NEW SONG

Psalm 149:1
Praise the Lord!
Sing to the Lord a new song.
Sing his praises in
the assembly of the faithful.



Serenading is one of the most rhythmic and artistic ways of conveying what's in a lover's heart. When we sing a love song to God it's so sweet to Him because music itself portrays God’s character. The timing, rhythm, artistry and precision can be traced even to God’s very own works of art all throughout nature. Only God could move the galaxy with precision timing, planetary rhythm and radiating beauty. Praise the Lord though music and song because in that artistry, God can be seen.

BLOOD

1 John 2:2
He is the sacrifice for our sins.
He takes away not only our sins
but the sins of all the world.



Sin is like a system error that never should’ve been part of our lives. Because the sin we’ve inherited is embedded throughout our lives, the only way for us to be sinless in God’s eyes is to have the blood of Jesus Christ run through our veins. 1 John 1:7 teaches us that, “The blood of Jesus, his Son, cleanses us from every sin.” Our system will run smooth when we our lives are cleansed of sin by the blood and Son is flowing our lives. Have you asked Jesus to cleanse your life of the sins embedded in your life?

GOLD STANDARD

Exodus 24:12
And the Lord said to Moses,
"Come up to me on the mountain.
Stay there while I give you
the tablets of stone that I have
inscribed with my instructions and commands.
Then you will teach the people from them."



When God gave us His commandments, He gave His children the gold standard of how to live. Standards are important for uniformity, consistency and most especially for safety. Since God’s commandments are the gold standard, the desirable results are very clear and you never have to question the safety of your actions. Simply put: kids get into trouble with their parents when the family standards are violated. Romans 13:4 tells us, “The authorities are sent by God to help you. But if you are doing something wrong, of course you should be afraid, for you will be punished. The authorities are established by God for that very purpose, to punish those who do wrong.” Set yourself up within God’s gold standard and your choices will always be a safe distance from the troubles of the world. Are you living your life fully within God's gold standard?

SUPER VISION

Matthew 6:13
And don't let us yield to temptation,
but deliver us from the evil one.



We learn in 2 Corinthians 11:14 that the evil one is a counterfeiter that presents himself as authentic: “But I am not surprised! Even Satan can disguise himself as an angel of light.” It’s nearly impossible for one to detect with the naked eye if that which is before you is from God or from Satan. The only way to correctly identify what's in front of you is by the use of our spiritual eyes which are opened by our prayers to the Lord. This is what the prophet Elisha did in 2 Kings 6:17, “Then Elisha prayed, ‘O Lord, open his eyes and let him see!’ The Lord opened his servant's eyes, and when he looked up, he saw that the hillside around Elisha was filled with horses and chariots of fire.” Elisha’s servant saw the angels of God who delivered him from the evil one. If you pray for super spiritual vision for your own life, you too will be able to identify the authentic over the counterfeit. Have you ever been fooled by a spiritual counterfeit?

NOT MY OWN

Jeremiah 17:16
Lord, I have not abandoned my job
as a shepherd for your people.
I have not urged you to send disaster.
It is your message I have
given them, not my own.



The first general order for a military sentry is, “To take charge of this post and all government property in view.” God gave us marching orders in Matthew 28:19-20 when He said, “Therefore, go and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Teach these new disciples to obey all the commands I have given you. And be sure of this: I am with you always, even to the end of the age.” Our order is to reach out with Jesus’ message. Move without fear because God is the only commander you'll ever have that stays with each soldier because His Spirit is in you wherever you may be.

NO WORK... NO EAT...

2 Thessalonians 3:10
Even while we were with you,
we gave you this rule:
"Whoever does not work
should not eat."



2 Thessalonians is quite consistent with what we are taught from Genesis 3:19 when God said to Adam, “By the sweat of your brow you will eat your food until you return to the ground, since from it you were taken; for dust you are and to dust you will return.” This explains why people have to work and it's important to point out that Christians are not exempt from this order. Jesus offered Himself, however, to be our partner to gain peace and survive the world's pressures. Matthew 11:28 teaches, “Then Jesus said, ‘Come to me, all of you who are weary and carry heavy burdens, and I will give you rest.’” This verse doesn’t imply that we can be lazy about our lives or that we no longer have to work hard, but rather that Jesus understands us and that He has a sincere desire to ease our load.

SAFE HAVEN

Proverbs 18:10
The name of the Lord
is a strong fortress;
the godly run to him
and are safe.



