Be Holy. As God is Holy.

The one who chose you is Holy. So you should be holy in all that you do. It is written, "Be holy, because I am holy."

1 Peter 1:15-16

  Why does God want us to be holy? Because that's what he has always intended. That's the way he made us.

  Did you know that when God first made us, we were holy? Adam and Eve were sinless. They were like God. But when they sinned, they fell from that high position. They lost their goodness and perfection. They became sinners.

  Ever since then, every person ever born is a sinner. He can only stop being a sinner and become a saint by trusting Christ and following him.
 
  God wants us to be like him. Why? So he can point to us whenever anyone asks and say, "That is what I'm like."

  God wants us to be little images of him, so that his universe is populated with people who love, give, sacrifice, care, and live in peace.


Make me holy, Lord, and help me to want to be holy, too.

In Jesus,
AMEN

It Must Come from the Heart

When you look for me with all your heart, you will find me.

Jeremiah 29:13

 What does it mean to seek God with "all your heart"?

The heart is the center of your spiritual being. It's the place where you think and feel and have motives and desires. It's the deepest part of your being. And it's the part God most wants us to share with him.
  
  
Why? Because our hearts are who we really are. When we give from the heart, we're giving from the deepest, most sincere, and most godly part of ourselves. The heart can't hide anythinging. It always tells the truth.



God wants our hearts because that's the part of us that is most like him. That's the part that talks to him and learns from him. That's the part that worships and loves him.                  


Are you seeking him with allnyour heart?  If not, why not?  And if so, have you found him?


Here's a prayer that you can pray:

Open my heart to your Word, Jesus,  that I might walk in your light.

In your name,
Amen.

Prewired for Hope

	For we have heard of your faith in Christ Jesus and your love for all of God's people, which come from your confident hope of what God has reserved for you in heaven. You have had this expectation ever since you first heard the truth of the Good News.

— Colossians 1:4–5

Did you know that you were prewired for hope? There is a restlessness in the human heart for something more than this world can offer.

As Augustine said, "You created us for Yourself, O God, and our hearts are restless until they find their rest in You."

As believers, our hope is built on a sure foundation, and that is the hope of heaven. The apostle Paul spoke of faith that springs from this hope: "For we have heard of your faith in Christ Jesus and your love for all of God's people, which come from your confident hope of what God has reserved for you in heaven" (Colossians 1:4).

It is a bit like the Golden Plovers. Native to Hawaii, these little birds migrate during the summer to the Aleutian Isles, some 1,200 miles away. There they mate and lay their eggs. Then, after their little fledglings are born, they return to Hawaii. Even more amazing is that their little fledglings, which are too young to return with their parents, fly to Hawaii once they have grown a little. God has given them a homing instinct that makes this possible.

In the same way, God has given us a homing instinct for a place we have never been. We have never been to heaven, but we long for it, because heaven is our home. C. S. Lewis calls it the inconsolable longing. This is what the Bible means when it says that God has set eternity in our hearts (see Ecclesiastes 3:11). Like the Golden Plovers, we have a heavenly GPS.