Proverbs 23:17-19

Let not thine heart envy sinners: but [be thou] in the fear of the LORD all the day long.
For surely there is an end; and thine expectation shall not be cut off.
Hear thou, my son, and be wise, and guide thine heart in the way.

Alright, I would like to dissect and define this verse for you guys, as it was on my meditator yesterday. First thing I would like to notice is that it says “let not thine heart.” You are completely in charge of the trigger position of your heart. You are completely in charge of whether or not you’re thinking Philippians 4 thoughts or if you are thinking Romans 1-3 thoughts. When you recognize a Romans 1-3 thought, then cast it down, and think about whatever it is that God gave you that morning. Don’t remember? Carry a meditation card with you and memorize it, and then meditate upon it.

Alright, so, don’t let your heart envy a sinner. What’s envy? Envy is discontentment with the superior service of another. Aren’t we Christians? Should not we be praising God when others do well? Is it worthy of praise? Philippians tells us to think on it. Is it good? Philippians tells us to think on it. Are you thinking on those things? Why not? Who are the sinners this verse is referring to? Everyone. It’s that simple: do not let yourself meditate upon discontentment with the performance of others. Don’t do it. Yield to the Spirit, because when you start to think on these other things it will ruin your day, and your spirit.

Next, live in the fear of the Lord. Allow each moment of the day to be one of reverance for the character and person of God. If you are in the fear of the Lord then it will be rather difficult for you to be envious of someone else’s position because you know you are exactly where God wants you to be, and they are exactly where God wants them to be, and you can rejoice with them. Can I just tell you that it is hard to rejoice with someone when you are not in a spirit of care and brotherly love? You can weep with those that weep, but it’s hard to rejoice with someone who got a job promotion, or a raise, or a new car, or some other blessing that you’ve been praying for and think you deserve. Rejoice with them my friend.

Why should we live in the fear of the Lord? Because our hope will not be deferred when we rest assuredly in Him. Hope deferred makes the heart sick, but when you’re resting in the fear of God, then there is an expected end, and you’re expectation shall not be cut off. You don’t have to worry about your hope being deferred when God is in the center of your meditations because then you’re looking at it from His perspective. You can say

Alright God, I know what I want, but I would like to thank you for this cross, the opportunity to die to myself, and live to the Spirit, and accept these circumstances that you’ve placed me in. All will happen in your time. Thank you for what you’re doing in my life.

Be wise, hear and listen to these sayings, and guide your heart. Again with the having control over your heart. You hear these sayings, guide your heart, and then you’re wise. You might not do it right every time, but at least you’re listening and doing, and you are likened unto a wise man. Isn’t that what we all want? Wisdom?

Hope you were thoroughly blessed. May God be with you all.

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Separation from God is an interesting subject.

I felt separated from God for over a month. In the RU Men’s Home, I was privileged enough to do chapel, as unworthy as I am. In my posts, I try not to get too personal, because I want my blog to focus more on expounding the truth that God gives me to the world, rather than what is going on in my personal life, but it will be a mixture of both.

With that being said, I was living in complete rebellion to God. Rebellion is the same as witchcraft. I began to idolize a girl in my life. I began to idolize this girl, and then my leadership asked me to take her out of my life when she began to wander away from the Lord. Let me just say this: your leadership always has your best interest in mind, and even if they don’t, God does, and can I just say, God works through your leadership to reveal His will for your life.

I took that girl, and placed her in my life where God should have been. I created an idol in my life. That was when the descent in my walk with God began. She consumed my thoughts. Nothing bad, but just what she was doing, how her day was, how her devotions were, praying for her. My thoughts were her. What’s so bad about that? My thoughts should be about God, and Christ, and His love for me, and His precious and holy Word.

Then my leadership asked me to stop talking to her. That’s when I stepped out from underneath the influence of the Holy Spirit, and began living under the influence of the flesh. The time I’ve spent at Reformers Unanimous has literally been the best year of my entire life, but I’ve also had the worst month of my entire life while I was here, and that was the month I was separated from God. I lost my peace, and my joy. I lost every aspect of my walk with God. The pain was unbearable. It hurt. Physically hurt. In Matthew 27, the only time Jesus cried out to God was during the ninth hour, and that was the most painful moment in Jesus Christ entire life, I believe, was that separation from God. Isaiah tells us that God’s hand is not slack, that He cannot save, nor is His ear heavy, that we cannot hear, but that our sins have separated us from Him.

