Thursday, March 6, 2014

Our Warfare


Here in America , as Christians, we are being confronted and challenged with an ever increasing pressure to abandon what the Bible tells us is right and wrong. On the surface it appears that certain groups, organizations and those whom adhere to certain philosophical and political persuasions have waged all out warfare against us. However, we must not be enticed to enter into such a mindset because it only leads to an emotional separation from the very ones that God has called us to love.

Mt 5:44 "But I say to you, love your enemies, bless those who curse you, do good to those who hate you, and pray for those who spitefully use you and persecute you,

With mounting evidence that the world is growing less tolerant of our Christian ideals:

According to the Pew Forum, between 2006 and 2010 Christians faced some form of discrimination, either de jure or de facto, in a staggering total of 139 nations, which is almost three-quarters of all the countries on earth. According to the Center for the Study of Global Christianity at Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary in Massachusetts, an average of 100,000 Christians have been killed in what the centre calls a ‘situation of witness’ each year for the past decade. That works out to 11 Christians killed somewhere in the world every hour, seven days a week and 365 days a year, for reasons related to their faith. (source: http://www.spectator.co.uk/features/9041841/the-war-on-christians/)

We must muster the courage to not enter into a confrontation in the natural. The warfare that we wage is not in the natural but the supernatural.(2 Co. 10:3; Eph. 6:12) We are wrestling against the very forces of darkness that want to destroy all of mankind not just us Christians. The way we war against this tide of opposition is twofold: 1. Praying always with all prayer and supplication in the Spirit :), being watchful to this end with all perseverance and supplication for all the saints— 2: Like Paul pray that we, the saints,  would have boldness to proclaim the good news (the mystery) of the gospel.

I challenge you to start praying more than you have before and discover the blessing that come from praying all the time in the Spirit.

Be Blessed

Wednesday, January 8, 2014

Fully surrendered

Romans 8:28 NKJV
And we know that all things work together for good to those who love God, to those who are the called according to His purpose.

Because Christ sits on the throne of My life I know that know matter what comes my way; no matter how great or devastating it may be that He is working it for my good. The trouble comes when we never truly allow Him to fully sit on the throne of our lives. We never fully give Him complete control of our lives yet we want the benefits that come from a completely surrendered life. The trouble that this presents is that when good things happen we tend to attribute it to our great choices and take all the glory for it but when bad things happen we want to blame God. This is where our faith begins to erode. When we kneel before Him and allow Him full control, no matter what happens in our life, His peace will reign supreme in us. Because our faith is firm we know He is using it for our good. It may not make sense but the fact and assurance remains that He is in it. Through the good times and difficult times our faith will grow stronger because He is truly Lord over our life. When we only give Him some control, through the good times our faith will grow or remain the same, but through the difficult times our faith begins to erode. We must make sure that He is truly Lord over every part of our life so that our faith continues to grow strong and so that we can truly shine His light. He wants to give us peace and rest but in order to fully experience this He must be the one and only sitting on the throne of our life.