Apicontent

Just as man is destined to die once, and after that to face judgment. (Hebrews 9:27)

There will come a time in every single person’s life when they will face death. If you knew that today was your last day to live, what would be important to you? Certainly your list of chores would be at the bottom of your priority list. When people face death they deal with two things: what they leave behind and where they are going. If you have ever stood next to the bedside of a dying person, you will have noticed they have a desire to wrap things up. They want to make things right with people that they have had misunderstandings with, and tell others how much they have meant to them. Another thing the dying tend to do, is examine their life to see if they are prepared to meet God. If we knew the day that we were going to die, we would certainly make sure that those important relationships were cleaned up before it was too late. The problem is, we don’t know when we will die. We need to live today as if it is our last. 

What about “where we are going?” Yes, there is life after death. We will stand before a just Judge. How do we know? God has told us in His Word.

How can you know without a shadow of a doubt that when you die you will go to heaven?

2 Corinthians 1:21-22 makes it clear when it says, “Now it is God who makes both us and you stand firm in Christ. He anointed us, set his seal of ownership on us, and put his Spirit in our hearts as a deposit, guaranteeing what is to come.”

1 John 5:12-13 also says, “He who has the Son has life; he who does not have the Son of God does not have life. I write these things to you who believe in the name of the Son of God so that you may know that you have eternal life.”

To be assured of your eternal life you need to know Jesus Christ as your personal Savior. It is His work that will get you into heaven, not yours. If you have not asked Christ into your life, go back to the devotional #12 entitled” What Does it Mean to be Born Again?” and follow the steps to having a relationship with Jesus. If you do know Jesus Christ as your Savior, stand on the promises of God that He gives us in His Word. Live each day as if this is your last one, loving God, living for Him, and serving others. The finish line may be closer than you think.

You do not have, because you do not ask God. When you ask, you do not receive, because you ask with wrong motives, that you may spend what you get on your pleasures. (James 4:2-3)

Have you ever prayed really expecting God to answer, or do you just say the words because you know you should? If you prayed for rain, would you carry an umbrella expecting to use it? Can you quickly list how God has answered prayer in your life this week? Maybe you haven’t had an answer to prayer lately and you wonder…why doesn’t God answer my prayers? 

Prayer is simply sitting and talking with God face to face. It’s a conversation. It doesn’t take big fancy words or a special voice, just words from your heart. Some of the best prayers in the world are the prayers of children because they just say what they want and don’t worry about how it sounds to anyone else. Prayer is how we get to know God better. It is the same as building a relationship with a friend. The more time you spend in conversation, the closer you become and the more you know about the other person. 

God gives us some straightforward directions about our prayer life in His Word. James tells us that if we do not come to God and ask in prayer, He can’t answer it. Many times prayer is our last resort after first going to friends or trying to figure it out ourselves. James also gives us another reason for unanswered prayer…wrong motives. If our prayer is simply to gain something for our own pleasure, God tells us that is a wrong motive. 

John 15:7 says, “If you remain in me and my words remain in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be given you.” 

We see in this verse the key to answered prayer…remaining close to God and keeping his commandments. That will help us understand how to pray in a way that will be answered. 

1 Thessalonians 5:16-18 also gives us helpful instruction for praying. “Be joyful always; pray continually; give thanks in all circumstances, for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus.” 

This is a clear statement of God’s will for our lives. He wants us to always be joyful, pray continuously, and be able to give Him thanks in all of our circumstances. If we truly understand God’s love and caretaking of us, we can be joyful all the time. We will pray continuously because we will believe He hears and answers prayer. Ultimately we will be able to be thankful in any circumstance because we know He is in control and has what is best for us in mind. 

Take some time to think through the commands in this verse. Are you joyful? Do you pray throughout your day giving things over to God? Can you give thanks to Him knowing He has full control and will take care of things so you can relax? This really is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus.

The weapons we fight with are not the weapons of the world. On the contrary, they have divine power to demolish strongholds. We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ. (2 Corinthians 10:4-5)

Driving down the road you replay the argument you just settled with your spouse that morning. You can remember the tone of voice they used and the look on their face. Perhaps you start saying out loud all the things you wished you could have remembered to say at the time, just to win the argument. By the time you get to work you are filled with negative feelings about your spouse. When they call you later that morning your tone is less than pleasant. You have become a victim of a negative thought life. What you think will always affect what you feel which in turn gives birth to action. How do you stop the rapid downward spiral of a negative thought life? Take it captive! 

