Appreciation

 

Appreciation

 

Colossians 3:15

And let the peace of God rule in your hearts, to the which also ye are called in one body; and be ye thankful.

 

               One thing that is common in both God and man is that everybody likes to be appreciated.  We will go to great lengths sometimes for others if they have a grateful heart and are appreciative of our efforts.  It is important that we always appreciate the Lord.  It is this appreciation that keeps us mindful of Him and all of His wonderful attributes and the blessings we so richly enjoy from Him.  It is a dangerous thing for us to develop an ungrateful spirit.  That spirit shuts us off from people and causes us to only be caught up with ourselves. 

               We see that thankfulness and appreciation to the Lord are basic steps of etiquette to entering into His presence and fellowship.  Psalms 100:4 tells us, “Enter into his gates with thanksgiving, [and] into his courts with praise: be thankful unto him, [and] bless his name.”  We can never appreciate the Lord too much and that heart of thankfulness and praise should be resident in us continually. Appreciation gives value to the one receiving it and it is an act of humility and respectfulness on the part of the one delivering it.

The lack of appreciation has far different results.  As many in the world were caught up in sin, it caused their hearts to become hardened toward God, as it can ours.  What was the result of their ungratefulness and lack of appreciation to the glorious God and Creator who authored our lives and gave us life?  Romans 1:18-32 gives the account of man’s ungratefulness and what results.  “The wrath of God is being revealed from heaven against all the godlessness and wickedness of men who suppress the truth by their wickedness, 19since what may be known about God is plain to them, because God has made it plain to them. 20For since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse.

21For although they knew God, they neither glorified him as God nor gave thanks to him, but their thinking became futile and their foolish hearts were darkened. 22Although they claimed to be wise, they became fools 23and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images made to look like mortal man and birds and animals and reptiles.

24Therefore God gave them over in the sinful desires of their hearts to sexual impurity for the degrading of their bodies with one another. 25They exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshiped and served created things rather than the Creator—who is forever praised. Amen.

26Because of this, God gave them over to shameful lusts. Even their women exchanged natural relations for unnatural ones. 27In the same way the men also abandoned natural relations with women and were inflamed with lust for one another. Men committed indecent acts with other men, and received in themselves the due penalty for their perversion.

28Furthermore, since they did not think it worthwhile to retain the knowledge of God, he gave them over to a depraved mind, to do what ought not to be done. 29They have become filled with every kind of wickedness, evil, greed and depravity. They are full of envy, murder, strife, deceit and malice. They are gossips, 30slanderers, God-haters, insolent, arrogant and boastful; they invent ways of doing evil; they disobey their parents; 31they are senseless, faithless, heartless, ruthless. 32Although they know God’s righteous decree that those who do such things deserve death, they not only continue to do these very things but also approve of those who practice them.”

               Our ungratefulness and lack of appreciation causes a perverted and arrogant way of thinking and leads us to God’s wrath and judgement.  On the other hand, a truly grateful, thankful and appreciative heart can lead us into God’s very presence and the fullness of joy.  What does God command us to do?  Love Him with all of our hearts and love our neighbor as ourselves.  That means we truly need to appreciate the Lord and appreciate those that God places in our lives.  We might be amazed at the difference we would have in our relationships if we really became sensitive and attentive to appreciating those around us.  We all want to feel that the things we do are worthwhile and that we are valued.  We all want to be appreciated, even God.

Blessings,

#kent 

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A Call to Godly Perspective

2 Corinthians 5:16-21
So from now on we regard no one from a worldly point of view. Though we once regarded Christ in this way, we do so no longer. 17Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has gone, the new has come! 18All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation: 19that God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ, not counting men’s sins against them. And he has committed to us the message of reconciliation. 20We are therefore Christ’s ambassadors, as though God were making his appeal through us. We implore you on Christ’s behalf: Be reconciled to God. 21God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.

