Bibles for America Podcast

The beauty of the wonderful Jesus is what attracts us. He is so lovely! Our dear Lord Jesus is a magnet, and by His attracting us, we can look away from everything unto Him.

The Lord Jesus didn’t say that our difficult situations would change for the better or suddenly be resolved. Instead, His promise to us is if we come to Him, He will give us rest—even rest for our souls.

At a world-renowned American university, a professor routinely inquired on the first day of class, “If you could ask God one question, what would it be?” Usually, students would flippantly say they’d ask God for money or similar things. But on one particular occasion, a student said, “I’d ask God, ‘What’s the purpose of my life?’”

In order to contact God, who now is the Spirit, we must know where He dwells. Our human spirit is the residence of the Holy Spirit.

It’s not doing things for the Lord that keeps us in a proper relationship with Him. After all, the church in Ephesus did many good things for the Lord, but He had one thing against them: they had left their first love. Loving Him with our first love is paramount.

We know consistent physical exercise keeps our body fit and contributes to our overall well-being. And we also know mental exercise like reading and solving crossword puzzles helps our mind stay sharp. But did you know that as Christians, we need an additional kind of exercise? For a healthy Christian life, we need spiritual exercise.

Listen to this inspiring testimony from a BfA staff member who has experienced much joy from sharing the gospel with those around him.  

We all go through high and low points in our lives. But when faced with the lows—the puzzling and difficult situations—what do we do? How do we react? Do we wish things were different?

See how praying to God is simply to converse with Him in a genuine, open way.

In 2 Timothy 1:6 Paul says, “I remind you to fan into flame the gift of God, which is in you.” What is the gift of God in us, and what does it mean to fan it into flame?

God’s rich mercy extends even farther than His grace, reaching to the lowest pit, not only to save us, but also to continually bring us into a position to receive Him as grace.

Learn how you can experience life and peace by setting your mind on the spirit.

Check out the wide variety of video content from Bibles for America!

How do we live our Christian life? Is it by imitating Jesus? Discover the way Christ wants His believers to live.

Learn practical lessons on how to pray from the story of two blind men in Matthew 20 that help you speak to the Lord about everything in your life.

Listen to this testimony to learn how to touch the Lord Jesus in a simple, enjoyable way.

Believers are inspired by the heritage of Christian hymns. A. B. Simpson’s classic hymn, “Once It Was the Blessing,” shares his discovery of “Christ in you.”

Discover what God’s complete salvation is for us in the Bible and how it gives meaning to our Christian life.

The new year is a great time to have a fresh start in reading the Bible.

Understanding the Bible can be difficult. Read about getting guidance to understand the meaning of the Word of God.

Jesus Christ is the reality of all positive things, including virtues like patience and wisdom. He wants us to experience Him as the reality of all we need.

A revolutionary concept about God’s Word that changes how we come to the Bible.

We received the blessing of God’s cleansing of our sins when we were saved. Knowing this truth greatly helps us in our Christian life.

In both a world filled with turmoil and in our own lives, is it possible to have inner peace? It is if we have the key.

A BfA staff member shares his experience of singing to the Lord as part of his daily Christian walk.

In Romans, Paul looks at the gospel of God in a rich and full way, describing our journey from sinners and enemies of God to sons of God.

God’s forgiveness is a wonderful gift to those who believe in Jesus Christ. Knowing the thoroughness of His forgiveness is a great help for our Christian life.

Ezekiel tells us that as Christians, we have a new heart with which to love the Lord. Each day, what can we do to keep our heart continually new?

Emmanuel, God with us, is an unspeakable blessing believers enjoy today.

Paul exhorts us 1 Thessalonians 5:18, “In everything give thanks.” How can we give thanks not just in the good things, but in everything?

After Jesus was crucified, a soldier pierced His side with a spear and out came blood and water. This detail, which only John records, has a deep significance.

Many of us would like to understand the Bible, but don’t know where to start. But good news! The first step in understanding the Bible is surprisingly simple.

Christians sing to the Lord in many different settings.

When you hear the word gospel, what comes to mind? Romans 5:10 shows us something we may not always consider when we think of the gospel.

The book of Ephesians, though brief, shares 7 profound aspects of what the church is in God’s eyes.

The disciples found peace in the stormy sea by taking Jesus into their boat. Today, we can find peace by taking Jesus into our troubled lives.

Christians may have many friends, both saved and unsaved, but they also need spiritual companions who will run the Christian race with them.

Five verses from Scripture that show the powerful benefits of praying to God in our Christian life.

The Bible uses two Greek words for “word” in the New Testament: logos and rhema. Find out the meaning of these words and how they impact our Christian life.

Praying the words of the Bible is one way for God’s Word to become living and personal to you.

In Mark 16, Jesus says to “proclaim the gospel” to all the creation. Find out who Jesus is talking to and why we need to proclaim the gospel.

