God Bless you this beautiful week. How have you been? I trust you are well.
This is a beautiful season, we are just about to go into summer where the flowers are in full bloom. We should see our lives like this when you find Christ and get to know him and the truth. When you accept Jesus into your life you become new again, Re born, the former things pass away. You may be in the same physical body as you were before but the greatest miracle of all time has just occurred if you have accepted Christ. Your spirit has been awakened to the spirit of God. Gods spirit now lives in you helping you, guiding you into all truth. This is what God has had planned for your life all along! When you ask Jesus into your heart and your spirit is awakened you are now like a baby. Just as a baby needs milk so does your spirit need food. Gods bible and his divine truth is the food that will make you grow strong! Same goes for a seed that will eventually become a flower. You have to plant that seed in good soil. The soil must be healthy otherwise it may have no chance of growing. How can a flower grow or bloom when there is bad soil? There could be weeds that choke the seed before it starts to sprout out or the flower could grow but become disfigured, not formed the way it was supposed to and not live the life span it was supposed to have either. So a flower needs good strong soil, Then you water the seed ( give it food) give it light, then it grows. Its becomes strong and just at the right season it blooms full, strong ready for the bees to take its pollen and produce honey. You may have been preparing for this stage for a long time. The flower may have had to bloom many summers before but never reached that full stage. When you have Christ in your life.. Our lives change. We change and instead of being disfigured ( via life’s hurts) or choked out by weeds we are able to bloom into who we were supposed to be. A beautiful, colourful, fragrant, strong and healthy flower. Get to know Christ, No weeds allowed where He is concerned and the good thing is this; Even if you are a flower choked out with many weeds once you enter into Gods kingdom one by one they drop off until you are free from all the tangled mess, weeds steal your nutrients and your food.. Jesus frees you from all those sorts of things. There is no need for anything to be zapping your life of nutrients, your energy, your life. Jesus freed all who came to Him.. He is still doing it today. Scriptures shares: “ Who the son sets free is free indeed“
Today we were going to continue with our study of 1 Corinthians 13:4-8
"Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. Love never fails."
We are going to look at “Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth”
We have learnt what love is, we have seen many descriptions of this in previous blogs. We also know that God is talking about walking in His type of Love Agape. That type of love is possible with the help of the Holy Spirit who empowers and enables us to walk in this way should we choose to co operate with him. We know that Love is the most powerful force around and that it obliterates evil! And God cannot be around evil, which is why satan was cast out of heaven. We learnt in previous blogs that God is LOVE! We have learnt that God says love is not proud, Love does not boast, Love does not record wrongs and so on as in 1 Corinthians 13:4-8.
We know that if they ( boasting, prideful etc) are the opposite of love then in fact they are part of satans nature which is evil. Evil is a poison that continues to spread itself through anything or anyone who will allow it. It is allowed to grow in people who by choice agree to behave in an evil manner. Its allowed to spread when people turn the other cheek instead of sticking up for what is right. Its allowed to be spread when the justice system fails us. It is allowed to spread when anyone chooses to give in to darkness instead of behaving right. God is telling you that It doesn’t have to be this way and in fact the reason it has spread so much is mans choice.
How sad is this. Its so sad! No one in the right mind likes evil right? You would be surprised at the amount of people who get off on seeing a person be judged wrongly or destroyed through no fault of their own other than circumstances beyond their control. You would be surprised how many people would allow evil to continue and watch it destroy innocent people rather than get involved themselves in order to stop it. Some people just don’t care, others can’t be bothered and others have the mentality of “if it stays away from me then oh well“! Evil does not need to be spread the way it is being spread. And the sad things is God gave us the tools to obliterate it in the first place as we have seen in previous blogs.
What would you class as evil? Before I knew the truth I would class a murderer evil. I would scale it like that. When in actual fact evil actions or intent can be much simpler than that. Would you say that screaming at someone for cutting you off in the road is bad? Or Good? Or how about giving up your place in the queue at the supermarket to someone who has less than you. Is that Bad or good? God notices these types of things as we already know, God sees all things and even knows the purposes of all men’s hearts. See previous blog. The smaller things matter just as much as the larger type things people do.
We have good and bad in the world. Good people and bad people, Good ground- bad ground, Good circumstances- bad circumstances. But what do you operate in? Do you enjoy seeing evil spread and causing problems for people or are you someone who rejoices in the truth?
1 Corinthians 13:6 “ Loves does not delight in evil but rejoices in truth”
Jesus came into the world to free us from evil. To bring us into the light.