A Call to Godly Perspective

We are naturally inclined to see, hear, smell, feel and taste. We tend to analyze and evaluate our world from a natural perspective. God has brought us into a spiritual sense. The Apostle Paul is talking here about no longer evaluating and seeing your world from a natural, self-centered perspective, but from God’s perspective. Paul is saying here that even Jesus, the Christ, whom you knew after the flesh, it is not His flesh that we relate with now, it is the Spirit.
What is the spiritual perspective of God? It is that He was in Christ reconciling sinful man back to Himself. The Lord Jesus fulfilled the act needed for man to be reconciled and now we are His ambassadors, His expression of love and truth to express the intent of God to man, as He has expressed it and made it real to us. We who have experienced Christ and His love and salvation working in our lives are now God’s voice to the world around us saying” Come and be reconciled to your God. Come to know Him through the shed blood of Christ that has made attonement for your sin so that they will not be counted against you.” We must see men, no longer after the flesh, but as spiritual beings in need of the message of reconciliation. The mission statement of the God is summed up in verse 21, “God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.” God is imploring us and He is imploring others through us, “Be reconciled to God!” We should carry this message of reconciliation to the world around us, if we do nothing else. Regard those around you as spiritual beings, lost and searching for the answer as to their existence and purpose. We find it when we are reconciled to God through Jesus Christ. God in Christ is making this appeal through us. Let us be faithful to live out of this godly point of view.

Blessings,
#kent

Confession of Faith

Philippians 3:3-6
I thank my God every time I remember you. 4In all my prayers for all of you, I always pray with joy 5because of your partnership in the gospel from the first day until now, 6being confident of this, that he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus.

Confession of Faith

Sometimes, if I start to see myself after the flesh, I will become discouraged, depressed and defeated. I will focus on all of the things I am not, all of the places I still fail, all the places I’m still selfish and self-centered and on all of that which I don’t yet see. I will allow my circumstances to dictate a life that I left behind when I identified myself with Christ on that cross and died to that old man of sin and death. If I allow myself, I could go back there again, but then that would be to deny Christ and what He has done for me. That would be to say that I wasn’t raised in the newness of His life, to live out of His life and no longer my own. That would be to return again and live under the law of sin and death, rather than out of the law of the Spirit of life that is in Christ Jesus. That would be to embrace the flesh, whose end is death and corruption, rather than embracing the Spirit, who enables and empowers me to walk in Life in the divine nature of His love.
What I am identifying with is what I am and am becoming, whether it be flesh or Spirit. It isn’t dependent upon what I see outwardly, it is fully dependent upon my believing the promises that my God gave to me or forsaking them to go back from whence I came. Behind me is only what brought me guilt and shame, but before me is my Jesus who has promised to bring to completion the good work that He began in me.
No, I may not see the fullness of Him yet, but I will keep pressing into Him, expecting and believing for His highest for me. I will not allow the discouragement, natural circumstances and even facts to detour me from the truth that I know in my heart. For I refuse to see through natural eyes alone anymore. He is teaching me to see all things after the Spirit; myself, my spiritual family and even the world around me. As I walk in the faith of who He is in me, I see more clearly others through God’s heart of love. I see that I walk in the earth, but I live out of heaven. I live in Christ Jesus who sits at the right hand of the throne of God. From that place I know that whatever touches my life has to come through the Father and the Son. I know that He works all things to my good, even the bad things, because He has loved me and called me according to His purpose. He doesn’t just love me, but in that love He corrects me, teaches me and stretches me. He makes me to come out of the dependency of my flesh, so that I can more full rest and rely upon Him. Only there will I learn of His rest that He has for me and only there can I operate out of the fullness of faith without which it is impossible to please Him.
I don’t know everything, I just know His Word. I don’t understand everything, I just trust the Holy Spirit to help me understand what I need to know. Life has a new meaning and purpose because He is in it. Because of that, it is no longer about me, it is all about Him. He has told me that all of His promises to me are “yes and amen”. As I walk in the faith of the Son of God who loved me and gave Himself for me, I believe I can walk into all that He has prepared for me. I don’t believe I have to die and go to heaven to experience and live out of a more abundant life. I believe heaven wants to live that abundant life through me as I walk in the earth. I believe God wants to manifest that kingdom in my earthen body as it is in heaven, but He can’t do that while I am still caught up in me. So with God’s grace and the power of His Spirit I submit myself and my will, which is the one gift He has allowed me to give to Him.
If you are looking for perfection in me, you won’t see it yet, but know that even in my human frailty and weakness I pursue Him who knows none. His blood continues to wash me and His grace certainly carries me. Out of His strength and abundance I will live and declare the name of the Lord, for He is my salvation, both now and evermore.

