So You Love God

If anyone says, "I love God," yet hates his brother, he is a liar. For anyone who does not love his brother, whom he has seen, cannot love God, whom he has not seen. And he has given us this command: Whoever loves God must also love his brother. 1 John 4:20-21 (NIV)

“Just Sayin” ...
It’s not enough to say you love God, if you dwell in God and God in you than you will love your brother. That doesn’t mean we won’t get our feelings hurt and even get angry but it does mean we will be quick to forgive, harboring a grudge and becoming bitter leads us to hate our brother. If you find yourself unable to feel the presence of God leave your gift on the altar and go be reconciled with your brother. You can’t love God and hate someone else. If you are not where you once were in Christ, who moved? It wasn’t Jesus.

“Love the one your with”
John is talking about seeing with our eye. We have not physically seen God and yet we say we love him while there are hurting people all around us that we see every day but we can’t find the time or inclination to love. If we cannot love (not in word but in deed) those that we see how can we love God? You can’t!

“Who is my Brother”
When Jesus told the lawyer that he must love his neighbor as himself in order to inherit eternal life, the man trying to justify himself asked, “Who is my neighbor?” Jesus then gave the example of the Good Samaritan. The use of brother parallels the word neighbor. It is time we stop trying to justify not loving those hard to love people and instead find reasons to love them. We must let the light of God’s love shine through us after all we are God’s children.

“Designed For Community”
You are made in the image of the Triune God. God the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit form the perfect community of love. We are most fulfilled when we are conformed to the image of Christ so let me remind you of His prayer in John 17:22-23, “And the glory which thou gavest me I have given them; that they may be one, even as we are one: I in them, and thou in me, that they may be made perfect in one; and that the world may know that thou hast sent me, and hast loved them, as thou hast loved me.” Jesus prayed that we would live in the same love and community that He and the Father have enjoyed for eternity. To love our neighbor and live at peace with our brothers and sisters is the ultimate witness of Christ in us.

“It’s a Command?”
We like to have options. The ability to pick and choose what we like is appealing to our flesh. Many apply this desire to their relationship with God. We prefer to think of God’s commands as suggestions. We do this at our own risk. Loving our brother is not an option or suggestion but a fundamental part of living in Christ. If Christ dwells in us and we dwell in Him we will love our brother.

But God

"But God"

Romans 5:8 (KJV) - But God demonstrates His love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.

Through the years I have heard many people say "Where was God." Let me tell you where God was. While you were living a life of complete disregard for God, He was dying to pay for the vilest of sins you committed. If God was there in your sinful life He most certainly will be there in your storm.

This passage reminds me of one of my favorite Scriptures, Ephesians 2:4 it starts out with the same two words "But God". No matter what the Devil brings against us! No matter what the accusation! No matter how bleak the circumstance! God is on the throne and He is rich in mercy, His love endures forever, and He has called us, anointed us, and raised us to sit in heavenly places with Jesus!

"But God, who is rich in mercy, for his great love wherewith he loved us, even when we were dead in sins, hath quickened us together with Christ, (by grace ye are saved;) And hath raised us up together, and made us sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus:" Ephesians 2:4-6 (KJV)

Think about the main point of this Scripture "God demonstrates His love toward us". Through out the ages God has demonstrated His love to a world bent on denying Him, abandoning Him, cursing Him, and ignoring Him. His love kept on longing, desiring, reaching, holding, He never let go and He will never let go. As the song says,

 "Could we with ink the ocean fill, And were the skies of parchment made;
Were every stalk on earth a quill, And every man a scribe by trade;
To write the love of God above Would drain the ocean dry;
Nor could the scroll contain the whole, Though stretched from sky to sky."

Man was created in the image of God and made to fellowship with Him. It was our sin that separated us from God. “The wages of sin is death!” If we got what we deserved all hope would be lost, but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus. It not about how sinful you have been it is about God’s love and grace. The amazing thing about grace Is that God "looks beyond our faults and sees our need".

Jesus said, "Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends.' I like that. Greater love! I want to be like Jesus. I want to be like Him. So my prayer is Lord give me a greater love. A love that brings me to my cross. A love that empties me. A love that makes me just like Jesus.

Jesus said in John 13:34-35 "A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this all men will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another." Loving like Christ loves cannot be accomplished without sacrifice. Laying down our lives for others is as much part of the Christian life as kneeling at the altar or picking up a Bible. It really is the essence of following Christ.

Why?

