A HEART CONDITION

Thank You Father.

I pray that everyone enjoyed the celebration of our Lord's birth.
I know I did, not because of presents, food and my beautiful family, but because the Lord revealed to me more of His love through His Word.

I believe that what we know about Christ is directly related to the level of our joy.
Joy is of the heart.

That said, what will follow will not be a traditional devotional pep talk, but it's what the Lord placed in me for today.
Amen.

So for all who have an ear to ear, hear.
Amen.


Dear friend, do not imitate what is evil but what is good. Anyone who does what is good is from God. Anyone who does what is evil has not seen God.

Through love and faithfulness sin is atoned for;
Through the honor and reverence of the LORD a man avoids evil.
Proverbs 16:6

It is the love and faithfulness of God that makes a way for all men to be saved.
It is love and not law that atones for sin.
John 3:16
This is the heart of God.

It is by the Word of God that men obtain knowledge enough to know the difference between love and evil.

The Apostle Paul teaches of the difference between law and love in Romans chapters seven and eight.
Paul teaches what to rely on and the effects of that which you choose to rely upon.

A very good and dear friend of mines, Jesus Christ said, "Blessed are you when people insult you, persecute you and falsely say all kinds of evil against you because of Me..."

The Lord didn't say that you were blessed if these things are spoken about you, because of you.
You are not blessed when you are evil spoken of because you are being and doing evil.

This is what legalism does to people and it is a struggle to get away from that way of thinking when it's been poured into your heart, but it is possible through Christ and His Word.

A lost and legalistic heart develops because instead of relying on the love of God and walking after His Spirit, people decide to rely on the law and walk after it.

You can be given 7 principles and points to God's blessing and every point will point to you and not to God.
This is legalism.

Paul said that he would never had known what sin was except through the law.

That he would never have known what coveting was if the law had not said,
"Do Not Covet"

Who told you that you were naked?
Sin will always seize the opportunity.

You don't ever want to call evil good and good evil.
This is what the devil does, he perverts everything that God has established.

The devil has perverted the prosperity of God.
The devil has perverted the sexuality of man.
The devil has perverted the government of God for gain.
The devil has perverted the meaning of Faith.

Sin is sin and it will be judged as such for all men.
This is why we come to Christ to be saved and then come to know our God who loved and saved us.

Anyone who comes to God honors God because first they believe that He is, and that He rewards those who diligently seek Him.
The word teaches that evil men have not seen Him.
Do you know why?
Because they have not sought Him but they have sought to carve out a way and path of their own twisting and plucking His Word apart.

Yet if we do seek God's face and hand, He faithfully rewards us with His will and knowledge, with His ability and grace to walk after His Spirit.

He rewards us with patience and the ability to trust in His guidance.

God rewards us by renewing our minds and cleansing our heart with the washing of water by His Word.

This is for people who believe what the Bible says is true.

The Bible teaches us that a wise man fears the LORD and shuns evil, but a fool is hotheaded and reckless.

The Bible teaches us that the heart of the righteous weighs it's answers, but the mouth of the wicked gushes answers.

So we see that evil is a condition of the heart, and whatever is in the heart always comes gushing out of the mouth.
Out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks.

This was the condition of the heart of man before the flood.
A heart that is slow to hear, quick to get angry and even quicker to speak.
There was nothing that Noah could have said to a people who believed that they knew it all already.

Genesis 6:5 records:
And God saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually.

The imaginations of the heart, what we think on all the day.
Grudge matches.
The heart of man is returning to this place.

Traditionally when we think evil we only think of what we read in the newspapers or hear on CNN happening in far off lands.
But evil rests in the heart of men and women everywhere.

Evil is devised in the hearts of homemakers against their neighbors.
False witnesses are rising up in every area of society, Christian and non Christian.
Women plot against other women.
Quote leaders heading up the Calvary of plots.

It's returning to the place where love is waxing cold because of the pride of life and the deceitfulness of riches.

Hear what I'm saying,
Things are going to get worse because the Bible said that they would, but you can overcome whatever comes if you know the truth.

As we close this year out I pray more now than ever that you be aware and diligently seek to know the Father.

If you are In Christ don't worry about tomorrow because He told us that each day has it's sufficient amount of evil, but if men being evil, know how to give good gifts to their children, How much more will our Father in heaven give good gifts to His children who ask Him.

Keep trusting in The Father.
I will daily examine my own heart and fill it with His truth.
The more you know of Him the easier it will be.
Pray and ask the Father for direction and then follow.

Evil is a condition of the heart.

Meditate on this.
Selah

LOVE Y'ALL
:)