What Is Controlling You? A Conditioned Stimulus?

What Is Controlling You? A Conditioned Stimulus?          By Kelly Durant 

 

Galatians 5:1 Stand fast therefore in the liberty by which Christ has made us free, and do not be entangled again with a yoke of bondage 5:13 For you, brethren, have been called to liberty; only do not use liberty as an opportunity for the flesh, but through love serve one another.

 

2. Have you heard the expression that when someone says, Jump!” that one shouldn’t ask, “Why” but rather, “How high? We love and serve each other, we influence and restrain one another, but we must become aware of the whys and motives. Control over another is a strange phenomenon; I observe many people are unaware of who is pulling their strings! This is an important topic to cover as many people are submitting to outside controls and influences not being aware if these controls are of good or evil. Today the minds of the uniformed of the gospel of Jesus are being seduced into the bondage of the world as never before! God is not allowed in the schools, workplaces, and government and consequently these powers now want to reign as the only gods of authority, but they are failed systems, corrupted, and unworthy! Too many people are being controlled by hypocritical, self-destructive, liberal, double-standard philosophies from agendas devised to control human behaviors into submission. How does control work?

 

I never liked the comparison but it can be observed that people are comparable to Ivan Pavlov’s experimental dogs. Do you recall that the psychologist Pavlov would ring a bell at the same time he would feed the hungry dogs to conclude later that if he rang the bell even without food, the dogs would salivate anyway? This is a conditioned stimulus. It is the combining of a normal daily action with another outside stimulus in order to get a predetermined outcome. It is the attaching of an expectancy, position, or emotion to a normally unrelated event. Why do I mention this? Because many people are unaware of how they emotionally, not logically, respond to the current matters of today! The media and peer pressure is brainwashing people who are not truth seekers into being someone they did not use to be! Truth is the new enemy!

 

Speaking of a ring, I have seen some people cringe their teeth when a certain person or their spouse is ringing the cell phone! It is almost as if the cell phone ring invokes fear and nervously, they answer fearing that a communication could be to ask for money, or to get yelled at over some imaginary wrong doing of theirs. People precondition and control other people and often neither one analyzes how they have been preconditioned to the other! Don’t be guilty of dishing out abuse or of permitting yourself to receive abuse as these types of controls are “opportunities of the flesh” to manipulate and are not of the spirit. Another example of conditioning is this, some people when hearing the word, Christian, or conservative are cross-wired to not take the words for their intended meanings (as something good) but rather they have been conditioned by movies, college professors, and the media to envision a bigot, racist, or a deceiver. Most all of the time Christians and conservatives are good contributing much to society contrary to what accusers and maligners say!  Don’t be a preprogramed dog! Don’t respond irate overriding what a normal response should be! 

 

3. Control, or managing the behavior of another, may be employed for good or for evil. Control is usually done by invoking fear! God wants us free from all fear but one, the fear of Him! One verse that stuck with me for a long time is this, Matthew 10:28 “And do not fear those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul. But rather fear Him who is able to destroy both soul and body in hell”. In other words, fear God only as only He is the ultimate one in control of your soul and the universe and He decides if your soul will be saved or go to hell according to your heart!

 

There are so many verses against fear such as 1 John 4:18 “There is no fear in love; but perfect love casts out fear, because fear involves torment. But he who fears has not been made perfect in love”. Proverbs 29:25 “The fear of man brings a snare, But whoever trusts in the Lord shall be safe”.

 

God alone should be the only one in control of anyone! (repeat) The problem is that people who do not know God’s word and obey it fall victim to being dominated by fear, or being in the flesh living an out-of-control life unaware of the truth of that. Dominating or being dominated are both “opportunities of the flesh”. A person without God may allow another person to be in control of them (by intimidation), or in a worst-case scenario allow a demon to be in control of their spirit! If it is not God’s rule dominating your heart controlling your behaviors, then it is someone else’s perverted precepts. This is a usurping of God’s statutes, which is a grave sin!

 

4. Let’s begin with the first principle in the verse of today being “liberty”. If a Christian is free, and is healthy in obeying God, he or she enjoys freedom with no one is pulling their strings, no one is feared or controlling them, and no one but God dominates their behavior. So, he or she never allows another person to control them, and by it being this way, then God, the Holy Spirit, and the person’s will is in harmony to have the control producing true liberty. The truth shall set you free!

 

The problem with liberty though is that it is a paradox. How do most people understand liberty? For example, if I tell you that God’s freedom allows you to do as you please, would you agree you can do “all” that you please because you are free? Obviously not! This is because you would then be abusing your liberty to satisfy carnal desires which is “an opportunity for the flesh”. To be out-of-control with your own life will destroy you and consequently adversely affect the lives of many others. The book of Romans speaks a lot about the subject of what you should or shouldn’t do in regards to your freedom, living under law vs. living without law, but that will be a subject for another day! 

 

One major point of this liberty is this: in life control is needed, but control must originate from within our own internal conviction to obey and respect (fear) God. We must with God’s help by the Holy Spirit have control over ourselves in every aspect. It is good to have a partner to be accountable to as well as this is very important to reinforce us away from our weaknesses, fears, and temptations. Who are you accountable to? If not controlled by God a person like you or me becomes more abusive over time and this damages the holy relationship we must all strive to maintain with God. How in control are you of your own spirit, emotions, and fears? How is your control (or lack thereof) being “opportunity to the flesh” affecting you and others? 

 

5. Let’s go deeper into what control bells do not mean for us as we establish our relationship with God, taking prayer as the example. For the non-Christian prayer is a time of spacing out of control allowing the mind to wander, not really caring about what is said or believing that what is said is what God will hear and answer. But for the Christian, who has already been affected emotionally and seen many people be emotional in prayer being desperate or elated because God answered and saved someone’s life, prayer then becomes a time of intimacy, soberness, joy, and concentration. James 5:16 (b) The effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much.

 

But I will argue that these effects of prayer are not a conditioned response as in Pavlov’s model, they are instead a quality that just naturally takes place because it is a real experience! (or supernatural one!). If prayer was of no use billions of people would not do it daily! Prayer and the worship of God will always be unique with each person but it is conclusively very effectual and encouraging and necessary for the spiritual strength one needs in life to overcome fears, the flesh, and manipulations. Some people get prayer only on Sunday but we need it daily! 

 

The sad thing is some people never experience the amazing blessings and feelings God has in store for them because they will not allow God to take full control of their life! This is due to pride and you must get free from it! For the Christian who loves God, freedom or liberty takes on a deeper meaning than what others understand it to be because it is our spirits that get free from the control of others who rely on the stimuli of fear to manipulate our behavior. Many Christians of late are caving to intimidators with nonsensical ideologies and political correctness, and this brings on bondage of spirit and a state of mental slavery, not liberty as God intended.

 

6. What I loathe are all the increasingly belligerent conditioned stimuli or “controls”, stigmas, and misconceptions being placed upon young people in society and on Christians or anyone who speaks truth standing up for their convictions! Never allow your right to be heard be bullied into bondage by intimidators!  Recognize it and fight it when someone from some preconditioned mindset is trying to “control” and suppress you, or shame or ridicule your God-given right to your faith convictions. Expose them for trying to demonize you by shaming them for trying to rob you of your God-given rights and freedom! You do have free speech rights and freedom of religion until now! But not for long if we don’t fight to keep them! The disciples went preaching everywhere, “Daily in the temple and in every house” (Acts 5:42) as the “Good News” was mandated to be shared to all everywhere and it legally cannot be degraded into oblivion as how evil men would like to see happen. 

