christianity

No Condemnation

August 14, 2017 By Annette1 2 Comments

Today we are reading from Romans 8:1-11.

There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.
Oh! I love this verse don’t you? To think that if we are in Christ, there is no condemnation heaped upon our heads! Why? Because we’ve been freed from slavery to sin!

2 For the law of the Spirit of life has set you free in Christ Jesus from the law of sin and death.
The Law of the Spirit has set us free! Think on that a spell! FREEDOM! No condemnation. That’s what the Lord God has wrought for us.

3 For God has done what the law, weakened by the flesh, could not do. By sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, he condemned sin in the flesh, 4 in order that the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not according to the flesh but according to the Spirit.
It’s what GOD did. Our flesh couldn’t… it was too weakened by sin to do anything about the state it was in…but God is above our flesh, above our weakness, so he fulfilled the law so that we could have that freedom to walk in the Spirit.

5 For those who live according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who live according to the Spirit set their minds on the things of the Spirit. 6 For to set the mind on the flesh is death, but to set the mind on the Spirit is life and peace. 7 For the mind that is set on the flesh is hostile to God, for it does not submit to God’s law; indeed, it cannot. 8 Those who are in the flesh cannot please God.
See…see the advantage of living by the Spirit? It changes your outlook on life. It changes mine! I know it gives me the ability to look for the positive in situations where finding the positive can be a challenge, but God hides blessings in places we don’t expect, so living by the Spirit keeps us open to that, you know what I mean??

I read verse 6-8 and I think oh.. how I struggle. I WANT my mind to be fixed on the things of the Spirit and so often I find it so hostile to God. caught up in the things of the world around me. I DO NOT want to be in a mindset that is hostile to God. I don’t. So how do I balance this dichotomy within?

9 You, however, are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if in fact the Spirit of God dwells in you. Anyone who does not have the Spirit of Christ does not belong to him. 10 But if Christ is in you, although the body is dead because of sin, the Spirit is life because of righteousness. 11 If the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, he who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through his Spirit who dwells in you.
Paul is so gracious… so full of reminders that if I am in Christ, I am living by the Spirit. I am. BUT if I don’t have the Spirit of Christ within me… you know what that means? It means that I do not belong to God, that I am not in Christ, that I am therefore living by the flesh, a state that is hostile to God. So, if I have accepted Christ’s work on my behalf, believing in his death and resurrection for me a sinner, than his Spirit lives in me. Therefore I am not living in a way hostile to God. OH…Oh.. that I would remember that more clearly more often. It would help me make better decisions eh?

What say you?

To follow along with the rest of this devotional series in Romans Click Here.

This post may contain affiliate links – using affiliate links from A Net in Time helps fuel this blog and our homeschool – thank you!

©2006-2017 A Net In Time. All rights reserved. All text, photographs, artwork, and other content may not be reproduced or transmitted in any form without the written consent of the author. A Net In Time . We are a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for us to earn fees by linking to Amazon.com and affiliated sites

The Delight vs The Captivity

August 9, 2017 By Annette1 2 Comments

Today we are reading from Romans 7:8-25.

8 But sin, seizing an opportunity through the commandment, produced in me all kinds of covetousness. For apart from the law, sin lies dead. 9 I was once alive apart from the law, but when the commandment came, sin came alive and I died. 10 The very commandment that promised life proved to be death to me. 11 For sin, seizing an opportunity through the commandment, deceived me and through it killed me. 12 So the law is holy, and the commandment is holy and righteous and good.
Can you see what sin does in a body? It seizes opportunities. It uses the commands, the laws, to produce covetousness. A great desire to possess something. It makes us want something that we don’t have. Can you see that? The law of God was meant to be freeing, but it wasn’t. The presence of the law revealed the heart…that heart that longs for something more. BE MINDFUL therefore…what do you covet? Don’t let it deceive you. Look for what it holy, righteous and good.

13 Did
that which is good, then, bring death to me? By no means! It was sin,
producing death in me through what is good, in order that sin might be
shown to be sin, and through the commandment might become sinful beyond
measure. 14 For we know that the law is spiritual, but I am of the flesh, sold under sin. 15 For I do not understand my own actions. For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate. 16 Now if I do what I do not want, I agree with the law, that it is good. 17 So now it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells within me. 18 For I know that nothing good dwells in me, that is, in my flesh. For I have the desire to do what is right, but not the ability to carry it out. 19 For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I keep on doing. 20 Now if I do what I do not want, it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells within me.
Paul asks himself, if I know that the law is good, did it then bring me death? The answer to that is NO. It was sin that produced death using what is good (the law). This shows sin to be sin. Paul tells us how often he does what he doesn’t want to do. I don’t know you about but I’m the same way. So often I react to the world in ways I don’t want to. It’s the physical part of me eh? It’s what sin does. It takes me away from the spiritual, of wanting to obey the law, and brings me into the physical realm.

