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Slide 1: ==== ==== All information regarding God, please check the provided websites: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=David_Cushion, http://www.rightpands.com, and others. http://EzineArticles.com/, http://www.rightpands.com ==== ==== Genuinely Want To Obey God God loves you mind-boggingly more than you could possibly love yourself. Because true, godly love is utterly selfless, your best interest is God's top priority. The infinite knowledge and wisdom of God make the smartest human decisions look like the guesses of a moron. If you combine all these facts and ponder their implications, it becomes clear that God's will is the wisest thing you could ever do. Now combine this with Scripture's famous truth: "The fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom" (Psalms 111:10; Proverbs 9:10 - Job 28:28; Proverbs 1:7; 15:33 are similar). To fear God is to literally fear the consequences of disobeying the One who is Wisdom. Ideally, we should be so in love with God that fear doesn't factor because God's happiness means so much to us that we would rather die than sadden him. If we truly loved, to know we had disappointed the Lord would devastate us so much that something terrifying could not make us feel any worse. Nevertheless, there is genuine reason to fear disregarding the directions of the God of all love and wisdom. In our relationship with God we are like electricians working on 100,000 volt transformers. We are perfectly safe, provided we act wisely. If you don't realize the danger for Christian and nonChristian alike, you know little about the God of the New Testament and I suggest when you reach the end of this page you explore a link there about the fear of God. Psalms 25:14 The LORD confides in those who fear him . . . The Lord shares his secrets with those who would sooner tongue kiss rattlesnakes than disobey him. John 7:17 If anyone chooses to do God's will, he will find out whether my teaching comes from God or whether I speak on my own. Jesus is saying that to receive the divine revelation as to whether it is just a man spouting his own thoughts or God speaking, the critical factor is one's willingness to obey God. An openness to God's will - resolving to obey him no matter how unexpected and what the cost - unlocks our mind to let God in to give us the revelation we desperately need. Note how the psalmist linked receiving divine revelation with a commitment to obey God. Psalm 119:34 Give me understanding, and I will keep your law and obey it with all my heart.
Slide 2: Psalm 119:145 I call with all my heart; answer me, O LORD, and I will obey your decrees. It is tempting to seek God, not because we want to obey him but because we are hoping to hear him say, "Yes, you can have what you want," and if he says anything else we'll ignore it. Such an attitude does not inspire the Almighty to speak to us. If we are not going to obey, the Lord telling us his will is not just God wasting his time, it increases our accountability and the severity of our judgment. To paraphrase Jesus, if you seek first the kingdom of God all other necessities will be provided (Matthew 6:33). Although Jesus said this in relation to our physical needs, the principle surely applies equally to spiritual needs. If we put God's glory foremost in our motives, he'll give us the guidance we need. Count The Cost What would you think of a soldier who was expecting war to be so easy that he gets upset when he breaks a fingernail and deserts? When urging the crowds to count the cost before committing to him, Jesus spoke of a king going to war. To succeed in war one must steel oneself with the expectation that it will be tough. Walking a tightrope might be easier than writing this webpage. Hopefully, from what I said earlier, you will understand how seriously I have failed you if I unintentionally foster a dread of God's will. Just presuming that it will be unpleasant can cause serious problems. What makes the tightrope so precariously narrow, however, is that it is also my spiritual responsibility to steel you for the possibility that, although not guaranteed, God's directions might occasionally seem unpleasant initially. We need to long to do God's will. And lest a closed mind causes us to mishear what God longs to tell us, we must be alert to all possibilities, which, of course, includes the likelihood that even in the short term God's plans for us will exceed our fondest hopes. Nevertheless, much of Jesus' teaching focuses on the cost, because he sought to instill in us the mental toughness required to be prepared for any eventuality. Without a willingness to embrace short-term pain for long-term joy, we Christians so easily fall into delusion. Should this happen we will be horrified when we face our Judge. Expecting to hear a "well done," we would discover that despite all our prayer, good living, hard work and sacrifices we have missed God's best and wasted our lives. We might make heaven but for all eternity we will suffer the loss. Sometimes God's answer is right in front of us, but we don't recognize it because we are