Author: admin

Far too many opportunities are lost because God’s people are intimidated by people or by their circumstances. When God invites us to join Him in His work, the time to respond is NOW. But sometimes we struggle to step forward, or to speak up, or to take action. We worry about what people might say or do. We wonder what people will think of us. We fear we are not skilled or knowledgeable enough to succeed. So we hesitate. And the opportunity is lost.

Timidity is not humility or meekness. It is fear. Timidity causes us to hesitate rather than to charge forward. It makes us second guess ourselves rather than advancing with confidence. It results in a life filled with regret and underachievement.

The cure for timidity is a growing faith in God. It is cured when we commit ourselves to obey God, regardless of how adequate we feel we are for the task. It is overcome when we are more concerned about pleasing God than about pleasing people. It is dealt with when we live with the constant awareness that we will one day give an account to our Lord for how we responded to His commands throughout our life. Are your living your life with confidence?

Our heritage can exert an enormous influence in our lives for good or for ill. Certain genes are passed on to us that either enhance our lives or predispose us to illness and struggle. Certain habits, lifestyles, values, and beliefs of our family can also play a huge role in shaping the way we live. Young Timothy had a father who was probably not a believer. Yet this was more than compensated by the fact that his mother and grandmother were devoted followers of Christ. Such was their influence on young Timothy that the apostle Paul was certain that their faith would also be his.

We must all be continually concerned for two issues in our family tree. First, we must be careful that we embrace the good that our ancestors have bequeathed us while studiously discarding harmful beliefs and practices that we wish to avoid. Ancestry is not destiny! We can break the cycle of ungodliness in our family if we so chose.

Second, we must allow God to begin new family traditions in our life. We may not be married or have children, yet we can initiate a new, godly legacy by the way we live. What a joy it would be for those who follow us to gladly embrace Christ because of our example. Our lives can make an enormous contribution to others. May you so live that later generations trace their godly living to the sanctified example you set before them!

God grants us relationships for many reasons. There is no doubt that the apostle Paul needed others if he was to accomplish the worldwide evangelization of Gentiles. Paul had far too much to accomplish for him to work alone! Paul also had an eye for investing in the next generation of leaders who would carry on his work, long after he was gone.

But there was another reason God granted numerous friends to Paul. It was because friendships encouraged and blessed the hard-working apostle. People like Timothy genuinely loved Paul. The former Pharisee from Tarsus seemed to engender deep feelings of love and loyalty in others. In return, Paul’s friends brought him joy. How hard it would have been to suffer the deprivations, persecutions, and lengthy imprisonments that Paul endured, if he had not had good friends who regularly brought him joy.

There is a popular theory that we should not allow ourselves to grow close to the people with whom we work. This viewpoint assumes that such relationships might cloud our judgment or tempt us to show favorites or to compromise our work. Yet the fact is that everyone needs friends. We all depend on others to walk with us and encourage us. Who is it in your life, that brings you joy?

Paul cared deeply about the people he worked with. He can sometimes be viewed as a Type A, driven, world evangelist, but he genuinely loved his friends and colleagues. Paul’s concern involved more than trite cliches. He prayed. Fervently. Regularly.

When you pray for someone consistently, your prayers change you. You cannot regularly pray for people without growing in your love for them. Praying for others helps you turn your focus from yourself and on to the growth and well being of others. God’s heart for people is laid over your heart. You begin to recognize God’s activity in their lives. You also learn to recognize how your life can be a part of the answer to your prayers. Even as you ask God to work in the life of others, God will invariably do a fresh work in you.

What a blessing to work with someone like Paul! What confidence it must have given Timothy to know that, even as Paul gave him demanding assignments, he also agonized in prayer for his proteges success.

How regularly, fervently, and faithfully do you pray for those you work with?

Few things bring any more joy to life than a pure conscience. Sin brings us down. It robs us of our peace of mind. It destroys our relationships. It troubles us at night. When our life is filled with sin, it is impossible to experience true joy.

A pure conscience does not come from a lack of sin, but with having thoroughly dealt with our transgressions. We can have a pure conscience when we know that our Savior remembers our sins no more. And, if Christ has forgotten our confessed sin, we ought to also.

Many try to serve God with guilty consciences. They vainly hope that they can somehow appease a holy God through their good deeds or sacrifice. But the truth is that you cannot do enough good work to atone for your sin. To achieve total absolution, you must repent of your sin and receive God’s forgiveness.

How are you serving your Lord? Weighed down by the load of your guilt? Or joyfully, free from guilt, because you know you sins have all been thoroughly dealt with in heaven?

