Today's devotional from Pastor Clay: Fallen Angels - Jude 1:6

November 28, 2014 View this email in your browser Fallen Angels - Jude 1:6 Yesterday we learned that just like the Israelites, Christians belong in the Promised Land! Today we explore some interesting doctrine; Fallen Angels... Example #2 - Fallen Angels (Gen 6) And the angels who did not keep their proper domain, but left their own abode, He has reserved in everlasting chains under darkness for the judgment of the great day Jude 1:6 The next example Jude uses is that of the fallen angels. Angels are beings created by God, they operate in the eternal realm, and they're purpose is to serve and minister to God. But they also have a will, and these angels apparently "left their proper domain" in rebellion to God. This rebellion was initiated by Satan, the greatest of all angelic beings. His fall is described in Isaiah 14: "How you have fallen from heaven, O morning star, son of the dawn! You have been cast down to the earth, you who once laid low the nations!" Isaiah 14:12 Jesus witnessed this event... "I saw Satan fall like lightning from heaven" (Luke 10:18) The Apostle John was given a vision of the event...  "…an enormous red dragon…His tail swept a third of the stars out of the sky and flung them to the earth…the great dragon was hurled down—that ancient serpent called the devil, or Satan, who leads the whole world astray. He was hurled to the earth, and his angels with him" Revelation 12:3-9 What sin is Jude referring to?  It's hinted at in Gen 6; There were giants on the earth in those days, and also afterward, when the sons of God came in to the daughters of men and they bore children to them. Those were the mighty men who were of old, men of renown  Gen 6:4 Many believe that this is describing how the fallen angels who rebelled with Satan came to earth and intermixed with humans, producing genetically corrupt human beings. (I have a personal theory that the "gods" of the Greek and Roman mythology may have been inspired by the legends of these "men of renown" from Genesis 6.) We're not told how this interbreeding was possible, perhaps it was some form of demonic inhabitation, either way it was an abomination to the Lord. It gives us some insight into why God chose to flood the earth: The unnatural union of humans and angelic beings corrupted the genetic pool of mankind to the point that severe action was required. But God found Noah; According to scripture Noah was "a just man," and he "walked with God." But there's an interesting statement; Noah was "a man perfect in his generations" (Genesis 6:9). We could take this to mean that Noah was "pure in his genetics," in other words his family wasn't corrupted by the angelic interbreeding. That, along with his obedience to God, made him a perfect candidate to repopulate the earth. (Sidenote: Just like Noah was perfect in his genetics, which qualified him to repopulate the new world, when a man or woman accepts Christ, the bible teaches that they become a "new creation" [2 Cor 5:17]. This present earth will be destroyed [Matt 24:35, 2 Peter 3:10, Rev 21:1], and only those who are in Christ will be able to inhabit the new Heaven and earth!) Bottom line: Just like the angels who rebelled and corrupted God's world, false teachers who rebel against God and corrupt God's truth are an abomination to God. And just like the angels, they will be punished. Tomorrow we'll look at the final example; Sodom and Gomorrah. Pastor Clay   Enjoy this devotional?  Share it with someone! Share Tweet Forward Connect Facebook Twitter Instagram Subscribe by email Copyright © 2014 Calvary Chapel of Wilmington, All rights reserved. You're receiving this email because you subscribed through our website or my blog. You can click the "Manage Subscriptions" link to manage your email preferences.   Calvary Chapel of Wilmington 2831 Carolina Beach Rd Wilmington, NC 28412 Add us to your address book 910-791-1858 | www.calvaryofwilmington.org   unsubscribe from this list    update subscription preferences

