Find A Christian Man

Tag: Spiritual Encouragement for Christian Women

  • Are You Giving God Enough to Work With

    Are You Giving God Enough to Work With

    Luke 6:37-38(NLT)
    “37 Do not judge others, and you will not be judged. Do not condemn others, or it will all come back against you. Forgive others, and you will be forgiven. 38 Give, and you will receive. Your gift will return to you in full—pressed down, shaken together to make room for more, running over, and poured into your lap. The amount you give will determine the amount you get back.”

    Giving, being unselfish, and pouring into the lives of others is more than a wonderful gesture. The practice of giving is a commandment from God. Giving is His nature, and as His children, it must be our nature as well. It begins in the heart, and once it is expressed outwardly through our actions, the act of giving becomes a powerful instrument of change, transforming the hearts and lives of others as well as our own. Jesus Christ makes it plain in Luke 6:37-38 that the practice of giving is a law, and it is immutable. This means it can’t be manipulated or changed by anyone. Giving initiates a process where the outcome is predictable. If we give, we will receive, and what we receive will be in proportion to what we have given. This is a profound lesson of love.

    In the Old Testament, our Heavenly Father was adamant to instruct His people to follow His statutes, commandments, and instructions. Doing so was the only way He could bless them. In Leviticus 18:4(NLT), He told them, “You must obey all my regulations and be careful to obey my decrees, for I am the LORD your God.” In Deuteronomy 5:32(NLT), through Moses, He instructed, “You must be careful to obey all the commands of the LORD your God, following his instructions in every detail.” And in Joshua 1:7(NLT), He told Joshua, Moses’s successor, “Be strong and very courageous. Be careful to obey all the instructions Moses gave you. Do not deviate from them, turning either to the right or to the left. Then you will be successful in everything you do.”

    God is a Righteous Judge. He does not bless any and every action or effort that an individual undertakes. God blesses His Word, because His Word is alive, righteous, and true. His Word achieves His plan and purpose. He said in Isaiah 55:11(NLT), “It is the same with my word. I send it out, and it always produces fruit. It will accomplish all I want it to, and it will prosper everywhere I send it.”

    Hebrews 11:6 tells us that God is a Rewarder. This is what He does. He rewards! He compensates! And He is more masterful at it than any of us can imagine, but He does not reward disobedience. He rewards those who obey and have faith in what He says. It’s amazing because He doesn’t make this complicated, yet we have somehow made it far more complex than He intended. His ways are not burdensome, they bring life to us and everything we set our hands to do. 1John 5:3-4(NLT) declares, “3 Loving God means keeping his commandments, and his commandments are not burdensome. 4 For every child of God defeats this evil world, and we achieve this victory through our faith.”

    In Luke 6:37-38, our Lord and Savior frames the heart God expects us to have in order to live our best blessed life. It’s two-pronged. First, he addresses the issue of forgiving others. This is essential to living a Christ-like life. It’s speaks to the condition of an individual’s heart. If we are committed to forgive in the way God has commanded, our hearts are humble and pliable. And this humility and flexibility are required to please Him and fulfill His requirement that we have a heart like Christ. Forgiveness is a gift we offer others that have hurt us in some way. We forgive them because God has forgiven us. We freely offer what has been freely offered to us. This demonstrates that God’s Word and love are first in our lives.

    The second prong teaches us about the law of God regarding our giving-actions. It teaches us how we can align our existences with His blessings by being obedient to this law. Through freely giving, we set a boomerang in motion. It has the potential to anchor us in God’s blessed and continuous cycle of giving and receiving. The thing that we must also come into consciousness about is that just the opposite takes place when we fail to heed God’s instructions about giving. Rather than setting ourselves up for blessings, when we don’t give, we are moving in the opposite direction of them. Through selfishness and the refusal to give according to God’s instructions, we set a negative cycle in motion. This is a condition that causes situations and circumstances to always work against our greater good.

    The refusal to give will always produce fruit that are equal to that refusal. A lack of forgiveness and generosity will yield the negative situations and circumstances that support it, and these will continue to keep a person cut off from the blessings they desire most.

    Many women are praying to receive God’s best but have not postured themselves to give God their best. The law of giving and receiving is one of God’s ways of positioning His kids for greatness and a fulfilling life. We must open our eyes to how our attitude towards forgiveness and giving are tied to whether we are accepting or rejecting what God has in store.

    He tells us in Malachi 3:10(NLT), “Bring all the tithes into the storehouse so there will be enough food in my Temple. If you do,” says the LORD of Heaven’s Armies, “I will open the windows of heaven for you. I will pour out a blessing so great you won’t have enough room to take it in! Try it! Put me to the test!” Here in the Old Testament, God is teaching us about tithing into His Kingdom as a way of blessing us through His law of giving and receiving. He’s showing us the immutability and endurance of His laws, and if there is any doubt in our minds about them, He challenges us to test them out, and find out for ourselves that His Word and Ways are true.

    Cutting to the chase, many of us aren’t giving God enough to work with. We’re refusing to rally our faith to give and sow in the way that God instructs. When it comes to being generous and sowing into His Kingdom, some of us still think that if we give our little bit to Him that He will allow greater lack to exist in our circumstances. We refuse to believe in His supernatural provision. When it comes to forgiving those that have hurt us, we allow fear and resentment to close our hearts, because we refuse to believe that God will keep us safe. All of this is a lack of faith, and it goes against the strategy that God has given us for an abundant life. We must believe that God will reward our giving, and this must be backed up by making forgiveness and giving the motivation of our hearts.■

    Scripture quotations marked (NLT) are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Wheaton, Illinois 60189. All rights reserved.

    “Are You Giving God Enough to Work With?”, written for findchristianman.wordpress.com. Copyright©2024. All rights reserved. All done to the glory of God through Jesus Christ, our Lord.

  • The Rules of Dating

    The Rules of Dating

    The rules of dating in a way that leads to marriage are not exactly outlined in the Bible in a step-by-step format. In fact, some have complained that not much about dating is specifically covered in God’s Word. This is because God never intended that dating should be the ‘thing’ that the world has made it out to be. With all our modern conveniences and intellectual advancements, it should be no surprise to any of us that most people view the standards of God’s Word relating to marriage and dating as antiquated. Personally, I’ve been told many times that I’m ridiculous for espousing abstinence, even though this is what God says in His Word. We’re at a place where denying God’s Word is so rampant that many are blinded to His guidance about dating. Their hearts are set on following their own way instead of following His way, and this tactic will not yield success.

