|
Christians are suppose to have a reputation for being happy and confident all the day long. Do they fake it for the most part or are they naturally in a good mood all the time? On several occasions Jesus told people to be of good cheer. If a believer is suppose to live a cheerful life, they must have a reason or an unseen power. There is a phrase Christians refer to all the time: fake it until you make it. We have a choice, we can fake our good mood or we can go to the Word and find a reason to be glad all day long, every day.
Mathew 9:2 Be of good cheer (courage, comfort); your sins are forgiven you. What is the reason we have to be of good cheer? Our sins are forgiven! What does it mean to have no sin? When we are born-again we become a new creature, God restores our image to resemble Him. We are just as righteous as Jesus and God is now our Father. He has made His abode within us, He will hear us and respond to every prayer. When our bodies become unfit to live in, He calls us up to Heaven where we will be forever and ever. Knowing this and accepting it all, how could anyone be anything but cheerful? John 14:3 I go to prepare a place for you, I will come again to receive you, and where I am you will be also. Jesus said that in the Father’s house are many mansions. He is not creating mansions, they are already prepared. Jesus said He was going to prepare a place for us, what was He talking about? Jesus had to die in order to make a place for us, it is called the Kingdom of God. The Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost are in this Kingdom and the devil was cast out. Jesus had to die so we could live with Him in His Kingdom, the place He has prepared for us. No born-again Christian will ever be homeless. God’s Kingdom is hidden in plain sight but only the humble will find it. God is a Father and He obligates Himself to take care of His children. Romans 4:7 Blessed are they whose iniquities are forgiven, and whose sins are covered. Born-again believers are blessed of the Lord, blessed means empowered to prosper. If a Christian is not constantly of good cheer, their mind is not stayed on their Lord. Christians have their share of troubles and hardships but their Heavenly Father has a solution to every problem. Be of good cheer. John 16:33 In the world you shall have tribulation: but be of good cheer; I have overcome the world. The devil is the god of this world and no matter what trash he dumps on us, God has already prepared the answer for us. If we are not consistently cheerful, we are not in agreement with the Lord. Think about this, if the Lord tells us to be of good cheer and we say no thanks, then we like being depressed and sad all the time. Some Christians like being victims, they enjoy whining all the time about how hard the world is on them. Jesus has all power but He can’t help people who don’t want it. He has overcome the world but they won’t accept it. The Lord has spoken, be of good cheer, and then He gives the reason why we should be “happy campers”. Now brethren, go out and be of good cheer. The love and blessings of your Lord have empowered you.
0 Comments
Every born-again believer who holds fast to their faith, is on schedule to undergo a physical change so dramatic the world won’t even accept it. God will not suffer His children to spend eternity in these weak corrupt bodies. This is not an evolution, it’s a miracle the world cannot conceive or imagine. The world is consumed with “extraterrestrials”, these creatures that are composed of material not from the world. Man’s physical body originated from the dust of the earth, this is a very small matter compared to what God is fixing to do.
Philippians 3:21 God will take over weak mortal bodies and change them into glorious bodies like His own, using the same power with which He will bring everything under His control. Can you imagine living in a body that will never feel pain, never hunger or thirst and never get tired or wear out? The spirits of reborn Christians are in Heaven right now but they have yet to receive their glorified bodies. All the believers who believe will put on this incorruptible body all together. This means all the saints in Heaven and all of those living here who are destined for Heaven. This is not a process, it is a miraculous event that happens in mere seconds. 1 Corinthians 15:52 In a moment of time (too quick to measure) like a blink of an eye, at the last trump; for the trumpet shall sound and the dead will arise and we will all be changed. This prophetic event will happen so fast the world won’t even consider it for weeks or months, and some will never know. I don’t fully understand it but I do fully believe it, come to me after I get my glorified body and I will be better able to explain it. Even the devil knows about the great make over, he’s been working to get men to doubt this day. He knows it will be his time to be locked in his own fiery pit, first a thousand years and then forever. There are some born-again Christians who openly dispute the rapture and the glorified bodies. They asked Kenneth Copeland about what he thought and he said: let it be done unto thee according to your faith. Hosea 3:6 My people are destroyed (cut off) for a lack of knowledge: because you have rejected knowledge, I will also reject you. God offers knowledge (truth) to all men but He never makes anyone accept what He declares. All men will stand in judgement for what they do or don’t believe. No man will be able to stand before God and explain who he chose not to believe. Why would anyone dispute God’s Word and deny what He said He was going to do? This is ignorance gone to seed! Saint Peter denied his Lord three times and then he wrote two epistles trying to explain how foolish he was. Peter messed up and he wants every saint to know how he felt and not to make the same grievous error. God has everything mapped out, He knew what He would do before the foundation of the world. We can’t hinder His plan but we can certainly disqualify ourselves from the event. Take a good look at your life and your body, we all need a great make over. The world does not trust God at all and most Christians don't trust Him much either. You cannot trust anyone until they have proven themselves to be trustworthy. How do we begin to establish trust in our Lord God? In the book of Genesis God put His first-born son in a garden. He gave His son one simple command, do not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. Adam did not need the fruit from that tree, he had a whole garden full of trees and the seeds to plant more. God told His son Adam that if he ate from the tree he would surely die. As we all know, Adam ate from that tree and he died spiritually and was separated from God.
