Your Words Set The Course For Your Life

"For we all stumble in many things. If anyone does not stumble in word, he is a perfect man, able also to bridle the whole body. Indeed, we put bits in horses' mouths that they may obey us, and we turn their whole body. Look also at ships: although they are so large and are driven by fierce winds, they are turned by a very small rudder wherever the pilot desires. Even so the tongue is a little member and boasts great things. See how great a forest a little fire kindles!"
James 3:2-5 (NKJV)

The words we use are far more important than most people have realized.  Some people have gotten the wrong idea about the value of our words, in part because of some extreme, unbiblical teaching in this area.  However, a study of what the Bible teaches about words will show the significance of the words we use in our everyday life.  The words we speak every day will set the course for our life.  The direction our life is headed today is based on the words we have spoken in the past.

In James 3:2-5 we have a couple of good examples of how our words work.  First, James gives the example of a bit in the horses' mouth, that little thing can direct a huge animal and guide it to where it needs to go.  Next, James talks about the rudder on a ship and how the pilot can set the direction the ship will go with a just very small part of the ship.  Then James says that in the same way the tongue is small but it can do big things.  If we want to set our course in life, if we want to turn some things around in our life, it is going to happen through our words.

So what should we be saying, what should we talk about?  What we need to do is find out what the Bible has to say and talk about that.  It is not as though our words have some magic power to them, but when our words are in agreement with God's Word we are allowing God an open door to move in our life.  If our words are contrary to God's Word we restrict His operation in our life.  Our words will set the course for our life; make sure you choose your words wisely and say the things that God has to say in His Word about every area of your life.

Living A Life Of True Contentment

"Not that I speak in regard to need, for I have learned in whatever state I am, to be content."
Philippians 4:11 (NKJV)

Paul was a normal human being who, even though he was called and gifted by God, faced life's difficulties just like the rest of us.  Paul told the Philippians that he had learned how to be content, no matter what was happening.  Paul was specifically talking about financial support, but I believe this can apply to every area of our life.  Paul was able to do the things God had called him to do because He had learned how to live a life independent of his feelings and circumstances, this is something we need to do too if we want to be successful in life.

So many people live a life of discontent, they are not satisfied with their life.  The key to living a stable, happy life is found in the definition of the Greek word Paul used in Philippians 4:11 for "contentment".  In the Greek language this word carries the meaning of being "independent of circumstances".  This is what living a life of true contentment, a satisfied, happy life is all about.  If we are dependent on some person or thing making us happy we will never be satisfied.  If we put our focus on God and His Word we can live a life of stability and victory.

Deuteronomy 28:67 talks about people who because of their fear and the things happening around them would say in the morning, "I wish it was evening" and in the evening, "I wish it was morning", this is a picture of dissatisfaction, discontent.  If we are thinking, "I wish this was happening", or "If that person would just act a certain way", or "If only this thing was different" we have our focus in the wrong place.  People, circumstances, and our feelings will change but God and His Word do not change; this is where our focus has to be, that is what we must build our life on.  This is how we can live a life of true contentment and satisfaction!

Stand, Stand, And Keep On Standing

"Put on the whole armor of God, that you may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil. Therefore take up the whole armor of God, that you may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all, to stand. Stand therefore ..."
Ephesians 6:11, 13, 14a (NKJV)

Sometimes if we are not careful we read over things in the Bible and we miss the significance of what is being said.  A good example of this is in Ephesians 6:11-14 where Paul begins talking about the armor of God.  In these verses Paul uses the word "stand" three times and the word "withstand" once, I think this is very important.  We might focus on the armor and the different pieces, or we may think about how we have an enemy who will attack us, but I believe it is extremely vital for us to realize that Paul mentioned standing, in some way, four times.

Paul said to take up, to put on, the whole armor of God and stand.  Paul did not say to put on the armor and hide or put on the armor and run away, Paul said we must stand.  Christians need to recognize that we have an enemy, we need to put on the whole armor of God, know who we are in Christ and understand the authority we have in Christ.  But, once we take our stand in faith and resist the devil, we stand, stand, and keep on standing!  We need to know how to stand so we can keep on standing no matter what.