    In Old Testament times, the people of Israel asked Samuel, God’s prophet, to petition God on their behalf. They no longer wanted to be under the Lord’s sovereignty. There is no one like God. He is majestic beyond majesty, brilliant beyond brilliance, and perfect beyond perfection. He is King! He chose the Israelites to be His people, and He desired them to honor His absolute sovereignty so they could remain under the covering of His protection and care. They decided they no longer wanted this but instead wanted a human king like all the other nations. They didn’t want to be set apart for God but wanted to be like everyone else. This is a humongous issue in the lives of believers today. Many of us no longer want to be set apart as God’s holy people. We want to follow the world and live outside God’s statutes and standards.

    It’s hard to imagine why anyone who witnessed the kind of miracles and wonders that God performed for the people of Israel would want to remove themselves from His sovereignty, but this is what they wanted and chose to do. They paid a very heavy price for this decision, and so will we if we choose to ignore God’s Will.

    God granted their petition, even though it was a blatant denial of Him and His sovereignty. He appointed Saul as their first king, but Saul messed everything up. He became arrogant with his rank and position as king, and disobeyed God’s directions and instructions. God then sent Samuel on a mission to anoint the next king. Left to his own devices, Samuel would have appointed someone that looked the part but didn’t have the heart God was looking for. When he tried to do this, God told Samuel in 1Samuel 16:7(NLT), “Don’t judge by his appearance or height, for I have rejected him. The LORD doesn’t see things the way you see them. People judge by outward appearance, but the LORD looks at the heart.”

    God looks at the heart, and He knows our hearts through and through. He knows when our hearts are valuing His Word, and He knows when our hearts are motivated out of a predominant desire to please Him. This is a person that can be guided by God’s Spirit. They have a heart that is loyal toward Him. He said in 2Chronicles 16:9 that He searches throughout the entire earth, looking for those that are fully committed and loyal to Him, so He can show Himself strong on their behalf.

    The rules of dating are simple; be obedient to God’s Word. He specifically looks for people who love and honor Him with their whole hearts, particularly when it comes to dating, because too many of us are abandoning God’s standards. When He finds people that have placed their faith in Him alone, He opens their eyes to His strength, and they see His wonders in their lives. He longs to do this for all His kids, because He loves us so much, but we must desire to please God wholeheartedly. The goal is not to please ourselves, but to please Him, and pleasing Him positions us to receive His rewards.

    In the Old Testament, God told His people repeatedly that if they would obey His commands and abide by His statutes, He would bless them and caused them to be prosperous and live long lives. In Leviticus 26:13(NLT), God told them, “I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt so you would no longer be their slaves. I broke the yoke of slavery from your neck so you can walk with your heads held high.” They were a stubborn people, and like many of us, they were intent to follow their own way, and that way led them to destruction. In Leviticus 26:13, our Heavenly Father had to remind them of who He is, and again, there are many records in the Old Testament where He had to do this time and time again.

    God had to remind them that He doesn’t change. He’s the God that delivered the Israelites from the tyranny of Egyptian slavery. He parted the Red Sea for their escape, fed them manna from Heaven, and in the desert, He made water burst forth from rocks for them to drink. He’s the same God that sent His Son to die as a sacrifice for our sins over two thousand years ago so that we would be saved from the slavery of sin and death. No, God has not changed, and His Word hasn’t changed. His standards are holy and righteous, and to show our hearts loyal to Him, we must obey them.

    The world is increasingly becoming a place where true disciples and followers of Christ stand out more and more, because so few of us are actually adhering to God’s standard. Our Heavenly Father has set us apart as His children of light. Dating can’t be a carve-out where His standards do not apply. His goal and desire are that we are blessed, happy, fulfilled, and married if we desire it. He’s given us His Word because it is life to us. It equips us for a thriving life in Christ, and by this we can know that He blesses His Word. Anyone that follows it will be rewarded. Companionship is one of those rewards, but we must never get ahead of God and let sin take us out of the race. He will send the right person for our lives, and until He does, we’d be wise not to allow dating to cancel or delay the blessing of a marriage that is founded on the unity and love of Christ.■

    Scripture quotations marked (NLT) are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Wheaton, Illinois 60189. All rights reserved.

    “The Rules of Dating”, written for findchristianman.wordpress.com. Copyright©2024. All rights reserved. All done to the glory of God through Jesus Christ, our Lord.

  • Marriage Is A Gift from God

    Marriage Is A Gift from God

    “Could it be that the reason you’re so frustrated with life is because things didn’t work out with your man?” A mutual friend asked Adrienne this question because she seemed to be having a tough week. She didn’t want to be around anyone, and this was unusual for a person as outgoing as Adrienne. We all suspected that she was going through something with the significant person in her life; it had been an on-again-off-again relationship for almost a decade. It was no secret that Adrienne wanted to marry this man, and she thought Stephon was changing his mind about marriage, but he never made any promises. She was in such a tailspin because he finally told her that he was nowhere near ready to be married. He didn’t want to hurt her, but ended their conversation with, “I just really don’t consider myself the marrying type.”

    Why do men do things like this? Why do they remain in a relationship for that long, knowing full well that the woman has marriage on her mind? To be honest, the answer to these questions isn’t difficult, and deep down, most women know it. The reason why a man will remain in a 10-year on-again-off-again relationship and never commit to marriage is because he knows he can. This isn’t a righteous move on his part, but it’s not just him. This is an issue that involves both the man and the woman.

    In Luke 9:62(NLT), our Master Jesus taught about the importance of commitment and the danger of procrastination. He said, “Anyone who puts a hand to the plow and then looks back is not fit for the Kingdom of God.”  A plow is a farming tool. Jesus Christ often used farming in his teachings because farming was a huge part of the lifestyle of those living during that time. They didn’t have the convenience of grocery stores back then, so they were dependent on farming for their own source of food. They had to maintain livestock that could be used for meat, and they had to grow their own vegetables, as well as grains for bread. In order to keep the land fertile for planting, a plow was used to manually turned over the soil each planting season, and this was not easy labor.

    It’s not difficult to understand why farming was key to survival. It was nothing to play around with. A farmer was expected to understand the requirements and get to it. He had to know that plowing is laborious and necessary work that is required to produce the beneficial and expected results. He also had to understand that a failure to produce a harvest might mean catastrophe for his family. This is the backdrop for Luke 9:62, and Jesus Christ zeroes in on the importance of what’s at stake.

    A qualified farmer is someone who provides and produces for others. He would never put his hand to a plow and then procrastinate and look away with hesitation. If he does this, Jesus says he’s not fit for the Kingdom of God. He’s not fit because he’s vacillating, and this equates to instability. James 1:8(KJV) states, “A double minded man is unstable in all his ways.”

    Is this what we think we deserve, someone that procrastinates or looks away in hesitation because they’re not sure about us. Both men and women have done this when it comes to the things of God. We’re not stepping up to the plate in faith, but we’re wavering, wondering if God is who He says He is and if He’ll do what He says He will do in His Word. We have our hands on the plow, but we’re not prepared to move it forth with the obedience and diligence God requires. If we’re not going to do it for God, our Creator and Source of all that is good, we are certainly not going to do it for another human being.

