Hebrews 13:15 AMP

Through Him, therefore, let us constantly and at all times offer up to God a sacrifice of praise, which is the fruit of lips that thankfully acknowledge and confess and glorify His name.

Have you listened to yourself lately? What are you saying?

Are the words that you are using glorifying God and ministering grace to all those that hear you? Or do people run from you because of the negative flow coming from your heart and out of your mouth?

We are to imitate God as dear children imitate their father. God has designed each one of us to be carriers of thanksgiving and gratefulness. We should always have something to thank God about and have control over the thoughts that we allow in our minds.

Because we are recreated spiritually through our confession that Jesus is Lord we should be the most positive people that we know. God has given us the power of His Word to change our attitude from negative to positive and affect the very words that we speak.

As we submit ourselves to Him on a daily basis as we are instructed in Romans 12:1-2 we can expect that we will be changed from the way that the world thinks, speaks and acts to the way that God wants us to think, speak and act. It’s time to check out the fruit of our lips.

We say, “If the shoe fits, OUTGROW IT!” Change is the goal of every maturing Christian. In order to change we have do two things:

Identify, where we are

Move, to where we should be

The “change agent” is the Holy Spirit. He is ready, willing and able to assist us in every change that we need to make in our lives.

Zechariah 4:6 NKJV -… ‘Not by might nor by power, but by My Spirit,’ Says the LORD of hosts.’

The truth is that we can NOT make the necessary changes in our lives with out the express help of the Holy Spirit. We must totally depend on Him to show us what to change and when.

Your weaknesses are no excuse to stay weak. As long as you follow the Holy Spirit you are able to destroy every crutch that you have leaned on in the past.

God has not called you to stay where you are but to come up higher, go farther and do more today than you did yesterday. You CAN outgrow the shoe!

“Moreover, when you fast, do not be like the hypocrites, with a sad countenance. For they disfigure their faces that they may appear to men to be fasting. Assuredly, I say to you, they have their reward. But you, when you fast, anoint your head and wash your face, so that you do not appear to men to be fasting, but to your Father who is in the secret place; and your Father who sees in secret will reward you openly. – Matthew 6:16-18 NKJV

Fasting should be as common as giving and praying according to Jesus. Just study Matthew 6. He wants His body to fast. He fasted and it was a part of His lifestyle!

Fasting can be a tough subject for Christians who have never fasted because it deals with the flesh and sacrifice. There are many wrong ideas about fasting that have evolved from many wrong teachings on the subject. The bottom line in fasting is to say NO to your flesh in order to say YES to your spirit and hear from God.

We should be so accustomed to fasting that we are consistently asking the Lord, “do you want me to fast something right now?”. It should be a lifestyle with us. We should live so connected to the Lord that we are willing to give up anything at anytime in order to spend more time in fellowship with Him.

My son, forget not my law or teaching, but let your heart keep my commandments; For length of days and years of a life [worth living] and tranquility [inward and outward and continuing through old age till death], these shall they add to you. – Proverbs 3:1-2 AMP

This verse draws a distinction between “length of days” and “years of a life”. You can experience both longer days and more years in life by being a doer of the Word of God!

Time is something that becomes more valuable as we become older in this life because the time we have left compared to the the time that we have spent (or invested) becomes less the older that we get. Make sense? Hopefully as we get older we learn more about the value of time and how to be better stewards of time. We invest it rather than waste it. I like what the New Living translation says in Psalms 9:12 “Teach us to realize the brevity of life, so that we may grow in wisdom.” Our time on this earth is like a vapor. It appears for a little time and then vanishes away. (James 4:14)

We add to each day by being a doer of the Word of God. We become wiser and more efficient the more that we hear the Word and put it into practice. Doing the Word causes a supernatural multiplication of your time each day! Believe it and confess it because it is the Word! Begin to say, I am more efficient and more effective because I am a doer of the Word of God therefore I experience an increase in the amount of time I have in each day! (and never allow yourself to say, “I just don’t have enough time”)

And they said, Go to, let us build us a city and a tower, whose top may reach unto heaven; and let us make us a name, lest we be scattered abroad upon the face of the whole earth. And the LORD came down to see the city and the tower, which the children of men builded. – Genesis 11:4-5 KJV

The ones that built the Tower of Babel were in one accord alright but did not consider God at all. They were like so many of people today trying to make a name for themselves. And sad to say but this is how much of the Church world has become. Glorifying self instead of glorifying Jesus.

One indication that we have allowed ourselves to be in bondage to Babylon is that most Christian parents make the following statement to their children; “You can become whatever you want to be!” Sounds good on the outside. We all want our children to become all that they can become. BUT it is not true that they can become what THEY want to be. Each person is designed by the Master with a specific plan for their life! We are to encourage (and lead by example) our children to seek God for each step of their lives. We want to glorify Jesus in each decision that we make and break free from Babylon!

Therefore I tell you, stop being perpetually uneasy (anxious and worried) about your life, what you shall eat or what you shall drink; or about your body, what you shall put on. Is not life greater [in quality] than food, and the body [far above and more excellent] than clothing? – Matthew 6:25 AMP

The words of Jesus about worry were powerful! STOP WORRYING! This was not just a suggestion, this was a “order” from our Commander in Chief.

If you are in the Army, do you have an option to obey orders? NO. Failure to obey a general order or command in the military will result in punishment by courts-martial according to Section 892 article 92 of the Uniform Code of Military Justice (UCMJ). There is no excuse to disobey orders, period.

For far too long we have approached worry as a “character flaw” to be proud of. It is not a “character flaw” and nothing to be proud of. It is sin! …and has to be dealt with as such. A Christian is to run from sin. Identify it and run the other way.

