CHOOSE TO FOLLOW JESUS...RIGHT NOW
God has a love for mankind that continues to draw men unto himself, and desires that none should perish, 2 Peter 3:9. But God has a special love for his children. As his children we have a work to do in the Kingdom right now and a standard to uphold in our lives every day. We must choose Jesus every day of this life..
It grieves my heart to see some "Christians" seem to think it is OK to go on a rant, expressing their anger and unrighteous indignation in any situation, any way they feel like it.. they threaten to beat up, call names and swear. i say, read the Word of God, especially the Gospels of Jesus, where He is crucified, see how many words of hate and anger he spoke in a vain, selfish and crude way.. NOT ANY. He even asked God to forgive his accusers for they knew not what they were doing, Luke 23:34. In James He tells us to have holy conversations and speech.. Do we? Are we really Christ-like? Do we really have pure hearts? Are we Holy as He is holy? Every day we need to ask ourselves who we represent in our lives. Who do we look like, who do we act like, who do we speak like? It is really pretty simple, we represent God or the Devil.. Each choice for self is a victory for Satan.. Each time we give in to the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes or the pride of life, we give the devil a foothold in our lives.. 1 JOhn 2:16. Jesus set our standard, God set our standard in His Word.
The Truth is, out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks.. Matthew 12:34.. The Truth is we will be judged for EVERY IDLE WORD we speak.. Matthew 12:36. Do we believe ALL of God's Word or not? Do we just pick the words of God that are easy to FIT INTO our lives? We cannot pick and choose. Maybe being holy and righteous in his sight is to just be quiet when angry so as not to sin against a holy and righteous God..to change our mind and call upon Him to keep us from sin BEFORE we open our mouth and insert foot. The Truth is we are to be quick to listen, slow to speak and slow to wrath.. James 1:19. Do we believe that followers of Christ are held to a higher standard? Absolutely NO compromise. We CANNOT look like this world.. it is not our home and we cannot look like it is.
Christ did not die to fuel the fire of cheap talk, anger and unrighteous indignation.. He came to reconcile us unto God, Colossians 1:20-22, so we can have abundant life to the fullest, IN HIM. Not a worldly life full of things and busyness, not the worldly life the devil would have you believe God wants you to have, 1 Timothy 4:1 . The devil desires to deceive and kill unto hell, Matthew 10:28, 1 Peter 5:8. Everything he does is contrary to a holy and righteous God, but he will have you believe it is good and right in your own eyes..Isaiah 5:20.
God wants us to have a true holy and righteous life here and now and into eternity, serving our one true God forever.. There is no greater joy or deeper peace than being in right standing with and serving our God in all circumstances whether it be joy or sorrow, trial or blessing. If we do not understand this, then we need to be reading our word more and praying more. There are no shortcuts to livng in the perfect will of God, it takes patience, endurance, perseverance, it takes faith, hope, love, it takes guarding a heart that is following hard after God on the narrow way marked out for us, consistently.
JESUS IS LORD OF ALL
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