Jesus is Alpha and Omega Ministries Presents the Healthy Family Walk!!!

What is a Healthy Family Walk?

The Healthy Family Walk is the walk that allows families to walk as a united front to dispel the attacks of the immoral society that seek to invade their homes. It is about spiritual leaders passing on godly values to the next generation. The Healthy Family Walk is a walkathon in support of a larger initiative to fortify families and bring them together so that they are powerful and productive. Proceeds from the Healthy Family Walk will be used to help support Jesus is Alpha and Omega Ministries’ (JAOM) Healthy Family Initiative, which seeks to pass on the values necessary to build powerful families that build strong communities.

Who Participates?

Men, women, and children are encouraged to participate as family teams, sponsors, volunteers, and walkers. Whether they walk as individuals or as part of a team, walkers are encouraged to ask friends, family, business associates, and others to sponsor them by making a donation to Jesus is Alpha and Omega Ministries. Others are encouraged to volunteer their time to register walkers, staff checkpoints, and offer refreshments.

Teams represent families, churches, companies, unions, schools, associations, clubs, and can range from five members or more.

Why Join the Healthy Family Walk?

The year 2012 will mark the inaugural year that Christians from all walks of life will come together in a spirit of unity to fortify families through JAOM’s Healthy Family Walk. We believe that more than a hundred families will participate in this “first of its kind” family walkathon.

When you and your team participate in the Healthy Family Walk, you will not only be contributing to history, but you will also become a co-laborer in Christ. The Healthy Family Initiative of JAOM needs your team’s assistance to help fortify families that have been fractured and divided by opposing worldviews, depression, and lack of godly empowerment. Participating means that you are aware of the spiritual decay that is devastating our families and seek to join a united front to defeat it.

How do I give?
If you choose to walk as an individual, the registration fee is $100, attainable through as many pledges as necessary. Teams, whether they be families, co-workers, friends, or colleagues, are in groups of a minimum of 5, and may register at $500. Individuals raising over $200 will qualify for a free t-shirt, where teams of 10, 15, or 20 that raise $2,000, $3,000, or $4,000 respectively as collectives will qualify for special prizes. To qualify for these prizes, your pledges must be received no later than, Sunday, May 13, 2012. Alternatively, you may simply donate toward the cost of the Healthy Family Walk or our Healthy Family Initiative. All monies toward the Healthy Family Walk itself are due by Friday, May 25, 2012

In America, there is a highly advanced attack on the family. Divorce rates are at an all-time high and many children are growing up in single-parent households where the dysfunction is so profound that many alternative family models are being sought. Other attacks, such as violence in schools, drug abuse, sexual immorality, homosexuality, and economic hardship only make the problem more profound. While there are many questions and problems, the solution appears to be much more difficult to comprehend. Only the knowledge of and connection to Jesus Christ can provide all the appropriate answers to these questions which cause emotional anguish to so many people. Therefore, it is imperative that we convey this message to a dying world.

There are many noble causes that raise thousands or millions of dollars that never tackle the root of an issue. Please prayerfully consider teaming up with JAOM’s Healthy Family Walk to make an impact in the lives of family members both in time and for eternity.

Teaming up with JAOM’s Healthy Family Walk is an excellent way to help reverse the attack on American families! Please make the prayerful consideration to walk to unify families against these immoral times for the Kingdom of God!

For more information, click here:

http://jaom.org/?p=721

Walking With God Chapter I, Part VIII (Finale)

Greetings folks:

