August 21, 2022
Greetings and blessings to all of you. Question: Do we value God above all else? Paul having been converted to Christianity and being beaten, arrested and told to stop preaching exhorted the Ephesians in 4:1 “to live a life worthy of the calling you have received.” How do we as Bible believing followers of Christ do that? #1 Live obediently. We are no longer children of the devil. We live in a decidedly optimistic but delusional age that places man at the very center of the universe and hails himself as the measure of all things. And because of this powerful delusion we may say to ourselves …Am I really that bad? The biblical answer is Yes. In Romans 3:12 “all have turned away they have together become worthless there is no one who does good not even one.” We have a propensity for evil and are inclined toward the very things that our consciences oppose and censure. Paul admitted the dilemma, “for what I am doing, I do not understand. For what I will to do, that I do not practice, but what I hate, that I do. (Romans 7:15). We need the supernatural power of God to open our hearts and minds, grant repentance, and give faith leading to the assurance of our salvation thereby we can express joy and a grateful heart manifesting itself into obedience. #2 Cultivate righteous indignation (RI) How? In Psalm 7:11 God is a just judge, and God is angry with the wicked every day. Psalm 5:5 says, “The boastful shall not stand in your sight; You hate all workers of iniquity.” Have we forgotten these verses. How often do preachers proclaim to sinners the RI of God against the sinner? Do the men of God address “divine anger” or “holy hatred”? Maybe some pastors want to be politically correct or seeker sensitive in order to keep the crowd coming? Do we as believers believe up can be down inside can be outside right can be left depending on circumstances and our perspective? The devil is a lie! There are moral absolutes and God established them. There is a right and wrong but above all there is THE TRUTH. The culture we live in today is absolutely aiming to live without the sovereign rule of God! And since we are made in the image of God, what God dislikes we should dislike; and be disturbed about it to a point of actively working against it. #3 Be humble. Change what you can change, pray about what you cannot change. Understanding that we too are fallible compelling us to walk circumspectly not as fools but as wise for the days are evil. (Eph 5:15)
With the Love of Christ First Lady Vivian C. Currie
Pastor ALC