Month: July 2017

July 21, 2017

Love Like Jesus Loved

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5 I am writing to remind you, dear friends,[c] that we should love one another. This is not a new commandment, but one we have had from the beginning. – 2 John 1:5 NLT
2 John 1:5-9 NLT

From the beginning, God based His plan on showing us love and teaching us how to love. We are commanded to love each other. Then God showed us the greatest example of love by giving His only Son to redeem us from sin. Jesus said that all of the law and the prophets were hinged on two commandments–“Love the Lord your God…. and love your neighbor as yourself”. Then over and over throughout the Scriptures we are reminded to love each other. We are also told that perfect love keeps us from fearing others and other things. The kind of love that God wants us to learn is love that expects nothing in return. God wants us to be like Him and love like He loves. If we follow the love chain throughout the scriptures, we can only come to one conclusion, “God is Love”. Christians should be like good hashbrowns, served smothered and covered with love and scattered among the people.​

John 15:9-13 NLT

“The Gospel has come to you because it’s on its way to someone else.” -Anonymous

Post 07-21-2017

July 20, 2017

The One and Only God!

even-smaller-bug-light121 Dear children, keep away from anything that might take God’s place in your hearts. ​ — 1 John 5:21 NLT

Once we have received Jesus Christ as our Savior, we are a new creation. We aren’t the old creation painted over, we are changed from the inside out. Will we still sin? Yes, as long as we are in these tabernacles of flesh, we will fail. But we will not adopt a lifestyle of sin. If we say that we have no sin then we make God a liar and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, Jesus is faithful and just to forgive us of our sins. It is not our faith or our holding on to Jesus that makes us secure, it is His faith and His holding onto us. No one can take us out of His hand. This is the fellowship and relationship that we have with Him and in Him. Being saved is a rational decision, not an emotional reaction. Once we make that decision, God places His Holy Spirit within us. Where there is Light, there can be no darkness. So our commitment to Jesus is that He is all we need, but we need all of Him. God doesn’t want to be in first place, he wants to be the only one in the race!!!! Let us keep our hearts pure and our eyes focused on Jesus!!!

 
14 You must worship no other gods, for the Lord, whose very name is Jealous, is a God who is jealous about his relationship with you. ​ – Exodus 34:14 NLT​

“The Gospel has come to you because it’s on its way to someone else.” -Anonymous

Post 07-20-2017

July 19, 2017

Believe God’s Testimony

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11 And this is what God has testified: He has given us eternal life, and this life is in his Son. ​ – 1 John 5:11 NLT

God has given us the gift of eternal life. But like every gift that is offered to us, we have to accept it. To accept this gift, we must believe that what God has told us is true. What we must believe is that the Father, sent His only Son to redeem us from sin. If we accept the Son, then we have the truth of God abiding in us. Not only do we have the truth, we also have eternal life.

Jesus told him, “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one can come to the Father except through me.—John 14:6 (NLT)


The only way to receive the gift from the Father is to accept His Son, Jesus Christ. This is more than just turning away from our sins, We must turn to Jesus and accept all that He is. Then we must live a lifestyle that allows others to see Jesus in us. We can do this by holding steadfast to Jesus and allowing the Holy Spirit to lead us and guide us into all truth. That truth will draw others to Jesus and expand His Kingdom.

“The Gospel has come to you because it’s on its way to someone else.” -Anonymous

Post 07-19-2017

July 18, 2017

We Are Winners Through Faith

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5 And who can win this battle against the world? Only those who believe that Jesus is the Son of God.  – 1 John 5:5 NLT​
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Because of His great love for sinners, such as us, God made His salvation plan very simple and free. Just believe! Once we are saved, we start on a journey that will require everything and every part of us. It is not easy to love all of God’s children. Even so, it is not a choice we can make, it is a command given to us by our Father. Then we must learn to obey His commandments.  Through this obedience and faith in the work of the Holy Spirit in us, we can become over​-comers. The flesh alone can not defeat satan in the smallest battle, we have to depend on Jesus to fight our battles. Our job is to “trust and obey”. Instead of worrying and being filled with fear, we just need to lean on Jesus. The world says “when the going gets tough, the tough get going”. Jesus says something totally different.

