The Quest For Truth » Thoughts from me

Until Our Faith Becomes Pure

Robert Sekhose — Sat, 20 Feb 2010 06:44:46 +0000

Faith is one of the key ingredients of the Christian life. We are saved by grace through faith. We have to have faith in what Christ has accomplished for us on the cross. It is by faith that we accept that we have been made holy in Christ. And it is by faith that we overcome the world and sin and the devil. But why is it that so many of us fail so often? It is hard to give any concrete answer because only God can tell what it is that goes inside each of us. There are things that even we don’t understand about ourselves. And when we feel that we have overcome suddenly we fall. But failure in the Christian life has to be viewed like failure in any other area of life. It is all a learning experience. We learn from our mistakes and we enrich the body of Christ by our learning. We should not give in to despair when we fail but rather lean upon the Holy Spirit to teach us more about God and His ways. Salvation from sin is what Christ came to offer us and it should be our quest to be free from every kind of sin we may have in our life whether known or unknown. But there are many failures in our quest for a pure and holy life. One of the reasons being that our faith is many a time polluted with our own imperfections and thinking. But every failure is a step to the purification of our faith if we learn from our mistakes and each step takes us closer to the kind of faith that Jesus had. So, we live and we fail and then we learn until our faith becomes pure.

Making Friends With Sinners

Robert Sekhose — Thu, 31 Dec 2009 18:08:58 +0000

Jesus was a friend to many sinners. He insisted that He came to save sinners and not the righteous. So how are we to relate to sinners? One way is to make friends based on your terms as found in the Bible and not giving in to their terms. Jesus never adopted any behavior of the tax collectors and publicans to win their friendship. It was always on His terms whether they liked it or not. And most of them did like it. They liked to be friends with a godly man and change their own ways.

Closing Our Hearts To Sin

Robert Sekhose — Thu, 31 Dec 2009 16:48:02 +0000

Taking sin too casually is a cause of much sin in our life.There has to come a time in our life when we say it is enough and close our hearts to sin. We don’t do this in our own strength but in the power of God through the Holy Spirit. Closing our hearts to sin is a blessed experience.

Fighting From A Position of Rest

Robert Sekhose — Wed, 02 Dec 2009 06:30:28 +0000

If we are full of turmoil and stress and tension inside of us then there must be something wrong in our belief system. As Christians we are not supposed to live like that. In the temptation of Jesus we see that He fought with the enemy but it was from a position of rest. He could always maintain His composure when fighting calmly with the devil. He was deriving strength from the inner man through the Holy Spirit. This is fighting from a position of rest and victory. We don’t fight to win but we fight from a position of victory that Christ has won for us.

Giving Out Of Greed

Robert Sekhose — Tue, 24 Nov 2009 13:38:24 +0000

It is true that God blesses us when we give and give lavishly for the kingdom of God. But giving can become a manifestation of our greed when we give in order to receive more from God. We give away our possesions and money so that God will give us a hundred fold return on our giving and some preachers may even encourage that. But giving to receive more should not be our motivation for giving. We should give out of obedience to the Spirit of God in our hearts. When we feel the impressions in our heart to give a certain thing or amount to certain individuals or groups, we should give out of obedience to the Holy Spirit speaking to us. We should give generously and cheerfully and not out of greed. Many Christians have been disappointed when the hundredfold return did not materialise. They gave away so much expecting even more from God but ended up frustrated because God does not honour greed. He honours an obedient heart.

Overcome The World

Robert Sekhose — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 06:43:49 +0000

So many times we think that we need to struggle to overcome our environment and our surroundings. We feel that the day will come when we will overcome. But that is not what we are supposed to believe. Jesus said, “Be of good cheer, I have overcome the world.” That means that we too have overcome the world through Christ. Because He lives in us we share in His victory. We have to accept this blessed fact by faith. Praise God that you have overcome the world. It may not seem to be true but nevertheless God’s word stands. As you apply faith this fact will become clearer to you and you will enjoy the victory of Christ over the world. Now we don’t need to fight to overcome the world. We put on the whole armor of God to withstand the enemy and stand on our ground as victors over the world and over every circumstance that comes against us.

