John 3:16 For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish, but have eternal life.

God’s love teaches us to value the souls of our fellow man and to dread everything hurtful to his purity and peace.  

1 John 1:9-11 The person who says that he is in the light but hates his brother is still in the darkness. The person who loves his brother abides in the light, and there is no reason for him to stumble. But the person who hates his brother is in the darkness and lives in the darkness. He does not know where he is going because the darkness has blinded his eyes.

Matthew 5:44 Love your enemies, and pray for those who persecute you so that you will become children of your Father in heaven because He makes His sun rise on both evil and good people, and He lets rain fall on the righteous and the unrighteous.

Micah 7:18 Is there any God like you, forgiving iniquity, passing over transgressions by the survivors who are your heritage? He is not angry forever because He delights in gracious love.

Is it possible for me to love others, even enemies or those who irritate and vex me, with His gracious love? If the Holy Spirit lives within my heart, I do have the ability to love as God loves. I am learning to show this love by:

• giving life-changing words to grant others the grace to come into all God has for them.

• seeing people the way God sees them and then helping them develop into the who they were created to be.

Delight in gracious love.

 I desire Jesus every day, every hour, and every moment in resurrection love and power dwelling in my heart, shining within me, filling me with love and joy. My heart yearns to be filled with this love to the point of spilling over to others.

© 2023 Debora Gilley

The post The Fruit of Love appeared first on Sandstreams.

Galatians 5:22-23 The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control; against such things, there is no law.
When we believe in Jesus as our personal Savior, He abides in our hearts through the Holy Spirit.

Ezekiel 36:26-27 And I will give you a new heart, and a new spirit I will put within you. And I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. And I will put my Spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes and be careful to obey my rules.

When we allow ourselves to be led by the Holy Spirit, He develops a new nature to cherish and cultivate as opposed to the old nature of sinful characteristics.

The fruit of the Spirit is developed as a person matures in Christ. This fruit is evidence of spiritual maturity in our lives and grows as we allow the Holy Spirit to work in us, not just through us. It is a distinct purpose as a Christian to progressively allow the Holy Spirit to produce His fruit in our hearts and allow Him to conquer opposing sinful desires.

O, please let me know and understand and walk in the very essence of Your Holy Spirit at all times.

Galatians 5:25 Since we live by the Spirit, by the Spirit let us also be guided.

Romans 8:5 Walk in newness of life.

© 2023 Debora Gilley

The post The Fruit of the Spirit in My Heart appeared first on Sandstreams.

Psalm 19:14 Let the words of my mouth, and the mediation of my heart, be acceptable in Thy sight, O Lord, my strength, and my Redeemer.

David begins this psalm declaring glory to God for His revelations of the heavens day and night. They proclaim His wisdom, power, and goodness proven by the counter-changing of day and night so that all who witness it are left without excuse. The heavens and all they contain constantly glorify Him, from the sun’s rising and setting in the day to the moon and stars following their path in the night. His eternal power and divine nature are clearly seen and understood by all who witness these constant and absolute events.

David then praises God for His perfect, steadfast, and pure law, which opens our eyes to His wisdom and drives us to His throne of grace there to worship. The revelations warn him of the perfect and pure law of the Lord. (Psalm 19:11) They point out his mistakes, and he asks to be cleansed from hidden sin. He desires to be upright and acquitted of great wickedness.

I pray my heart would be much affected by the excellence of the word of God so that the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart would be filled with thoughts of His glorious reality and that they lead to words and actions that are pleasing to Him at all times.

Practice the presence of God in stillness of heart.  

Psalm 62:5 My soul, be quiet before God, for from Him comes my hope. 

He is the living God that reveals Himself in His creation. His presence strengthens and satisfies our faith which wakens and grows bold in His glorying hope. Set your heart open in holy separation from the world. In adoration, meditate on God’s creation and how He uses it to speak to us day and night.

© 2023 Debora Gilley

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Philippians 4:7 And the peace of God, which passes all understanding, shall keep your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus.

I want to address you today as Paul does in verse 1 of Philippians 4: Dearly beloved and longed for, my joy and crown – stand fast in the Lord! Take these words to your heart and know they were meant for you.

Now go to verse 6 and realize that you can be anxious for nothing because (verse 7) the peace of God which passes all understanding will keep your heart and mind in Christ Jesus. Grasp this peace and let it flow over you and through you. Meditate on it all day. He will bring you into His rest.

Enjoy the Peace:

• Which through the Son, God also reconciled all things to Himself, whether things on earth or things in heaven, thereby making peace through the blood of His Cross – Colossians 1:20

Find peace in your heart by turning to the God of peace.

© 2023 Debora Gilley

The post Peace Shall Keep Your Heart appeared first on Sandstreams.

Psalm 73:25

2 Corinthians 4:6
For God, who said, “Let light shine out of darkness,” has shone in our hearts to give us the light of the knowledge of God’s glory in the face of Jesus the Messiah. But we have this treasure in clay jars to show that its extraordinary power comes from God and not from us. In every way we are troubled but not crushed, frustrated but not in despair, persecuted but not abandoned, struck down but not destroyed.

As light was the beginning of the first creation, so in the new creation, the light of the Spirit is His first work upon the soul. The treasure of gospel light and grace is put into earthen vessels.

In the beginning, “Let there be light! and there was light,” was spoken then and is spoken now with creative power in God’s Son, and the presence and the light of Him become the life and the light of the soul.

In all your thoughts of your Creator and your Redeemer, in all your efforts to know Him by His Son, remember that the true knowledge of God is something above sense and reason. God reveals Himself to the longing heart as the light shines on the opened eye created for it. The light and spirit of heaven can fill all our hearts.

