The Spirit Within

The natural spirit within us, the spirit un-renewed, the spirit untouched by the Holy Spirit is evil.

The unregenerate man within us is naturally evil and filled with evil tendencies. We cannot renew ourselves, not ever! We cannot regenerate ourselves! We cannot act the part of the Holy Spirit and change our hearts. We cannot be born again of ourselves.  Of ourselves we are filled with lusts-

Jas 4:5  Do ye think that the scripture saith in vain, The spirit that dwelleth in us lusteth to envy?

The spirit that dwells within us, lusts to envy. The Holy Spirit without saves us from the spirit inside of us that would have us live to the flesh.

Gen 8:21  And the LORD smelled a sweet savour; and the LORD said in his heart, I will not again curse the ground any more for man's sake; for the imagination of man's heart is evil from his youth; neither will I again smite any more every thing living, as I have done.

The imaginations of our hearts is evil from our youth.  We ONLY have hope in our SAVIOR.

Rom 1:16  For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ: for it is the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth; to the Jew first, and also to the Greek.

Rom 1:17  For therein is the righteousness of God revealed from faith to faith: as it is written, The just shall live by faith.

TRUTH! We live by what we can know without seeing!

Rom 1:18  For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who hold the truth in unrighteousness;

Rom 1:19  Because that which may be known of God is manifest in them; for God hath shewed it unto them.

Rom 1:20  For the invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead; so that they are WITHOUT EXCUSE:

Rom 1:21  Because that, when they knew God, they glorified him not as God, neither were thankful; but became vain in their imaginations, and their foolish heart was darkened.

Rom 1:22  PROFESSING THEMSELVES TO BE WISE THEY BECAME FOOLS,

Rom 1:23  And changed the glory of the uncorruptible God into an image made like to corruptible man, and to birds, and fourfooted beasts, and creeping things.

Rom 1:24  Wherefore God also gave them up to uncleanness THROUGH THE LUSTS OF THEIR OWN HEARTS, to dishonour their own bodies between themselves:

Rom 1:25  WHO CHANGED THE TRUTH OF GOD INTO A LIE, AND WORSHIPPED AND SERVED THE CREATURE MORE THAN THE CREATOR, WHO IS BLESSED FOR EVER. Amen.

Rom 1:26  For this cause God gave them up unto vile affections: for even their women did change the natural use into that which is against nature:

Rom 1:27  And likewise also the men, leaving the natural use of the woman, burned in their lust one toward another; men with men working that which is unseemly, and receiving in themselves that recompence of their error which was meet.

Rom 1:28  And even as they did not like to retain God in their knowledge, God gave them over to a reprobate mind, to do those things which are not convenient;

Rom 1:29  Being filled with all unrighteousness, fornication, wickedness, covetousness, maliciousness; full of envy, murder, debate, deceit, malignity; whisperers,

Rom 1:30  Backbiters, haters of God, despiteful, proud, boasters, inventors of evil things, disobedient to parents,

Rom 1:31  Without understanding, covenantbreakers, without natural affection, implacable, unmerciful:

Rom 1:32  Who knowing the judgment of God, that they which commit such things are worthy of death, not only do the same, but have pleasure in them that do them.

God or Self?   Whom do you serve?

We war against ourselves and the natural spirit within us, the flesh that would do evil. We must choose GOD over self and the natural spirit, the flesh ways. We make that choice daily, hourly, always as constant lusts will rise up in us.

Tit 3:1  Put them in mind to be subject to principalities and powers, to obey magistrates, to be ready to every good work,

Tit 3:2  To speak evil of no man, to be no brawlers, but gentle, shewing all meekness unto all men.

Tit 3:3  For we ourselves also were sometimes foolish, disobedient, deceived, serving divers lusts and pleasures, living in malice and envy, hateful, and hating one another.

