Month: September 2015

The ability to get outside of one’s own skin and serve another is not natural for anyone. But sitting back and doing nothing is not an option. We are called to love, to serve, to identify need, and to respond. That is not easy for anyone, but it is what the Holy Spirit helps us to do so that we can become more like Jesus.
–Rebecca Pippert

God commands us to have a servant attitude toward others… the same attitude of Jesus Christ:
Do nothing from selfishness…but with humility of mind regard one another as more important than yourselves; do not merely look out for your own personal interests, but also for the interests of others.

This is not easy.
It is not natural.
It willingly puts us under others, when our flesh cries out to be on top.
But…
…It is the command of God.

Serving others in this way is an aspect of dying to self which we are commanded to do.

What will you do?
Fight to stay on top?
Follow the counsel of the world?
Or seek to please God?
It won’t be easy, it won’t be comfortable, it won’t be natural… But obeying God is the best choice we could ever make as it will help us to become more like Jesus.

What is the ultimate good? It all ends in one thing: God Himself.
All the words of the gospel lead to Him, or they are not gospel.

For example: “salvation” is not good news if it only saves from hell and not for God. “Forgiveness” is not good news if it only gives relief from guilt and doesn’t open the way to God. “Justification” is not good news if it only makes us legally acceptable to God, but doesn’t bring fellowship with God. “Redemption” is not good news if it only liberates us from bondage, but doesn’t bring us to God. “Adoption” is not good news if it only puts us in the Father’s family but not in His arms.
–John Piper

I am so amazed and so blessed that God news has opened the way for me to find Him, has brought me into fellowship with Him, has liberated me to freely choose Him, and has put me in His arms.

Thank You God for the gospel… the ultimate good news!

We believe God is living and at work.
Our faith is not in a historical model; it is in a living Lord.

This sense of the aliveness and nearness of God must permeate our evangelism. As Chesterton writes, “Plato has told you a truth; but Plato is dead. Shakespeare has startled you with an image; but Shakespeare will not startle you anymore. But imagine what it would be to live with such men still living, to know that Plato might break out with an original lecture tomorrow, or that at any moment Shakespeare might shatter everything with a single song.” The person who lives in contact with the living God is a person “always expecting to meet Plato or Shakespeare tomorrow at breakfast.”
–Rebecca Pippert

Are you truly aware that God is alive? Have you realized that He is the living Lord who still transforms lives? Have you encountered Him lately? Has He changed your life?

Did you meet with Him today? Are you planning to meet with Him tomorrow?

Generosity means a disposition to give to others in a way which has no mercenary motive and is not limited by what the recipients deserve but consistently goes beyond it. Generosity expresses the simple wish that others should have what they need to make them happy. Generosity is, so to speak, the focal point of God’s moral perfection; it is the quality which determines how all God’s other excellences are to be displayed.
–J. I. Packer

Thank you, God, for your generosity toward me.
Help me to be generous to others – with my words, with my resources, with my actions, and with my thoughts.
Help me to generously desire for others to be happy and to have joy at their successes.
Help me to be like You.

Whatever else may be said about this state of affairs, it certainly makes it possible to learn a great deal secondhand about the practice of Christianity. Moreover, if one has been given a good bump of common sense one may frequently be able to use this learning to help floundering Christians of less stable temperament to regain their footing and develop a sense of proportion about their troubles, and in this way one may gain for oneself a reputation for being quite a pastor.

Yet one can have all this and hardly know God at all.
–J. I. Packer

Dr. Packer makes a great point that with all the information available to us from the Bible to the mass of Christian literature in the bookstores to the tons of websites about God and Christianity we can obtain much learning about God and His Word. But just gaining head knowledge about God does not mean you “know” God and have a personal, intimate, saving relationship with Him. And that is what you need.

I can know a lot about the President without knowing him personally.
I can know a lot about past historical people without ever knowing them personally.
And I can know a lot about Jesus without knowing Him personally – without ever making Him my Savior and my Lord.

Make sure that you aren’t one who knows about God but who doesn’t actually know God.
Ask someone who you know has a relationship with Him about how to start your own personal relationship with Him.