Romans 1 - Evidence for God

¹⁶ For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek. ¹⁷ For in it the righteousness of God is revealed from faith to faith; as it is written, “But the righteous man shall live by faith.” 

¹⁸ For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who suppress the truth in unrighteousness, ¹⁹ because that which is known about God is evident within them; for God made it evident to them. ²⁰ For since the creation of the world His invisible attributes, His eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly seen, being understood through what has been made, so that they are without excuse.

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God has placed the evidence of Himself not only all around us in His creation, but inside of us as well.  Everyone of us has known the longing for that "thing" that is missing in life, but only the Gospel has the answer.  The missing piece is a relationship with God, the Creator of the universe.

Sin, which we have from the beginning of our lives, separates us from God.  He cannot have anything, other than perfection, in his presence, including us... But God desired us to have relationship with Him so much, that He made a plan to remove the problem of sin from us.  He send Jesus to live a perfect life, be unjustly murdered on the cross, in our place...He took on the punishment of our sin...and gave us in exchange His record of a perfect life.  All that was accomplished as a gift, something free to take, with nothing in exchange but our sin.  All we need to do is stop trusting in ourselves to fix the sin problem and rely solely on Jesus as our ticket into relationship with God.

That is the Gospel, the Good News!  Jesus paid it all...and God created us and the world around us to remind us that we need HIM!

Proverbs 12:8 - Twisted View

8 A man is commended according to his good sense,
    but one of twisted mind is despised.  (ESV)

8 A man will be praised according to his insight,
But one of perverse mind will be despised. (NASB)


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This verse is what my family looked at today as we ate breakfast.  It is simple comparative statement of the results of different mindsets. When I read this in the ESV version this morning the idea of a twisted mind really struck me.

We can so easily have our view of the world skewed in such a way as to respond in our flesh.  We get easily angered, view accidents as personal assaults or a myriad of other ways our pride takes over... and our actions/words display our heart condition.

The antidote is of course to "walk by the Spirit" (Gal 5:16).  What an incredible blessing that THE Holy Spirit dwells within us.  I think we hear this so often we forget His power to transform us.  Consider for a moment that the God of the Universe made His dwelling in me...so that by His power, He can change me to be more and more Christ-like.

Lord, help me to be "led by the Spirit", soften my heart to Your will, and change me to be your man...

Acts 17- Made to Seek God

²⁴ The God who made the world and all things in it, since He is Lord of heaven and earth, does not dwell in temples made with hands;  
²⁵ nor is He served by human hands, as though He needed anything, since He Himself gives to all people life and breath and all things; 
²⁶ and He made from one man every nation of mankind to live on all the face of the earth, having determined their appointed times and the boundaries of their habitation, 
²⁷ that they would seek God, if perhaps they might grope for Him and find Him, though He is not far from each one of us;

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Let me remove some of the description to help you see what jumped out at me:

²⁴ The God who made the world and all things in it, ...²⁶  He made ... every nation of mankind...²⁷ that they would seek God,...

We all are chasing after something to fill that emptiness we feel.  Even when we know the truth of what Christ has done to restore relationship with the God of the Universe, we get distracted.  The Enemy of our soul and our fleshly desires come to us with an imitation of what only God can fully provide.  In our weakness we allow that temptation to capture out attention, which only draws us away from relationship with God.

We can see this most clearly as we look at our lost world.  Their seeking God often looks like lust, greed, power or sometimes being a savior to someone, or something else, anything that will give us purpose...

God, I pray that my life, my words and actions would be a lighthouse for You!  Use me to draw the lost and the distracted back to you...