Even If i Walk Alone

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

Matthew

A Stress-Free Life

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Much of the stress in our lives is brought on by the fact we are focusing on ourselves instead of on God. Trouble will find its way into each of our lives. Difficult, even tragic, circumstances will invade our serenity. Countless outside influences will cause us stress, but I maintain the primary culprit will always be a wrong focus. I know from personal experience that a surrendered heart that is thinking only of Jesus has no room for stress.

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The love, joy, grace, and sufficiency of Christ have an almost intoxicating way of melting away every care and concern. Personal experience also informs me that even a slight glance away from our Lord yields disastrous results. The implication is clear. If you want to live a stress-free life, keep your focus on Jesus.

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A Christianity of Convenience

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A reader wrote to me expressing her disgust over the fact so many “people today just want to live a Christianity of convenience.” I share her frustration. The reality is Christianity is never a convenient way to live. If it is, I guarantee you do not understand what it means to follow Jesus. The gospel of Jesus will never be popular or convenient. To follow Jesus is to live at odds with society and the surrounding culture.

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In my lifetime, this has never been more obvious than in the last few years. Christians around the world are murdered every day simply because of their faith. Even in the West, Christians are now being arrested for praying silently to themselves. The culture now views followers of Christ as threats to society. I’d say that’s a less-than-convenient way for us to live.

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The Gospel

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There is a plethora of bad teaching out there today. So many voices saying so many things about Jesus and the Bible. How do you know who to listen to and who to ignore? Trusted voices I’ve been quick to recommend in the past have proven to be unfaithful in recent years and are no longer proclaiming the simple truth of the Bible. The so-called “Prosperity Gospel” is spreading like wildfire with its focus on health, wealth, and success.

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Progressive ideology is misleading people by the tens of thousands. The most popular churches and most popular preachers are teaching a gospel that is no gospel at all. With all this in mind, I think it’s important to restate what the gospel, the true gospel of Jesus Christ, really is.

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A Devoted Life

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There are times you encounter things in life you just can’t shake. As I exited the church I was attending recently, the pastor and a man who had identified himself as the head elder were standing at the door, ostensibly to say goodbye to people as they were leaving. As we approached, I heard them conversing somewhat passionately about… the NFL playoffs.

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That may seem innocent enough, but it has been gnawing at me ever since. I suppose it was their way of letting off steam after putting in their obligatory sixty-five minutes of church for the week. To me, it was a picture of everything wrong with Christianity in a five-second window. We are so enraptured by the world that we no longer understand what it means to live a sacred and devoted life.

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Comfort Zone

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When faced with stressful and overwhelming circumstances, we all tend to pull back and retreat into what is most familiar to us. If what is most familiar and comfortable to us is sin, then we will find ourselves indulging in sinful behaviors every time our world feels like it is collapsing around us. Thus, when we most need God (as if we aren’t in constant need!), we are rebelling against Him. It’s not a good plan.

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A far better plan is to instill healthy spiritual disciplines that will cause us to retreat into habits like prayer and Bible reading when our life begins tilting upside down. Solomon wrote, “As shameful conduct is pleasure for a fool, so wisdom is for a man of understanding” (Proverbs 10:23). We need to be so obsessed with God and His Word that He becomes our comfort zone.

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