“Trust in the Lord and do good. Then you will live safely in the land and prosper.”
Psalms 37:3 NLT The only way to live is to live for the Lord! He created us and we cannot expect things to go well without living according to His specifications. He is the owner! He is the One who wrote the Owners Manual (The Bible). The specifications written in the manual are given to us to help us properly maintain the life He gave us. To ignore His principles is to bring about our own destruction. God is not a cosmic kill joy that takes pleasure in burdening us with regulations. “Loving God means keeping his commandments, and his commandments are not burdensome.” 1 John 5:3 NLT His regulations are designed to protect our well being and to bring prosperity to our lives and the lives of those around us. There are three basic things that God's principles do for us: 1. Protect our wellbeing. 2. Promote our health (spiritual, physical, financial, social, civil, relational). 3. Prepare us for life now and the eternal life to come. For a society to reject and refuse to obey Him is to invite death into its midst. God is Life. Satan is the opposite - death. The alternative to the blessing is the curse. Here is the result of disobedience: 1. Punishment - we reap what we have sown (see Galatians 6:7 and Hebrews 12:5-12). Should we choose to live for God, we will see blessing. Should we choose to live for Satan and please ourselves, we will see decay, defeat, and devastation. Take a moment today to read Deuteronomy 28. Read the entire chapter. God made a covenant with Israel and there were blessings for obedience and curses for disobedience. When you have contemplated the content of Deuteronomy 28, take a moment and ask yourself this question: "Do I want blessing on my life or do I want a curse?" The decisions you make about honoring or dishonoring God and His Word will determine the outcome. I know that we live in a day of God's New Covenant with us through Jesus Christ. However, I don't not believe that this negates the principles that God has given us throughout history. He is the same God - yesterday, today, and forever (see Hebrews 13:8). Should we choose to live a disobedient life, we will reap the consequences of that life. We cannot expect a good result if we choose to live a wicked life. “A good tree can’t produce bad fruit, and a bad tree can’t produce good fruit.” Matthew 7:18 NLT Today, I choose Christ! I choose to live for, and obey, Him! I choose life! Therefore, blessing is my inheritance.
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March 2020
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