THE TRENTON BULLETIN

THE TRENTON BULLETIN

Trenton Church of Christ, Trenton, Florida

There are many things to look at in the world that are beyond description in beauty. “The heavens declare the glory of God; and the firmament shows His handiwork” (Psalms 19:1). A baby’s smile will make the heart fill with love. The expression of love in an older couple is a wonderful testimony to the nature of devotion. The list is endless of those things that will inspire the eye with beauty. The wise poet of Psalm 119 made an observation about what we should not look at. “Turn away my eyes from looking at worthless things, and revive me in Your way” (Psalms 119:37).

Sadly, there are many “worthless things” that we look at. These things are vain and foolish desires that corrupt the heart and lead us astray from the holiness of God. Our possessions can become what we focus on more than God. Covetousness is the problem of looking at our “stuff” as more important than serving the Lord. Achan admitted the reason he took the forbidden things was that he coveted after them (Joshua 7:21). As a result he lost his life along with the life of his “sons, his daughters, his oxen, his donkeys, his sheep, his tent, and all that he had, and they brought them to the Valley of Achor … So all Israel stoned him with stones; and they burned them with fire after they had stoned them with stones” (Joshua 7:24). He should have turned his eyes away (Proverbs 23:5).

King David one evening “arose from his bed and walked on the roof of the king's house. And from the roof he saw a woman bathing, and the woman was very beautiful to behold” (2 Samuel 11:2). Instead of turning his eyes away he inquired of the woman, brought her to his house and committed adultery (2 Samuel 11:3-4). The result was a baby born which then died as punishment for the sin of David and Bathsheba. Further judgment was brought upon the house of David because he did not turn his eyes away (2 Samuel 12).

The Lord warns against lusting with the eyes. Job declares that he had “made a covenant with my eyes; why then should I look upon a young woman” (Job 31:1)? Jesus admonished in the mountain sermon, “whoever looks at a woman to lust for her has already committed adultery with her in his heart” (Matthew 5:28). In our world filled with immodesty, pornography (internet especially) and no restrictions on television we must follow the Psalmist in turning our eyes away from worthless things.

How do we turn our eyes away? In our text of Psalm 119:37 it says “Revive me in Your way.” Only by letting our lives be found in God and walking with God will our eyes be turned away from evil. “Let your eyes look straight ahead, and your eyelids look right before you. Ponder the path of your feet, and let all your ways be established. Do not turn to the right or the left; Remove your foot from evil” (Proverbs 4:25-27). Albert Barnes writes, “A man should be thankful in this world that he has eyelids; and as he can close his eyes, so he should often do it.”

The prophet Isaiah exhorts the people of God to shut their eyes from evil so that “Your eyes will see the King in His beauty” (Isaiah 33:15-17). We are what we look at and allow to fill our hearts with (Matthew 15:17-20). Jesus said, “The lamp of the body is the eye. If therefore your eye is good, your whole body will be full of light. But if your eye is bad, your whole body will be full of darkness. If therefore the light that is in you is darkness, how great is that darkness” (Matthew 6:22-23). Watch what you see!

Another year has come and gone. In fact, another century has come to pass and what has man done to the glory of his Lord? Before the foundation of the world, our Creator desired that his creation would accomplish great things thus glorifying his majestic name. "For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them" (Ephesians 2:10).

In this new year what are our intentions for achievement? In Romans we read of man exchanging the glory of our Father for that of corruptible man (Romans 1:25). Without thought, Christians behave the same with their carefree absorption into the pagan environment around them.

The United States is a country which has excelled like no other known civilization in the history of man's existence. Americans are masters at work, productivity, and efficiency in the secular realm. Oh, if the myriads of Christians in this great land would but transfer these invaluable talents, immeasurably blessed to us, into the service of the King (Matthew 25). Dear friends, this coming year we will be visited by two great forces. To which will we pledge our allegiance, our diligence and our talents?

The Visitation of Satan - Through Christ, Peter received this warning, though it was left unheeded: "Simon, Simon, behold, Satan has demanded permission to sift you like wheat; but I have prayed for you, that your faith may not fail; and you, when once you have turned again, strengthen your brothers" (Luke 22:31,32). The man who doubts the presence and power of the Tempter is truly a naive and disillusioned individual (1 Peter 5:8; Ephesians 6:11,12; 2 Timothy 4:17; Ephesians 4:14). Though the power of the evil one may be great, the man of God is not defeated but is reminded of the Greater Power from above (1 Corinthians 10:13; 2 Peter 2:9; James 4:7; 1 Peter 5:9). Be prepared for the visitation of Satan, for his eminent presence is just as sure as the inevitable consequences of his captors.

The Visitation of the Lord - Our Father with greater fervor and an assured love also desires our submission. This is manifest by innumerable opportunities for repentance and continual longsuffering on his behalf. Paul said, "Or do you think lightly of the riches of His kindness and forbearance and patience, not knowing that the kindness of God leads you to repentance?" (Romans 2:4). While one might argue that the way of the cross is a difficult road to find, there are undeniable proofs and truths God has laid before us. When presented with the love of God, we can but accept or reject the Lord's directives. Stephen, in Acts 7, told the Jews they were turning a blind eye to such. "You men who are stiff-necked and uncircumcised in heart and ears are always resisting the Holy Spirit; you are doing just as your fathers did." Moreover, Saul of Tarsus resisted the Lord unknowingly until confronted with the truth. "And when we had all fallen to the ground, I heard a voice saying to me in the Hebrew dialect, 'Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting Me? It is hard for you to kick against the goads'" (Acts 26:14).

