Written For Our Admonition.

We've all heard the saying about those who don't pay attention to history are doomed to repeat history's mistakes, yes? It makes sense doesn't it? When we don't listen to our own personal histories the same thing happens. We are doomed to repeat our same mistakes over and over and over again as long as we refuse to learn from our past. The fact that we have a past to pay attention to, to learn from is a blessing. Every single mistake we've ever made whether it was fifty years ago or two hours ago is a lesson for us to learn from. We have an opportunity to recognize our weakness and to open our hearts before God and seek His strength. We are given a chance to ask for forgiveness, to repent- desiring not to repeat our mistakes, and to live in the newness of life found only in Christ Jesus.

Biblically we are told we need to remember, we are told to learn so we are not ignorant of the truth.

Let's look at one instance…

1Co 10:1  Moreover, brethren, I would not that ye should be ignorant, how that all our fathers were under the cloud, and all passed through the sea; 

What fathers were under the cloud? What cloud?

Exo 13:18  But God led the people about, through the way of the wilderness of the Red sea: and the children of Israel went up harnessed out of the land of Egypt. 

Those slaves freed from Egypt by the Lord through Moses- these were the forefathers of those being spoken to.

Exo 13:21  And the LORD went before them by day in a pillar of a cloud, to lead them the way; and by night in a pillar of fire, to give them light; to go by day and night: 

Exo 13:22  He took not away the pillar of the cloud by day, nor the pillar of fire by night, from before the people. 

The LORD - in a pillar of a cloud.

1Co 10:2  And were all baptized unto Moses in the cloud and in the sea; 

Exo_14:16  But lift thou up thy rod, and stretch out thine hand over the sea, and divide it: and the children of Israel shall go on dry ground through the midst of the sea.

The cloud of the LORD, and the LORD parted sea.  Led by the LORD through Moses.

1Co 10:3  And did all eat the same spiritual meat; 

Exo 16:4  Then said the LORD unto Moses, Behold, I will rain bread from heaven for you; and the people shall go out and gather a certain rate every day, that I may prove them, whether they will walk in my law, or no. 

Psa 78:23  Though he had commanded the clouds from above, and opened the doors of heaven, 

Psa 78:24  And had rained down manna upon them to eat, and had given them of the corn of heaven. 

Psa 78:25  Man did eat angels' food: he sent them meat to the full. 

Deu 8:3  And he humbled thee, and suffered thee to hunger, and fed thee with manna, which thou knewest not, neither did thy fathers know; that he might make thee know that man doth not live by bread only, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of the LORD doth man live. 

Bread from heaven rained down upon the people by the LORD. Spiritual meat.

1Co 10:4  And did all drink the same spiritual drink: for they drank of that spiritual Rock that followed them: and that Rock was Christ. 

Isa 48:21  And they thirsted not when he led them through the deserts: he caused the waters to flow out of the rock for them: he clave the rock also, and the waters gushed out. 

Joh 4:14  But whosoever drinketh of the water that I shall give him shall never thirst; but the water that I shall give him shall be in him a well of water springing up into everlasting life. 

1Co 10:5  But with many of them God was not well pleased: for they were overthrown in the wilderness. 

Num 14:11  And the LORD said unto Moses, How long will this people provoke me? and how long will it be ere they believe me, for all the signs which I have shewed among them? 

Num 14:12  I will smite them with the pestilence, and disinherit them, and will make of thee a greater nation and mightier than they. 

Jud 1:5  I will therefore put you in remembrance, though ye once knew this, how that the Lord, having saved the people out of the land of Egypt, afterward destroyed them that believed not. 

Heb 3:16  For some, when they had heard, did provoke: howbeit not all that came out of Egypt by Moses. 

Heb 3:17  But with whom was he grieved forty years? was it not with them that had sinned, whose carcases fell in the wilderness? 

Heb 3:18  And to whom sware he that they should not enter into his rest, but to them that believed not? 

Heb 3:19  So we see that they could not enter in because of unbelief. 

1Co 10:6  Now these things were our examples, to the intent we should not lust after evil things, as they also lusted. 

EXAMPLES FOR US.

WE SHOULD NOT LUST AFTER EVIL THINGS.

What evil things?

1Co 10:7  Neither be ye idolaters, as were some of them; as it is written, The people sat down to eat and drink, and rose up to play. 