The Bible tells us that we stand by grace (Romans 5:2; 1 Peter 5:12), we stand by faith (Romans 11:20; 1 Corinthians 16:13), and that we need to stand firm in the Lord (Philippians 4:1; 1 Thessalonians 3:8).  When we put all of this together we get a complete picture of what it means to stand: we stand by the grace of God (His ability working in us), by faith (on His Word), and in the Lord (who we are in Christ and not who we are in ourselves).  No matter what situation you may find yourself in, take a stand in faith and allow the grace of God to empower you to remain in your place in Christ.  Then, keep on standing triumphantly in Christ and you will win!

Do You Know That The Holy Spirit Lives In You?

"Do you not know that you are the temple of God and that the Spirit of God dwells in you?" 
"Or do you not know that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God, and you are not your own?"
1 Corinthians 3:16; 6:19 (NKJV)

One of the greatest differences between the Old Testament and the New Testament has to do with the Holy Spirit.  In the Old Testament the Holy Spirit would come on people to empower them to do the work that God had called those people to do.  The problem was that the Holy Spirit was not available to everyone.  However, today as New Testament believers in Jesus Christ, as Christians, we have the Holy Spirit in us!  This is such a wonderful truth but it seems that a lot of Christians don't even know about it

In his first letter to the Corinthians Paul asked them the same question twice, "Don't you know that the Holy Spirit is in you"?  These people were Christians so they already had the Holy Spirit in them.  Salvation is a work of the Holy Spirit on the spirit of man (Titus 3:4-6) where someone becomes a new creation in Christ (2 Corinthians 5:17).  Paul said in Romans 8:9 if you don't have the Spirit of God then you are not even in relationship with God.  Once we become a Christian we have the Greater One, the Holy Spirit in us (1 John 4:4) and His job is to help us, teach us, and guide us (John 14:26, Romans 8:14).

The problem many Christians have today is what Paul was talking to the Corinthians about; do we recognize that the Holy Spirit is in us?  Do we have our attention on circumstances, our feelings, other people's opinions or do we focus on the Helper we have living inside of us?  If we put our attention on the Holy Spirit in us, if we allow Him to direct us and help us, then He will lead us into triumph (2 Corinthians 2:14), He will give us the strength we need (Ephesians 3:16), and He will guide us into the truth (John 16:13).  Thank God for the Holy Spirit, let's allow Him to help us do what God has called us to do!

How Do You React To The Truth?

"Now when they heard this, there were cut to the heart, and said to Peter and the rest of the apostles, "Men and brethren, what shall we do?"."
"When they heard these things they were cut to the heart, and they gnashed at him with their teeth. Then they cried out with a loud voice, stopped their ears, and ran at him with one accord;"
Acts 2:37; 7:54, 57 (NKJV)

The Book of Acts shows us two incidents where people heard the truth and then reacted to it.  The first story is from Acts 2 and it took place on the Day of Pentecost when Peter spoke to the multitude.  As Peter preached a message to the people it tells us that those people were "cut to the heart" by what they heard.  The multitude reacted by asking what they should do; they heard the truth and they willingly received it.  There is another story similar to this in Acts 7 where there was a much different reaction to the truth.

In Acts 7 Stephen is speaking to a group of people, these people also had a reaction when they too were "cut to the heart" by what they heard.  The thing is that this group of people in Acts 7 didn't ask about what they needed to do to change, they got mad about the truth they heard and they attacked and killed Stephen!   The group of people in Acts 7 who heard the truth rejected it and were upset with the messenger.  In both cases people heard the truth from God's Word and they had a reaction; there is something we can learn from these stories.

