Sunday Words of Encouragement May 1, 2011

This morning we did a Love Can Wait ring Ceremony with teens in our church. That was quite nice.
Then our pastor did a sermon titled: Holiness - A Matter of the Heart. Followers of Christ are called to be holy as "He who called us is holy." 1 Pet 1:15-16. This is not something we can do on our own. Mark 10:27.
But God gives us four things that help us towards holiness.
1>   He gives us the Holy Spirit to guide us. John 16:13.
2>   He gives us His Word (the Bible) to instruct us. Psalms 119:105.
3>   He gives us forgiveness when we stumble. 1 John 1:9.
4>   He gives us Christian friends to support us. Heb 10:25.
Pastor gave us this quote from Leonard Ravenhill: 

The greatest miracle that God can do today is to take an unholy man out of an unholy world, and make that man holy, and put him back into that unholy world and keep him holy in it.

Paul encourages: "I ...urge you to live a life worthy of the calling you have received." Eph. 4:1b.
The first step though is to change our hearts, then the change can work outward to our life style.

This song seemed appropriate to go with the message.
We can only be holy if we commit our lives to His will in all things.

A Verse for today:

Hebrews 12:14 (New International Version, ©2011)

 ¹⁴ Make every effort to live in peace with everyone and to be holy; without holiness no one will see the Lord.

We prayed this morning for the families, in Alabama and else where, who have lost and suffered through the tornadoes this past week.