Smallest Seed

Image from iStock. Your full potentials---this is what GOD wants you to get. Don't just get saved by grace; be transformed by grace, too. This is NOT an option. This normally happens during genuine regeneration in Christ. And I mean, you radically transformed and turned into something out of this world. Something this world has never yet seen---like how Jesus was transfigured on a high mountain. And mind you, the Greek word used in the New Testament for transformed and transfigure is the same: metamorphoo . It's also the same with the term metamorphosis . And here we picture out an ugly caterpillar enclosed in a cocoon to undergo radical transformation, turning the ugly caterpillar into a completely different creature. A completely different beautiful creature! Unless You Cease Unless this happens to you, you can never access your full God-given potentials. How wonderful are these potentials? The Holy Spirit is a deposit guaranteeing what you can be---a "foreta

iStock You must grow spiritually in Christ, no doubt. No growth means no life. No life means no part in Christ, whatsoever. And Jesus said the main reason why someone would have no life in him is because he refuses to eat Jesus' flesh. Unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life in you. [John 6.53] And what does it mean to "eat the flesh of the Son of Man"? The context is clear. It's about swallowing Jesus' radical teachings---like eating his flesh and drinking his blood. He taught them: "This bread is my flesh...whoever eats this bread lives forever."  Then later he told them what it all meant: "Whoever eats me (or feeds on me) will live because of me." He even hinted on how he also "ate" the Father (he lived because of the Father). All this eating business proved too much for some of his disciples so they left him for good. In other words, they were stuck to earthly teachings a

Dreamstime.com You seldom see Jesus approaching the rich in the Gospel. He took time to visit a dying servant (though he found her dead on his arrival) and personally visited Peter, James and John to invite them to be his disciples, but I don't remember him taking time to visit the rich or those in high positions. In Luke, he said "Blessed are the poor" and in another instance he praised a poor widow who gave her last two small copper coins, while belittling the donations of the rich. Except for one guy---Zacchaeus, I often wonder why Jesus stayed away from the rich. What did he see in Zacchaeus to invite himself to his house, even saying, "I must stay at your house today." Was it because Zacchaeus wanted to see him? But other rich people wanted to see him, too. Nicodemus wanted to see him, but Jesus never invited himself to his place. I think it was Zacchaeus' death-defying tree-climb that prompted Jesus to want to stay at his place. Seriousl

Wordpress.Com "Just look at the positive side of things." This phrase tacitly accepts there are negative sides to life. But it wants to ignore them and wants to focus on the "bright side" instead---which will never work. God knew this. I mean, he himself designed life to have both positive and negative, and he never intended to ignore or hide the negative. It will never work. If you're Truth (Jesus is the Truth), you have to openly deal with both without covering up or hiding anything. He calls good "good" and bad "bad." He never thought he had to hide the fact that one time he "regretted" ever creating man. Watch how he put it in writing in the bible: The LORD regretted that he had made human beings on the earth, and his heart was deeply troubled. [Genesis 6.6] He also "regretted" making Saul king [1 Samuel 15.11]. He could have just kept quiet about it or kept it a secret and focused on the bright side of t

Secret Entourage Ministers, especially pastors, should be extra sharp to discern the difference, because a very thin line separates one from the other. Are you Spirit-led or income-led? Did you end up in ministry because of a divine call or because you were looking for profitable work and got one, and then somehow ministry followed? To be sure, income sources are God's blessings. The more the merrier. I love to be in a lucrative business. In fact, the church can be in business as the Acts church was. But we are NOT to be led or controlled by our income source, business or money. All who are led thus end up like prophet Balaam---always bargaining for the right price while pretending to be after God's leading. Abram got wealthy while "in the process" of obeying God. He didn't leave Ur for greener pasture somewhere. He left Ur without knowing where he'd end up. He left simply because he obeyed God. Unlike a lot of pastors today who leave for the US, Ca

Flickr Among clear Kingdom teachings we find in the Gospel is how real happiness is really about compassion. The world often pictures a happy person as one who travels a lot and enjoying posh vacation resorts in the world, eating in fancy exotic restaurants, wearing the best apparels, riding the most expensive cars, owning huge mansions, etc. And all these could be a lot fun, really.  But the Gospel (the good news of the Kingdom) never highlights these things as true fun or happiness. It tells us real fun is what Jesus spoke about in the Beatitudes, which defined the life of Jesus Christ. And foremost among what the Gospel considers real fun is that happy are the poor in spirit . Jesus was the picture of a happy man, although he didn't travel the world or caroused day and night, or shopped till he dropped. Being poor in spirit means you find a lot of happiness in whatever you have or find before you. You're so easy to please. You don't need to look for other thi

