Understanding the Emptiness within 1 Corinthians 13:1-3 If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am only a ringing gong or a clanging cymbal. If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have absolute faith so as to move mountains but have not love, I am nothing. If I give all I possess to the poor and exult in the surrender of my body but have not love, I gain nothing. Do you have a heart? Yes, all of us have a heart, but not many of us have a heart for GOD and others, making us miss out on GOD's goodness for loving Him and others. Our heart is for ourselves, making it the underlying motive for many things we do. GOD understands where He stands in our hearts when He said, "These people honour Me with their lips, but their hearts are far from Me." No matter how holy our worship may seem, they are frivolous acts if our hearts are not in it. To GOD, our hearts are deceitful above all things and beyond cure. The lips can say one thing, but the heart means another. No one can understand what is in the heart because there is no congruence between what the heart says and what it means. GOD knows that. It is not without reason that Jesus asked us to 'Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.' The emphasis is on the word all. GOD demands that our love for Him should be 100% and nothing less. Without any other love coming in between our love for Him, our love will be genuine and sincere. Nothing will lure our hearts away, and they will forever be for GOD. Why do we need to have a heart for GOD and others? It is because no man is an island, and GOD has not made man to be an island. In the book of Genesis, even though GOD was with Adam, He still said, "It is not good for the man to be alone. I will make for him a suitable helper." Therefore, a man is not made to exist alone with GOD. He needs someone to complement him to make him complete. He is a part of the whole of GOD's organisational structure. The Apostle Paul illustrates the structure as: "The body is a unit, though it is composed of many parts. And although its parts are many, they all form one body." Therefore, we are, in Christ, many but are one body, and each member belongs to one another. Even if we exist as individuals, we do not belong to ourselves but to one another for the kingdom of GOD. Therefore, no one exists as a solitary star in the galaxy but as part of a constellation of stars twinkling for GOD. As individuals, to gel into GOD's structure as an integrated whole, we need love. The Apostle Paul avowed that love is the bond of perfect unity. Love is like gravity, which holds everything together and holds us together with GOD and others. Only when we stay in love with GOD and others will the blood of Christ flow through us to be one body. Only then, we could be as Jesus said, "I have given them the glory You gave Me, so that they may be one as We are one— I in them and You in Me—that they may be perfectly united, so that the world may know that You sent Me and have loved them just as You have loved Me." This bond of love is so strong that nothing could break it. The Apostle Paul ascertained that when he said, "Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall trouble or distress or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword? For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor principalities, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord." Many of us cannot comprehend the mystery of being one with GOD. He is spirit, and we are physical. To do that, we need to understand the spiritual realm. The only way we can connect to GOD is through the spirit. 1 Corinthians states, "He who unites himself with the Lord is one with Him in spirit." What does that mean? It is similar to what GOD said in Genesis, "For this reason, a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and they will become one flesh." Both mention being united to become one. The difference is in the realms. Perfect unity in the physical realm is called one flesh, while in the spiritual realm, it is called one spirit. If we can understand the concept of one flesh in the physical dimension, like between Adam and Eve, we should be able to understand the one spirit in the spiritual dimension between Jesus and us. Both are synonymous, and both require the bond of love to be in unity. It is not surprising that the Apostle Paul compares our relationship with Jesus to that of a husband and wife when he said, "Husbands love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her." Metaphorically, the superglue that bonds any couple to be united as one is nothing else but love. Therefore, before a couple decides to come together as one, they will confess their love for each other. In the name of love, many are willing to commit their lifetime to one another, demonstrating the magical power of love. However, whether they can achieve it is another question because love is more than an emotion but an attitude. To Jesus, love is a commandment to be with GOD and others, and it ranks above other commandments. If love is a commandment, it will mean we will have to adhere to it as long as we live. It cannot be taken lightly. If we ever break it, as in all commandments, we will have to face the detrimental effects of it. Yes, there are consequences to our unloving actions. Though it might seem harmless as we are not lying, stealing, killing or mass destruction, regardless, the repercussions are significant. Without love, the integrity of the spiritual matrix we are in with GOD and others will be compromised. It is similar to a family without the bond of love will soon break. Anyone who does not love will ultimately leave GOD's matrix for something else. Furthermore, if we have no love or cannot love, we would have failed fundamentally as Christians because GOD is love. It is the uniform we wear that will distinguish us from the world. That is to say, if we do not have love, we do not belong to GOD. As it is written in 1 John, "Beloved, let us love one another because love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. Whoever does not love does not know God because God is love." Love allows us to be with GOD and know Him. But what is so special about knowing GOD? Many people know GOD but do not love Him. Therefore, knowing Him is more than recognition and awareness. In the book of Genesis, the same word is used to describe the relationship between Adam and Eve. It writes, "And Adam knew Eve, his wife, and she conceived, and bare Cain, and said, I have gotten a man from the LORD." Adam and Eve were of one flesh, and knowing each other meant having an intimate relationship. If we love GOD and are of one spirit with Him, then knowing GOD, naturally, means that we have an intimate spiritual relationship with Him where we will bear much spiritual fruit. That explains why some people are more anointed than others. They love GOD more, so they bear more fruit. This intimate relationship with GOD can only happen if we love Him. Otherwise, we will never know Him and will not bear any fruit. To a non-Christian, if we leave GOD out of the picture, what is the purpose of love that binds a couple to be one flesh? Against all logic, many couples fall in and out of love, and after much hurt, disappointment and sadness, they still have the stamina to seek love out again and again. Isn't it once bitten, twice shy, but when it comes to love, they are not fearful of trying again and again. What are they looking for? Everyone is looking for completeness. Figuratively, Adam is not a complete man, and neither is Eve a complete woman. Adam has a missing bone that was given to Eve, and Eve is only a bone in need of a body. Only when they come together will there be completeness. This completeness is GOD ordained as He said, "So they are no longer two, but one flesh. Therefore what God has joined together, let man not separate." Without this completeness, a man will experience loneliness, as Adam experienced before he had Eve. GOD understood the no-good effects of loneliness when He said, "It is not good for the man to be alone." This loneliness is man's shortcoming, which is predestined from the beginning in GOD's perfect wisdom. Later, GOD used this shortcoming so that man could find his completeness in Him. This incompleteness could manifest itself in many forms, leading to emptiness, meaningless, unhappiness, depression, hopelessness, worthlessness, frustration, et cetera. Sadly, it cannot be filled with promiscuity, drugs, liquor or any form of destructive behaviours or addictions. When GOD created man with the capability for loneliness, loneliness became a spiritual issue that requires a spiritual remedy. The only remedy is to love and be loved. The Apostle Paul expresses the condition of being without love as 'I am nothing', denying his worthiness in all the good he did. Love adds warmth and colours to our world, meaning to our lives, purpose to our sacrifices, fulfilment to our achievements, contentment to the little we have, gratitude to goodness, appreciation to beauty, and forgiveness to wrongdoings. Love is so magical that it is the strength in weakness, the determination in hardship, the hope in hopelessness, and the steadfastness in adversity. In short, where there is love, there is GOD and the fruit of the Spirit - joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. As humans, we understand physical unity as one flesh. But then, what is spiritual unity as one spirit with GOD? In short, it is the unity of the heart, mind and soul with GOD. For that, we need to obey the greatest commandment to love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind because only then will GOD be in perfect unity with us in the heart, mind and soul. When we give our hearts to GOD, we will have the love of GOD and the mind of Christ (1 Cor 2:16). He will become our soulmate, understanding us from the inside out. Then, we will not be alone in our minds, hearts, and souls. We will find our match and never feel alone. The difference between being one flesh and being one spirit is no matter how close we are to a person as one flesh, the person cannot fully understand us. But GOD as one spirit with us can. The Psalmist expresses it, "O LORD, You have searched me and known me. You know when I sit and when I rise; You understand my thoughts from afar. You search out my path and my lying down; You are aware of all my ways. Even before a word is on my tongue, You know all about it, O LORD. You hem me in behind and before; You have laid Your hand upon me. Such knowledge is too wonderful for me, too lofty for me to attain." With such understanding of us, how can we ever be lonely or feel no one cares or understands? If anyone ever feels empty, void or lonely, needing to hit the pub or be involved in some frivolous relationships or activities, it might be that he has not loved enough. GOD is waiting for us like the father of the prodigy son. As long as we are willing to walk the one step towards Him, He will run the ninety-nine steps towards us. All we need to do is commit our hearts to Him, and we will never have to feel empty again. If love is the main reason for a filled and satisfied life, then how can a physical being love a spiritual being, GOD? There are many things we could do to express our love, but only one thing is needed, and that is to keep His command. Jesus said, "As the Father has loved Me, so have I loved you. Remain in My love. If you keep My commandments, you will remain in My love, just as I have kept My Father's commandments and remain in His love. I have told you these things so that My joy may be in you and your joy may be complete." Keeping GOD's commandments is the only currency GOD accepts for His love, and anything else is not necessary. It is not what we want to do for GOD that counts; it is what GOD wants of us. Therefore, some people do not experience the love of GOD despite all the things they did because they did it their way and not GOD's way. In conclusion, GOD in the New Testament is no longer the GOD of the Old Testament. He no longer exists as GOD and us as two separate entities but as GOD in us as one entity. GOD no longer put His law before us to separate us from Him. Instead, He is one spirit with us in heart, mind and soul to fulfil His Law. By loving Him and others, we have a deep spiritual connection with GOD and a strong affinity with others. We become one spirit in the body of Christ. We know, understand and feel for one another through the spirit. As long as we are connected in spirit with GOD, nothing can separate us, not time, not distance or place. With GOD with us and in us, we will not be lonely, isolated, or empty.

Lord God, You are the source of all true wisdom. Your Word says, “The fear of the LORD is the beginning of knowledge”​, and so I begin this prayer by humbly revering You. I acknowledge that apart from You I know nothing of lasting value. Teach me to fear You in the proper, reverent way – not with terror, but with awe and respect – because that is where wise living starts. I want to live as one who honors You above all else, for when I do, I am at the very beginning of knowledge and understanding. Please forgive me for the times I have been a “fool” despising wisdom and instruction, as Proverbs warns​. I don’t want to go my own ignorant way; I want to follow Your way. In Jesus Name, Amen

To achieve Perfection, Give Matthew 19:21 Jesus told him, "If you want to be perfect, go, sell your possessions and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow Me." Man is not perfect because GOD never made them perfect. When GOD transformed Earth in Genesis from being dark, formless and void to what it is today, He never once said that it was perfect. They were good or very good at the most but never perfect. GOD could have made all things on earth like the way He created Satan, 'the seal of perfection, full of wisdom and perfect in beauty'. That means Satan is flawless. He is more beautiful than anyone we have ever seen, and his wisdom is beyond Solomon's. Satan is full of wisdom, which is complete and whole. As for Solomon, his wisdom, as in the book of 1 King, is 'exceedingly deep insight, and understanding beyond measure, like the sand on the seashore'. Even though his wisdom was greater than that of all the men of the East, greater than all the wisdom of Egypt, it is not perfect. Solomon' is nothing compared to Satan. For whatever His divine reason is, GOD did not give anything on earth the seal of perfection. Hence, this is the sad fate of everyone, like Adam and Eve, who are prone to falling like a house of cards because of their imperfect architecture. Therefore, the saying 'to err is human' is an undeniable truth, as it is man's nature to make errors. With Satan as our tempter, we can understand how easily we can make errors and fall into his trap. He is the seal of perfection while we are not. We are like Humpty Dumpty, who sits on our imperfections and has a great fall. Even all the king's horses and all the king's men couldn't put Humpty together again. Many do not know the consequences of our imperfections. It is the part of us that makes us fail and sin against GOD. Success will always elude us in everything we do - in relationships, careers, health and wealth. Our imperfection is our weakness, causing us to make mistake after mistake. In contrast, perfection is like our strength, and it is like a fortress, infallible. Since we are made imperfect, we will blunder our way to failure. Therefore, we see failures in systems, policies, people, families, societies and countries. The issues are countless. It is not that we do not do our best, but our best is not good enough because we cannot expect anything good out of imperfections. No matter how careful we are, we will boo-boo here and there, jeopardising our success and especially our relationship with GOD. No matter how we view our disappointments, either due to our unfavourable or uncontrollable circumstances, it is our imperfection that contributes to them. It is our imperfection that leads us to unfavourable circumstances that become uncontrollable. As much as GOD made us imperfect, He does not want us to dwell in our imperfections from His creation. Our imperfection will cause us much pain and sorrow and distance us from GOD. The Palmist advises us to find our strength in GOD so that we will go from strength to strength and not succumb to imperfection. Jesus asks us, 'Be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect'. However, GOD is not leaving us to figure out our problem by ourselves. He told the Apostle Paul, "My strength is made perfect in our weakness." In other words, we can be transformed from imperfection to perfection. We need not hold on to our imperfections as our stigma because we are only human. Only when we are perfect do we not sin against GOD, and can we be like our heavenly Father in heaven, sinless. Therefore, being perfect is not a suggestion or advice but an edict. We must overcome our weaknesses of being imperfect so that we can be blessed in all that we do. However, it is much easier said than done because of what Jesus said, "For apart from Me you can do nothing". It is not that we can do nothing. What Jesus meant is that we cannot do anything that leads to life, only those that lead to death. That is to fulfil what GOD said to Adam, "for in the day that you eat of it, you will surely die". After the fall of man, the Tree of Life is under the guard of a whirling sword of flame with stationed cherubim. No one can access it till Jesus comes as the way, the truth, and the life. Only through Jesus will we find the way of truth to life. Without Jesus, life, as the opposite of death, will evade us. Therefore, overcoming our imperfection is not by our physical determination but by GOD's spiritual anointing through our walk with Christ as we become the doers of His Word. Only then will the narrow path be revealed so that we can find the way to truth in life. Jesus nor the Bible mentions much about being perfect, minimising its importance. In the encounter of Jesus with the rich young man, Jesus linked perfection as the criterion for eternal life. Therefore, perfection is more than not making errors or sinning but the standard of eternal life. It is a complex process of transformation to be like Jesus with the ability to fulfil the commandments of the old through Moses and the commandments of the new from Him. Jesus said, "Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets. I have not come to abolish them, but to fulfil them". Jesus came to fulfil the Law, and we must do likewise. If we are any short of the standard, we are not perfect. Let us elaborate on the story of the rich young man to understand the issues. The Jewish man knew all about GOD's commandments but did not have the answer to eternal life. He was rich, implying he must have been educated and not ignorant, having a deep understanding of the GOD's Word. In doubt, he could ask from his many of his teachers. However, no one probably could give him an answer, so he approached Jesus. His question was not out of ignorance but well founded. The Torah does not have the answer because, in the Old Testament, GOD did not offer anyone eternal life. No one, regardless of who they were or their capabilities, was not qualified for eternal life. In a larger scheme of things, since the Old Testament does not offer eternal life, this implies that fulfilling the Ten Commandments is not enough to qualify for eternal life. Obedience to GOD's Commandments, as stated in the book of Deuteronomy, only assured anyone of a blessed or abundant life, not an eternal life. Therefore, the young man lived a blessed life of wealth because he honoured GOD with his obedience to the commandments - Do not murder, do not commit adultery, do not steal, do not bear false witness, honour your father and mother, and love your neighbour as yourself. GOD will never shortchange us because He is fair and just. If fulfilling the commandments is enough, GOD would have offered eternal life to His promises. The Psalmist said, "For the LORD God is a sun and a shield; the LORD gives grace and glory; He withholds no good thing from those who walk with integrity." Walking in obedience to His commandments is synonymous with walking with integrity before GOD. Therefore, He would not withhold the good thing of eternal life to those who honour Him. If He did withhold, it must be that eternal life requires more than obedience to the Law. It requires perfection because Heaven is not a place for imperfect sinners who trespass the Law. If we do trespass against GOD, we will be a repeat of Satan, being cast out of heaven. Therefore, perfection is a must to be in heaven. Jesus came as the new order that is above the old to amalgamate the Old and the New as one so that we could, through Him, not only have a blessed life but also eternal life. The young man was standing at the point of inflexion between the Old Testament and the New Testament, where Jesus was the point of change. Therefore, Jesus could take his question because He is the answer. To understand the need for new order of Jesus is that the Old, through its Law, is to expose sinfulness and highlight the need for divine grace. The Law cannot save us from eternal death. Eternal life must be through Jesus Christ and nothing else, and without Him, there can be no eternal life. Therefore, Jesus has to come with the new order. If we were to go strictly by the rules to obtain eternal life, we need to abide by the old and new commandments. When the young man asked Jesus, Jesus did not supersede the old commandments or undermine them, even when He came as the crusader of grace, the new order, and not the Law, the old order. Therefore, many have misunderstood the scripture when they say they are not under the Law but under grace. If we are no longer under Law, then why would Jesus say to the young man, "If you want to enter life, keep the commandments"? Jesus should have said, "If you want to enter life, believe in Me". Unfortunately, He did not, but that is the thinking of many. They misinterpreted the epistle of Romans, 'For sin shall not be your master, because you are not under law, but under grace.' Only when we no longer sin will sin not be our master. Then, we are not under the Law but under grace. If we persist in sin, we will still be under the Law, and grace has no favour to us. We must read the Bible like reading a legal contract, not in isolation but in totality. We cannot lift, cut, paste, or arrange the sentence as we wish to make it palatable. Jesus was impartial and upheld the Law even with His disciples. They were not under grace because they were His disciples. Their wrongdoings were judged under the Law. For that, we can look at the difference between Peter and Judas Iscariot. Both betrayed the Son of GOD, but one was restored, and the other was not because one wrongdoing did not trespass the Law while the other did. Peter's wrongdoing was that he denied Jesus, but he did not trespass the Law to murder, commit adultery, steal, or bear false witness. He did not do Jesus any harm by walking away and denying Him. Judas indirectly murdered Jesus by going to the chief priests and agreeing to hand over Jesus in exchange for thirty pieces of silver. Judas' love for money is not a sin, but his love for money caused him to betray innocent blood. That is a sin. If grace can override the Law, and under grace, GOD takes no account of our wrong, then Judas should not be sickened with guilt but be overcome with love and forgiveness. Sad to say, the love and forgiveness did not come to fill his guilty conscience, and he was so filled with self-condemnation that he killed himself. Therefore, no one is above the Law, not even Jesus' disciples. The rich young man is a better man than Judas, but his fate is no different. He was a visionary of spiritual foresight. No one, not even the Pharisees or the scribes, questioned Jesus about the way to eternal life except him. He had self-discipline and control, not letting his desires control his obedience to the commandments. He indeed had a highly commendable personality. The Epistle of Mark commented that Jesus looked at him and loved him. He clearly met with Jesus' approval. He fulfilled the conditions of the Old Testament, so Jesus offered him the new requirement of the New Testament. Instead of having a to-do list of 'thou shall do this' and 'thou shall not do that' as tests of his obedience, he must give. His ability to give will make him like GOD, perfect. For that, he must give his possessions to the poor and give his life to GOD by following Jesus in total surrender. Only by following Jesus and exemplifying His way will he be made perfect. Jesus is perfect, and following Him would mean we walk the way of perfection. Unfortunately, despite his endeavour to keep all the commandments and be a better person, the rich young man did not get what he wanted: eternal life. He did not obtain eternal life, not because he was rich but because of his unwillingness to give. Jesus said to His disciples, "Truly I tell you, it is hard for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven. Again, I tell you, it is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God." Jesus used an exaggerated figure of speech to emphasise that it is beyond any doubt that a rich man will enter the kingdom of heaven. The issue is not with the wealth but the unwillingness to give. In retrospect, no one will remain wealthy if they keep giving away their wealth. Therefore, Jesus has nothing against rich people but people who are unwilling to give and only live to enrich themselves. If we are like the rich young man who is not contented by just life on earth, we also desire eternal life; we must do more than the young man. We must be like Peter, who said, "We have left everything to follow You". Then Jesus will reply to us saying, "Truly I tell you, in the renewal of all things when the Son of Man sits on His glorious throne, you who have followed Me will also sit on twelve thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel. And everyone who has left houses or brothers or sisters or father or mother or wife or children or fields for the sake of My name will receive a hundredfold and will inherit eternal life. Let us not let our unwillingness to give forfeit our eternal life. Therefore, be the transformation we want to see in ourselves, give.

