Do I Love God or Just Believe in Him?

Bible Reading: John 14

Focus Verse: "And you must love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, all your mind, and all your strength.’ ³¹ The second is equally important: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ No other commandment is greater than these.” Mark 12: 30-31

God first loved us and made possible redemption for our sins, through this love.  Maybe you have repented and accepted forgiveness through Jesus and you believe in God for this salvation.  Do you have love for God?  The Bible says that to love God is to obey him.  Jesus, himself, tells us that in John 14:15 "If you love me, you will obey my commandments." and again in verse 23, "Jesus replied, “All who love me will do what I say. My Father will love them, and we will come and make our home with each of them."  

As we look at what it is like to love God, we see in Mark 12:30 that we are to love God “with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength”.  This type of love will be focused and won't allow other loves to creep in to take affection away from God.  We can not love the worldly things and God at the same time.  1 John 2:15 tells us, " Do not love this world nor the things it offers you, for when you love the world, you do not have the love of the Father in you." Therefore, we must ask God to help us put aside those things that distract from our love for God, that are against God's commandments and that are not in His will for us.  

If we love God, we will desire to spend time with Him and follow Him.  He doesn't want to control us, but that we become eager to choose His best for us.  God, our Creator, offers more than we can imagine  in a relationship with Him and the glorious riches of His Word (the Bible) and He holds our future.  We can not live the life that he offers without our yielding to Him in obeying His will and not our own will.  If you struggle to yield, it is something to take to God Himself. Ask God to reveal any way that you need to yield and then ask him to strengthen you to do it.  Be honest with God.  Even Jesus talked to the Father in the Garden about taking the "cup" and said, "not my will, but your will be done" Luke 22:42

by Page Johnson

Interlocking Ministries

“Checkmate”

Scripture Reading: Romans 8:31-39

Focus Verse Romans 8:31  "What then shall we say to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us? 

There is a famous painting named “Checkmate”  that hangs in a museum.  In the painting Satan is playing a game of chess with a young man.  Chess is a board game with pieces that you move on the board.  The object of the game is to capture your opponent's King.  As you can see in the painting below the young man is sorrowful because the devil has declared “checkmate”.  That means that the young man will lose the game with the devil on the very next move, because his King is trapped.  One day a world champion chess player was touring the museum and he stopped to look at this painting. He studied the painting very closely. He noticed the devil laughing because of the victory he would soon enjoy.  He noticed the young man with a sad look on his face because of the seeming defeat.  Then the world champion chess player began to study very closely the placement of the pieces on the board. Then he made a startling discovery.  He discovered that the young man’s King still had one more move to keep from losing the game.

I don’t know what you are going through today in your life.  Maybe you’re near financial ruin, maybe your marriage is almost over, maybe your children are all messed up going the wrong direction, maybe Satan has you held in his chains of sin and you feel trapped and can’t get out.  Let me tell you your King has one more move.  King Jesus has one more move in your life.  For those who are born again having received salvation there is always hope because the Lord is with you.  Psalm 118:6 says,  “The Lord is with me, so I will have no fear.”  Satan is clever and wants to destroy you, but God is the creator of the universe and with you. God has no equal.  With your yielded heart to Him, you can rely on God to bring victory in your life because of the shed blood of Jesus.  This will leave Satan defeated and the victory is the Lord's.

Hebrews 4:16 So let us come boldly to the throne of our gracious God. There we will receive His mercy, and we will find grace to help us when we need it most.

Psalm 91:14-15 “Because He loves me,” says the LORD, “I will rescue him; I will protect him, for he acknowledges My name. He will call on me, and I will answer him; I will be with him in trouble, I will deliver him and honor him. 

Psalm 50:15 Call on me in the day of trouble; I will deliver you, and you will honor Me."

Psalm 54:4  Surely God is my help; the Lord is the One who sustains me.

Hebrews 13:6 So we can say with confidence, “The LORD is my helper, so I will have no fear. What can mere people do to me?”

Psalm 109:26-27  Help me, O Lord my God! Save me by Your loving-kindness.  Let them know that this is Your hand and that You, O Lord, have done it.