Deu 9:12  And the LORD said unto me, Arise, get thee down quickly from hence; for thy people which thou hast brought forth out of Egypt have corrupted themselves; they are quickly turned aside out of the way which I commanded them; they have made them a molten image. 

God commanded one way and the people turned away from the way God commanded- and made themselves idols of other things, in this instance it was a molten image they chose to have made so they could worship that image. What do we worship today, what takes the place of God in our hearts? We may not have an image of a golden calf set up in our house to bow down to, but there may be other things we are giving our hearts and minds to.

1Co 10:8  Neither let us commit fornication, as some of them committed, and fell in one day three and twenty thousand. 

Num 25:1  And Israel abode in Shittim, and the people began to commit whoredom with the daughters of Moab. 

Num 25:2  And they called the people unto the sacrifices of their gods: and the people did eat, and bowed down to their gods. 

Num 25:3  And Israel joined himself unto Baalpeor: and the anger of the LORD was kindled against Israel. 

Num 25:4  And the LORD said unto Moses, Take all the heads of the people, and hang them up before the LORD against the sun, that the fierce anger of the LORD may be turned away from Israel. 

Num 25:5  And Moses said unto the judges of Israel, Slay ye every one his men that were joined unto Baalpeor. 

Num 25:6  And, behold, one of the children of Israel came and brought unto his brethren a Midianitish woman in the sight of Moses, and in the sight of all the congregation of the children of Israel, who were weeping before the door of the tabernacle of the congregation. 

Num 25:7  And when Phinehas, the son of Eleazar, the son of Aaron the priest, saw it, he rose up from among the congregation, and took a javelin in his hand; 

Num 25:8  And he went after the man of Israel into the tent, and thrust both of them through, the man of Israel, and the woman through her belly. So the plague was stayed from the children of Israel. 

Num 25:9  And those that died in the plague were twenty and four thousand. 

Choosing others than God to commit our lives to fully and wholly. Choosing flesh over Spirit.

1Co 10:9  Neither let us tempt Christ, as some of them also tempted, and were destroyed of serpents. 

Exo 17:7  And he called the name of the place Massah, and Meribah, because of the chiding of the children of Israel, and because they tempted the LORD, saying, Is the LORD among us, or not? 

Num 21:5  And the people spake against God, and against Moses, Wherefore have ye brought us up out of Egypt to die in the wilderness? for there is no bread, neither is there any water; and our soul loatheth this light bread. 

Num 21:6  And the LORD sent fiery serpents among the people, and they bit the people; and much people of Israel died. 

1Co 10:10  Neither murmur ye, as some of them also murmured, and were destroyed of the destroyer. 

Exo 16:2  And the whole congregation of the children of Israel murmured against Moses and Aaron in the wilderness

1Co 10:11  Now all these things happened unto them for ensamples: and they are written for our admonition, upon whom the ends of the world are come. 

WRITTEN FOR US - EXAMPLES. WRITTEN FOR OUR ADMONITION.

1Co 10:12  Wherefore let him that thinketh he standeth take heed lest he fall. 

TAKE HEED.

We need to take heed! We need to listen to God, not to ourselves! We need to read the examples and realize that God is NOT TO BE TRIFLED WITH. By our standards today those people God destroyed were not guilty of any crime worth death. We've glorified evil until we've convinced ourselves that evil is good and we will no longer feel the wrath of God. God has come around to our way of thinking… LIES ALL LIES!  God hasn't changed! LORD please, please help us to know Your way and follow in Your way not in our own way! Give us all we need to be YOURS WHOLLY YOURS! Satan would have us confused and deceived so we think that we are Yours when we are not. Please LORD, please let us truly be YOURS. Open our blind eyes! Lead us in the way everlasting! Keep us from EVIL! 

More on all of this tomorrow, God willing!

May we be blessed in the Lord, all through the sacrifice of His only begotten Son, Jesus Christ, now and forever!!!!!!!

Amen.

Sin's Slow Deadly Poison.

