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The text that I wish to bring to your attention is one that indicates that God works to a timetable.

Nothing proves this better than these verses.

“But when the fulness of the time was come, God sent forth his Son, made of a woman, made under the law, To redeem them that were under the law, that we might receive the adoption of sons,” Galatians 4:4-5.

In like fashion, we are told that that the Lord, “Hath made of one blood all nations of men for to dwell on all the face of the earth, and hath determined the times before appointed, and the bounds of their habitation,” Acts 17:26.

God having timetable, which He most certainly will keep to, is a source of encouragement for us to live holy lives as Paul taught. “And let us not be weary in well doing: for in due season we shall reap, if we faint not,” Galatians 6:9.

Above all, do we not long for that time, unknown in its preciseness to us but absolutely certain nevertheless! “Because he hath appointed a day, in the which he will judge the world in righteousness by that man whom he hath ordained; whereof he hath given assurance unto all men, in that he hath raised him from the dead,” Acts 17:31. We are to, “Watch therefore, for ye know neither the day nor the hour wherein the Son of man cometh,” Matthew 25:13.

There have been many great days in the calendar of God’s mercy. Few greater than that of 31st October 1517! According to Philip Melanchthon, 31 October 1517 was the day Martin Luther nailed his Ninety-five Theses on the door of the All Saints’ Church in Wittenberg, Electorate of Saxony, in the Holy Roman Empire.

Have we not much to rejoice in and be thankful for on this the 507th anniversary of that glorious day!

I trust you benefit from this study.

Sincerely in Christ’s name,

Ivan Foster

“It is time for thee, LORD, to work: for they have made void thy law,” Psalm 119:126.

The above verse is part of the scheduled Bible reading (McCheyne’s Bible Reading Calendar) for 30th October. The time to tell the Lord to work has arrived when there has been a making ‘void’, or ‘disannulling or causing to cease’ God’s Law.

It has been that time in the British Isles for a long time now!

In very recent days, that ‘Arch-apostate’, Justin Welby, the leader of the Church of England, that religious organisation of which British monarchs have long held an honorary ‘headship’, and which has given a lead to the rebellion against God and His Word for a very long time now, has descended to depths he had not heretofore gone! (more…)

“Beloved, when I gave all diligence to write unto you of the common salvation, it was needful for me to write unto you, and exhort you that ye should earnestly contend for the faith which was once delivered unto the saints,” Jude 1:3.

This is a verse with which I have beeb acquainted from my earliest days as a Christian. It was frequently quoted and expounded from the pulpit of Ravenhill Free Presbyterian Church but the minister, Ian R K Paisley.

I have often employed it to expose the dangers facing the people of God from the agents of the devil who creep in to the assembly of the saints surreptitiously in order to destroy the gospel and wreck the work of God.

In recent days I have seen that there is another implication set forth by these words and it is that the people to whom Jude was writing were in need of being warned for they obviously were unaware of the dangers these ‘creepers’ presented! It was not just the wickedness of the creepers that concerned Jude, but the naivety of the saints!

I suppose we can all recall responding to the revelation of a deception wrought upon someone who believed a fraudster with the words, ‘How did they not see that it was a deception?’

We likely have reacted to some newspaper story of how a swindler had obtained from some person a large sum of money by using deceitful words that ought to have been obvious to the one deceived! That has happened and will continue to happen despite the warnings issued and the reports of others being duped!

Why is that so?

Christians, for it is them we want to think of in particular, are likened unto sheep and rightly so for they are easily deceived and led astray. They are in constant need of guidance and guarding.

“But made his own people to go forth like sheep, and guided them in the wilderness like a flock,” Psalm 78:52.

Being sheep and gullible, God’s people have often been brought into captivity. “But if ye will not hear it, my soul shall weep in secret places for your pride; and mine eye shall weep sore, and run down with tears, because the LORD’S flock is carried away captive,” Jeremiah 13:17. (more…)