For today, One Year Bible Online links here. I have been convicted over the last few weeks to seek to develop a disciplined prayer life. It is still a work in progress. Please pray for me, that the Holy Spirit may show me how to pray in a disciplined manner.
Someone who deceives their neighbor as a joke is like a madman randomly shooting into a crowd. The opportunity for causing harm is great, even if there is no intent to do so.
We will all come before the Lord sooner or later. Let us do so now with singing and joy, rather than later, sullen and in fear. I will enter into the presence of God with thanksgiving and praise. Shout to the Lord.
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We are to submit to government authority, even when it is a bad government. God calls us to be peaceable, considerate and gentle towards everyone. However, in the same sentence where Paul tells us to be obedient to the government and its agents he tells us to always be ready to do whatever is good. Here and elsewhere, Paul tells us that government authority is established by God and thus we should obey it. However, in telling us to always be ready to do whatever is good, he is spelling out the limits of government authority. The government does not have the authority to tell us to do that which God has told us not to do (which is anything which is not good).
Paul reiterates a theme here which permeates all of his writing in one form or another. We were not, and are not, saved as a result of our righteous actions. However, we were, and are, saved in order that we may perform righteous acts. We are not capable of living righteous lives on our own. However, God wishes us to be righteous, so He freely redeemed us and gave us the Holy Spirit in order that we might become able to live righteous lives. It is when we recognize that it is only through the Holy Spirit working in us that we are able to behave in a righteous manner that we are able to accept the Holy Spirit working in us to do that which is righteous.
The people of Judah and Jerusalem were convinced that God would protect them from all enemies, despite their refusal to follow His commands, until the day when He allowed the Babylonian army to destroy His Temple. This is a message for people of all generations. If we do not live according to God’s will, it is only a matter of time until death and destruction come upon us.