”But we all, with open face beholding as in a glass the glory of the Lord, are changed into the same image from glory to glory, even as by the Spirit of the Lord. “ (2 Corinthians 3:18)
Greetings again my Brethren. I cannot believe this year of 2023 is quickly slipping away. I guess it is true the older we get the faster time slips through our fingers. It only seemed like yesterday we moved to Germany, but that was 1996. It only seemed like yesterday our four kids: Dave, Daniel Constance, and Joshua were born and our seven grand kids. It only seems like yesterday I married the most beautiful woman in the world, but that was 9 November 1979. It only seemed like yesterday I gave my heart to the LORD, but that was 63 years ago. Time has a way of passing and humbling us. Okay enough of thinking of the past and let us get back to what the LORD has for us in September. Last month we looked at the law of our heart that God has built within us to keep His holiness and righteousness within our thoughts as a guide to navigate life. What a blessing the law of God is in our lives, without it we would be lost and have no hope of salvation. Like the Holy Spirit and conviction. Without the power of the Holy Spirit there would be no conviction in our lives and we would be left to our own desires and wants not knowing Godliness from ungodliness, holiness from unholiness, and righteousness from unrighteousness and of course be lost. So this month we will look at some examples God uses or the diversity of examples in general God uses to communicate with us. Paul in 1 Corinthians gives us some examples, “Moreover, brethren, I would not that ye should be ignorant, how that all our fathers were under the cloud, and all passed through the sea; 2 And were all baptized unto Moses in the cloud and in the sea; 3 And did all eat the same spiritual meat; 4 And did all drink the same spiritual drink: for they drank of that spiritual Rock that followed them: and that Rock was Christ. 5 But with many of them God was not well pleased: for they were overthrown in the wilderness. 6 Now these things were our examples, to the intent we should not lust after evil things, as they also lusted.
7 Neither be ye idolaters, as were some of them; as it is written, The people sat down to eat and drink, and rose up to play.8 Neither let us commit fornication, as some of them committed, and fell in one day three and twenty thousand. 9 Neither let us tempt Christ, as some of them also tempted, and were destroyed of serpents. 10 Neither murmur ye, as some of them also murmured, and were destroyed of the destroyer.” (1 Corinthians 10:1-10) Here the LORD brought things (what I call His dealings and judgments) into the lives of the Children of Israel so that God could approve or qualify them for what He had for them. My friend nothing is free in God! Everything we get from God will cost us something. God will bring or allow things into our lives so that we can suffer. Suffering softens our heart, but not to suffer for sufferings sake, oh no it is God’s intention for these things that He allows or brings into our lives to teach us His way. Here is verse six Paul says, God allowed these things in the lives of the Children of Israel so that the Church at Corinth would learn from them and not make the same mistakes. Now many would say God would never do that, well my friend just read the Bible and you will see time and time again God does or allows things to happen as a learning tool for our benefit. Believe it or not every bad thing (what we would consider bad) in the Bible is given to us as an example so that we too would not do or follow after whatever led to God’s judgement and punishment. Just name it. The story of Lot in the towns of Sodom and Gomorrah? Yes, of course. Homosexuality is evil in the eyes of God and He will judge it and punish all that have their hand and heart in this evil perversion. How about the stories of David and Bathsheba? Oh no, not the story of King David the most beloved King of all Israel. Well, yes. David committed adultery and made way for one of his generals to be killed some would say he committed murder, and by the way David was a horrible father just look at his sons: The oldest son, Amnon who raped his half-sister Tamar and Absolom who tried and almost succeeded in taking the kingdom from Him. I know these two examples are in extremes, but make no mistake I could have used any story in the Old or New Testament to prove my point. My friend God brings things (what we would call the good and the bad things) into our lives and people are to look at them and if a Believer believes it or not we are to judge them (the situation and the people) so that we can separate ourselves (from the people or situation) if need be or embrace them. You know there are some places you cannot go and be a Believer. There are some people you cannot hang around and be a Believer. But God will give us examples, allows things in our lives so that we can study and learn from others mistakes. So, I ask, what is God bringing into your life? What examples are you learning from? It matters my friend. I always said, it matters who your teacher is.
