The Abiding Life: Part 12 Romans 8:11

Romans 8:11

11 But if the Spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, He who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through His Spirit who dwells in you.

This should be an easy verse to understand. If the Holy Spirit dwells in you then that same spirit will give life to your body.

If we can accept that basic concept then we will find it so much easier to walk the Christian life. The Holy Spirit guides not just our hearts and minds but our very bodies.

Of course it's never that easy for us. We always have questions. A discussion that came up in our study was, "How can the "mortal body" be separate from the flesh?" Remember, Paul refers to the mortal body when discussing our physical self and the flesh when discussing sins, i.e. The sins of the flesh.

So how can it be separated? Physically, literally of course we can't separate our flesh from our bodies, but spiritually? Now that's a different story.

The moment temptation hits we must make a split second choice. Will we give in to temptation? Will we gossip, lie, cheat, steal, etc..? Or will we yield to the Spirit that dwells within us to flow through us? To guide our thoughts and actions. Yes actions by allowing the spirit to guide our "mortal bodies" we turn away from sin. At that moment our flesh (temptation) is separated from our "mortal bodies".

It's a delicate dance with God always allowing us to choose. Give in to the flesh or yield to the Spirit? Sadly, the correct choice often seems the harder one. That's because we are not yielding to the Spirit we are trying to be good or do the right thing on our own. People, it's possible but very very hard. And doing it ourselves does not glorify God. But by yielding? By allowing the Spirit to flow through us.. now that is so amazingly easy. Let go and let God.. remember that saying? Well, that's pretty much what happens when our "mortal bodies" are controlled by the Spirit. And oh the joy that can be found in doing so.

Shauni

*remember these are my thoughts on this verse and what I took away from my Bible study.. feel free to add yours to the discussion.

The Abiding Life: Part 11 John 15: 1-12

We all know this scripture but do we really understand it? Sure in theory maybe but have you broken it down??

John 15: 1-12

1 "I am the true vine, and My Father is the vinedresser.
2 "Every branch in Me that does not bear fruit, He takes away; and every branch that bears fruit, He prunes it so that it may bear more fruit.
3 "You are already clean because of the word which I have spoken to you.
4 "Abide in Me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself unless it abides in the vine, so neither can you unless you abide in Me.
5 "I am the vine, you are the branches; he who abides in Me and I in him, he bears much fruit, for apart from Me you can do nothing.
6 "If anyone does not abide in Me, he is thrown away as a branch and dries up; and they gather them, and cast them into the fire and they are burned.
7 "If you abide in Me, and My words abide in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be done for you.
8 "My Father is glorified by this, that you bear much fruit, and so prove to be My disciples.
9 "Just as the Father has loved Me, I have also loved you; abide in My love.
10 "If you keep My commandments, you will abide in My love; just as I have kept My Father’s commandments and abide in His love.
11 "These things I have spoken to you so that My joy may be in you, and that your joy may be made full.
12 "This is My commandment, that you love one another, just as I have loved you.
When I read this, I always took this to mean we are a family, in Christ. All of our branches connect due to the vine. Yes that could be considered accurate but it's seriously limiting God's power. Limiting how God uses you.

The essential nature of God (The Christian Life) is not something that we produce, it is something that flows through us. We are the branches, we BEAR the fruit but the vine itself is what actually produces it, cut off the branch and what you have is a dead branch but the vine can still produce.

By being Living Branches (huge shout out to my First Family High School Choir, the Living Branches) we can be pruned and sculpted. God will do whatever He needs to do in our lives to get us to produce the most fruit possible. Our dead weight removed in order to bear God's perfect fruit.

So what does this all tell us? We can't do it ourselves. We are incapable of creating the fruit, the Vine (God) creates the fruit. And once the branch starts to bear fruit, the Vinter (God) must do His utmost to make that branch strong enough to bear plentiful and abundant fruit.

And for being that branch we are rewarded. We are given a promise of a life full of Joy!!

Shauni

*remember these are my thoughts on this verse and what I took away from my Bible study.. feel free to add yours to the discussion.

The Abiding Life: Part 10 Col 1:27

Colossians 1:27
 
27 to whom God willed to make known what is the riches of the glory of this mystery among the Gentiles, which is Christ in you, the hope of glory.