 

Our freedom of expression to proclaim our Christian faith must be freely exercised or we will be intimidated, controlled, and be forced to live in fear under someone else’s subjugating Satanic agenda in the form of government or religion. Here, and around the world, many laws prohibit Jesus from being mentioned or taught with the penalty of execution or imprisonment! 35 Islamic nations prohibit Jesus’ gospel to be taught! Many other communist/socialist countries as well! Many laws today directly contradict God’s statues that respect life, the mentioning of His Son Jesus such as in schools to children, and do you not think Jesus is offended? Matt 18: 6 “Whoever causes one of these little ones who believe in Me to sin, it would be better for him if a millstone were hung around his neck, and he were drowned in the depth of the sea. 7 Woe to the world because of offenses! For offenses must come, but woe to that man by whom the offense comes! 

 

We must be bold and disobey anti-Christ agendas by people that try to control us so we fear and do not take the liberty to tell others about our liberating Jesus. Peter and the disciples lived by this standard of freedom and we must as well!  Acts 5:28  Saying, “Did we not strictly command you not to teach in this name? And look, you have filled Jerusalem with your doctrine, and intend to bring this Man’s blood on us!” 29 But Peter and the other apostles answered and said: “We ought to obey God rather than men.”  No man has any right of control over the mission of all Christians to preach Jesus Christ! “The earth is the Lord’s” but Satanic powers keep trying to subdue others by fear robbing God of His power and glory.

 

7. Our verses of today in Galatians deal with the Jews trying to “control” the new Christians by imposing on them the Mosaic law to rob their new freedom granted by God through Jesus’ redemption. To be honored as a pious perfectionist law abider was the goal amongst the want-to-be leaders in that day as well as today. But God’s favor is by grace in Jesus, not by works. 

 

If we translate this “control” into today’s modern world, from college classrooms and city halls the objective is to by man’s laws and regulations facilitate, indoctrinate, and intimidate everyone into accepting and practicing their anti-God, anti-Biblical, precepts which obviously enslave and destroy as “the wages of sin is death”.  Regarding passions of the flesh, Satanic ones parade the freedom to “do as one pleases”, and tout ‘freedom from religion’ (or from a guilty conscience which they never achieve!) as their model of freedom. These ones in the world are diametrically militantly opposed to the Word of God presuming the stance that you are your own god. After all, you should be free to let your carnal out-of-control flesh do all that it pleases without any bigoted, biased, racist religious person suggesting that self-control under God brings more peace and meaning to life than their hedonism!? The reality is, once you get to know them (as we all have), these so called liberated liberal proselytizers entrapped in their unreconciled deceptions live miserable lives enslaved to many agendas converting them into embarrassing hypocrites. Pray that God helps them to fall off of their high horses as Paul the apostle did to see the light of their bitter, murderous, intentions and repent.   

 

So unprecedented laws (actually lawlessness) permit the common people the liberty of nihilism, to consume drugs and commit acts that spread diseases, and while they are enthralled in ignorance the ones in power get away with scandal after scandal making mega billions each by corruption, lies, and extortion. Are you not tired of the poor getting poorer and having no power of say so? Well, expose the corruption and mental enslavers at every chance then! Check to make sure you are not subconsciously controlled by the deceptions and lies in the media, lies that are all touted in the name of equality being the perversions of standards, which are not the standards of God that have worked for 3,000 years ever since they were given to man.

 

8. So one important concept of this verse in Galatians 5 of today is that after one becomes a Christian and God frees you from your own sin, which was the liberation of the lawlessness of your own fleshly passions, or the freedom from the pride of trying to be more lawful, pious, and controlling than your peers, you must never go back to be entangled again or you are condemned! Never allow yourself the control over your own life (as it belongs to God now) or the desire control over others! Your freedom is in Christ alone and it is the only healthy freedom that exists to make one happy, holy, and superior to others who are enslaved to their illusive freedom of “doing as they please” or by pretending to be more righteous that you!

 

You must keep in check any of your desires for “control”. God is your pilot, but if you take the control panel over over-ridding Him for sure you are in danger of a crash before reaching your destiny! So liberty in God is a paradox, it is freedom but bound by the control of your will and at the mercy of God’s will. 

 

Here is one more aspect in the verse where it says, “but through love serve one another”. Leaders, pastors, government officials, or anyone can control what they want others to do by applying the conditioned stimulus model with threats, bribes, and coercion, but imposition then transfers into the sinful “opportunity for the flesh”. When a person takes advantage of others or becomes the controller over another’s actions, beliefs, or behavior that becomes something not “done in love” and it is a SIN. God is love and it is in divine love that we choose to serve each other!

 

9. Serving one another in love is a voluntary submission doing what we do for the glory of God and the desire is never to control another, condition another, or take advantage of their goodness. We must never invalidate our faith by being carnal, abusive, controlling, or out of control as these things are all “of the flesh”. You don’t need to be an atheistic liberal to offend others, you can be a rude Christian making others serve you, but if you are offensive and people find out you are a dog that barks and bites, you may discover that others are getting conditioned to avoid you! If you can’t love your brother whom you have seen, how can you claim to love God whom you have not seen?  

 

Criminals feed on making their victims fear, ask yourself “Am I one that loves power and control”? The fear of God liberates and overcomes, but fear torments!  2 Timothy 1:7 “For God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of power and of love and of a sound mind”.  Don’t control others or let yourself be controlled! Never be out of control and in the flesh! Examine what you agree with to compare if it is the world that has programed you by a conditioned response, you or by the truth in the Word of God! Don’t live as a preprogramed dog! Revelation 22:15 For without are dogs, and sorcerers, and whoremongers, and murderers, and idolaters, and whosoever loveth and maketh a lie.

 

 May God help us to live out and share the gospel of Jesus in order to liberate others who are enslaved to ungodly permissiveness in the form of worldly precepts, laws, or destructive ideals controlling them that they are not even aware of it!  Thank you Jesus for freeing us and giving us clarity of vision to see through lies, deceptions, and enslaving agendas: may we keep on living free! Ask yourself, am I being controlled? Am I a controlling individual? Jesus liberates! John 8:36 If the Son therefore shall make you free, ye shall be free indeed.

Judas: The Fighter for Social Justice Gone Awry

Judas: The Fighter for Social Justice Gone Awry                               Kelly Durant

 

Matthew 10:4 Simon the Cananite, and Judas Iscariot, who also betrayed Him.

 

2. Do you really understand how anger, pride, politics, and misinformation damages people? It will damage a person to the point of betraying Jesus and others who are good people and even those of their own family! All of us must take a serious look at what sets up a person to become a betrayer. 

 

Judas was a betrayer to Jesus, and when I first found out about that as a child, I thought, oh no, how could anyone be that horrible? A disciple hurting Jesus?! How is it that family will betray family? There are a few answers to be found. Here is a Biblical commentary on how we know Judas was a Jewish political radical.

