Peculiar

Let no one speak evil of you Paul tells Titus and instructs us. Paul instructs us how we are to deal with people. He tells us to be kind but stand firm on sound doctrine. We are not suppose to brawl or argue with people over doctrine or those who reject God and his word.  Paul goes on to say in the book of Titus, by our not arguing with “gainsayers”, those who contradict or deny scripture, makes us peculiar.

Who are we appearing peculiar to? Unbelievers. All you have to do is look at what is going on in the world today. People get angry over words. They kill people over spoken words. They attack people that disagrees with their point of view. True believers are told, do not do that. Stand on God’s word and sound doctrine. Be ready to give answers from God’s word why certain things happen.  God has not set you or me up to be judge, jury and the final word and if we argue with others, why would they want to ask you anything?

Paul explains to Titus how we are to handle people that want to argue and fight with us over things of life. Stand firm on sound doctrine and be kind, explaining from scripture, how God instructs us. If those we speak to reject what you say, it is not you they reject, it is God’s word they are rejecting. So then what do we do?

Titus 3:1-11 KJV
” Put them in mind to be subject to principalities and powers, to obey magistrates, to be ready to every good work,
2. To speak evil of no man, to be no brawlers, but gentle, shewing all meekness unto all men.
3. For we ourselves also were sometimes foolish, disobedient, deceived, serving divers lusts and pleasures, living in malice and envy, hateful, and hating one another.
4. But after that the kindness and love of God our Saviour toward man appeared,
5. Not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to his mercy he saved us, by the washing of regeneration, and renewing of the Holy Ghost;
6. Which he shed on us abundantly through Jesus Christ our Saviour;
7. That being justified by his grace, we should be made heirs according to the hope of eternal life.
8. This is a faithful saying, and these things I will that thou affirm constantly, that they which have believed in God might be careful to maintain good works. These things are good and profitable unto men.
9. But avoid foolish questions, and genealogies, and contentions, and strivings about the law; for they are unprofitable and vain.
10. A man that is an heretick after the first and second admonition reject;
11. Knowing that he that is such is subverted, and sinneth, being condemned of himself. ”

Until next time.

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The Connection – At Your Wit’s End

Before you get saved, your mind (soul ) speaks to your flesh. Thoughts come into your mind and the thoughts generally try to convince your mind and your flesh to do something good or bad. The flesh has lust, lust of the eyes, lust of the flesh. Scripture tells us, lust is not of God. Lust is in the world.

1 John 2:15,16 KJV ” Love not the world, neither the things that are in the world. If any man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him.
16 For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, and the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, is not of the Father, but is of the world.”

So lust works on your soul, your mind, and lust works on your flesh because your flesh is in this world.

When God first created man, he did not create man with lust. Adam did not know lust, or sin until after he took of the tree, he sinned. When Adam chose to take of the tree, chose to sin, then his spiritual relationship with God died, but Adam’s flesh did not die and Adam was now alive unto sin.

Before Adam sinned, his flesh and his soul knew nothing about sin. Adam’s mind, his will and his emotions did not know what sin was. Adam knows nothing about good and evil; Nothing about right or wrong.  Imagine taking a person who, from birth, was closed up on an island all their life and knew nothing of the world outside. Even today, parents shelter their children to protect them from the hurts of this world.

Then that person becomes exposed to  sin in the world  because of something they did. Now they feel fear, lust, hate and a variety of feelings they never felt before. Plus, their relationship with God their Creator, is not the same any more.

Imagine having that relationship with God and God puts you in control of the whole earth. God comes to talk with you, visit you, guide you, give you instructions in things, teach you. God becomes your best friend, your Father, you helper, your joy, your teacher. And now, after you sinned, that relationship with God is gone and you are on your own.

Then you come to realize you are having all these weird thoughts you never had before. Bad thoughts. You do not know where these thoughts come from and you do not know why you are having these bad thoughts. You ask God but he is not there any more.

Today, eventually people come to their wit’s end and realize, what they are doing is not working. Their life is not going in the direction they thought. So their mind gets broken and their heart breaks. They begin to focus on their failures in life. They beat themselves up inside themselves. They start quitting on life on the inside. Many often commit suicide. Why? They see no way out of their sadness and they think they have two choices, fake it and keep putting on a fake smile or end it. Question: Are those two choices appealing to the flesh, the soul or the spirit man?

Remember, information regarding life comes to all of us through our mind, our soul. Our soul is our mind, our will and our emotions. All information is knowledge. The information can be true or false and we have to sift through the information, research the information and investigate if the information is true or not.

Because evil is present in this world, information can be twisted and  bent to appear one way when in reality, some twist the information in to lies. That is what happened in the garden with Eve. Satan twisted the information Eve knew and Satan twisted it into a lie by telling Eve she would become like a god. Satan deceived Eve’s mind, her soul.

Because our spirit man and our flesh, our body, are commanded by our mind, we do things in life based on what our mind tells us. Eve listened to Satan and her mind, her soul, told her to disobey God and eat. So she did.

