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Following God – Truth

Exodus 34:6 says: “And the Lord passed by before him, and proclaimed, The Lord, The Lord God, merciful and gracious, longsuffering, and abundant in goodness and truth…”,

In what ways can you do these in your daily walk with God and with your neighbor: Abundant in Truth.

Jesus said “I am the way, the truth, and the life.”

Do you know someone who when they tell you something, you can count on it being true? This is what it means to say God is abundant in truth. He won’t deceive you, trick you, manipulate you.

When God says He loves you, you can count on it to be truth.

What does it mean to be abundant in truth to your neighbor?

It does not mean to use truth as an excuse to hurt someone. Too often this is the case. Saying things like, ‘well I was just being truthful…’, ‘I’m an honest person so I have to tell you…’  Sometimes this is true, but often it is an excuse to diminish someone, not to love them.

Abundant in truth means you won’t deceive someone, especially won’t deceive them to hurt them, to take something from them, or to dishonestly promote yourself, or to dishonestly dimmish those who you dislike.

It means you won’t be a tale bearer, telling something you don’t know, or speculating on something that makes others look bad.

Many times, this takes the form of exaggeration to try to make our point. This might be statements like ‘everyone says….’ ‘he never tells the truth…’.

Or you project that you know the secrets of the heart, when you don’t ‘he’s only out for his own self…’

There may be pressure to deny truth for social or political advantage. Don’t do it.

There will be times when truth is hard to say and hard to hear. This will be those very rare and extraordinary times, maybe times when you cry while because you love the person so much, and want their good so much.

Are you a person who is abundant in truth?

The more you practice, the more you can be abundant in truth. Honor God. God will greatly reward your practice.

 

 

Exodus 34:6 says: “And the Lord passed by before him, and proclaimed, The Lord, The Lord God, merciful and gracious, longsuffering, and abundant in goodness and truth…”

In what ways can you do these in your daily walk with God and with your neighbor: Abundant in Goodness.

Abundant doesn’t mean just a little bit. Not just enough to give someone a little bit of goodness, not just a little pinch of goodness or a little dose. Rather to give them more than enough, that they feel they have been given a generous tremendous amount of goodness. It’s being consistently abundant in goodness, even when it’s not easy or convenient. Maybe especially when it’s not easy or convenient.

Can you think of some people who have been abundant in goodness to you? What did they do? How did that make you feel?

You can be abundant in goodness in many ways. You can have the attitude of abundant goodness to your family. You can speak words which are abundant in goodness. You can do acts, large and small (especially small), which are abundant in goodness.

If your attitudes and actions have not been abundant in goodness, ask God to forgive you. Ask Him to give you wisdom, patience, strength, calmness, to be abundant in goodness.

The more you practice, the more you can be abundant in goodness. Honor God. God will greatly reward your practice.

Exodus 34:6 says: “And the Lord passed by before him, and proclaimed, The Lord, The Lord God, merciful and gracious, longsuffering, and abundant in goodness and truth…”,

In what ways can you do these in your daily walk with God and with your neighbor: Longsuffering.

The word longsuffering is not used much today, and as used as a characteristic of God may not be understood. The first though might be someone who suffers a lot. As used as a grace in scripture, it means to have self-restraint when one is stirred to anger. Slow to be offended, outraged, angry or upset – especially when one has a right to be so. A longsuffering person does not immediately retaliate or punish. This is especially important when one has the position or power to do so, but refrains.

Strengthened with all might according to his glorious power, unto all patience and long-suffering with joyfulness; – Colossians 1:11. We need God’s strength to have long-suffering, and especially to do it joyfully, not with resentment.

Put on therefore, as the elect of God, holy and beloved, bowels of mercies, kindness, humbleness of mind, meekness, longsuffering; – Colossians 3:12. As a follower of God, we want to ‘put on’ the traits of God.

Practice longsuffering today, with your own self, with those closest to you, with those you deal with often, and with strangers. Honor God. God will greatly reward your practice.

Exodus 34:6 says: “And the Lord passed by before him, and proclaimed, The Lord, The Lord God, merciful and gracious, longsuffering, and abundant in goodness and truth…”,

In what ways can you do these in your daily walk with God and with your neighbor: Gracious.

Gracious means marked by kindness and courtesy; characterized by charm, good taste, generosity of spirit.

