Who we are as a friend and who have as friends is important to our destiny. This story here in Mark 2;2-5, 10-12 shows us just that.

The Bible talks about friends a good deal. I found and studied 19 Scriptures all about friendship.

We learn about our  most important friend Jesus. John 15:9-17 NLT

There’s a song that came to mind .

What a friend we have in Jesus, all our sins and grief to bear what a privilege to carry all our sins to God in prayer.

Jesus calls us His friends and that’s a beautiful thing nothing to take lightly or for granted.  He’s the very best friend we will ever have. We are created for relationships. God is relational. He wanted a relationship with all of us.

In this season God wants us to evaluate who is in our circle.

Time to be sure that our circles aren’t keeping us in unnecessary cycles.

And that the cycles don’t hold us to bad circles.

We are to ask ourselves

Are our friendships feeding or depleting? 

Pushing us forward or pulling us back?

Are we sharpening one another?

Are we both trustworthy?

Are we there for one another in good and bad times, the ups and downs?

Are we concerned about what concerns Jesus?

God tells us that who we roll with has a direct effect on our journey on our destiny. Bad company corrupts good character.

Bad influence causes derailment and destruction.

Relationships/ Friendships are not to be entered into without using discernment. Are we on the same mission for Christ? The Bible asks “How can two walk together unless they agree?” They can’t. There will be discord then division.

Now, I let us ponder on this

Are we the friends we want?

Are we serving others well?

Are we accountable?

Are we reliable?

Are we kind?

Have we made ourselves available for friendships?

Or Have we let past hurts close us off from being friendly?

Matt 5:44-45 NKJV  and Luke 6:27-36 NLT

Speaks on that very thing. They state

“But I say to you, love your enemies, bless those who curse you, do good to those who hate you, and pray for those who spitefully use you and persecute you, that you may be sons of your Father in heaven; for He makes His sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and on the unjust.”

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‭‭“Love your enemies! Do good to them. Lend to them without expecting to be repaid. Then your reward from heaven will be very great, and you will truly be acting as children of the Most High, for he is kind to those who are unthankful and wicked. You must be compassionate, just as your Father is compassionate.”

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If we don’t love, forgive and bless those who have spitefully  used us, we become bitter and not better so, we miss out on the beauty of being friends.

It weakens our signal to hear from the Lord.

That’s not what God wants for us.

Proverbs 18:24 NKJV tells us that A man who has friends must himself be friendly, But there is a friend who sticks closer than a brother.

We are to be friendly if we want friends.

We can’t want open books while we are a closed library.

We are not meant to go through this life alone. Culture says we don’t need anyone but, that’s not true. God teaches us to love one another as He loves us. Friendships are important to our destiny.

Ecc 4:9 Two are better than one for they can help each other succeed. Friends are there in times of need.

We can’t get to our destiny with the wrong people in our circle.

God wants us to know that He is our friend and we are to make and be friends. John 15:12-17 NLT 

Follow Thru

"Therefore, my beloved brethren, be ye steadfast, unmoveable always abounding in the work of the Lord, forasmuch as ye know that your labour is not in vain in the Lord."

- ‭‭1 Corinthians‬ ‭15:58‬

How many times has someone promised to do something and didn’t deliver? How did we feel? What did we think? 

How many times have we been that person?  How do we think we made others feel? How do you think we made God feel? 

In this season God wants that to change. He wants us to Follow Thru.To keep our word to Him and to others. 

We’ve heard it said that “Promises are meant to be broken” but, more than the promise is being broken. Let’s think about that. Trust, hearts 

And the other thing is when we don’t follow thru it ends up being a lie. I know seems like a little thing but, a lie is a lie. There are no levels to it. God doesn’t want us to lie. 

2. The most important perspective to look at is the  Lord wants us to know and believe that He will Follow thru. His promises are Yes and Amen and we can stand on them. He doesn’t change His mind, His word won’t return to Him void and He can’t lie. If He said it stand on it and wait patiently for it to come to pass. 

We serve a Promise Keeper and He teaches us to keep our word. Keeping our word is so important to our character and integrity. 

