PRIDE

One of the most destructive sins a Christian deals with is pride. If you are a Christian thinking that you don't deal with it.... just no. You do. We all do. 
Pride looks comes in all different forms. It isn't something with a single definition. It's something that sneaks up on us in many different ways where we least expect it.

Some great verses warning us about pride are:
"Pride goes before destruction, And a haughty spirit before stumbling." Prov. 16:18
"Be of the same mind toward one another; do not be haughty in mind, but associate with the lowly. Do not be wise in your own estimation." Rom. 12:16
"For if a man comes into your assembly with a gold ring and dressed in fine clothes, and there also comes in a poor man in dirty clothes, and you pay special attention to the one who is wearing the fine clothes, and say "You sit here in a good place," and you say to the poor man, "You stand over there, or sit down by my footstool," have you not made a distinction among yourselves, and become judges with evil motives?" James 2:2-4
"But He gives a greater grace. Therefore it says God is opposed to the proud, but gives grace to the humble." James 4:6

What does pride look like? The most basic type of pride that I would dare say every Christian has dealt with, is dealing with, or will deal with is the kind that thinks we have it all together. Just when we think we have the Christian life down and figured out, is when we are about to fall. It is unpredictable, meaning we MUST be depending on the Spirit every day.

The next type of pride is the kind that thinks we are better than others. This may be counting ourselves as more righteous than others or judging others for not being like us. I think the temptation for many people in the United States (especially women) is to judge based on appearances. A) Why does it matter what someone is wearing or how they fix themselves up? and B) Who are we to be the ones to determine what is in or out of style? Appearances aside, this kind of pride makes us think very highly of ourselves in general. The danger here is that when we serve god, we give the glory to ourselves. Here's the thing. God will not use someone to do his work if they are doing it for their own glory. 

The last kind of pride I want to mention is the kind that keeps us from admitting when we are wrong or have messed up. We all know that stubborn person who never admits they are wrong. Don't be that person haha.  On a more serious note, when we act like we have everything together and ignore our mess ups we miss out on God's grace! God gives grace to the humble, and is opposed to the proud. As Christians we are to boast in Christ in ALL things. When God has blessed us with something or given us an opportunity to serve Him, praise Him by thanking Him and by telling what he has done for us. On the other hand, when we mess up God welcomes us back to Himself with open arms! Praise Him by telling others what He has done!

This is where people may disagree with me. I think a majority of the time the church is so concerned with "keeping a good testimony" or a "good witness" that we hide the fact that we all mess up and are human! Now I do NOT want this to sound anti-church, because I want to promote unity in the church, not cause people to leave it. The church will never be perfect because it is made up of a bunch of sinners, however, we do worship a perfect God. Anyways, with that being said, the church is supposed to encourage one another and work together keeping each other accountable. How are we to keep each other accountable if we all act like we have everything together? We keep a good testimony by living by the Spirit and living a life consecrated to Him. Everyone makes mistakes though.We belittle God's grace when we hide what He is doing in our lives because we don't want to admit our struggles. I'm not saying we go around waving every mistake we've ever done like we are proud. We do, however, relate to those dealing with sins we have dealt with in the past, be open about asking for prayer over current struggles, and NEVER lie about things of the past. To act like something that God brought us through never happened is to rob Him of His glory! Praise Him for using sinners like us to display his mercy, love, and grace!

Legalism or Surrender?

What is the biggest issue hurting the church’s testimony today?

In my opinion, legalism and those who excuse their sin in trying to flee from legalism.

Matt Slick defines legalism as “the excessive and improper use of the law (10 commandments, holiness laws, etc).  This legalism can take different forms.  The first is where a person attempts to keep the Law in order to attain salvation.  The second is where a person keeps the law in order to maintain his salvation.  The third is when a Christian judges other Christians for not keeping certain codes of conduct that he thinks need to be observed.”

Now even though legalism is a really big problem in the church. I’m not going to be addressing the issue itself. I’m going to address the problem I see more in my generation—people saying I can go party, drink, watch dirty movies, read filthy novels/magazines, have sex or close to it, listen to whatever music, and fill my head with whatever I want BECAUSE it’s legalistic for me to get rid of those things to work my way to God.

