Episode Transcript
[00:00:01] Speaker A: How exactly do we remain in Jesus?
We will look at John chapter 15, verse 10 as we start.
Jesus, still talking to his disciples, says, if you keep my commands, You will remain in my love, just as I have kept my Father's commands and remain in his love.
So what we see here is that when we obey what Jesus said, we actually remain in him and he is in us.
But for us to obey, we need to know what it is that Jesus says.
And how do we know what Jesus says?
We have to read the Word because this Word is the word of God.
This Word is the Word of Jesus.
So we begin to see that reading Scripture is so important that we need to take time to just look at this subject of reading Scripture.
And today what I would like to do is firstly to highlight the importance of Scripture.
I also wanted to just show us how to read God's Word and then help us with some practical things that sometimes come up as we try to read God's Word.
In fact, we are going to start with this last thing of the practical issues around just the reading of our Bibles or reading the Word of God.
Here is the first thing that normally comes up.
And maybe as I'm starting to talk about reading God's Word right now, you might be there and already you are saying, but I can't read.
It's not just that some people can't read, but there are also people who do not like to read.
It's so sad that the culture of reading is dying in this age.
People like to just look at quick videos or maybe to listen to something.
But picking up a book and actually reading is becoming hard for many people.
So if that's you, here is something that can help you.
Firstly, the Word does not just come through you reading it.
I stress and stress and stress that we all need to read the Word of God for ourselves.
But we need to remember that it's not just through us reading the Word of God.
Someone can actually read for you. You, it can be your child, it
[00:03:47] Speaker B: can be your spouse or a friend.
[00:03:52] Speaker A: They can pick up a Bible and read for you what's in there and you can listen.
These days we've got audio Bibles that come up on our phone or some other gadgets that we might have, and they just press the button and that voice reads the Word of God.
Some people even do little videos where the words are coming up or you can see the trees and the nature. And maybe if it's Jesus walking, you see a little Jesus picture walking as the message is being Read.
That.
That also works. If you cannot read, you can also listen to Bible centered preaching.
It said that there is so much preaching out there where people preach for an hour but they have not read from the Bible.
But thank God their people were so faithful to scripture.
They will open the Bible and preach and teach you from the Bible and we actually get to know God's word through that.
You can also listen to songs that are scripture based.
I think it's also a little bit sad that in this age we are getting fewer and fewer songs that are scripture based.
We can sing about.
That is very true.
But we are singing about what we know from scripture, not directly taking the words of scripture and putting them into a song.
But there are people who take scripture like the Psalms for example. People have sung all the psalms from Chapter 1 to 150.
And they use the exact words of the Bible.
And so it's a song. You can enjoy it, but you're also receiving the word of God.
So if you can't read or you don't like reading, this is something that you can do.
What if you don't have a Bible?
Last week we spoke about this very simple answer.
Buy a Bible and hear me. I said buy. I didn't say ask for a Bible.
Let's go and buy Bibles for those of us that might want to give somebody a Bible.
Because I know even though I say go and buy, some are still going to go and ask. For example, please don't give that Bible for free.
People do not use the Bibles that they are given for free.
We know we have received so many Bibles from the Gideon and even write not for resale.
But we get those Bibles. We just put them at home and we don't use them.
But the one that you buy for yourself, you are going to value buy the Bible.
What if I read but I don't understand or I don't remember?
How many of us ever felt like that?
I'm reading this but I'm not understanding it.
Oh, I understand it, but I don't remember.
Can I just tell you that you don't have to necessarily remember everything that you read in that moment.
I'll give you an example.
I could ask you, what did you eat last night?
How many of us remember what they eat?
We can eat.
Some people don't remember what.
Or maybe, maybe you didn't eat.
How about the night before last?
Can anyone remember Friday night?
How about I can see the food lovers in here.
Okay, let's go back a week. Last Week on Friday, last week.
Chances are you can't remember what you ate.
But do you know that you are alive today because of that food that you ate?
We don't have to remember what we ate for it to give us life, energy and strength.
People can blindfold you, they can put food in your mouth.
You may not know what it is, but it still works for your body.
It gives you life, it keeps you healthy.
And this is how scripture works sometimes.
It's there in us somewhere.
And the beauty of it is when the moment comes where you need that word, you find that the Holy Spirit brings it to remembrance.
Sometimes it's even just our brains. God has given us wonderful brain that can keep things in the subconscious and bring them up when they need.
So don't despair if you can't remember.
If you're not understanding, what we're going to look at now might help you.
We're going to look now at how to read the Bible.
I'm going to give you four steps.
The first step is pray.