How do we react when we hear the truth from God's Word, how do we respond when we hear a message that "cuts us to the heart"?  Are we willing to humble ourselves, receive the truth, and make an adjustment or do we get upset with the person we heard the truth from or make some excuse why the truth we have learned somehow does not apply to us?  When we hear the truth we need to accept it and then act on it.  If we do this we will develop and grow up spiritually, if we don't do this we will stay in a state of spiritually immaturity.  My choice is to be a doer of the truth that I learn and not just a hearer, how about you?

Faith And Patience Get The Promise

"And we desire that each one of you show the same diligence to the full assurance of hope until the end, that you do not become sluggish, but imitate those who through faith and patience inherit the promises."
Hebrews 6:11, 12 (NKJV)

The Bible is filled with stories about people.  Some Bible stories are very uplifting and inspiring while others are given to us as warnings to help us avoid doing things the way other people did them and getting ourselves into trouble.  Romans 15:4 tells us that the things that were written before, in the Old Testament, were written for our learning.  In Hebrews 6 we get some specific instruction about the kind of people we need to pay attention to and imitate, the people who through faith and patience inherit the promises.

In our world today so much takes place very quickly, this is nice but it can be a problem when this expectation is placed on spiritual things.  We can get into trouble if we expect God to do something instantly every time, all the time.  In Hebrews 6 we are told that both faith and patience are involved in receiving from God.  In Hebrews 10:36 we are told that we need patience so that after we have done the will of God we can receive the promise.  Too many Christians expect instant results when they exercise their faith and then when something does not happen immediately they get discouraged and they usually give up.

Two of the greatest enemies Christians have to their faith are the clock and the calendar.  Our problem comes when we expect results in a specific period of time.  While God can do things instantaneously some things will take time; a good example of this is if we are exercising our faith for financial provision.  God is not going to drop a bag of money out of the sky to meet our needs, we will have to exercise faith and patience so that after we have done our part in the will of God we will obtain the promise.  Whatever it is you need from God, find Bible verses that deal with that situation, take a stand in faith and exercise patience; when you do this you will receive the promise!

Confidence And Success In Prayer

"Now this is the confidence that we have in Him, that if we ask anything according to His will, He hears us. And if we know that He hears us, whatever we ask, we know that we have the petitions that we have asked of Him."
1 John 5:14, 15 (NKJV)

If you asked Christians what prayer is and how to be successful in prayer you would probably get a lot of different answers.  Some people think success in prayer is based on the amount of people that pray about a certain thing.  Other people think that the length of time that you pray is vital while others would even say that the volume that you pray at is important.  For some people prayer is nothing more than a wish or a hope that whatever it is they are praying about will work the way they want it to.  But prayer is simply us talking to God and not some spiritual form of begging or a necessary ritual we have to perform to satisfy some religious requirement.

If we really want to know how to pray and what God says about prayer we need to look into God's Word, the Bible.  1 John 5:14, 15 are key verses for prayer that help us to understand that we can have confidence and success in prayer.  For us to have successful prayers, our prayers have to be based on God's will, which we find in God's Word. If our prayers are based on God's Word then we can be confident that God not only hears us but that we are going to receive the things that we have asked God for; when we pray we must base our prayer on what God has already said in His Word.

Over the years that I have been involved in ministry and working with people I have found that prayer is an area of a lot of confusion. Many Christians seem to have no confidence in their own prayers and they think if they get some minister to pray for them they will have more success than if they pray for themselves.  Prayer is not something that we should dread due to uncertainty in the outcome but prayer is a wonderful opportunity for us to talk with our Heavenly Father.  By using God's Word as our foundation for our prayers we can be confident and have success in our prayer life, that is how God wants it to be!

What Are Your Words Doing?

"Let no corrupt word proceed out of your mouth, but what is good for necessary edification, that it may impart grace to the hearers."
Ephesians 4:29 (NKJV)

Over and over again in the Bible we see the importance of our words.  For example, if you read through the book of Proverbs you will see many verses that talk about the value of the right kinds of words and what our words can do for us and for others. In Ephesians 4 it tells us that we should not let any corrupt, literally "rotten", words come out of our mouth.  We are also told that we need to speak words that will edify and impart grace to those who hear us.  This is more than just a nice thought, it is a key to our success in life.