Serpents everywhere biting people, killing people - why? Because the people sinned against God. God gave the enslaved freedom, yet the enslaved were so filled with their mistrust, they could only think of the comforts of their slavery. Is it strange to believe there were/are comforts in slavery? Even right now at this very moment there are people caught up in the comforts of their slavery. It's not that they want to have a master over them forcing them to do their bidding no matter how laborious. They don't enjoy the whip, or chains, the restrictions on their ability to do as they please in all phases of their lives. They despise the abuse heaped upon themselves day after day and they do long to be free of the anguish of slavery. However, given an opportunity to leave a lot don't readily jump at the chance when it means suddenly having to fend completely for themselves. Yes, they are abused but they are also fed and clothed. Now on their own they have to find a way to provide for their own needs something their tortured, enslaved mindset can scarcely fathom. The fear of freedom can be overwhelming. Some would rather die than face that fear, others will leap at the chance to embrace that fear for their freedom.  God's chosen people, the descendants from Abraham were enslaved and now given their freedom. Out on their own, some began to believe they marched to certain death from deprivation of the necessities to life. They started to long to return to their enslavement - the comforts of slavery- rather than die free.

Even after all God had done to obtain their freedom, they still doubted His protection, they doubted His ability to provide for them. They were choosing death over living for God and the promises offered to them by God and that choice became quite literal for many. The serpents came. Deadly venomous serpents began striking out at person, after person and each bite brought the preferred slavery to death over the hardships of life.

Finally the people had enough losses of loved ones and the fear of their own demise. They turned to Moses, God's chosen liberator, and begged him to do something to stop the serpents from killing them all.  They took their minds off themselves and sought a redeemer, someone to save them. They realized they couldn't depend on themselves to keep safe, they needed outside help. They needed a supernatural power to stop them from dying. So…

Joh 3:14  And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of man be lifted up: 

Joh 3:15  That whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have eternal life. 

Moses was told by God what to do (Numbers 21:8,9) he lifted up the brass serpent on the pole and when anyone was bitten by a serpent all they needed to do was look upon that brass serpent and they lived.  Prior to the brass serpent every single bitten person died. Only those bitten who looked upon the brass serpent lived.

The Son of man, Jesus Christ just like that brass serpent had to be lifted up for all to look upon. Today almost 2000 years after Jesus was hung upon the cross He is still lifted up for ALL to look upon.

We can remain enslaved to sin and all its many, many comforts, or we can look to the lifted Christ and find freedom from sin's slavery.

Joh 3:16  For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. 

Joh 3:17  For God sent not his Son into the world to condemn the world; but that the world through him might be saved. 

Joh 3:18  He that believeth on him is not condemned: but he that believeth not is condemned already, because he hath not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God. 

Joh 3:19  And this is the condemnation, that light is come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil. 

Joh 3:20  For every one that doeth evil hateth the light, neither cometh to the light, lest his deeds should be reproved. 

Joh 3:21  But he that doeth truth cometh to the light, that his deeds may be made manifest, that they are wrought in God. 

Men loved darkness rather than light- why? Because their deeds were evil.

Those who embrace the evil hate light because they don't want their evil exposed for what it is. They want to call their evil a good thing, a right thing, it pleases them and brings them mental, physical, emotional pleasure to commit the evil. They believe they have a right to the evil and the evil can't be all that bad because it's what pleases them, and why shouldn't they be pleased on any level they choose? Why should they deprive themselves of any evil, they live for themselves and believe others should too.

There is so much evil in the world that is called good, so much. We don't want to believe things we do are evil so we convince ourselves they are good and along the way we have turned our backs on the God of truth, and serve the god of deception carefully disguised as the true God.

We need to look to the lifted Jesus Christ our Savior and seek only His truth. WE need to allow the Holy Spirit to convict us on any point in our lives that is a disguised evil. We need to throw ourselves as the foot of the cross and reach for the salvation found only through Christ.

This prison planet we are living on has a myriad of evil traps set up around every corner of our lives. Our hope must forever be before us, the hope of salvation, of a new life. With this hope of a new life we need to live with our eyes set only on the cross where Jesus our Savior died and then rose from that death to a newness of life so that we too may live in newness of life- newness of hope, that same Jesus will return for us and free us from this prison planet.

We have a liberator, we have a path to freedom, we will be set free right now and that hope of a future life without any of sin's stain will keep us free in the knowledge that sin will not win.

Please, Lord give us the newness of life through the Holy Spirit so we may live completely for You in Your truth. Protect us, keep us from ALL evil. Convict our hearts so that we may never be deceived and give us all we need to be wholly Yours now and forever!!!!!!!

Amen!

The Earthly and the Heavenly Things.

Jesus tells us we must be born again of water and Spirit. Jesus tells us outright that our original birth is not enough- we need a spiritual birth. Unlike our birth- which we had absolutely no say so in, we do have a say so in our spiritual birth.