The day we get saved is a wonderful, momentous day. In this podcast, though, we want to talk about the days that follow. After experiencing the joy of salvation, a person may wonder how to continue experiencing the Lord Jesus. Questions such as these come up: How can I know Jesus personally? How can I experience Jesus in my life? Is being forgiven and saved from God’s judgment all there is to the Christian life? Some may try different ways to experience Jesus like they did the day they were saved. Perhaps they try studying the Bible more, but though they learn something new, the Lord Himself still seems far away. Similar to how we need the right key, not just any key, to enter into a locked room, we need to use the right key to experience Jesus. What’s the key for us to know Jesus personally in our day-to-day life? Before we get into what the key to experiencing Jesus is, we need to grasp two important facts. The first fact is that Jesus redeemed us by His death on the cross. How we thank Him for this! And Christ’s redemption made possible the second fact, that Jesus has come to live in our spirit! Through Christ’s death, He saved us from eternal judgment, and in His resurrection Christ as the life-giving Spirit came to live in us, specifically, in our spirit. Knowing and appreciating this second fact is crucial to our experiencing Jesus in a real and daily way. God created human beings because He wanted to share His divine life with us. By having God’s life, we would be able to express Him in our living. But because mankind fell, two things happened: we became sinful, and our spirit was deadened, unable to contact or know God. So we had two great needs: we needed forgiveness of our sins, and our deadened spirit needed to be made alive. When we received the Lord Jesus as our Savior, these two great needs were met! We were redeemed and forgiven of our sins. And we were reborn in our spirit with the life of God. Now let’s talk about the key to experiencing Jesus. For human beings, three realms exist in the universe. We’re all equipped with the key to each realm, because God created us with a body, a soul, and a spirit: First, there’s the physical realm—the material world, consisting of what we can see, hear, touch, taste, and smell. The key to experiencing this realm is to use our body’s five physical senses. Second, there’s the psychological realm—the realm of the human soul, which is deeper than the physical realm and consists of intangible things like thoughts, feelings, and decisions. The key to experiencing the psychological realm is to use the faculties of our soul: our mind to think, reason, and analyze; our emotions to experience joy, sorrow, and other feelings; and our will to decide, form intentions, and choose. Last, there’s the spiritual realm—more mysterious and deeper than both the physical and psychological realms. John 4:24 says, “God is Spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit.” In spirit here means in our human spirit. The key to experiencing the spiritual realm is to use our human spirit to contact God, who is Spirit. To illustrate the importance of using the right key for each realm, let’s use the example of the delicious aroma of bread baking in an oven. To try to “experience” that aroma by using the faculties of our soul would be futile. Our soul is simply the wrong key. But with a single sniff, we can use our sense of smell and immediately experience that mouth-watering aroma. In the same way, we can’t experience Christ if we use the wrong key. Jesus Christ is no longer with us physically, so our five senses don’t help us there. And even using our mind to think about Him or our emotions to try to sense Him doesn’t work, because God is Spirit. Using our God-created human spirit is the right key for us to experience Christ who lives in our spirit. To use any part of our being means to exercise that part. So for example, physically we use or exercise our feet by walking. Psychologically, we exercise our mind by studying or considering. So how do we exercise the key of our spirit to contact and experience the Lord Jesus? The best way to exercise our spirit is by praying. Our prayer doesn’t need to be long, formal, or in a particular place. In fact, simply calling on the precious name of our Lord Jesus is a good way to exercise our spirit to contact Him in prayer. When we call on the name of the Lord from our spirit, we experience Him as living water, satisfying us and quenching our thirst at any time during our day. Another way to exercise our spirit is to pray with the Word of God. As we read the Bible, we can turn what we read into our prayer. When we pray with the Scriptures, we use not just our mind to read the Word, but more importantly we use our spirit to contact the Spirit in the Word. By exercising our spirit with the Word of God, we experience Christ as our spiritual nourishment. We can also exercise our spirit by praising and thanking the Lord for all He is and all He has done for us. By giving thanks to the Lord for all things, we can be filled with Him. By regularly practicing these different types of prayer, we can go on from our initial experience of salvation to know and experience Jesus more every day. The Lord Jesus doesn’t want to be an objective figure to us whom we worship from afar. He redeemed us and regenerated us to live in us and be our life. Jesus lives in us, so we can experience Him subjectively as everything to us in our everyday life. In all matters of our life, big or small, we can experience Christ as whatever we need when we contact Him by using the key of our human spirit. What a joy to experience Jesus by using this wonderful key of exercising our spirit! We can pray, “Lord Jesus, thank You for living in me and for showing me that using my spirit is the key to experiencing You. Thank You that I can exercise my spirit by praying. Lord, thank You for opening my eyes to see that I can experience You in my everyday life by enjoying Your living presence in my spirit.”