God informs us of the true enemy in the above verse. It is any thought or reasoning that sets itself up against God’s teachings. Thoughts can be subtle, because no one else hears them and cannot correct any error. That is why God has given us His Word and His Spirit to help us recognize the rebellious thoughts and take them captive. Through His Word we will know the truth as we study it so we can recognize the counterfeit when we hear it. Through His Spirit we will have the power to take the thought captive and demolish it. We need to recognize that the battle for our mind is ongoing. We need to evaluate what we think about. 

God actually gives us a measuring stick for our thoughts in Philippians 4:8: “Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—think about such things.” 

Throughout your day stop and evaluate your thoughts. If they are not true, noble, right, pure, lovely, admirable, excellent or praiseworthy then you need to demolish them by taking your thoughts captive and stopping the downward spiral by getting rid of those negative thoughts. How do you get rid of them? You need to recognize that your thoughts have set themselves up against God’s teaching. You need to confess those thoughts as sin. When you confess, you walk away from it and don’t have anything to do with it again!

Do you not know that in a race all the runners run, but only one gets the prize? Run in such a way as to get the prize. Everyone who competes in the games goes into strict training. They do it to get a crown that will not last; but we do it to get a crown that will last forever. Therefore I do not run like a man running aimlessly; I do not fight like a man beating the air. No, I beat my body and make it my slave so that after I have preached to others, I myself will not be disqualified for the prize. (1 Corinthians 9:24-27)

When an athlete decides to compete he goes into training. Regardless of the sport, he must be diligent in his training and consistent if he has any hope of completing the competition. When a runner runs he keeps his eyes focused on the finish line but use muscles that have been developing for years. The competitor has one goal in mind, to finish the race and win the prize. In the athlete’s mind the prize is worth the countless hours of training, pain, and self-denial. All the hours of training and practice make it easier to run the race. 

Paul uses the same analogy to teach us that we are also in a race with a finish line and a prize. Ours will be given to us in eternity, but it is definitely there and definitely worth the time of training. There are training tools that the Christian needs to use to help them in the race. These are the “basics” that we need to practice on a daily basis. These “basics” are bible study, prayer, and scripture memory. By using these training tools on a daily basis we will be better equipped to run the race that is laid out for us. We will be developing spiritual muscles that will make the race easier. Along the way we can benefit by having spiritual coaches who can help us grow and hold us accountable to practicing. A coach can help us develop a workout schedule that we can stick to. 

Evaluate your training schedule. Are you out of shape spiritually? Set a goal to read your bible, pray, and memorize scripture. Ask God to guide you to a more mature person who can coach you as you run the race. Meet with your mentor on a regular basis to evaluate how you are doing in your training. If there are other things crowding your training schedule, pray about what you can set aside to make practicing the basics your first priority. There is no other prize worth winning.

Jesus declared, “I tell you the truth, no-one can see the kingdom of God unless he is born again.” (John 3:3)

Why do you need to be born again? What in the world does that mean? You’ve heard Christians talking about how they have been “born again”, or “saved”, or have “received eternal life”. Do they all mean the same thing? Yes, all of those phrases mean the same thing. God gave us the way to be “saved” through His Son, Jesus Christ. He gave us a plan explaining how we can be “born again” and “receive eternal life” in His Holy Word, the Bible. Follow along as we go through some of the thoughts and scriptures God has laid out for us.

• God loves you and created you to have a personal relationship with Him.
  John 17:3 Now this is eternal life: that they may know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom you have sent.
  
• Mankind is sinful and separated from God, so we cannot know Him personally or experience His love.
  Romans 3:23; 6:23 For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God…the wages of sin is death.
  
• Jesus Christ is the only answer to the problem of separation from God. He died on the cross and rose from the grave to pay the penalty for our sin.
  Romans 5:8 But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.
  
• We must individually receive Jesus Christ as Savior and Lord; then we can know God personally and experience His love.
  John 1:12 Yet to all who received him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God.
  
• You can receive Christ right now by faith through prayer.

God is not as concerned about the exact words you use as He is with the attitude of your heart. If you’ve never asked Christ to be your Savior, and would like to ask Jesus to come into your life so that you can be “born again,” you can use the prayer below – or use your own words.

Lord Jesus, I am a sinner. I want to know you personally. Thank you for dying on the cross for my sins. I open my heart and receive You as my Savior and Lord. Thank you for forgiving me of my sins and giving me the gift of eternal life. Take control of my life and make me the person You want me to be. Amen.