Our Happy Cat One day I told a religious church leader that the Gospel was about how to be happy in life. His eyes widened, like he saw a ghost, and he protested: "The Gospel is about how we can be saved from sins!" I was about to tell him that the Gospel was also about being successful in life and career, but I thought I better not. He might have rebuked me like I were a demon. Of course, the Gospel is about how people can be saved from sins. But it's not limited to that. It's about many other things. It can be about how to deal with your boss or your subordinates effectively. Or how to choose the right career for you. Or how to save money and invest to grow it exponentially. Or how to be healthy and fit. God's Word is profitable for everything because it is about LIFE. And LIFE is not just about being saved from sins. Some folks may be shocked at this, but there's actually LIFE after salvation. And God wants that life to be happy. In fact, ano

Adhesives & Sealants Industry Here's Part 1 Residual income is income you get even after a sale is done and over. You still get income from that one sale you made a long time ago, and that income never stops. That's earthly marketing. Something like that also happens in the spiritual realms. Sharing God's Word to people and living out the Word of God daily (living the LIFE of Jesus daily) brings you great rewards. In fact, anything done for God and his Kingdom according to God's Word brings you rewards. God is not unjust; he will not forget your work and the love you have shown him as you have helped his people and continue to help them. [Hebrews 6.10] And another promise goes like this: Always give yourselves fully to the work of the Lord, because you know that your labor in the Lord is not in vain. [1 Corinthians 15.58] Continuing Blessings But blessings in Christ are not just one-time affairs. They keep going on---provided you continue to sh

From the site 123RF It's all so wonderful! Working for God in his Kingdom is very profitable. Whether you are a sower, a reaper, the one who waters or all of the above, you earn "points" that translate to rewards in God's Kingdom. The one who plants and the one who waters have one purpose, and they will each be rewarded according to their own labor. [1 Corinthians 3.8] You see two things here: 1. The one who plants and the one who waters should "have one purpose." As long as they have one purpose, everything will be fun and smooth sailing. The problem happens if they have opposing purposes. For instance, if churches are in competition because they have different denominations. They try to outdo each other in evangelism, ending up grabbing people from each other. One church may even say the other church "stole" its members. Clearly, they don't have one purpose, so what they do is not God's work---because God's work, acc

pixabay.com If you can't believe perfection, how else are you going to believe Christ's other teachings? Lots of church people and preachers trash perfection because they like to keep their status as "saved sinners." They keep holding on to that and plan to die with it. They often even shout their slogans: "Nobody is perfect, and you cannot be perfect. There's no perfect church!" They don't realize how they're beginning to sound like detractors than promoters of God's Kingdom on earth and God's plan for his "glorious" church. But ironically, these same people flaunt around their high standards. They like to show people how they post nothing on Facebook except bible verses. They like people to know that they are strict and want nothing but "the best" for God. For instance, you may see them practicing their songs or special numbers for long hours, repeating their rehearsals again and again, spending late ni

velopeter.dk The least is the greatest in the Kingdom of God. Before God uses anyone, he or she must first be the greatest in the Kingdom. So that person must be the least . Being the least , especially being least in the eyes of men---this is the main ingredient before God uses you powerfully. So He takes you to the desert. Jesus was taken to the desert as soon as he came out in the power of the Holy Spirit from being baptized. After a bathing of tremendous power like that, you need the wilderness experience to keep you humble. Only power made perfect in weakness can defeat Satan in the wilderness, not positions, money, achievements, degrees, titles, or anything valued by the world. Thus, the Holy Spirit immediately led Jesus to the desert so he can remain the least . John the baptizer was son of Zechariah the priest. Being priest, Zechariah led a materially abundant life. Priests and Levites were well fed and provided for as indicated in Deuteronomy 18. They had no inheri

www.dreamstime.com You may be wondering---why do we need to receive Jesus Christ into our hearts and why does he have to enter into our bodies? Why can't God just declare us saved once we have faith in him? Jesus has to enter our bodies because he needs to be revealed in us. We always carry around in our body the death of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may also be revealed in our body. For we who are alive are always being given over to death for Jesus’ sake, so that his life may also be revealed in our mortal body. [2 Corinthians 4.10-11] How important is Christ being in us? Paul described it simply: "Christ in you the hope of glory." It's God's plan to glorify Jesus Christ in our bodies. Thus, we have to receive him, invite him to enter our bodies---our lives---so we can reveal him in these last days. The idea is to form Christ in us: My dear children, for whom I am again in the pains of childbirth until Christ is formed in you, [Galatians 4.

dooneawa.net JUDGMENT. What if no one judged anyone as many today demand? Even church people demand this. Even some church leaders. People today cry out in the wilderness---"Do not judge us!" Or "Don't be judgmental!" Imagine if we all stopped judging. What would happen to the world? What would happen to church? It will be exactly as the time Moses went up Sinai for 40 days and the Israelites engaged in idolatrous revelry at the foot of the mountain. Without judgment, people are hellbent on idolatry, even church people. God's judgment is His love. He judges because He wants to correct our ways. He wants us to stay in straight paths. And in the bible, God did this by sending his servants to pronounce the judgment on people. His servants spoke for Him. If God is in you in Christ, you also should judge because you love your neighbor as yourself. Prophets were called to pronounce God's judgments. And they were hated for it. Just like today. And