Nicodemus was a ruler of the Jews.  As a ruler of the Jews we have to understand this man knew the laws and ways of the Jews inside and out. Unlike the majority of his fellow rulers of the Jews, Nicodemus' heart was right with God. Because his heart was right with God he desired to know more of Jesus. Going to him at night, when others were less likely to witness the visit, Nicodemus didn't want to be one of the blind and deaf Pharisee. He didn't want to write Jesus off as a crackpot, not when he knew that his forefathers had done that very thing to prophet after prophet in the scriptures. This particular Pharisee ruler wanted to seek truth and that meant going to the source. He told Jesus he knows that he is a teacher from God because of all the miracles He was doing- none but God could do such miracles. As soon as Jesus heard that Nicodemus believed that He was from God, Jesus knew that he was seeking truth and had his heart open to receive that truth.

Jesus went on to tell Nicodemus that people had to be born again of water and Spirit. This threw Nicodemus for a little loop, crazy talk from one that most of his fellow Pharisees thought was a lunatic? Jesus told him outright NOT to marvel at what was being said. He even accused Nicodemus of being a Master of Israel and not knowing these things was the surprise. He looked Nicodemus in the eyes and said-

Joh 3:11… We speak that we do know, and testify that we have seen; and ye receive not our witness. 

Joh 3:12  If I have told you earthly things, and ye believe not, how shall ye believe, if I tell you of heavenly things? 

Nicodemus wanted to know more from the man he believed was sent by God, the miracle performing man, yet Jesus outright tells him that he was finding it hard hearing earthly things, hearing heavenly things would really throw him for a loop.

We need to remember for a moment that Nicodemus could have left at any moment. He didn't need to stay there and listen to things that might be considered insulting, he didn't need to listen to Jesus, and yet he was compelled to do so even after being told that he should know these things already and that his finding it hard to believe the simple things would make it even harder to understand the heavenly things that he was there seeking.

Why are we studying this stuff about Nicodemus and Jesus?

Because we need to live our lives in Jesus Christ our hope, and we need a newness of life, we need to be born of the water and the Spirit if we are to survive this prison planet.

Jesus tells Nicodemus of the heavenly- of Himself. He came from heaven and just like Moses lifted up the serpent…

This is something Nicodemus was intimately familiar with- Moses. He knew Moses inside and out- every word ever written by Moses Nicodemus had read time and time again. When Jesus mentioned Moses lifting up the serpent, Nicodemus knew all about the raised serpent and its purpose. A plague of fiery serpents was killing off the people following Moses in the wilderness, a lot of people. The people witnessing person after person dying knew something had to be done so they said this to Moses--

Num 21:7  Therefore the people came to Moses, and said, We have sinned, for we have spoken against the LORD, and against thee; pray unto the LORD, that he take away the serpents from us. And Moses prayed for the people. 

They sinned and were in need of salvation.

Moses was told by God to make a brass serpent on a pole and when the bitten people looked on it, they would live.

Bitten by a serpent, knowing the bite is deadly and yet all they needed to do was look on the brass serpent there on a pole so they could live. Their faith in obeying the word of God healed them. They looked to the raised up brass serpent because they were told in doing so they would live.

Jesus used this example to predict the His own death.  Just as the serpent was raised up - He too would be raised up for all to see and look to so they could live. At the time Nicodemus had no real knowledge of Jesus' impending crucifixion. These words were cryptic to him and yet he wanted to comprehend. Nicodemus already wanted to be born again of the spirit, he wanted truth from God.

More on this tomorrow by the grace of our Lord, by the will of God. May we too forever be seekers of truth. May we be born of the Spirit always. May we look to the raised up and crucified Christ for our salvation, our hope of new life so we may live in Him always.

*******

Joh 3:1  There was a man of the Pharisees, named Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews: 

Joh 3:2  The same came to Jesus by night, and said unto him, Rabbi, we know that thou art a teacher come from God: for no man can do these miracles that thou doest, except God be with him. 

Joh 3:3  Jesus answered and said unto him, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God. 

Joh 3:4  Nicodemus saith unto him, How can a man be born when he is old? can he enter the second time into his mother's womb, and be born? 

Joh 3:5  Jesus answered, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God. 

Joh 3:6  That which is born of the flesh is flesh; and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. 

Joh 3:7  Marvel not that I said unto thee, Ye must be born again. 

Joh 3:8  The wind bloweth where it listeth, and thou hearest the sound thereof, but canst not tell whence it cometh, and whither it goeth: so is every one that is born of the Spirit. 

