The Election and Making Things Right - Purity 1494

Welcome to the MT for Christ 24/7 podcast. I'm M.t. Clark, and this is today's photo. To see today's photo, go to mtforchrist.com or follow me, M.t. Clark, on Facebook or Twitter, or watch us on YouTube. Good morning. Today's photo of a frosty, foggy November morning comes to us from yours truly as I stopped long enough from shivering and shaking to capture the scene yesterday. During my walk into the ethereal countryside haze along Waite Road in Easton, New York. Well, it's Monday, and while the pathway along Waite Road wasn't as clear as it normally is, I was confident that as long as I stayed on the road, I was sure I wouldn't get lost in that morning haze, just as I know that as long as I yield my life to Christ and follow after him, that I will be saved no matter what comes my way. As America prepares for Election Day tomorrow, the future is as unclear as today's photo. And the thing that is a little ironic is that both parties are pushing for people to vote with fervor because they envision the opposite side winning as an apocalyptic nightmare. Uh, it seems like we couldn't do— be more divided as a people right now, and it seems that the enemy has been busy at work filling people with fear and hatred. As a Christian life coach and prayer minister who tries to assist others to go to God in prayerful repentance to be set free from, from the sin and negative mind states that could be the result of demonic oppression, I understand that much of the turmoil in our country comes from the fact that people are trusting in the wrong things to save them. Our society at large doesn't believe in a sovereign living God that controls the history of mankind. And has instead wrongfully trusted in the government, other men, money, substances, or possessions to make them happy and to give them peace. As a society, we have made idols out of these things, and our idolatry and sin leave us open to the demonic forces of darkness to drive us into further sin and the negative mind states of fear, depression, and anger. Resulting in the loss of our peace and to our destruction if the enemy has his way. However divided and afraid our society is of the possibility of the other side winning, I know that regardless of who becomes the next POTUS, my future is secured in the safety of having a covenant relationship with the Lord through my faith in Jesus Christ. Jesus came to give men peace with God and to undo the works of Satan, to set the captives free. And so I will pray and continue to share the good news of Jesus Christ in the hopes that the Lord will use, uh, my efforts to save some and to help other Christians to be set free from the fear that politics drives into them and from the sins and wrong ideas that lead them to despair. We can be made right with God, and when that happens, the rest of life is taken care of as we yield to Christ and discover the wonders of his love and the freedom, peace, and joy that comes from walking in the Spirit into our certain futures in God's kingdom that starts right now and goes on from here to eternity. Speaking of making things right, today's Turning Point devotion, uh, with Dr. Gerald— uh, David Jeremiah addresses this topic, so I'm sharing it on the blog today to encourage us. And Dr. Jeremiah writes, um, making things right. And so, and so it is written, the first man Adam became a living being, the last Adam became a life-giving spirit. 1 Corinthians 15:45. There are— and David Jeremiah writes, there are no more welcome words in the midst of a conflicted relationship than these: I'd like to make things right between us. In a general sense, that is the story of the Bible as illustrated in 1 Corinthians 15:45, the comparison of the first Adam with the last Adam. The first Adam was created as a living being, but he lost his life spiritually and physically when he sinned. The last Adam, Jesus Christ, came to restore that lost life. He was a picture of what mankind should be like. He was the true Son of Man. His disciples and the public had never seen a man like Jesus, a man not marred by sin. When he performed miracles like the calming of the storm on the Sea of Galilee, his disciples exclaimed, "What kind of man is this?" We see in Christ what God created mankind to be. We also see that it is the likeness of Christ to which God is shaping those who belong to him. Is everything right between you and God? It can be when you yield your life to Christ. David Jeremiah, and he also shares a quote from J.I. Packer which says, sanctification is the progressive restoration of a man's rationality so that he becomes a man. And I say amen. I was blessed yesterday to walk with a brother in Christ as we as he got right with God through the prayerful repentance process, the Steps to Freedom in Christ. In the process, this man confessed all his known sins, forgave those who hurt him, and broke all ties to the occult, his sexual sins of the flesh, and generational curses. And going through— and in going before God in prayer, he was able to resolve the spiritual conflicts of the past. And so today we rejoice However, now begins the true journey of discipleship. Will he follow the Lord with the way he lives his life going