    Women need to understand this very basic piece of wisdom. They are expecting a man to commit to them wholeheartedly when they have not committed wholeheartedly to God. We can change this, and we should. 2Chronicles 16:9(NLT) says, “The eyes of the LORD search the whole earth in order to strengthen those whose hearts are fully committed to him.” This verse tells us that God desires to bless His people, and His people have the distinct pleasure and responsibility to present the landscape for His blessings to land.

    1Samuel 16:7 affirms that God doesn’t see things the way that we do. He doesn’t judge by outward appearance; God looks at the heart. He warns us in Proverbs 4:23(NLT), “Guard your heart above all else, for it determines the course of your life.” He’s telling us to guard against apathy, doubt, or anything else that comes against Him and His Word, because those things will shape a future that we will not like. Whatever is in our hearts will produce an outcome. It will either give God something to work with or not. And sometimes, we are crying out for the man to love us, when our hearts have not made enough space for God.

    Galatians 6:7(NLT) warns, “Don’t be misled—you cannot mock the justice of God. You will always harvest what you plant.” It is very clear that if we’re not putting the love of God out there in the way that God has ordained, we’re not going to get the return we expect. Many men will not be righteous in their dealings. They come into relationships and stay in them when they are fully aware of their intentions to remain unmarried, but women have a responsibility to God and to themselves to see this for what it is. We cannot expect a man to change his opinion about our worthiness to be his wife when he doesn’t even want one.

    In 1Corinthians 7:7(MSG), the Apostle Paul said, “Sometimes I wish everyone were single like me—a simpler life in many ways! But celibacy is not for everyone any more than marriage is. God gives the gift of the single life to some, the gift of the married life to others.” Paul understood that our whole purpose for being in the earth is to have a relationship with God and to grow more like Christ with each passing day. Most of us struggle with the truth that this is our purpose and choose to do our own thing rather than to follow after our King. Paul resisted this trap. He understood that our purpose is just that simple and that many people, especially women, have looked to marriage to fill their cups instead of God.

    This is why Paul said that being single is a simpler life. It allows an individual to be singular in focus when it comes to the things of God. For others, marriage is the way to go. God gives these individuals the gift of marriage because they understand that marriage is designed to deepen our relationship with God, not detract from it. At least one of the individuals in any couple must comprehend this truth. When that’s the case, they will always put God first, and He will reward them according to the love of Christ that is in their hearts. ■

    Scripture quotations marked (NLT) are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Wheaton, Illinois 60189. All rights reserved.

    “Marriage Is A Gift from God”, written for findchristianman.wordpress.com. Copyright©2024. All rights reserved. All done to the glory of God through Jesus Christ, our Lord.

  • I’m Open While Under Construction

    I’m Open While Under Construction

    How many of us go into relationships with our eyes wide open? Most single Christians would probably say they do, but even those of us that love God and desire His Will for our lives will misjudge our preparedness. We end up realizing our eyes were not as opened as we had thought. We expect a man to love us in a certain way, and we hope that he will be as generous and thoughtful as we believe ourselves to be. It’s disappointing to discover that this isn’t the case. It hurts when the man isn’t interested in making us a priority in his life. Most of us will chalk it up to the notion that the guy simply isn’t the right fit, and this is probably a correct assessment, but even so, it’s not the only assessment we should make.

    Jesus Christ gave us a razor-sharp piece of wisdom in Luke 14:28(NLT), and it is unbelievably relevant to relationships and spiritual preparation for marriage. He said, “But don’t begin until you count the cost. For who would begin construction of a building without first calculating the cost to see if there is enough money to finish it?” Many single people make a huge error in being lackadaisical about this verse. Relationships can fall apart before they get out of the gate because we don’t take the time to understand this amazing revelation.

    Before we even begin to think about partnering, we should count the cost. Our eyes are often closed to the sacrifices, endurance, faith, dedication, patience, and commitment that a strong and quality significant relationship will require. It will exhaust us mentally and emotionally because it will require us to relinquish our hold on attitudes and behaviors that keep us stuck in selfishness, fear, and controlling habit patterns. We don’t want to give up these things, and our current way of thinking is that God is okay with us holding on to them. He’s not. Partnering will not come together for us until our hearts are loyal to God in a way that yields to Him totally. Many of us are not quite there.

    Jesus Christ has set Luke 14:28 as a principle for life. It’s for everyone and every endeavor. Relationships require us to deny the “ME” and to be all about the benefit of the “WE”. Not many are willing to count the cost in this way. Our devotion to God sets the bar for all other relationships. Our commitment to Him signals the entire universe of our spiritual preparation to receive. Many of us try to fake it, but the truth is that if this kind of sold-out-ness to God isn’t in our hearts, we’ve not proven that we’re ready to receive what He has in store.

    When it’s not in our hearts, God knows it, and any potential mate can sniff it out. Sometimes, the stench of our habit of trying to give God crumbs is what they smell, and it’s why they repel against us. It’s why some men are not inclined to offer us their devotion. Our mouths say we’re ready for it, but our hearts are singing a different tune. And Proverbs 4:23(NLT) affirms that the heart is what “determines the course of your life.”

    Jesus Christ proclaimed in Mark 8:34-37(NLT), “34 If any of you wants to be my follower, you must turn from your selfish ways, take up your cross, and follow me. 35 If you try to hang on to your life, you will lose it. But if you give up your life for my sake and for the sake of the Good News, you will save it. 36 And what do you benefit if you gain the whole world but lose your own soul?” If we haven’t done this for Jesus, how can we pretend to know anything about the sacrifices required of us for marriage?

    Marriage teaches and prepares us as the Bride of Christ. That’s what marriage is all about. We don’t have to be perfect, but we at least have to be on the trajectory to being committed to yield and surrender completely and utterly to Jesus Christ. We have to understand that this is required. If our actions do not signal an understanding of this, we’re out of pocket. We’re not where we need to be spiritually.

    For instance, we think we know what we want and need in a partner. Nine times out of ten, we don’t have a clue. We have all these criteria we expect our partners to meet. He can’t be too fat, too skinny, too dark, or too light. He can’t have double chins or wear thick glasses. He can’t have kids or take the bus. He can’t make less money than me or he can’t be too needy. He must have a college degree. He must have his own place, and he must have his own car. The list goes on and on of all our must haves. We set the stage with these, and we then expect God and the man to comply.