The course is set before us. Will we kick against the righteous chastening hand of the Lord? In this new year God desires to make you what you can and will be for him if you will but comply. Jeremiah 18:1-6 describes the potter making and remaking the clay. We then read, "Can I not, O house of Israel, deal with you as this potter does? Declares the Lord. Behold, like the clay in the potters hand, so are you in my hand, O house of Israel." This is our challenge. Not just for the new year, but until the Saviour's return.

From this beautiful text, Mr. and Mrs. Clyde Williams penned the corresponding hymn:

In Luke, the seventh chapter, we are introduced to a Roman centurion--a non-Jew--whose highly regarded slave was sick and ready to die (7:2-10). Hearing about Jesus, but feeling too unworthy to even approach the Lord, this centurion solicited the help of his Jewish friends to ask Jesus to come and heal his beloved servant. Because he was such a good man, the Jewish elders were happy to go to Jesus on his behalf--and in doing so, they spoke very highly of him before the Lord.

As Jesus approached the centurion's home, the soldier sent some of his friends with a message--a message that truly revealed the humble character of this good man. He said, "Lord, do not trouble Yourself further, for I am not worthy for You to come under my roof; for this reason I did not even consider myself worthy to come to You, but just say the word, and my servant will be healed. For I, too, am a man under authority, with soldiers under me; and I say to this one 'Go!' and he goes; and to another, 'Come!' and he comes; and to my slave, 'Do this!' and he does it." (7:6-8).

Here was a man who really understood authority! But more than that, here was a man who completely trusted Jesus! He had absolute faith in the authority of Christ. He knew that Jesus had the authority to do as He wished; that Jesus needed only to command, and his servant would be healed. Wow! Are you impressed? Well, I'll tell you this: Jesus sure was! He was extremely impressed with this Gentile centurion! Not only was he a man of great humility and well thought of in his local Jewish community, but he was also a man of deep faith and confidence in Jesus! So impressed was Jesus with this man's faith that He made this profound comment: "I say to you, not even in Israel have I found such great faith" (7:9).

Now, I don't know about you, but I find this comment of Jesus to be quite interesting. Of all the places where Jesus felt He should have been able to find such great faith, it should have been in Israel. But here was a Gentile whose faith was greater than any Israelite's! That's impressive when we think of the Gentile centurion, but it's not so impressive when we think of the Israelites! How sad that it was not an Israelite--one of the chosen people of God--who had such great faith!

When I think on this, I am made to wonder if a parallel exists for us. Where should we find such great faith today? Surely it ought to be among those who are truly members of the kingdom of God--those in the church of our Lord! We are the ones who are the saved! We are the ones who are the people of God! And so, we ought to be the ones who have such great faith! But to our shame, sometimes it's not we who have such great faith, but rather it's those in the denominations--those who, like the Roman soldier, are not truly the people of God!

Yes, indeed, brothers! Sometimes our denominational friends show greater evidence of faith in their lives than we do. Some of them pray more than we do, talk more about God than we do, and even walk better by faith than we do! These things just ought not to be so! We need to do better than this!

Let's all determine to be more like the Roman centurion--people of faithreally! God is most certainly worthy of our trust! He surely can be depended on! So, let's do it! We say we are the people of God, so let's act like it! Let me encourage you like this: Be sure that, at least in you, we can find another one with such great faith!

A skyscraper must be able to bend or flex slightly with the wind, but it can't do that if it's not established on a solid foundation. In a similar way, we must be established as human beings. To "establish" a thing means to make it firm or secure. So to enjoy the benefits of establishment, we must be stable. Consider three areas where stability is especially important.

Principles. Our principles are our beliefs about what is real, and about what kind of conduct people ought to engage in. These convictions determine every other thing about us, so it should go without saying that we need to be careful. If we haven't established what our convictions are, then we're at the mercy of every wind that blows.

Character. It takes a while for us to finally figure out what kind of character we really want to have as mature adults, but eventually, we need to have an established character. That doesn't mean we can't grow or change, but it does mean that we know who we are and that the character that we've chosen is stable, rather than wishy-washy.

Conduct. Based on the establishment of our principles and our character, we then need to erect a consistent pattern of behavior. People around us need to be able to count on some predictability in our manner of living. Our lifestyle needs to be one that is solidly built.

All three of the above are important, but of the three, our principles are more basic than our character, and our character is more basic than our conduct. In other words, our character is an outgrowth of our principles, and our conduct is an outgrowth of our character. Too often, we try to reverse these: we try to establish our conduct without having established our character, and we try to establish our character without having established our principles. But that procedure never works, at least in the long run. Life's great challenge, then, is first to find out what the valid, true-north principles are. When we discover these and establish ourselves upon them, both our character and our conduct will stand firm. And out of them, good things will grow.