Bobby Johnson

Interlocking Ministries

 

 

Jesus Knows About Your Suffering

Scripture Reading: John 11: 1-16

Focus Verses John 11: 3-4 “Lord, the one you love is sick.  When He heard this, Jesus said, this sickness will not end in death.  No, it is for God’s glory so that God’s Son may be glorified through it.”

For most of us we don’t need to look very far to see someone that is ill.  Maybe it’s your parent, child, or even a close friend, or maybe yourself.  Sickness is something that happens in our lives because we are human.  Often it is the source of our fears and anxiety. 

As a believer in Christ we are invited to take our pain, sickness, and suffering to Jesus.  Many people have taken this path before you did.  And many have endured more sever suffering than you.  In fact no one knows about your suffering more than Jesus.  He suffered too, but we must remember that His suffering led to an empty tomb.  The suffering you are going through today is not the end.  As believers in Jesus we have so much more to look forward to.  Do you believe this?  John 11:35 says “Jesus wept.”  He was with his friends, Mary and Martha, who were weeping and it's possible that His weeping was compassion for their suffering.  (A demonstration of Romans 12:15) He knows our suffering.

As we look at the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus, God is saying “do you trust Me?”  We are never forgotten or left alone in our suffering.  We can trust that in our suffering God is able to bring about our healing if He chooses.  You may feel abandoned or forgotten.  Maybe you think there is no end in sight.  God knows what you are going through.  He suffered too, even to the point of death.  It is a mystery of our faith how Jesus died, and then was raised to life, but we also know He is coming again, and we will be raised with Him.  Let us rejoice in Him, no matter what suffering we are going through right now.

Bobby Johnson
Interlocking Ministries

What Is Your One Thing?

Scripture Reading: Philippians 3:12-21

Focus Verses: Philippians 3:13-14 "No, dear brothers and sisters, I have not achieved it, but I focus on this one thing: Forgetting the past and looking forward to what lies ahead, I press on to reach the end of the race and receive the heavenly prize for which God, through Christ Jesus, is calling us."

What gets you out of bed in the morning?  What is your passion in life?  Read our focus verses again.  The apostle Paul had it figured out.  He said I focus on one thing, “forgetting the past and looking forward to what lies ahead.”  That’s a really good objective for those who are in Christ because some people have bad habits, wrong motives or a really bad past with regrets and shame.   We can get stuck on our shame, but Jesus has taken our shame.  We can’t change the past so forget it and turn away from it and look forward to what’s ahead. God makes all things new.   Let’s press forward in our race to what God has planned for us now and in the future.   In Psalm 24:4 David says “The one thing I ask of the Lord, the thing I seek most, is to live in the house of the Lord all the days of my life, delighting in the Lord’s perfections and meditating in his Temple.”  

There are many things in this world that we could make as our “one thing” to focus on.  Some people have made money, friends, hobbies, family, pleasure, education, a house, a vehicle, a job, their “one thing.”  These things are not bad things, but when you make these things more important in your life than God, then that is a problem.

Let’s make sure our “one thing” is Jesus.  Nothing should be more important in our lives than Jesus.  We show Jesus that He’s our “one thing” when we spend time reading God’s Word and talking with Him in prayer.  So today let’s think about Jesus as the most important thing in out lives.

Bobby Johnson

Interlocking Ministries

Pray So God Will Hear You

Scripture Reading: Isaiah 59

Focus Verses: Isaiah 59: 1-2 

“Listen! The Lord’s arm is not too weak to save you, nor is His ear too deaf to hear you call. It’s your sins that have cut you off from God. Because of your sins, he has turned away and will not listen anymore.”

 

Maybe you thought God will always listen to you when you pray.  The Bible actually says there are some times when God will not hear our prayers.  Let’s say you know you have been involved in some sin and you begin to pray to God as if the sin never happened in your life.  God will not hear that prayer, because you are out of fellowship with Him.  However, if you begin that prayer by confessing that sin, and telling God you are sorry for what you have done wrong, then God will hear you and restore the relationship with you.  We will never be able to live a perfect life on this side of heaven, but we can make an effort to yield to Jesus every day.  Philippians 3:12  Paul says, “I don’t mean to say that I have already achieved these things or that I have already reached perfection. But I press on to possess that perfection for which Christ Jesus first possessed me”.

