The Way You Treat Your Neighbor

Is the way you treat God. “If a man say, I love God, and hateth his brother, he is a liar: for he that loveth not his brother whom he hath seen, how can he love God whom he hath not seen?” (1John 4:20 KJV). Humanity is only able to function acceptably, when God is understood as the motivator and motivation for all our actions. Salvation or religion is that window of opportunity for us to bluster out of our slumber and attempt to understand what has just happened. Unless the Spirit of God lays hold of us and we begin understanding His efforts to communicate with us from the Word of God, we will slumber back asleep, as if nothing happened. “O earth, earth, earth, hear the word of the LORD” (Jeremiah 22:29). LORD, You said, “Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God” (Matthew 4:4), grant to us the privilege of proving that with our lives. Make Your Word more valuable than our words, in our daily life. In Jesus’ name, we ask it. Amen. 

Why We Live

Christ is the reason we live. “For to me to live is Christ, and to die is gain” (Philippians 1:21 KJV). Anything else is robbing God. “Will a man rob God? Yet ye have robbed Me. But ye say, Wherein have we robbed Thee? In tithes and offerings” (Malachi 3:8). Our purpose for existing cannot merely be the keeping of commandments, but glorifying God from a pure heart. “Seeing ye have purified your souls in obeying the truth through the Spirit unto unfeigned love of the brethren, see that ye love one another with a pure heart fervently” (1Peter 1:22). How better to self-test our love of God, if Christ is indeed the reason we live, but do we love our neighbor as ourselves (1John 4:20)? Do we  love one another, especially the household of faith (John 13:35)? If we are like the rest of creation groaning, awaiting the future redemption of our physical bodies (Romans 8:23; 1John 3:2) in New Heavens and a New Earth, then we should be praying our understanding and cooperation with the indwelling Christ would grow, so He would hasten to physically and corporally return (Acts 1:11; Revelation 22:20). “Looking for and hasting [literally, hastening] unto the coming of the day of God, wherein the heavens being on fire shall be dissolved, and the elements shall melt with fervent heat” (2Peter 3:12). LORD, help us to see the daily fulfillment of our purpose for living is intimately connected with Your future plans for returning that “God may be all in all” (1Corinthians 15:28). That You would dwell with us forever (Revelation 21:3). Come quickly, Lord Jesus. Amen and amen.