 

“His (Judas) resume may also have included identification as a Zealot, an attribute held by only one other disciple, Simon the Zealot. How do we know that Judas was probably a Zealot? By his surname, Iscariot. Researchers believe this is a form of the title sicarii, meaning "dagger-men," a group of ultra-Zealots who carried a knife with them at all times to be prepared to assassinate traitors and capitulators. In English, we could call him Judas Daggerman.”https://www.bibletools.org/index.cfm/fuseaction/Topical.show/RTD/CGG/ID/654/Judas-Iscariot.htm

 

3. The zealots in Jesus’ day were the political activists, they were Jewish social justice radicals who despised the Roman governmental authority to the point they would attack any one of them they could verbally and/or physically. They were the violent protesters back then who were never happy because they wanted the power. Due to the hypocrisy and disobedience God was not blessing Israel. It seems history repeats itself as discontented ones, protesters, betrayers, and murderers have always been everywhere yelling and demanding that things be how they want them without getting right with God to be worthy.

 

And personally, I do not blame Simon (not Peter) and Judas for hating the Romans; both of them being zealots. The Romans were perverted, murderous, wasteful partiers getting rich off the heavy taxes they imposed on those conquered. They murdered, enslaved, and exploited all races, not just the Jews. Resistors to their dominance suffered extreme cruelty. Their oppressive system is still in place today but now it is not identified as Roman rule but rather is observed in dictatorship and communist systems. Notice all of these are run by cruel military rule which does not allow the citizens to be armed. 

 

4. Only Jesus return will topple these Satanic usurpers who think they own God’s world and resources, and they exploit the people God created to be free! Sadly, people are still considered as property around the world for false religious purposes, for gangs, for politics, and for sexual and labor trafficking and much more!

 

The dream of Judas, and of the zealots, was to have the Jews rise to power and conquer the Romans and become the new world leaders. The coming Messiah they knew about in the prophecies was supposed to help them accomplish this goal. They expected Jesus to be a political spiritual figure with absolute power to rule all the world forever. As Christians we know Jesus first had to come as the lamb of God, but He will return with all power and authority with the holy angels to reign forever. But this will happen in God’s time only; only He knows the hour!  

 

5. When we all look at history since the beginning of time, we observe that those in power have almost always had to carry out acts that are repulse to most of us. They have had to spy on friends and betray them, get certain enemies murdered, go to war causing hundreds of thousands of young men to lose their lives, and witness that they abuse their position to make their selves ultra-rich and despotic.

 

What has always disturbed me is how Satan temped Jesus and he told Him that he would give him the cities of the world if he would bow down to worship him. This reveals that Satan is the ultimate politician running all the world; but it’s only for now until Jesus return! Satan is the head of the ‘shadow governments’! He is the one behind the scenes pushing for population reductions, wars, divisions over race and wealth, exploitations, freedom for criminals, drug use (legal and not), and perversions that include desecrating and defiling the human body God created.  

 

Few altruistic, loving, caring, serving, tender-hearted Christians want anything to do with politics because of all the evil involved in it. Christians do want social justice, as “Jesus says we are blessed if we “hunger and thirst for righteous” The factor we have to deal with is this, “For evil men to succeed, we only need that good men do nothing!” It seems this is what has happened, few good men have confronted and fought for more true justice exposing the evil, corruption, and horrific abuses of the powerful ones in high places.

 

6. So, we see Judas was a character who was patient and deceptive in his ambition for power. He wanted to use Jesus as the leader to accomplish his political agenda and followed Him for over 3 years. Jesus was here to fulfil God’s will and pressuring Him did not work with the betrayal of Him, so this practice makes you wonder, how many men have fallen giving into the temptations of Satan?

 

Satan can only control a person who has a weakness. With Jesus, he tempted Him with trying to get Him to use His power for showing off His supernatural abilities (making bread from stones, or falling for angels to catch Him). Spiritual pride is one of the worst sins and we see too many Christians fall into that trap! They see God use them for a miracle then they think they are the ones with the power, but that is self-worship, not ‘glory only to God’ worship; and “Him only shall you serve and worship!”

 

And the riches and power that come with dominating cities and nations, how intoxicating that is! We see it in the lives of politicians, they lie, they cheat, they even murder to climb to the top because they are obsessed with gaining total control over others. How Satanic these people are and Judas fell for it due to his involvement with the wrong ambitious political zealot gang.  

 

7.  Romans 12:19 Dearly beloved, avenge not yourselves, but rather give place unto wrath: for it is written, Vengeance is mine; I will repay, saith the Lord. It is of God to despise evil and the evil deeds of the wicked, but never succumb to evil as Judas did. We can expose evil, we can help those suffering, we may rescue a few from injustices, but pray Romans 12:21

Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.  Amen!

 

    

A Message for A Prayer Vigil

A Message for A Prayer Vigil                                                         Kelly Durant    August 8, 2026

You have seen how the rabbis pray in Israel with their face against the wall, and how they move back and forth when they repeat their phrases.  A certain rabbi noticed the man next to him repeating, "I want to be with my people, I want to be with my people!" He stopped him and said, "What are you saying, you are here with your people!" Then the man began to pray again, "I want to be with my people in Miami Beach!" In the end, we learn that when we pray, we must express specifically what it is that we want! 

Often when I pray, I try to focus on the prayer model Jesus gave us. We often repeat the Lord’s prayer but I think we must internalize it and make it real in our lives personally. Here I will expound on what I find is import to recognize when we pray. 

To begin with Jesus said John 14:13 And whatsoever ye shall ask in my name, that will I do, that the Father may be glorified in the Son. We must always pray in Jesus’ name, amen!

Here is an important detail, God already knows what you and I need, so if that is the case, why do we pray and petition Him? For one Jesus does not want us to repeat mantras or repetitious phrases as a prayer because by doing that we are not even focusing in on what we are saying. He warns of this in Matthew 6: 8 Be you not therefore like unto them (the hypocrites that pray vain repetitions): for your Father knoweth what things you have need of, before ye ask him.

Here is a deeper reflection on Jesus’ prayer Matthew 6:9 After this manner therefore pray ye: Our Father which art in heaven, Hallowed be thy name.  Let’s start with that. God our Father Creator, the one who formed us in the womb, resides in the heavenly realm and He wants us to be reminded to reflect on that beautiful unseen realm where He reigns. God is in heaven and we are not there yet, He wants us by prayer to let our minds drift far away from the problems we experience on earth.

He also wants His name “hallowed” or regarded as sacred. When we speak of God, He wants us to be reminded that He is holy, and hallowed means to honor Him as Holy. It is a reminder that He is Holy and we are not, so we must approach Him with reverence, even with fear and trembling as it was with Isaiah and the prophets, giving glory, honor, and praise to Him.

10 Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done in earth, as it is in heaven. Jesus will return after the gospel is preached in all the world to all nations. Those that repent and convert to love God and Jesus start living right now in a heavenly way. This implies that Christians with their love, peace, and Holy Spirit, are in essence bringing the “kingdom of Heaven” down on earth. But to have a heavenly system on earth, we must be in obedience to God’s will, serving. loving, praising, and obeying as the angels do in heaven.

