Was reading in my Bible plan and several things stuck out to me. I was in Matthew 12.
Verse 50..."For whoever does the will of My Father who is in heaven, he is My brother, and sister, and mother.”
Doing the Will of God is paramount in the life of a Disciple. Our lives will be looked at before Christ by what we have DONE in the body for God. Not what places we have gone, things we have seen. Not what we have done in pursuit of our own happiness. We who are in Christ are essentially in training. There's no 2, 4 or 6 year degree to look towards. The training doesn't end until we breathe our last breath. The Disciples didn't take time off for recreation. They didn't take time off for sightseeing. They had no call off's for personal reasons. They began with the call of Jesus to come, follow Him and didn't stop until their lives were through. At all times they were about the Father’s business. All times.
In our world it's difficult with all our distractions to stay focused on our walk with Jesus. Satan intended it to be that way.
I saw the verse of the day say this:
1 Corinthians 10:13 NASB "No temptation has overtaken you except something common to mankind; and God is faithful, so He will not allow you to be tempted beyond what you are able, but with the temptation will provide the way of escape also, so that you will be able to endure it."
We are tempted in every way. Every way. Even when we try to redefine what a temptation is, God still says it is what it is.
We are tempted to give what belongs to God to this world. We are tempted but quite often need to push through that temptation because it might not be taken away. Note the last 9 words of 1 Corinthians 10:13.
Jesus spoke to several things in Matthew 12. He was rebuking the Pharisee's for their unbelief. He was very pointedly telling them that nobody would be forgiven for rejecting the Holy Spirit. That rejection being those who refused to be saved. There's countless trillions of people in Hell who rejected the free gift of salvation in Christ Jesus.
If you read that chapter carefully you will also see what is still happening today. Demon possession is actually rampant in our world just as much as it was in the times of the Gospels. Realize that while Jesus indeed cast out demons, as far as we can read, He didn't send them to Hell. So they are indeed still in this world. They are just incredibly better due to practice at hiding in plain sight.
Doers of the Will of God. There's no skating through the Christian life. There's no doing nothing for Jesus.
Perhaps one of the things that bothers me a lot concerning Christians today is their misdirected passion and excitement. That which belongs to God they give to things that are worthless in light of eternity.
One of my greatest struggles is with my time. I am not good at how I spend it. I, like many of you, have great intentions but little follow through.
Temptation isn't sinning. Giving in to it is. Resisting it is not. Joseph resisted and ran. Others we read didn't resist at all, they embraced it, and the consequences are written for us to see.
How often do you embrace temptation rather than run from it? How often are you standing there with arms open to it?
Yes, the Disciples gave up everything to follow Jesus. Look closely in the Gospels. To them everything was indeed everything. We see none of them regretting that decision. They gave up family and friends. They gave up possessions. In our world we see a greater fight to let go of things because of the pleasure that they bring.
Indeed we can learn and be the best we can be at our chosen vocation. Indeed we are called in Colossians 3:23-24 to do what we do as unto the Lord.
Are you a Doer of the Will of God or are you a Doer of Your Will?
While it's true that we read in the New Testament of the Apostles having families, their first priority was leading people to Jesus.
They placed that above other things.
Lastly in Matthew 12 I was reading about the things we think. Careless words said.
As I heard in Sundays sermon, we have several generations that like to call sins, mistakes. It takes away the sting of the guilt by re-labeling sin. We re-label what we think, what we do by way of justification of our decisions. Anything to not call it sin so that we can go ahead and sin. Our words and thoughts can and will get us into trouble.
Much to think about today. My life is still changing in settling into a smaller town way of thinking. Changes to routine, changes to others now being in our lives that weren't before. Believe it or not I struggle greatly with social settings but God's still working on me with that.
I want to hear Jesus say "Well done!" when I see Him face-to-face. I don't want to be seeing Him and being embarrassed to stand before Him knowing that I didn't do my best to live as His Word said. I certainly will have regrets when I give an account of my life. Opportunities lost, choices made that I shouldn't have made.
Are you doing your best at living for Jesus? Are you? That's the question.
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