This week we will wrap up our current unit with the reconciliation of the Galatians 6:1 principle with the Matthew 28:17 principle. We understand that God wants His Image and Likeness propagated. And that He passes down this Power for us to this in the context of friendship and love. This produces the need to love God with all of our hearts and very being…and in-turn love our neighbors. In other words, we cannot propagate God’s Image and Likeness (Genesis 1:26, 28), if we ourselves aren’t giving the selfless love first to Him and to those around us. To do this appropriately, we must also give reproof, as the Word of God is designed to both uplift and convict. So we must do so in a spirit of gentleness (also part of the Fruit of the Spirit we use to love one another, Galatians 5:22-23). We get unmet expectation levels, and “surprise circumstances” (they at least surprise us when our connection with God isn’t as tight as needs to be), and this can kill our desire to fellowship with God and give Him the time and love with Him He desires out of us. And when this becomes part of the behavior pattern we fall into humanism…either secular or religious. Now understand this…humanism, especially religious humanism, is not reflective (in of itself) of whether or not someone is saved, but rather, how empowered they are (see the next unit). Humanism essentially is, “Because of ‘xyz’ that happened or didn’t happened to me, I’m going to trust in ‘abc’ over God.” Can humanists be unsaved? Yes. But it is also reflective of a the power source the person is operating out of. The fundamental issue of these alternative power sources is that when the appropriate God of the Bible is removed from the picture, and is substituted out as the fellowship and power source, it is impossible to give appropriate reproof in love, or give love to others. And laying one’s life down for their friends (John 15:13) is also out of the window. Keep this and the other teachings in mind, and when you find yourself in an alternate power source, confess, get forgiveness, repent, and get BACK IN THE SPIRIT. Next week we’ll start a new unit on the nature of Salvation. Have a good week folks!

Walking With God Chapter I, Part VII

Greetings folks:

Last week we went over a set of case studies for different power sources. The last case study involved a recurring character and his young mentee. We had five answers and we wanted to discuss which one was correct. In case you do not remember:

“So you had that great marketing idea that you could launch man…weren’t you like a mathematician? You could use that stuff and get at these youth…get into these schools. What do you think?” The younger guy sighs and says, “Man I just have so much to do here…sometimes it feels like if I don’t know it, it won’t get done.” Our friend is kind of stunned. He’s never heard his young friend talk like that before. He knows he needs to connect to the Spirit for the next thing he says and do it just right for our friend. <> What do you think our friend should say?


A. “Well do what you have to do that is that hard? You don’t do anything here!”
B. “I think you’re just afraid to move on out on your faith.”
C. “It won’t get done? How little faith do you have? You need to tighten up on that! You’ll never grow with that attitude”
D. “Alright man, let’s sit down and lay out what you got over here and make sure we can make sure you get your stuff established. I’ll call in the rest of the team and spread this weight around if you like.
E. None of the above.

So let’s look at how effective all the answers are:

A. A religious humanistic response. 1 Corinthians 12 says that everyone has a role in the Body of Christ and none of those roles are inconsequential.

B. Also pretty religiously humanistic. Who’s to say that the young man is afraid to move out on his faith. And even if that’s true, language like this isn’t going to help. Also, the Word of God is designed to uplift and convict, and if our words are to reflect the Word of God, they must do the same.

C. Is even worse. Perhaps the young man should have more trust in God. But remember he’s early in his spiritual walk. And as a wise man once told me, “You don’t get on a person for not bringing home a paycheck when they are in diapers”.

D. This seems like the Kingdom right? Actually, it’s not. Think about this. Our friend didn’t even take the time to figure out what all he was doing before taking the work off of him. We in the Kingdom are supposed to always be on offense, but we are also always supposed to have our prep work done (through genuine prayer for those in our lives and subsequent insight given by the Holy Spirit). By pre-emptively taking work away from his mentee, which may actually go against God’s Will. We who are spiritual must lift up a brother in a fault in gentleness (Galatians 6:1), but must also carry our own load (Galatians 6:4).

E. So none of the above? Well I’m sure you’ve figured that out. Here is a response from my friend Brenda….

“I don't think any of the answers suffice, especially if he is a mentor. He should lift up his pupil, and offer his assistance in helping his young friend carve out a ministry to reach young folk."

Good work Brenda. If he’s that concerned about it, then he must make genuine provision to help him perform his tasks. Because he has his role in God’s vision for his mentee. Remember that there is an overall vision for God’s Kingdom, and each ministry seeking to advance it has an individual vision. And furthermore, we also have our own visions and our roles in our own visions. We must give our all for our brothers and sisters in Christ (as fitting to the Lord), for “Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13, ESV).

