Author: marquitabp

To know me is to accept me, and to love me is to help me.
Posted on

Daily Devotion

The Love Walk
 
"And this is love: that we walk in obedience to his commands. As you have heard from the beginning, his command is that you walk in love."  2 John 1:6
"And walk in love, as Christ also has loved us, and has given himself for us an offering and a sacrifice to God for a sweet smelling smell." Ephesians 5:2
 "It (Love) bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things."  1 Corinthians 13:7 (NRSV)
 
In the last scripture, Paul tells the Corinthians what extent love goes.  It bears all things, meaning when your brother or child cannot go any longer, you carry them along with your burdens.  You bear their pains, their struggles, their difficulties.  You are patient (GWT) and never give up (NIV) on the fact that God can change them even when they seem to have fallen off the path.  Love believes all things–not meaning that it believes everything, but here in another translation, it always has faith (NLT).  Love has faith and believes in spite of all things that it will get better even when worldly facts say otherwise.  Love trusts (NIV) that God will hold true to His word and respects the promises His words holds within.  The only similarity I have noticed through all of the translations is that love hopes through all things. In the love walk, you cannot give up hope.  It will get difficult to continue to love someone who hates you in spite of how they treat you.  It will be seemingly impossible to love the person that sins against you.  In marriages one of the hardest things to do is to hope for the best when one person has stepped outside of the marriage or has caused their spouse to lose trust in them.  But we must remember that we are all sinners and have fallen short of the glory of God (Romans 3:23)–so holding onto the transgressions of a person and living outside of love will cause you to disobey God.  For that purpose, we must have the love God gives, the love that can endure all things.  In spite of every obstacle thrown at you to lose heart, you must have that long-lasting, enduring love, the love that caused God to sacrifice the Son for our redemption.  Walking in love is not easy because we were no longer conditioned to love unconditionally, yet instead everything that goes against the essence of God is the predisposition of our flesh.  Walking in love means forgiving every wrong (don't be foolish though–use the wisdom God freely gives in all situations and the spirit of discernment–James 1:5), standing in the faith that God will bring His words to pass, hoping when it seems there is no need for hope, and enduring until the end–whatever that may be.  Yes this is a difficult road, but with the bounty being so great for us to reap in the afterlife, why risk living any other way?  Psalm 119:1-2 says this: "Blessed are the undefiled in the way, who walk in the law of the LORD. Blessed are they that keep his testimonies, and that seek him with the whole heart."  Blessed in some translations reads 'happy', or 'joyful'.  According to the first scripture and throughout the Bible, the first and greatest commandment is that we love God and love others, or walk in love.  So to ensure your own happiness, you must simply love God and others from every part of yourself, because love has the power to change all things.
 
"You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might."  Deuteronomy 6:5
Posted on

Daily Devotion

Have YOU Been Crippled?

“Let not your hearts be troubled. Believe in God; believe also in me.” John 14:1
“Peace I leave with you; My peace I give to you; not as the world gives do I give to you. Do not let your heart be troubled, nor let it be fearful.” John 14:27

I do not ask this question in the physical sense of the word. True indeed, we sometimes are physically crippled; many people suffering from debilitating diseases that serve to cripple them spiritually, mentally, and emotionally. We can be crippled by the past—but remember the past is dead and gone; it is over so let it go. But we initially become crippled with the negative seeds, thoughts and ideas that are tools the devil uses against us. Ephesians 6:12 GWT says “This is not a wrestling match against a human opponent. We are wrestling with rulers, authorities, the powers who govern this world of darkness, and spiritual forces that control evil in the heavenly world.” Suffering from some physical problem or some inadequacy can really mess with your head. For a long time right after I got sick in school, I thought I was less than human, not deserving God’s best because I had an illness. I allowed thoughts that I wasn’t worthy of good things to plague me, causing me to be complacent. Even last year I allowed things that happened to me to really paralyze me, stifling my growth and walk in God’s will. But we have to remember who we serve! We have to remember what He has given us: peace, power, love, and a sound mind. (John 14:27, 2 Tim 1:7) We have no reason to dwell on temporary facts about ourselves and let them stop us from getting the best God has already planned for us.

I had to write this for myself because I have been trying to overcome the spirit of doubt, and eradicate it completely from my life. But I had to be honest with myself, with every new situation and circumstance in life, doubt will always be there because as a human I cannot always see the big picture. God does not always reveal His plan in completion, why, because why would we need to trust Him? Why would we need to rely on faith that God holds true to His word and it does not return void? (Isaiah 55:11) I had to learn that with my dad’s health, realizing that our eyes deceive us. Yes, he may be in pain but God heals all pains. I had to realize that today, after I got a beautiful note from my friend Naomi. I had been questioning going forward with another pageant because of a money concern. But I remember for my surgery, I raised over 3 times the amount in question, having no needs after my surgery. So why wouldn’t God prosper me in this, if it is His will, especially since my goal is to do His will? But that is why we should pray to understand what His will is, and not be influenced by the devil, because we can trust God and God alone. Why don’t I trust that He will give us the desires of our hearts, when that is what His words say? (Psalm 37:4) Sometimes we have to remind ourselves that the battle is already won, because Jesus did it all already. (1 Cor 15:57) Psalm 21:2 says “You have given him his heart’s desire, And You have not withheld the request of his lips. Selah.” So we cannot be crippled by the tricks of the devil because we already have what we asked God for! We must believe, and cast out all doubt because the longer we let it set up shop within us, the longer we are keeping ourselves from what God has for us. Rebuke the devil and reaffirm your faith by speaking the word against him. Stand firm on the word and keep sowing God’s word seed in your life and the lives of others, because unlike grass, a true harvest does not happen overnight.

“No, despite all these things, overwhelming victory is ours through Christ, who loved us.” Romans 8:37