Tag Archives: honor

Religion

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Who accomplishes the will of the Living God?  Isn’t that the one who is constantly looking to him for direction?

To what direction should we look, since no man has ever been in heaven?  Doesn’t it require a deep and living friendship with the Holy Son of God?

And how should we be friends with one we cannot see or meet?  Doesn’t it require faith from God?

What faith can a man have in mere words?  It is required that God should give life to those words within us.

Religion by itself, produces nothing but its self.  But the faith that God gives spawns a religion all on its own.

People, you have it backward.  You present your religion is if God should honor it.  But such procedure comes from the imagination of man.  If it is not of God and from God it will be eternally destroyed.

No man can become anything more than his religion dictates.  And how very few even aspire to that.  But religion that is spawned from heaven, aspires toward heaven.  And once a man is caught up in the things of the Living God, he can no longer aspire to less.

The religions of man lean toward pride.  The religion that God grants leans toward complete humility.

We are what we eat.  Bake cow pies if you desire.  I will be satisfied with nothing more than the manna from Heaven.  And this, not from my righteousness, but it is the gift of God, lest any man should boast.

By His Grace

Christianity Demands a Choosing

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In everything our God told us, it is our joy to suffer for him.  As he was cast out, so will his disciples be, simply because he spoke what is true.  As we speak what is true, they will treat us like they treated him.

Everything he taught (and by the Holy Spirit of God within us, he still teaches) contains the element of extreme choice.  The teachings of Jesus do not offer mediocrity as an option.  The best examples of this can be found in Matthew chapter 25, and Revelation 3.

Matthew 25 tells us what became of the wicked and lazy servant.  Revelation 3 tells us what became of the Church of Laodicea. 

The world describes joy as happiness, peace, and pleasant prosperity; “Let’s all just get along”.  Christ Jesus describes his disciple’s joy as having the honor to suffer in His Holy name. 

Our joy is hidden in his promise.  The Christian’s joy is not revealed to him as the world defines joy.  For now we die.  But his promise is the eternal joy of eternal life.

As we openly associate ourselves with him, the world will come and try to take away our toys.  They will try, with everything they have, to destroy our right to speak; to mock a life of holiness.  That’s how they treated him.  He has promised, that is how they will treat his disciples.  For that is how they have treated every godly man.  I promise you in Christ, nothing has changed.

Christianity is divided about their response to this.  Some say, “That’s for the prophets only”.  Others say, “This applies to every Christian.  Everyone has to make up their own mind about this. 

10 “We have an altar from which the priests in the Tabernacle have no right to eat. 11 Under the old system, the high priest brought the blood of animals into the Holy Place as a sacrifice for sin, and the bodies of the animals were burned outside the camp. 12 So also Jesus suffered and died outside the city gates to make his people holy by means of his own blood. 13 So let us go out to him, outside the camp, and bear the disgrace he bore. 14 For this world is not our permanent home; we are looking forward to a home yet to come”.  (Hebrews 13 New Living Translation)

It is like humanity to choose the easy path.  It is like Christ to choose the path that leads directly to crucifixion.  But let every man make his own choice.  Only let us be sure that every Christian understands these things.  Teach them well, that they may make an intelligent and willful choice.

By His Grace

Happy New Year, Continued

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As it was written at the beginning of 2014, let it reappear at the year’s end.

Dear Lord Jesus:

“What is the number or the name of a day,

But an altar of stones along The Way.

A place that is set for the honor of You;

A love that was lived for the Love that is true.”

2014 [2015], what is it but more days to bring glory to our Lord.

A Happy New Year is only found by serving the Lord Jesus.

Christmas, Eternal

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Today is the day, established by men, to give one another gifts.  They say it is to honor the Holy One of God.

Will you know the nature of the True Gift of God?  Is your soul strong enough to learn?blind

39 Jesus said, “For judgment I have come into this world, so that the blind will see and those who see will become blind.”

40 Some Pharisees who were with him heard him say this and asked, “What? Are we blind too?”

41 Jesus said, “If you were blind, you would not be guilty of sin; but now that you claim you can see, your guilt remains.”

How does the “giving” of man, to one another, compare?  The Holy One of God offers the gift of Life.  Will you stash it under green boughs? Will you wrap it in flammable paper?  Will you place the names of the dead within the labels?

What man gives rots, even as he prepares it to be received with joy.  But what God, in Christ Jesus, gives is a growing body of life; pure Light of Holy Life.

Will you pray with humility of soul, at the opening of each gift today?  Will you strive to give proper place to the Holy Gift of God?  Eye entrancing beauty adorns the gifts of men.  But the precious Holy Blood of the Son of God adorns the eternal offer.

(Picture found at: http://gardenofpraise.com/bibcolor.htm)

Hypocritical Honor

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If I speak to receive the praise of men, can those words be words of God?  Yet if I am to speak words of any value, they must belong to the One who is eternally valuable.

I have seen how men praise one another for gallant and faithful action.  As if what is good can be borne among men.  If I join them in this praise where is my allegiance?  For anything that is truly good is born and borne of God.

Let the world praise their heroes.  I will honor, with worship, God’s hero: Jesus The Christ.

I say the following, knowing there will be misunderstanding: ‘I have come to despise the honor of men”. 

Men honor the ones who do good to and for them.  As a man may lay down his life (to whatever portion) for his fellow brother, he is honored. 

All the while, it is easy for them to despise the One who made them.  The One who truly loves them.  The One whom they have murdered.  The One who is shunned among them, even to this day.

Such honor of man is important among men, but only if it teaches us to treat The Living God with severe honor.  But this is not the definition used by men.

Men are paid to do what is good.  They are paid with money or fame; a type of immortality is placed on the mantle.  By this, men purchase honor.  Is it then truly honor?  Or does man hold one another hostage for the sake of reward?

But there is one who came, that he may do the will of the One who is forever Good.  Laying aside all possible human reward, he gave of himself without quarter.  What honor of man can compare?  Yet what distinct lack of honor men give him.

Every man knows this!  It is willing ignorance which keeps it hidden.  Willfully they are led to the pageantry of honor for those who are less than He.

They gladly stand at parades and wave their national flag.  Even a tear or two may be seen.  But mention the Living God’s Christ in a crowd of men and you will see them quietly disperse.  So man’s definition of Honor is defined.

This will not change until the Holy One is revealed.  But I am allowed to despise this hypocrisy of man.

By His Grace

The Useful Singer of Truth

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The one who constantly quotes the Bible to others is not likely to be well received.  If this is the thrust of his “ministry” to God and His people, he is likely to become a rather burdensome companion.  Consider how the Bible is treated in most households.  This one will be given the same honor.

But the one who does what the Bible says, this one is prone to be somewhat accepted.  But doing what the Bible says doesn’t mean that man’s testimony will be heard everywhere he goes.  Such a one might just selectively pronounce the Gospel, according to his own faith.  He might be accepted.  But he might also be rather a useless “Singer of Truth”.

Yet there is the one who does what the Bible says, listens to the timely and focused prompting from the Holy Spirit, and delivers a “living word”.  This one is acceptable.  This one sings the song of Truth with power and usefulness.  This one will find legitimate persecution.  This one is useful to both man and God.

Such a one won’t have to wait long for the world to hate him.  They already hate the One who drives him onward.  And, beyond description, this one will encounter hard resistance from the majority of the family of God.  Not because he is an irritation, but because he speaks what is true to the moment.  Not because he is quoting what is past, but because he brings the written, and blood honored, Word to the present.  The Wisdom of the Living God drives his willing heart.

Let the resounding gong and the clanging cymbal think this through.