Tag Archive | forgiveness

Matthew 18 – The forgiving heart

Mar25

Hello y’all. Happy midweek 🙂

Today we are looking at Matthew 18.

There is so much to learn from this chapter but I’m gonna focus on a few of the verses that spoke to me as I read the chapter.

Be blessed 🙂

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Verse 3 – 4 :

“Then he said, “I tell you the truth, unless you turn from your sins and become like little children, you will never get into the Kingdom of Heaven. So anyone who becomes as humble as this little child is the greatest in the Kingdom of Heaven”. (Matthew 18: 3- 4 NLT)

Being the greatest in God’s kingdom is all about humility and sincerity of heart. We can’t approach or serve God with pride in our hearts.  Rather we have to approach and serve him with humility. Let’s be careful not to get carried away by earthly status bestowed on us by men. Jesus has specifically told us what will qualify us to be the greatest in His kingdom. We must humble ourselves and be sincere in our walk with Him just like a little child is. 

Verses 8 – 9:

“If your hand or foot causes you to sin, chop it off and throw it away! You would be better off to go into life crippled or lame than to have two hands or two feet and be thrown into the fire that never goes out.  If your eye causes you to sin, poke it out and get rid of it. You would be better off to go into life with only one eye than to have two eyes and be thrown into the fires of hell.(Matthew 18 :8 -9 CEV)

God wants to give us the best of the best but there are distractions along our way that distract us from Him and what He has for us.The enemy doesn’t want us to enter into God’s rest. He will do whatever he can to make sure we are distracted and miss out on what God has for us. John 10:10 tells us His mission – steal and kill and destroy. Therefore according to verses 8 -9, we need to get rid of anything that will stand in the way of God in our lives. I love the way message version puts this.

“If your hand or your foot gets in the way of God, chop it off and throw it away. You’re better off maimed or lame and alive than the proud owners of two hands and two feet, godless in a furnace of eternal fire. And if your eye distracts you from God, pull it out and throw it away. You’re better off one-eyed and alive than exercising your twenty-twenty vision from inside the fire of hell.(Matthew 18:8-9 MSG)

Let’s examine our lives and get rid of anything that is not pleasing to God and standing in the way of us fully surrendering to Him and letting him have His way. Those things we are clinging to are not worth us losing our souls over.

Verses 21 – 35:
Basically, we need to forgive at all times. The truth is, offence is inevitable. People are bound to hurt us whether intentionally or unintentionally and we probably will do the same as well. We have to be prepared and make up our mind with the help of the Holy Spirit to forgive no matter the offence.

It’s easy to say we have forgiven with our lips but if we are honest with ourselves in our hearts we know we haven’t really forgiven the person. When we see them, we become angry and probably don’t want to have anything to do with them. You know you have truly forgiven when you see the person and it doesn’t stir up any bad emotions in you.

When we choose not to forgive, we give power to those who have offended us and we become prisoners to the offence. Funny thing is, the person who offended us has probably moved on with enjoying life and here we are moody, angry, letting them steal our joy and causing our prayers to go unanswered. No one is worth giving that kind of power to.

Forgiveness is crucial for us as Christians because if we don’t forgive others, God can’t forgive us as well. In the Lord’s prayer, Jesus teaches us to pray in this manner: “and forgive us our sins, just as we have forgiven those who have sinned against us”.(Matthew 6: 12 TLB). Also Unforgiveness hinders our prayer from being answered (Mark 11:25)

Forgiveness could be very difficult but I know that Jesus won’t ask us to do this if it was impossible. With the help of the Holy Spirit we can learn to forgive those who have offended us. He can help us begin to see them through the eyes of Christ and fill us with compassion towards them. It’s possible that the person who offended us is also hurting. I often hear Joyce Meyers say “Hurting People, hurt others”

I pray the Holy Spirit helps us to forgive those who have offended us, and fill us with compassion towards them.

Thanks for joining today.

Have a lovely evening 🙂

***With God all things are possible***

Genesis 11

Oct8

Good morning y’all.  Today we in chapter 11. This chapter shows us that there is power in unity and introduces us to Abram and his family.

Be blessed 🙂

There is power in unity. When we are all united in one purpose, there is nothing that we can’t achieve.

The people living after the flood understood this and they decided to build a tower that reaches up to heaven. Although their motive for building the tower was completely wrong. They were building the tower in order to make a name for themselves.They were prideful. God wasn’t gonna have any of that! He saw that they were united even though it was unity born out of wrong motives and because of the unity, could actually achieve what they set out to do, He confused the people and scattered them all over the face of the earth. As a result they couldn’t continue with their plans.

The Lord said, “If as one people speaking the same language they have begun to do this, then nothing they plan to do will be impossible for them. Come, let us go down and confuse their language so they will not understand each other.”   So the Lord scattered them from there over all the earth, and they stopped building the city. Genesis 11:6-8 NIV

The enemy knows this secret and that’s why he is always looking for ways to cause division amongst us. He knows that once we have a divided vision, it will be difficult, if not impossible for us to achieve our purpose or fulfill destiny as Christians.

Throughout the bible there are scriptures that encourages us to live in harmony with one another. One of such is found in Pauls letter to the Corinthians.

I appeal to you, dear brothers and sisters, by the authority of our Lord Jesus Christ, to live in harmony with each other. Let there be no divisions in the church. Rather, be of one mind, united in thought and purpose.1Corinthians1:10 NLT

For us to be able to live in unity, we need to learn to be patient with each other, be quick to forgive offences, walk in love, get rid of jealousy and pride, be humble.
Colossians 3: 13-14 and Phillipians 2:1-4 sheds some more light on this.

Bear with each other and forgive one another if any of you has a grievance against someone. Forgive as the Lord forgave you. And over all these virtues put on love, which binds them all together in perfect unity. Colossians 3:13-14 NIV

Christ encourages you, and his love comforts you. God’s Spirit unites you, and you are concerned for others. Now make me completely happy! Live in harmony by showing love for each other. Be united in what you think, as if you were only one person. Don’t be jealous or proud, but be humble and consider others more important than yourselves. Care about them as much as you care about yourselves. Philippians 2:1-4 CEVUS06

Today, with the help of the holy spirit, lets make a decision to live in harmony with those around us, bearing with each other and walking in love.

Prayer:
Dear Lord we thank you for your word today. Holy Spirit we ask you help us live in harmony with one another. Give us the grace to be patient, to quickly forgive offences, to be humble and walk in love. Thank you Lord.  In Jesus Name. Amen

Thanks for joining today. I’m blogging with Good Morning girls. Check us out at http://www.goodmorninggirls.org

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Have a blessed day and remember to walk in harmony 🙂

***With God all things are possible***