Biblical Moments with Frank King

The Person Called the Holy Spirit (Episode 149)

In Christianity, we regard the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit as three distinct persons that together make up the Godhead. We serve one God, but He manifests himself in three distinct persons.
By distinct persons, we mean you can distinguish one from the other. For instance, God the Father resides in heaven. Then God sent Jesus as His Son on earth to be the Savior of the world. And while Jesus was on earth, He prayed to the Father in heaven. Then on the day of Pentecost, God sent the Holy Spirit to indwell us. In this episode, Frank King focuses on the person of the Holy Spirit.
The reason the Holy Spirit is so important to us is because He is the one who helps us to accomplish the work of the church and to live a victorious Christian life. We can’t do either of those without the help of the Holy Spirit.
Jesus Promises the Holy Spirit
Before Jesus left His disciples, He promised to send the Holy Spirit to abide with them. “I will pray the Father, and he shall give you another Comforter, that he may abide with you forever,” Jesus promised (John 14:16, KJV).
Two notable things Jesus reveals about the person of the Holy Spirit here. One, He will be another Comforter. Not all versions of the Bible use the word Comforter in the verse. The NASB renders Helper. The NIV uses the word Counselor. Some other versions of the Bible may use a different word.
A key word in the verse above is the word “another.” In the Greek language, two words for another exist. One means another of the same kind. The other word means another of a different kind. In this verse, Jesus uses the word αλλος  (AL-loss), meaning another of the same kind.
In other words, the Father would send them another Comforter (or Helper, Counselor, Friend, or whatever word your Bible uses); and He would be just like Jesus. Secondly, Jesus said in the verse, the Holy Spirit would abide or remain with them forever. He would not leave them like Jesus was about to do, but He would stay with them until the end.
The disciples were saddened by the news of Jesus leaving them. But what they could not even imagine was how radically changed their lives would become through the person of the Holy Spirit. That miraculous change is clearly seen in the book of the Acts of the Apostles.

Praying through Difficult Times (Episode 148)

No matter who you are, it’s harder to pray when you are bearing a heavy load in your life. We tend to go through the routine of prayer when all is well. But when we pray under a load, it causes us to pour out our heart and emotions to God. The heavier the load, the more you tend to pour out your inside to God.
Prayer is vital because it is the means through which we communicate with God. Prayer is how we petition God. In this episode, Frank focuses upon the importance of praying through the difficult times in our life.
No one has ever gone through a trial as difficult as Jesus did when He faced the cross at Calvary. He even prayed to God that “if it were possible, the hour might pass from him” (Mark 14:35, KJV).
Moreover, Jesus told His disciples, “My soul is overwhelmed with sorrow to the point of death” (Mark 14:34, NIV). This was the human side of Jesus manifesting itself. Even He found it more challenging to pray because of the load that was upon Him. It is important to remember that He didn’t minister as God but as a human being while on earth. He was no exception; like us, He found it more burdensome to pray because of the heavy load that God had allowed to be placed upon Him.
But in the end, Jesus chose to obey the will of His Father in spite of how He felt. “Not what I will, but what thou wilt,” He prayed (Mark 14:36, KJV).
Jesus is our perfect example for how to pray through a trial. Facing the cross, bearing the weight of the world on His shoulder, sorrowful in spirit, abandoned by His closest friends on earth, He prayed through and pressed His way. Thank God that He did! Our eternal fate rested upon His obedience to the cross.
When you are praying through a trial, you do well to remember the words of Jesus to His disciples in the garden. “The spirit truly is ready but the flesh is weak” (verse 38). The point is that when you are in Christ, the Spirit of Christ indwells you. So, even though you may be weak in the flesh, remember that the Spirit of Christ within you is always ready to go with God.

Encourage Yourself in the Lord (Episode 147)

According to the book of Hebrews, chapter 10, we should exhort one another. Moreover, we should do that even more as we approach the day of the Lord. So, by default, all of us have been given the ministry of exhortation. To exhort means to encourage.
The local church is uniquely equipped for the ministry of exhortation. That’s because fellow believers understand each other in terms of their desire to learn of Christ and to follow Him. We understand the unique challenges of being in this world but not being of it. In this episode, Evangelist Frank King focuses on the need to encourage yourself.
In the days of King David, he and his army came from war to find that the Amalekites had destroyed their city and taken their wives and children captive. David and his men were devastated. Furthermore, “And David was greatly distressed; for the people spoke of stoning him, because the soul of the people was grieved…(1 Samuel 30:6a, KJV).
Why did the men of David’s army want to stone him? They were looking for somebody to blame and to direct their anger toward. David was the king, so they all blamed him. If he hadn’t taken them out to war, the Amalekites would not have been able to carry out their ambush. But of course, David was just as hurt as the rest of them. He had two wives. And both were gone. But the people were hurt so they directed their anger toward their leader.
So, how did David respond to the wrath of his army? “David encouraged himself in the Lord his God” (verse 6b).
The Choice is Yours
It’s those times like the one David found himself in that reveal what we are made of. If you want to persist in feeling sorry for yourself, there is little anyone can do to help you move forward. If you want to wallow in pity, no one can make you feel encouraged.
You can attend church every week and have people calling and pouring into you, and you can still stay in the dumps--if you want to. But if you choose to respond that way, it says something negative about your relationship with God. Why should you abide in despair when you serve the living God?
It’s good that we can come to church and be encouraged by the Word of God and the people of God. But when nothing else will do, you must know how to encourage yourself—in the Lord.

