{"id":540,"date":"2017-09-04T14:50:28","date_gmt":"2017-09-04T22:50:28","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.Bob4God.com\/?p=540"},"modified":"2017-09-04T14:50:43","modified_gmt":"2017-09-04T22:50:43","slug":"1-john-319-24-feeling-is-good-knowing-is-better","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.Bob4God.com\/?p=540","title":{"rendered":"1 John 3:19-24\u00a0 Feeling Is Good, Knowing Is Better"},"content":{"rendered":"

1 John 3:19-24 <\/strong>\u2013\u00a019\u00a0This is how we know that we belong to the truth and how we set our hearts at rest in his presence:\u00a020\u00a0If our hearts condemn us, we know that God is greater than our hearts, and He knows everything.\u00a021\u00a0Dear friends,\u00a0if our hearts do not condemn us, we have confidence before God 22\u00a0and receive from Him anything we ask,\u00a0because we keep His commands\u00a0and do what pleases him.\u00a023\u00a0And this is his command: to believe\u00a0in the name of his Son, Jesus Christ,\u00a0and to love one another as he commanded us.\u00a024\u00a0The one who keeps God\u2019s commands\u00a0lives 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.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

We are called to a simple faith, \u201cand everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be save<\/span>d (Acts 2:21<\/strong>).\u201d That if we \u201cconfess with your mouth the Lord Jesus and believe I your heart that God has raised Him from the dead, you will be saved<\/span> (Romans 10:9-10<\/strong>).\u00a0 Jesus gave us a simple rule so that we know exactly how to live, we are to love God with all that we are and to love each other (everyone) as we love ourselves (Mark 12:29-31<\/strong>).\u00a0 If we have faith in the person and work of Jesus, we will love Him.\u00a0 If we love Him we will obey Him, just as proof of Jesus\u2019 love for the Father was His obedience to Him (John 15:9-10, 14<\/strong>).\u00a0 The overarching commandment of the Lord to us is to love.<\/p>\n

So we know that we belong to God because He has put His Holy Spirit within us and the proof of that is the incredible love, not of this world, that we have for God and for each other.\u00a0 Not any love, but the love of God.\u00a0 The love of God that is behind our salvation and is the love of God that should live within us and will cause us to love and obey God and to love each other.\u00a0 As God\u2019s love draws us to Him, as we love Him and each other, so the love of God is complete (1 John 2:5, 1 John 4:17, Ephesians 3:19<\/strong>).\u00a0 Love is the answer.\u00a0 Not a silly nilly mindless love, but a serious, devoted, informed and wise love that is all encompassing and infinite because this love originates in the heart of God.\u00a0 It is a love that rushes to help, rushes to heal and encourage, and that rushes to be the representative of the great I AM who is the all, the everything, the one Answer to us all in every situation and at all times.<\/p>\n

If we remember a thousand rules, if we remember ten thousand rules, or even if we can remember one hundred thousand rules, we can be assured that there will be times when a circumstance will come up that does not have a direct answer in one of those rules. Jesus has not called us to remember endless laws and rules.\u00a0 Heavens no!\u00a0 We are free from all that.\u00a0 However, by no means does that mean that we will not obey and fulfill all the rules, and infinitely beyond.\u00a0 Jesus taught that the physical act is merely the product of what was first in the heart.\u00a0 You see the man whose heart and soul are pure, whose heart is filled with love for God, will not make a practice of entertaining evil things because it is not the rule He lives by, but by the Spirit, which is the love of God within us.\u00a0 We think to ourselves \u201cWhat would Jesus do.\u201d\u00a0 Yes, I know it may seem clich\u00e9, but that does not mean it is not true.\u00a0 And it is not that we need to remember a law to know what Jesus would do, we know what Jesus will do because we have read His Word and because the Holy Spirit has exploded the Word of God within us.\u00a0 That means we know Him.\u00a0 If we know Him, we know what He would do.\u00a0 We don\u2019t have to ask if we should love this person or that one because we want to be like Him and we know He loves all men and women.\u00a0 So we rush to do the loving thing because we love God and want to please Him.\u00a0 We want to obey Him because we love Him.\u00a0 So the commandment to love God covers everything.\u00a0 If we truly love God then we will love each other.\u00a0 If we truly love each other we will not only not do wrong, but we do everything we can for each other to express that love to each other.\u00a0 Yes, we do that to please God, but we needn\u2019t think to ourselves \u201cWell, I will do it because it will please God.\u201d\u00a0 Rather we will because we have His love within and what is unnatural to the world is \u201cnatural\u201d to us because we love God and have His love within us.\u00a0 Therefore the love of God has grown within so that it, rather than our flesh, motivates us.\u00a0 What is natural to the flesh no longer dominates our intent and will but rather the Holy Spirit of God that fills our hearts is what now motivates us.\u00a0 Here is the beauty of the love of God manifestly displayed.\u00a0 Yes, we love others because God has directed us to, but we do not love each other as some mechanical obedience to a law, but because it is what we do because it is who we are.\u00a0 We do so because it is who God Himself has made us to become.\u00a0 So God loves us, we love God, His love changes us, our love of God changes what we do from rote obedience to joyful expression of the new creature we have become.\u00a0 We don\u2019t have to think to love God.\u00a0 We do and so our lives express that.\u00a0 We don\u2019t have to love each other. \u00a0We do and so our lives express that.\u00a0 We are new creatures with new natures and that new nature is love.\u00a0 And that new nature of love means the old desire to sin fades to black as the new nature of love replaces the black with the light of who our God is, love.\u00a0 Wonderful!\u00a0 Praise God, so wonderful!<\/p>\n

