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Acts 8:1 Now Saul was consenting to his death. At that time a great persecution arose against the church which was at Jerusalem; and they were all scattered throughout the regions of Judea and Samaria, except the apostles.
When the going got tough for the Jews, many of the people left the area and scattered themselves throughout the surrounding areas.
We see this happening today with many people fleeing from persecution and wars to try and at least live a normal life somewhere else in the world.
But the apostles and many devout church leaders stayed behind to make sure the Gospel was told to the people. They were willing to face the persecution rather than leaving people without hope.
God calls us to stand up and trust Him. That is very hard when the world around you seems to be going mad!
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Luke 11:23 He who is not with Me is against Me, and he who does not gather with Me scatters.
I like to think of these words as encouraging us not to use the wrong stuff to try and do the right stuff with.
We can use a metal dish to mix things up with and even place in an oven, but we cannot use it in a microwave. We need to choose our tools and choose the time to use them correctly.
When we come forward to discourage people from doing wrong or following evil, we should not use evil to try and accomplish that with.
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Mark 9:40 For he who is not against us is on our side.
Just because someone is different does not mean they are doing it all wrong or working against you; it just means they are different.
The disciples came to Jesus and were upset that someone else dared to cast out demons just as Jesus had asked them to.
His response was not to discourage them for not being their own disciples but to allow them to continue doing things because they were doing it in the name of Jesus.
Working for Jesus Christ comes in many different guises and we all work together fulfilling God’s will.
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Matthew 5:4 Blessed are those who mourn, For they shall be comforted.
I believe this verse goes so much further than we read on the surface; I believe this verse talks of all the mourning in our lives and not just the mourning for people who have died.
If we are willing to mourn for all the evil, sin, wrong-doing and other negative things in ours and other people’s lives, then we shall be able to look for and find comfort from God.
God wants us to be able to give things to Him and to lessen the burden on our lives.
His comfort comes from loving and supporting us when everything around us seems to be falling apart!
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Psalm 30:5 For His anger is but for a moment, His favour is for life; Weeping may endure for a night, But joy comes in the morning.
Yes God does get angry when we continually do things wrong. Is He allowed to? Of course yes!
It is not an anger that is a reaction without thought but a righteous anger because we deserve it!
But His love and mercy continue on further and deeper than the anger and we can be sure His love will bring us more joy in the morning when we turn back to Him!
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Lamentations 3:23 They are new every morning; Great is Your faithfulness.
It is only because of God’s grace and mercy that we are being kept by Him today.
There is a whole lot of evilness and unpleasantness in the world today, but there is always goodness and mercy too.
We may feel like we are swamped by all the negative things all the time, but looking for the positive is always rewarding.
God has proved His faithfulness to many generations and we need to remember that and cling to it for ourselves too.
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Deuteronomy 7:9 Therefore know that the Lord your God, He is God, the faithful God who keeps covenant and mercy for a thousand generations with those who love Him and keep His commandments;
An idol cannot show mercy and faithfulness; but they can sit there and do absolutely nothing when you want them to!
God made promises to mankind in the beginning. God made promises to Israel. God made promises throughout history. And God keeps those promises!
We fall short, we give in, we bend the rules, we take short cuts and we still know God is willing to forgive and take us back!
A thousand generation is a very long time and this passage reminds us we are limited in time, but God is not!
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Exodus 20:6 but showing mercy to thousands, to those who love Me and keep My commandments.
When you try and remember parts of your bible you probably stick to the most well-known passages and verses; I know I do.
When you try to remember the Ten Commandments you may well forget about this verse.
God requires that we do server Him and Him alone, but He also offers encouragement to keep His will in our lives by showing us grace and mercy.
We fall far short of the requirements, but he continues to allow us to be forgiven and to be with Him. I love God!
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Exodus 32:1 Now when the people saw that Moses delayed coming down from the mountain, the people gathered together to Aaron, and said to him, “Come, make us gods that shall go before us; for as for this Moses, the man who brought us up out of the land of Egypt, we do not know what has become of him.”
How quickly do you give up waiting for someone before you go off and do something else?
How quickly will you forget about having to do something which you are not looking forward to having to do?
We all have limits and those limits are different for each of us, making us unique in many ways.
God continue to be patient with each of us and continues to try and encourage us to live for and with Him every day; it is our patience and staying power which crumbles and falls.
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Psalm 106:19 They made a calf in Horeb, And worshiped the moulded image.
Getting carried away with what you are doing seems normal for us; I often get too engrossed in the computer work I’m doing to watch time.
Before long I find myself doing work I never had imagined doing in the first place. Don’t worry, you are not alone.
Mankind has struggled with keeping focused on God; we all have gone astray; but we all should not be giving up so easily.