John 1:9 “ There it was the true light coming into the world that illumines every person”
That must have meant we were in darkness? We know this via other messages on the blog see genesis 3 . We know that God no longer wants us separated from him and sent Jesus Christ His son into the world to save us from the curse which was brought about through sin. John 3:16
Jesus came to deliver us from the control and the dominion of darkness Colossians 1:13.
We have learnt that satan is ruling the air and walks the earth influencing as many people as he can. See Ephesians 2:2 please read it, it may just save your life!. We know that the devil is "a liar and the father of lies", "there is no truth in him" John 8:44 and John 10:10
We have seen his ultimate goal is to keep people from finding out the truth and accepting it and especially accepting Gods free gift of love. His free gift of love is eternal life through Christ Romans 10:9-10. But God didn’t stop at that, He saw past our eternal well being and wanted us to be well, in control and happy down here also. He gave all believers the Holy Spirit and his Gifts Galatans 5:22
The Holy Spirit is "the Spirit of truth" John 14:17, 15:26
Jesus was sent back to free us from darkness and the deception operating in this present age.
Acts 26:18 “to open their eyes and turn them from darkness to light, and from the power of Satan to God, so that they may receive forgiveness of sins and a place among those who are sanctified by faith in me.”
Jesus its says in Galatians 1:4 “who gave himself for our sins to rescue us from the present evil age, according to the will of our God and Father”
He walked the earth so you could be free from the control of darkness. Hmm Control? If Gods word says it then you can bet it’s the truth and its exactly as it is. We will see this now:
Lets take a look at a few scriptures here:
All Gods words are true please read: Titus 1:2 and Hebrews 6:1
God's word is truth as said in John 17:17 “ Sanctify (cleanse and purify us) them with your word for your word is truth” also see Psalms 199:160 and 1 Peter 1:22
Why does God want us to walk in His truth? Is it for His benefit? No its for our own benefit. It will cleanse us, purify us from all the poison that has been flying around this world through sin.
Gods word says "The truth will set you free" John 8:32
Free from what? The curse the world has been put under. As we have seen previously in other blogs.
God desires truth in us. He wants us to "walk continually in his truth" Psalm 26:3; see Psalm 86:11. God desires truth in our inner parts Psalm 51:6. He wants us to choose the way of truth Psalm 119:30
Jesus Christ is "the truth" “ I am the way the truth and the life no one comes to the Father except by me" “John 14:6. And The Holy Spirit is "the Spirit of truth" John 14:17, 15:26
We know God is a spirit; we have seen this in previous blogs.
Let us look at this scripture which says “God is a spirit and they that worship him must worship him in spirit and in truth” John 4:24
Anyone who has not accepted Jesus Christ in their life has their spirit separated to God and therefore will not be able to love him and commune with him. (you may prayer to him but how do you know he hears you?)
And if a person delights in the evilness of this age doing the bad things the world likes then they too are not in the truth. You must think about this.
God's words are not just temporary truths, applicable only to the times in which Scripture was written, as some have asserted. They are eternal. They are always true. "Your word, O Lord, is eternal; it stands firm in the heavens" Psalm 119:89 "The word of our God stands forever." Isaiah 40:8 Jesus said, "Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will never pass away" Matthew 24:35. God does not change, and his truth does not change.
Your Heavenly father wants all men "to come to a knowledge of the truth" see 1 Timothy 2:4
Loving one another is walking in the truth it is so important, lets look at the Epistles of John. John a disciple of our Lord Jesus Christ wrote this whilst being divinely inspired ( working in the spirit of God)
1 John 3:11-18 but we will pick it up at verse 8 onwards:
“He who does what is sinful is of the devil, because the devil has been sinning from the beginning. The reason the Son of God appeared was to destroy the devil's work. ( free us from the curse and sin nature we were born into) No one who is born of God ( accepts Christ into their heart) will continue to sin, because God's seed remains in him; he cannot go on sinning, because he has been born of God. This is how we know who the children of God are and who the children of the devil are: Anyone who does not do what is right is not a child of God; nor is anyone who does not love his brother.
Love One Another
This is the message you heard from the beginning: We should love one another. Do not be like Cain, who belonged to the evil one and murdered his brother. And why did he murder him? Because his own actions were evil and his brother's were righteous. Do not be surprised, my brothers, if the world hates you. We know that we have passed from death to life, because we love our brothers. Anyone who does not love remains in death. Anyone who hates his brother is a murderer, That is how serious walking in love is. Anyone who hates his brother s a murderer!