Tit 3:4  But after that the kindness and love of God our Saviour toward man appeared,

Tit 3:5  Not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to his mercy he saved us, by the washing of regeneration, and renewing of the Holy Ghost;

Tit 3:6  Which he shed on us abundantly through Jesus Christ our Saviour;

Tit 3:7  That being justified by his grace, we should be made heirs according to the hope of eternal life.

Tit 3:8  This is a faithful saying, and these things I WILL THAT THOU AFFIRM CONSTANTLY,  THAT THEY WHICH HAVE BELIEVED IN GOD MIGHT BE CAREFUL TO MAINTAIN GOOD WORKS. THESE THINGS ARE GOOD AND PROFITABLE UNTO MEN.

Tit 3:9  But avoid foolish questions, and genealogies, and contentions, and strivings about the law; for they are unprofitable and vain.

TRUTH!

Please Savior, please bless us in YOU as every day we face challenges against the lust warring inside of us. Please, bless us! Keep us from all evil even the evil within us! Please, let us live for YOU and YOU alone! All through the power of Your only begotten Son, Jesus Christ our Lord and Savior!

Amen!

Adultery

Are you an adulterer or an adulteress?  Before you say no, let me clarify. Are you a SPIRITUAL adulterer or adulteress?  And by SPIRITUAL I mean, are you unfaithful to God? Is God truly your God, or do you serve another god? Do you serve the god of self over God? Do you serve the god of riches? Do you serve the god of the prideful? Do you serve the god of your belly? Do you serve the god of a loved one? Is another human being the god you serve? Whatever rules your life, whatever you use to lead your life even yourself, because yes, you can choose to serve yourself as your own god, whatever it is the you look to for guidance in life, in your day to day living, this is the god you are serving and if it's not GOD it's another god whether you want to call it another god or not, and you are an adulterer or an adulteress.

So you see the question isn't whether or not you are cheating on your husband or wife, but whether or not you are cheating on God.

'Ye adulterers and adulteresses, know ye not that the friendship of the world is enmity with God? whosoever therefore will be a friend of the world is the enemy of God.'  James 4:4

The friendship of this world is an enmity with God.

If you are a friend of this world, you are an enemy of God's.

This is truth.

Think about it for a moment.  Do you truly believe that this sin infected world is the world we were intended to inhabit?  For every seemingly wondrous thing in this world there seems to be a counter evil to it in some way. This is NOT what the Lord intended for us human beings.  There are many people who will tell you differently. They'll rattle off the millions of amazing things about this world and tell us we have to love this world, but God tells us we do NOT have to love THIS world. We are to Love one another as children of God, and we are to love God, but we are not to love the thing of this world.  Too many get caught up in loving the things of this world over loving one another and loving God. Too many allow the enticements of this world to capture them.  And there are enticements around every single corner we turn.

Today if you tell someone you despise this world they might go off on a rant about having to protect this world from pollution of all sorts, that we have to stop global warming and love this world we live on because it's our home.

Am I advocating purposefully destroying the world? No, I would never say it's fine and dandy to pollute the waters and land, to destroy the air we breathe. However I will never say we have to love this world either, especially not loving it over loving each other even the person that lives to bring destruction upon the earth.

We are told this--

1Jn 2:15  Love not the world, neither the things that are in the world. If any man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him.

1Jn 2:16  For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, and the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, is not of the Father, but is of the world.

1Jn 2:17  And the world passeth away, and the lust thereof: but he that doeth the will of God abideth for ever.

EVERYTHING in this world passes away, it corrodes, it degrades, it withers, it changes, it become completely invaluable to us upon our final rest.  Everything in this world can be destroyed and will be destroyed eventually.  The only thing that remains forever is God and His Kingdom and those of His Kingdom.

How can we have the love of the Father in us when we love the world and the thing of the world more than we love Him?

The lust of flesh.

The lust of the eyes.

The pride of life.

All thing of the world, not of the Father.

We are told--

Col 2:8  Beware lest any man spoil you through philosophy and vain deceit, after the tradition of men, after the rudiments of the world, and not after Christ.