The Bible mentions the flesh throughout the Old and New Testaments. But although Christians are clear about what sin is, many haven’t heard much about their flesh. Unfortunately, Satan’s obscuring of the truth about the flesh over the years has allowed him to damage many of God’s people. What is the flesh, and why is it so bad? Is it still bad now that we’re saved? Does our flesh get better the longer we’re Christians, or the more spiritual we become? Let’s take a look at what the Bible says about the flesh. First, what is the flesh and where did it come from? God created man with a spirit, a soul, and a body so man could contain God and express Him. Every part of man was pure, including his body. But when Adam and Eve ate of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, something terrible happened. They took in the sinful nature of the devil. This deadened their spirit, damaged their soul, and corrupted their pure body, changing it into the sinful flesh. We can see the apostle Paul’s awareness concerning the flesh in Romans 7:18: “For I know that in me, that is, in my flesh, nothing good dwells.” Paul’s words are emphatic. Nothing good dwells in our flesh. Why is that? Note 2 on this verse in the Recovery Version gives a clear explanation of what the flesh is: “The flesh here is the fallen and corrupted human body with all its lusts. This flesh was not created by God but is a mixture of God’s creature and sin, which is the life of Satan, the evil one. God created man’s body a pure vessel, but this vessel was corrupted and transmuted into the flesh by Satan’s injecting himself into it at the time of the fall. Now Satan as sin personified is in man’s flesh, making his home there and ruling as an illegal master, overruling man and forcing him to do things that he dislikes. It is this indwelling sin, which is the unchangeable evil nature, that constitutes all men sinners (5:19).” Satan is sin personified, and as Paul says in verse 20, sin now dwells in us. Now let’s consider the flesh after we’re saved. When we receive Christ as our Savior, our sins are forgiven and we’re cleansed and saved. But what about our flesh? Is it repaired? Are we free from the lusts of the flesh once we’re born again? The answer to these questions is hugely important to our Christian lives. After we’re saved, our flesh is exactly the same as it was before—it is still sinful and full of lusts. This is because when we received the Lord as our Savior, we were born again in our human spirit with the divine Spirit of God, but our flesh remains the flesh. John 3:6 says, “That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit.” For as long as we live in this physical life, our flesh remains the same. It never improves, and it never changes, no matter how long we’re saved or how much we’ve grown in the Lord. Only when the Lord Jesus returns will we be rid of the flesh by God’s resurrecting and transfiguring our fallen body, as Philippians 3:20-21 tells us: “We eagerly await a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, who will transfigure the body of our humiliation to be conformed to the body of His glory, according to His operation by which He is able even to subject all things to Himself.” God’s full salvation promised in this word includes our fallen body. But for now, our flesh remains the sinful flesh. Having the proper knowledge that even as believers our sinful flesh remains unchanged is essential, because it alerts us to the danger our flesh poses to us. Whether or not we know this can seriously affect us. Let’s say we don’t know a particular substance is extremely toxic. Because we don’t know it’s so dangerous, we might be very casual, even careless with it and hurt ourselves as a result. But once we find out its true nature, we’ll be quite careful how we handle it in order to protect ourselves. This illustrates how having proper knowledge of our flesh can help us believers, and how not having it can harm us. The danger to our spiritual life from our flesh is real. And unlike the toxic substance in our illustration, our flesh isn’t something apart from us that we can simply ignore; it’s part of us, ever present. Satan’s strategy is to hide the truth about the flesh from Christians. He wants us to think that our flesh isn’t a problem once we’re saved, or that it has improved and is no longer a danger since we’ve been following the Lord Jesus for some time. He knows that if we think like this we’ll begin to drop our guard, and sin will result. What do we mean by “drop our guard”? What does this look like practically? Let’s say we’re confident we won’t fall into a particular sin because we haven’t committed it in a long time, or we’re confident we would never commit such a sin because we never have before. What happens when we think we’re safe? Often, we’ll allow ourselves to be in certain situations that we don’t realize could stir up our flesh to overpower us. Perhaps before we were saved we went to bars with our friends and drank. And let’s say now our coworkers or friends invite us out to a bar. We go, thinking, “I can’t be tempted to drink anymore, now that I’m saved.” We don’t realize our flesh hasn’t gotten any better, and it’s still just as strong as before. Our flesh overcomes our willpower, drawing us back into the same life we previously had. We learn too late that we’re still subject to the lusts of the flesh. Or, using another example, we know that immorality such as fornication is sinful. But we may think, “Now that I’m a Christian, I definitely would never have a problem with that. My strong morals will prevent anything from ever happening.” So we repeatedly spend time alone with a member of the opposite sex, whether at work or elsewhere, because we think we’re immune to the lusts of the flesh. But eventually, through being alone together so much, we become less cautious, and in an unguarded moment, sin can be the result. We don’t realize our flesh is much stronger than our morals. The flesh doesn’t operate only in a certain type of person; it operates in everyone. Every human being has the lusts of the flesh, and every human being, including a Christian, is capable of any sin. Just being in the wrong environment can lead us into sin through the lusts of the flesh. In this way Satan damages believers, over and over again, lulling them into not guarding against their flesh. In the book of Romans, a book written to Christians, Paul clearly warns the believers to be on guard not simply against sin, but against sin hiding in their own flesh. Romans 6:12 says, “Do not let sin therefore reign in your mortal body so that you obey the body’s lusts.” If we aren’t careful with our flesh, sin can reign even in a believer’s body. What a tragedy! Seeing the danger of our flesh is the important first step in not letting sin reign. Our fallen, sinful flesh is like a wild animal that can never be tamed. Giving it the smallest amount of leeway can allow it to break free and cause great damage. Even things we see and hear can stir up our flesh. We really need to ask the Lord to show us the seriousness of our flesh and how to guard against it! If we give an inch to the flesh because we think we’re strong and can overcome it, or because we think we’re no longer subject to the lusts of the flesh, sin will be the outcome. In a future podcast we’ll discuss practical ways we can cooperate with the Lord to not let sin reign through the flesh. In the meantime, we encourage you to listen to the podcast, “What 2 Timothy 2:22 Says about Fleeing Lusts and How It Applies to Us Today.”

This podcast presents a Bibles for America staff member’s testimony about discovering her human spirit and how it affected her. We hope you enjoy her story: The blog post “A Life-Changing Discovery: My Spirit” really touched me because what it talked about is exactly what I have experienced. Since I began to see in the Bible that I have a human spirit, and then began to actually experience the Lord who lives there, my life has never been the same. I had always felt deep within that something was missing in my Christian life. When you believe into the Lord and get saved, then what? What did God want? What was being a Christian all about in my daily life? For a period of time I thought that maybe the Lord wanted me to help people. For instance, I thought of becoming some kind of doctor, or joining the Peace Corps. And then other times, I thought He wanted to me pursue and fulfill my dreams. There is a very specific moment in my life after graduating from high school that I’ll never forget. As I laid in bed with my two younger sisters, tears streamed down my face as I silently cried, trying not to wake them up. I was so desperate for something real. So I cried out to the Lord, “Lord, You have to be real to me! I can’t go on if You aren’t real to me!” The Lord really answered that prayer when I went to college. I met a group of believers there who showed me in the Bible that God had a purpose, and that in order to fulfill this purpose, He created man with a human spirit to contain and contact Him. Even growing up as a Christian, I had never seen or heard about this crucial truth. I was helped to see that when I believed into the Lord, He came to dwell in my spirit! I was also helped to see that God wants people to experience Him in their spirit. He isn’t this impersonal, faraway God that I had to try to please by doing good, or by doing something for Him yet apart from Him. No, the God of the universe was Someone I could turn to, fellowship with, and live by in my spirit. God became so real to me! For so long there had been an emptiness within me that I could never explain or fill. But when I touched the Lord in my spirit, that emptiness was gone. There was a sense of, “This is it! This is why I was created!” We were created to receive the Lord Jesus and enjoy Him as the Spirit in our spirit. I am so thankful to the Lord that this crucial truth has been revealed to me and that I’ve been able to experience the Lord Jesus in my spirit. My prayer is that so many others would be able to discover their human spirit and that the Lord would become as real to them as He has become to me.