Know therefore that the LORD thy God, he is God, the faithful God, which keepeth covenant and mercy with them that love him and keep his commandments to a thousand generations; Deuteronomy 7:9 (KJV)

Why?

Have you ever watched a little baby? Before they can speak, before they understand how things work, they watch. I love observing them as they look with loving eyes at their parents. Staring intently as Mom talks to them, it is almost as if you can see the wheels turning in their heads. I believe they are asking that question. Why? Why do they move their lips? How do they make that sound? What does that mean? We are born inquisitive and if we are fortunate we continue to ask question the rest of our lives.

So when I read that God is Faithful I have to ask myself, why? There is an old song that is based on a question entitled, “Who am I?”

“Who am I that a King would bleed and die for? Who am I that He would say not my will thine Lord? “

That question flows from the knowledge that we, all of us, are sinful and there is nothing in us that would attract a holy God. What have I ever done that makes me worth His life, His promise, His sacrifice, or His faithfulness.

We believe in the law of reciprocity. It goes like this, if you are generous to me than I will be generous to you. If you are loving to me than I will be loving to you. If you are faithful to me than I will be faithful to you. Often we are guilty of making God in our own image. We see Him as rewarding us for being good, loving us because we love Him, and being faithful because we are faithful. Somehow we make the blessings of God and the goodness of God dependent on our actions and in doing so we defile the glory of God. We make Him more like us rather than becoming more like Him.

Consider this verse,
"Yet you have not called upon me, O Jacob, you have not wearied yourselves for me, O Israel. You have not brought me sheep for burnt offerings, nor honored me with your sacrifices. I have not burdened you with grain offerings nor wearied you with demands for incense. You have not bought any fragrant calamus for me, or lavished on me the fat of your sacrifices. But you have burdened me with your sins and wearied me with your offenses. "I, even I, am he who blots out your transgressions, for my own sake, and remembers your sins no more.” Isaiah 43:22-25 (NIV)

God is speaking to Israel and brings a railing accusation against them. They have abandoned God and failed to keep His commandments but instead have heaped their iniquities upon Him yet God concludes by stating that He will blot out their transgressions and remember their sins no more. Why? For His own sake!

This Truth will stop you in your tracks and make you shout glory! Not because of what I have done, not because of who I am, not because of what I will become but because of who He is! He is faithful! What God has promised will come to pass not because I have earned it but because He is God and cannot lie. His promises are sure! They are not dependent on me they are stedfast because of Him.

Like a child I lay and behold His face. His eyes are looking at me with love, His lips are speaking to me, His ears are listening to me. What beauty I behold! What wonder fills my soul? I cannot comprehend His glory no matter how hard I try but every now and then I am blessed with a glimpse of understanding and I reach for His face.

God is faithful because that is who He is! He loves me because that is who He is! He covers me because …well you get the idea.

A Firm Foundation

Know therefore that the LORD thy God, he is God, the faithful God, which keepeth covenant and mercy with them that love him and keep his commandments to a thousand generations; Deuteronomy 7:9 (KJV)

Words mean something.  What we read and write are not just random marks on a page but those markings carry the intent of the heart.  In reading and studying the Word of God I use many different versions of the Bible.  No Jesus didn’t read the King James Version and Paul didn’t write in the King’s English.  Translating the ancient manuscripts from Hebrew, Greek, and Aramaic is an arduous task undertaken by men and women of much greater understanding than me.  Needless to say people spend their entire life studying these ancient languages and attempting to give us the best translation and understanding of what the authors were trying to say.  With that in mind I would like to examine the same verse today in two different translations of the Bible. 

The passage I would like to examine is found in Proverbs 16:6.  Originally written in Hebrew, translated to Latin then to English we find what appears to be two very different verses in the King James and  New International Version.
By mercy and truth iniquity is purged: and by the fear of the LORD men depart from evil.  Proverbs 16:6 (KJV)

Through love and faithfulness sin is atoned for; through the fear of the LORD a man avoids evil.  Proverbs 16:6 (NIV)

