“Every good and perfect gift is from above”

  • Charles Stanley’s Life Principle #19 says,  “Anything You Hold Too Tightly, You Will Lose”

  • Life Principle 19 “Anything You Hold Too Tightly, You Will Lose
  • What is it you hold tightly to? What would be hard for you to surrender if God asked you to? Or if He removed it from your life? Is it an attitude? Behavior? Money? Success? It will be different for all of us. Anything we set up as an idol that we “worship” instead of God. And as we learn from various Old Testament stories, God will not tolerate anything we place above Him. We are told in Deuteronomy 6:5(NIV), “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength.” And in Exodus 20:3(NIV), God commands us, ‭‭ ““You shall have no other gods before me”.
  • Jesus reminds us, in Matthew 6:24(NIV), “”No one can serve two masters. Either you will hate the one and love the other, or you will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and money.” 
  • Let us not become like the rich fool that Jesus talked about in Luke 12:16-20, What struck me about this one,  was how the farmer never gives any gratitude to God for all he's been given. It's all about what he's done. What he's accumulated. That his possessions would help him rest easy. He put his faith in his "stuff" instead of God. 
  • May we learn to hold things loosely whatever they may be, May we be willing to surrender what God may ask of us, and May we take to heart Psalm 118:8-9(NIV), “It is better to take refuge in the Lord than to trust in humans. It is better to take refuge in the Lord than to trust in princes.”
  • And always remember, “Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of the heavenly lights, who does not change like shifting shadows.” James‬ ‭1‬:‭17‬ ‭NIV‬‬

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  • Jesus reminds us, in Matthew 6:24(NIV), “”No one can serve two masters. Either you will hate the one and love the other, or you will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and money.” 
  • Let us not become like the rich fool that Jesus talked about in Luke 12:16-20, What struck me about this one,  was how the farmer never gives any gratitude to God for all he's been given. It's all about what he's done. What he's accumulated. That his possessions would help him rest easy. He put his faith in his "stuff" instead of God. 
  • May we learn to hold things loosely whatever they may be, May we be willing to surrender what God may ask of us, and May we take to heart Psalm 118:8-9(NIV), “It is better to take refuge in the Lord than to trust in humans. It is better to take refuge in the Lord than to trust in princes.”
  • And always remember, “Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of the heavenly lights, who does not change like shifting shadows.” James‬ ‭1‬:‭17‬ ‭NIV‬‬

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