Day Twenty - Obedience

I am not sure if you remember us doing a series of Sunday messages from Ephesians, but I spent weeks talking about the "Believer's Walk of Faith." We looked at our walk in unity, walk in love, walk in light, walk in wisdom and the walk in submission. Our walk of faith stems from our convictions, bore out of our Biblical worldview, and it is only possible by the work of the Holy Spirit (God's Power and Might that dwells within the Believer).

So, before we move on from this New Year's series of blogs, teachings, and sermons on destroying apathy and developing intimacy with Christ by prayer, study, fasting, and the filling of the Holy Spirit, I want to make sure I challenge you:

I have no idea what you may have laid aside temporarily or what you may have put out of your life permanently, but let me implore you to let this, whatever "this" has been for you, be the beginning, rather than the end.

Read Ephesians 4:17-24   

Note, please, in Colossians 3:16 that first phrase: "Let the Word of Christ dwell in you richly in all wisdom."
The wonderful, Spirit-filled life is one of obedience, but our God never expects us to do what He has not equipped us to do for His glory, the edification of others, and our own good. Praise God!!! Putting off the old self with the sin nature you were born with and putting on the new you is made possible through regeneration.

We know that Christ bled, died, and rose again to set us free from the bondage of sin, death, hell and the grave, but He lived on this earth for thirty-three years and a thousand days after His baptism to show us how to live. The Bible is a love letter to reveal to us not just who He is, but who we can be in Him. It was not given to us just so we would know how to act in Heaven after we die, but so we would know how to survive and thrive the gauntlet of this life on earth.

Examine your life by allowing the Holy Spirit to test, try, and prove who you are in comparison to Christ's life and the life outlined in Scripture. The saddest statement in all the Bible is King Agrippa saying to Paul, "Almost thou hast persuadist me." The most dangerous and saddest statement any of us can ever make is: "I know what the Bible says, but. . ." That conjunction presents a rebellious heart, not a yielded, fertile heart.

What has God said to you through these blogs and videos? What have you learned? Are you praying? Are you listening? Are you studying God's Word? Are you trusting and obeying? Are you depending on God's Power and Might to enable you to walk according to the new character God has given you?

In 2 Corinthians 6:17, Paul challenged his readers to "come out from among them (the world) and be separate, says the Lord." That is my prayer for you.

Read 2 Corinthians 10:1-6

In Christ,
Pastor Todd