Psalm 127:1 “Unless the Lord builds a house, it’s builders labor over it in vain; unless the Lord watches over a city, the watchmen stays alert in vain.” ~CSB

Marriages, parenting, relationships with friends, family and co-workers, will not reach their full spiritual potential without God at the head of it. Let us use marriage as an example. The world teaches us that marriage is hard. Statistics from the world show us that marriage failure is greater than marriage being successful. An even scarier look on marriage is that a couple that is incredibly happy in their senior years of marriage is extremely rare. Why is this?

It is because marriage is uncharted territory. A territory that is included in God’s plan for our lives. No one couple’s relationship is the same. This is why counselors for marriage do not have a secret blueprint for a successful marriage because there isn’t one. Counselors can only guide you to use what God has blessed you with to have a successful marriage. You see, marriage is God’s gift. It is uncharted territory because God has a different plan for every couple.

The foundation of marriage is God’s love, not the couple’s love. The couple’s love will fall during the tests and trials of marriage. The couple’s love is taught by the world to be based on money, worldly success and even built on a foundation of lust. Marriages based on these are doomed.

But it is that couple that finds God’s love in their hearts, for Him and each other, that will build the strong foundation in their marriage. Strong enough to weather all storms that may come. Strong enough to cease the yelling and anger in their arguments and find a calm that leads to God’s solution for their problems. God has the plan for us in our marriages. And when we embrace that, it becomes easier to handle other relationships in our lives.

As we discover and build a strong relationship with our spouse, we can automatically build those same strong foundations with others in our lives. Our children, our family, our friends, our co-workers, and yes, even strangers that may cross our paths on a daily basis.

Unless we allow the Lord to be the builder of our lives, we will have a foundation that will fall in any season of struggle. With God, we will have a foundation that will stand the test of opposition and time.

May God continue to bless and keep you as you journey in Jesus’ name.

Amen

1 Peter 1:13-16 “Therefore, with your minds ready for action, be sober-minded and set your hope completely on the grace to be brought to you at the revelation of Jesus Christ. 14 As obedient children, do not be conformed to the desires of your former ignorance. 15 But as the one who called you is holy, you also are to be holy in all your conduct; 16 for it is written, Be holy, because I am holy…” ~CSB

The hardest part for Christians is living righteously in this dark chaotic world. For example, we know that three of the Fruits of the Spirit, (Galatians 5:22-23), are self-control, patience and kindness. But the energy in our actions become weak when the world hits us with its influence. Influences like when someone cuts us off in traffic. You see, on Sunday our outward religious appearance looks good, but we compromise with the world’s standard when we do not exercise self-control, patience and kindness. We handle the traffic incident in the world’s way instead of God’s way.

At that moment in church where the Holy Spirit turns on. That point where the choir had just sung a song that we may have heard before, but not the way it was sung that morning. The preacher preached a sermon from a familiar verse, but we have never taken the perspective on that verse like it was preached to you that day. We are brought to submission when the morning has allowed the tears to well up in our eyes because of the reception of God’s love, power and healing.

This happens because today, we have prepared ourselves to receive power from on High. This is the day the revelation of Christ has taken root in our soul. In the text, Peter tells us to be ready. When we put ourselves in a position to hear the Word of God, we now must ready ourselves by clearing our minds of all that is not necessary for worship. Put aside the pain and struggle in our hearts so that we have room to receive the blessing of wisdom and strength from the revelations of Christ. In other words, that godly movement of that morning’s worship service has moved us from the side of just knowing a little something about Jesus; to the side of knowing Christ on a whole other relationship level. 

With this feeling of revelation we must take on the responsibility of obedience. This action on our part will flow and form a transformed mind and a vision of God’s holiness. From this point on, we must not fall back into what is not of God, but to live lives that are pleasing to Him. Because He is holy, we must be holy in everything we do and speak. Holiness is a response to God’s call and character.

May God bless and keep you covered and protected in his love as you journey in Jesus’ name.

Amen
 
~Billy