“Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. 

‭‭Romans‬ ‭12‬:‭2‬ ‭NIV‬‬

“Bless those who persecute you; bless and do not curse. If your enemy is hungry, feed him; if he is thirsty, give him something to drink. In doing this, you will heap burning coals on his head.” Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.”

‭‭Romans‬ ‭12‬:‭14‬-‭18‬, ‭20‬-‭21‬ ‭NIV‬‬

Disarming. 

Literally, it means to remove an enemy’s weapon in unexpected fashion. 

Normally, we expect something completely different from an adversary that serves to escalate our conflict. 

But Jesus knows nothing is resolved and nobody listens in an escalation. 

While weapons are still in hand, threats and emotions run high. 

If your heart is in the right place and your desire is to heal, not hurt, renew your mind with fresh new advice from the OG of relationships. 

Try something entirely different. Not just because it’s different. Because it’s your best move to pave the road to reconciliation. 

Overcome evil with good and create an environment where the hand of God can do the unthinkable. 

Now THAT’S disarming. 

You know what comes before a fall.

“Do not think of yourself more highly than you ought, but rather think of yourself with sober judgment, in accordance with the faith God has distributed to each of you.”
‭‭Romans‬ ‭12‬:‭3‬ ‭NIV‬‬

If we all thought just a little less of ourselves and a little more of others, we’d all be our best versions of ourselves.

Pride urges us toward self-aggrandizement but humility keeps us grounded in reality.

Sober judgment is where balance presides.

Life is not a competition. As they say, ‘I want all of us to win!’

Staying in your lane and living secure within the faith and grace apportioned to you both accepts and honors God’s design.

Don’t think more highly of yourself than you ought, but also don’t think too lowly either.

Use that sober judgment to consider yourself accurately and pride will never encroach upon you.

c LifeMeansSoMuch.com

“So too, at the present time there is a remnant chosen by grace. And if by grace, then it cannot be based on works; if it were, grace would no longer be grace.”

‭‭Romans‬ ‭11‬:‭5‬-‭6‬ ‭NIV‬‬

Grace is unmerited favor. 

Not deserved. Not earned. Not justified by anything we can do. Unmerited. 

Be a good person. Behave. Observe laws and rules. Tow the line. Work really hard at being the very best version of yourself you can muster and still miss the mark entirely. 

Seems unfair?

Somewhere along your journey of being good are blemishes and events that clearly demonstrate the opposite. 

We are all far from perfect. 

To deny that fact is to invalidate both the death and the resurrection of Jesus on our behalf. 

Props to you for all the effort but pursuing works as an entry fee into heaven, ironically, is a ticket to hell. 

Faith in Christ must precede our pursuit of good deeds and selfless works. 

Good deeds don’t earn salvation, they are the natural and necessary evidence of a living faith. 

God’s grace seals the gap between whose we are and what we do as a result. 

There were also false prophets among the people, just as there will be false teachers among you. They will secretly introduce destructive heresies, even denying the sovereign Lord who bought them—bringing swift destruction on themselves. Many will follow their depraved conduct and will bring the way of truth into disrepute. In their greed these teachers will exploit you with fabricated stories.

‭‭2 Peter‬ ‭2‬:‭1‬-‭3‬ ‭NIV‬‬

Ancient passages sometimes read like current events. 

As history unfolds before us prophetically, the villian’s end game is revealed.

I’m all too often surprised when people refuse to see the revelation of events foretold so long ago and still choose ignorance over acknowledgement. 

Schooled to believe that having faith in God is a weakness instead of the means to life everlasting, they buy the lie and deny the power of our Creator to rescue them from the very veil that blinds them and those who would mislead them.

Christianity is increasingly becoming little more than a conspiracy theory to those who are being lost. 

It’s in these moments that we need to desperately pursue those around us who have been misled and penned in as sheep for slaughter. 

Don’t give up. Earnestly present your case and reason for the hope that once rescued you from the same destiny. 

Knowing how it might end for some must be the beginning of your prayer for those who may still follow Christ and live.

Sometimes you just need to walk away. They’re not your problem and you’re not their solution.

These people are blemishes at your love feasts, eating with you without the slightest qualm—shepherds who feed only themselves. They are clouds without rain, blown along by the wind; autumn trees, without fruit and uprooted—twice dead. They are wild waves of the sea, foaming up their shame; wandering stars, for whom blackest darkness has been reserved forever.

‭‭Jude‬ ‭1‬:‭12‬-‭13‬ ‭NIV‬‬

Immovable, unshakable, and unbendably living toward evil ends, these people present empty of hope, love, or promise. 

Pray you never have to encounter ‘these people. They’ve crossed the line into soil in which only God can toil.

Jude minces no words about ‘these people.’

While god wants all to come to the full knowledge of the grace that saves, He knows some will not, and for the evangelically-minded believer, that’s a tough nut to swallow. 

But just as the farmer harvests from fields that are vibrant and living, he spends his resources on those with greatest potential and accepts that some are just dead chaff. 

This is a sad passage but a reality. 

And all the more reason to pray more earnestly for those hardest to redeem.

Redemption is a job for the only One who can redeem.

