Walk in the Spirit

Once again I sit at my desk in the early hours of the morning traveling my thoughts under the direction of my morning prayer, which went something like this; hallowed be thy name Father, there is no One like you, praise your glorious name. As I draw close to you, please draw nigh unto me and help me be sensitive to the doors which you may open throughout the day, may I bring you honour within those given situations… I prayed for my son, mother and family and the Christians across the globe that you would help all of them walk in the spirit. What is the point of feeding the flesh with so much time an effort as it will end sooner than we can image? And as James says, we “are a mist that appears for a little time and then vanishes.” Making reference to our lives in the flesh. 

All I long for is to be trained up in righteousness and yet there are obstacles in my path that do not want to move. However, there is most certainly a truth that is becoming very clear to me, “walk in the spirit and we will not fulfil the lusts of our flesh.” Did you know it is impossible for the Spirit of God to sin? The Christian has the Spirit of God living within them. And so the war rages on; a perfect influence that always pleases God and another which continuously looks to serve sin, in fact a slave to it. Both housed in the same vessel. However, Paul's encouragement is to look belong; “You, however, are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if in fact the Spirit of God dwells in you. Anyone who does not have the Spirit of Christ does not belong to him.” (Romans 8:9) - This then is the battle, are we aware of this truth and the way we ort to be. Knowledge is very useful if used correctly. We have the mind of Christ but we still have our carnalities looking to pull us in the opposite direction. 

Let me leave us with this thought, be brave and take courage, for the One we serve, the Lord Jesus Christ has overcome the world. If we call upon Him looking for help, comfort, or just sweet intimate fellowship what happens? - “Draw near to God, and he will draw near to you…” (James 4:8) – Double mindedness will always be like water, unstable in all its ways. Which wears an individual down, it may just be the time to dust down, forgetting the past, time to truly pick up your cross and serve God with your whole heart. To make a conscious effort, making it a priority to please God in our lives above all else.  

Paul gives us this gem to find release and to examine our hearts; “For all who are led by the Spirit of God are sons of God.” (Romans 8; 14)

Now the only obvious question we need ask ourselves, can we truly confess that our lives are a manifestation of being led by the Spirit of God?

Priority number 1 is to do whatever it takes in our lives to ensure that we are numbered amongst the sons of God.

That is all

Signing off

Tyrone

Objectives

Objectives! We all have them, but the key is to attain, to conquer, to win. To overcome is the ultimate goal, wouldn’t you agree? Take the simplest of examples in our everyday lives, pick an experience that belongs to you, a memory we call upon to find motivation, hope, joy and the will to push on. There could be numerous recollections to draw from…

On occasion I am taken to my military training and the lessons I learnt there, not about becoming a soldier per say but the heights I reach on a mental and physical level that I once believed to be impossible, I was wrong. Although we are fallen creatures and tainted by sin God has designed the human body with phenomenal ability. We are capable of so much more than we could ever imagine, it's only when we are put to the test that we really understand this valuable lesson. When the pressure is on we always look for the easy way out. Our default is to tap out far too soon. The Lord Jesus stayed the course, he drank a full cup of every permutation possible to man and even though the anguish at times was so severe that his sweat glands bled blood, he never tapped out. His objective to overcome sin in a human body, he was victorious. His aim, to please his heavenly Father, which he achieved in spades. As Christians surely this then needs to become our overarching objective in life, to please our heavenly Father and the only way to actually achieve this is too, as Paul puts it; “For God is my witness, whom I serve with my spirit in the gospel of his Son.” But why the emphasis on “my spirit”? This is the nitty-gritty of it all, we have to learn the difference between walking in the flesh (our natural ability) as opposed to the spirit. Faith is needed to accomplish this. This is my observation, if we serve in the spirit, if we truly have consciously “put on the mind of Christ” we are in a different zone and we begin to process information differently. The cares of this world are not so monstrous and we find a strength (grace) to endure, come what may. We believe that we are exactly where God wants us to be. We must fly this flag with confidence; our God is in control of all things. However when the flesh dominates our mind-set is one of panic when the pressure us on.