Spoiled through philosophies and vain deceits. Spoiled through traditions of men. Spoiled through the rudiments of this world.

Save through CHRIST.

We are told-

Rom 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.

The RENEWING of our MINDS in our Savior alone can save us and keep us from conforming to the world.

The renewing of our minds will help us PROVE what is the good, acceptable, perfect will of God.

Please, Father, we would NOT be conformed to this world. Please, we would not be adulterers or adulteresses, we would not be friends with this world! Help to be solely Yours! Please, Father, we would be YOURS and not the worlds! Renew our minds! Help us to know and to do Your will always!

In Your love, by Your Grace, all through Your only begotten Son, Jesus Christ!

Amen.

We lust, we ask amiss, our only hope is Jesus Christ.

We Lust.

Jas 4:2,3-

Ye lust,

and have not:

ye kill,

and desire to have, and cannot obtain:

ye fight and war,

yet ye have not, because ye ask not.

Ye ask,

and receive not, because ye ask amiss, that ye may consume it upon your lusts.

We Lust.

Mar_14:38  Watch ye and pray, lest ye enter into temptation. The spirit truly is ready, but the flesh is weak.

The fesh is very, very weak. All who comprehend that the we are at war with the flesh understand how week the flesh really is.

1Pe 2:11  Dearly beloved, I beseech you as strangers and pilgrims, abstain from fleshly lusts, which war against the soul

Our lusts war against our SPIRIT.   We have to fight our lusts, yet so many simply want to give into them claiming the impossibility of ever winning such a war. The truth is they're right, it's impossible for us to win the war. What isn't impossible is our SAVIOR winning the war for us.

Rom 6:16  Know ye not, that to whom ye yield yourselves servants to obey, his servants ye are to whom ye obey; whether of sin unto death, or of obedience unto righteousness?

Who do we yield ourselves to?

Do you yield to sin?

Or

Do you yield to obedience?

One leads to death the other to righteousness, to obedience.

If we CHOOSE to yield to obedience we are making the choice to live as our SAVIOR desires we live, not as our lusts, not as our flesh desires us to live.

Rom 6:17  But God be thanked, that ye were the servants of sin, but ye have obeyed from the heart that form of doctrine which was delivered you.

Rom 6:18  Being then made free from sin, ye became the servants of righteousness.

Rom 6:19  I speak after the manner of men because of the infirmity of your flesh: for as ye have yielded your members servants to uncleanness and to iniquity unto iniquity; even so now yield your members servants to righteousness unto holiness.

Rom 6:20  For when ye were the servants of sin, ye were free from righteousness.

Rom 6:21  What fruit had ye then in those things whereof ye are now ashamed? for the end of those things is death.

Rom 6:22  But now being made free from sin, and become servants to God, ye have your fruit unto holiness, and the end everlasting life.

Rom 6:23  For the wages of sin is death; but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.

We must become SERVANTS to GOD not to self.

Jas 4:2  Ye lust, and have not: ye kill, and desire to have, and cannot obtain: ye fight and war, yet ye have not, because ye ask not.

Jas 4:3  Ye ask, and receive not, because ye ask amiss, that ye may consume it upon your lusts.

WE ASK AMISS.

Our motives matter. Our heart matters. Our devotion to God, to His righteousness matters. Our obedience matters.

We can ask God, we can pray to God but we have to know that we can speak to Him amiss.  Just like there are people who think they are the Lord's but aren't, there are those who pray to God and they believe they are praying rightly but they are praying amiss.  Their motive even if it's deep down where they don't want to admit is a self-centered motive, not a God centered motive. They really want their own will to be done, not God's will and they can't hide it from God even if they can hide it from themselves.

Please FATHER, please help us seek You and Your righteousness in all we do. Please let Your will be done, NOT ours! Let us ask rightly, not amiss. Please, Savior, please we would be YOURS always YOURS, only YOURS. Save us from OURSELVES!