GOD's love comes with GOD's disciplines Hebrews 12:6 For the Lord disciplines the one He loves, and He chastises every son He receives. The way GOD loves is not the same as a man loves. Those who misunderstand His love as a man's love will find GOD's love irrational. When a man loves, as seen when a man loves a woman, he loves her for what she represents, as if she is a product carrying a perceived promise. He loves for a reason or with a motive. No one loves for no reason except for the sake of loving. Unless he is like GOD, loving unconditionally. GOD proves His unconditional love: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us. That is, despite us being vile, detestable and hideous according to His standard, GOD still loves us by dying for us. His love compels Him to do whatever is needed to make us right with Him so that we can be the beneficiaries of His goodness. Some might think that GOD is blinded by love. Yes, He is because love takes no records of wrong. Since GOD is love, His love is blinded to our sins, and for us, He can sacrifice 100% of Himself without consideration for Himself. For love, Jesus could, as in the Epistle of Philippians: Existing in the form of God did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, but emptied Himself, taking the form of a servant, being made in human likeness. And being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself and became obedient to death— even death on a cross. For love, Jesus bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, and endures all things. The main difference between GOD's love and a man's love is that one comes out of selflessness and the other out of selfishness. A man cannot sacrifice himself because, by nature, he is selfish. This nature is not a biased opinion but a biblical fact. The Bible has other terms to describe our selfishness: selfish ambition, vain, conceit, lovers of selves, self-seeking, pleasing ourselves, seeking our good, etc. His love is self-seeking for the enlargement of his ego, for his egoistic carnal ambitions. Hence, a man's love is not pure but tinted with motives, schemes and deceits. To elaborate, if a man loves a woman because she is an angel, talented or beautiful, his love is laced with motives. No matter how noble it might sound, it is filled with 'I love you because'. It is not a love of 'I love you regardless'. One day, a person might outlive their appealing attributes, and the reason for love will no longer exist. Then what happens? Love is liken to having wings, and it will fly away. Time will reveal the foundation of a man's love. Is it as solid as a rock, or is it as shifting as the sand?  GOD's love is unchanging with time and is unconditional in what may happen. Nothing can change His love. The Epistle of John writes, "For God so loved the world that He gave His one and only Son, that everyone who believes in Him shall not perish but have eternal life". The phrase 'GOD so loved the world' that John uses is unprecedented because GOD does not approve or accept the world. The people of the world, according to the Apostle Paul, are people of the flesh who are hostile to God. They do not submit to God's law, nor can they do so. Those of the flesh cannot please God. In the Epistle of 1 John writes, "Do not love the world nor the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him". The message is clear - despite His opinion of the world, He refrains from judgment and loves the world without prejudice and discrimination. Even if we are the vilest of sinners, His love will still cover us. No one will be ostracized from His love, and His arms are always open to everyone. That is how deep and how wide the love of GOD is. GOD's love is indeed magnanimous. It is a haven for all sinners, where GOD's judgement has to stay outside and where sinners find solace. In His love, there is no condemnation and where sins can hold nothing against us. His love becomes our source of comfort, strength and hope. No doubt, in His love is where everyone wants to dwell. Therefore, it is a topic that is well-preached and sung about. However, unbeknown to many, no matter how great GOD's love is, His love is not above His law. And no matter how much GOD loves us, He cannot allow us eternal life without complying with His law. The law states that eternal life only comes through Jesus Christ, and only those who believe in Him shall not perish but have eternal life. The Apostle John could have stated, 'For God so loved the world that He gave His one and only Son so that everyone shall not perish but have eternal life', and that would be so sweet. But he did not. That is to say, GOD's love is unconditional, but eternal life is conditional. Think about it: Metaphorically, could GOD allow the hand of His love to slap the face of His law? That will be foolish of Him. No matter how much GOD loves us, He does not allow us to trespass against His law. In other words, He does not allow us to sin against Him. Therefore, His love is not above His law. However, many have misconstrued GOD's love to supersede His law, quoting from the Apostle Paul that we are no longer under law but under grace. That is picking words out of context. The Apostle Paul did not suggest that grace had replaced the law. He only meant that when we believe in Christ, our master is no longer sin but Christ. Therefore, we are no longer slaves to sin but to righteousness. When we no longer sin, we are no longer under the law, and the law has nothing against us. We can understand it in this way: if we do not contravene any legislation, the government will not come after us. We will not be under any sentence of imprisonment, a fine, or other sanctions and are free to do whatever we want. In biblical terms, when we are not under the law, we are under grace. We are only under grace if we do not sin. We must remember that nothing is above the law, not even GOD's love. Therefore, we should not go overboard when anyone tells us that GOD is madly in love with us. It does not mean anything, as it is not an open door to eternal life, and it does not give us a license to sin. If GOD's love is not a ticket to eternal life, then what is its purpose in the architecture of humanity? Though GOD's love cannot directly give us what we want, it can pave the way there. As an analogy, GOD's love is like a mother's love, nurturing a child for greatness. Though a mother cannot bestow greatness on her child, she can nurture the greatest within him so that he can be great by his own merits. GOD's love will nurture us from sinners to saints, so by our merits, we will enter heaven. We will be able to stand tall among angels because we do not enter, figuratively, by the back door. In this journey to sinning no more, GOD promises that He will not leave us nor forsake us. He will be our refuge and strength, an ever-present help in trouble. No matter how many times we fall because of our weakness, like the Apostle Peter, GOD will be there to pick us up because His love will never fail. Like in the Apostle Paul, GOD's strength is made perfect in his weakness. He will be ours, too. GOD's love is not based on merits. Anyone is qualified for it. Therefore, no matter where we are in our relationship with Him, He will accept us as who we are. Even if we are the vilest sinners or non-Christians, GOD has no issue with that. He wants to give to us and not take from us for His purpose. Therefore, there are no criteria, conditions, or baselines except that we wish for His love. For the fallen world, He is willing to sacrifice the most precious of heaven, Jesus Christ, in suffering for its redemption so that heaven's gate is open for all who wish to enter. However, eternal life is not as simple as Apostle John put it simplistically - everyone who believes in Him shall not perish but have eternal life. What should we believe in Him, then? That He is the Son of GOD? Even the demons, Legion, knew that. Yet, it got them nowhere except to be cast into the pigs. We need to believe more than that. We need to believe every word of Jesus. If we say we believe, then we must do accordingly. If not, we are as good as non-believers. In GOD's context, knowing His Word is not enough, as we must be doers of His Word. When we believe in Jesus, we must be doers of His Word. Only when we do that will we not perish but have eternal life. Well, this is easier said than done. Many might be unaware that to be a doer of His Word is to sin no more. However, expecting a sinner to 'sin no more' is more challenging than for a drug addict to be drug-free. David wrote, "Surely I was brought forth in iniquity; I was sinful when my mother conceived me."  That means we are born in a state of sin, and we have been doing wrong since birth. Hence, to 'sin no more', we need to do more than change the habit of sinning; we need to eradicate the DNA of our sinful nature. If not, we are clean on the outside, while on the inside, we are still unclean.  We need a spiritual transformation of our inmost being. Without this, we will never be free from our sinful nature. That is when GOD's love comes with care, support and guidance, seeing us through our transformation of dying to our sinful selves and being empowered by Him in obedience. His love will surround us like a tiger mother, coaching us to stand against our enemy, the devil, who prowls around like a roaring lion waiting to devour us. GOD will discipline us to be fierce warriors against the devil's schemes and chastise us in our areas of weakness so that the devil will not have a foothold in us. We should not underestimate the devil as he can cause the downfall of any man and create havoc in anyone's life. Looking at the destruction he did to Job, we should be wary of him. As described in the Book of Ezekiel, the devil is the seal of perfection, full of wisdom and perfect in beauty. We are no match for him. If GOD is not with us, disciplining and chastening us to obedience, many would not be able to elude the devil's perfect temptation, causing us to sin. We will fall like Adam and Eve without any resistance.  The Epistle of Hebrews writes, "No discipline seems enjoyable at the time, but painful. Later on, however, it yields a harvest of righteousness and peace to those who have been trained by it. Therefore strengthen your limp hands and weak knees. Make straight paths for your feet, so that the lame may not be disabled, but rather healed." GOD loves us, and He has our best interests at heart. Through discipline, our limp hands and weak knees will be strengthened so we will not fall into sin away from GOD. Consequently, we will overcome sin and not perish but have eternal life.

Luke 6:38 Give, and it will be given to you. A good measure, pressed down, shaken together, and running over, will be poured into your lap. The measure you use will be measured back to you. To give is an expression of GOD's nature. When God expressed His love to the world, He gave. He did not just give as one gives to a beggar, a tiny fraction of the surplus of wealth and riches of heaven. He gave as one giving the best He had, His only beloved Son. Many know, but few understand the implications. That is to say, GOD did not give us the unwanted, the overrun, the rejects of heaven but His treasure, the One and Only one of heaven. GOD's giving is more than sharing what He has as what best buddies do. He gave us the most precious things He had when He gave us His one and only Son. Therefore, when GOD expressed His love, it was packed with sincerity and generosity that cost Him, figuratively, heart pain. David understood this principle when he said that he would not offer anything to GOD that cost me nothing. In the same manner, Solomon offered to GOD an extravagant sacrifice of 22,000 oxen and 120,000 sheeps for the dedication of the Lord's temple. These figures are meaningless unless we can add some understanding to them. If one sheep can feed fifty people, then 120,000 sheep can feed 6 million people. An ox is about the weight of seven sheep. Twenty-two thousand oxen would equate to the weight of 154,000 sheep. The amount can feed 7.7 million people. In total, Solomon's offering was a meal for 13.7 million people. According to the BAS Library, Jerusalem's population during the reign of King Solomon was around 5,000 people. Compared to the population, the number of the sacrifice was astounding and beyond imagination. Solomon did not need to overkill in his offering, but he did. GOD is not a beast that takes delight in the blood of oxen and sheep. However, in all sacrifices, GOD wants to see blood. If there is no blood, then it is not a sacrifice. Therefore, if Solomon's offering did not cause him pain, he would not, figuratively, bleed for it. In other words, if something were to cost us something, it must cause us heart pain. Only then would it be an acceptable sacrifice to GOD. If not, we are only offering GOD our surplus or donation that we can live without. Only when we understand giving as GOD gives will we know how to reciprocate, activating His promise of a good measure, pressed down, shaken together, and running over, will our giving be compounded back to us. As much as the principle might sound simple, GOD will return us more and above what we give, but it is not. Many would not give because it is not within our nature to give. As natural as a dog barks and a cat meows, we take, snatch, grab, hoard, rob, steal, etc. Therefore, to give is against our grain. In his epistle, the Apostle James states that we crave what we do not have and will kill and covet to obtain it. We quarrel and fight. GOD knows who we are beneath our facade. To guard against our default desire to take whatever does not belong to us, GOD put within the Ten Commandments that You shall not steal. Even that is not enough. He added another two commandments: You shall not covet, and You shall not murder. The first one is to prevent stealing from taking root in us by forbidding us from harbouring secret desires of coveting what belongs to others. The latter is to guard against killing others to take over their possessions, like David killing Uriah the Hittite and taking his wife, Bathsheba, as his woman. If it is not within our nature to take what does not belong to us, then GOD will not have gone to the extent of placing three out of the Ten Commandments addressing the weakness. And dangle such a big carrot of overflowing returns of a good measure, pressed down, shaken together, and running over, will be poured out to us. That is, when we give an apple, we reap a tree of apples. Or, like Abraham, who offered GOD his son and reaped descendants as numerous as the stars in the sky. GOD is exceptionally generous with His promises, outshining us in our giving. The next question is if GOD's promises are easily achievable, then everyone should be living in the promised land flowing with milk and honey. However, most of us are not. If not, then we need to look deeper into His promises, as we might be assuming something wrongly. GOD's promises are more challenging to achieve than we can imagine. The challenge is before we can give, our covetous nature must die. Without it dying, we cannot give. In other words, we are locked within our covetousness. It is as challenging as getting a stingy person to be generous, a rebellious child to be obedient, or a lazy man to be diligent. On the surface, changing might not be a big issue as it is a matter of orientation. Yes, if only we could orientate the sun to rise from the west and set in the east. Even Jesus, a Man of miracles, looked at the rich young man and shook His head. He could do nothing for him except to say, "Truly I tell you, it is hard for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven. Again, I tell you, it is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God." The rich young man was much better than many as he was obedient to the commandments - Do not murder, do not commit adultery, do not steal, do not bear false witness, honour your father and mother, and love your neighbour as yourself. The one thing he could not do is to give. He could not give up his wealth for the kingdom of GOD as Jesus wanted of him. The unfortunate truth is that many are like little children who cannot give up the little they can grab in their hands for the much that is in GOD's hands. They only want GOD to give them abundantly without them having to give anything first. However, GOD's principle does not work this way. If not, Jesus would not have instructed us otherwise and not to give, and it will be given to us. Therefore, giving is a prerequisite to receiving. Jesus, indisputably, came as the truth, and what He says is the way. Hence, whatever He instructs, we must follow. However, the hidden issue is not that we do not wish to follow, but by default, we cannot. That is what many are unaware of. The Apostle Paul understood when he said, "For I do not do the good I want to do. Instead, I keep on doing the evil I do not want to do. And if I do what I do not want, it is no longer I who do it, but it is sin living in me that does it." Jesus knows and understands our weakness and incapability, and He has a solution for us. Therefore, He said, "If anyone wants to come after Me, he must deny himself and take up his cross and follow Me." What must we deny? We must deny the sinful carnal man within us. This carnal man is not dead but very much alive within us. He is our best buddy in sin. He is the nagging voice luring us to do evil and the disapproving voice to do good. The Apostle Paul referred to him as our flesh. He said, "For the flesh craves what is contrary to the Spirit, and the Spirit what is contrary to the flesh. They are opposed to each other, so we do not do what we want." In other words, we do not have much choice but to listen to the flesh as long as he is alive within us. If not, he will nag 24/7 until we surrender. Consequently, we often do things that we regret later. Whoever listens to his flesh cannot obey GOD's commandments and will not please Him. As long as the flesh is alive within us, we can only be carnal Christians and not Christians transformed in the image of Christ. To be transformed Christians, we must be able to say, 'I have been crucified with Christ, and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me.' The crucifixion is in mind. It is in our thinking. We need to crucify the mind of our flesh. Therefore, the Apostle Paul urged us, "Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind." What that means is we must not think according to the logic of the world but to spiritual logic. We need to learn to think according to the wisdom of GOD's spiritual laws and not the wisdom of the world. For the wisdom of this world is foolishness with God. To carnal thinking, to give is to rob ourselves by ourselves, and this is a disputable fact. When we give, we will have less. No one ever gives and yet to have more. Hence, the less we give, the more we have. Therefore, no one with a rational mind would rob himself of good things by giving them away. The rich young man who wanted to obtain eternal life is likewise. He could do many things for GOD except to give. On the surface, he is a pious person, but deep within, he is self-centred. The motive of his actions is all for himself - to achieve abundant life on earth and eternal life in heaven. He could not give of his wealth as it would affect his abundant life on earth. Hence, he hoped to obtain his eternal life by doing and not by giving. Not giving is not a sin, as GOD never state in the Ten Commandments that You might give or be cursed. However, it is a sign of a lack of faith in GOD, and it will affect our ability to receive from Him. Proverbs 3 states, "Honour the LORD with your wealth and with the firstfruits of all your crops; then your barns will be filled with plenty, and your vats will overflow with new wine." That means if we share with GOD our wealth and all that we have, He will bless us with abundance, plentiful and overflowing. If not, the opposite will happen - scarcity, lack and shortfall. Why should this be so? We must remember that the ground is cursed after the fall of man, as it will yield for us thorns and thistles. That means when we plant a tomato plant, we will not get tomatoes but weeds. When we start a business, instead of making a profit, we make losses. As a rule of thumb, nine out of ten businesses will fail, even for well-funded companies with no exception. Whatever hard work we sow into the cursed ground, it is like sowing into a block hole. It will not be the result we expect. For this reason, we cannot look to the ground to give us the works of our hands. Instead, we must look upwards towards GOD. We need Him to nullify the curse of the ground so that we reap the fruit of our hands. Many are unaware that everyone is walking on cursed ground because we are spiritually blinded to the wilderness we are in. We cannot see beyond the physical to understand the spiritual realm of GOD. No matter how high we climb or how far we walk, wherever we turn or wherever we go, it does not matter because everywhere is the wilderness. Only GOD can lead us into His promised land that we will experience blessedness, for it is as described in the book of Deuteronomy, a good land, a land of brooks and fountains and springs that flow through the valleys and hills; a land of wheat, barley, vines, fig trees, and pomegranates; a land of olive oil and honey; a land where you will eat food without scarcity, where we will lack nothing; a land whose rocks are iron and whose hills are ready to be mined for copper. When we eat and are satisfied, we are to bless the LORD our God for the good land. We must remember that the ground is cursed, and nothing grows in it. Whatever excellent efforts we put in will go to waste. Therefore, we cannot expect to sow on earth and reap from earth. We can only expect to sow on earth and reap from heaven, seeking GOD to bless the work of our hands. We must give against our nature to give, having faith in GOD that He will enlarge our boundaries and multiply our hard work. Therefore, giving is not an option but an assurance that we will reap what we sow. Good measure, pressed down, shaken together, and running over, will be poured into us. Prayer: Oh God, we thank you for this understanding of the passage that You are our Jehovah Jireh. Teach us to sow generously whilst on this earth so that we will reap a abundant return in Heaven. In Jesus Name, Amen

