the Bible says that the reason we’re not making more of an impact on the world why we’re not shining his light is because we haven’t taken seriously the opportunity we have to take the things that God has given us and Max them out for his glory and for our good we’re not just going to sit and wait for God to make us the people that he’s called us to be the Bible won’t allow that if you don’t know that there’s hundreds of other scriptures I could bring to you that call us to put on the new life to take off the old life to walk in Hol
these are commands these are not suggestions so what is character what would we look like if we develop this character in our life people of strong character are usually people that are very disciplined they have fortitude Integrity ethical strength these are attributes that will distinguish you from one another these are the things that make you shine as a light in the darkness you’re a different kind of person character is an attitude that every young person every middle-aged person and every old person should have
embedded in their minds character is returning extra change at the grocery store character is honoring your commitments and honoring your word character is choosing the harder right instead of the easier wrong character is setting priorities that honor God and family and Country character in marriage is working through the tough times rather than throwing in the towel and looking for divorce character is being committed to the well-being of your family and friends Associates and other even if that’s personally costly and
character is setting a good example what kind of people do we need to be to live in this culture that is so messed up and hard to Define and we don’t know where it’s going and it always ends up where we didn’t think it would be we are told that when the Holy Spirit completely controls the life of a Believer this is what it will look like the fruit of the spirit is love joy peace longsuffering kind goodness faithfulness gentleness and self-control God’s description of a man for all seasons so in response to the question
what kind of people should we be at such a time in history as this here is God’s answer he calls us to be people of love and joy and peace he wants us to have endurance in our lives he he wants us to have compassion for those who who need our help we should be people of generosity this is God’s ideal person and believe it or not we can become like that we were meant to be like that could I just say it this way Christ died so that we could be that kind of a person the Lord Jesus Christ said in John 10:10 I have come that they might
have life and that they might have it more abundantly sounds like life beyond amazing but there’s some roadblocks that we need to get out of the way if we’re going to get to to the place we want to be if there’s a gap between the promise of what our Lord wants us to have and what we’re experiencing what is causing it what is happening to us that this Abundant Life that Jesus died for so that we could have it seems to always be at the end of our fingers but not quite in our grasp and I like to suggest to you the three things that I’ve thought
of in preparation for this that might help us understand this a little bit first of all I think for many of us we misunderstand our Salvation most Christians today view salvation strictly in the past tense salvation is something that has happened to us it’s history our Salvation according to many Christians is a done thing but the Bible doesn’t view salvation like that men and women the Bible views salvation in three different tenses the Bible views salvation like this I have been saved if I’ve trusted Jesus Christ as my savior as many of you
