Exhortations for The Soul

If you are here this morning, God is not done with you yet. If you are here this morning, God is giving us another chance to repent of our sins and make it right with Him or to continue to walk in obedience to His will. Family, God is a good God and His desire is to restore our relationship with Him.   It is past time for us to put away the distractions and concentrate on that which is good for the soul, our spirit. In the beginning of time, Adam and Eve lived in harmony and close connection with our Creator. At the end of the creation account, Genesis 1:31, ”God saw everything that He had made, and behold, it was very good and He validated it completely. But it wasn’t too long after that sin entered the world.   In the 2nd chapter of Genesis verses 15 - 17 , the Lord God told Adam, “You may freely (unconditionally) eat [the fruit] from every tree of the garden; but [only] from the tree of the knowledge (recognition) of good and evil you shall not eat, otherwise on the day th...

In the book of 2 Samuel chapters 11 and 12, there’s the story of King David lusting after and committing adultery with another man’s wife. We know that story. One evening David saw Bathsheba the wife of Uriah bathing on a rooftop. David desired her, plotted to have her, committed adultery with her, and got her pregnant. Of course we know this led to David setting up the husband Uriah to be killed.   Now as the king it seemed everyone was afraid to tell David he was wrong. But there was one. His name was Nathan. He was a prophet and he was David‘s friend. Like me, he couldn’t keep his mouth shut and he confronted David about this terrible thing he had done.   I can imagine the conversation going something like this, because I’ve had many such a conversation and I’ve been likewise spoken to: David you are a king and maybe you feel you could do what you like and get away with it but I’m your friend, I am a prophet and I have to call you out. You are a representative of God before...

This exhortation came to me one morning last week as I was driving.   My vehicle was very dirty on the outside and the inside. But I’ve been hesitating to clean it because it has to go into the body shop to fix the bumper that got damaged when a vehicle slammed into my back in December. When the vehicle goes to the body shop they normally give you back cleaned. Since the new bumper is ordered and on its way, I’m driving around a very dirty car. That doesn’t really sit too well with me and so I thought about just cleaning the outside and leaving the inside dirty. Because after all, I would feel better walking towards a clean looking car, and people will see the outside clean and assume the inside is clean as well. And guess what? That sparked a spiritual revelation. And not a moment too soon as my daughter decided to give the jeep a wash down yesterday! But the exhortation is still valid, so here goes. You know some Christian people they’re looking all nice and dandy on the outside,...