Faith Paradox

The Fruit of The Spirit Paradox

June 17th, 2023
I’ve been in a long period of transitioning in my walk of Faith from a very emotional and feelings based relationship with Jesus to something more based in Truth and Peace. As many of you know, a feelings based Faith is a hotbed for recurrent sin and stumbling. One of the most dangerous feelings that can be spawned from this type of Faith is called “desire”. It’s so easy for us to desire what we can’t or don’t have and it’s even easier to desire everything related to the deeds of the flesh. Faith based in these emotional feelings has no firm foundation in Truth, and when we allow ourselves to be seduced into an emotional state, our peace of mind is compromised and it produces worry, anxiety, and guilt. The danger of Faith based in feelings that can lead to carnal desires is illustrated in James 1:14-15 “but each person is tempted when they are dragged away by their own desire and enticed. Then, after desire has conceived, it gives birth to sin, and sin, when it is full grown, gives birth to death”.

Now contrast this to the Fruits of the Spirit in Galatians 5: 22-23 “love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control”. The challenge for the feelings based Believer is these traits and attributes can still be viewed as emotions, and taken as such. Reading further in verse 24 and 25; “Those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires. Since we live by the Spirit, let us keep in step with the Spirit”. Also Romans 8: 5-8 “Those who live according to the flesh have their minds set on what the flesh desires, but those who live in accordance with the Spirit have their minds set on what the Spirit desires. The mind governed by the flesh is death, but the mind governed by the Spirit is life and peace. The mind governed by the flesh is hostile to God, it does not submit to God’s law, nor can it do so. Those who are in the realm of the flesh cannot please God”.

So you see the constant cross pull of the Spirit and the flesh in our being. This is why it is so eternally important to keep ourselves in check and in self accountability mode through prayer, fellowship, and Bible study. It requires a strong support group and a close family of other Believers. If you are trying to pilot your own aircraft without a first officer and crew you are more likely to have a serious accident. Been there and done it.

The fruits of the Spirit are not emotions. They are self-sacrificial service traits related to affection, devotion, and respect. They have absolutely nothing to do with feelings. In a future post I will detail and discuss each of the nine fruit traits. These traits are the true marks of God’s saints and are in direct opposition to the deeds of the flesh, feelings, and emotions.

It is extremely easy for a new Christian to start off on the wrong foot, particularly since the moment of salvation can be so overwhelming, both spiritually and emotionally. This is one of the reason all of us as Believers sharpened by Jesus have such an obligation to teach and mentor our Brothers and Sisters. The Parable of The Sower comes to mind. We have to make sure those seeds find fertile soil.

Now on the other hand, there are many life events that become sudden blips on our radar that can send us into an emotional spiral. We are still human. Family deaths, physical illness, financial problems, the list goes on and on. I know I could not function on this Earth if I did not have my Faith. I would probably die. As much as I have my own self-inflicted troubles, and as often as I get out of the sheep pen and into the Holy woodshed, there is no possible way I could ever turn away from my Faith and deny God and Jesus. Not going to happen.

My prayer for everyone who reads this post is somehow a tiny seed of sharing can be planted in your heart and you can share these words with someone in your life to broaden your own personal ministry. I don’t claim to be a Bible scholar or theological genius but I do have God given wisdom, common sense, and street smarts. I’m not doing this for subscribes, likes, and follows. God is in control and He is going to have specific people of his choosing read these words. I’m not going to use my pride and selfish ambition trying to build a personal brand. I do not want the recognition. I only want God to be glorified by hopefully impacting someone’s life.

Have a Blessed weekend everyone..
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Your Hidden Personal Ministry

June 16th, 2023
When you made the heart felt decision to accept the free gift of pardon for all of your sins past, present, and future, and acknowledge Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior, you were instantaneously given many gifts, both Spiritual and eternal. You may not have felt anything different in regards to your wisdom, knowledge, and insight but you were made a beacon of light in a world of darkness. Christian believers have a different energy and aura about us. Those that are not completely hard hearted and spiritually blind will notice our fruits. Love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self control. These are the marks of the saints. They are in direct opposition to the deeds of the flesh, which corrupt the souls of humanity from childbirth.