November 27, 2014 View this email in your browser We belong in the Promised Land - Jude 1:5 But I want to remind you, though you once knew this, that the Lord, having saved the people out of the land of Egypt, afterward destroyed those who did not believe. Jude 1:5 In yesterdays post, Jude taught us that when we use grace as an excuse to live in open immorality, its like putting two locomotives on the same track heading towards each other; There's going to be a train wreck, and both grace and obedience will be destroyed - along with the passengers! That's why Jude says when a person uses grace as an excuse for sin, they "deny the Lord Jesus Christ," Jesus said... "Do not think that I came to destroy the Law or the Prophets ….but to fulfill. Matt 5:17 Its a misrepresentation of who God is. Its a misrepresentation of who God's people are and how they should live To help us grasp this truth, Jude gives us a few examples from the Old Testament, and the first one is Israel. Example #1: Israel (Numbers 13-14) 5 But I want to remind you, though you once knew this, that the Lord, having saved the people out of the land of Egypt, afterward destroyed those who did not believe. Jude is going back to the time when the nation of Israel was delivered by the power of God from the bondage of Egypt, and brought to the edge of the Promised Land. They witnessed the plagues, experienced God's miraculous deliverance at the Red Sea, they heard the very voice of God at Mount Sinai. They received manna from heaven, water from a rock, a cloud to cover them from the sun during the day, and fire from heaven at night! Standing at the edge of the Promised Land, they only needed to step out in faith and enter! But the spies saw how big the men were, and they became afraid. Joshua and Caleb tried to encourage them to go, but the people refused. They not only refused, they decided to stone Joshua and Caleb, pick another leader, and go back to Egypt! After all God did for them, they still lapsed into unbelief, and as a result they never entered into the place of blessing and rest God had for them. It wasn't that God was mad at them for not going into the land, it wasn't simple stubbornness.  By wanting to go back to Egypt, the Israelites were in effect rejecting God, they were rejecting all that God had done for them, and all that God had promised them. Their desire to return to Egypt revealed where their heart really was… in Egypt! There's an additional side note to this truth: Once a person accepts Jesus Christ, going back to Egypt is no longer an option. They can try, but Egypt will never be the same. Think about it, how would it have went for the Israelites had they returned to Egypt? Would the Egyptians have accepted them back, and things gone back to how they were before? No... their lives would have been much worse. The Egyptian slave-masters would have been more cruel, their bondage much deeper. The same is true with a Christian. Once you've accepted Christ, and the Spirit of the living God lives within you, Egypt is no longer an option. If we try and go back, our lives will be wose, our bondage greater. Christians, we belong in the Promised Land! Tomorrow, we'll look at the second example in Jude, fallen angels. Pastor Clay  Enjoy this devotional?  Share it with someone! Share Tweet Forward Connect Facebook Twitter Instagram Subscribe by email Copyright © 2014 Calvary Chapel of Wilmington, All rights reserved. You're receiving this email because you subscribed through our website or my blog. You can click the "Manage Subscriptions" link to manage your email preferences.   Calvary Chapel of Wilmington 2831 Carolina Beach Rd Wilmington, NC 28412 Add us to your address book 910-791-1858 | www.calvaryofwilmington.org   unsubscribe from this list    update subscription preferences

Today's devotional from Pastor Clay: The Great Train Wreck - Jude 1:3-4

November 26, 2014 View this email in your browser The Great Train Wreck - Jude 1:3-4 "The Collision of Grace and Obedience - Part 2" Jude tells us these false teachers sneak in disguised as Christians, but how did they get in? The watchmen were asleep - hence Jude's letter! While these men may have been unnoticed by men, they weren't unnoticed by God, and their condemnation was marked out long ago. Now when Jude says they are "marked out for this condemnation" – he's not implying that God ordained them to be condemned; God didn't force them to become false teachers, they made their choice of their own will. See there are two positions of false doctrine: Those who are deceived (which we know how to protect ourselves from, KNOW YOUR BIBLE!), The second are those who know better, and choose to deceive others. And Jude tells us that once they've made their choice, their end is determined, their judgment is assured. Jude says these men "turn the grace of our God into lewdness" – in other words, turning the grace of God into a "license to sin." The idea goes like this:  God loves you just the way you are, so It really doesn't matter how you live. We see this doctrine infiltrating the church today, especially with the gay movement within the church; "God made me this way, and God doesn't make mistakes, therefore my 'lifestyle' is fine in God's eyes." I'm not picking on the gay movement, because people apply this same faulty doctrine to other areas… "I'm in love with my co-worker, and I've prayed about it, and God is OK with me leaving my wife and family..." "My girlfriend and I love each other, we attend church, it's no big deal if we sleep together..."  True story - At an academic conference at the University of Cambridge last July, it was proclaimed that "pedophilia is "natural and normal for males." (This is not new, the early Greeks were fine with it as well...) This is what's called the "normalization of sin" – it's a worldly philosophy that's infiltrating the house of God. The tragedy with this type of "freedom" is that it actually leads to bondage. While they promise them liberty, they themselves are slaves of corruption; for by whom a person is overcome, by him also he is brought into bondage. 2 Peter 2:19 Any Christian that's gone down this road can attest, going back to our old lifestyle of sin doesn't make us free, it enslaves us again. I call this type of doctrine "a collision of grace and obedience." Picture two locomotives pushing a train; One represents the grace of God, who forgives sin. The other represents obedience, where God says "be holy, for I am holy." Just like the two locomotives, grace and obedience are designed to work together, supporting one another... "God has forgiven my sin, and freed me from the bondage of sin, therefore my desire is to walk in obedience to Him to the best of my ability." But when we use grace as an excuse to live in open immorality, it puts the two locomotives on the same track... In other words it leads to a train wreck, and both grace and obedience are destroyed - along with the passengers! So the point is this: Let's keep grace and obedience on the same track, going in the same direction, and avoid the train wreck! Pastor Clay (Stay tuned tomorrow for Part 3)   Enjoy this devotional?  Share it with someone! Share Tweet Forward Connect Facebook Twitter Instagram Subscribe by email Copyright © 2014 Calvary Chapel of Wilmington, All rights reserved. You're receiving this email because you subscribed through our website or my blog. You can click the "Manage Subscriptions" link to manage your email preferences.   Calvary Chapel of Wilmington 2831 Carolina Beach Rd Wilmington, NC 28412 Add us to your address book 910-791-1858 | www.calvaryofwilmington.org   unsubscribe from this list    update subscription preferences