First Friday Fellowship

“The Upside-down Kingdom,” is what Christ showed us, through servanthood, through sacrifice, through patience, and unwavering love.

While caesar and kings all over the world during the time Jesus walked on the earth were being served... Jesus was serving.

There is no freer man or woman, than one that has completely surrendered to being a slave to Christ.

THAT is what it means to experience God's “Upside-down Kingdom.”

THAT is what it means to experience freedom through obedience.

OBEDIENCE is THE KEY that opens every door.

Simple truths in this world seem more and more rare, and obvious lies are being spoken and accepted as truth, every day. Many of us Christians, especially, are finding ourselves rushing to relief... We binge-watch Netflix. We spend half a day on YouTube. We drink or eat a little too much. And what kind of used to be our entertainment, for some of us, has become more of a focus, and a little bit too important in the grand scheme of our lives.

We're tired, and we're just we're just a bit maxed out. We're looking for relief.

HOWEVER, what we really need, is RESTORATION.

True RESTORATION is only found in Him. He alone is the source:

Isaiah 40:31 / Matthew 11:28-30 / Luke 12:6-7

The Bible says, if you can master the tongue, you can master your whole body.

However, words can be weapons, and when someone becomes an expert at using them, they can get us to believe almost anything… PARTICULARLY, if we are not SOLIDLY grounded in THE TRUTH.  

The Bible says that in the end times, good will be called evil, and evil, good. And this is going to be accomplished, largely, by words being crafted in a way that makes us comfortable with dark ideas, and allows us to grow at peace with some of our darker impulses.

“Expert” liars become skilled at playing in the margins, working in the “GRAYS,” using mostly the truth, to get us to swallow the desired lie. 

The entire story of man’s fall, his condemnation to a life that ends in death, and the ultimate suffering of humanity, comes down to this EXACT principle.

WORDS MATTER!

When you look at the greatest moments in your life, and the most painful moments in your life, I bet you, WORDS were involved. 

Harness that tongue, reel it in! If you are about to say something hurtful that's unnecessary, BITE THAT TONGUE! 

Let’s let our speech lift others up. Let’s use it to praise the one, TRUE King, and use our mouth, and our tongue, and our WORDS to lead others to a deeper love and understanding of God, of Him, of JESUS.

Exercise is putting your body under stress, so that you can get stronger physically. We can develop strength, stamina, power…We workout. We lift weights. We do cardio. We make our bodies fit and strong… and they die anyways! 

But, when we invest spiritually, when we work hard spiritually, when we train spiritually… we take that into eternity.

If our trust is in the Lord, then we should know that our spiritual strength is INFINITELY more important, than our physical strength.

Suffering  produces perseverance, that ability to “Stick to it.”  

Whether our current “Dark Valleys are caused by our own sin, or caused by no fault of our own, if we turn to Him, if we repent, if we seek HIM, He will walk with us THROUGH IT.

That DOES NOT mean, He will get us out of it.

He is going to shape us, into the men and women that can be a blessing to everyone around us, and ULTIMATELY glorify Him, through our lives.  

Comparison is the source of all unhappiness.

Even though we have ALL SINNED, we are too easy to say, “I know I'm a sinner… but, not like THAT guy!”

When we only recognize a “Little Sin” in our life, we’re only a “Little Thankful.”

The closer we come to Him, the more we will be able to see how enormous our sin really is. And when we have THAT recognition, that will lead to enormous gratitude.

How do you know if an idea is in your head, or is legitimately a prompting from the Holy Spirit… Is part of God's plan for you, or if it's your own thoughts or feelings, or just secret desires flooding your brain?!

Test EVERYTHING by His Word. 

Continue to seek His Will, both in The Word and in prayer, and you'll get the truth. But it's going to take some patience, and ALWAYS, it takes discernment. 

God is always the same, and He will never violate His Word. God is 100% congruent, and you can get to know what He wants, through His Word.

When a flatterer, who doesn't love us, comes into our life and tells us how smart, and how beautiful, and how intelligent, and wise we are, this is an easy path to embrace, because flattery is REALLY seductive.

There will always be a temptation to embrace words that feed our ego, and our vanity, and our sinful nature.

Our world is aggressively training us to be hypersensitive to criticism; to treat criticism, as if it were some sort of assault; as terms are being redefined at a quantum rate, as language that sounds high-minded, and virtuous and moral in practice, many times is harmful and damaging, to not only us, but the culture at large.

Rejection of good counsel, and rejection of good criticism, is a tool from our ever-present enemy, to get us to embrace a natural inclination toward vanity.

If we're already perfect, why do we need a savior? Why would we need to repent? Why would we need salvation?

Criticism is never easy. Yet, criticism/correction is absolutely necessary to experience, if we intend to experience any type of growth or maturity.

Proverbs 27:6 / Psalms 141:5

The truth is not a popularity contest. The truth does not change, swayed and tossed by public opinion or outcry or acceptability. The truth remains. It will defend itself, and the wise will seek it, with everything in them.