BE DISCIPLINED

James 1:12 Blessed is the man that endureth temptation: for when he is tried, he shall receive the crown of life, which the Lord hath promised to them that love him.

If we are really going to be faithful to the Lord we must learn to discipline ourselves. Undisciplined Christians do not accomplish very much. They mostly do what they want to do or feel like doing regardless of the consequences to their spiritual growth or their Christian testimony.
Self control and restraint must be practiced. Every time we show restraint it strengthens us. When we make a strong effort to resist temptation (and to stay away from situations we know will tempt us) we become all the more strong in resisting future temptations. If we resist them enough eventually they will not even be temptations.
We must set rules for ourselves and set limits if we are to Glorify God. We must learn self control, over our tempers, our tongues and our attitudes. If we learn to discipline ourselves it will increase our faith, multiply our blessings, and enlarge our service to the Lord.

BE DEDICATED

Psalms 37:5 Commit thy way unto the LORD; trust also in him; and he shall bring it to pass.

Being faithful takes a commitment. It is a conscious choice on our parts that we are going to trust God.
We must commit our way to Him. If we are to walk with Him we must learn to listen, to believe and to follow. His word may not address every issue to the letter but it will address every concept that we encounter.
We are taught much about putting others before our own feelings and about forgiveness and seeking a closer walk with Him. We must pray, study His word and most of all share His love, through Jesus, with those we come in contact with.
We must cling to His promises and realize that it is He who will bring it to pass. Make a commitment today to trust in Him and receive the blessings that God wants to give you.

BE FAITHFUL

Revelation 2:10 Fear none of those things which thou shalt suffer: behold, the devil shall cast some of you into prison, that ye may be tried; and ye shall have tribulation ten days: be thou faithful unto death, and I will give thee a crown of life.

This verse of scripture was written by John just before he was to reveal to us the terrible tribulation of the last days. His message was plain, be faithful.
When things are going your way, be faithful. When things turn against you, be faithful. Even if you are persecuted be faithful.Think abou the word faithful. It means full of faith. Not faith in your abilities or your own strength but faith in a Great and Mighty God who is all powerful.
Remember Who it is that we have faith in. He is the Creator of all things. He is the sustainer of all things. All that there is, is because of Him. He is a Holy God and he has made promises to those who believe that He will never break because of His Holy nature.
John said it well, "Be thou faithful unto Death
The next few days devotionals will be lessons on how to be faithful. I hope you receive a blessing from them.

WHO DO WE BLAME WHEN WE SIN?

By Jeremy Burkes

Genesis 3:12-13 And the man said, The woman whom thou gavest to be with me, she gave me of the tree, and I did eat. (13) And the LORD God said unto the woman, What is this that thou hast done? And the woman said, The serpent beguiled me, and I did eat.

It wasn't my fault. I didn't mean to do it. He or she made me do it. We've all heard them before. We've all made excuses when we get caught in our sins.
Like Adam we blame family or friends. We even try to convince ourselves, if it weren't for him or her, I would not have done that.Sometimes we do like Eve and say, "The devil made me do it."
Who is to blame when I sin? The answer is me. I am the reason I sin and I have a will and can decide not to sin as easy as I decide to sin. If I sin it is ultimately because I want to more than I want not to.
Jesus came to pay our sin debt. In Him we have forgiveness of sins. Satan is constantly accusing us before God. Sometimes he even cast doubts on our salvation.
Our sins are covered in the blood of Jesus once we are saved. It is important to our fellowship to confess those sins to God. We can never excuse our sins. Jesus suffered for our sins which means that none of them are small. Take responsibility for your sins and confess them to God. The blood of Jesus will cleanse you from all unrighteousness.

Time

By Jeremy Burkes

Ecclesiastes 3:1 To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven:

Time is one thing we all have. It might not seem like it but we each have the same amount of time in a day. Some people never seem to have enough of it while others seem to have too much on their hands.
We spend time with family, time on our jobs, and sometimes we waist a lot of time.
Many people live their lives on a schedule and many just seem to do whatever is pressing at the time.
Some have schedules at work and even schedules at home.
Sadly many do not schedule any time to spend with God. We tend to get so busy with our time and schedules that we can easily leave God out of our day.
Remember that time was given to us by God. Whether you are on a schedule or not you should make sure each day you set aside some time to spend with Him.

THE BEGINNING OF SIN

1st Peter 5:8 Be sober, be vigilant; because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, walketh about, seeking whom he may devour:
Isaiah 55:8 For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, saith the LORD.

Sin usually begins in the back of our thoughts. Wild fires and thoughts are a lot alike. They both start with a spark and quickly get out of control. Just like the wild fires in National forests that are started by man, Satan will try to spark your thoughts out of control.
When you go to buy a new car and walk on the lot the salesman shows you around to get you interested. Soon he tries to get our attention on one particular car and then he starts to push for us to make a commitment.
Satan will do something similar with sin. First he just kind of shows you around to spark your interest. He will then begin to tempt you with what you are already interested in and finally he will try to push you into getting caught up in the sin.
Isaiah tells us that we don't look at things (including sin) the same way that God looks at them. We do not see the destructiveness of sin that God knows is there. Satan tries to get us to sin to destroy our testimony. He then renders us ineffective for God's service.
Jesus sent us the Holy Spirit to help protect us against the attacks of the devil. The Spirit will convince and convict us of sin if we will let Him.
We need to look at sin from God's point of view and be ready when Satan attacks us through our thoughts.

OSCAR WINNING CHRISTIANS

By Jeremy Burkes

Hebrews 12:15 Looking diligently lest any man fail of the grace of God; lest any root of bitterness springing up trouble you, and thereby many be defiled;

And the Oscar goes to ... We've all seen thise award shows. Sometimes the best actors in the world are Christians. We hide our sins and mask our real selves so that others don't know our weaknesses. It is like we are wearing masks.
Our mask shows the world the image we want them to see and we fail to realize that many of them can see behind our mask and God can see behind it all the time.
God knows who we really are and sometimes he sends other Christians to help peel away the layers of our mask. It is better to improve who we really are than try to pretend to be somehting we are not.
We need to let others help us. We need to listen to others and realize that while others help us we should be helping others. You never know, we all might be going through some of the same things if we would just be honest with ourselves and others.
We need to leave the Oscars to Hollywood, take of our masks, and try to become the best Christians we can be.