You’ve managed to pick up the nasty cold that’s going around. Sniffling, headachy, stuffed up, and feverish, you feel awful. Seeking relief, you drag yourself to the store to pick up one of those multi-symptom relief medications. After taking the first dose, you start to feel better. Nobody likes to be sick physically. But have you ever felt spiritually “sick”? You want to express Christ to people, but you find you’re not able to. You try to be patient with someone, but eventually you blow up. You’re “ailing” from a shortage of patience, or of kindness, or humility. You ask the Lord to give you more love, more kindness, or you ask Him to help you be patient. Have you ever wished you had a multi-symptom dose of something for the many problems in your Christian life? Well the Bible has good news: you do! Just as different elements are compounded into one medication to address multiple cold symptoms, we have an all-inclusive, spiritual remedy, a dose compounded with the wonderful ingredients of all Christ is to take care of all our spiritual needs. This all-inclusive dose is the Holy Spirit. Chapter 2 in The Economy of God by Witness Lee describes it this way: “Have we ever realized that the Holy Spirit is the best ‘dose’ in the whole world? Just one dose is enough to meet all our needs. All that the Father and the Son are and all that They have are in this wonderful Spirit. Consider how many elements are within this dose: God’s divine nature with Christ’s human nature, His human living with its earthly sufferings, the wonderful effectiveness of His death, His resurrection, His ascension, and His enthronement. Such a dose is beyond our imagination. Yet, praise the Lord, every day we can enjoy it.” When we believed in the Lord Jesus, He not only saved us from eternal judgment and forgave us, but He also came to live in our spirit as the life-giving Spirit. And His Spirit now includes every virtue, every element we need for our Christian life. When we contact the Lord as this life-giving Spirit, He supplies us with all that He is. Do you need patience? The Lord Jesus is patience. Do you need humility? The Lord Jesus is humility. He is strength, comfort, love, kindness, self-control, meekness, endurance, and so much more. Whatever we need in any situation, He is. Rather than giving us love, kindness, or patience by themselves, the Lord Jesus gives us Himself as the Spirit to be our love, kindness, and patience. He Himself and all that He is supply us for every demand. Whatever we may be short of is available to us in the one dose of the all-inclusive Spirit. We can never have a love, kindness, or patience that expresses Christ apart from Christ Himself. So striving to follow teachings, learning more doctrines, or modifying our behavior to be “good Christians” won’t work. We simply need to contact Christ as the Spirit in our spirit. When we do, we get Him and enjoy Him as the wonderful, all-inclusive dose that can be everything to us and for us. Here are just a few ways we can contact the Spirit to take Him as the healthy “dose” for our daily Christian walk. First, we can read the Bible. John 6:63 says, “It is the Spirit who gives life;…the words which I have spoken to you are spirit and are life.” When we come to the Bible, we must use not only our mind to understand the black and white letters, but even more, we need to use our spirit to open ourselves to God’s speaking. This way, we contact the Spirit in the Word, receiving our “dose” from the Word. Second, we can take the all-inclusive dose of the Spirit by praying. First Corinthians 14:15 says, “I will pray with my spirit.” When we pray with our spirit, we contact the Lord who is the Spirit. Our praying with our spirit is like spiritual breathing. Just as we take in the air when we breathe, when we pray, we take in more of the life-giving Spirit as the divine air. Third, we can sing. First Corinthians 14:15 also says, “I will sing with the spirit.” We can also contact the Spirit by singing hymns and spiritual songs with our spirit. As we sing with our spirit, we spontaneously enjoy the Spirit as the all-inclusive One. Next, we can call on the name of the Lord. First Corinthians 12:3 says, “Therefore I make known to you that no one speaking in the Spirit of God says, Jesus is accursed; and no one can say, Jesus is Lord! except in the Holy Spirit.” When we call, “Lord Jesus,” or say, “Jesus is Lord,” we are in the Holy Spirit and contact the Lord as the Spirit. By calling on the name of the Lord, any time and any place, we receive more of Him as the all-inclusive dose. Finally, we can take the Spirit as the all-inclusive dose as we read the Word. Ephesians 6:17-18 says, “And receive the helmet of salvation and the sword of the Spirit, which Spirit is the word of God, by means of all prayer and petition, praying at every time in spirit.” We can practice what’s taught in this verse by turning what we read into a prayer to the Lord. By praying with the Word of God, we “eat” the Word as our nourishment. The Word is full of nourishing, spiritual food that fills our hunger and sustains us. This is an excellent way to receive more of the all-inclusive Spirit. As the life-giving Spirit with our spirit, Christ is everything that’s required for us to live our Christian life. Our need isn’t to try harder to do better; our unique need is to contact and enjoy the Spirit daily by reading the Bible, praying, singing, calling on the name of the Lord, and pray-reading. By practicing these things, we take the Spirit as the all-inclusive dose.

