What It Means to Be a Temple of God

Hello again!

This is what God gave me today in His word:

Do you not know that you are God’s temple and that God’s Spirit dwells in you? If anyone destroys God’s temple, God will destroy him. For God’s temple is holy, and you are that temple. (1 Corinthians 3:16-17)

Something some people don’t realize, is that all Christians are temples of God. – Something which is understandable, as it isn’t exactly an idea that springs to the mind easily. – being a temple of God means several things, almost all of which we can see in the above verse:

It means we’re holy, that God will destroy those who destroy us, and that God’s very spirit dwells within us. Let’s look at these each, individually:

• We’re holy. Meaning that Jesus has now washed us clean, and that we’re spotless in the sight of God. But, along with this, it also means that God’s spirit helps to overcome sin struggles. Which is, of course, the usual way in which we think of “being holy.”
• God will destroy those who destroy us. Those who tear us down/try to stop our ministry will “reserve their due.” Look at 2 Timothy 4:14 to see some of what I mean.
• God’s Spirit dwells within us. Thus we have power to demolish strongholds, arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God. In addition to that though, having God’s spirit dwell within us also means two more things: we no longer want what our old Spirit, the flesh, wanted (i.e. instead of wanting to sin, we should now want to please God). And we each have gifts of the Spirit (read this post for more on that subject: http://goldenbible.wordpress.com/2012/02/03/to-each-his-own-gift-is-given/).

Addition to all those things though, there’s one more: because we’re the temples of God, our bodies are no longer are own:

Do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit, who is in you, whom you have received from God? You are not your own; you were bought at a price. Therefore honor God with your body. (1 Corinthians 6:19-20)

We were bought with a price: Jesus’ blood. Thus, we should now serve God as best as He has enabled us! We’ve been bought at a price: let’s keep that in mind as we go about our day today.

You are Loved!

Joshua Cleveland

 

Arriving at Truth

Hello again!

To give you some context of the following verse: Paul is talking about people in the “last days,” it’s just he described them in such detail I didn’t think it necessary to add that section of the passage here, if you want you can look it up in 2 Timothy 3:1-5 — This is what God gave me today in His word:

always learning and never able to arrive at a knowledge of the truth. (2 Timothy 3:7)

This a very important little verse, as it talks about those who read the Bible, but don’t apply what it says. Their the people who are constantly reading Scripture, but don’t take it in and apply it. This is extremely dangerous, as it starves our Spiritual selves. Think of reading the Bible and not applying it, as putting  a heaping plate of food in front of yourself, and then just staring at it: the food doesn’t do you any good, you aren’t nourished by it anymore than if you were without any food (not reading the Bible at all) at all! To quote James:

Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves. Do what it says. (James 1:22)

So, in fact, more than torturing your-Spiritual-self, reading the Word and not actually applying it also deceiving yourself. i.e. Because I’m reading the Bible I automatically become holy, righteous, and am just in general better than the guy over there. While the reality of the situation is that your Spiritual self is in the final throughs of death by starvation!

Now that we’ve discovered application of the Bible to be the clear necessity that it is… What exactly is a correct application of the Bible? Well pretty clearly it’d be difficult to come up with one, singular, application of the entire Bible: possibly, because of the sheer number of books in the Bible, in may not even be possible. But Paul does give us some general guide-lines for us to use with all Scripture:

All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, (2 Timothy 3:16)

A correct application, therefore, would contain teaching ourselves something that we didn’t already know (preferably), a reproof to ourselves or someone else (preferably ourselves, as doing it to someone else tends to clout our self-opinion), a correction for ourselves: something that we can do differently in our lives, and should in general help to train us in righteousness.

To wrap up: reading the Bible, though it has the value of putting Spiritual food in front of us, is useless unless we apply it (eat the food). Not only that, but a correct application is one that has teaching, a reproof, a correction, and helps to train ourselves in righteousness.

You are Loved!

Joshua Cleveland

 

A Dutiful Soldier, An Incredible Athlete, and a Hard-Working Farmer… Your Pastor?

Hello again!

