And these signs will follow those who believe: In My name they will cast out demons; they will speak with new tongues; they will take up serpents; and if they drink anything deadly, it will by no means hurt them; they will lay hands on the sick, and they will recover.” Mark 16:17–18 (NKJV) When Jesus gave us the Great Commission, He said, “Go into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature” (NKJV). But He didn’t send us empty handed. He followed it up with verses 17 and 18, which speak of the power we walk in as believers. Because of the finished work of Jesus, God’s forgiveness is available to you; it was won for you by Jesus, and this is …

Christ has redeemed us from the curse of the law, having become a curse for us (for it is written, “Cursed is everyone who hangs on a tree”). Galatians 3:13 (NKJV) Instead of saying, “Hello,” when they greet each other, the people of the Northern Natal tribes of South Africa say, “Sawubona,” which means, “I see you.” It is a very personal greeting that has a unique depth to it. This is the way God greets you. When Jesus died on the cross, He died for the sin of mankind. But it wasn’t the crucifixion or the soldiers who killed Him. What killed Jesus was taking on the sin nature of mankind. You see, when Adam and Eve chose to disobey God and follow Satan’s …

He was oppressed and He was afflicted, yet He opened not His mouth; He was led as a lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep before its shearers is silent, so He opened not His mouth. Isaiah 53:7 (NKJV) Jesus went to the cross silent. As I read Isaiah 53:7 while meditating on the message of the cross, it touched me. It’s interesting that Isaiah compared Jesus’ ordeal to a sheep being sheared. Sheep are one of very few animals who stay quiet while being sheared. If you tried flipping a cat over on its back to give it a buzz cut, that cat would be anything but quiet. But you can flip a sheep over with its legs in the air and it …

For the Son of Man has come to seek and to save that which was lost. Luke 19:10 (NKJV) God is all about love. The entire purpose behind why God sent Jesus to this earth was to restore His family to Him. Some think that God is focused on all your mistakes because His main goal is to make you perfect. That’s actually not His goal. If you were raised in legalistic religion or by perfectionistic parents, this may be a revelation to you. You may have grown up thinking that the only way you could be okay with God was to have your life all together. Or maybe the focus in your family was to never let others see your imperfections because you had …

Who has believed our report? And to whom has the arm of the Lord been revealed? Isaiah 53:1 (NKJV) The truth of what Jesus has done for us is so amazing that the prophet Isaiah wondered who would believe it. He wrote, “Who would have thought God’s saving power would look like this?” (Isaiah 53:1, The Message). Isaiah’s prophetic look at Jesus in Isaiah 53 starts out by describing the Saviour of the world as an ordinary man with “no stately form or majestic splendor” (v. 2, AMP). He certainly wasn’t what the Jews were expecting. Yet Jesus was exactly what God had in mind all along. The plan was for Jesus to “give himself as an offering for sin so that he’d see life …