Victory

This is the last part of I John, my favorite book in the Bible along with Romans. May we apply everything to our lives as we seek to live radical lives because our King lived a radical life.

I John 5:1,4

For everyone who has been born of God overcomes the world... And this is the victory that has overcome the world—our faith. 

Children of God. That is who we are. We have found our identity in Him and have given up trying to make a name for ourselves. Family, as children of God do we overcome the world as we are told that we should? Today, we have become so caught up in diluting the scripture in our personal lives and rationalizing it in our minds. This verse literally means that we can overcome the world and all of its pleasures and temptations, IF we are born of God, meaning that we have been saved by Him and have become imitators of Him. Verse 4 tells us plainly that due to our faith, we have victory over the world, over our former addictions, former selves, former thoughts, future temptations. We can win this fight through God’s grace and power. We can’t do it on our own. Family, do we truly believe this? Do we live as if we are able to overcome the temptation to be like everyone else, or “improve” our life, or to give into addictions? I honestly can say that I didn’t for a long time. I did not live as if Philippians 4:13 was my reality. Family, may we truly believe that through God, ANYTHING is possible. If we are going through God, we have to be with Him and we allow our wills to conform with His when this happens. Faith is the key to freeing us from our bondage. May we realize that GRACE HAS ALREADY BROKEN OUR CHAINS OF ADDICTION, but we need to leave them in order to experience freedom from it. And more importantly, may we live as if we believe that all things are capable through our God if we truly are His children. 

May we seek to please the King

Crazy Love

I John 4:10-11

In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins. Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another.

Today, on Christmas 2010, may we remember that God the Creator and King over all creation, became like His creation 2000 years ago. He came because we rejected Him and His plan for us. We committed treasonous acts against the King and reaped death and other consequences. So then, He humbled Himself in a way that we can never comprehend, going from God to man, He lived a perfect life, experiencing many of the things that we go through so that we can never say that He doesn’t know what we are going through, He died a death after being betrayed by one of His closest friends, and that death was a death of embarrassment, one of agony, one of excruciating pain, and He did that so that we may know Him. He gave us this gift that we did not deserve. We deserve death, and He offers life. We choose darkness and He exposes us in light. He offers redemption for us who have prostituted ourselves to other gods. He offers love to us when we deserve hate. He offers us mercy when we deserve punishment. He offers us grace when we deserve no such thing. This is crazy love my friends. This is reckless love. Love that would stop at nothing to know you and to have your love in return. The price is not much, you take your beaten life, faulted plans, and broken heart and exchange it for fullness and healing, purpose and meaning, and love and grace and mercy. It’s a daily choice though. One day of acceptance does not guarantee something. It is a lifetime of living and walking. You can run a race and never finish it if you stop along the way. May we finish this race depending on the strength given to us from our God. And may we pass on this gift that He has given us to others with reckless abandonment. May we give our all for those who God loves and for our God who loves.

It starts in our heart, this love, and becomes a large part of who we are. May we seek to be people that love like God loved us, with reckless abandonment, not seeking repayment but seeking to love unconditionally regardless of the cost.

May grace and peace and love abound to you my family

Crux Point

This may hurt. This will be deep. This requires us being honest with ourselves and God. As we read from I John 3 may we remember who God made us to be, what He hoped for us. He made us to not experience sin. He desired that we may be blameless and pure and innocent children of His, not knowing the evils that have become so ingrained in who we are. The question should echo in our heads throughout this devotion is “In all honesty, do I devote myself to God a multitude of times more than I do to any form of sin (whether it is blatant sin, disregarding God’s commands, exaltation of oneself over God, or idolatry)?” And “Can I go a full day without sin? If not, why can I so often go weeks without God? Which do I depend on more, sin or God?”

I John 3:6,9

No one who abides in him keeps on sinning; no one who keeps on sinning has either seen him or known him... No one born of God makes a practice of sinning, for God's seed abides in him, and he cannot keep on sinning because he has been born of God. 

