Living By The Rules

RO 14:17 For the kingdom of God is not a matter of eating and drinking, but of righteousness, peace and joy in the Holy Spirit, 18 because anyone who serves Christ in this way is pleasing to God and approved by men.

I just want to share a basic truth that can help to greatly improve your life. You see, as we walk through life and learn more we realize that things are actually much more simple than we might think. God built basic life rules of right and wrong into the root programming of our hearts which is called a conscience, and when we break these laws usually an alert goes off in our soul telling us that we are doing the wrong thing instead of the right thing. God's long term kingdom is made up of righteousness, or people who are willing to consistently do what is right. The earth and life are just a testing ground to see who will be obedient or not.

DT 30:19 This day I call heaven and earth as witnesses against you that I have set before you life and death, blessings and curses. Now choose life, so that you and your children may live

There are some things in life that we have no control over like the body or family we are born into. We also have no control over how other people around us break God's life rules and hurt us, but we do have control over whether we do the right or wrong things in our life. Doing right brings God's blessing and approval, while doing wrong brings a curse and God's disapproval. He doesn't do this to be mean or to single us out, He just needs to promote the right in front of everyone, and discourage doing the wrong as an example to everyone around us. God's wants good examples to bless in front of others so that they will in turn do right.

GE 4:7 If you do what is right, will you not be accepted? But if you do not do what is right, sin is crouching at your door; it desires to have you, but you must master it.

God has high hopes for us from the start, but satan does everything he can to damage us and destroy our trust so that we only trust in ourselves and in the wrong ways that we use to deal with life's problems. Sin is just life-cheating and satan loves to get us into habits of breaking God's life rules so that the abnormal becomes normal to us. Hell is full of damaged people that learned to cheat in life and break God's life rules from a very young age. God knows that there were some very powerful reasons why they chose to life-cheat, but He also knows that we are all responsible to come to Him for help, rather than by breaking His rules.

DT 11:26 See, I am setting before you today a blessing and a curse-- 27 the blessing if you obey the commands of the LORD your God that I am giving you today; 28 the curse if you disobey the commands of the LORD your God and turn from the way that I command you today by following other gods, which you have not known.

If you have lived a life that seems consistently cursed and disapproved of by God then you have an opportunity to turn that all around today by changing your life choices. If you are sick of always being on the loser end of the stick then look through your life and identify any area that you are breaking God's life rules and start doing right. God knows that you want a better life, but He must play by His own life rules just like we need to. God can only bless people that are willing to live by His rules. Today can be your turning point from death and curses, to life and God's blessing, so be willing to live by His rules and you will be blessed.

JER 29:11 For I know the plans I have for you," declares the LORD, "plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.