The Call to Salvation

Due to the first Adam’s sin, we are all born with a spirit dead in this sin (Ephesians 2:5). Our spirit must be Born Again for us to be a fulfilled human being with a living body, soul and spirit. 

Until we experience conviction for our sin, we live in self-righteousness. In our self-righteousness, we will never recognize our need for a Savior. We try to live a good life, earning our own salvation (Acts 4:11-12; Ephesians 2:8-9).

This prevents us from realizing our need for the indwelling Spirit of God. Though we live a moral life, we still need Jesus as our Savior. Unless our spirit is Born Again, we cannot enter the Kingdom of Heaven (John 3:7). 

When this conviction finally comes to our conscious awareness, then we do not need to listen to friends and family who try to talk us out of it. Salvation requires more than a formal, mental relationship with Jesus. 

We cannot connect with Him personally if we rely only on church services. We need a heart-changing revelation of who He is and what He means to us. 

Once this occurs, Jesus takes all of our sins, all of our fears, all of our needs and earthly cares and turns them into blessings.

God calls us to know Him intimately on a daily basis. He heals the deepest recesses of our soul and gives us His new life, one day, one moment at a time (Psalm 23:3). 

When we see Jesus, we see Calvary. We recognize the world for what it is, a cursed place. We no longer belong to this world, but are accepted into God’s beloved family (Ephesians 1:6).

Prayer:
Father God, thank You for revealing to us that salvation has nothing to do with our human effort or human love at all. When we base our salvation more on feelings than Biblical truth, the devil takes advantage of us and draws us away from You. 

Teach us to provide discipleship classes and to intercede for all new Believers. The intercession of Your Holy Spirit for the Saints in this present evil world can only be made through authentic Believers filled with Your Spirit (Romans 8:27). Remind us to pray diligently for them.

Thought for the Day:

As authentic Believers, we cannot help but to speak about the things that we hear and see Jesus do in our own life.

The Indwelling Spirit

 

When we reach the place of trust in Christ alone, we enter the rest offered to us by God in His Promised Land. We enjoy plentiful provision and we lack no good thing (Psalm 34:10). Our life no longer has deprivation or turmoil. As we follow the Holy Spirit’s direction, we win every battle and experience complete victory. Through our union with Christ, we accomplish everything He calls us to do (Ephesians 2:10), because He works through us in His strength (Matthew 19:26).

We could never provide any of this for our self. There is, however, a chance that we might fall short of entering into this rest of God because of our unbelief (Hebrews 4:1,11). Entering God’s rest takes a life of total surrender, as well as faith in God’s faithfulness. God’s first step is to bring us out of the world, and then to bring us to salvation through His work of redemption in our life. He fills us with His Spirit’s anointing and power.

Many Christians stop short of entering God’s rest by concentrating only on His elementary truths, so they never reaching spiritual maturity (Hebrews 6:1). God calls us to lay at the altar everything, which would separate us from Him, and then to embrace each Word of His Truth. He calls us to seek first His Kingdom, as He provides us with everything we need (Matthew 6:33). God’s Spirit conforms us into the likeness of Christ and we reflect His glory, which is full of grace and truth (John 1:14,17). 

As we surrender to God’s goodness and power, we give up all for Him. We walk in His love. Like Jesus, we return love for hatred and blessing for cursing (Luke 6:28; Romans 12:14). We can only accomplish this as we maintain fellowship with Christ throughout our day. We cannot enjoy God’s presence at the same time we indulge in the sins of this world. God’s indwelling Spirit transforms us into the humility and holiness of Christ along with all of His spiritual fruit (Galatians 5:22-23).

Prayer,

Almighty Father God, living for You in every moment of our day, we enjoy the greatest fulfillment available to us in this life. Yet, we often flee from times of aloneness with You in order to seek the momentary pleasures of this world. However, once we submit to You, the power of Your Spirit fills us and draws us to holiness and contentment with all that You provide for us. Your Spirit gives us both the power and the anointing to live in Your will for our life.

Thought for the Day:

There is no strain in living life for God according to His precepts, because it is indeed freeing to throw off the shackles of corruption.

 

Compromise with the World

 

Secular society has no idea of the advantages God gives us when we live our life dedicated to Him (1 Corinthians 2:14). The only way they have of seeing Christ is when He is consistently manifested through our life (John 14:19). If we claim the name of Christ and live in compromise with the world, we actually cast a shadow over authentic Christianity. It is only when the walking dead see an uncompromising difference in us that they see the reality of a life in Christ. They come to a crossroads where they will either accept Christ, or reject Him yet again as they continue to walk in the darkness of Satan’s defeat.

The spiritual life is far richer than the carnal life (Romans 8:6-11). We maintain our spiritual life in Christ as we fellowship with Him in prayer, in His Word and in His suffering. We walk in His faith through prayer, we learn His character through His Word and we come to know Him intimately through His suffering. He is the biographer and the fulfiller of our faith (Hebrews 12:2). Our whole life is based on our trust in Him (Romans 1:17). He is our confidence, our expectancy and our fulfillment (2 Corinthians 3:4).

Through Christ, we are reborn by the Spirit of God and have everlasting life through faith in God’s faithfulness (John 3:8, 17:3). The Spiritual life not only drenches our spirit with the indwelling Spirit of God, it also infiltrates our soul – our mind, will and emotions - through sanctification. Whoever is born of the flesh is flesh, but whomever is born of the Spirit of God is Spirit (John 3:6). Christ is our very life and He works in us through His indwelling Spirit (Colossians 3:4).

The mind controlled by the Spirit of God is full of life and peace (Romans 8:6). The emotions controlled by the Spirit of God mirror His spiritual fruit (Galatians 5:22-23). The choices controlled by the Spirit of God come from justice and holiness and reap righteousness (Proverbs 14:27). We shall never thirst, because His river of living water flows through us and out into the world around us (John 7:38). The soul possessed by the Spirit of God blossoms as a rose in the desert (Isaiah 35:1).

We, who are born of God, partake in the divine nature of God through Christ who dwells within us (2 Peter 1:4). We possess the fullest measure of Christ within us (Colossians 2:9; Ephesians 3:19). Since Jesus lives within us, we can face tomorrow with hope in our heart and joy in our soul (Jeremiah 29:11). He helps us never to compromise with the world. We will never experience the second death; because at salvation, we moved instantaneously from the earthly realm into the heavenly one.

Prayer:

Father God, while we live on this earth, You will cover us with Your feathers and under Your wings we trust that nothing will come against us that can ever irreversibly harm us. You are our shield to protect us from Satan’s arrows that fly by day; and his plagues, which come in the night; and his destructiveness, which comes at noon. Even if thousands fall all around us, we shall still stand because Your protection hold us up in Your hand (Psalm 91). Remind us that a spiritual mind is much more precious to You and to us than a fleshly one.

Thought for the Day:

A carnal mind is worse than a body containing a spirit, which dead in sin, because it limits God’s divine power from working in and through us.