What do our words do for other people?  Are we speaking the kinds of words that build people up and encourage them or are we speaking rotten, corrupt words that only tear people down?  When people come to us with a problem, a question, or they are just spending time with us at work or as a friend, do our words inspire them on to victory and success or do our words wear those people down and discourage them?  Christians should be the kind of people who always have something uplifting to say, Christians should not be the kind of people who find ways to criticize others or say things that are hurtful.

What do our words do for us?  There will be times when we have to go it alone without much if any support from others and we need to know how to speak edifying words to ourselves, sometimes we have to be our own best cheerleader.  It is so important for our own life and the lives of those around us to be the kind of people who can always bring a timely word of encouragement.  Find out what the Bible says so that no matter what situation arises you will always have something good to say.  Let's all make the decision that we will be encouraging, uplifting people that say the right things at the right time to build up ourselves and others.

How Much Of Something Bad Is Too Much?

"Be diligent to present yourself approved to God, a worker who does not need to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth. But shun profane and idle babblings, for they will increase to more ungodliness. And their message will spread like cancer. Hymenaeus and Philetus are of this sort, who have strayed concerning the truth, saying that the resurrection is already past; and they overthrow the faith of some."
2 Timothy 2:15-18 (NKJV)

If you were cooking some food, how much poison would you add to the ingredients?  The obvious answer is none, it is a foolish question.  How about sickness, would it be OK to have a little bit of cancer or some other terminal disease?  What about poverty?  Is it a good idea to not be able to pay your bills and have some poverty?  Again, the answer is that no one would want even a little of these bad things.  But when it comes to spiritual things, the teaching we listen to, and the people we allow to influence us, do we sometimes allow just a little bit of wrong teaching because it is a well known speaker or it is a popular doctrine?

Paul told Timothy to be diligent and know how to correctly interpret God's Word.  Paul also told Timothy to "shun" the wrong kind of teaching because it will lead to more ungodliness and spread like cancer.  Many people are stricter about their natural diet than their spiritual diet and then they wonder why their faith is weak, they don't know what to do, and their life is generally in a mess.  If we want to be strong stable Christians we need to be as diligent about our spiritual food as we are about the other important areas of our life.

In our information age with multiple channels on television, the Internet and an abundance of books, CDs, and DVDs it is easy to get access to people teaching something about the Bible.  But we have to be careful to see if what we hear is really in agreement with what the Bible actually says or we could end up having our faith in God overthrown as Paul mentions in 2 Timothy 2:18.  Be sure that what you are hearing is really based on God's Word so that you will not only be approved by God for yourself but you will also be a light to those around you.

Trust God To Guide Your Steps

"A man's steps are of the Lord; How then can a man understand his own way?"
Proverbs 20:24 (NKJV)

No one likes being uncertain about what to do next.  It can be very frustrating to be in that place where you have questions about what to do, especially when you feel pressured to do something, but you don't know what to do.  One good rule to follow is if you don't know, you don't go.  Making a move before we really know whether or not we should do it is never a good idea.  We need to understand that if God has not told us anything yet then we don't need to know anything yet.  God has given us His Word and we can always go to it and follow what we see there, that is always our starting point.

We must realize that God is a good God who loves us even more than we know.  While some people believe that God is mysterious and He is somehow aloof and does not really care about us, the reality is that He is far wiser and more intelligent than we are and there are times we really don't need to know some of the things we think we need to know.  When the time is right God will make clear to us what we need to know, what we need to do, and how we need to do it.  God knows our life and the path we are taking and even if we don't understand what is going on He does.

What can we do when we are in the place of wanting to take a step but we don't know what step to take?  If God is not giving us any specific direction then we should keep doing the basic things that we do know to do.  Stay with the general will of God while you are waiting for steps in the specific will of God.  Keep your mind focused on what you do know to do and not on the questions you don't have the answers to.  Spend time reading and studying God's Word and talking to God in prayer.  Doing all of these things will keep you in the right position so that when you do need to know what God wants to tell you, you will be ready to receive it and move forward with the plan of God.