Family, though no one of us will ever be perfect until we pass on from this life into eternity with God, one of our goals as Christians is to be holy as God is holy (I Peter 1:16). My question is how much do we pursue to live lifestyles that are pleasing to our King? And I am not necessarily discussing solely actions, but rather intentions and desire. If we go through the actions without the passion to please God and without a desire to serve Him joyfully, then what good do our actions do for anyone? Faith without works is dead, but works without faith is meaningless. If we do not have the belief in our God and the desire and passion to serve Him then why bother serving someone that you don’t love? Furthermore, if we are to call ourselves children of God, shouldn’t we be representatives of Him to this world? Instead, we often find ourselves entangled in addictions and lifestyles that are not pleasing to God and instead camouflage us in this world. Nothing sets us apart from them aside from our statement of beliefs which is not in practice. I say this out of love family. I have often found myself in this place of addiction and that place of living a lie. I know the pain that occurs there, the dark places that we do not want to revisit or have exposed, but if they are never dealt with, are we telling God that He cannot have what is rightfully His, that the Creator of everything known and unknown to us cannot have an area of our lives because we don’t want Him to. My response is, which do we love more? It is easy to reply that we love God more than the addiction, but if we are willing to reject Him for the addiction, the addiction is what our heart truly desires and what we truly love. We must fight this war family. Now is not the time for rest. THIS IS WAR! Will we fight the fight so that we may please our God or will we allow our sin to control us and our desires, causing us to reject the One we call Lord? I, for one, choose to fight.

This choice needs to be a daily one. It is a daily war. Will we fight it? It is a core foundational piece of our life. It is a crux point. This declares our true intentions. May we not be complacent, may we not be compromising, may we not be content.. May we be driven by Grace.

Blessings

Daily Living

1 John 2:15-17

Do not love the world or the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world—the desires of the flesh and the desires of the eyes and pride in possessions—is not from the Father but is from the world. And the world is passing away along with its desires, but whoever does the will of God abides forever.

Every day of our life that we wake up, we make a decision, a decision that is a declaration of what/who we will live for that day... We wake up to check our phones, eat, go on facebook, or just go through our day. However, how much more significant is it to stop, before anything else begins and just spend a bit of time with God? Though this may not be your personal devotion time, why not spend a few minutes at His throne in order to start your day out focused on Him and prepared by stating your purpose for that day in Christ. Honestly, very rarely do we ever even have a legitimate excuse not to do this. If we think about it, we sleep in to give ourselves more rest, we have other options and even if we wake up earlier, 5 minutes won’t kill us. We check our phones and facebooks and reboot our social life within a matter of minutes it seems, but we tell God to wait for us to finish with our friends and our social life. My family, this should be so heavy on our hearts if we do this, I am one who does this many times and am greatly convicted of it. We are telling God, the Creator of the Universe, the One who gives us life, our Father who saved us from an eternity of hell and has forgiven our heinous actions against Him, and we look at Him and tell Him that our social life is more of a priority to us than spending five minutes with Him. When we think about it that way, it’s a lot more serious. 

In this passage John warns us of loving the world. It is so attractive. Everything is presented to us so nicely. Alcohol  is advertised to take away your problems and help you have a great time, where really it makes you look like a fool, brings problems back stronger, and leaves you with a headache. Sex is presented to be the greatest thing ever and to be pursued in every relationship and hookup. Only thing is, it doesn’t fill that gap that is there. It just widens it. It doesn’t take away pain or make you more or less of a man/woman, it only says that you have given in to whatever everyone else wants you to do, a real man/woman would stand up for their beliefs. Lying is the easy fix, but never really seems to get easier as lies compound among each other. Pursuit of one’s own happiness never gets you to where you hoped you would be. You may reach the pinnacle of fame/success/love/etc... as you hoped, but it isn’t exactly what you had thought it would be. You still aren’t happy with it. This, my family, is the great lie of the world, that if you do/get these things, you will be happy. This is the truth, you will be far from happy. God wants you to find true joy and that can only be found in Him, by searching for Him, by knowing Him, by spending quality time at His feet. Will we do this today? 

May we seek Him from our very innermost being, allowing Him to have the core of who we are and everything else

Lifelong Commitment

I John 1:7

But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus his Son cleanses us from all sin

A prayer is not our salvation as Christians, a lifestyle is. A lifelong walk with God; one that may hit hard spots, pain, and much more, but never ends is what saves you. You don’t really know someone because you spoke with them once. You know someone because you have a true relationship with them. If this is the case, why then do we so often refuse to make God the best relationship in our life? I mean, He died for us, so that we can be forgiven, yet we barely acknowledge Him in our lives anymore. It almost seems like we personally are fine with Him taking the backseat in our life or not even being there at all. It’s so easy to just let life get in the way of knowing God, but God needs to come first.. Life is short and anything can end it at any time.. We need to make sure that we are ready to meet Him before its over because it can end at time. Are we prepared to stand before God? Will He say that He is proud of us, or that we had great potential but didn’t do anything with it, or that He never knew us? I hope that we all live in a way to receive the first statement. I can’t wait to hear God say “well done my good and faithful servant.” He truly has given us so much to live for, what will we give our life for?

Thanksgiving (I know it's cliche, but still...)

