God's Word on That

Tag: God’s Word

  • Failure Is Not Really Failure

    Failures are only temporary tests to prepare us for more permanent triumphs. Failure cannot happen in your life without your permission. “Success” and “failure” are both impostors and should be treated alike. Winston Churchill said: Success is never final; failure is never fatal… it’s courage that counts. If you learn from a defeat, you haven’t really lost.

    My flesh and my heart may fail, but God is the strength of my spirit and my portion forever (Psalm 73:26). Because of the Lord’s great love we are not consumed, for His compassions never fail (Lamentations 3:22).

    Ancient Proverb: He who is born in the fire will not fade in the sun. If you are beginning to encounter some hard bumps, be glad for at least you are out of the pit. There is little you can learn from doing nothing. Take what you have and use it and your talent will increase.

    Do you have eyes that fail to see and ears that fail to hear? (Mark 8:18). [For we should say] far be it from me that I should sin against the Lord by failing to pray for you, and I will teach the way that is good and right (1 Samuel 12:23).

    Failures are not detrimental, for they make us see things differently.

  • The Power of Virtue

    You will find it more difficult to uproot faults than to choke them out by gaining virtues.

    For this very reason, adding your diligent [to the divine promises], employ every effort in exercising your faith to develop virtue (excellence, resolution, Christian energy), and in [exercising] virtue [develop] knowledge (intelligence), and in [exercising] knowledge [develop] self-control, and in [exercising] self-control [develop] steadfastness (patience, endurance), and in [exercising] steadfastness [develop] godliness (piety), and in [exercising] godliness [develop] brotherly affection, and in [exercising] brotherly affection [develop] Christian love. For as these qualities are yours and increasingly abound in you, they will keep [you] from being idle or unfruitful unto the [full personal] knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ (the Messiah, the Anointed One) (2 Peter 1:5-8 Amplified).

    And over all these virtues put on love, which binds them all together in perfect unity [ideal harmony] (Colossians 3:14).

    The abundance of God’s love will do more to correct you than all anxious self-contemplation.

    Let us quiet ourselves and come to Him to learn virtue. For virtue makes us beautiful.

  • Abundant Grace

    If God could grow weary of me, He would have been tired of putting up with me long before now! All Scripture testifies to the importance of each individual to God.

    God will give to each person according to what he has done (Romans 2:6). The Lord has assigned to each his task (1 Corinthians 3:5) and each will be rewarded according to his own labor (1 Corinthians 3:8). For the Son of Man is going to come in His Father’s glory with His angels, and then He will reward each person according to what he has done (Matthew 16:27). At that time each will receive his praise from God Himself (1 Corinthians 4:5)!

    The unique, one-of-a-kind canvas of our existence is meant to be an inspiration to others, a true joy to behold and a heaven-sent blessing to those we meet in a day. Each of us has abilities which God wants us to pursue to give Him glory and to give us enjoyment of life.

    To each one of us grace has been given as Christ apportioned it (Ephesians 4:7). Each should use whatever gift he has received to serve others, faithfully administering God’s grace in its various forms (1 Peter 4:10).

    Jesus has heaped up gifts and supplied you with favor, spiritual blessings, and grace out of His abundance… Take it!

    Each of us is important in making up the whole.

  • Light and Momentary Trials

    Adorable and Suffering Body, in and with which we are forever united, give me please, together with Your cross, Your Spirit of love and self-denial. Teach me to think of the privilege of suffering with You, rather than of the pangs of that suffering. What can I suffer that You have not endured? Or indeed, how do I dare to presume to speak of suffering when I remember what You bore for me? Weak mortal, be silent! See your Mater and be silent. Lord, God, my Lord, my God, teach me to love You and I will not be afraid of any cross. Then, whatever grievous and bitter pangs may come, I will never have more to bear than I am glad and willing to bear.

    We rejoice in our afflictions, because we know that affliction produces endurance (Romans 5:3), seeing that we suffer with Him so that we may also be glorified with Him (Romans 8:17). So share in suffering as a good soldier of Christ Jesus (2 Timothy 2:3).

    Do not be afraid of anything on your way. God will lead you by the hand, if only you are filled with love for Him rather than fear for yourself.

    We may not see it from our standpoint, but suffering enriches us.

  • Let Us Not Weary In Doing Good

    Every choice for doing good sets into motion other opportunities for doing good. Each choice you make in obedience will bring a greater sense of order to your life.

    A man reaps what he sows… I will not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time, I will reap a harvest if I do not give up (Galatians 6:7, 9). In response to all He has done for us, let us out-do each other in being helpful and kind to each other, and in doing good (Hebrews 10:24 Phillips).

    My Merciful God, I have the desire to do good but cannot carry it out (Romans 7:18). But in You I have the power I need. You, God, tell me to love even my enemies, to do good to those who hate me, bless those who curse me, and pray for those who mistreat me (Luke 6:27-28). I am Your workmanship, O God, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which You prepared in advance for me to do (Ephesians 2:10).

