Proverbs 4:23 Keep thy heart with all diligence; for out of it are the issues of life.
God sees your heart. More than anything else, God cares what is in your heart. We can’t hide anything from Him. He sees what’s in our heart. You may appear right outwardly (you wear the right clothes, wear your hair right, walk the right way, speak the right lingo) so people will think you are spiritual. But when it is all about appearances you can only go as far and it doesn’t last long. There will come a time when covering for the bases and keeping up the act will be too complicated to follow through. Christian life will then be a process of outward conformity. We are cheating ourselves but most importantly God. So, put off the pretensions and be genuine with God and others. For in 1 Samuel 16:7 it says …for the Lord seeth not as man seeth; for man looketh on the outward appearance, but the Lord looketh on the heart.
Proverbs 4:4 He taught me also, and said unto me, let thine heart retain my words: keep my commandments, and live.
God sees every intentions of our heart. It is important to take note that outward changes only happen when there is a sincere inward transformation. The inward transformation far outweighs our outward conformity. Conformities are not God’s way of changing lives. We should guard our heart for out of thy heart flows the issues of life (Proverbs 4:23). Your heart will determine the way you think and feel. The unseen influence in every choice and decisions you make. So it will either guide you into God’s will or away from His will. That is why it is very important how and what we feed our minds with for it shall influence the desires of our hearts. Are we feeding it with the Word of God or the ways of this world?
Luke 16:15 And he said unto them, Ye are they which justify yourselves before men; but God knoweth you hearts: for that which is highly esteemed among men is abomination in the sight of God.
I have learned as I study the Word of God that God has no gray areas in all issues of life. It is either good or evil, Heaven or hell, righteous or unrighteous. I have learned that God wants me to surrender to His will and what He wants is what’s in my heart for I believe that the heart is the seat of my will and more than anything else I’d rather pursue His will than my own will. Now I see that more than anything else, God wants my heart for out of it flows the issues of life. I would like to focus on the issue of heart. There two kinds of hearts: the impure and the pure heart.
IMPURE HEART
A person with this kind of heart makes decisions as they move forward into spiritual danger and never seeing that black hole. Their warning device to alert you of spiritual danger doesn’t function properly. It is distorted. It is unreliable. It becomes as such because you don’t have the Holy Spirit as your warning device. And the only way for the Holy Spirit to work in your life is when you are saved. With every decision comes a lifetime consequence and when we make wrong decisions we live with it for the rest of our life.
Matthew 5:8 Blessed are the pure in heart: for they shall see God.
PURE HEART
A person with a pure heart sees God’s warning and sees the spiritual danger before it comes. Why? Because the Holy Spirit who is our guide gives us the wisdom that we needed thus with sound and sober mind we will be able to determine the right decisions. If you will come to your senses, a person with a pure heart sees God at work in every situation and every decision. How can you go wrong if you choose to follow God’s way? In that way, you are at peace in whatever situation you are in. Your heart is being used by God to help you see things that others won’t and understand things that other miss. Your heart is completely pliable and flexible to see and follow God’s purpose and will in your life no matter what.
Only with an obedient heart can you get right with God. Get saved! Does Jesus Christ lives in your heart? Is Jesus Christ your personal Saviour? Do you believe that He is the ONLY way to Heaven? Get your heart right with God!
APPLICATION: What does God see in your heart today? What are you allowing others to see that you know you cannot hide from God?
Scriptural passages to ponder from the Word of God:
Psalm 44:21 Shall not God search this out? for he knoweth the secrets of the heart.
Jeremiah 17:10 I the Lord search the heart, I try the reins, even to give every man according to his ways, and according to the fruit of his doings.
Monday, August 18, 2008
Saturday, August 16, 2008
The Living Word of God
If you are a saved and born again Christian you will love the Word of God! Have you read your Bible lately? Have you opened the Bible more than any other books? Have you spent time with God and meditated on His Word? Or have you been spending more time doing things of this world? Maybe you have spent more time with all the distractions that this world has to offer by allotting more time watching what is on the television, or surfing the Internet or reading magazines or books or listening to worldly music?
I am privileged, unlike people in other countries where Bible is prohibited, to be able to open and read God’s Word. And with this privilege I just want to share to you that there is also a responsibility that goes with it. My responsibility is to heed the voice of the Holy Spirit in my life that I may fulfill His Word in my life. I say responsibility because I as a child of God want to do that which is good in His sight that will bring honor and glory to His precious name. But take note, I do not do things out of my own righteousness but I am able to do His will through Jesus Christ which strengthens me. And it is my responsibility to witness to other unsaved souls and win them to Christ.
I know God is not the author of confusion but of peace (1 Cor. 14:33). The Word of God is not hard to understand if you are a child of God. If you read the Word of God and words merely swim in front of your eyes and seems like you want to give up because you can’t understand what it means, pray that the Lord may send His Holy Spirit to guide and teach you for He says that He is a rewarder of them that diligently seek Him (Hebrews 11:6).But first you must get save in order for the Spirit to quicken you, meaning from a dead spirit you become alive through the saving grace of Jesus Christ. For we know that the gods of this world hath blinded the minds of them which believeth not lest the light of the glorious gospel of Christ Jesus should shine unto them (2 Cor. 4:4). Don’t give up. Just keep on reading His Word and in time the devil will flee from you and tempt you not to fulfill your flesh and instead you yearn of spiritual things.