Thanksgiving.... Why should we be thankful today?? I mean, we live lives that are so consumed with the latest and greatest, for our gratification and fulfillment, why should we take today to stop, only to pick it back up a few hours later with Black Friday and all its craze. Christmas even has become this way, losing all of its meaning for most, and has become a day to worship self and others through receiving gifts and giving gifts to others out of reciprocity. Yet, Christmas is our reminder of Jesus’ birth, of the humbling that He partook in so that we may know Him and not perish, but be redeemed. He died and that was His gift to us. Something we did not merit, but was given to us without regret. This is our purpose of Christmas, to remember that and to treasure that and to share it. This is our joy. For many, the holidays suck and Thanksgiving signifies the beginning of this time of pain and loneliness. They are reminded of loved ones that have passed away, of the problems that haunt their life, they see portrayals all over of people smiling and worry-free as they swipe their credit cards to purchase gifts and those real people are asking real questions of “why am I not happy,” “why am I alone,” “what is the point of this,” and “what am I missing that they apparently have?” 

The bible tells us in Philippians that we are to rejoice ALWAYS. How can we rejoice always? It’s not easy. Things go wrong, life throws curveballs at you all the time. People hurt you, you let yourself down, promises are broken, people judge, you feel lonely, you feel empty, life feels like it loses its meaning. How can you feel thankful for this? May I suggest that we can because even though things may be going wrong in life, we have life, though we have fights with family and friends, we have family and friends, though work may be rough, we have a job, though school can be so tiring and it may suck, we are gifted with the ability to learn and to gain an education. Most importantly, you have been saved and have the promise of eternal life and your sin and mistakes have been covered and erased, IF you believe in God with all of your heart. If nothing else, you can be thankful for this.

Life itself is a precious gift that we have abused and take for granted.. May we remember how much our life means to our Creator and live like we believe it. 

I am truly thankful for you family. As we walk through life together, may we grow with each other and with our King. May we glorify and please our King.

Be blessed and be a blessing. 

The Church

Matthew 16:15-18, “He (Jesus) said to them (the disciples), “But who do you say that I am?”  Simon Peter answered and said, “You are the Christ, the Son of the living God.” Jesus answered and said to him, “Blessed are you, Simon Bar-Jonah, for flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but My Father who is in heaven. And I also say to you that you are Peter, and on this rock I will build My church, and the gates of Hades shall not prevail against it.” The rock that Jesus refers to is the foundation of Christianity, that Jesus is the Son of the Living God. That there is a living and active God who is involved in our lives and that we have a relationship with and have placed our trust and belief in. Without this, we cannot be saved (John 3:18- Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only Son of God). If you believe in Him, you are a Christian, a follower of God. You are part of a much larger group as a Christian. As a true follower of God you are a part of the Church. The body of believers that have been saved by faith and belief in God through His grace. You serve a purpose in this body of believers. What it is, I don’t know. But, God does. His plan for you includes your role in this group. Without you, the body is not as strong as it could be. You have been given specific gifts (discussed in I Corinthians 12) that contribute to the body of the Church. The Bible talks about this body as God’s bride that He will marry (ex: Jeremiah 3:14, Revelation 19:7-9, and 2 Corinthians 11:2). We eagerly wait for His return so that we may be with Him forevermore. Though the Church is usually thought to refer to a group of Christians gathering for an organized service in a specific location, it refers to the universal group of believers of all times. The church (lowercase “c”) typically refers to the local group of believers. This is not the building. We, the people of God, are the Church and anytime we are together, we are the church. God created this group to give His people a community. A sense of family. A group of people that would experience life together, that would learn to be godly people together, exhorting one another in love to strive towards the goal that he has set before us. Paul, in I Corinthians, discusses division in the Church. We are not to be divided with any hostility, though we will have differing views, and problems will arise between people, we are to realize that we are people under God, saved by His grace that now have been transformed through Him and will all spend eternity together. We are to demonstrate the love of God to them regardless of their beliefs or our disagreements. It almost seems that we can be more open to hearing people of a different belief speak rather than people of a different denomination or a differing perspective on non-salvational topics (such as the time of a rapture, whether we are predestined to salvation or have total free will, and many other topics). The church has been given a specific mission by Christ to do until the time of our physical death or until He returns. This is known as the Great Commission. It states, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age (Matthew 28:18-20, NIV).” This is our mission, our hope (our future) is that we will spend eternity with the King.

May we grow as a body with one mind, spirit, joy,  and goal to serve the one God and King. Let’s experience life as one. You are not alone in this walk. Family is always there.

Blessings family

Knowing God And Experiencing His Grace

2 Peter 3:18

But grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. To him be the glory both now and to the day of eternity. Amen.