But this step of praying is actually something that you need to do before you read, as you read, after you read.
So in other words, our Bible reading needs to be immersed in prayer.
So step number one, step number two, actually read the scripture.
Open your Bible and read that particular scripture that you're reading for that.
Step number three, understand when the Bible talks about, meditate upon. Like in Joshua 1:8, where it says, this book of the Lord shall not depart from your mouth. Meditate on it day and night.
This is what he's talking about.
You need to take time to understand.
And in this part, you need to ask a lot of questions.
When we read our Bibles, let's come with a lot of questions.
Let's come very empty, wanting to be filled.
For example, just a question of what is this saying?
You have read the story, but when you say what is it saying?
You are bringing yourself to a place where you can actually turn around and tell somebody else what the Bible is saying.
You are not interpreting anything.
You are not looking at what is it meaning to me.
You are just saying what is it saying?
You need to ask also.
In fact, these two questions are very important, not always into us.
Number one, ask what did it mean to the original readers of that or the first people to hear it.
And you don't always need commentaries and all these other books to get that.
For example, when the Bible says, when Jesus says to the people, you are the light of the world, you need to put yourself in the place of those people. Sitting there listening to Jesus and imagine what you think you are the life of.
Because when we hear life today, we think of a life.
Why not?
I can't hear you.
They were not light worlds.
So when Jesus said, you are the light of the world, Some kind of a lamp, that actually can help you to get the real meaning of what the scripture is saying.
But then you need to come to a place where you say, what does it mean to me?
Now you're taking the principle from there into the principle of today.
And then after that, you're going to step number four, which is applying the word.
Now, we are looking at what we have learned from that scripture, and you're saying, is there anything that I need to stop doing?
Is there anything that I'm being told to keep on doing?
Is there a new thing or something that I'm being told about God?
Is there any action that I need to take?
So it can be questions and questions and questions, but it's now to do with you.
It's no longer just in general, what does it mean to people today, but it's about you.
And whatever it is that you pick from that scripture for you, you go out and you do that.
If the scripture was talking about repenting, and maybe you remember there's something that I actually need to say sorry to God about, That was nice information. Thank you, God. Bye. Have a good day.
You actually pray a prayer of repentance.
If it was something that you were doing, you go out and you stop doing that thing.
Or if it was something that you need to be doing, but you go out and you start.
So pray, read, understand, apply.
Now we're gonna. We're gonna do this together.
And this is gonna be a bit tricky for me, and maybe for us as well, because I want to teach you how to read, but I also want to preach at the same time.
So it's not gonna come out perfect. Okay?
But get ready, because I want a volunteer to pray for us right now.
Because step number one is pray.
So let's say you have found your little nice corner. You've opened your Bible now.
Now you want to pray.
Does anyone want to pray for us?
So you pray. And we have prayed.
So this morning, we are going to look at Matthew, chapter 7, verses 24 to 27.
So let's open our Bibles there.
Matthew, chapter 7, verses 24, verse 24 to 27.
Okay, I'm gonna. I'm gonna read from us here. And you can read this one.
Matthew 24.
7, Mikey 7, Arctic 24.
Zimawomba, sinague.
I like that.
Amen.
[00:19:32] Speaker B: Matthew 7, verse 24 up to 27.
Therefore, everyone who hears these ways of mine and puts them into practice is like a wise man who buried his house on the rock.
The rain came down, the streams rose and the winds blew and beat against that house, yet it did not fall because it had its foundations, foundation on the rock.
But everyone who hears these weights of mine and does not put them into practice is like a foolish man who built his house on sand.
The rain came down, the streams rose and the winds blew and beat against that house, and it fell with a great crash.
[00:20:15] Speaker A: I think Olive's reading was better than mine.
Okay, so we have read our scripture.
What is step number three?
Any understand?
Okay, this whole line, you're not allowed to answer anything.
Maybe the second one even.
Okay, I don't want the pastors to be answering yet. Okay, so understanding is meditating, comprehending.
So we say two main questions.
The first one is, what did it mean at that time?
There are certain things that you might even see just jumping out at you that will catch your attention.
So for example, with me, I looked and I saw that it says, everyone who hears.
And the word everyone got hold of me.
This is not something for just the Abusas.
It's not something for the spiritually mature.
It's not something for the good people or the people in church.
This is for everyone who is hearing what Jesus.
And so whoever you are right now, this is for you.
And as I'm listening and reading on that time, I might be young, I might be old, I might be poor or rich.
I might be from Malawi or Malagasy.
I might. I might be, I don't know, money in my pocket. No money in my pocket.
This word is for me as well.