When Jesus was set upon and betrayed and the people who did so delighted in evil. “ loves does not delight in evil but rejoices in truth” They couldnt stand in the truth, have the truth near them or taught to them because it exposed them for who they were and they were not willing to change or accept that they had it wrong. Instead they delighted in sowing evil. They delighted in doing their fathers work ( the devil) and tried to kill Jesus not knowing that in fact them putting him on the cross sinless was exactly what was going to free billions of people from the evil that they delighted in. Jesus is now alive risen and hold all authority over evil. Praise God!
Genesis 50:20 Lets look at the story of Joseph.
Joseph was born to Jacob and Rachel. He was his father's eleventh son. As a boy, Joseph received an elegant coat from his father. He also dreamed that the sun, moon, and eleven stars bowed down before him, which indicated that some day Joseph's family members would bow down before him.
Joseph was betrayed by his own brothers and left to die in a hole in the ground. All because they were jealous of him because He was different to them. He had dreams, dreams where he fore sore future events. ( they were of God) and His Father loved him very much. He was left to die and had his life stolen away from him. He was found and bought into slavery and had a life of terrible suffering in prison all the while he never thought bad of God and stayed righteous. I love this story so much because Joseph ended up being positioned in the right place by God. He was in Egypt and the Pharaoh was having dreams that he could not understand. Joseph was able to interpret the dreams to the letter. Unlike the magicians who were not of the truth; Long story short Joseph ended up in a position of influence and in charge of Egypt’s food stores. There was a great famine just as Joseph had dreamt and His brothers came to Egypt from Israel to get help.
Joseph disguised his identity, held one of his brothers hostage in prison, and demanded that the rest of them bring their youngest brother Benjamin to Egypt. Joseph also put his brothers' money back in their sacks of grain. When they returned Joseph revealed his identity and brought his father Jacob to live in Egypt. After Jacob died, Joseph's brothers wondered if he would hold a grudge against them, but Joseph replied, "You intended to harm me, but God intended it for good, to preserve many lives"
Delighting in evil is not of your creator and maker. Here are a few scriptures on the subject of evil:
Romans 12:21 “Do not let yourself be overcome by evil, but overcome (master) evil with good“.
Psalm 34:12-22 “You must do these things to enjoy life and have many happy days. You must not say evil things, and you must not tell lies. Stop doing evil and do good. Look for peace and work for it. The Lord sees the good people and listens to their prayers. But the Lord is against those who do evil; he makes the world forget them. The Lord hears good people when they cry out to him, and he saves them from all their troubles. The Lord is close to the broken hearted, and he saves those whose spirits have been crushed. People who do what is right may have many problems, but the Lord will solve them all. He will protect their very bones; not one of them will be broken. Evil will kill the wicked; those who hate good people will be judged guilty. But the Lord saves his servants' lives; no one who trusts him will be judged guilty.
These are harsh realities but they are the truth. Whether you like it or not. Its doesnt matter whether you believe it or not either. Its doesnt alter the truth. The truth stands forever.
Scripture says this:
"The Son of Man [Jesus] will send out his angels and they will weed out of his kingdom everything that causes sin and all who do evil. They will throw them into the fiery furnace, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth. Then the righteous will shine like the sun in the kingdom of their Father" Matthew 13:41-43.
God does not want this for anyone. Satan does though! This is prophecy at what will happen when Jesus Christ returns. This will be after every man and women has heard the Gospel of Christ and either accepts or rejects it. Matthew 13:41-43 is a reality that some people have tried to supress, ignore or laugh at for 4000 years! It really is no laughing matter, However Gods gift of Love sure is. You'll laugh with Uncontrolable joy the rest of your days. You should try it!
How do I do those things? how is it possible to change to stop sowing evil which to people are minor silly things but in fact they bread more of satans nature into man and the world? Jesus Christ paid the price so that you could receive Gods gifts of love. The Holy Spirit, Gods word and His truth will help you. Would you rather stay in evil in satan’s kingdom or come into the light where you can be free? God loves us all the same no matter wat you have done or ever could do. He wishes for us all to be with him. And to walk in His ways here on earth. You have a choice. Its called freewill!
Scripture tells us, over and over, to love good and hate evil Let see here:
Amos 5:15. "Hate what is evil; cling to what is good"
Romans 12:9"Turn from evil and do good"
Psalm 34:14 "Stop doing wrong, learn to do right"
Isaiah 1:16 "Let those who love the Lord hate evil" Psalm 97:10
"To fear the Lord is to hate evil" Proverbs 8:13
We should be "eager to do what is good" Titus 2:14.
It tells us to avoid every kind of evil. "I will have nothing to do with evil" Psalm 101:4.