11 Give us this day our daily bread. The prayer now has shifted from being focused on God to being focused on us! God is very interested in seeing our needs supplied. To not be in poverty and starvation, food is at the top of the priority list for most of us. If we ask God to supply our daily food, then this implies we must then give thanks to Him for supplying it! 

12 And forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors. These “debts” can be referred to as offenses, so now God wants us to focus on others and our relationship with them. Have we wronged or offended someone? When someone almost hit your car, did you curse at them, or did you remember that you also in the past have almost hit someone? The implied here is forgiveness. How can we be deserving of forgiveness if we will not forgive? We all make mistakes and God wants us to not be revengeful but rather merciful. 

13 And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. Does God lead us into temptation? Temptation is always there like a fly trying to get into your house, but we are the ones who open the door or not. James 1:13 Let no man say when he is tempted, I am tempted of God: for God cannot be tempted with evil, neither tempts He any man. The idea here is that we should be vigilant and pray without ceasing counting on God to keep evil away from getting close to us. We should pray always for protection provided by the Holy Spirit so we have discernment and do not fall into the traps our Adversary would like to put us in. All it takes is one slip up, one night of drunkenness, of lust, of cheating or harming a person and your whole life could be set on a path to absolute ruin. 

Satan in particular targets the righteous, the prayer warriors, the ones who are doing God’s will as best they can. It’s like the guy that went duck hunting and he fired his shotgun in the sky at a flock of ducks and dozens fell down. He told his companion, “Run bag the live ones, don’t let them get away! Leave the dead ones ‘til later, we already got them!” When Satan owns a soul, he no longer has to tempt them, they already get twisted in all directions from sin and are a dead soul. The live ones, are us the Christians who have eternal life, Satan wants to wound us and capture us so we leave our obedience to God.

For thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, for ever. Amen. When we hear how God owns “the Kingdom” it refers to the only valid, true, worthy kingdom there is! All the kingships, empires, thrones, governments, and dictatorships that have ever existed are all as ashes in God’s perspective. No kingdom of man lasts forever, not even for a 1,000 years! But God’s Kingdom will last for all eternity! His power is absolute (He created all things!) and He is outside our world that decays and falls apart. God’s Kingdom is forever!

I often pray for people I know who are going through hard times. Here is an important point: 

Job 42:10 And the Lord turned the captivity of Job, when he prayed for his friends: also the Lord gave Job twice as much as he had before.

In other words, when our prayers are focused on others, not just on our needs, then God honors that as a worthy virtue, He rewards unselfishness and a loving concern for others.

Prayer is about relationship! Our Creator wants us to spend time with Him, honoring Him, remembering how majestic He is! He also is concerned for us and hears our prayers for supply, for healing from sickness, and for repentance and forgiveness. He hears us when we pray for others, He wants us to put their troubles into His hands, so when the healing comes, when the answers come, we know it was His working, His miracles, that came through in a way we as humans could not possibly answer. 

Justice or Mercy? What God Offers. What do you offer?

 

Justice or Mercy? What God Offers. What do you offer?           Kelly Durant                                                      

Hebrews 5:1 For every high priest taken from among men is ordained for men in things pertaining to God, that he may offer both gifts and sacrifices for sins: 2 Who can have compassion on the ignorant, and on them that are out of the way; for that he himself also is compassed with infirmity.3 And by reason hereof he ought, as for the people, so also for himself, to offer for sins. 4 And no man taketh this honor unto himself, but he that is called of God, as was Aaron.

There is a tale repeated about Napoleon and one of his soldiers. The young man had been afraid of the war and had run away but he was caught in the city. The young man was to be executed and before all Napoleon announced a day of a firing squad.  Suddenly a woman ran up and was yelling, “Please don’t, he is young and he made a mistake, give him a chance!” Napoleon answered, “I am responding with the justice he deserves for deserting, justice is to be served, do you not agree this is justice? Justice is execution for desertion”! The mother’s reply was, “Well, honorable sir, I am not asking you for justice I am asking you for mercy”!

There is nothing more real than this scripture… Romans 3:23 For all have sinned and come short of the glory of God. No one, if they are honest with themselves, will claim to be perfect, as Christ or God is perfect. We all know that even as a child we did wrong things.

So, what is the restitution solution? Should one be stuck in a Karma loop to suffer for everything that you did and will do that is unjust? Some religions claim God is this way, full of justice and has no mercy! But that sets a horrible president, if everyone had to pay an equal price for every single mistake, the spirit’s punishment would then be locked into hell as nothing would be forgiven and no heaven could exist.

But our loving God sent Jesus to break the curse of the death that our consequences bring, He released us from the punishment we deserve! What mercy God has! There is one condition though, to “Go and sin no more”! And that is possible when you are so thankful you will do anything God wants from you, even not repeating mistakes that destroy you and those around you.

What does God want from us? He wants us to be merciful! He is merciful with everyone! Mercy is a concept that some people do not want to grasp as they are hell bent on revenge after they have been wronged! Murder, rape, thief, human trafficking, labor exploitation are all egregious crimes and laws exist to punish offenders with time locked up. This brings safety for the victims. But always?

Justice is needed in our society as a murderer, or evil doer, should not be free to murder as he pleases! And here is the contradiction, some judges, grant mercy to those who never stop, nor repent of their wrongs. It seems these kinds of people confused or agenda driven people levitate to the top to position themselves above the law. 

These kinds of judges are practicing the law inverted, defying God’s ways, and this destroys people as lawlessness is an evil scourge on innocent lives.  

Mercy is for those who seek God and decide to obey His commands. Mercy was never intended for evil people who steal, kill, and destroy! God created a heaven and a hell for a reason. Some people who never repent, who never stop destroying, do not deserve to go into heaven in the afterlife.

Heaven is justice! A safe haven for those who practice loving God and others as themselves. This is the future residence of spirits that obtained mercy! Blessed are the merciful, for they shall attain mercy!

Soldiers, Defenders of the Faith: Use Apologetics!

 

Soldiers, Defenders of the Faith: Use Apologetics!       By Kelly Durant 

2. On trial in the Methodist board in England, they were trying to persecute William Booth to stop his evangelistic activity which would bring the poor in the church. He was hearing the authority and then it came his turn to speak. He was silent a moment, and then Catherine stood up in the back and shouted, “Don’t you shilly shally!” Meaning, don’t procrastinate, to be so slow to answer! He must have been embarrassed! But the Booths influence is still with us today because they were a team defending the right!

Have you ever been slow to respond when unjust people are imposing their values on you? Probably most all of us have at some time or another. We must prepare. We must know their arguments and then be ready to respond. 1 Peter 3:15 But sanctify the Lord God in your hearts: and be ready always to give an answer to every man that asketh you a reason of the hope that is in you with meekness and fear:

All your life as a Christian you will be challenged, made fun of, and provoked by those who have everything in their minds mixed up, these are the people with their minds fashioned by the corrupt worldviews of the day or false doctrines. These people are always confused and the author of confusion is Satan and we must answer him back when he uses people around us! To defend the faith implies we need…

3. Apologetics: Apologetics (from Greek ἀπολογία, "speaking in defense") is the discipline of defending a position (often religious) through the systematic use of information. It is not an apology as some minds might deduct it is a polemic stance with intelligent defense! How intellectually prepared are you to defend Christ? To defend you must be opinionated; you have a right to believe what you choose! Never let another person intimidate you that you must accept heresy!

