If you are reading this, you are likely an educated, high-impact professional, which is the profile of the people who tend to read this Word for the Week, as well as attend our conferences and churches. I did not choose this profile for our audience, but I’m happy with it. I did not know this until a few years ago, and had never fashioned my message to fit any particular group, but have mostly addressed what I felt the emphasis of the Spirit was on. Even so, knowing this profile does help.

     We cannot understand the ways of God without understanding His judgments, yet this may be the most neglected of biblical teachings in modern times. This is because many think of the judgments of God as condemnation and/or destruction. These are actually very rare consequences of His judgments, but the un-regenerated do tend to think in extremes.

Last week we discussed how change is a healthy process that every living thing experiences. The challenges that change brings to our lives can help us to be a wineskin that can hold new wine without bursting. The great, Russian writer Alexander Solzhenitsyn once said, “Even biology teaches us that perpetual well-being is not good for any creature.” Biology also teaches that when there is an excessive resistance to change, it is a sign that the death process has begun.

We have established three of the four cardinal points on the compass using the map provided by biblical prophecy, which will help us to navigate through our times. These three points are:

Has our policy in Iraq failed? Civil war in Iraq is now a reality; it is only left to be determined how long and devastating it will be. Even though there has been a noble attempt to avoid such an internal conflict, it was probably inevitable and should surprise no one. Even so, the progress toward stable and lasting reform in Iraq has been truly remarkable. In fact, things are going so well that we should not have much doubt that it is possible for Iraq to become one of the most stable and prosperous democracies in the world.

This week we continue our study with Ephesians 4:14:

In Ephesians 4:11-13 we are told, “And He gave some as apostles, and some as prophets, and some as evangelists, and some as pastors and teachers, for the equipping of the saints for the work of service, to the building up of the body of Christ; until we all attain to the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to a mature man, to the measure of the stature which belongs to t

Significant events which take place in the natural often reflect what is happening in the spiritual realm. The Persian Gulf War is such an event. It is essential that we understand this war because the prayers of the church can be more powerful in effecting world events than all of the politics and weapons combined. Effective prayer moves God, and He is the One who controls the affairs of men. The following are a few of the natural parallels which I believe we should consider in relation to their spiritual applications:

 
 We continue with our study of how love is the foundation of the kingdom economy. Because we are told in I Corinthians13:8 that “love never fails,”

We are going to spend the next few weeks examining the lessons from the recent elections because we probably will not get a greater illumination of the times than this for a long time.