Peter’s closing words in his letter. May we grow in grace, having a deeper desire for grace, a deeper appreciation of it, realizing that thanks to this amazing grace, we have nothing to fear anymore, we have been forgiven, we have been saved, we have been found, we have been given purpose, we have reason to live. We don’t deserve it and we never will. God pursued us with reckless abandon. He gave us a way to know Him, a privilege not to be abused, but so often we abuse it. Do we KNOW God? The next part of the verse corresponds with the theme of grace, knowledge. Do we know God? Truly know God? Know in an intimate manner, in a deep, meaningful relationship that requires effort? The word know in the Bible refers to an intimate way of knowing someone. A way that is sacred. To be considered extremely close knit. To be considered as one. God wants to know us so well and us to know Him so well that we know His will for our lives, and even when we don’t we trust Him, knowing that His plan surpasses our own. He wants to know our problems, our pain, our joys, our requests, and everything else about us and He wants to hear it from us. He already knows all of it, but He wants to communicate with you. He wants to speak to you and you to Him.

Peter ends this with a statement that declares our purpose: to bring Him glory. May we seek to bring Him glory through HIS GRACE TO US AND OUR INTIMATE KNOWLEDGE OF HIM.

Is this our goal? Do we seek to know Him more in this manner and to seek his grace more and more?

Blessings

Where Does It End?

2 Peter 2:14-15a

They have eyes full of adultery, insatiable for sin. They entice unsteady souls. They have hearts trained in greed. Accursed children! Forsaking the right way, they have gone astray.

We are people that desire more. More money, more pleasure, more possessions, more more more.... But where does it end? Is there an end? Peter lays it out straight for us in this passage. Do we have a desire for sin that is not satisfied? We desire more and more sin and sin becomes our driving factor in life, regardless of if we even realize it? It is so easy to lose focus of our original motivation and find ourselves off target and seeking the wrong thing or having the wrong motivation. We serve because of reputation or obligation many times, we get caught up in accepting glory for ourselves in the areas that God has gifted us in, we don’t put in the effort that we ought to in work, school, relationships, or whatever else because we love laziness, we don’t dig deep into our walks because it often brings answers about us that we don’t want to find. We see how ugly we are in comparison to God, the King, the Perfect and Holy God. This verse raises the question of what is our priority, God or sin? Have we turned astray from the King or do we have misplaced passion? Has our religion become our passion rather than our relationship? Do we seek to do things rather than grow close with God? Rather what we do should be a reflection of our growth with God. But family, let us not continue in misplaced passions. May our hearts burn for God rather than sin. May we feel that we cannot go a day, an hour, a minute without our God rather than feeling so captivated by sin that we feel in bondage to it and can’t go a day without it and view a day without sin as a near impossible or irregular task, sometimes not even desirable. May our desire for God surpass and destroy our desire for sin and may we push forward towards the goal set before us (Phil 3:14) and keep in remembrance that ALL THINGS ARE POSSIBLE WITH GOD (Philippians 4:13). Do you believe this?

Misplaced passions end here.

Blessings,

A fellow believer seeking the King, seeking to live a life forsaking misplaced passion daily

Misplaced Passion

Every action requires effort. Any desired result requires you to put in the work to reach the goal. What’s our goal? Where do we put our effort? Do we have misplaced passion? 

2 Peter 1:5-8

For this very reason, make every effort to supplement your faith with virtue, and virtue with knowledge, and knowledge with self-control, and self-control with steadfastness, and steadfastness with godliness, and godliness with brotherly affection, and brotherly affection with love. For if these qualities are yours and are increasing, they keep you from being ineffective or unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ.

