Faith for life

1. Be an imitator of Christ As the Coronavirus continues, you may be wondering how you can glorify God whilst practising social distancing and staying at home more. The first thing you can do is to imitate Jesus, by focusing on Him and doing the things that He did. In Matthew 22:36-40, one of the disciples asked Jesus: “Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the Law?”  Jesus replied: “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’   All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.” You see, if we have fulfilled these two crucial requirements, then we have done what is pleasing to God. Love God - use this time (and I’m speaking to myself here too) to deepen your love for God. Spend time with Him, talk to Him, listen to Him and be led by Him. Read the Bible. Ask Him to help you grow. Praise Hi...

The Lord is fire, He is wise, He loves, He will judge and He is faithful. As the world around us has changed over the centuries, so has faithfulness. God, who embodies faithfulness, created the world to be faithful. We read, again and again, in the Bible, that nature, everything that is around us, is obedient and faithful to the Lord. The mountains quake before God and the hills melt away (Nahum 1:5), the sea does not rise over the limit that God has given to it (Proverbs 8:29) and the valleys sing for joy to the Lord (Psalm 65:13). Nature acts this way because it acknowledges God as its creator. God also created mankind to be faithful. God's intention was for Adam and Eve to be faithful to Him, but, instead, they betrayed His trust, they took His faithfulness for granted. Since the time of Adam and Eve, mankind has found more ways to be unfaithful. Sometimes partners betray each other, friends do not remain faithful to one another, organisations deceive their customers, and t...

This third post of my 'God is' series will be looking at the love of God. I want to emphasize that my aim is to explore the biblical observation that a part of God's personality is that He is loving, not that God is only loving. I hear a lot, from many, many people, that 'God is love'. They declare this happily, joyfully and... finally. And, of course, one way of looking at that statement is that God created love and love comes from God. Which I completely agree with. God's love is an awesome, amazing, miraculous part of Him. What worries me, however, is that a lot of people fall into the trap of believing that God is only loving and then they disregard all of God's other personality traits. I think that a lot of people do this, because they believe that it will make their lives easier; that their relationships with God will be stronger and more enjoyable if they accept this part of who He is, without searching for anything else from Him. This is a dang...

The scriptures are very confident of this, simple, fact: God is wise. Throughout both the old and new testaments, God's wisdom is glorified and exalted. And because He is wise, we also read of His understanding, sympathy, kindness, righteousness and that He is all-knowing.  Desiring wisdom is something that all people strive for. In fact, many people sacrifice a great deal in order to gain wisdom; even if the wisdom they are pursuing is foolishness in the eyes of God. Many people desire wisdom, because they desire everything that normally comes with worldly wisdom: power, money, authority, control, love etc. Yet, they do not see what they are missing. In fact, they do not know that they are missing anything at all... And what they are missing is the most precious of human possessions; Jesus. Therefore, not only are they without true wisdom but they are also without salvation. That's a scary thought. The scriptures below highlight a variety of the characteristics o...

If you want to know yourself, why you have the gifts you do, why you are where you are and what your purpose is then you need to get to know who God is, first. Who Jesus is. Get to know His personality and through that He will, in turn, reveal who He has made you to be. This is the beginning of my 'God is' series. Over the next month, each one of my blog posts will be exploring a different element of God's majestic personality. Each post will reveal what the scriptures have to say about God and WHO He is. With these revelations, not only will we come to know our heavenly Father better, but we will also come to know ourselves better as we strive to look more like Jesus.  The first personality trait I will be exploring, is the 'fire' of God. The fire of God appears in many different forms, in the Bible. And below, I have listed what those forms are and the scriptures that explore them. In many ways, the fire of God is a joyful, beautiful spectacle to behold. ...

Security. Whether it’s the lock on your front door, the key to your safety deposit box, the wedding ring on your finger or the password protection on your laptop, we all crave security and stability. And why do we crave it so much? What does security provide us with? I believe the fundamental reason we crave the feeling of security so much, is because we long for protection. We want to protect our families, loved ones, property, money etc. We want the things we care for to be safe. And whilst there are more and more measures being introduced every single day to protect the things we love, accidents always happen, evil happens. Thieves break into houses. Keys go missing. Marriages break up. Laptops get hacked. There is only so much security we can put into our lives today. One of the hardest things, I think we as humans go through, is the pain of losing the ones we love. This is one of the things that reminds us that we are not in control. And, ultimately, what happens to all of the...

Some of you reading this, will be in a season of waiting. As I wrote, in a previous post, waiting can be extremely difficult and a particularly emotional time. You may be asking God some of these kinds of questions: Where should I be living? What job should I be doing? Who do you want me to marry? Should I have children? What should I do with my finances? Should I be buying a house? Should I stop doing this? Should I change direction? Wow, big big questions! There are so many questions God is asked every single day, and the good news is that he hears each and every single one of us and has prepared the answers to our questions since the beginning of time.  “But certainly God has heard me; he has attended to the voice of my prayer.”  Psalm 66:19 Waiting is not particularly enjoyable, no matter what situation you find yourself in. But it produces in us perseverance and trust in God, which then leads to hope.  ‘Not only so, but we a...

A promise is a very special, important and binding deal made between friends. When you promise to do something, believe in something or help with something you are stating emphatically that you WILL do it. Promises are so desired by all kinds of people, that even little children make promises with their friends, because they crave the security and intimacy of their friendships.  It is sad, that as the years go on promises are made much too easily and without a great deal of thought or genuine intent. Husbands and wives promise not to leave each other, friends promise to be there for one another during hard times and families promise that they will always be there. However, these promises are frequently broken, whether by choice or by circumstance. This destruction of a promise does much to harm and confuse us, where it hurts, in our heart and soul. However, when we trust in God we are putting our trust in someone that is incapable of lying, unwilling to be disloyal and una...

The Bible tells us, over 400 times, to ‘fear not’. It is the most common command given to believers in the Bible. If the word of God tells us the same thing, so many times, then we need to realise that it must be important. That we need to learn from it and obey what he has asked us to do or not to do. ‘ Do not be anxious about anything, but in every situation, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.’ Philippians 4:5-7 It is important here, that we do not confuse mere ‘fear’ with the fear of God. We are told numerous times in the Bible to fear God, because our fear leads to understanding, knowledge, wisdom, goodness, God’s protection and, ultimately, salvation. To fear God is to respect God and know that he is a God of justice. He will not let evil go unpunished. Therefore, when we fear him we respect him and keep his c...