4. Focus: Tertullian (c. 160 – c. 225} was a notable early Christian apologist and a polemicist against heresy. Tertullian is called "the father of Latin Christianity"[3] and "the founder of Western theology."[4] Though conservative, he did originate and advance new theology to the early Church. He is perhaps most famous for being the oldest extant Latin writer to use the term Trinity (Latin trinitas),[5] and giving the oldest extant formal exposition of a Trinitarian theology. 

The theology of God the Father, God the Son, and God the holy Spirit as being equal in power still stands today due to him, which formulated the Nicene Creed, or Apostles Creed which was written in the 4^th century.  The opposing view of the Arians, that God is superior and that Christ really is nothing, being inferior, provoked a war for centuries and thousands died defending the stance of the truth of the Trinity! Even today, the Unitarians, Jehovah’s Witness and other sects still support the rejected for centuries Arian view! It is called Arian because it is from the teachings of Arius ( AD 250–336), an Egyptian who taught the primitive church his misguided doctrine. And how much conviction do you have?

5. & 6.To take an example of apologetics on the trinity look with me at: Doctrine 3 of the Salvation Army says what? We believe that there are three persons in the Godhead - the Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost - undivided in essence and co-equal in power and glory. 

In the history of the Christian church, Tertullian, was used by God to persuade the Romans to respect the Christian worldview as valid. Among his apologetic writings, the Apologeticus, addressed to the Roman magistrates, is a most pungent defense of Christianity and the Christians against the reproaches of the pagans, and an important legacy of the ancient Church, proclaiming the principle of freedom of religion as an inalienable human right and he demanded a fair trial for Christians before they are condemned to death.

In other words, we have the freedom to read about Tertullian today instead of some pagan Romulus and Remus because he was a hero and a bold Christian who fought for the rights of those of the true Christian faith. He approached the authorities with the risk of getting himself killed! So he was polemic and opinionated, politically involved in defense of Christ, and intelligent in his arguments. He was a model for all of us!

7. Christian conservative stances in todays’ world that are reported upon more and more as stupid and antiquated as the propaganda news channels repeat to everyone subliminally and overtly that no one intelligent would ever be biased or express religious convictions. For decades now Satan has been at work in all the media outlets to discredit Christians like you and me. It is time to fight back with intelligence and persuasiveness. 

What a lie people have swallowed that no one must ever mix politics and religion! The politicians impose their immorality and escape the even the law. They say, keep your morals, religions, and opinion to yourself! How shameful they want to make you look if you offer intellectual discourse going against the grain of the corrupt society exposing that it is their debauchery that is bankrupting the nation! 

8. We are living in times as it was in Isa. day, Isaiah 5:20 Woe unto them that call evil good, and good evil; that put darkness for light, and light for darkness; that put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter!

The world is going to hell before our eyes so we must improve in our apologetics! It is our fight, this one against evil in the world, defending the thing most dear to us, our loving savior Jesus Christ! The one who frees us from the slavery of sin!

A true gardener does not just love the flowers, he also hates the weeds that would kill the flowers! The same it must be with Christians, we must combat the popularization and acceptance of evil systems that destroy each person’s salvation, hope, and health!  Actually, there are quite a few Christian groups in the world that protest against sins and the heretical blasphemers of the Holy Scriptures but notice how they are ignored, attacked, and mocked by the news! 

But the blood of the martyrs is the seed of the church! Rome couldn’t wipe out the Christians by mass extinction in the Coliseum! No nation can stop Christians, not even the Communists, where 26 million were killed under Mao Tse Tung, and 10 million under Stalin, and who knows how many under Castro and others! But we are responsible for not letting the truth of the Holy Scriptures disappear!   

9. What we as a church must focus on is the spreading of our faith, which includes right living or holiness, as this was the fight of our movement’s founding fathers. Our apologetics come to light as we vocalize to others how we combat sin, poverty, and addictions. The Salvation Army is most effective in these areas. 

Each church movement has its niche in the world, Our niche is evangelism as a means to overcome deep seated sin to bring each one into light and holiness! There are multi-millions we have educated in God’s word to become clean useful citizens for the rest of their time on earth and they will continue on in holiness eternally in God’s Kingdom! Satan would love to stop us!

If you want to know how to strengthen your faith in apologetics, start digging through the historical books of church history. Start asking yourself, “why, do I believe what I do”? 

10. Today I took the tried and proven Trinity doctrine as a practice run. But now let’s play the devil’s advocate a minute and ask some hard questions. A Muslim would confront you on this belief that you are worshipping not just one God but 3 gods and therefore you are a pagan being polytheistic and a heretic must die! What are you going to answer to that? (pause)Should you be allowed to be killed?

To answer you might have to do a personal Bible study to discover that the Son, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit, have been with God ever since the beginning. Many verses in the O.T confirm this, such as the Holy, Holy, Holy salute to God, but in the end 3 being one in equality is in the essence of the N.T. and justifiability considered a mystery. Ephesians 3:9

And to make all men see what is the fellowship of the mystery, which from the beginning of the world hath been hid in God, who created all things by Jesus Christ. 

It is sort of like the egg, with the shell, the white, and the yolk, all three make up the egg, but we just accept Jesus words who commanded us to Matt 28: 19 Go ye therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost: (in other words these three are required and are therefore equal in authority, being though different in their manifestations)

A Jehovah witness would tell you that you have the Trinity all misunderstood. That the Father is dominant, so the son just had to obey Him and therefore the son is just a man so you must pray only to Jehova. Say what?! By this they strip Jesus of His redemptive importance insulting to God!  John 16:26 At that day ye shall ask in my name: and I say not unto you, that I will pray the Father for you:

So Jesus makes it clear everyone must now get to the Father through Him only!

11. Heretics arguing from ignorance, or from Satan’s logic, contradict basic doctrines or conservative principles that have been debated and resolved by the most intelligent Bible scholars of all time for centuries and centuries. 

You have to conclude that argumentative people, people who will not accept that intelligent anointed by God men must be right in their teachings, are just honestly mentally challenged and have a reduced capacity to reason and apply abstract logic, or they are full of pride wanting to show off, or they just love to divide and take away the peace from others! With misinformed people we will show some tolerance, but with prideful people causing division we must expose it for what it is, and reject those who promote heretical stances contradicting God, from satan himself.

12. Proverbs 26:12  Seest thou a man wise in his own conceit? there is more hope of a fool than of him . 

Everyone has an idea of right and wrong, but please Christians, defend the faith when you know there is a verbal or unjust attack happening. Start doing your research in your Bible, in the library, or on the internet as to why you defend the truth of what is right! 

The challenge I give you today is to be bold and courageous because as the word says    2 Timothy 3:13But evil men and seducers shall wax worse and worse, deceiving, and being deceived.     2 Timothy 2:15Study to shew thyself approved unto God, a workman that needeth not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth. Are preparing yourself to fight the good fight of faith? Ask Jesus for wisdom, and ask Him for a passion to defend the right things of God, His truth!

