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Luke 14:5-9 BSB And He asked them, “Which of you whose son or ox falls into a pit on the Sabbath day will not immediately pull him out?” And they were unable to answer these questions.      Rules and laws are meant for a reason, to keep order in society. But they are not always the right thing to do. Following the rules or the laws of man, when it goes against ethics and God’s law isn’t the best thing to…

 John 17:9-24 I pray for them. I am not praying for the world, but for those you have given me, for they are yours.  All I have is yours, and all you have is mine. And glory has come to me through them.  I will remain in the world no longer, but they are still in the world, and I am coming to you. Holy Father, protect them by the power of your name, the name you gave me, so…

Matthew 22:37-39 BSB Jesus declared, “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’      If we can do those 2 things, we are on solid ground and again, it comes back to love. Love the Lord, love yourself, love your neighbor. The bible is a love story from Genesis through Revelations. In…

Matthew 7:1 ESV “Judge not, that you be not judged.” John 8:7 b ESV “Let him who is without sin among you be the first to throw a stone at her.”      Those 2 verses (3 chapters apart) go together extremely well and could be followed up with Romans 3:23 “for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God” None of us are perfect, all of us will sin. We must learn to do like the Lord does…

Proverbs 4:25-27 Let your eyes look forward; fix your gaze straight ahead. Make a level path for your feet, and all your ways will be sure. Do not swerve to the right or to the left; turn your feet away from evil.      My dad was a businessman and he felt obligated to pass on what he learned about life and business to us kids, usually in stories. The example I remember most is a story of him joining the Army…

Deuteronomy 6:5 KJV And thou shalt love the LORD thy God with all thine heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy might.           If we are building a “business model” for our lives, this is where we must start. It all starts with love. God’s love for us, which created us, breathed life into us, built a world for us, and bought us grace and eternal life. Our love for him because he has blessed us with all…

Galatians 5:14 NLT For the whole law can be summed up in this one command: “Love your neighbor as yourself.”      One command, two parts, but still words to live by. First, for the idea to work, we must love ourselves; if we are having trouble with that, we should remember whose image we are made in and love the God inside us. Jesus suffered and died for us, so we should know we are worthy of His love. Second, we…

Proverbs 31:8-9 BSB Open your mouth for those with no voice, for the cause of all the dispossessed. Open your mouth, judge righteously, and defend the cause of the poor and needy.      Being a Christian, believing in God, and behaving ourselves isn’t enough. We have to act, to stand up for the poor and oppressed and the badly treated. Not hurting them ourselves means nothing if we see them being hurt and fail to act. If we can stop a…

Matthew 7:12 NKJV Therefore, whatever you want men to do to you, do also to them, for this is the Law and the Prophets.      If we were to build a business model for our faith this might be a good place to start. “Do unto others as you want them to do to you” was one of the first lessons my mom taught us. It is short, to the point and appealed to toddler logic. Want your sister to share…

Colossians 3:23-24 BSB Whatever you do, work at it with your whole being, for the Lord and not for men, because you know that you will receive an inheritance from the Lord as your reward. It is the Lord Christ you are serving.  People talk about tithing being all about money, but it is not. God needs our time just as much. Think about how much time you spend with God every day…. How much time praying; how much time…

Romans 12:1-2 BSB Therefore I urge you, brothers, on account of God’s mercy, to offer your bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God, which is your spiritual service of worship. Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what is the good, pleasing, and perfect will of God.       We are to offer ourselves as holy sacrifices, in the spiritual worship of…

Joshua 24:15 NIV But if serving the LORD seems undesirable to you, then choose for yourselves this day whom you will serve, whether the gods your ancestors served beyond the Euphrates, or the gods of the Amorites, in whose land you are living. But as for me and my household, we will serve the LORD.”      Joshua doesn’t say “we will serve the Lord on the Sabbath” or “we will serve the Lord after the field is plowed” or “we will…