Daily Bread 2-26-18
The Sermon on the mount
Matthew 6:24
No man can serve two masters: for either he will hate the one, and love the other; or else he will hold to the one, and despise the other. Ye cannot serve God and mammon.
ref. - Lk 16:13 - No servant can serve two masters: for either he will hate the one, and love the other; or else he will hold to the one, and despise the other. Ye cannot serve God and mammon.
Gal 1:10 - For do I now persuade men, or God? or do I seek to please men? for if I yet pleased men, I should not be the servant of Christ.
1Jn 2:15 - Love not the world, neither the things that are in the world. If any man love the world, the love of the father is not in him.
Have you ever heard the term, the third wheel? It pertains to when there are three friends doing something together and there is always one that is left out. You can especially see this if you watch children play. As simple as this seems it is a clear explanation of how we are with God if we allow anything else to have an equal part into our lives and our spiritual direction. If we try to divide ourselves between God and worldly things, we will either be able to pay attention to one or the other. This being because they contradict one another and we will have to choose sides. Too often we choose sides that are convenient at the given time. We choose one thing this day and God the other and this turns us into hypocrites. Our first commandment is that there shall be no other God's before us. He does not want to share us and have us double minded. We are told in James 1:8 that a double minded man is unstable in all his ways. This scripture tells us we cannot serve God and mammon. Mammon being money. We are shown in 1 Timothy 6:10 that the love of money is the root of all evil. How can we serve something that is so pure and righteous in God and also serve something that is the root of all evil? Truth is, we can't. Our love and devotion must be to God and God alone. Do we need money to survive? Yes we do, but it should not become our love. In the reference verses we are also told that our service is not to men but to God. It also tells us not to love the world. If we do this the love of God is not in us. So we mustn't get too attached to the things of this world, we must live here and survive but if it comes right down to it we mustn't want to remain on this earth over the opportunity to go and be with our Lord. This commandment alone is the downfall of many a good man.(everybody wants to go to heaven, but nobody wants to go now) And the only way that we can become more in love with God than anything else in the world is by going through the Spiritual changes that we call Salvation(repentance and remission of sins), Sanctification(the inner cleansing of our souls through the word of God and the understanding of his word), and the filling of the Holy Ghost(Holy Spirit of God) . It will be only when this Spirit has entered us that we will see the true, unequalled beauty of our savior and the God we serve. Stay focused, stay, the course, and give your attention and love to the things of the cross. It will get us where we were made to go and in the presence of the one who created us!! Have a great day!!!