DAY 771 - Be Able to Discern Who Are the False Teachers (請按此處收聼廣東話Cantonese podcast click here)

I started to write my "Devotion on Fire 2" blog again two days ago. Please read today's blog, a very important message to all of us about Esther, about how the Lord is calling us to take the role of Esther to fight spiritual warfare: http://bishopsilas2.blogspot.ca/

                               Today's Reading: 2 Peter 2:10b-22

** If you would like to learn a simple and good way of Daily Devotion method please read my “Count Down 5” from my Devotion on Fire blog:

http://bishopsilas.blogspot.ca/2009/08/count-down-5-subject-shifting-devotion.html

To use this simple and good way of Daily Devotion method please click this link:

 .Subject Shifting Devotion.pdf

Please click this link to read 2 Peter 2:10b-22

English(ESV): https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=2 Peter 2&version=ESV

Chinese: https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=彼 得 後 書 2&version=CUV 

Bible Study

     Peter warns his readers not to follow those false teachers in yesterday's passage. In today's passage, he gives us a list to check who those false teachers would look like. 

Let's take a look at what Bishop N.T. Wright says (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/N._T._Wright ) :

      
      His first charge against the dangerous teachers - that they are arrogant and self-willed - is backed up by what, to us, seems strange and remote.. The point seems to be that at the fountainhead of all rebellion against God there is a rejection of appropriate authority, which in Peter's day emerges as blasphemy against angels…
    Second, there is a particular sorrow, a kind of ironic horror, about people who have come close enough to Christian faith and life to discover the way of genuine holiness, but who then decide it's too hard and head off in the opposite direction.  They run away from moral danger one minute, then the next minute they creep up to it again…What's going on here is like a dog being sick in the street and then coming back to eat it all up again.  Disgusting?  Yes, precisely,  that's why Peter says it.  Time for a reality check.    

N.T. Wright. The Early Christian Letters for Everyone. Louisville,KY: Westminster John Knox Press, 2011, p.114, 116.

      So, let's have a self-examination whether we have a tendency to be cheated by those false teachers or we become somewhat like false teachers?A self-reflection and self-awareness is an important process for us to do once every few months to see if we are on track with Jesus. 

Let's have a time to be still and give the Holy Spirit space to speak through the passage we have just read. Offer this time up to Jesus as you listen to him, while listening to "Gabriel's Oboe":  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jmax47l2hLU

Spiritual Journal

    The title I heard from Jesus today is: Be able to discern who are the false teachers

    The message I got from Jesus today is a call that we need to be able to discern who are the false teachers. There are too many of them working secretly everywhere. Most of their motives start with what Peter and Bishop Wright say, Arrogant, self-will, not listening to their superiors or even despise the authority, then later, they invented their weird ideas not according to the teaching of the Bible or teach what the Bible says but live opposite to the Bible teaches.

    Those false teachers will certainly lead many Christians going back to their old route of self-destruction. Or, Peter is talking about those people who misunderstand the essence of Christian faith as a moral standard that they cannot do and so they quit. They do not know it is not the "doing" but the "being" is what is important. "Doing" can get us to a place we would soon quit because we are unable to do. "Being" will get us into a relationship with Jesus each day that we have Jesus to follow as our model and Jesus as our coach being changed to be more like Him.  

Dear Lord Jesus,
Lead us to be able to discern who are the false teachers so that we won't be led to a wrong direction away from you. In Jesus name we pray. Amen.

Please click this link to worship with us -

從心合一

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZJWZQyLzDRQ

10,000 Reasons (Bless the Lord) Matt Redman

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DXDGE_lRI0E

You may choose to follow my other daily blog: 

Daily Devotion on Fire 2(2 years plan -One year New Testament, one year Old Testament): 

http://bishopsilas2.blogspot.ca/

Daily Devotion on Fire (3 years and 3 months plan, one chapter a day to finish reading the whole Bible): 

http://bishopsilas.blogspot.ca/

Break.Build (40 days daily devotion- For Renewal or First Step for new Christians): http://www.breakbuild.blogspot.ca/

Emmanuel330 (40 weeks First Step Bible Study): 

http://emmanuel330.blogspot.ca/

This blog:
Discipler 123 (Daily devotion using N.T. Wright's NT for Everyone as source)

http://discipler123.blogspot.ca/


Rev. Nicky Gumbel's daily devotion: Bible in One Year
http://www.htb.org.uk/bioy