One of the most effective tools of The Holy Spirit is the new and just saved baby Christian, who is on fire for Jesus and full of an exuberant enthusiasm about their new found Faith. It’s just such a joy to watch someone be translated from the darkness of a life in sin to being an eternally influential child of God and personal friend of Jesus Christ. The baby Christian can affect people in their area of influence in amazing ways. It gently forces unbelievers into self evaluation mode and reveals the motives of the heart. At the same time, seeds of sharing are planted in those individuals, and as people will naturally do, they begin to tell others and the behind the scenes cascading effect begins. The Holy Spirit can send a shockwave out from the new Believer that can reach a lot of people. The baby Christian does not even realize this is happening.

God’s Word enables us and equips us to be His ambassadors. Saturating oneself in Bible study and praying for supernatural Spiritual enlightenment is a prerequisite for Believers. This enlightenment creates a loving boldness in our innermost being, capable of powerful and effective actions within the realm of human communication. Every Believer has access to this power, but needs to properly prepared and equipped with Holy armor and weapons. It can be challenging, uncomfortable, difficult, and impossible at times. We are not going to get better by it being easy. The effectiveness of your personal ministry is paradoxical to your sufferings. But fear not, you will be protected.

In the modern Church age, we have more silent Believers than I can ever remember and I think I understand why. It’s fear of persecution and possibly even physical harm. When Believers think of being involved in “ministry” or having a “personal ministry”, their minds immediately picture having to speak to a group, be a teacher, or even be a pastor in the pulpit. Many Believers at my church or in my men’s class are just not comfortable having a conversation with someone about God, His Son, and eternal life. I admit myself that it’s not easy having those conversations sometimes, but I’ve found over the years the more I dig deep into God’s word the less anxiety I have about sharing.

I do understand we all have different Spiritual gifts, but that does not disqualify us from being used by God to impact His Kingdom. We all do not have to be bold frontline warriors in the battle of 24/7 spiritual warfare. I think many Believers are unaware of the hidden personal ministry that is out beyond the boundaries of their social circles and church life, that they have created by just by being a child of God.

Everyone everywhere that is a Believer has family, friends, neighbors, coworkers, and people in every little nook and cranny of their lives who knows they are a Believer. In the modern age of social media and networking you can also have a visible online appearance, which is actually why I created this blog. The point is we all have or own personal ministry just by default. It does not have to be thought of and labeled as such.

I am a firm believer in the power of planting seeds in people’s hearts. Seeds that can impact and transform people’s lives from a spiritual perspective. The powerful reality is you don’t have a clue how far your personal ministry has branched out from you exponentially. You may have said something as simple as “Have a Blessed day” to a young store clerk. Maybe that person was already struggling in some area of their life. They start thinking about what you said after you leave the store. You forget about it on the drive home. The young clerk starts to think about what “being Blessed” means and does a web search and discovers Christianity and Jesus and gets saved and becomes a teacher and plants even more seeds and it just keep going and going. This legacy is part of your personal ministry. And you don’t even know anything about it. Just by saying to a young troubled store clerk “Have a Blessed day”.

You have a hidden personal ministry out there larger than you can ever possibly imagine. This is how The Holy Spirit is active in our lives. It is supernatural and it’s eternally effective.

This is why it’s so important for us to acknowledge people that God brings into our lives with simple words of encouragement or common courtesy. The Holy Spirit is infinitely more effective at networking and planting seeds than you can ever be on your own, and it’s an awesome power we have available to us instantly. Is that not cool or what?

So keep building your hidden personal ministry and go out of your way today to tell someone to have a Blessed day.
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The Waiting on God Paradox

June 15th, 2023
Before I retired in 2020 I had a small but active ministry at my job involving customers and employees. It was risky business in the work environment because sometimes non-believers are easily offended by anything related to Christianity, which is another topic for another day. I felt like I had a purpose. Mentoring young employees, praying with them, and having thought provoking conversations with customers and suppliers. I was in a proactive place in my walk of Faith.

