Shepherd and Sheep Series-Sheep Must Be Protected While They Eat

In this Shepherd and the Sheep Series, we are studying the subject of meditation. God says if we meditate on the Word we will be wiser than all our enemies. "O how love I your law! It is my meditation all the day. You through your commandments have made me wiser than my enemies: for they are ever with me" (Psalm 119:97-98). Sheep are defenseless. They have no way of protecting themselves. They cannot kick, bite, or hide. In fact, they cannot even run away from the enemies that prey upon them. The normal body temperature of sheep is 103 degrees F. If they run very long, their thick coats of wool will cause their body temperature to rise dangerously, and then they will die. Since sheep have no built-in defense system, they have many who prey upon them. Chief among these are lions, bears, and wolves. These predators stalk the sheep day and night, placing the sheep in need of continuous protection. One of the chief functions of a shepherd is to guard the sheep. God compares Satan to a roaring lion, seeking whom he may devour. (See 1 Peter 5:8). False teachers are pictured a ravenous wolves who creep into flocks and carry away captive the young and the weak. Sometimes they enter under the guise of being sheep themselves. Jesus warned, “Beware of false prophets, which come to you in sheep’s clothing, but inwardly they are ravening wolves” (Matthew 7:15). We need to learn how to spot vicious enemies. Cults are counterfeits of the Christian faith. They often use the Bible in their teachings, but they distort and misapply verses in an attempt to support false conclusions. The Christian who meditates upon God’s Word should be able to detect false cults quickly. However, it is also the responsibility of the shepherd to expose false teachers and to protect the flock from them. Learning how to avoid poisonous foods. Lions, bears, and wolves are not the only danger from which the sheep need to be guarded. They also need protection from poisonous plants which grow among the grass they eat. Sheep will eat any green plants they find, even if they are poisonous. Once eaten, these plants will cause severe damage or death. For this reason, the shepherd must go into a field and prepare it for the sheep by searching out, pulling up, and destroying any poisonous plants. The same precautions are necessary to protect sheep from polluted water. On the way to pure streams, sheep may stop and drink from germ-infested puddles. Here they can pick up various parasites and diseases. This preparation is also the responsibility of the “under-shepherds” of Christ. They must identify worldly philosophies and humanistic presuppositions that so easily creep into teaching materials. Collisions 2:8 warns that we are to let no one deceive us “through philosophy and vain deceit, after the tradition of men, after the rudiments of the world, and not after Christ.” We are also commanded in II Corinthians 10:5 to bring every thought into captivity to the obedience of Christ. We must learn to discern what doctrinal heresy is. Just as sheep can eat too much of one thing, such as clover, and become bloated, so a Christian can overemphasize one truth and become heretical and schismatic. Every Biblical truth has a balancing truth: law is balanced with grace; justice is balanced with mercy; work is balanced with rest; love is balanced with truth. Truth out of balance leads to heresy. Dr. Ken Copley is available for counseling, conferences, and local church meetings.

The God Box

Jeremiah 2:11 "Has a nation changed their gods, which are yet no gods? But my people have changed their glory for that which does not profit." The above verse speaks of putting God in a man made box. Here are some of the boxes I have observed God being stuffed into. I. The ritual box. God is a distant presence who only wants to be honored by patterned worship. II. The fairy godmother box. Whenever we have a need we can run to him, expecting him to wave his hand and make everything better. III. The Burger King box. God will do it our way. We treat His truth like a smorgasbord. Flannery O'Connor said "The truth does not change according to our ability to stomach it." IV. The generic box. Churches today compete for attendance by making Christianity as watered down as possible. Such Churches never face a call to discipleship that befits the Lord of glory and transforms their lives. V. The self help box. Ben Franklin said "God helps those who help themselves." Robert Schuller said "You can be anything you want to be, you can go anywhere if your are willing to dream big and work hard." The idea is you are the master of your own destiny; God only helps out as a silent partner. VI. The formula box. The most evident result of scientific thought on theology. We serve God by obeying principles such as six steps to a more vital prayer life, five steps to deal with anger. We must never miss the Person of the principle. VII The God told me to box. This box allows us to pursue our own ambitions by stamping them with God's endorsement. Its amazing how many people today God has called to be rich and famous, and how few He has called to self-sacrificing ministry. In conclusion: these boxes motivate people to action, and those actions can produce temporal results. Extra effort can make significant temporal change for many people, but they never learn to trust God, to hear His voice, to submit their lives to His ways and find true life in Christ. Dr. Ken Copley is available for counseling, conferences, and local church meetings.

