BLESSINGS!! - Deborah
Antignano Devotional
ROMANS 10:1: Brethren,
my heart's desire and my prayer to God for them is for their
salvation.
Blessings!!
The words you just read
above from Apostle Paul is my very heart's desire, too.
It is to truly edify and want to draw you closer to the
FATHER'S heart, opening up your Spiritual eyes to really understand
HIS heart better and what it is HE desires for us all which
is ultimately our Salvation.
I just want to share
what is the most important goal of my ministry with you all.
First and foremost, the goal of my ministry is to not
"change" anybody's religion. "Religion"
is NOT what the LORD is after. What the LORD
is after is what lies deep within your heart. He wants
you to understand what it means to truly worship HIM in "Spirit
and in Truth".
Listen to what the Word
of the LORD says in Isaiah 29:13 about "religion".
The passage reads: THESE PEOPLE COME NEAR
TO ME WITH THEIR MOUTH AND HONOR ME WITH THEIR LIPS, BUT THEIR
HEARTS ARE FAR FROM ME. THEIR WORSHIP OF ME IS MADE
UP ONLY OF RULES TAUGHT BY MEN.
That verse was very KEY
to opening my eyes to what the LORD is really after.
Here is another powerful verse that HIT ME when I started
my spiritual journey 7 years ago. Listen to the LORD
in Isaiah 64:6:
For all of us have become
like one who is unclean and all our righteous deeds are like
a filthy garment and all of us wither like a leaf and our
iniquities like the wind take us away.
ALL OF US", I pondered
this. Okay, I'm included in the "all of us"....
Here is another verse
which the LORD is talking about "all of us" in Romans
3:10:
There is none righteous,
not even one. There is none who understands. There
is none who seeks for God. All have turned aside together
they have becomne useless. There is none who does good,
there is not even one. Their throat is an open grave
with their tounges they keep deceiving, the poison of asps
is under their lips, whose mouth is full of cursing and bitterness....."
The LORD is talking about
ALL OF MANKIND!!
So what is the remedy
if all of mankind seems to be doomed? Listen to what
JESUS says in Matthew 18:3:
Truly I say to you, unless
you are converted and become like children you will not enter
the kingdom of heaven.
Okay, I thought.
How does a grown person become converted like a child?
HE is talking to us all. We ALL have to be converted
like a child to enter HIS kingdom. Yes, we are HIS creation,
but we have to become "legal" children in GOD'S
family. How? Well, then, listen to the LORD HIMSELF
when HE answered that very famous question long ago in John
3:3 it says: Truly, Truly I say to you, unless one is
born again he cannot see the Kingdom of God.
One must be "born
again" to become "converted" as a "child"
to enter into GOD'S family
God's plan for Salvation
for man is rather simple. We tend to complicate it and
make it harder than what it is to truly understand how to
become a true child of the living GOD.
Listen to how you become
a child of the living GOD:
Book of Romans 10:9-10:
If you confess with
your mouth JESUS AS LORD and you believe in your heart that
GOD raised HIM from the dead, you will be saved. For
with the heart a person believes resulting in righteousness
and with the mouth he confesses resulting in salvation.
Once you "confess"
and "receive" CHRIST INTO YOUR HEART, you have the
HOLY SPIRIT living in you which is CHRIST'S RIGHTEOUSNESS
now given to you as a "free gift of HIS grace",
Ephesians 2:8-10.
Romans 8:11 reads:
If the SPIRIT OF HIM who raised Jesus from the dead dwells
in you, He who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will also
give life to your mortal bodies through His Spirit who dwells
in you.
HIS SPIRIT, the Holy Spirit,
HAS TO DWELL IN YOU (that's what being born again means)
Once that takes place,
once you repent of your sins and ask the LORD to come into
your hearts, the HOLY SPIRIT is then given to you as a gift
of HIS grace; therefore you are now "converted"
to "children" and become sons and daughters of God.
Romans 8:15 says:
For you have not received a spirit of slavery leading to fear
again, but you have received a spirit of adoption as sons
by which we cry out Abba! Father!
You see the word "adoption", GOD
wants you to be adopted into HIS family. "Abba"
in the Greek means "daddy". HOW AWESOME!!
That's how we become "converted".
That's what JESUS is talking about!
The AWESOME ALMIGHTY GOD
wants to "adopt" you right now!! HE is ready
to give you HIS HOLY SPIRIT if you repent of your sins and
turn to him right where you are.
"Without the shedding
of blood, there can be no forgiveness of sins" Jesus
shed HIS blood for you so you, too, can be saved by HIS sacrifice
by receiving HIM truly into your "hearts" today.
It is a "Matter of
the Heart". Sometimes our pride gets in the way
when we think, Oh, I'm not that bad. I never murdered
someone. The LAW OF GOD, the Ten Commandments, is what
we will all be tried against when we stand before HIS judgment
throne. NOT ONE OF US will be able to represent
ourselves. JESUS CHRIST is our Advocate and our Defender
and our LIFE GIVING REDEEMER. Once you "truly"
turn to HIM and ask HIM into your "heart", you then
are "cleansed from your sins" and the HOLY SPIRIT
enables you to live a life that is pleasing to the FATHER!!
That's the goal of my
ministry through the songs and writings that GOD is giving
me. My heart's desire is that many come to an accurate
understanding of what GOD requires from us all. HE is
not interested in "what church" we go to.
He wants your heart.
Will you give it to HIM
today?
Amen
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