I do not professed to have mastered it, far from it, but I am able to call on memories when I was happiest and a peace surpassed all rational understanding. Why?  My conclusion, I was walking in the spirit. The man Jesus always walked in the spirit although he was a man with a blood and bone body who accomplished so much. Why? He saw way beyond the grave. It would be almost impossible for a man to forgive someone killing them when it is actually happening. Stephen did it! A man filled with the Spirit of God and dressed with the whole armour of God. I am convinced this is the lesson. Our flesh will suffer when we are walking in the spirit, it has to give way for a better approach and it’s the only way we will ever truly please our heavenly Father. 

If you are still not convince, the Lord is our ultimate example. Peter understood this well and this is his instruction;  “Since therefore Christ suffered in the flesh, arm yourselves with the same way of thinking, for whoever has suffered in the flesh has ceased from sin, so as to live for the rest of the time in the flesh no longer for human passions but for the will of God.” (1Peter 4:1-2) – All three points tied up in the same verse, arming our mind with Christ’s mind, the flesh suffering to stop its wicked behaviour and finally to be about the will of God.

The clear water behind this instruction can become muddy if stirred incorrectly. There are two sets of rules, or at least that is what I wish to explore when it comes to application from the instinct of an individual prior to salvation and after the switch is flip. I do not wish to spend time debating the actualities of this truth, salvation, when does it happen? But the realisation of our own understanding when our lives are turned on their heads for the first time, when people look at you as if you are mad, etc. That beautiful day when tears of joy flooded your soul and you cried out I can see, I can see. And then we begin to grow, as time ticks by we begin to become weary, there are many questions that need answering, not that salvation and the truth behind it is every question, NEVER! But in hindsight, muddling the flesh and the spirit into one pot becomes a world of pain. I know and yet I really knew very little, if I was wiser, folly would not have encapsulated so much of my life. However He who is in us is greater that he who runs the world and thankfully we are transported to our senses. God continue to have mercy on the struggling pilgrim’s souls, not because we deserve it but because you have it in your power to be merciful.

What is the conclusion? Our objective; we must learn to walk in the spirit, put on the mind of Christ, dress for battle, putting on the whole armour of God (see Ephesians 6). When these application are in place, we will be walking in the spirit and therefore never be tripped up by the lusts of our flesh. So it’s easy to gauge; lustful behaviour of any sort and acting upon it proves but one thing that we have the flesh dominating, we are walking in the natural, our behaviour is that of the individual prior to salvation. The old man/woman dictating. When we walk in the spirit, with God’s Spirit directing our paths we radiate a Shekinah glory and through the trial of life the light of Christ shines in us, which will obviously affect the onlookers for the sake of the gospel. Either way people will be affected. I suppose the actual proof for me would be a tranquillity, the peace of God. It’s when baffled onlookers see the apparent hardships that accompany that peace. This is where God is glorified, the peace of God in a believer’s life is impossible to fabricate, because it comes from the Spirit and not the natural.

Understanding the theory is one thing, but application to it is the actual test. God give us the strength to put off childish things and to dress for battle. How can we be of any use to others if we cannot master our own lives?

Signing off

Tyrone

Origins of God

What is the most pressing question we are all after? Peel back the layers of our existence and the questions we always seem to be searching for, even if we are unaware of it at the time becomes very obvious. The Oracles of God is the answer. We want to know what lies beyond the grave. And until we come face to face with our own realities we will be duped into believing so many lies. The biggest one of them all is just so long as I believe something to be right and I apply faith to it all will be well, wrong!

The truth is we need to get on God’s bus if we are to understand the essence of life, any other form of transport will lead us down the same road but with a different emphasis place upon our drive, trickery to keep us from the knowledge of the truth is the enemy’s main objective. The final stop for all is death and then the judgement, period! We must find favour from the One with the power to execute our eternal sentences. With so many voices out there who’s to know which opinion is right? Well I suppose this is where the mercy of God burns ever so bright and without His light illuminating a person’s understanding, finding true peace would become impossible. It’s the goodness of God that leads a man unto repentance, period! He gives us the knowledge to understand our sin and then He points us in a direction of repentance. Without His intervention in our lives repentance would become an impossible task.