There are actually two types of sins we can be guilty of.  Sin of commission is when we break a commandment. Which is doing something God has said not to do.  Then there is the sin of omission, and that is not doing something God has told us to do.  Let us be aware of this as the Psalmist writes in Psalm 66:18  “If I had not confessed the sin in my heart, the Lord would not have listened.”

God wants to hear your prayers.  But when we come to Him with unrepentant sin in our lives He must turn away until we confess that sin because He is a holy and righteous God. 

Bobby Johnson

Interlocking Ministries

A Crippled Spiritual Life

Bible Reading: Acts 3:1-10

Focus verse: "They are darkened in their understanding, alienated from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them, due to their hardness of heart." Ephesians 4:18

Charles is a young camper at Sagarume camp station. He accepted salvation today during our Children Bible lessons. He was so touched through the story in Acts 3:1-10 where Peter heals a crippled beggar. Just like the crippled beggar was healed of his physical condition and was able to walk, he too said that he has been crippled in his spiritual life and needed to stand up from his bad behaviours and begin to walk with God for the first time. He stood up and said that, "I have been crippled in my spiritual life and today in the name of Jesus of Nazareth I am standing up and beginning a new life with God" He was lead to salvation and was happy to be born again.

We are all spiritually deficient before we repent from our sins and submit ourselves to Christ.  Christ makes us new. "Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come." 2 Corinthians 5:17

If Christ has made you new, you can live your life for Him, tell others of this salvation and praise Him.  If you are still spiritually crippled, you have the opportunity to be made new.

~Page Johnson, Interlocking Ministries

with the story by Pastor/Director Eliazar Wambo, 

Bethesda Faith Ministries & Makira Baptist Church

Continual Habit of Sin

Scripture Reading: 1 John 3:1-9

Focus Verse: 1 John 3:8 “He who sins is of the devil, for the devil has sinned from the beginning.  For this purpose the Son of God was manifested, that He might destroy the works of the devil.”

There’s a saying that goes like this, “there are two certainties in life, death and taxes.”  Let’s add another one, sin.  The Bible even says that we all sin.  1 John 1:8 “If we claim we have no sin, we are only fooling ourselves and not living in the truth.”  This verse doesn’t give us an excuse to go out and commit sin.  

 

I believe the Bible teaches that once you have humbled yourself to repent of sin, believe God's Son Jesus was the sacrifice to pay the price for our sin and accept Christ to lead your life and are saved, then there is enough grace to cover you so you cannot lose your salvation.  Does that mean you can go out and live anyway you want?  No! That desire denies your heart for God. If you are living in a pattern of continual sin, then you don’t understand what Jesus did for you on the cross.  When you come to Christ for salvation, justification takes place.  Justified means that God sees me “just as if I had never sinned".  When you come to Christ for salvation there will be a change in your heart which will change your life choices. 

 

Someone who continues to sin WITHOUT being sorry for that sin is not in danger of loosing their salvation, but they may have never been saved to begin with.  Even as Christians, none of us are perfect, but we should have a pattern of doing what is right and not what is wrong.  A beliver has a pattern that brings internal conviction, repent and seek holy living.  God has justified the saved believer, so there should not be a continual unrepentant habit of sin in our lives.

Bobby Johnson

Interlocking Ministries

 

For more: "All of us have weaknesses and can fall into sin, even if we don’t want to. Even the apostle Paul did what he didn’t want to do because of the sin at work in his body (Romans 7:15). Like Paul, the response of the believer is to hate the sin, repent of it and ask for divine grace to overcome it (Romans 7:24-25). Although we need not fall because of God’s sufficient grace, sometimes we do because we rely upon our insufficient strength. When our faith grows weak and, like Peter, we deny our Lord in word or in life, even then there is still a chance to repent and be forgiven of our sin."  From Got Questions at https://www.gotquestions.org/forgive-same-sin.html