Tag: Colossians

Accountable to God: Day 18

On By Ben JenningsIn Devotional7 Comments

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February 1, 2012
Today’s Text:  Read Colossians 3:23, 1 Samuel 12:24
Today’s Key Thought:  If we consider that God has made us and redeemed us we should want to serve Him in return.

I’m in the beginning of my journey as a parent.  I have loved being a dad even more than I thought I would.  One of the things we have to teach Melana is how to respond correctly to things that happen in her life.  Two of the big ones are to say “Thank You” and “I’m sorry.”  She is really learning them quickly, although at times she doesn’t always respond correctly.  Sometimes she says “I’m sorry” when she falls down and hurts herself.  Sometimes she forgets to say thank you when we give her something.  As a loving parent we try to gently remind her, and sometimes passionately remind her to respond correctly.
Our heavenly Father is no different.  There is a right response to Him and a wrong response to Him.  We’ve learned this week that we are twice owned by God as our Creator and our Redeemer.  One of the right responses to Him is to serve Him.  This means we must be obedient to His commands, and it also means we must serve Him with all that we have.  As our passage says today, everything we do should be done “as unto the Lord”.  Why?  Because everything we can do is made possible by Him!

Application:
As you live today, are you living to serve God?  Are you on His mission and doing His purposes with your time?  Are you serving your God, yourself or something else?

Accountable to God: Day 1

On By Ben JenningsIn Devotional14 Comments

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9 For this cause we also, since the day we heard it, do not cease to pray for you, and to desire that ye might be filled with the knowledge of his will in all wisdom and spiritual understanding;10 That ye might walk worthy of the Lord unto all pleasing, being fruitful in every good work, and increasing in the knowledge of God;11 Strengthened with all might, according to his glorious power, unto all patience and longsuffering with joyfulness;12 Giving thanks unto the Father, which hath made us meet to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in light:13 Who hath delivered us from the power of darkness, and hath translated us into the kingdom of his dear Son:14 In whom we have redemption through his blood, even the forgiveness of sins:

Collosians 1:9-14

We are starting a 13 week journey exploring the topic of being “Accountable to God”. We’ll be looking at many different principles and truths that flow out of this Biblical reality.
In today’s passage, Paul is speaking to the church at Collosae. He lets’ them know that He has been praying for them, and what He prays for them is not about simply temporary, earthly needs and desires.Paul has been praying for their character and their spiritual lives.
Notice what Paul prays for them: that they would walk worthy of the Lord, be fruitful in good works, increasing in the knowledge of God, be strengthened with all might, and that they would be patient. He prayed that they’d give thanks to God for making them heirs of the inheritance “of the saints in light.” Paul also points out that we have been delivered from darkness to light by the redemption that came by the blood of Jesus Christ.
These aren’t just spiritual cliche’s that are irrelevant to life. Rather, these are important truths that need to be a part of our life.

Application:
Here’s the point as we think about being accountable to God: Because we have been delivered from darkness into light, it should affect what we value and how we live.
There were things that we valued when we were in spiritual darkness. What we value should be different now that we have been brought into a relationship with God.

As we start this series, think about this. Has your faith impacted your values to the degree that it has influenced your decisions and daily actions?

Loving my Brother… Part 1

On By Ben JenningsIn UncategorizedLeave a comment

Colossians 1:1-4
 1Paul, an apostle of Jesus Christ by the will of God, and Timotheus our brother, 2To the saints and faithful brethren in Christ which are at Colosse: Grace be unto you, and peace, from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. 3We give thanks to God and the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, praying always for you, 4Since we heard of your faith in Christ Jesus, and of the love which ye have to all the saints,

tumblr l8qpofgsik1qd8s9iIf you had a sibling growing up, then you learned about a life-long struggle early on.  The struggle that I’m talking about is consistently loving those around you.  One thing that I’ll be willing to admit about my relationship with Shad (my brother) is that I wasn’t always lovable.

The problem with that fact was that I was around my brother.  A lot.  We were in the same family, same school, same youth group, shared a room, went on the same vacations, and my mom even bought us the same clothes (different sizes obviously 🙂 ).  

Being part of a family doesn’t mean that you’ll automatically love each other.  It takes work.  With my brother it took a lot of work because we were around each other so much.  This meant more opportunities to hurt each other, and a lot of opportunities to make some great memories.  I love my brother!  We get along great now, and he’s one of my best friends.  That wasn’t always the case.

If we were all honest we would admit that we aren’t always loveable, and neither are our brothers and sisters in Christ.  We’re not always worthy of love, Jesus said that they will know we are his followers by our love for each other. In this passage, Paul commends the Colossian church of their “love for all the saints.”  These people loved the family of God, so much so that Paul had heard of it where he was.

Today I want to start a series of posts that I’ll do ‘til Friday, specifically on loving other Christians.  Come on back for more!

Do you love other believers?  Your church? Your Sunday School class? How do you show it?