    The common mantra is “I’m God’s best and I deserve the best.” While that may be true, we’re not the ones that determine what qualifies as ‘the best’, God does this. 1Samuel 16:7(NLT) tells us, “But the LORD said to Samuel, “Don’t judge by his appearance or height, for I have rejected him. The LORD doesn’t see things the way you see them. People judge by outward appearance, but the LORD looks at the heart.” Our discernment and discrimination about what we want in a partner is secondary to God’s plan for our lives. No matter what we feel we deserve, it must never overshadow the reality that God knows what we need. He’s the Leader, we’re the followers. He knows how to bless us, and He knows the best fit for our lives. He requires our total surrender to His perfection and Will in every area of our lives.

    You might think, “Well, after I’ve totally surrendered this area of my life to the Lord, what happens when I meet someone that likes me? How will I know he’s the one the Lord sent? How will I know he isn’t a trick from satan?” When the Lord makes a presentation, there’s no way not to know it. One of the ways Heavenly Father solidifies that we’ve met the man He has sent is that this man will demonstrate an extraordinary kindness, and this kindness will reveal his heart towards us. It’s a “Boaz” kind of kindness, one that will be very meaningful to you. It may be overlooked by most, but it will be a gesture that only the Lord will confirm. And it won’t stop there. If God has sent him, He will continue to confirm it as the relationship develops.

    Again, God is not demanding that we be perfect in this area. We’re going to make mistakes and missteps along the way. However, when our heart’s motivation is to honor God and to please Him with our whole lives, He will continue to help us in the development and growth of a relationship that He sanctions. Meeting the person doesn’t mean that our spiritual preparation for marriage has ended. It means that we’ve counted the costs and are ready to build. We will have shown God that our hearts are fully open to Him, even while we’re still under construction.■

    Scripture quotations marked (NLT) are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Wheaton, Illinois 60189. All rights reserved.

    “I’m Open While Under Construction”, written for findchristianman.wordpress.com. Copyright©2024. All rights reserved. All done to the glory of God through Jesus Christ, our Lord.

  • The Prince of Peace

    The Prince of Peace

    God’s extraordinary prophecy in Isaiah 9:6(KJV) proclaims, “For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given: and the government shall be upon his shoulder: and his name shall be called Wonderful, Counsellor, The mighty God, The everlasting Father, The Prince of Peace.” Undoubtedly, many of God’s people were taught this Old Testament scripture as it was passed down from generation to generation. The manifestation of it then landed in the Gospels, as the birth of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, finally came! Mary, the woman who was engaged to Joseph, was a willing vessel. The angel, Gabriel, gave her the Good News that the Holy Spirit would come upon her and the power of the Most High would overshadow her. She would give birth to a son named Jesus, who would be very great and the Son of God. Luke 1:38(NLT) tells us that her response was, “I am the Lord’s servant. May everything you have said about me come true.”

    In Luke 1:28, the angel, Gabriel, called Mary, highly favored one, blessed among women. Our Heavenly Father knew every detail of Mary’s and Joseph’s lives and future. He knew they would be good parents for His only begotten Son, Jesus Christ, and He chose them for this esteemed honor. Our precious Lord and Savior left the throne of God to come to earth, and although he is deity, Jesus came as a human being. If our all-powerful, all-knowing God had wanted Jesus Christ to come to earth as a fully-grown man, then it would have been done this way, but that was not the case. Jesus was born from a mother’s womb like us. As a baby, he allowed himself to be one of the most vulnerable creatures on earth, and with a watchful eye, God entrusted his care to Mary and Joseph.

    A Son is given
    Before he left the throne of the Most High, Our blessed Redeemer, Jesus Christ, had not taken human form. He was indeed God’s Son, but our Heavenly Father’s plan for the redemption of humanity meant that His Son had to be given. He had to take on the form of a human being and become like us in order to save us. Hebrews 9:22(NLT) says, “In fact, according to the law of Moses, nearly everything was purified with blood. For without the shedding of blood, there is no forgiveness.” According to God’s Law, our sin makes us guilty, because our sin is rebellion against God and His Word. Romans 6:23 tells us that the penalty or cost of sin is death, and this was the weight and curse we carried before Christ came to the earth.

    Romans 5:12(NLT) says, “When Adam sinned, sin entered the world. Adam’s sin brought death, so death spread to everyone, for everyone sinned.” Our sin made us enemies of God, and we desperately needed a Savior to restore our friendship with Heavenly Father and to rescue us from sin and death. We couldn’t do this for ourselves, so God sent His Son. 1John 4:10(NLT) declares, “This is real love—not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as a sacrifice to take away our sins.” Jesus came to the earth not as an angel, but as a man who shed his blood and died an agonizing death on the cross so that we could be made righteous and live eternally with God.

    The government shall be upon his shoulder
    When Adam sinned against God, he transferred everything God had given him to satan, including his dominion and authority in the earth. Ephesians 6:11-12(NLT) tells us, “11 Put on all of God’s armor so that you will be able to stand firm against all strategies of the devil. 12 For we are not fighting against flesh-and-blood enemies, but against evil rulers and authorities of the unseen world, against mighty powers in this dark world, and against evil spirits in the heavenly places.” Wars, rumors of wars, poverty, violence, wickedness, crime, chaos, confusion, and cruelty, these and all other remnants of darkness and destruction are a result of satan’s influence over our world. Right now, the government isn’t upon the shoulder of our King, Jesus Christ, but one day it will be.

    Philippians 2:10-11(NLT) proclaims, “10 that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, 11 and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.” In the world today, every knee has not bowed, and every tongue has not confessed that Jesus Christ is Lord, quite the contrary. In these modern times, people are finding new ways to rebel and reject God and His Word, but one day this will all cease. On that glorious day when our Lord and Master returns to the earth, he will set up his Kingdom, a Kingdom that will never end. The government will be on his shoulder, and it will be a government of his peace, love, joy, and power.

    Wonderful, Counsellor
    Jesus Christ is our wonderful counsellor, and he is so deserving of this title. There isn’t a detail about any aspect of our lives that he doesn’t know, and he wants to help us with any problems or obstacles we may face. Hebrews 4:14-15(NLT) tells us, “14 So then, since we have a great High Priest who has entered heaven, Jesus the Son of God, let us hold firmly to what we believe. 15 This High Priest of ours understands our weaknesses, for he faced all of the same testings we do, yet he did not sin.” Jesus Christ is our Mediator and Advocate, and he’s a member of the Most Holy Council of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. 

    So often we face situations in life that confound us. It seems that there isn’t a solution, but that is never the case. Jesus is the answer to all our problems. He invites us in Matthew 11:28-30(NLT), “28 Come to me, all of you who are weary and carry heavy burdens, and I will give you rest. 29 Take my yoke upon you. Let me teach you, because I am humble and gentle at heart, and you will find rest for your souls. 30 For my yoke is easy to bear, and the burden I give you is light.” Jesus paid the price for our sins because he loves us so much. He deserves to be the first resource we turn to, not the last. Whether it’s mental, emotional, physical or spiritual, through our faith in him, he will help us to overcome. 