Staying with the Truth (Episode 146)

In this episode, Evangelist Frank King encourages believers to stay with the truth found in God’s word. How often do we encourage other believers to do that?
First, we must know what the truth is before we can stay with it. One thing we know is that not every faith is of the truth. If they were, everyone’s faith would agree with everybody else’s. And we know that’s not the case. But Jesus said to God, “Your word is truth” (John 17:17, NASB).
In Paul’s letter to the church at Galatia, he rebukes the believers there for their abandonment of the truth for another gospel. He writes, “I am amazed that you are so quickly deserting Him who called you by the grace of Christ, for a different gospel (Galatians 1:6, NASB).
One takeaway from these words of Paul is that just because a person has been presented with the truth does not safeguard that person from ending up in error. To prevent the latter from happening, it is incumbent upon the individual to stay with the truth. The Galatians had been presented with the gospel of Christ. But they chose to turn away from the truth to embrace another gospel.
A Warning for These Last Days
This episode is entitled, “Staying with the truth. That’s what we are talking about. That’s what Paul was challenging the church at Galatia to do. Also, in his first epistle to Timothy, Paul issued a related warning concerning the last days.
“The Spirit explicitly says that in later times some will fall away from the faith, paying attention to deceitful spirits and doctrines of demons,” Paul wrote (1 Timothy 4:1, NASB). Note how those believers whom he refers to will end up departing from the faith. They will give heed to demonic spirits and teachings.
We do well to heed Paul’s abovementioned words to the Galatians and to Timothy. Again, just because a person has been presented with the truth does not safeguard that person from ending up in error. To safeguard oneself from that undesirable fate, it is incumbent upon the individual to stay with the truth.

God's Ability to Protect You (Episode 145)

We live in an increasingly dangerous world. We must give due attention to our personal protection. On the other hand, there are serious limits to the extent we can protect ourselves. In this episode, Frank King addresses God’s ability to protect you.
The mounting dangers around us are changing our way of life and the landscape of our cities. We have security systems in our houses. Because of hackers, we have multiple layers of security on our computers. Due to threats of terrorism, we have physical barriers around our high-risk facilities, etc.
The reason our faith in God is important in this matter is because faith gives us a healthy response to the dangers at hand. And the goal of this episode is to encourage you to believe that no matter what you see going on around you that God is able to protect you.   
In Psalm 91, the psalmist addresses the subject of divine protection. But this psalm does not apply to every believer. That’s an important point because sometimes we embrace promises in the Scriptures that don’t apply to us. Or promises that we have not properly positioned ourselves to receive the fulfillment of.
As for the applicability of the psalm, the psalmist writes, “He who dwells in the shelter of the Most High will abide in the shadow of the Almighty” (Psalm 91:1, NASB). Those who dwell in “the shelter of the Most High” are those who have chosen to make the Lord their dwelling place (verse 9). These are they that Psalm 91 applies to.
How God Protect Us
The psalmist makes some phenomenal statements about God’s ability to protect us. The question is, how does He accomplish that protection? According to verse 11, God gives His angels charge over us to keep us. We can’t see them, but angels are all around us. They are under divine orders to protect those who love and fear the Lord.
Some people may say that they will just be super careful and protect themselves. But being super careful is not enough. We don’t have to go looking for danger, but danger will come looking for us. Of course, we should do what we can to protect ourselves from danger. But that alone is not nearly enough. In times like these, only God has the absolute ability to protect us.

