Discipleship

Personal Holiness

March 25, 2021 by Tim Sherfy

God calls each of us to live a life of personal holiness. This goes much deeper than having a daily prayer time or attending a service on the weekend. Personal holiness is more than what we do. It’s also about what we don’t do. It’s what we choose to think about, and what we refuse to dwell on. Personal holiness will affect the words we say and those we don’t speak.

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It’s all-consuming. When we allow the holiness of God to permeate our entire being, everything changes. Everything looks different. We cannot afford to let even the smallest hint of sin take up residence in our hearts because it will eventually infect our entire body.

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Trust Him

March 22, 2021 by Tim Sherfy

It is not uncommon when praying to reason with God and present our arguments why He should grant our requests. The idea would be laughable if not so common. While God wants us to bring our petitions before Him (Philippians 4:6), when we do so, we should simply lay them at His feet. God knows everything we need (Matthew 6:31-33) and has the context of every person and event past, present, and future.

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Therefore, He alone can make the wisest decision regarding our appeal. When we go on about why Jesus should give us what we are asking for, we make ourselves a foolish babbler, filling our prayers with many words that impress no one except ourselves. Again, Jesus knows what we need before we even ask Him (Matthew 6:7-8). We can trust Him, and we must if we want to have a vibrant prayer life.

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Focus on Today

March 15, 2021 by Tim Sherfy

The wise man Agur gave us a wise principle when he asked God to give him “just enough for today” (Proverbs 30:8-9). Jesus affirmed the wisdom of the principle when He taught His disciples to pray. He said for them to ask for God to provide them with their “daily bread”. Whenever you find an Old Testament teaching affirmed in the New Testament, it bears extra attention as we know God is teaching us an important lesson meant to last throughout the ages.

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When we live with our focus on today alone, we are showing obedience to Christ and a faith that trusts Him to take care of everything that’s coming. We free ourselves from the anxiety and worry of an uncertain future in this world.

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God is Not Safe

March 11, 2021 by Tim Sherfy

Our God is not safe, but we like to pretend that He is. The Western version of Christianity has become fat, lazy, and oblivious to what most of our brothers and sisters in Christ face on a day-to-day basis. Not only has our version of God become perhaps irreparably skewed, but we export that version to other countries, leaving them ill-prepared when persecution comes to their door.

I’m not sure who first came up with the idea that following Jesus would dissolve all your problems and leave you happy, healthy, and wealthy. But they obviously did not read God’s Word. Jesus was clear that the world will hate, persecute, and kill us (Matthew 10:17-22). When we read Jesus saying He came to bring a sword and not peace (Matthew 10:34), isn’t it clear that God is not safe?

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Speak His Truth

March 1, 2021 by Tim Sherfy

In a culture that is ironically becoming less tolerant in the name of tolerance, disciples of Jesus must remember He calls us to continue to speak His truth to a world floundering in deception. Our calling is not to espouse political opinions or to pontificate on economic policies. Our calling is to spread the gospel of Jesus Christ and to bathe the world in His love (Matthew 28:18-20).

It’s not wrong to hold opinions about things outside of God’s Word. Having opinions is part of what makes us human. But when we saturate our speech with more political rhetoric than Godly truth, we are going too far and fighting battles the Lord does not intend for us to fight.

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