Reflecting God - Embrace Holy Living - WordAction - The Nazarene Publishing House [The Foundry Publishing House] in Kansas City. Missouri, United States - The Global Church of the Nazarene "Gentleness In Identifying Sin" by David Restrick for Thursday, 6 July 2017 - Galatians 5:13-26

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Reflecting God - Embrace Holy Living - WordAction - The Nazarene Publishing House [The Foundry Publishing House] in Kansas City. Missouri, United States - The Global Church of the Nazarene "Gentleness In Identifying Sin" by David Restrick for Thursday, 6 July 2017 - Galatians 5:13 For, brothers, you were called to be free. Only do not let that freedom become an excuse for allowing your old nature to have its way. Instead, serve one another in love. 14 For the whole of the Torah is summed up in this one sentence: “Love your neighbor as yourself”;[Galatians 5:14 Leviticus 19:18] 15 but if you go on snapping at each other and tearing each other to pieces, watch out, or you will be destroyed by each other! 16 What I am saying is this: run your lives by the Spirit. Then you will not do what your old nature wants. 17 For the old nature wants what is contrary to the Spirit, and the Spirit wants what is contrary to the old nature. These oppose each other, so that you find yourselves unable to carry out your good intentions. 18 But if you are led by the Spirit, then you are not in subjection to the system that results from perverting the Torah into legalism. 19 And it is perfectly evident what the old nature does. It expresses itself in sexual immorality, impurity and indecency; 20 involvement with the occult and with drugs; in feuding, fighting, becoming jealous and getting angry; in selfish ambition, factionalism, intrigue 21 and envy; in drunkenness, orgies and things like these. I warn you now as I have warned you before: those who do such things will have no share in the Kingdom of God! 22 But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, 23 humility, self control. Nothing in the Torahstands against such things. 24 Moreover, those who belong to the Messiah Yeshua have put their old nature to death on the stake, along with its passions and desires. 25 Since it is through the Spirit that we have Life, let it also be through the Spirit that we order our lives day by day. 26 Let us not become conceited, provoking and envying each other.------- As a boy, my pastor/father would admonish us saying, “Before you say anything about anyone, ask yourself the questions, ‘Is it true? Is it kind? Is it necessary?’” He would then tell us that if the answer to any one of those questions was “no,” then we should not say what we were thinking of saying. Paul’s instruction in Galatians 5 to “walk by the Spirit” has a similar ring to it, especially as he describes the fruit of the Spirit. We often encounter behaviors in others that do not coincide with a Christian life-style. We really do want to help them leave their sins and follow the way of Jesus. But, we must not bluntly confront these errors as sins. Rather we trust the Holy Spirit to guide us. The fruit of the Spirit needs to be evident as we confront others. Our genuine love for them enables us to speak with self-control so that we can speak kindly and gently and not interfere with what the Holy Spirit is saying to them. In the end, it is the voice of the Holy Spirit that others must hear. Only the Spirit can turn people from their sin and turn them to Jesus. "Be Thou My Vision" from a Traditional Irish Hymn, translated by Mary E. Byrne 1. Be thou my vision, O Lord of my heart; naught be all else to me, save that thou art - thou my best thought, by day or by night; waking or sleeping, thy presence my light. 2. Be thou my wisdom, and thou my true word; I ever with thee and thou with me, Lord. Thou my great Father; thine own may I be, thou in me dwelling and I one with thee. 3. Riches I heed not, nor vain, empty praise; thou mine inheritance, now and always; thou and thou only first in my heart, high King of heaven, my treasure thou art. 4. High King of heaven, my victory won, may I reach heaven’s joys, O bright heaven’s sun! Heart of my own heart, whatever befall, still be my vision, O Ruler of all. Thought for Today: Always be humble, gentle and patient, bearing with one another in love,[Ephesians 4:2]. Please pray: That many people in Liberia will come to know Yeshua the Messiah and receive the fullness of the Ruach HaKodesh. This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now

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