This is what God gave me today in His word:

Share in suffering as a good soldier of Christ Jesus. No soldier gets entangled in civilian pursuits, since his aim is to please the one who enlisted him. An athlete is not crowned unless he competes according to the rules. It is the hard-working farmer who ought to have the first share of the crops. (2 Timothy 2:3-6)

Paul tells Timothy (and by extension, to all pastors) to be three different types of people: a soldier, an athlete, and a farmer. To be a little more specific: a good soldier of Christ Jesus, who “doesn’t get entangled in civilian affairs.” An athlete who must compete according to “the rules”. And a hard-working farmer that gets a “share of the crops.”

A soldier who “doesn’t get involved in civilian affairs,” is, when you think about it, rather like a pastor who doesn’t get involved with his the personal lives of each and every of member of his Church. Don’t get me wrong, a pastor can of course form friendships with members of his congregation, etc. but it’s the job of the deacons to take care of the members.

An athlete who “competes according to the rules,” seems to actually be rather similar to a pastor who preaches his sermons in accordance with what the Bible says. For example, a pastor who “preaches” a “sermon” on the latest sporting event, isn’t exactly competing according to the rules… At all.

Likewise, a hard-working farmer who gets “the first share of the crops,” is really rather similar to a pastor who does in fact receive some money for his preaching.

Is your pastor a soldier, an athlete, and a hard-working farmer?

You are Loved!

Joshua Cleveland

 

Pursuit of…

Hello again!

This is what God gave me today in His word:

But those who desire to be rich fall into temptation, into a snare, into many senseless and harmful desires that plunge people into ruin and destruction. For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evils. It is through this craving that some have wandered away from the faith and pierced themselves with many pangs. But as for you, O man of God, flee these things. Pursue righteousness, godliness, faith, love, steadfastness, gentleness. (1 Timothy 6:9-11)

Paul gives several things here: a warning against the love of money, and admonition to pursue righteousness, godliness, faith, love and the rest that he mentioned. With that said being said, trying to get money isn’t wrong in the least.  Unless you’re a farmer (can provide yourself with food) who is able to build his own house and appliances, and don’t need electricity, you’ll be wanting some form of money. There’s nothing wrong with that at all. It’s when the getting money takes importance over either your family (if you have one) or God that it becomes a problem. Thus Paul giving Timothy (and us) the admonition to pursue a couple of things, namely:

• righteousness
• godliness
• faith
• love
• steadfastness
• gentleness

I believe Paul charges us with pursuing these things for the simple reason that, if we have righteousness, God will take first importance in our minds and, thus, lives. Not only that, but if we godliness, we’ll be growing into Jesus’ image, and to be frank, Jesus never fell to the love of money. Likewise if we have faith in God, we won’t place our faith in money. If we have love for God, you can bet we won’t love money. If we have steadfastness, we’ll stand steadily in God and won’t fall to the shaky ground of the love of money. And finally, if we’re gentle, we won’t do one of the main things that seems to make money (if not friendships), and be harsh with employees (we’re assuming that we have a business). Alright, terrific. But, how is it again we’re supposed to pursue those things?

Well, as it would take too long for this one post to describe what the Bible says about how to pursue each and every things that Paul mentioned, and because we’ve already discussed godliness in the last post, I’m going to briefly focus on just a couple of them (namely: faith, righteousness, and love):

What does the Bible say about faith?

Faith is a topic which the Bible talks on a lot, so for the most part I’ll let it do the talking:

Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and do not lean on your own understanding. (Proverbs 3:5)

For we walk by faith, not by sight. (2 Corinthians 5:7)

The above passage tells us something very important about faith in God: though we don’t see Him, faith makes us believe in Him. That, for the Christian, is really the essence of faith. But how do we pursue it?

¹⁷ Consequently, faith comes from hearing the message, and the message is heard through the word about Christ. (Romans 10:17)

Faith comes through “hearing the message”. We can see from the context of this passage that the “message” is the Gospel. Thus, if we want to increase our faith, we   should remind ourselves about what Jesus has done for us; that He died for us, and even no intercedes on our behaves before God.

What does the Bible say about righteousness?

⁵ And to the one who does not work but believes in him who justifies the ungodly, his faith is counted as righteousness, (Romans 4:5)

Righteousness is something that comes after faith, something we can see by the fact that our faith is counted as righteousness. This is important to note, because righteousness is, according to a quick search on Bing, “justifiable.” Once we we’re saved, i.e. have faith, our acts should become “justifiable.”