Love indeed is the answer.\u00a0 Not love as the world knows it.\u00a0 But the love of God living in us and changing us.\u00a0 When love rules the day, strife, fear and hatred fade.\u00a0 Not that we will agree on everything.\u00a0 You can still like rainbow sherbet ice cream while I like vanilla ice cream.\u00a0 You can like this political candidate and I can like another.\u00a0 None of these things will separate us from loving each other. God had a grand plan.\u00a0 A plan of love, forgiveness and redemption.\u00a0 May we be the extended arms of the great I AM and reach out with His love to all.\u00a0 If we do that, our hearts are at rest, our consciences don\u2019t condemn us, our hearts are free and pure, our prayers are answered and the proof of our eternity with God, the Holy Spirit within, gives us a clear path to the ear of God.\u00a0 Then we know we please God because we know we do what He has commanded.\u00a0 And even if our heart should mess up, and we think that God is condemning us, we know that we are forgiven and loved by Him, because we know Him, we know His heart and we know Him and His heart because the Holy Spirit has revealed it to us through His Word.\u00a0 Family, God is good and He loves us.\u00a0 Let us love one another.<\/p>\n

Psalm 150:6<\/strong>\u00a0–\u00a0Let everything that has breath praise the Lord.\u00a0 Praise the Lord!\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Micah 7:7<\/strong>\u00a0– But as for me, I watch\u00a0in hope\u00a0for the\u00a0Lord, I wait for God my Savior; my God will hear\u00a0me.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Micah 6:8<\/strong>\u00a0–\u00a0He has shown You, O man, what\u00a0is\u00a0good; And what does the\u00a0Lord\u00a0require of You but to do justly, to love mercy, And to walk humbly with Your God.<\/span><\/p>\n

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1 John 3:19-24 \u2013\u00a019\u00a0This is how we know that we belong to the truth and how we set our hearts at rest in his presence:\u00a020\u00a0If our hearts condemn us, we know that God is greater than our hearts, and He knows everything.\u00a021\u00a0Dear friends,\u00a0if our hearts do not condemn us, we have confidence before God 22\u00a0and…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1192],"tags":[82,821,1841,23,213,7,482,62,8,100,1019,1688,13,93,94,17,2332,1676,10,2331],"class_list":["post-540","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-devotion","tag-acts","tag-confidence","tag-ephesians","tag-father","tag-friends","tag-god","tag-hearts","tag-holy-spirit","tag-jesus","tag-john","tag-lord","tag-lord-jesus","tag-love","tag-mark","tag-micah","tag-psalm","tag-rainbow-sherbet","tag-remember","tag-romans","tag-vanilla-ice-cream"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.Bob4God.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/540","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.Bob4God.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.Bob4God.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.Bob4God.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.Bob4God.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=540"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/www.Bob4God.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/540\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":542,"href":"http:\/\/www.Bob4God.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/540\/revisions\/542"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.Bob4God.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=540"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.Bob4God.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=540"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.Bob4God.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=540"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}