To think of God’s faithfulness is amazing. To think He is perfect, He is apart from evil, and He brings people into His world in heaven from His son Jesus Christ is amazing. He could have not given us the chance at eternal life to live for Him and to spend with Him in heaven which we would have deserved because of our sin but He still wanted us with Him.
He is faithful to His word in letting an ultimate “lamb of God” come to earth one without blemish to die for our sin which we could have died and been a part of God’s wrath. He then put that wrath on His Son, His only Son, to die and go in our place!
I can’t fathom what God the Father would dwell on when He looked at His son and saw the world’s sin and turned away. He was seen as sin to God because every sin was laid on Him.
He bled and then died taking our punishment and rose again, bodily and is one day coming again!
To think He has done so much in people’s lives in the bible and in our lives as well, how great is God’s faithfulness!
I keep falling short of Him. I must realize though also because I keep depending on my strength that even if I am faithful it is God’s glory I should depend on because I still can’t make things “right” with Him. I still have sin no matter what I do but I can sin less because there are things I can avoid as I know what is right and wrong.
I must remember what He has taught me up to this point in my life and to resist the devil’s plans which is to avoid living for God.
But the Lord is faithful, who will establish you and guard you from the evil one.II Thessalonians 3:3
I should use my body as a living sacrifice to God.
To have my body to be to serve Him totally and fully. And treat it like it is an instrument of “righteousness” to God like when Paul encouraged the people He wrote to which we find in Romans 6:13.
I miss the intimacy that I used to have with relationship to God and I want to return to that because it is what He desires of all of us, to be close to Him.
God may we all see how awesome it is to live for You. Thank You Lord for Your faithfulness and may we be established in Your will and keep guard so You can keep us from the evil one Satan. Amen.
When people come to church should they only think of their own spiritual refreshment?
What is a church body? Do they care for others within the church as well?
I believe I have mentioned this before but sadly a lot of new young Christians have a certain attitude about church. Touching on above they only go to church for their own learning of what the sermon from the bible will tell them and then leave.
Some might act this way selfishly and not realize it totally. Hey I’ve been in that boat myself.
But lately I have been hoping the church can be like a New Testament type of church. Not literally being like this but from the people in the book of Acts were impacted by God. The people had just received the holy spirit (that Christ had promised before going to the cross after He died and rose again) so the fellow believers were moved by it to show love towards each other. They acted selflessly giving all of their things to each other for whoever needed what they had.
I didn’t even think about that when starting this article, haha, so I guess I wasn’t thinking right even before now.
We must help each other and lift each other up in the Lord if we are part of a body of believers.
Here’s the verse I found for devotion today:
Therefore encourage one another and build each other up, just as in fact you are doing 1 Thessalonians 5:11
To explain some context Paul was speaking to the church in Thessalonica (in modern day it is Greece) who were new Christians. There were popular things they were doing in life and he was warning them not to be a part of it as they were contrary to the life of believers in Christ.
We must reflect that for fellow believers and even help grow them in Christ’s way. This is the only way we can have a strong next generation or people young who need a role model or person in their life who can tell them important things to help edify their walk.
I have started reading a book called “The Greatest Thing in the World” by Henry Drummond. It made me wonder what it was going to be about.
I thought is it purely about only what Christ did on the cross? Is it about witnessing or many aspects of being a Christian?
It is more simpler than that. About not only that God is love but it is about love.
We need to reflect love to each other so that others will see and desire that love in their lives. We also need to love others no matter what.
Can we reflect HIs love in selfishness? I don’t think that would be so good an example of a person following Jesus.
Let’s lift each other up and care for each other in God-honoring, real love and may the world see it!
Why is it so easy to take our eyes off of God? Either through sin or by sin in the forms of being afraid of things in life. We have some daily challenges but there is no reason to not trust in God because He wants to there for us!
We must not be afraid or have emotions that guard us from really trusting.
I just thought about Peter crossing the ocean during a terrible storm. He sees while he is on a boat out that Jesus is out walking on the water and after he walks on the water himself(!) he looks over at the waves and the horrors happening from the storm and falls into the ocean.
Jesus then has to rescue him.
Should we have to fear because of what we curently see in life?
Here is an extreme example.
In Mark 5 in the NKJV (New King James version) of the bible a man who runs a synagogue comes running up to Jesus knowing He has done miraculous things.
With a daughter who is dying he with desperation tells her to please lay healing hands on her. After Jesus is sidetracked by a different situation (a separate miracle) a man who lives with Jairus the one of the synagogue who lived with him informs him that his daughter has now died and he shouldn’t bother the “Teacher” any further.
Then this verse is as such:
As soon as Jesus heard the word that was spoken, He said to the ruler of the synagogue, “Do not be afraid; only believe.”Mark 5:36
What troubling news when you go to a man who people say can heal others and the person you are worried about is passed away already.
But Jesus goes to the man’s house with a few of His disciples and then brings the daughter back to life!