    The mighty God, The everlasting Father, The Prince of Peace
    Romans 5:1(NLT) tells us, “Therefore, since we have been made right in God’s sight by faith, we have peace with God because of what Jesus Christ our Lord has done for us.” We grossly underestimate the level of gratitude that our God deserves for rescuing us from death and darkness through His only begotten Son, Jesus Christ. No one could do for us what God sent His Son, Jesus Christ, to accomplish on the earth. The awe, majesty, honor, praise, and glory that we should have for the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit should far exceed the adoration and devotion we have for any other person or thing. Jesus Christ is the Prince of Peace, and because he is, our hope in him will never disappoint us, because he has all power and authority. He is King of kings and Lord of lords, and one day the whole world will know it!■

    Scripture quotations marked (NLT) are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Wheaton, Illinois 60189. All rights reserved.

    “The Prince of Peace”, written for findchristianman.wordpress.com. Copyright©2023. All rights reserved. All done to the glory of God through Jesus Christ, our Lord.

  • Simple and Ordinary Have Value

    Simple and Ordinary Have Value

    Ecclesiastes 1:9-11(NLT)
    “9 History merely repeats itself. It has all been done before. Nothing under the sun is truly new. 10 Sometimes people say, “Here is something new!” But actually it is old; nothing is ever truly new. 11 We don’t remember what happened in the past, and in future generations, no one will remember what we are doing now.”

    Getting up every morning and doing the same thing can seem quite mundane for many of us. We fix lunches, drop off the kids at school, go to work, cook dinner, go grocery shopping, and put the kids to bed. It can feel as though nothing changes from day to day.  You start to think that life is full of repetitive tasks, and many of them go without thanks or acknowledgement. Let’s suppose that our Heavenly Father thanked you every day for doing the mundane things that your love ones sometimes take for granted. Would your attitude about your everyday routines change or remain the same?

    The Book of Ecclesiastes was written by King David’s son, Solomon, who also became King of the Israelites. 1Kings 3:5 tells us that the Lord appeared to Solomon in a dream, and in this dream, God asked Solomon, “What do you want?” Solomon replied in 1Kings 3:9(NLT), “Give me an understanding heart so that I can govern your people well and know the difference between right and wrong. For who by himself is able to govern this great people of yours?” God was very pleased with Solomon’s request and said in 1Kings 3:12(NLT), “I will give you what you asked for! I will give you a wise and understanding heart such as no one else has had or ever will have!” So, King Solomon is known as the wisest man that has ever lived.

    Solomon explored every facet of human life that was available to him. He thought this practice would reveal a depth of meaningfulness that would yield overflowing fulfillment, but this was not the case. Instead, he found that life was a series of endless cycles, and he complained about the sameness of it all. He understood that the souls of humans are like empty cups, and life is lacking and void without that cup being filled. As he searched the lives of thousands of individuals that were at his beck and call. Their lives were mirrors of this sameness, serving him and taking care of their families. He found that the existences of those he examined were as thankless and mundane as he found his own life to be.

    Boredom is such a dangerous course because it breeds ingratitude. Solomon spent a great deal of time being enamored with the gift, instead of being captivated by the Giver. During his intellectual and recreational explorations of human life, he looked for God in things rather than seeking the things of God. He became lost in the endless sameness of it all and came away with the realization that nothing seemed new.

    After writing so much about the emptiness of life, King Solomon realized that true fulfillment comes from serving God. In Ecclesiastes 12:13-14(NLT), he wrote: “13 Fear God and obey his commands, for this is everyone’s duty. 14 God will judge us for everything we do, including every secret thing, whether good or bad.”

    Jesus Christ taught us that it is more blessed to give than to receive. From his teaching, we can know resolutely that life is more about giving than receiving. Our God is the Great Giver, and when we give of ourselves to others, we are imitating God’s nature. This is the epiphany that Solomon ultimately realized. Life is energized through God’s love, and when sharing His love becomes the motivation for everything we do, the mundane and ordinary become infused with meaning.

    Our Heavenly Father values the simple and ordinary. He didn’t intend for our lives to be complicated and weighed down by anxiety and burdensome tasks. Nehemiah 8:10 tells us that the joy of the Lord is our strength, and we find this joy in seeking Him first, above all other things. There’s nothing wrong with wanting to have excitement in our lives. But we must remember that God is life. He is love, liberty, and light, and living through Jesus Christ guarantees that every moment of each day is the blessing God intends it to be.■

    Scripture quotations marked (NLT) are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Wheaton, Illinois 60189. All rights reserved.

    “Simple and Ordinary Have Value”, written for findchristianman.wordpress.com. Copyright©2023. All rights reserved. All done to the glory of God through Jesus Christ, our Lord.

  • When A Man Stands for Christ

    When A Man Stands for Christ

    David was a beautiful baby boy who grew to be an incredibly handsome man. In his eyes, his good looks afforded him none of the perks that most of us assume. When he looked in the mirror, he didn’t see handsome, but rejection and sometimes anger. He was continuously bullied and made fun of for being slow in his earlier school years, so his Uncle Joe taught him how to box. By the time he was 11, he had already been expelled from grade school three times for fighting. One day, when he was sitting in detention, a sweet little girl walked up to him and asked if he knew Jesus. Up to that point, he didn’t, and even though he pretended to ignore her, the love in her heart had caused his to skip a beat, and he was never the same.

    It was something about that name, “Jesus”, and he played the question that the little girl had posed over and over in his young mind. Financially, things at home were tough, but there was lots of love in his family. His father passed away shortly after David was born, and his mother and grandmother raised him and his two other sisters. The other siblings were smart as a whip, and even though David wasn’t ‘book smart’ like them, he could take apart anything and put it back together better than it was.

    When his Uncle Joe went to prison, it tore David up inside. His mother could hardly work a week without getting a call from David’s school about all the fights he was getting into. Shortly after his 12th birthday, the school recommended he receive a battery of tests, including a cognitive assessment for ADHD. He didn’t quite understand what was happening at the time, but he saw the look on his mother’s and grandmother’s faces, and it scared him. He felt as if people outside his family were looking for a way to dispose of him the way they had done with his Uncle Joe.

    The night before he was to be tested, David panicked. He felt the burden of taking care of his family without his Uncle Joe and was terrified of being sent away. He laid awake in bed running all kinds of terrible scenarios in his mind, and he felt as if he were about to explode, but then something happened. Like oil being poured all over his body, a peace blanketed his entire being. He heard the words, “I have a plan for you, David, and everything is going to be alright.”