To me, this verse firmly takes us from being inactive to active. God not only dwells in us but now H is using us as a witness. God in all his fullness. Yes, His Spirit (the Holy Spirit) dwells in us but we must remember that we represent the Trinity, the fullness of God.

John 14:7
 
7 If you had known Me, you would have known My Father also; from now on you know Him, and have seen Him.”

And does our purpose become? To have Chris in us with the hop of glory.

*Glory - enhance the reputation of another

There are discussions about the meaning of glory pertaining to this verse.

• Some think it means that while Christ lives in us now, we have the promise of future glory in heaven with Him.
•  Others believe that it means that if we allow Christ to guide us, to flow through us, we have that glory right now.

While I agree with the first explanation, we as Christians will live in Glory with Jesus, in heaven. I personally feel that this particular verse has a more imminent meaning. In this body, right now. If Jesus lives in me, I have the hope of a life of glory. Being used as an instrument to glorify God.

*To Glorify - To cause the dignity and worth of something else to be clearly seen, understood and acknowledged by another.

1 Peter 2:12

12 Keep your behavior excellent among the Gentiles, so that in the thing in which they slander you as evildoers, they may because of your good deeds, as they observe them, glorify God in the day of visitation.

By choosing to walk in the Spirit, we bear witness to Him. By our very actions we glorify Him by word and deed. 

Shauni

*remember these are my thoughts on this verse and what I took away from my Bible study.. feel free to add yours to the discussion.

 

The Abiding Life: Part 9 Romans 8:1

ROMANS 8:1

Therefore there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.

13 words that's all today's verse entails. 13 words that release us from the troubles of this world. It's rather amazing, isn't it?

Romans 8:1 tells us that we are not condemned to live with the "I" factor. We are FREE if we understand the spiritual life.

There is so much that can be said about this verse, so many ways to rejoice but I am going to focus on the fact that we are FREE from bondage. We are no longer slaves to Sin. For if we put our lives in Jesus' hands. If we allow the spirit to flow through us. If we choose Christ then we are FREE. It's that simple!

Shauni

*remember these are my thoughts on this verse and what I took away from my Bible study.. feel free to add yours to the discussion.

The Abiding Life: Part 8 Romans 7: 15, 17, 19 & 20

Romans 7: 15 - 20

 15 For what I am doing, I do not understand; for I am not practicing what I would like to do, but I am doing the very thing I hate.
 16 But if I do the very thing I do not want to do, I agree with the Law, confessing that the Law is good. 
 17 So now, no longer am I the one doing it, but sin which dwells in me.
 18 For I know that nothing good dwells in me, that is, in my flesh; for the willing is present in me, but the doing of the good is not.
 19 For the good that I want, I do not do, but I practice the very evil that I do not want.
 20 But if I am doing the very thing I do not want, I am no longer the one doing it, but sin which dwells in me.

I am going g to break this down just a bit... first let's look at verses 15 & 19

 15 For what I am doing, I do not understand; for I am not practicing what I would like to do, but I am doing the very thing I hate.
 19 For the good that I want, I do not do, but I practice the very evil that I do not want.

 These two verses are full of what I call the "I" factor (otherwise known as me, Me, ME). We as Christians want to serve God but continually fail. Why? The "I" factor. I want to do righteous deeds but because I am born of the flesh I fail. And sometimes find myself falling back on my SIN nature.


Let's take this a bit further by adding verse 17 after verse 15

15 For what I am doing, I do not understand; for I am not practicing what I would like to do, but I am doing the very thing I hate.

 17 So now, no longer am I the one doing it, but sin which dwells in me.

And verse 20 after verse 19

19 For the good that I want, I do not do, but I practice the very evil that I do not want.

 20 But if I am doing the very thing I do not want, I am no longer the one doing it, but sin which dwells in me.

I read this and realized how easily this can be misread.  Paul did not write this as an excuse for his sin nature but rather as an explanation for his sins. 

Basically the way I see it, we want to walk a righteous path but Sin (pride, temptation, etc...) dwells (lives) within us and is constantly tempting us to stray. When we flounder we need to allow God's Spirit to flow through us. And when we stumble, when we falter, when we sin, we need to recognize where it is coming from. Then once again yield to the spirit.

