{in}courage

I recently started reading a ‘blog’ (more like a ‘site’) called "(in)courage". I have not read much of the site since I am new - but what I have read,  I do like. It is ‘encouraging’. I signed up to have new posts come directly to my email. This morning I received my first post. It was called "Putting a Bullet Through His Phone". (Don’t read just yet…finish reading THIS first!) It was basically about struggles in life & ‘how bad’ do you really want to ‘give it up’?  I do really agree with what is said –however- they left out one ingredient.

One.Very.Important.Ingredient: Jesus. Actually the MAIN ingredient is Jesus… He is not just one of the ingredients. He is like the flour in bread. Without it you don’t have bread. Without Jesus you have no relief from your struggles, no freedom & no peace. Without Jesus you can never really be free. You may have times, even a very long period of time where you think you are winning over your battle. However, you will never really be free from it without HIM. 

There is nothing WE can DO to make this happen. It happens by FAITH in His work on the cross. Keep that in mind when reading this post from “(in)courage”. Our ‘works’ will not give us the true victory over our battles. FAITH in JESUS WILL give us victory over these battles! The Holy Spirit will not work properly if we are functioning by works and not by faith. The Holy Spirit works by faith alone.

Without Jesus and what He did for us on His cross – we can never have true victory from our struggles & we will never be fully FREE. We need to place our faith in His finished work on the cross. He died not just for our eternal life.  His death on the cross broke that ‘sin nature’ we were born with.

The ‘sin nature’ is still IN us…

~BUT~

Once we get saved, the ‘sin nature’ is no longer controlling us! We are dead to it!

It is like a lamp plugged into the wall socket. The electricity lighting the lamp gets TURNED OFF when the plug is unplugged! There is still electricity in the wall socket – but it can not reach the lamp to light it unless the lamp is plugged in. We are unplugged from the  ‘sin nature’ when we get saved!

How awesome is HE! He did this for us!

God’s Holy Spirit will work great wonders in our life as long as we have our faith placed in the correct object. The Cross of Christ. No not just the wooden beam… but what He did on the cross! He broke the power of the ‘sin nature’! Have faith in this finished work & the Holy Spirit will work in your life to give you a helping hand!

So now. Go read the post from (in)courage called, "Putting a Bullet Through His Phone".

It is an encouraging read. And it makes sense.

Just don’t forget the most important ingredient: JESUS and His finished work on the cross!

Ok. Now go read!