Tag Archives: Christ followers

Signed, Sealed, and Delivered Saints

22 Sunday Jul 2018

Posted by in Spiritual

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

, , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

The Seal Of God

 

 

It’s in Christ that you, once you heard the truth and believed it (this Message of your salvation), found yourselves home free—signed, sealed, and delivered by the Holy Spirit. This signet from God is the first installment on what’s coming, a reminder that we’ll get everything God has planned for us, a praising and glorious life. ~ Ephesians 1:13-14, MSG

 

The Holy Spirit is the One who seals believers in Christ. Father God allows the Holy Spirit to seal Christ’s followers so that they can feel safe and secure in God’s Love, Power, and Promises. Furthermore, it is the sealing of the Holy Spirit that accomplishes Father God’s signed, sealed, and delivered spiritual Objectives, which are as follows:

1. He seals with (stamps God’s Approval on us; validates us via) God’s Insignia so that we not only can receive the Holy Spirit inside us and on us but also can receive our eternal sonship, our eternal life, and our other promised eternal gifts.

2. He seals up (preserves, locks in) our faith that God has given to us so that unbelief, nonbelief, and apostasy) will be sealed out.

3. He seals to (protect, secure, and save) us by marking us with God’s Seal—a visible impression to the forces of darkness—so that demonic/evil forces will know they can’t enter us. In other words, God’s Seal will let Satan and his imps know that we Father God’s Children.

Shalom . . .

Every blessing . . . . .

It’s A New Year: HAPPY 2018

28 Thursday Dec 2017

Posted by in Spiritual

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

, , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Happy-New-Year2018

 

 

Christ arrives right on time to make this happen. He didn’t, and doesn’t, wait for us to get ready. He presented himself for this sacrificial death when we were far too weak and rebellious to do anything to get ourselves ready. And even if we hadn’t been so weak, we wouldn’t have known what to do anyway. We can understand someone dying for a person worth dying for, and we can understand how someone good and noble could inspire us to selfless sacrifice. But God put his love on the line for us by offering his Son in sacrificial death while we were of no use whatever to him. ~ Romans 5:6-8, MSG

 

 

Looking back can be intimidating,
Frightening, discouraging, but the
Same is true about looking forward;
Since alive in Christ believers get to
Start over let’s be ready to face what
Lies ahead with high heads, high spirits,
High hopes for a victorious life that
Overcomes the world, Devil, flesh—a
Life that matures spiritually in this
New Year.

Stay in the Word of God, stay filled
With the Holy Spirit, stay surrendered,
Obedient, faithful, and loving children
Who trust in the Father for strength, for
Power, for authority, for peace, for grace,
For the fulfillment of all promises He says
He will do for all Christ followers in this
New Year.

Each New Year the Father lets us see is
Him sharing His Gift that keeps on giving
Us refreshed lives filled with new hope;
So, let us press forward grateful for this
Chance to become everything He intends
For us to be in Christ, settling for nothing
Less than courageously, powerfully, godly
Living to the fullest the lives He blessed us
To have at such a time as this—that’s best
Way to thank Him for letting us see this
New Year.

 

 

HAPPY NEW YEAR!
2018

Godly Motivators

04 Wednesday Nov 2015

Posted by in Devotional

≈ 2 Comments

Tags

, , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Vine & Vineyard

 

If you abide in me, and my words abide in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be done for you. ~ John 15:7    

 

Most believers need something that will keep them rooted and grounded in God’s Word. Put differently, they need strong motivators that effectively urge them to produce much fruit. For Christ Followers, the strongest motivators are the Vine and His Vineyard—the Lord and His Life of blessing and serving others.

The Word of God provides plenty of examples of prayers and petitions that God answers, as well as plenty examples of every need that He meets, when believers begin to look more and more like Christ. Living holy and righteous lives is the kind of living that brings believers before Father God with the assurance that whatever they ask of Him He does for them, as long as they are doing those good works that become their treasures up in Heaven. This truth is why the Vine and Vineyard are Christ followers’ motivators. They urge true believers to become more and more like Christ—to perform those full of love and joy Christlike deeds that earn them Christ’s “Well done, my good and faithful servant” praise.

Now Christ followers’ personal investment is in the love and joy they have for Christ and others. Because the strongest motivators are the ones in which people have a personal investment, this truth means Christ followers’ personal investment makes their strongest motivators the Vine (Christ) and His Vineyard (the Lord’s Life of blessing and serving others). It is the Vine who gives believers everything they need to remain connected to the Vine, while they use everything they have to bless others. Without doubt, Christ followers know that the more love and joy they receive from serving Christ and others will mean their eternal rewards are increasing. As a result, Christ followers will be more fruitful.

Because their love and joy come from the Vine, this spiritual truth is why Christ followers need their motivators in order to be fruitful (good) stewards. These believers know that the moment the Vine no longer abides in them and they no longer abide in the Vine is when they also no longer can be fruitful Vineyard workers. That is why the Vine and Vineyard motivate Christ followers to continue to stay present in the Vine and the Vineyard—to continue to remain connected to the Vine and Vineyard—because they are believers’ sources for love and joy.

Let the Vine and the Vineyard motivate you to live a fruitful life that is full of love and joy. Shalom.   

Keep it real…Live it out…Watch it work!   

 

~ from my new book, Keeping It Real: Daily Renewing the Mind (published October 20, 2015)

Seven Unities

16 Sunday Aug 2015

Posted by in Devotional

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

, , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Christian Unity

There is one body and one Spirit—just as you were called to the one hope that belongs to your call—one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all. But grace was given to each one of us according to the measure of Christ’s gift. ~ Ephesians 4:4-7, ESV

 

There are seven unities that all believers in the Body of Christ share. As members of ONE Body of Believers, we all have Father God’s ONE Spirit. Then too, our ONE Father calls us to ONE Hope through ONE Faith in ONE Lord and ONE Baptism. These seven unties bind us—all believers in Christ—to one another. These seven unities also perfect us—they spiritually complete believers who are true Christ followers.

Now even though we all do not have the same function—we are not all pastors—our Lord’s true Body has no divisions. In other words, it is because of God’s seven Unities that we all should be preaching and teaching the same Divine Truths. According to the unadulterated Word of God, it is by His ONE Spirit that we all make up Christ’s ONE Body. It also is by His ONE Spirit that we all have the same Commission our ONE Lord (ONE Master) first gives to His initial Disciples.

The bottom line is that we all possess equal status in the Kingdom of God—we born again and saved Christ followers are Kingdom of God Citizens. Most important is the fact that—as Kingdom of God Citizens—our equal status is independent of our measure of faith. Our equal status also is independent of our spiritual callings. In Christ our function(s), our level of spirituality, our years of formal training, our years in His Vineyard, our years in a local church, or our chronological age neither makes any of us more important nor less influential than someone else in the Kingdom of God. The point here is that—regardless if we are first-century or twenty-first century believers in Christ—the unity that Christ’s finished Work on the Cross makes possible for His Body to have is more important to God than our diversities. Unfortunately, we neither seek nor welcome the unity God wants to see in the Body of Christ—the unity that is the Godhead kind of Oneness.

God does not want us to have any divisions. This truth is why He is not pleased with our different ideologies, theologies and denominations. He sees how they divide us into opposing groups of disciples. He sees how our friendly-fire skirmishes deny the Oneness that His indivisible Unities give us. This truth is why we—Christ’s Disciples—need to seek and receive the Oneness that God desires to see in Christ’s ONE Body. Shalom.

 

~ from my soon-to-be-published manuscript – Keeping It Real: Daily Renewing the Mind