The Bible says that he who loves people has no cause for stumbling in him. The goal is not to sin less, but to love more. As we learn to receive the love of God and love people as a result, sin will automatically fade away. And love will keep up from becoming conceited and power-hungry as we pursue the gifts of the Spirit.

Water baptism is about dying with Christ and rising with Him into new life, free from sin and empowered for a lifestyle led by the Holy Spirit. Baptism is not merely an outward sign of inward change. The biblical context of baptism suggests that proper faith makes the moment of our baptism the very moment that we die with Christ and receive freedom. Baptism is not required to be saved, but for all of us who have the opportunity to be baptized, it is expected -- a must.

The book of Haggai prophesies that the latter temple, understood as the church, would have a glory that would be the Desire of all Nations. What about Jesus makes Him the desire of all nations? All creation longs to be freed from the bondage of corruption, and that's exactly what Jesus came to bring us. If we, as Christians, cannot see it through that people are set free from sin, we have become a reproach to the gospel. Our calling is to deliver people from the power of Satan and unto new life in Christ. We are not here to merely deliver a message of heaven after death. Eternal life is about present transformation and deliverance from the corruption of this world, where peace and joy through righteousness will reign.

A clear understanding of who we are is critical to becoming people of great faith. Our right standing with God and identity in Christ makes for a confidence with God. And faith itself is not something like a spiritual tool we occasionally use. Faith is to be something we become -- a disposition, something inherent to who we are. By definition, true faith carries no doubt with it. And faith that carries no doubt never fails to succeed. We are to renew our minds until expectation of the miraculous becomes automatic to us -- our response by default. Until conviction of spiritual realities becomes our natural response, we are not people of great faith.

The gospel demonstrates the righteousness of God -- the equity, kindness, and impartiality of God. When we are redeemed and brought back you our created purpose, the goodness of God though us is put on display to the world. The restored marriage, a mended family, a captive set free, an infirm person healed...all these things testify of the love of God for mankind. We all were once destined to destruction and eternal separation from God, but when the kindness of God appeared in the person of Jesus Christ, salvation came to us all, proving to every principality and power and opponent of God, that no man is forgotten by God, no man is cast aside; no man is left without the opportunity to be delivered from the corruption of this present, evil world.

The devil has attempted to accuse us and accuse God from the beginning. He's made every effort to make sure that we doubt the goodness of God. But he's lost the war. Now that our hearts are won to the Father because of the love of the gospel, the Holy Spirit in us reveals the goodness of God and proves to the devil that his accusations are invalid. We've been made right with God. Our struggle is not in there effort to get right with God. The battle is to resist the devil and reveal the love of God to the world around us.

Everything that Jesus did He did as a man in perfect relationship with God. He temporarily emptied Himself of His omnipotence and omnipresence to minister to the world as a Man anointed with the Holy Spirit, while maintaining His deity in nature. This He did, in part, to prove to us that we to do what He did, because we have the same Spirit that He had living in us as well. All that separates us from Christ, aside from His divinity, is that we have the history of a sinful nature that He came to wash away. As long as our minds remain stained by guilt and shame, we will be powerless and our potential in Christ neutralized.

Jesus told His disciples that they should be one with each other just as Jesus is one with the Father. He also said that the Father loves us just as He loved Jesus. As we receive the love of the Father, that same love will be proven in our relationships with people, and that love with produce unity -- oneness. We are told to seek to fully comprehend His love, to fully become and possess His love...when we are love as He is love, we will be filled with the fullness of God.

When Jesus overcame all that He suffered, He proved to us that we can overcome all that we suffer. Christ was crucified to bear all of our sorrow and pain upon Himself, so that believing in Him, we could be free. The love that continued in Christ while He lived is the same love that dwells in us, so we have the ability to walk and love just as He did. No mistreatment from man, no matter how harsh, is any excuse to be overcome by evil and react with rage or clamor. When, by the love of God within us, we choose to not be defined or affected by man's slander, we prove that we have been delivered from the corruption of this present world.

Our hearts are now the place of God's dwelling. The sons of God being made manifest is synonymous with the legendary Most Holy Place being made manifest. If we cannot have confidence in God-in-us, we will not have confidence in God anywhere else. A self-confidence in Christ, in knowing our identity, is the foundation of a living intimacy with Christ. For our communion with God is by the Holy Spirit dwelling within us. Worship is now in spirit, unhindered by locational or circumstantial limitations.

The Blood of Jesus now supplies us with the boldness to enter into the Most Holy Place of intimacy with God, where we hear His voice and experience the life-transforming power of His manifest Presence. When we believe in the Blood of Jesus and let His work be the basis of our intimacy with God, we experience His Presence and our lives are conformed to His image. The righteousness of Christ in us, working in our hearts and making us more like Him, makes us unashamed before Him, washing away our sin and removing the consciousness of it. Now that sin has been washed away, it should no longer be the reason we pray, but forever defeated.