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FOLLOWING THE CLOUD

Good is always the enemy of best.  Doing good things for God is not the same as doing the thing that God asks us to do.  We can fill our lives with many religious activities and good works, and still be disobedient to God because we do not do the thing that He asks.  Saul, the first King of Israel, fell out of favor with God by offering a great sacrifice to the Lord instead of simply obeying what he had been told to do.  Jesus told a rich ruler who had kept all of the commandments since he was a child that he yet lacked one thing from having eternal life.  That man walked away grieved because, despite all his devotion, he could not do the one thing Jesus asked.   After being delivered from the Egyptian army at the Red Sea, the Israelites were then lead by Moses into the Desert of Sinai.   God had told them that He would lead them to a land flowing with milk and honey - the Promised Land - but they didn’t know where that was!   They didn’t know...
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THE PATH OF THE JUST

“But the path of the just is as the shining light, that shineth more and more unto the perfect day.” (Proverbs 4:18).     There is a path that we all must walk through this life.  It is the course that each of us must run from birth to death.  The Bible teaches that the path of the just (those who have accepted Jesus Christ as Savior) is a much different road than that of the wicked (those who have not accepted the Lord). Among the just, there is a lot of diversity in the way that people choose to walk their path with God.  Christians are at all levels of growth and spiritual maturity.  Some grow rapidly, moving from faith to faith as they learn to apply God’s Word to their lives, while others seem content to live as they always have and never seek to climb to a higher plain.  We must be careful not to judge or condemn those we feel don’t “measure up” to our standards or preferences, however.  Jesus told Nicodemus, “ For God sent not His Son i...
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LOOKING UNTO JESUS

“ … looking unto Jesus the author and finisher of our faith ; Who for the joy that was set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is set down at the right hand of the throne of God.” (Hebrews 12: 2).   These three words, “looking unto Jesus,” seem to be at the heart of Paul’s letter to the 1 st century Hebrew Christians, but it is also the heart of the Gospel message to every soul that has received Him from the 1 st century until now.  Paul especially wanted to make sure that these Jewish converts were placing their faith solely on Jesus Christ and His finished work of redemption rather than in the trappings of religion they formerly trusted.   He knew that it would do no good for them to rely on angels, a worldly temple, an earthly priesthood, a temporal Promised Land, a fleshly covenant, or carnal sacrifices to secure their eternal salvation.  All those things were part of the old covenant and were ineffective in bringing God’s people to...
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