What does the Bible say about love?

⁴ Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant ⁵ or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; ⁶ it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. ⁷ Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. (1 Corinthians 13:4-7)

I believe the above passage pretty much says it all. In order to “pursue love”, we would pretty much have to pursue all of its characteristics, and/or lack of characteristics (such as arrogance, rudeness, etc.). — But, to give it a general definition, love is kind.

You are Loved!

Joshua Cleveland

P.S. I apologize for accidental posting this before I finished it! I’m not exactly sure how it happened, but I must have accidentally pressed the publish button. Anyway, for everyone who receives my posts through email, I apologize.

 

A Guide to Godliness

Hello again!

This is what God gave me today in His word:

Have nothing to do with irreverent, silly myths. Rather train yourself for godliness; for while bodily training is of some value, godliness is of value in every way, as it holds promise for the present life and also for the life to come. The saying is trustworthy and deserving of full acceptance. (1 Timothy 4:7-9)

We’re looking at a couple of things here: first, Timothy is told not to have anything to do with “irreverent, silly myths.” Then he’s told, instead of focusing on (irreverent, silly) myths, he’s to train himself for godliness. We too, in a manner, are told through Timothy (in a manner of speaking) to do the same thing. So then, because understanding what we’re told to do, is a major step towards doing it… And because there isn’t any need to define silly, irreverent myths (as I’m pretty sure the adjectives are enough for understanding what that sort of myth is about), let’s instead decide on the actual meaning of “godliness”.

Godliness, as you may have guessed, is the act of being like God. An act which will need a lot of “training for,” seeing as becoming like God is a feat only accomplished by one man, and that particular man was also completely God (His name, by the way, is Jesus). However, everyone is able to have characteristics of God. We’re His sons and daughters, it only makes sense that we would have Spiritual aspects of Him: just like we have physical aspects of our physical moms and dads.

To have godliness means a couple of main things: first, it means we have unfailing love, like God does. It also means we’re perfect, like God. It also means our sense of justice is like God’s. Now none of us has unfailing love, are perfect, or has a sense of justice like God’s. But we each of aspects of those: some people seem to find it easy to almost always be loving (they’re the people who are always smiling/hugging people). Others seem to be blessed more by God with the ability to overcome temptation. But don’t get me wrong! Every Christian can overcome any and every temptation. I’m just saying that, though every true Christian will always be tempted, some seem to be able run to God instantly in prayer and overcome. – This is a complicated subject, and if you ask me about it either through email or in a comment, I’ll try to explain it more thoroughly. – In addition, some Christians seem to have a greater sense of justice than others (not always a good thing, as those people don’t always have the perfect combination, like God does, of unfailing love along with that justice). So, to put all that simply: we all show parts of God, though those parts aren’t at all limited to the three I named.

Now that I’ve said all that, we should also train ourselves for godliness. As I mentioned, those that have a sense of justice somewhat like God’s, should work on increasing their love. Those who God has blessed with the almost instinctive ability to run to Him as soon as they are tempted should also “work on” their love, so that they don’t see another Christian whose failing to overcome temptation, and become prideful. Those with love almost like God’s, should work on their justice, otherwise they may tend to simply let wrongdoing slide. But, how is it that people can “work” on becoming more “like God”? I mean, we’ve been talking about it this whole time, but it seems no one actually knows how to “do it.” Let’s see what Paul has to say on the matter:

⁷ But to each one of us grace has been given as Christ apportioned it. ⁸ This is why it^[a] says:

   “When he ascended on high, 
   he took many captives 
   and gave gifts to his people.”^[b]

 ⁹ (What does “he ascended” mean except that he also descended to the lower, earthly regions^[c]? ¹⁰ He who descended is the very one who ascended higher than all the heavens, in order to fill the whole universe.) ¹¹ So Christ himself gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the pastors and teachers, ¹² to equip his people for works of service, so that the body of Christ may be built up ¹³ until we all reach unity in the faith and in the knowledge of the Son of God and become mature, attaining to the whole measure of the fullness of Christ.