Genesis 3:24 So God drove(divorced) out the man from the garden and placed angels at the gate to keep him out. God divorced Himself from His first-born son and kicked him out of the garden. How could God do this to His only son? Couldn't He compromise and find a way to restore Adam? When God says something, He will do it no matter the consequences. Psalm 89:34 My covenant will not break, nor alter the thing that is gone out of My lips. God would not change His Word to accommodate His own son, if He says something He will stand by it no matter what happens. God has proven Himself to be trustworthy over and over in His Word, this is all for our benefit. Galatians 3:13 Christ has redeemed us from the curse of the law being made a curse for us: for it is written cursed is everyone that hangs on a tree. God told Moses to hang the law breakers on a tree and He would curse them in order to spare the land from the curse of sin. Several thousand years after God gave Moses this law, Jesus was born of a virgin. Jesus was the Son of God who became flesh. When Jesus was crucified on the cross(tree) God had to obey His own law. God had to speak the curse over His Son and as Jesus was dying He said, "Father why have You forsaken Me?" The Father had to forsake Jesus because He was made to be sin. What place has righteousness with unrighteousness? None! Over and over God has proven Himself to be trustworthy, we can entrust Him with our very souls. Why do some Christians have such a doubtful character? They have given themselves over to a lying spirit called the devil, the ruler of darkness. Do you know how to distinguish the lies of the devil? Go to the Bible, the book of truth and you won't be able to find the lies. God is not a man that He should lie, He is not capable of lying. If God came out and said two plus two is five, we would have to change all of our math books. Psalm 9:10 They that know Your Name will put their trust in You. If you truly know the living God and all He says, then you can put all your trust in Him. If He says He loves you, then you can know He loves you and He is committed to blessing you as much as you will let Him. You cannot talk yourself into trusting God, you must let Him and His record of life convince you. I fully trust my God, my Lord and Savior. He has always done exactly what He said in His Word He would do. The term religion has two different meanings, it can refer to the faith one practices or it can be how one interprets the Bible. I want to deal with the latter of the two. Anyone can take the Bible and make it say whatever they want and when they do they create religion. From the time of Adam to the day of Moses, there was no record of sin because there was no law against what man did.
