Let us have peace with God, that peace will abound in us, Let us find fulfillment and satisfaction in this present life in the walk with the light, by just willing to be near him and gaining understanding of his principals and the outpouring of His grace in us, through Christ Jesus, let us grab a hold of this wonderful gift of righteousness, which has been given freely to us, and through which we can attained the blessed hope, the understanding of salvation, the eternal peace of God, In the here and now and forever.
Many will read these words and will ask themselves, what pipe has he been smoking from? And that is because they cannot gain an understanding that it has not been given to them.
But you know quite well what I am talking about, in spite of your occasional disdain and exasperation at my persistence, you do understand and know that only by tapping into the source of eternal living water can you discover the fountain of youth, and the truth.
I was a sharp Business man, my friends used to say I could pull money out of a rock, or sell the rock and make money, and I do admit I still have a God given gift to do certain things with business that most common folks cannot do, the thing is that I don't do business any more, and that is because every time I got involved with dealing and transacting and negotiating and closing, I ended up walking away from the light and into the darkness, because the passion of the next deal becomes the craving and excitement of winning and this implies tweaking and fine tuning and aligning and..
...
; and soon enough I am doing things that do not increase the grace of God in me but lead me to condemnation; in other words, I start remembering sentences like "nice guys finish last", "power is blitz"; and there isn't a thing on this earth that is more important to me than the love of God, so the only way to not walk into darkness, the only way to honor God truly was simply not to do business any more.
Is this a giant sacrifice? You bet it is! But "I have been crucified with Christ, and is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me.
The life I live in this body, I live by faith in Christ who loves me and gave His life for me".
(Gal 2:20) that is the principal I want to live by today, and I need to remind me every day that I am a recovering sinner, who needs to die every day in order to live.
I know you do understand what I am saying, and even if you do not admit it, by looking within, you are quickly going to identify your sources of idolatry because we all have them; be it cigarettes, or women, or the internet porn, or going fishing, or jewelry, or overtime work, or cars or suits.
Anything in your life which becomes more important than God is a source of idolatry, and I know what you say, it's not like you do it every day.
Some acts of unrighteousness are obvious, others are not so obvious, but it is God who tells us what is good and what it's not so good, and it is you who ought to decide what is most important in life, a moment of blitz, or a lifetime of joy, and then life eternal in the presence of the almighty.
I love this passage in the book of Romans: "The law was added so that the trespass might increase.
But where sin increased, grace increased all the more, so that, just as sin reigned in death, so also grace might reign through righteousness to bring eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.
" (Romans 5:20-21).
In other words, we are sinners because we are sinners, but God gives us righteousness through Christ so that we can increase grace and righteousness in our lives thus bringing joy and fulfillment to ourselves and glory and honor to the almighty God.
Forever his name be praised! Amen Rev.
Jose A.
Luna A servant of Christ Jesus