CHRISTIANS AND TIMES OF LIFE
CƠ-ĐỐC NHÂN VÀ THÌ GIỜ
Kinh thánh: Thi thiên 39: 4-13
Câu gốc: Thi thiên 39: 5 phần A – Kìa, Chúa khiến ngày giờ tôi dài bằng bàn tay, Và đời tôi như không không được mặt Chúa.
CHIRSTIANS AND TIMES OF LIFE
Bible: Psalm 39: 4-13
Main verse: Psalm 39: 5 part A – Indeed, You have made my days as handbreadths, and my age is as nothing before You.
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– As we are almost at the end of the Lunar year of 2018, we use this opportunity to remind each other about the time in human life in order to prepare ourselves wisely in the coming Lunar year of 2019.
– Except the soul, one of the most precious things we have in this life is time.
– Many people say that time is money, but for us Christians, time is more important than that. Time is life and death, and not just for this world, but for eternity as well.
– As we have experienced throughout our lives, time is never wait for anyone. There are many things we can stop for a while, but nobody can stop time except God.
– According to the Bible, when Joshua was a judge to the Israelites, God had stopped time during the battle of Gibeon and made the sun and the moon stood still in one place:
JOSHUA 10: 12-13 – Then Joshua spoke to the Lord in the day when the Lord delivered up the Amorites before the children of Israel, and he said in the sight of Israel: Sun, stand still over Gibeon; And Moon, in the Valley of Aijalon. So the sun stood still, and the moon stopped, till the people had revenge upon their enemies. Is this not written in the Book of Jasher? So the sun stood still in the midst of heaven, and did not hasten to go down for about a whole day.
GIÔ-SUÊ 10: 12-13 – Ngày mà Đức Giê-hô-va phó dân A-mô-rít cho dân Y-sơ-ra-ên, thì Giô-suê thưa cùng Đức Giê-hô-va tại trước mặt Y-sơ-ra-ên, mà rằng: Hỡi mặt trời, hãy dừng lại trên Ga-ba-ôn; Hỡi mặt trăng, hãy ngừng lại trên trũng A-gia-lôn! Mặt trời bèn dừng, mặt trăng liền ngừng, Cho đến chừng dân sự đã báo thù quân nghịch mình. Điều đó há không có chép trong sách Gia-sa sao? Mặt trời dừng lại giữa trời, và không vội lặn ước một ngày trọn.
– At another time we will have a chance to study those miracles that were recorded in the Bible to strengthen our faith in God and in His Word. But today we only focus on the important of time and how to use it.
– God not only stopped time, He could also make time go backward as in the case of king Hezekiah when God promised to heal his sickness:
2KINGS 20: 8-11 – And Hezekiah said to Isaiah: What is the sign that the Lord will heal me, and that I shall go up to the house of the Lord the third day? Then Isaiah said: This is the sign to you from the Lord, that the Lord will do the thing which He has spoken: shall the shadow go forward ten degrees or go backward ten degrees? And Hezekiah answered: It is an easy thing for the shadow to go down ten [degrees; no, but let the shadow go backward ten degrees. So Isaiah the prophet cried out to the Lord, and He brought the shadow ten degrees backward, by which it had gone down on the sundial of Ahaz.
2CÁC VUA 20: 11 – Vả, Ê-xê-chia đã hỏi Ê-sai rằng: Bởi dấu nào tôi phải nhìn rằng Đức Giê-hô-va sẽ chữa lành cho tôi và đến ngày thứ ba tôi sẽ được đi lên đền của Ngài? Ê-sai đáp: Nầy là dấu Đức Giê-hô-va ban cho ngươi, đặng làm chứng cho ngươi biết Ngài sẽ làm thành điều Ngài đã phán ra: Ngươi muốn bóng tới trước mười độ hay là lui lại mười độ chăng? Ê-xê-chia đáp: Bóng tới trước mười độ thì chẳng khó gì; không! Thà nó lui lại sau mười độ thì hơn. Thầy tiên tri Ê-sai cầu khẩn Đức Giê-hô-va, Ngài bèn đem bóng đã giọi trên trắc ảnh A-cha lui lại mười độ, là mười độ đã xuống rồi.
– These were two occasions that God had used His power to stop time, but in all human history, time never stop and we all know about that. That’s why God wants us to use our time on earth wisely, because if it was passed, we never got it back
COLOSSIANS 4: 5 – Walk in wisdom toward those who are outside, redeeming the time.
CÔ-LÔ-SE 4: 5 – Hãy lấy sự khôn ngoan ăn ở với những người ngoại, và lợi dụng thì giờ.
– As God is The Righteous One, He has given all mankind an equal amount of time to be used. No one has more time than others. We all have 24 hours day, no more, no less. Wherever a person is on social status, he cannot have more time than others. And it’s up to each person how to use it.
– According to the Bible, a wise person is the one who knows how to use his time properly, or in other words, knows how to make time benefiting himself.
– Therefore we Christians should ask God for help in order to know how to use each moment of our times wisely so that we can be benefited in this life and in eternity:
PSALM 90: 12 – So teach us to number our days, that we may gain a heart of wisdom.
