3 Powerful Bible verses in attaining holiness

If there are 3 bible verses I’ve learned to treasure and appreciate so much this year.
It would be these bible verses which has left deep marks in life on how TO BE victorious for Him.

Yes I mentioned in in my other blog that our faith without action is null and avoid. And that we have a role to play in living holy for Him. But I know you know for sure that doing it by OWN STRENGTH and WILL POWER is NOT enough. We need to stop wearing our “old eyeglasses” and start wearing Gospel lenses found in these 3 verse I’m going to share with you.

 

 

 
TO DO vs. TO BE
Firstly, 2 Corinthians 5:17 says,

Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come: The old has gone, the new is here!

This verse teaches us to stop condemning ourselves. Stop with our self-pity parties. If we have Christ as our Lord and Savior and have asked forgiveness of our sins.
Remember that you are Already forgiven. You’re Already cleansed.

In our moment or weakness and being tempted to sin. Our tendency is to start thinking of what’s on our TO DO list,

These are some examples,
I should read my bible more.
Pray kneeling down with teary eyes.
Talk with my mentors.
I have to put that anti-porn software on my computer.
Listen to my favorite worship song and sincerely sing my heart out for help.
Take a bath with Ice.

Now these things are not wrong and I do them myself too but when I reminded myself TO BE who you I am in the sight my God. That I am a new creation. The old has gone and Christ lives in me. That I’m free and that I am a child of God.

God doesn’t see us the way we see ourselves. When he sees us, he is delighted in us. He sees us holy and made clean not by our own wrong doings and meaningless effort but through the precious blood of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.

GOD’s MERCY
Next is Romans 12:1-2.

Therefore, I urge you, brothers and sisters, in view of GOD’s MERCY, to offer your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God—this is your true and proper worship. Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is —his good, pleasing and perfect will.

It’s very powerful for me because it takes my eyes off of myself but to who God is, His character. That in view of GOD’S MERCY and not on my own standards, other people’s opinion but on how God view of sin, how it hurts Him. I would find myself meditating on what he has done for me. That God’s will for me is good, pleasing and perfect. God hates the sin but he loves the sinner. Every time we sin, we are doing something God hates.

He has laid down his own life for me (PAST). That He is currently teaching me to trust and rely not on my own strength, will and abilities but on His power everyday (PRESENT) and that His plans for us is good, pleasing and perfect (FUTURE).

The GRACE of GOD
Another powerful verse I’d like to share with you is in Titus 2:11-12.

For the GRACE of God has appeared that offers salvation to all people. It teaches us to say “No” to ungodliness and worldly passions, and to live self- controlled, upright and godly lives in this present age,

Grace is God’s unmerited favor. I don’t deserved His love and forgiveness but He still chose to save me and allow me to experience His unconditional love.

Certain belief extremists have created this doctrine called “Grace-ism“. This doctrine made other believe that no matter what we’ve done God still loves us. That even if we continue sinning it’s OK because of the Grace of God. In my opinion, It’s a twisted and wrong understanding of God’s Amazing Grace.

The Grace of God is truly amazing just as how the popular described it. It’s “amazingness” (if there such a word) is not that it licensed me to sin more because I sincerely believe that the Lord will forgive me (I think I’m being selfish). Rather we will stop doing the things that he is not pleased with, things that hurts Him, Sin. The Grace of God is amazing because it liberates us. It sets us free. It enables us. It empowers us. It teaches us to say “No” to sin. It should stop us and not continue sinning. It’s by fully relying in His Grace we can have the victory over sin.

Now allow me to make an honest confession. A confession that up until now I still haven’t fully understood God’s grace.
I can’t contain. I can’t fully describe it.  I can’t fully comprehend how He has allowed a sinner like you and me experienced Him.

Now for that’s POWERFUL. It makes me cry. It overwhelms me.
And it would be  very difficult to just keep to myself.

JESUS you’re SO AMAZING!

related post : Struggling for Holiness?

Struggling for Holiness?

Are struggling for holiness too? I believe we aren’t to be called humans if we don’t. Without thoughts, words we say and act we commit. Why do we do not holiness experience it more in daily living? Why do so many Christians feel constantly defeated in their struggle with sin? Let me share excerpts my notes from the book “Pursuit of Holiness” by Jerry Bridges.

1.Our first problem is that our attitude towards sin is more self-centered than God-centered.

We are more concerned about our own “victory” over sin than we are about the fact that our sins grieve the heart of God.

We cannot tolerate failure in our struggle with sin chiefly because we are success-oriented, not because we know it is offensive to God.

We never see it aright until we see it as against God.-W.S. Plumer.