Romans 8:13

13 for if you are living according to the flesh, you must die; but if by the Spirit you are putting to death the deeds of the body, you will live.

A veritable fork in the road. Yes sin dwells within us but we need to consciously choose to live by the Spirit.

Galatians 5:25

25 If we live by the Spirit, let us also walk by the Spirit.

So we make that conscious choice to live by the Spirit. We choose the path we walk on. And once we choose to walk in the Spirit the "I" factor will fade as God's Spirit will shine through.

Shauni

*remember these are my thoughts on this verse and what I took away from my Bible study.. feel free to add yours to the discussion.

The Abiding Life: Part 7 Romans 6:12-13

Romans 6:12-13

 12 Therefore do not let sin reign in your mortal body so that you obey its lusts, 

13 and do not go on presenting the members of your body to sin as instruments of

unrighteousness; but present yourselves to God as those alive from the dead, and your members as instruments of righteousness to God.

Therefore? Way back in Mrs. Elkhart's 7th grade language arts class, I was taught... if it says therefore, find out what it's there for. So what's your therefore, there for? Remember yesterday's verse,   Romans 6:11

11 Even so consider yourselves to be dead to sin, but alive to God in Christ Jesus.

There's our therefore... if we are dead to sin and alive in Christ, we must not let sin reign in our lives. Wait...that's confusing isn't sin a constant in our lives??? Well it's there. But in this case we are not speaking of the sins of the flesh, rather of sin. There's a difference???

SIN - the original pride, self centeredness, power or entity that tempts us. Going all the way back to push temptation and doubt into our lives... aka Lucifer, Satan, The Devil, Bealzabub, etc...

Sins - those actions we take when we give in to Sin.

There is plenty of terminology in these two verses that can lead to some confusion. What exactly is Paul referring to when he says mortal body? Just that. The flesh, bones, muscle of our physical selves...as opposed to when he says flesh, that usually implies our sinful nature, ie. Sins of the Flesh. What are the members he speaks of?? This can be compared to our senses... and instruments? What do we all need to play the tuba? No an instrument is a tool of sorts. A tuba is in fact a musical tool.

So, what does that mean to us?

We are dead to Sin sooo do not let it control our body's actions. Do not let it back inside. What we need to do is take our physical body to God allowing Him to use all of us (head, shoulders, knees and toes) not just our bodies but our senses, our heart, all of us. And use them as tools (or be realistic allow God to use them as tools) of righteousness to God.

Any clearer?

Bottom line, use our tools to serve God not sin.

Shauni

*remember these are my thoughts on this verse and what I took away from my Bible study.. feel free to add yours to the discussion.

The Abiding Life: Part 6 Romans 6:11

Romans 6:11

 11 Even so consider yourselves to be dead to sin, but alive to God in Christ Jesus.

Even so? Even so what? Today's verse is a continuation of Part 4. We slipped Colassions 2:12-14 in there yesterday because it works well in this series BUT Romans 6:11 is a pivotal part in truly believing in an Abiding Life.

A one verse lesson? Well yeah, look at the power in that single verse. From the moment of your baptism, your acknowledgement if Christ's sacrifice for you, you may consider yourself dead to sin....

Consider??? Doesn't that mean think?? As in you think you might possibly be?? Nope.. In this case the word consider has more depth. When you ask someone to do a favor a response could be "Consider it done". As in you can put the very possibility of it not being done right out of your mind. So it isn't a case of waffling between seeing it done and hopping maybe it's true. No, in this case, in God's case it's a matter of it's already done. Know it, believe it.

Sometimes it's hard because we get list in the translation. But when we remember that God doesn't deal in maybes. God deals in absolutes. He has declared us dead to sin and Alive to Christ. Embrace this...revel in it.

Shauni





*remember these are my thoughts on this verse and what I took away from my Bible study.. feel free to add yours to the discussion.

The Abiding Life: Part 5 Col 2:12-14

You may have noticed that I am going back and forth between this Abiding Life Series and my Daily Psalms Series. I am doing this because I want to follow our discussions in our Sunday class.

