Obedience – Karen Gamble Writes

Looking At Judas

Looking at Judas Iscariot I sometimes see myself.

Judas turned his back on Jesus in search of personal gain., choosing to put self and money first.

He even went so far as to betray Jesus by telling the Pharisees where to catch Him so they could arrest Him.

I may not try to get Jesus arrested, but every time I turn my attention to the world and it’s shiny objects, making them more important than my faith walk, I betray Him.

Every time I choose to spend time watching t.v. but decide I’m too tired or don’t have time to read my bible, I betray Jesus.

Every time I say I don’t have tithe money but go out to eat or shopping, I steal from Jesus.

Every time I do it my way instead of submitting to His will, I choose self over Jesus.

The answer is simple, really

Give Jesus the attention He deserves.

Give Him the first of my time and money, not the leftovers.

Category: Faith, God, Obedience, People in the Bible, Submission | LEAVE A COMMENT

Bible Study Tools

Studying your bible is a very important part of your faith walk. (find out more about why here)

Here are some resources and tips to help you better understand what you read so you can have a deeper and more thorough understanding of God’s word.

Chase A Verse

A good way to get a better and deeper understanding is by doing what I call chasing a verse.

Many bibles have a column of numbers running through the middle of the page. This is called a cross reference. If you will look at the small numbers you will see they coincide with the passages on the page.

These are followed by verses. If you look those verses up you will see they are related to the original verse. You can also check out the cross reference verses related to the verses you just looked up when you cross referenced the original verse. By “chasing” these verses you can gain a broader understanding of the passage you are reading.

Another way to improve and expand your understanding is by looking up the words in the verses you are studying.

There are several good resources to help you do that.

Blue Letter Bible – www.blb.org is a website that has several versions of the bible you can read for free.

It also has a feature that allows you to look at a word’s original Greek, complete with definition.

(To access this feature, you must choose the King James Version (KJV) bible translation.)

To use this tool begin by using their search box to look up the word or verse you are interested in.

Look at the middle of the upper part of the page and you will see a box marked Strong’s. If you click on it then it will put a blue number by each word.

Clicking that blue number takes you to the original Greek word and definition.

Another feature Blue Letter Bible has is a search box so you can look up words and it will show you every time that word is in the bible.

It does differentiate between tenses so be sure to look at all of those too; for instance run and ran are considered 2 different things.

A good resource for studying a particular subject you are interested in is by consulting the Nave’s Topical Index (also called Nave’s Topical Bible) https://www.naves-topical-bible.com/ (also available as a printed book). It is arranged by topic (also known as subject), and gives you virtually all the information from the bible on that topic. It is arranged similar to an encyclopedia.

Category: Obedience, Scripture Study, Teaching | LEAVE A COMMENT

Studying Scripture

Studying the Bible is an important part of being a Christian.

Commonly called Scripture or God’s Word, the bible teaches us about God and His son, Jesus, their redemption plan for all mankind, as well as how we should live our lives.

It’s important to understand it is not just some book a bunch of people wrote a long time ago.

The men who wrote it were inspired by God.

Look at this verse:

¹⁶All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, ¹⁷so that the servant of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work. 2 Timothy 3:16-17 (NIV)

or put another way:

¹⁶All Scripture is inspired by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for training in righteousness; ¹⁷so that the man of God may be adequate, equipped for every good work. 2 Timothy 3:16-17 (NASB)

In other words, God inspired the men to write the bible and it has an important part to play in our lives so that we can become better Christians. Reading Scripture teaches, corrects, scolds (rebukes) us, and trains us to be righteous. It does this so that we will have what we need to do what God calls us to as well as live our lives in a way that pleases Him.

Scripture plays an important part in leading and guiding us through life.

Category: Obedience, Scripture Study, Teaching | LEAVE A COMMENT

This Thing I Do

I was talking to my good friend, MHR, about this blog.

She’s the first person I’ve shown it to and I was nervous.

Would she like it?

Would she think it’s too cheesy?

Is it offensive?

Is it total garbage?

I was relieved to learn she likes it and plans to keep reading it!

She had a lot of good things to say. Encouraging things.

Her good words have inspired me to try harder. To write more.

She even inspired me to finish the books I’m writing.

Yes, I am going to finish them. Every. Single. One. Of. Them. And write others, too! (Thanks for the encouragement MHR!)

I’m very thankful she was so encouraging to me and appreciate her friendship so much.

Her support makes it easier for me to keep doing this blog.

I do it for 2 reasons:

Category: Family, Life, Obedience | LEAVE A COMMENT

Sermon Notes – May 5, 2019

This past Sunday our pastor talked about Hebrews chapter 7.

He mentioned that when Jesus started His ministry the Jews believed they were in good standing with God because they carefully followed the law, had a royal priesthood, gave proper animal sacrifices, ate the prescribed Jewish diet, and gave the exact amount of tithes the law called for.

They were doing all the right outward things God’s law had said to do and assumed they were therefore okay.

Then Jesus Christ came along and told them they were wrong because they were doing all the right and “clean” things on the outside – BUT – they hadn’t changed on the inside.

Instead of being humble before the Lord and following the law as an acknowledgement of God’s greatness and their position below Him, they were puffed up with pride at how well they were following the law and presumed they were therefore of great importance.

They were being legalistic and giving external conformity without inner surrender, conformity, or submission.

In short, they had changed on the outside but not the inside.

When Christ was here on earth He, being fully man yet fully God, looked like everyone else on the outside – BUT – on the inside He was different than those around Him.

God asks the same of us.

God calls us to be different on the inside.

God calls for inner conformity, obedience, submission, honesty, integrity, and humility. Not because we are that great, but because Christ is and as Christians we are to model ourselves after Him.

1 Samuel 16:7 tells us that the Lord does not look at the things man looks at. Man looks at the outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart.

It is this inner part of us we are to pay attention to and work to bring in to obedience to Christ.

Yes, we are to dress modestly (more on that in another post!), but it’s not about what’s on the outside – it’s about what’s in your heart and who you are on the inside.

After explaining all of this the pastor asked these questions:

Category: Obedience, Sermon Notes, Submission | LEAVE A COMMENT