You must rid yourselves of all such things as these: anger, rage, malice, slander and filthy language from your lips. (Colossians 3:8)

Clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience. (Colossians 3:12)

Have you ever gone to the doctor only to be told that he didn’t know what was wrong with you but he could give you some pills to make you comfortable? You are comfortably sick. That is what it is like when you find relief from sin instead of obtaining cleansing. Relief from sin allows you to be comfortably separated from God. 

As a follower of Jesus you need to take the subject of sin seriously. If sin is the diagnosis, there couldn’t be better news! There is a cure for sin. Jesus died to cleanse us from sin. The cure is fast if you use the proper diagnosis and treatment. If you fail to get a proper diagnosis for your outbursts of anger, and hostility towards others, you can spend a long time being sick. 

The Bible calls anger and hostility sin. If you accept this diagnosis, turn to God, confess your sin, and repent. You will receive forgiveness, cleansing and renewal. If you reject the sin diagnosis you will continue to look for another source to blame, probably family or friends. 

If you are going to deal with your sin, you must turn to the Creator and Savior for cleansing, strengthening, and changing. If it is sin, society did not put it into you; society only stirs up what is already in you. If it is sin, society can’t help you. This diagnosis of sin requires a supernatural cure. 

The cleansing process is like taking off dirty clothes and putting on clean clothes. The Colossians verses above instruct us to put off, or get rid of, anger, rage, malice, slander, and filthy language. We are then told to put on, or clothe ourselves with, compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience. 

The choice is yours. Are you a Christian who turns to God for a cure? Are you a Christian and partial humanist who turns to the world for relief from sin? What will it be, a little relief or a real cure?

When I want to do good, I don’t; and when I try not to do wrong, I do it anyway. Now if I am doing what I don’t want to, it is plain where the trouble is: sin still has me in its evil grasp. (Romans 7:19-20, TLB)

Have you ever decided to get your life in order and do what is right before God, only to find out that you couldn’t get through a day without messing up? You agree with the Bible that swearing, anger, and pride are wrong, and you decide you are going to stop doing those things. You don’t even make it to work! While you are driving, someone cuts you off and you start yelling obscenities at them. You didn’t mean to do that. You really wanted to do what is right! Those words just flew out of your mouth before you knew it! What happened? You were swearing, angry, and your pride took over because you felt like your time was more important than the other person’s. You failed again. It isn’t fair that the Bible tells you to do something and after you decide to do it you find out that you just can’t! 

The Romans verses above give us a clear answer as to why we can’t do what is right even when we decide to. Sin still has us in its evil grasp. That sounds simple enough. We just need to get rid of the sin by confessing and we’ll be ok, right? There is still another step that needs to take place after we are cleaned up. We need the power to walk the way God wants us to. 

2 Corinthians 3:5-6, CEV tells us: Not that we are in any way confident of doing anything by our own resources—our ability comes from God. It is he who makes us competent administrators of the new agreement, concerned not with the letter but in the Spirit. The letter of the Law leads to the death of the soul; the Spirit alone can give it life. 

It is only through God’s Spirit that we can walk uprightly and do what is right. It is through His resources that we will succeed. Left on our own we will try, try, try, only to find we will fail, fail, fail. Take a moment to talk to God in prayer and ask Him for the power, through His Holy Spirit, to do the things He commands in the Bible. Then go out and walk, by faith, in His strength and not your own.

Surely the arm of the LORD is not too short to save, nor his ear too dull to hear. But your iniquities have separated you from your God; your sins have hidden his face from you, so that he will not hear. (Isaiah 59:1-2)

“How are your quiet times lately?” my mentor asked during my accountability session. “Well…kinda dry. I feel like I’m not as close to God as I used to be.” I replied. “I just don’t know what happened.” 

Do you sometimes feel that way? Maybe your relationship with God used to be vibrant and alive. You felt like you had a two-way conversation going with Him all the time. Your Bible reading was rich and your prayer time left you with a peace that lasted all day. Now you sit down to spend time with God because you know you have to. God seems distant and not listening to your prayers. You try to do all the things you think a “good Christian” should do. You smile when you don’t feel happy, you say “you’re fine” when you really aren’t, you say all the right things but you feel dead inside. You don’t really love your neighbor but you try to act like you do. Do you realize that you’re just acting? Acting loving is not the same as being loving on the inside. 