Finding true success through the Word of GOD Joshua 1:8 This Book of the Law must not depart from your mouth; meditate on it day and night, so that you may be careful to do everything written in it. For then, you will prosper and succeed in all you do. All roads might lead to Rome, but there is only one way that leads to prosperity and success. Some might think it is through hard work, creativity, perseverance or any positive traits. They are definitely good attributes, but they are not the way. As conceited as it may sound, we have only one option to ironclad achievements and successes so that they will be everlasting, not something that comes by day and flies by night. That way is through the Spiritual way of GOD, according to the Book of the Law. In other words, nothing we do is good enough to give us true success unless we follow His way. Only that will make a difference. Unbeknownst to many, this is where many fail. Why? We do not know the way. Jesus has cautioned us that the way that leads to life is narrow, and the gate to it is small. Unlike the wide is the gate and broad is the way, few will find it. Therefore, we might think we know the way, but we might be wrong. Our failures prove that we do not know the way. Our weakness is we know far too little of the Bible while assuming we know enough to be right with GOD. Once we are not careful, we might end up like the foolish virgins in the parable of the ten virgins, being locked out of the wedding feast. The difference between the wise virgins and the foolish virgins is that one group has more oil-nointing than the other. Presumably, the foolish virgins knew GOD's promises and claimed them in faith without working out their salvation. Unlike the foolish virgins, the wise virgins not only knew GOD's promises but also the terms and conditions to fulfil them. They worked out their salvation. One group fulfilled the requirements and made it to the wedding feast, while the other did not. Therefore, knowing GOD's promises is not enough. We need to meet the conditions. Jesus is no exception, and He met GOD's condition before He was given a name beyond others. Many of GOD's promises are conditional, meaning we must pay a price for them. In other words, they require sacrifices. Without doing so, we cannot claim the promises. Even though Jesus paid the price for our salvation, it does not mean it is free. To claim it, we must repent from our sins. That is to mean we must sin no more. We are not free to do as we wish but what GOD wants of us. Many know the promise of salvation, but a few are aware of the condition that they have to sin no more. If they had known, many would not have jeopardised their eternal life for eternal condemnation by sinning. Sinning gives us temporary gratifications but eternal sorrows. Therefore, it is not worth the indulgence. Living in GOD's promises is like enjoying the breathtaking mountain view. However, to enjoy the view, we must scale the mountain. Realistically, without scaling the mountain, there will be no view. If we do not scale, we remain like chickens that peck the ground instead of eagles that soar into heaven. As much as we might be acrophobic, remember, when Adam and Eve fell, GOD cursed the ground, and the consequence of that is we must toil to eat off the ground all the days of our lives. Both thorns and thistles will make the ground yield for us. Instead of eating from the sweetness of the fruits, we eat the blandness and bitterness of the plants of the field. Today, if we think that our lives lack sweetness, we can change it by scaling the mountain of GOD's Word. Only then can we distance ourselves from the cursed ground and soar in the blessings of GOD. Yes, as long as we do everything written in the Book, all His promises are always yes and amen to us because GOD rules heaven and earth according to His Word. As simple as it might sound, many do not know its implications. We must become slaves to the Word or slaves to righteousness, as Apostle Paul phrased it. Ultimately, it means we must, according to the Book of Deuteronomy, faithfully obey the voice of the LORD our God and be careful to follow all His commandments. No matter how we choose to understand it, we must be obedient to His Law 100%. Where He leads, and we must follow. When He says yes, we will not say no. We willingly relinquish our rights to be under His sovereignty as Christ did for the Kingdom of Heaven. In truth, GOD holds sovereignty over heaven and earth because He is the creator of them. Everything in the universe revolves around Him, whether we want to acknowledge it or not. His kingdom comes, and His will be done on earth as in heaven. As much as we want, nothing revolves around us - our wishes, hopes, or purposes. We are not the centre of anything, not by our will, our might or our strength. Nothing happens unless GOD permits it. If our lives ever turn out well, it is that we first seek the kingdom of GOD and His righteousness because GOD does not bless unrighteous people. For the righteous, He ensures that we are the head and not the tail; we will only move upward and never downward. Only when we recognise we are nothing without Him will we be willing to align ourselves according to His will so that we may bear much fruit. It is not without reason that the Bible writes, 'Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven'. Only those who are not blinded by their self-centredness know they are poor in spirit. They recognise their spiritual emptiness and the need for GOD, seeking Him with all their hearts. Only they will find Him. Be that as it may, many understand that Jesus is the vine, that we are the branch, and that we can do nothing without Him. However, that is not the case when they are in church. Nobody goes to church to pray as the branch for His kingdom to come and His will be done. Few pray to be more like Jesus in obedience to GOD the Father and love others as Jesus has loved us, fulfilling GOD's will on earth. Instead, we pray for ourselves for our kingdom to come so that we can be wealthy and better than most men, winning their admiration. We pray against those who go against us and despise them as they are not like us. We fail to be better persons because we are not like Christ, full of the fruit of the Spirit. Many times, difficult people are those who are different from us and have different perspectives coming from contracting circumstances. Once we have the patience to understand them, they might not be as obstinate as they seem. Similarly, there are no wayward children, only neglected ones. All we need to do is exhibit the fruit of the Spirit, and many things will change. When we do that, we invite the Holy Spirit to work in our midst. There is no situation that is impossible for GOD to resolve. When a man's ways please Him, He makes even his enemies to be at peace with him. GOD will fill our shortcomings with His strength to be what He wants us to be: good children, spouses, parents, friends or enemies. If any of them slaps us on our right cheek, we will turn to him the other. If he forces us to go one mile, we will go with them two. And if he wants to take our tunic, we will let him have our cloak as well. To meet the unreasonable demand of going a mile is stretching beyond human limits. And to go for an additional mile is inhuman; it requires divine empowerment. GOD is not joking when He asks us to go the extra mile. If we cannot, it only means that we are not empowered to do so and are unable to follow instructions. Therefore, we need to go before GOD on our knees, asking for His divine intervention so that we can do what we cannot. If not, we cannot fulfil the will of GOD. Many might think GOD is teasing for stating such an OMG request, but He is not. He was also not teasing when He asked the Israelites to conquer the promised land dominated by giants. Though time and situation have changed, GOD has not. Even when there are no more giants to fight, His demands are as impossible as ever. To do His will, we need more than human strength; we need divine empowerment to deny our internal resistance, which is called fallen nature. Only then will we be able to carry the cross and follow the path of Jesus. As ugly as it might sound, if we cannot deny our fallen nature, we cannot embrace GOD will and welcome His kingdom. The big question is: are we still GOD's children if we do not do His will? Can we believe in GOD, do whatever we want and still be called children of GOD? Simply put, can we pass a maths test without knowing how to answer the questions and only knowing the English words? The bottom line is if we cannot do everything written in the Book of the Law, how do we qualify as children of GOD? Many might argue that the rule has changed, and it is no longer by work but by grace through faith that we are saved. It is a gift of GOD. We do not need to work for our salvation but to believe and have faith. Jesus came to settle all the documentation for us so we could have an unconditional visa to heaven. Yes, it is true, but it is not as simple as what we think. Salvation is a gift only by GOD's gracious invitation and not something that we can buy with our work. GOD is magnanimous and has given everyone an invitation to salvation through Jesus Christ without prejudice. However, if we decide to accept the invitation, we need not do anything except attend the wedding banquet where GOD has prepared for His Son. The condition is we need to dress according to the wedding code. If we do not, we will be thrown out, as illustrated in the parable of the wedding banquet. Even though salvation is not by work, it does not mean we do not need to put any effort into it, as some might assume. The only thing free is the invitation. We are not prequalified to be invited, but anything more than that is not. If we are staying for the banquet, we need to change to wedding clothes. There are expectations to be met. Therefore, we cannot oversimplify things or assume wrongly. No work does not mean no expectations. When GOD promised Joshua success in all that he did as the next leader after Moses's death, the condition was that he must know the Book of the Law by heart by meditating on it day and night and that he be careful to do everything written in it. Only then, figuratively, will whatever he touches turn into gold, implying that all God's promises are "Yes" and "Amen." He understood the gravity of his situation, as no one was fit enough to fight the giants. In other words, they are digging their graves. GOD did not ask Joshua to hope in Him to deliver them but to do everything written in the Book. If GOD were to save the Israelites regardless of whether they adhere to His Word or not, then it would be redundant to instruct Joshua to mediate night and day in His word. Therefore, knowing the Word is paramount to his success. Likewise, it is paramount to our success, and we should put in every effort to seek it. Joshua 1:8 This Book of the Law must not depart from your mouth; meditate on it day and night, so that you may be careful to do everything written in it. For then, you will prosper and succeed in all you do. All roads might lead to Rome, but there is only one way that leads to prosperity and success. Some might think it is through hard work, creativity, perseverance or any positive traits. They are definitely good attributes, but they are not the way. As conceited as it may sound, we have only one option to ironclad achievements and successes so that they will be everlasting, not something that comes by day and flies by night. That way is through the Spiritual way of GOD, according to the Book of the Law. In other words, nothing we do is good enough to give us true success unless we follow His way. Only that will make a difference. Unbeknownst to many, this is where many fail. Why? We do not know the way. Jesus has cautioned us that the way that leads to life is narrow, and the gate to it is small. Unlike the wide is the gate and broad is the way, few will find it. Therefore, we might think we know the way, but we might be wrong. Our failures prove that we do not know the way. Our weakness is we know far too little of the Bible while assuming we know enough to be right with GOD. Once we are not careful, we might end up like the foolish virgins in the parable of the ten virgins, being locked out of the wedding feast. The difference between the wise virgins and the foolish virgins is that one group has more oil-nointing than the other. Presumably, the foolish virgins knew GOD's promises and claimed them in faith without working out their salvation. Unlike the foolish virgins, the wise virgins not only knew GOD's promises but also the terms and conditions to fulfil them. They worked out their salvation. One group fulfilled the requirements and made it to the wedding feast, while the other did not. Therefore, knowing GOD's promises is not good enough. We need to meet the conditions. Jesus is no exception, and He met GOD's condition before He was given a name beyond others. Many of GOD's promises are conditional, meaning we must pay a price for them. In other words, they require sacrifices. Without doing so, we cannot claim the promises. Even though Jesus paid the price for our salvation, it does not mean it is free. To claim it, we must repent from our sins. That is to mean we must sin no more. We are not free to do as we wish but what GOD wants of us. Many know the promise of salvation, but a few are aware of the condition that they have to sin no more. If they had known, many would not have jeopardised their eternal life for eternal condemnation by sinning. Sinning gives us temporary gratifications but eternal sorrows. Therefore, it is not worth the indulgence. Living in GOD's promises is like enjoying the breathtaking mountain view. However, to enjoy the view, we must scale the mountain. Realistically, without scaling the mountain, there will be no view. If we do not scale, we remain like chickens that peck the ground instead of eagles that soar into heaven. As much as we might be acrophobic, remember, when Adam and Eve fell, GOD cursed the ground, and the consequence of that is we must toil to eat off the ground all the days of our lives. Both thorns and thistles will make the ground yield for us. Instead of eating from the sweetness of the fruits, we eat the blandness and bitterness of the plants of the field. Today, if we think that our lives lack sweetness, we can change it by scaling the mountain of GOD's Word. Only then can we distance ourselves from the cursed ground and soar in the blessings of GOD. Yes, as long as we do everything written in the Book, all His promises are always yes and amen to us because GOD rules heaven and earth according to His Word. As simple as it might sound, many do not know its implications. We must become slaves to the Word or slaves to righteousness, as Apostle Paul phrased it. Ultimately, it means we must, according to the Book of Deuteronomy, faithfully obey the voice of the LORD our God and be careful to follow all His commandments. No matter how we choose to understand it, we must be obedient to His Law 100%. Where He leads, and we must follow. When He says yes, we will not say no. We willingly relinquish our rights to be under His sovereignty as Christ did for the Kingdom of Heaven. In truth, GOD holds sovereignty over heaven and earth because He is the creator of them. Everything in the universe revolves around Him, whether we want to acknowledge it or not. His kingdom comes, and His will be done on earth as in heaven. As much as we want, nothing revolves around us - our wishes, hopes, or purposes. We are not the centre of anything, not by our will, our might or our strength. Nothing happens unless GOD permits it. If our lives ever turn out well, it is that we first seek the kingdom of GOD and His righteousness because GOD does not bless unrighteous people. For the righteous, He ensures that we are the head and not the tail; we will only move upward and never downward. Only when we recognise we are nothing without Him will we be willing to align ourselves according to His will so that we may bear much fruit. It is not without reason that the Bible writes, 'Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven'. Only those who are not blinded by their self-centredness know they are poor in spirit. They recognise their spiritual emptiness and the need for GOD, seeking Him with all their hearts. Only they will find Him. Be that as it may, many understand that Jesus is the vine, that we are the branch, and that we can do nothing without Him. However, that is not the case when they are in church. Nobody goes to church to pray as the branch for His kingdom to come and His will be done. Few pray to be more like Jesus in obedience to GOD the Father and love others as Jesus has loved us, fulfilling GOD's will on earth. Instead, we pray for ourselves for our kingdom to come so that we can be wealthy and better than most men, winning their admiration. We pray against those who go against us and despise them as they are not like us. We fail to be better persons because we are not like Christ, full of the fruit of the Spirit. Many times, difficult people are those who are different from us and have different perspectives coming from contracting circumstances. Once we have the patience to understand them, they might not be as obstinate as they seem. Similarly, there are no wayward children, only neglected ones. All we need to do is exhibit the fruit of the Spirit, and many things will change. When we do that, we invite the Holy Spirit to work in our midst. There is no situation that is impossible for GOD to resolve. When a man's ways please Him, He makes even his enemies to be at peace with him. GOD will fill our shortcomings with His strength to be what He wants us to be: good children, spouses, parents, friends or enemies. If any of them slaps us on our right cheek, we will turn to him the other. If he forces us to go one mile, we will go with them two. And if he wants to take our tunic, we will let him have our cloak as well. To meet the unreasonable demand of going a mile is stretching beyond human limits. And to go for an additional mile is inhuman; it requires divine empowerment. GOD is not joking when He asks us to go the extra mile. If we cannot, it only means that we are not empowered to do so and are unable to follow instructions. Therefore, we need to go before GOD on our knees, asking for His divine intervention so that we can do what we cannot. If not, we cannot fulfil the will of GOD. Many might think GOD is teasing for stating such an OMG request, but He is not. He was also not teasing when He asked the Israelites to conquer the promised land dominated by giants. Though time and situation have changed, GOD has not. Even when there are no more giants to fight, His demands are as impossible as ever. To do His will, we need more than human strength; we need divine empowerment to deny our internal resistance, which is called fallen nature. Only then will we be able to carry the cross and follow the path of Jesus. As ugly as it might sound, if we cannot deny our fallen nature, we cannot embrace GOD will and welcome His kingdom. The big question is: are we still GOD's children if we do not do His will? Can we believe in GOD, do whatever we want and still be called children of GOD? Simply put, can we pass a maths test without knowing how to answer the questions and only knowing the English words? The bottom line is if we cannot do everything written in the Book of the Law, how do we qualify as children of GOD? Many might argue that the rule has changed, and it is no longer by work but by grace through faith that we are saved. It is a gift of GOD. We do not need to work for our salvation but to believe and have faith. Jesus came to settle all the documentation for us so we could have an unconditional visa to heaven. Yes, it is true, but it is not as simple as what we think. Salvation is a gift only by GOD's gracious invitation and not something that we can buy with our work. GOD is magnanimous and has given everyone an invitation to salvation through Jesus Christ without prejudice. However, if we decide to accept the invitation, we need not do anything except attend the wedding banquet where GOD has prepared for His Son. The condition is we need to dress according to the wedding code. If we do not, we will be thrown out, as illustrated in the parable of the wedding banquet. Even though salvation is not by work, it does not mean we do not need to put any effort into it, as some might assume. The only thing free is the invitation. We are not prequalified to be invited, but anything more than that is not. If we are staying for the banquet, we need to change to wedding clothes. There are expectations to be met. Therefore, we cannot oversimplify things or assume wrongly. No work does not mean no expectations. When GOD promised Joshua success in all that he did as the next leader after Moses's death, the condition was that he must know the Book of the Law by heart by meditating on it day and night and that he be careful to do everything written in it. Only then, figuratively, whatever he touches will turn into gold, implying that all God's promises are "Yes" and "Amen." He understood the gravity of his situation, as no one was fit enough to fight the giants. In other words, they are digging their graves. GOD did not ask Joshua to hope in Him to deliver them but to do everything written in the Book. If GOD were to save the Israelites regardless of whether they adhere to His Word or not, then it would be redundant to instruct Joshua to mediate night and day in His word. Therefore, knowing the Word is paramount to his success. Likewise, it is paramount to our success, and we should put in every effort to seek it. Prayer: Dear God, help us to understand more of your Words through the Holy Spirit so we are equipped to do your Will on this earth and to glorify your Name. Amen

