Since you have in obedience to the truth purified your souls for a sincere love of the brethren, fervently love one another from the heart.
1 Peter 1:22
But the goal of our instruction is love from a pure heart and a good conscience and a sincere faith (1 Timothy 1:5). This is what we are aiming for.
We are called to love. The verse at the beginning indicates our problem. We cannot love without God (1 John 4:7). Why? Because our souls are corrupt without Christ.
We are called to love from a pure heart, because it is only out of pure, sincere motives, that we can truly open up and be open to others, without being hurt. It is in the place of His perfect love, with no fear, that we are able to truly be brothers. This is the mark of the authentic gospel.
And, this cannot happen without sincere, gospel faith. It simply can’t. When you walk by the Spirit you do not gratify the desires of the sinful nature (Galatians 5:16). It is by faith that we come to know and believe in God’s great love for us (1 John 4:16). It is in the secret place of Him that we are able to live.
You looked, O king, and there before you stood a large statue—an enormous, dazzling statue, awesome in appearance. The head of the statue was made of pure gold, its chest and arms of silver, its belly and thighs of bronze, its legs of iron, its feet partly of iron and partly of baked clay. While you were watching, a rock was cut out, but not by human hands. It struck the statue on its feet of iron and clay and smashed them. Then the iron, the clay, the bronze, the silver and the gold were broken to pieces at the same time and became like chaff on a threshing floor in the summer. The wind swept them away without leaving a trace. But the rock that struck the statue became a huge mountain and filled the whole earth.
This was the substance of the dream of the king. Some of the major points of what the king saw are:
A large statue. Enormous, Dazzling, Awesome
Head of pure gold
Chest and arms of silver
Belly and thighs of bronze
Legs of iron, feet partly of iron and partly of baked clay
The entire statue exists at the time of Nebuchadnezzar seeing it. It has four parts, and they all comprise the same statue.
This I say then, Walk in the Spirit, and ye shall not fulfil the lust of the flesh.
Galatians 5:16
This verse is Paul’s advice on how to avoid sin. This is the simple solution to the issue plaguing the church today.
I call it the Million Dollar Question, that is, why are new testament believers not living according to their new creation nature? We know why the world does, because it’s in ’em. But, why does a Christian?
Many in the church would like to go deeper, they honestly would. Despite modern church culture being filled with the seeds of the devil with false wisdom such as “Don’t be so heavenly minded you’re no earthly good”, or “God doesn’t want us to be perfect”, or, even the more scripturally documented lies such as “All who do evil are good in the eyes of the Lord, and He is pleased with them.” and “God isn’t going to judge.” (Malachi 2:17), despite these, many people would actually like to get free from the sin in their lives. Some people are actually still grieved by the sin that they cannot seem to get free from.
Keep thy heart with all diligence; For out of it are the issues of life.
A pupil is not above his teacher; but everyone, after he has been fully trained, will be like his teacher.
Luke 6:40
In this life of hungering and thirsting for the Lord, when will it ever be enough? Jesus answers this clear enough:
A disciple is not above his teacher, nor a slave above his master. It is enough for the disciple that he become like his teacher, and the slave like his master. If they have called the head of the house Beelzebul, how much more will they malign the members of his household!
Matthew 10:24-25
It is enough to be like him. For the slave to be like the master.
Jesus presented another parable to them, saying, The kingdom of heaven may be compared to a man who sowed good seed in his field. But while his men were sleeping, his enemy came and sowed tares among the wheat, and went away. But when the wheat sprouted and bore grain, then the tares became evident also. The slaves of the landowner came and said to him, ‘Sir, did you not sow good seed in your field? How then does it have tares?’ And he said to them, ‘An enemy has done this!’ The slaves said to him, ‘Do you want us, then, to go and gather them up?’ But he said, ‘No; for while you are gathering up the tares, you may uproot the wheat with them. ‘Allow both to grow together until the harvest; and in the time of the harvest I will say to the reapers, First gather up the tares and bind them in bundles to burn them up; but gather the wheat into my barn.
We are not in the barn yet, that one thing is for sure. So, the wheat and the tares stand side-by-side.
If anyone comes to me and does not hate his father and mother, his wife and children, his brothers and sisters—yes, even his own life—he cannot be my disciple
Luke 14:26
Jesus is the Way, the Truth, and the Life. Heaven and Earth will pass away before any one of His words passes away. Many people would like to interpret this passage into obscurity, equating it with similar, albeit, related scriptures, such as this one.
Luke 16:16
“The Law and the Prophets were proclaimed until John. Since that time, the good news of the kingdom of God is being preached, and everyone is forcing his way into it.
Music from “Ancient Cry” by Chris Harvey (www.chrisharvey.org).
I tell you the truth, we speak of what we know, and we testify to what we have seen, but still you people do not accept our testimony.
John 3:11
One of the tenets of the Gospel is faith. This can mean many things to some people, but a Bible definition goes something like this: Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen. (Hebrews 11:1). While many people claim to have a “faith”, their claims prove to be nothing at all. They are houses built upon sand (or worse), and they have no ability to stand up for the Truth.