As Paul says “So now it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells within me.” Just like Paul, I have this desire to do what it is right, but I can’t always get myself to do it. You know what I mean? Surely you do. It’s the age old struggle.

Paul’s conclusion is that it the sin in us that it is at fault. Not my mental outlook, or the spiritual aspect of me wanting to do what is right, but the sin that lives in us. It’s at fault.

21 So I find it to be a law that when I want to do right, evil lies close at hand. 22 For I delight in the law of God, in my inner being, 23 but I see in my members another law waging war against the law of my mind and making me captive to the law of sin that dwells in my members. 24 Wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death? 25 Thanks
be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, I myself serve the
law of God with my mind, but with my flesh I serve the law of sin.
So here you the law. It’s good and right.
And you know what you find lying right next to it? SIN!
It’s right there, ALL THE TIME. Staring you in the face.
Causing you to not do what you know you want to do.
Paul sees clearly the wretchedness of it all. The horror of it. Wanting to do what is right but being unable to. Like a snapped trap!

But don’t miss it.. I almost did. Paul DELIGHTS in the law of God within himself. That delight is there. And he sees the battle clearly. The battle between the spiritual and the physical. The delight vs the captivity.

But look.. there is hope.
Paul puts it this way. Thanks
be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, I myself serve the
law of God with my mind, but with my flesh I serve the law of sin
We have help. God, through Jesus Christ our Lord. He is our help. No other way through it. God is our help. We can serve God with our mind.. sticking to his law. Our bodies will fight with us being trapped to sin, but With God’s help.. we can still serve him.

What say you?

To follow along with the rest of this devotional series in Romans Click Here.

A commentary I found helpful with this passage>
Amazon.ca: Haldane’s Commentary.
Amazon.com: Haldane’s Commentary.

This post may contain affiliate links – using affiliate links from A Net in Time helps fuel this blog and our homeschool – thank you!

Marriage compared to the Law

August 8, 2017 By Annette1 2 Comments

Today we are reading from Romans 7:1-6.

Or do you not know, brothers—for I am speaking to those who know the law—that the law is binding on a person only as long as he lives? 2 For a married woman is bound by law to her husband while he lives, but if her husband dies she is released from the law of marriage. 3 Accordingly, she
will be called an adulteress if she lives with another man while her
husband is alive. But if her husband dies, she is free from that law,
and if she marries another man she is not an adulteress.
Paul continues to talk about our freedom to not be enslaved to sin. Now he uses the example of marriage and how in a marriage, while our partner lives we need to stick to the bounds of marriage. BUT if our partner dies, we are free to live as we choose. Makes sense right?

4 Likewise, my brothers, you also have died to the law through the body of Christ, so that you may belong to another, to him who has been raised from the dead, in order that we may bear fruit for God. 5 For while we were living in the flesh, our sinful passions, aroused by the law, were at work in our members to bear fruit for death. 6 But now we are released from the law, having died to that which held us captive, so that we serve in the new way of the Spirit and not in the old way of the written code.
So just as we have freedom after the death of a spouse, can you see the freedom we have now that Christ freed us from slavery to sin? The law’s power over us is dead. We are free! So though we were living under the power of the flesh, stuck in the law, we don’t have to anymore. It is dead! Think about that for a moment.

The drive to sin, that living under the law with it’s penalty of death. It is dead!

We don’t have to live by that old way.

We have been released from it, able to serve a new way. That new way is the life of the Spirit. Life I tell you. Isn’t it wonderful?

What say you?

To follow along with the rest of this devotional series in Romans Click Here.

This post may contain affiliate links – using affiliate links from A Net in Time helps fuel this blog and our homeschool – thank you!

Slaves to Righteousness

August 8, 2017 By Annette1 2 Comments

Today we are reading from Romans 6:15-23.

15 What then? Are we to sin because we are not under law but under grace? By no means!

What are we to be? Slaves to sin or Slaves to Righteousness. That is the question Paul has for us today.

He starts off by asking us. Should we sin because we live under grace?
He gives us an emphatic answer. NO.

Why?
Because how we present ourselves in obedience shows who our master is.
Do
you not know that if you present yourselves to anyone as obedient
slaves, you are slaves of the one whom you obey, either of sin, which
leads to death, or of obedience, which leads to righteousness?
We could sin, but it shows that we are on the path to death. OR we could be obedient to God which leads to righteousness. What do you want people to see?

