Relational Bridges

HELPLESSLY DEAD...MADE ALIVE BY GOD Romans 5:6 " When we were utterly helpless, Christ came at just the right time and died for us sinners." Ephesians 2:4-5 " But God is so rich in mercy, and he loved us so much, that even though we were dead because of our sins, he gave us life when he raised Christ from the dead. (It is only by God’s grace that you have been saved!)" It is utter folly to think that human beings can live strong, whole and complete lives without the Presence, Life and Power of God. Unless God, Himself, becomes Life within us, unless He is life within us by the indwelling power of the Holy Spirit then real life, full humanity is an impossibility. Spiritually dead people have no more ability to change their condition on their own than a corpse has the capacity to become enlivened by the exertion of its own power. It has no power, no life in it to do anything. Even decomposition is not due to its action. What is dead cannot change its circumstance. Th...

 CONVICTION When the Holy Spirit convicts us of sin, He doesn't ask us to make it right. We can never add to what Jesus Christ has already done on the cross to deal with the totality of our sin. The Holy Spirit asks us to accept the truth, turn from sin and turn to the Lord. Then He will make it right. Remember Who our faith depends on from start to finish, that salvation is of the Lord alone. Laying aside every hindering weight and the sin that so easily trips us up (different for everyone), we are to run the race He has given us to run with perseverance, fixing our eyes on Jesus. He is the One upon Whom our faith depends on from start to finish. He will never run out of eyesight any more that a good shepherd would go ahead of the sheep he was leading where they couldn't see to follow. Hebrews 12:1-2 "Surrounded then as we are by a great cloud of witness to the life of faith, let us strip off everything that hinders us, as well as the sin which dogs our feet, and let us r...

 FAMILAR SPIRIT OR THE HHOLY SPIRIT? There is a demonic subtlety that is intent upon binding the people of God to attitudes and behaviors that will not make for life but will convince you that they are essential to your livelihood and sense of self. Scripture calls them "familiar spirits". They are demons. The thing about a "familiar spirit" is that is a demonic force trying to establish a stronghold in one's mind, it lies and tells you in so many non-verbal ways that you need it to be safe and sound. The stronghold in your mind may be, "You must be in control. People will try and control you, even in what you eat! So, you must show them YOU are in control." Anorexia is such a familiar spirit. It speaks in demonic whispers that you are not what you see in the mirror. "You are fat!" As so, given heed and authority, this familiar spirit of control works to kill you, starve you, deny the true nutrition that would bring about physical health and ...

  JUSTICE If there is no God, justice is an empty concept; good and evil are merely constructs with no basis in reality and no practical application since without God, there is no basis for determining one from the other.  When someone says that something is unjust, they must have some practical, existing basis to determine what justice looks like. If that sense of "what it is" is grounded merely in their personal opinion or in something they heard in a college classroom without linking it to some immovable and substantive truth, then, anyone can come up with reasons to say your sense of justice is injustice because of how they feel. It's all emptiness and chasing the wind. BUT...if God Who He has declared He is and has recorded His character and Person by speaking His own Word to be recorded so we are not crawling in the dark looking for answers in ourselves, then there is a "ground" for justice. God is the One Who establishes and defines immutably the existent...

 Forgiveness Just because you have been victimized gives you no right to victimize those you identify as your "oppressors". To believe you can, makes you an oppressor.  Forgive as you have been forgiven by God. Jesus forgave from His cross as He bore the wrath of God against the sin of humanity, not just part, but the whole. Forgiveness is not the response to someone saying, "Sorry." Forgiveness comes from that deep God-given realization, that conviction that causes you to see that your sin was more deadly that their offense and God met you with grace so that you might be an ambassador of grace...forgiveness greater than yourself...the gift of God in Christ Jesus.

CONFIDENCE IN PRAYER We can hardly have confidence in prayer if we aren't convinced that His will for our lives far exceeds anything we could ever ask or conceive of. His will for us far exceeds anything we might "will" for our own lives. Isaiah 49:15 " Can a mother forget the baby at her breast   and have no compassion on the child she has borne?  Though she may forget,  I will not forget you!" God knows us. God will never forget, forsake, or abandon His own. He is the only One worthy of our worship. He alone is worthy to serve and love. People have trouble in prayer and doubt God because they don't get what they prayed for when they determined that what they prayed for should be answered in the way they had decided the "answer" would look like. They say, "If God was good, He would have answered this way at this time." They have made an infinite determination with a finite perspective and blind eyes. They have determined how God should ...