THI THIÊN 90: 12 – Cầu xin Chúa dạy chúng tôi biết đếm các ngày chúng tôi, hầu cho chúng tôi được lòng khôn ngoan.
– But surprisingly, many Christians used to ask God for many things, like being blessed with riches, health, happiness, successes, but rarely we heard of Christians who actually prayed God helping them to know how to count their days.
– We should add it to the list of our prayers every time we come before God and constantly ask for it until we know how to count our days precisely. And we would like to suggest that each one of us should have a note book or use our phones to record all things that we do or things that happens in everyday of our lives.
– So now we know that two things to make Christians being wise are fear God and know how to count our days on earth:
PROVERBS 9: 10 – The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, and the knowledge of the Holy One is understanding.
CHÂM NGÔN 9: 10 – Kính sợ Đức Giê-hô-va, ấy là khởi đầu sự khôn ngoan; Sự nhìn biết Đấng Thánh, đó là sự thông sáng.
– Also according to the Bible, we, as God’s children, should ask for wisdom from God, because it’s one of our most priority and knowing how to count our days is one step nearer to be a wise person.
PROVERBS 4: 7 – Wisdom is the principal thing; Therefore get wisdom.
CHÂM NGÔN 4: 7 – Sự khôn ngoan là điều cần nhất; vậy, khá cầu lấy sự khôn ngoan; Hãy dùng hết của con đã được mà mua sự thông sáng.
– So, as we are going to celebrate a Lunar new year in our lives, we should remember those Bible verses to hold time precious and count our days carefully in this coming year.
– As the end of this year is coming we want to thank God for the peace, joy, health and good fortune that God had blessed us. But at the same time we should remember to use time wisely and carefully in the coming year 2019.
– We should always remember that when we lost something, we can have it back, but if we lost our souls and times, we never get them back. They will lost forever, so we must be real careful to keep our souls in God and count each minute, or even each second of our days.
– Nowadays we have many things that can make us lose time hugely or profusely. We would like to give some examples of them. We will need more time to study about this subject and we will look into matters one by one in order to know how to use time benefitingly.
– Firstly we should into the effects of time on human body. We all know that with each passing day our bodies change a little bit.
– For children, they will grow each passing day into adulthood and they will face the hard reality of life. Therefore we must prepare them for the days they will be on their own in this life. The days they must fight for their survival in human wicked world and struggle with human emotion in every aspect of their lives.
– We will have another time to learn about this particular subject with the instructions in the Bible, but there is one verse that we are parents should remember in order to help our children growing up in fear of God:
PROVERBS 22: 6 – Train up a child in the way he should go, and when he is old he will not depart from it.
CHÂM NGÔN 22: 6 – Hãy dạy cho trẻ thơ con đường nó phải theo; Dầu khi nó trở về già, cũng không hề lìa khỏi đó.
– In reality, many Christians parents had not trained their children carefully enough to keep them on the path that God has instructed us to follow. The consequences are the suffering of our children and of ourselves, too.
– We hope that with our dedication in following the Bible’s teaching on the subject of using time wisely, we and our children will not suffer the fate of unbelievers on the day our Lord Jesus comes back to earth.
– For adult, we all know that with each passing year, we become older a bit, and the day we must face God is nearer, therefore we must prepare ourselves accordingly, as it was written in the book of Amos:
AMOS 4: 12 – Therefore thus will I do to you, O Israel; Because I will do this to you, prepare to meet your God, O Israel!
A-MỐT 4: 12 – Hỡi Y-sơ-ra-ên, vậy nên ta sẽ đãi ngươi dường ấy; hỡi Y-sơ-ra-ên, vì ta sẽ đãi ngươi dường ấy, nên ngươi khá sửa soạn mà gặp Đức Chúa Trời ngươi.
– Although this verse was recorded in the Old Testament for the Israelites, but we Christians are called spiritual Israelites, so we have also take heed of this warning.
– Although there are statistically more than one billion of Christians in the whole world, but those who actually live according to the Bible’s teachings are very few that it is becoming insignificant each passing year. This problem had been forewarned by our Lord Jesus Christ two thousand years before that on the day He comes back to earth He will not find much of faith among those who called themselves Christians:
LUKE 18: 8 – I tell you that He will avenge them speedily. Nevertheless, when the Son of Man comes, will He really find faith on the earth?
LU-CA 18: 8 – Ta nói cùng các ngươi, Ngài sẽ vội vàng xét lẽ công bình cho họ. Song khi Con người đến, há sẽ thấy đức tin trên mặt đất chăng?
– Therefore, according to Christ’s warning, we should try our best to increase our faith in Him in this new year and keep on growing non-stop until we see Him face to face on His glory day.
– In these first weeks of the Lunar New Year we will study the Bible more on this subject of using our time carefully in every aspect of our lives in order to be wiser according to God’s command so that while in this world we can glorify Him and being able to stay away from the wicked lifestyle of others.
– May God bless us abundantly in this New Year so that we can be encouraged to apply to our lives every God’s teachings in the Bible, especially of knowing how to use time wisely and carefully. Amen.
(will be continued)