THE GOOD FIGHT OF FAITH

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Following his failed attempt at usurping The Throne of God and his subsequent expulsion from Heaven, the devil is determined to get back at God by endeavoring to destroy the object of God’s perfect love – the human race, created in the image and likeness of God. He is a deceiver and an accuser of the brethren. The Good News is, Jesus overcame him for us and gave us power and authority over all his powers with a promise that nothing shall by any means harm us (Luke 10:19)  

The devil knows his time is limited and so he is busy looking for opportunities to wreck havoc in our lives and drag as many as he can with him to his ultimate eternal destination – the lake of fire. That’s one reason we are compelled by the love of God to spread the Good News of salvation to everyone so all can have the opportunity to believe in Jesus and be translated from the kingdom of darkness into the Kingdom of God.

⁸ Be alert and of sober mind. Your enemy the devil prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour. ⁹ Resist him, standing firm in the faith, because you know that the family of believers throughout the world is undergoing the same kind of sufferings. – 1 Peter 5:8-9 NIV

We resist him by steadfastly holding on to what the Word of God says, for God cannot lie and doesn't go back on His promises to us, He is not a meanie who would promise us one thing and then turn around and do the opposite as the devil would have us believe. If there is anyone trustworthy, it’s our Heavenly Father who loves us eternally. The Word of God says “let God be true and every man a liar” (Romans 3:4).

The enemy cannot block what God has promised to do in and through our lives, the enemy cannot limit what God can do in our lives, but we can. Satan tries to deceive us into cutting ourselves off from God’s supply and provision by planting seeds of doubt and unbelief in our minds, for he knows once we entertain unbelief, we will effectively be limiting God and what He can do in our lives.

The story of the children of Israel is a good example, God wanted to bring them into the land that He had promised them but because of their unbelief, they limited what God wanted to do for and through them. The result: an entire generation perished in the wilderness, they short-circuited the will and plan of God for their lives. That’s how evil unbelief is…beloved let’s not entertain it regardless of how it presents itself to us.

Unbelief may manifest as “wisdom”, “concern”, “being real or practical” or any other form but whichever way it rears its ugly head, it will ultimately cast a shadow of doubt over what God has said. Thanks be to God for by His grace we are not ignorant of the enemy’s devices.

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God is not reluctant when it comes to blessing us or meeting our needs and desires. It is not about what we have done, remember we do not qualify for His blessings because of what we have done but because of what Christ has done. The enemy wants us to look at our failures as the reason why God isn’t going to bless us, but the truth is, if we are in Christ, our sins and failures have already been dealt with and Christ is our advocate with the Father when we sin and on top of that God remembers our sin no more!

Let us keep on fighting the good fight of faith by holding on to the assurance of what we hope for and by being convinced of what we cannot yet see (Hebrews 11:1). He who has promised is faithful and He will do it. 

Let’s keep on walking by faith!

         

OVERCOMING THROUGH LOVE

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38 I am convinced that nothing can ever separate us from God’s love which Christ Jesus our Lord shows us. We can’t be separated by death or life, by angels or rulers, by anything in the present or anything in the future, by forces 39 or powers in the world above or in the world below, or by anything else in creation. - Romans 8:38-39 GW

That serpent of old – the devil – knows that God loves us so much that He came down into the human race, lived among us, destroyed the works of the enemy, orchestrated and perfected our salvation and gave us authority over all the works of the enemy. Not only that, Jesus also commanded us to go and keep on doing what He did, He sent us forth exactly the same way He was sent forth (John 20:21)

Let us resist and overcome the devil by walking in love, for it is our faith that overcomes the world, it is by faith that we are able to quench all the fiery darts of the enemy and as the Word reminds us “faith works by love” (Galatians 5:6) .

The enemy doesn't want us to see, experience and believe in the love that God has for us, let’s not fall for his lies.