What Do You Say About Yourself?

"And they asked him, "What then? Are you Elijah?" He said, "I am not." "Are you the Prophet?" And he answered, "No." Then they said to him, "Who are you, that we may give an answer to those who sent us? What do you say about yourself? He said: "I am the voice of one crying in the wilderness: Make straight the way of the Lord,"' as the prophet Isaiah said.""
John 1:21-23 (NKJV)

John the Baptist was a man sent by God to help prepare the way for Jesus.  When John the Baptist started his ministry there was some natural curiosity about him; who is this man and why is he doing what is he doing?  People heard John speak and they saw what he did but they wanted a direct answer from the man himself.  The religious leaders of the day sent a group to John to ask him, "Who are you, what do you say about yourself?"  This is a good question for us today as well.

When John the Baptist gave the answer about who he was, notice what he did not say.  John did not talk about his family background, his financial status, his level of education, or his life experiences.  When John responded to the question about who he was, John focused on what he was doing for God.  John had the emphasis in the right place; he realized that his relationship with God and what he did in his life for God was the most important thing.  It is also interesting to see that John connected what he was doing with something from the Bible; it is good to find our identity and purpose from God and His Word.

What you say about yourself is very important and it identifies who you are.  What others say about you and what others think about you does not matter as much as what you say and think about yourself.  Our question today is the same question that was asked of John the Baptist, who are you and what do you say about yourself?  The devil will try to stir up problems in our life and confront us with questions about our identity of who we are and what we are doing.  Knowing the answer to these questions will help us succeed in life; we need to know who we are in Christ.

With God, It’s Not Where You Start, It's Where You Finish

"I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith."
2 Timothy 4:7 (NKJV)

When I was in high school I used to compete in various running events.  There were always three parts to the race, the start, the actual race, and the finish.  When they lined everyone up at the start of the race, some people were in better positions than others but I don't remember anyone ever crying because of where they started.  Even during the race itself, someone might not have been in the best position in the middle of the race but that did not really matter either, what mattered is where you finished the race.

The Apostle Paul did not start out well; he was actually fighting against God's plan and the spread of the Gospel before he became a Christian.  When he wrote his second letter to Timothy, Paul knew that the end of his physical life was near.  Did Paul talk about his regrets from the past and all of the mistakes he had made?  Did Paul say that he wished he would have been born into a better situation or that he could not succeed because he did not have some advantages that others had in life?  No, Paul talked about how he had finished the race God had given him to run, even though he did not start out in the best position.

No one starts out in a perfect situation with every advantage in life; no one has a problem free existence.  We should not look back at our past but instead realize that no matter where we start, or even where we are now, we can finish strong.  We may have come from a bad family or a bad economic situation, but we don't have to stay there.  It does not matter where you were born, what matters is that you were born again and that you have a loving heavenly Father who wants to help you.  Do like Paul did and fight the good fight of faith and overcome all of the obstacles in your path so that one day you too can say that you have finished the race God gave you to run.

Are You Like The Bereans Or The Athenians?

"Then the brethren immediately sent Paul and Silas away by night to Berea. When they arrived, they went into the synagogue of the Jews. These were more fair-minded than those in Thessalonica, in that they received the word with all readiness, and searched the Scriptures daily to find out whether these things were so.

For all the Athenians and the foreigners who were there spent their time in nothing else but either to tell or hear some new thing."
Acts 17:10, 11, 21 (NKJV)

In Acts 17 there is a story about two groups of people, the Bereans and the Athenians.  Both groups had the opportunity to hear the teachings of the Apostle Paul.  The thing is that each group seemed to have a different way of doing things and I think that both groups are similar to what we see with Christians today.  One group, the Bereans, received the word with all readiness and searched the Scriptures to see if what they heard was accurate.  The other group, the Athenians, spent all their time either telling or hearing about something new.