Love = Life A Study of Love in I John 3

Love = Life   A Study of Love in I John 3                      Kelly Durant 

 

Money can buy a dog, but only love can make his tail wag! You can give a beggar bread, but if you put butter on in, then that is love!

 

When I was in college years ago and I was studying all the religions of the world, I was hoping to find one that could meet my spiritual needs and my desire to be loved. Even though my mother was nice, I actually was disappointed in the lack of love that existed in most everyone I knew. God made us to hunger for love! Only His love can satisfy us!

 

In the early 70’s Buda was popular, transcendental meditation was popular, and I tried these for a while but they did not fill the spiritual emptiness of love that I longed for. It was only when I was invited in the home of some non-judgmental (say this because my hair was long then), loving Christian missionaries that I experienced a hug and love as I had not known it before! It was their love and sincere interest in me that touched my heart my to want to hear what they had to say and make me want serve Jesus and be an on-fire Christian as they were. Love=time: we must show it in some way to prove it!

 

Today we are in the month of love and will do a study on love as the Bible describes it in I John. I want to tell you, when the news gets back to me that one of you did something loving for another my heart jumps for gladness and I praise God for you! 

 

In the same manner, when someone reports on someone doing something unloving mine and Regina’s heart gets very sad, angry, and disappointed. God has no other hands to serve others with but ours and they do nothing good if they are not motivated by love!

 

Remember John the disciple was called the beloved because he got that good name from understanding and practicing his master’s love. John is my favorite disciple!

 

1 John 3

3:1 How great is the love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God! And that is what we are, children of God or of love! That is our main characteristic! 

 

No Christian should ever say that they are unloved or do not know or have love, because only the lovers and followers of Jesus get to be the sons of a God love! You are very special! If the entire world treats you like you are trash, if all your family rejects you, if your life gets complicated, you can still sleep in peace to know that you are special and that you could die happy because you are loved by God!... and that love is enough to make you cry and sing, and praise Him for the rest your life!

 

2 Dear friends, now we are children of God, and what we will be has not yet been made known. But we know that when he appears, we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is.

The greatest love of all is that Jesus will not let us die just as He did not die! One day we will get to resurrect and have a supernatural body as He has. That is what the verse is stating; that we will be like Him one day! Love is sharing with another the same gifts you have, and Jesus’ love includes giving us in the future a supernatural body as His is!  

 

3 Everyone who has this hope in him purifies himself, just as he is pure.

Here is an important detail, just as Jesus is pure, we must be pure in order to feel and experience being in His beautiful love! 

 

Pure people wake up in the morning and purify themselves, and they use God’s word and prayer like bleach and they clean their minds and hearts. Those who are not pure wake up and start throwing dirt on others and in the process get their selves dirty! How pure are you? Love means making your thoughts, your heart, and your spirit clean by prayers, obedience, and the Word.

 

4 Everyone who sins breaks the law; in fact, sin is lawlessness. 5 But you know that he appeared so that he might take away our sins. And in him is no sin. 6 No one who lives in him keeps on sinning. No one who continues to sin has either seen him or known him. 

I want you to see the shift in the context in which John explains it. It implies, you either have God’s love and live in it, or without it you will have sin and with sin you will be separated from God!

 

This is a good thesis statement for the day: You either have love, or you have sin!

 

When people do wrong things, they are breaking the law. Do not worry, all of us have broken the law in our days of ignorance and Jesus forgave us, but Jesus tells us to go and sin no more! In other words, you will not be able to feel nor enjoy God’s love in your life if you keep on sinning and doing wrong, unloving things. These words in this chapter are of love but they are strong; they say that you do not even know Jesus if you keep on sinning and hurting God and others which means you will not have eternal life and go to heaven if you do not stop doing your sins and start loving God, Jesus, and everyone!

 

7 Dear children, do not let anyone lead you astray. He who does what is right is righteous, just as he is righteous.

Isn’t that clear, it is as simple as this, if a person does good and loves and stops sinning, then they are in God’s righteousness. People can distinguish between a rose and a weed right away! Unjust people are unjust in everything! Good and righteous people are good and righteous in everything!

 

 8 He who does what is sinful is of the devil, because the devil has been sinning from the beginning. The reason the Son of God appeared was to destroy the devil's work.

It does not matter what addiction, what sin, what problem you have, Jesus came to free everyone from it; and if we are letting His love work, all the chains of the flesh will be cut off and Jesus will be the victorious one governing in your life and mine!

 

Often, we forget to remind people that Satan is real. He comes into our minds and even in our lives in this world through evil people to temp us to be participating in a sin, to be cold hearted, selfish, and proud, and to destroy others that are of God that expose your unrighteousness preventing you from getting your wants. 

 

 9 No one who is born of God will continue to sin, because God's seed remains in him; he cannot go on sinning, because he has been born of God. 10 This is how we know who the children of God are and who the children of the devil are: Anyone who does not do what is right is not a child of God; nor is anyone who does not love his brother. 

 

In the end you will be judged to be a child of God or a child of the devil according your actions, whether you loved Jesus and your brother or not! And you are either of God or of the devil according to who you love! Did you choose to do what is right or did you not care and sin against God knowing it causes everyone to stumble by seeing your horrible example?

 

11 This is the message you heard from the beginning: We should love one another.

My brothers and sisters, up until now we are getting this message over and over to love one another! 

 

 12 Do not be like Cain, who belonged to the evil one and murdered his brother. And why did he murder him? Because his own actions were evil and his brother's were righteous. 

 

Now we are seeing a new element that destroys the love between us…jealousy! Cain killed his brother because Able was loved, or accepted by God more than Him over the sacrifice. Able was simple, he just loved and obeyed God; whereas Cain did not want to love and obey God as God wanted and his sin caused him to hate and attack his brother.

 

Everyone sees this sin of attacking and killing others verbally every day in the news media and in families. This hate and jealousy is even within the churches and everywhere, and this is a product of having no love, God, or forgiveness at all; It is sin as the jealousy leads to hate, and then it leads to murder!

 

13 Do not be surprised, my brothers, if the world hates you. 14 We know that we have passed from death to life, because we love our brothers. Anyone who does not love remains in death. 15 Anyone who hates his brother is a murderer, and you know that no murderer has eternal life in him. 

 

Here we are getting a repeat of how not having love makes a person a murderer whether there is a dead body or not! He wants us to understand, if you hate your brother you will not have eternal life! In the world the non-Christians hate us because we proclaim Jesus, and anyone hating will have to pay with eternal death for their charge of being a murderer. And as stated here only being in God’s love brings us into life eternal!

 

16 This is how we know what love is: Jesus Christ laid down his life for us. And we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers.

There is the ultimate test of love, have you laid down your life as Jesus for dis for us? Many people will not give up $10, or even one hour for someone in need! True Christians, however, do what ever they need to for Jesus and for their brothers! Ask your self, how much do I lay down my life for the brothers and sisters? What have I done lately that is proof of a real sacrifice for others? How much love do you have?

 

 17 If anyone has material possessions and sees his brother in need but has no pity on him, how can the love of God be in him? 18 Dear children, let us not love with words or tongue but with actions and in truth. 