Next month we will end up this section by looking at human instruments and then we will move on to how the word is received in a diversity of circumstances. He is speaking to us, but do we have the hearing ears to hear what the LORD is saying to us? Written by David Stahl
ARTICLE REVIEW:
Reaching God
The “nominal” church (remember we are the true church, the Bride of Christ not a denomination or organization) today has done a poor job at best in helping the people get to God. Paul in Ephesians shared this truth to the Church at Ephesus to establish a base line of thinking and to lay a foundation in them that would enable them to rightly understand the functioning and the power of this mystical body. Paul writes, “And he gave some, apostles; and some, prophets; and some, evangelists; and some, pastors and teachers; 12 For the perfecting of the saints, for the work of the ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ: 13 Till we all come in the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ:” (Ephesians 4:11-13) Notice the giving of “apostles; and some, prophets; and some, evangelists; and some, pastors and teachers” was not for the edifying of the church, but for “the body of Christ.” There is a huge difference. And the job of the “apostles; and some, prophets; and some, evangelists; and some, pastors and teachers” was for “the perfecting of the saints” to enable and empower (through teaching and personal example) the people to be able to reach God NOT to be entertained. Again, not the perfecting of the church. The goal was for us to come “unto the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ:” God’s idea was for us to be conformed into the stature and character of Jesus Christ not build some organization. We my friend are the church, “we are the workmanship of God . . . ” (Ephesians 2:10) Sadly, we (the apostles; and some, prophets; and some, evangelists, and some, pastors, and teachers) have taught the people how to sing, dance, do skits and dramas, pray (to a certain degree), give money to the church, do good works (feeding and clothing the poor), even traveling the world in missions under the banner of the “great commission,” but have miserably failed to teach the people how to reach God for themselves. And why? Well, if the people can reach God for themselves there is no need for a pastor to call when they need something from God. There will be no need for a pastor to pray over them or even intercede on their behalf in their time of crisis or time of need. Now there are times when we must come for prayer, but this is often a stop gap method and should never be the norm in our daily Christian walk. At times the LORD will direct us to someone who does have a call on their life in spiritual gifts, but that is a very very small portion of the Body of Christ. Most Spiritual gifts I would say 90% of the Spiritual gifts are for the administration (see 1 Corinthians 12:28) of the day to day running and operation of a local body of Believers. Somehow (I am sure due to our self-important thinking) we all have gotten it backwards thinking we all have Spiritual gifts listed in 1 Corinthians 12:7-10 for the Body of Christ. This is an old trick to keep people involved and coming to church like giving people certain jobs just to keep them at the church. I have seen this for years. Now the LORD will use us, but very few are called by God to be “apostles; and some, prophets; and some, evangelists; and some, pastors and teachers,” but the rest are called to be pew sitters and the better pew sitters we are the better God can be to the Body of Christ.
Back in the late 70s there was a notable shift in the delivery of the Gospel message from evangelism to teaching. Everyone was suddenly teachers and scholars. It was like when we had our church in Germany many of the African pastors living in Africa were just that pastors or lay leaders, but somewhere over the Mediterranean Sea they became apostles, prophets, and bishops. Magically they were “transformed by the Spirit” so they could have a bigger title (how the church is influenced by titles) and name to fleece the flock more completely. The title Jesus gave Himself knowing He was the Son of God was the “Son of man.” Is the servant greater than the Master? How we like to have Dr. and letters added behind our name. Funny how we can help plant a church and now we are called bishop or “Bish” by our close friends. Do we really think adding titles to our names is going to help us get people to know God? The goal is not to add to our selves, but to help people come to know God. When we started our church in Germany after every service I would “open up the altar” (not sure what that really means) for those who wanted prayer, well Sunday after Sunday the same people would come forward asking for the same things week after week. After a while of this and getting phone calls in the middle of the night I saw I was teaching the people to bypass God and come to me or come to me to get to God. Either way both are 100% wrong. God must be first in our lives and first on our lips when we reach out. This is what Jesus taught the disciples in Luke in what we call the LORD’s prayer. “And it came to pass, that, as he was praying in a certain place, when he ceased, one of his disciples said unto him, Lord, teach us to pray, as John also taught his disciples. 2 And he said unto them, When ye pray, say, Our Father which art in heaven, Hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done, as in heaven, so in earth. 3 Give us day by day our daily bread. 