As a part of our annual Q Series, this was a question that was turned in: Are there ghosts?
Check out the video below…
The Scriptures I reference in this answer:
For other Q&As from this series, check out discussions about the Bible here, and questions about the mark of the beast here, and a question about a Christian losing his/her salvation here.
Our annual Q Series is where folks send their questions to me on a variety of subjects and we do our best to answer them. This week many of the questions were about the Bible. Questions like:
Here’s what we discussed, along with the time this discussion appears on the video:
We’ll be discussing more questions this upcoming Sunday, so be sure to send them my way. For all of the ways you can send questions, please click here.
If I were to ask five different Christians to give me a definition of sanctification, I just might get five different definitions!
Part of this comes from incorrect either-or thinking. However, Jesus seems to tell us that sanctification requires a both-and thinking.
In Christ’s prayer for His followers in John 17, He uses the word sanctified three times (see verses 17-19). Although He is using the same Greek word each time, He uses a different “flavor” of the word to make it really clear what He means.
First of all, the Greek word for sanctified means the process of being made into a saint. So sometimes I like to say the word this way: SAINT-ified.
Check out Christ’s prayer. First He says, “I sanctify Myself,” and then He says, “that they too may be truly sanctified.” Same Greek word, but each time is slightly tweaked.
Jesus uses a “flavor” of Greek which means sanctification is something that He has done completely and totally on His own once and for all. In other words, Christians are completely and totally sanctified at the very moment they surrender their life to Him.
But when He talks about His followers, the “flavor” of Greek means sanctification is something that is an ongoing process. In other words, we are being SAINT-ified.
So which is it? Sanctified once, or sanctified through an ongoing process?
It’s not either-or. It’s both-and!
Think about a married couple. From the moment the pastor says, “I now pronounce you husband and wife” they are married. It is done; fully completed. There is nothing the bride or groom can do to become more married.
However, the groom can begin to look at the marriage through his bride’s eyes. Then he can serve her in a way that helps her feel more joy, more satisfaction, and more fulfillment within the marriage. Neither of them becomes more married, but they can get more enjoyment within the marriage.
The same thing for Christians. At the moment we ask Jesus to be our Lord and Savior we are saved from the penalty of our sins. We can’t be more saved. But through the process of SANIT-ificiation we can experience more joy, more satisfaction, and more fulfillment within our relationship with Jesus.
My paraphrase of 1 Peter 1:15-16—But just as He who called you has paid for your once-for-all saint-ification, so keep on being saint-ified in all you do; for it is written: “Be holy, because I am holy.”
What about you? Are you satisfied with just being saved, or are you striving for a joy-filled, more fulfilling, increasingly satisfied relationship with Jesus Christ? It can truly be a wonderful both-and relationship!
Without exception, all human beings have exactly 168 hours in a week. No one gets any bonus time and no one has any hours taken away. We’re supposed to get 8 hours of sleep a night, and most of us work about 40 hours each week. So let’s do the math…
In those 72 hours there must be time for eating and taking care of chores. But what about going to church? The problem for many people is looking at church attendance as just another “chore” or item on their “To Do” list.
But instead of thinking of going to church as “I have to,” how about if you looked at all of the “I get to” benefits?
Here are 10 great reasons for going to church regularly. I get to…
“Sometimes we make it sound like we’re making a sacrifice to go to church, but think about the very real sacrifice Jesus made so that we could meet together as brothers and sisters!” —Scott Troost
How about it? Do you think you could invest an hour or two of your 72 discretionary hours in a local church this week?
My thanks to my brother, Scott Troost, for sharing such a timely message!
“Ladies and gentleman, come see the amazing high wire act! Watch closely as he crosses the chasm on a tightrope without a net!” Well, at least that’s what it feels like to me.
On August 13, 20, and 27 we will be doing our Q Series at Calvary Assembly of God. These are Sundays where I don’t prepare a sermon, but I prepare myself to answer questions that are thrown at me on any topic. And I feel a little like the man walking on a tightrope without a net!
Here we go!
If you’d like to submit a question, you can do so in the comments below. You can always send questions to me via Twitter or email. If you won’t be able to attend the services, we’ll be broadcasting on Facebook Live and will make the video on YouTube following that.
If you can attend in person (each of these Sundays at 10:30am), we will have a text number available so you can anonymously text your question to the computer techs.
