John 14:6 says, “I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life. No one comes to the Father, except through Me.”

All of man's questions are answered in this verse. Our world today is on such a fast pace that we can't even catch our breaths.
We have concerns and questions about what is happening in our world.  What is happening to me?  We are basically searching for three things. We want direction (the way.)  We want something that is real (the truth,) and we want something that will last forever (life.)  It all comes down to this verse.  Who is the Father?  God.  Who is the way, the truth, and the life? Jesus.  Now that you know, stay tuned to find out more.

It has been almost a full year since I’ve written on this site. I had good intentions but let all kinds of events draw me away from creating any meaningful dialogue with you the reader or with God my creator. I decided late December to write a devotional everyday of the year 2019 on Facebook using The Bible App. I also determined to once again read the Bible through by using The Bible App and going to a site written by Nicky Gumbel called Read the Bible Through 2019. Very few people seemed to stumble upon this page and leave any comments. The Facebook devotionals gave instant feedback and quite frankly, I neglected this site altogether. I’m going to give it a try again and see if I can gain readers for this blog. I do hope you will read my blog and make comments and apply the Biblical truths to your life. We live in a world that needs understanding and love. With that in mind, here is a scripture that we all need to reflect upon as to how we treat those around us.

Galatians 6:9-10 ” And let us not grow weary while doing good, for in due season we shall reap if we do not lose heart. 10 Therefore, as we have opportunity, let us do good to all, especially to those who are of the household of faith.”

We live in a selfish and contentious world. We are experiencing a phenomenon whereby many people are living to satisfy their fleshly desires above doing good to others. The Bible clearly lays out the works of the flesh: adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lewdness, idolatry, sorcery, hatred, contentions, jealousies, outbursts of wrath, selfish ambitions, dissensions, heresies, envy, murders, drunkenness, revelries, and the like. We are to guard against such practices as those who persist in doing so will not inherit the kingdom of God. These are the words of the apostle Paul.

There are many fruits of the Spirit mentioned in Chapter five of Galatians. The most important one for us to dwell upon is the first one mentioned…love. Love is kind and doing good to those who you come into contact. Love does not envy. Love is not conceited nor does it try to show how important it is. Love is not rude to others nor is it ever provoked. Love does not think evil thoughts nor commit evil deeds. Love does not rejoice in iniquity. Love does rejoice in the truth. Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, and endures all things. Love never fails. In case you do not know this, it comes from 1 Corinthians 13. If all people would live by the love chapter, our world would have peace and harmony. The problem is selfishness. We want what we want. We live in the flesh instead of the Spirit. Determine to daily walk in the Spirit of love. Do good deeds for others. Pursue love.

Mark 8:34  “If anyone wants to follow after me, let him deny himself, take up his cross, and follow Me.”

Yes, deny yourself.  Sounds kinda easy, right?  When you try to do so, it is harder than it sounds!  We struggle daily to overcome our sin nature.  Just when we think we have accomplished the task, we fall.  Or at least, I do!  There is the secular Christmas song, “All I Want for Christmas is You,”  and it can remind us that we do want our all to be for Jesus.  However, we must remind ourselves that secular wishes will not get rid of our sin nature.  Doing good things for others will not save us from our sins.  The Bible is plain on this–we can even cast out demons in the name of Jesus, but if our heart has not love (Jesus), we miss salvation.  We will hear the words, “Depart from Me, I never knew you.”

We must take up our own cross daily.  That means we must deny our fleshly desires and love others unconditionally.  Jesus knows our hearts!  This is the season to get our hearts right and deny ourselves.  Let’s do it! 

1 Corinthians 13:2  “If I Have a faith that can move mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing.”

Most people would give anything to be able to super naturally move things.  I suppose that is why super-hero movies are so popular. From a young age, children want to be Batman or Superman or Wonder Woman. Yet, we are told in the above scripture that being able to do so is worthless if we do not have love in our hearts.  The Bible plainly tells us that the devil has powers on this earth and can do supernatural things.  There are those people who have willingly given their souls to the devil to do those powerful deeds. What is sad is that some of those people will commit acts of healing and miracles.  But, because they are doing so out of selfishness and not love, they will be told to depart from Jesus as He does not know them.  Matthew 7:22 tells us about this fact. (New Living Translation) On judgment day many will say to me, ‘Lord! Lord! We prophesied in your name and cast out demons in your name and performed many miracles in your name.’  How can this be?  How can these miracles be worked in the name of Jesus and yet the individual doing them will hear the dreaded words in verse 23?  “Depart from me, for I never knew you.”  This person lacked the love of Jesus.  They had the head knowledge and got the miracles they asked for, but they did not have the heart knowledge of love.  How sad it is for someone to think they will be saved on Judgment Day, only to find out they did not understand love.

