Even If i Walk Alone

Instructing and encouraging you to live your life as a disciple of Jesus

God's Kingdom

Your Best Life

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What are the spiritual disciplines you want to have in your life but have not yet implemented? It seems we always think there will be a tomorrow to get started in building a life that looks more like Jesus. As I write this, a new year is approaching. There is something about the end of one year and the beginning of the next that always seems like a great time to make changes in our lives. The tradition of new year’s resolutions dates all the way back to the Babylonians and continues to this day.

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Before we get caught up in this again, we need to remember Jesus taught we should not be building treasures in this life, but storing up riches in Heaven (Matthew 6:19-20). The point of following Jesus is not to build your best life now, but to build your best life after you’ve passed on from this earth.

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Live in Love

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One of the things I learned from Brother Lawrence’s wonderful little book, “The Practice of the Presence of God”, is that any action which is devoid of love is worth little in the Kingdom of God. Love is the very essence of who God is. When you subtract love from any situation you are left with Godlessness. Where God is, there is love.

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Paul wrote in his letter to the church of Corinth no matter what else we might possess, no matter what skills or talents we have, if we don’t have love, we have nothing (I Corinthians 13). No amount of anything equals anything without love. When we love, we honor God. When we don’t, we dishonor Him. It’s a simple formula. Every follower of Christ yearns to live a life that looks like Jesus. The surest way to accomplish this is to live in love every day.

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Creating New Habits

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Andy Stanley mentioned in a recent sermon, “Every habit begins with a first time.” It sounds obvious, doesn’t it?  While obvious, I think it houses some profound truth. If every habit does indeed begin with the first time, then we must be ever diligent about what “first times” we are allowing to occur in our lives. I believe this is one reason why Paul encouraged us to take every thought captive (2 Corinthians 10:3-5).

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If we don’t, we begin to create thought patterns that become more and more difficult to change as time goes by.But it’s not just our thoughts. Every action we take and every word we speak for the first time begins creating new habits. If we aren’t intentional about our thoughts, words, and actions, we will be creating new habits we don’t want to have.

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Radical Obedience

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I’ve been mulling over the phrase “radical obedience” in my mind of late. Radical means far-reaching or thorough. That describes the type of obedience I long to have with Jesus. In fact, I would say it is the type of obedience demanded by Christ and required of all those who claim Him to be their Lord. Radical obedience is thorough. It is far-reaching. What it is not occasional or situational. Too many follow Jesus when it is convenient or expedient. When push comes to shove, their obedience wanes.

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This type of obedience, which is no obedience at all, runs rampant through our churches and results in an abundance of nominal Christians. Practicing radical obedience should be the rule, not the exception. It is sad the opposite is reality today.

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Urgent Enough

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Something with which I have been struggling is whether I am living my life urgent enough. I don’t know if it’s because I’m getting older or because I’m gaining more clarity on my mission here on earth, but I have a constant suspicion my life is not being lived urgent enough. The fact is our lives are finite. They are going to end. Most of us probably do not have as much time remaining as we think we do. I know this because few of us think about the end of our lives in a meaningful way.

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As long as we are healthy, we tend to always think there will be a tomorrow, next week, and next year. Those who learn they only have weeks or months to live tend to live their lives differently; they live with an urgency about them. The rest of us? We take life as it comes, always planning for a tomorrow that may never arrive.

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