithe that is the question?

Dear people, we have to know that God’s priests do not do any industrial activity but they teach and preach, so they have to eat. Paul says, in 1 Corinthians 9:9-12,

“9For it is written in the Law of Moses: “Do not muzzle an ox while it is treading out the grain. “Is it about oxen that God is concerned? 10Surely he says this for us, doesn’t he? Yes, this was written for us, because when the plowman plows and the thresher threshes, they ought to do so in the hope of sharing in the harvest. 11If we have sown spiritual seed among you, is it too much if we reap a material harvest from you? 12If others have this right of support from you, shouldn’t we have it all the more?”

So Paul expects the people in the church who were fed Spiritual Food to share with them material needs. That is to say, we are to give unto the Priests and Pastors a Free-Will Love Offerings to sustain them in their work, while the Tithe is already paid to the Government of each country in the terms of PERSONAL INCOME TAX. Surely a good God will not burden his people again by requiring them to pay double taxation. When God does not even require of us to be circumcised, why then would God require us to pay such heavy duty tax to both the Government and to his Church. The bible says, God loves a cheerful giver and we are to give according to our means and be happy about it. So how to be a cheerful giver when we are required a fixed amount, we must give from our hearts.

So why are the Prosperity Churches growing when they deceive the world?

Martin Luther was a noted Christian theologian whose unorthodox teachings not only inspired but also influenced the doctrines of Protestant and other Christian traditions. Martin Luther was born to Hans and Margaretha Luder on 10 November 1483 in Germany and was baptized the next day on the feast of St. Martin of Tours and he was thus named Martin.  Luther’s clarion call to the Church to return to the teachings of the Bible led to the formation of new traditions within Christianity and the Counter-Reformation in the Roman Catholic Church.

In 1505, Martin Luther received his Master’s degree and in keeping with his father’s wishes, he enrolled in the law school of that university. But his destiny was rewritten when a lightening bolt struck near to him as he was returning to school. Terrified, he cried out, “Help, St. Anne! I’ll become a monk!”.  Martin was saved of his life, but regretting his words, Martin Luther dropped out of law school and entered the monastery. Martin fully dedicated himself to monastic life and began his efforts to noble deeds to please God and to serve others through prayer. He indulged in fasts and long hours in prayer, undertook pilgrimages, and constant confession. The more he tried to devotedly work for God, the more aware he became of his own sins. In 1507 Luther was ordained to the priesthood. In 1508 he began teaching theology at the University of Wittenberg. Luther earned his Bachelor’s degree in Biblical Studies on 9 March 1508 and a Bachelor’s degree in 1509. On 19 October 1512, the University of Wittenberg conferred upon Martin Luther the degree of Doctor of Theology. After earning the doctorate in theology, Luther instead of settling down to a scholarly monkish life or an uneventful university career teaching theology, began to develop his own personal theology, when he protested the use of indulgences in his ‘95 Theses’.

Martin Luther married Katharina von Bora, a former nun and with it began the tradition of clerical marriage within several Christian traditions.  Luther’s translation of the Bible also helped to develop a standard version of the Bible in German language.  Luther’s hymns were responsible for the development of congregational singing in Christianity. The compulsion of priesthood and the demand for delivering lectures prompted Martin Luther to study the Scriptures in greater depth. Luther engrossed himself in the teachings of the early church and began researching on them.  The uproar and tumult started with the publication of his 95 Theses and the controversy that was let loose brought even more pressure on Martin Luther to more intensely study the Bible. This intensive study convinced him that the Church had lost sight of several central truths the Bible contained.

Luther’s first writing was ‘The Sermon on Good Works’, in which he argued that good works do not benefit the soul but only faith could do that. Things took a turn for the worse when Pope Leo declared 41 articles of Luther’s teachings as heretical teachings, and Luther’s books were publicly burned in Rome. This made Luther more indignant in his effort to reform the church. His treatise, “Address to the Christian Nobility of Germany,” exhorted the German people to use military means to force the church to discuss grievances and reform. Luther initially saw himself as a great reformer of the Catholic Church, and though a simple monk thought the force of his ideas would redirect the Leviathan of the church. But in the end, however, he divided Christianity into two separate churches and the second division came to be known as Protestantism.