Orange Moon Cafe "Strong In the Lord"

The Special of the Day… From the Orange Moon Cafe

"Strong In the Lord"

     

        Last week's memory verse - "be strong in the Lord and in the power of His might - provides one of the greatest Scriptural assurances whereby we walk in the peace of the Lord Jesus Christ (Ephesians 6:10).  As each day begins, God offers His trusting children the promise of living our lives by His presence, leading, and enabling, as opposed to our mere human abilities.  Those abilities will become the vessels that contain and express His working, most often in quiet ways we may not even realize, but which nevertheless reveal the actions of the Divine, as revealed through the trusting of the human.  

   "By the grace of God I am what I am.  And His grace which was bestowed on me was not in vain, but I labored more abundantly than they all, yet not I, but the grace of God which was with me" (I Corinthians 15:10).  

   Let us ponder the wonder of such promise in pointed terms.  Our Heavenly Father offers to us the grace of being strong in Christ regarding every aspect of our lives.  This includes our thinking.  Our attitude.  Our trust.  Our submission.  Our words.  Our fellowship with Him.  Our relationships with people.  Our responses to the blessings, challenges, and mundane moments of life.  Our everything.  Indeed, the Christian life, or rather, the indwelling life of Christ in believers, applies to the entirety of our existence.  "Whatsoever ye do, do it heartily, as to the Lord" (Colossians 3:23).  "Heartily" means from the heart, which directs our attention away from ourselves and unto the One who lives within our hearts - "Christ in you, the hope of glory" (Colossians 1:27).  This is the One by whose strength we live, the One who overcame every challenge as He trampled sin, hell, and the grave under His nail-scarred feet in glorious exit from the tomb (Colossians 2:15).

   What if every moment of this day involves our living not merely as ourselves, but rather as ourselves inhabited by the living, eternal, infinite, and inexpressibly wondrous Creator and Sustainer of all things?  This is not merely conjecture or fanciful yearning for born again believers.  This is truth.  This is fact.  This is reality. This is who and what we are as "the temple of God" (I Corinthians 3:16).  Our Savior redeemed us not merely to get us to Heaven, but rather for Heaven to come to us and inhabit the epicenter of our very being.  Moreover, His indwelling presence offers us the promise of a Life beyond life regarding all things.  "I can do all things through Christ which strengtheth me" (Philippians 4:13).

    In the glory of such holy light, let us set sail upon the voyage of this day with sails open and fluttering to the "rushing, mighty wind" of the Holy Spirit who purposes and promises to reveal the power of the risen Christ in us  (Acts 2:2).  Any other perspective of God and ourselves falls far short of the Gospel that freely birthed us through Christ, and now offers us the living of our lives by His overcoming life and capabilities…

"In this was manifested the love of God toward us, because that God sent His only Son into the world, that we might live through Him."

(I John 4:9)

Weekly Memory Verse    

   For by Thee I have run through a troop.  By my God I have leaped over a wall."

(II Samuel 22:30)

  

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