One of the excellent traits of God is that He is gracious. We have great gratitude to God because of His graciousness. We seek to be around those who are gracious, and as followers of God, we seek a gracious spirit and to show grace to others.

Psalms 145:8 The Lord is gracious, and full of compassion; slow to anger, and of great mercy.

It’s easy to respond hatefully to people who offend us, disrespect us, make us angry, hate us, or disagree with us. Christ would have us to be different.

Then said Jesus unto his disciples, If any man will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow me. – Matthew 16:24

This Bible verse is rich and packed full of meaning and applies in a lot of different ways. One is to deny your natural tendency to respond to harshness with harshness. This is always true, whether it is to someone you perceive as higher in status than you, equal to you, or lower in status than you. Think your boss, politicians, CEO’s, rich people; or your neighbor; or someone who has less power than you – maybe your child, or a family member who has less. How hard is it to hold back blasting a person who truly deserves it? Consider what great fruits it can have when you respond with graciousness, kindness and generosity. Not only will it demonstrate your honor to Christ’s love to you, it will tend to cause the other person to respond more graciously to you, and maybe to love you more.

Practice graciousness today, with your own self, with those closest to you, with those you deal with often, and with strangers. Honor God. God will greatly reward your practice.

Exodus 34:6 says: “And the Lord passed by before him, and proclaimed, The Lord, The Lord God, merciful and gracious, longsuffering, and abundant in goodness and truth…”,

In what ways can you do these in your daily walk with God and with your neighbor: Merciful.

Mercy is showing kindness and compassion, especially to someone who has offended and doesn’t deserve the kindness and compassion.

Why should you be merciful to someone who clearly doesn’t deserve it?

First, consider how great is the mercy that God has shown you. God’s nature is infinitely holy and completely without sin. Every sin we commit is against God’s nature, and therefore against God. Yet, though our sins are a great affront to God, God reaches out to us in mercy, forgives us, and makes us a part of His family, i.e. a child of God. When you deserve punishment, He grants mercy. Your offense against God is so much greater than any person could offend you.

Consider how much you need God’s mercy, and that none can give greater mercy than God.

By being merciful to others, God’s merciful will be abundant to us: “Blessed are the merciful: for they shall obtain mercy.” – Matthew 5:7 :

Your thought now may be something like, “ But they don’t deserve mercy!” “They won’t appreciate mercy.” “They have not even asked for mercy!” Continue reading “Following God – Merciful”

What are the traits and characteristics of God?

Let’s start with some basics:

• • God is all-knowing. (omniscience)
  • God is all powerful. (omnipotence)
  • God is supremely good. (omnibenevolence)

Sometimes we may hear that we should ‘be like God’. But wait! What does that mean? Can we be all-knowing? Can we be all powerful? Can we be supremely good?

The honest answer is no. There are groups and teachers that misinterpret the scriptures and teach things like we are gods, we become gods, we can speak things into existence. No. Just no. You are not God. You will never be God.

Ephesians 5:1 says: “Be ye therefore followers of God”.

When we are followers of God that does mean that we will seek to imitate God in some ways.

Let’s discover some characteristics of God that we can try to imitate in our daily walk.

Exodus 34:6 says: “And the Lord passed by before him, and proclaimed, The Lord, The Lord God, merciful and gracious, longsuffering, and abundant in goodness and truth”

In what ways can you do these in your daily walk with God and with your neighbor:

• • Merciful
  • Gracious
  • Longsuffering
  • Abundant in goodness
  • Abundant in truth
•  
• Remember that we were created in Christ Jesus for good works. A good work is something that is done. It’s not our good intentions, or thinking we will do good someday, or wishing that we do good. It’s doing good.
•  

  Let’s go practice doing good!

 

 

One of the most sneaky sins is the sin of self-righteousness. It’s self-deceiving and self-destructive.

It can easily deceive us, because righteousness is good. We want to be righteous. We are told to seek righteousness. “Blessed are they who hunger and thirst after righteousness, for they shall be filled.” (Matthew 5: 6) The Bible says “Be ye holy, for I am holy.” – I Peter 1:16 Throughout the Bible, we are told that God is righteous.

Certainly, true righteousness is something that we want.

What we must guard our hearts against is distorted righteousness.