Staying Out of Harms Way

“It is the LORD your God you must follow, and him you must revere. Keep his commands and obey him; serve him and hold fast to him" (Deuteronomy 13:4). Upon entering the promise land the children of Israel faced a powerful foe. That enemy was idolatry, which Moses had strongly cautioned his followers against. Every foreign land has idols and the Canaanites worshiped, among other gods, Baal, he was the favorite god among the Canaanites (the people who lived in the land of Palestine). Some of the Israelites became Baal worshipers, including King Ahab, under the influence of his wicked, Baal worshiping wife, Jezebel. The false god Baal was believed to be the storm god. The farmers looked to Baal to give them success in growing crops. They believed he controlled the weather. When the children of Israel moved into the promised land, they lived among the Canaanites, and some became Baal worshipers. In a conversation over the back fence, a Canaanite might have advised his Israelite neighbor "You had better offer sacrifices to Baal, or your seed might be bad or you might not get rain this season." There is never a good time to listen to the counsel of the ungodly. The problem with idol worship is the glory that belongs to the Lord is given to a false god. Who is the One who is really in charge of the rain, seed germination and storms? The true and living God is in charge and He must receive the credit due Him. Because God is sovereign over all His creation and He is in absolute control, all glory goes to the Almighty. Moses also cautions against the idolatry that could rise among themselves. That is why we need to be well acquainted with the truths and precepts of the Scriptures. For we can expect to be tested by temptations of evil that come under the appearance of good, and we will face error that comes in the guise of truth. God's Word will equip us with the discernment needed to rightly oppose such temptations. One way we demonstrate our love for the Lord is by rejecting that which is false and pretentious and clinging to that which is true and right. We are not only to reject the temptation but we are not even to give the temptation a hearing. We must plug our ears and reject such details with disdain. We may even have to utter "Get behind me Satan." Some temptation is so vile that we are not to debate about it or allow our minds to ponder it. Keeping out of harms way works best when we are walking with the Lord. That is why we are to "Hold fast to the Lord." Dr. Ken Copley is available for counseling, conferences, and local church meetings.

Is Our God the Only God

“I, even I, am the LORD, and apart from me there is no savior. I have revealed and saved and proclaimed I, and not some foreign god among you. You are my witnesses," declares the LORD, "that I am God” (Isaiah 43:11-12). I remember as a freshman in Bible College reading a critical, critique of the Christian faith by an ungodly individual. He said the Christ faith is "nothing more than a psychological crutch." My response was how dare he attack my God and my faith. Then it dawned on me, he had not experienced the power and grace of God that comes through the new birth. The above verse does bring to mind the question, Is belief in God something for the weak, a childish gullibility, a way of side stepping reality? From [Freud’s] perspective, God is merely a creation of the human mind, a projection emanating from human need and desire rather than a distinct reality or being that exists independently of the human mind. Freud’s notion of God acting as an idealized father figure for humans, providing a cushion from the harshness of the real world and a comforting friend in the midst of life’s troubles, reduces God to a human construct. Indeed, for Freud, God is made in humanity’s own image and is the “ultimate wish-fulfillment”; God does not actually exist but is merely the creation of humanity’s imagination and desire for a loving father figure. Can we as believers respond to this? Is God really able to be explained away so easily by one aspect of psychology? The answer is a resounding no. As the song writer stated "He lives, He lives, I know my Savior lives, for He lives within my heart." Our verses for today reminds us we are here as witnesses to "Declare the praises of him who has called us out of darkness into his marvelous light" (I Peter 2). Unlike the blind unbeliever we are recipients of God's blessings. We are the people who anticipate His mighty deliverance yet to come. How dare we remain silent? There is no place for discouragement or retreat in our lives. To be discouraged is to lack courage. No believer has the luxury of discouragement, for we are in a battle for truth. Jesus Christ is our Commander and Chief, and He won the battle for us back at Calvary. Thus we fight from victory, rather than for victory. The same God who made the corpse of Jesus our living Lord is the same God Who is mighty to save. Being a witness of the living God, ought to humble us. Jacob was humbled when God touched his thigh, he was renamed Israel and walked with a limp the rest of his life. We ought to beware of any Christian leader who does not walk with a limp. Sometimes God orders circumstances into our lives to develop humility and create greater dependence upon Him. It is because God works greater through weakness than strength. The truth is we can get humility voluntarily or involuntarily. Its much easier if we get it voluntarily. "God gives more grace to the humble" one way or the other we'll get it. For God commissions humble, trusting, witnesses to do His Kingdom work. Dr. Ken Copley is available for counseling, conferences, and local church meetings.