Walking in His Spiritual Enlightenment 2 Corinthians 12:9 But He said to me, "My grace is sufficient for you, for My power is perfected in weakness." Therefore, I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses so that the power of Christ may rest on me. Weakness makes us imperfect. Weakness is the flaw in perfection. With it, we are deemed as sheep to be slaughtered because weakness will lead us into temptation. Once tempted, many of us are like Eve, clueless about what to do next except to fall into it. Temptation is nothing to be desired as it is nothing but evil. Hence, Jesus taught us to pray that our Father will not lead us into Temptation but will deliver us from the evil one. Jesus further warned us to: "Watch and pray so that you will not enter into temptation. For the spirit is willing, but the body is weak." That is, our bodies are weak, and whatever we hope to achieve is different from what we can achieve. We can have the best intentions, but they are hard to fulfil because of our inherent flaws: weakness. It is like having an underpowered car that does not allow us to go the extra mile. Having an underpowered car is not a big issue as long as it gets us somewhere. However, having weakness means we have a low resistance to temptation. If ever we fall in, we fall into the pit of no return. Then, it can be a treacherous issue. Eve was one of many being clueless when tempted. Even great men like David and wise men like Solomon were clueless, too. If not, they would not have fallen into sin. We must understand that only if there is a need, then there is a desire. It is similar to the phenomenon of hunger. If a man is hungry, he will naturally desire to eat. If not, he might not be tempted to eat. Likewise, a weakness is like a hunger that opens our appetite to temptation. Paul understood the struggle when he said, "For I do not do the good I want to do. Instead, I keep on doing the evil I do not want to do." Nevertheless, it is absurd to hear from Paul, a ruthless man of command and control who has little control over his weakness. That is, weakness is not limited to the non-achievers or losers, who are undetermined or foolish, but it transcends to the superb, mighty, wise, or ruthless. Therefore, no matter who we are or where we are in life, we are plagued with weaknesses at our level of competency, so we do not do the good we want but the evil we do not wish to do. At this instance in the epistle of Romans, Paul was quick to dismiss his responsibility for his weakness by saying, "And if I do what I do not want, it is no longer I who do it, but sin living in me that does it." Paul disassociated his sinful behaviour as if it had nothing to do with him but the sin living in him. We can link his behaviour to that of Adam, who told GOD, "The woman whom You gave me, she gave me fruit from the tree, and I ate it." Indirectly, Adam was blaming GOD for the woman He gave him for inducing him to eat from the forbidden tree of the knowledge of good and evil and causing him to disobey Him. He was an innocent party, and whatever happened had nothing to do with him as he was caught in the web of decision-making, of which none was his. From Adam, we can see the birth of man's weakness, and after Jesus was crucified, died and risen, Apostle Paul still held on to the Adamic weakness of the attitude that it has nothing to do with me. Paul was as clueless as Adam. Indeed, Adam did not make any decisions on his own except to give all the animals and his women their names. He had all the decisions made for him. GOD chose the woman for him as his companion, and the woman chose the fruit that he should eat. Even though GOD had warned him against eating the forbidden fruit, Adam made no reservations about eating it as his woman gave it to him. He had no reason to doubt the woman that GOD gave him would do him harm. Even if he did not trust GOD, he would not doubt her, who is the DNA of his bone and flesh. Adam trusted Eve and listened to all the decisions she made. He did not utter a word during the conversation between the Serpent and his woman as he watched passively beside her. He did not clarify the misconception when the Serpent distorted the truth. He left her to assume wrongly as the Serpent misled her. When Eve gave him the forbidden fruit, Adam could have rejected it, but he did not because he, like many, could not say no to their flesh. In other words, Adam was the sheep, and his woman was his shepherd. Is there anything wrong with that? Yes, when we listen to the wrong voice and do not do what is right, our whole life will be a mistake. GOD told Cain, "If you do what is right, will you not be accepted? But if you refuse to do what is right, sin is crouching at your door; it desires you, but you must master it." The moral is that we must do right if we want to straighten our lives, and it is more than not doing wrong. Adam did not do anything wrong. He did not take the forbidden fruit, but it was given to him as one of the fruits of the garden. Therefore, he was clueless about what went wrong when GOD questioned him when he went into hiding. Only Eve had the answer, and that is, the Serpent deceived her. Therefore, contrary to the belief of many, Adam was punished because he ate the forbidden fruit, but that is only the secondary reason. The main reason GOD said, "Because you have listened to the voice of your wife and have eaten from the tree of which I commanded you not to eat." The issue is not about eating but listening, which causes the outcome, which is man's downfall. The voice he obeyed determined his action, resulting in his fate. Listening to the wrong voice was the first step of a thousand miles in the wrong direction. The difference can be between life and death. Despite being warned, why did Adam do it? Adam was stuck in a tug-of-war between GOD's restriction and his woman's inducement. Between the two of them, he had to choose one, and he chose his woman. There was little of a choice. It was either he betrayed GOD, his creator and provider, or himself, as the woman was his bone and flesh. From then till now, little has changed. Many men will still choose themselves over GOD, succumbing to their flesh within or without, causing themselves much grief. David and Solomon were among one of them. Despite their greatness, they could not control their flesh. Therefore, it is not without reason when Jesus said, "If anyone comes to Me and does not hate his father and mother and wife and children and brothers and sisters—yes, even his own life—he cannot be My disciple." Therefore, without the element of hate for anyone, including ourselves, who will turn our ears away from GOD's instruction, we cannot be Jesus's disciples. Adam could not do it for GOD, but approximately 2000 years and 21 generations later, a man did it for GOD. He was Abraham, and he listened to GOD faithfully to the extent of even sacrificing his only flesh and blood, his son. For him, GOD was also willing to sacrifice His Son, so through Abraham's lineage came Jesus. Therefore, because of Abraham through Jesus, we become a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for God's possession, to proclaim the virtues of Him who called us out of darkness into His marvellous light. Hence, anyone who wants to have life must eat his flesh and drink his blood. The implication is that Christ's DNA is in His flesh and blood, and to eat his flesh and drink his blood is to take on His DNA of obedience and listen to GOD. Therefore, the blood of Christ proves its effectiveness once we are willing to listen. After the fall of man, there is a change in plan. The woman took on a new role and became a separate entity from Adam. She was given a name, Eve, to signify the change. Before that, all the animals were given names except Eve because she existed as an integral part of Adam as she came from his rib. She was his extension of him and, figuratively speaking, like his tail, following wherever he went. She did not exist as an individual. After the fall, GOD switched Eve's role from one dictating Adam to one submitting to him. For that reason, GOD said to Eve, "Your desire will be for your husband, and he will rule over you." If Eve had been submitting to Adam and not ruling over him, that statement would be redundant. It is like asking a child to clean his room when the room has been cleaned. Eve was no longer the voice that Adam listened to. In the new spiritual structure, Eve's voice has been replaced because GOD ordained Adam to rule over Eve, and Eve has to listen to Adam. The new voice will be of Adam's new flesh, not Eve, but his fallen nature. And this voice is passed on to us like an inheritance. We know of it from the next scene of Cain and Abel's offerings. GOD mentioned that sin is crouching at Cain's door, desiring him. What does sin desire Cain to do? It desires Cain to steal, kill and destroy, which is the modus operandi of Satan. The next thing we know, Cain killed Abel. From this, we know sin as his inner voice manages to convince Cain to kill. Cain did not manage to master the compulsion of his sinful nature, which led him to be punished. GOD has a reason to use the Serpent as the personification of Satan and Eve, the flesh, to show how the spiritual world connects to a man in the relationship between Satan, the flesh, and man. As depicted in the book of Genesis, the Serpent never once spoke to Adam directly, only to his woman. Many might take this for granted, as that is how things happen. Do not take any details for granted, as secrets of enlightenment might be hidden behind them. The puzzling thing is that when God asked Adam about what had happened, Adam was clueless even when he was with Eve during the whole conversation with the Serpent, as if the conversation between them was viewed from him. Only Eve had the answer. What can we infer from them? Could it be possible there is a gatekeeper between God and man or Satan and man? The gatekeeper of the physical man is his spiritual man, who decodes, translates, and understands all spiritual matters. Though the physical man might be clueless about the spiritual happenings, the spiritual man understands because spiritual issues must be spiritually discerned. As Paul wrote in 1 Corinthians, "The natural man does not accept the things that come from the Spirit of God. For they are foolishness to him, and he cannot understand them because they are spiritually discerned." Therefore, it is possible that Eve, before the fall, was the personification of 'Adam's spiritual man' as the Serpent, Satan. Thus, whatever happened, Eve seemed to know better than Adam. Furthermore, in the Epistle of Romans, Paul wrote, "The Spirit Himself testifies with our spirit that we are God's children." Apostle Paul did not write: the Spirit Himself testifies with us that we are GOD's children. He understood the sequence, and when GOD speaks, it is from His Spirit to our spirit. The physical aspect of the man might not be aware of the happening. It is like what happened to Peter when Jesus asked his disciples, "Who do you say I am?" Peter answered, "You are the Christ, the Son of the living God." Jesus replied, "Blessed are you, Simon, son of Jonah! For this was not revealed to you by flesh and blood but by My Father in heaven." Apostle Peter must have been clueless about what he said on the spur of the moment until Jesus enlightened him. GOD talks to us and guides us literally in ways we do not know. Therefore, Jesus said, "When you are brought before synagogues, rulers, and authorities, do not worry about how to defend yourselves or what to say. For at that time, the Holy Spirit will teach you what you should say." GOD's voice is the power within us, giving us the knowledge to defeat our enemies by not falling into temptation so we do not do what we do not want to. Therefore, Paul delights in weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and difficulties because one word from GOD will change his situation and even his life. For when I am weak, then I am strong. Prayer: Father, thank you for giving us the Holy Spirit to dwell in me, so I am no longer a spiritual orphan. I will be able to discern spiritually the things of God and walk according to God's power and strength. Whether I turn to the right or the left, my ears will hear Your command within me: "This is the way. Walk in it." My ways will be pleasing to you, and I will never be clueless in the face of temptation. Amen.

Understanding His Faithfulness Psalm 100:5 For the LORD is good, and His loving devotion endures forever; His faithfulness continues to all generations. Have we ever wondered why Jesus came only approximately 4000 years after Adam? There are estimated to be thirty-four generations from Adam to Abraham and forty-two generations from Abraman to Jesus, totalling seventy-six generations. The figures imply that salvation came after 4000 years and seventy-six generations later. Are these figures just numbers, or is there significance in them? Many might be unaware that GOD not only speaks through His Words but also His actions. Therefore, the Bible consists of more than the law, rules, and practices. It consists of stories and events that reflect the act of GOD in the lives of His people. When GOD says He will be good to His people, the stories will reflect His goodness to His people. Then, the next question we will ask is, how many times? If it is all the time, then there must be sufficient records proving it. Basically, GOD will do what He says and what He says are not empty words. Hence, the Bible records the events as testimonies of GOD's goodness. If GOD says He will show loving devotion to a thousand generations of those who love Him and keep His commandments, He will do it. Even if the promise is yet to be fulfilled, then heaven and earth will have to wait for Him to fulfil His promise before the world can come to an end or anything else can happen that will jeopardise His promise. If not, GOD does not live up to His Words, speaking in a figure of speech and exaggeration. It means He cannot be trusted, overpromising and under-delivering. Therefore, GOD let time prove everything, and what He says is true. GOD took 4000 years and seventy-six generations to demonstrate His faithfulness to His Word. Despite all the unfaithfulness from His people through the generations, God remains faithful and even sends Jesus to the cross for His unrepentant people. In any given situation, even if all have given up, GOD will never give up. GOD has to prove Himself faithful even in our unfaithfulness. Paul asserts that if we are faithless, GOD remains faithful, for He cannot deny Himself. Therefore, time became the acid test of GOD's true nature. He is what He is according to His Words, without addition, subtraction, multiplication, or division to them. When GOD says, 'My purpose will stand, and all My good pleasure I will accomplish,' there can be no deviation. And if GOD says a thousand generations to those who love Him, it must be a thousand generations and nothing less. Just imagine someone telling us something, giving us a solemn promise, and at the end of it, saying he was joking and did not mean what he said. GOD is not like that; He is not a Joker, and He does not joke with His promises. GOD is faithful in His promises, but not all promises are easy to grant, especially those involving the destruction of our enemies. Because being kind to one is being cruel to the other, we must be patient with GOD because all things must happen according to His will in His time. Our enemies are nothing more than good people being disobedient. Therefore, many things cannot be rushed, and we must understand that if it is not within GOD's perfect timing, we cannot see the promise. It is written in Hebrews that many were all commended for their faith, yet they did not receive what was promised. To say it bluntly, GOD did not save them from their enemies because the timing was not right. The reality of living in the dualistic world is that for good to live is for evil to die, or for light to exist is for darkness to vanish. Therefore, if it is not time for GOD to destroy evil like the way GOD destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah, then the good will have to suffer. When we pray for GOD to deliver us from evil, and if it is not happening, it is not that GOD is dead, but we need to have patience. As much as GOD wants to deliver us from our sufferings by destroying evil, He first needs to save those still in bondage to evil. In Epistle 2 Peter writes: The Lord is not slow in keeping His promise as some understand slowness, but is patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish but everyone to come to repentance. As long as there is a possibility that someone might change his heart for GOD, GOD is willing to wait. It is similar to taking a plane. As long as we have checked for departure, the plane will wait even though we are late for boarding. Therefore, Jesus said, "And this is the will of Him who sent Me, that I shall lose none of those He has given Me, but raise them at the last day. For it is My Father's will that everyone who looks to the Son and believes in Him shall have eternal life, and I will raise him at the last day." In other words, as long as our names are in GOD's manifest, we will never miss the plane. God is adamant about fulfilling His promises on the one condition that none of His chosen ones perish, but everyone comes to repentance. That is GOD's faithfulness. Only when GOD is assured that all who are good have left the so-called Sodom and Gomorrah will He show no mercy in destroying it. GOD is answerable to those who love Him and keep His commandments to be faithful to their thousand generations. There is a little secret here. If we want to see our children, grandchildren, and many generations after that be well, we must love GOD and keep His commandments faithfully and carefully. Even if we are not good parents and grandparents, GOD will not fail us in taking care of them. In other words, when we are faithful to GOD, He will take care of our fruit. It is when we take care of the roots, and the fruits will take care of themselves. When we have strong roots with GOD, our fruit will naturally be strong. Even when we are long gone, His faithfulness will never leave them. In view of GOD's commitment to the descendants of those who love Him, He must be faithful not only to the living but also to the dead. GOD is in a tight spot, having to find a fair balance between them. Therefore, in the parable of the weeds, GOD did not remove the weeds from the wheat but let them grow together until harvest. There is another way of looking at this parable. GOD is faithful even to the evil ones, as seen in the parable. He will not prematurely remove the weeds until harvest, giving the weeds a chance to be full-grown before they are removed. The epistle of James writes: Then after desire has conceived, it gives birth to sin; and sin, when it is full-grown, gives birth to death. Only when sin is full-grown will it lead to death. Any time shorter than full-grown, GOD will not sentence them to death. That is GOD's mercy and grace. Though a weed cannot change to a wheat, a man can change from one who belongs to evil to good. The penitent thief on the cross next to Jesus changed in his last hours. If GOD had prematurely removed him, he would have missed his salvation. Many times, we will not understand GOD's wisdom, especially those whom the thief stole from. Just imagine the frustration, anguish, and suffering the thief would have caused if he had stolen from the poor, needy and helpless. We must know that a thief has no morals; if not, he would not be stealing. He would not have considered the consequences of his actions to his victims. Despite all the evil he had done, everything could be forgiven through Jesus. To the thief, this is grace, but to his victims, it is injustice and unfairness. That is the fact, whether we like it or not. GOD is not going to ostracise the thief for us. It becomes our obligation to forgive if we love GOD. To forgive is a huge obstacle we must overcome. As Jesus taught us to pray: And forgive us our sins, for we also forgive everyone who sins against us. Instead of hating our enemies, we must love our enemies and pray for those who persecute us, that we may be sons of our Father in heaven. If we do not forgive, GOD is not going to forgive us. Therefore, when we meet with our oppressors, we must be magnanimous and forgive. No matter how unwilling we feel, this unwillingness will turn to willingness if we understand how much Jesus suffered for us. If we are reluctant because we cannot see the pain of Jesus on the cross, then we will lose more than what we have lost: our eternity. Never be penny wise, pound foolish. Therefore, when we pray, please refrain from praying for the death of our enemies or curse them to hell. That is not biblical. All we can do is to ask GOD to deliver us from our enemies. Anything more than that is evil. We must understand that GOD hates the sin but loves the sinners. Therefore, when sinners oppress us, we must learn to forebear and not sin against GOD by complaining. We must remember the condition of GOD's forgiveness is that we forgive those who sin against us. As in the story of the prodigal son, GOD shows His faithfulness by His willingness to wait and keep on waiting for His sons to come back. However, it is on His terms and not on their terms. That wait can be as many years as it needs, as nothing can stop GOD from being faithful. In our lifetime, we can only see a fraction of GOD's divine plan, not the whole plan. Therefore, we must have faith in GOD as Abraham did when GOD promised to make him a great nation and that his descendants would be as numerous as the stars in the sky. Abraham never once saw any of those happen. GOD is faithful; even when Abraham was long gone, GOD ensured that He fulfilled what He promised. What can we understand through this? We count our time by years within a lifetime, while GOD counts His by generations by thousands of years. What is considered a long time to us is not long to Him. Though long, GOD's plan is not infinite but finite, with a definite beginning and an ending. Within His allocated time, He will demonstrate who He is through the lives of His people. If GOD does not prove Himself, what He says might be empty words. However, when GOD reveals Himself, it is not as simple as writing a book. His Words must become life, force or energy to His people, leading the way and revealing the truth. When we want to know GOD, we must read His actions. As action speaks louder than words, we must countercheck His Word with His action to know His true intent. His actions are a way GOD uses to define His Word so that there is no misinterpretation. If GOD says He loves us, then how much does He love us? For that, He has to show us through His action. If GOD does not demonstrate it, then what is the value of His Word? When GOD says He loves us, it means He is willing to die for us. That is when we see GOD as Christ on the cross. That far exceeds any love declaration from any man to his lover. Without His actions, we cannot understand the magnitude of His love. Therefore, be highly suspicious of salesmen promoting GOD, like selling snake oil, with their stories and testimonies from their unverified scriptwriters, which are fictitious. Do not be swept away like Eve did by the words of the Serpent. Be also suspicious of false prophets who weave lies with the truth. Only the Bible is the officially accepted Word of GOD. Therefore, please do not believe in any unofficial sources that will convince us with a bit of truth and lead us to lies. GOD has used 4000 years to write about Himself in His stories, and they should be enough to lead us through the most one hundred and twenty years of our lives. Prayer: Thank you, God, for your faithfulness to me through time and generations. Your faithfulness knows no boundary or obstacle. Even when I am unfaithful and evil, you remain faithful. Your love for me will never change. As you will never give up on me, let me not give up on myself. Continue to be that hand that lifts me when I fall and to guard me from my foolishness as I find my way home to you. Amen.