The Struggle For The Kingdom Of God

Robert Sekhose — Wed, 14 Oct 2009 01:08:02 +0000

The life of a Christian is joy and peace and strength from the Lord. But there is another side to it and that is struggle in the Spirit. God is a progressive God and so, He is always on the move. If we want to move with God we have to be ready to live a life of exploits and overcoming. This brings us to the struggle we are talking about. It is not a struggle of the flesh but divinely inspired struggle. We have to be continuously moving in the inner man even though at times it might be at a snail’s pace. The journey is a lifelong struggle to bring the will of God on this earth. It is a struggle for freedom in the lives of people and for justice, righteousness and the character of God to be displayed in our lives. But in all this struggle there is the power of God which moves us. We are struggling not in our own strength but in the strength of God. It is a struggle to move to newer heights and conquer more ground for the Kingdom of God. The struggle is real because the opposition is real. We are wrestling with the powers of darkness, with principalities and powers and rulers of the other world. But each victory brings us closer to the finish line and finally we will be able to say like the Apostle Paul that we have finished the race, we have kept the faith and now there is a crown waiting for us.

Calm The Inner Man

Robert Sekhose — Wed, 14 Oct 2009 00:31:41 +0000

The sure sign of a healthy spiritual life is calmness in the inner man. We have to refuse to be moved by the flesh and instead move by the Spirit. How do we know when we are moving in the flesh and in the Spirit? When we move in the flesh there is usually a struggle and uneasiness in what we are doing. We have to make an effort to do anything. This is living in the flesh. When we are moving in the Spirit, there is a freedom and we soar like an eagle. We accomplish more and do more. We know in our inner man that we are at rest. The temptation to most of us is to move in the flesh and do something for God. So we move prematurely, like Moses did when he killed the Egyptian or like Abraham did by bringing Ishamel into this world who was the son of the flesh as the Apostle Paul said. When we feel like nothing is happening, we have to remain still and wait for the strength of God to move us. How do we know all this? You will know because the Spirit of God resides in you and He will teach you all things. You will have to learn to trust the leading of the Spirit in the inner man. We might make mistakes but we will learn from them. We have to refuse to do anything in the flesh and in our own strength even though it might be a good thing and the most logical thing to do at that moment. God’s ways are higher than our ways and His thoughts higher than ours. So, learn to move in the Spirit and you will have peace in the inner man. There will be a sweet calm that covers your life. Mountains will be removed and nothing shall move you for you have learned to trust God in everything. You will have the calmness of God that comes as a result of faith and trust in Him and refusing to move in the flesh.

Lord, Help My Unbelief.

Robert Sekhose — Sat, 22 Aug 2009 14:16:42 +0000

It is true that faith comes by hearing the Word of God. But it is also true that we cannot make the “hearing” a “work”. We may listen to cds and tapes to the extent where we are trying to manufacture faith as a product of our hearing. But God does not want us to live like that because that is not what faith is. Faith is simple trust and belief. There is no formula or magic in it. And if we fall short why can’t we pray like the man in the Bible who prayed “Lord I believe, help thou my unbelief.” It is so simple that many a times we stumble upon that truth. We find it hard to believe that the things of God are so simple that it is easily understood even by a small child. If you find that your faith is lacking, just pray a simple prayer asking God to help your unbelief. And you will be pleasantly surprised that God Himself makes your faith complete because does not the Bible say that He Himself is the author and finisher of our faith? Trust Him to come through where you fall short even in the matter of your faith.

Absolute Surrender

Robert Sekhose — Mon, 06 Jul 2009 03:37:31 +0000

Christ demands absolute surrender from every believer. We have to reach the state where we are willing to do anything for Christ as He commands. We have to give up all self efforts in the Christian life. For all the good works that we produce in our own human self efforts will be burned in the day of judgement. What a waste it will be if that is the case for us. We have to inspect our lives and see that we are strenously working with the mighty power of Christ that works in us. May the Holy Spirit open our eyes if we are living the Christian life in our own strength.