 ¹⁴ Then we will no longer be infants, tossed back and forth by the waves, and blown here and there by every wind of teaching and by the cunning and craftiness of people in their deceitful scheming. ¹⁵ Instead (a), speaking the truth in love, we will grow to become in every respect the mature body of him who is the head, that is, Christ. (Ephesians 4:7-15)

By “speaking the truth in love,” and not scheming, etc. we’ll “grow up into Jesus” (who is one with the Father). — The “truth” which we are to speak which Paul is referring to, can only be the Gospel. Think about it a minute: deceitful scheming, cunning and the rest are all “of the world.” Meaning that the truth that we are  to speak in love, must be the Gospel of Jesus, as that is the exact opposite of the world. By the way, we can clearly see that the ‘truth that we are to speak in love’ is in opposition to the world by the “Instead” Paul puts in there (see: a).

Now that we’ve answered that question, let’s ask another question; purely out of a desire to understand what’s going on: how can speaking the Gospel (of Jesus) in love, grow us into Jesus’ image? Well, let’s think about it a minute:

Jesus’ death on the cross on our behaves, is the ultimate display of God’s love, justice, and perfection. It displays God’s love by Jesus dying in our place. It displays His justice, because God couldn’t let our sin simply go, there actually did have to be a substitute, and it displays His perfection by the fact that, to put it simply, Jesus’ substitution was accepted. Only a perfect, unblemished sacrifice would be accepted, and His was. Thus, by speaking the Gospel in love (i.e. by, when we speak the Gospel, not banging people over the head with it, so to speak), the aspects of the Gospel are “added unto us.” Something which makes sense, because whenever we speak or write something, that something in a way becomes a part of us.

So, to try to summarize (we’ve covered a lot this time): we are to try to train ourselves in godliness, by speaking the truth of the Gospel in love.

You are Loved!

Joshua Cleveland

 

Using the Law, Lawfully

Hello again!

We’ve finished the book of James, so let’s move back a couple of books, and go to 1 Timothy. — This is what God gave me today in His word:

Now we know that the law is good, if one uses it lawfully, understanding this, that the law is not laid down for the just but for the lawless and disobedient, for the ungodly and sinners, for the unholy and profane, for those who strike their fathers and mothers, for murderers, the sexually immoral, men who practice homosexuality, enslavers, liars, perjurers, and whatever else is contrary to sound doctrine, (1 Timothy 1:8-10)

If one obeys the law, “lawfully,” that person is apparently obeying the law correctly. Alright, so how does one obey the law lawfully? Well, Paul doesn’t exactly answer that question; instead, he seems to expect that Timothy would understand what he meant. Alright, well, go Timothy! But that doesn’t really help us much. So, if Paul won’t give us any help in the matter, why not look at the definition of the word “lawfully,” and go from there?

a : being in harmony with the law <a lawful judgment>b : constituted, authorized, or established by law : rightful – Taken from: http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/lawfully

So let’s say that sentence (obey the law, lawfully) in a different way: obey the law, in a way that is in harmony with the law. Meaning that, if your aren’t going to murder, don’t murder! However, as well as not murdering, obeying the law in a way which is in harmony with the law, means not disobeying any of the commandments. As James says:

For whoever keeps the whole law and yet stumbles at just one point is guilty of breaking all of it. (James 2:10)

That’s why Paul, in verse nine, says that the law is not just for the ‘upright’, but for the unholy, the profane, etc.. So, now that we know what it means to obey the law, lawfully, does this mean that by obeying the law in that lawful manner, we actually can earn our own salvation? Yes, it does. If you were somehow, by your own power, to, from the time you were conceived, be perfect. As that isn’t possible, the law is instead helpful as a sort of guide (if not, as Paul put it, “good” in of itself). The law isn’t meant to save us, it’s meant to lead us to Jesus. This happens because, once we realize the impossibility of always managing to obey the law, we start searching for something, or someone, who can save us. Even if we don’t know we’re searching, we still are.

To wrap up: the law can’t save, Jesus can. Jesus can save us because He’s died for us. Jesus died for us, because He loves us. He loves us for reasons known only to Himself.

You are Loved!

Joshua Cleveland

 

The Word of Truth

Hello again!