After the SARS-CoV-2 virus hit our company in the Spring of that year, I was directed by our parent company in Europe to terminate one third of our employees. They called it a “preemptive strike”. I was never told how they calculated we needed to terminate so many people. I had to let a lot of good people too. It was one of the most difficult things I’ve ever had to do in my life. We literally did not have enough people left to run the business and they put a no overtime policy in place, in addition to a hiring freeze. Orders weren’t shipping, customers were complaining, and of course as a regional vice president, this all became my fault. For the first time in my 40 years with this company I felt like I needed to get away from it all and I did. I quit/retired in August of 2020 at age 60.

I had no plan in place to use my free time. I wanted to take up golf again but right after leaving my job I was unable to sleep and I got involved with a woman I met on a dating sight I had no business being involved with as a Believer. The insomnia got worse. It affected my church life. It was horrible and I felt exhausted around the clock. It affected my ability to function on a lot of levels and the sleep medications prescribed by my doctor were giving me bad hangovers. In January of 2021 I started having bad nausea around the clock. It lasted for thirteen months and I had two upper endoscopies done. Both doctors told me I needed to drastically change my lifestyle, which I made an attempt to do through physical fitness. Unfortunately in April of 2022 I sustained a severe neck injury by overextending with an abdominal roller and pushing the top of my spine into the base of my skull. The pain was intolerable. During the physical therapy I developed a dependency to pain medication. I stopped working out and my Mom passed away a few months later. I’ve been trying to help my sister manage my Mom’s estate in Georgia, making frequent trips there to help clean out her house.

During this three year period I never gave up on my Faith, although at times I felt like there was a total disconnect between me and God and His Son. My prayers became quick, repetitive, and without meaning. I began to question my own salvation. I went to a Christian counselor because I was convinced the instantaneous transformation I went through on the night of December 7, 2013 was somehow not real, even though I experienced it and it changed everything from my appearance to my voice. I was also convinced my Baptism in front of three thousand people had somehow been nullified. I still have my struggles, but I have finally come to a place where I’m praying for God to open doors for me so I can talk to people about The Word.

The problem I face right now is I have too much free time on my hands with no coherent plan in place to use it. I’ve considered going back to work which is a viable reality as of this writing. I’ve considered trying to start a new class at my church for young adult men but I have to make sure I’m not doing it out of pride. I need to be around people for sure. I have a Spirit driven need to spread God’s Word, but I never feel like I’m doing enough and I’m just waiting for God. It’s so difficult to have that fruit of patience, especially since I’m not getting any younger.

A few weeks ago I really started ramping up my prayers in regards to how I could reach more people and plant seeds of sharing in their minds and hearts. I’ve never been on social media before and I don’t have any interest in it. I keep a case of Bibles in my vehicle to give out to random people when I’m out and about, but for me to reach more people I needed an outlet. I had forgotten about the blog option but remembered it doing some clean up work in my browser bookmarks.

I had not intended for this post to turn into an “About Me” page but I’ve obviously gone down that path. As I was gathering my thoughts before writing this I had intended to give examples from Scripture to support the idea of being patient while waiting for God, but I realized all of God’s Word is a call to spiritual action. Complacency and procrastinating must be absent from our hearts while we are waiting for God to align the interwoven cosmic complexities of our lives. I think the lesson I’ve learned from this post is God is probably waiting on us more than we are waiting on Him.
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Ever Increasing Evil

June 14th, 2023
In the days before the internet and social media, you would rarely ever pick up a newspaper and read an article from a pastor publicly outing and judging another pastor for all the world to see. You most certainly would not see anything on television or hear radio news where a pastor is openly criticizing someone at another church for spending over the budget approved by the church leaders and members.