I hope you enjoyed these case studies. Next week we will go into the reconciliation of the Galatians 6:1 principle and the Matthew 28:17 principle.

Walking With God Chapter I, Part VI

03/19/2012

Greetings folks:

Last week we talked about three fundamentals that distinguished the Kingdom from other power sources. This week I want to talk about a fundamental of all power sources, and that’s the transfer of power. If everyone is on the same page, something will transfer, good or bad. Jesus’ Prayer, The Lord’s Prayer from Matthew 6, is Jesus’ primary desire, “Thy Kingdom Come, on Earth, as it is in Heaven”. Both Christ and the Father wish to see image and likeness passed on. Well, image and likeness get passed on to the next generation whether it’s the Kingdom or not (unless SOMEone plugs into Christ and breaks this cycle). Kingdom-driven empowerment, however, is always love-mediated. If there’s no love, there’s no empowerment. Let’s look at some case studies.

Example 1: Let’s say there’s this guy who claims Christ. And he goes to a church and he’s getting the Word every Sunday and participates in a men’s group one a month. He comes across a friend of his, who has been saved for 10 years already. The friend asks him, “Hey man, how’s it going? It’s been a while I missed ya! I’ve been busy man, going over and taking care of my mother; you know she hasn’t been feeling well. You know my daughter has been kind of sad since that guy dumped her. You remember the one I was telling you about. So I’ve been comforting her. In my Word deep too; I’m so glad I have God in my business. What’s new with you?” The first guy tells him, “Well you missed a good Word man; you should really come to church more often. There’s no excuse man; we have to connect to God daily.”

So, who’s in the Kingdom, and who is the religious humanist? Easy one, right? God is omnipresent. Abram didn’t set up contact points with God within a church. He did it as he moved so he could stay connected to God. The connection was more important…and it eventually paid off with the Abrahamic covenant. While church is nice, and the babe probably needs to be there, God will judge us contingent on how genuine our connection is with Him (so that we can go do His Work), NOT how often we are in church.

Example 2: Let’s use the second guy from Example 1 again. On top of being saved, he’s married as well (only relevant for this example). He has a buddy at work who wants to go out with him. They go out to a pool hall and shoot some pool. The work buddy notices that a woman is checking out his boy. “Say man, that chick is fine! You should holla at her!” Our friend kind of shrugs him off, saying, “Nah man you need to focus on this here game ‘cuz I’m pickin’ you apart!” The work buddy comes around and whispers, “Man I know you and your wife been kind of fussing lately; she don’t look at you right. Ol gurl is lookin’ at you the right way. Look man; you bailed me out at work a few times. Let me bail you out. I’ll pay for you to use the Super 8 ‘cross the street if you can get at her, and I’ll cover for you.” Our friend puts down his pool cue and looks at his work buddy. “Come on man; this got to be the most disrespect thing you’ve ever told me. Look man; my marriage ain’t perfect but it’s doing what God wants it to do. It also got a purpose. I’m gonna say this once; don’t ever come at me like that again.” The work buddy, taken aback, asks, “Why you had to pull God into this?” Our friend says, “Because I was on my way to hell but God had other plans. Maybe God can have some for you if you turn away from this foolishness.”

Kind of obvious again, right? Our friend has a secularized work buddy…don’t wanna hear about God. But while our friend was upset, he didn’t attack the guy moreover as he attacked the mindset/worldview he had. He may not get any immediate fruit from it, but that may very well be in work buddy’s head 2 and 3 days later.

Last example:
Our friend is involved in his church. He does some of the finance budget balancing and they recently let on a new staff member. Younger guy who is single with no kids. Enthused about the Lord but not a lot of his own stuff established so that he could have his own ministry to edify the Body. Our friend has established a solid friendship with the younger man, and the younger man looks up to our friend as a big brother figure. Our friend goes to the younger guy and asks him, “So you had that great marketing idea that you could launch man…weren’t you like a mathematician? You could use that stuff and get at these youth…get into these schools. What do you think?” The younger guy sighs and says, “Man I just have so much to do here…sometimes it feels like if I don’t know it, it won’t get done.” Our friend is kind of stunned. He’s never heard his young friend talk like that before. He knows he needs to connect to the Spirit for the next thing he says and do it just right for our friend. <> What do you think our friend should say?