Mercy becomes love and truth becomes faithfulness!  How did that happen?  Let’s leave the scholars to their linguistic arguments and just contemplate these words in our hearts.
I have heard mercy defined as unmerited favor, grace that isn’t deserved.  Your Strong’s concordance tells you that the Hebrew word was “hesed” and the top three translations of the word are mercy, kindness, and loving kindness.  It is God’s great love that moves Him to have mercy upon us.  It was God’s love that led Jesus to the cross where mercy was poured out upon the lost.  Mercy and love both speak of the same attribute of God’s heart. One is the root and the other the fruit.
That one was easy.  Now let’s look at faithfulness and truth. The Hebrew word used here is “emet” and turning to our Strongs for help we find something that can only be described as amazing.  This word is derived from one that means stable or stability.  In one place it is used to denote a wall which firmly holds a nail in place and another to describe a house with a firm foundation.  Treasure hunting can be tedious and requires sifting through lots of extraneous material to find the pearl of great price.  Here we have found a great treasure. 
Truth and faithfulness are the foundation of our salvation.  We are held in the hands of a loving God that has shown great mercy, underserved favor to each of us.  He will never leave us and we have no fear of being forsaken.  His faithfulness is grounded in His Truth.  In this world of relativism where absolute truth is ridiculed it is hard to grasp the concept of undeniable, unchangeable Truth.  But there are absolutes.  White is still white not eggshell or any other blend.  Pure is still pure, holy still holy and God is still God.  He never changes.  His love is established in Truth.  This is the essence of His faithfulness. 
Oh what joy to know that our sins have been washed away!  Not because of something that has a short life span but because of God’s great, unchanging love.  Our iniquity has been purged; our sin atoned for by the blood of the Lamb.  We have a sure and a firm foundation that cannot be shaken and we cry out, “O Lord, Great is thy faithfulness!”  He is truly “el hanne eman” The Faithful God.

Faithful God

Know therefore that the LORD thy God, he is God, the faithful God, which keepeth covenant and mercy with them that love him and keep his commandments to a thousand generations;  Deuteronomy 7:9 (KJV)

This week we are exploring the depths of  "el hanne eman" - The Faithful God

     The human body is perhaps the greatest feat of engineering in the universe.  From the unsearchable mysteries of the human brain to the complex working of the foot the body inspires wonder.  We take the parts and pieces of our body for granted.  I am sitting here on the couch with a broken calcaneus bone. I have walked on that bone for fifty six years and never knew the name, never understood how it worked, and really never gave it any thought, until it shattered.  One twelve foot drop off a ladder and everything changed.  The intricate balance of our bones, nerves, muscles, blood, and tissue work day in and day out keeping us mobile and functioning in this world, yet we give them very little thought.  Oh, we wash the body but mostly so that we can be comfortable and not offend others.  We groom the hair and clip the nails, clean the ears, and eat, but how much thought do we give to the body when we do these things.  Really we treat it with little thought about how wonderful and amazingly faithful it is.  We just use it.

     We often treat God much the same way taking for granted the blessings and presence of His hand in our lives.  We remember the “big” moments!  The times that God reached into our lives and rescued us but those dramatic events are not what really define the relationship we have with our Heavenly Father.  He never leaves us.  When we are alone and things are quiet, He is there.  When we are playing, He is there.  When we are holding our children and grandchildren in our arms, He is there.  In the quiet meadow or the rocky mountain top God has always been there. 
We love to talk about how God was in the lion’s den with Daniel keeping him through the night but we forget that God was there when Daniel was taken captive; He was there when Daniel was chosen to serve in the King’s Court, and He was there at the window three times a day.  The faithfulness of God is not found in the great rescue but in the mundane repetitions of the everyday lives of His people. 

     This is what truly amazes me about God.  Every morning when I open my eyes He is there.  For most people that moment doesn’t bring about a dynamic religious experience.  They don’t even acknowledge Him.  Not even a good morning.  But He has been there every day for the last fifty six years of my life.  When I was a slave to my sinful nature and didn’t give Him a thought, He was there. When I ignored His warnings and lived my life in defiance to His holiness, He was there.  When life did not seem worth living, He was there.  When I called out through the pain of my own existence, He was there.  His love has never failed, never abandoned me, and never let me go.  Like the Father of the Prodigal Son, He stood on the porch and looked down the road waiting for me to come home.  He was there!

     When we relegate God’s faithfulness to the miraculous events in our lives we fail to truly understand His love for us.  Ask any woman who feels deeply loved and she will tell you it’s not the big dates, but the assurance of her loves faithfulness is in the little things, the everyday things.  Yes, God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son and that love has been faithfully demonstrated to us every day of our lives.

Who Is My Neighbor

Matthew 22:37-40 (NIV) Jesus replied: "'Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.' 38 This is the first and greatest commandment. 39 And the second is like it: 'Love your neighbor as yourself.' 40 All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments."

