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Apples of Gold
Radio Script for November 30, 2010
“The Seal Makes It Official”
Hello, I’m Doug Apple…with Apples of Gold.
One of the owners of this radio station, Mr. Mike Floyd, passed away earlier this year.
He left behind a great legacy…and a lot of stuff here in a back room.
It was full of artifacts from many years of both ministry and business.
As I sorted through the stacks of boxes I came across a musty old pouch. On the cover it said, “Make it ‘official.’”
Inside was an old fashioned “seal embosser.” You know how some companies have a corporate “seal”? It’s usually a fancy circle with the company’s name, state and year of incorporation.
The seal embosser is like a paper press. You stick the paper in, squeeze the embosser, and it literally impresses the corporate seal into the paper. It’s not that the seal is on the paper. It is literally in the paper. It has infiltrated the paper. It has changed the structure of the paper.
So why do this?
It’s like the pouch said, it makes it official. When you see the seal, you know it’s real.
You can use the seal on contracts, for example. A seal on a transaction is almost like a signature.
The seal is also a mark of ownership. When you see the corporate seal on something, you know it belongs to the corporation.
This whole idea of a seal is important because it shows up in the Bible.
When we believe the Gospel and receive forgiveness and salvation through Christ, we become God’s property, so to speak, and He seals us.
He seals us by pressing His Holy Spirit into us.
Listen closely to Ephesians 1:13 and 14. It says, “In Him you also trusted, after you heard the worth of truth, the gospel of your salvation; in whom also, having believed, you were sealed with the Holy Spirit of promise, who is the guarantee of our inheritance until the redemption of the purchased possession, to the praise of His glory.”
So it indicates that, after we heard the gospel and believed, we were sealed with the Holy Spirit.
The NIV says, “When you believed, you were marked in Him with a seal, the promised Holy Spirit…”
The Amplified Bible says you were “stamped with the seal of the long-promised Holy Spirit.”
Marked with a seal; stamped with a seal – when we were saved by Christ, we were sealed with the Holy Spirit. God declared the authenticity of the transaction and made His ownership official by pressing His Spirit into us.
Ephesians 4:30 says, “And do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, by whom you were sealed for the day of redemption.”
Do you have the stamp, the embossed seal of the Holy Spirit? Is the Holy Spirit literally pressed into you, even changing the structure of your being?
Second Corinthians 2:22 says God has “sealed us and given us the Spirit in our hearts as a guarantee.”
The NIV says that God “set His seal of ownership on us…”
Over and over the Bible talks about the Holy Spirit dwelling inside God’s people.
First Corinthians 6:19 says, “Do you not know that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God, and you are not your own?”
God has sealed us with His Holy Spirit, and it is a seal of ownership. We no longer belong to ourselves, but to God, and the evidence is His seal, which is the Holy Spirit inside of us.
Not that we are some random piece of property. Romans 8:16 says, “The Spirit Himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God.”
Yes, we belong to God – as His children!
You may feel like an old piece of paper today. You may feel like something in a back storage room, gathering dust.
But if you are a Christian, if you have been saved through faith in Christ, then you are a child of God. You have been marked by God, and that mark is the presence of His Holy Spirit which He has impressed into you.
I wish I could show you this seal embosser I found. It’s cool how it presses the seal deep into a piece of paper.
And as I look at it, I can easily picture how God did the same with me, pressing His Spirit into me.
It’s an official transaction!
How do I know?
Because I see the seal – the seal of God’s Holy Spirit pressed deeply into me.
Comments?
E-mail me: dougapple@wave94.com.
May God bless you today! With Apples of Gold…I’m Doug Apple.
© 2010 The Arrow’s Tip
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(Proverbs 25:11 – “A word fitly spoken is like apples of gold in settings of silver.”)
Why “The Arrow’s Tip”? Each morning, after diligently seeking the Lord, I write Apples of Gold. Then before I release it to the public I pray one final prayer, “Lord, send forth your arrows.” I envision Apples of Gold as arrows, tips dipped in the river of the water of life that flows from the throne of God (Rev. 22:1), sailing toward the hearts and minds of men and women around the world.
Doug Apple
General Manager - Wave 94
Christian Radio for Tallahassee
PO Box 4105
Tallahassee, FL 32315
(850) 926-8000
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