(December 9, 2011)
Prayer House News!
It’s Friday and there is still no snow on the ground. Isn’t that something! I think it is. That also means we are only a couple of days away from worshipping God together once again. I look forward to seeing you on Sunday.
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. The Devotional for this week is taken from my message from Sunday.
=====================================
Devotional!
Jesus’ Purpose
Let’s talk a little more about Jesus’ Purpose in coming to earth. Christmas so focuses on the baby Jesus and the manger scene with all of the animals and the wise men – the shepherds and angels singing about his birth when in reality – this was a very serious event. Jesus had to come to earth because man with his free will was making wrong choices. Though he had the power to make right choices he was primarily making bad choices. Man had become what his mind told him he was.
I don’t know if we fully understand the signigicance of a free will. Some of it is brought out in Proverbs 23:7 which says, For as he thinks within himself, so he is. A man is what he thinks he is. This verse could basically say, A man is what he wills himself to be. (James Allen’s book, As a Man Thinketh).
The power of the mind is incredible. It gives us just a glimpse of the power God gave us. What the scriptures teach us is that we are attracted to those things we secretly harbor. The things we love and also the things we fear. Our outer world of circumstances shape itself to the inner world of thought. Circumstances do not make the man. The tendency today is to blame the circumstances of life for our unhappiness when in actuality the circumstances are the result of who we are. We don’t attract what we want, we attract what we are. Everyone wants a better life but it seems the circumstances of life won’t allow it. Not true. Regardless of what you want out of life you are attracting the kind of lifestyle that defines who you are.
That’s exactly what Proverbs 23:7 is saying – As a man thinks (or you could say, as a man wills) so is he. You might say, “how do I change my will. I’ve tried but I just can’t.” You are right you can’t in your own strength so what you do is surrender your will to the will of God. That’s all salvation is. Salvation is saying – not my will but yours. I give you my heart (will). Remember, Jesus had the same free will that you and I do and yet he did not sin because he surrendered it to his Heavenly Father.
Men often want to improve their circumstances but are unwilling to improve themselves subsequently they remain bound. To this end Jesus came to earth. He came to teach us how to speak to God once again. If the scripture is true that a man is what he thinks that can work to our advantage as well. However, because man had lost the capacity to talk with God something had to happen. God had to reveal himself to man in a unique way. He did so through the birth of his Son.
Because a man is what he thinks he is the scriptures tell us to set our affections – our mind – on things above not on things on the earth. Be transformed by the renewing of the mind. These are things that are only possible through the spirit of God.
The spirit of the day we are living in is totally different from the spirit of God. Suppose you have a man who is poor and he is extremely anxious about his condition but is living according to the spirit of the day rather than the spirit of God. His home and comforts should be improved yet on the job he shirks his duty, and considers himself justified in trying to deceive his employer on the grounds of his insufficient wages.
That man does not understand the simple rudiments of the biblical principles of prosperity and how God honors a strong work ethic. Not only is he totally unfit to rise out of his own dilemma but he is attracting to himself a still deeper problem by dwelling in and acting out lazy, deceptive, and ungodly thoughts. A man is what he thinks.
Good thoughts and actions can never produce bad results; bad thoughts and actions can never produce good results. This is saying that nothing can come from corn but corn. Nothing can come from a grain of wheat but wheat. Men understand this law in the natural world, but few understand it in the mental and moral world and therefore, do not co-operate with it.
Consider this; Eve was deceived Adam was not. The woman chose unknowingly. The man chose with open eyes. Man can throw no stones at woman. If the woman failed God that day, the man failed both God and the woman. If it is true that through her came the beginning of the world's sin, through her, also, came that which was far greater--the world's Savior.
The choice was made. The forbidden fruit taken, the act was done. That simple act was equally tremendous! Just think of what happened! Gordon says, “No fathoming line can find its depth. No measuring rod its height nor breadth. No thought can pierce its intensity. That reaching arm went around a world. Millenniums in a moment. A million miles in a step. An ocean in a drop. Volumes in a word. A hell of suffering in one act. The depths of woe in a glance. The sharpest pain in the softest touch. God mistrusted. Satan embraced. Sin's door open. Eden's gate shut.” Jesus came to earth to re-open Eden’s gate.
Adam sinned and though he felt shame for it, sin could not be allowed to stay in Eden. Sin had now become a part of man. The man and sin were now interwoven. They were inseparable. Sin has such a tenacious, gluey, sticky touch! It could not be taken out of the man without his being taken out also. So man had to be driven out for his own sake to rid Eden of sin. However, the man was driven out so that he might come back one day --changed. Love drove him out so that later it might let him in. The tree of life was kept from him for a time that it might be kept for him for an eternity. When he had changed his spirit, and changed sides in the fight with evil, and gotten victory over the spirit trying to dominant him, then he could return. Whenever the stain of his choice is taken out of the fiber of a man it becomes his right to retrace his steps, and reenter his heavenly home. He can once again talk with God and walk with God. This is Jesus’ Purpose. He came to this earth to ultimately pay the price of our bad, sinful choices, so that we will one day be able to enter into his presence and come boldly before the throne of Grace – there to worship our creator.
====================================================
Medication: A Merry Heart
Faults
Just think: If it weren't for marriage, men would go through
life thinking they had no faults at all.