God wants us to keep focused on His Work and Word because He knows how He can reward us.
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Psalm 106:15 And He gave them their request, But sent leanness into their soul.
When the Israelites were wandering through the desert they longed for meat because they were living on mana and missed the luxuries from their lives in Egypt.
But it is not always the luxuries and trimming as should be looking for in our lives; God gives us what we need and for that we should be grateful.
Always wanting more can be good if we are focused on giving God the glory, but when you focus back on your own wants and desires you are blocking God’s will out of your life.
It seems so easy to say words like these, but difficult to carry them out…
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Psalm 78:29 So they ate and were well filled, For He gave them their own desire.
I love verses like this which tell of how God will supply our desires; but they always get talked about out of context!
Yes God can do anything and He is willing to do so much for us despite us being self-centred. But what we end up getting may not actually be to our benefit!
Our wants and desires can take us away from the will of God before we realise it because our self-will blinds us from God’s will.
Be concerned about what you want and what you ask for. Be concerned about what God wills in your life.
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2 Peter 2:17 These are wells without water, clouds carried by a tempest, for whom is reserved the blackness of darkness forever.
When you are in the middle of a drought one of the most frustrating things is to see clouds appear which end up without rain. Another frustrating thing is to dig boreholes or wells and not find water.
Have you tried cloud-watching before? Most pictures you see only last for a few minutes or even seconds before they are taken away.
Don’t be fooled into following people who are like those clouds which never bring rain or those which last a few seconds.
God will give them what they deserve when the time comes; stay firm in your relationship with Christ.
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Matthew 15:14 Let them alone. They are blind leaders of the blind. And if the blind leads the blind, both will fall into a ditch.
I’m sure we have all seen films, clips or even live action of people walking into walls, glass, doors or lampposts. Each one because they did not see where they were going.
If we have our eyes open and are attentive to our surroundings, most of the time we will not fall into ditches and such.
We have to keep our eyes open to the spiritual ditches and pitfalls in our lives and not just the physical ones.
God wants to keep us safe and if we cannot keep our eyes on the pitfalls, then we need Him to guide us continually so we can be safe.
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Isaiah 9:16 For the leaders of this people cause them to err, And those who are led by them are destroyed.
How often do you totally rely on a Sat-Nav system to guide you to a destination you have never been to before? I know I tend to rely on them a great deal!
But what would happen if it carried on telling you the wrong directions each time you asked which way to go?
If our leaders do not have a firm grip on the direction God has set before us then we are following people who do not know where they are going either!
Put your faith and trust in God instead of in men who make all the right noises but don’t tell the truth!
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Matthew 5:48 Therefore you shall be perfect, just as your Father in heaven is perfect.
Always read verses in context. If we think we can achieve some sort of perfection in our lives we are only fooling ourselves.
Yes we can hope to become better at things and hope to better influence people, but if we want to achieve some sort of perfection we have to have a whole lot of outside help!
Christ is willing to make us perfect; but we should be willing to love the people around us just as He has asked us to.
Start with that love and invite Christ in to help you become a better person with His help!
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Deuteronomy 18:13 You shall be blameless before the Lord your God.
When God was giving the people of Israel the rules and regulations about how to live He was not trying to create an impossible maze for the people to live in but pointing them toward how they should live.
Yes it may well seem impossible for us to live up to the rules and regulations in the bible, but they define a new way of living.
Man has always sought boundaries in which to live and God was defining them as clearly as possible.
One of two phrases sum up the purpose of the Commandments well; this being one of them.
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Psalm 27:13 I would have lost heart, unless I had believed that I would see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living.
We always have hope. That hope may seem very slim or even non-existent at times, but it is always there.
God made this hope real when He allowed Jesus, His Son, to die for our sins and make that hope very real.
We live in that hope; the goodness of God came through the promise Christ gave to us.
We do indeed live amongst the living.
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Psalm 116:9 I will walk before the Lord in the land of the living.
When you invite God to be a part of your life you are making a very big change to your life; not just lifestyle but many things in your life change.
The psalmist expands this thought by saying their life is an open book to God; nothing can be or will be hidden from God.
They then give us all further hope by reminding us we are amongst Christians; we live amongst a living people, people who have life because we have a Saviour who gave it all for us!
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Psalm 52:5 God shall likewise destroy you forever; He shall take you away, and pluck you out of your dwelling place, And uproot you from the land of the living.
When I read verses like this I am both encouraged and discouraged!
I am encouraged to know God thinks of little old me in such a big way that He is willing to change so much just to make sure I know Him and His ways.
I am discouraged to know there are people who are willing to throw it all away just to get their own way instead of aligning themselves with God.
God’s ways are good whereas our own desires and ways are inherently corrupt. Trust God.