When history is studied it enlightens our understanding, it broadens our knowledge on any given subject, and this is why God gives us the Bible to understand His origin and how we all fit into His plan. A factual record endorsed by God Himself. Yes, indeed written by men, but guided by the hand of God. Now anyone worth their salt when it comes to studying or trying to disprove the bible as fact, ends up pleasantly surprised and realise that their quest was somewhat futile. There are even those who have been saved by God undertaking such a process. Lee Strobel was an atheist journalist with a machete to grind. He needed to disprove that his wife was wrong and therefore his personal quest was to disprove the existence of God. He failed! He became a devout believer in the finished work of Calvary, so much so that he vigilantly defends the gospel of truth. He did a complete 180 degree turn. What would have such an effect on this type of man? The mercy of God and understanding the origins of God. Sadly too many are driven by the here and now, having no clue that this life in fact is the test for our eternities. We all only get one crack of finding true repentance and calling upon the name of Jesus Christ the Lord to be saved from the looming destruction that will eventually arrive.  

Understanding the oracles of God is mankind’s number one priority. Get this wrong and doom and destruction awaits your eternal devastation. I am really not concerned about people’s opinions if it drives me from God’s truth. There is far too much at stake to entertain fools on this subject. This then is my motto; “Let God be true though everyone were a liar”. The question we all need to ask ourselves, do we look to please men or God? You choose… I have made up my mind. “Let God be true though everyone were a liar”. What now becomes the difficult process is walking in the Spirit and putting on the mind of Christ. Not that it is difficult to walk in the Spirit, there are storerooms of grace available to the Christian, but the war rages on and the battle is fierce. Be that as it may so long as God gives me breathe and as useless as my life may seem to some I will by the grace of God press toward that high call. Christianity is not for the faint hearted and let us remember that the armour of God is available to each and every believer.

Signing off

Tyrone

Discernment

(1 Corinthians 2:14) “The natural person does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are folly to him, and he is not able to understand them because they are spiritually discerned.” 

It’s a new day, a new year and the call of God remains the same for all, repent and be saved. Why does the call repentance elude so many? To most it is foolish behaviour and the truth of Spiritual things elude them. Simple put they cannot understand what they cannot see. But for the Christian we see and understand through the eyes of faith, which is a gift of God and we are never to forget that. Be patient with family and friends but never buckle on the message of repentance. Pre adventure God may just give them sight.

Although the voices out there are doing their best to try and accommodate tolerance as the Christian thing to do, which it is, so long as acceptance does not become a reason to excuse our sin? The expression behind the wave is driving mankind into a lull of false security, with a flag hoisted high, which clearly reads “acceptance for all”. However the small print is overlooked by so many. How many of you actually read the terms and conditions of any given contract from start to finish? But even if your intention was to uncover any trickery it would be impossible, as the ink use here is invisible, unseen to the naked eye and foolishness to believe we are being duped. The singlehanded way to uncover the trickery, is to put on the “mind of Christ”. The only way to have access to the “mind of Christ” is to cry out to Jesus Christ the Lord and ask Him to save you from the looming destruction that is just over the horizon.

Once you are forgiven and that spiritual miracle takes place, you are then given spiritual eyes, all this simple means is that the unknown which was once in the dark is now quicken and the mind is able to make sense of certain unseen truths. It is a phenomenal gift from God. And as in any walk of life, there will always be someone in our path to make life difficult. Nevertheless take joy in this truth, as Christians we have more for us than against us. God will always be victorious. Ask yourself this question, will God have the final say? Which is an obvious conclusion, why do so many shirk His call to repentance, outside of it appearing foolish? Although it would be impossible to separate deception and foolishness as they are interlinked. Stay here a while, mull it over, explore the depths of it all and you will arrive at my conclusion, trickery rules the way. However deception with a feel good persona energizing it all, quite brilliant in fact. But then again did you know that Satan was created by God full of wisdom? Mankind is no match for him, but Jesus defeated Him on Calvary, that is why we need the “mind of Christ”. I trust I have made sense and you are able to understand the urgency of it all. We must make a conscious decision in the mornings to put given time aside and to do whatever it takes to find the grace of God to put on the “mind of Christ”. Just one day at a time. This is what we have been called to do. Without time spent in the Word of God sitting at the feet of Jesus, we begin to wither away, no differently to people marooned on a desert island trying to live off the bare provisions of the land; we have all see those TV episodes and in just a short time people lose astronomical amounts of weight. Christian discipline is crucial for our growth in the Spirit.