expecting the Lord to find some soft option to our crisis, when no such option is in his loving plans for us. Too often we overlook our Savior's insistence that we take up our cross and follow the One who for the joy set before him dragged his cross to Golgotha where he was tortured to death. Yes, Scripture says it was for the joy set before him that Jesus endured the agony of crucifixion (Hebrews 12:2). Our Savior said that doing God's will was his food (John 4:34). It was prophesied of him that he delights to do God's will (Psalm 40:7-8; Hebrews 10:5-7). Nevertheless, in the garden of Gethsemane we find our perfect Role Model sweating, as it were, drops of blood; hoping against hope for a legitimate way of avoiding God's will. So let's get real: if we are Christlike, there will be times when God's will seems the most agonizing and undesirable option. At such times
Slide 3: everything within us will seem to cry out against doing God's will, and since we love God, we will be pressured to disobey and fool ourselves into thinking we are still obeying him. God's goal for us is to become champions. Could our goal sometimes be an easy few years, regardless of how much it eats into our eternal reward? The glory of Christ's champions is, through him, to do things that seem impossible. Jesus kept saying we must deny ourselves. Peter said, " . . . since Christ suffered in his body, arm yourselves also with the same attitude, because he who has suffered in his body is done with sin (1 Peter 4:1). The parable of the sower refers to those who fall away when the going gets tough (Matthew 13:20-22). If, for the One who gave his all for us, we are unwilling to embrace severe hardship, the possibility of falling into self-deception will skyrocket when obeying Christ becomes costly. If so, instead of having ears attuned to the Spirit's whispers we will have, to use Paul's words, ears itching to hear what we want to hear (2 Timothy 4:3). When writing of those whose "god is their stomach," Paul seems to be referring to people who thought they were Christians (Philippians 3:19). No matter how Christian they look, and how convinced they are that they are serving God, their real god - the one they serve and let determine the course of their lives and their eternal destiny - is not the wise, loving Lord, but their own passions and cravings. Romans 16:18 For such people are not serving our Lord Christ, but their own appetites. There are those who seem indistinguishable from Christians when they can have a cozy life while acting godly. It is only in situations where they cannot have both their own way and God's way that their real god is exposed. Even then, they will be so desperate to have both their fill of ease and the temporal status and eternal comfort of being Christians that their minds will buzz with excuses and rationalizations to the point of utter self-deception. Despite putting their own interests foremost, they convince themselves they are serving the real God. These good people can be so anxious to have both God and their sin that they become the most devout non-Christians on the planet. We each have the potential to end up so sold-out to God that we match the Jews who went to extremes in keeping themselves ceremonially pure while finalizing the murder of their Messiah (John 18:28). We could find all sorts of Scriptures to confirm the correctness of our actions, just like Satan found Scripture to prove the correctness of his arguments when tempting the Son of God to sin (Matthew 4:5-6). Once a person decides he or she wants to sin, the human capacity for self-deception knows no bounds. It is not the slightest surprising to find gay churches, embezzling pastors and adulterous or even incestuous Christian leaders. We could find ourselves following not our crucified Lord but Ananias and Sapphira; struck dead for thinking they were having the best of both worlds by being hailed for their devotion, while secretly indulging themselves ( Acts 5:1-11). The easy way leads to destruction (Matthew 7:13-14; Luke 13:24). If we want both our Lord and the easy life we can find ourselves with the throng on Judgment Day who will say, "Lord, Lord, did we not . . ." and will be stunned to hear those terrifying words, " I never knew you. Away from me, you evildoers!" (Matthew 7:22-23). As Jesus says:
Slide 4: Matthew 7:21 "Not everyone who says to me, 'Lord, Lord,' will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only he who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. . . ." Elsewhere the tragedy is described this way: Proverbs 30:12 [There are] those who are pure in their own eyes and yet are not cleansed of their filth In the words of the prophet: Jeremiah 17:9 The heart is deceitful above all things and beyond cure. Who can understand it? No wonder the psalmist prayed: Psalms 139:23-24 Search me, O God, and know my heart; test me and know my anxious thoughts. See if there is any offensive way in me . . . When Sin Sparks a Divine Communication Breakdown Many of us suffer a love-hate affair with a particular sin. Our loving Lord is most patient when we genuinely want to be freed from it but have not