THE THINGS I WOULD DO ARE THE THINGS I DO NOT
I send greetings in the name of Jesus:
It almost seems silly to ask someone if you've ever done something that you normally think you would never do? I found that in my life this became more of a theme than anything I could have imagined. As a child, I was taught honesty and truthfulness were among the greatest assets I could ever have. "NEVER SAY ANYTHING THAT YOU DON'T MEAN" was a thought that I had adopted along these basic lines very early in my childhood; they were adopted even before I started school.
I am not sure why, but even in my very early years I was drawn toward God... Of course not understanding anything about God, who he really was, or what salvation was about; I was still drawn to him more like having a childlike friend to talk to and to spend my alone time with. I found myself alone quite a lot because my older brother was nine years older than me, and by the time I had entered the first grade he was already gone from home. I believe that had he and I been closer in years my life may have turned out much different. There have been many times in my life where I have gone back to the Scripture that refers to Paul's words "the things I would do the things that I do not do, and the very things I would not do are the things that I do". Although I have long been able to relate to that concept for many years in my life I did not understand it.
I learned later in life to see that statement somewhat differently in that all men no matter who they are must go through a series of changes in their nature to even be able to hear the spirit of God speak to their hearts. I'm finding out the very few people really understand faith properly, at least a life-changing faith. We need to be very careful to try to understand faith as Paul uses the word because he ties faith so closely to salvation from the very beginning of his writings in Romans. It is something that we must do in order to earn salvation because if that were true then faith would be just one more deed and Paul clearly states that human deeds can never save us (Galatians 2:16). Instead, faith is a gift that God gives us because he has determined that he wants to save us (Ephesians 2:8). We can all know this plan of salvation very well without ever implementing it in our lives, and there are a lot of people in our churches today who are sitting and watching as others worship a God that they don't completely understand because they have not put a relationship with God in you place in their lives.
I mentioned earlier that I had determined as a child never to say anything that I did not mean. It is amazing to me how the enemy of God can use such a simple statement against us in our hearts even though we may have pure intent in its use in our lives. The concept of that statement sounds right to our mind until it is twisted by the world and used against us. I could've been a murderer before I got out of the first grade because of that statement. Like most children, there is always someone to taunt you on the playground, and my life was no exception. We only had three people in my first-grade class. There was me, a girl named Janice, and one other boy. For some reason, this girl decided that she liked me, and wanted me to be her boyfriend. I did not like her in return because I felt she was a little strange. At any time my mother would come on the playground she would follow her, pulling on her skirt tail calling her Mr. Crowell! She had an older brother however who was in the second grade, and his name was Edward. Edward decided to taunt me one day as he was sitting on the playground monkey bars and I was walking by..."Larry and Janice sitting in a tree K.I.S.S.I.N.G.!" The short version of the story is that after I had asked him to stop three separate times he continued... At which time I said, "If you say that again I will kill you!" Here's where what seems good to men on the surface can be often twisted to become something very dangerous. Because I had tried to fashion my life around creed that I felt was very loyal, right, and good I found myself falling very deep into my own trap. Yes, Edward did say it again... And yes I did pull him on of the monkey bars and begin to choke him, and things would have ended very badly had the teachers not pulled me off of him. It would be many years later that I would actually be able to understand the complete ramifications of what had happened in my young life. It would not be until I was close to 13 years old that my relationship with God would begin through my acceptance of Jesus Christ as my Savior, and yet from the very beginning of my life God's spirit has taken the very fiber of who I was as a man, and began to work on a character that had been so entrenched in generations of sin that the character of the man itself had to die and be reborn in order to fit into God's kingdom. May you richly bless God through your life in him.
THE UNWORTHY SERVANT
It almost seems silly to ask someone if you've ever done something that you normally think you would never do? I found that in my life this became more of a theme than anything I could have imagined. As a child, I was taught honesty and truthfulness were among the greatest assets I could ever have. "NEVER SAY ANYTHING THAT YOU DON'T MEAN" was a thought that I had adopted along these basic lines very early in my childhood; they were adopted even before I started school.
I am not sure why, but even in my very early years I was drawn toward God... Of course not understanding anything about God, who he really was, or what salvation was about; I was still drawn to him more like having a childlike friend to talk to and to spend my alone time with. I found myself alone quite a lot because my older brother was nine years older than me, and by the time I had entered the first grade he was already gone from home. I believe that had he and I been closer in years my life may have turned out much different. There have been many times in my life where I have gone back to the Scripture that refers to Paul's words "the things I would do the things that I do not do, and the very things I would not do are the things that I do". Although I have long been able to relate to that concept for many years in my life I did not understand it.
I learned later in life to see that statement somewhat differently in that all men no matter who they are must go through a series of changes in their nature to even be able to hear the spirit of God speak to their hearts. I'm finding out the very few people really understand faith properly, at least a life-changing faith. We need to be very careful to try to understand faith as Paul uses the word because he ties faith so closely to salvation from the very beginning of his writings in Romans. It is something that we must do in order to earn salvation because if that were true then faith would be just one more deed and Paul clearly states that human deeds can never save us (Galatians 2:16). Instead, faith is a gift that God gives us because he has determined that he wants to save us (Ephesians 2:8). We can all know this plan of salvation very well without ever implementing it in our lives, and there are a lot of people in our churches today who are sitting and watching as others worship a God that they don't completely understand because they have not put a relationship with God in you place in their lives.
I mentioned earlier that I had determined as a child never to say anything that I did not mean. It is amazing to me how the enemy of God can use such a simple statement against us in our hearts even though we may have pure intent in its use in our lives. The concept of that statement sounds right to our mind until it is twisted by the world and used against us. I could've been a murderer before I got out of the first grade because of that statement. Like most children, there is always someone to taunt you on the playground, and my life was no exception. We only had three people in my first-grade class. There was me, a girl named Janice, and one other boy. For some reason, this girl decided that she liked me, and wanted me to be her boyfriend. I did not like her in return because I felt she was a little strange. At any time my mother would come on the playground she would follow her, pulling on her skirt tail calling her Mr. Crowell! She had an older brother however who was in the second grade, and his name was Edward. Edward decided to taunt me one day as he was sitting on the playground monkey bars and I was walking by..."Larry and Janice sitting in a tree K.I.S.S.I.N.G.!" The short version of the story is that after I had asked him to stop three separate times he continued... At which time I said, "If you say that again I will kill you!" Here's where what seems good to men on the surface can be often twisted to become something very dangerous. Because I had tried to fashion my life around creed that I felt was very loyal, right, and good I found myself falling very deep into my own trap. Yes, Edward did say it again... And yes I did pull him on of the monkey bars and begin to choke him, and things would have ended very badly had the teachers not pulled me off of him. It would be many years later that I would actually be able to understand the complete ramifications of what had happened in my young life. It would not be until I was close to 13 years old that my relationship with God would begin through my acceptance of Jesus Christ as my Savior, and yet from the very beginning of my life God's spirit has taken the very fiber of who I was as a man, and began to work on a character that had been so entrenched in generations of sin that the character of the man itself had to die and be reborn in order to fit into God's kingdom. May you richly bless God through your life in him.
THE UNWORTHY SERVANT
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