[Fwd: My Utmost For His Highest : "The Vocation Of The Natural Life"]

#1 · January 17, 2008, 9:55 pm

Quote from Forum Archives on January 17, 2008, 9:55 pm
Posted by: masinick <masinick@...>

Dear friends,

Have you ever thought about why we are alive and what God wants from us? I think about that a lot. It is my belief that, first and foremost, God wants us. He wants our hearts, He wants our attention, He wants our love, He wants our affection. God most certainly pours all of that and more in our direction.

Do any of you have children? Most of you probably do, but even if you don't, you were once a child. Unless you came from a terribly broken family you know the kind of sacrificial love that a parent displays toward their child. As humans, we are not perfect, and a few of you may even say you had awful parents that did not display much of anything to you.

Well, that is not God. He is a perfect father, THE PERFECT Father of all creation. You have to understand something about God. Our God is Spirit, and those who worship Him must worship both in Spirit and in truth. But God loved us enough that He realized because of the way He made us - with choice and independence, that we would inevitably choose wrong, a path heading for sure destruction. He gave us choice in the first place because He desired and still desires our attention and love out of our free will. He desires to compel us to love Him but never forces us, either to love or to do anything else. Any movement that smacks of "forcing" anything is wrong, and should be challenged and questioned.

Jesus Christ is God. He became a man so that He could be face to face with us, live among us, experience in the body all that we experience. He came, moreover, as a sacrifice for us, living a sinless life only to give it up on the Cross, then take it up, conquering both sin and death once for all. Do you believe that, and do you believe that He did that for you? Trusting in Him, believing Him at His Word is the basis of the Christian faith. That is what we mean when we talk about how "He saved us". Are you a true Christian by that definition? Do you have what you would call a personal relationship with Jesus Christ, that is, do you read the Bible, the Word of God, each day, then have a conversation in your spirit with His Spirit? That, my friends, is the relationship that our God is looking for, and that is why we have life and breath!

Yours in Christ,

--
Brian Masinick

634745b10e61e.rfc822

Posted by: masinick <masinick@...>

Dear friends,

Have you ever thought about why we are alive and what God wants from us? I think about that a lot. It is my belief that, first and foremost, God wants us. He wants our hearts, He wants our attention, He wants our love, He wants our affection. God most certainly pours all of that and more in our direction.

Do any of you have children? Most of you probably do, but even if you don't, you were once a child. Unless you came from a terribly broken family you know the kind of sacrificial love that a parent displays toward their child. As humans, we are not perfect, and a few of you may even say you had awful parents that did not display much of anything to you.

Well, that is not God. He is a perfect father, THE PERFECT Father of all creation. You have to understand something about God. Our God is Spirit, and those who worship Him must worship both in Spirit and in truth. But God loved us enough that He realized because of the way He made us - with choice and independence, that we would inevitably choose wrong, a path heading for sure destruction. He gave us choice in the first place because He desired and still desires our attention and love out of our free will. He desires to compel us to love Him but never forces us, either to love or to do anything else. Any movement that smacks of "forcing" anything is wrong, and should be challenged and questioned.

Jesus Christ is God. He became a man so that He could be face to face with us, live among us, experience in the body all that we experience. He came, moreover, as a sacrifice for us, living a sinless life only to give it up on the Cross, then take it up, conquering both sin and death once for all. Do you believe that, and do you believe that He did that for you? Trusting in Him, believing Him at His Word is the basis of the Christian faith. That is what we mean when we talk about how "He saved us". Are you a true Christian by that definition? Do you have what you would call a personal relationship with Jesus Christ, that is, do you read the Bible, the Word of God, each day, then have a conversation in your spirit with His Spirit? That, my friends, is the relationship that our God is looking for, and that is why we have life and breath!

Yours in Christ,

--
Brian Masinick

634745b10e61e.rfc822