While YES it is legalistic to do those things just to work our way to God and merit righteousness, WE ABUSE GOD’S GRACE WHEN WE LIVE BY OUR FLESH.

Galatians 5:16-26 16 says, “I say then: Walk in the Spirit, and you shall not fulfill the lust of the flesh. For the flesh lusts against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh; and these are contrary to one another, so that you do not do the things that you wish. But if you are led by the Spirit, you are not under the law. Now the works of the flesh are evident, which are: adultery,[a] fornication, uncleanness, lewdness, idolatry, sorcery, hatred, contentions, jealousies, outbursts of wrath, selfish ambitions, dissensions, heresies, envy, murders, drunkenness, revelries, and the like; of which I tell you beforehand, just as I also told you in time past, that those who practice such things will not inherit the kingdom of God. But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, 23 gentleness, self-control. Against such there is no law. And those who are Christ’s have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires. If we live in the Spirit, let us also walk in the Spirit. Let us not become conceited, provoking one another, envying one another.”

This passage really says a lot about living by the Spirit, so don’t just read it as a list of do’s and don’ts. First off in verse 16 when it says “Walk in the Spirit, and ye shall not fulfill the lust of the flesh”, the word lust has a different connotation in Greek then we have. We say it with an evil connotation, but in Greek lust of the flesh refers to the desires of the flesh (music, entertainment, works of do-gooders, etc.) There are many things which themselves are not evil, but they take the place of spriritual things. Secondly, after the list of the works of the flesh it says “those who practice such things will not inherit the kingdom of God.” This implies continuous actions. Christians are not perfect and will mess up, so don’t think that messing up one or two times is going to send you to hell. Draw near to God and thank him for his grace when you mess up and flee the sin you are struggling with by the power of HIS Spirit. Next, notice that it says, “the FRUIT of the Spirit is..” Fruit in this passage is singular! That means they are wholistic. We cannot say well im doing good with love, but patience is a little iffy. They all run together under love. We cannot earn them. The Lord must prune us and make the fruit grow in us. J. Vernon McGee says, “The problem is that we offer ourselves to God as a living sacrifice, but when the altar gets hot, we crawl off. We are to ABIDE in Christ if we are to produce fruit.” Now let’s look at verse 25 when it says, “If we live in the Spirit, let us also walk in the Spirit.” Walk in this passage is stoichomen in Greek. This word is the basic, elementary meaning “to proceed or step in order”. It means to learn to walk. Just as we learn to walk physically by the trial and error method, we are to begin to walk by the Spirit—it is a learning process. Lastly, this passage ends with “Let us not become conceited, provoking one another, envying one another.” Don’t let the Christian walk be a competition. Don’t evaluate your life by comparing yours to other peoples. It’s God’s place to judge, not ours. J. Vernon McGee comments, “We are not to challenge and envy one another. We are to get down from our high chairs and start walking in the Spirit. The Christian Life is not a balloon ascension with some great overpowering experience of soaring to the heights. Rather it is a daily walk; it is a matter of putting one foot ahead of the other, in dependence upon the Holy Spirit.”

Now that we’ve broken down Galatians 5:16-26 im going to kind of switch directions.

Because of the lack of Christians living by the Spirit, I think many of us have become discontent with the Lord. Our hearts have turned from Him to our flesh for satisfaction.

Sinclair Ferguson says, “Contentment is the direct fruit of having no higher ambition than to belong to the Lord at His disposal.”

If the main focus of our life is to have fun, get a good job, find our soulmate, and live the American dream then we will never find contentment. Our hearts must be fixated on Christ with furthering the kingdom of God as our main objective. The battle for the placement of our hearts is real and we are often oblivious to it. Ephesians 6:12 says, “For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places.” Satan and his forces are working at all times to steal our contentment. This is where living by the Spirit comes back in. Don’t let Satan choke our your contentment by giving in to partying, drinking, watching movies and listening to music that feeds your flesh, reading an erotic novel.. It’s a cheap trade and those things WILL leave you empty. We don’t give up these things to earn our own righteousness, for we know that Christ has imputed us with His righteousness! BUT we stay clear of these things to guard our hearts and starve our flesh. It is not legalistic to guard our heart. Proverbs 4:23 commands us to do so. It is being wise.