28 Then Jesus said, “Come to me, all of you who are weary and carry heavy burdens, and I will give you rest. 29 Take my yoke upon you. Let me teach you, because I am humble and gentle at heart, and you will find rest for your souls. 30 For my yoke is easy to bear, and the burden I give you is light.”–Matthew 11:28-30 (NLT)


Jesus will never leave us nor forsake us, just rest in His arms and praise Him!


“The Gospel has come to you because it’s on its way to someone else.” -Anonymous

Post 07-18-2017

July 16, 2017

Loving Like Jesus Loves

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13 And God has given us his Spirit as proof that we live in him and he in us. – 1 John 4:13 NLT
1 John 4:13-17 NLT

Before Jesus ascended to heaven, He told His disciples and us that He would send us a Comforter and that Comforter would teach us everything.

25 I am telling you these things now while I am still with you. 26 But when the Father sends the Advocate as my representative—that is, the Holy Spirit—he will teach you everything and will remind you of everything I have told you.—John 14:25,26 (NLT) ​

The Holy Spirit abides in us and His job is to teach us everything, including how to love God and how to love others. The English language does not have words for different kinds of love. In the Greek, there are at least 6 words for love, Let’s look at four of those. We have philos or phileo (brotherly, friendly love), storge (natural or love for family) eros (sexual) love. These three can be accomplished to a degree in the natural and involve both parties loving and giving. The fourth word is agape (unconditional) love. This is the love that comes only from God, It is the love that only the Spirit can teach us. It is unilateral love, God loves us whether we return that love or not. The flesh can not love in that respect. This is the love that we are to be striving to show to others. But, as Paul said, we “must strive toward the mark”. We must keep practicing loving without expecting anything in return.


“The Gospel has come to you because it’s on its way to someone else.” -Anonymous

 

Post 07-16-2017

July 15, 2017

Real Love

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10 This is real love—not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as a sacrifice to take away our sins. – 1 John 4:10 NLT
Real Love

​As long as we live in the flesh, we will not have the capability to love like God loves us. But, over and over, in the Scriptures, God instructs us to love Him first and most of all and then to love our neighbors as ourselves. God gave up His only Son to redeem us. Jesus gave up all His glory in heaven, came to earth to walk among us in the flesh and submitted Himself to death on a cross to demonstrate His love for us. This was while we were still sinners and separated from Him. Not many of us will be asked to give up our physical life for Christ, so how do we demonstrate our love for Jesus? We do that by giving up our rights, putting Jesus first, others second, and ourselves last. This is the example that Jesus set for His disciples then and for us now.

29 And everyone who has given up houses or brothers or sisters or father or mother or children or property, for my sake, will receive a hundred times as much in return and will inherit eternal life. 30 But many who are the greatest now will be least important then, and those who seem least important now will be the greatest then—Matt. 19:29,30 (NLT)


“The Gospel has come to you because it’s on its way to someone else.” -Anonymous

Post 07-15-2017

July 14, 2017

Truth or Deception?

even-smaller-bug-light16 But we belong to God, and those who know God listen to us. If they do not belong to God, they do not listen to us. That is how we know if someone has the Spirit of truth or the spirit of deception. – 1 John 4:6 NLT
1 John 4:3-6 NLT

We must be very careful who we let speak into our Spiritual lives. Are the people with whom we spend the most time encouraging us in our Spiritual life or are they more concerned with worldly activities, such as our social life? Do we spend more time on Facebook or in the Book? There are at least two very easy ways to find out where we are “laying up our treasures”. One is to look at our checkbooks to see where we spend our earthly treasure and the other is our phones/computers to see with whom we converse and what we converse about. Are we tithing our money and our time? We don’t need to be spiritual fanatics beating people over the head with the Bible, but we do need to be sure that our lives reflect the fact that we are redeemed and that Jesus Christ is our Lord, We need to listen to God, first of all, and then to those who belong to God. We need heavenly wisdom, not earthly wisdom.

18 Do not fool yourselves. If you think you are wise in this world, you should become a fool so that you can become truly wise, 19 because the wisdom of this world is foolishness with God. It is written in the Scriptures, “He catches those who are wise in their own clever traps.” 20 It is also written in the Scriptures, “The Lord knows what wise people think. He knows their thoughts are just a puff of wind.”—1 Cor. 3:18-20 (NCV)


Our brains are the most fantastic computers ever designed and we all know the old GIGO principle about computers. So, we need to limit the amount of garbage the world puts in us and increase the amount of wisdom that God is so anxious to give to us. We do this by meditating on the Scriptures and listening to and spending time with the right people.