The modern world faces vast security challenges that are an ongoing threat. 9/11 is an obvious example of how a powerful nation can be attacked by coordinated terrorists members of a much smaller militant group. Now, if a global power is vulnerable to such types of strikes, where in the world can someone go to be completely safe? The Word of God is clear on this matter. The name of the Lord is our strong fortress because the name Jesus means "Jehoshua," which translates to “Savior.” In times of trouble call on His Name because He is our strong fortress and our safe haven. When you're in trouble, do you truly call upon God first?

SLEEPYHEAD

Proverbs 10:5
A wise youth works hard all summer;
a youth who sleeps away the
hour of opportunity brings shame.



Time is one of the most important assets that all people have equality with. Opportunity rides upon the ebb and flow of time, which explains why when a unique opportunity is gone, it’s likely gone forever. Two types of thoughts about opportunities are: “That’s the person I used to be”; or “That’s the person I could’ve been.” In Proverbs 10:5, King Solomon reminds us to watch out for every opportunity that God gives us, to work on those chances and to refrain from “sleeping in” or “sleeping on it”. After all, an opportunity lost because of laziness is worthy only of shame. Have you ever lost a chance at achieving or obtaining something because of laziness?

HARDWORK PAYS

Proverbs 10:4
Lazy people are soon poor;
hard workers get rich.



The Bible teaches that if you want to gain wealth, there’s no substitute for hard work. According to Forbes’ Magazine, Asia's richest man, Li Ka-Shing dropped out of school at age 15 after his father died, to be a factory worker in a true “rags-to-riches” tale. The article goes on to say that nearly two-thirds of the world's 946 billionaires made their fortunes from scratch, relying on grit and determination, ignoring that they had not been born into wealth. These people are living proof of the lessons taught by the Word of God. In fact, this particular lesson applies not only to becoming rich, but anything that a person should desire to improve upon and achieve. No pun intended, but hard work… pays.

FINISH WHAT YOU START

Ecclesiastes 7:8
Finishing is better than starting.
Patience is better than pride.



Inventors typically start and finish a creation to make people’s lives better, despite the difficulty of the challenge at hand. Some inventions are still works in progress, but they can still have a large impact on culture and society. For instance, Henry Ford of the Ford Motor Company did not have a reverse gear installed on his first cars, but that didn’t stop him from putting America on wheels. Acts 20:24 teaches us, “But none of these things move me, neither count I my life dear unto myself, so that I might finish my course with joy, and the ministry, which I have received of the Lord Jesus, to testify the gospel of the grace of God.” Be patient and finish what you start despite the challenges and difficulties that should come upon you. Typically, the challenges offer huge and invaluable lessons for you while moving towards the goal of completion.

GODLY IS BETTER

Psalm 37:16
It is better to be godly
and have little than to
be evil and possess much.



Let's get something straight: having possessions isn’t a bad thing. Here's the catch: if you don’t do what's right with those possessions, you likely head down the path to evil. The Apostle Paul wrote in 1 Timothy 6:17, “Tell those who are rich in this world not to be proud and not to trust in their money, which will soon be gone. But their trust should be in the living God, who richly gives us all we need for our enjoyment.” Trusting in the Living God was clearly explained by Jesus in Matthew 19:21 when Jesus told a rich man, “If you want to be perfect, go and sell all you have and give the money to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow me.” The rich man didn’t trust Jesus’ teaching for fear of losing all of his accumulated possessions and he departed from Jesus with a sorrowful heart. Sadly, that rich man didn’t understand that in God's eyes, it would've been better to have obeyed Jesus' teaching and been left with just a few possessions while still having a godly outlook. Do you find that you place too much value upon your worldly possessions?

DOING WRONG

Numbers 5:6
Give these instructions
to the people of Israel:
If any of the people –
men or women –
betray the LORD
by doing wrong
to another person,
they are guilty.



Doing something wrong to another is a betrayal of God because the Lord gave us specific instructions to have a consistent walk, and to respect the rights of others while in our walk. Our God is the God of justice and in order for Him to maintain justice, the standard of His commandments must be kept. When a violation of another person’s rights occurs, there is a plain disobedience of His command. If you’re walking right, you’ll keep the golden commandment, loving your neighbors and keenly keeping His commandments for your life.

POWERFUL WEAKNESS

2 Corinthians 12:8-9
Three different times I begged the Lord to take it away.
Each time he said, "My gracious favor is all you need.
My power works best in your weakness."
So now I am glad to boast about my weaknesses,
so that the power of Christ may work through me.



We might identify and categorize our own personal weaknesses as handicaps, but these weaknesses have been given to us by God for specific purposes. They weren't ever intended to make us less of a person, but rather to display His power working in our lives. Your own strength and ability displays the kind of person you are and it is primarily in your weaknesses that God displays who He is. After all, it's usually at a person's weakest point that people humble themselves to His will. At the end of the day, it’s usually apparent that God’s power is most obvious when we’re at our neediest. It's at that point where we clearly hear His still small voice and we can see His hand moving around us.

