Caring for Our Bodies in Christ’s Image

Meditation Thought: “Do you not know that your bodies are members of Christ?” (1 Corinthians 6:15)

Christ in each cell! With the yielding of my will to His will, my body is transformed into Christ living in the world today! How can I treat His body with anything but care and love?

Bodies come in all shapes and sizes. Genesis 1:27 says that God created people in His own image. That cannot refer to our physical beings – if it did we would all look like each other! Therefore, spiritually we are made in God’s image. Made to seek Him and His way. Made to care for the body He chose to encase our spirit. Not to abuse it, not to bemoan it, but to care for it and love it. And by so doing, we are then able to love others.

Finding Peace: Now and in the Future

Meditation Thought: “for we walk by faith, not by sight.” (2 Corinthians 5:7)

We walk by the inner light, not the outer darkness.
We walk in the joy of the Lord, not the confusion of the world.
We walk in the righteousness of God’s way, not the selfishness of the heart.
We walk in love, not in envy.
We walk in service, not in demanding to be served.
We walk beside the still waters, while the storm rages only a short distance away.
We walk in the peace of forgiveness and in the hope of the future.
We know that future is secure for it is fashioned as a place of refuge and heart’s desires by our loving Father. This is true if we will walk by faith in Him and not by faith in ourselves.

Cleansing and Beautifying Your Inner Temple

Meditation Thought: “Do you not know that you are God’s temple and that God’s Spirit dwells in you?” (1 Corinthians 3:16)

Look at yourself – look at your heart! Take time to compare the temple you are with the temples of those who walked with Jesus. This will help you to restructure and redecorate your own temple in a manner more befitting the residence of God on earth. You! A residence of God on earth!

Jesus as a man was the perfect temple: no mortal can become a perfect temple – but it is possible to yield to the Spirit within you to the point of becoming a pleasing temple, a temple based on the Ideal Temple.

Suggested Prayer: Oh Lord, help me to every day improve my temple to be more fitting as a place for You to dwell. Cleanse me of sin, shine me with Your righteousness, beautify me with Your love. Let me be a place where others are drawn to worship You, to come to learn more about You, to rejoice in You. Amen.

Research Optimization

Meditation Thought: “God has revealed to us through the Spirit. For the Spirit searches everything, even the depths of God.” (1 Corinthians 2:10)

How can we change our life-style? What about our style-of-life? Money must be spent to give us the ability to change our life-style. Which begs the question, what does it take to change our style of life? Only the Holy Spirit activated can change our style of life.

The knowledge to activate the Spirit is easy to find. The difficulty lies in denying our human willfulness. We often dictate what we will think, say, and do. Instead, we should yield to God’s will. It is especially important to accept the manner of His teaching.

We would prefer to learn with little effort having our lessons all laid out before us, without any research and commitment on our part. But this is not the way we learn in depth. To learn in depth takes the lesson learned beyond the ‘head knowledge’ and extends it to ‘heart knowledge’. The lessons become part of our actions as well as our mind.

It is the Spirit that keeps us researching, who leads us to new discoveries and resources. We must ask for His help – and accept it and heed His instructions. Only with His help will we learn the lesson and, having learned it, make it a true change to our style of life.

Trusting the Director of Your Life’s Journey

The wisdom of the ages is set before you. Will you partake?

Meditation Thought: “May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, so that by the power of the Holy Spirit you may abound in hope.” (Romans 15:13)

The wisdom of the ages is set before you. Will you partake? It is the background for the action taking place in your life – its presence affects your performance. Your performance affects your audience.

Come, the time is ripe to be directed into a great performance of the Father’s will. You have been rehearsing and practicing. Now come the years in your life to perform what you have been learning.

The Director is in charge; if you will listen to Him, the performance will be effective for you and your audience. You don’t know the effects of your performance. Therefore, you must believe with all your heart that the instructions of your Director are bringing your performance to exquisite perfection that it may bring enlightenment and appreciation into all who see it, that they might rise up to give glory to the Author, and recognition to the Director.

Will you obey the Director, trusting His judgment is better than yours?

Principles of Spirit and Matter

As we move together, harmoniously and joyfully, we expand our effectiveness step by step through your life on earth. Thus is the Father’s will done on earth as it in in heaven.

Meditation Thought: “Therefore let us not pass judgment on one another any longer, but rather decide never to put a stumbling block or hindrance in the way of a brother.” (Romans 14:13)

“Take My yoke, for it is designed to carry much more as we go in double-yoke than you can carry alone. Concentrate on perfecting our movements in coordination, not looking back as to the character of the load, or as to its size. It matters not: as we pull together, coming to know each other and how to work together, we will pull larger and larger loads, loads which would be difficult were it not for My knowledge of how to manage them.