The Isaiah verses above tell us that when we have sin, or iniquity, in our life it will make God seem distant. The first thing to do when you feel far away from God is to sit down and look for sin in your life. If you don’t find anything, ask God to show you. God knows sin hurts us and will show us sin because He wants us to stop sinning and turn to Him. When He shows you sin, confess it. Then you need to admit to God that you are helpless to produce the fruit that He wants in your life, the fruit of the Holy Spirit. Since love is a fruit of the Spirit, if you don’t feel loving towards a person, ask God to give you His love for them. First comes cleansing, then comes strength; a strength not your own but God’s. Only God can change you deep down in your heart. Jesus was the only person who lived the Christian life perfectly. Only Jesus, in control of your heart, will enable you to live the Christian life today. 

The Holy Spirit is like a hand inside of a glove. Whatever the hand does, the glove can do. On its own the glove is powerless. When the hand comes inside the glove, the glove takes on the same strength that the hand has. Together they can get the work done. You are the glove and the Spirit is the hand. Go find a glove, either a garden glove or a rubber cleaning glove. Put your hand in the glove and move your fingers. Remember that the power you have, as the glove, comes from God. Now thank God for the power that He gives you, and trust in Him today!

He who covers his sins will not prosper, but whoever confesses and forsakes them will have mercy. (Proverbs 28:13, NKJV)

If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. (1 John 1:9, NKJV)

Imagine what the world would be like if there was no longer any sin. Sounds like paradise, right? Unfortunately we live in a world where we will struggle against sin until we go to heaven with Jesus. Do you know what God calls a sin? If you don’t know what sin is, you will suffer from its effects and probably wonder why! The Proverbs verse above says that if you cover your sins you will not prosper, but if you confess and forsake them you will have God’s mercy. 

What is sin? One dictionary defines it as “an offence against God.” So what exactly is an offence against God? There are many places throughout the Bible where God tells us what His desires are for our lives, where He instructs us on how to and how not to act. Specifically Mark 7:21-23, Romans 1:28-31, Galatians 5:19-21, Ephesians 4:25-31, and 2 Timothy 3:1-5 are passages where you will find lists of what God calls “sin”. Read through these verses and make a list of all the sins you find. Evil thoughts, lust, covetousness, adultery, lying backbiting, quarreling, anger, rebellion, selfish ambition, deception: pretty depressing reading, right? But that is not the end of the story! 1 John 1:9 above says that if you will confess your sin, God will forgive you and cleanse you from all unrighteousness. 

The good news is that no matter how many sins you have, you are just one prayer away from a supernatural cure! It all comes back to one thing; Will you agree with what God calls sin? If you do not, you will look for the cause of your pain and a solution for it in the world around you. But if you will call your pain what it is – sin, you are looking at the simplest problem in the world to solve. Jesus Christ died on the cross to pay for your sins.

Take the list of all the sins you found in the above verses and ask the Lord to show you any that you are guilty of. Then confess and get cleaned up. You are just a prayer away from victory over your sin.

The acts of the sinful nature are obvious: sexual immorality, impurity and debauchery; idolatry and witchcraft; hatred, discord, jealousy, fits of rage, selfish ambition, dissensions, factions and envy; drunkenness, orgies, and the like…But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. (Galatians 5:19-23)

There are things in this world that we cannot see, but we can see the influence they have. For example, we cannot see the wind but we can watch the influence it has on the trees as the leaves move. The wind is made visible through the trees. 

So it is with the Holy Spirit. We cannot see Him, but we can see His influence in our lives when we turn to God and receive the Holy Spirit. When I ask Jesus Christ to come into my life and give me eternal life, He gives me the gift of the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit is not an it, but a person. The Holy Spirit is God. (Acts 5:3-4) What does the Spirit look like? Love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. When I reflect those attributes I am filled with the Holy Spirit. To be filled by the Spirit simply means that the Holy Spirit is in control of my life. 

Imagine that the control of your life is represented by a chair that we will call the “Throne of your life.” Who is sitting on the throne and in control? There are only two options to choose from. Either your sinful nature is in control or the Holy Spirit is in control. The differences between each nature are described in the verses above. The influence they have in our lives is easily seen by those around us. 

What qualities describe what you are feeling right now? Would you describe what is going on inside you as love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control? Would others? If not, and you know Jesus Christ as your Savior, you simply need to let the Spirit have control of your life. You can do this with a simple prayer: 

“Father, I am sorry that I took over control of my life. Forgive me. I give you back control and ask that you will live through me and make yourself visible to those around me through my life.” Amen.