NO MORE FEARS

Psalm 34:4
I prayed to the Lord,
and he answered me,
freeing me from all my fears.



Fear can be brought about by many factors. The devil will often capitalize upon our fears to paralyze us from making difficult decisions while under duress or when in unclear situations. Professor Harold Urey, a Nobel Prize for Chemistry winner, wrote the famed “I’m a Frightened Man.” As a member of the Uranium Committee on key operations of Uranium 235, Urey wrote, “I write to frighten you. I am a frightened man myself. Even the learned are fearful.” The bondage of fear can paralyze anyone and the best solution to that bondage is prayer to Almighty God because there is nothing that God cannot conquer in your life. Because He is all powerful, go to Him in prayer and to be freed from all your fears.

DADDY

2 Corinthians 6:18
And I will be your Father,
and you will be my sons and daughters,
says the Lord Almighty.



A father is the root or source of a family. If you've come to Christ personally, God is your spiritual father. There are two spiritual fathers that the Bible speaks of: the devil (John 8:44) and God the Father (John 1:12). Jesus Christ came and died on the cross to cleanse us from all our sins to make a way for us to be part of the God’s family, so when you receive and believe in Jesus Christ as your Savior, you become rooted to God the Father. Galatians 4:6 says, “And because ye are sons, God hath sent forth the Spirit of his Son into your hearts, crying, Abba, Father.” With God as your Father, you’re no longer a slave, but a child of God, and if you’re a child of God, you’re an heir of God through Christ.

GRUMBLERS AND COMPLAINERS

Jude 1:16
These people are grumblers and complainers,
doing whatever evil they feel like.
They are loudmouthed braggarts,
and they flatter others to get favors in return.



Grumblers and complainers are typically people that only think of themselves. The Word of God says in Philippians 2:14, “In everything you do, stay away from complaining and arguing”. I read this silly piece about a conversation between a person's feet and their mouth. The feet said, “Hey mouth, you’re the luckiest thing on earth. You are forever getting the best of me. Here I am, running around all day, wearing myself out and all you do is eat.” The mouth replied to the feet, “Hey, how’d you like it if I stopped eating so that you could stop running around?” Ironically, Christians sometimes behave in this silly and childish way. Face it, grumbling and complaining do little to bring people closer together. If you truly want to be a child of God, humble yourself and be obedient to the instructions of the Word of God.

LUST FOR PLEASURE

1 John 2:16
For the world offers only
the lust for physical pleasure,
the lust for everything we see,
and pride in our possessions.
These are not from the Father.
They are from this evil world.



Sometimes people mistakenly identify worldly pleasures that are received as blessings. Now, if we’re not really careful, we may even mistakenly ask God for worldly things as a blessing. Be leery to understand that Satan is a counterfeiter and he will try to imitate what God wants to give us, except Satan will do this with evil and unrighteous intentions. Satan will never seek to give someone a blessing. Always seek authentic, real and righteous blessings from God, while being careful to identify the signs of a counterfeit fake.

YOU BETTER RECOGNIZE

John 1:10
But although the world was made through him,
the world didn't recognize him when he came.



You’ve probably heard the saying, “Beauty is in the eye of the beholder.” Well, I'm here to tell you that’s just not true! I would propose, “Beauty is inherent,” because the beholder may ultimately fail to recognize the beauty before their eyes. Interestingly, tungsten metal which is by and large considered the best metal to create filament is produced from a nearly worthless metal ore called wolframite. However, once wolframite is reduced to bars of tungsten in an electric furnace and pulled into filament wire, wolframite increases in value from pennies to hundreds of thousands of dollars per ton. Likewise, the baby Jesus that was born in a farm manger, wrapped in swaddling clothes and of no apparent value to the world was all while the King of Kings: Christ the Savior. Knowing this, we need to give Him the recognition due to a Sovereign King.

EVIL

Romans 12:21
Do not be overcome by evil,
but overcome evil with good.



The stark reality of the world is that evil exists. You may have heard of “necessary evils” or the very newsworthy “questionable ethics” which have been used to achieve solutions for “the greater good.” Well, according to the Word of God, these aren’t ways to solve any challenging problems. Simply put, you cannot overcome evil by using evil. The only way to overcome evil is by using that which is good. Emperor Vespasian of the Roman Empire would not let a day pass by without doing something good. If he found that a single day had passed by without his performing a good deed, he would enter into his journal Diem, "perdidi," meaning "I have lost a day." Don’t lose any days where you can personally overcome evil by simply doing something good.