    So I will depart from evil and do good; I will seek peace and pursue it (Psalm 34:14). I will strive to keep my ways pleasing to the Lord, for then God will make even my enemies to be at peace with me (Proverbs 16:7).

  • God is For You

    Sometimes when you are in a dark place you think you have been buried; but you have actually been planted. Remember: there is light behind every shadow.

    For You created my inmost being; You knit me together in my mothers’ womb. I praise You because I am fearfully and wonderfully made. Your works are wonderful; I know this full well (Psalm 139:13-14).

    You were knitted together; each strand thoughtfully selected. You weren’t mass-produced. You aren’t an accident; no assembly line product. You were deliberately planned, specifically gifted, and lovingly positioned on this earth by the Master Craftsman. He has a purpose and a plan for you.

    “For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the Lord, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.” (Jeremiah 29:11).

    Your parents may have forgotten you. Your teachers may have neglected you. Your siblings may be ashamed of you. But within reach of your prayers is the Maker of the Oceans! God is for you…

    Your life may not be an easy one, but God has placed you and skilled you for a reason.

  • According To Your Faith

    Nothing happens in the realms of life without either faith or fear. Fear saps our will-power and leaves us feeling depleted and hopeless. Look around and we shall be disheartened. Look within and we shall be discouraged. Look to Him and our fears vanish. When we look at the things around us, we must learn to look for the unseen things that are behind the visible things. This is spiritual discernment.

    Our faith must be tested, since God builds no ships except those He sends to the sea. How thankful we should be that God’s blessings are dispensed according to the riches of His grace and not according to the poverty of our faith. Faith is an action word – you cannot passively respond to God. Faith is the grit in the soul that puts the dare into dreams. Faith’s way of walking is to cast all care upon the Lord in trials, and then to anticipate good results from the worst calamities. Faith in the future begets power in the present. Jesus responds to people who have enough faith to draw from His power.

    Faith is expectation.

    According to your faith let it be done unto you (Matthew 9:29).

    Let us soar on our wings of faith as God intended for us to do.

  • Pleasant and the Unpleasant

    There are unpleasant things which we must endure bravely, and pleasant things for which we must not stop. Those which are bitter serve to crucify what mars us, if we receive them simply with an unlimited acceptance. Those which are pleasant and which are given to support our weaknesses we must readily receive to conform to the plans of God our Father. We must use them at the moment, like a remedy, without self-satisfaction, without attachment, without possessiveness. Because the source of presumption is in growing an attachment to these passing and sensory gifts.

    To allow ourselves to be a plaything in the hands of providence, to put no limits to this submission, this is to serve Him by renouncing ourselves. This is to really treat Him as God. God of our lives and of all our situations. God, who could have saved us without crosses, has preferred to let each of us grow little by little. In this He is the Master. We have only to be silent, to fully submit, and to adore His profound wisdom without understanding it.

    I know that there is nothing better for men than to be happy and do good while they live. That everyone may eat and drink, and find satisfaction in all his toil – this is the gift of God (Ecclesiastes 3:12-13).

    A treasure may also be a trial. It is all the same. All things are meant to remind us to trust in God.

  • Accepting the Circumstances

    Circumstances do not change us, they expose us. Look to heaven and realize this current arrangement of circumstances are sovereignly put together for your good and His glory.

    When times are good, be happy.  But when times are bad consider: God has made the one as well as the other (Ecclesiastes 7:14).

    God’s lights in our dark nights are as numerous as the stars in the heavens, if only we would look for them. When you persevere through a trial, God gives you a special measure of insight. Believe in Him steadfastly, and everything that challenges you will strengthen you. For us who believe, our job is to believe God can do His job. Like the special smell that comes with a draught breaking rain, God loves the aroma of His children’s joy, especially when He is the source of its delight.

    Delight yourself in the Lord and He will give you the desires of your heart (Psalm 35:4).

    Accept your current circumstances, and God will give you wisdom to get through.

  • Zen for the Christian Soul

    A blink of an eye is in itself nothing; but the eye that blinks, that is something. A span of life is nothing; but the man who lives that span, he is something.

    We can never get too weak for the Lord to use us — but we can get too strong, if it is our own strength. We can never be too ignorant for the Lord to use us — but we can be too wise in our own conceit. We can never get too small for the Lord to use us — but we can surely get too big and get in His way!

    When we grumble, it shows our pride. Faith breaks the peace between what is and what ought to be. Faith doesn’t comfort you where you are but challenges you to be where you should be. Faith defies obstacles and laughs at impossibilities. Faith infuses courage, molds character, and directs conduct.

    It is when we move past discouragement to praise that we begin living above our problems. Thanksgiving is vitally important to God. It is the key to releasing His supernatural power around you.

    We are called to be peaceful, unassuming, humble — different from those around us.