With great power comes the responsibility of love for all mankind.  Jesus showed that love when He was willing to die on Calvary’s cross for our sins. He could have called a legion of angels to save Him; yet, Jesus knew that love was more important than power.  Like it says in 1 Corinthians 13,  “love conquers all.”  The devil does not understand this.  The world does not understand this!  Jesus came to show us this love.  We are to practice the love of Jesus daily in all of our dealings with others.  We are to love the unlovable. You might say, “That is just too hard!” Oh yes, it is hard to forgive those who are mean to you and use you and make fun of you.  But, we are called to forgive and love.  Let love surround you and teach you this Christmas season.  Allow the love of Jesus to shine with all you come into contact.

Matthew 18:21-35  Jesus was teaching His disciples with a parable about the unforgiving servant.  In a nutshell, Jesus forgave His servant when the servant begged forgiveness of his debts.  But that same servant went out and became cruel to his own servant who owed him money.  He had him cast into prison.  Upon hearing how the servant Jesus had forgiven acted, Jesus went to him and had no pity on him and cast him into prison to pay his debts.  Verse 35 teaches us how we must handle conflict–with forgiveness.  We cannot control how someone else handles conflict and whether or not they forgive us.  We are accountable for how we handle conflict.  We must forgive.

Many people have unhealthy reactions to conflict.  Past hurts can leave a person unable to handle criticism.  Some people repress any discomfort and pretend it doesn’t even exist.  Others place blame while defending themselves.  If we don’t handle conflict with a forgiving spirit, we limit our potential to grow.  We can develop an unforgiving spirit, which leads to bitterness and resentment.  It is not an easy task.  The perfect example of how to do this is found in Luke 23:34.  Jesus prayed for those who wrongly accused Him by saying, “Father, forgive them; for they do not know what they are doing.”  I’ve actually prayed this prayer for someone in the church who wrongly accused me of something.  It was not easy.  I wanted to tell others how wrong they were.  But, that is not the way to handle conflict.  Jesus hung there for our sins.  We must learn to “hang there” when conflict arises.

Another way to handle conflict is to realize divine perspective.  In Romans 8:28 we are promised that as believers, all things will work to the believers benefit.  God not only uses difficulties to teach us, but He allows us to demonstrate our love for Jesus by the way we choose to respond to conflict.  There was a fellowship dinner in the church basement and a man walked into the kitchen with his wife’s dish and the lady in the kitchen said rather harshly that what did he mean only bringing one dish when she had slaved over five dishes.  The man could have taken issue with the distraught lady.  Instead, he replied that he was so happy she fixed so many dishes as he knew they wouldn’t run out of food.  He turned the negative into a positive.

We also must be ready and willing to respond to something we may have done wrong.  Our response should be to apologize and ask forgiveness.  We must listen to the other person and acknowledge their feelings and carefully consider their comments.  Try to turn negatives into positives.  You definitely need to pray for strength to stay calm and do what is right.  Again, it is not an easy task.  However, God wants us to respond with forgiveness and a gentle attitude.

How do you deal with accusations and criticism?  Forgiveness is the only response that will keep you from becoming a victim of resentment and anger.

Hebrews 5: 14 (CEV)  “Solid food is for mature people who have been trained to know right from wrong.”

IT use to be easy to tell the bad people from the good ones back when I was a kid cause all you had to do was look and see what color of hat they had on.  If it was white, they were the good guys and if it were black, they were they bad guys.  That  all changed in the sixties and truth became so much harder to discern.  We were told how bread was so important and we needed to eat more of it to stay healthy.  We later found out this “truth” was not true!  I could go on and on about all the things we have come to find out as falsehoods that we once were convinced as truths.  So, how do you know what to believe in today’s world? We do have the luxury of getting on line and researching at our fingertips.  The problem becomes that we can also find several opinions that are conflicting!  So then, how do we discern the truth?

First of all, we must be ready to listen.  You heard me…listen.  Too often we like to hurry on our way and not give truth a fleeting thought.  When you want to find the truth of a situation, you must be willing to sit and listen.  It is no different in our walk with the Lord.  To know the Truth, we must listen.  It requires we spend some time in thought and prayer.  That may require you to get up earlier or set aside some time just for prayer and listening.  My biggest problem in my marriage is listening.  I think i listen, only to find out later my listening skills were not functioning properly.  If it is a spouse or friend, it helps to completely look them in the eyes as they talk so you can listen.  I’m notorious for walking and talking.  So much can get lost in the  conversation!  I am slowly learning to stand and  listen rather than walk.  God wants our undivided attention too.  We should sit in our quiet place and listen.

Once we have listened, we need to apply what we have learned.  Reading God’s Word will help us to apply what He is telling us.  Reading scripture opens our eyes to see from God’s perspective so that we can make wise choices.  It is then that discernment comes.  As we read God’s Truths, we are able to discern everyday truths.  When we don’t read scriptures, it becomes harder to discern what really is the truth.  It is also easier for the devil to deceive us and for us not even to realize it.  I heard the story of a lady in a church who found out another lady in her Sunday school was cheating on her husband and was so appalled that she went to her pastor and told him that he had to tell the lady she had to leave the church.  Wow.  The devil really deceived this first lady into thinking she was so much better and needed to get sin out of the church.  Unfortunately, the lady had sinned in her gossip!  Should she then also leave the church?  How unrighteous we become when we attempt to judge others.  Discernment shows love.  Unconditional love.  We should strive to become Christ-like in our love toward others.  That is discernment.

