Proverbs 22:4 “Humility and the fear of the Lord; its wages are riches and honor a life.”

Proverbs contains many strong statements about the benefits of wisdom, including long life, wealth, honor, and peace. What if you are not experiencing any of these, does this mean you are low on wisdom?

Not necessarily, because instead of providing guarantees, these statements are general principles as the book of Proverbs is often describing life the way that it should be. In a perfect world, wise behavior would always lead to these benefits. Even in our troubled world, living wisely usually results in living a blessed life, but not always.

Sometimes sin intervenes, and some blessings must be delayed until Jesus returns to establish His eternal kingdom. That is why as Christians, we must “live by faith, not by sight” (2 Corinthians 5:7”). If we believe in Christ, we can share Paul’s hope and confidence of eternal life with Christ. Let this hope give you confidence in your faith and inspire you to gain wisdom and understanding of the Word. We can be sure that this wisdom ultimately leads to Jesus’ blessings.

Owning a fish tank has serendipitously exposed me, in a miniscule way, to God’s view of His creation. I believe one of God’s greatest wishes for us is “that we should love one another” (1 John 3:11; John 13:34-35). The reason I feel this is because of what happened to me today. My female Guppy started to birth live fry. I was so happy as I watched a newborn swimming in an ecosystem, I was responsible for. Then it happened – as quick as you can imagine, a tropical Zebra fish ate the newborn.

If I felt so bad for a fry being MURDERED, how much more should I not frantically want to allow God to save His creation by working through me?

In 1 John we are given many reasons why our Savior came to earth. Here are all the “so that” statements (ESV):

• 1 John 1:3 so that you too may have fellowship with us

• 1 John 1:4 so that our joy may be complete.

• 1 John 2:1 so that you may not sin.

• 1 John 2:28 so that when he appears we may have confidence …

at his coming.

• 1 John 4:9 so that we might live through him.

• 1 John 4:17 so that we may have confidence for the day of
judgment,

• 1 John 5:20 so that we may know him who is true…

Jesus wants us to know Him and have fellowship with Him so that we might live eternally through Him. Friend, would you consider saving your family and friends by baptizing them, in Jesus Christ’s name, for the forgiveness of their sins so that they may receive the gift of the Holy Spirit (Acts 2:38)?

Back in 2015, a hilariously dramatic video came out of Shia LaBeouf in front of a green screen screaming “JUST DO IT” along with other incoherent, ad-libbed motivational proverbs. Surprisingly, this ridiculous video had a huge impact on me because, silly as it was, it spoke the truth. At Freed-Hardeman, I was surrounded by people who grew up going to church most of their lives. They already knew everything that they were supposed to do. However, a lot of my friend had trouble actually living it out. I realized that I was one of those people in some areas of my life. In the summer of 2015, I decided to take action in my life and make more changes to be conformed to the image of Jesus (Rom 8:29). This year has also had many of those same transformations.

My exhortation to you is to take action in your spiritual life. I am sure that most of you already know the things that you should be doing, but you have made excuses because it is an inconvenience. Have you been evangelizing? Have you been praying? Have you gained self-control over your temper or lustful thoughts? There are many reasons why you may have put these off. It takes hard work to change many of these things! But the devil is tricking you into thinking you can do it later, that you will have more energy and time later, that it will be more convenient later. But that is a trick to get you to continue doing it so that it will only be more difficult to stop later on. If you know what you need to do, the time is now. Just do it! “Therefore, to one who knows the right thing to do and does not do it, to him it is sin” (James 4:17; NASB).

Let’s talk about love.  Valentine’s Day is traditionally a day to recognize the special love in your life.  We all have that someone special, but what does your heart really favor?  Valentine’s day is a good time to review who and what we love.

 If any man loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him.  1 John 2:15

Where do we spend all of our time?  David Shannon once said in a workshop, ”Show me your calendars, show me your bank statement, and what you talk about, and these 3 things will tell us what we love.”

Is your calendar filled with sporting events, travel, parties, etc.?  Do you book activities during worship times? Do you schedule and attend fellowship activities?  Do you plan time for outreach and serving others?  Looking at your calendar will tell you where you spend all of your time, where your priorities are. 

What will your bank statement tell you?  Is it to support your calendar habits?   When is the last time you invested in your soul?  How long since you attended a Marriage Enrichment Seminar, Youth Rally, Retreat, or bought a good book on the Church?  How many entries will be to support your church and in outreach to others?

What are your conversations about?  Do you talk only about current events, politics, sports?  What kind of jokes do you tell?  If someone overheard your conversation, would they know you are a Christian; can they tell that you love the Lord?  Are you prepared to tell someone about Jesus when an opportunity arises?

Brothers and Sisters, the Bible tells us in Mark 12:30 to “love the Lord our God with all of our heart, with all of our soul, with all of our mind.” 

· Think about loving God with all of our heart (That is what your calendar will tell you)   

· Think about loving God with all of our soul (That is what your bank statement will tell us)  

· Think about loving God with all of our mind (That is what your conversation will tell you)                 

God Is Love!

(Valentine’s Day is also my dad’s birthday. Happy birthday!)