It’s always fun and educational, so I hope you will be able to join us.
Take just a minute to get a clear mental picture of your best friend.
Got it?
Now, think of a few adjectives you would use to describe your best friend.
Did you think of words like loyal … trustworthy … honest … loving … faithful … reliable … authentic … funny … patient ….?
What about godly? Would you describe your best friend with that word? After all, if your friend is godly, wouldn’t he or she also be loyal, trustworthy, honest, loving, and so on?
This gives us an idea of how important friendships are to God. If calling someone “godly” sums up the very best attributes of your very best friend, then that means that you can see God in your friend. And hopefully they can see God in you too!
Jesus told His followers that He viewed them as friends. He told them…
Eugene Peterson said, “Friendship is not a way of accomplishing something but a way of being with another in which we become more authentically ourselves.”
Your best friend is someone you can be completely real around, right? No games, no masks, just come as you are. And your friend still loves you completely. This is how it is with God as our Best Friend too!
There is nothing you could ever do to make God love you any less, so stop worrying!
There is nothing you could ever do to make God love you any more, so stop trying!
Friends love us enough to be totally honest with us. That’s why Solomon said, “Wounds from a friend can be trusted, but an enemy only multiplies kisses” (Proverbs 27:6).
Friends want us to have the very best, and to stay on paths that lead to success. So again Solomon wrote, “As iron sharpens iron, so a friend sharpens a friend” (Proverbs 27:17).
Oswald Chambers tells us, “Friendship with God is faith in action in relation to God and to our fellow men.”
So be assured of God’s friendship with you. Then be God’s friend to those in your life, and allow them to be God’s friend right back to you … THAT’S WHAT REAL FRIENDS ARE FOR!
We have so much fun together!
If you live near Cedar Springs and don’t have a church family, I would love for you to join us! Click here to get all the details, or leave me a comment if you have questions.
There is a relationship killer that seems to be particularly hard for men. It’s hard because men’s brains are designed in a way that sometimes prohibits them from even seeing this issue.
Bill & Pam Farrel wrote a book called Men Are Like Waffles, Women Are Like Spaghetti. The Farrels identify how men tend to compartmentalize their lives. That is, guys can be so absorbed in one “box” in their life that they are completely oblivious to the other boxes. For instance, when a man is at work he seldom thinks about the other areas of his life (his wife, his kids, the bills that need to be paid, what he’s going to have for lunch).
In addition, men’s brains are also designed to stay in those boxes where things can be quickly fixed. A guy likes fixing things, so the boxes where he can do something and see an immediate result is a box he’s going to keep going back to again and again.
Here’s the trouble… Relationships don’t fit in nice, neat boxes. Neither are relationships something that can be “fixed.” And relationships are never, ever fixed or improved quickly.
So if a guy isn’t aware of these things, he can be unintentionally sabotaging the relationships around him.
King David illustrated this in his unintentional lack of involvement in three of his sons’ lives—
Dave Wills wrote, “We all tend to craft a self-focused view of the world where we emerge as either a hero or a victim in every scene. We’re never the villains in the story. The truth is, though, that we’ve all been the bad guy more often than we’d like to admit. A life of love requires that we look in the mirror and give an honest and humble self-assessment.”
The way to defeat this relationship killer is to become aware of it through humble self-assessment. David learned this truth and shared his prayer with us: “Search me, O God. Show me any areas in my life where I am off-track” (Psalm 139:23-24).
In response to this prayer, the Holy Spirit must have showed David how he had unintentionally starved his relationships with Amnon, Absalom, and Adonijah, because he became highly involved in his son Solomon’s life.
So much so that as Solomon talked to his children about how they should live, he also told them where he had learned how to do this—his father taught him (Proverbs 4:1-4).
Guys, it doesn’t matter how long you’ve been unintentionally in another box. It doesn’t matter how strained the relationship may have become. If you will humbly ask God to search you, reveal to you where you’ve messed up, and ask Him to help you get better … your relationships WILL begin to improve!
Don’t wait another day to pray that “Search me” prayer!
Craig T. Owens 
The Q Series—Parables, End Times, And Prayer
August 21, 2017 — Craig T. OwensHere’s what we discussed, along with the time this discussion appears on the video:
We will be answering your questions one more time next Sunday. Please click here to find all the ways you can submit your questions.
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