He says for us not to make a vow to Him and not keep it. Ecclesiastes 5:4-5 NKJV Deuteronomy 23: 21-23 NKJV 

3. The other follow thru is staying on task. We give up when it gets tough or not going as we planned. What we have been given to do by God He will help us perform and see the promise come to pass. He says I will never leave you nor forsake you. He told Moses and Abram I will be with you. When we give up we’re depending on our own strength not His. It’s also disobedience. Jonah was told to go deliver a message to Nineveh and he chose to go the opposite way. Then gets swallowed by a whale for 3 days. 

4. Lastly , Stay connected and love on one another. As life gets hectic, we tend to reach out one time, pray for folks and forget about them. Where’s the follow through. God wants us to keep love alive. Follow up and follow through. Make time for one another and not get so busy that we let that life slip away. In the church building let’s not focus so much on filling the seats and not love on who’s in the seats. So much of connection in community is lacking because we lost how to follow through. Let’s get it back and build up our communication in our communities. 

How to we follow thru

1. Do things as though we’re doing them for the Lord not man. Stay focused on God not people. God won’t let us down. 

📖 Work willingly at whatever you do, as though you were working for the Lord rather than for people. Col 3:23 

2. Remember obedience is far better than sacrifice. Do what the Lord says to do when He says do it in full. 📖 1 Samuel 15:22 NLT  But Samuel replied, “What is more pleasing to the LORD: your burnt offerings and sacrifices or your obedience to his voice? Listen! Obedience is better than sacrifice, and submission is better than offering the fat of rams.

1. Love your neighbor as yourself           📖 The second is equally important: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ No other commandment is greater than these.”   Mark 12:31 NLT 

We will be more inclined to follow through as we would want someone to do for us. 

Be intentional with what we say and do. 

Romans 3:30 There is only one God, and He makes people right with Himself only by faith, whether they are Jews or Gentiles.

I don’t know if you all have seen or remember the movie the Seat Filler with Kelly Rowland and Duane Martin well let me share a bit of it with you really quick, Duane's character took this job to be a seat filler at award ceremonies. He would fill the void in the audience to make it look full.  They search for people to do this job. Fill the void.

Don’t we look for things or people to fill the God sized void in our hearts and lives?

When we substitute the fake for the real you see and feel the difference. Let’s take designer bags for example, we can tell when someone is trying to pass a fake off as real. It doesn’t have all of the details and components that the real one does.

That brings us back to the seat fillers, They are in a place that’s not truly meant for them.

Sometimes to make ourselves look and feel better we try to fill God’s space, only to feel worse because, no one else is God. No one else can love us like God.

When we do we ended up with an even bigger hole. Feelings hurt, ready to throw all people away because of one person. That’s because we may have put that person before God and made them our god and God said NOPE!!! That’s what we call “Looking for love in all the wrong places” God is LOVE and He is the source of love. Fill up on the real. Yes, we experience His love through others but, we must get it from Him 1st and want it from Him. Chase His love not other people or things . Seek Him 1st above all else. Matt 6:33

Money can’t, won’t and doesn’t love us, clothes, cars, houses they don’t either. Now, here’s the thing I’m not saying having those things are bad before you get your undies in a bunch what I am saying is having those things fill the space in our hearts that only Jesus can fill is. It makes those things our gods and we begin to idolize them.

Constantly chasing the next thing for the fulfillment that only a relationship with God can bring. The thirst will always be there like He told the woman at the well, basically this water will cause you to thirst again but, I am the living water and you will never thirst again with Me.

Regular water or Living Water?

Fake or Real?

Death or Eternity?

We probably don’t realize we’re doing this because, it feels so natural but, it's exhausting. Whatever gets more of our attention is God’s replacement in our lives. We have put it or them in God’s seat. The things we focus on most are the things that grow.  God is bringing it to our attention to help us turn back to Him. He reveals what He desires to heal.

I want to share three points to help keep us from looking for Seat fillers.

1. Put God 1st before we get up and out before we make decisions talk to Him.

2. Stay connected to Him  The same way we want to tell our family and friends things tell God. Talk to him about everything during the course of our day.

3. Be thankful for everything even the hard things. Be grateful for the time and love we share/shared with  our loved ones . Be grateful that God loved us enough to share them with us. Be grateful for what is to come.

