The Good Life

THE GOOD LIFE

 

Today is the start of the New Year 2013, and I had not received a scripture portion for the New Year "until" I read the devotional from the ODB for today. It was written by David Roper based on a portion of Psalm 73, and he quoted a verse from "Blessed Assurance" by Fanny Crosby, and finished with this closing word "The wonder of it all---just to think that Jesus loves me", which of course is also part of another old hymn. So as a result of this prompting I read the entire Psalm 73 and have chosen a certain verse for this year 2013. I have named this article "The Good Life" based on this scripture. This Psalm was written by Asaph who was troubled by the wicked men who seemed be much better off than the righteous "until" he went into the sanctuary to worship God. When he did this he declared "Then I understood their end". Then he could write verse 38 "It is good for me to draw close to God", and I think I will take that verse to be my motto for 2013. The fact is that God is never far away from us, unless we are running away from Him for some reason, and even then His Holy Spirit abides with us "forever", so trying to run away from Him is impossible! So why not draw near to Him on purpose every day instead?

 

This seems like a logical question to ask yourself, but your "flesh" will give you a lot of reasons why you can't do that. We all have a "flesh nature" even after we are "born again" by receiving Jesus as Lord and Savior, and being adopted by Father into His Forever Family. A lot of followers of Jesus don't seem to understand this fact. The original sin we inherited from our original parents Adam and Eve died with Jesus on the cross and we are free from that sin. But this Flesh nature that fights against the Spirit who indwells us will be with us until we die, as far as I know. See (Rom 8:1-2), and also

(Gal 5:16:23) to learn how to have victory over this sinful flesh. The answer would seem to be to simply "walk in the Spirit and you will not fulfill the lusts of the flesh". The "Fruit of the Spirit" is contrasted against the "works of the flesh" in this passage from Galatians 5, so we need to read this carefully and fully understand this provision our faithful Father has made for us! So as I understand scripture we have absolutely no excuse for continuing to be involved in continuously committing certain sinful activities that have hindered us in our walk with the Lord. So I suggest that we all adopt this motto for 2013, and "Draw Near To God"!!

Sincerely submitted.

Dave Jamer                                                                              01/01/13