A. “Well do what you have to do that is that hard? You don’t do anything here!”
B. “I think you’re just afraid to move on out on your faith.”
C. “It won’t get done? How little faith do you have? You need to tighten up on that! You’ll never grow with that attitude”
D. “Alright man, let’s sit down and lay out what you got over here and make sure we can make sure you get your stuff established. I’ll call in the rest of the team and spread this weight around if you like.
E. None of the above.

Answer away in the comments. We’ll go over all FIVE answers next week. Have a good week folks!

Walking With God Chapter I, Part V

Greetings folks:

Last week I discussed the different types of power sources and how they contrast from one another. So we all understand that God wants uninterrupted fellowship with us. This is so that the power (His Power) may flow freely through us and do His intended Work for us. I’ve also discussed how all have sinned and thus fallen short of the glory of God (Romans 3:23), and how we can confess our sins and receive forgiveness (1 John 1:9) in order to get back tight with Him (reconciliation and restoration). I’ve even taken some time in discussing the practicality of recognizing when we are faded away from God and confessing and repenting in an expeditious manner.

Well today, I wanted to take a look at the danger of religious humanism, at least from the perspective of those who are presenting another “gospel” other than the one as laid out in the Word. God is a God of Standards, Order, and Boundaries (Exodus 20:4-18, 1 Corinthians 11:3, Galatians 5:19-23; Ephesians 5:18-6:10), and He wants our lights to so shine that God is Glorfied…in other words, He (1) wants us to spread His Image and Likeness (Genesis 1, particularly 1:29), and He wants people to see His Son (Image, Hebrews 1:3) when they bump into us.

But what happens when those in religious humanism are not doing these but are still perceived as “representing God”? Remember that the Word is designed for teaching and reproof (2 Timothy 3:16-17). But there are three fundamental things that must be genuine to make God “practical” and emotionally desirable.

(1) The “First and Greatest Commandment” (Matthew 22:35-39): Jesus tells us that loving God with everything that we have is the first and greatest commandment. While this Commandment not necessarily designed to replace the Law of Moses, it is designed to supersede it. When we do this, we get Grace as opposed to bumping into the Law. The other Commandment that is like it, loving thy neighbor as thy own flesh is also very important. They are alike because it starts with loving God which will capacitate us to love our neighbor unconditionally as well. It’s when we fall out of this that we get grumpy with folks and disenfranchise them from the things of God (if they are not already well-rooted). We only FALL out of love when we are too wounded to have the courage to love, whether that be love for God or love from others. If we act like this, visibly in humanism because we want to justify behavior patterns, towards someone with question marks about God, we don’t give that person the right answers and God is not Glorified through us.

(2) “Only useful for building up” (Ephesians 4:29): The entire passage is Ephesians 4:25-32 and it is also very important as well. We must watch what we say because (1) from the outflow of the heart so the mouth speaks (Matthew 12:34) and (2) we will have to give account for our careless words at judgment time (Matthew 12:36). But even more practically, the passage of Ephesians 4:25-32 tells us to also “not grieve the Holy Spirit” and “not let the sun go down on our anger, giving Satan a foothold”. Give Satan a foothold? How? Well if we are giving things that aren’t useful for building up, then we aren’t in Kingdom power system. After all, when have we ever seen God use fluff, let alone something that deliberately bashed someone for the sake of bashing them? So if God doesn’t do that, and we do, we misrepresent Him, hurt others, and again, do not Glorify Him.

(3) “Greater love hath no man than this, than a man lay his life down for his friends (John 15:13): A wise man once told me, “Me and God are best friends.” Some of you have either met or heard of this man, but that’s not my point. My point is that Jesus said that we may put ourselves to the side for the sake of our fellow man. Coupled to Matthew 22:35-39 and Galatians 6:4, we fulfilled the Law of Christ. And as Christ is God, then loving like Him allows us to represent God. Should you go get nailed to a cross and die? Well no; John 3:16-18 isn’t talking about you, now is it? LOL But that being said, selflessness is next to Godliness. And if we can’t do this, then we aren’t being Godly.

