Living Righteously in Dark Times
The news is very depressing these days. But that’s nothing new. Believers today need to be like those throughout time, living by faith.
faith
The Righteous Live by Faith
Are these days making you fearful? Don’t be surprised and don’t be alarmed because we have the power of God at our disposal.
Picking Up the Shield of Faith
We told that we have a shield of faith that we’re to use. “In all circumstances take up the shield of faith, with which you can extinguish all the flaming darts of the evil one” (Ephesians 6:16, ESV). This verse raises a question, though.
Galatians 2:16
Yet we know that a person is not justified by works of the law but through faith in Jesus Christ, so we also have believed in Christ Jesus, in order to be justified by faith in Christ and not by works of the law, because by works of the law no one will be justified.
Romans 5:1
Therefore, since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.
Galatians 2:20
I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.
Putting Our Hand in His
We helped raise our granddaughter so she was often with us, and one time we were walking through Queens. She was about five or six and a bit ahead of us. Then some junior hoodlums turned the corner ahead of us, and they were trying to look hard, and their jeans are falling off their backends. They’re cursing, shoving each other and yelling, “You got nothing. Let me see what you got.”
The Exceeding Danger of Unbelief
“And to whom did He swear that they would not enter His rest, but to those who did not obey? So we see that they could not enter in because of unbelief.…. Beware, brethren, lest there be in any of you an evil heart of unbelief in departing from the living God” (Hebrews 3:18-19,12).
God Has Set His Heart on You
What does the cloud of witnesses from Hebrews 12:1 have to say to you and me? Simply this: “For the eyes of the Lord are on the righteous, and His ears are open to their prayers” (1 Peter 3:12).
I don’t believe this great crowd of heavenly witnesses would speak to us about holding to complicated theologies or doctrines. I believe they would speak to us in the simplicity of truth:
The Ultimate Test of Faith
There comes a time in the life of every believer—as well as in the church—when God puts us to the ultimate test of faith. It’s the same test Israel faced on the wilderness side of the Jordan. What is this test?
It is to look at all the dangers ahead—the giant issues facing us, the high walls of affliction, the principalities and powers that seek to destroy us—and to cast ourselves totally on God’s promises. The test is to commit ourselves to a lifetime of trust and confidence in his Word. It’s a commitment to believe that God is bigger than all our problems and enemies.