The Mailbox Club Course 1 Lesson 7
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Dear Friend, When you trusted Christ as your Saviour, all of your sins were forgiven. Every sin that you have ever committed was paid for by Christ's death on the cross. The Bible says,
"...your sins are forgiven you for His name's sake." I John 2:12
This is wonderful, but you must remember that you have
a terrible enemy, Satan. You have taken a step that has made him very angry. You have left
him and joined those who belong to the Lord Jesus. And anyone who tries to live for Christ
will soon be attacked by Satan.
Satan cannot take you out of God's family, but
he will do all he can to discourage you. He will try to make you doubt your salvation. He
will tell you that you will never be able to overcome temptation. He will try to get you
to doubt God's love for you.
But God has begun a good work in you, and you can be sure that He will continue
that good work. The Bible says,
"...He which hath begun a good work in you will perform it until the day of Jesus Christ." Philippians 1:6
In this lesson we are going to tell you four things God wants you to know. We will give you verses for each of these things. We want to show you how you can use these verses to answer Satan's temptations. Be sure to memorize these verses.
1 God Wants You To Know That You Are Saved
| "This is the record, that God hath given to us eternal life, and this life is in His Son. He that hath the Son hath life; and he that hath not the Son of God hath not life." I John 5:11,13 |
One of the first things Satan will do after you are saved is to try to make you doubt your salvation, Perhaps he will put questions like these into your mind:
"You don't really think you are saved just by believing on Jesus, do you? That's too easy. Besides, you are still the same person you were before. And how can anybody know for sure that he is saved?"
When Satan puts these thoughts into your mind,
what will your answer be? You cannot say, "I know that I am saved because I have such
a good feeling." You may not have a good feeling tomorrow.
The way we know that we are saved is by the Word of God and not by our feelings. Our
feelings change every day, but God's Word is always the same.
What does God say in His Word? He says that if you have Christ as your Saviour, you
have everlasting life. You can say, "I know that I am saved because God
says so in His Word!"
The Lord Jesus not only saves us, but He also keeps
us. He calls us His "sheep" and He says that we will never perish. Jesus
said,
"My sheep hear My voice, and I know them, and they follow Me: And I give unto them eternal life; and they shall never perish...." John 10:27,28
The word "perish" means to be lost. Jesus says that we will never be lost. Jesus tells us that we are in the hands of His Father. No one can ever take us out of the mighty hands of God. Jesus said,
"My Father ...is greater than all; and no man is able to pluck them out of My Father's hand." John 10:29
2 God Wants You To Know That You Can Overcome Temptation
| "There hath no temptation taken you but such as is common to man: but God is faithful, who will not suffer you to be tempted above that ye are able; but will with the temptation also make a way to escape, that ye may be able to bear it." I Corinthians 10:19 |
Here is another way the devil may attack you. He may put thoughts like these into your mind:
"All right, so you're a child of God, but you are a defeated Christian and you always will be. You have certain sins in your life which you will never be able to overcome. You have failed before and you will keep on failing. "
Here again, our weapon to defeat Satan is the Word of God. Let us look at our verse and see what it says. It is a long verse, so let us think about it in four parts:
1 "There hath no temptation taken you but such as is common to man...."
This means that other people are tempted with the same things that tempt you.
2 "God is faithful"
This means that God always does what He says He will do. You can count on the fact that God is faithful.
3 "Who will not suffer you to be tempted above that ye are able"
This means that God promises that He will not let you be tempted beyond what you can bear.
4 "But will with the temptation also make a way to escape, that ye may be able to bear it."
This means that God will always make a way to escape
out of temptation so that you don't have to sin.
Be sure to memorize this verse. It is a long verse and it may take you awhile to
learn it perfectly, but work at it until you know it by heart. Then use it in times of
temptation.
Sometimes Satan tries to make us think that we have
sinned just because we have been tempted to do some terrible thing. But temptation is not
sin. We sin only when we give in to temptation. The Lord Jesus was tempted many times but
He never sinned.
As long as you are in this world, you will be tempted. But, with God's help, you can
overcome temptation. God does not want you to be afraid of Satan and his temptations. The
Bible says,
"God has not given us the spirit of fear; but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind." II Timothy 1:7
God will give you power to overcome temptation so that you do not have to sin.
