Swayed

​Love you all, praying for you,
 
I just love God’s Word – it separates.  It distinguishes, it makes very clear what is right and what is not, no matter what people say.  Have you ever noticed the power of peer pressure.  Most people live their lives like those around them. If the character of the culture recognizes the moral truth and authority of God’s Word (like the early days of America), then people will conform, even if they don’t fully believe.  But if the culture abandons God’s Word of truth, they go right along with it, afraid to stand for what is right, preferring the praise of men, over the praise of God.  It’s amazing to me how ignorant people, can ridicule or criticize those who put their faith in Jesus Christ, and in God’s Word – the very thing which has remained unchanged since the Creation of the universe and the human race. They laugh at those who believe what God says is true, little knowing, the joke’s on them.  God laughs at them, He holds them in derision.  He knows their days are numbered.  He loves them and offers freedom, but if they refuse, they will reap the judgment that their deeds and their words deserve. Can you imagine if you didn’t know God’s Word?  If you didn’t know the love of God? If you didn’t know His commands that bring you success, if you didn’t know that He loves you and has a plan for you?  Can you imagine if you didn’t have His wisdom, that brings wealth, honor, and life, if you didn’t know the peace that He gives, that goes far beyond mental understanding, if you didn’t have the joy that His Word, His Presence, and Obedience to His Word and His plan – brings you?  Can you imagine if you didn’t have faith that sees things as they really are, not just what they look like right now?  If you didn’t have hope, the hope of what He has promised?  You’d be hopeless, joyless, faithless, wisdom-less, lifeless.  You would just get what you could do in your own strength, you’d be helpless against powers stronger than you, nothing you do would last, it would all burn up in the fire at the end.  Some people’s problem, is not that they have never known, but they have forgotten.  They got swayed… They leave what works, they ignore what could save them, they neglect what could strengthen them and bring them success.  What sways you?  Inputs.  What you look at, listen to, and hang out with. Be careful.  Praying that you will remember what works, and turn from what doesn’t.  Praying that you will seek God’s Word – like your life and strength, and joy, and peace, and future depend on it.  That you will know His plans, and obey them completely, that you will soak in His presence, and walk in His strength, that your faith will increase, that your joy will overflow, that your hope will grow, and your peace will remain.  Praying that you won’t worry, fear, or fret.  Praying that you won’t let the mockers, the foolish, who have perished for generations, sway you, or keep you from fully pursuing, fully doing, and fully believing, everything He is, everything He said, and everything He tells you to do - if you’ll ask Him.  Praying that you will love Him - His Word, His Presence, and His Promise.  That you will love others (even those who don’t yet know Him) – with the love that He has for them.  Praying that you will never be swayed by those who don’t believe, that you will never forget what God said, or neglect what got you this far…  But that you would grow in His grace – the power to live the life that He has chosen for you – that will bring His reward – for all of eternity.  His truth and His life is so much better down here, just like it’s so much better up there.  Praying that you will never let yourself be swayed, but that you will be steadfast, immovable, always growing in His grace.   
 
Love you all,
dad