Religion says that we are not supposed to read the Bible and interpret it on our own. But that is just how Satan works and men are not aware of his devious works. You should ask yourself, why is the Word of God given to men if they are not supposed to read it? There is really no logic in it. But that is just the way the devil tries to manipulate us away from knowing God and His will in our lives. They may quote 2 Peter 1:20-21 that says: Knowing this first that no prophecy on the scripture is of any private interpretation. For the prophecy came not in old time by the will of man: but holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost. In order to better understand the context of this chapter, you must understand that what Peter was talking about was that the prophecy on the scripture was not made up by man and not by the will of man but that some were a living witness to this prophecy which is all about Jesus Christ. You must read 2 Peter 1:16 that says: For we have not followed cunningly devised fables, when we made known unto you the power and the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but were eyewitnesses of his majesty.
I truly believe what 2 Timothy 3:16-17 says, All Scripture is given by inspiration of God,(there is no other book or books other than the Bible that is given to men that is inspired by God, so the Bible is the book unlike other religions that believes that there is the Bible and other books that they live by) and is profitable for doctrine,(the true doctrine by which we believe and live for e.g. salvation, baptism, holy trinity, that brings glory and praise back to His precious name) for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness. That the man of God may be perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all good works. And that is how I know when I am not in the perfect will of God for the Bible is there for me to search and study and to know what the Lord wills for His child.
It is so true how sometimes we don’t want to hear what the Bible tells us because we don’t want to be corrected. We don’t want to give up our flesh so we can be filled with the Spirit. Or, sometimes we thought that what the preacher is teaching God’s people is wrong (not being well verse yourselves with the Word of God as what Matthew 22: 29 says, Ye do err, not knowing the scriptures, nor the power of God) then why don’t we heed the advise given in the Bible in Acts 17:11 that says, These were more noble than those in Thessalonica in that they received the word with all readiness of mind and searched the scriptures daily whether those things were so and John 5:39 that says, Search the scriptures; for in them ye think ye have eternal life: and they are they which testify of me.
So, it is my prayer that someday, if not now, that we lay apart all filthiness and superfluity of naughtiness, and receive with meekness the engrafted word, which is able to save souls (James 1:21). Don’t wait for somebody to interpret what you should believe in. You have the Spirit that lives in you to guide and teach you.
Psalm 119:105 Thy word is a lamp unto my feet, and a light unto my path
I am privileged, unlike people in other countries where Bible is prohibited, to be able to open and read God’s Word. And with this privilege I just want to share to you that there is also a responsibility that goes with it. My responsibility is to heed the voice of the Holy Spirit in my life that I may fulfill His Word in my life. I say responsibility because I as a child of God want to do that which is good in His sight that will bring honor and glory to His precious name. But take note, I do not do things out of my own righteousness but I am able to do His will through Jesus Christ which strengthens me. And it is my responsibility to witness to other unsaved souls and win them to Christ.
I know God is not the author of confusion but of peace (1 Cor. 14:33). The Word of God is not hard to understand if you are a child of God. If you read the Word of God and words merely swim in front of your eyes and seems like you want to give up because you can’t understand what it means, pray that the Lord may send His Holy Spirit to guide and teach you for He says that He is a rewarder of them that diligently seek Him (Hebrews 11:6).But first you must get save in order for the Spirit to quicken you, meaning from a dead spirit you become alive through the saving grace of Jesus Christ. For we know that the gods of this world hath blinded the minds of them which believeth not lest the light of the glorious gospel of Christ Jesus should shine unto them (2 Cor. 4:4). Don’t give up. Just keep on reading His Word and in time the devil will flee from you and tempt you not to fulfill your flesh and instead you yearn of spiritual things.
Religion says that we are not supposed to read the Bible and interpret it on our own. But that is just how Satan works and men are not aware of his devious works. You should ask yourself, why is the Word of God given to men if they are not supposed to read it? There is really no logic in it. But that is just the way the devil tries to manipulate us away from knowing God and His will in our lives. They may quote 2 Peter 1:20-21 that says: Knowing this first that no prophecy on the scripture is of any private interpretation. For the prophecy came not in old time by the will of man: but holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost. In order to better understand the context of this chapter, you must understand that what Peter was talking about was that the prophecy on the scripture was not made up by man and not by the will of man but that some were a living witness to this prophecy which is all about Jesus Christ. You must read 2 Peter 1:16 that says: For we have not followed cunningly devised fables, when we made known unto you the power and the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but were eyewitnesses of his majesty.
I truly believe what 2 Timothy 3:16-17 says, All Scripture is given by inspiration of God,(there is no other book or books other than the Bible that is given to men that is inspired by God, so the Bible is the book unlike other religions that believes that there is the Bible and other books that they live by) and is profitable for doctrine,(the true doctrine by which we believe and live for e.g. salvation, baptism, holy trinity, that brings glory and praise back to His precious name) for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness. That the man of God may be perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all good works. And that is how I know when I am not in the perfect will of God for the Bible is there for me to search and study and to know what the Lord wills for His child.
It is so true how sometimes we don’t want to hear what the Bible tells us because we don’t want to be corrected. We don’t want to give up our flesh so we can be filled with the Spirit. Or, sometimes we thought that what the preacher is teaching God’s people is wrong (not being well verse yourselves with the Word of God as what Matthew 22: 29 says, Ye do err, not knowing the scriptures, nor the power of God) then why don’t we heed the advise given in the Bible in Acts 17:11 that says, These were more noble than those in Thessalonica in that they received the word with all readiness of mind and searched the scriptures daily whether those things were so and John 5:39 that says, Search the scriptures; for in them ye think ye have eternal life: and they are they which testify of me.
So, it is my prayer that someday, if not now, that we lay apart all filthiness and superfluity of naughtiness, and receive with meekness the engrafted word, which is able to save souls (James 1:21). Don’t wait for somebody to interpret what you should believe in. You have the Spirit that lives in you to guide and teach you.
Psalm 119:105 Thy word is a lamp unto my feet, and a light unto my path
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