Today we start 2 Timothy. – This is what God gave me today in his word:

Do your best to present yourself to God as one approved, a worker who has no need to be ashamed, rightly handling the word of truth. But avoid irreverent babble, for it will lead people into more and more ungodliness, and their talk will spread like gangrene. Among them are Hymenaeus and Philetus, (2 Timothy 2:15-17)

Or, in other words: be good and don’t get into trouble, or else you’ll end up like “the bad examples”. A little more specifically, God tells Timothy do to do his best to present himself before God as one approved, and to avoid irreverent babble. Slightly more specifically, he tells Timothy to rightly handle the word of truth. If you’d look back to 1 Timothy with me, we’d find this verse:

O Timothy, guard the deposit entrusted to you. Avoid the irreverent babble and contradictions of what is falsely called “knowledge,” for by professing it some have swerved from the faith. Grace be with you. (1 Timothy 6:20-21)

So then, this, “word of truth” seems to also be something a deposit that was entrusted to him. Paul in 2 Timothy says, “But avoid irreverent babble,” Notice the “but” in there, that indicates that the word of truth and irreverent babble could be in contradiction with each other… Let’s skip ahead to the point: Paul’s telling Timothy to “handle rightly” the Gospel of Jesus; which is that he died and rose again to save us. With that established, let’s ask the actual question, “What does it mean to “handle rightly” the Gospel?”

It means doing the opposite of irreverent talk. i.e. It means sharing The Gospel. Which naturally implies that The Gospel should take first importance in everything Timothy did. Again, we see in 1 Timothy:

Avoid the irreverent babble and contradictions of what is falsely called “knowledge,” for by professing it some have swerved from the faith.

Have you ever heard of how to break a bad habit? Part of the process involves replacing the bad habit with another, better one. Thus it seems that by saying (not that Timothy had a habit of babbling irreverently) for him not to do something, while at the same time telling him to guard the deposit that was given him, it’s natural to assume Paul was indeed telling him to spread the Gospel. And, by extension, he was also telling us, it seems, to do the same. We can make this particular assumption in good faith, because we see in this verse here:

Therefore, if anyone cleanses himself from what is dishonorable, he will be a vessel for honorable use, set apart as holy, useful to the master of the house, ready for every good work. So flee youthful passions and pursue righteousness, faith, love, and peace, along with those who call on the Lord from a pure heart. (2 Timothy 2:21-22)

That it is in fact what Paul is getting at. So then, if Paul is telling Timothy (and by extension, you and I) to share the Gospel, the questions arise, “How? And for that matter, why would we do this?”

1.  Why share the Gospel? There’s nothing in it for us.

¹⁴ How, then, can they call on the one they have not believed in? And how can they believe in the one of whom they have not heard? And how can they hear without someone preaching to them? ¹⁵ And how can anyone preach unless they are sent? As it is written: “How beautiful are the feet of those who bring good news!” (Romans 10:14-15)
Paul describes the process of why we would quite nicely: first we must believe. Believe in what? The fact that Jesus died and rose again to save us from our sins. But how can we believe? By first hearing Jesus through his word. But how can we hear Jesus, or more accurately, what he did for us in the Bible? By someone first expounding upon the word to and for us. But how can anyone preach or teach to us if their not sent by God? They can’t. Thus leading to us acting like the Bereans did and first looking at what a Pastor said, then looking at scripture for confirmation. – In other words: We hear that Jesus Christ laid down his life for us. Then we understand what exactly that means. Finally, we in turn share that with others.

2.  How can we share the Gospel?
Refer to point number one; we’re sent, we teach, they believe.

This whole thing can pretty much be summed up in these few words:

We are to share the Gospel with others. We can only do that, though, if we first have heard the Gospel, which is that Jesus died and rose again to save us from our sin.

You are Loved!

Joshua Cleveland

 

Godliness: Our Perfect Example in Jesus

Hello again!