yet discovered how to draw upon God's power for total deliverance. The entire process is a rich, though frustrating, spiritual learning experience, which will cause us to grow, even though during most of our struggle we will feel that we are going backwards. A link at the end of this page will help you. If, however, we are not struggling against our pet sin but want to keep it, divine patience will begin to wear thin. Until we repent, we can expose ourselves to the danger of a communication breakdown with the Lord. Psalm 66:18 If I had cherished sin in my heart, the Lord would not have listened [to me] Isaiah 59:2 But your iniquities have separated you from your God; your sins have hidden his face from you, so that he will not hear. That is what happened to King Saul. He had surrendered to sin (for instance, he was continually trying to kill David, who as Saul had been, was God's anointed). The spiritual implications of Saul's sins came to a head when he desperately needed to hear from God. Not surprisingly, given his behavior, the Lord was silent. In desperation, he added to his sin by turning to a medium for guidance, despite being so aware of the sinfulness of this that he himself had previously banished all mediums from the land. He died just hours later (1 Samuel 28:3-29). We can do the same in one of two ways. The first way is to keep trying to find the answer we want, rather than the answer we know God has given. If the Lord gives us an answer, but not one that we want to hear, we can keep seeking Christian advisors until we find one who says what we want to hear and choose to believe it, despite knowing deep down that it is not God's counsel. There are things we should not pray about because we already know God's will on the matter and
Slide 5: praying simply means we are hoping for a response that is contrary to the God of the Bible. For example, if a Christian prays, "Lord, should I rob a bank?" he is not praying to the real God because he already knows the true God is opposed to stealing. If he receives the answer he wants, it will not be from the true God. Such a person is, of course, careering into deception. When we are genuinely confused, the Lord is most patient with us, but if we know the answer is staring at us in the Bible and we are asking simply because we don't like the answer the God of the Bible gives, then we are on very dangerous ground. The second way we can act like King Saul is to consult non-Christian spiritual guides, such as reading the stars, having our fortune told, or even some secular means that does not focus on the Bible and seeking God through Jesus, and encourages us to take a path contrary to the leading of the one and only true God. Scripture says that God put a lying spirit into hundreds of prophets, causing them to entice the king of Israel into a war that killed him. Why would the God of truth do that? Because these were prophets of a false god whom the king chose to worship; not prophets of the true God (1 Kings 22:5-38). The Bible even says that God can go to the extreme of letting prophets of false gods foretell a miraculous sign that actually happens, and it is God testing his people to see if they truly love him or will knowingly reject him in favor of false gods (Deuteronomy 13:1-3). So to hear from God we must want God to wrench from our lives, not just the sins we hate, but the sins we love. And if at any time we have sought occultic guidance, we must repent and seek God's forgiveness so that there is no blockage in our relationship with God. Look Beyond Human Advisors The word of God often comes to us served up by people. The Lord loves speaking to us through people because he loves people and delights in giving the objects of his love the astounding honor of sharing in his great work. We are part of a body. We need each other, and the Lord has very deliberately placed spiritual leaders and teachers in the body of Christ. These are helps that we dare not ignore. If what we believe to be God's guidance differs from the views of respected leaders, it is strong evidence that we have misheard God. We must be ever so cautious about disregarding their views. Nevertheless, as I have said elsewhere, your church and favorite Bible teachers might be excellent and have far deeper understanding than me, but does that make them infallible? I doubt if anyone on the planet has a one hundred percent correct interpretation of every aspect of the entire Bible. How then can you be certain that that fraction of a percent where your church or Bible teacher is incorrect does not include the very issue you are seeking God about? No matter how wise and spiritual people seem, they, like you and me, can occasionally have their own blind spots and their own hidden pressures influencing their judgment. We must not be content to have blind faith in anyone, but must personally seek confirmation from our Lord. Even when God's counsel comes to us through people, it is our responsibility to ensure that God