I wanna tell you, I have never felt so far from God. Even when I was saved, and I thought about it, I thought God was with me. Every time I opened the Bible or heard someone preach, they mentioned obedience, and God would tell me “Michie, be obedient,” but I didn’t listen. Finally, the pain became to the point where I wanted to do anything I could to numb it. I did what I know best, and that’s drugs. When I came home that night, I had to call my boss, sobbing in tears at the realization of what I had lost. I don’t mean the year sobriety, or the respect of my colleagues, but rather, my relationship with God. We began to take steps of action to correct the errors in my life. The entire time, God was calling out to me, saying “My child, I love you, I forgive you, come back to me.”

I want to close with a Bible verse: Jeremiah 31:3

The LORD hath appeared of old unto me, [saying], Yea, I have loved thee with an everlasting love: therefore with lovingkindness have I drawn thee.

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I want to talk to you guys today about a fruit of the Spirit. This fruit is joy. Galatians 5 is where we learn that the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, goodness, gentleness, faith, meekness, and temperance, and that there is no law against those things. So, we see then that as we yield to the power and influence of the Holy Spirit that the outcome in our life will be selfless love, a calm rejoice in all of life’s circumstances, freedom from worry, so on and so forth. Today, I wanna talk about joy, because joy has been severly lacking in my walk with God as of recently.

Alright, so, this is all going to be taken out of the book of Philippians. Philippians was written by Paul at a very tumultuous time in his life. He was in the Roman jail. And yet, in spite of all this, we find him encouraging the church at Philippi to “rejoice in the Lord.” The first time in Philippians that we find him using this phrase is the first verse of chapter 3. “Finally, my brethren, rejoice in the Lord.” The word finally basically means in conclusion. The rest of the book is about rejoicing in the Lord. One such way of rejoicing in the Lord is forgetting those things which are behind. What do we mean by this?

Forget those things which could become a discouragement to you. In my Christian walk, I recently had a severe fall, a severe backslide, as I had been living in self-righteousness in over a month, and my walk with God was almost non-existant. For almost two weeks I was extremely discouraged about what had happened, because it was consuming my meditations. The events leading up to this falling away, along with the events that took place, and they were all very discouraging to me. The devil continued to bring them to remembrance and I was so weak in the Lord. A smile on my face was almost non-existant, and I had most definitely lost my joy. You see, joy is in spite of your circumstances in life! I had lost my joy! Well, I needed to forget about my past shortcomings, and keep pressing on, keep going, to know Him! Forget about my shortcomings, and run, run the race to reach supremecy in my relationship with Christ, pressing toward the mark for the prize. Chapter 3 is one of my favorite chapters, and I suggest an in-depth study of Philippians 3 by anyone who is struggling with joy, but I also recommend looking at chapter 4, which is where I will be expounding.

In chapter 4, Paul tells us a second time to “rejoice in the Lord,” and the exact phrase he uses is “rejoice in the Lord always, and again I say rejoice,” so he has told us, under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, to always be rejoicing while surrounded to the limits by the Lord, and in chapter 4 he gives us another way to do this. Philippians 4 says

Rejoice in the Lord alway: [and] again I say, Rejoice.
Let your moderation be known unto all men. The Lord [is] at hand.
Be careful for nothing; but in every thing by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known unto God.
And the peace of God, which passeth all understanding, shall keep your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus.
Finally, brethren, whatsoever things are true, whatsoever things [are] honest, whatsoever things [are] just, whatsoever things [are] pure, whatsoever things [are] lovely, whatsoever things [are] of good report; if [there be] any virtue, and if [there be] any praise, think on these things.

So, based on this, I would like to show the way that this happens. He’s telling us to rejoice in the Lord. The word moderation means calmness. Joy is a calm delight. So, as we rejoice in the Lord, then people are going to see our moderation, or our calmness in the face of adversity. How do we have this moderation? Because we are not to be full of care for anything, but still yet in everything we are to come to God humbly, asking and making petition, with thanksgiving. As we take our concerns and place them up to the Father, then we can remove those negative problems and begin to focus on things that are honest, pure, just, lovely, of good report, etc. And so we see here that it’s a perpetual circle that continues. As we rejoice, and place all our cares and concerns upon God, then His peace will guard our hearts (our meditations) and our minds (our information) through Christ. Ya know, I would love to explain this peace to you, but it surpasses all understanding. You’re just gonna have to find it for yourself.

Love you all, and may God be with you. God bless.

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