Joh 3:9  Nicodemus answered and said unto him, How can these things be? 

Joh 3:10  Jesus answered and said unto him, Art thou a master of Israel, and knowest not these things? 

Joh 3:11  Verily, verily, I say unto thee, We speak that we do know, and testify that we have seen; and ye receive not our witness. 

Joh 3:12  If I have told you earthly things, and ye believe not, how shall ye believe, if I tell you of heavenly things? 

Joh 3:13  And no man hath ascended up to heaven, but he that came down from heaven, even the Son of man which is in heaven. 

Joh 3:14  And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of man be lifted up: 

Joh 3:15  That whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have eternal life. 

Joh 3:16  For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. 

Joh 3:17  For God sent not his Son into the world to condemn the world; but that the world through him might be saved. 

Joh 3:18  He that believeth on him is not condemned: but he that believeth not is condemned already, because he hath not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God. 

Joh 3:19  And this is the condemnation, that light is come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil. 

Joh 3:20  For every one that doeth evil hateth the light, neither cometh to the light, lest his deeds should be reproved. 

Joh 3:21  But he that doeth truth cometh to the light, that his deeds may be made manifest, that they are wrought in God. 

Imprisoned Yet Given New Life.

2Co 5:17  Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new. 

Rom 6:4  Therefore we are buried with him by baptism into death: that like as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life. 

All things are newly spiritual in Christ. We are raised from hopelessness, to hope. Our walk in the newness of life is one of hope. We have an advocate, we have someone fighting on our behalf.

The prisoners on this planet who choose to remain imprisoned even after they are offered freedom- live under a death sentence and they are controlled by the warden running this planet- Satan. We are surrounded by the unredeemed prisoners and as such, our lives will be far from easy. We must holdfast to the newness of life we are given- a newness we renew every single day of our new spiritual life.

This is truth-

Joh_3:3  Jesus answered and said unto him, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.

Joh 3:4  Nicodemus saith unto him, How can a man be born when he is old? can he enter the second time into his mother's womb, and be born? 

Joh 3:5  Jesus answered, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God. 

Joh 3:6  That which is born of the flesh is flesh; and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. 

Joh_3:7  Marvel not that I said unto thee, Ye must be born again.

1Pe_1:23  Being born again, not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible, by the word of God, which liveth and abideth for ever.

BORN AGAIN.

As soon as Jesus uttered those words, the very wise Nicodemus asked the logical question all of us would have needed to ask, right?

How? We can't very well go into our mother's womb again and be born. 

Do you think perhaps Nicodemus may have said that with a hint of amusement? Seriously. He was an old man and here he was being told that he needed to be born again. The very idea of having to enter his mother's womb a second time was laughable. Jesus wasn't laughing though, Jesus was telling Nicodemus a very important truth. In fact, this truth was so important Jesus told him that without being born again there is NO entering the kingdom of God.

Now Nicodemus was fully listening to these strange words, this strange concept.

Joh 3:5  Jesus answered, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God. 

Joh 3:6  That which is born of the flesh is flesh; and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. 

Joh_3:7  Marvel not that I said unto thee, Ye must be born again.

A man must be born of water.

A man must be born of the Spirit.

Without this new birth it would be impossible for the man to go into God's kingdom.

Flesh is flesh, every human being most obviously is born of flesh, no man is born without flesh. Once a man exists in the flesh that birth of the flesh is over- no turning back. Being born of the Spirit is a whole other matter. There are going to be millions and millions of people who have never been born of the Spirit.

Jesus went on to tell Nicodemus not to be surprised by His telling him that he needed to be born again and He explained.

Joh 3:8  The wind bloweth where it listeth, and thou hearest the sound thereof, but canst not tell whence it cometh, and whither it goeth: so is every one that is born of the Spirit. 