The answer for worry is to get so full of the Word of God that there is no room at all for worry. Trust God, fill your heart with the Word, watch your words, say what the Word says and worry will be a thing of the past!…at last!

Then Jesus, full of and controlled by the Holy Spirit, returned from the Jordan and was led in [by] the [Holy] Spirit. – Luke 4:1 AMP

There are two things that are necessary in order to be constantly led by the Holy Spirit.

1. Being FULL of the Holy Spirit
2. Giving control of our lives to the Holy Spirit

Jesus did what He did in His ministry on earth because He was filled by the Holy Spirit and controlled by the Holy Spirit. He was led by the Spirit of God because He decided to be. Jesus had a will (this was real obvious in the Garden in the final hours of His life). He had to decide to be baptized by John in the Jordan river. This is also the time that He became filled with the Holy Spirit. After being baptized with the Spirit He then had to give control of Himself to the Holy Spirit so that the Holy Spirit could do His job and lead Jesus to do the Father’s will at all times.

If we desire to be led by the Spirit of God on a continual basis we must be filled with and controlled by the Holy Spirit. This requires us to yield ourselves (spirit, soul and body) to the Holy Spirit. We can think of our will as the remote control for the TV. The TV cannot choose which channel it shows at random. When we bought the TV it became ours and belongs to us. The remote control came with the TV and is used to change the channel. The TV has no control over itself. It serves us.

We need to give the “controls” of our life more and more to the Holy Spirit and get out of control! Hand Him your will and step back waiting for Him to lead.

Will you do it?

Beloved, let us love one another, for love is (springs) from God; and he who loves [his fellowmen] is begotten (born) of God and is coming [progressively] to know and understand God [to perceive and recognize and get a better and clearer knowledge of Him]. 1 John 4:7 AMP

God is love and love comes from (or springs from) God. Without God there is no love. These are absolutes, this is THE TRUTH from the Word of God.

We have weakened the power of love by our nonchalant and overuse use of the word “LOVE”. We love chocolate, cars, vacation, starbuck’s coffee, walking on the beach, sunsets, ice cream, sports teams, (and the list goes on and on)…

We say that we love things that do not have the ability to love us back. Because we use the word love so much we do not have a handle on what we really do love.

The Word of God says that we should love the Lord with all of our heart, soul and strength! (every part of our being!) He is to be Lord and Master of our universe. Then He tells us that we should love people (our neighbor, our brothers, spouse, children, family, friends, co-workers and everyone). People have the ability to love us back. (sidenote: we do not love those that only love us back but everyone that we come in contact with)

We should check up on the way that we use the word LOVE and make sure that we are not overusing it. Instead we should say “like” when we are speaking of an object that we appreciate. Guard your affections and make sure that you are only loving God and people. Begin to use the word love with a new sensitivity of the power in love and new awareness that only God and other people are worth your full affection, attention and admiration!

Love is patient and kind. Love is not jealous or boastful or proud or rude. It does not demand its own way. It is not irritable, and it keeps no record of being wronged. It does not rejoice about injustice but rejoices whenever the truth wins out. Love never gives up, never loses faith, is always hopeful, and endures through every circumstance. – 1 Corinthians 13:4-7 NLT

The love of God manifested through the children of God will transform the Church of God!

“It (love) should be preached from the pulpit until every member of the congregation becomes love conscious, until it would be impossible for them to quarrel or say unkind things to one another.” – E.W. Kenyon

We are ordered to obey the love command by the Head of the Church, Jesus Christ. It is not an option but a holy command that when Jesus obeyed it, it allowed God the Father to restore the relationship between Himself and His most prized possession: mankind.

The Church is in the restoration business. Our job is to restore man to God. But we must be living a life of extreme love in order to accomplish the task that we have been given. We must obey the “love command” to a greater extent in order to see the Harvest come in. The Harvest that Jesus spoke about in Matthew 9:38 will only come in to the degree that the Church is living according to the commandment to love each other AS Jesus has loved us. We must get busy focusing on the love command and quit focusing on the things that do not matter.

(1Peter 5:5b) Yes, all of you be submissive to one another, and be clothed with humility, for “GOD RESISTS THE PROUD, BUT GIVES GRACE TO THE HUMBLE.”

Is it any wonder why the subject of submission gets a bad rap? In today’s society of MY rights, MY likes, MY dislikes, me, me, I, I… we still do not understand that life is not all about the big “ME”! God did not create us to be self-seeking and self-serving…these are attributes of Satan. Thinking only about yourself and considering everything that everybody has done to you or not done for you will lead you to a life of loneliness and bitterness.

The more that you perform constant self-examinations on all your hurts, pains and fears, the more that you draw into yourself and put up walls between you and everyone else. Like the Word says “God Himself resists the proud”.

To submit to God means to quit looking at what God can do for you and begin doing what God has told you to do by obeying His leadership. Pride is the opposite of submission. “I deserve better”, “if only they cared about me…”, “after all that I have done for you…” – these phrases reveal the heart of someone that is in pride. It is not recognized as pride because it is masqueraded with hurt and “weakness”. God cannot help someone in the middle of a “pity party”. He can only give grace to someone that submits themselves to Him and His Word to the point that they are willing to admit fault, receive instruction and then change.

Have you noticed how easy it is for everyone in the world to blame everyone else in the world for their problems? Indications of a proud heart…

The humble and submitted heart is the one that is doing the Word in every way. Obeying God, loving people (and not demanding from them). Love is not touchy, fretful, rude…it does not take any account of any wrong done to it…it doesn’t try to get it’s way.

Submission is not bondage, but true freedom!