You’re not alone if you’ve asked yourself the question, “I’m saved. What comes next?” Many of us didn’t know what came next after we received the Lord Jesus Christ as our Savior. We surely greatly appreciate the tremendous steps God took to redeem us and to impart His eternal life into us so that we could be born again. But believing in Jesus Christ is just the beginning of our Christian life. So much more lies ahead! Let’s talk about some things that follow our first believing in the Lord. First, we can be baptized. Our believing in Jesus Christ is the inward aspect of our being saved, and our being baptized is the outward affirmation of our being saved. So after we believe, what comes next is the step of baptism. These two go together. Mark 16:16 says, “He who believes and is baptized shall be saved.” The New Testament Recovery Version has a rich note on this verse that can help us understand why both believing and being baptized are necessary: “…To believe and to be…baptized are two parts of one complete step for receiving the full salvation of God. To be baptized without believing is merely an empty ritual; to believe without being baptized is to be saved only inwardly without an outward affirmation of the inward salvation. These two should go together. Moreover, water baptism should be accompanied by Spirit baptism, even as the children of Israel were baptized in the sea [that is, in the water of the Red Sea]…and in the cloud [that is, in the Spirit]—1 Cor. 10:2; 12:13.” We gain so much by believing and by being baptized! Another step we need to take after we’re saved is to consecrate ourselves to the Lord. To consecrate yourself means to give yourself to the Lord. Paul says in Romans 12:1, “I exhort you therefore, brothers, through the compassions of God to present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, well pleasing to God, which is your reasonable service.” By consecrating ourselves to the Lord, we become a living sacrifice, putting ourselves completely in God’s hands. Previously, our life was for ourselves; now it’s for Him. Consecrating ourselves to God helps us to walk in God’s way, grow in the life of God, and enjoy God’s salvation. It also allows God to work in us. Third, after believing and being baptized, we begin to undergo a lifelong process of Christ spreading out from our regenerated spirit where He dwells, to our entire being, filling us with Himself. This process is called transformation in the Bible. Ephesians 3:17 says, “That Christ may make His home in your hearts through faith.” When we believed in Him, Christ came to live in our spirit. But this verse shows us a further step: Christ desires to spread from our spirit into our heart to make His home there. He wants to “settle down,” make His home, in our heart, not as a guest but as the resident. As Christ makes His home in our hearts, we’re changed, that is, transformed, in our inward parts: our mind, our emotion, and our will. Of course, this doesn’t happen overnight, but gradually over time. In Romans 12:2 the apostle Paul exhorts us to “be transformed.” Note 3 on this verse in the Recovery Version helps us see what transformation is and how it takes place: “Transformation is the inward, metabolic process in which God works to spread His divine life and nature throughout every part of our being, particularly our soul, bringing Christ and His riches into our being as our new element and causing our old, natural element to be gradually discharged. As a result, we will be transformed into His image (2 Cor. 3:18), that is, conformed to the image of the firstborn Son of God as His many brothers ([Rom.]8:29). Thus we will be suitable for the building up of His Body.” A beautiful piece of petrified wood is an excellent picture of transformation. Petrified wood is the result of a process that takes many years. First, a branch from a tree falls and is buried in soil with constant exposure to water. As the water flows around and through the branch, elements in the water gradually replace the material of the wood. Over time, the wood is changed, transformed into an object that has the color, texture, and weight of a stone. As we allow God’s life as the living water to saturate us and spread in us, we too are being transformed. But this incredible transformation takes place in our soul, with all the elements of who Christ is! Since God never forces Himself on us but rather allows us our free will, our being transformed comes only with our cooperation. Here are a few ways we cooperate with God to be transformed: First, by praying—speaking to the Lord in prayer, we open our hearts to Him and keep our hearts in a good condition with Him. Second, by spending time with the Lord—a daily, dedicated time in prayer and the Word with the Lord is critical to our relationship with Him. Next, by calling on the name of the Lord—whether loudly or quietly, we can call on the Lord to contact and enjoy Him throughout the day. Fourth, by reading the Bible—the healthy habit of daily Bible reading is one of the best ways receive the new element of Christ. One major benefit of reading the Bible is that we’re nourished with spiritual food. First Peter 2:2 says, “As newborn babes, long for the guileless milk of the word in order that by it you may grow unto salvation.” Just as a baby needs milk to grow, we need the Word of God as our spiritual nourishment so we can grow unto salvation. And finally, we can cooperate with God to be transformed by obeying the sense in our spirit from the Lord—we have a sense from the Lord dwelling in us concerning matters in our daily life. For example, perhaps we want to purchase a particular item, but we have an uneasy sense or feeling from the Lord in our spirit about it. That’s an opportunity to obey Him. Obeying Him to not buy that item allows the Lord to spread a little more into our soul. Another item that follows our first believing in the Lord is that we should begin to meet with other Christians. God doesn’t intend for Christians to be alone. After we’re saved, we need to find other believers in Christ with whom we can meet, fellowship, and go on. We can even pray, “Lord, lead me to others who love You and follow You.” Gathering together to fellowship with believers in Christ strengthens our faith and encourages us to experience more of Christ. Additionally, when we gather with other believers to fellowship and praise the Lord, God can be expressed through a group of people to fulfill His plan. So much awaits us after our first believing in Christ! We’re now on a lifelong journey of enjoying Christ’s rich presence and experiencing a rich and full salvation that continues throughout our entire lives.

