If .. Then
May 31, 2017
If/then statements have ruled the world forever! As parents, it’s how we raise our kids and our dogs. It was an if/then statement that changed the world from what it could have been to what we know and live by today.
It’s because Eve ate the fruit from the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil that our lives are limited in years, there are feast and famine, disease and prosperity. God is the master of all things in our lives, we know this. IF we live to glorify Him, THEN we will have eternal life with Him. IF we don’t live to glorify Him, THEN we may still have a good life, but, “What does it profit a person to gain the whole world, yet forfeit their soul? For what can a man give in exchange for his soul? (Mark 8:36-37)”
Christianity is about faith, but without wholehearted faith, we have doubt. “He must ask in faith, without doubting, because he who doubts is like a wave of the sea, blown and tossed by the wind. (James 1:6)” The if/then is implied there, IF we do not have wholehearted faith, THEN we will not have a foundation and direction.
Peter wrote in in his second letter some very important words about this if/then concept. He wrote, “IF these qualities are yours and increasing, (then) they render you neither useless nor unfruitful…For he who lacks these qualities is blind or short-sighted, having forgotten his purification from his former sins. (2 Peter 1:8-9)”
IF we build our faith daily by learning about and increasing our relationship with Jesus, THEN we will build our lives on His solid rock foundation, rather than the unstable sand of the seashore. IF we are not practicing self control and growing in our relationship and knowledge of Jesus, THEN as Peter explains in 2:20, “the last state (sin) has become worse for them than at first.”
When we know Jesus and turn away from Him, then “It has happened that the true proverb, “A DOG RETURNS TO HIS OWN VOMIT,” and, “A sow, after washing, returns to wallowing in the mud. (2 Peter 2:22)”” When we know Jesus and turn away, then life gets worse than before. Blessing to you today. 🙂
(Photos of Our Daily Bread daily devotionals)