    The tests proved there were no cognitive issues with David and that he was highly sensitive and intuitive. This was partly because he was deaf in one ear and had never been properly diagnosed. When he returned home, he was changed. A door had been opened and he had a kind of confidence he had never known. He was given a special hearing aid, his grades improved, and he grew into a wonderfully empathetic and dutiful young man.

    His freshman year of college, after his 19th birthday, David gave his life to the Lord, and with a few of his other Christian friends, he took a vow of celibacy. He was extremely thankful for what God had done in his life, and the words the Spirit spoke to him when he was 12-years old were branded on his heart. He knows that God has a plan for his life, and he is determined to marry and have a family with a woman whose commitment to the Lord Jesus Christ mirrors his own. Almost seven years later, he had no idea how challenging it would be to find the right woman.

    When he met Yasmine, there was an instant connection and they seem to share a love of Christ, but Yasmine has not taken a vow of celibacy. The first time she tempted him to stumble, he told her, “Yasmine, I value my body temple as much as you should value yours.” She was offended and a little ashamed, but it would not be the last time they crossed that bridge. After a few months of seeing the strength of David’s commitment, Yasmine decided celibacy wasn’t for her and thought it was best if they parted as friends.

    Whether or not you believe it, there is a match for every person that exists. There’s someone in the world today that in some way equals your strengths, weaknesses, and commitment to God. In many ways, David is an absolute dream. He’s not perfect, but he’s committed to receive what God has planned for him. He believes the discipline and commitment that he has chosen to demonstrate at this time in his life will soon pay off in a great way; he’s very confident in this.

    Being in a relationship outside of marriage can present many challenges, this is why it’s so important to have a strong, made up mind about knowing how and when to say no if ever you’re in a situation that’s tempting. As women, we rarely think of a man standing for Christ the way David is. “Something must be wrong with him in that area.” We think. This shows us how far away from God’s standard we have moved. A simple but meaty truth is that our eyes will not be able to land on a person like David unless we’re a match. That may be an ‘ooch!’ for some, but it is very true.

    1 Corinthians 6:18(NLT), tells us, “Flee sexual immorality.  Every sin that a man does is outside the body, but he who commits sexual immorality sins against his own body.” God makes it very plain that sexual intimacy with anyone that isn’t your spouse is a sin. He tells us to run from it because it harms us and most severely, it harms our relationship with Him. When we commit this sin, we sin against our own bodies, which means our own bodies will betray us. Like many of us, David has witnessed in the lives of his sisters and friends what happens to us spiritually when sex is taken outside the boundaries of God’s love. Often, in the relationship that we hoped would last, something is lost, and it cannot be regained.

    2Chronicles 16:9 tells us that the Lord searches the entire earth looking to strengthen those who have a heart that is fully committed to Him. Oh, how we’ve underestimated this verse. God is the One who has all power. He’s the One who blesses, not us. He puts the man and woman together. He strategically positions them so that they are in the right place at the right time. The magnet that draws them is their passion for Heavenly Father. We must be passionate about pleasing God. When we are, our faith is activated in a remarkable way.

    Sexual sin is the culprit of a kind of cynicism and darkness that has wrecked the blessed potential for significant relationships in the lives of many believers. The sweet fragrance of repentance and sacrifice does not emanate from them. It does not float up to heaven and out to others because they continue to allow the trap of sexual sin to hold their faith captive. Because so many are blinded by lust, most women can’t even imagine that such a man as David exists, that’s he’s living in the earth today and waiting for a woman who matches his commitment to Christ. Sadly, they can’t imagine it because they themselves will not be equal to it.

    We can’t be involved in the lust of this world because we represent Christ and the virtue of God should flow from our pores. 1Corinthians 6:20(NLT) states, “for God bought you with a high price. So you must honor God with your body.” God paid the price of our sin with the life of our beloved Savior’s sacrifice on the cross, and in gratitude for all Heavenly Father has done, we should want to keep ourselves spiritually pure before Him. This is David’s heart, and it should be ours as well. God has visions of radiance for our body temples. He has visions of grandeur for them, because they were created to house His divine glory. By this we should realize that changing the way we think, behave, and treat our bodies makes a statement for all eternity. It will either open doors of beautiful possibilities or keep them closed. It’s all up to us. ■

    Scripture quotations marked (NLT) are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Wheaton, Illinois 60189. All rights reserved.

    “When A Man Stands for Christ”, written for findchristianman.wordpress.com. Copyright©2023. All rights reserved. All done to the glory of God through Jesus Christ, our Lord.

  • If You Will Allow It

    If we stuck to God’s Word and allowed it to lead, guide, and direct us when it comes to relationships that lead to marriage, every woman today that desires a husband would have one. We should never think that there aren’t enough men to go around for Godly women. That could never be true because our God deals in the exceedingly abundantly. Blessings continually flow from heaven and do so unendingly. Our Heavenly Father took care of our needs before any of us were born. You can have every confidence that there’s someone in this world that was born around the same time you were that will be just as thankful to have you in his life as you will be to be a part of his life. The distance between you and your future husband is always about your faith and what you’re doing to back it.

    Ephesians 3:20-21(ESV) says, “Now to him who is able to do far more abundantly than all that we ask or think, according to the power at work within us, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, forever and ever. Amen.” God has already proven to us, and to everything else He has created, that He is able to do the exceedingly abundantly. He has established the incomparable and unyielding nature of His power and put a period behind it. We sometimes forget this.

    When people witness God’s power in their lives in a mighty way, many of them will think that He moved just in the nick of time in their personal circumstances. In reality, He knew about the situation ions ago, and settled it long before we came to be. Our mode of thinking and praying must get in gear with the all-knowing, all-powerful, sovereignty of His being. God knows the end at the beginning and the beginning at the end. He set the solution to all our problems in motion before even our great, great, great grandparents were born.

    Genesis 2:3(ESV) says, “So God blessed the seventh day and made it holy, because on it God rested from all his work that he had done in creation.” God rested! He has already completed the ‘far more abundantly than all we can ask or think’ of Ephesians 3:20, and He completed it through Jesus Christ. John 1:1-4(ESV) tells us, “1 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. 2 He was in the beginning with God. 3 All things were made through him, and without him was not any thing made that was made. 4 In him was life, and the life was the light of men.” The “Word” in this passage is referring to Jesus Christ, the living Word of God. He was with God in the beginning and all things were made through him. God isn’t making things up as we move along. Our Heavenly Father’s plan for the universe was finished when He rested. It’s a done deal, and we must make room in our understanding for this in order to move in the power and authority of Christ. God said in Hebrews 4:3(NLT), “For only we who believe can enter his rest. As for the others, God said, “In my anger I took an oath: ‘They will never enter my place of rest,’” even though this rest has been ready since he made the world.”