As Christian we will fall and fail, one the reasons for this is to remind us that we have been saved by grace, which is a gift of God and without failure in our lives we would certainly become puffed up with pride. However this will never excuse our sin as acceptable, forgiveness we will find, when we fall to our knees seeking out God’s mercy. We have been called to a life of holiness, wow! How far I have yet to travel. While we have breath we have hope, and each morning as we wake let us make it our priority to “put on the mind of Christ”. Christians all have the mind of Christ; “For who has understood the mind of the Lord so as to instruct him?” But we have the mind of Christ.” (1 Corinthians 2:16) – It needs to be triggered, switched on if you like, and activated by prayer and the Word of God. And what better time to do this with the rising of the sun, not the end of the day, we don’t write an exam and then study for it afterwards.

Signing off

Tyrone 

             

Survival, the art of war or outwitting the nemesis we come against is surely what life is about.

The devil's schemes

(Ephesians 6:11) “Put on the whole armor of God, that you may be able to stand against the schemes of the devil.”

It is good for us to realign our perspectives with God’s Word, it nourishes the soul and redirects our steps after they begin to wander down carnality’s path. God’s Word pushes us towards the dam of faith, which in turn feeds the trees of hope, nourishing our souls.

The devil has his schemes; simple put, to trip up the Christian and bring a berating accusation against our God. The war in the heavenlies is fierce and we are the pawns that fuel the fire. We are not privy to the sight of it all and yet we know it is as real as the rising of the sun, for the Word of God has declared it to His children. We know it to be true, but often forget the pressing issues at hand; when we are caught up by our own selfish wants. I do not make reference to material gain, although that has its part to play. However sinful natures crave satisfaction no differently to a heroin addict needing their fix. This is the devils playground and how often do we play into his hands? This is why it is imperative to dress for battle, we must put on the whole armour of God. Without it we have no hope, zero chance of surviving the onslaught. 

There is an unseen war happening and the sooner we make this truth a priory in our lives the sooner we will be able to deal with the froth of it all, but until then we will keep looking for our fix and always looking for justification for our actions. A reason why we are behaving like an unbeliever, it is seldom our fault, really! We always have our part to play in any given circumstance. We have the greatest example to mirror our actions off, Jesus Christ our glorious Saviour. Was he ever at fault? And yet he was crucified, silencing principalities and powers and glorifying his heavenly Father. That is the example of what it takes to defeat the enemy. 

If we find ourselves not willing to forgive others, then we have not put on the belt of truth, that part of God’s armour that helps us recognise our sin and all the areas that still need active repentance.

In conclusion; it’s the will of God, for us to live holy lives and the devil’s purpose to get us to fail. That is the nuts and bolts of the equation. Our behaviour will determine where we are at any given time. Our example depicts our understanding and growth in Christ. It’s only when we understand our lives and what is needed from us that we find productivity in them. The fruits of the spirit is what we are after, not fleshly recognition. We look to please our God, period! We need much grace for this to happen, but happen it must.   

New Year’s Eve is happening shortly, we are the salt of the earth and we are being watched, let us remember to put on the whole armour of God. Our example may just play its part and lead someone in repentance to call upon the name of the Lord. And so let me leave you with this though; “For “everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.”” (Romans 10:13)

Eternity hangs in the balance…

Signing off

Tyrone

The belt of truth

(Job 27:4) “My lips will not speak falsehood, and my tongue will not utter deceit.”

