Forward Focus

May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace as you trust in him, so that you may overflow with hope by the power of the Holy Spirit. (Romans 15:13)

 

You may have heard the old expression, “Everything old is new again.”  -  If not, you’ve heard it now. ;-)

 

I recently read some words that were penned very long ago that prove to still be timely and relevant here and now, so I thought I’d share:

 

 

"Well begun is half done."

-- Aristotle

 

"We could do nothing better than take a quiet hour, during the last days of the year, and go over the record of our year's life, honestly asking whether we have neglected any duty or whether any work has been left undone that ought to have been done. If so, we should seek if possible to do these neglected tasks even yet before the bells ring out the old and ring in the new.

 

In all lines of life, we see abandoned buildings. The business world is full of them. Men begin to build — but in a little while they give up, leaving their work uncompleted. They set out with gladness — but tired at length of the toil, grew disheartened at the slow coming of success, and ceased to strive after the beautiful ideal.

 

Many homes present the spectacle of dreams of love which failed of realization. For a time the beautiful vision shone in radiance, and two hearts sought to make it come true and then gave up in despair.

 

Thus life everywhere is full of beginnings never carried out to completion. There is . . .

not a soul-wreck on the streets,

not a prisoner serving out a sentence behind iron bars,

not a debased fallen one anywhere —

in whose soul there were not once visions of beauty, bright hopes, holy thoughts and purposes, high resolves — an ideal of something lovely and noble. But, alas! the visions, the hopes, the purposes, the resolves, never grew into more than beginnings.

 

We should train ourselves to finish our work. Nothing should be allowed to draw us away from our duty."

-- JR Miller



“Part of our mission as Christians—is to glorify God on the earth. "So whether you eat or drink or whatever you do—do it all for the glory of God." says Paul. How are we to do this? We may do it by accepting every opportunity to speak of God to others, to tell them what He is  to us, what He has done for us. Then we may glorify Him on the earth in our own lives. We are in this world—to repeat Christ's life. He was the Word—the great revealer of God. We are to be words, little words, giving out gleams of God. We may do this in our love for others. We may be kind, compassionate, thoughtful, gentle, unselfish, helpful.

We glorify God on the earth—when we go about serving others as our Master did, showing kindness, making the paths smoother for weary feet, giving encouragement and cheer to discouraged ones, putting more of Christ into other homes and lives.

We may also glorify God by living victoriously, cheerfully, unselfishly, helpfully. We glorify Him whenever we show men a picture of God in our own life, even the smallest fragment of God's beauty—patience in enduring wrong, self-denial in love and service, humility in exaltation. It makes the world a little sweeter and brings God a little nearer to men—when we live as Christ lived and repeat even in smallest measure, His gentleness and truth.

Are we living thus? Are we glorifying God on the earth through our lives? Is He better known anywhere through our living, or through anything that we have done? It was said of one that he left a few flowers growing in this world after he was gone, which but for him would not have grown. Are there flowers of love growing in any heart, in any home, in any lowly neighborhood, which but for us would not have grown?”

-- JR Miller



For more of the above articles by JR Miller (1840-1912)
(Finishing our Work) (Finishing our Work#2)
  

One thing that will thwart us from finishing the work we have started is the onslaught of spiritual attacks from temptations that we will face. Physical acts of war come by land, air, and sea. Temptations (spiritual attacks) come by the world, the flesh, and the devil. To successfully overcome these challenges and win these battles we , faithful children of God, must learn how to appropriately respond to these varied attacks which prevail upon us or else we will continue to be conquered by sin due to foolishly responding, like a nation sending their army’s infantrymen to seek and destroy an enemy’s submarine.


Let us not forget 1 Corinthians 10:13 and that we won't be tempted beyond our ability and that while experiencing temptation there will be a way of escape provided so that we may be able to endure it!



The Holy Spirit teaches us to FLEE temptations to sins of the flesh in order to overcome them. (1 Corinthians 6:18, 1 Corinthians 10:14, 1 Timothy 6:10-11, 2 Timothy 2:22) The proper response is to RUN.



When it comes to attacks of the devil we are not to run, but to resist (James 4:7) We are to don the full armor of God (Ephesians 6:10-18) and to respond to the devious lies that appear as truth but really is only deceptive and worthless counterfeit, as Jesus did - by being able to say “It is written, it is written, it is written!” Fleeing here will only end in failure, as God’s armor has nothing to protect our backside! The only appropriate response that will lead to victory with this specific type of attack is to FIGHT.



Finally we will overcome sins of the world when we FORGO worldly temptations by conforming to the image of the Son. (Romans 8:29) We are not to pattern ourselves according to worldly values but rather be living sacrifices (Romans 12:1-2) as part of our spiritual worship. We are to hide God’s Word in our hearts (Psalm 119:11) so that when facing worldly temptations we can overcome them by hiding ourselves in Christ.  (Psalm 17:8, 27:5, 143:9) Failing to do anything else but HIDE will prove to result in our failure in conquering this type of attack.



So whenever we are faced with temptation we need to identify the type of temptation that is at hand so that we can appropriately RUN, FIGHT, or HIDE. 



Don’t be conquered by sin in 2019!! FORGO temptations of the world , FLEE temptations of the flesh, and FIGHT temptations of the devil in order win this year for Jesus, considering He has already won for us an eternity with God in heaven!!!

 

CORAM DEO,

1 Timothy 6:12