17 But
thanks be to God, that you who were once slaves of sin have become
obedient from the heart to the standard of teaching to which you were
committed, 18 and, having been set free from sin, have become slaves of righteousness.
Do you see it? We can thank God that we don’t have to live like we used to.. like slaves to sin! We’ve been set free! You see we’ve been taught a new way to be… and are committed to it Obedient from the heart. That’s what we become with good teaching. And that good teaching helps us to become slaves to righteousness.

19 I am speaking in human terms, because of your natural limitations. For just
as you once presented your members as slaves to impurity and to
lawlessness leading to more lawlessness, so now present your members as slaves to righteousness leading to sanctification.
It’s like Paul is saying..make a choice! Will you or won’t you… make the choice RIGHT NOW.. to be a slave to righteousness. To choose to let our bodies be obedient to God. You once had no real choice right? Natural limitations and all that, but then God stepped in. Now you have that choice, so choose to let yourself be bound to the cause of righteousness. Take the path that leads to sanctification!

20 For when you were slaves of sin, you were free in regard to righteousness. 21 But what fruit were you getting at that time from the things of which you are now ashamed? For the end of those things is death. 22 But
now that you have been set free from sin and have become slaves of God,
the fruit you get leads to sanctification and its end, eternal life. 23 For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.

We’ve been set free you know? Do you really know that? You don’t have to be a slave to sin. Where it’s reward is that of death. NOW, NOW we’ve been set free. And if we live by that freedom…the end result is not death, the end result is eternal life in Christ Jesus.

Isn’t that awesome?

What say you?

To follow along with the rest of this devotional series in Romans Click Here.

This post may contain affiliate links – using affiliate links from A Net in Time helps fuel this blog and our homeschool – thank you!

Hymn: Shout to the Lord

August 7, 2017 By Annette1 2 Comments

“Shout the Lord” is a praise song we sang in church this morning. It was kinda fun to sing though I missed the trellos that used to accompany it in the church I learned it in. 🙂 Written by Chris Tomlin, I like much of the music he has put together.

Chris Tomlin is an American contemporary christian music author. who has put together more than 14 albums of music set to Praise the Lord God. He learned guitar from his dad, and wrote his first song at age 14.

Lyrics

[Chorus]
Shout to the lord, all the earth
Let us sing
Power and majesty, praise to the king;
Mountains bow down and the seas will roar
At the sound of your name
I sing for joy at the work of your hands
Forever i’ll love you, forever i’ll stand
Nothing compares to the promise i have in you

[Verse]
My jesus, my savior
Lord, there is none like you;
All of my days
I want to praise
The wonders of your mighty love
My comfort, my shelter
Tower of refuge and strength;
Let every breath, all that i am
Never cease to worship you

[Chorus]
Shout to the lord, all the earth
Let us sing
Power and majesty, praise to the king;
Mountains bow down and the seas will roar
At the sound of your name
I sing for joy at the work of your hands
Forever I’ll love you, forever I’ll stand
Nothing compares to the promise I have in you

This post may contain affiliate links – using affiliate links from A Net in Time helps fuel this blog and our homeschool – thank you!

Death to sin, live letting God use us for Good.

August 3, 2017 By Annette1 4 Comments

Today we are reading from Romans 6:1-14.

So do you think we should continue sinning so that God will give us even more grace?
I always find this an interesting question. The thought that it even needs to be raised! To me it’s an automatic no, though in some way I can understand people thinking it, so I guess it did need to be raised.

2 No! We died to our old sinful lives, so how can we continue living with sin? 3 Did you forget that all of us became part of Christ when we were baptized? We shared his death in our baptism. 4 When
we were baptized, we were buried with Christ and shared his death. So,
just as Christ was raised from the dead by the wonderful power of the
Father, we also can live a new life.
Paul gives an emphatic NO. We shouldn’t be running around sinning thinking we’re all that, so that God’s grace can abound all the more in us. Seriously dude… when we believe in Christ, in his death on the cross, that means we are part of him. Do we really want something as ugly as sin to be part of that as well? ICK when you think about it. Adding that dirtiness to something so pure. Paul’s point is this though… we have DIED to our old sinful lives, so why would we want to deliberately choose to continue living in that sin. Just as Christ was raised to a new life through God’s power, so we can have that new life as well.   Don’t live in the past!

