Measurement
Academic excellence or superior knowledge or high educational attainment should not be the basis the goodness of a person is measured. Professional or material success is not the pinnacle of a person’s achievement. It is the godly character, moral integrity or the spiritual wisdom one possesses as a Christian that a person is fondly regarded or remembered for.
Real friend or faux ami
It takes years in order to find the genuineness of a true friend. It takes tests and trials to discover whether one is a true friend or un faux ami (a false friend).
In friendship, titles are stripped, everyone is equal; no one is superior over the other; the bond is based on love and respect.
Pain in the neck
Some of these are friends/relatives/neighbors who have the habit of borrowing money but tenaciously refuse to return it at the promised period. Some borrow because of poverty, or for emergency reasons; others for business purposes. Some have the capacity to pay; others don’t have. It’s just that there are those who are shamelessly stubborn or unwilling to pay, or have no word of honor at all.
There are people who live on borrowing, whose lifestyle revolves around borrowing, living beyond their means, but fail to fulfill their obligations because of the mountainous debts that have accumulated by their constant borrowing.
“Owe no man any thing, but to love one another: for he that loveth another hath fulfilled the law.” Romans 8:13
The heart’s affections
“… The challenge of biblical sanctification is that it is first at the level of the soul and the affections.
Where does your heart and affections run where you are alone? Do you love to come and commune with Christ by faith? Is Christ glorious and precious to your inner man? …”
The lonely Christian
Where does your heart and affections run where you are alone? Do you love to come and commune with Christ by faith? Is Christ glorious and precious to your inner man? …”
The lonely Christian
Emotions are dangerous especially if they are left unguarded. Even a Christian suffers from emotions that are not the fruits of the Holy Spirit. A feeling of desolation, abandonment and despair will make a lonely Christian an easy prey to the wrong people, or people of unbiblical “Christian” persuasion. If the Christian is raised or is deeply rooted in a doctrinally sound church, he will persevere and not be swayed. Above all, if he constantly clings to God through His Word in every predicament then God’s loving protection and the wisdom of the Holy Spirit shall be his armour in this spiritual and emotional battle.
That is why the lonely Christian longs for the company of people of his faith. The brethren and especially the leaders of the church should therefore be perpetually guarding the flock before the sheep loses its way and walks along the precipice.
Righteousness
“Blessed (truly happy) are they who do hunger and thirst after righteousness – not after happiness. Do not go on seeking thrills; seek righteousness.
Seek for happiness and you will never find it, seek righteousness and you will discover you are happy – it will be there without your knowing it, without your seeking it.
Do you want to know supreme joy? Do you want to experience a happiness that eludes description? There is only one thing to do, really seek Him, seek Him Himself, turn to the Lord Jesus Christ Himself.”
-Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones, Spiritual Depression
Solus Christus
Jesus Christ alone is the source of salvation. The blood He shed and nothing else cleanses the sinner from his sin. Jesus Christ alone through His death on the cross paid for the sinner’s sin-debt, imputing on the sinner God’s righteousness, justifying him, saving him from eternal damnation.
“Let me put it plainly, I will not make my boast, I will not glory, even in my orthodoxy, for even that can be a snare if I make a god of it. I will glory only in that Blessed Person Himself by whom this great thing has been done, with whom I died, with whom I have been buried, with whom I am dead to sin and alive unto God, with whom I have risen, with whom I am seated in the heavenly places, by whom and by whom alone the world is crucified unto me and I am crucified unto the world. Anything that wants to come into the centre instead of Him, anything that wants to add itself on to Him, I shall reject. Knowing the apostolic message concerning Jesus Christ in all its directness, its simplicity and its glory, God forbid that anyone of us should add anything to it. Let us rejoice in Him in all His fullness and in Him alone.”
-Dr. Martyn Lloyed-Jones, Spiritual Depression
Poetry
Goodbye
by maria maqui
by maria maqui
Good bye is a lonely word;
It strikes a lonely cord.
But it resonates with freedom;
It liberates the heart
From its wrong affections.