Month: October 2019

From the Kitchen Table

Victorious Living Day 8

Thus says the Lord: “Cursed is the man who trusts in man and makes flesh his strength, whose heart turns away from the Lord. He is like a shrub in the desert, and shall not see any good come. He shall dwell in the parched places of the wilderness, in an uninhabited salt land. “Blessed is the man who trusts in the Lord, whose trust is the Lord. He is like a tree planted by water, that sends out its roots by the stream, and does not fear when heat comes, for its leaves remain green, and is not anxious in the year of drought, for it does not cease to bear fruit.” The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately sick; who can understand it? “I the Lord search the heart and test the mind, to give every man according to his ways, according to the fruit of his deeds.”          Jeremiah 17:5-10

We have a choice and He has compassion.  We get to choose today to live under the curse or in the blessing.  We can live in our own strength and power, which the Bible calls a curse, or we can live by God’s strength and power which the Bible says is a blessing.  We can know where we’re living by what we’re living in, fear or fearlessness.  And here’s the thing, God knows our hearts and minds better than we do and He gives us what we live for, not necessarily what we think we want.  Our Father has set up a world, a life, where we work and walk with Him to live this life.  He gives us what we want, what we live for.  We must understand that truth.  God loves us and will lead us but He won’t lean on us.  We get to choose how we will live with or without Him.  Thank goodness He doesn’t give us just what we think or feel but according to how we live, according to the fruit of our deeds.  We’re not cursed or blessed just by the thoughts and feelings that swim through our minds but we find ourselves among the cursed or with the blessed by how we chose to live.  Live in God’s love and out of God’s love and we will live from God’s love and by God’s love.

From the Kitchen Table

Victorious Living Day 7

But I say, walk by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh. For the desires of the flesh are against the Spirit, and the desires of the Spirit are against the flesh, for these are opposed to each other, to keep you from doing the things you want to do. But if you are led by the Spirit, you are not under the law. Now the works of the flesh are evident: sexual immorality, impurity, sensuality, idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, fits of anger, rivalries, dissensions, divisions, envy, drunkenness, orgies, and things like these. I warn you, as I warned you before, that those who do such things will not inherit the kingdom of God. But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law. And those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires.  If we live by the Spirit, let us also keep in step with the Spirit. Let us not become conceited, provoking one another, envying one another.  Galatians 5:16-26

It’s not how we start but how we finish, it’s not how we dress but how we do, it’s not where we’re from but where we’re headed.  There’s no need for excuses anymore, the mature Christian burns hot for God.  He burns so hot for God that his fleshly desires are burned up in the process.  He/She doesn’t need a name tag, bumper sticker or cross neckless to be recognized as a follower of Jesus Christ.  He doesn’t just want to belong; he wants to be.  The maturing Christian walks with the Spirit, from the Spirit, in the Spirit and overcomes the skin (fleshly desires).  It’s all motivated by love for God, man and self.  Love licks our lips for living life.  What we love will wet our lips for how we live.  It’s not how we start but how we finish that matters.  We can’t fool anyone.  Maturity looks like the Savior and immaturity looks like the skin.  We will live where our love is and with what our love wants.  Mature Christians doesn’t just put on their big boy pants, it lives a big boy life with a big boy heart, and it’s shows.  Want a greater love?  Get a greater longing!

From the Kitchen Table

Victorious Living Day 6

But solid food is for the mature, for those who have their powers of discernment trained by constant practice to distinguish good from evil.  ​ Therefore let us leave the elementary doctrine of Christ and go on to maturity, not laying again a foundation of repentance from dead works and of faith toward God, and of instruction about washings, the laying on of hands, the resurrection of the dead, and eternal judgment. And this we will do if God permits. For it is impossible, in the case of those who have once been enlightened, who have tasted the heavenly gift, and have shared in the Holy Spirit, and have tasted the goodness of the word of God and the powers of the age to come, and then have fallen away, to restore them again to repentance, since they are crucifying once again the Son of God to their own harm and holding him up to contempt. For land that has drunk the rain that often falls on it, and produces a crop useful to those for whose sake it is cultivated, receives a blessing from God. But if it bears thorns and thistles, it is worthless and near to being cursed, and its end is to be burned.
Though we speak in this way, yet in your case, beloved, we feel sure of better things—things that belong to salvation. For God is not unjust so as to overlook your work and the love that you have shown for his name in serving the saints, as you still do. And we desire each one of you to show the same earnestness to have the full assurance of hope until the end, so that you may not be sluggish, but imitators of those who through faith and patience inherit the promises. Hebrews 5:14-6:12

We can’t hide maturity, it shows up in everything we see, say and show.  It gets things done.  Victory is found in maturity because maturity brings victory with it.  We can grow old and never really grow up and therein lies the problem.  Maturity happens in those who hear the word of God and honor it in their lives.  The mature hear not just the petitions, but the promises and they let those things motivate the way they think and talk and travel through life.  The Bible says that they are able to discern between good and evil.  The mature know what’s good and choose it.  They know what is good and plant it.  The mature are full of hope to the end.  Immaturity comes across as being slow spiritually, mentally and relationally and sluggish physically, socially and emotionally.  If we can’t keep up, maybe it’s because we need to grow up.  Today is our day because we have God’s promises and God’s permission to live in those promises.