You are not what you think but the spirit that controls you Ephesians 6:12 'For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this world's darkness, and the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms.' To a layperson, this statement might sound too bizarre and far-fetched, as if we were walking through the Star Wars movie studio pretending to be Jedi to battle against Darth Sidious, the Dark Lord of the Sith. It is like we are in a world of make-believe where the spiritual forces of darkness in the heavenly realms are warring against us. In other words, we are attacked by alien invisible forces that are not flesh and blood like us. True, our real enemy is something we cannot see. If we are struggling with what we can see, then we are fighting a fake enemy. Most of us might be wondering, since we cannot astral travel, where our consciousness leaves our bodies, and how to fight a spiritual battle against the dark forces, the equivalent of Darth Sidious. The only evil forces we experience are from the people around us, the ones residing in our homes, offices, churches, or circles of friends, holding invisible knives and daggers, stabbing us with unkind words, deeds and intentions, and leaving us broken, wounded and in pain. With that experience, we can proceed to the next level of understanding. Our struggles are with no one else but with ourselves and the people around us who are no aliens to us, the flesh and blood with whom we are in daily contact. The thoughts and deeds are not of GOD's. The unloving, ungiving and non-sacrificing nature that takes, steals, kills and destroys. It is our source of unhappiness, and because of it, we suffer. Even though this is an indisputable fact, according to Paul, the people are not the culprits. Just as Jesus rebuked Peter and said, "Get behind Me, Satan! You are a stumbling block to Me. For you do not have in mind the things of God, but the things of men." Peter is not the culprit in obstructing Jesus from fulfilling his Father's will to bring salvation for all by dying on the cross. The culprit is the force behind Peter's thoughts. Peter was utterly unaware that, at that moment, he became Satan's tool to become Jesus's stumbling block. How could it be possible for Satan to use Peter as his mouthpiece? Peter spoke to Jesus as the Serpent spoke to Eve, being Satan's voice. What happened at that moment for Peter to utter words of concern and care that were, in fact, words against the will of GOD that Jesus had to rebuke him as Satan? For that, we have to look at Peter's heart. We must understand that Peter had every intention for Jesus to reign as the king of the Jews rather than to suffer and be killed at the hands of the elders, chief priests and scribes. When Jesus called Peter to be his disciple, He promised Peter that he would become a fisher of men instead of a fisherman. If Jesus were to die, the implication is Peter would have to return to being a fisherman and not become a fisher of men. That happened precisely after Jesus's death. His three-year effort of following Jesus around would have been a waste of time. In other words, Peter had self-interest or a personal agenda at heart when he said those words. Even if he did not want Jesus to die because of his love, that is considered a personal agenda. His self-centred agenda becomes an open door to evil influences and the devil's foothold. Is it biblical for Satan to have a foothold in us? Yes, it is biblical because of our fallen nature, and Satan has a legal right over us. Therefore, we are programmed to think evil and do evil. Hence, we do not need to be disciplined to do evil but to do good. According to biblical records, Satan did not come with a whip to get us to do evil. Instead, GOD has to whip us to do good. With that, we can see that we are born with Satan's DNA within us. To cut a long story short, to save us, GOD ended up whipping Himself for our sins. Therefore, in the New Testament, GOD no longer holds the whip but His love to lead us to repentance. To put it another way, GOD whips Himself for every sin we commit. Thus, those who believe in His love shall not perish but have eternal life. As long as we are self-centred and unrepentant, the nature of our flesh, Satan, has a foothold in us through our fallen nature. Satan can speak through us as if it is our intention. When Jesus rebuked Peter, He was rebuking Satan, the mastermind behind Peter. From this encounter, we can conclude that we are nothing more than vessels. We are what fills us. If we are not convinced, we can look at another incident that happened to Peter. When Jesus asked His disciples, "Who do you say I am?" Peter answered, "You are the Christ, the Son of the living God." Jesus replied, "Blessed are you, Simon, son of Jonah! For this was not revealed to you by flesh and blood but by My Father in heaven. This time, Jesus did not rebuke Peter. Instead, He complimented him for saying the right thing. Jesus used the words flesh and blood as Paul did, indicating that the information is not of human origin. It is not a rumour that Peter heard but a spiritual revelation that Peter perceived from no one else but the Father in heaven. In other words, it is a spiritual enlightenment when a person is filled with the Spirit to understand spiritual matters. This encounter is not limited to Peter, but it happened to many people in the Bible, like Bazalel, Elizabeth, Stephen, Barnabas, David, Ezekiel, and the list goes on. From Peter's two spiritual encounters, one with Satan and the other with the Father, we can deduce that a man is only a vessel, and he is what he is filled with, either good or evil. What fills him will be the voice he hears, good or evil. And what fills him will depend on what is in his heart. When he lives for himself, he has eyes only for himself, and is self-centred, then he is filled with the fallen nature. If he lives for GOD and others, has eyes for people in need, and is GOD and people-oriented, then his heart is filled with the Spirit of GOD. Hence, whoever he listens to will be his master. Hence, whatever we think is not our own. It is from whom we allow to fill our hearts. Unless we can change a person's heart, we cannot change his mind. His mind is controlled by what fills his heart. Paul understood, beyond what meets the eye, the relationship between our hearts and the spirits that control our minds. Therefore, he said, 'For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this world's darkness, and the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms.' It is not without reason that GOD always talks about the heart more than the mind of a man. He referred to David as a man after His heart and not a man after His mind. Once our heart is right with GOD, then our mind will think within the framework of GOD. Another excellent example of understanding how the heart affects the outcome of the mind is in the story of Nebuchadnezzar. GOD made Nebuchadnezzar great for His purpose, and his greatness was like a tree large and strong, whose top reached the sky and was visible to all the earth, whose foliage was beautiful and whose fruit was abundant, providing food for all, under which the beasts of the field lived, and in whose branches the birds of the air nested. One day, he was walking on the roof of the royal palace of Babylon, and he exclaimed, "Is this not Babylon the Great, which I myself have built by the might of my power as a royal residence and for the glory of my majesty?" When his heart was filled with pride in himself and his greatness, GOD struck him down with madness. He was driven away from mankind. He ate grass like an ox, and his body was drenched with the dew of heaven until his hair grew like the feathers of an eagle and his nails like the claws of a bird. Only after seven years did GOD restore his sanity, and He praised and exalted and glorified GOD as the king of heaven, for all His works are true and all His ways are just. The moral of Nebuchadnezzar's story is that the heart determines our future more than our efforts. When Nebuchadnezzar's heart was filled with himself, God flipped his mind like a pancake. One moment, he was sane, and another moment, he became insane. Only when God felt that Nebuchadnezzar was humbled enough did God flip his mind back. In other words, our mind is nothing more than a marionette where the puppeteer controls every movement of the puppet with strings. The puppet is not free to do as it wishes, but according to the puppeteer that controls it. Likewise, our mind is not free to think as we want to but according to whom fills our hearts. In computer terminology, a man is only the hardware, and the software that helps him to think and operate comes from the spiritual realm. In the book of Proverbs, Solomon wrote, 'Guard your heart with all diligence, for from it flow springs of life.' Why the heart and not our mind? Solomon understood that when he gave his heart to GOD, GOD gave him a perfect mind filled with wisdom and understanding. Once his heart turned away from GOD, his wisdom and understanding were lacking to preserve his kingdom. Only GOD holds the key to the springs of life, and the secret passage to them is the heart. The mind can think as many dreams as it wants, but it will only be wishful thinking. Therefore, if we want to have the blessings of heaven, we must have a heart for GOD. It is more than going through the ritual of going to church, giving tithes and offerings or doing charities. It is to put GOD as the centre of our life and let our world revolve around Him. Filling our hearts with the love for GOD and not with the desires of our fallen nature is the key to success in life. It is only through the guidance of GOD that we find life. If we follow the advice of our fallen nature, we will find death because life is only in the hands of GOD. Therefore, if we are not of GOD, whatever we do is a waste of time because there can only be one outcome - death. In other words, we will make lousy decisions despite our best efforts because we are ill-advised. Anything not under GOD's counsel is not under His will. Epistle 1 John writes, 'And this is the confidence that we have before Him: If we ask anything according to His will, He hears us. And if we know that He hears us in whatever we ask, we know that we already possess what we have asked of Him.' To understand this statement from the opposite perspective, if we do not ask according to His will, He does not hear us. Therefore, those who go to church to pray for nothing else but themselves are praying in vain because they are not asking according to GOD's will. They are nothing more than mouthpieces of Satan, praying for the desires of their fallen nature, which are evil. GOD will not listen to them. GOD wants us to worship Him in Spirit and truth, meaning the Holy Spirit must anoint our thoughts, teaching us to pray. Our prayers will align with GOD's will, and He will be pleased to listen to us. Whatever we do, we will not contravene the first and second greatest commandments, which are to love God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind and to love your neighbour as yourself. Only if we live a self-centred life will we contradict a god-centred life. When we live for GOD and others, we have to sacrifice our self-centred lives for them because we cannot put our interests and GOD first at the same time. There can be only one first. We must choose one over the other. Therefore, we must rightly select what should be within us: the Spirit of Life or the spirit of death. Prayer: Thank you for enlightening my mind with Your words. Continue to teach me Your truth so that I may walk in it and find life. Protect me from the deceits of my enemies, who come as wolves in sheep's clothing. Continue to renew my mind with the truth so that I can be transformed into your image. Amen.

Know Thy Enemy 1 Peter 5:8 Be sober-minded and alert. Your adversary, the devil, prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour. Sun Tzu, a Chinese military general, strategist, and philosopher, once said, "Know thy enemy and know yourself; in a hundred battles, you will never be defeated." Knowing ourselves alone is like a blind archer shooting arrows at a target, hoping one will hit the bullseye. Knowing ourselves and our enemy is like an archer with eagle-eye vision, and with every arrow he shoots, he will surely hit the bullseye. Therefore, we cannot walk naively through life, blind to our enemy, knowing nothing of him except his name. Ignorance is not bliss. In the book of Hosea, GOD said, "My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge. Because you have rejected knowledge, I will also reject you as My priests. Since you have forgotten the law of your God, I will also forget your children."  Who is our enemy? Anything or anyone that turns us away from GOD is our enemy. Therefore, as children of GOD, we cannot be as innocent as doves but also as wise as serpents to know who our enemy is. We cannot be like Eve, knowing good and not evil or knowing light and not darkness. She is not at fault because she has not taken the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil during that time to know the existence of evil. She only knew a friend but not a foe, good but not evil, that could turn her fate for the worse. Hence, she was as innocent as doves. We cannot be like that because within us is the knowledge of good and evil, so we must be more than innocent as doves but as wise as serpents to know the traps of evil. We cannot be living in a fool's paradise, thinking that GOD will save us from the hand of the devourer. He will not since He did not save Adam and Eve from the deceit of the Serpent that led them into suffering, pain and death. Why would he make an exception for us? To beware of our enemy, we should never let anyone sweet-talk us into believing anything that seems too good to be true—it probably is. GOD's actions speak louder than His Words. Unless those gifts are under goodwill, everything of GOD, protection, provision, blessings, or promises requires us to walk on the tightrope of obedience. Even though Eve is ignorant, naive, or impressionable, she could not have fallen into the Serpent's lie if she had walked tightly on the rope of obedience. God's protection and provision are only found in obedience, and anything out of obedience is out of His protection. Hence, once Adam and Eve disobeyed, they had to leave Eden away from GOD's protection and provision. GOD did not show them leniency even when they were first-time offenders deserving a second chance.  Once fallen, the second chance only came a few thousand years later in the form of Jesus Christ. Even if we are given a second chance, it does not exempt us from being disobedient to do as we wish. We still have to be obedient in the face of temptations. Even if Jesus's love covers all sins, it does not mean we can continue sinning. Anyone who continues to sin shows he is unrepentant. Forgiveness requires a repentance heart and demands us to turn over a new leaf. If there is no change and transformation, it will mean that there is no repentance. In the epistle of 1 John, John states, "No one who remains in Him keeps on sinning. No one who continues to sin has seen Him or known Him." That implies that knowing GOD will teach us to stop sinning, which is where forgiveness comes in. If we keep sinning, then we need more than forgiveness; we need tolerance. But GOD is willing only to forgive sin, not tolerate sin. Coming back to what is written in the book of Hosea, we are destroyed by a lack of knowledge because we have rejected knowledge. At face value, we are blockheaded to reject knowledge, but in reality, our fallen nature refuses to accept the things of GOD. It is written in the Epistle of Galatians, 'For the flesh craves what is contrary to the Spirit, and the Spirit what is contrary to the flesh. They are opposed to each other, so you do not do what you want.' Therefore, no matter how hard we endeavour, as long as our flesh is alive, we will refuse to learn. It is not that we do not want to, but we cannot because the flesh, our gatekeeper, has a natural rejection of the law. The law of GOD goes in one ear and out the other. Metaphorically, we are like a filter that absorbs all evil influences and sieves out all good. Through the prophet Hosea, GOD reprimanded the Jews for being blockheaded, but it is not a Jewish problem but a universal one. Anyone who wants to become a child of GOD will face the issue of incompatibility of their fallen nature with GOD's. They are like oil and water, immiscible. Indirectly, GOD is saying through the prophet Hosea that whoever rejects the law is incompatible with Him and cannot be His children. Therefore, anyone holding on to his flesh becomes an enemy of GOD and cannot be his child. In today's context, many believe that once their sins are forgiven, it means that God has accepted them as who they are—fallen beings. Do not be deceived. If this is true, then many things cannot add up. If the blood of Jesus can wash away our sins and transform our fallen nature, then Jesus would not ask us to deny ourselves, take up our cross, and follow Him. Jesus's blood can only wash away our sins but not transform our fallen nature. When Jesus said, "It is finished." And bowing His head, He yielded up His Spirit. It does not mean that, with His death, we are free from our fallen nature. Our enemy hopes we will believe that. Jesus meant He had finished his mission on earth. He conquered man's eternal death so that whoever believes in Him will not perish but have everlasting life. If Jesus's death is enough to put to death our fallen nature, then it is redundant for Jesus to ask us to deny ourselves. That is to say, Jesus has done His part, figuratively, to bring us to the water. We must drink the water ourselves. If we want to belong to Christ Jesus, according to the Epistle of Galatians, we must crucify the flesh with its passions and desires. No one can do that for us except ourselves. We hold the last piece of the puzzle to salvation as we have the final say - to crucify or not to crucify our flesh. Now, standing between God and us is our common enemy, the fallen nature. With Christ's death on the cross for our sins, God no longer holds against us for the old debt, which is committed by our fallen nature. God is willing to let bygones be bygones. However, bygones will never be bygones if we keep sinning by listening to our fallen nature, keeping the beast alive. In the epistle of Romans, Paul states, 'For if you live according to the flesh, you will die; but if by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live.' This verse refutes the catchphrase of 'once saved, always saved.' No one is saved until they put to death the deeds of the body. That is to say, if there is no death of our fallen nature, we will not be saved. When we believe in GOD, He expects us to be transformed. A confused mind is the devil's playground. Therefore, we must be clear of the changes between the old and the new covenants. Jesus came to fulfil the old covenant by His death on the cross, bringing about the new covenant. If we are not clear about the change, then we will be like Eve, falling into our enemy's deceit. To understand this change, we must understand Paul's writing by understanding who he is. Jesus recruited Apostle Paul after He had resurrected, in a spiritual encounter, where Jesus appeared to Paul in an audible voice. Paul is unlike Jesus's twelve disciples, who among them were fishermen, tax collectors and peasants. Paul was a Pharisee, a student of Gamaliel, a man held in great esteem by all Jews. Therefore, Paul was not a nobody like the rest but someone proficient in the Law of Moses. He wrote and contributed about fourteen out of the twenty-seven epistles of the New Testament, having a dominant no lesser than Jesus's disciples. Instead of selecting one of the twelve disciples whom Jesus closely taught to champion the post-Christ movement, GOD chose Paul, who had never met Jesus and didn't claim to have met him. Paul is similar to Moses, who was taught by the best of the Egyptian court, and Paul, who was trained by Gamaliel, recognized as a Pharisee doctor of Jewish Law. Through Moses, GOD established the Old Covenant and through Paul, the New Covenant. Many of Paul's writings are challenging to comprehend and are unlike those written by Jesus's disciples, who are narrations of Jesus's ministry. Paul's writing expounds on the ministry of the Holy Spirit. When we put to death the deeds of the body, we are no longer under the law but under the Holy Spirit. Jesus's death parted a way for those who believe in Him to walk out of the bondage of sin like GOD parted the Red Sea for the Israelites to leave the bondage of Egypt. Unless we are willing to sin no more, we will not move out of the bondage of sin. The good news is the door remains open and will be opened forever to anyone who wants to leave their sin behind. The contention is not about the open door but who is exiting through the door. Many praise GOD for His goodness for the open door, but no one is leaving their Sodom and Gomorrah because they love sinning too much to leave. Therefore, no matter how good GOD is, it has nothing to do with anyone unless he wants to stop sinning. After evaluating all that Christ has done by His death on the cross, Paul still warns us that if we live according to the flesh, we will die, implying that the flesh is still alive in us, residing in the still soft voice, leading us into the way of evilness. Jesus's death or blood has no detrimental effect of it. It is still much alive, working its way to our death. It is like some cancerous cells working within us that cannot be removed by any means except by the Holy Spirit. Only those under the Holy Spirit have the power of the Holy Spirit to put to death the deeds of the body by sinning no more. Only then will they live. Many do not know that our enemy is well hidden within us, the first one to greet us in the morning and the last one to wish us goodnight, always talking to us and helping us make decisions. Those who listen to it become futile in their thinking and darkened in their foolish hearts. Paul describes them as having a depraved mind to do what ought not to be done. They have become filled with every kind of wickedness, evil, greed, and depravity. They are full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, and malice. They are gossips, slanderers, God-haters, insolent, arrogant, and boastful. They invent new forms of evil; they disobey their parents. They are senseless, faithless, heartless, merciless. The blood of Jesus did not put a stop to the evil influences we are hearing. As long as we are willing to listen, it will speak. Once we listen, we become accomplices in crime, like Cain, who killed his brother Abel. Our enemy is much nearer to us than we think and more influential to us than we know. He is not the big bad fox lurking in the forest but the coaxing voice that, as our second nature, justifies us to sin. When we look at the broken lives, broken relationships, or broken bank accounts of many, we know many have listened to its foolishness and treated it as wisdom. We cannot outsmart our fallen nature because it has evolved through time to understand the weaknesses of men. Therefore, we need to stand firm on GOD's commandments and not depart from them. Only then can we not fall into destruction. However, despite our best intentions and determination, it will be challenging because we do not have what it takes to be better than our fallen nature. We are like David fighting Goliath, sure to be defeated. We are, as Jesus commented, 'Watch and pray so that you will not enter into temptation. For the spirit is willing, but the body is weak.' Jesus could have given us a better answer as to how to combat the weakness, but He did not. What He said is as good as asking us to wait and see that we do not enter into temptation. It is not that He does not want, but it is not under His purview but the purview of Paul to introduce the Ministry of the Holy Spirit. Without this, the work of the Trinity would not be complete. Only then will we be like Samson in an incident where suddenly, a young lion came roaring at him, and the Spirit of the LORD came powerfully upon him, and he tore the lion apart with his bare hands as one would tear a young goat. We will be tearing apart the roaring lion, our devour. Prayer: Thank you, God, for giving me the Holy Spirit to empower me to defeat my enemy and for opening my eyes to see how easily my enemy can infiltrate my mind and heart—just as easily as the Serpent is able to access the Garden of Eden to talk to Eve. Only when I study your words carefully will I not be like Eve, deceived into believing something that is not true. Continue to teach and guide me through your Holy Spirit so that I will not fall into the devil's trap and sin against you. Amen.