In previous podcasts we talked about the importance of spending time with Jesus every morning and how to build up such a habit. This wonderful habit is key to our relationship with Christ. Perhaps you see the benefits of this kind of habit and want to build it up, but aren’t sure what to do during that time. How do we spend time with Jesus? What do we do in our mornings with Him? Throughout the centuries, Christians who loved the Lord and sought to know the Lord have discovered many enjoyable, beneficial ways to spend their mornings with Him. We’ll go through some of these discoveries. But first, let’s quickly refresh our view on what this morning time with Jesus is all about. Spending time with the Lord Jesus each morning isn’t to fulfill some kind of religious duty or perform a ritual. If we just “clock in” and “clock out” without our heart being in it or our spirit engaged, we may develop a habit, but it won’t be an enjoyable one nor will it help us know the Lord more or grow in Him. Keeping a lifeless practice is pointless and fruitless. Instead, we should approach our time in the morning as an opportunity to be with the One we love and who loves us, our dear Savior Christ. The Lord Jesus is a wonderful Person who lives in us. The goal of this time is to contact Him in our spirit, be fed by Him in His Word, enjoy Him, receive His speaking, and speak to Him. With this in mind, let’s look at some ways we can spend time with Jesus each morning. First, we can call upon the Lord’s name. Sometimes just calling upon the Lord’s name is the best prayer. In our time with Jesus in the morning we can simply pray, “Oh, Lord Jesus.” Our calling on the Lord can help us begin to open our heart to Him and exercise our spirit to contact Him. As we call, we can pray further, “Lord Jesus, I turn my heart to You again this morning. Lord Jesus, I want to contact You in my spirit to receive Your life.” When we call, we contact the Lord as the life-giving Spirit in us, and we receive His life. In one of her wonderful hymns, M.E. Barber puts this well: “Just to breathe the name of Jesus is to drink of life indeed.” Next, we can tell the Lord we love Him. The Lord Jesus wants our love, and we have a sweet sensation when we greet Him each morning with, “Lord Jesus, I love You.” The more we tell our Lord we love Him, the more our love for Him grows, and the more we enjoy His love for us. Our hearts become soft and open to Him. Third, we can praise and thank the Lord Jesus for what He’s done and for who He is. For example, we can praise Jesus with the wonderful facts we find in God’s Word: “Lord Jesus, I praise You for Your accomplishment and victory on the cross.” “Praise You, Lord, You are the resurrection and the life.” “Praise You, Lord Jesus, You are God, and You are the perfect, sinless man.” “Lord, You are the Lamb of God—praise You!” Ephesians 5:18 and 20 tell us we can be filled with the Lord in our spirit by giving thanks. Besides the many specific things in our lives we can thank the Lord for, we can also thank Him for who He is to us and what He does, as revealed in the Bible. For example, we might pray: “Thank You, Lord Jesus, for Your new compassions to me this morning.” “Thank You, Lord, for being my life.” “Lord Jesus, thank You for loving me and saving me.” “Oh Lord, thank You for living in me and being in me always.” “Thank You, Lord Jesus, for being the bread of life to me.” Fourth, we can also confess our sins to the Lord Jesus each morning as He makes us aware of them through our conscience. This is very important in our fellowship with Him. We’ve all experienced the awkwardness of being with someone we’ve argued with or offended. It’s difficult to even talk together. We may care for one another but a barrier separates us that makes it hard for us to have a pleasant time. Our relationship with the Lord Jesus is even more delicate. He lives in us and knows all things. Although He wants to fellowship with us, He can’t tolerate sin. So when we’ve sinned or disobeyed Him, a barrier separates us from Him. But we can confess our sins to Jesus to be forgiven and washed. The barrier is removed, and we sense peace between us and the Lord. We can once again fellowship freely with the Lord with a light and open heart. Fifth, we can read the Bible in the morning and even use it to pray. For this, it’s best not to read too many verses but to instead focus our prayer on one or two. We can use other times to study His Word. The goal in our morning time with the Lord is to be fed. We can read a chapter in the Bible, or half if it’s a long chapter, and then go back and pray with one or two verses the Lord touches us about. Suppose, for example, you read John 4 for your regular Bible reading, and verses 10 and 14 stand out to you. You can pray with these verses: “Lord Jesus, You’re the living water. Oh Lord, I come to You right now to drink of You. You give me the water that quenches my deep thirst. Thank You, Lord, You are now the living water in me, a fountain of water springing up into eternal life. Keep me drinking You today.” Whatever else we may do during our morning time with Jesus, we should always include time in the Word in prayer to receive substantial nourishment. We can speak to Jesus with His Word and He can speak to us in His Word. As we pray over and with the Word of God, His Word nourishes, refreshes, enlightens, and strengthens us. Finally, we can also sing to Jesus. Sometimes a hymn expresses our thoughts and feelings better than our own words can. Singing or prayerfully reading a hymn can open us deeply to the Lord Jesus. The mornings are a great time to sing to Him. Ephesians 5:18 and 19 tell us that singing with our hearts to the Lord is another way to be filled in our spirit with His Spirit. Hymnal.net is an excellent resource of hymns with their accompanying music. We can certainly pray about different matters or persons in our lives, but the Lord Jesus is a living Person who wants to have a relationship with us. So we should first come to Him to enjoy His presence, rather than starting our day by bringing Him all the things on our “wish list.” When we’ve first contacted the Lord in our spirit and enjoyed Him in His Word, He will lead us how to pray for these matters according to His will. The six matters we’ve talked about in this podcast are not in any particular order and shouldn’t be taken as a formula. Sometimes we might begin by praising the Lord Jesus and thanking Him. The Lord may then shine on us about our disobedience in something the day before, and we can confess that sin to Him. Or sometimes we may pray over His Word, call on His name, and sing to Him all at the same time. The main thing is to open our heart and exercise our spirit to touch the living Person of Christ. This keeps our time from becoming something methodical, routine, or dead; instead we’ll enjoy our Lord Jesus freshly morning by morning. As we practice, the Lord will show us how to contact Him in a living and personal way.

In another podcast we discussed one of the biggest questions a Christian may have: Can I lose my salvation? We saw the clear and definite assurance the Bible gives us that once we believe in Christ and receive Him as our Savior, we’re saved eternally. We can’t lose our salvation. But here’s another question: Does it make any difference whether we know we can’t lose our salvation? The answer is yes, and in this podcast we’ll talk about why. There are dangerous consequences of thinking you can lose your salvation. To think you can lose your salvation at any time makes progressing in the Christian life extremely difficult, if not impossible. In fact, this thought can undermine your entire Christian life. Let’s see how this could happen. When we sin, we naturally feel ashamed and regretful. This is a healthy reaction. But if we don’t know that we can confess our sins to the Lord to be forgiven and washed, then we don’t know what to do about our sins. Our conscience becomes weighed down. And as we commit more sins, as we inevitably will, we may begin to think the accumulation of all our sins undoes our salvation. A question starts to eat away at us: “Am I still saved?” With this question constantly bothering us, we become disheartened in our Christian life. Instead of being joyful in our salvation, loving the Lord, and pursuing Him with an unburdened heart, we feel unworthy. We find it difficult to pray to Him or read the Bible. We become focused on our behavior, our failures, and ourselves, and begin to lose sight of Christ and all He’s done for us. And in spite of our best efforts, we sin yet again. So our unconfessed sins continue to pile up, burdening our conscience even more, and making us feel hopeless. Sadly, at this point, some give up on following the Lord because they’re convinced their Christian life has suffered irreparable damage. Feeling they’re already lost, they think to themselves, “What’s the use? I’ve already lost my salvation. Why try anymore?” So they give up, go back to their old life, and live as they did before they were saved. They don’t realize that the blood Jesus shed on the cross redeemed them and saved them eternally. And they don’t know that same precious blood of Jesus can also wash them of every sin they commit and confess to Him after they’re saved. Knowing these things—knowing we can’t lose our salvation—has a positive effect on our Christian life. God forgave us and washed us of our sins when we first believed in Jesus Christ and accepted Him as our Savior. At that time, we were also born again in our spirit with the divine life, and Christ came to live in us. Now that Christ lives in us, He wants us to go on from being saved to knowing Him personally and experiencing Him subjectively. He wants us to enjoy Him and grow in Him. He wants to be our life so we can express Him in our living. If we know we’re saved eternally, we can go forward with a lightened heart to build on that, unhindered by the erroneous and damaging thought that we could lose our salvation. If we don’t know this important truth, we’ll miss out on all that’s before us in the Christian life. Of course, the Lord doesn’t want us to sin, and we grieve Him when we do. Even we ourselves don’t want to sin, and we feel guilty when we do. But when our conscience makes us aware we’ve offended the Lord, we’re not left hopeless and helpless. We can and should simply confess our sin to the Lord so He can forgive us and cleanse us from that sin. Knowing we can never lose our salvation rescues us from despair and from giving up when we fail. Instead, we can leave the realm of doubt and despair by standing firmly on God’s faithful Word concerning His eternal salvation. Then we can go forward into the realm of experiencing and enjoying the rich, wonderful, and full salvation God has provided for us in Christ!