In the Old Testament, as the Israelites were about to go in to possess the land, He had promised them, God warned His people against this sin: “Speak not thou in thine heart, after that the Lord thy God hath cast them out from before thee, saying, For my righteousness the Lord hath brought me in to possess this land:” (Deuteronomy 9:4)

Distorted righteousness leads us to believe we are more righteous than others – we are more righteousness because we go to church, our church is more righteous than any other church. Many churches, pastors, and church member are oblivious to their sin of self-righteous. How many have accepted the title “Great man (or woman) of God”, secretly feeling self-righteous. It’s thinking how great we are, or what we have done for God.

Distorted righteousness can lead to believe that we can stand on our own righteousness – that we are righteous on our own, and we don’t need God’s righteousness.

This is self-deceiving. It blinds you to your own sins. It closes you off from growth. It is not honest with God. It blinds you to your dependency on God. We don’t see our own sins. We exault ourselves and dimmish others – you are more righteous than them. don’t see that we are diminishing others so that we can feel good about ourselves. We can’t get better if we don’t see our need to change.

Guard against becoming self-righteous like as in Matthew 23:23-24:

“Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you tithe mint and dill and cumin, and have neglected the weightier matters of the law: justice and mercy and faithfulness. These you ought to have done, without neglecting the others. You blind guides, straining out a gnat and swallowing a camel.”

True righteousness of justice, mercy, and faithfulness.

True righteous will show through love of God and love of your neighbor.

“To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven” – Ecclesiastes 3:1

Have you ever thought about balance in your life?

The Bible verse above reminds us that there is a time for everything. That means a time work, a time to play, a time to relax, a time to worship.

It’s easy to go overboard in any aspect of our lives. We want to do good. We want to see progress. Usually, we want to see it fast! Sometimes our good intentions can damage our lives.

Some leaders – even well-meaning Christian leaders – imply that you should spend every waking hour in worship, or in devotion, or in study, or in work. But no. There is a time for everything.

Watch out for those who try to guilt you into not having balance in your live. Speaking of the religious leaders of his day, Jesus said: “For they bind heavy burdens and grievous to be borne, and lay them on men’s shoulders; buy they themselves will not move them with one of their fingers.” – Matthew 23:4

Others imply that you should fully enjoy life by spending all of you time doing whatever makes you happy – play, be entertained, spend all of your time with family, play video games, go on vacations. But no. There is a time for everything.

Solomon tried spending all his time on the pleasures of life. He said: “I said in mine hear, Go to now, I will prove thee with mirth, therefor enjoy pleasure: and, behold, this also is vanity.”

Work hard. Study hard. Worship hard. Play hard. Take time to rest. Take time to relax and refresh. Take time to enjoy life.

Ask God to guide you to have a balanced life. He will give you a good life.

 

In all thy ways acknowledge him, and he shall direct thy paths. – Proverbs 3:6

What a wonderful promise that God will direct our paths.

There are so many choices, so many options, so many ways to go. How can we know what to choose, what will be right for us. Who better to know the future, and to know the best path for you. God is always working for your good.

God promises that if we will acknowledge Him, He will direct our paths.

To acknowledge Him in your ways means to recognize that God is in complete control of your life. Your life is in His hands. The world is not in control, your circumstances, your employer, your family – these are not too difficult for God to control.

Listen for God’s direction. Seek His will by reading His holy word as given in the Bible. Pray and ask what is right. “If any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God, that giveth to all men liberally, and upbraideth not; and it shall be given him.” – James 15. Admitting that we don’t know the best is start of opening our heart to hear God.

There can be no greater blessing than to follow in the way God directs.

“Brethren, I count not myself to have apprehended: but this one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind, and reaching forth unto those things which are before,

I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus.” – Philippians 3:13-14

The past is important. We learn from the past, we grow from our past experiences. We are enriched from the people we known and the relationships we’ve had in the past. Sometimes things in the past damage us. Experiences can be so horrific we can’t get them out of our mind. There’s no easy solution. It’s difficult. Yet, the goal is to accept the past and move forward.

If someone, or something, has hurt us, it’s easy to get hung up in the past. To relive the experience, to dwell on what we should have done, what could have happened. We all do it. Acknowledge the past, but resolve that you won’t stay there in the past.

Live in the present. Plan for the future.

“forgetting those things which are behind”. You have to let go of the past.

What are the things you need to leave behind?

When Plan A fails, it’s not the end. God can provide a great Plan B and you can have great blessing in your life. Don’t give up.

Our past shapes who we are, for good and bad. But our past does not determine our destiny. God is in control of our destiny.