The Temptation Matthew 4:1 Then Jesus was led by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil. The purpose of the Bible: Not love To romanticists, the Bible is a love story between God and man because God loved the world so much that He gave His one and only Son so that everyone who believes in Him shall not perish but have eternal life. This statement becomes the foundation of a Christian's faith, a faith founded on sacrificial love. However, this self-sacrificing statement has been perverted, with many cult teachings arising from it. The truth in everything is like a fine line, which nothing can be added or taken out of it. Anything out of the line is a perversion of the truth. It is like the Serpent expounding on the good of eating from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, emphasising the gain and diluting the consequence. When the truth gets distorted, it is no longer the truth. The first lesson: The temptation As much as we wish it were love, the unfortunate truth is that the Bible's priority is not love but something else. We can see that the Bible did not state its beginning with the proclamation of love and that GOD is love and His love for the world. The central focus of the beginning was GOD's creations, and immediately after that, the scene jumps forward to the temptation. Through the temptation, GOD gave man his first performance report. Regardless of the reasons for failure, he is not good enough and cannot be trusted to uphold the standards of heaven. In other words, man was put on a scale and weighed and found to be wanting. If GOD had no intention of weighing the man's heart to know how the weightage was His Word in him, then He would not have let the Serpent in. No one allows a snake into the house unless one is rearing it. If GOD had no other purpose for the Serpent, then He did not need to fortify it with extra cunningness and the ability to speak human language. GOD does not create useless things, and the Serpent would never have been created in the first place for no reason. Nothing would happen if GOD did not want it to happen. GOD does not work on hindsight but foresight because He knows the end from the beginning. Therefore, it was not man's misfortunate to have met with the Serpent but GOD's divine plan. Temptation, the essence of the Bible Understanding the law of the first mention and the subsequent events reveals that temptation has greater relevance, priority, and significance in the Bible than in other mentions. Temptation is the determinant for all that follows in the Bible. That is to mean that without it, the Bible has no purpose, and GOD has no value. Though temptation might seem like the cause of man's downfall, the truth is that it is man's weakness. Without being tempted, man does not know his weakness and his need for a saviour. If a man has no part to play in the fall, then GOD would be seen as unreasonable to impose the death penalty on an innocent party. Therefore, we cannot look at things on the surface. As much as we must examine the cup on the outside, we must also examine the cup on the inside. On the outside, it is the Serpent's fault, but on the inside, it is man's weakness to resist temptation. Therefore, he is being punished for his weakness and non-compliance. Often, the issue is more than skin deep; we need to look deeper beyond the facade. If we cannot identify the problem, then we are not applying the right medicine to the situation. As it takes two hands to clap, so we cannot be partial. If not, we would be solving the symptoms rather than the root cause. Understanding issues well is essential because it affects our salvation or ending. Temptation, our best friend Without a doubt, love warms the heart and gives strength to the heavy-laden. However, love cannot help solve any problem. Therefore, we should not be too infatuated with love. All of us have temptations to fight, and fighting temptation must be our sole purpose in life. It is the crux of the Bible. After the creation, GOD could have started the Bible with a more positive outlook, with man growing in wisdom and stature as Jesus did, but He did not. Genesis, the first book of the Bible, starts with a double tragedy, where Adam and Eve are being cast out of Eden, and Cain kills his brother, Abel. All happened because they could not resist their temptations: one to disobey and the other to kill. It is interesting to note that the voice of the temptress disappeared after the fall of man. Before the fall, the voice of the temptress came from the Serpent, a being outside of man. After its first grand appearance in Genesis, it no longer reappeared. It does not mean that it no longer exists, but the voice of the Serpent has become the voice of sin existing beside man. It is as tangible as the Serpent talking to Eve in that small voice that is constantly talking to us like our best friend. To be precise, sin is residing at the doorstep, desiring to become the soulmate, trusted advisor and counsellor to those who would listen. GOD's strict instruction is: If we refuse to do what is right, sin is crouching at our door; it desires us, but we must master it. Mastering sin, avoiding temptation Joshua 1:8 This Book of the Law must not depart from your mouth; meditate on it day and night so that you may be careful to do everything written in it. For then, you will prosper and succeed in all you do. Mastering sin was GOD's first instruction to the firstborn of the fallen man, Cain, and through him, it becomes the central message to us as the descendants of the fallen man, Adam. Therefore, it is the focus of the Bible. Hence, it is the erroneous thinking of many that they are made for a higher purpose or to do extraordinary things. The only thing GOD wants of us is not to conquer the world but to conquer our fallen selves, mastering sin and the desire to do evil. The Bible is fundamentally written as a manual for sin management, more than a love story. If we can manage sin well, we will be highly favoured by GOD. With GOD with us, nothing can stand against us. If we are willing to fight the battle within ourselves so that we will not sin against GOD, He will fight the external battles for us. By paraphrasing what Joshua said, if we do not sin against GOD, we will prosper and succeed in all we do. Therefore, we must start our first step right by mastering sin, and we will be a thousand steps in the right direction, walking in blessedness. If not, we will be walking on cursed ground, as Cain did, where the ground no longer yields its produce in whatever we do. Our worst enemy: Ourselves Ecclesiastes 9:12 For surely no man knows his time: Like fish caught in a cruel net or birds trapped in a snare, so men are ensnared in an evil time that suddenly falls upon them. If life does not do us well, we think the world and everyone are against us, like the current of the stream pushing us downstream or like the ground producing thorns and thistles instead of the fruit of our labour. It is far from the truth. The truth is we are our worst enemy. By falling into temptation, by listening to the wrong voice within and without, we plague ourselves with many sorrows. We will be like fish caught in a cruel net or birds trapped in a snare when we are entangled in temptation. Even David, who was strong enough to overcome Goliath, bigger and stronger than him, had no strength to resist his sinful desire for Bathsheba. Even Solomon, with his great wisdom, was no match for his foolish desire to please his foreign wives and concubines in idol worship. No one caused the downfall of David or Solomon but themselves. GOD was with them, and nothing was more powerful than them to topple them except themselves. There was no greater evil force against them except themselves. Therefore, when things do not work well with us, we do not need to look far from ourselves. If we are willing to change, all will be forgiven, and our predicament will change. Nothing can hold us back from the blessings of GOD except ourselves. GOD puts a hedge around those who love Him, and no evil can touch them. If we resist temptation and do not sin against GOD, we will never fall into any cruel net or trap in a snare. Guaranteed. The unfortunate truth Ideally, if we do not fall into temptation, we will not be ensnared in an evil time. However, this is easier said than done because the one thing we miscalculated is our uncontrollable and untameable flesh, or fallen nature, has little resistance to temptation. Therefore, David found comfort in what he should not be seeing, and Solomon in doing what he should not be doing. If they felt their actions were out of character, they would have turned away immediately, as Joseph did when Potiphar's wife seduced him. Instead, they let their choice lead them deeper into their indulgence. As stated in the epistle of James, after desire has conceived, it gives birth to sin, and sin, when it is full-grown, gives birth to death. Therefore, no one led them to their bad endings except themselves. Remember, though the lips of the temptress drip honey and her speech is smoother than oil, in the end, she is bitter as wormwood, sharp as a double-edged sword. The Bible does not try to discredit David and Solomon but states that even great and mighty men fall under temptation, so we must be very mindful. All are tempted, no exception. Temptation is not limited to man but to all, including the angels and Son of GOD, Jesus. We know that the Holy Spirit led Jesus into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil, and the Serpent tempted Adam and Eve. We have never heard of the temptation of Satan. It is not stated but deduced. If the angels were not tempted, then how would they fall? There must be a seducer before one can be seduced, and there must be a cheater before one can be cheated. From the effect, we know there must be a cause, as there is no smoke without fire. Satan, like David, looked too long at something that did not belong to him. Then, he said in his heart, "I will ascend to the heavens; I will raise my throne above the stars of God. I will sit on the mount of assembly in the far reaches of the north. I will ascend above the tops of the clouds; I will make myself like the Highest." With that thought, Satan fell into temptation and fell out with GOD. He led one-third of the angels away as his fallen angels to form his so-called kingdom of darkness when GOD cast them out of heaven. GOD's love, no entry permit to heaven When Adam fell, he was cast out of Eden with Eve, and when Satan fell, he was cast out of heaven with his fallen angels. Only Jesus, the Son of GOD, made it through the temptations in complete obedience to GOD. For His steadfastness, He is rewarded in heaven and is at the right hand of God, with angels, authorities, and powers subject to Him. GOD the Father loves the Son, but His ascension to the throne was not pathed with love but tragic. To meet the demands of heaven, He was like a rose trampled under the feet of sin. Nothing came free or easy for Him. Therefore, GOD's love is not our entry permit to heaven. His love is our strength, support and comfort, like a pair of loving hands holding on to ours as we go through the painful progress of dying to our fallen nature by resisting temptation and sinning no more. However, this love will get us nowhere if we refuse to master sin. GOD's promise The message is clear: If we cannot stop sinning, we cannot master sin, and we cannot overcome temptation. At the end of the Bible, Revelation, GOD promises, 'To the one who overcomes, I will grant the right to sit with Me on My throne, just as I overcame and sat down with My Father on His throne.' What we should overcome is a question mark. By context, we must also overcome what Jesus has overcome. Jesus has overcome sin, temptation, and the world, so we must do the same. The message of temptation started in Genesis, GOD, ends in Revelation, promising those who overcome temptations to share with Him the throne of heaven. That is His demand: we must stop sinning and not be contented that our sins are forgiven. There is no compromise on that. Conclusion As in the Lord's Prayer, Jesus taught us to plead with God to keep us from temptation and deliver us from evil. Indirectly, Jesus is telling us that GOD wants us tested through temptation that leads us to evil, as happened to the first man, Adam. If GOD has no such intention, then the statement in the prayer is redundant. Jesus understands the Father's heart, so He wants us to seek leniency. Therefore, as we walk through life's journey, let us be fully aware that we are set up to be tested. Let us hold firmly to GOD's Word and never turn to the right or left of it. Only then will we be like Jesus, avoiding the deadly traps of temptation. Prayer: Our Father in heaven, hallowed be Your name. Your kingdom comes, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. Give me this day my daily bread. And forgive me of my debts, as I also have forgiven my debtors. And lead me not into temptation but deliver me from the evil one. GOD, have mercy on me because I am weak in the face of temptation. Please give me an extra anointing of the Holy Spirit so I will be strengthened to stand against my temptress by mastering sin. I want the right to sit with Jesus on His throne as He sat down with the Father on His throne. Amen

You can predict your future! Hebrews 10:23 Let us hold firmly to the hope we profess, for He who promised is faithful. The uncertainty of tomorrow Luke 12:19-20 Then I will say to myself, "You have plenty of good things laid up for many years. Take it easy. Eat, drink, and be merry!" But God said to him, 'You fool! This very night, your life will be required of you. As many might assume, whatever happens to us may be based on random selection. Many can plan for tomorrow, but there is no assurance that things will go as planned. Like in a card game, no one is in control of the cards in a card game as no one is in control of one's fate; all go by chance and probability. There is only so much we can do, and the rest is in the hands of GOD. As Solomon stated, "Time and chance happen to all."  There is no certainty about what the future might bring because no one knows what surprises tomorrow might hold. Today, we might be wise in our eyes, but when tomorrow comes, the situation might turn against us, and what wisdom is becomes foolishness. Or what is good might turn sour, what is fast might break down, or what is strong becomes weak. Tomorrow is a game changer, ushering in changes and new challenges, obsolating the old and giving birth to the new. If we are not careful, we might be caught off guard and be thrown into the ocean under the mercy of the unpredictable storm called tomorrow that can sink any ship. Today's success does not mean a successful tomorrow. When tomorrow's earthquake comes, it will level down any giant, making a joke of anyone's hard work. Therefore, the race is not to the swift, nor the battle to the strong; neither is the bread to the wise, nor the wealth to the intelligent nor the favour to the skilful. That is the reality that all have to face. The certainty in the uncertainty Psalm 1:3 He is like a tree planted by streams of water, yielding its fruit in season, whose leaf does not wither, and who prospers in all he does. If everyone's life is laced with uncertainty, then what certainty can we expect? As Jesus described, our precariousness is like the grass of the field, which is here today and tomorrow, thrown into the furnace. That means today, we can be happily swaying in the field, enjoying the breeze, and tomorrow, we will be burned in the furnace. What hope do we have in an ever-changing environment where today's field might become tomorrow's fury furnace to us? If we want to avoid such precarious moments, we must be like a tree and not grass. We cannot be any ordinary tree but a tree planted by streams of water, yielding its fruit in season, whose leaf does not wither and who prospers in all he does. Such a tree is not affected by dry spells or storms that threaten its existence or uproot it. Beneath the tree, where no one can see, is living water, nourishing the tree from physical damage, threats or dangers. Sun or rain, nothing is going to affect the growth of the tree. It can only get bigger and stronger every day, bearing fruit —a hundredfold, sixtyfold, or thirtyfold. The certainty Matthew 5:17-18 Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets. I have not come to abolish them but to fulfil them. For I tell you truly, until heaven and earth pass away, not a single jot, not a stroke of a pen, will disappear from the Law until everything is accomplished. Unbeknown to many, in the world of uncertainty, there is certainty, and it is found in the law. A law describes the outcome under certain conditions and predicts what will happen as long as those conditions are met. Even when heaven and earth pass away, not a single jot, not a stroke of a pen, will disappear from the Law until everything is accomplished. Hence, everything in the entire universe happens according to Law—there is no such thing as chance. Every effect must have a cause, and in turn, that cause must have an effect. Thus, we have the perpetual, never-ending cycle of cause and effect. In farming terms, we reap what we sow. In scientific terms, it is the equal and opposite reaction of every action. In spiritual terms, it is karma or retribution. In idiomatic terms, it is the chickens who come home to roost. The predictability of the law Joshua 1:8 This Book of the Law must not depart from your mouth; meditate on it day and night, so that you may be careful to do everything written in it. For then, you will prosper and succeed in all you do. No matter what terms we use to define certainty, the message is clear: nothing happens by random selection or chance. The uncertainty that many face is the certainty of an outcome because they are not under the protection of the law. Simply explain, those who live in obedience to the law live in certainty that things will work out as planned, while those who live in disobedience to the law live in uncertainty that nothing will work out as planned. That is to say, the law protects all who obey. Those who disobey will have to face the penalty of the law. Regardless of whether it is common law, scientific law or spiritual law, all have the same power to enforce their predicted outcome. If they cannot, then they are good practices, good to know but not necessary to follow. Therefore, whatever we do, we should not trespass any law and expect to get away. There is no getting away until every arrears is paid. No man is above the law. Galatians 3:11 For it is written: "Cursed is everyone who does not continue to do everything written in the Book of the Law."  As much as we think we are free to do what we want, no one is entirely free to do so. We are free to do as we wish, but only within the boundary of the law, not just spiritual but scientific or common law. Once we cross the boundary, we walk out of the hedge of protection of the law. We have to suffer the consequences of our actions. It is similar to observing the traffic rules. If we don't, the predictable outcome will, indeed, ultimately, be hit by other vehicles. We do not need watchful eyes to enforce the punishment. The traffic system can self-regulate itself and eliminate the offender. If one gets into an accident, there are three predictable outcomes: injuries, death or license suspension. If we do not want to end up with such curses, we should be obedient and observe the law. Ignorance of the law Luke 23:34 Then Jesus said, "Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing." However, many things are easier said than done. No one wants to trespass the law and add curses into one's life. Many of us are like Eve, not knowing what we are doing. We are like grass that cannot go through any strong wind, unlike a tree that goes unaffected by the storm of life. The difference is that one does not know the rules of the game, while the other does. If we do not want to be like grass that is constantly tossed around by the whims and fancies of the wind until we do not know what we are doing, we must precisely understand the requirements of the law. Then, we will be like a tree drawing living water, where the storm is nothing but a breeze. However, The law is not a friend but a foe. Galatians 5:17-18 For the flesh craves what is contrary to the Spirit, and the Spirit what is contrary to the flesh. They are opposed to each other, so that you do not do what you want. But if the Spirit leads you, you are not under the law. As much as we want to obey the law and live under its protection or provision, it is beyond our human nature. Obeying the law is more complex than turning to the right or the left. It is more than stopping when the traffic light turns red and moves on when it turns green. That was the mistake the Israelites made when they were at Mount Sinai when they said, "We will do everything that the LORD has spoken." They wrongly assumed that doing everything that GOD has spoken about was as easy as moving out of Egypt with GOD parting the way and levelling all obstacles. Unbeknownst to them, that was courtship. The real test was in the marriage when they agreed to GOD's proposal. That innocent statement of 'I do' sealed their fate and everyone's fate from then on to be under the law. With their consensus, GOD issued His house's rule, the Ten Commandments. From then on, everyone who wants to be with GOD enters into a covenant relationship with Him, and those who obey will be blessed, while those who cannot will be cursed. The law condemns Romans 4:14-15 For if those who live by the law are heirs, faith is useless, and the promise is worthless because the law brings wrath. And where there is no law, there is no transgression. In courtship, God did everything for the Israelites. After marriage, as in all marriages, the Israelites had to DIY. Therefore, in the Book of Numbers, chapter 14, the Israelites wanted to divorce God because they did not want to DIY with the giants. The treatments, figuratively speaking, before marriage were not the same after marriage. GOD's purpose in His law is, unlike other laws, to reveal our sins. The law was given to prove otherwise to what the Israelites thought, 'We will do everything that the LORD has spoken'. We cannot do what GOD wants because of our fallen nature. The law is to catch our weaknesses and prove our need for GOD. As Jesus commented, apart from Him, we can do nothing. Recalibration John 15:5 I am the vine, and you are the branches. The one who remains in Me, and I in him, will bear much fruit. For apart from Me, you can do nothing. Despite our best efforts, nothing will go as planned because we are not the game masters. Only GOD is. We are only game players. As long as we are not the game masters, we cannot control the game. Therefore, our destiny is in the hand of He who holds it. That is that much we can do to ensure success. We like kites; if the wind does not pick us up to soar through the sky, we are nothing but some beautifully crafted paper. Even if we are not the game masters, GOD is good because He plays by His rules. As long as we act according to His rules, against our fallen nature, whatever we do will be according to His Word. That is the certainty of our future according to GOD's Word. Conclusion: Matthew 7:17-18 Likewise, every good tree bears good fruit, but a bad tree bears bad fruit. A good tree cannot bear bad fruit, and a bad tree cannot bear good fruit. If we want to be successful in all that we do, we cannot be the lords of our lives. We cannot listen to ourselves and be wise in our eyes. Instead, we must be wary of our fallen nature, which will lead us away from the way of GOD and guide us to an aimless life. Today, if we look within and are unhappy with ourselves and what we are doing, then we are guided not by the Word but by our fallen nature. The fruit of our decision will never lie. If it is from GOD, it will be a good fruit. If not, it will be a rotten fruit. If we are not getting the result that we want, we must go back to GOD's Word and reexamine our lives. Prayer and positive proclamation will not make what is wrong right. Ignorance is not excusable. GOD rules everything according to His Book. As long as we do everything according to the Book, our lives are as predictable as written in the Book. GOD will have to act according to His Word, and we can predict the outcome as promised. Prayer: Thank you, GOD, for your Word. That is my trust and strength. Nothing will be done out of the context of your Word. No one can stand against your Word or override it. Help me keep it in my heart that I may not sin against You. Instead, I can predict my future according to Your Word. Amen.