My goodness, considering Job pronouncing these words when his life was falling apart around him leaves me dumbstruck, I am almost unable to process the truth behind it all, wow! How a man could uphold such integrity when the pressure was on is beautiful. His mind consisted of exactly the same matter we all have, flawed matter driven by its fallen nature, sin. This is the Apostle Paul's conclusion; “Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, I myself serve the law of God with my mind, but with my flesh I serve the law of sin.” (Romans 7:25)

How often do you find yourself in a pickle and before you have time to blink falsehood becomes part of who you are, a little lie to easy the situation. Some may even be thinking, “I do not lie” and then we are taken deeper, God shines His glory into our lives and we soon see ourselves for who we are. As soon as we are put on the spot and even the smallest of lies will make life easier for us, what happens? This is why we have been instructed to “put on the mind of Christ”. We need to dress for battle, the war is fierce and if you are not privy to that truth then you must be still wearing nappies. To be a babe in Christ is a beautiful thing, to have God the Father in our corner is a phenomenal privilege. But when a person has been saved for many years and still wears diapers, well not such a pretty display. But when that nappy is replaced with “the belt of truth” what a glorious spectacle. How that must please our God and Father.

Satan had challenge God about Job and how he would get him to buckle. When the pressure was on, this was Job’s retort; “My lips will not speak falsehood, and my tongue will not utter deceit.” His example silencing the enemy but above all things, bringing glory to God.

“For everyone who lives on milk is unskilled in the word of righteousness, since he is a child. But solid food is for the mature, for those who have their powers of discernment trained by constant practice to distinguish good from evil.” (Hebrews 5:13-14) 

May we all arrive at the resolve of Job and learn to distinguish “good from evil”, as there is no such thing as a white lie finding a pass from God.

When we move on from here and we bomb the test, if we are caught off guard, which is as real as the rising of the sun, let us be quick to acknowledge our fault and confess our sin, this is where the scale of our growth can be managed. Our understanding must be tested, it is the trail of our faith, it will be put to the test and I thank God for this truth in my life, to be like Jesus is all I am after, praise His name and thank you my King for your example. The road in long but the end is near and eventually we will take our last step, look up and we will be there; God the Father, heaven and all its glory, Amen! And what a day that will be.

Signing off

Tyrone

Comprehension

(Matthew 7:11) “If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father who is in heaven give good things to those who ask him!”

How often I have heard believes pray, why is this happening? Or please make this horrible situation go away. When we become desperate in our prayer we are often in danger of losing sight on God’s will and our wants take priority. We lose perspective, but before we can pray with the right motivation we need to understand how we should pray. Our foundation to prayer must spring from our new life in the spirit. We once were dead in our trespass and sin but now have been quicken and made alive in and through the finished work of Calvary. The Lord Jesus Christ is our illustration; to find a solution in a maths equation an example is normally used by the teacher to educate a scholar on how to find the result. When the student understands the theory they can then apply the formulation to the problem and will end up with the correct answer. The theory commands attention and must be plainly understood; now for all those who have received the spirit of adoption whereby we are able to cry “Abba Father” must learn God’s formula for our prayer life.

I appeal to all of us who love to fall on our knees and pray to God our Father; how He loves to hear the prayers of the saints, in fact their prayers all being stored in heaven to be used upon the golden altar. They are deeply treasured; “And another angel came and stood at the altar, having a golden censer; and there was given unto him much incense, that he should offer it with the prayers of all saints upon the golden altar which was before the throne. And the smoke of the incense, which came with the prayers of the saints, ascended up before God out of the angel's hand.” (Revelation 8:3-4) - When we get to heaven and the angel offers up the prayers of the saints on the golden altar you may even hear your voice reverberate to the glory of God. What an overwhelming thought! Bless the name of Jesus Christ my Lord and Saviour, how precious He is to me.

We fall into a dangerous trap when we begin to misuse this privilege that God has afforded us. I think the apostle James gives us the best teaching on the misuse of prayer and explains why we find life frustrating at times. He tells us that we often pray expecting a favourable answer but our requests elude us. I have often heard people explain it away like this, “in God’s time”, but if our prayer is outside the will of God, it will never be answered to our liking, how could it ever be? The deceiver may have permission to lure us by the deceitfulness of sin and we may even think our prayers have been approved by God, when in fact they could never have been as they are outside His will, that request was never penned by the quill that God held in his hand before time began. It was never scripted. Receiving a grant at the obvious expense of others it is flawed prayer; foundationally we must build correctly to end defined. Let’s look at how James puts it; "... you covet and cannot obtain, so you fight and quarrel. You do not have, because you do not ask. You ask and do not receive, because you ask wrongly, to spend it on your passions. You adulterous people! Do you not know that friendship with the world is enmity with God? Therefore whoever wishes to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God. Or do you suppose it is to no purpose that the Scripture says, "He yearns jealously over the spirit that he has made to dwell in us"? (James 4:2-5)