I looked again and I saw that it says anyone wears these words.
So it's like some particular words that Jesus is talking about.
He didn't just say anyone who hears words of mine.
It means the people that were there knew the words that Jesus was talking about.
There are some words that Jesus said, say it to them in that time.
So that will make me go back a little bit.
What are the words that Jesus is just saying to these people?
And this is where it's not perfect. Now if you go back, you will see. Ah, he's saying he's talking about this, but he didn't start there.
And if you go and look at it, it's going to take you all the way back to chapter five.
In chapter five, he tells Us that he saw the crowds coming to him.
He went upon a hill, and he said, there, this is what we call the Sermon on the Mount.
Because Jesus literally went up.
As he was preaching.
Now I'm gonna need to start looking at the things that he was teaching them.
And some of these things I don't even need to be reading, because in some of our Bibles, you see the headings, you see why Jesus told them about the Beatitudes, where he was teaching them that what the world calls blessed was different.
Jesus, he taught them about things like adultery, that if you just look, you can actually commit a direct.
He told them about prayer, about fasting.
And he said, these things, you should do them, but don't do them as a shock.
We know these things as Jesus is teaching.
He said, you are the light of the world.
And this was a bunch of poor peasants, helpless.
And Jesus is looking at them and saying, you are actually the light of the world.
You are the ones who bring light.
You are the ones who bring salt and flavor to the world and must have carried such impact to them.
Really, I'm just a Jew is in slavery to the Romans, and this man is telling me, I am the light of the world.
And you begin to see the impact. That is very scary.
He said, when you get married, you should not divorce.
He said, be honest, so that you only need to say yes or no.
You don't need to say, I swear by my grandfather.
You know me. You know me.
The moment you say those things, that means you're not very honest.
People should trust you enough to just hear yes or no.
He said, you should love and pray for your enemies.
He said, instead of worrying, you need to put God's kingdom before all these things that you're running.
And there's a whole lot more that we can see if we go there now, those people sitting there, they would have listened to all those things.
Now Jesus is saying, if you hear these words of mine, everything that is just said, and they say, if I take all these things that this man is saying, if I put them into practice, my life is going to stay.
But if I do not put them into practice, even though I hate them, even though I can remember them, even though I memorized them, if I'm not doing what he said, my life is not going to stay.
This is what the people would have been hearing.
We could go more and more and more into this, but I think we need to move on now. We need to look.
What does it mean to us?
What does it mean to the person living in 2026 in Malawi.
I wish we had time to hear from different people.
Yeah, but we don't. So I'm just gonna go with of some of the things that I picked.
This is saying to me, no matter who I am, if I hear Jesus swears today and obey them, my life is going to stay.
But also no matter who I am, I might have all the money, all the strength, all the privileges.
But if I ignore Jesus words, my life will not stand.
So the issue is not whether or not winds or rain or storms come.
These things are guaranteed because life will have challenges. It's just the nature of life.
They will come.
The issue is also not whether you are building or not.
Everyone is building.
Hearing from this scripture because he says the two men built.
It's not that one of them didn't build.
They both were busy building.
And notice that that you are the one doing the building.
Because he doesn't say the two men got their mothers to build for them.
It's not your teacher building for you or your dad or your boss.
You are doing the building.
All of us. This is what it means to us today.
Whatever it is that you are doing, you're building your life.
What matters is how are you building those houses might have looked the same.
Maybe the one hand stand might even have looked better.
But the thing that mattered was that what it looks like on the outside house was planted.
And you know, in, in many of us lives today, We can all come into church, we can all raise our hand.
And come and give that money here.
Outside we can see it looks like a house, but the foundation.
And the foundation is not in what it looks like.
It's in where it's planted.
And being planted means you are doing what the word is saying.
You can give money, but walking in disobedience.
You can raise your you in your heart.
You look holy on the outside, but inside is not all okay.
What are you building your life upon?
Because what matters is the foundation.
And foundations can be seen. They're underground. There you.
Where do you get direction for your life?
Who told you to marry the one that you're married for? You need to get married. Who told you that you should?
How about the career choices of your life?
Are you really because God told you to do that or because you. This is what our family does.
The business that you are into business is marriage. Who told you to do that? If you get any direction from anyone?
Because some of us had a clear word from the Lord not to go down a certain path, but we still went down that path.
I'm telling you, you are building consent.
What informs you in your life that this is right and this is wrong? You know, many people come to like leaders, please pray for me about this thing.
But if you read in the Word of God, you will find the answer in there.
We need to know this for ourselves.
If you hear what Jesus is saying and you go and you do it, your life is going to be a success.
