For it is God which worketh in you both to will and to do of his good pleasure.
Philippians 2:13 KJV
https://bible.com/verse-of-the-day/php.2.13/10585
Category: Salvation
Are you listening?
God does speak to us today, but many people don’t know how to truly listen to Him. They ask, “How can I hear God speak to me?”. Well, if you would read the Bible, God’s Word, you would hear Him speaking in every verse of it. Sometimes He gives encouragement and sometimes He is rebuking you by His Word but He is speaking to you and to each of us. Sometimes we will search God’s Word until we find something that we like and we will say that God agrees with our position on whatever it is but that is not seeking His will for you that you trying to justify something that you know is wrong!
The funny thing is that God will let you get away with your justification until you realize that you truly made a mistake because it isn’t working out the way you hoped it would. Things are getting worse rather than getting better. You need to pick up God’s Word and seek His will for your life by prayerful meditation and reading with prayer so that you truly are hearing from Him and not your own “conscience” voice. You know your mind-voice can sound like your idea of God’s voice. You can convince yourself that you are hearing from God and all you are doing is talking to yourself. You can get pretty good at it too until one day when all of the “things” which your god told you to do come crashing down on your head and you realize, hopefully, that those were not God’s words of direction but your own.
How can you tell the difference? Because if you truly were hearing God’s voice and following His direction those “things” wouldn’t have crumbled to dust around you. If you truly were listening and following His directions like you thought you were…things would work out the way He intended for them to. It is a novel concept and it is shown in the Bible very clearly. When a prophet or king follows God and does the things which God tells him to do, the way He tells him to do it, everything works out wonderfully. But, when you try to inject your ideas or change things so that people will like you rather than following God’s directions there are consequences which follow and most of the time they aren’t fun at all.
Most of our lives are like that as well. When we are truly following God’s direction in our lives and not trying to do things our way all the time everything works out most of the time. I say most of the time because none of us follow His directions perfectly, but if we are listening to Him we try our best to follow Him. God expects us to follow Him and His directions when we are His and we have given our life to Him but if you don’t know Him or if you are being stubborn and ignoring His direction or His calling in your life then your ideas and your pathway will not be so easy nor will they work out the way you had hoped.
Seek His guidance and His direction by following Him and giving your life to Him because He paid for your sins on the cross. Is being a Christian easy? No, it is not because there are going to be temptations and situations where you want to do things your way or even go back to doing things like you did before you asked Jesus for His Presence in your life. I pray that anyone who feels His call on your life through reading this or even by a dream or hearing God’s Word preached will answer and ask Him to come into your life and change you into the person that He knows you can be.
Apart from Christ we are nothing
I am the vine, ye are the branches: He that abideth in me, and I in him, the same bringeth forth much fruit: for without me ye can do nothing.
John 15:5 KJV
https://bible.com/bible/1/jhn.15.5.KJV
My part doesn’t count
Don’t ever think this thought! I have thought it at times but your part does count! God can use your life, your voice, your message, your witness in ways that you have no idea just how much good it may do. But He does!
He knows how many people will hear or listen to or even read your words, like on this blog, and He will use your voice to take His message to the world and those who are desperate to hear the gospel of Jesus and His love for them. Just as when it is time to vote for a President or a Senator, your vote…your voice does count! If John had not gone to Ephesus and preached to them they wouldn’t have heard about Jesus. If Paul had not gone to all of the places that he went to with the good news of Jesus and the salvation through Him then many people would never have heard about Jesus.
Each of us has a part to play in the grand scheme of life, whether we believe in Jesus as our Savior or not. Our part is not usually a small part because we do influence people around us whether we realize it or not. It is that influence which carries His message to the world most of the time. A thank you to a stranger or blessing the food at a restaurant or just opening the door for someone who may have their hands full or maybe you are just doing it “just because”. Any of these small interactions can have a big impact on people and then their impact on others will be affected too.
None of us can truthfully claim that what we do in this life makes no difference. Adam and Eve ate a fruit that they weren’t supposed to eat. It doesn’t sound like much until you realize that God had told them not to before they did it. They disobeyed God’s command and did their own thing, which is what we’ve been doing ever since. It was a small decision but it had huge consequences for the rest of creation. Don’t ever discount a decision that you are thinking about. Whether you think it is big or not, seek out God’s perspective on it if you are a believer because His advice is always right. Though many of us today are too impatient to wait for His answer at times.
