davidbowerkingwood

 Are You Content With Your Quality of Life

In the privacy of your own thoughts do you find that your life consistently displays the fruit of the Holy Spirit? Can you say with conviction that the vast majority of the time my life manifests love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control? If you can, then you are living a Spirit led life; if you cannot then the opportunity still exists to change that.

I believe we can generally agree had God chosen He could have taken his children home the very moment they were born again into His family; He has obviously chosen not to do that. We, as His children, are given the opportunity to live out our appointed days endowed with a living soul, a living spirit, and a mortal cursed body. I have found it amusing that the only part of us that can be seen is the one part of us that has not been redeemed.

Our mortal bodies will either return to the dust or be transformed as a part of the First Resurrection as described in 1 Thessalonians 4:16-17, “16 For the Lord himself will come down from heaven, with a loud command, with the voice of the archangel and with the trumpet call of God, and the dead in Christ will rise first. 17 After that, we who are still alive and are left will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. And so we will be with the Lord forever.”

In the meantime what about quality of life you may well ask and we are given an answer to that in a number of places. In Romans 8:28-30 we are told, “28 And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose. 29 For those God foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brothers and sisters. 30 And those he predestined, he also called; those he called, he also justified; those he justified, he also glorified.”

During our mortal lives we are experiencing the process of being conformed to the image of his Son and in addition we have responsibilities as determined for each of us by our Lord. Our quality of life depends on how amenable we are to this process of conformation and how faithful we are to the practical daily implementation of God’s word in our lives. Our lives come with a lot of assembly required and the Bible is the manufacturer’s assembly instructions; we ignore it at our own peril.

Please remember that our eternal security as a part of God’s family is never in question. We can confirm with confidence that we are “Once Saved, Always Saved” and Romans 8:1-2 should be a source of great joy to the Christian, “Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus, because through Christ Jesus the law of the Spirit who gives life has set you free from the law of sin and death.”

A Daily Choice

Each day brings a fresh opportunity to choose our lifestyle and our perspective on life and living; at the most basic level we can choose to live by faith or live by sight. The Bible is filled with advice from our Creator on how to live each day in a manner that will provide the greatest joy and satisfaction; God wants His children to enjoy life and offers the Holy Spirit as a guide and counselor.

The fruit of a Spirit led life includes those qualities all of us seek but look for in all the wrong places. In Galatians 5:22-25 the qualities of the Spirit led life are listed, “²² But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, ²³ gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law. ²⁴ Those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires. ²⁵ Since we live by the Spirit, let us keep in step with the Spirit.”

It is most important to realize that the fruit of the Spirit is a blessing generated by the power of the Holy Spirit; it is not a work that we do in our own power. For us to think we can produce this fruit in our own power is pride and you know what the Bible says about pride, “Pride goes before destruction, a haughty spirit before a fall.” Proverbs 16:18

There are probably few, if any, human beings who would not like to have their lives characterized by love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Why then do they seem to be so rare? How many Christians do you know whose lives are consistently characterized by these qualities? There may be a few but probably not many.

What is the Problem?

Since these qualities are so desirable for enriching one’s life why are they so inconsistently found in the Christian community? There is a simple answer to that question and the answer is sin. Although our eternal position before God has been perfected by the shed blood of Christ our daily battle with sin is an ongoing problem with which we must all live. The Bible tells us in Romans 14:23b, “everything that does not come from faith is sin.” That means it is very easy to sin; whenever we worry, fear, doubt or think or do anything that is not of faith we are sinning against God and quenching the power of the Holy Spirit in our lives. When the power of the Holy Spirit is quenched in our lives the fruit of the Spirit is gone too!

God knew we would have a problem with sin so He provided an answer for His children which is stated in 1 John 1:8-10, “⁸ If we claim to be without sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us. ⁹ If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness. ¹⁰ If we claim we have not sinned, we make him out to be a liar and his word is not in us.”

The key to God’s answer to our sin problem is found in verse 9, “If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness.” In His grace, God not only forgives us our known sins but also purifies us from all unrighteousness as well. When we confess our sins to God the power of the Holy Spirit can be restored in our lives and we then have the opportunity to live a Spirit led life and manifest the fruit of the Holy Spirit.

In Summary

As Christians we have been eternally justified before the Father by the shed blood of the Lord Jesus Christ. Our position as God’s child in God’s eternal family has been secured by the power of God and is unalterable; we can never lose our salvation! Our daily experience with sin is another matter entirely and while it has nothing to do with our eternal security as a believer it has everything to do with the power of the Holy Spirit in our lives and our overall quality of life.

When we live our lives by sight and not by faith, we are sinning and quenching the power of the Holy Spirit. If we recognize our sinful thoughts or deeds and confess them to God He will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness and this restores the power of the Holy Spirit in our lives and opens the door to a Spirit led life filled with the fruit of the Spirit.

Don’t Miss Out On The Blessings God Wants You To Enjoy!