1 Timothy 6:6 says, “But godliness with contentment is great gain.”

So let our prayer be that we find our contentment in Christ alone. Pray that God will open our eyes to any judgemental and legalistic bone in our bodies. Pray that God will show us where we are feeding our flesh. Pray that God will prune us and grow us in Him, and spend time abiding in Him. Draw near to God, and He will draw near to you.

Abide, Rest, Wait

"He made us with a capacity for the highest enjoyment. He made us with a capacity to enjoy Himself. There can be no joy higher. Because there is no one higher than God."- Eugina Price

God made us for Himself, and He alone can satisfy the longings that He created us to have. Also, not only is He the only one who can satisfy, but he is also the only one who can do the work that he asks of us. I think many times christians try to serve their way to satisfaction in Christ, and while that does bring joy to our hearts, Jesus is the only one who can make us truly satisfied. As humans it is our natural tendency to talk about our works and our salvation, but unfornuately we emphasize these things and the blessings of God more than we do about our actual Saviour Himself!"

"We trust him for the initial process called salvation then we try to grow, increase our faith, abide, and be peaceful while Jesus Christ stands reminding us with the simplicity and majesty of God himself that 'without me ye can do nothing'" -Eugina Price

The only way for us to grow in the Lord, serve the Lord, and experience His blessings, is for us to simply abide in Him. Nothing more. Nothing less. We have complicated things by talking so much about what is expected of Christians rather than talking about Jesus Christ. When we try and be good by ourselves, it is an epic fail, and im sure you don't need me to tell you that. We oftentimes look at the Bible and Christianity in general as a list of rules and standards to live up to. We are trying to fight off our sins and work our way to heaven while Jesus has already said "It is finished". Now we have the freedom from worrying about making sacrifices to pay for our sins like the old testament christians had to do. We can just abide in Jesus, and if we are truly abiding in Him, we WILL become more and more like him. This is the key to being sanctified (being made holy like Christ), to abide in Him.. not to work our way to Him. John 15:4-7 says,

"Abide in Me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself unless it abides in the vine, so neither can you unless you abide in Me. I am the vine, you are the branches; he who abides in Me and I in him, he bears much fruit, for apart from Me you can do nothing. If anyone does not abide in Me, he is thrown away as a branch and dries up; and they gather them, and cast them into the fire and they are burned. If you abide in Me, and My words abide in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be done for you."

These verses say it plain and simple. We cannot do anything apart from Christ, but if we abide in Him we will bear much fruit!

We ask God for safety, prosperity, peace, growth, and many other blessings, but how often do we ask God just for Himself? Do we want Jesus or His blessings? Yes, His blessing are great and He wants us to enjoy them, but it is a package deal. For instance, let's look at peace. This is a gift the entire world is begging for. How do we experience peace? We can't just think our way to peace. We must trust got to get rid of the enemies of peace. God is a holy God and cannot dwell where sin is. Therefore, when we are living in sin there cannot be peace in our hearts. The only way to stay out of a lifestyle of sin is through Jesus Christ. There is no way to go around Jesus and straight to his blessings. He is the door.

"Fellowship with God is something one dare not cover, for it smothers to death."

So I encourage you to open up your Bibles and spend time in prayer this week, not asking only for God's blessings, but asking that He reveal Himself to you. Spend time abiding in Him, dwelling on who He is and what that means for your life. Spend time resting in Him, resting in the freedom we have received through Jesus. And spend time waiting on Him. Don't lose hope in what he has in store for you. God has perfect timing that we most of the time do not understand. So just focus on abiding in Him and He will lead you where He wants you to be. Everything will fall in place.

“I can of myself do nothing to glorify thy blessed name, but I through grace cheerfully surrender soul and body to thee.”

Jesus throughout the Bible!

I was looking through some old documents I saved on my computer and ran across this. It shows Jesus in every single book of the Bible! It is all about Jesus even from Genesis! The world and everything in it belongs to God, and I am so thankful that He allows me to partake in His kingdom!

