Grace-living

I made of list of things I should or could be doing.

BUT....I'm bored with all that.  I do but I don't want to do any of it.  Is it about what I want or is there something You want?  Sometimes grace gives me too much freedom that I don't know how to live in it.  

How do I live in Your grace today? 

“You who are trying to be justified by the law are alienated from Christ; 

you have fallen from grace.”

Galatians 5:4 

So don't try to be justified by the law.  Stop trying to be okay (aiming for some degree of perfection) as a means of feeling like you're okay.  Being perfect does not work because there is no way any of us can do what true perfection demands.  So stop!  Just stop. 

Before you turn around and start picking up your nonsense again...take heed of what a life lived in grace means ...like today, right now.

To live in grace we must first step away from our tendency to make ourselves feel okay.  This means we may have to sit with that terrible feeling of boredom or anxiety or restlessness until it passes through our system or God tells us to calmly do something.  But we must not try to run from it, because it is a part of our suffering on earth to feel how bad things could have been in order to rejoice in how good things truly are thanks to Jesus!  This life will show us bad things for a reason, and instead of fearing those feelings we must learn to sit in them with God as we are being trained to live in His grace. 

So you feel bored? Anxious? Overwhelmed? Confused? 

Don't try to do something to feel okay. 

Don't fall from grace. 

(Galatians 5:4)

To live in grace often means to feel why we need Him so much.  We are useless, void, empty, and pathetic without Him.  We are nothing without Christ.  When we feel those terrible feelings come over us, let them lead you into His grace.  

Be taken in by your good Father for an epic embrace.

“For you were called to be free, brothers; 

only don’t use this freedom as an opportunity for the flesh, 

but serve one another through love. 

For the entire law is fulfilled in one statement: Love your neighbor as yourself.”

Galatians 5:13-14 

What matters is faith working through love...

Evidence of a life lived in grace is a life lived in loving others. 

Today.

Right now.

Are you living in grace? 

Jmegrey 

We are parfum le Saint-Esprit!

If you need a do-over today, take time to confess your sins to God, ask Him for forgiveness, and start over because you can!

We are like, as they say in French, "parfum"
Very, very precious and expensive parfum.

Chanel smells expensive, Dior smells rich, bath and body works smells fun, but there is a scent that gives off more than just a scent.

There is a fragrance that, when smelled, produces the ability to fill you with life!
Not the feeling that life is good, but the reality of it!  A scent that gives you full confidence that God is real, God is good and God loves you!  A parfum that has power to change a person's heart!  Would you want this powerfully life-giving parfum?

God has given this to each of us, which is the Holy Spirit.  We've been given the parfum of God and it is our job to bring people the aroma of life!  Not the feeling of it, but the reality!

How do we spread this scent?
We simply go where God will put us on display for someone and we seize that opportunity let the Holy Spirit ooze from our hearts like a strong aroma!  All we do is recognize that God is putting us on display!  You're being displayed because God is about to pump out the scent of life to save someone through you!  Not of you, but of the Holy Spirit in you.  All you do is whatever the Holy Spirit says in that very moment.  He doesn't give the whole plan, He gives moment by moment directions.

Some people love walking into a coffee shop because the room smells like coffee!  How much more would children of God love walking into a room that smelled like God!
Let us become a people who, every word and expression that comes from us, fills the lost or stumbling up with life!

I sometimes store away my expensive perfume to save it because it runs out the more I use it, but this parfum WORKS DIFFERENTLY.
This parfum, if not used, will run out!
But the more you use it the more of it you will have!

“But thanks be to God, who
always puts us on display in Christ and
through us spreads the aroma of
the knowledge of Him in every place.

For to God we are
the fragrance of Christ among
those who are being saved and
among those who are perishing.

To some we are an aroma of death leading to death, but to others, an aroma of life leading to life.
And who is competent for this?
For we are not like the many who market God’s message for profit. On the contrary, we speak with sincerity in Christ, as from God and before God.”
‭‭2 Corinthians‬ ‭2:14-17‬ ‭

Who is competent to be an aroma of life?
Do you feel able to do this?
I don't!
All I know is that Jesus died for my sins, so all my incompetence is swallowed up by His blood!
I'm only competent to be a life-giving parfum if I am in Christ!  Forgiven, empowered, and filled by His Spirit to go where He will put me on display to seek and save all those who are lost.
Though our outer man is dying (our flesh is weak) our inner man is being renewed day by day with the parfum of life!  Our renewing others is in turn a renewal for ourselves as well!

“We have this kind of confidence toward God through Christ.
It is not that we are competent in ourselves to consider anything as coming from ourselves, but our competence is from God.
He has made us competent to be ministers of a new covenant, not of the letter, but of the Spirit.
For the letter kills, but the Spirit produces life.”
‭‭2 Corinthians‬ ‭3:4-6

Don't forget you are very precious and expensive parfum with a purpose today!  To spread the aroma of life to everyone and anyone God puts you on display for!

Love you guys.
Jmegrey