forward? As Jeremiah put it, will he yield his life to Christ? I pray he does, and I'm willing to walk alongside him as long as he chooses to follow after the Lord, and anyone else I meet on my walk into God's will for my life. Being right with God requires faith in Jesus, and a daily decision to do things God's way. This is the pathway to peace, meaning, and purpose for our lives. And unfortunately, few know it because few are willing to yield their life to Jesus. Few are willing to surrender. But those of us who do know what I'm talking about, uh, keep on walking and talking with God and share the good news of the Gospel of Jesus Christ and the freedom and victory that is available to us when we decide to live by faith in the power of the Holy Spirit. As Peter said to Jesus when he— when many began to walk away and Jesus questioned whether or not he wanted to leave too, Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life, and we have believed and have come to know that you are the Holy One of God. We have come to know that Jesus is the Holy One of God. When we trust in Jesus for our salvation and experience our freedom in Christ, we know there is nowhere else to go but to follow him into the peace, love, and joy that comes from being right with God and living with and for him. As always— well, no, I always— I always go there. Um, today's Bible verses are brought to us from the Quick Scripture Reference for Counseling by John G. Crews. This morning's meditation verses come from the section on giving, and today's Bible verses come from Luke 21. And today we are sharing 1 through 4 from the New Living Translation, which says, while Jesus was in the temple, he watched the rich people dropping their gifts in the collection box. Then a poor widow came by and dropped in two small coins. I tell you the truth, Jesus said, this poor widow has given more than all the rest of them, for they have given a tiny part of their surplus, but she For as she is, has given everything she has. Today's verses fall under the first point of our Counseling Reference Guides on the, uh, section on giving. And yeah, so there you go. Um, yeah. And yeah. Oops, sorry, my bad. On giving. And well, what is that first point that you may ask? Well, I didn't paste that into the PowerPoint, but I do know it's here somewhere. Let me take a look. The first point is that Jesus heartily approved of this widow's small gift. So there, um, today's Bible verses teach us that a little bit can mean a lot when we give in the name of the Lord. Here, the widow had a pittance to give, but because of her willingness to give the little she had to support the good works of the temple, Jesus declared that her small offering meant more than the offerings of others who gave out of their abundance. God calls us to be good stewards of what we have and to give to others generously when we can, because it supports the good works he put us here to accomplish and because it demonstrates our trust in him to provide. While we shouldn't give to get and bankrupt ourselves hoping for some fantastic blessing from sowing a seed inspired by some prosperity gospel preacher, we should go to the Lord and listen to what he's telling us about giving. We need to be wise and discerning when we follow God, but we should also be willing to do what normally would be unthinkable, like giving to others, because when we do so, we become more like Jesus, who paid for everything, for everyone, for always. As always, we encourage everyone to go to mtforchrist.com, where we always share insights from prominent Christian theologians and counselors to assist our brothers and sisters in Christ with Today we continue sharing from According to Your Word: Morning and Evening Through the New Testament by Stephen F. Alpert. And in Alpert's devotional, he prompts us to read a chapter of scripture. Today's chapter is Revelation 15, and from that chapter he shares a portion of verse 3, which says, 'They sing the song of Moses, the servant of God, and the song of the Lamb.' And Stephen Alpert writes, 'It is beautiful to see that the song of these redeemed and sheltered Hebrews concerns none other than the Lamb. They sing not of their own courage, fidelity, and endurance in suffering and death, though they shall suffer as no one, humanly speaking, has ever suffered. But they sing of the power and glory of the Lamb. What height of spirituality is this! How pleasing to God! For then no suffering, no trial would ever dim the joy that is set before the truly spiritual Christian. Who has his vision filled with the glory of the Lamb, placed himself under the cross, despising the shame because of the joy that was set before him. Paul says that he reckons that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed in us. And Offered ends by praying, oh, that this principle would be true in my experience, Lord. Amen. Amen. Yeah. So we should always sing of the glory of the Lamb, of, you know, Jesus Christ. He's the sacrificial lamb, right? In the Old Testament, they had, you know, the lambs, you know, there were sacrifices made, and Jesus became our sacrifice because he was truly God and truly man. His sacrifice on the cross paid for all of men's sins. It's— however, uh, we, in order