In Genesis Jesus is the ram at Abrahams altar.
In Exodus He is the Passover Lamb.
In Leviticus He is the High Priest.
In Numbers He is the cloud by day and the pillar of fire by night.
In Deuteronomy He is the city of our refuge.
In Joshua He is the scarlet thread outside Rahab's window.
In Judges He is our judge.
In Ruth He is our kinsman redeemer.
In I and II Samuel He is our trusted prophet.
In Kings and Chronicles He is our reigning king.
In Ezra He is the faithful scribe.
In Nehemiah He is the rebuilder of everything that is broken.
In Esther He is Mordecai sitting faithfully at the gate.
In Job He is our redeemer that ever liveth.
In Psalms He is our shephard and we shall not want.
In Proverbs and Ecclesiastes He is our eternal wisdom.
In Song of Solomon He is the beautiful bride and groom.
In Isaiah He is the suffering servant.
In Jeremiah and Lamentations He is the weeping prophet.
In Ezekial He is the wonderful four-phased man.
In Daniel He is the fourth man in the midst of the fiery furnace.
In Hosea He is the love that is forever faithful.
In Joel He baptizes with the Holy Ghost.
In Amos He is the burden bearer.
In Obediah He is our Saviour.
In Jonah He is the foreign missionary that takes the Word of God into all the world.
In Micah He is the messanger with beautiful feet.
In Nahum He is avenger.
In Habakkuk He is the watchman who is always praying for revival.
In Zephaniah He is the Lord, Mighty to save.
In Haggai He is the restorer of our lost heritage.
In Zachariah He is our fountain.
In Malachi He is the Son of righteousness with healing in his wings.
In Matthew He is the Christ, the Son of the living God.
In Mark He is the miracle-working God.
In Luke He is the Son of man.
In John He is the door in which anyone must enter to know the Father.
In Acts He is the shining light that appears to Saul on the way to Damascus.
In Romans He is the justifier.
In I Corinthians He is our resurrection.
In II Corinthians He is our sin bearer.
In Galatians He redeems us from the law.
In Ephesians He is our unsearchable riches.
In Philipians He supplies our every need.
In Colossians He is the fullness of the Godhead bodily.
In I and II Thessalonians He is the soon coming king.
In I and II Timothy He is the mediator between God and Men, the man Christ Jesus.
In Titus He is our blessed hope.
In Philemon He is a friend that sticks closer than a brother.
In Hebrews He is the blood of the everlasting covenant.
In James He is the Lord that heals the sick.
In I and II Peter He is the chief shephard.
In I, II, and III John He is Jesus the tenderness of love.
In Jude He is the Lord, who is coming with 10,000 saints.
In Revelations He is King of Kings and Lord of Lords.

HOW GREAT IS OUR GOD!

Spiritus Sanctus

This a prayer from "The Valley of Vision" which I absolutely love!

O Holy Spirit,
As the sun is full of light,
the ocean full of water,
Heaven full of glory,
so may my heart be full of thee.
Vain are all divine purposes of love and redemption wrought by Jesus
except thou work within,
giving me eyes to see Jesus,
showing me the realities of the unseen world.
Give me thyself without measure,
as an unimpaired fountain,
as inexhausible riches.
I bewail my coldness, poverty, emptiness, imperfect vision, languid service,
prayerless prayers, praiseless praises.
Suffer me not to grieve or resist thee.
Come as POWER, to expel every rebel lust, to reign supreme and keep me thine;
Come as TEACHER, leading me into all truth, filling me with all understanding;
Come as LOVE, that I may adore the Father, and love Him as my all;
Come as JOY, to dwell in me, move in me, animate me;
Come as LIGHT, illuminating the Scripture, moulding me in its laws;
Come as SANCTIFIER, body, soul, and spirit wholly thine;
Come as HELPER, with strength to bless and keep, directing my every step;
Come as BEAUTIFIER, bringing order out of confusion, loveliness out of chaos.
Magnify to me thy glory by being magnified in me, and make me redolent of thy fragrance.

Living in His Presence

“What a stupid world this would be if one never did anything different for fear of criticism.”

