$hrewd, Part 6, Eternal Investment @imagechurch Dumfries, VA
We are all going to die... We have felt the pain of loss, this life does NOT go on forever. Remember that not only will we die, but we cannot take ANYTHING with us. All those gifts that we give and receive at Christmas time, are going to stay here and rot away, we cannot take it with us.
In this life, there are investments that we can make that WILL go on forever.
When we put faith in our good works, this works no longer glorify God, they glorify ourselves.
None of our struggles are about external things, they are about our hearts. We need to choose who to serve, God or ourselves! Our struggles are just symptoms of the issue in our hearts, about who is in control of our lives. Do we put faith in ourselves or God? Do we love money or God?
While the religious leaders are caught up on their religion and themselves, there are people who are coming to Jesus with their lives and the religious leaders hated that. They believed that they already knew everything about God, they missed Jesus.
We celebrate Christmas, but without Jesus, there is not holiday. This season is not about gifts, but about the greatest gift ever given by God, Himself. But the way that we live our lives the other 11 months of the year truly reflect who we love. It is easy to say you know and love Jesus during the Christmas season but what do we invest in?
Our eternal investment for God, to glorify God, to shine the light of God: investing in other people. When we see the value of Jesus, we understand how much it is worth it, the cost of ourselves is nothing.
When we feel weary and tired of investing eternally, God reminds us of what our investments have brought to fruition for God. He reminds us about people, because that is what it is all about.
Jesus did not come to abolish the law, but came to fulfill it and remind us that it is His law to begin with.
We are called to invest in the eternal, not the temporal. Jesus calls us to invest in eternal things, that means people. Remember that those who do not know Jesus, are going to Hell. We cannot make that decision for anyone, but Jesus can. Jesus chooses us to share with those around us.
We are only called to preach the Gospel to those we share our lives with, but it is up to God to melt the heart of stone. We love, He transforms.
We need to remember that the whole point, the meaning of life... is JESUS!
In the depth of our depravity, God still has to remind us not to murder, commit adultery, and lie. Jesus takes it one step further to say that thinking these thoughts is the same as doing them. But even deeper than this, Jesus calls us to LOVE OUR ENEMY!
When we get caught up in obeying the rules, we miss the point of the Gospel. It is not about us.
Jesus has done so much for us that we have no choice but to share that with others, to share Jesus with other people, investing eternally in other people.
If Jesus has brought us back to life from the depth of sin, when was the last time we thanked Him? When Jesus raises our lives from the dead, we should be excited to tell others about it.
If we have met Jesus we should want, like Lazarus, to let everyone know what He has done for & to us. We could know everything about the Bible and memorize scripture, even do good works, but if we miss Jesus then we MISS THE WHOLE POINT!
We sacrifice for what we believe in. If we know Jesus, then we should want to invest in another life.
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