¹⁶ We have known and believed that God loves us. God is love. Those who live in God’s love live in God, and God lives in them. – 1 John 4:16 GW

We know and believe God loves us and we abide in that love knowing that nothing, absolutely nothing can separate us from the love of God. Jesus said:

⁹ “As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you. Now remain in my love. ¹⁰ If you keep my commands, you will remain in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commands and remain in his love. ¹¹ I have told you this so that my joy may be in you and that your joy may be complete. ¹² My command is this: Love each other as I have loved you. – John 15:9-12 NIV

Beloved, the beauty of it all is this: Jesus gives us a command and then by His grace He enables us to obey it, He doesn't leave us to depend on our own strength. He is with us always by His Spirit to strengthen us to do His will. Walking in love is walking in God, for God is Love. As we receive and believe in the love that the Father has for us, we will find ourselves touching others with that same love, for we will be willing vessels through which His love can flow to the world He died to save.

In Ephesians 3:16-19, the Apostle Paul prayed that we may be rooted and grounded in Love and that we may know the love of Christ with surpasses all knowledge so that we may be filled with fullness of God, whose very essence is Love.

God loves each one of us, no one is insignificant in His sight, so beloved, know this: you are perfectly loved by God, He hasn't stopped His blessings from flowing into your life and you shouldn't either. We can short-circuit God's blessings in our lives when we stop believing His Word. Let's not dwell on our past failures, sins and shortcomings, Christ took them all on His body on that rugged cross, never to be held against us anymore. To dwell on our past sins

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and failures is to walk in unbelief, as we will be trusting in ourselves more than trusting in God's love for us and what Jesus He has done to reconcile us to Himself. 

The enemy will try to remind us of them to discourage us and paralyze our faith but let’s not give him that opportunity. Let’s focus on Jesus and what He has done for us, not on ourselves and certainly not on our shortcomings.

Let us live our lives with the confidence of knowing that God loves us perfectly, unreservedly and eternally. God loves you – no ifs, ands or buts!   

CHRIST OUR RIGHTEOUSNESS, CHRIST OUR PEACE!

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¹² By now you should be teachers. Instead, you need someone to teach you again the first things you need to know from God’s Word. You still need milk instead of solid food. ¹³ Anyone who lives on milk cannot understand the teaching about being right with God. He is a baby. - Hebrews 5: 12-13 NIV

The milk of the Word is necessary for growth, it would not be possible to renew our minds without it and with unrenewed minds we would not be able to know the will of God and not knowing the will of God will result in us making unwise decisions which more often than not translate into sorry, miserable and defeated lives.

It is no wonder that the Apostle Peter encourages new believers to desire the pure unadulterated milk of the Word so they may grow (1 Peter 2:2). Milk represents the foundational teachings of our faith, the basics, as it were. We are to grow and go on to solid food and not be like the Hebrew believers who at the time they should have been teachers they still needed – not wanted – milk.  

Anyone who still lives on milk doesn't understand the doctrine or teaching about righteousness; now if we read the Hebrews 5, the entire chapter we will quickly see that Jesus is our High Priest after the order of Melchizedek, the King of Salem. Since the word Salem is a variation of Shalom it is interpreted as Peace, it follows that the title King of Salem is King of Peace. Jesus is called the Prince of Peace and has given us His Peace, not as the world gives, His is the true peace that passes all understanding. He is the King of Peace.

The name Melchizedek means - King of Righteousness, isn't that interesting? The Holy Spirit is highlighting these two titles of Christ (King of Peace and King of Righteousness) to us for a reason. Christ is both our Peace and our Righteousness. As our Peace, He has broken down that wall of separation that kept us away from Himself and has made us one in Him. As our Righteousness, He took all our sin that separated us from God on His body on the cross and in exchange gave us His righteousness.

We receive His gift of Peace and Righteousness by faith as we believe in Him and what He has done to reconcile us to Himself. So when we understand that we are considered righteous before God, not because of what we do but rather because of what Jesus (Our High Priest, Our King of Peace and King of Righteousness) has done, then we are well on our way to maturity in our walk with the Lord. 

