When I read the word Valor I think of Cuba gooding jr in deep sea diving gear. But this word came up today while I was reading my devotional. It was in 2 Peter 1:2-11. In this passage of scripture it telling us to put on these things and it makes a long list of things, and I'm not gonna lie, many times I just read this passage and quickly skip over it like yeah yeah yeah I'll do all of that! yeah right! but today I took some time and looked up a few of the words and well......lets just get into it!
The first thing it suggested that we have is faith. now some might say faith is a weakness, your just believing in things you can't see. Yes believing in the God we can't see is a part of faith but it is not the whole picture. Faith is having confidence and trust in God. Confidence that what God said he would do, he will do it! I am happy to say that I have that confidence.
Next it spoke of virtue. Which is moral excellence, uprightness and valor (Boldness or determination in faceing great danger.) Do you have virtue? or are you like me, you have some virtue but you need to work on it. I know I need to work on my moral excellence. I feel I am upright, but there are some things that I feel aren't as bad as others and therefore my uprightness isn't as upright, ya feel me?
Next it when on to speak of knowledge. which are truth, principles and facts. As a christian we have a set moral compass, and how we find out what is in that compass is to read the bible. God has clearly put together a great list of do's and don'ts. But the bible is so much more than just do's and don't think of it as a list of having a great life vs. having a bad life filled with pain, lonelyness and seperation from the father! HEY! I'm just sayin!
Next is Steadfastness, which means you are fixed in direction. As christian our attention should be focused on heaven. that is our direction, let us fix our eyes on it and acheieve it. I heard a music minister say once, "If you are thinking about the things of this world to much, then you are not thinking about heaven enough." Let us fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfector of our faith.
Next on this list was godliness. which is having great reverence for God, also going from the carnal to the spirtual. godliness is one of those really hard ones to master. After all we all live in a flesh suit and lets face it the flesh is stubborn and when it doesn't get it's way it throws a fit like a 5 year old in walmart, ya dig? Paul talked about beating his body and making it his slave. That is exactly what we all need to be doing today. Take your body and make it submissive to your spirit. Easier said that done right? but that doesn't mean we can just dismiss it and move on about our day. Let us beat out body and make it our slave.
Next is brotherly affection. Which is devotion, also in the definition it talked about the act of influencing, and at first I gotta admitt I was like, "WHAT!?" but then I began to think about it and it makes sense. When you have affection for your brother or sister or fellow human being wearing a flesh suit, you influence them to be affectionate to someone else! it challenges them to spread the love And last but certainly not least was love. Now love is a profound tender passionate affection for another person.
My prayer is that love would motovate everything I do. That when I hold the door open at the store for a bearded man, that my motovation would be love. Christians should be the face of love to the world, but they aren't.
Are you being the face of love? are you showing God's love to the world around you.
What are you doing today to show someone love.
I challenge you to show someone love today and not exspect a thing in return.
Just love and leave it at that.
I am curious, how are you loving on others today?
-The Adam
No comments:
Post a Comment