Living constantly in awareness of the presence of God is not a common thing for the average Christian, although I wish I could say it was. If we truly lived in constant communication with Christ, it would shape our lives. We would look completely different than we do right now. This should be our desire. If we are going to start to live in the presence of God, it is going to take a conscious effort to keep Christ on our minds at all times, praising God without ceasing and praying without end. As we go through the day, we should open our souls and entertain the glory of the Lord in everything we see.The only problem is that we fail. We fail often. No matter how hard we try to make every thought about Christ, we still get distracted oh so easily. It is okay to fail with this though. If you think about it, we are already living in failure as we spend a majority of the day thinking on temporal things which will not matter in eternity. Christ is always faithful to pick us up and get us right back on track though. After a while of living in constant awareness of God's presence, it will become habit.

  “If we are so impoverished that we have nothing to reveal but small talk, then we need to struggle for more richness of soul. Money, praise, poverty, opposition, these make no difference, for they will all alike be forgotten in a thousand years, but this spirit which comes to a mind set upon continuous surrender, this spirit is timeless.”

My prayer is that we will be in constant fellowship with the Lord to the point where small talk is boring to us, where everything that the world strives after seems completely pointless. I want my life to be all about living in the Spirit and letting God use me to advance His kingdom! This is the purpose of the church! Why are we so easily distracted? Let us ask ourselves at the end of each day, "Was my goal to glorify Christ today or did I live selfishly?" Let's be real, this is so hard for me. It is easy to be in Christ's presence during church or during my time in the Word and in prayer, but it's hard for me to live a Spirit-filled life all day long. I want to look at people using God as my glasses, colored with His love for them.
The disciples spent 168 hours a week with Jesus. They were with Jesus 24 hours a day for 3 years! What would happen to us if we spent our every moment in fellowship with the Lord? Our minds would be transformed, our spirit renewed. Our words would be streams of fresh water in a world that is cast in the desert. Think of all the times we think to ourselves about the things going on around us. What if we talked to God in those moments instead? Our hearts would be filled with the joy of the presence of the Lord. Out of the fullness of the heart, the mouth speaks. Let us seek Christ passionately in every moment to fill us up and send us out. In this process of seeking the Lord at every moment, we will not always have a deep emotional feeling, but we will have a peace that passeth all understanding. The emotions will have their moments too.

“The greatest pains or pleasures of this world are not to be compared with what I have experienced of both pain and pleasures in a spiritual state. Therefore, I am careful for nothing and fear nothing, desiring only one thing of God—that I might not offend Him.”- Brother Lawrence

I pray that our love of the Lord grows stronger each day and that our desires are only towards things of eternal value. Perfect love casts out fear. May our pains and pleasure only be in the spiritual realm. Let nothing of this world cause us distress and our only fear be of the Lord. Let us take pleasure fully in delighting in the Lord. It may mean surrenduring even harmless pleasures if they take any affection away from Christ to whom all glory is deserved. Let us live in the presence. Let us die in the presence.

“The Lord is not outside of you, pouring down favors. The Lord is within you. Seek Him there, within… and no where else.”

Can You Lose Salvation?

A big question in the church today is "Can you lose salvation?". Let's see what scripture has to say about it.


First off, let's look at the passages that people use to say that you can lose salvation.
Galatians 5:11-6:12
"Cncerning him we have much to say, and it is hard to explain, since you have become dull of hearing. For though by this time you ought to be teachers, you have need again for someone to teach you the elementary principles of the oracles of God, and you have come to need milk and not solid food. For everyone who partakes only of milk is not accustomed to the word of righteousness, for he is an infant. But solid food is for the mature, who because of practice have their senses trained to discern good and evil.
Therefore leaving the elementary teaching about the Christ, let us press on to maturity, not laying again a foundation of repentance from dead works and of faith toward God,  of instruction about washings and laying on of hands, and the resurrection of the dead and eternal judgment. And this we will do, if God permits. 