We are discussing first knowing our faith and the using our knowledge to live an abiding life in Jesus. Then finally how to use that knowledge of our faith to witness and share that faith.

Colossians 2:12-14 

12 having been buried with Him in baptism, in which you were also raised up with Him through faith in the working of God, who raised Him from the dead.
 13 When you were dead in your transgressions and the uncircumcision of your flesh, He made you alive together with Him, having forgiven us all our transgressions, 
 14 having canceled out the certificate of debt consisting of decrees against us, which was hostile to us; and He has taken it out of the way, having nailed it to the cross.

Buried with Him - of course we were not physically wrapped in linens and buried in the tomb with Jesus but spiritually, that's a different matter. In His death, He gathered our tattered souls riddled with sin and took them with Him. Upon rising from His death He returned to us a new soul, cleansed of any sin and surrounded by the Holy Spirit.

With our baptism, we acknowledge His sacrifice. Thereby dying with Him and rising from the waters a new being.

Think About it -clean slate-  with a new spirit, alive in Christ.

ALL of our Sins have been forgiven. Not just the ones we are aware of, not just the ones we have committed, but ALL of them. Past, present and future.

Cancelled our certificate of debt.

Best analogy??
It's like a credit card, we accumulate debt and once a month we receive a statement. We can either pay a monthly amount, keeping us in debt, or we can pay off the entire bill.

God has paid our debt in full. Only we don't receive a monthly statement. We get that one time, when we stand before the throne. Fortunately for us, our bill will be stamped Paid in full.

All of our Sins have been forgiven. That doesn't mean we should run out and sin Willy, nilly. No, we need to continue to strive to live a Christ like life.

But.. when we stumble, when we fail, God has already created a way we can continue on.


1 John 1:9 

 9 If we confess our sins, He is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.

We know that God has as already forgiven our Sins but we still need to acknowledge our unrighteousness. We need to confess these sins and allow God to show us His faithfulness.

We are a truly blessed people! All we need to do is grab a hold of the promises God has made us and we can live that abiding life in Christ.

Shauni

*remember these are my thoughts on this verse and what I took away from my Bible study.. feel free to add yours to the discussion.

The Abiding Life: Part 4 Romans 6: 3-4

Romans 6:3-4 

3 Or don’t you know that all of us who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? 

4 We were therefore buried with him through baptism into death in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, we too may live a new life.


There is an interesting concept among believers, it started in the early church and in some ways continues to this day.

Concept: 
The more we sin, the better we show God's grace.. *snort* 

You have to give them credit.. that particular concept allows us to almost unaccountable for our sins. But people that's just not it!

If you want the full context you need to read vs 1-13. 

Sure we were born into sin but we died to sin in our baptism. We rose with new souls clean and pure. Why would we then choose to tarnish it with sin. Instead we should strive to remain dead to sin and show God's grace by our commitment to Him.

"Our victory over temptation begins by what we KNOW about ourselves" Tom Schoeneck

We have been baptized in Christ,
    Baptize- Immersed, signifies Change

So we KNOW:

• we have been Baptized in Christ
• we have risen with a new heart and a new spirit
• that God has shared His spirit with us

So instead of sharing God's grace through sin we must walk in the newness of life.

Shauni

*remember these are my thoughts on this verse and what I took away from my Bible study.. feel free to add yours to the discussion.

The Abiding Life: Part 3 Ezekiel 36: 26-27

Yesterday I spoke of the need for a new heart. Fortunately for us, God is willing to give us that heart AND a new spirit as well.. He is willing, in fact he truly desires to do just that, to remove our hearts of stone and give us hearts of flesh.

Ezekiel 36:26-27 

26 I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you; I will remove from you your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh. 

27 And I will put my Spirit in you and move you to follow my decrees and be careful to keep my laws.

God promises us three things in these verses..

1. 1. A New Heart
2. 2. A New Spirit
3. His Spirit.

In one promise He says He will basically renew us, not repair the old heart and spirit but give us NEW ones. 

