Showing posts with label Fasting. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Fasting. Show all posts

The Flesh Tried To Crash My Fast!

I decided to fast from coffee, cakes and cookies that day for spiritual advancement. You know that fasting is a way to connect more deeply with God and we can fast from anything.

I had mackerel that day for dinner. When I finished eating I apologetically thought, Oh wow! I need to eat some cookies to counteract that fish breath! 

When the thought came, I was mentally full steam ahead to the cookies. I felt it was needed and that excused me from slightly breaking my fast. Sometimes, all it takes is a positive reminder, a reminder that the flesh will never give.

The Holy Spirit said, Not so fast. Floss and brush you teeth, sister, and get to your spiritual advancement!

The flesh always wants a way out of rightness and discipline and is there to trip us up and cheat us. The spirit is willing but the flesh is weak. (Matthew 26:41) God's Holy Spirit is a powerhouse and guides us to success! 

The Holy Spirit is a person, the third person of the Triune/Trinity of God. He has a personality and God sends him to comfort and guide us. The Spirit of God takes up residence in our bodies, His temple, when we accept Jesus as Our Savior. Being filled with The Spirit, however, is a more advanced position that many Christians do not experience but whom anyone can if he/she desires. God does not withhold his goodness from us.

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Secret Faithfulness To God = Outward Reward

Public or outward acknowledgement is the reward that Christians who are secretly faithful receive from God.

One way or another, our private devotion to God will show outwardly. We don't have to try, we don't have to uplift ourselves to others, we don't have to beg people to believe that we know God through Jesus Christ.

When we are faithful in seeking God's face and drawing nigh to him, his power will emanate from us. When we pray, fast and give from our secret closet, God will reward us outwardly. 

We will receive some type of open acknowledgement, from God, for our secret faithfulness.

Matthew 6:6

Matthew 6:17-18

Matthew 6:3-4