Mostrando resultados por autor "Rick Noyes" en Todas las categorías

Now I want you to know that like a baby born into God’s family, I was not born knowing much and I made some mistakes. In my early years of being called by God, like a baby, most of what I was learning about God and His word came from experiencing it as the Spirit of God taught me. This idea of experiencing God and His Word makes me wonder if that isn’t why people are drawn to reading the Psalms, because they reveal what it was for someone else to experience God. Phrases like taste and see the Lord is good and His Word is sweeter than the honeycomb are conveying the experiencing of God ...

I believe there is need for direction is built into our being. We not only want to know where we are, but where we are going. The problem is that the goal or direction for where we are headed can often be unclear. This is one of the main reasons the Apostle Paul wrote the letter to the church in Philippi of Macedonia. He loved this church and desired to give it the directions to finish well in their race toward the goal of knowing Messiah. He wrote this letter toward the very end of his life. Consequently, Paul lays out a map for the church, to set a correct course to finish well. The aim ...

I believe for the people of God that settling of the safety of the status quo leaves us immature and weak. I think that is why God has employed the tool of change to keep us going on toward maturity. Acts is a travel log of the church’s journey through the many changes that God puts in the path of His people. Change is the thread which weaves its way through the whole book. I subtitled this study guide When everything changes again because I think this theme not only draws out what is described by Luke, but also because it has real world application for anyone reading this. It is for this...

Acts is a travel log of the church’s journey through the many changes that God puts in the path of His people. Change is the thread which weaves its way through these first twelve chapters of this first volume and really the whole book. I subtitled this study guide When everything changes because I think this theme not only draws out what is described by Luke, but also because it has real world application for anyone reading this. The reason is most people find at some point in life that everything changes. How we view life through the glass of that change can either be character building...

You will find that much of what I present here is counter culture to the psychology and martial counseling approaches today. It centers on a perspective that is taught in the Bible which gives a mindset as to how biblical marriage differs from that popular notion many today follow. That mindset becomes the spring board to the how to of living out a biblical marriage that is not only fulfilling, but gives clarity to life in a way that most don’t understand.

Everywhere you turn nowadays someone is trying to influence your thinking. Whether it is the products that we buy, the candidates we vote for, the places that we go, or the way perceive life, someone wants us to jump on their bandwagon of thought. With so many vying for the hearts and minds of people today, much of the persuasion comes cloaked in deceit. Wouldn’t it be nice to simply have the truth for once? Wouldn’t it be nice to know that there was in fact undeniable truth we could count on? If you have ever felt that way then the Apostle Paul’s letter to the Colossians is for you. ...

Have you ever longed for justice, desiring for a wrong to be righted or inequality to be avenged? I often think I am prone to desire justice, if justice does not hold me personally accountable. When it comes to justice, I rarely think about God dispensing justice, because after all that is somewhere in the future right? This study of the book of Ezekiel challenges my own thinking about justice by examining when God demands justice. If God’s justice were happening right now, would the scope of that interest you? Maybe it should.

Esther is one of the books of the Bible which draws critics to discount it as having an unproven validity, in an attempt to prove the Bible is unreliable and not the unerring Word of God. It is a curious book because it is a historical narrative, which has no spiritual references or specific lessons and, in many ways, it appears that its only purpose is to put the celebration of Purim into a historical context. However, the narrative is loaded with lessons and applications for the people of God. Even though God is not mentioned in the narrative, just like in creation, His sovereignty and ...

When you saw the title for this book, what came to mind? Perhaps your thinking was drawn to the heroes of the Bible, who led extraordinary lives. Did you think about a religious duty or mission of biblical proportions? I would guess that one thing that was not in your thoughts was you. That is because we are given to thinking that God’s call is too immense, too demanding, and out of the reach of the average person. But what if I were to tell you that you are exactly, whom the Holy Spirit of God had in mind, when those words were penned. Would that spark your interest? I hope it goes ...

This started out being a book about prayer because I am taken back by how little the church today gives to this most important part of a maturing faith and instead it turns out to be zeroing in on faith, genuine faith. So then, are you tired of it? Are you tired of living a life where faith is more façade than reality? Where a fading faith must be propped up by inspirational messages and music to make you feel like you are not a failure. Are you tired of motivational speakers who prod the church to do better, when you already feel like you are spent? If you answered yes to those questions ...

