Never Alone

I want to encourage every lonely person reading this post to realize from your innermost depths - not just in the surface of your thoughts, but down in the depth of your soul - that you are not alone (Hebrews 13:5; Psalm 46:7, 62:5). God is your husband and Jesus is the lover of your soul (Isaiah 54:5; John 3:16). Having a loving and nurturing mate in your life is just not as important as you think it is.

If God wanted you to have a special human relationship right now, He would certainly provide one for you. He cares about every area of your life. You can enjoy God’s total peace, if you will completely surrender this issue to the Lord. It is usually not until you are completely happy with Jesus, and realize that you do not really need a loving mate, that God will provide you with a fulfilled marriage.

The only thing in this life that is truly exciting and fulfilling is serving our King Jesus. When we look for happiness from people or circumstance, we are disappointed. But, when we allow God's Spirit to direct our steps, we find pure joy. Listen to the Spirit, and let Him direct your steps (Proverbs 3:5-6). Soon you will be so busy for God that you will realize that you are already complete and whole in Him (Colossians 2:10).

We cannot change our life by worrying about anything, or by wishing, hoping or dreaming that it will change. We can take a lesson from the flowers. They bloom right where they are planted. God provides everything they need. We can have the assurance that God will provide for us too. We are even more valuable to God than any bird, animal or tree (Luke 2:27-28).

Start counting your blessings. Stop looking at what you do not have and start thanking God for what you do have. Before long, He will start giving you even more than you ever dreamed possible. He puts His desires in our heart and fulfills them for us (Psalm 37:4). If having a mate is His desire, He will certainly bring one to you in His timing and way.

·       I met my husband at a bookstore. What are the odds of that???? 

·       My girlfriend met her future husband when her plumbing leaked and she called a plumber. 

·       A friend met his future wife when she came in Walmart singing praises to the Lord and he joined her in singing. 

·       Another man went to the wrong house looking for a certain address and met another of my friends; a week later he returned to that wrong address and asked my girlfriend on a date. 

·       Another girlfriend went to visit a sick friend and was introduced to her future husband at their mutual friend’s sickbed. 

·       Another girlfriend met her Canadian fiancé at a church in the USA.

·       Several of my friends wanted to divorce their ungodly husbands. Each one decided not to get a divorce and instead to get her own apartment. She continued to be friends with her husband. God honored their commitment and trust and worked in all of these men's lives.

·       Trust God and you will have your own story to tell too.

Prayer:

Father God, we want to seek You and Your Kingdom first and stop worrying about the things, which unbelievers are concerned about (Matthew 6:25-33; Luke 12:22-31). We know that You have our best interest in Your heart and that You will supply every one of our needs from Your glorious riches (Philippians 4:19). Help us to focus on You and Your will for us instead of our own will for our life. Remind us that You love us so much that You sent Your Son to die for us.

Thought for the Day:

As we place our hope solely in the Lord, we will find true joy, contentment and peace.

A New Way of Life

 

God loves the prayers of His Saints. In fact, God considers our prayers, and our gifts to the poor, as an offering directly to Him (Acts 10:4; Matthew 25:45). God does not require us to pray in any certain way, at any certain time or using any certain words. The Bible suggests that we pray from our heart in Jesus’ name, in order to invoke all of His power behind our words (John 14:13). In reality, prayer is not an action, but a way of life. It is our communication with our Living Lord.

The Bible tells us to pray without ceasing. This means that we live every moment of our day as a prayer to God. We commune with His Spirit to find out what He has planned for each moment of our day (Ephesians 2:8-10). In fact, the Holy Spirit actually prays for us according to the will of God (Romans 8:26-27). We really have need of nothing, because He promises to provide all of our needs, as we seek first His Kingdom (Matthew 6:33).

Christ makes us complete in Him (Colossians 2:10). Prayer enables us to separate our self from the roller coaster of life by entering into God’s rest (Hebrews 4:10). He lives in us and also through us at home, work, church and in our community. He gives us the gifts and spiritual fruit we need to accomplish His will for our life (Acts 2:38; 1 Corinthians 12: 4-11; Galatians 5:22-23). He even enables us to forgive others, so that He can forgive us (Mark 11:25).