    There is nowhere in the Bible where anyone will find that God has left the state of rest He entered into and told us about in Genesis 2:3. In truth, the rest He entered is so profound that He commanded us to make that day of His rest holy and remember it forever. So, God is still in His state of rest, and He invites all those that love, honor, and obey Him through Jesus Christ to enter into His rest.

    God is brilliant beyond brilliance, magnificent beyond magnificence, and powerful beyond power. He has given us His Word, and His Word is His Will. God has already moved. He made Christ our Savior long before Adam and Eve were created or ever sinned. There’s nothing that is a surprise to Him, and He tells us in Proverbs 19:21 that we can make many plans, but His purpose will forever prevail. God’s Will and Word was established before He created humans. Again, He has already miraculously, prophetically, and meticulously moved, and He commands us to step into His unchangeable and perfect Will. He has created the universe in such a way that once we have aligned our will with His Will, everything around us will cooperate with us and we will see His Will come to pass in our lives.

    If you know this, then you will read Ephesians 3:20 with amazing clarity about your power and authority in Christ. You will understand that God has moved, it’s our turn. We are the ones with dominion and authority in the earth, and He commands us to stand in it through Christ Jesus, our Lord.

    God has done the exceedingly abundantly, and if we allow it, the exceedingly abundantly will show up in an amazing way in our lives. The condition of witnessing the exceedingly abundantly of Ephesians 3:20 is in this same verse. He tells us that we will witness the exceedingly abundantly “according to the power at work within us.” This means that as we think about the future spouse, and as we ponder the who, what, how, and when, we need to look in the mirror and ask, “Am I allowing the power of the Holy Spirit to be at work within me?” And if you answer, “yes”, the next question is what have you done that testifies this is so? 1Corinthians 4:20(NLT) declares, “For the Kingdom of God is not just a lot of talk; it is living by God’s power.” So, the power that works in us isn’t just a lot of talk. It’s about the tangible evidence of your faith.

    It’s about what you are doing right now to back your faith in God regarding what you are expecting Him to fulfill. You see, our Heavenly Father has a different idea about our potential than we do. He knows what He’s given us in Christ and tells us in Philippians 4:13 that we can do all things through Jesus Christ who gives us strength. He tells us that when we ask Him for a blessing beyond the ones we’re currently enjoying, we should get busy thanking Him for it before it even arrives.

    Jesus Christ said in Matthew 16:19(NLT), “And I will give you the keys of the Kingdom of Heaven. Whatever you forbid on earth will be forbidden in heaven, and whatever you permit on earth will be permitted in heaven.” We’re the ones with the keys, and we decide what we will or will not allow in our lives. This is up to us. We can lock ourselves out of blessings or open the door to them. If the latter is our choice, then we must do as so many others have done in God’s Word. We must back our faith by demonstrating to God how thankful we are to be saved and filled with His Holy Spirit. The way to thank Him has not changed. It’s not to focus on what we don’t have, but to focus on what we do have in Christ. We must use the authority and power of Christ to demonstrate our love for God by growing in His Word and doing the good works He has commanded us to do in the lives of others.■

    Scripture quotations marked (NLT) are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Wheaton, Illinois 60189. All rights reserved.

    Scripture taken from The Message. Copyright ©1993, 1994, 1995, 1996, 2000, 2001, 2002. Used by permission of NavPress Publishing Group.

    “If You Will Allow It”, written for findchristianman.wordpress.com. Copyright©2023. All rights reserved. All done to the glory of God through Jesus Christ, our Lord.

  • They Instead Became Fools

    Romans 1:20-22(NLT)
    “20 For ever since the world was created, people have seen the earth and sky. Through everything God made, they can clearly see his invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature. So they have no excuse for not knowing God.  21 Yes, they knew God, but they wouldn’t worship him as God or even give him thanks. And they began to think up foolish ideas of what God was like. As a result, their minds became dark and confused. 22 Claiming to be wise, they instead became utter fools.”

    Pure joy. That’s how Carolyn felt after her first date with Marvin. They’d met each other through a mutual friend and after talking on the phone a couple of weeks, they decided to meet up. Carolyn was all in after that. She had butterflies at even the thought of being in his company. Never wanting to seem overzealous, she tried to be patient and allow the relationship to slowly develop, but that quickly went out the window. It had been two years since she last dated, and since Marvin seemed to be as smitten with her as she was with him, they both jumped in.

    Marvin is a single dad with two teenage boys that he absolutely adores. They came to live with him after their mother remarried. Carolyn was an only child with no children of her own, but she always believed she’d be a good mother. They had been dating over six months and everyone she knew was excited because Carolyn was happier than they had ever seen her. She had never known a more loving man than Marvin, but as their relationship settled a little more, his deep devotion to his boys became more apparent. He had been upfront with her about a commitment he had made to them, and Carolyn knew that he would only bring the woman he dated around them if he was confident it was long term.

    As she thought about her few brief encounters with Marvin’s sons over the last several months, Carolyn began to feel insecure about her relationship with Marvin. She’s so afraid of rocking the boat that she won’t ask him why he continues to keep distance between her and his sons. Could it be that although he cares for her, he’s seen qualities that make him question if she can really be the mother that he believes his sons deserve?

    God tells us in Romans 8:28(NLT), “And we know that God causes everything to work together for the good of those who love God and are called according to his purpose for them.” As single women, we would be well suited to allow the heft of what God is telling us in this verse to marinate for a while. You see, God is not a stranger to anyone. Romans 1:20-21 makes it clear that people see His wondrous creation every day. They breath His air and bask under His sun. We can’t get it twisted. It’s God who makes everything come together, and the evidence of His wondrous power is the effortless quality of how He works. All you and I have to do is sit back and watch God.

    Proverbs 19:21 reminds us that we can make many plans, but God’s purpose will prevail.  When His anointing flows in a situation, for us, it’s like He’s parted the Red Sea and all we have to do is walk through. That’s what He does when we honor Him and seek Him first in all things, but some of us become so excited about meeting someone new, that we leave God and His wisdom out of the equation. Unlike the folks whose minds become dark and confused, as believers that are fully persuaded in God’s power and love, we should never question or be confused about His brilliance and attention to details. We shouldn’t take anything for granted when it comes to our walk with Christ, and we should be confident that when God does the exceedingly abundantly in our lives, He doesn’t miss a beat.

    Romans 1:23-25(NLT) goes on to tell us, “23 And instead of worshiping the glorious, ever-living God, they worshiped idols made to look like mere people and birds and animals and reptiles. 24 So God abandoned them to do whatever shameful things their hearts desired. As a result, they did vile and degrading things with each other’s bodies. 25 They traded the truth about God for a lie. So they worshiped and served the things God created instead of the Creator himself, who is worthy of eternal praise! Amen.”