God wants to be our all and all He’s a jealous God. He deserves our all. Let’s not try to fill God sized voids with anything but our Awesome and Beautiful God. God wants His FaceTime with us His children. We were created for relationship with Him. Let’s take those things out of His seat.

Remember It’s no one else’s or nothing’s responsibility to make us happy. God is the Source and the strength of our life. The center of our lives. God is the foundation for all other relationships to flow from. Let’s let Him pour all of His love into us and fill every void we have. He’s the only answer.

Romans 5:3-5 assures us that We can rejoice, too when we run into problems and trials, for we know that they help us develop endurance. And endurance develops strength of character, and character strengthens our confident hope of salvation.

So last week we talked about the Confusion Illusion the distractions and spiritual warfare well this week He’s giving us other perspectives to our storms and hardships. I believe God wants us to change how we see the storms right now and forevermore. We see our storms as bad things and He doesn’t. Remember that time when Jesus was asleep during the storm? He was worried at all we can take notes. The rain is meant to train and make things grow. Can seeds grow without water?

God allows the storms to come to do things in and for us. He’s allowing them for good reasons we may not understand while we’re in them but, we will later.  There may be strongholds that He wants to break off us, idols He wants to destroy out of our hearts. There may be somethings we may have picked up that may be taken up room in our hearts that are causing rot and decay to begin like a cavity in a tooth. Or we maybe we have picked up an idol and placed it where God should be in our lives. Whatever it is God wants to get us back on track before we go too far off the right path. God allows the storms for purification, sanctification, and refining; we are to be holy like Jesus. It’s all for our good.

In the storms He’s training/preparing us for what’s ahead. There’s growth, strengthening and endurance that He wants to build in us. Let’s remember the testing we endure in school; we cannot graduate to the next grade level until we have completed all the work and testing on the current grade level. The same in our walk with Christ. He’s working in and on us to perfect our faith in Him. Like David in the field fighting off bears and lions He wants to get us ready for a tremendous victory.  Training ground. 

Some storms are a result of our decisions. God is disciplining us, Correcting us. He loves us that much. 

James 4:8 NKJV Draw near to God and He will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, ye sinners and purify your hearts ye double minded.

Some Context: So God says come close to God and wash your hands, purify your hearts, for your loyalty is divided.

the Scriptures before this is telling us that we can’t be friends with the world and be friends with God. That makes us God’s enemy.  Reason being is the world is full of sin and it’s the enemy’s space for the time being. When we love the world and the things in it we have no space for God in our hearts and God wants to keep us from being destroyed. We are His. He’s a jealous God. He wants us all to Himself.

God has life and the enemy only has the death to offer.. Deut 30:19 

When we come close and stay close we show that our loyalty is to God and He cleanses and purifies us through His Son Jesus. I mean let’s be honest no one wants No one wants their friends loyalty divided.

Let’s look at the definition of What is intimacy is – it is a close familiarity and usually affectionate, loving personal relationship with another person or group. Closeness between people.  It’s a tight bond

Intimacy requires participation from two or more (small group of) people who are willing to share all of the parts of themselves openly. One can’t be willing to share while the other isn’t interested in truly knowing. Someone is missing out.

I believe God is calling us to look into Him and see. See who is for ourselves. Seek intimacy. Alone time with Him. I know we have heard this before but, I believe someone needs a reminder and this may be new to someone. Maybe He’s saying really look into Me. He wants to help us do that. 

Be blessed….. subscribe to this podcast and follow me on Instagram @iamdmalone I love you

Luke 5:1-11 NLT, John 21:1-17 NLT

This is a story that  I pray our spirits leap for joy over as we hear the Lord speak to us about how He wants us to learn to trust Him and not ourselves. I pray this lesson changes minds which will in turn change lives. In this story Simon Peter the professional fisherman was asked to go fishing one more time at the time that was said to be the wrong time of day, the morning. Instead of him allowing what he knew or even how he felt keep him held back he chose to drop his pride and follow what Jesus instructed or advised. Which lead to the Miraculous Catch not just of fish but of men This was the call to discipleship for Simon Peter and his partners. They learned to trust Jesus and then followed Him. Can we see ourselves here? Jesus wants to do the same with us. Will we do it One More Time with Jesus?

I love you,

Be Blessed but more importantly be a Blessing.

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