4And forgive us our sins; for we also forgive every one that is indebted to us. And lead us not into temptation; but deliver us from evil.” (Luke 11:1-4) I always found it odd that John the Baptist could teach His disciples to pray before Jesus could teach his disciples. Jesus taught the disciples to pray “Abba Father” or direct address to the Father. Now the disciples thought this to be strange because they as good Jews have been taught to pray “Ave Father” or around through to the Father. Every Christmas season many folks sing a song called “Avia Maria” which means salvation through Maria. Jesus was teaching His disciples prayer it is not around through to the Father, but direct address to the Father. This too is what we need to teach our folks to pray (which is translated many ways: comforter, asking, beseeching, but most translated direct address) directly to the Father and do not go through anyone that means your pastor, teacher, mentor, friend, whomever. I saw in reality my job was to work myself out of a job. The more I could do to get our folks to do for themselves the better off they were in God and the more time I had for my time with the LORD and my family. How liberating this was. So that is what I did. I took my hands off the reins and let the folks do what God had called them to do. It was wonderful. I would come to service at 10:45 (unless I wanted to go to Sunday School) and take my place in the audience and when I was called by Joseph (our assistant pastor) to minister the word or talk about something we are doing. If not, I did not need to be seen or get involved. Everyone knew who and what I was, no need to tell everyone. Anyway, how else are the leaders of Christliche Gemeinde Stuttgart (our church) going to learn how to be better leaders? How else are they going to learn how to succeed or fail? My Bible Teacher Charles Haun said he was not a teacher (only the Holy Spirit can teach us), but a dispenser. I have thought about that over these many years and you know he is right. We can teach no one anything. All we can do is dispense to one another what God has put in us. That should be our goal. To dispense God out from our lives helping others reach God in some way. As we look forward to the future and beyond, we better be able to get to God on our own if not we will never make it and then what will we do? Written by David Stahl
THOUGHTS FROM KAREN:
The Center of Bible Engagement compiled extensive research findings by Arnold Cole, Ed.D. & Pamela Caudill Ovwigho, Ph.D. into a document titled “Understanding the Bible Engagement Challenge: Scientific Evidence for the
Power of 4.” In the study, they polled 40,000 people ages 8 to 80. They wanted to see how people were engaging in Scripture. As they compiled the results, they made a profound discovery they were not even looking for when they originally planned the survey. The study indicated that when people engaged in the Scripture one time a week, which could include a pastor instructing the congregation to “open your Bibles…”, there was negligible effect on some key areas of their life. The same result was true if people engaged in the Scriptures two times a week. The result equaled little to no effect. Three times a week saw a small indication of life. There was a slight pulse, a faint heartbeat. Something moved in the behavior of the person engaging in Scripture. The eye opener happened when Bible engagement reached at least four times a week. A steady climb of impact would have been expected, but that was not the case. The level was basically stagnant over days one and two, with a small bump on day three. But when day four was reached, the effects spiked in an astounding way. The stunning findings included the following:
1. Feeling lonely drops 30%
2. Anger issues drop 32%
3. Bitterness in relationships drops 40%
4. Alcoholism drops 57%
5. Sex outside of marriage drops 68%
6. Feeling spiritually stagnant drops 60%
7. Viewing pornography drops 61%
8. Sharing your faith jumps 200%
9. Discipling others jumps 230%
The research literally leaps off the charts. The findings hammer home the truth that there are profound differences
between people who engage the Scripture at least four times a week and those who engage with the Scripture less
often. This data is extremely revealing. There is a full-blown effort to keep the followers of Christ from consistently reading the Bible on a daily basis. Integral to these findings is that people who engage the Bible one to three days a week indicate basically the same effect on their personal lives as those who do not engage at all. The deceptive reality is that they can feel good about their activities without any sustainable results. They think they’re being “good Christians,” but their lives are no different than people who aren’t Christians at all. This can be devastating to a movement. Limited activity is elevated to the same effect as consistent activity, when it is actually the same as no activity. The reality is that with a lack of consistent Bible engagement defined as at least four times a week, Christians have less confidence in sharing their faith with others and are more vulnerable to falling prey to false teachings, as well as a lethargy and apathy in consistently living out their faith in their circle of influence. The studies show that the best spiritually based predictor among 13- to 17-year-old teenagers was their engagement in Scripture. The other side of the coin is equally conclusive and encouraging. The more Christians read or listen to the Scriptures at least four times a week, the more bold they will be in sharing their faith and growing in their faith. Their lives will begin to have a profound impact on those immediately around them. There will also be fewer times of stagnation in their spiritual growth. They will become viral in their faith. Written by Karen Stahl
NEEDS NO WANTS:
1. In Dobrich, Bulgaria Pastor Niki Marsov and in Silistra Pastor(s) Yanko, and Marcho. Times are troubled in Bulgaria much prayer and support is needed.