People who consider suicide are receiving information in to their mind that tells them, there is no other way out of this. So their soul commands their flesh, their body, to kill themselves. But ask yourself, what part have these people left out of their decision? Their spirit, right. And your spirit man is your connection to God. Your spirit man is how God speaks to you, how God works in you and this world. And it is only your spirit man that can over come this world, over come your flesh, over come your mind, your soul.

If your spirit man is still dead to God, you can not hear God direct you. You can not hear God encourage you. You can not hear God guide you. And your soul only hears you rehash your problems so you feel helpless. God promises believers,

Galatians 5:16,17 KJV  ” This I say then, Walk in the Spirit, and ye shall not fulfil the lust of the flesh.
17 For the flesh lusteth against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh: and these are contrary the one to the other: so that ye cannot do the things that ye would.”

The only successful way to fight depression and suicide is to do it with God. You need to get saved so you can hear God speak to you. You need to give Jesus Christ your heart and invite him in to your heart to save you. Then start reading God’s word. Start in the gospel of John. Why John? Because John deals a lot with the spirit man and God the Holy Spirit.

Until next time.

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The Connection Part 3 Soul Makes Decisions For Flesh & Spirit

Remember what God tells us through Paul in what we must do to be saved in the book of Romans. Look at Romans 10:8-11 KJV.

” 8. But what saith it? The word is nigh thee, even in thy mouth, and in thy heart: that is, the word of faith, which we preach;
9. That if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved.
10. For with the heart man believeth unto righteousness; and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation.
11. For the scripture saith, Whosoever believeth on him shall not be ashamed.”

We are not believing what our denomination says, what our parents say, what our teachers say or even what our church says. We are believing what God says, in his word, about the Lord Jesus Christ.

Another words, we are to make a choice of whose words we are going to believe. It is all about “words” .  We make a decision on words we hear spoken to us. Are these words spoken to our spirit, soul (mind, will, emotions) or are the words spoken to our flesh?

The words are spoken to our soul, our mind our will and our emotions. If the words are man’s words, they speak to our soul and our flesh. If the words spoken are from the scripture, they also speak to our soul and then our spirit man. Now remember, before you get saved, you do not understand the things of God.

Mankind is born into sin because we come from Adam and Eve who died spiritually after they sinned.  So we are all born dead spiritually. Adam’s flesh did not die after he sinned, his spiritual connection with God died. And because we are the offspring of Adam and Eve, we are born dead spiritually. That is why Jesus said in John chapter 3, Ye must be born again of water (word of God) and the Spirit.

Mankind grows up in a part of the world and is taught culture of their country, religious beliefs of their country and educated in the world’s systems. When they grow up, they need to decide for themselves if they will believe their upbringing or if they will believe God. In America, our founding fathers who set up this country set the country up according to God’s word, the Scriptures. For years America prospered and was blessed by God.

But in the early 1900s some people decided they did not want to follow God’s ways so they worked at removing God’s word, God’s teachings, prayer and  God’s laws from society and education. They decided to establish government run schools to indoctrinate children in a different education. The world’s system. Slowly, laws changed, youth were taught to disregard the Holy Scriptures and they eliminated prayer in schools.

Some group came along and changed the education system in America because of what? What caused the change? Was it spiritual? Carnal / fleshly? No. It was a soul change. A group of people changed their thinking on God and God’s ways and decided to follow the world’s ways. Believers know Satan is the god of this world as scripture says. It is spiritual warfare.

Now for about a hundred years, generations of youth have been educated in the world’s ways. Then comes a Christian who says, you have to change your thinking to change your life and people are afraid to change. They want to hang on to the bond age of Egypt, so to say.

Just as governments try to control their population with laws and rules, churches do the same thing. Churches try to control the flesh by setting up rules of the church. Dress codes, entertainment, activities of the flesh, governments and churches try to control the flesh.

When people look at you or determine if you are a “good” person they base their conclusion on what they see from you. They look at your looks, your clothing, your speech, your education, your actions and yes, your beliefs. But God does not look at any of that. God looks at what is not seen. Your heart. Why you do what you do. In law or legal terms, we would call that a “demur”.

So take a person raised and taught the world’s ways and the world’s systems and tell them to believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou  shalt be saved – it does not make sense to them. Why? Because the world’s ways and systems do not teach faith in God any more. The world teaches, believe it when you see it. The world teaches some things are impossible. The world teaches evolution when God says he created the heavens and the earth. You have to choose to believe God and his word, or not.

Yes, we see a physical world with our eyes and we live in the physical world in our flesh but God tells us, there is a spiritual world we can not see with our earthly eyes. And for those who are believers, their fleshly body lives and operates in the physical world we see but their spirit man lives and operates in the spiritual world. And our spirit man is suppose to bring our flesh into subjection to our spirit man. This use to be taught to American children in churches and in school houses around the country. That is what stitched together the fabric of America and God blessed us.

Today, many Americans and believers have chosen to follow the world’s ways and society is degrading. Entertainment, so called, has turned pornographic and indecent. Civility and working together is being unraveled and it is coming from all areas of society and fueled by a media that hates God. All these actions appeal to the flesh. So how do you change your life?