But hey, can’t I just do these things through my deeds and be alright? Well, other than God not being mocked (Galatians 6:7), we also will have to give an account for our motives as well as our deeds at judgment time (1 Corinthians 4:5 for motives, 1 Corinthians 3:10-15 for deeds). So we have to be genuine in this. God is a Holy God through and through, and there’s no holiness without genuineness. Next week I’ll give some (purely hypothetical) case studies on how this operates, perhaps a little interactiveness too. Have a good week, folks!

Walking With God Chapter I, Part IV

Greetings folks:

Last week I went over the different power sources. Now I’m going to go over how each source orients us into walking with God. Let me just start by saying that these power sources don’t necessarily determine whether or not we go to Heaven, they just determine how we are growing in relation to God and how we are growing spiritually (see next unit). These are just different power sources. There’s one power source left over, and THAT one may be determinant of Salvation, but I’m not going to discuss that one.

Remember when I said that both forms of humanism use certain techniques to justify behavior patterns? Well if you look at the behavior pattern, you’ll find the power source. Let’s take a look.

In secular humanism, remember that God has been removed from the equation and that people are trying to fix their flaws in an earthly system. When this doesn’t work, they get depressed and move into circles that justify their behavior patterns. Think about the man who is fussing with his wife. They are both saved but the wife wants him to step up in his masculinity and he’s shrinking away from the task. He’ll find comfort in the arms of a group that will tell him his wife is wrong, or he’ll just go find himself an extramarital affair. But that would be the actions to justify behavior patterns…not necessarily the behavior patterns. This man (not an actual man) is clearly running away from God’s Call to him as a husband/spiritual household leader to justify the things he’s not doing right (in his mind). And once he gets in deep with his other sources, he’ll find sources to justify that behavior. It’s a very interesting application of the fruit of the flesh (Galatians 5:19-21). Spirit and flesh can’t be in the same place; they will clash. This is the choice that the flesh flees from the Spirit (of God) and seeks to do it’s own thing. The prime flaw in this is that people operating out of this power source will be temporal, and thus, always have some sort of worry or “not-peace”.

The Kingdom says that we are no good and we need a Savior (thank God we have one [John 3:16-18], amIrite?]). I’m doing this one first because if you asked someone in the third power source, they’d tell you Kingdom (although it’d be a throwed idea of the “Kingdom”). In this idea, all things come from God. And there’s an innate set of understandings that (1) God loves us no matter what (2) He’s the best thing for us and (3) There is no greater source of authority than Him. The Fruit of the Spirit is Love, Joy, Peace, Long-Suffering, Kindness, Meekness, Self-Control (Galatians 5:22-23)…all these are within God’s Standards. Spirit and flesh clash…and this is the choice that involves the Spirit booting fleshly things out. This is where that Peace of God (Philippians 4:7) comes over us and supercedes all understanding (like humanism). There’s an innate genuineness in the Kingdom Power Source. While the King is perfect, the Kingdom itself is eternally working toward His Ideal Model but you could take any snapshot in time and see flaws. The primary difference between this and the secular humanism is that submission to God leads to the “fixing” of the flaws (which themselves play a role in our need for a Savior both from damnation and from ourselves [Philippians 2:12]).

Religious humanism is arguably the most complex of the three power sources. Why? Because it talks about God. Well, sort of. There’s nothing about the God of the Bible necessarily because God is the First and the Last and there is no other God beside him (Isaiah 43:10, 44:6). And if we have an immutable God of the Bible, a God that can change to justify behavior patterns is a false God. God has a set of Standards as laid out in Exodus 20:4-18, but there are also a set of essential doctrines (later study) that provide boundaries for the Kingdom and who God is. Again, people are justifying their behavior patterns, but they throw a God on it to divinate them. The issue with this is, is that these are the same people going out and evangelizing into false faith systems and leave the lost with more question marks than they had before. Or, they leave them with exclamation points. How? By using the Word to wound as opposed to uplift and teach (Galatians 6:1, Ephesians 4:29, 2 Timothy 3:16-17). This disenfranchises folks to anything with “God” attached to it and drives them into secular humanism or some other religious humanism that justifies their behavior pattern.