God want us to walk in obedience – not victory.
Obedience is oriented toward God; victory is oriented toward self. This is not to say that God doesn’t want us to experience victory, but rather to emphasize that victory is a byproduct of obedience.As we concentrate on living an obedient, holy life, we will certainly experience the joy of victory over sin.

2. Our second problem is that we have misunderstood “living by faith” (Galatians 2:20) to mean that no effort at holiness is required on our part. in fact, sometimes we have even suggested that any effort on our part is “of the flesh”.

The bible says, faith without action is dead. I strongly believe with this. Our faith in him should result not just NOUNS but VERBS. Verbs is testifies the integrity of Nouns. Christian needs personal exertion and work as well as faith. Thus, we have a personal responsibility for our walk of holiness. Now I’m not trying to sound like I’ve got it all already, I too am writing to myself with regards to this.

3. Our third problem is that we do not take some sin seriously. We have mentally categorized sins into that which is unacceptable and that which may be tolerated a bit.

Question here is, are we willing to call sin “sin” not because it is big or little, but because God’s law forbids it?

God does not require a perfect, sinless life to have fellowship with Him, But He does require that we be serious about holiness, that we grieve over sin in our lives instead of justifying it, and that we earnestly pursue holiness as a way of life.

related post : 3 Powerful Bible verses in attaining of holiness

The Pursuit of Holiness is a joint venture

by: Jerry Bridges

 

A farmer plows his field, sows the seed, and fertilizes and cultivates – all the while knowing that in the final analysis he is utterly dependent on forces outside of himself.

He knows he cannot use the seed to germinate, nor can he produce the rain and sunshine for growing and harvesting the crop. For a successful harvest, he is dependent on these things from God.
Yet the farmer knows that unless he diligently pursues his responsibilities to plow, plant, fertilize, and cultivate, he cannot expect a harvest at the end of the season. In a sense he is in partnership with God, and he will reap its benefits only when he has fulfilled his own responsibilities.

Farming is a join venture between God and the farmer. The farmer cannot do what God must do, and God will not do what the farmer should do.

We can say just as accurately that the pursuit of holiness is a joint venture between God and the Christian. No one can attain any degree of holiness without God working in His life, but just as surely no one will attain it without effort on his own part. God has made it possible for us to walk in holiness. But He has given to us the responsibility of doing the walking: He does not do that for us.

7 Negative Effects of Porn

by. BJ Stockman [Resurgence]

This is a rather frank post on porn, so proceed, or not, with that in mind.

Porn is a problem. It’s a personal problem for many and a cultural problem for all. You may think you have not been affected by porn, but you have because it’s embedded in the surrounding culture. The staggering size of the pornography industry, its influence upon the media and the acceleration of technology, paired with the accessibility, anonymity, and affordability of porn all contribute to its increasing impact upon the culture.

Pornography affects you whether you’ve ever viewed it or not, and it is helpful to understand some of its negative effects, whether you are a man or woman, struggling with watching it, or simply a mom or dad with a son or daughter. There is a plethora of research on the detrimental effects of pornography (and I do not think that what follows are necessarily the worst of them), but here are seven negative effects of porn upon men and women:

1. Porn Contributes to Social and Psychological Problems Within Men

Anti-pornography activist, Gail Dines, notes that young men who become addicted to porn, “neglect their schoolwork, spend huge amounts of money they don’t have, become isolated from others, and often suffer depression.” (Pornland, 93). Dr. William Struthers, who has a PhD in biopsychology from the University of Illinois at Chicago, confirms some of these and adds more, finding that men who use porn become controlling, highly introverted, have high anxiety, narcissistic, curious, have low self-esteem, depressed, dissociative, distractible (Wired for Intimacy, 64-65). Ironically, while viewing porn creates momentary intensely pleasurable experiences, it ends up leading to several negative lingering psychological experiences.

2. Porn Rewires the Male Brain

Struthers elaborates,

As men fall deeper into the mental habit of fixating on [pornographic images], the exposure to them creates neural pathways. Like a path is created in the woods with each successive hiker, so do the neural paths set the course for the next time an erotic image is viewed. Over time these neural paths become wider as they are repeatedly traveled with each exposure to pornography. They become the automatic pathway through which interactions with woman are routed….They have unknowingly created a neurological circuit that imprisons their ability to see women rightly as created in God’s image (Wired For Intimacy, 85).

In a similar vein regarding porn’s effect upon the brain, Naomi Wolf writes in her article, “The Porn Myth,”

After all, pornography works in the most basic of ways on the brain: It is Pavlovian. An orgasm is one of the biggest reinforcers imaginable. If you associate orgasm with your wife, a kiss, a scent, a body, that is what, over time, will turn you on; if you open your focus to an endless stream of ever-more-transgressive images of cybersex slaves, that is what it will take to turn you on. The ubiquity of sexual images does not free eros but dilutes it.