 

In other words, this love is not just talk, “I love you”? No, love makes sacrifices to help and shows pity. That is what the Salvation Army, and every Christian should be about, that we should be doing actions to prove we are loving and showing God’s love by doing actions from our hearts. Many times, I have given away my furniture, clothes, and things. 

 

19 This then is how we know that we belong to the truth, and how we set our hearts at rest in his presence 20 whenever our hearts condemn us. For God is greater than our hearts, and he knows everything. 

 

Only you know how you are in your heart, if you feel condemned or not. When you go to bed at night, do you feel restless like there was something you needed to do that God brings into your mind? It says it here clearly that God knows everything! If something is not right, then fix it as soon as possible! If you were unloving, go back and do something loving!

 

21 Dear friends, if our hearts do not condemn us, we have confidence before God

 

So, when a person feels guilty for not being loving due to sinning and not helping someone as we are clearly taught to do; it is judgment and consequences that they will have. They will have a disturbed, sad, and restless heart, not just now on earth, but forever in hell as there is no rest for the wicked! 

 

22 and receive from him anything we ask, because we obey his commands and do what pleases him. 

The implication here is God will answer prayer if we are in Him, loving and obeying Him, but if not, God does not answer our prayers! That is only fair right? You do not reward a child with an ice cream who has been disobeying you all week! But those who love by doing deeds of love, these are the ones who have a good relationship with God, and a confidence that He is close and they get their prayers answered in the way God sees fit.

 

23 And this is his command: to believe in the name of his Son, Jesus Christ, and to love one another as he commanded us. 24 Those who obey his commands live in him, and he in them. And this is how we know that he lives in us: We know it by the Spirit he gave us. 

 

Does your spirit sense God near you? You know or not if you really believe in Jesus’ love: you measure your love by how much you believe, obey, and live in Him! Let’s love and obey all the way! Amen? Ask God for more love!

El Amor = Vida
Un Estudio del Amor en 1 Juan 3 Kelly Durant

El dinero puede comprar un perro, pero solo el amor puede hacer que mueva la cola! Puedes darle pan a un mendigo, pero si le pones mantequilla, ¡eso es amor!

 

Cuando estaba en la universidad, hace muchos años, y estudiaba todas las religiones del mundo, yo esperaba encontrar una que satisficiera mis necesidades espirituales y mi deseo de ser amado. Aunque mi madre era amable, en realidad me decepcionaba la falta de amor que existía en casi todas las personas que conocía. ¡Dios nos creó con hambre de amor! ¡Solo Su amor puede satisfacernos!

A principios de los años 70, Buda estaba de moda, la meditación trascendental era popular, y las probé por un tiempo, pero no llenaron el vacío espiritual de amor que yo anhelaba. ¡Solo cuando fui invitado a la casa de unos misioneros cristianos que no me juzgaron (digo así porque en ese entonces tenía el cabello largo) ellos fueron amorosos y experimenté un abrazo y un amor como nunca antes había conocido! 

 

Fue su amor y su sincero interés en mí lo que tocó mi corazón, me hizo querer escuchar lo que tenían que decir y me impulsó a querer servir a Jesús Cristo y ser un cristiano en fuego como ellos. ¡Amor = tiempo: debemos mostrarlo de alguna manera amor para para que sea tangible! 

 

Hoy estamos estudiando el amor y haremos un estudio sobre el amor tal como lo describe la Biblia en 1 Juan. Quiero decirles que, cuando me llega la noticia de que uno de ustedes hizo algo amoroso por otro, ¡mi corazón salta de alegría y alabo a Dios por ustedes! 

 

De la misma manera, cuando alguien reporta que alguien hizo algo sin amor, el corazón de Regina y el mío se entristece mucho, se enoja y se decepciona. ¡Dios no tiene otras manos para servir a los demás más que las nuestras, y estas no hacen nada bueno si no están motivadas por el amor!

Recuerden que al discípulo Juan lo llamaban “el amado” porque recibió ese buen nombre por entender y practicar el amor de su Maestro. 

¡Juan es mi discípulo favorito!         1 Juan 3

3 Mirad cuál amor nos ha dado el Padre, para que seamos llamados hijos de Dios; por esto el mundo no nos conoce, porque no le conoció a él.   Y eso es lo que somos: ¡hijos de Dios o de amor! ¡Esa es nuestra característica principal! 

 

Ningún cristiano debería decir jamás que no es amado o que no conoce el amor, porque solo los que aman y siguen a Jesús son hijos de un Dios de amor! ¡Ustedes son muy especiales! ¿Que esperamos del mundo? Si el mundo entero los trata como basura, si toda su familia los rechaza, si su vida se complica, aún así pueden dormir en paz sabiendo que son especiales para Dios y que podrían morir felices porque ¡Dios los ama!... y ese amor es suficiente para hacerlos llorar, cantar y alabarlo el resto de nuestras vidas!

 

2 Amados, ahora somos hijos de Dios, y aún no se ha manifestado lo que hemos de ser; pero sabemos que cuando él se manifieste, seremos semejantes a él, porque le veremos tal como él es.
Jesús nos dio un amor sobrenatural y no nos va dejar morir, Un día resucitaremos y tendremos un cuerpo sobrenatural como El suyo! Eso es lo que dice el versículo: ¡que un día seremos como Él!

El amor es compartir con otros los mismos poderes que uno tiene, y el amor de Jesús incluye darnos, en el futuro, ¡un cuerpo sobrenatural como el tiene! No habrá más dolores, abre, ¡ni ningún sufrimiento! 

 

3 Todo el que tiene esta esperanza en él se purifica a sí mismo, así como él es puro.
Aquí hay un detalle importante: así como Jesús es puro, ¡debemos ser puros para sentir y experimentar su hermoso amor! Las personas puras se despiertan por la mañana y se purifican; usan la Palabra de Dios y la oración como lejía y limpian su mente y su corazón. Los que no son puros se despiertan y empiezan a embarrar con suciedad los demás y, en el proceso, se quedan sucios ellos mismos.  ¡Amor implique la santidad!

¿Qué tan puro eres tú? El amor significa limpiar tus pensamientos, tu corazón y tu espíritu mediante la oración, la obediencia a la Palabra.

 

4 Todo aquel que comete pecado, infringe también la ley; pues el pecado es infracción de la ley. 5 Y sabéis que él apareció para quitar nuestros pecados, y no hay pecado en él. 6 Todo aquel que permanece en él, no peca; todo aquel que peca, no le ha visto, ni le ha conocido.

Quiero que vean el cambio de contexto en el que Juan lo explica. Implica que o tienes el amor de Dios y vives en él, o sin él tendrás pecado y con el pecado estarás separado de Dios. Esta es una buena tesis para el día: 

¡O tienes amor, o tienes pecado! ¡NO puedes tener los dos al mismo tiempo!

Cuando las personas hacen cosas malas, están violando la ley. Pero no se preocupen, todos hemos violado la ley en nuestros días de ignorancia y Jesús nos perdona (es nuestro abogado), y Jesús nos dice: “Ve y no peques más”. En otras palabras, no podrás sentir ni disfrutar el amor de Dios en tu vida si sigues pecando y haciendo cosas malas. 

 

Estas palabras en este capítulo son de amor, pero son fuertes: dicen que tu no conoces a Jesús si sigues pecando y lastimando a Dios y a los demás, y eso significa que no tendrás vida eterna ni irás al cielo si no dejas tus pecados atrás y empiezas a amar a Dios, a Jesús y a todos los demás.