Slide 6: truly is the real source of our guidance. The Holy Book preserves for our instruction the instance in 1 Kings 13, where a young prophet let himself be persuaded by a more mature prophet who claimed to have heard from God. Though it was contrary to the younger prophet's personal leading he chose to believe the more experienced prophet. The mistake cost the young man his life. Never Give Up Jesus deliberately made it hard for people to understand his teaching. We see this in his parables. Although powerfully helpful to the few who got close enough to him to be given the key to their meaning, to everyone else most of his parables were little more than frustrating puzzles (Matthew 13:10-13). But Jesus even went beyond using parables in making things difficult for his listeners. He kept coming up with weird, even offensive, sayings such as, "Unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life in you" (John 6:53). This saying was enough for many of his disciples to leave him. He could have explained. He could have worded it differently. He could have avoided the subject. Instead, he used it to test them. The twelve, though as bewildered and as offended as the others, clung to Jesus. It was perhaps years later - after the resurrection - when it eventually made sense to them, but no matter how ridiculous Jesus' teaching seemed, they stubbornly clung to the belief that Jesus had the answers they needed and that if they kept with him for long enough, he would eventually reveal what they needed to know. God has not changed tactics. He still uses silences and Bible difficulties and offensive situations as challenges for us to rise to the occasion and prove that we believe that no matter what, the answer is found in Jesus and in him alone, and that if we cling to him for long enough, all that we need will be revealed. We again see this in Jesus' interaction with the Canaanite (Syrophenician) woman. She needed him. He gave her the silent treatment. Instead of giving up, she hounded him all the more. When she finally wrung a response from him it was worse than nothing. He insulted her and said he wouldn't give her a thing. Still she hounded him and ended up receiving not only her request but Jesus' high praise (Matthew 15:21-28). It turned out that despite not revealing a hint of it until it was all over, her persistence thrilled him. And when you receive the silent treatment, your determination to keep badgering him because you believe he cares and will not remain silent forever, will likewise thrill him, gain you high praise and you'll hear from him as well. It seemed to Lazarus's sisters that Jesus had let them down by not responding immediately to their urgent plea for him to come and heal their brother. But they were wrong. (John 11:1-45). Jesus is always faithful and always cares and always has more ways of bringing good out of disaster than our powers of imagination could cope with. To our great loss, it is usually suppressed from official biographies, but many - perhaps all - great men and women of God have reeled in agonized bewilderment at having been certain they had heard from God; only for circumstances to later prove they had been mistaken. Why God allowed it, I do not know, but what proved these people's greatness is that after that sickening blow they staggered to their feet and kept pressing forward for God. We sometimes feel sure God will answer a prayer a particular way and for some mysterious reason it doesn't happen. It can be bitterly disappointing and defy all understanding, but we
Slide 7: continue to believe in prayer. Likewise when it turns out that we had misheard from God, we need to continue to believe in God's guidance and his integrity. Cling to him. Whenever God communicates, whether it be through the Bible, through circumstances, or whatever, he usually whispers. The further we let ourselves drift from him, the more likely it is that we won't catch everything he is saying and we will unknowingly fill in the gaps with what we suppose he is saying, thus exposing ourselves to danger. Go to Part 3 0f 3 parts, not much more to read! Grantley Morris is in his fifties and was true to the Lord when the Lord asked him not to marry for the sake of the gospel. He works full time but over the past few years has built the best Christian website I have ever visited. He won't sell you anything, he won't ask you for money to support him, he exists on the web purely to teach people about Jesus Christ and His Father God and to help people live the life they were born to live. He already responds to well over a hundred emails a week personally helping people work through the issues his writings have addressed and would welcome you if you dropped him a line. You have to go through a spam filter to contact him, yet I promise he will write back to you in a matter of days. Grantley's web address ishttp://net-burst.net/search.htm Be sure to check him out. Be sure to check out his bigger then e-books free on the site. Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Grantley_Morris ==== ==== All information regarding God, please check the provided websites: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=David_Cushion, http://www.rightpands.com, and others. http://EzineArticles.com/, http://www.rightpands.com ==== ====