i love this verse ! it shows that God loves us so much. When were going through tough times He is always there for us no matter what. He is always constant with His words (The Bible) and we always have Him to look towwards(:

This verse is definitely a reiteration of ‘love thy neighbor’ and it really caught my attention. I’ve been trying to do this and reiterating it will help me out.

These two verses would be great for someone who is not yet a Christian, or not sure if being a Christian is the right thing. Here it says that even though we may go through trials on earth and may be tested throughout our lives, we still can look forward to the day that the Lord returns and we will be in Heaven with him.

I love this visual.It givev me motivation to perservere when things get tough. Gold and other precious metals are generally refined and made stronger in fire. That is how it is when our faith is tested.

Though I can never be perfect, I need to always keep perfection in my sights. I will never hit the target right on, but I always need to be aiming to get as close as I can get. I need to not let myself get discouraged with failure. By my human nature, I will fall down and fail. There will be times where I fall into temptation and sin. However, I can’t let that get me down. I need to listen to my conviction, repent of my wrongdoing, and get back on track for pursuing godliness. Just because I can’t keep myself as a fully pure, distilled glass of water, that doesn’t mean that I dump clods of dirt into it. I need to rely on the Holy Spirit in me to empower me in living a godly life to fulfill the good works that God has already planned out for me to do ahead of time!

This verse talks about two things. Having a pure, clean heart (alongside a clear conscience) and loving the people around us. The first one is directly related to righteousness, as our earthly hearts are full of sin and wicked. Although I have been saved, I still greatly struggle with sin, and my heart and thoughts aren’t always pure, and things that keep my conscience clear. I need to make it a battle to keep myself from sin, striving for righteousness in the highest sense – Godliness. Secondly, I need to continue to show love to everyone around me, especially the people that treat me wrongly. As Pastor Bobby said in a sermon a few weeks ago, I should be treating others the way I would like to be treated, not how they treat me – the Golden rule. I want to be a person that shows love to non-Christians, demonstrating God’s love through me, as well as a person that deeply loves my brothers and sisters in Christ – encouraging them, keeping them accountable, and never fighting a foolish fight with another Christian. If I am not loving other Christians, how am I to love non-Christians? I pray that the Lord will really help me to amplify both the quantity and quality of love I show.

This verse calls us to be like Christ!! We are expected to strive to be like Christ and live holy lives!! However, God knows that that will never happen!! That is why he sent his son to die on the cross for our sins so the sins we committ can be forgiven by the blood of Christ!! However, we are still called to live lives pleasing to God! Just because Christ forgives our sins doesnt mean we can just go out and sin a bunch on purpose and know God will forgive us and then do it again!! We are to live as Christ did, or strive to live as close as we can, which doesnt come any where near close!! When we do sin, God will forgive us, and we should learn from that and work hard to do that same thing!!

MARANATHA!!!!!!!!!!!!

“And if you call on him as Father who judges impartially according to each one’s deeds, conduct yourselves with fear throughout the time of your exile,”

After we read through Hebrews, this reminded me of Abraham who waited for his true promised home in Canaan his whole life. Abraham ‘sojourned’ throughout lands most of his life, in fact as if he didn’t belong, but only a temporary visitor, because he was trusting in the promise God made to him.

The same is with our lives, we are not of this world, our life is to come in Heaven with Jesus. Now we should conduct ourselves with fear in our exile.

There is only one life to live, only one sophomore year, only one chance to live as 16, only one chance to live this day for Jesus. The days are ending and we can’t waste any of them.

I can imagine in Heaven, before Jesus, some profound regret, some wishing that we wouldn’t of wasted our life, our 16th year of life, our summer, our sophomore year, our second semester, our time that we could of stood up for Jesus boldly. The ‘should of’s’ and ‘could of’s’ will be many; I don’t doubt it. Yet, I believe that if we conduct our lives in fear now, understanding the worthiness of our Lord now instead in the future when it is too late, then we will rejoice in heaven knowing that our life did not go unused. We did not waste our life…

Maranatha! Come soon!!

Thank you Lord for your Word that remains forever. While other things pass away, it stays the same! Can’t wait for True North tomorrow morning!