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The Holy Spirit in Hebrews desired to tell them a lot more about Jesus as Melchizedek but was limited by their dullness of hearing. What causes dullness of hearing? Jesus often said, "pay attention to what you hear". Let us hearken to what the Holy Spirit is saying to us not limit what He can do in, for and through us. Let us not forget we are in His Kingdom which is Righteousness, Peace and Joy in the Holy Spirit. Blessings!

TO SEE GOD, LOOK AT JESUS

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⁷ If you know me, you will know my Father also. From now on you do know him and have seen him.” – John 14:7 NRSV

It is interesting to note that right after Jesus tells His disciples they know and have seen the Father, they aren't too sure and so they turn right back at Him and ask Him to show them the Father. The disciples must have figured if Jesus is constantly talking so highly of the Father, they’d do well to get to find out more about Him. And so this time it wasn't Peter who spoke up but Philip:

⁸ Philip said, “Lord, show us the Father, and we will be satisfied.” ⁹ Jesus replied, “Have I been with you all this time, Philip, and yet you still don’t know who I am? Anyone who has seen me has seen the Father! So why are you asking me to show him to you? - John 14:8-9 NLT

The Lord then reassures His disciples that the very fact that they have seen Him, means that they have already seen God the Father, for He and the Father are One. It’s no different for us today, to see the Father, we must look at Jesus, to know the Father we must know Jesus. Not only is Christ the express image of the Father, but He is also the only way to the Father.

¹⁸ No one has ever seen God. It is God the only Son, who is close to the Father’s heart, who has made him known. - John 1:18 NRSV

To really know God the Father, His character, His will, His heart, what He is like, we must look at Jesus. How Jesus conducted himself, how He answered His critics, how He confronted the religious leaders of the day. He always showed mercy and compassion to the hurting, He healed people, blessed them, provided for them; never causing pain but was and is always seeking to ease human suffering. Jesus came to show us who and how God the Father really is. Matthew 11:28 comes to mind.

Jesus also said:

³⁰ I and the Father are one.” – John 10:30 NIV

Jesus also said He does nothing of Himself but only what He sees the Father doing, He also pointed out that it was the Father in Him doing the work. The Jews were so offended when He called God His Father and wanted to kill Him for saying that (John 10:33), but He wasn't deterred, He knew who He was and why He came – His very essence – LOVE, compelled Him to come and redeem us and reconcile us back to Himself.

Just look at how Jesus interacted with people, He didn't go around giving sicknesses to people, on the contrary he never refused to heal anyone who came to Him. He never caused storms but when they arose He calmed them.

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He welcomed those society thought were lowlifes, He didn't shun them like the hypocritical religious leaders did. Remember when His disciples wanted to call fire down from heaven to destroy a Samaritan village for refusing to welcome Him? He rebuked His disciples and said to them "you do not know what manner of spirit you have, the son of man did not come to destroy people's lives but to save them" - Luke 9:54-56. Now that's exactly how God the Father is; He has no ill will towards anyone but desires that all should come to know the truth and be saved.

God is Love, He loves you perfectly, passionately, unreservedly and eternally! 

WANTED: TRUE WORSHIPERS, APPLICATIONS ACCEPTED IN CHRIST!

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²³ But the hour is coming, and is now here, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for the Father is seeking such people to worship him. ²⁴ God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth.” – John 4:23-24 ESV

When talking to the Samaritan woman at the well, Jesus said God is seeking out those who would worship Him in spirit and in truth. To this very day, God is still seeking true worshipers, not beggars, not spoiled brats, not even servants but worshipers. Jesus’ statement alone should make us pause and take a long good look at what true worship is and then make ourselves available to the Father as true worshipers.

God is spirit, we are spirit with soul and body; now the only way we can truly worship God is by our recreated spirit that is joined to His. As we do so, we will be able to present our bodies as living sacrifices to Him and be renewed in our souls to know what His will for us is, otherwise we will find ourselves being conformed to the pattern of this world system while deceiving ourselves into thinking that we are truly worshiping Him. Romans 12:1-2 comes to mind.