In a previous podcast, we saw the benefits of reading the Bible daily and why it’s an excellent habit for every Christian to develop. But how do we get started? What can we do to develop this healthy and necessary habit? In this podcast, we’ll cover seven practical points to help you build up a daily habit of reading the Bible: First, pray for a hunger for God’s Word. In Psalm 119 we can see the psalmist’s love and hunger for God’s word. In verse 103 he overflows with his joyous experience of God’s word: “How sweet are Your words to my taste! Sweeter than honey to my mouth!” We, too, can have this kind of joy in God’s Word; we can simply ask God to give us a hunger and a taste for His Word. Surely this is a prayer God would like to answer. Second, choose a set time to read the Word. It helps to schedule a set time for reading the Bible. Morning is an excellent time, before the hustle and bustle of the day begins. Other times like during lunch or before going to bed can also be good. A scheduled time helps us remember to read the Word and makes it a part of our daily routine. Third, read consecutively. Perhaps we’ve read the Bible occasionally, reading here and there in the Scriptures. But a good way to help us regularly and consistently read the Word is to read it consecutively, chapter after chapter and book after book. This way we don’t have to decide what to read each time, and as we read the Bible cover to cover we’ll begin to see what a cohesive book it is. Fourth, turn your heart to the Lord before reading. Every time we come to the Word, it’s good to turn our heart to the Lord Jesus. Before we start our Bible reading, we can pray a simple prayer like this: “Lord, as I come to Your Word, I turn my heart to you. I open to You and to Your speaking. Speak to me, wash me, and shine more light from Your Word on me today. Dear Lord, there is so much more for me to see in Your Word. Enlighten me more as I read today.” Praying a simple prayer like this will help us be open to anything the Lord would like to speak to us in His Word. By opening our heart and spirit, we’ll contact the Lord Jesus in His Word and His Word will be food to us. Next, pray over what you read. Sometimes as we’re reading the Bible, a certain verse stands out to us. It may comfort us, convict us, or apply exactly to our situation. Other times, a verse may perplex us. Whatever our reaction, we can stop and pray what we’ve read back to the Lord. We might thank the Lord or praise Him for certain portions, we might ask Him to show us the meaning of a certain verse, or we might just talk with Him about a verse. In this way the Bible can be a prayer book to us, helping us to spend time with the Lord. As we practice this, the Bible will become more than words on a page to us; it will become a place where we meet with our dear Lord Jesus. Sixth, keep track of your Bible reading. Keeping track of what you’ve read is helpful, and there are many ways to do so. You can check off what chapter or book you’ve finished in your Bible. You can use a blank page or the table of contents to check off each book as you read it. You can also mark the number of times you’ve read the whole New Testament and the whole Old Testament. Online tools like ReadHisWord.com and LettheWord.com are also available to help you keep track of your Bible reading. Keeping track encourages us in our habit. For example, you may think you’re going too slowly if you read one chapter per day. But even if you only read one chapter per day, you’ll finish the entire New Testament in under one year. After five years of reading the Bible daily, you might look at your record and find you’ve read the whole New Testament seven times! Seeing this kind of progress really encourages us to continue on. Finally, treasure your daily Bible reading time. Reading the Bible daily is so important for us as Christians, so we must treasure and guard the time we’ve set aside to enjoy the Word of the Lord. Our lives are full of things that can interrupt or distract us, so we really have to be active to guard the time we set. For example, you may want to silence your phone during your set time for reading the Bible so incoming calls, texts, and notifications don’t interrupt you. Resolving not to respond to these alerts will keep the time you’ve reserved for the Word from being eaten into. Some people find reading the Bible using an electronic device is less than ideal because of the distractions that are only a click away. In this case, so you can focus your whole attention on God’s Word, you could try using a print version of the Bible instead. A daily Bible reading habit will lay a foundation for our Christian life, strengthen our Christian faith, and help us to know the Lord Jesus in a deeper way. May God grant us all His grace to daily read His Word so that we can be brought on to the full knowledge of the truth!

In our podcast on “The Best Time of the Day to Spend with the Lord Jesus,” we discussed the benefits of having a habit of spending morning time with the Lord. In this podcast we’ll discuss some helpful points for building up this healthy spiritual habit. First, being motivated is key to building up any good habit. And knowing the advantages of a particular habit positively motivates us. Likewise, knowing the disadvantages of not having that habit also motivates us. For instance, we know regular—not occasional—exercise helps us feel better, work more efficiently, and even live longer. Keeping these positive benefits in mind motivates us to get off our chairs, get active and moving, and persevere, especially when we don’t feel like exercising. As another example, we know we’ll have dental problems if we don’t regularly brush and floss. So we floss, not because we enjoy it, but because the negative outcome if we don’t encourages us to. Similarly, habitually spending personal time with the Lord Jesus each morning positively affects our spiritual life and our daily living. When we enjoy Him and His Word in the morning, we’re nourished and supplied with His life to face the challenges of the day. And by being nourished, we’ll grow in the life of Christ. But not having this daily habit affects us negatively. Without being nourished regularly, it’s difficult to maintain our vitality and joy. And when we’re weak from a lack of spiritual nourishment, we succumb to temptations more easily. Our personal knowing of Christ and our growth in His life are hindered. Next, a habit is something that’s part of your life; it’s a regular practice. If you do something only occasionally, it’s not a habit. Forming a habit takes time and repeated practice, and in the process, sometimes we fail. But when we remember that it takes repeated practice, our occasional lapses won’t overly discourage us. We’ll just pick up our practice again afterward. To establish the habit of spending time with the Lord every morning is no different. It takes time and repeated practice, and restarting after our lapses. So, here are some practical pointers for developing this habit: First, spend time to pray about this matter. The Lord wants to have a personal relationship with us and will surely answer our prayers about this. He will faithfully remind us of our desire and intention to build this habit. We can pray, “Lord Jesus, I really want to start my day with You, not other things. Lord, supply me with grace in the morning to put everything else aside so I can be with You first.” Praying about this opens the way for the Lord to be the grace we need to build this healthy habit morning after morning. Second, go to bed a little earlier so you can get up earlier in the morning to have time to be with the Lord. Burning the candle at both ends—staying up very late and trying to get up early enough to have this time—usually results in failure and discouragement. But by planning ahead this way, you’ll have specific time carved out to be with the Lord each morning. Third, keep in mind that forming a lifelong habit takes time and practice. When you fail, don’t give up. You can simply start afresh the next day because, as Lamentations 3:22-23 says, the Lord’s mercy is new to us every morning. Just take one day at a time. Next, determine the least distracting way for you to read the Bible. For instance, some find a printed copy of the Bible is better for them than a digital one during this time since email, news, and texts are all just a click away, and we can easily be distracted by things on our digital devices. Especially when starting out, it’s good to minimize distractions where we can. Finally, begin by aiming for a short time each morning. This is easier and more realistic than trying to go from spending zero minutes with the Lord to spending sixty. After you establish a shorter time first, say ten minutes, you can add more time. As you taste the joy of being with the Lord in the morning, you’ll spontaneously want to add more time, building up to perhaps a solid twenty minutes. And as you go on, if you have more time, you can spend more time. It’s up to you. Building up the habit of spending time with the Lord each morning is a worthwhile endeavor that benefits us for our entire life. For help on what to do during this morning time with the Lord, keep an eye out for an upcoming podcast on “How to Spend Time with the Lord Jesus in the Morning.”