Come with me on a journey through time to the not-so-distant future – to our judgment day. Our friend, Jesus Christ, whose commands we have been obeying all our lives, warned us that this day would come unexpectedly (Mt.24:36) and sooner than later (Lk.12:20). Because we trust the Words of our Lord and Savior, intellectually we know this is true – THE JUDGMENT DAY IS
IMMINENT.

Now, imagine that today is that Day. As we move towards the great Throne, we notice forlorn souls we love deeply being led away to an eternity of pain and misery. Some of these may be our parents, siblings, children, best friends, and fellow worshippers. Our hearts break because there is nothing we can do. But every one of us knows that we did not do enough when we still had the time. And with crushed and broken spirits we remember Jesus Christ saying, “we must work the works of him who sent me while it is day; night is coming, when no one can work” (Jn.9:4).

Friends let us reason together. Since we know THE JUDGEMENT DAY IS IMMINENT and we know we are surrounded by many heading to hell, why not, while we still have time, don’t we reach out now and save those we love so much “by snatching them out of the fire” (Jude 1:23)?

The Christian life is a life of joy, but that does not mean that it is not a life full of struggle and difficulty. In fact, in Philippians, the “letter of joy,” Paul is imprisoned and might be facing the death penalty. Yet, he still rejoices (Phil 1:18–19).

Most Christians do not struggle with external worldly threats. Rather, the main conflict is with your own sinful inclination. Paul describes this reality as a battle between the flesh and the spirit, “For the flesh sets its desire against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh; for these are in opposition to one another, so that you may not do the things that you please” (Gal 5:17; NASB). As several know, this battle is not fun in the moment. Manifesting self-control, one fruit of the spirit, is anything but fun for your mind. This is especially true with habitual sin, such as gossip, lying, anger, pornography, and drunkenness. Rejoicing in the midst of these battles is extremely difficult. It will take practice and patience. However, once you reframe the temptation as a choice between loving our Redeemer or simply gratifying your own flesh, you will suddenly see the reality of the situation. In this way, the Truth will empower you to continue walking in the Spirit rather than seek self-gratification. Eventually, you will be able to happily suffer through temptation for Christ’s sake because of his love for us.

Romans 10:2. “For I bear them witness that they have a zeal for God, but not according to knowledge” (NKJV).

In this passage from Romans, the Apostle Paul was speaking about his Jewish brethren who had yet to accept Christ. However, he gives us two factors to determine where we are as a Christian: zeal and knowledge.

Type 1: No zeal, no knowledge.
This person is spiritually dead. They don’t know, and they don’t care.

Type 2: Knowledge without zeal.
This is a very dangerous place to be. It was to these types that Jesus spoke in Matthew 18:5 (quoting Isaiah 29:13), “These people draw near to Me with their mouth, and honor Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me.” We should all be pursuing greater knowledge of the Word, because it’s through the Word we come to know our Lord. But it can be very easy to know all the right things in our heads yet be totally unaffected in the heart.

Type 3: Zeal without knowledge.
This, of course, was the type Paul was addressing in Romans 10. He was writing of Jews who cared greatly about God but remained under the Law instead of submitting to Christ for their righteousness. And as admirable as their zeal was, it would not save them. Knowledge is crucial. When someone first becomes a Christian, this will typically be their state, and that’s ok… for a time. Zeal that is never paired with knowledge is a whole other kind of danger. This person can have a fire to do things for God and tell others about Him, but if there is no knowledge there, they will deceive both themselves and others. For this reason we must “grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ” (2 Peter 3:18a NKJV).

Type 4: Zeal with knowledge.
This should be the aim of every Christian. There are times when our zeal will be strong, and times when it will wane. There will always be areas in which we can expand our knowledge. It is a life-long pursuit to have hearts filled with passion for God and heads filled with knowledge of who He is and what He desires from us. But it’s a worthwhile
pursuit.

So the real question is, which of the other options do I have a tendency toward, and how do I avoid it? Knowing which one we are, praying about it, and applying ourselves to growth is the best way to truly possess both zeal and knowledge.

This is an edited version of an article by Jack Wilkie, Focus Press.

One day Jesus found himself in conflict with the Pharisees. It escalated to the point of name calling. The Pharisees riled saying, “We were not born of sexual immorality” (Jn.8:41). And Jesus responds, “You are of your father the devil” (Jn.8:44).

The point Jesus was making is that families reap what they sow. Therefore, if our families are attempting to emulate godly families, we would be building each other up in at least three different ways.

First, we do not lie to each other because we have no secrets we need to hide. “Rather, speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in every way into him who is the head, into Christ” (Eph.4:15 ESV).

Second, we do not lose our tempers with each other. However, on the occasion we do get angry we will remember not to sin. Instead, we would “not let the sun go down on your anger” (Eph.4:26 ESV) through confession and repentance.

And lastly, we would build each other up by entertaining the Holy Spirit’s attitude towards each other. “Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, as God in Christ forgave you” (Eph.4:32).

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To read more go to lesson 4 day 4 in “My Life in Him” (t.ly/bwNi). Summit members can access our video reading at t.ly/3iiQ or our achieve to catch up at t.ly/MI2O.