God loves us. We hear that often said and it is true, but if we aren't filled with an understanding of God's Word, we can throw it out there like a blanket, covering and accepting the sins and iniquity that God hates and has no part in. It is often said that "God loves you where you are, but too much to let you stay there"! So true! “For this is how God loved the world: He gave His one and only Son, so that everyone who believes in Him will not perish but have eternal life." John 3:16 "For I have come down from heaven to do the will of God who sent Me, not to do My own will. And this is the will of God, that I should not lose even one of all those He has given Me, but that I should raise them up at the last day. For it is My Father’s will that all who see His Son and believe in Him should have eternal life. I will raise them up at the last day.” John 6:38-40
Yes! And He also loved us so much that He gives us the freedom to choose whether we would accept or reject His Son Jesus and His Kingdom. He also wants us to fully understand the cost of that rejection. “Today I have given you the choice between life and death, between blessings and curses. Now I call on heaven and earth to witness the choice you make. Oh, that you would choose life, so that you and your descendants might live! You can make this choice by loving the Lord your God, obeying Him, and committing yourself firmly to Him. This is the key to your life. And if you love and obey the Lord, you will live long in the land the Lord swore to give your ancestors Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.” Deuteronomy 30:19-20 I am the Door; anyone who enters through Me will be saved [and will live forever], and will go in and out [freely], and find pasture (spiritual security). The thief comes only in order to steal and kill and destroy. I came that they may have and enjoy life, and have it in abundance [to the full, till it overflows]. I am the Good Shepherd. The Good Shepherd lays down His [own] life for the sheep. John 10:9-11 AMP
The Lord God is our loving Father. He is not a friend or an ATM, nor is He a "pushover" who freely gives us what we want no matter how sinful our life is or how bad it is for us. Part of our difficulty in seeing Him clearly as a good Father is that today's society has so misrepresented the role and importance of a father. They don't show fathers as providers, protectors, teachers and disciplinarians. The love of a father is all those things. Your earthly father may have fallen short of that description, but your Heavenly Father never will! Seek the Kingdom of God above all else, and He will give you everything you need. So don’t be afraid, little flock. For it gives your Father great happiness to give you the Kingdom. Luke 12:31-32
If you are a parent, would you stop your child from running out into the street? Would you protect them from doing anything that might hurt them or endanger their life in any way? Let's say they are 8 years old and they ask for a gun, would you buy it for them? Sometimes your job as a parent is to protect your child from themselves and what they think they want! They aren't mature enough to understand the danger that may come with it. Sometimes they do something that requires being disciplined. The Lord God, as a loving Father, does all of those things also. “My child, don’t make light of the Lord’s discipline, and don’t give up when He corrects you. For the Lord disciplines those He loves, and He punishes each one He accepts as His child.”
As you endure this divine discipline, remember that God is treating you as His own children. Who ever heard of a child who is never disciplined by their father? If God doesn’t discipline you as He does all of His children, it means that you are illegitimate and are not really His children at all. Since we respected our earthly fathers who disciplined us, shouldn’t we submit even more to the discipline of the Father of our spirits, and live forever?
For our earthly fathers disciplined us for a few years, doing the best they knew how. But God’s discipline is always good for us, so that we might share in His holiness. No discipline is enjoyable while it is happening—it’s painful! But afterward there will be a peaceful harvest of right living for those who are trained in this way. Hebrews 12:5-11
When we understand the love of our Heavenly Father, when we are being filled with His Word and the Holy Spirit, we will be better able to love the world as Jesus did. We love the person, but never embrace the sin. We are to see and love the spirit within them, as our Father does!
To know what the Lord God considers sin, study His Word, don't listen to the world. Don’t you realize that those who do wrong will not inherit the Kingdom of God? Don’t fool yourselves. Those who indulge in sexual sin, or who worship idols, or commit adultery, or are male prostitutes, or practice homosexuality, or are thieves, or greedy people, or drunkards, or are abusive, or cheat people—none of these will inherit the Kingdom of God. Some of you were once like that. But you were cleansed; you were made holy; you were made right with God by calling on the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God. You say, “I am allowed to do anything”—but not everything is good for you. And even though “I am allowed to do anything,” I must not become a slave to anything. You say, “Food was made for the stomach, and the stomach for food.” (This is true, though someday God will do away with both of them.) But you can’t say that our bodies were made for sexual immorality. They were made for the Lord, and the Lord cares about our bodies. And God will raise us from the dead by His power, just as He raised our Lord from the dead.
Don’t you realize that your bodies are actually parts of Christ? Should a man take his body, which is part of Christ, and join it to a prostitute? Never! And don’t you realize that if a man joins himself to a prostitute, he becomes one body with her? For the Scriptures say, “The two are united into one.” But the person who is joined to the Lord is one spirit with him.
Run from sexual sin! No other sin so clearly affects the body as this one does. For sexual immorality is a sin against your own body. Don’t you realize that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit, who lives in you and was given to you by God? You do not belong to yourself, for God bought you with a high price. So you must honor God with your body. 1 Corinthians 6:9-18
All that you know about Jesus and His Kingdom are precious jewels that are unseen and misunderstood by the world until you show them through your life. If you truly love someone, you won't want them to spend eternity in the torture of Hell. Yes, Hell. We cannot believe in Heaven and not believe there is a Hell. The world would have you believe that you must embrace everything a person is doing to love and accept them. Stand on the foundation of God's Word and never falter. Don't preach, but be a living example of Jesus and the Words of God! “You are the light of [Christ to] the world. A city set on a hill cannot be hidden; nor does anyone light a lamp and put it under a basket, but on a lampstand, and it gives light to all who are in the house. Let your light shine before men in such a way that they may see your good deeds and moral excellence, and [recognize and honor and] glorify your Father who is in heaven." Matthew 5:14-16 AMP
Be ready,
Deborah Luchie
www.kingdomcitizens.org
All scriptures are NLT unless otherwise noted.