Blessings,
#kent

The Pothole of Self Pity

 

The Pothole of Self Pity

Jonah 4:1-4

But it displeased Jonah exceedingly, and he was very angry.  And he prayed unto the LORD, and said, I pray thee, O LORD, [was] not this my saying, when I was yet in my country? Therefore I fled before unto Tarshish: for I knew that thou [art] a gracious God, and merciful, slow to anger, and of great kindness, and repentest thee of the evil Therefore now, O LORD, take, I beseech thee, my life from me; for [it is] better for me to die than to live.  Then said the LORD, Doest thou well to be angry? 

In the Word of God perhaps Jonah serves as kind of the poster child of self-pity.  He had to go where he didn’t want to go, preach to a people he didn’t want to preach too, and then see God’s mercy toward them when they repented, that he didn’t want to see.  He made no bones that he had an attitude concerning the matter.  So he is just telling the Lord to end his life, it’s not worth living any more.

While it is easy for the reader to see how wrong Jonah’s attitude was, he didn’t see it and most of the time we don’t really see it in us either.  

I really think the enemy tries to feed our minds with thoughts of how unfair life is to us and how we so often are mistreated, abused, neglected or unappreciated.  That is not to say that there is never any substance to these feelings, for often there are valid reasons we feel this way.  What we must guard against is the subtly of the enemy and our own self, as we tend to get our eyes on us and all of our woes.  

The Lord gave me a good revelation of this in myself recently.  Request were always being made of me to do this or that which was okay, but then I began to feel that they really never seemed interested in caring and responding to my needs.  Now the thing about self-pity is that it’s like a good stew, the longer it simmers the better it gets, the more justified we feel and the more unfair life seems.  So finally it all came out and the other person had to sit and listen to all of my “woe is me”.  The truth is they probably had feelings of being neglected or taken advantage of just like I did.  Afterwards I began to get a revelation of the pothole of self-pity I had stepped into.  Here is all of this talk about how we need to lay our lives down and walk in love and all of sudden I look up and see this big old stain of selfishness in me.  Sometimes we get these wake-up calls about how shallow our love really is.  I realized that whenever I am turning inward and caring more about me than about others, I am going to be discontent and unhappy, because my needs and expectations will seldom be really met by others.  I need to be leaving those feelings with the Father, because He is the one who completes me and fulfills me.  The truth is, I am probably often going to be a disappointment to others in meeting their wants and needs just as they are in meeting mine.  How many times do needs and expectations not get met because we are living selfishly, upset about what we don’t have while we fail to consider if we are really meeting the needs in others.  This introspection usually just leads to greater and greater polarization.  That is why the Word is always exhorting us to get our eyes off ourselves and on to the needs of others.  The less place that we give to self, the less place it has to feel sorry for itself.  

We often think or say, “Will, if the Lord had given me a better husband or wife, or better children, or a nicer neighbor or better Christian friends, or different relatives, I wouldn’t feel and act the way I do.  Do we ever consider that may be exactly why we have these people in our lives?  In a perfect world you will never be stretched and grow beyond where you are at.  Only opposing forces cause us to reach further, try harder, and exert more energy to overcome our opposition.  We say, “Well, that person just brings out the worst in me.”  Praise God, how would you and I ever know what was in us if we didn’t have people that revealed our true heart.  It is the irregular people in our lives that give us the opportunity to exercise and practice our Christian values.  Instead of seeing the irregular people in our lives as our problem, maybe we need to view them like our spiritual gymnasium where we can workout, exercise and practice our Christian love, values and the nature that God wants to work in us.  It is only when I see and acknowledge my sin and weakness that I can repent of it and seek the Lord’s help in overcoming it.  There is no one that can help us become more conformed to the image of Christ than our enemy.  If Jesus would have had no Judas or religious leaders to betray and falsely accuse Him, there would have been no Calvary and we would not have the salvation we are now partakers of.  Our adversity can serve to bring us up into godliness as we meet it with the Spirit and attitude of Christ.  If we have a selfish or self-centered attitude, then like Jonah we are going to become angry and bitter as we justify and feel sorry for ourselves.  

Watch out for that pothole of self-pity.  It is one you can really twist your ankle on and cripple your walk.  Do all things as unto the Lord and for His glory and honor, counting it all joy that in your service you first serve Him. “Let all your things be done with Love (1 Corinthians 16:14).”