“The Gospel has come to you because it’s on its way to someone else.” -Anonymous

Post 07-14-2017

July 13, 2017

Beware of Wolves in Sheep’s Clothing!

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2 This is how we know if they have the Spirit of God: If a person claiming to be a prophet acknowledges that Jesus Christ came in a real body, that person has the Spirit of God. – 1 John 4:2 NLT
 
1 John 4:1-3 NLT

As we all know not everyone that speaks to us has the Spirit of God abiding in them. There are those sent from satan who masquerade as “angels of light” but are actually false prophets.

13 These people are false apostles. They are deceitful workers who disguise themselves as apostles of Christ. 14 But I am not surprised! Even Satan disguises himself as an angel of light. 15 So it is no wonder that his servants also disguise themselves as servants of righteousness. In the end they will get the punishment their wicked deeds deserve.–2 Cor. 11:13-15 (NLT)


We must always test the spirit and see if it acknowledges the Lordship of Jesus Christ. The devil knows that God exists and he knows the Scriptures better than we do. The Spirit that dwells in us will witness to us if a person has a kindred Spirit to ours. But if you are in doubt, you can always ask if they believe that Jesus shed His blood on Calvary for our sins. If they acknowledge that this is true and they acknowledge the Lordship of Jesus, then we have assurance that it is not a false spirit.

3 So I want you to know that no one speaking by the Spirit of God will curse Jesus, and no one can say Jesus is Lord, except by the Holy Spirit.—1 Cor. 12:3 (NLT)


“The Gospel has come to you because it’s on its way to someone else.” -Anonymous

Post 07-13-2017

July 12, 2017

Believe. Trust. Obey.

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23 And this is his commandment: We must believe in the name of his Son, Jesus Christ, and love one another, just as he commanded us. ​ – 1 John 3:23 NLT


We are saved by grace through faith. Faith requires that we believe that Jesus Christ is the sinless Son of God. If we truly believe this, then we know that our sins are forgiven and that we are children of God. This knowledge will be reflected in our lifestyle and how we treat others. When we fail, and we all do, satan will try to condemn us using false accusations and condemnation. The Holy Spirit does not condemn, it convicts. When we are convicted, we must confess and Jesus is always sure to forgive us of our failures. Remember that salvation is based on knowledge and believing that Jesus died for our sins. Although, some do get emotional when they are saved, it is the knowledge and believing (faith) that saves us. As long as we live in these tents of flesh, our emotions are going to run the gamut of highs and lows. If we allow our emotions to control us, life will be just one long roller coaster ride and, no, it will not be fun and thrilling. It will be scary and depressive. No matter what satan accuses us of doing, we have to STAND on the Rock of Ages. Submit to God, resist the devil and he has to flee. Then we can have the joy of the Lord because God will never leave us or forsake us.


“The Gospel has come to you because it’s on its way to someone else.” -Anonymous

Post 07-12-2017

July 11, 2017

Light! Love! Action!

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16 We know what real love is because Jesus gave up his life for us. So we also ought to give up our lives for our brothers and sisters. ​ — 1 John 3:16 NLT

As Christians, most of us, at sometime or other, have met other people and we sensed immediately that they were Christians. There was a kindred Spirit that we could easily identify. This Spirit is God’s Holy Spirit indwelling us and we can feel the love of the other person almost immediately. We must never feel hatred for those around us, whether they be Christian brothers and sisters or not. We must always reflect the love of Jesus by loving others. First, to our own household, then our church, and then those around us. We should never have the attitude of the expert in religious law that Jesus encountered in Luke 10. He asked Jesus, “who is my neighbor”? This was an effort on his part to get Jesus to identify specific people that he should help. This would limit his responsibilities to others. We are to help all those that Jesus puts in our path. It is not God’s will that any should perish. Therefore, it becomes our responsibility to lead as many as possible to Christ by showing them the love of Christ. Our lifestyles should show others that Christianity is not a bunch of “don’ts” and negativism, but that it is a positive relationship with a living Lord.


“The Gospel has come to you because it’s on its way to someone else.” -Anonymous

Post 07-11-2017