Greetings to you on the last day of Spring 2017! May the blessing of – the God of all mankind, for whom nothing is too hard for be upon you and yours! I trust that you had a great weekend…a Happy Father’s Day and an equally good Monday.Today we begin the transition from Spring to Summer – I pray that it will be a welcome experience for you. Today I will be praying for you, asking Father to be present with you wherever you are today to encourage and inspire you.
Last night in Bible study we were looking @ 1 John 5:1-5 where John is talking about living “victorious lives” and I must confess that I had not thought a lot about that, although I claimed it and testified to it…and I even sung – “Victory in Jesus” a few times. So last night was a time to look more closely at that experience.
John makes a point of saying that real life faith must meet three criteria – must express belief in Jesus Christ as the son of God ; must lead to obedience to God’s commands as revealed in the Word of God ; must include loving those who have met the previous two ‘musts’ – belief, obedience, and love. I, therefore, determined that a ‘victorious Christian life is really quite simple. When I lay my head down at night with my faith in Christ intact and when I have been obedient as best as I can and when I loved others, as difficult as that can be at times … then I will go to sleep claiming ‘victory’!
The victory comes from facing the three enemies that sneak into our lives every day – wanting your own way, wanting everything for yourself, and wanting to appear important … 1 John 2:16 The Message – and keeping belief-obedience-love of others activated. I am sure you know that those can be difficult battles but our belief is in the One who has already won, securing our victory. Small wonder that we are instructed to keep our focus on Jesus – there is “Victory in Jesus” in the past, in the present, and in the future as we walk upon those ‘streets of gold beyond the glassy sea’.
Be blessed my fellow ‘victor’!