Tag: Bible

“Too often the cares of your day hinder your ability to trust Me. You look at the challenges before you and they loom big in your eyes. Trust Me! Trust My promises to you. I am faithful. Often I delay answers to make you turn your heart around to Me. When I am more important than your problems, answers will come. I love you! You are Mine. I will take care of you!”

Mark 4:18-19 AMP 

18) And the ones sown among the thorns are others who hear the Word;

19) Then the cares and anxieties of the world and distractions of the age, and the pleasure and delight and false glamour and deceitfulness of riches, and the craving and passionate desire for other things creep in and choke and suffocate the Word, and it becomes fruitless.

 2 Cor. 1:8-10 NIV  

8) We do not want you to be uninformed, brothers, about the hardships we suffered in the province of Asia. We were under great pressure, far beyond our ability to endure, so that we despaired even of life.

9) Indeed, in our hearts we felt the sentence of death. But this happened that we might not rely on ourselves but on God, who raises the dead.

10) He has delivered us from such a deadly peril, and he will deliver us. On him we have set our hope that he will continue to deliver us…

 

Father God is developing a bridal heart and the same character that Jesus has in those who will respond. We must be like Him in our hearts if we are to intimately walk with Him and live passionately for Him. Can you imagine Jesus coming for a church that is selfish, self-centered, and harbors murder in her heart?

Can you imagine Him enjoining Himself to one who looks to the delicacies around her that please her more than He pleases her? Does it seem possible that Jesus would function in a relationship where His bride would not have the same desires, the same motives, and the same purposes in all that they do together? To think so is ludicrous!

How then is Jesus going to form us, who need His character developed in us during these end days, before He comes?  He is going to allow us to see who we really are. He will allow us to face ourselves, so that we can come to repentance. He will do what it takes to expose our sin. Each time we repent, He will change us to be more like Him. It is an act of astounding love on His part. It is also our choice to respond or reject His efforts.

Make me who I need to be, Lord,

Jim Corbett

“Purity has a purpose. The pure in heart will be able to understand My heart. You will be able to gain insight into Who I am and why I do what I do. As you remove all of the clutter that darkens your reasoning process, you will be able to move closer to Me. We will move in concert. I will be able to trust you with more of My plans, for you will desire to implement them with honest motives. Come to Me today to be cleansed from everything that the world has to offer. Come to gain My heart in everything you do. If you see with My heart, you will see Me and your world much differently.”

Ps. 24:3-4 AMP

3) Who shall go up into the mountain of the Lord? Or who shall stand in His Holy Place?

4) He who has clean hands and a pure heart, who has not lifted himself up to falsehood or to what is false, nor sworn deceitfully.

Matthew 5:8 NIV 

“Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God.”

Luke 12:1 NIV

Meanwhile, when a crowd of many thousands had gathered, so that they were trampling on one another, Jesus began to speak first to his disciples, saying: “Be on your guard against the yeast of the Pharisees, which is hypocrisy.”

Phil.4:8 AMP

For the rest, brethren, whatever is true, whatever is worthy of reverence and is honorable and seemly, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely and lovable, whatever is kind and winsome and gracious, if there is any virtue and excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think on and weigh and take account of these things [fix your minds on them].

 

One year, Merry and I had the opportunity to watch the Super Bowl with some fellow believers. Actually, we watched very little of the game, but had a delightful time simply being with those who loved the Lord and are pursuing Him with all of their hearts.

When half-time came, the so called “entertainment” intruded upon us with the kind of filth that violated the senses of everyone in the room to the point that we turned the TV off and began to pray. The program was embarrassing and an intrusion upon everything we believed.

I know that what is happening to the world is predicted. I know that we are coming closer to the coming of our Lord and that the world is being prepared to accept anything that is not of Christ. I see the world getting darker, but I also see the remnant believer desiring to be separated from anything that is of that world.

As we are able to see Who our Lord is with less distorted vision, anything having true value is compared only to His beauty. He becomes the benchmark for what is worthwhile in our lives to the point that dark values become distasteful and putrid. Those who love them are seen as pawns who need Jesus, rather than those to be envied and idolized.

Create in me a clean heart, Lord,

Jim Corbett