Fluffy

Hey ya'll.
Computer at home caught a virus. Be awhile before it gets cleaned up. Dont know when I'll be on again. Blessings to you all!
Later,
Fluffy

__________________
Be transparent before God, He sees right thru you, anyway!
http://www.likepreciousfaith.org/testimony_val.htm
Please pray for your local emergency responders, daily.

Fluffy

Did I say "A" Virus? Let me change that... we had 1,555!!!!! But now...is fixed! yay!

__________________
Be transparent before God, He sees right thru you, anyway!
http://www.likepreciousfaith.org/testimony_val.htm
Please pray for your local emergency responders, daily.

Bondman

Message #111

THAT NEW COMMANDMENT - Part 1

I’ve mentioned this New Commandment of Jesus’ before, but never done a Message on it. Which is incredibly slack of me because this is SO IMPORTANT!!! His New Commandment 'add on to' where He changed the Old Testament Ten Commandments into just TWO: the 1st where we LOVE GOD TOTALLY, the 2nd where we LOVE EVERYONE ELSE. In John Ch 13 He called this His NEW COMMANDMENT - then to ENSURE that we really 'got it' He REPEATED it TWICE MORE in John Ch 15!!

John 13: 34 A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another; as I have loved you, that you also love one another.
John 15:12This is My commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you.
John 15:17 17 These things I command you, that you love one another.

This command to us all is quite, quite NEW. And not complicated even one bit! STRAIGHT DOWN THE LINE, He is instructing us that we MUST love each other, meaning that as a Christian Believer I am to love each and EVERY ONE of my brothers and sisters in the Lord. Do you think that we actually DO this? Well we better, cos He says that it's a COMMANDMENT to be kept!

God's COMMAND to EVERYONE in the world (whether they know it or not) is to love everyone else. If everyone hated each other imagine the chaos of THAT!! As it is we're NEVER free of war somewhere in the world where people hurt others, hate others, kill others.

HAS TO BE AGAPE LOVE!

Here lies a major problem for we who call ourselves Christians. We make friends and spend time with people who love us back. But this is NOT agape love. In the NT, God's love is always 'agape' (a totally GIVING love) and OURS must be the same!!! – otherwise it's NO different from that between two unbelievers!! AND THAT'S TRAGIC!! Agape (God's) love just GIVES and GIVES and GIVES – AND REQUIRES NOTHING IN RETURN!! Let me illustrate with a living example:

Most who know us seem to think we're reasonably okay people, and yet we have no friends left. Every Christian we've had in our life over the last 20 years has GONE! Mostly they just drift away, disappear, they just GO! Apparently without reason... It's quite astonishing! Of course the reason is our chronic ill-health!!

I remember a nice Christian couple who came to visit us a couple of times, which was SO incredibly lovely!! But at that point an UNWRITTEN societal rule (that almost certainly you will NOT be aware of) came into play: once they'd visited us, WE WERE SPOSED TO VIST THEM BACK! But we are too sick to do that! So quite subconsciously they reacted and responded to this - and they simply DUMPED US, without further contact!

DARE WE ASK: WHAT'S HAPPENING HERE? We've observed this sort of thing just about everywhere: it seems clear that WITHIN THE CHURCH there's a social climate indicating that we mostly DON'T truly love each other, and therefore we are BREAKING Jesus' New Commandment!

continued in Part 2...

- BM and his Lady

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Faithwoman

Great message Bondman

Quote:

Here lies a major problem for we who call ourselves Christians. We make friends and spend time with people who love us back. But this is NOT agape love. In the NT, God's love is always 'agape' (a totally GIVING love) and OURS must be the same!!! – otherwise it's NO different from that between two unbelievers!! AND THAT'S TRAGIC!! Agape (God's) love just GIVES and GIVES and GIVES – AND REQUIRES NOTHING IN RETURN!! Let me illustrate with a living example:

I will say that I am sure the totally giving love is what is hard for folks.. I have had to learn that.. that I am to give and give with nothing in return.. For most of the male/female relationships I have been in.. I have just wanted to be loved back.. I give so much of myself when I am in a relationship and then just yearn for that love back.. now what comes to my mind as I type is that if I was in the right relationship. that love would be there right? I mean look at the troubles folks have in marriages and such. and then they as a Christian and true believer are to just keep loving with all their heart.. now aside from these relationships, I will say in relationships with other people, I do love others and keep loving them.. Lord help me see if I am not doing that.. it has just always been the struggles in the one on one relationships that I have struggled with..
Your message was a great message .. and may I go forth and keep loving those folks in my day to day walk that could potentially want to change my way of thinking on that.. .. and Lord.. help me with those people at work.. may I continue to be shining light.
Hope you and the Mrs are doing better.