That is a wonderful miracle tanks to God and Jesus who glorified His father.
We must never take our eyes off of God just because of things happening in our lives.
One other verse is more minor than the former part of the bible.
There Jesus tells the multitudes many things to follow His father. He spoke of the beatitudes and also things that they can struggle with and tells them about daily issues.
We must not be so bothered about tomorrow that we worry. I have worried about big stuff before but I also knew the truth so I shouldn’t have been so deeply afraid and emotional about it.
But here Jesus talked about being concerned of what to wear or food to take the next day.
Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about its own things. Sufficient for the day is its own trouble.Matthew 6:34
As I said this one is not as big as the earlier story but it is important to our daily life.
It okay to be concerned about these things but not to be so bothered by it. If we worry to a point we take our eyes off of Jesus and lose trust.
And how can we then seek His way if we are so “afraid” about these little things?
We must live for Him and trust in Him fully. Hopefully people will see our example and will be led to follow Jesus as well.
God, glorify us and may we conform to Your will not our own or fleshly ways. May we learn not to worry or to be afraid and may we keep our eyes on Your ways and realize how much You are in control. Amen.
Got up kind of late today. I need to hammer in a time to go to bed and wake up.
Hello. I hope you are doing well.
How easy is it do you think to depend on your own strength versus God’s? I think it is too easy.
Especially when you have been young and think you’ve “got it” and can pretty much do anything, have you realized now how wrong you were?
And how easy is it to wait on things in your life if you hope in God’s timing?
Waiting on Him is seeking Him on what can happen in your life. Waiting on answers for your life on things hoped for.
Listen to this verse from Isaiah:
But those who wait on the LORD Shall renew their strength; They shall mount up with wings like eagles, They shall run and not be weary, They shall walk and not faint.Isaiah 40:31
This is a very well-known inspirational verse.
To be renewed in strength, the strength only He can give us through knowing Christ.
But I wondered what exactly could it all mean. So I looked up some context and this is what I found.
For most of the rest of the verse it said about mounting up with wings as eagles “This is the measure of strength the LORD gives us – strength to soar above everything else.”
We can “soar” over our situations knowing He is in control and to live depending on Him which is His strength.
They shall run and not be weary,They shall walk and not faint. “This is the purpose of the strength the LORD gives us – strength to move forward and progress for Him. It isn’t strength to show off, but strength to go forward in.”
To live for Him is to be shown His strength by Him. We must day to day see ourselves developing in His love and mercy through Christ so that we not fall again and again into peril for our hearts.
Following God is the one option that leads only to life everlasting and that can only be helped by other fervent followers of Christ.
God, may we find our strength in You alone so that we will see You in our lives impacting us daily. Amen.
“Seek His face always.” Hmm. Need to remember that again.
There’s always an excuse to not live a life more for Jesus. Something to fall back on, reasons to not read the Word of God, giving reasons not to witness.
Yet the entire time God is there waiting for us to want a relationship with Him.
A lot of people nowadays who call themselves Christians also don’t even read the bible! It’s like we are living in times where we are going to church and doing rituals yet not even thinking about Him in our spare time.
For many years I have done that. Yet God has so much to offer when we read His word. He wants to tell us so much and we don’t want to use our “ears” to listen to it.
There is more than we might think about what God offers. Thanks to Jesus we have a path open where we can speak intimately to God and He can do things in our lives we might not even realize.
One of those is to ask for wisdom.
It says in James we must do so:
But let him ask in faith, with no doubting, for he who doubts is like a wave of the sea driven and tossed by the wind.James 1:6
The context explaining before that verse “If any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask of God, who gives to all liberally and without reproach, and it will be given to him.”
Wow so we must learn to ask God for wisdom to applied to our lives?
I’ve actually asked for wisdom and He answered my prayer.
That is only because God loves us so much and wants us to live in Him as much as we can. It’s like an adventure to live for Him! There is always something good that comes from it and a life worthwhile living.
This is all possible because of an intimate relationship is something that is worthwhile living for and He wants us to desire that above all other things.
It is worth it to live for Him and to be close to Him in so much of our daily life.
Draw near to God and He will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners; and purify your hearts, you double-minded.James 4:8
Why does it seem we desire to sin and turn away while Christ wants to take us in in love?
We must desire the truth and have the God of love fully in our hearts.
Wow seeing the phrase “double-minded” hit home! Before I looked it up I felt I already understood what it could mean.
In valdosdailytimes.com it says it means “To be double-minded is to be inconsistent, vacillating, to be and act one way today and be and act some other way tomorrow.”
Living the life like people during Paul’s is not the way to go. Why can’t we fully immerse ourselves in the life of a follower of Jesus?
What is holding us back to really live in Him?
Sometimes I had trouble answering that because I was so steeped in self.
But to really “live” we must be mindful of not just the ones we pick and choose but all of His commandments. Amen!
wondermedia 