 

7 Hijitos, que nadie los engañe. El que hace lo que es justo es justo, así como él es justo.
¿No esta claro? Es tan simple como esto: si una persona hace el bien, deja de pecar, y entonces está en la justicia de Dios. ¡La gente distingue entre una rosa y una mala hierba de inmediato! Con el tiempo se nota que es justo y quien no. ¡Las personas injustas son injustas en todo! Las personas buenas y justas son buenas y justas en todas sus acciones.

 

8 El que practica el pecado es del diablo; porque el diablo peca desde el principio. Para esto apareció el Hijo de Dios, para deshacer las obras del diablo.

No importa qué adicción, qué pecado o qué problema tengas, ¡Jesús vino a liberar a todos de ello! Y si dejamos que el amor de Dios obre, todas las cadenas de la carne serán cortadas y Jesús será el vencedor que gobierne sobre tu vida y en la mía. 

A menudo olvidamos de recordarles a las personas que Satanás es real. Él entra en nuestras mentes e incluso en nuestras vidas en este mundo a través de personas malvadas para tentarnos a participar en el pecado El vuelve el corazón frío, egoísta y orgulloso, ¡y a destruir a los que no se liberan! ¡Exponen su injusticia! ¡Podemos tener victoria en Jesús!

 

9 Todo aquel que es nacido de Dios, no practica el pecado, porque la simiente de Dios permanece en él; y no puede pecar, porque es nacido de Dios. 10 En esto se manifiestan los hijos de Dios, y los hijos del diablo: todo aquel que no hace justicia, y que no ama a su hermano, no es de Dios.

 

Al final serás juzgado como hijo de Dios o hijo del diablo según tus acciones, según hayas amado a Jesús y a tus hermanos o no. ¡Y eres de Dios o del diablo según a quién amas! ¡Si somos de Dios, perdemos el deseo de pecar! 

 

11 Porque este es el mensaje que habéis oído desde el principio: Que nos amemos unos a otros. 

 

12 No como Caín, que era del maligno y mató a su hermano. ¿Y por qué causa le mató? Porque sus obras eran malas, y las de su hermano justas.

 

Ahora vemos un nuevo elemento que destruye el amor entre nosotros… ¡los celos! ¡Y el odio! Caín mató a su hermano porque Abel era más amado o aceptado por Dios que él en el sacrificio. Abel era sencillo, solo amaba y obedecía a Dios; en cambio, Caín no quería amar ni obedecer a Dios como Dios quería. 

Su pecado lo llevó a odiar y atacar a su hermano. 

Todos vemos este pecado de atacar y matar verbalmente a otros todos los días en los medios de noticias lo hace Y vamos esto en las familias. ¡Este odio y celos están incluso dentro de algunas iglesias y en todas partes, y es producto de no tener amor! Los que no tienen a Dios no perdonan; y los  los celos llevan a uno al odio y luego al asesinato.

 

13 Hermanos míos, no os extrañéis si el mundo os aborrece. 14 Nosotros sabemos que hemos pasado de muerte a vida, en que amamos a los hermanos. El que no ama a su hermano, permanece en muerte. 15 Todo aquel que aborrece a su hermano es homicida; y sabéis que ningún homicida tiene vida eterna permanente en él.

Aquí repetimos cómo no tener amor convierte a una persona en homicida, haya o no un cadáver. ¡Quiere que entendamos que si odias a tu hermano no tendrás vida eterna! En el mundo, los no cristianos nos odian porque proclamamos a Jesús, y todo el que odie pagará con muerte eterna por su cargo de homicida. ¡Y como se dice aquí, solo estando en el amor de Dios entramos en la vida eterna!

 

16 En esto hemos conocido el amor, en que él puso su vida por nosotros; también nosotros debemos poner nuestras vidas por los hermanos

Ahí está la prueba definitiva de amor: ¿has dado tu vida como Jesús la dio por nosotros? ¡Muchas personas no dan ni 10 dólares ni una hora por alguien necesitado! Los verdaderos cristianos, sin embargo, hacen todo lo que sea necesario por Jesús y por sus hermanos. Pregúntate: ¿cuánto doy mi vida por los hermanos y hermanas? ¿Qué he hecho últimamente que sea prueba de un sacrificio real por los demás? ¿Cuánto amor tienes?

 

17 Si alguien tiene bienes materiales y ve a su hermano en necesidad, pero no tiene compasión de él, ¿cómo puede estar en él el amor de Dios? 18 Hijitos, no amemos de palabra ni de lengua, sino con hechos y en verdad. En otras palabras, este amor no es solo hablar: “Te amo”. No, el amor hace sacrificios para ayudar y muestra compasión. Eso es de lo que se trata el Ejército de Salvación y todo cristiano: hacer acciones que prueben que estamos amando y mostrando el amor de Dios desde el corazón. Muchas veces he regalado mis muebles, ropa y cosas.

 

19 Y en esto conocemos que somos de la verdad, y aseguraremos nuestros corazones delante de él; 20 pues si nuestro corazón nos reprende, mayor que nuestro corazón es Dios, y él sabe todas las cosas.

 

Solo tú sabes cómo estás en tu corazón, si te sientes condenado o no. Cuando te acuestas por la noche, ¿te sientes inquieto porque hay algo que Dios trae a tu mente que debías hacer? ¡Aquí se dice claramente que Dios lo sabe todo! Si algo no está bien, ¡arréglalo lo antes posible! Si fuiste sin amor, vuelve y haz algo amoroso. 

 

21 Queridos amigos, si nuestro corazón no nos condena, tenemos confianza delante de Dios. Así que, cuando una persona se siente culpable por no ser amorosa debido al pecado y por no ayudar a alguien como claramente se nos enseña; tendrá juicio y consecuencias. Tendrá un corazón perturbado, triste e inquieto, no solo ahora en la tierra, sino para siempre en el infierno, ¡porque no hay descanso para los impíos! 

 

22 y recibimos de él todo lo que le pedimos, porque guardamos sus mandamientos y hacemos lo que le agrada.
La implicación aquí es que Dios responderá la oración si estamos en Él, amándolo y obedeciéndolo; pero si no, ¡Dios no responde nuestras oraciones! Eso es justo, ¿verdad? No le das un helado a un niño que te ha estado desobedeciendo toda la semana. Pero los que aman haciendo obras de amor son los que tienen una buena relación con Dios, confianza de que Él está cerca y reciben sus oraciones contestadas según lo que Dios considere apropiado.

 

23 Y este es su mandamiento: Que creamos en el nombre de su Hijo Jesucristo, y nos amemos unos a otros como nos lo ha mandado. 24 Y el que guarda sus mandamientos, permanece en Dios, y Dios en él. Y en esto sabemos que él permanece en nosotros, por el Espíritu que nos ha dado.

 

¿Tu espíritu siente a Dios cerca de ti? Sabes o no si realmente crees en el amor de Jesús: ¡mides tu amor por cuánto crees, obedeces y vives en Él! ¡Amemos y obedezcamos hasta el final! ¿Amén? ¡Pídele a Dios más amor!