Even If i Walk Alone

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

I Peter

Show Mercy

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Jesus said, “The merciful are blessed, because they will be shown mercy” (Matthew 5:7). While not a direct command, the implication is clear: we should all show mercy. Our response to wrongs against us must not be like that of the world. Revenge should be a motivation foreign to every follower of Jesus. Each of us will suffer their fair share of injustice in this world.

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As my mother told me from an early age, “Life is not fair”. Thank God for that! Imagine if it were. As my friend Aaron Pelsue sings in his song, “Mercy,” “I deserve all the worst, yet you offer mercy.” Jesus does not exact the punishment we deserve from us, so we should not seek to right the far more trivial wrongs committed against us (Romans 12:19).

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Unstained

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There are many parallels we can draw between the Biblical account of Sodom and Gomorrah (Genesis 19:1-29) and our modern culture. The people in those cities were unrepentant in their engagement in sexual sins. That characteristic is prevalent across the globe today. People not only consider sexual sins normal, but they celebrate them, much like they did in those wicked cities of old.

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It would be easy to spend this entire article digging into this point alone, but there is much written about that, and I am certain you’ve heard it all before. What I want to focus on is the lifestyle of Lot. Day after day he lived among the worst kinds of debauchery and perversion, yet kept himself unstained by it (2 Peter 2:4-10). The people of those cities recognized Lot was different, and they despised him for it (Genesis 19:9). He set a great example for us to follow.

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Sin

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Almost all our sins will fall into two categories. We sin because we are trying to make ourselves equal with God, or by refusing to be who God created us to be. Either way, we spend our days in rebellion, as both forms of sin deny God is who He says He is. When we make everything about us, we place ourselves on God’s throne.

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We deny the sufficiency of Christ and fall into sin when our desires overrule our surrender and our wants become needs (James 4:1-3). This has been the story of mankind since the Garden of Eden as our pride and selfishness usurp God’s authority and drive a wedge between us and our Creator (Genesis 3:4-6; Romans 1:21-23).

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Get Ready

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Jesus is coming back and we better get ready. Scripture makes it clear that His coming will be unexpected (Matthew 24:36). It’s going to shock everyone because we aren’t living our lives in eager anticipation of His return (1 Thessalonians 5:2-6). Since you got out of bed this morning, how many times have you thought about the fact that this could be it? You might see Jesus in the very next minute!

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Most days, we would have to answer that we have given little thought to it at all. Sure, on an intellectual level we recognize the possibility He could come back today, but that’s a far cry from eagerly anticipating it (Philippians 3:19-21)! Why are we not more excited about the coming of our salvation? Is it because we’ve become enamored with this world?

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Be Holy

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Never underestimate the wisdom of those who came before us. Today’s messaging is slick, and the messengers are even slicker, but most of what passes for wisdom these days is fluff and void of any scriptural moorings. There is great value to be gleaned from those voices from the past. Consider this from the writings of J. C. Ryle:

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“Sin never announces itself to us with its full intentions. It never says, ‘I am your deadly enemy and I want to ruin you forever in Hell’. It shows its pleasure but hides its pain; shows its sparkle, but hides its death.” None of us is immune from sin’s deception. To survive, we must heed the Lord’s command to be holy, just as He is holy (1 Peter 1:15-16).

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