 “I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion.” It does not, therefore, depend on human desire or effort, but on God’s mercy.”

‭‭Romans‬ ‭9‬:‭15‬-‭16‬ ‭NIV‬‬

Nice thing about being God is you answer to no one. 

No protesters calling you divisive. Nobody waving signs against your policies.  No voting you down for what you stand for or against. 

God answers to no one but himself. 

He makes the rules and applies them absolutely. 

All the god wannabees in the world who believe in their own personal omniscience discover they are also neither omnipresent nor omnipotent.

Since time began, all human attempts at justice and mercy, though bravely fought and well intentioned, have failed miserably at their own standard bearing. 

Mercy and compassion are gifts given solely by the one who created their qualifying criteria: faith and profession of belief in the son he gave.

There. is. nothing. more. required. 

But if you seek mercy and compassion, make the first move and see what happens. 

That which was from the beginning, which we have heard and seen with our eyes, which we have looked at and our hands have touched—this we proclaim concerning the Word of life. The life appeared; we have seen it and testify to it, and we proclaim to you, the eternal life, which was with the Father and has appeared to us.

‭‭1 John‬ ‭1‬:‭1‬-‭2‬ ‭NIV

A dozen guys with an identical eyewitness so real that each is willingly martyred in rather than recanting their experience. 

Today we’d call this a cult. 

But history’s billions and billions have drank the Christian kool-aid and lived changed lives as a result. 

They are from the world and therefore speak from the viewpoint of the world, and the world listens to them.

‭‭1 John‬ ‭4‬:‭5‬ ‭NIV‬‬

One gulp leads to a first and then to a second death. Their ignorance is based on a worldview that opposes God and his rightful placement on the throne.

But isn’t most of our beliefs based on truths we don’t observe first-hand but we trust in the story behind them. Better yet, enacted beliefs prove themselves to be true over and over again. 

We will all believe in something. 

I choose that which people willingly die for to uphold, defend, and consequently have proved over and over for centuries.

If we claim to have fellowship with him and yet walk in darkness, we lie and do not live out the truth. But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus, his Son, purifies us from all sin.

‭‭1 John‬ ‭1‬:‭6‬-‭7‬ ‭NIV‬‬

The world loves it when a professing believer falls. 

They feel great joy when hypocrisy is revealed and chalk it up for a relentless rebuttal of Christianity writ large. 

Truth is, a fall that’s confessed sincerely is forgiven completely and returns us without blemish to the light and fellowship with God. 

Those who lie in wait watching for our inconsistencies just use them to reinforce their ignorance of saving grace and proof against ever obtaining something that doesn’t exist. 

Falling is gonna happen. Then happen again. 

Stop putting on their show, further distancing them from being reconciled to God and get your act together. 

Believers are always on stage and in the spotlight of critics and their bad reviews. 

Get used to it, get help, and get better. 

Not for them, for you, and for your testimony of God’s love and salvation.

Lot, living among them day after day, was tormented in his soul by the lawless deeds he saw and heard.
‭‭2 Peter‬ ‭2‬:‭8‬ ‭NIV‬‬

Halloween is just around the corner with its more than usual abundance of witches, ghouls, monsters, and opportunities for a scare or two by characters each famous for its own special history of lawless deeds.

Sodom and Gomorrah was ground zero for an uncostumed display of such lawlessness that left Lot and his family in fear and torment from evil so rampant and on parade, daily life there became no holiday.

Things we see, hear and celebrate in our culture, especially living in Sin City, have become so overwhelming we are, ourselves now underwhelmed by them.

But for many, trying to live righteously in constant battle with our own personal demons is no party and it’s become harder and harder to find and number truly good people in our midst to assist.

Celebrating darkness and all it conjures up is now no big deal. The counterculture now is being prudish on the holiday affectionately regarded as the day of the dead.

We are called to celebrate life and life everlasting.

Halloween?
Not a fan.

“For if you live according to the flesh, you will die; but if by the Spirit you put to death the misdeeds of the body, you will live.”

‭‭Romans‬ ‭8‬:‭13‬ ‭NIV‬‬

The Holy Spirit is a lot like our conscience. 

Conscience is the moral arbiter which guides our thinking, moment by moment, setting the best path for our behavior that follows. 

It convicts us, navigates us through every whim and fancy, and carries us past waves of human temptation onto saner shores. 

Jesus said the Holy Spirit is the gift that would follow with power that enables us to follow him through salvation and sanctification when our desires and urges threaten to overtake our sanity. 

God grant us serenity to accept the things we cannot change ourselves. 

The Holy Spirit rewards our obedience with a peace that passes all understanding. 

Having a conscience is what sets us apart from mere primal beings, confirming God’s ways are good, leading us not into temptation and delivering us from evil. 

“There is a way that seems right” is a quote from Proverbs which warns that a path that appears correct to a person may ultimately lead to destruction. 

Relying on one’s own judgment or perception can be misleading and lead to negative consequences because human judgment can be flawed or selfish. 

Seek divine wisdom instead of trusting solely in your own understanding.  

In the words of Jiminy Cricket, let conscience be your guide.