*For in the case of those who have once been enlightened and have tasted of the heavenly gift and have been made partakers of the Holy Spirit,  and have tasted the good word of God and the powers of the age to come,  and then have fallen away, it is impossible to renew them again to repentance, since they again crucify to themselves the Son of God and put Him to open shame. * (the verses everyone uses to say you can lose salvation)


For ground that drinks the rain which often falls on it and brings forth vegetation useful to those for whose sake it is also tilled, receives a blessing from God;  but if it yields thorns and thistles, it is worthless and close to being cursed, and it ends up being burned. But, beloved, we are convinced of better things concerning you, and things that acco mpany salvation, though we are speaking in this way. For God is not unjust so as to forget your work and the love which you have shown toward His name, in having ministered and in still ministering to the saints. And we desire that each one of you show the same diligence so as to realize the full assurance of hope until the end,  so that you will not be sluggish, but imitators of those who through faith and patience inherit the promises."


First off, if this verse is saying you can lose salvation, then it also says it is impossible to be saved again after losing it. You must look at the context of this verse. It completely changes the meaning. I have put in bold some of the major things which tell the context of this passage. The writer here is talking about the fruit of salvation, not the root of salvation. When he says repentance, he is talking about repentance from dead works. Also, he goes on for a while about the christians having to be fed milk instead of meat. Unsaved people do not need milk. They need life. This passage is talking about saved people in need of growth. I put in bold the phrase "being burned". This phrase points us to the conclusion that the writer is talking about works. In 1 Corinthians 3:11-15, we see how God tests our works with fire. Also in Revelations, it talks about how Jesus eyes are like unto fire which represents judgement of works. All Christians will be judged when we enter before the throne of Christ for every work we do. This is what this passage is all about. Once you do sinful works, it is impossible to be renewed unto salvation (from dead works) again. What is done is done. God will judge us for our sins, and that cannot be undone.


The next controversial passage is Hebrews 10:26
"For if we go on sinning willfully after receiving the knowledge of the truth, there no longer remains a sacrifice for sins"


Again at first glance at this passage, it looks as if it is saying you can lose salvation, but context completely changes the meaning. In this passage, the writer is speaking to Hebrew Jews who were still going to the temple to make sacrifices under the Mosaic law after Jesus had already died on the cross and changed everything. Continuing in the Mosaic law became a "willfull sin" because it denies Jesus, and Jesus Christ himself said "No man can come to the Father but by Me". Therefore, if they continue going on in the Mosaic law after receiving knowledge of the truth of Christ, there no longer remains a sacrifice for sins, Jesus' sacrifice.


The last passage many use to say you can lose salvation is Galatians 5:4
"Christ is become of no effect unto you, whosoever of you are justified by the law; ye are fallen from grace."


The term "fallen from grace" does NOT mean losing God's grace unto eternal salvation. This passage again is talking about Christian living. If once you have been saved, you choose to live in a lower way of living, you are fallen from grace. This is a matter of sanctification (Christ making us holy), not salvation. We know from the Bible that our best works are still filthy rags in comparison to Christ's standards. This is where grace comes in. We cannot live the Christian life through our own efforts. Christ must impute His righteousness on us himself. Later in this chapter we are introduced to the fruits of the Spirit which God gives us by grace. This verse is clearly talking about those who try to do good works by the law and not by God's grace. Christ has no effect on them. They still use their own power and the law to justify it.


Here is a list of verses which support the assurance of salvation.


1 John 5:7-11: In this passage we see the trinity testifying that we are saved.
Hebrews 10:17 : God remembers our lawless deeds and sins no more.
1 John 5:13  : This says we can know we have eternal life.
Ephesians 4:30 : "Do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, by whom you were sealed for the day of redemption." This speaks for itself. We are sealed.


All of the verses thus far give biblical truth to "once saved, always saved", but there is still a problem. What about passages that say "faith without works is dead"? These kinds of passages make us think that works are involved in salvation, but this is not true. Ephesians 2:8-9 says, "For by grace you have been saved through faith; and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God; not as a result of works, so that no one may boast." Therefore salvation has nothing to do with works. It is completely God's grace that we can have eternal life. Works are just evidence of true salvation. If you are really saved, you will produce fruit. This is why I like to say "Once saved, always saved, IF saved." It is a heart change which brings about a change in the way you live.