Prayer House News!
It’s Friday and there is still no snow on the ground. Isn’t that something! I think it is. That also means we are only a couple of days away from worshipping God together once again. I look forward to seeing you on Sunday.
-----------------------------------------------------------------
. The Devotional for this week is taken from my message from Sunday.
=====================================
Devotional!
Jesus’ Purpose
Let’s talk a little more about Jesus’ Purpose in coming to earth. Christmas so focuses on the baby Jesus and the manger scene with all of the animals and the wise men – the shepherds and angels singing about his birth when in reality – this was a very serious event. Jesus had to come to earth because man with his free will was making wrong choices. Though he had the power to make right choices he was primarily making bad choices. Man had become what his mind told him he was.
I don’t know if we fully understand the signigicance of a free will. Some of it is brought out in Proverbs 23:7 which says, For as he thinks within himself, so he is. A man is what he thinks he is. This verse could basically say, A man is what he wills himself to be. (James Allen’s book, As a Man Thinketh).
The power of the mind is incredible. It gives us just a glimpse of the power God gave us. What the scriptures teach us is that we are attracted to those things we secretly harbor. The things we love and also the things we fear. Our outer world of circumstances shape itself to the inner world of thought. Circumstances do not make the man. The tendency today is to blame the circumstances of life for our unhappiness when in actuality the circumstances are the result of who we are. We don’t attract what we want, we attract what we are. Everyone wants a better life but it seems the circumstances of life won’t allow it. Not true. Regardless of what you want out of life you are attracting the kind of lifestyle that defines who you are.
That’s exactly what Proverbs 23:7 is saying – As a man thinks (or you could say, as a man wills) so is he. You might say, “how do I change my will. I’ve tried but I just can’t.” You are right you can’t in your own strength so what you do is surrender your will to the will of God. That’s all salvation is. Salvation is saying – not my will but yours. I give you my heart (will). Remember, Jesus had the same free will that you and I do and yet he did not sin because he surrendered it to his Heavenly Father.
Men often want to improve their circumstances but are unwilling to improve themselves subsequently they remain bound. To this end Jesus came to earth. He came to teach us how to speak to God once again. If the scripture is true that a man is what he thinks that can work to our advantage as well. However, because man had lost the capacity to talk with God something had to happen. God had to reveal himself to man in a unique way. He did so through the birth of his Son.
Because a man is what he thinks he is the scriptures tell us to set our affections – our mind – on things above not on things on the earth. Be transformed by the renewing of the mind. These are things that are only possible through the spirit of God.
The spirit of the day we are living in is totally different from the spirit of God. Suppose you have a man who is poor and he is extremely anxious about his condition but is living according to the spirit of the day rather than the spirit of God. His home and comforts should be improved yet on the job he shirks his duty, and considers himself justified in trying to deceive his employer on the grounds of his insufficient wages.
That man does not understand the simple rudiments of the biblical principles of prosperity and how God honors a strong work ethic. Not only is he totally unfit to rise out of his own dilemma but he is attracting to himself a still deeper problem by dwelling in and acting out lazy, deceptive, and ungodly thoughts. A man is what he thinks.
Good thoughts and actions can never produce bad results; bad thoughts and actions can never produce good results. This is saying that nothing can come from corn but corn. Nothing can come from a grain of wheat but wheat. Men understand this law in the natural world, but few understand it in the mental and moral world and therefore, do not co-operate with it.
Consider this; Eve was deceived Adam was not. The woman chose unknowingly. The man chose with open eyes. Man can throw no stones at woman. If the woman failed God that day, the man failed both God and the woman. If it is true that through her came the beginning of the world's sin, through her, also, came that which was far greater--the world's Savior.
The choice was made. The forbidden fruit taken, the act was done. That simple act was equally tremendous! Just think of what happened! Gordon says, “No fathoming line can find its depth. No measuring rod its height nor breadth. No thought can pierce its intensity. That reaching arm went around a world. Millenniums in a moment. A million miles in a step. An ocean in a drop. Volumes in a word. A hell of suffering in one act. The depths of woe in a glance. The sharpest pain in the softest touch. God mistrusted. Satan embraced. Sin's door open. Eden's gate shut.” Jesus came to earth to re-open Eden’s gate.
Adam sinned and though he felt shame for it, sin could not be allowed to stay in Eden. Sin had now become a part of man. The man and sin were now interwoven. They were inseparable. Sin has such a tenacious, gluey, sticky touch! It could not be taken out of the man without his being taken out also. So man had to be driven out for his own sake to rid Eden of sin. However, the man was driven out so that he might come back one day --changed. Love drove him out so that later it might let him in. The tree of life was kept from him for a time that it might be kept for him for an eternity. When he had changed his spirit, and changed sides in the fight with evil, and gotten victory over the spirit trying to dominant him, then he could return. Whenever the stain of his choice is taken out of the fiber of a man it becomes his right to retrace his steps, and reenter his heavenly home. He can once again talk with God and walk with God. This is Jesus’ Purpose. He came to this earth to ultimately pay the price of our bad, sinful choices, so that we will one day be able to enter into his presence and come boldly before the throne of Grace – there to worship our creator.
====================================================
Medication: A Merry Heart
Faults
Just think: If it weren't for marriage, men would go through
life thinking they had no faults at all.
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