“Our Daily Bread” http://odb.org/
The Daily Devotions of Greg Laurie
http://www.harvest.org/devotional/daily-devotions/home.ht
“Homily Grits Devotional” http://www.homilygrits.com/
2 Peter 1:5-9… But also for this very reason, giving all diligence, add to your faith virtue, to virtue knowledge, 6 to knowledge self-control, to self-control perseverance, toperseverance godliness, 7 to godliness brotherly kindness, and to brotherly kindness love. 8 For if these things are yours and abound, you will be neither barren nor unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. 9 For he who lacks these things is shortsighted, even to blindness, and has forgotten that he was cleansed from his old sins. (NKJV)
The opening scripture was written by the Apostle Peter… We know that the Apostle Peter is near the end of his life, because he mentions this in…2 Peter 1:14-15… Tradition says that Peter died under Nero’s persecution… Nero died in A.D. 68, so it is believed that Peter wrote this just before, in A.D. 67-68…
I have spent the last 7 days, in one way or another…trying to impress on all readers, how the life of a Spirit filled Christian who is walking with the Lord, is so much more rewarding than the Christian who still has baggage they are struggling to rid themselves of… Baggage of sin and self that keeps them from being all that God wants them to be…
I came across a 46 minute video this morning, I have shared with many people already…which I believe has the answer I have been searching for, for some time now… Here is the link for a video by Francis Chan, that is titled…“The Holy Spirit’s Power and Our Effort – Part 1” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Deuca-kXtnI I can’t remember when I have seen any better video presentation, that has moved me like this one…
If you stopped reading right now, and just listened to this video…I believe you would be way ahead of the game… I can’t begin to compete with this man’s excitement…with his spiritual knowledge and maturity…nor his presentation of the specifics, with just words on a page…
I am sure many Christians (me included), go to our Father in heaven, with prayers about helping us with all kinds of problems and situations we have in our lives… We pray for a good job if we are out of work… We pray for help before we take a test, if we are in school… We pray for God to fix our circumstances that we find ourselves in…
I’m not saying we shouldn’t go to God in prayer for these things… God may decide to help us…or God may decide to leave us in our current circumstances (even if their bad)… We can never understand the mind of God… He might be trying to teach us patience… Or God might even be chastising or scourging us, because we have taken our eyes off of Him…Hebrews 12:6-11…as we live with un-confessed sins…
What is most important to God, is not what we want to accomplish for ourselves…it is what God wants His children to become in Christ… Here is scripture from my writing on 2/22… 2 Corinthians 4:7… But we have this treasure in earthen vessels, that the excellence of the power may be of God and not of us. (NKJV) Our treasure is found in “the excellence of the power” of the Holy Spirit, residing in the Christian…
From my writing on 2/23… Psalm 34:8… Oh, taste and see that the Lord is good; Blessed is the man who trusts in Him! (NKJV) God want to bless those “whotrusts in Him”, not themselves…
From my writing on 2/25… James 4:7-8… Therefore submit to God. Resist the devil and he will flee from you. 8 Draw near to God and He will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners; and purify your hearts, you double-minded. (NKJV) When we totally submit to God…He will protect us from Satan, and draw nearer to us…as we draw nearer to Him…
From my writing of 2/27… Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. (NKJV) We must first put our faith and trust in God…
God wants to give His children an abundant life (John 10:10)… But He wants us to come to Him first; and then He will be free to bless His obedient children…Deuteronomy 11:26-28…
All the Christian need do is look at the opening scripture, for the key to God’s richest blessings… Faith is needed, in order to become a Christian to begin with…Hebrews 11:6… But without faith it is impossible to please Him,for he who comes to God must believe that He is, and that He is a rewarder of those who diligently seek Him. (NKJV)
But after becoming a Christian (because of God’s gift of grace, through saving faith alone in Jesus
Christ…Ephesians 2:8-9)…the Lord wants us to be continuously growing the spiritual fruit that God gave us at the time we were filled with the Holy Spirit… In the opening scripture, we see the words “virtue”, “knowledge”, “self-control”, “perseverance, “godliness, “brotherly kindness, and “love”… These are all to be cultivated, along with the original faith we needed to become a Christian…
Christian’s are to make every effort (giving all diligence), to growing our spiritual fruit…as we grow closer to God, and are being conformed into the image of His Son…Romans 8:29… This opening scripture tells us that “if these things are yours and abound, you will be neither barren nor unfruitful”…
Friends, we have our mortal thinking all wrong !! We as Christians need to concentrate on becoming the Spirit filled and continuously growing Christian…who is making every effort to focus on what God wants us to become in Christ…not on what we want our successful worldly self to become… If we don’t have God and our spiritual growth as our priority…the opening scripture reveals that…yes, we are Christians…but we are “shortsighted, even to blindness” !!!
Once God sees that we are on a consistent path towards growing our spiritual fruit…and that we are doing our best to be walking in sweet fellowship with Him, as much as humanly possible…God, and the power of the Holy Spirit, will open doors and accomplish goals that God knows are important to His children…
Ephesians 3:19-20… to know the love of Christ which passes knowledge; that you may be filled with all the fullness of God. 20 Now to Him who is able to do exceedinglyabundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that works in us, (NKJV)
Heavenly Father, I pray that Your Word, and/or the video by Your faithful servant Francis Chan…will open the eyes of any of Your children, who have placed their own wants and needs ahead of first making every effort to please You, in their quest to be conformed into the image of Your Son, Jesus Christ… Help all of us Lord, to first get our priorities straight…and then Lord, I pray that You would help us “to do exceedinglyabundantly above all that we ask or think”… I pray for this Power from above and from with-in…in Jesus’ most precious name and for His sake…Amen…
written by bruce r mills
P.S. Previous days writing can be found @ www.Godsmanforever.wordpress.com
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