The purpose of science in GOD's plan John 1:3 Through Him, all things were made, and without Him, nothing was made that has been made. Science removes our need for GOD. Science dispels faith and the need for GOD. Many of the life's answers can be answered by science. Hence, no one needs to run into a church for healing if they can walk into a hospital. No farmer needs to pray for an abundant harvest when they have agricultural science behind them, ensuring many of their problems can be resolved through science. Therefore, no one needs to go to GOD in prayer for every trivial matter. In other words, GOD outsources man's reliance on Him to Science. Hence, a man does not need to waste his time early in the morning praying for his sheep, goats, cows, donkeys, and a long list of mundane things but to pray for things of eternal value. GOD, through science, answered man's prayers before he even asked. Via the Internet, any problem can be answered immediately. All we have to do is ask the most knowledgeable person, AI ( artificial intelligence), and the next thing we know, voila, we get a perfect answer. Science allows us to solve things ourselves before we approach GOD. Even if we ask God, we might not get a fast answer. Therefore, science, in terms of technology, plays a more significant role in a person's life than GOD. Supremacy of GOD over science Proverbs 25:2 It is the glory of God to conceal a matter and the glory of kings to search it out. If science dispels faith and the need for God, then what is God's purpose for science? GOD is a jealous GOD, and He will not allow anything to stand higher than Him, not Satan and not even science, replacing His importance. He is the creator of all things, and He will not create anything that diminishes His supremacy. He planned the beginning from the end and knew the cause and effect of everything so nothing would catch Him by surprise. When GOD said, "For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so My ways are higher than your ways and My thoughts than your thoughts", He means He is supreme beyond our understanding. He is much better and knows much more than we do. Science is merely a search engine that searches for what GOD has concealed. Since science discovers the mysteries of the universe that GOD has, it implies science is not above GOD and will not supersede Him because the master behind science is GOD. Science's failure to find GOD. Mark 4:12 They may be ever seeing but never perceiving, and ever hearing but never understanding. Science often messes up our heads regarding GOD. What science cannot establish does not mean it does not exist. Science establishes itself through facts and figures, while GOD is through faith. If we use facts and figures to measure GOD, we will not be able to find Him because we are using the wrong parameters. It is similar to using a thermometer to measure the volume of water. We cannot use physical means to measure spiritual matters because GOD can only be spiritually discerned. Since science has yet to develop a spiritual detector, it fails to find GOD. To see Him, we need faith to connect with Him and know His existence. Without faith, we are spiritually dead and can never find Him. Science is like an atheist, lacking in spiritual dimension; it is spiritually dead and, metaphorically speaking, has no wifi connection to GOD. They are 'ever seeing but never perceiving, and ever hearing but never understanding.' Only spiritually alive people have spiritual detectors to see and hear from GOD. Hence, science, figuratively speaking, cannot hear and see from GOD. GOD, beyond science but within the Bible John 1:1 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. What science cannot do, but we can. By reading the Bible, we can discover GOD. He presents Himself in the complexity of His Word, the Bible through events, stories and parables. To find Him, we cannot read the Bible at face value as if reading a novel. The Word needs to come alive by the anointing of the Holy Spirit to make GOD alive. Then, we can piece Him together. If not, we will be like the six blind men from ancient Indian folklore of the blind men and an elephant. Each blind man who had never seen an elephant tried to imagine what the elephant was like by touching it. Each blind man feels a different part of the animal's body, but only one part. They then describe the animal based on the portion they touched. The first man who touched his leg said the elephant was like a pillar. The second man who touched his tail said the elephant was like a rope. The third man who touched his trunk said the elephant was like a tree branch. The fourth man who touched the ear said the elephant was like a fan. The fifth man who touched the belly said the elephant was a wall. The sixth man who touched the tusk said the elephant was like a solid pipe. The importance of knowing the whole picture The descriptions of the same elephant differ from one another, each insisting he was right. All of them were right in parts, but none of them got the whole picture right. Therefore, none of them know what an elephant is. It was no fault of their own as they were blind. We are not blind, but GOD is like the elephant, too big to see within our range of vision. Our eyes limit us. Therefore, our minds cannot conceptualize Him. To know GOD with our restricted vision, we need to piece the fragments of GOD together with the borrowed eye of the Holy Spirit to see through the Bible, to see what we cannot. Like a puzzle, we need to put all the parts together to understand the totality of GOD. If not, it is as good as holding a piece of the puzzle, thinking we know GOD through it. Thus, if anyone were to tell us something different from what we know, do not label them as false prophets. Instead, be humble and pray for GOD to open our eyes and expand our minds so that we can see beyond what we can. Science does not point us to GOD. Romans 8:13 For if you live according to the flesh, you will die; but if by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live. Spiritual blindness robs us of knowing GOD. Science has no spiritual radar. It is spiritually blind and cannot see GOD. Therefore, science cannot discover GOD and point us to Him. What science cannot do, the Bible can. The reason for our spiritual blindness is our carnal nature, the flesh. If we cannot master our evil nature, we are confirmed blind. Our evil nature turns us away from GOD, so we cannot see Him. If we are not totally blind, we can be partially blind because of our spiritual limitation, which comes from the lack of anointing of the Holy Spirit. The Bible is like the elephant in ancient Indian folklore, and we are like the blind men. When we read through the Bible, we touch the different facets of God. However, we are partially blind towards Him because we are stiff-headed in our opinion, not accepting all that is written in the Bible, wearing blinkers, and, like the blind men, refusing to look from other angles. Mental blind spot syndrome In other words, we have mental blind spots that lead to spiritual blindness, which science cannot help. The reason is many perceive God from their favourite perspective by accepting what suits our sinful nature, creating a lopsided view of GOD. Preachers like to speak on messages of forgiveness of sin but not on stopping sin, and blessings but not curses because that is what many want to hear. We become like small children; they pick what they like to eat, and we choose what we want to hear, which is unhealthy. Therefore, like the six blind men's ideas of an elephant, we create our idea of GOD. He becomes an alien, not who He is, but what we formulate Him to be. Scientific discoveries are from GOD. God said, "Now, if any of you lacks wisdom, he should ask God, who gives generously to all without finding fault, and it will be given to him" He understood that many mysteries of things are beyond our understanding and scientific investigation. In other words, by default, we lack wisdom and understanding. However, when a solution is critically needed, those who seek Him, regardless of believers or unbelievers, will be satisfied. When we ask, He will answer. The advancement in science is that many who ask GOD tough questions get solid solutions. He will not find fault with anyone who asks, even if he is not with His. Therefore, it is GOD, through science, who created the miracles, not science, through the ingenuity of men. Hence, the solutions that science provides are nothing more than ideas from GOD. Everything revolves around GOD, including science. Science liberates us time to know GOD. Science improves life and liberates many of the inconveniences of living, providing solutions to many earthly problems. God wants us to be more like Mary and not like Martha, who was weighed down with the daily chores and worried over many things. GOD does not want us to be busy with unnecessary things, so we have more time for Him. He wants us to concentrate on one crucial thing: spending more time learning His Word and developing a closer relationship with Him. The purpose is for us to prepare for our eternality. Without enough spiritual knowledge, we cannot grasp the different aspects of God, making Him contradictory and lacking in consistency. If we want to know God, we need to seek Him with all of our hearts by understanding His Word. Only when we have spiritual understanding will we have the tools to decode the mysteries written in the Word and not be misguided by our ignorance. If not, we are like a computer lacking the required language to understand spiritual matters. Knowing the Bible is not knowing how to read all the words in it but understanding what is being said in between the lines. Science reduces our transactional relationship with GOD. When there is a problem, there is a need, and that is when a man needs GOD. If a man is happy and has what he wants, he is contented with life and has no problems. He does not need GOD. That is the reality: a man only seeks God when he is in need. Once his problems are over, he may forget about Him. This transactional relationship with God, akin to a marriage of convenience where the focus is on 'What can I get out of it?' is dangerous. When the need is over, the relationship is over. A relationship based on needs is a one-sided relationship with much to be needed. The person in need puts himself in a disadvantaged position in the relationship where he is always not measuring up. If we worship GOD, it is out of motive and not out of love. GOD's love for us is pure, without motives. Therefore, He does not want to dangle carrots in front of us for love. He does not want us to be like a bird in a cage but a bird free to soar the sky. If we love Him, we will fly back to Him voluntarily, without compulsion but of love. Science reduces the problems of life and our reliance on GOD. That releases us from a relationship out of need but out of choice. If anyone were to choose Him, it would not be out of benefits but because they want to. Science becomes a good test of a man's heart towards God. Science frees man from many mundane problems and frees us from the need for GOD. So if the Son sets us free, we will be free indeed, even of Him. Through science, GOD created a better and more exciting world for us that is independent of Him. The question remains: Do we still want Him who is against our fallen nature or move on to one who is accommodating to our fallen selves? Time and advancements in science have revealed the answer. In Europe, many churches of the early Christians are left empty and are converted for drinking, dancing, and other purposes other than a place of worship. There are more people in the pub than in a church, showing that Christianity has lost its favour and popularity. In other words, men have left their faith because they have found something better. Once GOD has outlived His usefulness, they dump Him. Conclusion: The limitation of science Science can have its benefits, but it is not above God. No matter how excellent science is, it can only clean the outside of the cup and not the inside. What is of eternal value is to clean the cup on the inside, which science cannot do. No matter what science can do for us to liberate us from the need for God, we should not let go of Him. Our lives are more than what we have on earth. Improvement, progress and advancement are only temporary. What we have with GOD is eternal. Prayer: God, thank you for the comfort and convenience that science and technology bring. Continue to open my eyes and expand my mind to know You better. Let Your Word wash the inside of my cup, and let me not be contented with science that cleans on the outside. Science is only Your servant. Let me not be contented with Your servant and miss out on You, the Master

Ecclesiastes 5:15 As a man came from his mother's womb, so he will depart again, naked as he arrived. He takes nothing for his labour to carry in his hands. The Transient of Life Ecclesiastes 1:17 So I set my mind to know wisdom and madness and folly; I learned that this, too, is a pursuit of the wind. We brought nothing into the world, so we cannot carry anything out of it. That is the futility of all of our hard work at the end of our lives. Nothing matters. Regardless of riches, wealth, fame, power, achievements, status or credentials, they are meaningless at the end of our journey. It is like the currency of a country becomes worthless when we leave for another country. Only if we have a way of converting it to the currency of that country will it retain its value. If not, we will have to leave everything behind as if we never had it. That is futility or, to be specific, the meaninglessness of our lives, like robbing ourselves of our well-deserved medals. As Solomon expressed it: It is futile and a pursuit of the wind. All our efforts are a waste of time, transient, lacking eternal value. In other words, wasting our time. What if we are good? Soon, there is someone better to replace us. So, what if our invention is excellent? Very soon, it will be obsolete. Even if we leave behind a legacy, it will soon be superseded. Our dreams, visions, aspirations and even our lives are like sandcastles, soon will be washed away by the waves, leaving no trace behind. That is the reality we have to deal with; we are as good as we were last. The Permanence of Our Existence Genesis 2:7 Then the LORD God formed man from the dust of the ground and breathed the breath of life into his nostrils, and the man became a living being. Our life on Earth is temporal, and we will one day leave for another place of permanence. Even though we leave Earth through the process called death, we, literally, will never die even when we stop breathing. Once born, all possess the breath of life, which GOD breathed into the first man, Adam. This breath, as eternal as God, cannot be destroyed and will keep us living forever, for better or for worse. Regardless of our religion or spiritual orientation, we will live on either in life in heaven with GOD or in our second death in hell away from GOD. Even when we breathe our last breath and are reduced to dust back to the Earth, we will not be reduced to nothing or vanish into thin air. Death will not bring the end of us, and it will not end the repercussions of our actions, otherwise known as karma. Therefore, bygones will not be bygones when we are gone. Nothing ends except our trials in life when we are put to sleep for the Day of Judgment. When the Book of Life is opened on that day, we will face judgment and give an account of our deeds and for every careless word we have spoken. We will continue living after judgment according to the judgment. And if anyone whose name is not written in the Book of Life, he will be thrown into the lake of fire where there is no end. Those whose names are written in the Book of Life will be with GOD in the new heaven and new earth. Either in hell or in heaven, life continues after death. Planning Forward John 14:2 In My Father's house are many rooms. If it were not so, would I have told you that I am going there to prepare a place for you? Once created, we cannot be destroyed; we can only be converted from one form to another. As water changes from a liquid to a gaseous state, we change from physical to spiritual form. We are the same as Jesus Christ, unchanged through death. The unfortunate truth is that only we can undergo spiritual metamorphosis, not our material possessions. They are unable to morph with us. In a nutshell, once we die, it is eternal separation from our material possessions. Dying is like our emergency evacuation from an aircraft; we cannot take our luggage along. What we can bring is what we have on. With this in mind, we can rethink our strategy and plan forward with eternality in mind. Planning with the End in Mind Jeremiah 29:11 For I know the plans I have for you, declares the LORD, plans to prosper you and not to harm you, to give you a future and a hope. Only things can happen with a plan. Even GOD has plans for us, plans to prosper us and not to harm us, to give you a future and hope. When we fail to plan, we plan to fail. If we do not have eternity in mind, we will fail to plan for it and take what is necessary to achieve it. If that happens, that could be our regrettable oversight or foolishness. What is unseen or unknown might not be non-existent. What we cannot hear does not mean there is no sound. It might be an inaudible sound that our ears cannot detect. Many things exist beyond our imagination, like holding a phone and hearing someone who is far away speak. If we discard reality beyond our imagination, then we might be too arrogant to think we know everything. If GOD says so, it is better to take it seriously. Unless we think we know better than GOD. Rethinking of our Eternality John 3:16 For God so loved the world that He gave His one and only Son, that everyone who believes in Him shall not perish but have eternal life. Therefore, we should not be myopic in thinking that we only last a lifetime, which, in fact, we are made for eternity. Comparing a lifetime to an eternity is like a drop in the ocean. If we have plans only for this lifetime and neglect our eternality, we will have much to regret. We can mess about our lifetimes, but never our eternality because eternity is too long to live if it encompasses pain, suffering, and regret. To prevent these, we must plan early in our lifetime for it. It is like getting a good education when you are young, so your future is secure. As much as we must sacrifice when young for our future, so we must sacrifice our lifetime for eternality. To do well in our studies, we cannot do as we wish, but we must learn well. Likewise, to prepare for eternality, we also cannot do as we want but must do well in what is required of us. Failing to do so, we will miss out on our excellent future in eternality. Rethinking our Priority Matthew 6:33 But seek first the kingdom of GOD and His righteousness, and all these things will be added unto you. Jesus said, "What does it profit a man to gain the whole world yet forfeit his soul? Or what can a man give in exchange for his soul?" In other words, Jesus is saying that things of temporal value cannot be compared to things of eternal value. Once we lose the things of eternal value, nothing of temporal value can replace it. Therefore, we cannot have misappropriated priority by placing temporal things over eternal, even if they might not be relevant now. We put the gain of the whole world as more value than our souls. If we lose our souls to the things of the world, Jesus said that there is nothing we can use to exchange it back. It is like losing a person to the evil of drug abuse. If the drug has taken control of the man, there is nothing much one can do to get him back. Rethinking of our Alliances James 4:4 You adulteresses! Do you not know that friendship with the world is hostility toward God? Therefore, whoever chooses to be a friend of the world renders himself an enemy of God. We need to survive in the world, but that does not mean we need to compromise by sacrificing our souls. In other words, we need not exchange our gold coin or a copper coin of the world. The evil one wants our gold coin, and we will be foolish if we ever exchange with him. Therefore, we should never sell our souls by betraying GOD, our characters and principles for the ill-gotten gains of the world. Getting them will bring no benefits to us except to increase the ills in our lives. However, if we do not walk the way and indulge in the practices as the world does, those in the world will hate us. Therefore, Jesus said, "Everyone will hate you because of My name, but the one who perseveres to the end will be saved." If we want to prove ourselves worthy of God's love and the right to eternal life, we need to make a difference, stand apart from the world and never give away our gold coin. Rethinking of our Treasures Matthew 6:19-21 Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy, and where thieves break in and steal. But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where moth and rust do not destroy, and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also. What is of value to GOD might not be to the world. Natural man does not define treasures as GOD does and does not accept the things that come from the Spirit of God. For they are foolish to him, and he cannot understand them because they are intangible, unquantifiable, unseen and unproven. In other words, nonsense. Therefore, natural man only stores treasure on earth and not in heaven because he values things differently from GOD. Since the time frame of man is temporal, his mind frame is on temporal things. If he wants to prepare for life after death by storing up treasures of eternal value in heaven, he must change his mind frame by changing his heart towards the things of temporal value. He must treat things of temporal value as worthless and things of eternal value as treasures and pursue them with all of that he has. To him, the kingdom of heaven must be like a treasure hidden in a field. Once he finds it, he hides it again and, in his joy, goes and sells all he has and buys that field. The kingdom of heaven is also like a merchant in search of fine pearls. When he finds one very precious pearl, he goes away and sells all he has and buys it. Rethinking our Investment Portfolio 1 Corinthians 3:19-20 For the wisdom of this world is foolishness in God's sight. As it is written: "He catches the wise in their craftiness." And again, "The Lord knows that the thoughts of the wise are futile." As the saying goes, 'No pain, no gain.' If we cannot give up our treasures on earth, we cannot build our treasures in heaven. If we cannot give up the wisdom of the world for the foolishness of GOD, we cannot gain the wisdom of GOD, which is the foolishness of the world. If we want to build our treasures in heaven, do things that matter, and give us a future, we must change our perspectives. We must value the foolishness of the world that produces eternal value. When we invest our resources in time, talent, and money, we must calculate the ROI (return on investment) of things, not only on earth but also in heaven. If it does not have eternal value, then our returns are short-term gains but long-term losses, which is not ideal. It is foolish for a man to start a business that materially enriches him but spiritually bankrupts him. Therefore, whatever we do, we must understand not only the short-term implications but the long-term effects. If not, we are only wise for a moment but foolish forever. Conclusion: Where your treasure is where your heart will be 1 Corinthians 15:54-55 When the perishable has been clothed with the imperishable and the mortal with immortality, then the saying that is written will come to pass: "Death has been swallowed up in victory." "Where, O Death, is your victory? Where, O Death, is your sting?" Many are afraid of the sting of death because they are not prepared for eternality. They are like students going for an examination without having enough preparation. Unless we have been faithfully building treasures in heaven, we will not fear. If we have not, then we have much to worry about when the time is nearing. And those with immense treasures on earth will be reluctant to leave as they are unwilling to part with their wealth. However, this appointment with death is imminent, and no one is exempted. Only when we are secure that our treasures are in heaven will we be willing to leave everything behind for heaven because we have emptied our lives on earth and have nothing to hold us back. Prayer: God, please open my eyes to see the things of eternal value so that I will diligently work towards them. Let me not be fooled by the deception of the world and waste my life on things that do not value-add to my eternal life and rob me of it instead. I brought nothing into the world, and I would not carry anything out of it. Let me be generous in sharing Your goodness so that my treasures will be great in heaven. Amen.