The Lord of the Desert

"Then Jesus was led by the Spirit into the desert to be tempted by the devil" (Matthew 4:1). There is a feeling (almost a doctrine) among conservative evangelicals that goes like this, "If you do right and act right, you will be blessed with a nearly trouble free life." Such teaching is flat out heresy. Should you, for some reason believe this, I would advise you to check in with the Apostle Peter. Reading several chapters from one of his two books will set anyone straight on the matter of troubles, trails and suffering. We know Jesus was led by the Spirit of God into the desert, but why? To be "Tempted by the devil" is the answer. Why would God lead his Son, or you or me into the desert? Answer, there is a whole lot of learning that takes place in the desert. "Though He were Son, He learned obedience by the things He suffered." "Desert Theological Seminary" is where we learn about ourselves. Hey, I can handle life when everything is going my way. Desert living is the place where we choose to commit to living by every Word of God, and not by bread alone. Its where we learn to respond to every temptation by citing what the Word of God says about the temptation. Its where we learn to separate the wheat from the chaff of life. The desert is a place of forging convictions and shaping character. As Christians we have a great need, the Scriptures must be written on our hearts, that we might know how to respond to any given situation. Its typically our reactions, not our actions that kill us. The Word says, "The truth shall set you free." Knowing and doing the will of God allows us to live free even when we are tempted by that which is evil. have you noticed that deserts are very quiet. There is little to no activity in the desert. However it is often the place where the devil speaks the loudest, because the desert is our place of weakness. When I am in the desert I don't have the comforts of the "Normal" to cling to. In the desert I'm not in control, if I was in control I wouldn't choose to be in the desert. I have also noticed when I am in the desert the heavens often seem to be made out of brass. God is frequently silent in the desert, however it can also be a place where God (when He chooses) speaks the loudest. The word desert comes from the Hebrew word "Dahbaar" which means "To speak." He usually speaks to me when I finally shut up and am ready to listen. I have spend a lot of time in the desert, desert living isn't so bad, (in time it kind of grows on you), its a great place to meditate on the Word. Its God's classroom to teach us how to withstand the unique temptations that come to us in the desert place. Desert is where we learn the importance of spiritual warfare. Its a great place to draw on the grace of God, which is operative even when He is silent. And its the place to take our stand with God. He and He alone is Lord of the desert. Dr. Ken Copley is available for counseling, conferences, and local church meetings.

Your Mission

Paul wrote to the Colossians because there was heresy being brought into the church. In order to destroy false teaching he taught them the truth. "We proclaim him, admonishing and teaching everyone with all wisdom, so that we may present everyone perfect in Christ. To this end I labor, struggling with all his energy, which so powerfully works in me." (Colossians 1:28,29). Before his conversion to Christ Paul had been a member of the Sanhedrin. He had been a strict Jew of the sect of the Pharisees. Paul really knew what bad new was, it was living as a legalistic Pharisee, apart from God. Once Paul received the revelation of the grace of God it became the theme of every conversation. He couldn't stop talking about Jesus and what the Lord was doing in him. Being led by the Holy Spirit, he would warn (counsel) and teach (instruct) everyone in the wisdom of God, with the purpose of presenting them to the Lord as mature (perfect) believers. Paul didn't just preach the gospel, he preached the whole counsel of God. Paul proclaimed a person (we proclaim Him), not just a philosophy. Paul had to expend physical, mental and spiritual energy toiling to this end. The entire statement shows that through faith in Christ we can link our life with a source of strength that enables us to rise above our natural limitations. This was a total change from his Pharisaical days when religious duties were performed in the flesh. We live in a day when good is called evil and evil is called good. Anyone who stands for the truth taught in the Scriptures is likely to be castigated by being labeled intolerant. Paul knew it takes Biblical truth to change a life and he wasn't afraid to stand up and declare it. How about you, are you willing to proclaim Christ, that others might come to know Him? Are you helping others grow in the grace and knowledge of Christ? Dr. Ken Copley is available for counseling, conferences, and local church meetings.

Changeless Truths in a Changing World

Please read Hebrews 13:8-16. In these eight verses we find several changeless truths that will impact our world of superficiality. Each truth revolves around Christ, the immutable One who is the changeless Rock of stability and faithfulness. First, the doctrine of immutability. We live in a world that knows nothing but accelerating change. God is not fickle; His moods don't swing, and His dealings with us are not subject to cancellation or redefinition. He always deals with us on the basis of His revealed Word. Second, a warning against heresy. The word "Divers" comes from the same Greek word from which we get the term "Polka dot." False teachings come in many colors, they are pleasing to the eye and they sound good to the ear. However, heresy is always destructive to the soul. The text mentions one source of weakness, food, our "Hearts are to be established with grace not meats". The writer is saying "Do what is right and Scriptural." No person is ever benefited by following a heresy. Third, our involvement for spirituality. The writer gives us a list of four specifics that touch the lives of those who embrace grace and the person of Jesus Christ. We have an altar to use. This is a reference to the cross, where Christ's sacrificial offering was made. Those who seek fulfillment in form rather than substance have "No right to eat" from this altar. We also have a reproach to bear. There is a price to pay for identifying with Christ. There is a separation stigma with which we must live. This is part of the curriculum of grace. God has given us a city to seek. This city is on the horizon which God Himself has designed and built. It is in no way earthly. And we have a sacrifice to offer. Although we have no sanctified earthly altar, we still have a sacrifice of praise to offer, that of doing good and giving. Forth, we have a means to practicality. Three perspective-shaping lessons come to light in the above passage. A changing world emphasizes my need for a changeless Christ. A changeless Christ redirects my desire toward a grace relationship. And a grace relationship strengthens my hope in a secure eternity. Are you feeling the need for a Rock to which you can cling? Are you desperate for that which is Unchanging? I encourage you to run to Jesus, "For there's room at the Cross for you!" Dr. Ken Copley is available for counseling, conferences, and local church meetings.