The thing is, God is Omnipresent and Omniscient, that is He is everywhere present at the same time and He is also all knowing at all times, so when Jesus says He is seeking worshipers, it is not that God doesn't know who they are or where they’re at, but by using such language, Jesus is offering us this incredible opportunity of joining the ranks of true worshipers, He is inviting us into intimacy with the Father through Him. We will do well to avail ourselves of such an awesome opportunity, the Samaritan woman did and her entire town got to hear the Good News and many believed in Jesus.

The Scriptures also say:

⁹ The Lord’s eyes scan the whole world to find those whose hearts are committed to him and to strengthen them. – 2 Chronicles 16:9a GW    

If you are in Christ, your heart is committed to Him and so you can rightfully expect Him to strengthen you to victoriously face everything the world, the flesh and the devil can throw at you. That is the reason why the Apostle Paul said, “I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me” –Phillipians 4:13

Let us make ourselves available to the Father, not just as kings and priests, not just as sons and daughter, not even as servants but as worshipers. The Father delights in us so much, He desires intimacy with us both collectively as well as individually, that’s why Jesus came – to reconcile us to God, to make us one with Himself by dealing with sin that had separated us from God.

Worship to us who are His is never an event but a way of life. Worship to us who have been redeemed by the precious blood of the spotless, blameless Lamb of God who was slain from the foundations of the world, is not limited to a weekly event we call a worship service, it has everything to do with how we live.

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We worship God as we live by faith, we worship Him as we love others, we worship God as we serve others, we worship Him as we faithfully use our gifts and talents to bless others. We worship God as we live the abundant life He provided for us, we worship Him as we walk in the good works that He has already prepared for us (Ephesians 2:10). And the best part is, He graciously enables us to do all these things, for it is He who works in us both to do and to will for His good pleasure (Philippians 2:13)

Worship Him today and everyday! 

SHUN UNBELIEF, DON’T LIMIT GOD

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God delivered the nation of Israel out of Egypt with an awesome display of power and glory, Psalm 105 summarizes the entire account beautifully, here is just a part of it:

³⁷ He brought them forth also with silver and gold: and there was not one feeble person among their tribes.

³⁸ Egypt was glad when they departed: for the fear of them fell upon them.

³⁹ He spread a cloud for a covering; and fire to give light in the night.

⁴⁰ The people asked, and he brought quails, and satisfied them with the bread of heaven.

⁴¹ He opened the rock, and the waters gushed out; they ran in the dry places like a river.

⁴² For he remembered his holy promise, and Abraham his servant. – Psalm 105:37-45 KJV

It was God’s plan and desire to bring them all into the land He had promised Abraham, they were His covenant people, but as we all know that is not what happened. It wasn’t God’s will that an entire generation of those that came out of Egypt should perish in the desert, He did not bring them out of slavery to annihilate them in the wilderness,  but sadly, an entire generation didn’t make it to the promised land.

It wasn’t God’s fault, it wasn’t God’s inability to bring them into the land He had promised Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, no they perished because of their unbelief, nothing else. That’s how powerful  – in the negative sense, unbelief is .

⁵ Though you already know all this, I want to remind you that the Lord at one time delivered his people out of Egypt, but later destroyed those who did not believe. – Jude 1:5 NIV

Our Lord was often amazed, not positively, by the the unbelief He encountered even from His disciples, remember the time He went to His own town and couldn't do many miracles there because of their unbelief? You see beloved, unbelief is essentially calling God a liar, believe me, you don’t want to be guilty of that crime, I know I don’t! Unbelief limits God, it ties His hands so to speak, the Israelites were guilty of doing just that and it cost them an extra 40 years of wandering in the desert.

⁴¹ Yes, again and again they tempted God,
And limited the Holy One of Israel. – Psalm 78:41 NKJV   

God always means what He says and says what He means, He is truth personified, there is no falsehood in Him, all His promises to us are yes and amen in and through Christ. We have no reason whatsoever to doubt God’s Word, it is the enemy of our souls who is constantly trying to get us to doubt God’s promises, if not His promises then His willingness to grant them to US.