I had a disturbing video show up in my YouTube feed last night from a popular pastor on the web with nearly five hundred thousand subscribers. The pastor in question apparently overspent on the approved travel budget and a few other things. The pastor who posted the video online actually went so far as to resort to name calling by referring to him as “spending like a drunken sailor”. The more disturbing part of this is the video had over 400 comments from his supporters cheering him on for his actions and “exposing” the guy he was verbally attacking. Initially I was dumbfounded, then angry. Then I wrote a retaliatory post and sat there for a minute before I posted it. At the last moment I decided to pray for the guy instead of posting my scathing rebuttal which included references to Scripture about how he should handle these kinds of situations. The attacking pastor even admitted he knew the man, which makes it even more disturbing. This is a man with a masters degree in theology and a large public following.

I want to give all of you some words from the mouth of our most precious Lord and Savior Jesus Christ as He is discussing the signs of the end times in last of the five Olivet Discourses. Keep in mind this is some of the most important prophetic material in all of Scripture. Matthew 24:10 – “At that time many will turn away from The Faith and will betray and hate each other”. This is literally what we are beginning see among the global church of Believers. Instead of making every effort to preserve the unity of the church we are going behind the backs of each other and attacking like wolves. Understand this: Every Believer on this planet is a flawed human being. They are flawed in their actions, words, teachings, writings, and every other phase of their life. When we accepted the free gift of pardon for our sins past, present, and future, and were baptized into The Holy Spirit, we did not get sprinkled with magic Christian dust and become perfect. Absolutely not. We are all still messed up and we have a daily obligation to pray and repent. Of course being saved does not give us a license to sin. We could do an entire class on that topic alone.

One of the fifty plus commands of Jesus is Matthew 18:15 – “Go to Christians who offend you”. I am not judging this gentleman who failed miserably at following the commands of Jesus, I am only discerning his fruit, of which there was none in his video. If he actually knows the guy like he claims don’t you think his first inclination would have been to speak with him privately as he is commanded? Apparently not. he chose to record a ten plus minute video outright attacking him and calling him a “drunken sailor”, with his followers piling on and saying “get him boy” essentially. I am sure every last one of these people who were involved in this call themselves followers of Jesus Christ. Do you see where this is headed?

Indeed maybe the end times are upon us. I try not be lose focus of evangelizing by channeling my energy into prophecy date setting. There is enough of that going out there already, but Jesus literally predicted this would start happening. I think this is a great time for us to conduct a fearless and searching moral inventory of ourselves and see if we currently measure up to The Will of God and His Son. We have an eternal obligation to keep each other built up and refreshed. If another Believer is getting off track, firstly we need to be praying for him, and secondly we need to be making some kind of heartfelt effort to get the person reconciled. Can you imagine if a church membership started posting derogatory attacks about each other on Facebook and Twitter, or is that already happening too?

My prayer for everyone is let’s all be careful of having a prideful and selfish admiration for earthly distractions. With all the crazy stuff happening in the world today and communication traveling the entire globe at light speed, it’s way too easy for us to get off track. I do it. We all do it. We can’t go ten minutes without keeping up with latest worldly whatever. Challenge another Believer in your life to replace cell phone, television, and internet time with Bible study time and also challenge yourself. And above everything else, follow the commands of Jesus Christ and live out His Word.

Blessings everyone, you are all super special in God’s eyes..
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The Parable Paradox

June 13th, 2023
My lifelong Bible reading and study have ramped up over the last ten years or so and I’m particularly fond of Paul’s work and The Epistle of James. I’ve recently done a video series on the Book of Revelation which was enlightening, particularly since the author did a great a job delving into Old Testament prophecy along the way. I’m also fond of The Gospels, particularly anything related to the commands and Parables of Jesus. The Book of Psalm and Proverbs is high on the list as well, but I usually just go where The Spirit leads me. To be frank, I get more joy and peace of mind out of studying The Word in a quiet private setting than I do at most church sermons and classes, although I do attend regularly for the fellowship and putting myself in a place where God and Jesus can open more doors for me to impact and transform people’s lives.

Sometimes in my studies I get spiritually stuck and the divine message within The Scriptures just doesn’t hit my heart like I pray it will and I’m left to try to rediscover it another day. There is much of this in the Old Testament and within The Mosaic Law. I’m a big fan of study Bibles and also the internet is a huge help at times, but you really have to discern manmade interpretations this day and age. It’s super easy to burrow down a rabbit hole and suddenly find yourself having those doubting feelings. Much of the Bible study material online right now has a worldly vibe to it. My God given spiritual senses usually have me recognize it but I have been known to allow feelings about something I’ve read morph into a diluted version of what the actual Word says.