We cannot overcome this world, unless the Spirit does it for us (1 John 5:4). Therefore, walking in the Spirit is the foundation for every other discipline and gift God desires for us to receive. The more we walk in the Spirit, the less we desire anything offered to us by the world, the flesh and the devil (Romans 5:16, 25). This works on the same principle as dispelling darkness from the room. The only way to accomplish this feat is by turning on the Light (1 John 1:5-7).

Prayer:

Father God, the closer we walk to You, the further the devil stays away from us, the less we want to sin and the more we accomplish Your will for our life. You chose us before You created the world. This both humbles and excites us. Help us to walk holy and blameless in Your sight (Ephesians 1:4). Teach us to develop prayer as a way of life, which never ceases. Draw us close to You, and never let us go (James 4:8). Remind us that You created us to work for Your Kingdom, not for our own goals, ambitions and desires (Ephesians 2:10).

Thought for the Day:

We desire to walk firmly rooted and built up in Christ, living in His will and brimming over with thankfulness. – Colossians 2:7

Intimacy Through Union

 

Once we come to Christ in Salvation, we never need to search for significance again. He dwells within us. We are one with Him and with the Father (John 17:21). It is an indestructible union that neither principalities, powers, rulers of the darkness of this world, nor anything else in all creation can demolish (Romans 8:39; Ephesians 6:12). We have more intimacy and oneness with God than is possible with any human relationship, because Jesus dwells within us by His Spirit (Romans 8:9).

Christ’s presence transcends feelings and human reasoning. He is there whether we “feel” Him or not. Jesus lives in us and through us. Our relationship is a union in which the more we decrease, the greater He increases in us to the glory of God the Father (John 3:30; Philippians 2:11). We are the manifestation of His Body in the world today. His supernatural abilities reside within us by His Spirit. We are able to do whatever He calls us to do, no matter how impossible the task appears (John 14:13-14).

We do not strive to become like Christ; we simply surrender to Him. Then He uses His power and authority through our life. We will do greater works than He did, because He lives within us (John 14:12). Keeping Biblical mandates and the Law does not keep us from sinning. The opposite is actually true. Our failure to keep the law makes us more aware of our sinfulness and failings. The power of sin is in the Law (1 Corinthians 15:56; Romans 3:19-20). God gave us the Law in order to point us to Christ (Galatians 3:23-25). When we slip into sin, we have an advocate with the Father (1 John 2:1).

We are so united in our intimate relationship with God, through Christ by the Spirit, that sin is the only thing that can bring a division between us. Yet, once we repent of our transgression, God is quick to restore our union with Him again (1 John 1:9). This union brings us liberation from sin and the world. Sin has no power over authentic Believers, because Jesus, who has the power over sin and death, lives within us (Romans 8:2-4). Now we live under grace (Romans 6:14). God made Jesus, who never sinned, to be sin for us. Now we are the righteousness of God in Christ (2 Corinthians 5:21; 1 John 1:9).

God is not a personality that lives way up on a throne in Heaven. Christ dwells within us (Colossian 3:3). Once we realize the overpowering truth of this statement, our whole attitude about life changes. Nothing in life happens to us alone. It also affects the triune God living within us. God use these circumstances for His purposes: to perfect our life and to further His Kingdom in the earth. Once we get fed up with trying to keep the law and completely surrender our life to Christ, God rejoices. He wants us to live our life with our focus on Christ, not on our self.

We simply need to ask God to reveal His will and purpose to us in the situation we are in right now. We ask Him what He wants us to do and say. Then we listen and follow the leading of His Spirit within us. We find more purpose and meaning in life with this mindset. Nothing happens by chance, but by God’s design and for His reasons. Christ is all and is in all (Colossians 3:11). God created everything through Christ and nothing was created except through Him (John 1:3). We are complete in Him (Colossians 2:10). Our burdens are lighter, because we have taken His yoke upon us (Matthew 11:28-30). When we are weak, then we are strong in Him (2 Corinthians 12:10).