Walking With God Chapter I, Part III

This week we get back on track with walking with God…and more specifically, different types of power sources. I want to explain some things first though.

First off, why is the knowledge of different power sources important?

1) We have the mind of Christ (1 Corinthians 2:15-16). This essentially means that God has given us the ability (although it has to be grown into) to discern all things (including people around us). Why do we want to do this? When we figure out what’s going on we can show them the love, teaching, and reproof necessary specific to them, to show God to them so that God may be glorified and the person be…encouraged.
2) Piggybacking off of number 1, all things that they do will flow from the power source they come from. Think about it. The fruit (or works) of the flesh are adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lewdness, idolatry, sorcery, hatred, contentions, jealousies, outbursts of wrath, selfish ambitions, dissensions, heresies, envy, murders,[drunkenness, revelries, and the like (Galatians 5:19-21, KJV) while the fruit (or works) of the Spirit love, joy, peace, long-suffering, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control (Galatians 5:22-23). See the stark contrast between Spirit and flesh?

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Why human reasoning? Because all those things seem pretty humanistic when we think about it. Every time someone in the Bible (or throughout history) was left to their own devices some sort of humanism came up. Well there are two essential kinds of human reasoning, and they are as follows:

Secular humanism: Secular humanism is a mindset of human reasoning that disallows God to show up in the business. They don’t desire God, but view humanity as “basically good” but has to work up a few flaws. What’s the flaw in this system? When someone goes back and works through the same set of flaws over and over again in humanism, they find themselves “broken” and immediately go into circles that would lead them to justify their behavior or allow them to blend in or fit in.

Religious humanism: Religious humanism is much different (and more dangerous than) secular humanism in that many operating out of religious humanism think they are connected to God. Based on that trip to the judgment seat after we die (Hebrews 9:27), that’s going to be a rude awakening for these folks. Why? Because religious humanists take a “god”, any “god”, and they use this “god” to justify their behavior patterns (to again say they are “basically good”). God has a set of Standards (Exodus 20:4-18, the Ten Commandments) and Matthew 22:37-39, but yet we can never meet them (Romans 3:23, Romans 7:7, 1 John 1:8-10). We must rather make our behavior submit to God, as opposed to the other way around…and have the appropriate God as represented by His Word (2 Timothy 3:16-17). In other words, the Word is designed to both uplift AND convict.

Godliness/The Spirit/Kingdom: The Kingdom says that humanity is no good and needs a Savior. It also says that those who received this Savior (Jesus Christ) will have everlasting life and have a guarantee at the judgment seat (John 3:16, Ephesians 1:13-14). The Law (see above) shows us how much of a “joke” we are next to God’s Standards. Even Adam, who had direct fellowship with God, couldn’t maintain his dominion over all things around him (this was the first commission Genesis 1:28-29, and the first commission to have self-control, Genesis 2:16-17). So thanks to Adam, we shall surely die…unless we get some Christ in our lives and plug into the Power.

Next week I will discuss how the different power sources orient us next to walking with God. Have a good week folks!!

Walking With God, Chapter I Part II

This week I want to go into 4 (not all the) really base fundamentals of our spiritual walk...

First of all….what is the spiritual walk? Well to put it simply, it is the day-in and day-out activities we have with God…whether it be us spending altar time with Him (altar time to be discussed later), prayer, fellowship with Him, fellowship in general, or anything we do that we freely allow God’s Order and Standards to penetrate our minds and shape our imagery, and thus, our behavior patterns. So how do you keep a solid spiritual walk? Later units will discuss more rote details of this process, but here are the four basic fundamentals.

