Faith staggers not: it is the voice of God, and must therefore be received and honored. Hard things and wonderful things were proclaimed to Noah...
O fools, and slow of heart to believe…” (Luke 24:25). Of this verse, Oswald Chambers said, “To believe is literally to commit...
We so often associate prayer with kneeling that we may fail to notice the various positions of prayer in the Bible. In fact, standing was often the assumed position of prayer in scripture. Genesis 19:27 "And Abraham gat up early in the morning to the place where he stood before the LORD." We know what Abraham was doing when he stood before the Lord. He was praying. The New Testament also supports the stand up and pray attitude. Mark 11:25 "And when ye stand praying, forgive, if ye have ought against any: that your Father also which is in heaven may forgive you your trespasses." The phrase, "when ye stand praying," shows that to be a common position of the body for prayer during this time. Yes, they also kneeled. This is seen in numerous passages: Luke 22:41; Acts 9:40; 20:36. But standing was a common and accepted way to pray. We should not hesitate to stand up and pray today.
After Jesus cast an unclean devil out of a man in a synagogue service, the people cried, "What a word is this! for with authority and power he commandeth the unclean spirits, and they come out" (Luke 4:36). Many bibles will take passages that refer to "power" and change it to "authority." However, here we see the importance of both. Authority is the right to do something. Power is the ability to do something or to make something happen. Among men, a person can have one without the other. A man may have a position that gives him the right to make a decision (the authority), but he may not have the power to make it happen. On the other hand, some people have the power to do certain things even when they do not have the proper authority to do them.
"Honor: A History," a new book written by James Bunting, deals with the importance of honor as a concept in the past and the loss of that sense of honor today. The Bible commonly uses honor (spelled "honour") in the sense of giving honor to someone else (as to God) or receiving honor from others (as in honoring our father and mother). The closest Bible word for what is meant by a sense of honor is the word honourable. To be honourable is to receive honor or to be worthy of receiving honor. Samuel was introduced to Saul as a man of God and "an honourable man" (1Samuel 9:6). Jabez, who prayed and received answer to his prayer, was "more honourable than his brethren" (1Chronicles 4:9). Joseph of Arimathaea was "an honourable counsellor, which also waited for the kingdom of God" (Mark 15:43). Honor is the opposite of shame in the Bible. Therefore, a sense of honor involves living in such a way as to avoid shameful acts and associations. The emphasis in the Bible on having a "good name" (Proverbs 22:1; Ecclesiastes 7:1) embodies the idea of that sense of honor; that determination to act in an honourable way. George Washington was famous for the importance he placed on his reputation and honor. We long to see such honor today.