After reading this passage, thoughts flood my mind... I question myself, am I applying these things to my life or am I a CONTENT CHRISTIAN, being happy with where I am and not seeking to do or grow more? Do we find contentment in living a 50-50 lifestyle? Living for God one day and ourselves the next? We NEED to live the Luke 14 lifestyle in that we have such a great love for God that nothing, not even our love for family can compare to or even CONTEST our love for Him. We need to put Him before us, His will, His rules, His power before our own. Our lives are to reflect Him and to bring Him the glory, as that is the purpose in life. And lastly from Luke 14, we need to count the cost. The lifestyle of Christianity is not free.. Anyone who tells you that it is is lying to you. It costs your life. The life that is unfulfilling, the life that is so easily broken, the life that is miserable, the life that seems to have it all perfect in everyone’s eyes, but you know that it is so far from that assumption. WHERE DO YOU STAND? Are you willing to give up your faulty plans, your pain and misery, your vain pursuits of popularity, money, and pleasures and find perfect plans for your life, meaning, peace, joy, satisfaction, and so much more? Above all these though, are you willing to experience grace, the giving of something that is not deserved. Grace which is your salvation. Grace that you can never be good enough for but yet can be given to you. Grace that takes your debt, pays it, and then gives you all you could ever want and more. You sinned, you deserved death, yet God humbled Himself to be like us for 30 years, living among us as a man, with the end in mind that He would die a horrible and excruciating death while experiencing the punishment of your sin FOR YOU, that you may experience this grace. Why? Because He LOVES you. You can’t do anything on your own, nothing good comes from your life. You can find no meaning for yourself that lasts, you can find no satisfaction for yourself, you can find no joy when life falls apart, you can never find pure love that has no bounds and no conditions. You can’t even live up to your own standards many times. Yet, regardless of all this, God loves you enough to die for you and give you and I meaning. This is personal. It was for you that He died. It was for me that he died. He offers grace if you give your life. Not giving Him a prayer, only to disregard it after a given amount of time, but a lifestyle that demonstrates one’s BELIEF in God because that is what saves. If you believe in God you will be saved. If you cry to Him to save you, He will. But you have to believe that He will. You have to believe in a way that alters your life. It has to impact EVERY ASPECT of your life.This means that you are never the same person, you may have some of the same interests, but nothing comes close to God for you, you may have a similar personality to before you believed in God, but you will be changed. 

This passage speaks of the effort that we put forth in our daily walks that we may not be ineffective for the Lord. As Christians we are to be striving to grow, even when life is telling us to be happy with the progress we have made and to take it easy. This temptation hits hard. My life has been hit here so many times. It’s not an easy chain to break, but its one that needs to be broken. If it’s not broken then family may I ask what is our goal? Do we seek to be the best disciples, the best followers of God, that we can be for our King and His glory? If so, then that is great and CONTINUE! Don’t stop. May the Lord give you strength to persevere. If not, then why not? I desire that you search within yourself to see where your belief in God is. Not just a belief that He exists, but a belief that is APPLIED and ACTIVE that He holds you in His hand and loves you and gave Himself for you, can you give yourself for Him? And lastly, a question that I must ask myself often to see where my heart lies, if I saw my King today face-to-face, what would He say to me? Would He ask why I did not give more effort to follow Him and why I wasted the potential He gave me, why I wasted the opportunities that he presented to me so that I may experience being His vessel to be used as desired for His glory, to play a role in a story that will last all of eternity? Or will He look at me in the eyes, smile at me, and say, “I’m proud of you”

What will He say to you?

Is your belief in God an active belief that seeps into every aspect of your life? If not, what kind of belief is it?

Blessings

Wake up and Keep Going!

I Peter 5:8-11

Be sober-minded; be watchful. Your adversary the devil prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour. Resist him, firm in your faith, knowing that the same kinds of suffering are being experienced by your brotherhood throughout the world. And after you have suffered a little while, the God of all grace, who has called you to his eternal glory in Christ, will himself restore, confirm, strengthen, and establish you. To him be the dominion forever and ever. Amen.

Imagine with me that you are in a jungle, you don’t know what is in the jungle, you were dropped off there and don’t know how to get out. You are completely dependent on your map to get you out and get you to where you need to be. However as you are venturing through the wilderness, you hear some very very soft rustling of leaves from behind you. At this point, what are you going to do, sit still and take a nap or be on guard while running to the goal, depending on the map to guide you through? 

Here is how the Message translation goes for this same passage:

Keep a cool head. Stay alert. The Devil is poised to pounce, and would like nothing better than to catch you napping. Keep your guard up. You're not the only ones plunged into these hard times. It's the same with Christians all over the world. So keep a firm grip on the faith. The suffering won't last forever. It won't be long before this generous God who has great plans for us in Christ—eternal and glorious plans they are!—will have you put together and on your feet for good. He gets the last word; yes, he does.

