“I AM the Way, the Truth and the Life. No one comes to the Father except through Me”
John 14: 6
12 “Look, I AM coming soon! My reward is with Me, and I will give to each person according to what they have done. 13 I AM the Alpha and the Omega, the First and the Last, the Beginning and the End.
Amen. Come, Lord Jesus.
Revelation 22: 12-13
Pastors Noreen & Henry Kevern
Whoever Does the Will of GOD Lives Forever
15Do not love the world or anything in the world. If anyone loves the world, love for the FATHER is not in them. 16 For everything in the world—the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life—comes not from the FATHER but from the world. 17The world and its desires pass away, but whoever does the will of God lives forever.
1 John 2:15-29
Walking in the way of the LORD requires two things: faith and trust. Faith in believing that GOD is Who He says He is, and trust, that no matter what we go through, GOD is with us every step of the way and He will bring us through whatever may be happening in our lives. Faith causes us to learn from God and His Word and trust shows us how to live out His life in our life. It is a narrow path, this journey of life that we are to travel; it will take us through high places and low places but if we walk in faith and not by what we see in front of us, the journey will be safe because He Who is in us is greater than he who is in the world.
We were created in the very image of God and within our created being, is an implanted desire for God and to be as God is. There are many distractions from the world that intend to drown out the voice of God. Just because someone denies that God exists does not make it so. Whoever denies that Jesus came in the flesh and died and then rose from the dead, is an antichrist, a person who does not believe in the truth of God. They have no faith because they block their ears to hear God. They deny Him, calling Him a myth because of the lives that they live. People who deny God, actually deny their very existence. They have no room in their hearts to know and to love GOD. They have stopped up their ears to GOD and keep on listening to the devil.
Some people do not like being referred to as sheep because they think of sheep as smelly, dirty creatures. But that is what we are when we live in sin. God know how sin makes us. We are smelly and dirty because we allow the world and the flesh to cover us in its filth. JESUS, our Shepherd, loves us even with our unclean lives. He already knows our sins. That is the reason He came to this world that He created. He came in love because GOD is love. He came to wash away our dirty sins and make us white by His blood shed on the cross. He loves us because we are His children. He does not want us to continue to sin and lead a life that will drown out His still small voice. When we choose Jesus, His voice will lead us. He will shepherd us because He loves us. And when we walk in His light, we follow only Him. The world means nothing to us because we are walking through the gate into God.
I love that fact that Jesus is the gate that we are to go through in order to find our way in the LORD. He is the very face of the Father, showing us by the life that He lived on earth, what pure love looks like and how pure love is to be lived.
Total surrender is what GOD requires of us. And it is not something that He has not done for us because Jesus lived a life of perfect surrender to the FATHER. Let’s imagine for a moment, what it was like to be JESUS. When God created the heavens and the earth, He was planting a world in perfection. God existed before time and space. God had created the angels long before us. God loves to create and He does so with perfect love. As someone who loves to do arts and crafts, I can understand how God must have felt in the beginning when He created the heavens and the earth. When I think up something I want to make or draw or paint, a see a perfect creation in my mind. Sometimes everything is perfect and everything comes together just right. But there are times that no matter what I see in my mind, it does not come out in what I am trying to create. Years ago, I use to play with clay. I loved sitting at the wheel with a lump of clay before me. That was all it was, a lump; no form, unusable and ugly. But then, when I put water on my hands and on the lump of clay and began to spin the wheel, I would just run my hands over and over, getting a feel for the clay. I envisioned what I wanted to make, a cup, a bowl, or a vase, it did not matter what I was going to create. Then I began to put pressure on the clay. I took and changed it shape and I molded it into something that I wanted it to be.
I have always understood how God used the clay and the potter description to teach us how He changes us from a lump of clay and into a vessel of His choosing. I am the clay and God is the potter. Some people do noble and great things and others do small and what seems to the world, nothing of consequence .Pride gets in the way and people see what is simple and beautiful in God’s eyes as nothing, but see themselves as better than others. But we are all made by GOD and for God and so we are all brothers and sisters. We need to stop looking at each other as black or brown or white but as beautiful creations of God, each with a purpose created by Him for our lives.
God is the ultimate Creator. He spoke this whole world and universe into being. He spoke and created humans. No one truly knows the timeline of GOD. In His Word, God says, a day is but a thousand years, and a thousand years are but a day. God does not need us to know how old He is. It does not matter, as GOD has always been. We have to stop trying to describe God in human terms and just accept God as God. He is perfect in every way but we are not. No one knows how long Adam and Eve were in the garden before they sinned. And before someone says it, their names are not important, but the fact is God created male and female, in the image of God He created us. He created us to care for the world He created, to be in charge of it and to procreate human life. That is a big responsibility but GOD knows we have it in our very being. God is perfect in every way. His love is perfect as He is love. And just as I said earlier, when I set about to create something, it does not always come out in my perfect vision.