1) We must know precisely where we are in our walk. The Word of God is designed to uplift and convict. If it’s only doing one or the other then we must look deeper into ourselves. The purpose of doing this is to know the very nature of our fellowship with God and get the most out of it. We have to freely let this be guided by God based on His Word (for example, the 10 Commandments in Exodus 20, or Christ’s Commandment in Matthew 22:37 [see previous unit about godly love]). Unless we comprehensively know both our strengths and our weaknesses, we cannot truly edify the Body and know our role in the Kingdom. Therefore we must examine ourselves at the time of fellowship, and there is no greater (as in more intimate) fellowship with God than Communion, which gives us the very charge to make this examination. (Ref: 1 Corinthians 11:27-32)

2) Know that whatever we do, it’s not enough. We inherited our default nature and bodies from the 1st Adam. We all know how that piece turned out…he was so focused on what God had given him (Bone of my bone flesh of my flesh anyone?) that he lost sight of what God wanted him to do. Genesis 3 God sets out the first punishment for sin after the first sin has been committed. And taking a closer look at the Bible, EVERY “great figure” fell (but Christ). Abraham (went into his concubine), Moses (lost his faith), David (slept with another man’s wife), Solomon (had a harem)…and the list goes on. Christ walked the ONLY sinless walk in recorded history, which makes sense because he’s God the Son. The rest of us? Well Romans 3:23 says we all have sinned and have fallen short. So no matter what, so long as we inhabit our physical bodies our PRACTICAL RIGHTEOUSNESS says “We a joke and we need Jesus”.

3) Know that it’s “okay”. No God doesn’t want you to sin. But He knows it’s going to happen…probably a lot. Our God is a long suffering God and gave us His Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins while we were still sinners (Romans 5:8). Salvation comes by Grace through Faith in Christ (John 3:16-18). We shouldn’t be sinning but even if we do, we have a mechanism of forgiveness to re-establish fellowship (1 John 1:9, to be discussed in several weeks). However, beating ourselves us is just as deceptive as the sin that brought us to that point. Romans 8:1 explains that there is no condemnation for members of the body (those in Christ Jesus). So we shouldn’t sweat that we sinned beyond comprehensively examining the sin and putting it and the cares that brought us to it to God. And thus we shall receive the power to defeat our iniquity by getting empowered by the Spirit (Romans 8, Galatians 5:22-23, Philippians 4:8)

4) Seek out God for everything that we do. Have you ever heard that term “What would Jesus do?” As cliché as it sounds, that should be our default setting. It clears up a lot of our insecurity and gives us a lot of insight. God is a faithful God and He gives grace and knowledge to those who genuinely seek Him out (Psalm 119:1-40). The very charge itself made by Christ is to seek out the Kingdom and its righteousness. (Matthew 6:33). A similar charge is to let our let so shine (Matthew 5:16) As any given Kingdom is a representation of the King, this is how we get close to the King.

Next week I'm going to talk about different power sources. Have a good week, and pardon the late send!

Walking With God, Chapter I Part I

I will start off with just with a brief introduction. Do you know what it means to be a powerful and productive believer? More important, did you know that this is what God wants for us all? Did you know that God wants us all to produce after Himself How do I figure? Let me show you.

There are two great commissions that God discusses in the very first chapter of the Bible. To go out and do two things: subdue/take dominion, and to be fruitful and multiply (Genesis 1:28). God is the wisest thing He knows, and as we already discussed, God is love. So God loves us enough in order to give us these things that He knows in order so that we reflect His Image (Hebrews 1:3) and Likeness (Galatians 5:22-23). However, in order to do these things we must walk with God and defeat the things in our business that separate us from Him.

If we take a look at 1st and 2nd Corinthians, as well as many of the epistles, Paul takes a deeper look at the mechanism of things that separate us from God….you know, sin. However, we sin because our belief is not fortified in Him. Why do I say that? Because Philippians 4:6-7 tells us so. When we worry, we lose security (faith) in Him, so that leads us to sin, but when we go to seek Him out and defer the totality of our business to Him, then we get that peace that empowers us to go do whatever it is we need to do (Philippians 4:13). Let me just take a moment to give you a bit of a nugget to munch on. When reading Phi 4:13 in the amplified version, it says that my sufficiency is in the sufficiency of Christ (paraphrase).

Check it out on www.biblegateway.com if you don’t have access to an AMP Bible. It’s some good stuff to know that Christ is all you need.