All by the grace of God, all through the love of our Savior Jesus Christ our Lord!

Would you rather die than deny your lusts?

'From whence come wars and fightings among you? come they not hence, even of your lusts that war in your members?'

Lusts vary within us, and the lusts do war in us.

Psa_78:18  And they tempted God in their heart by asking meat for their lust.

Talking about the Israelites who were led out of Egypt and slavery into the wilderness. The Israelites were not satisfied to have been freed from slavery, they wanted their old lives back in many ways and one of those ways was food.  Food lust. Do you know what food lust is? Most of us do. Most of us have obsessed over food in some manner.  We like our bellies to be full. We like our appetites to be sated. We love when our cravings are well met.  What we don't like is being denied food we desire. We do not like to only get a single bite of something we want especially when there is more to be add.

The lust we have for food isn't much talked about in the way it probably should be.

There really is a sin in food lust.

Wikipedia says-

'Lust is an emotion or feeling of intense desire in the body. The lust can take any form such as the lust for knowledge, the lust for sex or the lust for power. It can take such mundane forms as the lust for food as distinct from the need for food. Lust is a powerful psychological force producing intense wanting for an object, or circumstance fulfilling the emotion'

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Lust.

Dictionary Definition-

noun
1.intense sexual desire or appetite.
2.uncontrolled or illicit sexual desire or appetite; lecherousness.
3.a passionate or overmastering desire or craving (usually followed byfor):a lust for power.
4.ardent enthusiasm; zest; relish:an enviable lust for life.
5.Obsolete.
1. pleasure or delight.
2. desire; inclination; wish.
verb (used without object)
6.to have intense sexual desire.
7.to have a yearning or desire; have a strong or excessive craving(often followed by for or after).

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The lusts of our flesh are LETTING the desires we have rise up and rule over us.

Is sex wrong? No, not in and of itself, but is a lust to the exclusion of all else for sex, wrong? Yes!  And it's this way with most lusts.

Food is something we are meant to enjoy, meant to desire. We are made to have to eat. We are given taste buds so that the pleasure centers of our brain connected with food are trigger when we enjoy what we are eating, and vice versa. A lot of things that are bad for us taste bad for us.

The children of Israel were slaves and yet even as slaves they were fed consistently. They had meat to eat and maybe they weren't overfed, maybe they even went hungry a lot, but they knew they'd be getting a little meat all the time. They never envisioned a time when they wouldn't have food available to keep them alive.  When they went into the wilderness that all changed. For the first time they had to worry about a lot of things they never had to worry about before. They were given food to eat to sustain them, but they were not given food that they were used to and desired.

Psa_78:18  And they tempted God in their heart by asking meat for their lust.

They lusted after meat, enough so that they put it before God, they put it before their deliverance. Some even said this--

Exo 16:2  And the whole congregation of the children of Israel murmured against Moses and Aaron in the wilderness:
Exo 16:3  And the children of Israel said unto them, Would to God we had died by the hand of the LORD in the land of Egypt, when we sat by the flesh pots, and when we did eat bread to the full; for ye have brought us forth into this wilderness, to kill this whole assembly with hunger.

 They would rather have DIED than lived without their lust satisfied. We can't say they'd rather have died than slowly starved because they were NOT starving! God was not letting them starve! They were being fed but NOT with what they lusted for.  And they'd rather die than not satisfy their lusts, their desires!

We are filled with lusts that consume us.

'From whence come wars and fightings among you? come they not hence, even of your lusts that war in your members?'

Lusts do war in our members.
We are consumed in our lusts, we live inwardly toward selfish fulfillment so much more than outwardly, selflessly.

More tomorrow by the grace of our God, by the will of our God.

Lord please help us to learn to recognize our lusts that would consume us. Let us NOT make excuses for them. Let us NOT hide them but seek forgiveness and seek to give our lives to You so You can be our all in all. Help us LORD, keep us from all EVIL.

