“Or”…. Many Choices on the Path of Christian Discipleship – Purity 645
Purity
645 02/03/2022 Purity 645 Podcast
Good
morning,
It’s Thursday and I share photos of pathways today
as an encouragement to all to get on the path of Christian Discipleship by
choosing to live by faith and by the power of the Holy Spirit. That might sound a bit mystical, but it merely
points to a life that is intentional about living according to God’s wisdom and
ways and that is defined by our efforts to know God, to seek His presence, and
to see the fruit of the Spirit manifest in our lives.
I lead a Freedom in Christ Men’s Discipleship
Course meeting via Zoom tonight and I am looking forward to it because I have
been blessed with the opportunity to encourage men to experience their freedom
in Christ from all over the eastern parts of the United States and regardless
of whether they are in Florida, North Carolina, Georgia, Massachusetts, or New
York the advice for all of these men tonight will be the same: make the daily
choice to follow the Lord into the life of freedom that He has for you.
The thing I love about walking with the Lord and
about that simple advice to follow Him is the fact that although the advice may
be the same for all these men, the way the Lord directs their individual paths
of discipleship is always different.
We have a personal God that knows all about us
and He has a very specific plan for each of our lives and He has a variety of
purposes for us to walk into to experience our increasing freedom and maturity
in Christ.
In counseling a friend the other evening, we
discussed various decisions they could make in their life to overcome the
problems they are facing. I invited them
to think outside of the box and brainstorm various alternatives for what they
could choose to do to get out of the mess they are in and then assured them
that no matter what course they chose the Lord would be with them.
I stated that the Lord was with them wherever
they go and that He would never leave them or forsake them so I advised that it
would probably be best to try to communicate with God to see if He would give
them some wisdom and guidance in the things they should choose to do.
I kept saying the word “or” over and over again
as we discussed the options they had to demonstrate that the Lord gives us
freedom in the choices we make, and He will allow us to make them even if they
aren’t the wisest options.
Sometimes the Lord allows us to learn from trial
and error, but I wanted to encourage my friend that instead of thinking that
the solution is just some blind stroke of luck by choosing some random course
of action, the Lord has given us the Bible to discern what principles of life
we should live by.
Any of the options before us that would go
against the truth of God’s word are not the ways the Lord is directing us to go. Instead of being overwhelmed by all the
various choices in life, the word of God helps us to make wise decisions.
The authority of God’s word stands above the
opinions of men and the ways of the world.
When we choose to walk in the Spirit, we summarily reject the worldly
ways of doing things that led to the mess we are in and instead we choose to do
things God’s way.
I pointed out that living this way could simplify
our lives tremendously as God’s righteous path for living never leads to regret
but at the same time assured my friend that the principles of God’s word still allow
for spontaneity of actions and making bold choices that may be seen as thinking
outside of the box of the world system but will be dynamic and creative and
approved by God!
The faithful examples of men and women who
answered the call of God on their lives in the Bible show us that God doesn’t
always direct us in ways that we can expect but when we are true to His call
the things He suggests always seem to work for the ultimate good of the
situation even when we may initially face trials and turmoil when we choose to
follow Him.
God gives us the choice to trust Him and to
follow Him and when we step out in faith to do what He directs us to do we
discover that we are blessed for our obedience. When we obey God, we learn.
When we obey God, we grow. When we walk in
the Spirit long enough, we discover that there simply is no better way to live
our lives than in the Lord’s presence and according to His principles and
purposes.
So make the daily decision to trust the Lord by
renewing your mind with His word and by making changes to how you live your
life based on His wisdom. When you do
that you leave the darkness behind, problems get solved, and a life that is
transformed by the victory and freedom that God brings emerges from what was a
dysfunctional worldly existence.
So keep walking and talking with God. He welcomes you to follow His lead and to
experience the peace, love, and joy that naturally comes from walking in
the Spirit.
Today’s Bible verse comes to us from “The NLT Bible Promise Book
for Men”.
This morning’s meditation verse is:
Matthew 5:4 (NLT2)
4 God blesses those who
mourn, for they will be comforted.
Today’s verse comes from Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount and encourages us that comfort will come to those who mourn.
Today’s verse acknowledges the harsh realities of loss in our lives. The verse indicates that there will be things to mourn over in our lives, but the Lord tells us that if we allow ourselves to mourn we will be comforted.
There are two life applications for this verse.
The first deals with loss and the physical, mental, and spiritual benefits that come from mourning. Unfortunately in some Christian circles, there is a tendency to discourage mourning for loss loved ones because we are to know theologically that whatever their eternal destiny is on the other side of life, God is good and what happens to them will be right.
If they had faith in Jesus they will be with Him in paradise, if they didn’t they will be rightfully separated from the One they rejected and receive the judgement they willfully chose for themselves by refusing to accept God’s gift of salvation.
Rarely, when someone dies is this second option considered as the consensus opinion is that everyone who dies is in “a better place”. Be compassionate, wise, and discerning in how you share that truth in love and be sure to offer your friendship and presence to the grieving more than your ideas on their loved one’s final destination. The game is over for the departed so let’s offer the peace of God to the living by letting them mourn in peace to be comforted.
