MID-TERM EXAMS

I can remember my days in school, especially college, when we would have mid-term exams about halfway through the semester. These provided a part of your final grade, but they also provided a tool for evaluating how well you were learning the material. They could provide you with a tool to understand if you were doing well or if you needed to work harder for the remainder of the term.

We have just passed the halfway point of 2008. Perhaps it would be good to take a mid-term exam. Did you make some resolutions at the beginning of the year? How are you doing with those? Perhaps you decided to lose weight, or to stop a bad habit, or to maintain better control of your anger. Whatever it may have been, are you making an effort to accomplish the goal? Can you look back at January and seen an improvement between then and now?

What about goals you set for spiritual growth? Read the Bible more, develop Christian attitudes, bear fruit, and exhibit the fruit of the Spirit. These are a few examples of possible goals you may have set for yourself at the beginning of the year. Do a self examination. How are you doing? If you were to receive a grade, would you be passing the course?

I am not saying the Christian life is like taking a class in history or math, but there is a need to look at ourselves and see where we stand in our relationship with the Lord.

Lamentations 3:40 – “Let us search out and examine our ways, And turn back to the Lord.”

2 Corinthians 13:5 – “Examine yourselves as to whether you are in the faith. Test yourselves. Do you not know yourselves, that Jesus Christ is in you?—unless indeed you are disqualified.”

We need to search and examine. If we find we have strayed from the Lord, we must turn back to Him.

The mid-term exam is only a precursor to the final exam. In school, we had final exams at the end of the semester. It was after these exams that the final grade was determined. Up until the final exam, there were opportunities to improve the grade and to prepare for the exam. Upon completion of the final, there were no more opportunities.

In Matthew 25, Jesus uses three parables to illustrate the necessity of being prepared. We do not know the duration of the “semester.” Death is an appointment everyone will keep (Hebrews 9:27), but we do not know the time (James 4:13-15). Jesus’ second coming is certain, but the time is unknown to all except the Father (Matthew 24:36). We must take advantage of every opportunity to be prepared for that moment (death or the second coming) at all times.

Take a moment and complete your mid-term exam. Are you prepared for the final?
--Lamar

A DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE

This past Friday, people across this nation celebrated our Independence Day. This is the day that we remember and honor the adoption of the Declaration of Independence on July 4, 1776. The Declaration established the United States of America as an independent nation, free from foreign rule, and standing alone on her own laws and principles. The Colonies - now the independent states – declared that they would no longer conform to the laws and edicts of the ruler that had governed them to that point. Here's a quote from that document: “The history of the present King of Great Britain [George III] is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States.” The signers of the Declaration were determined to do what was necessary to break away from King George's grip – even if it involved armed conflict – because they knew that he wouldn't let them go without a fight!

You can make such a “declaration of independence.” You can declare your independence a ruler who is much worse than King George III, or any other political ruler. You can gain freedom from the worst tyrant of all time, Satan. Jesus said, “Most assuredly, I say to you, whoever commits sin is a slave of sin” (John 8:34). All of us are sinners (Romans 3:23), thus we are All salves to sin.

It is common for us to think of sin as a servant rather than a master. When we choose to commit sin, we usually do so because we think that it will serve our interests, our selfish desires. Sin is viewed as a tool to bring us pleasure, and we view ourselves as being in control. The sin will go no further than we want it to go, and we can stop it whenever we want. But we are naïve! We are like Eve who only saw the forbidden fruit as a means to satisfy her desires and ambitions, but could not see the terrible consequences of her choice (see Genesis 3).

Once we give in to sin, we become enslaved to it. What we thought of as our servant suddenly becomes our Master. It takes us places we did not plan to go and causes changes in our lives that we never intended. Then, we realize that the great liberation and freedom that sin offered was only a trap. We find instead that we have sold ourselves into slavery, and it is a bitter slavery indeed.

The good news is that because of Jesus Christ, you and I can make a declaration of independence from sin. Christ, through His death on the cross, paid the ransom price to free us from the bondage of sin (1 Peter 1:18-19). Christ ratified this Declaration of Independence from sin with His own blood (Matthew 26:28). You and I can “sign” the declaration through our obedient faith – trusting in God (Hebrews 11:6), repenting of sin (2 Corinthians 7:9-10), confessing Jesus (Romans 10:9-10), and being baptized (immersed) for the forgiveness of sin (Acts 2:38; 22:16). Signing the declaration is also expressing a commitment to live according to its principles so that we can continue to be free from sin (1 John 1:7). “Therefore if the Son makes you free, you shall be free indeed” (John 8:36).

Will you sign the “Declaration of Independence” from sin?

--Edited
“Living Waters”
Church of Christ at Creekwood
Mobile, Alabama