In YOUR love, all in the name of our Savior Jesus Christ, our Lord!

Amen.

If the Lord Will

From whence come wars and fightings among you? come they not hence, even of your lusts that war in your members? Ye lust, and have not: ye kill, and desire to have, and cannot obtain: ye fight and war, yet ye have not, because ye ask not.  Ye ask, and receive not, because ye ask amiss, that ye may consume it upon your lusts.

Ye adulterers and adulteresses, know ye not that the friendship of the world is enmity with God? whosoever therefore will be a friend of the world is the enemy of God.

Do ye think that the scripture saith in vain, The spirit that dwelleth in us lusteth to envy? But he giveth more grace.

Wherefore he saith, God resisteth the proud, but giveth grace unto the humble. Submit yourselves therefore to God.

Resist the devil, and he will flee from you.

Draw nigh to God, and he will draw nigh to you.

Cleanse your hands, ye sinners; and purify your hearts, ye double minded.

Be afflicted, and mourn, and weep: let your laughter be turned to mourning, and your joy to heaviness.

Humble yourselves in the sight of the Lord, and he shall lift you up.

Speak not evil one of another, brethren.

He that speaketh evil of his brother, and judgeth his brother, speaketh evil of the law, and judgeth the law: but if thou judge the law, thou art not a doer of the law, but a judge.

There is one lawgiver, who is able to save and to destroy: who art thou that judgest another?

Go to now, ye that say, To day or to morrow we will go into such a city, and continue there a year, and buy and sell, and get gain Whereas ye know not what shall be on the morrow.

For what is your life? It is even a vapour, that appeareth for a little time, and then vanisheth away. 

For that ye ought to say, If the Lord will, we shall live, and do this, or that. 

But now ye rejoice in your boastings: all such rejoicing is evil.

Therefore to him that knoweth to do good, and doeth it not, to him it is sin.

James 4:1-17

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Truth.

Tomorrow we will delve into the truth above, 'if the Lord will'.

Truly, our lives are out of our own hands. We don't know whether we'll be alive from one moment to the next. We have hope to live, hope to love, hope to excel and yet these hopes need to be focused on our Lord, not our selves. Our excelling should be to His glory, not ours and this confuses so many of us in so many ways.

Please, Father in Heaven, please bless us as we seek to LIVE our lives here and now for You and Your will not for ourselves and our own will.

Please.

Thank You!   In the name of our Savior the Lord Jesus Christ.

Amen.

Envy Not.

Pro 23:17  Let not thine heart envy sinners: but be thou in the fear of the LORD all the day long.

We spend way too much time envying sinners.

First all. We do NOT like to call anyone a sinner. Yet there in God's word we are told NOT to let our hearts envy sinners. 

To do that we have to recognize sinners. 

I'm a sinner.  We are all sinners, yes? All of us are in need of forgiveness. And truthfully we should envy NO ONE. Right?  This is truth.

Pro_14:30  A sound heart is the life of the flesh: but envy the rottenness of the bones.

Envy the ROTTENNESS of the bones.

Pro_27:4  Wrath is cruel, and anger is outrageous; but who is able to stand before envy?

Worse than cruelty and anger is ENVY!

Mar_15:10  For he knew that the chief priests had delivered him for envy.

Jesus was delivered to be killed because of ENVY and Pilate knew this. 

Act_13:45  But when the Jews saw the multitudes, they were filled with envy, and spake against those things which were spoken by Paul, contradicting and blaspheming.

ENVY, the Apostles had to deal with the envy of the Jews.

Tit 3:3  For we ourselves also were sometimes foolish, disobedient, deceived, serving divers lusts and pleasures, living in malice and envy, hateful, and hating one another.

Tit 3:4  But after that the kindness and love of God our Saviour toward man appeared,

Tit 3:5  Not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to his mercy he saved us, by the washing of regeneration, and renewing of the Holy Ghost;

Tit 3:6  Which he shed on us abundantly through Jesus Christ our Saviour;

Tit 3:7  That being justified by his grace, we should be made heirs according to the hope of eternal life.