We’ve all heard someone say, “I’ve been blessed by God,” usually in relation to success, health, family, wealth, or a job. We’ve even heard athletes say this after winning a big game. We all want to be under God’s blessing. The common understanding of what it means to be blessed by God is that He gives us good things. In this respect, we can say that God’s blessing is on everyone, believers and unbelievers alike. Matthew 5:45 says that the Father who is in the heavens causes His sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the just and unjust. But does God’s blessing pertain only to material things? Though these are included, thinking of God’s blessing as mainly material things severely limits our understanding of what is in God’s heart for us as believers. So what is the fuller meaning of being blessed by God? Let’s begin with the blessing of Abraham by God in Genesis 12:3: “And in you all the families of the earth will be blessed.” We might think being blessed here means something outward, like having a good life. But in Galatians 3:13 and 14, the apostle Paul specifically explained what blessed in Genesis 12:3 means: “Christ has redeemed us out of the curse of the law, having become a curse on our behalf; because it is written, ‘Cursed is every one hanging on a tree’; in order that the blessing of Abraham might come to the Gentiles in Christ Jesus, that we might receive the promise of the Spirit through faith.” These verses explain both how we can be blessed and what the blessing of God is. How can we be blessed? As fallen sinners, we deserve nothing but judgment and curse, certainly not blessing. And our good works or behavior can never make us “blessable.” But Jesus became a curse on our behalf. On the cross, He bore the curse that was upon all humanity and died in our place. Because of the redemptive work of Christ on the cross for us, we cursed sinners can now receive the blessing of God through faith in Christ. What is the blessing of God? Galatians 3:14 makes clear that the blessing in Christ Jesus that God wants us to receive isn’t material things, but something far greater—the promise of the Spirit. Note 2 on this verse in the New Testament Recovery Version helps us understand what this blessing is: “In the gospel we have received not only the blessing of forgiveness, washing, and cleansing; even more, we have received the greatest blessing, which is the Triune God—the Father, Son, and Spirit—as the processed, all-inclusive life-giving Spirit dwelling in us in a most subjective way for our enjoyment. Oh, what a blessing that we can enjoy such an all-inclusive One as our daily portion!” But in this verse what, or who, is “the Spirit” that we receive? The next note on verse 14 says this: “This verse indicates that the Spirit is the blessing that God promised to Abraham for all the nations and that has been received by the believers through faith in Christ. The Spirit is the compound Spirit,…and actually is God Himself processed in His Trinity through incarnation, crucifixion, resurrection, ascension, and descension that we may receive Him as our life and our everything. This is the focus of the gospel of God. “The physical aspect of the blessing that God promised to Abraham was the good land (Gen. 12:7; 13:15; 17:8; 26:3-4), which was a type of the all-inclusive Christ (see Col. 1:12 and note 2). Since Christ is eventually realized as the all-inclusive life-giving Spirit (1 Cor. 15:45; 2 Cor. 3:17), the blessing of the promised Spirit corresponds with the blessing of the land promised to Abraham. Actually, the Spirit as the realization of Christ in our experience is the good land as the source of God’s bountiful supply for us to enjoy.” Christ dwells in us as the all-inclusive Spirit, so we can experience Him in a personal, subjective way by contacting Him with our spirit. We can pray, call on His name, and read His Word. By simply turning to Christ in our spirit, talking to Him throughout the day, we can enjoy Him as our rich portion. Suppose you pray for a better job and get a higher paying position. Happily, you thank the Lord for it. But what happens when the new work environment presents some difficulties? If you realize that God didn’t just bless you with a new job but with much more, with the all-inclusive Christ who lives in you, you’ll contact the Lord as the life-giving Spirit dwelling in your spirit. So instead of asking the Lord to take away the problems or bless you with another job, you’ll open your heart to Him and ask Him to be your wisdom, strength, or whatever you need, to face the troubles at work. You’ll begin to experience Christ as the bountiful supply in that difficult situation. You’ll enjoy Him—the top blessing. If we think God’s blessing is mainly of things in the material realm, we’ll pursue these things, spend our prayer time asking God for them, and when we don’t get them, wonder whether we’re blessed by God. Meanwhile, we’ll miss enjoying the broader, fuller, and more real blessing of God—Christ for our experience and enjoyment. By focusing on and pursuing Christ, we can enjoy the all-inclusive Spirit as the top blessing of God! Surely we should be thankful for the material things the Lord gives us. But we’re truly blessed when we experience Christ as our love, our peace, our patience, our satisfaction, our joy, and so many other aspects of Himself. We have this wonderful Person now within us, the greatest blessing in the universe! We can pray, “Lord, thank You for dying as a curse for me so I could be blessed with Yourself. Thank you for living in me as the Spirit. Open the eyes of my heart to see beyond the physical and material blessings You’ve given me. I desire to experience You as the highest blessing in the universe!”