Christians, are we spiritually asleep? We are in the middle of a spiritual war and yet we can so often be found napping in the middle of the battlefield, in the middle of the jungle, basically waiting to be taken captive by the enemy. Why? Is it because following God takes too much effort? That you have to give up too much to be a Christian, yet you call yourself one anyways? This life is meant to be a fight, you are supposed to give it your all. No one said it would be easy. Jesus, God Himself, died for you so that you could know God in a relationship, yet we think that this walk consists of solely saying a prayer and going to church. If Jesus had to die for it, why do we believe that we won’t have to give anything for it? We did not deserve His sacrifice. We spat in His face, we hated Him (that is what sin is after all, a demonstration against God by us. Rebellion against the King), and yet He died so that we could know Him through His grace. You did nothing to deserve it. It is all God. But, He chose you so that you may know Him, and experience this grace. It may be difficult for 100 years on earth, but that is nothing in comparison with eternity. It can be difficult now for a brief period of time or it can be difficult for eternity in hell because we did not know Him. We may know of Him, but do we truly know Him? Do we have a relationship with Him that consists of more than prayer for food, a prayer saying we are sinners and attending church however regularly we go? We can go to church every day, but if we do not place our faith in God and follow Him, that relationship cannot be real. Following is an action, it requires effort. Will we put in this effort to be able to know the One that made us and that gives us forgiveness, wholeness, meaning, purpose, love, and so much more. Family, do we know the God of the Bible? If we do not read His Word, then how can we know Him? God has called us to Him. But how many of us really have sought to get to know Him? And even when we do know Him, do we continue to strive to know Him more and more? Or are we content with what we know about God? Are we content with where our relationship is with Him? If we are to have a passionate love for Him, how come we don’t seek Him? How come we are fine with being mediocre Christians? Do we compare ourselves with other Christians instead of looking at ourselves in comparison to God? If you compare yourself with God instead of man, it will make you uncomfortable and you won’t like what you find, but you will realize the extent of the grace you have received and you can’t live a life that ignores it completely. You will either have to push it away constantly and fight with it or you will have to give in to it, realizing that God loves you, even in the midst of your hideous and rebellious sins He decided to die for you. And He doesn’t regret it. He wanted to. But my question is, you have to make a choice about this grace, will you ignore it and live a life belonging to the darkness, hoping that a prayer will get you to heaven and just hope that when you die you will look at God and He will say “I love you, and your prayer said that you believe in me and placed your faith in me so you can come in.” Is that going to be what you want? A simple hope? Not a promise, no guarantee? A life filled with compromise that is ruled by sin and lust but hopefully your prayer cancelled all that out? I have been there. I thought about what God would say to me, and though I don’t know whether or not that prayer saved me, I know that had I continued to live that way and by the grace of God get into heaven, God would’ve looked at me and said, “I love you, but what did you do with everything I gave you? You abused my grace, treating it like a spoiled person treats money. You had potentials to do great things to bring me glory, but you rejected them, instead taking the glory for yourself. You loved your sins, you wouldn’t try to give them up, and when you did, you were happy with the progress you had made and then were content to return to them.” What will He say to you? I pray that He may look us in the eye and be proud of us with a tear of joy running down His cheek because He knows that we love Him and gave Him our everything and He is proud of us.

I believe this following statement 100%: 

“A prayer will not save you, a belief that you place your hope and your faith in will however.”

Family, did you know that nowhere in the Bible does it say to repeat the sinner’s prayer after a pastor in order to be saved? No! It says multiple times throughout the book of Acts to believe on the Lord and we will be saved. Believe. A belief is something that your whole life is formed around. It impacts everything. You fully are behind it. Has your life been fully impacted by God? 

May we believe in God with all of us, our core behaviors to our actions and thoughts. May we be a generation filled with belief about our God.

Blessings

Suffering

I Peter 4:16

Yet if anyone suffers as a Christian, let him not be ashamed, but let him glorify God in that name.