You can hear the wind but just like the wind you really don't know where it is coming from ultimately and you can't tell where it is going to go.  Imagine yourself on a sailboat out to sea and you can't even see land any longer only water. You've no method other than the sail to move your boat and there is absolutely no wind at all whatsoever, not even a tiny breeze. There you are, stuck at a complete stand still. You need to head in a certain direction to get where you are going but you can't. You wait…one day…two days…three days… where is the wind?! Why is there no wind?!  This isn't an unreality, this is truth, this happens. Wind does not always blow. There have been many times I've been working outside in the sweltering heat, sweat pouring off me, and I long for a breeze. I comprehend the state of being surrounded by absolutely no wind.  As the boat in the middle of the sea is stranded, as I perspire relentlessly in the heat, the wind is desired and we may even be praying for the wind to appear. Where do we think that wind needs to come from? Can it be on its way? Will it appear out of nowhere in a great gust? Will we have a storm of wind so powerful it will knock us over, tip the boat on its side?  Wind is a marvelous thing and unpredictable.  Yes, the scientist may tell us all about wind… the sun, air pressure, molecules and so on and so forth. They can make predictions about wind force in storms and even measure the force of hurricane and tornado winds. The mystery is still there, they too are subject to sweating on a hot day and longing for a breeze. 

Joh 3:8  The wind bloweth where it listeth, and thou hearest the sound thereof, but canst not tell whence it cometh, and whither it goeth: so is every one that is born of the Spirit. 

You hear the wind, but even with all scientific knowledge you can't absolutely predict when it will come and when it will go. You will have guesses as a meteorologist, but absolutes are not going to happen. You will have theories and computations, and some might be spot on, but not all of them. No one can predict with certainty the actions of the wind. Often they'll be more fierce than expected, or less severe that is the nature of the wind.

When we are BORN of the SPIRIT it isn't a birth like a child. You know when a child is about to be born, you can generally tell the mother is very pregnant. Again, this isn't an always situation, but the majority of time births are expected and known about before they occur. Our Spiritual birth is not something that can be known, we aren't inside our pregnant mother when this birth happens. The Spirit is given to us, the new life we must have in Christ is given to us in such a way that it could happen at any time without any prior expectation of it occurring. You can hope for this Spirit birth, want this Spirit birth, and you can wait for it expectantly- but ultimately the Spirit like the wind, will go where it wills.

More on this tomorrow…all by the grace and will, the love of our Savior and Lord, Jesus Christ. And yes, all through the Holy Spirit!

God help us all!

We Are All Prisoners.

Newness of life.

We quite literally go from having a very real eternal death sentence over us to having a very real eternal life offered to us. New life.

Having seen several shows on television, and reading about the true life stories that some of those show themes are taken from, I have heard about people being exonerated after years of incarceration. What joy to have their good names cleared at last. How they react to such newfound freedom varies. Some embrace it with that new zeal for living, others holdfast to desiring revenge for the wrong done to them.

Then you have criminals who have been justly locked up for many years obtaining their freedom, but without exoneration. Their crimes hang over their lives forever, following them wherever they go (unless they can buy a new identity and move to a place no one knows them etc.)  These criminals too can embrace their freedom from prison with joy or anger.

I know I'm minimalizing what they can experience, there is truly a wide range of emotions they'll go through in either scenario given above. Some may go through several emotions- happiness, anger, sadness and so on.

WE ALL ARE PRISONERS.

We, as guilty prisoners in life, condemned to eternal death by the weight of our sins will remain imprisoned with that death sentence to come if we do not accept the salvation offered to us by the Author of our lives.

The prison for all people is earth.  Think about it for a long, long moment. This is a prison planet. Truly it is a prison planet in so many, many ways and it has been disguised as being a planet of freedom. We are born inside this prison planet and while we are allowed a semblance of what true freedom may be like, all around us are reminders of our incarceration.

In fact just moments ago as I paused for a short necessary break and came back to resume my writing, I took a moment to check my social media page and right there was a post from an Animal Rescue site I belong to and on it a picture of a beautiful owl. The story wasn't beautiful though. The brief caption read- 'glue traps are inhumane'  it went on to tell how awful glue traps are for animals- their suffering before death and such. This beautiful owl was brought to the clinic with a glue trap stuck to its feathers in such a way it could not fly. It took the clinic a long, long time to get the trap off the owl and they are hoping for an eventual full recovery- some of the primary flight feathers were involved. My heart broke, the tears started as the horror of such things as glue traps exist at all!  It's this awful, awful prison world we live on that allows such things! Things such as that torture trap -even for the rodents and pests deemed nuisances that those the traps were made for, that they even exist is horrific! One of millions of clues to the type of planet we belong to. Prison planet earth, and we are all a part of it, no one escapes.