    When a woman is so afraid of losing a man that she will not ask him questions that are extremely important to her, it tells you a lot about her priorities. It’s possible that she’s more interested in her standing in that relationship than she is in her standing in Christ. Some of us make a lot of compromises in our significant relationships with men, and some of them are an offense to our relationship with God through Jesus Christ. We must be careful that we’re not worshiping people and things instead of worshiping our Creator in spirit and truth. If there’s any hint of this in our lives, we must repent.

    As believers in the Lord Jesus Christ, we have an enemy, the devil, and he would like nothing more than to make a fool of us. Don’t trade your rights and privileges in Christ for quick pleasure. Just because it looks right doesn’t always mean it is right for you. Society has made relationships of today very challenging, and we must be careful that we are partnering with a man that God has ordained for us. He’s the One with the plan, and we need to leave all the details to Him and make doubly sure that we’re hearing His directives. We can rest assured that when God’s hand is in it, things work together according to His purpose. You’ll experience the liberty and peace of Christ in yourself and in your significant relationship as you both welcome each other into one another’s lives.■

    Scripture quotations marked (NLT) are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Wheaton, Illinois 60189. All rights reserved.

    Scripture taken from The Message. Copyright ©1993, 1994, 1995, 1996, 2000, 2001, 2002. Used by permission of NavPress Publishing Group.

    “They Instead Became Fools”, written for findchristianman.wordpress.com. Copyright©2023. All rights reserved. All done to the glory of God through Jesus Christ, our Lord.

  • We Can’t Rush God

    We Can’t Rush God

    Society has taught us many things, and one of them is to expect results immediately. If it seems to us that a process is delayed, we use every available resource at our disposal to speed it up. Our modern society has almost no tolerance for the reality of patience, and if people don’t receive results quickly, impatience gets the best of them. That’s when we see the worst side of human behavior. We see attitudes that our Heavenly Father commands us not to have, the ones where we try to rush people and circumstances to give us what we want. Many of us make the mistake of trying to bring these ‘in a rush’ attitudes and behaviors into our prayers and expectations regarding marriage. We want results from Heavenly Father on the double, and we want to know exactly what we can do to speed things along.

    Philippians 4:6(NLT) tell us, “Don’t worry about anything; instead, pray about everything. Tell God what you need, and thank him for all he has done.” This verse conveys the action steps of believing and trusting God in a way that pleases Him. We’re not to worry, and many of us view this one as a tall order. With some of us, we are more committed to worrying than we are in having faith. A brother or sister in Christ can encourage us until the cows come home, but our minds are fixed on what we perceive as reality, and we will not allow ourselves to be encouraged in the strength and power of God. Instead, we worry about the things we’ve prayed to receive. We become increasingly anxious because we understand that the timing of the results isn’t under our control. Timing is a matter of waiting on God. It’s a crucial aspect of patience, and patience is a fruit our Heavenly Father requires us to produce.

    Philippians 4:6 also tells us to pray about everything and tell God what we need. This part we’ve got on lock. We know how to pray and ask God for what we want, but the wait is the part that triggers all kinds of emotions and doubts. The wait is the part that trips us up. We’re begging the Father to tell us what we can do to take the fruition of our status-change off the waiting list. Well, He hasn’t kept this a secret from us, but it’s possible we haven’t been paying attention.

    Examine yourself
    There’s no doubt about it, God has already told us what to do in His Word, but sometimes we need a refresher course of the basics of faith. James 2:26(NLT) tells us, “Just as the body is dead without breath, so also faith is dead without good works.” Faith is inactive without doing the Christ-like things that make it lively. We kinda forget this as we’re trying to amp up our believing.

    2Corinthians 13:5-6 The Message (MSG) challenges us, “Test yourselves to make sure you are solid in the faith. Don’t drift along taking everything for granted. Give yourselves regular checkups. You need firsthand evidence, not mere hearsay, that Jesus Christ is in you. Test it out. If you fail the test, do something about it.” The rubber meets the road in this verse. The one thing that we do not want our Heavenly Father to tell us on judgment day is that we were too arrogant to test ourselves. We don’t want to hear Him say that we were coasting along, stuck in our own patterns and conditions, and we refused to learn more and do more for His Kingdom.

    Too focused on the wrong groom
    The marketplace is flooded with accurate teachings on God’s Word. We can research any subject covered in the Bible online and sharpen ourselves in the Word to such a degree that we could be leaps and bounds ahead of where we are. Many of us don’t do this. We’re missing the very Word that will profoundly connect us to our purpose. Yet we’re expecting God to bypass the fact that we refuse to take the test. We want Him to overlook the reality that we haven’t done anything about the test we keep failing.

    Whether it’s our past or our present, some of us are so focused on a mortal man to bring us to the precipice of joy that the bliss over the return of the True Bridegroom is nowhere in our hearts. We have allowed our desire for marriage to get us caught up in the flesh. Even today, while we are praying and asking the Father to position us to meet the right man, our pasts echo the times that we compromised our love and allegiance for Christ with the wrong man repeatedly and never truly repented for it. This is not just about physical intimacy, but the many other ways we compromised as well. In past relationships, we did everything possible to spend quality time with the man but did nothing to spend quality time with Jesus. We took time off work sometimes to enjoy a day canoodling with the man but won’t read the Bible every day. Things like this reveal our heart towards God, and we can’t afford to dismiss it.

    In so many instances, we’ve chosen the man over Jesus Christ, our beloved Bridegroom. Understand, it’s that one compromise against Christ—the One who rescued us from darkness, delivered us from evil, and brought us to new life—that puts us in the same category as Eve. For many women, this rebellion against Godliness is in their hearts today, and it is the thing that keeps the blessing of a husband at bay. In Colossians 1:13-14(NLT), God tells us, “13 For he has rescued us from the kingdom of darkness and transferred us into the Kingdom of his dear Son, 14 who purchased our freedom and forgave our sins.”  Philippians 2:9-11(NLT) says that God has elevated Jesus Christ to the place of highest honor and “gave him the name above all other names, 10 that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, 11 and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.”

    Jesus Christ is our King! And we have not always behaved as if we know this. We must repent from our past behavior of not honoring him with our whole hearts and whole minds. Many of us chose to bow to the wrong man in the past, a man that was not the one God ordained. So, rather than bringing a mentality of impatience to the forefront or trying to rush a prayer through, we need to take care of a little housecleaning. We must make sure that this behavior of compromising our love for Jesus Christ is completely out of hearts. When it is, our Bridegroom, our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, will find us with hearts that are ready to greet him when he returns. ■

    Scripture quotations marked (NLT) are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Wheaton, Illinois 60189. All rights reserved.

    Scripture taken from The Message. Copyright ©1993, 1994, 1995, 1996, 2000, 2001, 2002. Used by permission of NavPress Publishing Group.

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