You can’t choose your neighbor. They can be any religion, any race, or any nationality. You may notice that Jesus didn’t say love your friends, family, or fellow church members. Luke records this event and tells us that the Pharisee trying to justify himself asks, “Who is my neighbor?” Perhaps a closer look at the word can help him. It comes from two old words, “nae” meaning near and “buer” meaning dwell or residing. The Greek word used is “plesion” which is a derivative of a word meaning “near”. Literally anyone near us is our neighbor.

Jesus responds to the Pharisee by telling the story of the Samaritan. The example Christ used of a neighbor was someone that was found injured on the road. When the Samaritan came near to the man he became his neighbor. The Jews and the Samaritans were at odds over religion, there were plenty of things that could have separated them and they didn’t even know each other. In this story Jesus takes away every excuse that we use to separate us from people. Rich or poor, educated or illiterate, Christian or pagan we must love those that are near.

I have observed some that would give cheerfully to orphans half way around the world but disdain the poor in their own town. It might be easier to love those that are distant. Their faults don’t shout at us over the miles. However, the faults of the man that just cut us off in traffic or the neatly dressed couple that just knocked on our door to share their particular brand of religion can be hard to overlook. I believe that is why Jesus chose the word neighbor. Those that are in close proximity to you. We must share the love of Jesus with those that we happen upon along the road to Jericho. Every day we meet people that have been abused by others, sometimes in the name of religion. It is up to us to pick them up, dress their wounds, address their needs, and love them just like God has loved us.

The Heart Of The Matter

Matthew 22:37-40 (NIV) Jesus replied: "'Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.' 38 This is the first and greatest commandment. 39 And the second is like it: 'Love your neighbor as yourself.' 40 All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments."

While a rookie police officer I had to ride for the first six months with a Training Officer. One night my Training Officer and another decided that they would have a contest. We would see who could give out the most tickets in one evening. (Yes, this is a true story. Yes, Policemen are people too.) Being new to the job and ready to protect and serve the public I thought the night would be filled with dangerous traffic stops where we would be stopping speeders and drunk drivers while making the streets safer for the public. My T/O drove us to a quiet neighborhood in the poverty stricken part of our district and began to slowly drive down the residential street. Suddenly he stopped and said,

“There’s one!”

I looked around for the danger not seeing any other moving cars on the road but he grabbed his ticket book and ordered me out of the squad car. I followed him to an old parked car and watched as he wrote a ticket for expired registration and placed it on the car’s windshield. We spent the next eight hours giving out tickets to cars that were parked too close to the sidewalk, too far from the sidewalk, broken windshields, expired tags, and a variety of other minor infractions. At first I was disappointed that we were being so petty but soon I begin to count the tickets that were piling up and reveled in the thought of “winning” the competition. Thankfully this only happened one night and I was able to actually do police work for the rest of my training. But that night four police officers who could have been serving the community spent far too much time competing against each other and not accomplishing their mission. Christians can do the same thing.

God has called us to fulfill His will. There is a mission field all around us and people are in need of someone to share the Gospel of Jesus Christ with them. This is their only hope. Death has them in its grip and hell is enlarging its mouth to receive the multitude that are lost in this world but far too often God’s people are busy looking for minor infractions. There are hurting souls, ruined lives, blinded eyes, and dying hearts that need someone to rescue them and until God’s Church rises up in love they will continue to perish. There is no time for pettiness, no time for competition, no time for games, we must be about the Father’s business.

The Pharisees that confronted Jesus were too busy finding the minor infractions of life. They had forgotten the purpose that God had given us the law. Not to condemn but to lift up. God’s didn’t want us to fail, He wants us to succeed and in order to do that we must take hold of each commandment filled with the love of God. The Law of God was written from a heart of love, God’s heart, and to keep those commandments we must respond to them with the same heart. That is why outside of Christ it is impossible to keep the Law.

Many today are striving in their own strength to please God, believing that their labor will somehow endear them to a holy God. They will spend their night in futility trying to attain that which can only be received as a free gift. God’s love is given to each of us freely. When we receive that love and allow it to become the catalyst for every action we can finally begin to walk in understanding, knowing the heart of God.

Oh, for those that need closure, my Training Officer and I lost the competition but to this day I still know what a 4000a CVC violation is.

Hanging the Commandments

Matthew 22:37-40 (NIV) Jesus replied: "'Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.' 38 This is the first and greatest commandment. 39 And the second is like it: 'Love your neighbor as yourself.' 40 All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments."

