1 Thessalonians 3 "clique"

I feel we read verses like this

 ¹¹ Now may our God and Father himself and our Lord Jesus open up a way for us to come to you.¹² May the Lord make your love grow. May it be like a rising flood. May your love for one another increase. May it also increase for everyone else. May it be just like our love for you.

and think of the wording as clique, we hear it so often in church and in the way people talk we just glance over it as something that means love a lot.  Well I do that, and I really tried to dig out this chapter cause I felt after the first few times I read it that it was just history, just telling what happened.  

For love to be like a rising flood, then it is something that cannot be stopped by human hands, it has nature behind it pulling the strings, an act of God.  To have love like that is not only a gift it is a blessing and a power like very few have.  I long to have this kind of love God, please mold me so I will one day be worthy for this gift.  

Amen.

1 Thessalonians 2 "Bold"

To be as bold as Paul someday would be an amazing thing.  To be able to go into anywhere and spread the word of God is one thing but to do it in your own back yard and everywhere you go is another. This is what Paul does and is not ashamed of being torn down from it.  This is real strength.  

God lead me to have strength in you, knowing I cannot do this on my own and it is in you I find true strength.

Colossians 4 "Prayer"

The only real thing I can gather from this chapter other than Paul has a lot of friends and they say hi is that Prayer is important.  I like how Paul shows this rather than straight up preaches it.  He asks for it.  Most of us look up to Paul as a strong christian role model, why do we think we are too good to ask for prayer?

Colossians 3 "Convicting"

I love this chapter, I have printed it off and I hope to read it regularly to remind me of my new life and of how I am now meant to live.  This chapter is one of the ones I feel Paul is writing directly to me.  This chapter is simple about how we are to live our lives.  If you read this and can't see how to live your life, if you ask how to do the things it asks then your life is too busy you need to slow down and concentrate on what is simple what is right what is true.  STOP Be Quiet Read and Listen.

Colossians 2 "Inside and Outside"

Read this chapter then re-read verses 20-23.  These verses I had no idea were in the Bible but they make perfect sense.  When we try to stop our sinful nature what do we do?  We try to treat the symptoms not the cause.  If we fix the cause then the symptoms will go away, right?  We are doing this not realising we are trying to do this by human ways, even if we ask for help from God I do not think we can defeat sin this way alone.  We cannot only take a human approach to fix this problem.  

We are trying to fix it the same way we fix everything; by making laws that try to fix the outside because it is hard or too difficult to fix the inside.  Anyway I am working on fixing my insides and it is hard work.  I pray for myself to have strength and for others who are fixing the outside to begin to look within and find what is causing their symptoms.  

Pilippians 4 "Content"

It seems the world today trains us to never be content.  It seems we always want more even when we have enough, when we don't have anything we want more and when we get it it is not enough what is this desire for earthly things that we get so wrapped up in.  It seems even when I am able to grasp contemptment I am not able to hold on to it for long.  

Philippians 3 "This hits home"

¹² I have not yet received all of those things. I have not yet been made perfect. But I move on to take hold of what Christ Jesus took hold of me for.

 ¹³ Brothers and sisters, I don't consider that I have taken hold of it yet. But here is the one thing I do. I forget what is behind me. I push hard toward what is ahead of me. ¹⁴ I move on toward the goal to win the prize. God has appointed me to win it. The heavenly prize is Christ Jesus himself.

 ¹⁵ All of us who are grown up in the faith should see things that way. Maybe you think differently about something. But God will make it clear to you. ¹⁶ Only let us live up to what we have already reached.

If I can believe this in my heart as much as Paul did, that is my goal. 

Philippians 2 "Even God"

Even God on Earth didn't consider equality with God but made Himself less taking the very nature of a servant. We are so much less than that how do we ever think, even when we are free from sin due to Christ dieing for us on the cross, we are equal or even close. Christ was God, was free from sin and he died for us on the cross. I pray God allows me to die so someone else may find Him.

Plilippians 1 "Strenghth"

When you show strength you are not only doing it for you benefit it also brings others up, same for weakness, you are making it ok for others to be weak and making them less bold to speak about Christ.  

Even if you must put on a front it is better, not the best but better, than not sharing God's word.  True strength comes from the father and through Him life is worth living.

Ephesians 6 "Armor"

Paul talks about God's armor in this chapter, I find that the fights hardest to fight you can't see what you are fighting.  So I guess it makes sense you should use armor you can't see either.  I especially like the helmet of salvation and the shield of faith; to me this means we should consistently focus our mind on our salvation and what Jesus did for us and our hearts on faith to balance our uncertainty in our heads.  

Ephesians 5 "Really with Brian"

I thought this was interesting, and makes sense but I never thought it was such a big deal

¹² It is shameful even to talk about what people who don't obey do in secret.

I guess us talking about it is our way of seeing if is socially acceptable and thus giving ourselves the ok to do it, plus if we have the mind set to know it is wrong we don't talk about it (ex. raping children, obviously wrong), people doing drugs we may want to have the freedom to sin if it is socially acceptable.  Bottom line it leads to bad things.

Interesting.

Ephesians 4 "Weakness"

The last part of this chapter talks about how we should turn our weakness into a strength for the Lord as to better make sure it is no longer a weakness.  If you are getting good grades in all your classes except math, does it make sense to study spanish even more and hope your math grade gets better?  So my response to this is to give more and more so that I do not value earthly things, I can value only what is important.  I often am reminded that it is easier for a camel to fit through the eye of a needle than it is for a rich man to get into heaven.

Ephesians 3

 ¹⁶ I pray that he will use his glorious riches to make you strong. May his Holy Spirit give you his power deep down inside you. ¹⁷ Then Christ will live in your hearts because you believe in him.

   And I pray that your love will have deep roots. I pray that it will have a strong foundation. ¹⁸ May you have power with all God's people to understand Christ's love. May you know how wide and long and high and deep it is. ¹⁹ And may you know his love, even though it can't be known completely. Then you will be filled with everything God has for you.

Ephesians 2 "Different"

Though it is different, seem harder, and difficult to live up to what God asks it is ok because that is not what he asks from us to give us the gift of His Son. Even though as kids we can understand, and today understand, that He gave us His son so that we might live it is difficult because everything we have in our earthly possessions "we earned" (to say God gives us everything though that is not how we see it). We are raised to understand that if we want something we need to work for it, we need to get a job or do chores to earn money to get the things we want.
I believe though it is necessary God gives us this even though we don't meet the criteria, because we can't, I think it creates problems. Do to our nature and comparing God's gift to others we have gotten, if we do not work for it we take it for granted. We don't appreciate the gift we are given. I don't know how to get past this but to try to change my nature. I am con viced God is the one who is right in this situation and for me to be able to live with accepting this gift I must also live in the way I can receive it without taking it for granted; meaning I must life as freely as this gift was given and trusting and knowing my needs will be met because they already have been.