This article may only be reproduced, in print or on the internet, if the author's name and website address are included at the end of the article as originally placed. Thank you.
Yes! And He also loved us so much that He gives us the freedom to choose whether we would accept or reject His Son Jesus and His Kingdom. He also wants us to fully understand the cost of that rejection. “Today I have given you the choice between life and death, between blessings and curses. Now I call on heaven and earth to witness the choice you make. Oh, that you would choose life, so that you and your descendants might live! You can make this choice by loving the Lord your God, obeying Him, and committing yourself firmly to Him. This is the key to your life. And if you love and obey the Lord, you will live long in the land the Lord swore to give your ancestors Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.” Deuteronomy 30:19-20 I am the Door; anyone who enters through Me will be saved [and will live forever], and will go in and out [freely], and find pasture (spiritual security). The thief comes only in order to steal and kill and destroy. I came that they may have and enjoy life, and have it in abundance [to the full, till it overflows]. I am the Good Shepherd. The Good Shepherd lays down His [own] life for the sheep. John 10:9-11 AMP
The Lord God is our loving Father. He is not a friend or an ATM, nor is He a "pushover" who freely gives us what we want no matter how sinful our life is or how bad it is for us. Part of our difficulty in seeing Him clearly as a good Father is that today's society has so misrepresented the role and importance of a father. They don't show fathers as providers, protectors, teachers and disciplinarians. The love of a father is all those things. Your earthly father may have fallen short of that description, but your Heavenly Father never will! Seek the Kingdom of God above all else, and He will give you everything you need. So don’t be afraid, little flock. For it gives your Father great happiness to give you the Kingdom. Luke 12:31-32
If you are a parent, would you stop your child from running out into the street? Would you protect them from doing anything that might hurt them or endanger their life in any way? Let's say they are 8 years old and they ask for a gun, would you buy it for them? Sometimes your job as a parent is to protect your child from themselves and what they think they want! They aren't mature enough to understand the danger that may come with it. Sometimes they do something that requires being disciplined. The Lord God, as a loving Father, does all of those things also. “My child, don’t make light of the Lord’s discipline, and don’t give up when He corrects you. For the Lord disciplines those He loves, and He punishes each one He accepts as His child.”
As you endure this divine discipline, remember that God is treating you as His own children. Who ever heard of a child who is never disciplined by their father? If God doesn’t discipline you as He does all of His children, it means that you are illegitimate and are not really His children at all. Since we respected our earthly fathers who disciplined us, shouldn’t we submit even more to the discipline of the Father of our spirits, and live forever?
For our earthly fathers disciplined us for a few years, doing the best they knew how. But God’s discipline is always good for us, so that we might share in His holiness. No discipline is enjoyable while it is happening—it’s painful! But afterward there will be a peaceful harvest of right living for those who are trained in this way. Hebrews 12:5-11
When we understand the love of our Heavenly Father, when we are being filled with His Word and the Holy Spirit, we will be better able to love the world as Jesus did. We love the person, but never embrace the sin. We are to see and love the spirit within them, as our Father does!
To know what the Lord God considers sin, study His Word, don't listen to the world. Don’t you realize that those who do wrong will not inherit the Kingdom of God? Don’t fool yourselves. Those who indulge in sexual sin, or who worship idols, or commit adultery, or are male prostitutes, or practice homosexuality, or are thieves, or greedy people, or drunkards, or are abusive, or cheat people—none of these will inherit the Kingdom of God. Some of you were once like that. But you were cleansed; you were made holy; you were made right with God by calling on the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God. You say, “I am allowed to do anything”—but not everything is good for you. And even though “I am allowed to do anything,” I must not become a slave to anything. You say, “Food was made for the stomach, and the stomach for food.” (This is true, though someday God will do away with both of them.) But you can’t say that our bodies were made for sexual immorality. They were made for the Lord, and the Lord cares about our bodies. And God will raise us from the dead by His power, just as He raised our Lord from the dead.
Don’t you realize that your bodies are actually parts of Christ? Should a man take his body, which is part of Christ, and join it to a prostitute? Never! And don’t you realize that if a man joins himself to a prostitute, he becomes one body with her? For the Scriptures say, “The two are united into one.” But the person who is joined to the Lord is one spirit with him.
Run from sexual sin! No other sin so clearly affects the body as this one does. For sexual immorality is a sin against your own body. Don’t you realize that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit, who lives in you and was given to you by God? You do not belong to yourself, for God bought you with a high price. So you must honor God with your body. 1 Corinthians 6:9-18
All that you know about Jesus and His Kingdom are precious jewels that are unseen and misunderstood by the world until you show them through your life. If you truly love someone, you won't want them to spend eternity in the torture of Hell. Yes, Hell. We cannot believe in Heaven and not believe there is a Hell. The world would have you believe that you must embrace everything a person is doing to love and accept them. Stand on the foundation of God's Word and never falter. Don't preach, but be a living example of Jesus and the Words of God! “You are the light of [Christ to] the world. A city set on a hill cannot be hidden; nor does anyone light a lamp and put it under a basket, but on a lampstand, and it gives light to all who are in the house. Let your light shine before men in such a way that they may see your good deeds and moral excellence, and [recognize and honor and] glorify your Father who is in heaven." Matthew 5:14-16 AMP
Be ready,
Deborah Luchie
www.kingdomcitizens.org
All scriptures are NLT unless otherwise noted.
This article may only be reproduced, in print or on the internet, if the author's name and website address are included at the end of the article as originally placed. Thank you.
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