Like a hook anchored to the wall which holds all the books of the law this command often goes without much notice.  The hook is not pondered or given much thought it just does its job and remains firmly entrenched, never moving, always in place.  The men who came to Jesus had become obsessed with the Decalogue.  They studied them, meditated on them, created traditions and laws around them without ever paying attention to what held them in place.  We are often guilty of this type of thinking. 

Today is my Mother’s birthday.  Her care for me has always been sacrificial.  I didn’t always know it or pay much attention to the time she invested in my life.  Children seem to take their parents for granted.  Mom’s are suppose to cook, clean, wake you up, buy your clothes, help with your homework, teach you how to dress, comb your hair, drive you where you want to go, give you money, and always be there to talk to.  But why?  Why do they take such care?  Why does a young woman allow her body to go through such changes and pain to bring a child into the world?  Why does she lay down her life so that child can learn how to survive and thrive?  I know that everything my Mother did for her children flowed from her heart.  With all of her heart, soul and mind Mom cared for all seven of her children.  I don’t think she considered it a sacrifice.  She never had to “work up” the love that she showed to us.  She never had to be convinced that it was worth it.  She didn’t go to seminars on how to be a better mom or how to lay down her life for her family.  She just did it because she loved us. 

Living for God is like that.  Someone is not going to teach you how to keep the commandments.  They are not going to give you a twelve step guide to being a successful Christian.  True obedience must flow from the heart.  When we love God with all of our heart, soul, and mind we will simply follow Him.  Our obedience will come natural and our praise will flow from our innermost being.  With a heart of compassion we will seek God and desire to know Him.  Sacrifices will become joys and labor will become pleasure.  Every trial will serve to bring us closer to Jesus and every temptation will only remind us of how much we love Him. 

Jesus reminds us in this passage to lift our eyes from what hangs from the hook and make sure that the hook is firmly in place.  “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the first and greatest commandment.”

Unexpected Answers

Matthew 22:37-40 (NIV)  Jesus replied: "'Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.'  38  This is the first and greatest commandment.  39  And the second is like it: 'Love your neighbor as yourself.'  40  All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments."

Jesus was surrounded by those that wanted Him to fail.  In Matthew 22 the Sadducees and Pharisees were pressing Jesus with questions designed to trap Him.  They were looking for an answer that they could use against Him.  Religious people tend to do that.  They word their questions in such a way that if you don’t give them the answer they have already decided to be correct they can accuse you of not “being like Jesus” or not “following the Bible”.  Typically they are proud, arrogant, and slaves to the law and customs that bring death and not life.

“What is the greatest commandment?”  That question had been debated by the religious leaders for centuries.  The Pharisees were men that had formed their own opinions and worked to establish them as custom among the people.  Using their intellect and power they herded the multitudes into carefully made corrals where they could be squeezed into submission.  There was no love for God’s people only the longing for power and authority.  All Scripture was defined according to their understanding.

The Pharisaical lawyer that posed this question to Jesus was used to men bending under the weight of the collective scorn and intellect of these religious types. Whatever this unlearned Nazarene would answer they would attack and embarrass Him in front of the crowd.  And then Jesus spoke Truth into the midst of the storm.

“Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.”
I
t was like driving a sword into the heart of the raging bull that was waiting to crush Him.  Instead of wrestling with the law Jesus defined the law. If you Love God supremely then you will keep His commandment.  Not for duty or reward but from a heart that can do nothing else.  The man or woman that loves God above everything in this life will never take His name in vain or make graven images to worship.  They will hold everyday as holy and live their lives surrendered to Him.  Love always puts the other first. Love never speaks evil. Never looks to self but always holds the other in greatest esteem. Living for God is easy if you love Him with all your heart, soul and mind.

It is easy to become trapped by the Pharisees.  To begin to live life as a set of rules and expectations placed upon us by others and there are many who would love to be the ones setting the rules.  But Jesus has shown us a way to transcend the “law-givers”.  There is an old song that comes to mind,

“Love lifted me. Love lifted me. When nothing else could help, love lifted me.”

What defines your relationship with Jesus?  He loves you!  Everything that God has done for us is borne on wings of love.  “For God so loved the world…”  Everyone knows that verse.  Let’s make sure they know our counterpart to it.  “For I so loved God…”

With All My Heart

Matthew 5:8 (KJV) Blessed are the pure in heart: for they shall see God.