We can ONLY hope to be washed, regenerated, renewed by the Holy Spirit and in that hope that our evil sinning traits are done away with. We must be justified by our SAVIOR.

Envying sinners. 

Envying anyone is WRONG.

We cannot judge the sins of others, only God is the judge and can grant eternal life, as He knows the hearts of all. We can look at the lives of others and those in blatant sinning and know God would not have us stealing, lying, hating, murdering, breaking the Sabbath, committing adultery, etc. And still we cannot judge the end of any person.

To envy is to desire something that you don't have, to desire to be someone else, wikipedia says this-

'Envy

Envy is an emotion which "occurs when a person lacks another's superior quality, achievement, or possession and either desires it or wishes that the other lacked it" Bertrand Russell said that envy was one of the most potent causes of unhappiness. 

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How often do we find ourselves envying?

In the world we live in it has become NORMAL to envy. We taking envying as a means to spur us to get more, to change and we call it good.

It is so incredibly easy to get caught up in envying and it will happen inevitably when we live for this world.

Seriously.

The only way to avoid envy is to live for eternal life, not for this temporary life. We are to put our treasures in heaven- all of them. We need to live for the second coming of our Savior not for this world, this life.

Only by the grace of God is this possible!  Only by His mercy, His love!

More on this tomorrow by the love of our Father, our Savior, and the Holy Spirit.

What does it mean to worship Satan?

The mere mention of worshipping Satan brings up images of people clothed in black robes surrounding a pentagram covered altar, chanting to Satan. The truth however isn't that simple. Satan worship doesn't end and begin with people in ceremony. How many men and women claim to worship God and yet they don't spend their days in a church. 

Satan worshippers and God worshippers do not necessarily live the life of one worshipping day in and day out at an altar.

There are those called to serve God in that capacity, and there are those who choose to live in that capacity, but the majority of people are not to live a life serving the temple of the God of their choosing.  The majority of people live outside of the churches attending them on occasion. Some attend weekly, some monthly, some yearly, and then again some never go to a church to worship.

So what does it mean to worship Satan, it means not worshipping God.

A lot of people want to get around this by claiming neutral ground, neither believing in Satan nor God. In this choice they give themselves over to the one who accepts such non-worship. 

Those who choose to worship God know that God commands obedience and worship, that God is not satisfied with those who refuse to worship and obey.  However, God will NEVER force a single person to worship Him. Though this is what He commands, He will not force. You can command without forcing. You can rule without force. And God rules without force.

Satan will force. Satan will take any he can in any way he can without any thought otherwise. Satan will take all who do not choose God.  And all who are chosen by Satan, all who are taken by Satan will not worship Satan outwardly, and most will worship him and not even know.

Do you hear that? Do you understand?

Most of Satan's worshippers will not even realize they are Satan's.

To worship nothing means to worship yourself. Believing you have no need of God is believing you are your own God, your own ruler. Is it no wonder you are given over to Satan when you believe- like he believed- that he was greater than God, that he had no need of God.

Isa 14:12  How art thou fallen from heaven, O Lucifer, son of the morning! how art thou cut down to the ground, which didst weaken the nations!

Isa 14:13  For thou hast said in thine heart, I will ascend into heaven, I will exalt my throne above the stars of God: I will sit also upon the mount of the congregation, in the sides of the north:

Isa 14:14  I will ascend above the heights of the clouds; I will be like the most High.

Satan's evil is the evil of mankind without God.

Satan's worshippers are mankind without God.

And if you are with God then you are these-

Rev 14:12  Here is the patience of the saints: here are they that keep the commandments of God, and the faith of Jesus.

May God bless all who worship Him in truth, in spirit, in love by the grace of Jesus Christ.

May God open the hearts of those who are deceived by Satan, those who don't even realize they belong to the great deceiver.

Please Lord, save us!