 

Blessings,

kent

The Crossroads of Life and Death

The Crossroads of Life and Death

John 5:24
Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that heareth my word, and believeth on him that sent me, hath everlasting life, and shall not come into condemnation; but is passed from death unto life.

We have discussed how Adam’s sin and fall brought all of mankind into a state of spiritual death and separation from God and the tree of Life. Not only was it manifested in spiritual separation, but also the spirit of death worked to bring corruption and decay to all of creation. That spirit of death is at work in every creature from the time that they are born till the time that it consummates in the cessation of physical life.
When we come to the cross of Jesus Christ, we come to a crossroad and intersection of Life and Death. It is a place and a valley of decision that leads us to a turning point in our lives where we believe in Christ and pass from death to Life or we continue down the road to spiritual death. Jesus Christ stands as a doorway to Life and faith is the key to enter in. When we make the choice to enter into Him a couple of things should happen. When we enter the Master’s door and come into His house we need to remove our outer garment of the body of sin. We hang it there on the cross where Jesus died, as we identify with His death. Where we have now come too, that outer garment of self is but a hindrance and unacceptable apparel in the house where we now abide. Not only do we take off the outer garment or our former self-centered ways, but also we remove our shoes, for now we are standing on Holy ground. We no longer walk in those former ways that we walked in when we walked down the pathway of death. Now, instead we have shod our feet with the preparation of the gospel wherein we carry and communicate the life of God to all men. “And your feet shod with the preparation of the gospel of peace; (Ephesians 6:15).”
When we come into the Father’s house through our faith in Christ, the blood of Jesus has washed us from the filth and stain of sin and death. In the place of our garment of sinful flesh, we are given the spiritual garments of the righteousness of Christ. In these garments we now have right standing and restored fellowship with the Father. When He now beholds us, He no longer sees the sinful man or woman that we were. He sees the righteousness of His Son, because His blood has washed us clean of all unrighteousness. 1 Corinthians 1:30 says, “But of him are ye in Christ Jesus, who of God is made unto us wisdom, and righteousness, and sanctification, and redemption.” Also at the door we are given a white turban upon our heads called the mind of Christ. Along with this cleansed body we are given a new mind as it exhorts us in Romans 12:2, “And be not conformed to this world: but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, that ye may prove what [is] that good, and acceptable, and perfect, will of God.” Clothed with spiritual apparel and now abiding in the place Christ has prepared for us we begin living in the Life He has given us. Formerly we did not discern between life and death. All we knew was the natural dimension of life and death. Now at the juncture where we have made a right turn into the way of Life we begin to choose the ways of Life. More than a right and wrong issue of our moral choosing, our life in Christ becomes choices of life and death. We know that His Word and His Spirit are Life. The spirit of the world is selling death and calling it life. In as much as our eyes are open to the Spirit of Life and godliness we perceive the lie, rejecting it and make our choices for Life. Proverbs 23:7 warns us, “For as he thinketh in his heart, so [is] he.” It is warning us that things and people are not always as they appear on the surface. The truth is in their heart. What is in our hearts today? Are we feeding from the tree of Life? Many of us are still planting the seeds of death and bearing it’s fruit in our lives because we are not choosing and living in the Life we proclaim to have. We are experiencing spiritual defeat and we wonder why? What are we continually abiding in? What is the focus of our lives? Which tree are we feeding off of, the tree of Life or the tree of the knowledge of good and evil? The Lord doesn’t want us to be double minded in our living and our choices. He has called us to abide in the Spirit of Life and to choose Life and not death. “Be not deceived; God is not mocked: for whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap. (Galatians 6:7)”