This is what God gave me today in his word:

Have nothing to do with irreverent, silly myths. Rather train yourself for godliness; for while bodily training is of some value, godliness is of value in every way, as it holds promise for the present life and also for the life to come. (1 Timothy 4:7-8)

Train yourself in godliness. Why? Because it’s important. This seems to be what Paul is saying. – First, let’s figure what exactly godliness is. As, in order to train oneself in anything, it’s rather necessary to understand the thing which your training yourself in:

Web definitions:

piety by virtue of being a godly person.wordnetweb.princeton.edu/perl/webwn

In its essence, godliness (as an act) means being Godly. Thus Paul is telling Timothy and those with him to be Godly. With that in mind, let’s list some qualities of being Godly (this does have a point, believe it or not):

• Loving; when you’re Godly, you love others.
• Grace; you give grace to (and receive grace from) others.
• Forgiveness; you forgive others.

Or, if you wanted to simplify all those things into one person; Jesus. Paul’s basically telling us to become more Christ-like. In fact, the perfect fulfillment of these things is in Christ (possibly because he was in fact God as well as man, thus was completely Godly) on the cross. When he died for us, it was the perfect display of love, grace and forgiveness… As well as the perfect display of God’s righteous need for justice. – Let’s look at some more qualities of Godliness:

• Justice; as already mentioned, God has a holy sense of justice. And thus having godliness would require that attribute.
• Perfection; to be Godly requires perfection (we’ll get to that in more detail in a moment).
• Instruction; must be able to give (and for us, because we’re human, receive it too).

Justice: how can we be just? How can a former Spiritual outlaw, namely us, have any sense of justice; Any sense of right and wrong? Here, I would like to bring out the fact that the package does come with the label, “some on going training required”. In of ourselves naturally we can’t have justice; this is one of the questions evolutionists actually have a hard time answering (how could morality or justice form out of chaos?). However, in God (who has a perfect and incorruptible) sense of justice, we can learn. Plus, we have the greatest display of justice right in the bible; God requires death for sin, thus Jesus died for our sin.

Perfection: It’s impossible to have godliness if you are not, in fact, perfect. Something that is utterly impossible for us to accomplish. That’s why Jesus accomplished on our behalf on the cross. When he died for us, thus removing our sin and coming to live in our hearts.
Instruction: An attribute Paul had already made known that he wanted Timothy (and crew) to have. For pastors, likewise, it is important. For us, it’s important. We must be able to take instruction and be able to give Godly instruction. – As I said, Paul wanted Timothy (and us) to grow to become more Christ-like, this area is no exception. Jesus shows us the ultimate obedience to instruction when he accepts his fathers will and submits to being crucified. And he shows us how to give Godly instruction when he shows his disciples how to pray.
Godliness can, in fact, be summed up in exactly five words: Jesus Christ On The Cross.

You are Loved!

Joshua Cleveland

 

The Exam(ing)

Hello again!

Today we’re starting 1 Timothy. – This is what God gave me today in his word:

Now we know that the law is good, if one uses it lawfully, (1 Timothy 1:8)

The law is good, if you use it lawfully. There’s an interesting statement. – The law he’s referring to is the law God gave to Moses; the one which required people to be circumcised etc. In other places (see Galatians 5:11 and Romans 6:14 on this) Paul talks about how ‘he no longer preaches circumcision’. He also talks about how we’re no longer under law but grace. So then, is the law still good and valid, or is it invalid, or is it somewhere in between? Right now, it seems like Paul may be contradicting himself.

This ↑ = This ↓

understanding this, that the law is not laid down for the just but for the lawless and disobedient, for the ungodly and sinners, for the unholy and profane, for those who strike their fathers and mothers, for murderers, the sexually immoral, men who practice homosexuality, enslavers, liars, perjurers, and whatever else is contrary to sound doctrine, (1 Timothy 1:9-10)

What I’ve said before I will say again: the law has been done away with, as much as a God-man nailed to a tree is dead. The law now serves only as a guide; as an example of what we’re unable to do. Meant to lead us to Jesus, because ‘he can’ (fyi, that’s an all-inclusive statement).

Sinners, the profane, liars, homosexuals. They are the ones who put themselves under the/a law. Why? People who are living in sin, need to reassure themselves that what they’re doing is right; need to rationalize it somehow… Surprise quiz: Do you feel a need to be reassured that something you’re doing is right? Assuming you do, why? Because you feel guilty about it? Because your just not sure? Paul tells us to examine ourselves; to make sure what we’re doing or going to do isn’t sin.