3. Porn Turns Sex Into Masturbation

Sex becomes self-serving. It becomes about your pleasure and not the self-giving, mutually reciprocating intimacy that it was designed for.

4. Porn Demeans and Objectifies Women

This occurs from hard-core to soft-core pornography. Pamela Paul, in her book Pornified, quoting the research of one psychologist who has researched pornography at Texas A&M, writes,

‘Softcore pornography has a very negative effect on men as well. The problem with softcore pornography is that it’s voyeurism teaches men to view women as objects rather than to be in relationships with women as human beings.’ According to Brooks, pornography gives men the false impression that sex and pleasure are entirely divorced from relatoinships. In other words, pornography is inherently self-centered–something a man does by himself, for himself–by using another women as the means to pleasure, as yet another product to consume (80).

Paul references one experiment that revealed a rather shocking further effect of porn: “men and women who were exposed to large amounts of pornography were significantly less likely to want daughters than those who had none. Who would want their own little girl to be treated that way?” (80).

“
It becomes about your pleasure and not the self-giving, mutually reciprocating intimacy that it was designed for.
”

Again, it needs to be emphasized, that this is not an effect that only rests upon those who have viewed porn. The massive consumption of porn and the the size of the porn industry has hypersexualized the entire culture. Men and women are born into a pornified culture, and women are the biggest losers. Dines continues,

By inundating girls and women with the message that their most worthy attribute is their sexual hotness and crowding out other messages, pop culture is grooming them just like an individual perpetrator would. It is slowly chipping away at their self-esteem, stripping them of a sense of themselves as whole human beings, and providing them with an identity that emphasizes sex and de-emphasizes every other human attribute (Pornland, 118).

5. Porn Squashes the Beauty of a Real Naked Woman

Wolf, in her own blunt way, confirms this,

For most of human history, the erotic images have been reflections of, or celebrations of, or substitutes for, real naked women. For the first time in history, the images’ power and allure have supplanted that of real naked women. Today, real naked women are just bad porn (Quoted in Wired for Intimacy, 38).

6. Porn Has a Numbing Effect Upon Reality

It makes real sex and even the real world boring in comparison. It particularly anesthetizes the emotional life of a man. Paul comments,

Pornography leaves men desensitivzed to both outrage and to excitement, leading to an overall diminishment of feeling and eventually to dissatisfaction with the emotional tugs of everyday life…Eventually they are left with a confusing mix of supersized expectations about sex and numbed emotions about women…When a man gets bored with pornography, both his fantasy and real worlds become imbued with indifference. The real world often gets really boring…” (Pornified, 90, 91).

7. Porn Lies About What it Means to be Male and Female

Dines records how porn tells a false story about men and women. In the story of porn, women are “one-dimensional”–they never say no, never get pregnant, and can’t wait to have sex with any man and please them in whatever way imaginable (or even unimaginable). On the other hand, the story porn tells about men is that they are “soulless, unfeeling, amoral life-support systems for erect penises who are entitled to use women in any way they want. These men demonstrated zero empathy, respect, or love for the women they have sex with…(Pornland, xxiv).”

God’s works or yours?

 The destined end of man is not happiness, nor health, but holiness. God’s one aim is the production of saints. He is not an eternal blessing machine for men; he did not come to save men out of pity ; he came to save men because he had created them to be holy. ”  

 - Oswald Chambers

“Let go and let God” , this was a catch from the late nineteen century. A college student is said to have written on six postcards the letters LETGOD and placed the six cards on the wall of his room. One day, the wind blew down the letter D. He is said to have discovered the secret of letting God control himself by letting go of himself. Many people have found the words helpful. However, they raise a serious issue about holiness over which Christians disagree.

Some see holiness as a work of God to which the Christian makes no contribution.my part as a Christian is simply to relinquish control. His part is to work through me. My efforts to strive after holiness will be unavailing. In me-that is, in my flesh-dwells no good thing so that I have nothing of value to contribute.

I therefore trust-that is, I rest in His goodness. I do not struggle to control my temper, but allow Christ to handle my angry feelings. I say with Paul, “Not I, but Christ.”It is a though, like a sea captain, I have been up to this point at the helm of my life, and now Another is going to take over. Even faith is seen as a positivity of will- a resting and relaxing, not a seizing or appropriating.

If yielding means bowing down to Him as King, let us day by day, hour by hour yield every part of our beings in allegiance to Him.  Let us reserve no part of our lives to serve selfish interests and ambitions. But having done that, let us assume the whole armor of God and by miraculous strength declare war on all that is evil within and without.

excerpts from the article Holiness by John White