Enduring faith in the God of the Word brings glory to God, no matter if the outcome is what we had hoped for or not. You know there are those who look at faith as a kind of currency. Believe and receive is a popular concept today among many, who view faith as their penny to put into God’s gumball machine. All they have to do to claim the prize, is to use their penny of faith and turn the handle by confessing their sincerity. That is not Biblical enduring faith. Biblical enduring faith waits patiently when life’s circumstances don’t match up to expectations, and looks to a future hope ...

For me, this story of 2 Samuel is like discovering that my favorite hero of days gone by was more of a scoundrel than a hero. David had been called by God and he is remembered here more for things he did that were questionable and out of character for one called by God, than for the good things that has many people giving him the title of a man after God’s own heart. Much of the good of his relationship with God is recorded in this book as well as the failure that proved him to be human, like you and me. When God called David, He was not expecting perfection, but faithfulness. The same is...

The gospel of Mark is written like a no-frills travel log of a mountain climbing expedition, pressing on toward the summit of faith in Messiah. This gospel is also written for the skeptic, because it focuses on just the facts to challenge our thinking concerning God’s Messiah. This is a reason I find this gospel intriguing. It is the analytical approach it uses to present the Messiah in a bare bones approach of cultivating faith for any skeptic.

Are you tired of all the promised changes, of all the band-aids solutions for the brokenness within you and in the world, of all the rhetoric that is just the same old lies packaged in a new way. Do you long for real change? Do you ever wonder how just one person could possibly make a difference when you cannot even make a difference in your own life? Do you want a revolution that will tear it all down and start over? Then become a revolutionary. Take up God’s plan and purpose for you to experience and see real change in you and those around you.

Lately a verse from the Apostle Paul’s letter to the Ephesian church has been rattling around in my mind. And do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, in whom you were sealed for the day of redemption. Rarely do I consider the grief of God when I think about grief and yet there it is in that verse. It is an oddity for me to think about God experiencing grief and yet the apostle makes it clear that He does. The other perplexity that verse reveals is that I can be a key factor in bringing grief to the Lord of my life.

I invite you into the process I use to dig out just what God has for me in this letter from Paul, so that you too may know the satisfaction of finding God’s Spirit is sufficient in illuminating His Word to your mind and applying it to your heart and life, unlike the spoon-feeding that most books on Romans provide. It is when we engage the Word of God through the Spirit of God that we will find our lives are changed as He conforms us the image of His Son, the Lord Jesus Christ. The Word of God is found in the gospel and the gospel is the theme of Paul’s letter to the Romans. It is power ...

This letter is addressed to Jewish Christians outside of Jerusalem and because it has a distinctly Jewish slant, it is often misunderstood by a Gentile mindset, which makes up most of the church today. I am of the opinion that the issue James is tackling in the letter is a loss of faith’s focus. When we lose sight of the object of our faith, life in the church reflects this loss of focus. The Jewish believers were perhaps manifesting behaviors that were not in line with what faith in Messiah ought to look like. It is possible the Jews who had been called to faith in Messiah were having a ...

When people talk about religion, they often speak of faith and belief, but what do those words mean and do they mean the same thing to you as they do to me? If faith is an integral part of relationship to God, don’t you think we ought to understand just what genuine biblical faith is all about? The second book of Moses, which we today call Exodus, is a blueprint for understanding what faith is and what it is not. Will you join me discovering how faith is married to a relationship to God.

This study guide is going to emphasize a method for developing your abilities to do your own inductive Bible study. My desire is not so much to instruct concerning the letter to the Ephesians, although you will get that as I share my discoveries with you from doing the study together, but to teach you how to learn on your own from the Bible without having to be taught from anyone but the Spirit of God, who will lead you into all truth (John 16:13).

The book of Lamentations written by the prophet Jeremiah. It addresses this topic of when we ought to mourn, but don’t. It has a peculiar style, and it is a book not widely taught today. When was the last time you sat in on a teaching from this small contribution to the Old Testament, which is found after the other writings of the prophet Jeremiah? Even though this book is neglected, this is a study everyone should do to gain a proper education in grieving before God. But the greater reason for a study in this little book is that I see a parallel between the church in America today and ...