3 God Wants You To Know That He Will Forgive You When You Sin
| "If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness." I John 1:9 |
It is true that we do not have to sin. It is also true that we still have a sinful nature, and we often fail. The Bible says,
"If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us." I John 1:8
What happens when we sin? Immediately Satan comes to condemn us:
"Now you've done it! You are supposed to be a Christian and look what you have done. Christians aren't supposed to do such things. Now God is displeased with you and He will not forgive you,"
When we think about our sins, we have to admit that
they are wrong and that they are displeasing to God. But what does God say in His Word? He
says, "If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins."
No matter how many times we fail, God promises to forgive us when we confess our
sins to Him. God does not like our sins, but He loves us. His love for us never changes.
God says in His Word,
"I have loved you with an everlasting love...." Jeremiah 31.:3
God loves all people, but He has a special love for His own children. You may wonder how God can love us when we are so weak and sinful. The reason God loves us so much is that we belong to Christ. When God looks at us, He sees us "in Christ." God loves us as He loves His own Son. This is hard for us to believe, but it is true. The Lord Jesus said,
"The Father Himself loveth you, because you have loved Me, and have believed that I came out from God." John 16:27
4 God Wants You To Know That He Hears and Answers Prayer
| "Hitherto have ye asked nothing in My name: ask, and ye shall receive, that your joy may be full. " John 16:24 |
Becoming a Christian does not mean that we will not
have any more problems. In His Word, the Lord Jesus told us that we would have many
troubles and problems in this world.
When you have a great problem, what does Satan do? He tries to discourage you. He
tries to make you doubt God's love and His faithfulness. Satan may put thoughts like these
into your mind:
"God doesn't really care about you. If He did, He wouldn't let this happen to you." Or he may say something like this, "God is far away and He is concerned with more important things. He is too busy to care about you and your problems."
But what does the Bible say? The Bible says that God is our heavenly Father and that He hears and answers the prayers of His children. God loves us and He wants us to come to Him with our problems. The Bible says,
"Casting all your care upon Him; for He careth for you." I Peter 5:7
What should we do about our needs? We should pray to the Father in Jesus' name. Jesus taught us that God really is our Father. We are to come to Him and ask Him for what we need. Jesus said,
"...ask, and ye shall receive, that your joy may be full." John 15:24
God does not promise to answer our prayers when we have some sin in our life that we are not willing to give up. But, if we do the things that are pleasing to Him, God will give us what we ask for. The Bible says,
"Whatsoever we ask, we receive of Him, because we keep His commandments, and do those things that are pleasing in His sight." I John 3:22
Remember These Four Things
We have learned four wonderful things in this lesson. Let us go over them:
After thinking about all the wonderful things
the Lord has done for you, what does it make you want to do? It makes you want to love the
Lord, doesn't it? That is just what the Lord wants you to do!
The Lord Jesus who lives in you is a Person. He loves you and He wants you to love
Him. The Bible says,
"We love Him, because He first loved us. " I John 4:19
To love the Lord Jesus means to give Him first place in your life. You bring joy to His heart when you love Him with all your heart and do those things that please Him.
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One of the ways we know that we are truly saved is that we want to please God. Would you like to know how you can please Him? Here are some ways:
As you read your Bible, you will discover other ways to please God.
Memory verses for Lesson 7:
"And this is the record, that God hath given to us eternal life, and
this life is in His Son. He that hath the Son hath life; and he that hath not the Son of
God hath not life." I John 5:11, 12
"There hath no temptation taken you but such as is common to man: but God is
faithful, who will not suffer you to be tempted above that ye are able; but will with the
temptation also make a way to escape, that ye may be able to bear it." I Corinthians
10:13
"If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to
cleanse us from all unrighteousness. " I John 1:9
"Hitherto have ye asked nothing in My name: ask, and ye shall receive, that your joy
may be full." John 16:24
Would You Like to Learn More About the Lord Jesus?
You can continue your study of the Bible with Course II of The Mailbox Club. There are ten
exciting lessons in this course on "The Life of Christ."
Find the answers to these and many other questions in Course II of The Mailbox Club! When you complete Course II, you will receive another beautiful certificate!
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