You change your life when you change your thinking. It was a thought process that got you into a mess and it will be a thought process and actions that will help you out of your mess.

When you preach and teach the world’s ways and teach fleshly things, you build up your flesh. When you preach and teach spiritual things, you build up your spirit man. So when someone preaches against believers, mock believers, call believers names and divide believers, you are only causing yourself problems because you are sowing strife and division among believers.

No, believers do not agree on everything but God has anointed believers to do his work. Just like David said he would not go against Saul. David knew God had anointed him king but for the time being, Saul was still king. God anointed Saul king. Yes, Saul failed and screwed up, but it was not David’s place to mock, speak against, try to divide or teach against Saul. Did David agree with Saul? Not always. Believers can not speak against other true believers  because they do not like their teaching. God will deal with them. Read Proverbs 6:16-19 KJV.

The world teaches their people how to get results in life. All of the world’s teachings is based on something you must do, actions, works.  But God’s ways are not man’s ways and God spoke the worlds into existence. Jesus had an encounter with Satan while Jesus was in the flesh (see Matthew 4). How did Jesus respond? Jesus spoke words. When Jesus comes back in Revelation, how is he going to fight? Speak words.

Until next time.

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Career Decisions – HeavensRecord

Making “career” decisions is probably one of the most difficult things we do. Why? Because we have several things we like and then have a few things we think we would like to do. Then, if a believer, we want to serve the Lord Jesus Christ so we look for “jobs” in the ministry. We struggle sometimes trying to decide if we should work in ministry or take a position in the secular world.

As believers, we know God has created us with specific gifts and talents while we were in our mother’s womb.

Jeremiah 1:5 KJV – ” Before I formed thee in the belly I knew thee; and before thou camest forth out of the womb I sanctified thee, and I ordained thee a prophet unto the nations.”

Do a study on the word “womb” and you see God formed you in the womb. Even Samson was, from the womb, called to ” begin ” to deliver Israel from the hands of the Philistines, Judges 13.

Jeremiah and Samson had no clue they were being created for those purposes. And Samson is a good picture of someone, of God, doing his own “thing” and yet Samson is mentioned in Hebrews 11 Hall of Faith.

God does tell us why he does some things. Usually when God tells us some things, he gives us nuggets of other things. A good example is Genesis 2:1-5 KJV  “1 Thus the heavens and the earth were finished, and all the host of them.
2 And on the seventh day God ended his work which he had made; and he rested on the seventh day from all his work which he had made.
3 And God blessed the seventh day, and sanctified it: because that in it he had rested from all his work which God created and made.
4 These are the generations of the heavens and of the earth when they were created, in the day that the LORD God made the earth and the heavens,
5 And every plant of the field before it was in the earth, and every herb of the field before it grew: for the LORD God had not caused it to rain upon the earth, and there was not a man to till the ground.”

Notice in the explanation, God says heavens, plural. So we learn there is more than one heaven.

Notice the heavens and the earth are populated. God says ” and the host of them”.

Notice verse 5, every plant of the field before it was in the earth. And in Genesis 2:9, God tells us the trees he created to be pleasant to sight but also for food. If you want to see why God created some things, read all of Psalm 104 KJV.

So God creates all this stuff once. Yet 6000 years later, we see in the earth trees, streams, mountains and so forth. How is it fruit trees, vegetables, herbs and other supplies for earth and man are still here?

Because when God created these things, God said Genesis 1:11 KJV ” And God said, Let the earth bring forth grass, the herb yielding seed, and the fruit tree yielding fruit after his kind, whose seed is in itself, upon the earth: and it was so.”

Things are perpetuated through seeds. Even in the New Jerusalem, trees produce fruit every month. God provides for us through seeds and we provide for others through seeds.

From your mother’s womb, God created you and put seeds inside you. Not just seeds for reproducing children, but like Samson and Jeremiah, seeds of your calling and purpose.

Many times people, including believers, will use their God given gifts and talents in the world and to benefit the world. But God wants us to use those gifts and talents for his glory first. Remember, seek ye first the kingdom of God and all these things shall be added unto you?

God puts seeds in all of us when he created and formed us in our mother’s womb. Those gifts and talents, our purpose, is God’s investment in you and me. Will we use those gifts and talents to profit the world or to profit the ministry, the church? Do we use our gifts and talents to exalt ourselves or to exalt the Lord?

Just like we expect returns on our investments, God expects a return on his investment in us. That is the whole purpose of the parable of the unproductive fig tree in Luke 13:6-9 KJV – ” 6 He spake also this parable; A certain man had a fig tree planted in his vineyard; and he came and sought fruit thereon, and found none.
7. Then said he unto the dresser of his vineyard, Behold, these three years I come seeking fruit on this fig tree, and find none: cut it down; why cumbereth it the ground?
8. And he answering said unto him, Lord, let it alone this year also, till I shall dig about it, and dung it:
9. And if it bear fruit, well: and if not, then after that thou shalt cut it down. ”

Luke was a physician and we read in scripture how Luke, for a time, traveled with Paul on Paul’s journeys.

What gifts and seeds did God create in you in your mother’s womb? Are you giving God a return on his investment in you?

Until next time.

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