Rely on my experience in hauling every type of load, and every quantity of load – simply imitate My movements by closely observing all I do. The key is in leverage: the use of the abilities the Father created in the proper manner and in the proper sequence, according to the principles of Spirit and matter which He reveals through Me to you. By My obedience unto suffering and unto death, I have perfected in human form the movements in harmony with these principles. As by faith you yoke yourself to Me, you feel My movements tugging on you. Adjust yourself to feel comfortable and coordinated with My movements.

As we move together, harmoniously and joyfully, we expand our effectiveness step by step through your life on earth. Thus is the Father’s will done on earth as it in in heaven.”

Dare to Trust

Will you hand Me each one that I may warm it in My Spirit and expand it into fulness and bless your neighbors and yourself?

Meditation Thought: “Love your neighbor as yourself.” (Mark 12:31 and quoted by Paul in Romans 13:9)

“You shall minister to your neighbor as yourself. In every thought, every word, every deed, it matters not who is the recipient – the action is to be as unto Me.

When you care for your body, you care for Me,
When you enrich your mind, you enrich My glory,
When you say words of encouragement to your enemy, you praise My name,
When you sacrifice your desires to minister to another, you sing the song of angels exulting in the fellowship of My Presence.

As you pour yourself out in all the means available to you, when you pour yourself through My Spirit rather than pouring directly into the world, My Spirit enriches your expressions and makes them blessings multiplied on earth and in heaven.

Just as a kernel of corn puffs up in the heat and the volume expands, so too, when you pour yourself out through My Spirit, what is returned to you is gently returned in a new, more desirable form. Do you dare trust Me with every kernel in your life? Will you hand Me each one that I may warm it in My Spirit and expand it into fulness and bless your neighbors and yourself?”


Food for Thought – Literally

“Brain-wash” yourself with the Word…

Meditation Thought: “…present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship.” (Romans 12:1)

As you can learn to bring health by proper nutrition, so you can learn to bring health by proper spiritual food. You ae ‘wonderfully made” (Psalm 139) – many interrelated and interacting parts, which need to be kept in good working order. Sin would rob you of the best health of body, mind and spirit.

By the sacrifice of choosing what is healthy instead of choosing what is appealing at that moment, you bring the blessing of the peace of a healthy body, mind and spirit. The healthy foods are listed in your ‘instructional handbook’ (Bible): read it every day that your choice of all the foods may be healthy!

“Brain-wash” yourself with the Word, for this kind of cleansing of old sinful thoughts will purify your mind and renew it with the thoughts of the Father being fed into it. His thoughts prompt actions which are within His will and acting in His will is the presentation of a holy body to Him as sacrifice. And His will is infinitely more healthy, more desirable, more rewarding to you than your own will.

You are Called

Yield to the softening flow of grace…

Meditation Thought: “So too at the present time there is a remnant, chosen by grace. But if it is by grace, it is no longer on the basis of works; otherwise grace would no longer be grace.” (Romans 11:5-6)

Take heed not to have pride that you feel the call of God in your life. It is by grace you are called, not by your worth or your works. Rejoice in your call that God’s grace has been poured upon you, and know that this grace is poured upon you for the transforming of your mind and your heart that you may be the means of God’s love poured into the world. Yield to the softening flow of grace – do not resist the change it is the accomplish in you: God’s purpose will quickly be accomplished if you yield your will to his grace.

An Heir to all that is Valued in Life

His estate is more to be desired than any worldly wealth; all good things are in it: the gifts and fruits of the Spirit, the peace and love for which all men search, the contentment of ever-sure help and guidance, and confidence of being heir to all that is to be valued in life.

Meditation Thought: “Pay attention to what you hear: with the measure you use, it will be measured to you, and still more will be added to you.” (Mark 4:24)

Conform. Conform to Christ for the measures of love, forgiveness, help, acceptance, are the measures used by your King. Use His measures – not the measures of the world: greed, selfishness, ego, power, grasping and self-centeredness.

Keep pouring out Christ’s measures – they will be multiplied as you learn the art more completely.

It is the will of the Father to be glorified in the Son and the Son’s works. The Son’s works must be operative every day through the body of believers for the Father’s glory. As part of the body, it is your duty and your privilege to use the identical measures of Christ. They are your inheritance, handed down to you from His estate. His estate is more to be desired than any worldly wealth; all good things are in it: the gifts and fruits of the Spirit, the peace and love for which all men search, the contentment of ever-sure help and guidance, and confidence of being heir to all that is to be valued in life.