Acts 10:28 b says. “But God has shown me that I should no longer think of anyone as impure or unclean.  Then in verse 34, Peter replies, “I see very clearly that God shows no favoritism.”

This is the month we celebrate the life of a brilliant American, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.  He was a champion for showing love to all people.  Jesus laid down His life to show love for all mankind.  Yet, there are those who show hatred, bitterness, strife, and persecution of anyone they feel do not measure up to their idea of what they think is acceptable.  Let’s face it, people have become very opinionated about just about everything.  We have our favorite friends, our favorite shopping venues, and our favorite websites.  We show favoritism toward one friend over another and hurt others  feelings in the process.  There are parents that think their child never does anything wrong.  I’m sure you have experienced a parent getting upset at other parents over problems their children are having.  These situations teach conditional love.  No wonder we have so many problems with relationships.  Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was a champion for showing love to all people.  He gave his famous speech, “I Have A Dream” that espoused having an unconditional love.  There was another man who lived very long ago to teach what true love is.  Jesus taught us we should lay down our lives for our friends and he did just that. Jesus laid down His life to show an unconditional love for all mankind. We should challenge ourselves to daily practice the love that shows no favoritism. If we would practice this type of love, we would be happier with each other.  We would also stay healthier.  We would be showing a witness for unconditional love.  Our world needs more of this type of love.

God knows your needs!  God knows when you have a week left in the month and you have already spent all the money you have.  This happened to my husband and I many years ago.  We had a dear friend that handed us some money they said they owed us.  We were so surprised but extremely grateful.  And then,  my parents sent money in the mail for no reason.  Our needs were met!  We never forgot how we prayed and asked for our needs to be met.  God did that!  Since that time, we found out that you cannot out give God.  He has blessed us so richly!  We have tried our best to stay in His word and pray without ceasing.  God honors us when we serve Him.  It is a promise!

So many times though, we let Him down.  He knows that our sinful nature leads us into situations that take us away from Him.  In Luke 22:40 (NKJV), Jesus told His disciples, “Pray that you may not enter into temptation.”  Jesus knew us!  The disciples went to sleep.  Unfortunately, we “go to sleep” in the ways of the world.

Fortunately, there is good news! When Jesus died on that cross for you and me, He gave us a special gift of the Holy Spirit.  We can tap into power that can help us steer clear of temptation.  All we have to do is pray!  Ask and receive.  It is Biblical.  It is so simple that most people cannot even fathom how to become childlike and believe.  When you do believe in Jesus, all things are possible!  Don’t let the world steal your joy.  Believe and your joy will be fulfilled.  You can overcome temptation.  And what is fabulous? Your needs will be met!  Claim the promise from Philippians 4:19.  There are many other verses where God wants to meet our every need.  Believe!

I strive as many of you do to make my motives pure.  It tells us in the Bible in 1 Corinthians 3:9, “For we are God’s fellow workers; you are God’s field, God’s building.” You may not feel like you belong because of all your daily struggles.  If you ever ask Jesus into your heart…you do belong.  Do not deceive yourself by self doubt.  As believers, we are responsible to carry out the work set before us in scripture.  Our problem is that we easily forget to do God’s work because we are too busy with getting our children to bed, up and to school, to sports or other events and homework done, job responsibilities and all the other activities of the day.  Our motives become secular in nature…not Godly.

From the outside, we may look like we have it together and are living obediently the Christian life.  We go to church and take food to a shelter or help with disaster relief.  On the outside, it looks as if our motives are pure and honorable.  Yet, underneath we may not even realize our motives are undesirable to the Lord.  We need to constantly ask our heavenly Father to reveal to us whatever may be driven by selfish motives.  Unfortunately, I am speaking to myself.  So…what do we do?  We must go to the Lord in prayer and stay in His word.  We must ask God to reveal whatever selfish motive to be exposed and brought under His authority.  Only then, can we rejoice in all things.  We may still face trials and tribulations, but God will be with us and we can rejoice.

Keep trying!  There is a story I once read about a man in his early nineties.  He said this, “I am going to live to be 100, or die in the attempt.”  I thought that this was well put…even a little comical.  He had hope and joy in life and though the odds were against him to reach 100, he was not going to let that dampen his enthusiasm.  In a similar way, though we will not be perfectly pure in our motives, and it may look impossible to change, we should not give up hope of trying because Jesus is there to cheer us on.  We can change our motives to one of purity.

How can I change my motives to ones of purity?  Here is a Psalm to pray and memorize to make your motives spiritual.  Psalm 51:10 says, “Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew your right Spirit within me.”  We must remember to pray this Psalm daily so our motives remain pure.  There is no limit to what God can do with your help.  Get involved! Your life will be transformed.