Matthew 25:45 Then the King will answer, 'Truly I tell you, whatever you did not do for one of the least of these, you did not do for Me.' A Paradigm Shift Mark 2:22 And no one pours new wine into old wineskins. If he does, the wine will burst the skins, and both the wine and the wineskins will be ruined. Instead, new wine is poured into new wineskins." The New Testament is a game-changer and paradigm shift. It is like new wine that cannot be contained in old wineskin. Hence, we must refrain from using our old mindset to understand GOD's new teaching, or it will become our stumbling block, a block that will cause us to fall away from our faith. When Jesus first introduced His new teaching, many of His disciples could not accept it, so they turned back and no longer walked with Him. His teaching created resistance then and would also now. Today, if we hear something that goes well with us and does not turn us off, then the teachings are most likely being compromised. If the core of His teaching has not changed, then we should have the same reaction as Jesus's disciples did: rejection. It is like drinking bitter medicine. However, if the medicine is not bitter but sweet, then we should be wary that something is wrong. GOD's bitter medicine does not go well with our fallen nature, so rejection should be the natural response. If it sounds soothing to our ears and appeases our fallen nature, then most likely, it is an alternate teaching to His. His fake teaching is like entering through a wide gate with a broad path; do not believe it because it leads to destruction. GOD has instructed us to walk through the small gate with the narrow path that few will find, and it leads to life. And any other way is a misdirection. Therefore, do not be misled by hype teachings that are pleasing to the ear but will lead to destruction. Stop sinning vs forgiveness of sin. Daniel 4:27 Break away from your sins by doing what is right, and from your iniquities by showing mercy to the oppressed.  If we want to be strong in GOD, we must be able to accept hard truths, things that are hard to the ears but good for our souls. Such a message is a high calling because our fallen nature can do nothing but sin. And GOD's Word bites our fallen nature. Therefore, it does not go well with our ears and is a nail to our flesh. A message that our fallen nature loves is the forgiveness of sin, a message of no condemnation to every action. Then, we are no different from a dog that returns to its vomit as we sinners return to our sin. Thus, many Christians live in the comfort of GOD as Yahweh Hessed, GOD of forgiveness. With that, many live in the impression that they can be who they are as there is nothing they can do that cannot be forgiven under the blood of Christ. If not, His blood is no different from that of sheep, goats, bulls, doves, or pigeons. Therefore, nothing can rock their salvation as it is secured in the blood of Jesus.  The Fallacy Galatians 6:7-8 Do not be deceived: God is not to be mocked. Whatever a man sows, he will reap in return. The one who sows to please his flesh, from the flesh, will reap destruction, but the one who sows to please the Spirit, from the Spirit, will reap eternal life. If any of us think that the blood of Jesus will keep us away from sin, we are deviating far from the truth. Forgiveness of sin only releases us from the bondage of sin, which has no eternal value. It is like a person being set free from prison. Then, what from then on? It is what we make out of ourselves after being out of prison that matters. Metaphorically speaking, when we sin, we get ourselves into prison, and when GOD forgives us, He releases us from prison. If we keep on sinning and asking for forgiveness, we are repeating the cycle of being in and out of prison. Then what is the purpose of forgiveness if we have no intention of getting out of sin? We are doing nothing but fooling around with GOD, taking Him as a joke. No one ever fools around with the law and gets away. What more, with GOD, the Lawmaker of heaven and earth, and hope nothing will happen? The all-mighty blood has its limitations. Matthew 12:31 Therefore, I tell you, every sin and blasphemy will be forgiven men, but the blasphemy against the Spirit will not be forgiven. Jesus's blood is powerful enough to forgive all sins except the sin of unrepentance. For that, His blood has no effect. His blood can cleanse us of all sins but cannot keep us away from sinning. It is written in the Bible that if we deliberately go on sinning after we have received the knowledge of the truth, no further sacrifice for sins remains, but only a fearful expectation of judgment and of raging fire that will consume all adversaries. Anyone who rejected the law of Moses died without mercy on the testimony of two or three witnesses. How much more severely do we think one deserves to be punished who has trampled on the Son of God, profaned the blood of the covenant that sanctified him, and insulted the Spirit of grace? Therefore, there is a limit to 1 John 1:9 - If we confess our sins, He is faithful and will forgive us our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness. No one in the Bible ever received unconditional and perpetual forgiveness like the way we think, sinning without guilt and remorse. GOD often leaves us case studies to substantiate His Word. If there is none, then most likely, we misconstrue His Word. What does it mean to stop sinning? 1 John 3:6 No one who remains in Him keeps on sinning. No one who continues to sin has seen Him or known Him. Many times, we have been told to stop sinning, but many do not understand GOD's expectations. To many, as long as we do not cause anyone any grievous harm by killing, stealing, and destroying, we are not sinning. And as long as we do not violate GOD's commandments, we are not sinning. All these are true in the Old Testament, but in the New Testament, definitions become more comprehensive. Anyone angry with his brother will be subject to judgment. And anyone who says, 'You fool!' will be subject to the fire of hell. Without physical contact, even looking at a woman to lust after her has already committed adultery with her in his heart. Therefore, to stop sinning is more than not doing evil. We must do good. The new requirement John 3:19 And this is the verdict: The Light has come into the world, but men loved the darkness rather than the Light because their deeds were evil. Within our fallen nature is the desire to do evil. Therefore, in the Old Testament, after the fall of Adam and Eve, GOD wanted man to master his evil desires, as He told Cain, who represented the new generation of fallen men. In the New Testament, when GOD became Man, man not only had to master the evil within him but also to overcome evil with good. Only the one who overcomes will Jesus grant him the right to sit with Him on His throne, just as He overcame and sat down with His Father on His throne. The requirement has changed before and after Christ. Hence, we cannot use old methodology on new theology as we cannot sew a patch of unshrunk cloth on an old garment. The patch will pull away from the garment, and a worse tear will result. Jesus's new teaching will stretch us to be more than who we can be. If we cannot be stretched, we will tear in unbelief. Not being able to say to this mountain, 'Move from here to there,' and it will move. Nothing will be impossible for us. In Christ, we must do more and be better. Nothing will be impossible for us, even to the extent of loving our enemies and praying for those who persecute us, that we may be sons of our Father in heaven. We no longer are allowed to stop at 'Love your neighbour' and 'Hate your enemy.' The truth is that many cannot cross this threshold of irrational demand. Then how many can overcome evil with good? Why must we overcome evil with good? Romans 12:21 Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good. If we can overcome evil with good, it proves the authenticity of our transformation. We are born again in the Spirit, and we are cleaned on the inside of the cup and dish so that the outside may become clean as well. Remember, we have fallen nature and are incapable of doing good. If we have extreme self-control, we can control the beast within us. To overcome evil with good is beyond the capacity of our fallen nature. It is like asking the lion to eat grass. Therefore, if a lion eats grass, it only proves that it is no longer a beast but has morphed into something else. In Christ, we are His new creations, meaning we are more than GOD's creation but a new, improved version. We no longer hold the flaws of imperfection but the perfection of GOD. Therefore, what the fallen nature cannot do, the godly-infused nature can. Hell is prepared for those who do no good. Matthew 25:45-46 Then the King will answer, 'Truly I tell you, whatever you did not do for one of the least of these, you did not do for Me.' And they will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life. To illustrate His point, Jesus talked about a time in the future when He would be in His glory, and all the angels would be with Him as He sat on His glorious throne. Then, He would separate the people one from another, as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats. One group would inherit the kingdom prepared for them from the foundation of the world. And the other group would be cursed into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels. What good did the first group do to deserve heaven, and what bad did the other group do to deserve hell? No one in the heaven group stood out as any hero, nor anyone from the hell group stood out as any villain. The compliment for the righteous was - For I was hungry, and you gave Me something to eat; I was thirsty, and you gave Me something to drink. I was a stranger, and you took Me in; I was naked, and you clothed Me; I was sick, and you looked after Me; I was in prison, and you visited Me.' Then the righteous will answer Him, 'Lord, when did we see You hungry and feed You, or thirsty and give You something to drink? When did we see You a stranger and take You in, or naked and clothe You? When did we see You sick or in prison and visit You?' And the King will reply, 'Truly I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of Mine, you did for Me.' The unrighteous were accused of not performing any acts of kindness as the righteous did, and their punishment was the eternal lake of fire. The King did not accuse them of massacres or blasphemy against GOD that deserved the lake of fire, but their fate was no different from that of the vilest sinners. The Conclusion Not doing good is as good as sinning, deserving the lake of fire. Many might view this as perversity, as the deeds do not deserve such punishment. On Judgment Day, many will question God about His justice and fairness, not knowing that sin is sin, regardless of how small or big. Jesus said, "Truly, truly, I tell you, no one can enter the kingdom of God unless he is born of water and the Spirit." As long as the Spirit does not transform us, we are not born of the Spirit. We are still sinners destined for hell. However, the issue is not that many do not want to do good, but they do not have the tenacity to do so because of their fallen nature. Many can try, but they do not have the know-how to do it. If we want to know, we need to die to our flesh. Then, the anointing of the Holy Spirit will guide us. For this reason, our world still feels lonely and cold despite its advancement, vibrancy, and activities. The affluent are highly affluent, and the poor are extremely poor, and the gap is not narrowing. If everyone were anointed with the Holy Spirit and spontaneous in sharing simple essentials such as food, water, and clothing, the world would be a better place. GOD does not require us to save the world by doing great and mighty things because that job belongs to Him. He is our Hero, and we do not need another hero. All He wants us to do is small things with great love. We would have met GOD's expectation of overcoming evil with good. Prayer: Thank you, GOD, for opening my eyes and ears to your word. Let your word quicken my heart and enlighten my mind that they are alive in me so that I can be alive in your word. Then your word will not return to you empty, but it will accomplish what you please, and I will prosper in it. Amen.

Proverbs 3:5-6 Trust in the LORD with all your heart, and lean not on your understanding; in all your ways acknowledge Him, and He will make your paths straight. Our decisions are not good enough. As the heavens are higher than the earth, GOD's ways are higher than our ways, and His thoughts are higher than our thoughts. As much as we want to walk in wisdom and understanding so as not to walk foolishly, there is a limit to our sound judgement, keen discernment and deep comprehension. When we make good decisions, we move forward to success, and when we make bad decisions, we move backwards to failure. Many times, we move backwards more than we move forward. GOD has made known to us that we are nowhere knowing how to make good decisions. If we can, then there is no need to trust Him with all our hearts and wait for GOD to act. We are capable of acting for ourselves. Between GOD's wisdom and our wisdom is between heaven and earth. That is to mean the wisest of us are still fools to Him. To say it offensively, we are retarded compared to GOD. We do not do what we should; instead, we do what we should not. Instead of listening to good advice, we listen to bad. In Jesus's opinion, we do not know what we are doing. We are like blind men in the darkness, groping about and not prospering in our ways. To sum it up, we are nothing more than blind, confused and mad. Despite stating so clearly, only those with wisdom will agree, while the foolish have no idea. We have the minds of sheep and not a serpent. GOD understands we have the minds of sheep and not of the Serpent. If Adam and Eve were shrewd enough, they would not be deceived by the Serpent. The fact that they had been deceived proves that they did not have sharp acumen. In other words, Eve did not know she was like a fish caught in a cruel net or a bird trapped in a snare, so she was ensnared in the evil that was beyond her to free herself. Many might think that Eve was plain unlucky to be deceived by the Serpent. She was not unlucky but targeted. No one goes to war without a strategy, and the Serpent was no exception. The Serpent knew that GOD's Word was not alive in Eve because GOD did not speak to her directly. When GOD told Adam not to eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for in the day that you eat of it, he would surely die, He told it to Adam alone because during then Eve was not created. She was created after GOD warned Adam. We have to question the rationale of GOD's action. Why? Won't it be better if GOD were to warn both of them together? What is the purpose of telling one and not the other? We become the weak link when GOD's Word is not alive in us. What Eve knew was secondhand information from Adam. That became the weak link that caused the downfall of man. It was like the Telephone or Chinese whispers game in which messages are whispered from one person to another. Errors typically accumulate in the retelling, resulting in an erroneous message being passed down. Eve lacked the rationale behind the forbidden fruit, so the Serpent could confuse her understanding. Adam could have been the second line of defence to the fall since he was given the word. He did not uphold GOD's Word because of his love for his flesh and bone, and he accommodated her decision. Eve was his missing rib, and only with her, he felt complete. Therefore, whenever she went, he would follow, and whatever she did, he would do likewise. Man was not made to be alone as God said, "It is not good for the man to be alone. I will make for him a suitable helper." Ironically, the helper GOD gave Adam, besides other things, helped him to fall into sin.  It is no one's fault that many are like Eve, having a compromised understanding as GOD's Word is not alive in them. Therefore, they can be misled or deceived. Many times, GOD is oversold like some commodity which is not Him. Like some marketing products, GOD is packaged and promoted as a miracle drug of great promise. Unbeknown to the naive, GOD does not give out big promises without terms and conditions unless those are common to all. Nothing is as easy as it sounds. Like Eve, we are unable to know the exact meaning of the words once they are stretched, twisted, and rearranged. Flesh-pleasing decisions If not Eve, we could be like Adam, who followed his instincts rather than the Word, pleasing his flesh instead of GOD. Before the fall of man, Adam's flesh was Eve. To please her, he listened to her despite GOD's warning. As they were one flesh, whatever she wanted was whatever he wanted. Listening to her more than to GOD, he ate what she fed him, which resulted in his downfall. After the fall, man's flesh is no longer his woman but his fallen nature. Therefore, whoever listens to his fallen nature will fall as Adam did. After the fall, man and woman no longer exist as one entity. They became separate entities, with Adam giving Eve her name, signifying her autonomy. She was no longer nameless, and neither was Mrs. Adam but Eve. She stood by her own identity and style of thinking. That moment was like an independent day, where Eve gained independence from Adam to signify man's independence from GOD. Man's decisions: Lose-Lose From the actions of Adam and Eve, we can derive two decision-making patterns. One is like Eve, who tried to be smart with reason and logic but could not outsmart her deceiver. The other is like Adam, who disregarded the facts and figures to follow the desire of his heart, living for what feels good. Not knowing what feels good might not be good at all. Either think like Adam or Eve; no one is a winner. That is the sad fate of man; his mind cannot go through intense mental gymnastics to recognise the truth. Therefore, many are, like Eve, easy targets for scams and deceits and fall away from the truth. As much as they cannot trust their mind to reason out correctly, they also cannot trust their heart to feel the right thing to do.  GOD's decisions: Win-Win If we could realise how impaired we are in our minds and hearts, we would be shaking our heads. Adam and Eve are a representation of us, and through them, we know we cannot rationalise well. Therefore, many suffer from making the wrong decisions due to bad judgments. Hence, we need GOD to guide us in making good judgments and sound decisions. For this reason, GOD wants us to trust in the LORD with all our hearts and lean not on our own understanding; in all our ways, we must acknowledge Him, and He will make our paths straight. In short, we must not trust ourselves in heart or mind to make proper judgments. As long as we surrender our will to GOD, acknowledge that He is omniscient, and await His decision, He will lead us in the right direction. Hence, we should not make rash decisions based on FOMO (fear of missing out). Instead, we must seek GOD out in all that we do. Even young lions go lacking and hungry, but those who seek the LORD lack no good thing. Prisoners to bad decisions Everything might sound straightforward. It is not. The complexity of the matter is that even though we know what we must do, only a few know how to act accordingly because no man is free to do as he wishes. We are all prisoners of our fallen nature. Simply put, we are the prisoners of our addictions and compulsion nature where there is no escape. Therefore, the saying - a leopard never changes its spots. That's the reality that many cannot understand. We cannot change ourselves, and neither can we change others. If we cannot agree with the statement, we can try to change our family members and see the futility of our efforts. The only way to change a leopard's spots is to de-skin it and give it a new coat. That is where Jesus comes in. Jesus is the new coat, and He will provide us with His coat of righteousness. If we want to change, we must endure the anguish of being, metaphorically, de-skin. In other words, we must be circumcised, not physically but spiritually, by cutting away the filth of the fallen, sinful human nature. Only then will we be transformed to be GOD's new creations. We will not be a leopard that never changes its spot but a lamb without blemish. The condition for good decisions To put it another way, without the circumcision of our flesh, we are not meeting the terms and conditions of GOD's contract, making His blessing invalid to us. He will not be our help in times of need. Remember, when we say the sinner's prayer, we agree to turn from our sins and invite Jesus to come into our hearts and lives. To turn from our sins means we will sin no more. To invite Jesus to come into our hearts and lives means it is no longer I live, but Christ lives in me. Our lives will no longer be under our control but under Christ's as our Lord. To do that, we must die for Christ to live within us. We must crucify our flesh. If not, we cannot fulfil our part of the agreement with GOD, making the contract with Him void. Therefore, many Christians are holding onto a non-binding contract because they refuse to crucify their flesh. GOD goes by the book even if He is love. Only when we fulfil the contract will it take effect. Only then will we be the brides of Christ. If not, we will be the foolish virgins that Christ will deny as His. First step of good decision: Stop sinning Getting the first step right is paramount, and without it, nothing we do for GOD does matter. To put it differently, if not, all that we do for Him is a waste of time. A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step, and that step is to sin no more. Only when we master our fallen nature will we sin no more than we can move towards GOD. Those who cannot stop sinning will forever be at point zero, the starting point. If we persist in sinning, then we will be on a journey of a thousand miles in the wrong direction, away from GOD.  Stop sinning sets us free from blind spots. No one ever plans to fail by doing the wrong thing, and no one ever intentionally sin so that they will go to hell. Like the rich man who died at the same time as Lazarus, he did not know that he would go to Hades and be in torment. If he had known, he would have done things differently. Therefore, he wanted Father Abraham to send Lazarus to his father's house to warn his five brothers of the existence of Hades. Many are like the rich man, not knowing what they are doing until it is too late. They cannot see the reality of Hades, evil and sin because all these words do not exist in their vocabulary. They are people of the world, having the mindset of it and not seeing anything beyond that. Therefore, many are like frogs in a pot, not knowing that they are slowly being boiled to death. Living in sin is not repulsive under our fallen nature but instead enjoyable, just as promiscuity is more pleasurable than faithfulness. Why have one when we can have many? Therefore, GOD makes us suffer under sin, so we will know the consequences of sin and seek Him. However, many will not learn, living like fools in paradise. Only when we seek Him will He open our eyes to the knowledge that sin is hideous, repulsive and grotesque. It not only turns us into beasts but also robs us of a fulfilling relationship with our soulmate, GOD. There is nothing to gain from fooling with sin but everything to lose. If we are rich, we might be like the rich man, realising too late that his wealth could do nothing for him in Hades. It would have been better if he had been a beggar like Lazarus. Being poor would deprive many of the opportunities to sin and every opportunity to seek GOD and ensure their salvation. Therefore, no one should despise the poor but instead, be good to them. After everyone's death, there will be a turn of events, like in the story of the rich man and Lazarus; the rich will end up in Hades suffering, and the poor will be in paradise enjoying. If the rich had been good to the poor, the poor would pray night and day, seeking GOD for their salvation. Would GOD not listen to those who mourn for the salvation of their benefactors? The solution: Blindfold ourselves and trust GOD Unless GOD is willing, no one escapes the blindness that plagues the world; no amount of fallen wisdom, understanding, or intuition will do. Therefore, it is futile to trust our hearts and lean on our understanding to lead us to a straight path. It is like an ant trying to move a mountain. As natural men, we will not be able to comprehend the things that come from the Spirit of God. For they are nonsensical to us, as ants cannot understand rocket science, and we cannot understand higher wisdom that leads to life because they are spiritually discerned. We need to trust GOD by blindfolding ourselves and follow Him wherever He leads. Then, we can safely say we always make good choices and are on the journey to eternal prosperity. Prayer: GOD, I acknowledge that you are the Lord of lords and the King of kings. I submit my mind and heart to you. Lead me and guide me according to your way so that I will find eternal success. Amen.