I previously posted a piece about spiritual blindness and some of it’s implications in the secular world. In summary I described how people who are rabidly opposed to Christianity will distort The Bible for their own benefit, not having the supernatural wisdom to understand they are putting their foolishness on full public display.

I actually think spiritual blindness is something that can be a temporary stumbling block in the lives of Believers. I have seen it firsthand in some of my teaching and mentoring situations, and I’ve most certainly experienced it myself.

I didn’t get saved and baptized until 2013, although God marked my heart around 1972. Despite my exuberant enthusiasm to read, study, and listen to God’s Word, I’ve always struggled with many of The Parables of Jesus. I totally get why Jesus taught this way. The spiritually blind would never understand what he was talking about. I knew this of course as I was reading and studying and I began to develop somewhat of a complex as to why it just wasn’t sinking in. It’s divinely amazing God knows exactly what He is doing with our lives.

My ten years as a Believer has been a roller coaster ride. When I got saved my Faith had a foundation in feelings and emotion. My new class teacher at the time, a man who I instantly developed a bond with, was very knowledgeable in all things Bible but he was also very emotional about his Faith and his feelings lighted his path. He and I worked together to build a men’s class at my church from about ten men to around thirty. Long story short he had a conflict with the gentleman who was the director and we both left the church. I was called back later to teach but I left again after I was pulled into a church politics situation when I was recruited to be a teacher for a new singles class. Still again I was called back to teach but was verbally attacked by a class member and I left again. Then I went back and applied for a staff position as a young adult counselor. I was told I had the job but they never followed through on it and I left yet again. All of these situations could have been avoided if my Faith would have had a firm foundation rooted in Truth and Peace rather than feelings and emotion. I have returned to the church with a renewed sense of peace and calm, however Scripture tells us that our personal ministry is paradoxical, that is the more effective you are the more you are going to be spiritually attacked (2 Corinthians 6: 8-10), which is actually happening right now, but I am more prepared for it, simply because my Faith has matured. Somewhat.

So The Parables of Jesus is where I have really struggled through the years. I’ve printed out a list of the forty six parables and I’m studying one each morning. I’m finally gaining some wisdom in this area but what I really want to explore is the life application aspect, but I’m not quite there yet. I think if we can identify areas in our lives that have alignment with these Parables, the more effective we can be in our prayer life and personal relationship with Jesus. It also makes us much more effective in evangelizing and sharing The Good News.

I will revisit and follow up on this topic after I complete my Parable studies and identify life application situations in my life and the lives of those God brings into my life.

My prayer for everyone reading this is that somehow a tiny seed of thought can be placed in your heart and you can share this with other people in your personal circle of influence. God has me on a seed planting mission right now and I certainly do not want to take any credit for it, because I’ve had pride and self ambition issues in the past and I still struggle with them. This method of communicating relieves me of a lot of that. I don’t need to be personally recognized. I just want to have some part of me be content with the fact that someone’s life could possibly be changed simply by something they read written by a flawed ordinary guy on the internet.

Blessings everyone, God loves you more than you can comprehend.
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Biblical Paradoxes and Apologetics

June 12th, 2023
Spiritual Blindness. Let’s talk about that. What is about any human that will vehemently deny the existence of a divine creator to the very core and heart of their being and have a vested lifelong interested in everything that is the polar opposite of whatever is true, noble, right, pure, lovely, admirable, excellent, and praiseworthy (Philippians 4:8)? It literally breaks my heart when I try to have a conversation with someone whose life is in utter turmoil and chaos about The Good News, and they viciously defend many of their poor choices with logic and reason that has no basis in basic common sense, much less any Faith based values. These traits and attributes are evident in many of our elected political officials, sports heroes, Hollywood stars, and many others who maintain a highly visible profile in the public spotlight. Social media has become infested with every kind of evil you can possibly think up. It’s gotten so bad I don’t even maintain any social media presence any longer. I’ve insulated myself from “news” sources and other forms of entertainment because it’s so pervasive in every nook and cranny of our society now. I feel polluted every time I take a peek at it. I don’t know how our children and teens are able to grow into responsible young adults. The satanic corruption is worse than I ever remember.

