Finding it difficult to forgive those who’ve hurt you? Understanding God’s grace can help.
—Daniel 4:5
In April 2005, many Americans and the world heard the story of the "runaway bride," Jennifer Wilbanks. The thirty-two-year-old Duluth, Georgia, resident disappeared just days before her six hundred-guest wedding was to take place. Her family and fiancé, certain she had been kidnapped, pleaded for her safe return, and the missing bride became a national story for the major news media. When she turned up alive, the truth was revealed that the bride-to-be ran because of "certain fears" that controlled her life.
Most of us would say, "Well, she should have talked to her fiancé or her pastor instead of running away." But how many of us easily confront our fears? You may not have ever physically run away as did Wilbanks, but I bet emotionally there are things you're running from. You're constantly looking over your shoulder trying to keep whatever you're afraid of from catching up with you.
Satan loves causing people to dread and avoid confronting unpleasant issues, because he knows that he loses power when his lies are confronted. Even though a lie is not true, it becomes reality for the person who believes it. Don't believe the lies Satan tries to deceive you with.
Lord, expose the lies that I've believed and that give strength to the fears that harass me. Shine Your light of truth on them and break their deceptive power. Amen.
Nothing in Common
by Dr. Paul Chappell
“And when he went forth to land, there met him out of the city a certain man, which had devils long time, and ware no clothes, neither abode in any house, but in the tombs. When he saw Jesus, he cried out, and fell down before him, and with a loud voice said, What have I to do with thee, Jesus, thou Son of God most high? I beseech thee, torment me not.”
Luke 8:27–28
At the end of Animal Farm, George Orwell’s classic parable about Communism, there is a scene in which the pigs, who have taken over running the farm after the humans were chased away, have a meeting with surrounding farmers. The other animals, watching from outside the farmhouse, make a shocking discovery. “The creatures outside looked from pig to man, and from man to pig, and from pig to man again; but already it was impossible to say which was which.” Orwell’s point was that the distinctions between the leaders of the revolution and those they had replaced had been blurred away.
We are not supposed to be like the world. The expression of the demons, “What have I to do with thee” literally means “We have nothing in common.” There are no similarities between God and Satan, and the differences between their children should be plainly visible. James tells us what the fruit of a real walk with God is: “Pure religion and undefiled before God and the Father is this, To visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction, and to keep himself unspotted from the world” (James 1:27).
In our day when so many are trying to break down the distinctions between the church and the world in the name of being more effective in reaching people, we need a return to the realization that we should have nothing in common with the world. While we are to reach out to them in love, we are not to be like them.
Luke 8:27–28
At the end of Animal Farm, George Orwell’s classic parable about Communism, there is a scene in which the pigs, who have taken over running the farm after the humans were chased away, have a meeting with surrounding farmers. The other animals, watching from outside the farmhouse, make a shocking discovery. “The creatures outside looked from pig to man, and from man to pig, and from pig to man again; but already it was impossible to say which was which.” Orwell’s point was that the distinctions between the leaders of the revolution and those they had replaced had been blurred away.
We are not supposed to be like the world. The expression of the demons, “What have I to do with thee” literally means “We have nothing in common.” There are no similarities between God and Satan, and the differences between their children should be plainly visible. James tells us what the fruit of a real walk with God is: “Pure religion and undefiled before God and the Father is this, To visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction, and to keep himself unspotted from the world” (James 1:27).
In our day when so many are trying to break down the distinctions between the church and the world in the name of being more effective in reaching people, we need a return to the realization that we should have nothing in common with the world. While we are to reach out to them in love, we are not to be like them.
Today’s Growth Principle:
Keeping your life separated from the world preserves your testimony and effectiveness for God’s work.
Still Running?
by Joyce Meyer - posted March 13, 2016Finding it difficult to forgive those who’ve hurt you? Understanding God’s grace can help.
—Daniel 4:5
In April 2005, many Americans and the world heard the story of the "runaway bride," Jennifer Wilbanks. The thirty-two-year-old Duluth, Georgia, resident disappeared just days before her six hundred-guest wedding was to take place. Her family and fiancé, certain she had been kidnapped, pleaded for her safe return, and the missing bride became a national story for the major news media. When she turned up alive, the truth was revealed that the bride-to-be ran because of "certain fears" that controlled her life.
Most of us would say, "Well, she should have talked to her fiancé or her pastor instead of running away." But how many of us easily confront our fears? You may not have ever physically run away as did Wilbanks, but I bet emotionally there are things you're running from. You're constantly looking over your shoulder trying to keep whatever you're afraid of from catching up with you.
Satan loves causing people to dread and avoid confronting unpleasant issues, because he knows that he loses power when his lies are confronted. Even though a lie is not true, it becomes reality for the person who believes it. Don't believe the lies Satan tries to deceive you with.
Lord, expose the lies that I've believed and that give strength to the fears that harass me. Shine Your light of truth on them and break their deceptive power. Amen.
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