Each of us has been entrusted with God’s truth. We have all received Scriptural promises that can set us free and provide abundant life. But it must be guarded. Just as seed cast upon the rock can be snatched away by birds and withered by the sun, so God’s truth can do us no good if we neglect it.

One of the ways to neglect God’s truth is to allow our minds to become so filled with unnecessary or worldly thoughts that we inadvertently crowd out God’s word from our life. We can become such experts on sports statistics or celebrity news or theological rabbit trails that we devote insufficient time to meditating upon the mighty truths of God.

You might be the defending champion of your family’s trivia game, but how well do you know, and apply, Scripture? You may be able to recount the batting averages of every player on your favorite team or recite an extensive list of stock prices, but how many verses of Scripture have you memorized? If we are not careful we can fill our minds with superficial data and yet neglect truths that could radically improve our life.

Others become enamored with theological speculation and popular religious fads. They spend countless hours debating and discussing issues of no importance and then neglect profound biblical principles. Time is precious and spent far too quickly. We must use our time wisely to nurture the great work God has begun in our life.

Every person has the potential to be rich. One simply must measure the right treasure. Some people spend their entire adult lives accumulating material possessions that will not last. Certain people have become extremely good at this and have accumulated impressive collections of material wealth.

Despite what “health and wealth” television evangelists may claim, not every follower of Christ will become financially wealthy. But every believer can become rich in good works. In truth, if God has granted you significant material wealth, it is so you can give more away. Wealth does not merely provide you a greater opportunity to buy, but a greater possibility to give.

It is as you give to others that you become rich toward God. The country is littered with monuments to tycoons who greedily hoarded their possessions throughout their lives. The wise person invests their wealth into eternity while they have the power to do so. Knowing they cannot take their money with them, godly investors make sure their assets are invested into God’s kingdom where it will pay eternal dividends. What has been the quality of your eternal investments, lately?

Christians in Paul’s day were much like those in ours. Those with worldly wealth often assumed that they were superior to those in the church who were poor. Unfortunately in our churches today, we can often cater to those with money and worldly influence. Who do we put on the elder or deacon boards? Who serves on the finance committee? Who does the minister befriend? Who wields the most influence in church business meetings? Often it is those who wield the most worldly influence.

In the church, godliness should be the measure by which we allot influence. We pay heed to the prayer warrior’s comments more readily than the person with the highest annual income. We seek counsel from those most like Christ, not those who put the most money in the offering plate. We elect into leadership those with the greatest servant heart, not the largest tax bracket. Humility ought to be predominant among church leaders and pride ought to be scarce.

Our problem is that too often we try to run our churches by using the world’s methods. We assume that administrative ability, and financial acumen are keys to good church leadership. We end up with churches that function just like a secular business. The world will not be drawn to Jesus because we operate like it does. Be sure you are operating with God’s standards.

Our entire life is spent before God’s watchful gaze. In fact, God the Father, who gives life to all things, Jesus Christ, who faithfully stood before Pontius Pilate, and the Holy Spirit, who dwells within us, all witness our life as it unfolds. We never make decisions, or sin, in anonymity.

The apostle Paul urged his young protege to follow through with his commitments with a profound sense of awareness that he was living his life before a divine audience. With them there could be no excuses. Therefore, Timothy needed to be blameless.

We often feel that doing “the best we can” is good enough for God. It is not. God’s standard for our conduct is blamelessness. He seeks to help us live our lives in such a manner that there is no “spot” or blemish on our record. Such a life is a tall order! In fact, it is impossible unless God helps us. It is also unlikely unless we live our lives with the constant awareness that one day Christ will return and will then have us give an account to Him of what He already knows we have done.

How much do you want to be godly and glorifying to God? What price are you willing to pay? What sins are you prepared to renounce? What battles are you ready to fight? Paul knew full well the lengths one must go to fully live out one’s Christian life. His spiritual journey had been anything but easy. He had faced many opponents. He had undergone hardships and deprivations. Certain friends had disappointed him and abandoned him. Yet Paul chose to fight the good fight.

At times we fail to experience all God has for us because we do not have the stomach for the battle that is required. We don’t want to fight. We want an easier, less troublesome path. So when opposition strikes or critics assault, or pressures mount, we make our excuses and exit the battlefield. We may avoid conflict, but we will also miss out on the victories that might have been ours had we fought the good fight.

If you are presently in a spiritual conflict, don’t lose heart! Every saint in history has been engaged in such a battle. Just as those who prevailed experienced spiritual victories on the battlefield, so you, too, will see God bring you success, if you hold your ground and refuse to lose heart.