We must understand and grasp that our existence as believers is to find God’s will for our lives. So when we look at the Lord Jesus’ paradigm we see the attitude “of not my will but thine be done”. We will always be tempted to pray and ask amiss until we understand the importance of God’s will in our lives. Why must it be this way? God is sovereign and therefore is in control of all things, yes choice is afforded us as we can align ourselves with His will or we can be driven by our own wants. However it is only His will and purposed that will carry with it a true blessing with honour.

Let’s use history to tell us the same story; the destruction of God’s creation; “So the LORD said, "I will blot out man whom I have created from the face of the land, man and animals and creeping things and birds of the heavens, for I am sorry that I have made them." (Genesis 6:7) We see that God had determined that the time to judge the world had arrive and He was about to destroy it and all who lived in it with a flood. What if Noah pleaded with God to change His mind and he prayed day in and day out that God would repent. It would have been a futile prayer and obviously outside the will of God. God has already made up His mind. Some may say but Moses got God to change His mind, my retort would be when where you summoned to sit with God in the flesh for forty days? Although destruction loomed, Noah found grace in the eyes of the Lord and he followed God’s instruction to the tee and built an ark. He settled his understanding, I am not sure what that entailed, we can ask him when we see him in heaven, but he got on with the task at hand. His prayers must have revolved around building the boat, how to gather the animals, and what provisions to take along. All these prayers hinged around the outworking of God’s will and not his selfish wants. In like manner when we pray in accordance with God’s will, how will our prayers be answered? Does a father give his son a gift that he knows will cause damage? Therefore we must put others before ourselves and pray with earnestness to find grace in time of need to apply ourselves to His will for our lives and if that is our persuasion, will we not find grace to walk in the spirit in accordance to His will. We have God in our corner, Amen! He will never be against His children, nevertheless we must learn to find His will in our lives. I understand that this is a process and will happen over time but we must shoot for victory. Our aim must be to glorify our God and Father with our lives. Let us store this glorious quote into the forefront of our minds; “How much more will your Father who is in heaven give good things to those who ask him!”

Signing off

Tyrone

The grace of God

The inconsistencies of mankind verses the perfection of God. A topic well worth understanding as it will free the mind from some of their strongholds. There needs to be a breaking down in the formation of the building blocks that sin has cemented to our thought patterns. The book of Romans is of great assistance when unpacking this subject.

Let’s do some self-reflecting; how often do you find yourself saying I will do this or that but wane due to some interference? It may or may not be a valid reason why you cannot kick the ball  in the garden with your son, but to him all you have done is broken your word; the times I have said something and for one or other reason gone back on my word, actually disgusts me. And yet sin has taken care of that attribute in our lives, it is who we are! Here are some verses to back this up; “For I know that nothing good dwells in me, that is, in my flesh. For I have the desire to do what is right, but not the ability to carry it out. For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I keep on doing. Now if I do what I do not want, it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells within me.” (Romans 7:18-20) – Now some astute scholars would suggest that Paul is making reference to us prior to salvation, which I cannot accept, why? Test it against your own life after salvation; have you never again failed in that area? If you can which honestly say “I haven’t”, then by all means take the teaching of those verses and appropriately apply it to an unsaved person. If not and you have been found wanting as I have, then we must in my opinion conclude that this reality is still relevant to us after salvation. However with that said we must not isolate our understanding as we are instructed to put on the mind of Christ, so although this war is real we have the tools now to put the flesh under. Does the Spirit of God ever fail? Obviously not! Christians now have God's Spirit living in us. So what then is my conclusion; walk in the Spirit and we will not fall in the flesh.

