But also for this very reason, giving all diligence, add to your faith virtue, to virtue knowledge, to knowledge self-control, to self-control perseverance, to perseverance godliness, to godliness brotherly kindness, and to brotherly kindness love. For if these things are yours and abound, you will be neither barren nor unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Yashua. 2 Peter 1:5-8
This morning the Lord made a point to me about walking in the Spirit and not tripping up because of the cares of this world. How to be in the world but not of it. With part of the thought being how do we get to where we have no on going problems and can simply focus on the Lord. While at the same time turn 4 talents into 8?
Everything with God is about balance, trying to keep our focus on him while living your life out, working out what he is working in. No matter what you do in this life there is always going to be problems. Even if you go live on a deserted island or in the mountains somewhere where no one else lives. There are still problems. Of course most problems we face are man made by evil or stupid people. But there are always problems.
So the simple point the Lord made was always seek me in all cases. When times are good or bad. We tend to seek other people when times get bad as we go to friends, counselors, church leaders… But we do not go to God seeking his wisdom.
As I find myself somewhat consumed with this ongoing legal problem which keeps growing from just a money issue into a criminal issue with threats on my life and that of my family. Spending a lot of time going to the police to keep this going. I find it difficult to get my mind quiet before the Lord to hear him teach me more. At first I thought it was a Daniel story issue where God was sending me a message but the evil spirits delayed it. But then with what he showed me today, I realize the process is the teacher.
Yashua is showing me that in seeking his will in all things and not making decisions in and of myself, and when he stops me if I go down the wrong path, I obey and stop. Then this is my teacher, my circumstances. As long as the focus is on Yashua and you walk in the Spirit, moving forward with the things you know you need to do, and stopping if the Spirit of God restrains you. You are learning.
Just like Yashua who was made perfect in the things he suffered, so are we who walk according to his good purpose. One of the problems however is we run to the church or the bible to find out the purpose, when what Yashua really expects is us to run to him. The growth in us will not come from any other source except Yashua. There is no other way to the Father except through the son. And this is exactly what this verse means.
Do we get carried away with the cares of the world and it chokes the very life of Yashua from us? When the problems come, is your focus on the problems and how you can get out of them? Or is the focus on Yashua, the author and finisher of your faith. I can promise you that you will not have any other issues in life if you focus is on Yashua.
Many of the teachings from Yashua are about fear, worrying, things that bring anxiety and mental problems. I went through many of these some 20 years ago when I went through hell in my life while still practicing religion as a catholic. My religion and other knowledge did nothing to help me. But it also made me seek for truth and answers and when seeking I found God who had the answers. He has the perfect and righteous answers, although many of them are not what we want to hear. And almost all go compoletely against the teachings of men.
Men teachers focus is on keeping worldly peace. Political correctness, telling people what they want to hear and not what they need to hear. They make it a godly thing where it goes against God and his truth. This is why we do not know God and hear him, he speaks and we cannot hear him because he makes no sense to us, we dismiss his voice.
“For if these things are yours and abound, you will be neither barren nor unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord” I can tell you this verse is 100% truth, but very few ever come to understand it because very few actually come to know Yashua. We might come to understand a few things in life because of reading the bible or listening to a preacher, going to school. But the depths of his majesty and Kingdom only are learned through life and seeking him to lead your way.
I sati here thinking of the discussions I get into with people, debates or arguments if you will. About many things from worldy issues like health and nutrition, to vaccines and treatments. To who God really is and what he expects. And it is interesting to me how satan uses people to come at you to try to discredit you when you follow Yashua, and they do not even kno9w it. They think they are good with God and will be sitting at the beer pub next to all their friends in heaven. Or seeing their dog again, or whatever it is they believe about the next life. But I can tell you because I know Yashua and what he expects, these doctrines are not of him and will not give you life eternal. The only life eternal is in Yashua, knowing him and obeying him and keeping your focus on him when the problems or cares of the world come to you.
But again the main part of the message today is simply to take the cares of the world when they come, because they will come. And seek the wisdom of God and his way to navigate through them instead of focusing on the problems and try to find self made solutions to them.
One thing more with something the Lord was reminding me about last night again. Using sports and coaching. There are bad ways to play a game, good ways, better ways and the best way. The best coaches show you the best ways to perform at the highest level. And as you learn from the coach who teaches the best ways, it changes your mind and reactions so you do it the best way. In practice and in games, the great excellent coach will stop you and remind you when you are doing something wrong and teach you how to do it right. Yashua reminded me of a game we were playing and how the other team kept scoring easy baskets against us because of one simple little move using a pick. So I took my girl sitting on the bench and showed her what they were doing and told her how to stop this from happening. I then put her in the game and took the other player out to show it to her. It changed the game completely around, no more easy baskets, just from one simple little adjustment.
This is exactly what Yashua does in your life if you let him, he takes things you are doing wrong, shows it to you and gives you the answer of how to do it right and at the highest level. The verse from Peter tells us this exactly if you have ears to hear. Through this process of purification (changing how you are doing things) he gives you all these things, virtue, faith, knowledge, self control, brotherly kindness to love. You cannot learn these things in any other way, you might learn something from other men, like reading this. But I cannot teach you in the heat of the battle anything like Yashua can.
And this is what he expects, you allow worldly events to make you seek his truth more and not allow them to get on top of you and destroy you.