Romans 5:13 Sin was committed in the world before the law was given, but sin is not charged against anyone when there is no law against it. There was no law that described sin until Moses, so man made up his own laws, this is the epitome of religion. The purpose of the law was to give man a record of what was right and what was wrong. All the people who were of the Jewish religion began to believe that the law gave them salvation and righteousness. The Apostle Paul told them they were wrong and they hated him for telling them the truth. Over the years religious men waged wars against those who believed in Christ. Did God tell then to persecute the Christians? No way! Religious people are not under the authority of God's Word, they create their own belief and sign God's Name to it. Mathew 26:59 Now the chief priests and elders, and all the council, sought false witness against Jesus, to put Him to death. Religion will kill anyone who opposes it, even the very Son of God. When I was growing up I was told the only people who could go to Heaven were Catholics. The Mormons said their men would take their wife and be the gods on one of the planets. The Jehovah's Witnesses claimed that there would only be one hundred and forty-four thousand people in Heaven and they would be Jehovah's witnesses. Religion is on it's greatest display when it comes to questions of morality. I went to one church where the women had to wear long dresses, no make-up and they could not cut their hair. Religion will always attempt to control its members in the Name of God. John 8:32 And you shall know the truth, and the truth you know will make you free. Jesus spoke this word to the Jews that were bound to their religion because they were out to kill Him. If you belong to a denomination that hates other denominations, you are in the same company as the Jews who wanted to kill Jesus. How people practice their allegiance to Christ is none of my business, my business is to live for Christ according to His Word. Some people who think they are free cannot be free if they are debtors to their flesh. When Jesus said the truth would make them free, He was referring to their carnal nature where religion thrives. Their problem wasn't Jesus, it was their demon controlled flesh that they were not even aware of. If you want to be free, you must be willing to listen to Jesus, and it will take awhile. No one will understand spiritual truth by hearing it once. God never changes, He will say the same thing over and over to every man. The problem is our mind is so full of nonsense it takes awhile for the truth to work through it. Faith comes by hearing and hearing and hearing, it must get passed our mind and into our heart. If you truly want to be free you will continue in the Word until you believe it more than what your flesh can feel or see. Religion is a stronghold and we must let God wash it out of our brains, where it won't interfere with the impartation of truth. A Christian is someone who has received Christ as their Savior. The Bible is very clear about the born-again experience, God the Holy Ghost comes and dwells in the heart of every convert. Some believers are not even aware of God's presence in their lives. But should they be?
After Paul of Tarsus' supernatural conversion he was caught up to the third Heaven where God sits on His throne. He gave Paul some revelations that the church was in desperate need of. Paul began to preach these revelations and he attracted opposition from the devil. The devil turned Paul's own people against him, the Jews beat him five times with thirty-nine stripes. They would never surpass thirty-nine stripes because any more than that would kill a man. What were these revelations God gave Paul that the devil felt were such a threat to quest to his ministry of discrediting the Holy One, the Son of God? Ephesians 3:3-6 The mystery of God was given to me by revelation that the gentiles should be fellow heirs of the same Body(of Christ). The Jewish converts did not believe the gentiles had as right to have what Jesus died to give only them. Paul shared the mystery that the Lord gave him in Heaven and he then was called to be an apostle to the gentiles. If you read Paul's experience in Heaven, you will note that he was given several revelations. Colossians 1:25-27 I have been made a minister of the revelations that were hid for generations. God made known to me the glory of this mystery among the gentiles, which is Christ in you the hope of glory. Christ (the anointed one) is in everyone who believes He died and rose again. He is our hope of glory (manifestations), the Holy Spirit in us, who with us will display the glory of God. How do we come to know our Lord and Savior on a more intimate level? Before Jesus was born in Bethlehem, He was in Heaven and He was called the Word (John 1:1). If we read the Word of God, accept it and believe it, we are having intimacy with our Savior. John 16:13 When the Holy Spirit of truth comes He will lead you into all truth. He will not speak of Himself, he will speak of whatsoever he hears. The Holy Spirit has a voice in which He speaks to everyone who has ears to hear. He does two things, He will speak of Jesus and He will lead us into all truth. If you will choose to hear Him you will come to know Jesus on a very personal level. The Holy Spirit was sent to show us how to have intimacy with our Savior. Philippians 3:10 I want to know Christ and experience the mighty power that raised Him from the dead, I want to suffer with Him. Paul knew Jesus on a very personal level, Jesus appeared to him and spoke to him in Heaven. Now Paul is about to be executed and yet his greatest ambition is to know Christ. The word know means: be aware, perceive, be sure of, understand. God is not a respecter of persons, we can have the same experience as Paul had, we can come to know Jesus on a very intimate level. I know my Lord and Savor and we commune every day just like the Bible says we can. |
TEXT FOJCHURCH
TO 84576 OFFERING DECLARATION
We are in dangerous times, the world is void of truth. The innocent are hated, and all liars are honored. But I choose the truth, and I give God His tithe. In a world full of chaos, I will always be blessed. For I am one of His sheep. |
RSS Feed