We often speak of the heart as the center of our love. “I love you with all my heart”, is spoken to those that we cherish greatly. I recall the story of the mother that would pull each of her children aside and tell them “I love you the most. You are my favorite but don’t tell the others they will be upset.” She told each of her five children this and throughout their lives each child believed that they were her favorite and kept the secret faithfully. When the Mother passed away the children were making plans for her funeral service when the youngest told the others that she was her Mother’s favorite, each sibling then shared the many times that they had been told the exact same thing. What a shock! I am sure that in the Mother’s mind she did love every one of her children “with all her heart”. But deep down inside of this loving mother was the knowledge that she could not give all her heart to more than one child. Thus she had them all keep the secret.

We are like that with God. We love Him deeply and want to walk the path’s of this life hand in hand with our Heavenly Father. We want God to love us and abide with us. But there are others, those things that demand our time and become the object of our affection. We bring them into our lives and allow them to possess a part of our heart. When we come to Jesus we compartmentalize our lives placing each “love” into its own secret place. Life has a way of allowing us to accept what we know we shouldn’t and soon those secret places and loves seem normal, just a part of life. Like a man who has two wives, two families, two homes and orders his life so that each doesn’t know about the other. To the rest of us that seems burdensome and peculiar but he has lived with the secret for so long that it seems right. That is until the two families meet.

To have a pure heart, a single eye, requires to be honest about the secret places in our lives. We know that when our two loves meet only one can survive as the “one true love”. Perhaps the road to being pure in heart must start with an abundant dose of honesty. There is an old song that states, “Is your all on the altar of sacrifice laid. Your heart does the Spirit control…” The altar is a good place to start in our search for a pure heart but only if we are honest about the things we have kept in our secret place.

A Face for the Name

2 Chronicles 7:14 (KJV) If my people, which are called by my name, shall humble themselves, and pray, and seek my face, and turn from their wicked ways; then will I hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin, and will heal their land.

One of the four conditions given to the people called by God’s name is to seek His face. Too often, in the midst of our trials, God’s people look for his hand. Our prayers are full of requests and our faith is exercised to “move the hand of God”. Imagine a bride that loves the money and gifts her husband brings to her and keeps asking for more but avoids spending time with him. She doesn’t take time to talk to him, won’t read his letters to her except to find out ways to get more stuff from him, and never spends any time thinking about him. Once a week she spends an hour in the same room as him listening to others talk about him. This bride tells the world that she loves him but she really doesn’t behave like a woman in love. To this people God cries out “If you will humble yourself and pray, and seek my face, and turn from your wicked ways; then I will hear, forgive, and heal your land.”

Imagine the sorrow of the Bridegroom. He loves His wife so much that He gave up everything to redeem her, even laying down His life for her. He is powerful, rich and lacks for nothing but His desire is for her to desire Him. It is His great pleasure to give her the kingdom. Why won’t she love Him? Not in words but in deeds! God cries out “Seek my face! Spend time with me! Get to know me!” What will our answer be? Words and intentions can never be of value unless they are carried by the heart to a place of fulfillment. Remember faith without works is dead and so is love without sacrifice.

X4

Isaiah 41:10 (NKJV) Fear not, for I am with you; Be not dismayed, for I am your God. I will strengthen you, Yes, I will help you, I will uphold you with My righteous right hand.'

In this verse God makes four proclamations; no need to fear I am with you, no need to be dismayed I am your God, Need strength I will help you, and finally here is my hand to hold you up. In every aspect of our lives God wants us to know that he is more than enough. There is no problem that God did not foresee. He is not up in Heaven wringing His hands and worrying about what is going to happen. He has it under control. As Christians we acknowledge God’s sovereignty and walk by faith. That is not just a colloquialism but an intricate and vital part of our daily life. Walking by faith through the valley of the shadow of death I can fear no evil. Walking by faith as I navigate the rocks and crevices of the mountain top I know that God is with me. Walking by faith though the storm howls in my face I am secure in His arms. The righteous hand of God is upon me! Whom shall I fear? I can say with Paul “Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall trouble or hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword? As it is written: "For your sake we face death all day long; we are considered as sheep to be slaughtered." No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord". Romans 8:35-39 (NIV) Each time God proclaims a truth into our lives He punctuates it by reminding us that He is able to deliver everything that He has promised. I am with you! I am your God! I will strengthen you! I will help you! I will uphold you! It is MY righteous hand! Now that’s something you can depend on.