Examine yourselves to see whether you are in the faith; test yourselves. Do you not realize that Christ Jesus is in you–unless, of course, you fail the test? (2 Corinthians 13:5)

And the reason we should test ourselves is because (assuming we pass the test) Christ does live in us. We are his temple, his sanctuary, the place and people he died for. – The point being this: the law is done away with for us. And to make sure we’re actually living under the law of liberty, we need to test ourselves and our motives for everything.

You are Loved!

Joshua Cleveland

 

For The Love Of Money!

Hello again!

This is what God gave me today in his word:

By this we know love, that he laid down his life for us, and we ought to lay down our lives for the brothers. But if anyone has the world’s goods and sees his brother in need, yet closes his heart against him, how does God’s love abide in him? Little children, let us not love in word or talk but in deed and in truth. (1 John 3:16-18)

If you have money and someone else doesn’t, it’s important to give. If you have two coats while your neighbor has none, and all that. – Basically, John’s telling us not to be stingy. Because if we are (stingy, that is), God’s love cannot abide in us. Which is never a good thing.

³You ask and do not receive, because you ask^(B) wrongly, to spend it on your passions. ^4(C) You adulterous people!^[c] Do you not know that friendship with the world is enmity with God?^(D) Therefore whoever wishes to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God. (James 4:1-4)

In fact, not only does being ‘stingy’ separate us from God, it brings us closer to money. Specifically, to the love of money; or the love of whatever else it is that we’re being stingy about.

 Stinginess → Not Giving → God’s Love Leaves → Thus We Become More Stingy → We Grow Closer To The World

The Devil never tries to do anything if doesn’t think he has a chance of succeeding; he always plans his attack, always maps out places he must take in order to make head way (pardon the pun about the head). Remember what was said in Genesis: The serpent was the craftiest of all animals. He is the same way with ‘earthly possessions’. – I’m not saying you need to go bankrupt in order to help someone else; if you have the means, give. For example, if you have 5 million dollars in debt, it may not be the best time to try to help someone else get out of debt. Instead, it would be better to concentrate on getting out of your own debt first, followed by helping others. Help Yourself → Help Others → We’re All Happy.

⁵Keep your life^(A) free from love of money, and^(B) be content with what you have, for he has said,^(C) ”I will never leave you nor forsake you.” (Hebrews 13:5)

But how is it exactly we can keep our lives free from the love of money? As the picture (to the right) states, money is part of life. So is income, debt, spending and the rest. We’re surrounded by the stuff! How can anyone keep from loving it?

⁶ But godliness with contentment is great gain. ⁷ For we brought nothing into the world, and we can take nothing out of it. ⁸ But if we have food and clothing, we will be content with that. ⁹ Those who want to get rich fall into temptation and a trap and into many foolish and harmful desires that plunge people into ruin and destruction. ¹⁰ For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil. Some people, eager for money, have wandered from the faith and pierced themselves with many griefs. (1 Timothy 6:6-10)

Godliness with contentment is great gain. Rather than love money, we should be content (like Paul was) with what we have. The only way to be content though, is by having “Godliness”. Which basically means having Jesus live in us. How does Jesus come to live in us? Does he just waltz in one day and say, “Oh hey there, I was wondering if you could rent me a room in your heart?” Does he try to (pardon this pun to please) buy us off? No and no. Rather: He died for us, followed by us being saved (by the latter) and his coming to live in the temple of our hearts.

The Gospel of Jesus, is that he came, died, and rose again. This is what magically makes me not love money? That is what makes me not always hope to see, “Amount of Funds: 73,505,274″ when I look at my bank account (not that I have one)?

If you remember my post about “Characteristics of the Effective and Fruitful Christian” You’ll remember that Godliness, by extension, resulted from faith in Jesus. So no, there is no magic involved; there is faith, though. Through our faith in Jesus Christ, that he died and rose again for us, God makes us more and more into the image of his son; more and more Godly. Which leads to being content in every situation, no matter how hard it may be. – When we’re like Paul in that we learn how to be content in every situation, we no longer love money. In fact, we can even give some of it to others.

The point is this: Through the power of Jesus and his death for us, we can manage to survive without the love of money (shocker, right?).

You are Loved!

Joshua Cleveland