You know what, if the enemy can’t get you to doubt God’s promises to you, He’ll get you to disqualify yourself from receiving from God by pointing you to your failures and shortcoming insinuating that because of them you do not

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qualify to receive anything from God. Beloved, pay that old serpent no attention, you have been redeemed by the blood of the Lamb of God, you are the righteousness of God in Christ, all the promises of God are yours not because of your performance but because of Christ’s performance. He did all the work, you repeat the benefits, that the New Covenant in a nutshell.

God calls unbelief evil, so beloved we will do well  to shun all manner of evil, beginning with unbelief. The Lord's command to us today saying: "Do not be unbelieving, but believing" - John 20:27 

Let's obey Him by choosing to believe God today!

DEPEND ON HIM ALONE

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Behold, I stand at the door and knock; if anyone hears and listens to and heeds My voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and will eat with him, and he [will eat] with Me. - Revelation 3:20 AMP

This verse is part of a message that was given by the Head of the Church – Jesus Christ our Lord to the Church at Laodicea. This church had slowly drifted away from communion with and dependence on Christ. The believers there had been deceived into believing that through their own efforts they were self-sufficient in every aspect. That attitude of independence from Christ led them down the path of indifference and lukewarmness. They figured they had it all, they had said of themselves “we have need of nothing” (Revelation 3:17)

The problem was not so much their claims of having it all and needing nothing, it was more to do with the fact that they trusted in their own efforts more than they did in Christ’s ability and provision. In their perceived self-sufficiency, they had lost their child-like faith and the total dependence on Christ that they had when they first believed. They had departed from the simplicity that is in Christ.   

Now, before we pharisaically look down our noses at these Laodicean believers, let’s take stock of our own individual as well as collective situations. Is Christ front and center in our lives or are we now trusting in some other “deeper revelations” or “special” anointings? Are we fully trusting Jesus or have we declared independence from Him? Are we busy trying to impress God with our performance in hopes of earning brownie points with Him? Are we flowing with or frustrating the grace of God in our lives? 

Christ is calling us back to communion and dependence on our First Love – Him! There is no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus (Romans 8:1) ; condemnation will only serve to heap guilt on us and cause us to drift even farther away from Him who loved us and gave Himself for us. The Holy Spirit is continually pointing us back to Christ and He is always reminding us that we are the righteousness of God in Him. So, when you hear Him knocking on the door of your heart (you are one with Him in spirit already), let Him in and He will reveal His heart to you and as you behold Him you will be transformed into His likeness.

The Lord loves us with an everlasting love and desires to fellowship with us, to share His heart with us as we share ours with Him. God doesn't want you to lean on your own understanding for when you do so, you limit Him, you shut Him out, essentially telling Him we don’t need Him, we can handle stuff on our own; now that’s a recipe for one wretched, miserable sorry life void of the love, power and testimony of Jesus.

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Beloved, let's stop relying on our own efforts and instead, let's depend on Christ for everything. In all our ways let's trust Him who is the Author and Finisher of our faith. He is the vine, we are the branches and without Him we can do nothing, but through Him we can do all things.

Let's heed this call back to intimacy with the Savior, Lord and Lover of our souls! Amen! 

NOT IGNORANT OF HIS DEVICES

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⁹ For to this end I also wrote, that I might put you to the test, whether you are obedient in all things. ¹⁰ Now whom you forgive anything, I also forgive. For if indeed I have forgiven anything, I have forgiven that one for your sakes in the presence of Christ, ¹¹ lest Satan should take advantage of us; for we are not ignorant of his devices. – 2 Corinthians 2:9-11 NKJV

Apostle Paul was instructing the Corinthian believers to forgive a brother who had obviously sinned and hurt them. He is letting them know that their unwillingness to forgive the brother would be to their own disadvantage as the enemy would use that situation to gain inroads into their lives and take advantage of them. The Apostle so desired to see the Corinthian believers walking in obedience in all things and thereby denying the enemy room to operate in their lives.