5 Christ
died, and we have been joined with him by dying too. So we will also be
joined with him by rising from the dead as he did. 6 We
know that our old life died with Christ on the cross so that our sinful
selves would have no power over us and we would not be slaves to sin. 7 Anyone who has died is made free from sin’s control.
Oh.. I like this line. ” Anyone who has died is made free from sin’s control.” To be free of sin’s control. It’s such a battle you know? To always want to live in the past, with what I know so well. And yet seeing that brighter future and possibility. Fighting for that. You know what I mean? Paul gives us hope here. He tells what the new reality is. We have DIED to the old way. God’s power is there to help us live a new life. Take that power! Use it. Remember that sin doesn’t have control of us anymore.

8 If we died with Christ, we know we will also live with him. 9 Christ was raised from the dead, and we know that he cannot die again. Death has no power over him now. 10 Yes,
when Christ died, he died to defeat the power of sin one time—enough
for all time. He now has a new life, and his new life is with God. 11 In the same way, you should see yourselves as being dead to the power of sin and alive with God through Christ Jesus.
Paul spells it out for us.
We died with Christ (if we believe in him). That means we also LIVE with Christ.
Christ, raised from the dead. We live with him.
He can’t die again. Death has no power over him.
Think about that. We live with Christ…one that death has no power over, he can’t die again. We live with him. That’s a surety don’t you find? A surety of hope, of sin no longer having the upper hand.
I need to see this more clearly in my life, what about you? To see God’s power to keep me in the new life.

12 So, do not let sin control your life here on earth so that you do what your sinful self wants to do. 13 Do
not offer the parts of your body to serve sin, as things to be used in
doing evil. Instead, offer yourselves to God as people who have died and
now live. Offer the parts of your body to God to be used in doing good.
14 Sin will not be your master, because you are not under law but under God’s grace.
Hear Paul’s Words to us. Do not let sin control your life. Don’t let parts of your body be used for evil. Don’t let that sinful self do what it wants. Remember.. we died to sin’s control.

Instead do this:
Offer your body up to do good. Give it up to God. You are under God’s grace, not under the law of sin. So let God use your body to do good. I see choice in these words. People can choose to live the old way, the way they died to. OR they can choose to let God use their body for good. and live Follow the old way.. or choose to let God work in you. Let us today make that right choice eh?

What say you?

To follow along with the rest of this devotional series in Romans Click Here.

This post may contain affiliate links – using affiliate links from A Net in Time helps fuel this blog and our homeschool – thank you!

Parenting Series: Control

August 3, 2017 By Annette1 2 Comments

Can you believe we only have three chapters left!!! I know.. time flies eh?

Today’s chapter is about control…and I like this chapter. Frankly it fits where we are at in the raising of our lad. We are giving him more and more choices about things and it’s flummoxing him. He’s such a people pleaser that we are trying to give him no-fail options and he’s still struggling. I think with time it will come, but right now he’s just flummoxed.

You see.. I figure if he starts out small… when we can help guide his actions and help him consider the larger ramifications of things in the light of who GOD wants us to be, it will serve him well in the long run.

We ran into that today with a “game troll” today that has the lad all upset and wanting to respond to him, and we told him.. Let it Go. Don’t feed the troll. Ignore him and eventually he will stop (or at least we’ll get used to ignoring him). The lad didn’t understand why or how that would work and why he couldn’t yell at this troublemaker. Which gave us a chance to talking about how if you don’t feed the troll it helps bring peace again. How God calls us to go beyond ourselves. It’s good to help him think these types of things through.

So as we work through this choice and decision making time with our lad we need to consider his needs.
For Guidance, protection, instruction, wisdom, authority, rules, structure, preparation, understanding, confrontation, discipline, warning, love, forgiveness, and security.

But beyond this wonderful list there is a deeper need that our children have.
To understand their sin so they will call out to God for mercy.
To understand the nature of sin so they don’t negate it’s danger
To understand that their problem is not with their parents, but with God.
To understand that sin produces behaviour problems.
To understand their only real help is to run to the forgiving grace of God.

The end is God. That’s where it is.
Working through decisions, you need to see God’s help.

This is what I need to do with my lad…help him to see God in his decision-making, helping him, guiding him, forgiving him. This is something he is needful more and more of seeing.
Seeing it this deeper need, makes the letting go of a lad an easier thing. A good thing as he matures and becomes more of the person God has called him to be.

This post may contain affiliate links – using affiliate links from A Net in Time helps fuel this blog and our homeschool – thank you!

christianity

No Condemnation

The Delight vs The Captivity

Marriage compared to the Law

Slaves to Righteousness

Hymn: Shout to the Lord

Death to sin, live letting God use us for Good.

Parenting Series: Control

Amazon Affiliate information

Tinker Crate Affiliate

christianity

Want to Stay Informed?

Thank you!

Footer

Amazon Affiliate information

Tinker Crate Affiliate