This is so profound to me. If you are suffering, if you are in the midst of persecution, losing a job, losing friends, a rough time in your relationship, school not going well, rough time at home with family, you are not to be ashamed of it, but you are to turn and glorify God. I won’t lie, that is one of the last things I want to do when suffering hits. I don’t want to glorify God for the hard times I am going through. Family, we are to glorify God everyday. That is our mission, our calling, our purpose is it now? Though these things take such a toll on us and wears us out and it can seem like the walls of life come crashing down, in the midst of this can you glorify God? Can you give it all to Him and trust that He will get you through it instead of taking it into your own hands? Can you know that you are serving a God that is greater than any of your problems and can your life fully reflect that? This concept of suffering reminds us of another, I am reminded firstly about the story of Paul. He sat in the midst of suffering constantly and yet gave God all the glory of his life. He desired God to use him in mighty ways so that he might bring God the glory. He knew that compared to life that God was worth so much more. He knew that whether he died or not, it did not change that he would be glorifying God. he said that “to live is Christ and to die is gain” to say that if he lived, it would be Christ living in and through him instead of Paul living his own life, living by his own agenda, and if he died that he would be spending eternity with the King in paradise, glorifying God constantly,  forever more singing His praises. Another is Jesus’ suffering on the cross. That was done for God’s glory. That you might be forgiven so that you could know the Father intimately and in a real relationship, so that He could take you how you are and form you into the masterpiece that He created you to be, that He could satisfy you. May we not be afraid of suffering. May we know that when we suffer, that we suffer for the King. May we represent Him in those situations, may we respond as He would and not seeking our own benefit but putting others before us, humbling ourselves for the sake of the relationship. May we pursue our love of the King with reckless abandon, letting nothing stand in the way of it. May we seek His direction and guidance diligently so that we may bring Him glory through the situation. Family, through Christ alone will you get through the tough times. Through Christ alone will you ever truly experience peace and comfort in the midst of your world collapsing. Will you just trust him? Peter and the other apostles were in the midst of an insane storm, being tossed around, not knowing if they were going to die, yet when all hope seem lost, they saw Jesus at a distance, walking on the water. Peter called out to Christ that he would get out of the boat and walk to Christ in the midst of the storm if Christ called him to. He did. Peter listened in faith, ignoring the storm around him, completely fixated on his King, and he walked on the water to his Rabbi. Then he began looking around at the seas raging and listening to the roar of the wind and lost focus on God. His problems and circumstances began to look bigger than his God. His storm overcame Him. He began drowning. His life was about to end at the hand of this violent storm. Yet, when it seemed that it was over, Christ grabbed Peter’s hand, He rescued him, pulling him out from the water, pulling him out of the storm. Family, it is the same for us. The only ways that we will ever glorify God in our storms is if we seek Him throughout the storm or if we are saved by Him, through His mercy, when we are about to perish. May we strive to stay focused on our God so that we don’t have to go through the horrific process of losing sight of God and being overcome by our trials and only reaching out to Him as we are about to give up all hope. 

He loves you, enough to suffer for you more than you can ever understand. Can you bear suffering for Him in this one life for the sake of bringing Him more glory that will resound for eternity?

Blessings family. 

One Body

I Peter 3:8

Finally, all of you, have unity of mind, sympathy, brotherly love, a tender heart, and a humble mind. 

This last Sunday night I attended service with some of my best friends out in Costa Mesa at the church they have been attending. We were finishing up Philippians 1 and when we hit verse 27, he raised the question, “family, do we spend more time fighting face to face, toe to toe about the Bible and our faith or do we stand side by side for the gospel?” In all honesty, the church we see today has become so divided, all the hundreds of denominations, all of the fights about who is right, I have to wonder, how badly does it hurt God to see His people more worried about winning a non-salvational theological debate about predestination or free will with a brother or sister in Christ instead of putting all of that effort into ministering and encouraging each other and to anyone and everyone else and spreading the gospel like we are told by Christ in the Great Commission (In Matthew 28)? (Theological discussions are not wrong, it is good to discuss with one another what God has shown us and our views and to discuss them in hopes that we may have a clearer understanding of who God is and His relationship with us, but when it becomes almost a repulsion to people who have differing viewpoints than your own is when it is an issue, that is not the love that God demonstrates to us) In I Corinthians Paul speaks about being ONE BODY, can we honestly say that this is a descriptor of the Church? We need to be united in mind, heart, purpose, and love. We have one mission, to glorify God through having an intimate and real relationship with Him and, consequently, share that relationship with others. We tear each other down so often rather than build each other up. I share this passage not to bash on Christians, but instead to encourage change, beginning in our own hearts. We pray for revival, but do  nothing to bring our own lives to a point of revival. If we cannot be united on the one thing that has saved us from an eternity of punishment for our heinous actions, how can we ever expect someone to want to join the family? Regardless of if we are Calvinists, Arminians, Catholic, Protestant, Baptist, or whatever, we have something in common, the greatest thing in common, that we who were dead in our sins, were loved by God, and He gave of Himself a sacrifice so that we could be redeemed and could experience a real and intimate relationship with Him without sin’s bondage over us anymore and that, through His sacrifice, we now have a relationship with that very God. Though we will have disagreements, we will have conflicts in the Church, we will have issues, it is not to take away from the fact that we are brothers and sisters in Christ, that are living a life in pursuance of Him every single day. We have the same goal, will we live as One Body? We serve the same God, will we unite as one bride? 

Family, may we begin to love one another, friend or enemy alike, in a way that God loves us, without bounds. May we unite as one body, one Church, and go through this life together, pushing one another to grow with the Lord.

May the world see that the Church is one body, serving the One True King

Blessings

A Holy Nation, A Chosen People

I Peter 2:9-12

But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for his own possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light. Once you were not a people, but now you are God's people; once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy.