Those who do not allow themselves to mourn may be subject to the enemy as their denial of loss and pain could be seen as an active deception. Conversely those who get stuck in a period of mourning can also run the risk of being oppressed by the enemy’s lies as the emphasis on the pain of loss can be used to cause the grieving to distrust the Lord’s goodness or to make their departed loved one an ‘idol” in their life.
The idea behind Jesus’ words, as the Son of God, is that we are to mourn by going to God to find comfort. It is in the Lord’s presence that we can find healing and comfort for the heartache that results from loss. So we are not to draw into ourselves in mourning and reflect on what we think or feel that death means, but we are to be comforted by what God tells us about death and how He offers eternal life to those in relationship with Him through faith in Jesus. There is comfort to be found when we seek the Lord’s truth.
And that brings us to the second application of this verse: the personal mourning we face when we have a realization of our sin and separation from God. When the Lord reveals to us that we are not living right and that we are on the road to perdition, we should be greatly grieved in our spirits. We may question how God could condemn us for our sins or may frantically grasp at some way for us to be approved in our own efforts.
God doesn’t mind this search for meaning in our lives as we weigh out how we are supposed to live our lives but in the final summation we are supposed to find the futility of any ideas that we can “save ourselves”. In our realization of our failings, we are to mourn our self-righteousness as being inadequate to save us. We are to mourn our own efforts and be comforted by surrendering to God by making Jesus our Lord and Savior.
When we mourn our sinful existence, we can find comfort, healing, and life in Christ alone.
And finally, beyond salvation, today’s verse also can point to repentance in our daily walk as those besetting sins and those periodic mistakes should cause us to mourn and to be comforted by surrendering to the Lord’s call to discipleship and actively crucifying the flesh and renewing the mind to experience our freedom in Christ.
So mourning is not a bad thing. The Lord tells us that those who mourn will be comforted. So whether it is dealing with the loss of things or loved ones, the morning of our separation from God, or our feelings of sadness over our habitual or periodic failings, go to the Lord to mourn and express your feelings but accept His wisdom and ways to find comfort, healing and strength that will take you from the darkness of mourning to the joy that comes in the morning of the dawn of a victorious life of freedom In Christ.
As always, I invite all to go to mt4christ.org where I always share insights from prominent Christian theologians and counselors to assist my brothers and sisters in Christ with their walk.
Today we continue to share from Dr. Neil Anderson’s . “Restored: Experience Life with Jesus”. Today, we continue sharing from Chapter 7.
As always, I share this information for educational purposes
and encourage all to purchase Dr. Neil Anderson’s books for your own private
study and to support his work.
UNDERSTANDING SEXUAL BONDAGES
The Apostle Paul identifies every child of God with Christ in His
life, death, burial, and resurrection in Romans 6. That association is true,
because our souls are in union with God, and His life is eternal. We are to
continuously choose to believe that we are alive in Christ and dead to sin.
There is a law of sin and a law of death and laws cannot be done away with. But
they can be overcome by a greater law, which is the law of life in Christ
Jesus.145
So sin is still present and tempting, and physical death is still
imminent. But the law of life in Christ Jesus ensures us that we will continue
to live spiritually and be forever in the presence of God. And the law of life
in Christ Jesus is greater than the law of sin. As long as we live by faith
according to what God says is true and in His power, we will not sin. Paul goes
on to say that it is our responsibility not to let sin reign in our mortal
body, and he tells us how. “Do not go on presenting the members of your body to
sin as instruments of unrighteousness; but present yourselves to God as those
alive from the dead, and your members as instruments of righteousness to God.”146
If you commit a sexual sin, you use your body as an instrument of
unrighteousness and you allow sin to reign in your mortal body. Confession
alone will not resolve this. There is one other passage in the Bible that is
important for overcoming sexual strongholds as follows:
Do you not know that your bodies are members of Christ? Shall I
then take away the members of Christ and make them members of a harlot? May it
never be! Or do you not know that the one who joins himself to a harlot is one
body with her? For He says, “The two will become one flesh.” But the one who
joins himself to the Lord is one spirit with Him. Flee immorality. Every other
sin that a man commits is outside the body, but the immoral man sins against
his own body. Or do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit
who is in you, whom you have from God, and that you are not your own? For you
have been bought with a price: therefore glorify God in your body (1
Corinthians 6:15-20).
SEXUAL BONDING
Bonding takes place when unholy sex is committed. The person has
become one flesh with his or her partner. That is true even in the case of
incest or rape. The body is used as an instrument of unrighteousness. The
temple is violated. But that isn’t fair! Of course it’s not fair, and I can’t
promise that it won’t happen to you or anyone else. But I can tell you how to
resolve it in Christ so that you don’t have to stay in bondage to the sexual
abuse. We have observed that if there is voluntary compliance with the sexual
abuser, the victim usually will become very sexually active. In cases of rape
and incest, a woman will usually shut down sexually, even if she is now married
to a Christian husband. Sex is dirty in her mind, and she can’t stand to be
touched.
We are warned to flee from any form of immorality, because it is a
self-destructive sin that we commit against our own bodies. God and Satan both
know our weakness to sexual passions. Satan plays on that weakness, but God
provides a way of escape.
---------------------------more
tomorrow------------------------
Join our “Victory over the Darkness”, “The Bondage Breaker”,
"Freedom in Christ" series of Discipleship Classes via the
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Encouragement for the Path of Christian
Discipleship