Others belong to a large group of self-proclaimed literary and scholarly elites who will devote their entire lives viciously denying the existence of God and all things Biblical, not even realizing denying Him is confirmation of His existence. Why such a passionate need to deny Him if He doesn’t even exist? This hate for Christianity is masked in every manner of deception you can possibly think up. Political leaders and military powers throughout the ages have exterminated tens if not hundreds of millions of people of Faith. Even in the modern age of so called intellectual enlightenment this mindset is more pervasive than ever. The majority of these anti-God people do not have any love or compassion for you whatsoever. You will recognize them by their fruit.

If you take a quick mental inventory of all things on this planet that have a questionable existence, The concept of a divine creator is at the top of the list for people who oppose such things. Where is the outrage and organized effort to shut down and eradicate bigfoot, UFO’s and aliens, vampires, the tooth fairy, witches, ghosts, and the list goes on and on. People I have personally known throughout the years that don’t believe in God are typically very bitter and angry about it. In my mind this speaks volumes.

Many of the anti-God debaters are actually more knowledgeable about the Holy Bible than I am. I’m really shocked someone would go to this extreme in an attempt to further strengthen their argument why God does not exist. It takes thousands of hours of study and research to memorize The Bible. The level of commitment is evidence of their hatred for it. The Word contains over one hundred references to being spiritually blind. It is a living and breathing God inspired book unlike anything else we have in this world. These debaters will never discuss the concepts of being spiritually blind, instead focusing on verses that in their minds are paradoxical to each other, in an effort to nullify their validity. I was able to identify around fifteen sets of verses that appear to be contradictory at first blush. Most of these will typically be used in attempt to invalidate The Word:
- John 12: 47 and John 9: 39
- Proverbs 26: 4-5
- Matthew 7: 1 and John 7:24
- Isaiah 9: 6 and Matthew 10: 34
- Malachi 3: 10 and Luke 4: 12
- Matthew 5: 40-41 and Matthew 7:6
- Matthew 5: 16 and Matthew 6:1
- Ecclesiastes 1: 2 and 1 Corinthians 10: 31
- 1 Peter 1: 17 and John 5: 22
- Matthew 11: 30 and Matthew 7: 14
- Romans 3: 28 and James 2: 24
- Matthew 11: 29 and Galatians 5: 1
- Luke 17: 10 and Ephesians 2: 10
There are many others. The anti-Bible debaters will take these verses out of context in a weak and feeble effort to discredit key Biblical concepts and sound doctrine. Those of us who have a passion for Christian apologetics would do ourselves well to dig into God’s Word and be ready to educate these naysayers. I personally believe God knew exactly what He was doing when laying these traps in Scripture for the unbeliever and the spiritually blind.

So as Christians and Believers what can we do to impact and transform the lives of those who are so vehemently opposed to God’s Word? The word evangelize comes to mind. Sometimes I think we get too caught up in acknowledging the enemy in a defensive posture and we don’t convey the message that God loves everyone through common grace. He’s just patiently waiting for man to use his free will in an eternally positive manner. The only thing I can do is use my Lord and Savior Jesus Christ as an example and follow His commands, but I still have dig in deep to God’s Word and understand it and know it. It’s definitely a lifelong process and journey.

We were talking in my men’s class a few Sundays ago about how all Believers have a noticeable positive energy emanating from us. Indeed like beacons of light. Even when we are under attack and challenged to defend what we believe, I think it’s of the utmost importance to keep the fruits of the spirit as our core behavioral playbook.

The next time God puts you in a position to defend the Gospel I hope this helps you in some small way, or maybe it will spark a new thought process in your heart you can share with others. I think the spirit of fellowship and sharing have incredible potential to fuel heart change, both Believers and non-believers alike.
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Just Exactly What The Heck Is Going On?