But if you hear what Jesus is saying and you ignore it, you don't do it, your life is not going to smooth.
And we know this applies to all of Scripture now because it's not just these words from chapter five to chapter seven of Matthew, Because in James it also says, do not merely listen to the Word and so deceive yourself.
Do what it says.
I can't remember if It's James, chapter one twenty. I know it's verse 22. Maybe it's chapter one or chapter. Do you have it? There, there. We've got nothing.
Okay, it's verse 22. That's what I know.
So there is hearing the Word and then there is applying the Word doing what the Word says.
We don't just hear and go out.
We hear and do it.
If you do these two things, hearing and obeying, hearing and obeying, I promise you, you are going to try out when the storms come.
The fuel is not there, the prices are going up, you can't find the one to marry.
You can't find a house.
You, you are sick.
All these things.
But you know what?
You are going to still stand.
You're going to still exhibit that joy.
You show up in church.
If you know you did not eat last night.
Because you're walking in obedience, you will bear fruit.
You begin to see things coming out of your life that only God could have done.
We started by reading. If you remain in me and my ways remain in you, then there's going to be fruit that comes. When you read the rest of John, chapter 50, it's going to help you to avoid sin.
You know what it says in Psalm 119 says, how can a young man keep his way pure?
This applies to all men and women as well.
So much impurity in the world that we're living in today.
People no longer bother to cover themselves when they dress up.
People no longer guard their lips. They just speak. Even anywhere.
So much impurity.
By guarding it according to the word of God, I've hidden in my heart.
You notice it's not here.
It's here.
When it's here, the Holy Spirit brings it up in that moment when you are being tempted and it helps you to. For instance, in Psalm 1 and Joshua 1, we hear about someone meditating on the word of the Lord and it says he prospers in all that he does.
Spoke about this last week. Again, you're going to see prosperity.
And from the first scripture that we read in John 5, 10, we saw that you will remain in Jesus.
The Word of God helps us to remain in Jesus.
So now we're going on to number four, step number four.
Anyone can still remember what that is.
We are applying this now because all these things we've been talking about can be general to anyone.
But now you need to ask yourself, which one of these things is pointing to me?
Which one of these things is talking to my life?
You need to ask yourself, how am I building my life right now in this moment? Ask yourself that question, how are you building?
Is it on what Jesus taught?
We are totally ignoring him.
You're listening to politicians, you're listening to teachers or some elders somewhere who are not walking in the way.
Perhaps your issue is to do with some of the things that were mentioned in that Semon on the Mount.
Maybe your issue is around prayer.
You know it, you know it, you know it's that you need to adjust. Something to do with praying your life.
Maybe it's around giving that moment when they say, can you come and give?
Something in you here is not right.
Perhaps you just need to be a bit more generous in life. Not even giving in church here.
Maybe it's something to do with relationships, says, pray for your enemies.
Some of us, our enemies are the people that we have in our home, those close relatives.
We're not getting along.
Now we are hearing these words telling us that you don't need to be angry, you don't need to revenge, you don't need to fight like the world fights.
Jesus is telling us a different way of approaching God.
Love them, pray for them.
Live revenge for God.
Perhaps it's in the area of honesty or integrity, if you like the bigger word. But you know that your yes is not a yes.
If I say yes, I'm coming, I may not come.
If I say no, I didn't do this.
It's just my lips saying that.
Now the word of God is pointing at you and you need to start changing something.
Or maybe there's just something that you know God has been challenging you on.
It may not even have been mentioned in this service today, Sister. But you know it something that you know, God is speaking to me on this thing and I need to make some adjustments.
And in this moment, anyone who hears the word of God and does it, he is the one that's going to send, but the one who ignores.
Not like God is just. This is just. When I ignore these ones, I ignore it. Let them see what they want.
There are consequences.
But life is not going to stand.
Maybe some of us are actually feeling. My house is already cracking.
I can see, I can tell that my foundation has not been okay.
And this thing is going to fall.
Can be many different issues.
Maybe it's a. Maybe it's a job issue.
Job.
Or maybe it's a career choice thing.
Maybe it's a health issue.
It's just a purpose issue. You're like, I'm in this life, but I don't know my purpose.
Things are just creeping all around, all around me and crumbling down.
The question is, are you going to follow what the word says?
Are you going to do what the word says or you are going to keep ignoring?
Jesus said, you don't need to try hard, you need to remain in my life.
And he said, if you keep my commands, if you do what I say, you will remain in my life.
[00:43:19] Speaker B: Together,
[00:43:22] Speaker A: shall we take time to pray today?