Blessings,
kent

Faithfulness in Marriage

Faithfulness in Marriage

Malachai 2:14-16
You cry out, “Why has the LORD abandoned us?” I’ll tell you why! Because the LORD witnessed the vows you and your wife made to each other on your wedding day when you were young. But you have been disloyal to her, though she remained your faithful companion, the wife of your marriage vows.
Didn’t the LORD make you one with your wife? In body and spirit you are his. And what does he want? Godly children from your union. So guard yourself; remain loyal to the wife of your youth. “For I hate divorce!” says the LORD, the God of Israel. “It is as cruel as putting on a victim’s bloodstained coat,” says the LORD Almighty. “So guard yourself; always remain loyal to your wife.”
Our hearts are not different than those that have gone before us. They are still deceitfully wicked and perverse. Unless guarded and kept under the Lordship of Christ and led by the Spirit they will lead us in the ways contrary to His will. We live in a day when the divorce rate is somewhere around fifty percent. One out of two marriages end in divorce. What is even more sad is that it isn’t a whole lot better even among the Christian community. What is this telling us about the condition of our hearts? In Matthew 19:8 Jesus says, “He saith unto them, Moses because of the hardness of your hearts suffered you to put away your wives: but from the beginning it was not so.”
From today’s passage we can readily see that this isn’t the will of God and what His attitude about divorce is. The enemy is doing a masterful job of destroying our homes, families and marriages. The moral fabric of our society is deteriorating before our very eyes, as we become more complacent and accepting of it. So many of us end up playing right into this destruction and we wonder why God isn’t blessing us and answering our prayers. Could it be that we have become too self-centered rather than God centered? Probably the only ones who will continue reading this if it is an issue in their lives are those who really care more about God’s will than their own. None of us like to be confronted with our sins. We, like the world, want to run from the light. The difference is that we are children of the light and if we are really Christ’s then our spirit won’t let us run away even when we are in error. We have a conviction to return to what is right and repent of what is wrong.
Our biggest temptation today is self-isolation. We become too absorbed in what we want to do, what is important to us and what meets our needs and wants. As a result we isolate ourselves from the demands and needs of those around us, especially our spouses. Life begins to slowly and subtly take us in different directions and begins to place a wedge in our relationships. I can be perfectly content going my own way and doing my own thing, but when I got married and committed to that woman my life, love and loyalty, I gave up being just about myself. It is the two of us that make up one person and while we are individuals with differences we are one flesh both of us living for the good and well being of the other and not just ourselves. I know how oblivious I can become to the needs of my wife because I get so caught up in what I need to do and what is important to me. I have to remember that my top priority next to God is my wife. When I forget that I begin to unwittingly open myself up to a breakdown in our relationship. Just as I must cultivate and spend quality time in my relationship with the Lord, I can do no less with my spouse.
What I am learning is that our spiritual relationship is directly related to our natural relationship with our spouse. When there is disharmony and dissension in the natural, it hinders the spiritual dimension of our relationship with the Lord. As 1 Peter 3:7 says, “Likewise, ye husbands, dwell with [them] according to knowledge, giving honour unto the wife, as unto the weaker vessel, and as being heirs together of the grace of life; that your prayers be not hindered.” We have to remember that we are not in this by ourselves, we are together in union with Christ. We need that unity to maintain right relationship spiritually. This is another reason we as husbands and wives must commit to keeping our hearts in an attitude of submission before the Lord and to one another, willing to pray together and share our hearts together without fear of reprisals. We will all have our difficult times, but if our hearts and attitudes remain right we can resolve them.
If we are finding ourselves in the place in our lives where the storms of divorce are brewing, start by submitting your hearts to the Lord and His will. It is only in being right with Him that we can be right with each other. Love has to be the conquering force to all obstacles and we know that His love is greater than ourselves. Let His love reign in your hearts and relationships always and let us submit ourselves to one another in the spirit of that love.

Blessings,
kent

Trust in the Lord with all your Heart

Trust in the Lord with all your Heart
Proverbs 3:5-8
Trust in the LORD with all thine heart; and lean not unto thine own understanding. In all thy ways acknowledge him, and he shall direct thy paths. Be not wise in thine own eyes: fear the LORD, and depart from evil. It shall be health to thy navel, and marrow to thy bones.

