A Time to get Real

As a believer in Jesus Christ and committed follower of the teachings of Jesus Christ I think it is high time to get real on some issues of life.  If you are an observer of society you ought to be very concerned for the direction of society.  But a general observation is that most people in life are just going through the motions or are living in some make believe world.  When our world comes crashing down we wonder why God did not stop it.  What I am going to share is my opinion based upon my observations of Christians through the three decades of ministry experience.  I think present day Christians need to get real because unless we do the church never will get real and if the church does not get real then the world will never take our message seriously and they will remain in their sin.  This list of things to get real about are not in any priority list and that is done by design because others would have a different list and a different concern on priorities.  All I am saying as well is the basic assumption that this list is for Christians.  First thing is that we must get real in our relationship with Jesus Christ.  People are loving for a genuine God seen through people who have a real passionate relationship with God.  It is not very important how well you are able to live the religious life going through a false sense of religious practices but do we know God and our faith is making an actual difference in how we live out our faith before God and man.  Second thing is that we must get real that we are in a spiritual battle that will end only until we see Jesus face to face.  There is a real devil who wants to defeat you and unless we are conscious of this battle we can begin to fight a spiritual battle using human strength of which we will lose every time.  Satan and demons are either mischaracterized by Hollywood or dismissed completely as being prehistoric or only for the naïve.  Both these positions is actually a lie from Satan himself to get us to play rather then to fight our spiritual battles using the blood of the Lamb in the name of Jesus which brings defeat to our enemy every time.  Third thing is that we must get real in our relationships.  Our most important relationship must remain the most important or we will never do well in all our other relationships.  Jesus said the most important commandment is to love the Lord God with all our heart, our strength, our soul and our mind.  Getting real in our worship of Jesus is a huge part of truly loving God in a manner that is pleasing to God.  When we get this right and base all our other relationships upon how we love God then we will not be nearly as selfish in our family and friend relationships which is the biggest enemy of a relationship.  To be real in our relationships it is obvious to any student of the Bible that love must be present for this to work.  Fourth thing is that we must get real with where we presently are in life while at the same time know where you want to be in the next ten years.  This is why we are encouraged to examine ourselves to see if we are in the Faith.  We must get real in the areas in our lives that we need to change, this present reality check is one the hardest things to do in life but unless it is done our lives will never change for the good.  In fact if there is any change it is usually for the bad unless we have a consistent reality check.  After I make this reality check then I must make decisions to move forward in Christ by being committed and discipline to do the things that will please the heart of God.  The apostle Paul made this very clear in Philippians 3:13-14 "Brothers, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it.  But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus."
May the Lord help us to get real in a world that is just trying to get through another day.  It is time to get real to show a lost and dying world that God is real by being real in our love relationship with Him.

Pastor John