It is a sad but true statement that many Christians are more like the Athenians than the Bereans.  So often Christians are more interested in hearing and telling about some "new" thing than they are about searching the Scriptures daily to see if what they hear is true.  It is interesting to see that the people who were diligent to search the Scriptures to check the validity of what they were hearing were the same people that the Bible describes as being ready to receive the Word of God.  It would seem that the more you are focused on God's Word the more ready you are to receive what it has to say.

If all we do is look for what is "new" we will get into trouble.  Our goal is not intellectual stimulation but spiritual growth through the truth of God's Word.  We may hear some things that are new to us but if they are right and true we will find the basis for these "new" things in the written Word of God.  Don't just go after whatever seems to be new and exciting.  Be like the Bereans and make sure to check up on what you are hearing, is it really teaching and truth from the Bible or not?  If we keep ourselves firmly grounded in the Word of God we will stay stable and steady in an ever changing world of "new" ideas.

What's So Good About Good Friday?

"And He, bearing His cross, went out to a place called the Place of a Skull, which is called in Hebrew, Golgotha, where they crucified Him, and two others with Him, one on either side, and Jesus in the center."
John 19:17, 18 (NKJV)

Today is known as Good Friday, it is the day Christians celebrate as the day Jesus died on the cross.  The question is, why is Good Friday so good?  Looking at the day and the things Jesus experienced it was not a good day for Him, being executed is not something that a person would be very happy about.  But the Bible does tell us that Jesus endured the cross because of the joy set before Him (Hebrews 12:2); Jesus understood His place as the sacrifice for the sin of mankind but it was still not something He did because it was such a great experience for Him.

Good Friday was not a good day for the devil.  The crucifixion of Jesus meant the defeat of the devil and the end of his dominion over mankind through sin.  The devil must have thought that he had won the ultimate victory when Jesus was crucified.  But it turned out to be the worst day of all for the kingdom of darkness because through His death and resurrection Jesus triumphed over the devil and the principalities and powers of darkness (Colossians 2:14, 15).  Jesus died on the cross and took our place so we would not be ruled by the devil and sin but so we could reign in life (Romans 5:17).

If Good Friday was not a good day for Jesus and especially for the devil, what about us?  What do the events we celebrate on Good Friday mean for us?  Good Friday is a great day for us because it means that the price for sin has been paid!  We had a debt of sin we could not pay but Jesus died in our place.  Good Friday is a day that we can rejoice because it was not the end of Jesus but just the beginning of His work for us that brings us into a right relationship with God through the blood of Jesus.  Good Friday is a good day for us because it is all about our redemption and freedom from sin and all of it effects.  So when you think about Good Friday, realize that it is a day of liberty for us that we can celebrate all year long!

God Is A Good God

"Oh, give thanks to the Lord, for He is good! For His mercy endures forever."
Psalm 107:1 (NKJV)

If you took a survey and asked people who God is and what He is like you would probably get many different answers, depending on who you asked.  Some people have a view of God that He is an old man with a long white beard just passively sitting up in heaven barely aware of what is happening on the earth.  Some people would probably tell you that God is powerful and just and ready to punish people for their sin.  But what is God really like?  The best place to find out what God is like is from the Bible, God's Word.

God is a good God, plain and simple.  While this seems to be a concept that should be easy to understand many people do not really know that God is a good God.  Often people have had a negative experience with organized religion of some kind or a strict authority figure in their life and they transfer that experience into their understanding of who God is.  Then, because of this wrong belief these people have difficulty expecting God to do anything good for them or even approaching God at all.  God provided a way through Jesus for us to have a relationship with Him, not based on our goodness but on His.

If we want to have a right relationship with God then we have to have a proper understanding of who God really is.  If we don't know about how good God is we can end up trying to earn His favor, His help and His blessings; we need to get to know God for who He really is.  We can't base our understanding of God on our past experience or what others might say; we can only learn who God is by looking into His Word.  God is a loving heavenly Father who wants to do good for His children, once you understand that it is easier to get to know Him, receive from Him and do His will.