Mindset For Success

What is causing the quarrels and fights among you? Isn’t it because there is a whole army of evil desires within you? You want what you don’t have, so you kill to get it.  You long for what others have, and can’t afford it, so you start a fight to take it away from them. And yet the reason you don’t have what you want is that you don’t ask God for it. And even when you do ask you don’t get it because your whole aim is wrong—you want only what will give you pleasure.  You are like an unfaithful wife who loves her husband’s enemies.  Don’t you realize that making friends with God’s enemies—the evil pleasures of this world—makes you an enemy of God? I say it again, that if your aim is to enjoy the evil pleasure of the unsaved world, you cannot also be a friend of God. Or what do you think the Scripture means when it says that the Holy Spirit, whom God has placed within us, watches over us with tender jealousy? But he gives us more and more strength to stand against all such ...

If anyone can control his tongue, it proves that he has perfect control over himself in every other way. We can make a large horse turn around and go wherever we want by means of a small bit in his mouth. And a tiny rudder makes a huge ship turn wherever the pilot wants it to go, even though the winds are strong. So also the tongue is a small thing, but what enormous damage it can do. A great forest can be set on fire by one tiny spark. And the tongue is a flame of fire. It is full of wickedness, and poisons every part of the body. And the tongue is set on fire by hell itself and can turn our whole lives into a blazing flame of destruction and disaster. Men have trained, or can train, every kind of animal or bird that lives and every kind of reptile and fish, but no human being can tame the tongue. It is always ready to pour out its deadly poison. Sometimes it praises our heavenly Father, and sometimes it breaks out into curses against men who are made like God. And so blessing and cur...

O Lord, you have examined my heart and know everything about me. You know when I sit or stand. When far away you know my every thought. You chart the path ahead of me and tell me where to stop and rest. Every moment you know where I am. You know what I am going to say before I even say it. You both precede and follow me and place your hand of blessing on my head. You made all the delicate, inner parts of my body and knit them together in my mother’s womb. Thank you for making me so wonderfully complex! It is amazing to think about. Your workmanship is marvelous—and how well I know it. You were there while I was being formed in utter seclusion! You saw me before I was born and scheduled each day of my life before I began to breathe. Every day was recorded in your book! Search me, O God, and know my heart; test my thoughts. Point out anything you find in me that makes you sad, and lead me along the path of everlasting life. - Psalm 139:1-5,13-16,23-24 (Living Bible) He knows you complete...

How to persevere trials 1. Joyous Attitude Consider it nothing but joy, my brothers and sisters, whenever you fall into various trials. - James 1:2 (Amplified Bible) The natural human response to trials is not to rejoice; therefore the believer must make a conscious commitment to face them with joy in the light of an unassailable, unchanging relationship with the sovereign Lord of all creation. - John MacArthur 2. Understanding Mind Be assured that the testing of your faith [through experience] produces endurance [leading to spiritual maturity, and inner peace]. - James 1:3 (Amplified Bible) Through tests, a Christian will learn to withstand tenaciously the pressure of a trial until God removes it at His appointed time and even cherish the benefit. - John MacArthur 3. Submissive Will And let endurance have its perfect result and do a thorough work, so that you may be perfect and completely developed [in your faith], lacking in nothing. - James 1:4 (Amplified Bible) The testing of faith...

Why must we endure adversity? 1. To test and strengthen our faith Trials reveal whether our faith rests in God Himself or only in comfort and outcomes. These trials are only to test your faith, to see whether or not it is strong and pure. It is being tested as fire tests gold and purifies it—and your faith is far more precious to God than mere gold; so if your faith remains strong after being tried in the test tube of fiery trials, it will bring you much praise and glory and honor on the day of his return. - 1 Peter 1:7 (Living Bible) 2. To humble us Suffering reminds us of our dependence on God and strips away self-reliance. Do you remember how the Lord led you through the wilderness for all those forty years, humbling you and testing you to find out how you would respond, and whether or not you would really obey him? Yes, he humbled you by letting you go hungry and then feeding you with manna, a food previously unknown to both you and your ancestors. He did it to help you realize tha...

God tested Abraham’s faith and obedience. “Abraham!” God called. “Yes, Lord?” he replied. “Take with you your only son—yes, Isaac whom you love so much—and go to the land of Moriah and sacrifice him there as a burnt offering upon one of the mountains which I’ll point out to you!” The next morning Abraham got up early, chopped wood for a fire upon the altar, saddled his donkey, and took with him his son Isaac and two young men who were his servants, and started off to the place where God had told him to go. On the third day of the journey Abraham saw the place in the distance. “Stay here with the donkey,” Abraham told the young men, “and the lad and I will travel yonder and worship, and then come right back. ” Abraham placed the wood for the burnt offering upon Isaac’s shoulders, while he himself carried the knife and the flint for striking a fire. So the two of them went on together. “Father,” Isaac asked, “we have the wood and the flint to make the fire, but where is the lamb for the ...