But that is okay. God knew from the moment He created us that He was taking on chance on whether or not we would walk in His perfect love. He already knew who the devil was, as God created Satan in perfect love, but in the devil’s heart, was pride. The devil wanted to be God and has always tried to destroy what God created. That is what the evil one does here on earth. Try as he might though, all it takes on our part is a little faith and trust to overcome the devil and to walk in GOD’s love.
Walking in faith is really simple but the world has blocked out the simple choice that we have. The world and the flesh have been corrupted by the evil one but God has never left us without hope. He promised from the first sin to crush the evil one. That is why God came to earth as one of His Own creations. But because people cannot understand God’s nature, some people do not believe in God. God sent His love here to earth, to live a life and in doing so, teach us His perfect way, His perfect truth and His perfect life. When we accept Jesus as our LORD and Savior, we are to be born again of water and the Spirit. As believers we are to put on CHRIST, and live the very life that HE lived and died. And to walk in the hope of the promise that we too, when we leave this world will walk in perfection with God. We are here to learn to be perfect as God is perfect. When we surrender to GOD and accept JESUS as the way in which GOD decided to show us His love.
We who walk in the light of God’s love do so because we have overcome the world and the evil one. We overcome all that the devil puts in our way to trip us up by trusting in GOD. No matter if we are not rich, no matter what our health may be, no matter what, God’s plan for our lives is to mold us into perfect images of Him. He knows your name, He knows your shame and He loves you with a never ending love. Let go of the world and learn to walk in His perfect love. Walking in faith, keeping your eyes on Jesus, knowing that we have hope that no matter what is going on in our lives, GOD is greater. God will walk with you every step of the journey and will bring us to His perfection. We walk in faith and not by sight. We stand firm in GOD: In His Word and in His truth. The world may come against us and tell us that we are wrong. But those who say that are listening to the father of lies. John uses the word—antichrist—because the devil does not want you to know Jesus. Jesus is the perfect human creation of GOD. His whole life was to die for our sins and to rise to a new and glorious body. We who accept Jesus are His body, His vessel to be used to show others God’s love. When the world says that God’s way is not right; when the world says that we are racist and bigots because we do not accept the devil’s way; when we stand in faith and not back down in our trust in GOD, we are doing so in love. Because God wants all of His creations to be with HIM forever.
When we walk in faith, we are to put off the world and its desires and put on Christ and His desires. Jesus showed us that we are to always do the FATHER’s will. That is what He did on earth. Jesus said the FATHER and He are one and that if we believe in Him and follow Him, we will be one with HIM and with the FATHER. And when we accept Jesus, God’s Spirit comes and lives in us and teaches us what we need to know. If we walk in His light, as Jesus is the light, we are walking with GOD. Jesus is the only way to the FATHER. That is why God came to earth, to show us that we can be just like HE is.
God knows we are not perfect. But if we would trust Him and live our lives in His way, He will mold us into His perfect creation that He has for each of us. And we are different because just as each part of our bodies of different and each has a different function, we also have different functions. Follow His voice, Jesus will lead us home. Celebrate being the smile that you give to someone; the cleaning up of the bathrooms; the beautiful voice that sings glory to God; the person who shines from within of God’s light; the baker, the mother and the father, the banker, the ditch digger; it does not matter what we do as long as we do it for the glory of GOD. Our lives are to be lived in seeking GOD with all that we are and to walk in His way, His truth and His love.
FATHER, thank You for giving us Your very being in Jesus and showing us the way in which we are to live our lives. We thank You that You never leave us or forsake us. WE pray that You will use each of us in whatever purpose You have for our lives. Help us to walk in Your light and to let Your light shine out through us so that others will see You in all that we say and do. Thank You for dying on the cross and saving us from ourselves. Father, we pray that You will continue to fill us with Your joy which is our strength so that no matter what the devil throws at us, we will be able to stand firm in Your Word and in our faith in You. We surrender all to You; we give You our lives; we trust You; we love You. Thank You for loving us first.
We pray LORD, for those who do not know You and deny You. We pray that their hearts would be opened and all that the devil’s strongholds are demolished and that You will mold them into what You created them to be. We pray that the devil is defeated in our families, our children, our and in our friends that You have placed in our lives. Nothing is impossible for You GOD. Nothing.
Jesus, we are awaiting Your return. We know Your love and want to live with You forever and to forever thank You for dying and rising; for being the perfect human being. Thank You for Your Spirit that teaches us how to live in Your way, Your life and in Your truth. Help us to accomplish all that You have for our lives. We are Yours.
We pray this in Your Name, Jesus. Amen.