What has change after our born again experience is that we have all been given the mind of Christ; “The natural person does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are folly to him, and he is not able to understand them because they are spiritually discerned. The spiritual person judges all things, but is himself to be judged by no one. "For who has understood the mind of the Lord so as to instruct him?" But we have the mind of Christ.” (1Corinthians 2:14-16) - We can now understand spiritual truths, and our thoughts deepen as we grow in Him, nevertheless to some degree at salvation we must understand who God is and what He has done for us in and through His Son the Lord Jesus Christ. He has forgiven us of our sin, which required punishment but because of God’s mercy and grace we have escaped that punishment and all because the full price for our sin was paid for by Jesus Christ! The love of God! This is a miracle and can only ever be spiritually perceived. Through this God given wonder we are now sanctified by the blood of the lamb and flawlessly acceptable in God’s eyes. We have been reconciled to Him because of His perfect grace. In His perfection He was able to free His enemies and make them allies, He achieved this through love, not malice and we (born again believers) are now sons of God! God has made a way! Praise His glorious name now and forever more, Amen and Amen!

Nevertheless the war of right versus wrong continues to bombard our minds and we need to fight for daily sanctification. And the only way we will ever get through our struggles correctly, is to find grace. Some may have learnt to somehow keep sin at bay in certain areas of their lives, though some restraint or program but if it is outside of the provision of the grace of God is will only ever leave a person boastful. Here are two beautiful verses that gives us absolute clarity; “For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast.” (Ephesians 2:8-9) – The danger we face as carnal people is we like to work under the cloak of independence. We get saved and now we believe there is a certain path we should follow, which there is! However the mistake the church at Galatia made was the same mistake so many of us make, which is this; “I am astonished that you are so quickly deserting him who called you in the grace of Christ and are turning to a different gospel-- not that there is another one, but there are some who trouble you and want to distort the gospel of Christ.” (Galatians 1:6-7) – We get save in the spirit and then we look to earn our salvation though the feats of our flesh. This is a common mistake amongst believers and we need to trim our sails regularly so that we do not lose our way. This is why I love the WORD OF GOD so much as it always sets us straight when we unpack it correctly.

This is where the beauty of God is most evident. In His perfection, which is complete, it’s not as if God acquired grace to give out, He is grace, He never developed it but He is perfect in grace. The human race all fall under the provision of God’s grace. Believer or not, common grace is appreciated by all, the air we breathe, the rising and the setting of the sun, the list is endless. However saving grace is a very special portion of God’s grace that the select receive. Who are these people? Again is not difficult to arrive at an accurate conclusion; those whose names are penned in the “book of life”. And the only way to be amongst that number is in and through the Lord Jesus Christ, period! It is not a complicated message;  "For “everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.”" (Romans 10:13)  

It is obvious that we (mankind) are sinners. Has anyone lived a life with breaking one of God's commandments? Obviously not! God is grace and within His eternal script He is working that out perfectly; with no blemish, His perfect plan unfolds even though some curse God as they worship His creation, not acknowledging Him as the creator. God does not flinch for a second but continues in perfection to offer grace to His enemies. Wow! How big is our God! What is our natural tendency when we are attacked? To retaliate. Our characters are worlds apart.

Do you see how futile it is for us to boast about anything we achieve in Him? We are sinners saved by grace, imperfect, tainted by sin and yet God sees us as righteous in Christ. Only God’s perfect grace has accomplished this and obviously the perfect love of God completes Him to be merciful, Wow! As soon as we look to take some sort of recognition for our own feats we forget about the perfect grace of God. This is why we are so aptly taught that God resists the proud but gives grace to the humble! “Humble yourselves, therefore, under the mighty hand of God so that at the proper time he may exalt you, casting all your anxieties on him, because he cares for you.” (1Peter 5:6-7) - His perfect grace becomes our reality when we learn to trust Him in every area of our lives. Sure we will experience grace in the areas we yield to God, but what about all the secret hidden pockets in our lives? May God help us to trust Him even more as we see that day approaching. I suppose when we understand that we cannot help God with this process, bar laying our lives at His feet, total surrender is what is required and that we will have to work out through testing, which in itself is a process, we must learn to put on the mind of Christ.  

Today is Christmas and if you are persuaded that we must celebrate today as the day of Christ’s birth, I plead with you do not then share it with other idols like Santa and the like, make sure your message is clear and concise, used today to propagate the gospel as you side-line the straw men that have been designed to take peoples eyes off God’s grace!

Signing off

Tyrone