Beloved, the devil is out to deceive us, he goes around like a roaring lion seeking whom he may devour (1 Peter 5:8). He seeks to plant seeds of doubt and unbelief concerning what God has said of us, to us and about us in His Word. The enemy knows that once you are in unbelief you cannot enter the rest that God has for you (Hebrews 4:10-11) and if you aren't resting in God and quietly trusting Him and His Word, chances are, you are toiling in your own strength, trusting in yourself, leaning on your own understanding; walking in doubt and unbelief, effectively short-circuiting God’s grace from flowing in the areas of need in your life.

We wrestle not against flesh and blood but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of darkness and against spiritual wickedness in high places (Ephesians 6:12). The question is, how is this “wrestling” done? We don’t somehow go into the “heavenly realms” and literally wrestle these powers, obviously, so how do we do spiritual battle? We do battle from our vantage position of victory in Christ, that’s how:

³ For though we walk in the flesh, we do not war according to the flesh. ⁴ For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal but mighty in God for pulling down strongholds, ⁵ casting down arguments and every high thing that exalts itself against the knowledge of God, bringing every thought into captivity to the obedience of Christ – 2 Corinthians 10:3-5 NKJV

The battlefield is in our minds, that’s where the enemy seeks to erect strongholds of deception, doubt and unbelief. Using the armor of God that we have on (Ephesians 6:10-18), we wrestle with every thought the enemy bombards our minds with, we bring every thought to align itself with the Word of God – Christ. Every battle you face, you either win it or lose it first in your mind and we have absolutely no excuse to lose for the Greater One is in us.

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We quench the enemy’s fiery darts with the shield of faith; the only fight we are to fight is the good fight of faith and that is nothing less than standing our ground believing and holding onto God’s Word over the devil’s lies. 

To walk in victory, we must believe what God has given us and what He says about us; we have been given authority to trample on all the powers of the enemy and there's nothing that can harm us. We are the righteousness of God in Christ and that we are seated with Him in heavenly places in the Spirit far above all principalities and powers.  and that our Father loves us eternally and unconditionally. 

Reject every thought that is trying to get you to doubt God’s Word, reject the enemy’s attempts to get you to start fretting over stuff. 

Fix your eyes on Jesus, your King and Redeemer knowing this: He loves showing Himself strong on your behalf, every single time!    

THE WORD AND THE BLOOD

³ You are already clean because of the word I have spoken to you. – John 15:3 NIV

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The Lord spoke these words to His disciples after He had washed their feet and told them that they were clean but not all of them (John 13:10-11) for He knew what Judas was up to.

According to Luke 22:3-6, Judas Iscariot had already conspired with the Jewish religious leaders to betray Jesus, he was now looking for an opportune time, so he was the only one who wasn't clean even though he too had heard the message of Christ, just as much as the other disciples.

If we have set our hearts on our own ways, we may hear God’s Word but it won’t profit us, Judas Iscariot demonstrates this fact very well. Sadly, even after coming to his senses instead of repenting and asking God to forgive him, he allows his guilt to drive him to suicide. Regardless of how much we think we've messed up, let’s not wallow in guilt, shame or condemnation, Jesus took our sins, all of them on His body on the cross once and for all, let’s turn to Him, to His Word and His cleansing Blood.

The thing is, Holy Spirit will not override our will, He’ll gently nudge us, He’ll quietly tug at our hearts, He’ll use multiple ways and means to get us to hear Him but He won’t beat us into submission and obedience. If God were to intervene every time we decided to do our own thing, He would've done so in Eden just before Adam and Eve ate from the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. He didn't intervene then, He is not going to intervene now.

Jesus is the Word of God that became flesh (John 1:1), He is also the Way, the Truth and the Life (John 14:6). He is also the Light of the World, God calls Himself Light too… (1 John 5-7) The Psalmist was inspired to see the Word of God as a lamp and a light (Psalm 119:105) and rightly so.