*an interesting side discussion came up during our class & something worth noting. God says He will remove our heart of stone and replace it with a heart of flesh. We as Christians often refer to the flesh as being part of our sinful nature. God is NOT replacing our hearts of stone with a heart with a sinful nature, we already took care of that.. Here it means He will replace it with a softened heart open to Him

Another explanation is he will take away Satan's pride. 

IS 14: 13-14

13 "You said in your heart,“I will ascend to the heavens; 

I will raise my throne above the stars of God;

I will sit enthroned on the mount of assembly,on the utmost heights of Mount Zaphon. 

14 I will ascend above the tops of the clouds;

I will make myself like the Most High.”

Think about how a heart can harden into stone and make these statements or lead us to lead such a prideful life. 

Our pride will offer cold comfort when we are cast from God's presence. But God offers to remove that dead and hardened heart and to replace it with a living breathing part of Him.

Seriously!! Hallelujah!! 

Shauni

*remember these are my thoughts on this verse and what I took away from my Bible study.. feel free to add yours to the discussion.

The Abiding Life: Part 2 Mark 7:20-23

Mark 7:20-23 

20 He went on: “What comes out of a person is what defiles them. 

21 For it is from within, out of a person’s heart, that evil thoughts come—sexual immorality, theft, murder, 

22 adultery, greed, malice, deceit, lewdness, envy, slander, arrogance and folly. 

23 All these evils come from inside and defile a person.”

Basically what is being said here is that all of our sins come from the heart of man. When we remain without God's Guidance, help, spirit we remain a sinful being. 

We can be extreme discipline and work become one of the "good" people. People who want to do good who help others and try to live a decent life but we retain our sinful hearts and are sure to eventually fail. It can't be helped we can not be Godly using our sinful heart. We will stumble at beast falling into the vices of the flesh. Be it greed, jealousy, vice, whatever.. We are more susceptible to fall .

In order to serve God, truly and faithfully, we need an entirely new heart. We need God's spirit to cleanse us of our fallen flesh and rejuvenate us with His heart and Spirit.

We will still be tempted, we might still stumble and we might still fall but that will be when we deny ourselves of God's Spirit and Heart.

Shauni

*remember these are my thoughts on this verse and what I took away from my Bible study.. feel free to add yours to the discussion.

The Abiding Life: Part 1, Gen 1:26-27

We recently started a Bible Study on verses that help with our Abiding Life.. And how that can lead into discipleship. I thought I would use the verses for my individual Bible Study. To further study each verse. Then the light bulb went on and I decided to go ahead and post my thoughts here. It's time I got back to my bog and this was an excellent place to start.

I have discovered over time that it really helps me to put my thoughts about such class discussions into writing thus making it even easier to share with you all.

Genesis 1:26-27

26 Then God said, “Let us make mankind in our image, in our likeness, so that they may rule over the fish in the sea and the birds in the sky, over the livestock and all the wild animals,[a] and over all the creatures that move along the ground.”

27 So God created mankind in his own image, in the image of God he created them; male and female he created them.

Interesting fact.. This is the only time in the Bible when the words image and likeness are both used. Usually they are interchangeable but the nuances of the words matter this time.

Image - 1)Copy or Replica 2)Able to express the essential nature of something.

So when we were made in God's image we were created to express God's essence. Not so much as His looks and form but rather the spirit. The part that makes Him God. We were created to share God's essence..

Likeness - True representation, like a picture.

This is more what we think when we say image. We were created in God's likeness. We are not God we are representatives. It's like a picture, that's our likeness on paper but it lacks our essence. But Good took care of that. He created us in both His image and His likeness.

So there you have it, Mankind was created to represent the essential and true nature of God.

Now that we hold such an awesome gift from God, how should we use it? We need to remember that we share God's image, His essential essence and let that shine through.

Most Christians (actually most people) are judged not by what they do (Like Dr, Lawyer, Cook, Bottle washer, etc..) but in who we are. What are essence is. Think about it.. you have a brilliant doctor.. great at his job but he's a total jerkface. While we might appreciate his talents we don't want to socialize with him. That's his essence we don't particularly like.

The easiest way to start witnessing to others is to allow God's essence to shine through in our everyday life. Make that who we are.

Shauni

*remember these are my thoughts on this verse and what I took away from my Bible study.. feel free to add yours to the discussion.