This is the scripture I run too when I am faced with decisions and I don’t know the right answers. All I know is there is safety in God’s will. I also know that His ways are often not my ways and His thoughts are not my thoughts. He sees the beginning and the end of all things. His understanding is infinite and perfect, while mine is so shallow and lacking. The wonderful thing is that even if we don’t have a great mind, if we have enough sense to trust in the Lord and lean not on our understanding, if we make it our practice to put the Lord at the forefront of all that we do, we are so much further ahead than those that are wise in their own eyes. 1 Corinthians 2:16 says, “For who hath known the mind of the Lord, that he may instruct him? But we have the mind of Christ.” That mind of Christ is the Spirit and the Word in us. It rules us and guides us into all righteousness and right decision making. It keeps our eyes and heart from being self-centered and keeps us God-centered.
Often I don’t have an obvious answer to the problem or decision at hand, but I keep listening with my spiritual ears. I weigh the counsel of those around me, which should also be godly. I search the motives of my heart and I ask for God’s divine providence to intervene to close those doors that He would not have me go through and open the ones that He would have me go through. After all, He did promise to direct my paths. I believe that if we follow this scriptural principle we may not do everything perfectly, but God will perfect our ways.
People have often told me, when I make up my mind about something, I am very stubborn about changing my mind or doing it a different way. Of course that is just their perspective. I do know that if I can get that way with people then I can get that way with God. Stubbornness to walk in God’s ways is a good thing, but stubbornness to go my own way is not a pretty attribute. I believe the Bible describes it much like rebellion and the sin of witchcraft, but it is my own manipulation, compromises and devices to get my way. That’s just sin, and there is no getting around it.
The latter part of this promise is that not only will the Lord direct my path, but if I don’t get proud and I turn away from evil, it will be health to me. I take that in both physical and spiritual context. If I can really trust the Lord with all of my heart and I don’t have to try and figure everything out with my wisdom then that is going to bring me into the rest of God. How many know that you tend to be a lot healthier when you are rested? Here is a way for us to take stress out of our lives. In Matthew Jesus says, “seek first the Kingdom of God and all these thing will be added unto you.” His whole message is quit stressing and worrying about stuff. Take care of what is important, your relationship with God, family, others, and the rest will take care of itself. That’s health to your navel and marrow to you bones. Be blessed, rest and let God direct your paths.

Blessings,
kent

Life Principle

Matthew 7:12
So in everything, do to others what you would have them do to you, for this sums up the Law and the Prophets.

Life Principle

The base nature of man is selfishness and self-centeredness. Life starts out being all about me; my wants, my needs, my hunger, my well being, my dry diaper. A lot of people grow up without deviating much from that principle of “what about me”. As we grow up and mature, even natural law teaches that as I become responsible for a spouse and family, it isn’t as much about me anymore, in normal development it becomes more about them.
Jesus gives us life principles in His Word, that if we follow them, we can live a fuller richer life than our natural ways would or could ever provide for us. Our natural man is prone to live after the flesh in what gratifies and satisfies our natural needs and wants, but Jesus comes along and awakens in us the reality of our spiritual man that has been pretty much lying dormant. He makes us aware through His Word and Holy Spirit that life isn’t just about living to our own gain and dying. It isn’t about the person that dies with the most toys wins.
What do they win, an award for being the most selfish, greedy, self serving, covetous, and immoral? That is a hedonistic and totally selfish philosophy.
Jesus taught us two primary life principles that everything else operates out of and both of them are based in love. Matthew 12:28-33 gives these principles, “One of the scribes came and heard them arguing, and recognizing that He had answered them well, asked Him, “What commandment is the foremost of all?”29Jesus answered, “The foremost is, ‘HEAR, O ISRAEL! THE LORD OUR GOD IS ONE LORD;30AND YOU SHALL LOVE THE LORD YOUR GOD WITH ALL YOUR HEART, AND WITH ALL YOUR SOUL, AND WITH ALL YOUR MIND, AND WITH ALL YOUR STRENGTH.’31“The second is this, ‘YOU SHALL LOVE YOUR NEIGHBOR AS YOURSELF.’ There is no other commandment greater than these.”32The scribe said to Him, “Right, Teacher; You have truly stated that HE IS ONE, AND THERE IS NO ONE ELSE BESIDES HIM;33AND TO LOVE HIM WITH ALL THE HEART AND WITH ALL THE UNDERSTANDING AND WITH ALL THE STRENGTH, AND TO LOVE ONE’S NEIGHBOR AS HIMSELF, is much more than all burnt offerings and sacrifices.””
The life principle we should come to grasp is that God is Love and the light of the spirit is love. When our spirits comprehend that love then our bodies, souls and lives should become the expression of what our spirit has attained. We should come to grasp that it is only as we live out of love that we are transported into Love which God is. Love is the transport system that brings us into God’s presence and will. It first starts vertically with us and Him. As that relationship and communication is established then what fills our spirit should be spilling into our soul which is our mind, will and emotions. As that is filled then it should be transmitted horizontally through our lives into others. As we maintain that place of fellowship, intimacy and relationship with Father, then what and who He is begins spilling out of us into others.
We come to understand that selfishness and self-centeredness, only kept us from being the full expression of who we were meant to be, the expression of God’s love which is the essence of Him.
We come to understand that in the blessing of others we are blessed. The principle has a reciprocal effect upon our lives. In our giving and extending to others, it gives back to us. Even if it is not always seen, Jesus says we are storing up for ourselves riches in heaven where thieves can’t break in and steal, and where moth or rust cannot destroy. Our being spent for others is our investment in heaven. Everything that we gain in this life quickly perishes as does as our mortal man, but the higher purpose is to live to impart God’s love into others through our extravagant giving and generosity. That doesn’t just speak to material things, but our time, out attention, our grace and forgiveness, our willingness to see past the faults in others, as Jesus saw past ours, to meet our need, even as we endeavor to meet the needs of others. Loving God and loving others is the gateway of kingdom living and being. As believers in Christ, our physical beings, should simply be God deposits in the earth, conduits and transmission lines through which He can bring His power and love into the earth and all of mankind. It is the key principle of true life.