to, you know, receive the gift of the forgiveness of our sin and life in the kingdom, we, we do have to believe in Jesus. We have to believe what he did was meaningful and that he was who he said he is, that he was the Son of God and God the Son. And when we put our faith in him and that work on, on the cross, uh, we become children of God through faith in Jesus, and, uh, we can move into the freedom that he has for us. For the joy set before him that he went to the cross, um, because he knew that we needed salvation, the forgiveness of sins, but he also knew that we needed freedom from sin and from all the negative mind states that come from, you know, not knowing the truth. And so we, we ask the question always, have you fully surrendered to God? Have you put your faith in Jesus and are you living your life according to him? Have you yielded your life to Christ? We've discovered that this is the pathway to peace and purpose and meaning for life for all people. And, um, when we discover it, you know, we have joy. So we encourage people to do that every day. Uh, when you do it, amazing things happen. You know, you can find freedom in every new possible, and usually you find a purpose. And for me, um, one of the purposes that I've been called to is, uh, the leader at Celebrate Freedom support group at Starpoint Church, which is a Christian Recovery and Discipleship Ministry. Um, it's a support group, so come and get support. Uh, if you're in Upstate New York, we're in Clifton Park in the K-3 classroom every Wednesday. Um, and so we invite you to come out. Um, however, if, uh, you're not in Upstate New York and wanted to be encouraged, um, for men, there's a men's support group that I'm doing online called Grace for the Holidays, in which we'll be walking through the original Freedom in Christ, uh, Grace course. And basically, we're doing it during the holidays to support one another, to learn about God's grace, to try to experience more of God's grace in our lives. And I'm happy to say that people have already registered and paid their way. And so we're definitely doing this. So if you'd like to— if you know a man, or you're a man, and you want to sign up, basically, to join us, You know, um, go to mtforchrist.com and the groups teaching coaching page, whatever I have. I forget what it is, but it's on there. Um, it's a group event teaching event page, um, at mtforchrist.com, and you'll see Grace for the Holidays. You'll get more information about it, and you'll be able to submit your name and information for registration, and then we'll send you, you know, the bill, $60 for 6 weeks of, uh discipleship. Um, but, um, you know, we offer that as well. Um, beyond that, into the new year, we're doing the Freedom in Christ course yet again for Freedom in Christ Ministries. We'll be doing on 6:30 PM, uh, Freedom in, uh, Nationwide for Men again. Um, we do men's ministry, I guess. And, um, yeah, registration is open and I know people are signing up, or at least they indicate they're going to sign up. So, uh, we encourage you to register now rather than later because there's only so many spots, and we're talking a very small amount of spots for the entire nation to jump in. And this is the only Freedom in Christ course available in the evenings to men, uh, so we encourage you to jump on board. Um, beyond that, if you can't make those groups, or if you're a woman and want to be encouraged, we believe you can find or increase your freedom in Christ by joining one of our podcast classes on YouTube. Um, we have classes for Bondage Breaker, Victor Over the Darkness, Freedom in Christ, and, uh, the Celebrate Freedom Discipleship course, among many other playlists on our playlist page. So we encourage you to get there if you want good Christian teaching. And, um, you know, basically isn't just me, I share other people's, uh, other Christians, uh, stuff as well to encourage us, because we need to know these things to help us in our walk of faith. And we end with saying, or asking, are you empty for Christ too? And being empty for Christ just means you're willing to open yourself to what the Holy Spirit wants to do in your life and to follow him. And if you are empty for Christ, we say, great, keep on walking and talking with God. If not, we encourage you to pray and seek the Lord. Pray, pray for God to reveal himself, and then prayerfully you'll pray to make Jesus your Lord and Savior, make the decision to follow him into the life he has for you. Um, so let's pray today. Lord God, Heavenly Father, we thank you for another day in your kingdom. Lord, we thank you for the freedom that we saw won yesterday during our freedom appointment with our brother in Christ. We pray for you to bless him And Lord, we pray for you to bless us today. We pray for you to move us in the way you want us to go, open our eyes to the things you want us to see, and, uh, help us to represent you, Lord. We also pray for anyone listening or reading or watching today's message, um, that you bless them and their prayer requests, their walk of faith, Lord, because we all need your help and we need it desperately. Uh, Lord, um, we thank you, we praise you, we love you, and we pray all these things in the mighty name of Jesus. Amen.