Praying for More Spiritual Insight (Episode 144)

We must never become stagnant in our relationship with the Lord and in our knowledge of Him. One important aspect of our spiritual growth is spiritual insight. As the term implies, spiritual insight refers to insight into or knowledge of spiritual things, particularly those things that have bearing our relationship with Christ. That is the subject of this podcast episode.
In his letter to the church at Ephesus, Paul said he made mention of the congregation in his prayers (Ephesians 1:16). He prayed that God would give them “the spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of Him” (verse 17). This was to the intent that their understanding would be enlightened (verse 18). In effect, Paul prayed for the people’s spiritual insight to be increased.
Paul mentioned three areas he wanted the people to increase in understanding (verses 18-19):
That they may know the hope of God’s calling.
That they may know the riches of the glory of the inheritance
That they might know the exceeding greatness of His power toward them
As Paul the apostle prayed for the church at Ephesus, we do well to pray that God will impart to us the spirit of wisdom and revelation. No matter where we are in Christ, there is always room for our understanding to be more enlightened.
Without spiritual insight from God and His Word, we are left with our own understanding of who we are in Christ. Our thinking will be far below where God’s thinking is because His ways are so much higher than ours.
When we read what God says for us to do, at times we may be tempted to say, I can’t do that. But as we gain spiritual insight and get the right revelation of who we are in Christ, we learn that we can do what God says that we should.

Making Sense of What God is Doing (Episode 143)

Sometimes, making sense of what God is doing in your life is nearly impossible. Or of what He is saying through what you are going through. God tends to not do things in a straightforward way. It’s seldom possible to look at where you are and say you can see where God is taking you.
In this episode, Frank King reminds us that when God is in the process of blessing us, what we are experiencing may not feel or look like a blessing. That’s why we must walk by faith and not by sight (2 Corinthians 5:7).
Consider Joseph, the son of Jacob. He was his father’s favorite son. That brought about much envy from his brothers. When the opportunity came, the brothers did Joseph dirty. They put him in a pit and eventually sold him to some merchants. They in turn took him and sold him in Egypt.
At the time, Joseph was only 17. He was the second youngest of the twelve sons. After they sold him, they took his coat his dad had made, killed a goat and dipped the coat in blood. Then they brought the bloody coat to their dad, saying they had found the coat. So Jacob believed his son was dead.
Meanwhile, in Egypt where Joseph had been sold, he was accused by his master’s wife of trying to rape her. For that, he was put in prison. But God was with Joseph (Genesis 39:2). Eventually, Joseph got out of prison and became the most powerful man in Egypt, second only to the Pharaoh.
Working Good Through Our Bad
To be sure, when Joseph’s brothers threw him in the pit and sold him, making sense of what was going on was impossible. He certainly didn’t feel blessed at that time. But once he got in Egypt, God caused him to prosper in his master’s house. Then God gave him favor in prison. Finally, God promoted him to power in Egypt. It was then that Joseph could see the hand of God working in his life.
Accordingly, after Joseph had risen to power, he shared with them his amazing perspective on his painful past. “But as for you, ye thought evil against me; but God meant it unto good, to bring to pass, as it is this day, to save much people alive,” he said (Genesis 50:20, KJV).
Similarly, you may not be able to make sense of what God is doing in your life. But He knows what He's doing. If you trust Him, things will work out in your favor.
 
 

God's Power to Save Sinners (Episode 142)

Most if not all of us would agree that the times we live in today are spiritually much darker than they were 20 years ago. So many people today are dealing with a variety of overwhelming issues. What we are seeing is nothing less than the ramped-up works of the devil. The Bible says he is the prince of the power of the air, which is the spirit at work in the children of disobedience (Eph. 2:2).
The good news is that God’s saving power is just as real and powerful today as it was in the days of Jesus and the apostles. In this episode, Frank King addresses God’s power to save sinners.
In Paul’s first letter to Timothy, he refers to himself as the chief of sinners. Before his conversion, Paul hated those who loved Christ. This means Paul, then known as Saul, was a terrible person. In his epistle, he also refers to himself as a blasphemer, a persecutor and injurious (1 Timothy 1:13, KJV).
On the other hand, that very fact makes Paul’s salvation experience the perfect example of God’s power to save sinners.
An Important Take Away for Sinners
What is the main point we should take away from Paul’s salvation experience? He writes, “For this cause I obtained mercy, that in me first Jesus Christ might show forth all longsuffering, for a pattern to them which should hereafter believe on him to life everlasting” (verse 16, KJV).
In the verse, Paul highlights God’s longsuffering. What is longsuffering? It is the ability to hold your peace while being provoked. Can you imagine how Paul’s actions before his conversion must have provoked the Lord? But God remained patient with Paul.
Paul said God did that as a pattern or an example for other unbelievers going forward. You see, one of the reasons for the Lord’s tarry today is His longsuffering toward the lost. And Paul said God saved him as an example of His longsuffering. He was chief of the sinners. Accordingly, he was the perfect example of God’s power to save sinners.
Some unbelievers believe they are too bad for God to be interested in them. But if they seriously consider Paul the apostle’s experience, they might have a change of heart.
Also, if you are reading this post, and you don’t know the Lord as your Savior, know that God is more than able to save you and use you for His glory.  For the gospel is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes (Romans 1:16).