Hugs
Faithwoman

forgivenWretch

Bondman it is sad to say that man truly will never be capable of agape love. We are so wrapped up in worldly beliefs that they forever cloud our minds with muck. As a society man is totally blinded to true love.

Oh, there are those who come so close, most assuredly, but our human minds disallow us to fully understand what "agape" love entwines, and most of us would find it entirely too hard to put forth the effort required, to fulfill it's true meaning.

These disabilities for a Christian, are too many times, the cause of our falling away, but yet they, for many, are merely a stepping stone that carry us closer and closer to our ultimate desire to be Christlike.

Christianity is most definitely a daily battle that we confront in our strides as a Christian, and that is why we must surround ourself with others who hold the same values.

The highest goal as a Christian is to become like Christ! And even in church, as you stated there remain the "cliques" that wage against us. God tells us that the road to Him is not easy, that there are many pitfalls and barriers that will come before us, but the simplest desire of our minds can and will overcome these barriers, because we are not alone. God lives within us and He will guide us where ever we go.

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I do not feel obliged to believe that the same God who has endowed us with sense, reason, and intellect has intended us to forgo their use. ~Galileo

Faithwoman

Awesome reply... your whole reply was awesome!

Thanks for sharing!

faithwoman

forgivenWretch

Thank you Faithwoman!, but all glory is God's, which without Him, such words could never come from such a simple mind.

Be Blessed,

Wayne

__________________
I do not feel obliged to believe that the same God who has endowed us with sense, reason, and intellect has intended us to forgo their use. ~Galileo

Bondman

Absolutely right - man alone is incapable of anything remotely resembling agape. But the Christian certainly CAN truly love with agape - as His love IN us reaches out to others THROUGH us. Selfless giving love, requiring nothing in return!

To reach this point most certainly does require some effort on our part - but certainly NOT struggling-type effort. The way to this is rather via FAITH and ACCEPTANCE of what His Word says. I must add a note that when you struggle with constant illness this can be much harder than for those who are well, but seeing that I've managed it, then with determination I'm perfectly confident that others can also!

Wayne, I agree with Faithwoman, and love this statement of faith also!

__________________

Bondman

Message #112

THAT NEW COMMANDMENT - Part 2

...continued from Part 1

We certainly all need to be loved (and loved back). That's how God made us to be. It's perfectly simple: we all NEED love! But there are two important matters here: 1) Human love will never ultimately satisfy, only God's love will (more on this below). 2) For as long as we CONTINUE in the human pursuit of SEEKING LOVE BACK from people, we can NEVER hope to get filled with agape! We desperately need to recognise that agape is the only

.:: TRUE
.:: GIVING and
.:: UNSELFISH

LOVE that exists!!! All other love fails the test. Thus in Jesus' 1st and 2nd Commandments in Matthew 22:37-39, Jesus says we are to agape God, and we are to agape all others. Neither of these is human love, because such love will NEVER be up to this task.

So as a Believer, when you find yourself lacking the love that you need, please recognise that - THIS IS GOD!! That is, He is lovingly showing you that the ONLY love that can ever satisfy your longings is HIS agape (love). This comes via His Spirit. It is available to us all. What we need is to CHANGE OUR FOCUS TO POINT TOWARDS GOD rather than pointing towards people. Please have no fear on this: when we are allowing His agape to fill our hearts, THEN WE WILL BE LOVING PEOPLE WITH IT!! In fact we can then give and give and give - WHY? Because we are receiving the love we need from God Himself.

Does that mean human love is then unimportant? NO! We need this too. But it will FAIL TO WORK FOR US AND TO SATISFY US until we get that FOCUS right, i.e., for so long as we remain not fully connected to the Lord, and thus unfilled with HIS LOVE because we are not being FILLED WITH HIS SPIRIT. Ephesians Ch 5:18b be being filled (always) with the (Holy) Spirit. Pray for this! Ask God for it, and keep asking!!

IN SUMMARY:

1. A lot of the time we are giving out love to others and expecting or hoping for love back from them - but sadly the love we are giving as well as the love we receive is HUMAN LOVE.

2. This is NOT how the New Testament says that Christian Believers live. We have to learn how to give agape to others as described above - THEN we will neither expect nor need them to give any love back to us!

I know that may all sound, well, radical. And it is! But it's simply what His Word is saying to us if we'll LISTEN and then ACT upon it.

continued...

- BM and his Lady

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Faithwoman

In Romans 1:28 it states:

And even as they did not like to retain God in their knowledge, God gave them over to a reprobate mind, to do those things which are not convenient;

Can you help me with this? Why would God give them over to such a mind to do those things?


What does this mean?

Thanks
Faithwoman