PERSECUTED

Matthew 5:10
Blessed are those who are
persecuted because of righteousness,
for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.



Matthew 5:10 is steeped in irony. How is it possible for one to be happy if they’re persecuted? Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount tells us that we are blessed, or happy, if we are persecuted because we then know that we’re doing the right things. In stark contrast, the ungodly typically feel that doing things according to God's will is an encroachment upon their individual rights. If teaching the Godly, safe, and correct things deems you a bigot by the public, then according to Jesus’ preaching you’re blessed. There’s good news for those that are living a righteous lifestyle: Jesus said that the kingdom of Heaven would be yours. And that, without argument from anyone, is a very big deal.

AUTHORITY

Proverbs 29:2
When the godly are in
authority, the people rejoice.
But when the wicked are
in power, they groan.



Many Christians isolate themselves away from the mainstream of society for fear of possibly embracing or being influenced by worldly things. This approach really doesn't work. The better way is to insulate oneself from the influences of the world, not to isolate oneself. If God's people truly desire Christ-like leaders for the world, then the world must not be left to the worldly and unrighteous. Christians have an obligation to engage in the leadership of our towns, cities, states and nations because when the Godly are in authority, the people are happy. When leadership, however, is held by the unrighteous and wicked, we will all be groaning. Are the leaders in your life Godly people?

MARRIAGE

Hebrews 13:4
Marriage should be honored by all,
and the marriage bed kept pure,
for God will judge the adulterer
and all the sexually immoral.



The Word of God says marriage is between a man and a woman, and that has been God's plan for marriage since the very creation of man. Our Lord Jesus Christ also speaks of this in Mark 10:6-7, "But God's plan was seen from the beginning of creation, for 'He made them male and female.' This explains why a man leaves his father and mother and is joined to his wife" Don't change the formula of the marriage relationship if you don't want to see the judgment of God. Do not deviate or reason away from His will on the matter of marriage. Stick to the plan and keep it pure.

REPLACEMENTS

Joel 2:25
The LORD says, "I will give you back
what you lost to the stripping locusts,
the cutting locusts, the swarming locusts,
and the hopping locusts. It was I who sent
this great destroying army against you."



Have you ever worked for a paycheck only to feel like your cash has been kept in a bag full of holes? Have you ever felt that at the end of a long workday your life's still lacking and unsatisfying? It’s hard to fathom that the word, “sad,” could ever be associated with the words “rich,” “young,” and “ruler," but Jesus met such a person in Matthew 19:22-23 which tells us, “But when the young man heard this, he went sadly away because he had many possessions. Then Jesus said to his disciples, ‘I tell you the truth, it is very hard for a rich person to get into the Kingdom of Heaven.’” If you make God your Lord and money your servant, you can simultaneously achieve being rich and happy. Whatever it is that you think might be lost for making a commitment, fear not because God's promise is that He'll give back whatever was destroyed.

CHOSEN

Psalm 33:12
What joy for the nation whose God is the LORD,
whose people he has chosen for his own.



When you think it through, the entire nation of believers that we see today actually began with a family that would grow generation after generation. Following this logic, the idea of starting out correctly within a family to create a joyful nation isn’t all that far-fetched. God showed us this in in Genesis 12:2-3 when He said to Abraham, “I will make you into a great nation and I will bless you; I will make your name great, and you will be a blessing. I will bless those who bless you, and whoever curses you I will curse; and all peoples on earth will be blessed through you.” Through all of it's generations, God made Abraham’s family into a nation. Get your family off to a good start for the future by choosing to serve God in the way of Joshua 24:15, “But as for me and my household, we will serve the LORD." If you obey Him in this way, your family will truly be blessed.

DIVINE POWER

2 Corinthians 10:4
The weapons we fight with are
not the weapons of the world.
On the contrary, they have divine
power to demolish strongholds.



The things of this world are constantly affected by the activities of the spiritual realm. The existence of a Spiritual Being as taught in the Word of God is undeniable and science cannot explain it, but the proof manifested by that of a Higher Power in people’s changed lives is overwhelming. Paul wrote in Ephesians 6:12, “For we are not fighting against people made of flesh and blood, but against the evil rulers and authorities of the unseen world, against those mighty powers of darkness who rule this world, and against wicked spirits in the heavenly realms.” This is one of the main reasons that Jesus offered to come into your life. When Jesus departed, He gave us the Holy Spirit - the divine power that can clean our lives and protect us from the evil influences of the spiritual realm. Always remember that the Holy Spirit is with you and be careful to listen to and obey His guidance.