"Fear the Lord and shun evil" Proverbs 3:7
"Do not set foot on the path of the wicked, or walk in the way of evil men. Avoid it, do not travel on it" Proverbs 4:14
"Turn from your evil ways" 2 Kings 17:13
"Turn now, each of you, from your evil ways and your evil practices" Jeremiah 25:5
God cannot tolerate evil. "Your eyes are too pure to look on evil; you cannot tolerate wrong" Habakkuk 1:13 God is pure love He cannot look upon evil.
It is important to God, who is supreme above all things in heaven and on the earth! Who created every star, solar system, every constillation! It is also for our own benefit no just short term but Long term eternally!
Instead we are to rejoice in the truth! 1 Corinthians 13:6
The bible is the truth, Gods words are spirit and they are Life. Choose life! As seen in Deuteronomy 32
Love rejoices with the truth that God is personal. Jesus said, "I am the truth." John 14:6
We can rejoice that Christ is the truth, for he shows us the reality of human life that is pure in heart - sincere, unsullied by evil, full of integrity. We can rejoice with the truth of his life. There is something to rejoice about - we need not be cynical or despairing of life, of goodness, of truth.
Love rejoices with the good news that Jesus has triumphed over evil on the Cross. We can rejoice that if he is victorious over evil we can share in that victory with him. Jesus came to save us from evil. We cannot delight in evil and rejoice with the truth. We have to choose between the two. That choice is an act of faith, a decision that is critical for our lives. Christ can take men or women at their worst, steeped in wickedness and sin, and still deliver them from evil. That is why we can rejoice with the truth of the Gospel.
Love acts on the power of the truth that is in Jesus to change lives. Love does not delight in other people's failings, but rejoices with the truth that saves us. Love is the grace of God that reaches out to us in Jesus. When we receive him, and live with him, and are empowered by his Spirit, we have his truth within us. That gift of love is cause for rejoicing that is the greatest gift you will ever be given. When you receive his gift of love you will be rejoicing in the truth and you will no longer be in darkness but in the light.
Philippians 4:4 “Rejoice in the Lord always [delight, gladden yourselves in Him]; again I say, Rejoice! “
Psalms 5:11 “But let all those who take refuge and put their trust in You rejoice; let them ever sing and shout for joy, because You make a covering over them and defend them; let those also who love Your name be joyful in You and be in high spirits.”
1 Chronicles 16:31 “Let the heavens be glad and let the earth rejoice; and let men say among the nations, The Lord reigns!”
1 Thessalonians 5:16 “Be happy [in your faith] and rejoice and be glad-hearted continually (always).”
Habakkuk 3:18 “Yet I will rejoice in the Lord; I will exult in the [victorious] God of my salvation!”
Psalm 118:24 “This is the day which the Lord has brought about; we will rejoice and be glad in it.”
What a great confession! Say this Psalm 118 daily for the next three months. See how your life is after that! Things will be very different!
This has been another sensitive subject to talk about “love does not delight in evil but rejoices in truth” .
Will you stay in darkness if you haven’t accepted Jesus into your heart? The scriptures are truth. One way to find out is to study and apply them in your life yourself. God will never ever let you down. His words are Truth and Jesus came to set you free from darkness into all truth.
Do you want to be free from evil and rejoice in truth. Now is the time to call out to your heavenly Father. Ask Jesus into your heart.
Say this prayer:
“Jesus Christ, I pray in line with Romans 10:9 I believe that you are raised from the dead, thank you for dying on the cross for me and saving me from my sins, Forgive me. I believe you are my Lord and savior. Come into my heart, Cleanse me and guide me into all truth, Help me and Change me to who am I supposed to be for your Glory Father, Help me be a blessing to many In Jesus Christ Holy Name Amen”
If you have said that prayer you a have now entered into the Kingdom of God. You are His child now. He loves you and wants you to grow in His truth, To see all truth and to walk and live in truth. There is nothing greater. There is no other truth. You can now rejoice in His truth forever. God bless you.
Loves Living Word Ministries UK would love to hear from you.
If you have any questions or wish to discuss anything please contact Loves Living Word Ministries UK via email at the bottom of this blog.
For others who haven’t said the prayer the question is:
Are you ready for the truth?
Have a blessed week.
Jesus loves you, he desires you live and walk in his light. Be of the light, get away from darkness the opportunity has been given.
We will pick up with 1 Corinthians 13:4-8 next week stay blessed.
Love Lisa
http://www.youtube.com/user/TheShekinahLove
llwmuk@hotmail.co.uk
1 Corinthians 1:18
"For the preaching of the cross is to them that perish foolishness; but unto us which are saved it is the power of God".
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