Good morning. John the
Baptist has been taken into custody, and now Jesus comes preaching the same
thing that he did “repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.” He then calls
Peter and Andrew his bro telling them to “follow Me, and I will make you
fishers of men.” He then gets James and John. He preaches and heals, and
multitudes follow. He then gives the beatitudes. Blessed are the poor in
spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Of course, poor in spirit does not
mean “oh woe is me”. Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted.
Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth. Our strength and power
is in Christ, not in ourselves. We cannot do it on our own – we need His help.
There are too many Christians who think that it is up to them to live the
Christian life. But if it were, then they could brag about it. It is all His
doing. Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they
shall be satisfied. Think of a time when you most desperately had to have
either food or water. That's how much you should want to have righteousness in
your life. But sadly few of us do. We want righteousness, but only up to a
point. We don't want it to interfere with what we want to do. Jesus wanted it
for us more than we do. In fact, He was willing to die on the cross to obtain
it for us. Father thank You that the reader is meek and poor in spirit. He/she
desperately hungers and thirsts for righteousness in his/her life. Meet his/her
needs. Supply all that he/she needs quickly.
Therefore I exhort you, be imitators of me
Good morning. Paul then gives a list of a lot of things that he has gone through as an apostle. I do not write these things to shame you, but to admonish you as my beloved children. For if you were to have countless tutors in Christ, yet you would not have many fathers, for in Christ Jesus I became your father through the gospel. There could be many people that you listen to either in church or through the Internet or other means; but there was only one person (as a general rule it was a person) that lead you to Christ. Therefore I exhort you, be imitators of me. He was saying that just like a child imitates his or her father, they were to imitate him. He says that again seven chapters later. Since it is easy to forget some things about people we have not seen in a while, Paul says that he sent Timothy to them to remind them of his ways which are in Christ, just as he taught everywhere in every church. Some have become arrogant, as though I were not coming to you. I shall find ou...
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