Blessings,
kent

Father has been Pleased to Give You the Kingdom

Luke 12:32-34
“Do not be afraid, little flock, for your Father has been pleased to give you the kingdom. 33Sell your possessions and give to the poor. Provide purses for yourselves that will not wear out, a treasure in heaven that will not be exhausted, where no thief comes near and no moth destroys. 34For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.”

Father has been Pleased to Give You the Kingdom

Our culture and focus has not been so different than that of Jesus’ day. Men have always been striving after earthly wealth, position, power, comfort and provision. People have always been concerned about the food they would eat, the clothes they would wear and the houses that they would live in. An earthly people are concerned for earthly things, but a kingdom people are concerned for kingdom things.
Where we are at now is the same place Jesus was speaking to the people on the Sermon on the Mount. He was sharing kingdom economy, vision, culture and living. He was telling us these aren’t just lofty ideas; He was telling us this is what kingdom living is all about. The truth of the matter is, very few of us really live in that kingdom culture.
The Father has been pleased to give you the kingdom, but to live in the kingdom you have to embrace kingdom culture. In our “Christian culture” we more or less have a mentality of an earthly culture cake with a spiritual icing. Outwardly we want to look spiritual, but inwardly it is pretty much like the rest of the world.
Jesus is telling us that there is a higher way that Father has been pleased to give us, but we have to let go of the one to embrace the other. Most of us are struggling with letting go. A lot of our prosperity messages appeal to us because we see that as a way of having the best of both worlds.
Earthly culture is all about us. It quite honestly is self-centered. Our first concern is our survival and our benefits. We are driven by how we can do better and have more, but are those God’s goals for us as believers. The real question is not how much you have, but what possesses and obsesses your heart? It is like Jesus says, Your Father knows what you have need of, so do we trust Him or do we trust us? Now Father’s ideas and yours may differ, but then who needs to make the adjustment?
Kingdom living is getting the heart of the Father and living into that with all of your being. If you want true treasure, heavenly treasure, then sow into what is in Father’s heart. Your reward may not be great on earth, but it will be eternal and rich in heaven. What we strive to attain here is but for a breath of time and then it is forever gone, but what we sow into kingdom living will prosper us always.
In this time of uncertainty many of us are asking where do we invest to protect our assets and all that we have worked for. We can foresee the economy tanking and much of what we have worked our whole lives for becoming worthless. God is telling us today the same thing that Jesus told those that he preached to on the Mount. Invest yourself in the kingdom of God, that is the only thing that is not going to be passing away. If you want to be rich, be willing to become poor, if you want to be strong, then be willing to become weak, if you want to be wise then be willing to become the fool. God is building a kingdom not out of the dust of the world, but out of lively stones that have been redeemed by the blood of the Lamb. What He is building is by His Spirit, not by might, nor by power or by the will of man.
How many of us really want the kingdom that the Father is pleased to give us? We must be willing to relinquish ours that we may fully embrace His. “For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.”

Blessings,
kent