Attitudes Count

What is an attitude? It is a state of mind, a prevailing thought and it influences every aspect of our life. As a melancholy from birth, my attitude reflected a pessimistic bent.

I had a hard time seeing a glass half full, because my fearful and insecure personality saw everything as a potential problem. I was never satisfied and rarely hopeful. Depression constantly nipped at my heels.

The stresses of life intimately influence our attitude, which effects our thoughts, words and deeds. According to doctors, stress causes illness and infection to invade our physical, mental and emotional state of being.

Scientific research found a direct correlation between stress and our cortisol levels, which is supposed to help us to deal with stress. The adrenal glands produce cortisol, so we are able to flee or fight.

After we deal with the stress of a situation, the cortisol and adrenalin are supposed to subside and our body returns to normal. However, with chronic stress these chemical are constantly on high alert and affect our heart, digestion, sleep and energy level, and cause us to suffer from weight gain and adrenal fatigue.

In turn, adrenal fatigue contributes to major issues such as autoimmune disease and its accompanying illnesses. Pessimism exacerbates these issues and affects our mental and emotional status as well.

The exception to this rule is when a healthy sense of pessimism encourages us to seek wise counsel, make prudent plans and discourages us from taking unnecessary risks.

However, optimism usually works more in our favor. If we discipline our inner dialogue with our self to stay positive and trust God to help us, we will live more optimistically. Godly optimism empowers us to make a difference in our life and also in our world.

Prayer:

Father God, remind us that negative self-talk in our mind will defeat us every time. Satan whispers lies in our "ear" and we end up embracing them. Help us to stop judging or criticizing our self and others, and to be encouraging - especially to our self.

As a pessimist, life feels overwhelming to me, but I thank You for helping me to reword my self-talk and to think more positively. You changed my thought processes and are helping me to change my world by allowing Your Word to cleanse my soul and to restore to me the joy of my salvation (Psalm 51:10).

Thought for the Day:

God's Spirit will choose one aspect of our life at a time, and change our way of thinking about that issue, which helps us to change our focus about other issues as well.

Eternally Secure

Doomed by our sin, and following the crowd in a sinful lifestyle, made us servants of Satan, who is actually our adversary. Our life was full of evil and under God’s wrath (Ephesians 2:1-3).

But in His rich mercy, God loved us so much that even though we were still dead spiritually, He became a man to free us from the penalty of our sins.

God’s love for us is so great that He gave us His undeserved favor by sending Jesus to die in our place (Ephesians 2:4-7). He did not come to condemn us, but to save us (John 3:16-17).

Only those who refuse to trust in Christ for eternal salvation are already condemned, because of their refusal to believe that Jesus is the only way to heaven (John 3:18).

However, those who believe that Jesus is the son of God and our Savior, are children of God. Christ in us helps us to love one another and to love our Father God as we obey His Word (1 John 5:1-4).

Once we come to the saving knowledge of Jesus Christ as our Savior, there is nothing in heaven or on earth, which can separate us from His love (Romans 8:37-39).

Even though we have not yet seen God, He lives in us by His Holy Spirit. This is our proof that we are in Him and He is in us (1 John 4:12-17).

God began His saving work in us and will continue to sanctify us and to help us to grow in His grace until Jesus comes again for His Bride, the Church (Philippians 1:6).

Our eternally secure salvation gives us an anchor for our soul - our mind, decisions and emotions, because Salvation give us this connection to God.

God dwells in the Holy of Holies in heaven, as well as in our spirit, along with Christ, who is our great High Priest and constantly intercedes for us (Hebrews 6:19-7:1)

We are crucified with Christ, and the life we are now living on this earth, we live in the power of Christ within us (Galatians 2:20). We are citizens of God’s Kingdom and we belong to His household forever (Ephesians 2:19).

Prayer:

Father God, through Your kindness, You saved us when we trusted in Christ rather than in our self for our salvation. This is not a reward for our behavior, and we can take no credit for it (Ephesians 2:8:9).

You created us as human beings and provided us a new life in Christ before we were ever born. Therefore, nothing we do to earn our way to heaven will bear any fruit toward salvation (Ephesians 2:10-11).

Thank You for sending Christ to make us all, Jews and Gentiles alike, Your unified family, by breaking down all the walls, which used to separate us. Because of You, we are no longer strangers and aliens to heaven, but members of Your own dear family (Ephesians 2:14).

Thought for the Day:

Apart from God, and far away from a life in Him, we are His enemies; but in Christ we are God’s children and He is near to us, living in our spirit, and making us eternally secure - Ephesians 2:12-13

Born Again

God breathed the breath of life into Adam and he was born in body, soul and spirit (Genesis 2:7; 1 Thessalonians 5:23). Adam lived in total union with our Father God in the Garden of Paradise. God’s perfect design included us living with Him in Paradise for eternity as well. There was only one commandment Adam had to keep, and his pride would not allow him to remain faithful. Adam’s sin separated him from God. When Adam sinned, his spirit died.

All human beings are born with a body and soul, which are alive, but our spirit is dead is sin too. That is why human beings crave spirituality, seek Nirvana and go on holy pilgrimages. We are trying to reconnect to God and experience the rebirth of our spirit. Before He created the world, God designed a plan to redeem man back to Himself. He took a human form and sacrificed Himself to pay the penalty of our sin.