As we continue to live according to the revelation and understanding we receive from the Word of God, we are being cleansed by blood of Jesus. The more we order our lives according to the light of the Word that we have, the more we are being cleansed and since we are in Christ – the Light, we can confidently expect His blood to continually cleanse us.

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The Word of God is Truth and Truth is what sanctifies us. Jesus who is both the Word and the Truth, while praying for His disciples and for all of us who would believe in Him later, said:

         ¹⁷ Sanctify them by the truth; your word is truth. – John 17:17 NIV

Since we are sanctified by God’s Word, we’d do well to acquaint ourselves with it; the Holy Spirit will speak to us, quickening the Word in our spirits. That’s how the Lord leads us in paths of righteousness for His name’s sake.     

Beloved, rest assured, you hear and know His voice because you are His, and He knows you (John 10:27). His voice conveys His Word to us, it is never condemning nor is it accusing, on the contrary it always affirms our identity and our acceptance in and by Him, even when He is rebuking or correcting us. He loves us eternally, oh yes, He does! 

SERVING CHRIST AND FOLLOWING HIM

²⁶ Whoever serves me must follow me. Then my servant will be with me everywhere I am. My Father will honor anyone who serves me. – John 12:26 NCV

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This is for everyone who believes in Jesus as their Lord and Savior. By confessing Jesus as Lord, we are willingly submitting ourselves to Him. He is now the Master of our lives and we are His servants and as servants we do nothing but the Master’s will and bidding.

Our Lord gives us very clear instructions - well it's a command actually. If we serve Him, then we must follow Him. We cannot claim to serve Him while going our own way, we cannot claim to serve Him while doing our own thing, we cannot claim to serve Him being full of me, myself and I. To serve Him, we must first be known by Him and know Him for ourselves, we must first establish that relationship and the Good News is, by the perfect sacrifice of Himself on that rugged cross that took away our sin, He has made it possible for us to know Him and be known, accepted and reconciled to Himself.

Now, you’ll notice that little word “must” in this translation? Yeah, that means it’s not an option nor is it a suggestion, it is imperative, there is no way around it, as His servants we MUST follow Him. The implication here is, anyone who doesn't follow Him is not His servant, regardless of any claims they might make. Is it any wonder Jesus said many would come to Him in that day saying we did this and that in your name but He’ll say to them “I never knew you”.  Let’s read that passage:

²² On that day many will say to me, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and cast out demons in your name, and do many deeds of power in your name?’ ²³ Then I will declare to them, ‘I never knew you; go away from me, you evildoers.’ – Matthew 7:22 NRSV

That phrase, “I never knew you” implies that these people did not start out in a relationship with the Lord, contrary to what many think. He didn't know them right from the beginning of their “ministries” when they prophesied and cast out demons and did all that ministry stuff in His Name. So it is quite possible to do all that and still not “know” Jesus, how tragic is that. The lesson here is: don’t be fazed by supernatural manifestations, check the fruit, I could go on and on but I digress…

The reason a servant must follow the master is simply so that they are in the master’s presence and ready to serve Him whenever needed. Now how do we follow the Lord Jesus, our Master? We follow Him by obeying His Word, we follow Him by walking in the Spirit and as we do, the Fruit of the Spirit will be evident in our lives, we will be walking in love towards others and drawing them and pointing them to Christ, not to ourselves. Strife, envy, jealousy, suspicion and  selfish ambition will have no place in us.

The Father appreciates everyone who serves Christ, He honors His servants and that honor manifests in different forms, from meeting all our needs to granting us the desires of our hearts. The honor this world has to offer pales in comparison to the honor that the Father bestows on those who willingly serve Him out of love and submission to Christ.

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We serve God by offering ourselves to be used as His vehicle for reaching out to others with the Good News of Salvation that is through Christ alone, we serve Him as we humbly submit to the Holy Spirit and allow Him to minister and bless others as He pleases through us by His Gifts.

May the grace of God enable us to faithfully serve and follow Christ, our Lord and Master today and everyday. Amen!