He must increase, but I must decrease.

(John 3:30) “He must increase, but I must decrease”.

“He who comes from above is above all. He who is of the earth belongs to the earth and speaks in an earthly way. He who comes from heaven is above all.” We now have the mind of Christ, all those who have His Spirit, must begin to reason with His mind.

By now you may well understand the simplistic way I reason things out; I do not look for the snake in the grass, or the needle in the haystack, many of us spend half our lives if not more concerned about things that needn’t concern us. I have a good friend and brother that likes to stretch me and as he would put it, “to think out of my box”. I understand his heart in the matter and at time that is a good thing. But we must never bite off more than we can chew. You see, if we where to compare one another side by side, I would be defeated hands down in all the natural God given faculties, i.e. human intellect, memory and the like, but as far back as I can remember he has always been gifted with those ability. My point is this, regardless of which we are and what we achieved outside the will of God and in glorifying His names it is but a bag of dry bones, it will never produce life in eternity. It will be wood, hay or stubble and when it is judged with fire it may well burn bright and clear but eventually all it will leave behind is ash. Whether we are in either camp, it does not limit God in His ability to work with us as His children, He is a great God, He will always be worshiped as the great I AM and He will never be boxed by man and their intellect or lack of it. In order for God to be glorified in our lives we must decrease; “He must increase, but I must decrease”. (John 3:30)

I was asked a question, “Why are no more books added to the Bible? The answer is simple, God has so willed it as the canon of scripture is complete as the work of the cross in now a finished work, and Christ has risen! I have not over thought it, but simply accepted it in faith and received my direction from God’s Word. Let me not speak on behalf of others as that would not be fair, but I will speak on my own behalf in this regard; when I question scripture to a point of over analysing it, I then am in danger of missing it’s direction. However having said that, we must study His Word: - “Study to shew thyself approved unto God, a workman that needeth not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth.” (2Timothy 2:15) – The correct balance is needed, but we may miss its simplicity when we over think it; I say that with caution as I do not want that to be misinterpreted or misrepresented. Let me use an example to illustrate; back to the snake in the grass, it may well be there but until I am confronted by it I needn’t be concerned by it. Others may say, just in case it is there we need to make sure, and for much of their time away on their bushveld holiday they spent hours looking for it. We may deliberate which of the two attitudes would be advantageous, but I say on the authority of God’s Word it is obvious which would be profitable. Let the Lord Jesus teach us as He is our greatest teacher; we by nature worry about so many things, especially when it comes to the well being of family and self. Please see the underlying principle for life and all that goes with it in this illustration. “Therefore do not be anxious, saying, 'What shall we eat?' or 'What shall we drink?' or 'What shall we wear?' For the Gentiles seek after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them all. But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be added to you. "Therefore do not be anxious about tomorrow, for tomorrow will be anxious for itself. Sufficient for the day is its own trouble.” (Matthew 6:31-34) – How often do we worry about snakes in the grass that never appear, how difficult we make this walk for ourselves when it needn’t be difficult at all. I do not profess to have mastered this application to my life, but that changes me not the truth and the application we should all live by.

You may ask why then do I spend so much time on the warnings of that which is false, i.e. false prophets and teachers, it should be obvious, those snakes have shown themselves and we now must confront the issues at hand.

We must learn to live by faith and believe God and His Word regardless of anything else. Faith feeds our hope, and without hope we would perish. But we have great hope, the greatest of all hopes, Heaven is our destination and the only true God has promised all those that endure to the end that He will be our God and we will be His son’s. If that is not worth dying for then nothing will ever be. Lets us embrace His Word, let us believe it even when we are hard-pressed and life and its struggles squeeze the life out of us, may we remember that our Great Saviour has risen from the dead and He has conquered death, praise His name! Don’t you get excited when you think on these things, I am alone in my study with the sun just breaching the horizon, and as I pen I find myself doing air punches, just as well no one can see me as it would look rather ridiculous. I am forever thankfully to our great God for sending His Glorious Son to die for a wretch like me.

Press on struggling pilgrim, it won’t be long now before we all sing praises to our King in that wonderful Celestial City, even so we cry come quickly Lord Jesus!

Signing off

Tyrone