June 10th, 2023
When I was a small boy growing up in West Georgia in the 1960’s, my Mom would haul me and my siblings to church on Sunday mornings as far back as I can remember. I felt the cross pull of sin and holiness even at a very young age and recognized it for what it was. Even though the Holy Spirit marked my heart for eternity in the pews of that tiny country church, I never went through the traditional church ceremony of walking down the aisle and doing the public confession of my Faith, much less being baptized. That didn’t happen until late 2013 at age 53.

One of the many things about my Faith I never understood or was never taught is that a true personal relationship with Jesus Christ has absolutely nothing to do with feelings and emotion, but only about Truth and Peace. How did I miss this? I always just conceded that my Faith was weak and I was a lifelong habitual backslider. Sin in our lives is spawned by desire, whether consciously or unconsciously, and it’s very cunning and very deceiving. This is one of the primary reasons we need the saving grace of the penalty paid by Jesus Christ on the cross.

The Epistle of James has always been one of my favorite sources of Bible study, teaching, and mentoring, but I completely missed the obvious implications of James 1:14 in my own life until recently. “But each one is tempted when he is carried away and enticed by his own desire”. Desire is not based in Truth or Peace. Desire is an emotion that is a pathway to deeds of the flesh, recurrent sin, and backsliding. Don’t misunderstand, I get the fact every Believer’s personal relationship with Jesus is very different and deeply intimate on levels that are quite frankly none of my business, but it’s my observation at my church many Believers are nearly always in an emotional state, masking it as being “Spirit filled”. This is particularly obvious in a lot of the worship music presentations of today that literally resemble rock concerts.

So how do we eliminate feelings and emotion from our lives as Believers in a world energized by satan and transition into the Truth and Peace that Jesus not only wants us to have because he loves us but because he commands it? In John 14:15 Jesus very specifically tells us, “If you love me, keep my commands”. There are over fifty of these commands. I am currently in the process of completing a morning devotion, prayer, and Bible study on these commands and the bar is definitely set high, as it should be. One of the cool things about our walk of Faith is that you can never complete it. You always have to keep striving and persevere because you are a messed up sinning hypocrite just as I am, save by the blood of Jesus Christ.

One of those commands is Matthew 5:48 “Be perfect, therefore as your heavenly Father is perfect”. So just exactly how are we supposed to pull this off? You have already failed just trying to pursue it. Jesus Christ has already attained this prerequisite for our benefit. God will never compromise his own holiness, righteousness, and perfection. I can’t put into words the comfort and contentment this gives my soul, knowing that God’s plan and playbook for us is without flaw and designed in perfection by Him for our benefit because he loves us more than our human minds can even contemplate.

Another command from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ is Matthew 6:25-26 “Let not your Heart be troubled”. Meditating on this graces me with the most incredible peace and serenity, which is something I desire right now with nearly all of my will. Sometimes it seems like the harder I try on my own to do what I think God and Jesus wants me to do I end up falling all over the place due to my pride, selfish ambition, and vane conceit. I get these ideas for my church or witnessing or even this new blog without praying about it and checking in with God first, which brings me to todays paradox.

I have strong desires (there’s that word again) to do things for God and Jesus but due to my excessive enthusiasm it’s extremely difficult for me to be patient, which is of course one of the nine fruits of the Spirit in Galatians 5:22-23. I always feel like I need to be doing something that can impact and transform people’s lives. I keep praying for doors to be opened. For years.

So that’s one of the reasons I started this blog and today is the first post. I’ve been praying about how I can reach as many people as possible and God put it on my heart to use technology. I don’t have formal training or a seminary degree but I do have wisdom and street knowledge, plus thirty five years of management experience in the real world.

My goal here is to plant seeds in people’s minds and hearts that they can share with others and get the vines growing. Both Believers and non-Believers. I’m not really all that concerned whether you agree with me or not, that’s not the point of the blog. I’m not here to debate, I’m here hopefully to help people think with Truth and Peace in their hearts and spread thoughts and ideas.

Have a Blessed Day Everyone..
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