| January
06, 2007
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We spend much of our time in this newsletter
encouraging people to think seriously about the Lord, but
some people do this already. Serious Christians like to
find ways of improving their Christian life. They want to
make a good experience better.
At the end of the well-known chapter on love is a simple
verse, “And now abideth faith, hope, and love…”
1 Corinthians 13:13. The implementing of these into the
daily experience of a Christian will certainly make the
New Year go better.
Faith is simply trust. The Word of God – and God Himself
– must be trusted. Linked with that, of course, is
obedience to it. If we are to have a productive and happy
Christian life, we must do what God says. And there are
so many practical statements in the Bible that would give
daily direction to our lives. Sometimes people make the
excuse that they do not find the Bible easy to understand.
This is sometimes an excuse for not doing what they know
to be right. Mark Twain, the author of Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry
Finn, once said that it was not what he did not understand
in the Bible that troubled him, but what he did understand.
Simple faith in God can make 2007 a better year.
And then there is hope. Hope is having an expectation that
events will turn out well in the end. Mind you, to be realistic,
they do not always turn out well in the short term. Yet
a Christian knows that God has plans for the world as a
whole and for individual lives as well. With that in mind
he can trust God for the future.
And then there is love. The apostle Paul says, “…..the
greatest of these is love…..” 1 Corinthians
13:13. First there must be love to God. Yet this comes from
God’s expression of love to us. The apostle John stated,
“We love him because He first loved us.” 1 John
4:19. God’s love was manifest in his giving the Lord
Jesus Christ to die for our sins.
If the world is to see love, they must see it in Christians
manifesting love to those around them. Displaying love preserves
the heart from withering up. Cynicism, nit-picking, gossiping
and a host of other things are overcome by the love of God.
If the New Year is going to be a happy New Year, it will
be the result of the manifestation of faith, hope, and love
in the life of a Christian.
Jim Beattie,
submitted by Russ Nesbit
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