Let my whole heart be opened to Him, to receive, as a flower does the light of the sun, His secret, mighty, divine working in me. I trust this omnipotent God to work out in me His every promise, and I hold fast to the light, blessing, and joy of each one.

Isaiah 9:1
The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light; For those living in a land of deep darkness, a light has shined upon them.

© 2023 Debora Gilley

The post Light of my Heart appeared first on Sandstreams.

Psalm 40:8 I delight to do Your will, O my God: yes, Your law is within my heart.
Psalm 119:103 How sweet are thy words unto my taste! yes, sweeter than honey to my mouth!
Psalm 119:11 Thy word have I hid in my heart, that I might not sin against Thee.
Psalm 34:8-10 O taste and see that the Lord is good: blessed is the man that trusts in Him. O fear the Lord, you His saints: for there is no want to them that fear Him. The young lions do lack, and suffer hunger: but they that seek the Lord shall not want any good thing.

Taste and see God’s goodness; take notice and take the comfort of it. He makes all truly blessed that trust in Him. It is Jesus and God’s word as my heart’s treasure. It is worth laying up. It is the opened door to the Father’s heart, the treasure chamber of God.

Every heart longs for truth. It also longs to be made free of sin. That I might not sin against Thee. God’s word speaks to you. Listen to how He tells you how to live a heavenly life. Consider Jesus; you will find all the heavenliness you need in Him. God’s word will bring real life and blessing and be the power of fellowship with Him.

Taste the sweetness of God’s word today and make it your own.

© 2023 Debora Gilley

The post His Word – My Heart’s Treasure appeared first on Sandstreams.

Ezekiel 36:26-27
I’m going to give you a new heart, and I’m going to give you a new spirit within all of your deepest parts. I’ll remove that rock-hard heart of yours and replace it with one that’s sensitive to Me. I’ll place my spirit within you, empowering you to live according to my regulations and to keep my just decrees.

I desire to have faith that overcomes “the will of the flesh” which dwells within me, whose workings make it painfully manifest in my inward conflict with the carnal mind. I desire victory over the flesh, profanity, sin, and treachery working all around me. If I follow the Lord fully and yield myself wholly to what God in Christ is ready to do, I shall find in the gospel and in Christ everything that I need for a life of joy, strength, and final victory.

Isaiah 55:8 “For My thoughts are not your thoughts, nor are your ways My ways,” declares the Lord.

Romans 3:24 Being justified freely by His grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus.

Find peace in your conscience by accepting this Gospel grace and conforming your mind to His. Instead of being profane, contentious, selfish, or sensual, you will become patient, humble, kind, and peaceable.

2 Corinthians 3:18 As all of us reflect the glory of the Lord with unveiled faces, we are becoming more like Him with ever-increasing glory by the Lord’s Spirit.

A yielded heart led by the Holy Spirit can expect to profit from the teaching of this Word and truly know Jesus Christ in His divine saving power. Angels brought beautiful messages from God in the past, but now God is drawing nearer to you and waiting to speak in a far more wonderful and blessed way by revealing the eternal Word in your heart.

God is awesome in that He knows our hearts and fills them with His Spirit, which will make a difference in how we act and make decisions. Learn to yield your heart to the Holy Spirit, and you will see His ways and thoughts become your own.

© 2023 Debora Gilley

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Psalm 9:1
I will praise Thee O Lord, with my whole heart; I will show forth all Thy marvelous works.

I always feel like I’m on the edge of something, either the edge of being good or bad, the edge of understanding something but never getting it, the edge of figuring out a mystery but then not being allowed to know the truth. And then I feel far from understanding what God is doing with me – if anything. There is a fear that He may have no more use for me at this stage of my life. I have felt like one of a million in a sea of faces.

But I believe, unwaveringly, in the Son of God, Jesus Christ, my Creator, and Redeemer, and I am wonderfully reminded that He knows my name.

Isaiah 43:1b Do not be afraid, because I’ve redeemed you. I’ve called you by name; you are Mine.

Jeremiah 1:5 I knew you before I formed you in the womb; I set you apart for me before you were born;

Know Him to be a God of truth and faithfulness. Rejoice in His word of promise and rest upon that. Know Him to be an Everlasting Father and trust Him with your soul at all times, even to the end. Continually seek Him with your whole heart in the entire course of your life. He is worthy of all praise and glory.

© 2023 Debora Gilley

The post My Whole Heart appeared first on Sandstreams.

Psalm 73:25-26

Whom have I in heaven but You? And there is none upon earth that I desire besides You. My flesh and my heart fail: but God is the strength of my heart, and my portion forever.

Psalm 73 is a testimony of Asaph grieving over the prosperity of the wicked. As he struggles with his anger towards this injustice, he cries out to God for understanding and finds victory over his envy as he begins to understand God’s purpose.

In the book of Ecclesiastes, Solomon complains that all life is vanity. 

Ecclesiastes 1:14 I have seen all the works that are done under the sun; and behold, all is vanity and vexation of spirit.    

If you know about the life of Solomon, you know that he had everything in the world that anyone could want. Yet he found that it was all weariness and vexing to his spirit. He found it all to be wickedness and misery, and the more he understood this, the more he lamented and mourned.

Realizing that nothing in this world can truly satisfy is very painful. To draw near to God is our wisdom, honor, safety, peace, and riches. Draw near to the One who knows your heart, knows your every need, and you will never want for a thankful heart towards Him.

There is nothing desirable except God; let us desire only Him. All other things must pass away; let our hearts abide in Him, who alone abides forever. Turn from the glitter of wealth and honor which fascinates to true gold of peace found in the presence and love of God.

© 2023 Debora Gilley

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