Prayer:

Lord Jesus, if we think of our self as separate from You, then we feel the need to carry our burdens alone. The only reason we would have to be upset about our circumstances is if we forget that we are not helpless in them. They are also happening to You within us. You are a permanent resident within our spirit. We are one with You. Once we realize that You want to reveal Yourself in us and through us, then we will never walk alone again (Galatians 1:15-16).

Thought for the Day:

There is no spiritual life in us apart from Christ in us, our hope of glory.
– Colossians 1:27

Walking in the Fullness of Christ

Read: 2 Timothy 1:9-10

“And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.” – Philippians 4:7

Jesus established a new covenant with the world by His blood, offering forgiveness and salvation to anyone who would approach Him in faith (Matthew 26:28). He gave His body as the ultimate sacrifice, and did away with the need to sacrifice animals for our sins. The Lamb slain before the foundation of the world offered a perfect sacrifice to atone for sins for anyone who will choose to repent and believe (Revelation 13:8; 1 Peter 1:20; 1 John 2:2). Having neutralized the spiritual powers and authorities through His death, He made a public display of them, defeating them forever by the cross (Colossians 2:15).

As a divine metal smith, God removes the dross in our life through His refining fire, and He gives us a new life (Proverbs 27:21; 2 Corinthians 5:17). We are given the fullness of Christ, which makes us complete in Him (Colossians 2:10). Our Heavenly Father gave us His grace before the beginning of time, and is now revealed to us through Jesus Christ (2 Timothy 1:9-10). Through His grace we have the privilege of confidently approaching God’s throne at any time of need (Hebrew 4:16). Because of His grace, we are entrusted with the secret things of God, so that we can prove our faithfulness in sharing the Gospel of Jesus Christ with everyone we come in contact with (1 Corinthians 4:1-2).

The more time and intimacy we invest in our relationship with God, the closer we come to being conformed to the image of Christ. He uses our trials to instruct us, mold us and to develop the perseverance of our faith (James 1:3). He constructs a pliable heart of flesh out of our hardened heart of stone (Romans 2:29; Ezekiel 36:26). God fashions us into a replica of His Son (Romans 8:29). Then He puts His desires in our heart as we delight our self in Him (Psalm 37:4). The rewards we receive from following God’s desires for our life far outweigh any fulfillment we receive from pursuing our own carnal, earthly desires.

We do well to adopt Jesus’ attitude in life. His sole desire was to only do the work that would glorify His Father (John 17:4). As Job did, we can delight in the Almighty and lift up our face to God (Job 22:26). When anxiety overwhelms us, God’s consolation brings joy to our soul (Psalm 94:19). Out of our love for Him we walk in His ways, even when we feel incapable of fulfilling His calling on our life (Ephesians 2:10). Our Sovereign Lord gives us everything we need to perform the ministry, which He calls us to do (1 Corinthians 4:7).

We gain an understanding of God’s Word through daily reading and weekly Bible study. Worshipping with fellow Believers gives us accountability and strengthens our walk. Our faithfulness goes beyond our beliefs into our walk and our works. If we say one thing and do another, we are no better than the Pharisees, whom Jesus referred to as hypocrites (Matthew 23:27) The hypocrite’s eternal destination is full of weeping and great pain (Matthew 24:51). On the other hand, Jesus promises to share Paradise with authentic Believers for all of eternity (Luke 23:43).

Prayer:

Lord Jesus, God in all of His fullness is pleased to live in You. Through You, God reconciled us to Himself along with all things whether here on earth or in heaven. He made peace through Your blood, which You shed for all of us on the cross (Colossians 1:19-20). Even though we have not seen You, we love You and believe in You. You fill us with an inexpressible and glorious joy (1 Peter 1:8). Thank You for allowing us to experience Your love, although it is too great to fully comprehend. Thank You for making us complete in You, with all the fullness of life and power that comes from God (Ephesians 3:19).

Thought for the Day:

According to the riches of God’s glory, He strengthens us through His Spirit with power in our inner man. - Ephesians 3:16