Does your influence count? Yes it does. A parent has a lot of influence over a child’s growth and their ideas about life as they grow older. We may not think that they are listening but they are and they hear more than you think they do. A teacher or a coach has a lot of influence in the lives of those that they come in contact with over the course of their careers. Sometimes they may not find it out until years later. Society and social media today have a lot of influence on people of all ages, as well as the smart phones which we all seem to have attached to our hands.
God loves each of us and He does care about your life and your eternity. All that you need to do is believe in Him and give your life to Him so that He can give His Life to you.
I will remember…
The beginning of Wisdom
The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom: and the knowledge of the holy is understanding.
Proverbs 9:10 KJV
https://bible.com/bible/1/pro.9.10.KJV
He came to save you!
In the Bible, the words which point you toward faith in Jesus don’t tell you the whole story. Jesus, Yeshua, was and is God in the flesh. God came down to Earth to be among those that He created. Not to make us feel unworthy, although we are, but to show His love for us because we don’t deserve it at all. Humanity failed Him in every way and we are still failing Him. Oh, those of us who truly are His followers are at least moving in the right direction but the majority of people in the world tend toward apathy or even hatred toward God and especially Jesus.
We are human and we aren’t capable of pleasing God without having faith in Him. But, we aren’t born with that faith. When God calls us to know Him, He is the giver of the faith necessary to know Him. We can’t just decide to believe in Him one day, all of us are chosen by Him to be His. But it is still our decision to accept that invitation and many still refuse because they don’t want to give up their sins…their life without Him being a part of it.
So, why is this important? Because, whether you believe it or not, there is an eternity on the other side of your last breath here and it is your choice which determines where you spend that eternity. The Pope can’t save you nor will any other religious figure from any other religion. Only Jesus came to pay the price for your soul and for your sins and since He stands at the right of the Father in Heaven and is not in a grave somewhere, you have the chance to live into eternity with Him. But only if you choose to follow Him and ask Him to forgive your sins and give you the strength to walk with Him until your last day on this Earth.
Why is being a Christian and believing in Jesus as your Savior so important? Because of the eternity which is there if you don’t believe in Him for your salvation. If there is a heaven there is also a hell and it is spoken of in God’s Word many times as an eternal punishment. Not for just a little while or instantaneous vaporization! Hell was created by God to punish Satan and his demons who have hounded mankind for thousands of years. They have driven some people mad and they are the ones who caused all of these aberrant religions which dealt in child sacrifice and other abominations. They will do anything to point people toward any “ideal religion” which doesn’t believe in or follow God the Father.
I pray that anyone who reads this will seek Jesus out as their Savior. In His Word, in a Bible-teaching church or Bible study. Any way that you can learn more about Jesus and His love for you and the fact of His Love for you that was so powerful that He chose to go to the cross and die for your salvation. One day soon the church will be taken from the Earth and there will be seven years of hell on Earth because of those who chose not to believe in Jesus for their salvation. I pray that you will not be here during this time but will be with the church in Heaven.
God is our Defender
Do not deceive yourself
Be not deceived; God is not mocked: for whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap.
Galatians 6:7 KJV
https://bible.com/verse-of-the-day/gal.6.7/32916
The little things do count
When you read the gospels and the accounts of all of the different ways that Jesus interacted with people and healed some and raised some from the dead or freed them from demonic possession it makes you wonder what else He might’ve done in between all of these. When you read about everything that He did in the few years that His disciples walked with Him and then read at the end of John’s gospel that “if everything that Jesus did were written down the world couldn’t hold all of the books“.
Jesus payed attention to all of the little things. The children that were around Him, the women who were supporting His ministry and were disciples too. He looked at the small lunch which fed over five thousand people and knew it was possible. He noticed so many things around Him in His ministry which aren’t recorded in the gospels. So, how do I know that He noticed these small details around Him? Because He was and is the Creator! An artist notices the color of clouds and birds and flowers and trees so how much more would our Creator notice everything and everyone around Him?
Even if the writers of the gospels didn’t notice it and He didn’t bring it to their attention, He would’ve noticed. Every flower and bird and tree and cloud and the stars at night. He was there during creation so why not take in your creation and truly notice all of the beauty in everything around you? I know I would have and you would too.
Jesus is our Savior and He paid that price for our salvation willingly. His humanity was afraid of the pain and suffering but He knew it had to be done. He is the Author of Life and the Creator and He did all of this for us. So when you feel His call in your heart and you know it is Him, please don’t turn away from that call because that call may be the only one you will hear or maybe the last time you may hear from Him. I pray that all of you who read this will give your heart and life to Jesus and follow Him for the rest of your life.
The Living Message of Christ 