Jesus, the man, was connected to God in Spirit throughout His lifetime (Johan 1:1; 1 Timothy 3:16; John 4:24). Since God was His true Father, He was not born with the curse of Adam’s sin on His life (Luke 2:11). He did live in this sin-cursed world, however. Like us, His soul – thoughts, choices and emotions – was influenced by the carnality in the world around Him. His soul had to grow in wisdom and his body in stature, and it was His choice to grow in favor with both God and man (Colossians 2:3; Luke 2:52).

As God the Son, the second person of the Trinity, Jesus willingly laid down His life for us. Our human body will go to the grave, but our soul – our thoughts and emotions - will never die (John 11:25-26). Only those who trust in Jesus and turn from their wicked ways are Born Again in our spirit. We have eternal life through Jesus Christ, our Lord (1 John 5:11-12). We abide in total union with God, live and move and have our being in Christ, and are led by God’s Spirit all the days of our life (Acts 17:28; Galatians 5:16, 25).

Prayer:

Lord Jesus, You suffered in life just as we do (Hebrews 2:14-18). You became a man, so that in You, we can live as You (2 Corinthians 5:21). Your Spirit exchanges our carnal humanity with Your righteousness. We have Your life dwelling within us (1 John 5:12). We grow in wisdom and stature by Your sanctifying process in our soul. We thank You for dying in our place and giving us Your eternal life now and forever. Teach us to have eternal values now as well. Show us the reality of our union with You in this life, so that we can reap the benefits of holy living both now and in eternity. We find our true identity in You.

Thought for the Day:

When our spirit is Born Again, we are united with Christ, who is our life (Colossians 3:4).

 

 

What Does It Mean to be Saved?

Read: John 3:16-18

"I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for me." - Galatians 2:20

God issued a universal call to all men to come to Him for eternal life (John 3:16). Due to our unbelief, we are lost in our trespasses and sins. We are condemning ourselves to eternal doom, because we refuse to accept Jesus’ death as a ransom for the penalty of our sins (John 3:18). We cannot cross over from spiritual death to everlasting life until we do surrender our life completely to Christ. Jesus took our sins and received the punishment of that sin on our behalf (2 Corinthians 5:21). In exchange, He gave us His righteousness.

When God sees the Believer now, He no longer sees our faults, but only sees the perfection of Christ within us (Philippians 3:8,9). Once we do accept Christ as our Savior, our old, sinful nature is crucified with Christ on the cross (Galatians 2:20). Sometimes, we are still enticed by the lusts of our flesh, the draw of Satan’s deceitfulness, or the temptation of the world. Then we allow sin to war in our soul – our mind, will and emotions - against the things of the Spirit. Thankfully, our carnal nature no longer holds power over us, because we are set free through Christ’s redemptive work on the Cross (Romans 8:2).

Though we still struggle with sin in the flesh, the Bible declares we have victory over both the penalty and the power of sin. As we walk in the Spirit, we will no longer fulfill the lusts of the flesh (Galatians 5:16, 18, Romans 7). Once we see ourselves as being crucified with Christ, we can also see ourselves as resurrected with Him. This resurrection life starts with salvation and is ours now and for all eternity (Romans 6:4-5).

As we walk in this crucified life, our lives are a witness to the freedom of the gospel message to everyone who knows us.  We receive power to live a victorious life free from sin. We are made alive in the peace and joy of Christ to live righteously (Romans 6:18). We are set free from sin and are now slaves to God. Eternal life is our reward for living in holiness (Romans 6:22). We eventually come to a point where we stop living according to the flesh, and we set our mind only on the things of the Spirit instead.

Whoever is born of God does not live in habitual sin, because God’s seed remains in us. Our spirit is eternal, holy and spotless. We are no longer slaves to sin, but set free to enjoy God’s glorious freedom (Romans 6:2). We cannot live a sinful lifestyle, because we have been born of God through Jesus’ death on the cross (1 John 3:9). Christ lives in us now and His power breaks the yoke of bondage to sin in us, so that we are continually growing closer to the point of being totally dead to sin of any kind (Colossians 1:27; Romans 6:11).

Pledge to surrender your life to Christ, then to fill your life with Bible reading, praying, serving and worshipping God. Attend services with your church family. Surrender to the guidance of His Holy Spirit all day long. The more time we spend in God’s presence, the less time Satan will have to tempt us to sin. Salvation is something even the prophets wanted to know more about when they prophesied about God’s gracious salvation prepared for us (1 Peter 1:10). The reward for trusting Christ is the eternal salvation of our souls (1 Peter1:9).

Prayer:

Lord Jesus, thank you for the undeserved favors of Your mercy, the power of grace to resist sin, the peace of a spiritual walk, the discernment to detect Satan’s wiles and the wisdom to walk away from them. We know that to be carnally minded is death; so we choose to be spiritually minded and to enjoy Your life and peace (Romans 8:5-6). Let our light so shine that everyone we know will see our good works and glorify You and want to join us in heaven.

Thought for the Day:

Live a life, which is both dead to sin and raised to walk in the freedom of Christ.