Beloved, I urge you as sojourners and exiles to abstain from the passions of the flesh, which wage war against your soul. Keep your conduct among the Gentiles honorable, so that when they speak against you as evildoers, they may see your good deeds and glorify God on the day of visitation.

Christian, what separates you from the world? Do we seek approval from the world, to fit in, to be popular, to be famous, or are we willing to be despised by the world? Though many followed Christ during His time on earth, many people despised Him, death plots ran amuck, people hated Him, He did not fulfill their Messianic expectations, they expected a conqueror over Rome, not over sin. People spat, punched, mocked, beat, Him while He was carrying the cross to Golgotha. Yet we expect the world to love us and receive our message of Jesus’ forgiveness with open and warm arms. Why? Jesus, Himself, told us that people would hate us. 

As John 15: 18-21 says, 

“If the world hates you, know that it has hated me before it hated you. If you were of the world, the world would love you as its own; but because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, therefore the world hates you. Remember the word that I said to you: ‘A servant is not greater than his master.’ If they persecuted me, they will also persecute you. If they kept my word, they will also keep yours. But all these things they will do to you on account of my name, because they do not know him who sent me.

Does the world love you? Or are you despised by the world because you do not dwell in darkness. I John says that darkness can have no fellowship with light. Are you attempting to combine the two? It will never be done. There is either light or dark, never both. The two cannot dwell with each other. God is light, He pierces the darkness, exposing the flaws, the deceit, the brokeness, the sorrow, the wandering nature, the desires that are so often drunk away such as a desire for perfect love, not sex, not an emotional attachment, but agape, unconditional love in the perfect form. Such as a desire for meaning, one found not on this world, given by others around us, but a definition that comes from an authoritative source, one outside of all human comprehension, God. Do we live in the light or in the dark? Which do we seek? Which do we love? You must choose. You can only have one, you can’t have both. 

Do we understand that we are chosen by God? That God has personally called us to Him. That He, in all of His glory and honor, desires to know you personally and intimately. He chose you to be His masterpiece. The question is, will you stop fighting, and though it may hurt, will you allow Him to form you how He wants to form you? WIll you give up and just let Him take control? A sculpture does not form itself, rather the sculptor forms it, exactly how He wants, chiseling away where he desires, until the sculpture is complete, a beautiful masterpiece. Will you just give yourself to Him so that He can form you into His masterpiece, into His sculpture? 

We have meaning and purpose and family in God. We were once not a people, but now we are people of the King. That is so amazing! That God, the perfect and just God who can have no part in sin and hates sin, loved us regardless of our sin, provided a way for our redemption and has adopted us as His children though we did absolutely nothing to deserve it. We spat in His face, rebelled against Him, betrayed Him, and yet He loves us more than we will ever know. “For God SO LOVED THE WORLD.” If you don’t strive to understand God’s love, you will never understand what it means to be His child. If you have never experienced His love, ask yourself why not? What is keeping you from finding true and perfect love? A love that will never fade, that will never leave you, a love that will never disappoint, a love that seeks your betterment, a love that will blow your mind, yet we treat it as second rate to our whimsical, self absorbed concept of love? Why? Are we truly content with the “love” that we know, or do we want more? Christian, after much time thinking about this question I must ask, if you are satisfied in your current knowledge of God’s love and don’t desire to experience it more than you are, what or who has your heart? If you don’t have a passion to seek the love of God out, to experience it more and more each and every day, to learn more about it, to live out a life, mirroring that very same love, I must ask if God truly has your heart or if it lies elsewhere?

Lastly, where do our passions lie? Do we desire God and God alone? Or do we constantly tell God that He is not enough for us? That we need to experience a sensual love, a materialistic love, an emotional love, that we need to drink or smoke because we find happiness? Is God not enough for us? Was our old life really that great that we cannot completely leave it behind for love, meaning, joy, satisfaction, peace and so much more? Even more so, was our old life so great that we tell Christ that though we appreciate what He did for us, that it just isn’t enough, that His love, His sacrifice is not enough for us? That we are not content in knowing Him, that instead we must have the world and its desires and lusts in order to find any “satisfaction.” Family, when we say that it is impossible for us to live a day without sin, but yet we live weeks without spending personal, quiet time at the Lord’s throne, our passions are mixed up. We are then living for the wrong things. We are living for the world, and not God. We need to be so dependent on God that without Him, we cannot function, we cannot get through our day without spending time with Him, that we cannot help but spread His message because of the joy it has brought us. 

Family, do we live like a chosen race, a royal priesthood, and a holy nation? If we are true believers, this is what/who we are. Time to start living that way.

Blessings family

May grace and peace abound with you from God our Father and may we experience this walk together, serving our King as one body