2. Constanta, Romania Pastors Luke and Jacob at Bethel Church and in Agigea Pastor Jacob as the interim Director for the Romanian Center for Cross-cultural Studies Bible School.
3. Pastor S. J. Peter, Founder of DAWN Ministries in Hyderabad and Pastor Wilson and his son Pastor Julian at Gospel Assembly in Sankaraguptham, India.
4. Dan, Cathy, and members of Uskudar Son Buyruk Kilisesi in Istanbul, Turkey.
5. Pastor Elieti Msangi in Dar Es Salaam and Pastors Isreal Mutaitina and John Balone in Bukoba, Tanzania.
6. Pastor Tek Dahl at Gethsemane, Church (his church) and their radio station “Good News 105.1 FM” in Kathmandu, Nepal.
7. Bishop John, Samuel Kamanzi (from the Congo), and, Emmanuel Ndolimana in Ruhengeli, Rwanda.
8. Christian and Ina Kopjar Missionaries to the County of Liberia.
9. Brother John Vlad, (serving as the Operations Officer), his wife Cristina, and three daughters aboard the international ministry ship Logos Hope.
NEXT HOME GROUP MEETINGS:
19 September at 7:00 pm
At 232 Everett Drive
Sneads Ferry, NC 28460
7:00 pm please RSVP
(910) 382-9287
BEHOLDING HIS GLORY ON THE RADIO:
On WJCV Jacksonville, NC
“Pebbles of Truth”
1290 AM or 98.3 FM
Every Tuesday and Thursday morning at 7:30 am
FUTURE BHG SCHEDULE:
September: Eastern Europe
October: Local Ministry
November: Local Ministry
I am still available to share what God has given me at churches and/or home groups. If God moves on your heart to support BHG or other ministries we personally know we would be honored to serve as a go between. Remember, if we want a blessing from God the spiritual principle is we must bless others. Remember, God is to you what you are to God.
CONTACT INFORMATION:
Address:
David and Karen Stahl
232 Everett Drive
Sneads Ferry, NC 28460
Phone:
Mobile: (910) 382-9287
FAX: (910) 741-0489
Email:
Website:
Blog:
http://bhisglory.blogspot.com/
FREE OFFERS
Booklets on Spiritual Authority, Spiritual Leadership, Prayer, Body of Christ, and Righteous Living the Four Anchors of God are now available by contacting us and requesting one. You can see them on our home page. Get one now.
The Author House link below will lead you to our latest book, “Thoughts for Consideration.” Just copy it into your web browser and return. Also you can purchase two of our other books “Adventures with God.” and “God Still Performs Miracles: A Book of Personal Encouragement.”
http://www.authorhouse.com/AuthorCenter/Protected/BookHome.aspx?bookID=61464
Please take a minute and take a look, they all make for a great encouraging gift, giving hope and sharing God’s love through a deeper teaching that someone can enjoy again and again. All of our books can be purchased at all book stores like Barnes and Nobles, Borders, Book-A-Million, and etc., any Christian Book Store that orders, and all book ordering on-line companies like Amazon.com. Or if you are like me from the old school just contact us, we will let you know the price and then we will mail it out to your home address. Postage and handling is on a case by case basis.
If you know someone you think would enjoy receiving this newsletter or if you receive this newsletter and do not wish to please let me know. Contributions to this ministry is always appreciated and needed the more time continues. Please feel free to contact us with the above information.
