Truth Be Told: A Blog by Pastor Bill Alderson

  "A little while, and you will no longer see Me ; and again, a little while, and you will see Me."  Some of His disciples then said to one another, "What is this thing He is telling us, 'A little while, and you will not see Me; and again, a little while, and you will see Me'; and 'because I go to the Father'?" So, they were saying, "What is this that He says, 'A little while'? We do not know what He is talking about." Jesus knew that they wished to question Him, and He said to them, "Are you deliberating together about this, that I said, 'A little while, and you will not see Me, and again a little while, and you will see Me'?  "Truly, truly, I say to you, that you will weep and lament, but the world will rejoice ; you will grieve, but your grief will be turned into joy.  "Whenever a woman is in labor, she has pain, because her hour has come; but when she gives birth to the child, she no longer remembers the a...

  Therefore, having been justified [aorist passive participle - declared righteous] by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ .            Romans 5:1 The above verse tells us that the true believer, the one who has been declared righteous by faith is intended by God to live in peace. The Greek word translated as peace is eirene and it has multiple meanings and applications. The primary meaning is that which is the opposite of war. It can mean harmony between individuals. Another meaning might be tranquility, a state of peace. It also has the sense of health, welfare or prosperity, every kind of good. We can also understand eirene in light of the Hebrew word shalom which stands for wholeness, soundness, hence health, well-being, or prosperity. It is through our Lord [ Kurios – master, supreme, sovereign one] Jesus [ Iesous – God saves] Christ [ Christos – anointed one, Messiah] that this peace comes to hi...

          But as many as received Him, to them He gave the right to become children of God, even to those           who believe in His name, who were born, not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of           man, but of God.        John 1:12-13   We see from an examination of different New Testament Scripture writers that each one has particular insights that others do not. For example, if you want to understand the role and importance of God’s grace, you will consult the Apostle Paul and his letters. James, the half-brother of Jesus had an understanding of the power of the tongue like no other author. The Apostle John is the one who provides the deepest understanding of the new relationship with God in Christ, being born of God.   John testifies in Verse 13 that being born of God is not the result of anyone’s genealogy (i.e., born of J...

In Matthew 3:1-2, we are told that the ministry of John the Baptist is best characterized in his statement, " Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand ." Once he was put into prison, Jesus picked up John’s mantle, signifying the beginning of His public ministry as Matthew gives the following testimony: Now when Jesus heard that John had been taken into custody, He withdrew into Galilee; and leaving Nazareth, He came and settled in Capernaum, which is by the sea, in the region of Zebulun and Naphtali. This was to fulfill what was spoken through Isaiah the prophet: " THE LAND OF ZEBULUN AND THE LAND OF NAPHTALI , BY THE WAY OF THE SEA, BEYOND THE JORDAN, GALILEE OF THE GENTILES— "THE PEOPLE WHO WERE SITTING IN DARKNESS SAW A GREAT LIGHT, AND THOSE WHO WERE SITTING IN THE LAND AND SHADOW OF DEATH, UPON THEM A LIGHT DAWNED." From that time Jesus began to preach and say, "Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand."     Matthew 4:12-17 The Greek ...

"Beware that you do not forget the Lord your God by not keeping His commandments and His ordinances and His statutes which I am commanding you today; otherwise, when you have eaten and are satisfied, and have built good houses and lived in them, and when your herds and your flocks multiply, and your silver and gold multiply, and all that you have multiplies, then your heart will become proud and you will forget the Lord your God who brought you out from the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery. “He led you through the great and terrible wilderness, with its fiery serpents and scorpions and thirsty ground where there was no water; He brought water for you out of the rock of flint. “In the wilderness He fed you manna which your fathers did not know that He might humble you and that He might test you, to do good for you in the end. “ Otherwise , you may say in your heart, ‘My power and the strength of my hand made me this wealth.’ “But you shall remember the Lord your God, for...

In the Garden of Eden, God gave Adam the responsibility to cultivate [ abad – work] and keep [ samar – watch, guard, care for] it (Genesis 2:15-17). The Lord would give him the ability to carry out these requirements by providing all the provisions of life from the trees found in Eden, including the tree of life. There would also be one restriction: “ but from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat , for in the day that you eat from it you will surely die .” The Lord God (Yahweh Elohim) granted man the right to choose, and man would decide and suffer whatever blessings or curses were attached to his decision. The right to choose is the essence of freedom. Adam could decide for himself the quality of his relationship with God. Now the serpent was more crafty than any beast of the field which the Lord God had made. And he said to the woman, “Indeed, has God said , ‘You shall not eat from any tree of the garden’?” The woman said to the serpent, “From the fruit of...