Because we are born with the propensity towards sinning- no one escapes from that either- we are on this prison planet. We all have been offered a pardon from this planet, a very special pardon- a full exoneration that we can claim. The thing is, while we may accept the pardon with full exoneration, we will not be freed from living our physical lives here on the prison planet. Notice I said, physical lives. We are given a newness of life, and that newness is our being allowed to be born again only this time our birth isn't into eventual sin, but into spiritual living.  The promised pardon and exoneration is ours, the knowledge that we are freed from our death sentence is ours. We must choose to live in a new spiritual life focused on our Redeemer, our Creator, our Hope. Our trust must be kept in HIM and the promise we've been given. While we continue to suffer this prison planet, we walk in newness of life. The weight of eternal death is no longer ours.

2Co 5:17  Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new. 

Rom 6:4  Therefore we are buried with him by baptism into death: that like as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life. 

All things are newly spiritual in Christ. We are raised from hopelessness, to hope. Our walk in the newness of life is one of hope. We have an advocate, we have someone fighting on our behalf.

The prisoners on this planet who choose to remain imprisoned even after they are offered freedom- live under a death sentence and they are controlled by the warden running this planet- Satan. We are surrounded by the unredeemed prisoners and as such, our lives will be far from easy. We must holdfast to the newness of life we are given- a newness we renew every single day of our new spiritual life.

More on this tomorrow by the grace and will of our LORD, our SAVIOR, JESUS CHRIST!

What Part of Us Should Die Daily?

What part of us should die daily?

1Co 15:31 … I die daily.

Death to Selfishness. Death to Self-serving.

Denying ourselves- what part of us are we denying in order to take up the cross of Christ and follow Him?

Luk 9:23  …let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow me. 

What is this cross we must take?  How are we to follow Christ to be worthy of Him?

Mat 10:38  And he that taketh not his cross, and followeth after me, is not worthy of me. 

The commandments of God are summed up like this by Jesus- God with us-

Mat 22:36  Master, which is the great commandment in the law? 

Mat 22:37  Jesus said unto him, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. 

Mat 22:38  This is the first and great commandment. 

Mat 22:39  And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. 

Mat 22:40  On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets. 

Loving God with ALL our heart.

Loving God with ALL our soul.

Loving God with ALL our mind.

Do we? Look into your heart and lay it bare right now. Open your heart before God and search for a moment, what is in there? Who is in your heart, what is in your heart? We put other people in our hearts- but aren't we supposed to? We are told the second commandment of ranking is loving others as we would be loved. To love they have to be in our heart, don't they? The answer is truthfully yes and no.  Let me try to explain.

God must be first in our heart- we must love HIM with ALL of our heart and that leaves what left over? Nothing. It is ONLY when we do love God with ALL our heart are we able to love others WITH that very same love, God's love.

We surrender our all to God and out of that surrender He will enable us to live as He wills. We won't be loving with our own imperfect love that is riddled with flaws, but we will love with God's love and HIS love is perfect. God's love can love what we deem most unlovable. God's love will continue to love through many, many betrayals- we as human beings have turned our backs on God time and time again, yet He still loves us.

God's love has provided hope.

God's love will in truth destroy utterly into non-existence those who cannot love. It is that love which knows all the people who choose not to love would never be content if forced to live in that love offered. No forced love, no forced will, no forced hope, God allows each of us to choose- daily.

There is no one-time only choice and you are forever held to that choice regardless of all circumstances.

The initial choice is allowing the life-long commitment to be possible. As soon as you choose to allow God to have all your heart, soul and mind you are choosing to love Him. The forgiveness you find through the sacrifice of His only begotten Son, Jesus Christ our Lord, our Savior, allows us to love.

Because you do not stop thinking, breathing, functioning as you've always done up to that point, you will be prone to temptations that will want to draw you away from God, not towards Him. Daily a renewed commitment must be made. You don't simply stop after baptism, you don't stop after the newness wears away. Every day RECOMMIT your life to God. EVERY DAY. Wake up and choose every day to exalt God above all other things in your life no matter what they are- and love Him with all your heart, mind and soul. Seek forgiveness as soon as you recognize any other entering your heart before Him. Put God before all, and love others with HIS love.

Rom_5:5  …the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost which is given unto us.

I asked above-

What part of us should die daily?

1Co 15:31 … I die daily.

Death to Selfishness. Death to Self-serving.

Denying ourselves- what part of us are we denying in order to take up the cross of Christ and follow Him?

Luk 9:23  …let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow me. 

What is this cross we must take?  How are we to follow Christ to be worthy of Him?

