Lee Stoneking/ Be Loyal

Be Loyal

…Them that honour me I will honour, and they that despise me shall be lightly esteemed. - 1 Samuel 2:30

God honors those who honor Him. He’ll never forget the seeds of loyalty you sow. He’ll multiply them and give them back to you in a harvest of blessing. And Malachi 3:17 says when He makes up His jewels, you’ll be forever among them. Forever. Think about that for a moment. By honoring God with your life and your lips, you’re stepping into a realm of blessing that will literally take an eternity to explore. Once you begin to get that kind of eternal perspective on things, you’ll see that it’s grossly immature to get mad at God when temporary things don’t work out exactly how and when you want them to. You’ll see that your loyalty must be first of all to God, that you must seek first His kingdom—even when things seem to be going wrong. The Bible says that if you’ll do that, all these other things will be added unto you. God never forgets. He’ll never forget that in the heat of the battle, when others were giving up and saying, “Hey, this faith stuff doesn’t work!” you were still honoring Him by standing firm and speaking His promises. So determine in your heart today to be loyal toward God in every word you speak. Make up your mind once and for all that nothing in your life is as vital as honoring Him. Keep honoring Him and speaking words of faith. It will work deliverance for you in this life, and in eternity you’ll sure be glad you did. Born Again! Jesus answered and said unto him, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God. - John 3:3 Born again. Do you know what Jesus had in mind when He said those two words to Nicodemus? He was talking covenant talk. He was telling Nicodemus what it meant to have a covenant with God. Let me paint the picture I believe was in Jesus’ mind. Imagine a baby, a little baby born of an unwed mother. No one knows who its daddy is and no one wants to know. He is a child no one wants. He doesn’t belong to anyone. Now, picture the best kind of family you can think of. A family that loves God. The man has a good job. They’re blessed financially. They’re givers and lovers of people, and they fall in love with this baby. Before long, they adopt it. What’s happened? That baby was reborn. He got a new set of parents. Through adoption, he has now become an heir. Why? Not because of anything the baby has done. Those parents didn’t say, “I want you to look at that baby. I’m so impressed with all that that child has done for us. He has certainly earned our love and respect.” No, it’s a baby. It couldn’t have done anything to earn its new life. This man and this woman agreed together out of the love in their hearts and bestowed grace on that child. Now he has access to everything they have. When they offer him a bottle, he doesn’t knock the bottle away and say, “I’m so humble and undeserving. Just give me water.” Of course not. That baby acts like part of the family—and not just part of the family but the best part of the family. Because in Jesus’ day a covenant or adopted child had the same birthright as the firstborn son. That’s what Jesus was talking about when He said, “You must be born again.” He was talking about grace. He was talking about a new relationship of favor. A new family. A new authority. A new power. If you feel unworthy to receive the rich blessings God has for you today, think about that. Meditate on it, so instead of worrying about and struggling with the needs in your life, you can just walk boldly into the throne room of your Father and receive help to get those needs met. Discover what it really means to be a blood-bought child of Almighty God.  Discover what it means to be born again! Don’t every think you don’t know enough, I got a feeling you’ve learned a lot.

Plan of Salvation read acts 2:38