Thursday, February 10, 2011

Stay Rooted and Grounded in God's Love!!!

There are three ‘friends’ that can cause separation between you and God, family members, friends and/or your job.
They can cause destruction, division and death.   They bring other ‘friends’ with them once they settle in our lives.   A few of their ‘friends’ are:  unforgiveness, bitterness, hatred, lies, deceit, sickness, selfishness, pride, anger, disobedience,  fear, control and manipulation.
In Mark 4 we learn that Satan will come to “immediately” steal the word that was sown in our hearts.
Satan will always find someone to irritate or provoke us until we step into strife.  The Greek translation for ‘devil’ is, “a constant irritating, poking, pressing, or pecking away at something in order to penetrate and get entrance into it.”
That describes Satan and how relentless he is!  He goes after the word/seed in your heart by poking at you through someone’s words or actions.   He harasses you with the thoughtless or irritating behavior of others.
He tries to provoke you into reacting so you will violate the commandment of love because when you do that, he gains entrance into your life. 
Strife implies a struggle for superiority, pushing to get a position.  Strife arises from fear that somebody is going to take advantage of you.
Most Believers who have any spiritual maturity at all know better than to consciously engage in that kind of discord.
Paul writes in 1 Cor. 3:1-3 to the Believers that strife has kept them immature and carnal (worldly). 
Strife will deaden your spiritual senses.   It will also keep you from hearing from God.
Those in strife and opposition to others are in captivity to Satan.  We can get into strife over an offense or when someone doesn’t treat us the way we expect them to.   Strife is one of the ways Satan keeps us in bondage and without realizing it we are now serving him. He will use us as an instrument to strike out and hurt others.
We keep strife out of our hearts by acting on our love for the Lord.  The more you practice obeying the commandment of love, the more rooted and grounded in love you will become. 
We need to guard our hearts and keep putting the word of God in it consistently.
You can live a life of joy, peace and love in Jesus!

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