What part of us should die every single day? Our life outside of God. Truly all we do should be to His glory and not our own in any way. That cross we must take up is the knowledge we are choosing a path less traveled, a path that will have us making choices the world will not want us to make. In fact the self-serving part of us is going to fight against putting God first in every way it can. 

Can you put another person before all your own wants and needs? Yes, I said needs. Or do you think or say things like, I need to do this before I can help you with that. My need is just as great as yours. I need to take care of me first. Again I ask, can you put another person before ALL your own wants and needs?  If called to do so, could another person come before your preferred way of life? And by preferred way of life I mean- doing the things that make you most comfortable, most content, most at ease. Will you choose others before your own ideas of how you want your day to unfold?

We must allow God's way to unfold for us and follow HIM wherever He leads us and that will mean taking up a CROSS and that CROSS will kill our self serving and by the grace of God make us God serving first, and from that serving others!

Please LORD, we would be YOURS! Please! Put to death all the self-serving inside of us that would take over and kill You in Your rightful place in our hearts! All in the name of our Savior, Jesus Christ!

From What I Was Then....

From what I was then to what I am now.

To read these words-

1Co 15:31 … I die daily.

Luk 9:23  …let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow me. 

Mat 10:38  And he that taketh not his cross, and followeth after me, is not worthy of me. 

To read the above words is to comprehend death to self. This is something that needs to be before us constantly as Christ followers, constantly.

When we first accepted Christ as our Savior in genuine conversion from being lost to sin to being saved to eternal life, a change took place in us. A new world was opened up for us to witness. A hope that didn't exist before was suddenly present in us. The knowledge that we were lost in our sins and are now saved through the grace of Christ is something exquisite beyond measure. The conversion experience for a lot of people is quite remarkable and there is a pointed old man to new man that people who know us witness. While we may have been caught up in partying to please self- we are now caught up in living to bring the amazing truth of salvation to others. Sometimes our initial conversion experience is so powerful we can't help but shout it out to all who will listen to us. We explain to those we were once partying with that something awesome has happened and it can happen for them too. More often than not, those we are trying to convey our new sense of purpose too will shun our new found faith and as a result, shun us. We didn't mind though, we felt the weight of sadness that one feels as they witness someone missing out on an amazing opportunity, but we didn't feel regret over our conversion.

To be able to say our lives before accepting Christ we were different people is something a lot of Christ followers can say. I won't say all, because I truly don't know how it might be for everyone. Some Christ followers are raised to be so from their childhood and slip into their conversion differently perhaps.

From what I was then to what I am now.

Can I still say those words or has my life after many years from that initial conversion become such as it would be unrecognizably different from my life before that conversion?

I'll tell you the truth for myself- I have lived on a slippery slope. There I was standing upon the mountain, upon the rock, the firm foundation in Christ and then somehow without much realization that rock was being chipped away at. The mountain was being excavated so subtly I wasn't aware on a fully conscious level- whether choosing to not hear the bulldozers and earth excavators, the dump trucks being filled with foundation boulders, I don't fully know. On some level I have to believe I was handed some ear plugs and I chose to put them in my ears. I was also given a blind fold and I slowly chose to slip it on over my eyes. Then after a while I unstopped my ears and removed the blindfold only to find myself no longer upon the mountain, no longer standing on the firm foundation only found in Christ. I was at the bottom of what remained of my destroyed Christ following life and I was living for myself- very selfishly concerned with my self-centered pursuits- even though some of those were tokens of my former Christ following life that I wanted to keep so I could try to keep myself deceived that I was still where I needed to be- on that narrow Christ following road.

Again, truthfully, over the course of the last forty years of my life I have climbed the mountain a few times, only to climb down again. I stopped my daily dying to self gradually so as not to shock myself back into continuing to do so. 

Our CROSS must be picked up DAILY.

Our DYING TO SELF must be done DAILY.

This daily cross bearing and dying is a DAILY recognition of our not naturally wanting to bear that cross, or die to self. We choose to bear the cross KNOWINGLY, we choose to put our self-serving to death KNOWINGLY. We don't indulge the self-serving in ourselves that will forever fight for supremacy.

Our daily choices must be done with recognition, not done by rote to the point we no longer think much about what we are doing.

More on this tomorrow by the GRACE and WILL of our LORD and SAVIOR JESUS CHRIST!

Eph 2:10  For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them. 

2Co 5:17  Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new. 

Rom 6:4  Therefore we are buried with him by baptism into death: that like as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life.