Having a Vision for the New Life God Has For You – Purity 1245

Having a Vision for the New Life God Has For You –
Purity 1245

Purity 1245 01/11/2024 Purity 1245 Podcast

Purity 1245 on YouTube: Coming Soon!

Good morning,

Today’s photo of the view of what was to become my
backyard down by the River comes to us from April 17, 2020, and yours truly as
I decided to take a look back into my phone’s photo archive and decided to
share this scene from my first visit to the property that was to become my
home, and eventually be called River House. 
To those of you who may be admiring those manicured levels that go up
the hill toward the back of my property,  I regret to say that my thumb isn’t as green
as the previous owner’s and I only clear that first level beyond the big tree
to the right.  And that big evergreen
bush in the foreground and that quaint white bed frame sticking out of the
ground? – They’re gone. I’m somewhat of a minimalist when it comes to yard work
and because I had no intention of maintaining a “flower bed” – that metal bed
frame was extracted and recycled and that big bush was an annoyance and was ripped
up by the roots.  Just because something
has been there for years, doesn’t mean they have to stay and if they serve no
purpose or get in your way what you want to do, there is no reason to continue
to work to maintain them or to keep someone else’s dream alive.  

Well, It’s Thursday and I normally share pathway
photos to encourage us to get on or to keep walking on the path of Christian Discipleship
but I decided to share this one because it represented a destination, a dream,
a hope, and when we start walking and talking with God, we should have a vision
for where we want to go. 

On that day back in 2020, I was doing a walk through
of the property at 1788 State Route 9J alone because of Covid 19 restrictions
and looking to see if it could serve as an adequate home for me and my children
to go to as the terms of my divorce agreement called for the selling of our
former home.  I looked at the property
with a critical eye but I loved the view of the River, the garage, the backyard,
the basement, and the first floor and although I recognized that there would
have to be some renovations to change the layout upstairs to suit my children’s
needs– I was overcome with the realization that “this could work” and that I
wanted it and was going to make an offer immediately.   

I was working two jobs at the time and after that initial
visit I changed my commuting route to my second job in Hudson to drive past what
I hoped would be “my house” every time I went to work.  Each time I rounded the bend of State Route
9J and drove past the house, I was filled with hope that someday it would be mine
and I saw each and every drive by as an act of faith that was declaring my
belief that it would be.  My offer was
accepted, I made arrangements with a contractor to do the work to make repairs
and renovate what needed to be done to make the house what I needed it to be after
the sale was final.  And on June 22, 2020,
the closing was completed, and the house was mine.  My contractor finished the work a few days
later and I moved into my new home on June 25^th – my birthday and
rejoiced.   Things may have changed a
little bit since 2020 but the house at 1788 State Route 9J in Stuyvesant is
still mine and it continues to fill my heart with joy when I think about how it
all came to pass and how it became my house “down by the River” and how my
wife, TammyLyn later named it River House.

It was my hope, and it became my reality, and it
represents overcoming and freedom. It required hard work, sacrifice, faith, and
the Lord’s blessings but it came to pass. 
When we follow the Lord, we can hope for good things, we can hope for a
new life, and we can hope for freedom.  So
although we walk with the Lord day by day and just try to do our best to follow
Him, remember to pick your head up and to have a vision for where you want to
go.  Things don’t have to stay the same just
because they have been that way for years. You don’t have to live according to
someone else’s demands or dreams that keep you in bondage.  Jesus came to set us free and to change the
things that aren’t right and when we trust in Him and set our eyes on the life
that He has for us, nothing is impossible. 

So keep walking and talking with God and He will
empower you and guide you to live the life that you always wanted to live but didn’t
think you could.  We have a good, good
Father in the Lord and He gives good gifts to His children and rewards those
who repent and diligently seek Him.  

You can be free of your bad habits, character
defects, addictions, and bad relationships but you have to have a vision for
the life you want, and you have to follow the Lord’s ways to make sure you’re
on the right path to find it with peace, love, and joy!

——————————————————————————————–

Today’s
Bible verses come to us from “The Quick Scripture Reference for Counseling” By
John G. Kruis.

(
While Bible verses on various topics of Counseling can be found with a quick Google
search, we encourage you to purchase this resource to support the late author’s
work. (https://www.amazon.com/Quick-Scripture-Reference-Counseling-Kruis-ebook/dp/B00CIUJZT2?ref_=ast_author_dp )

This
morning’s meditation verses come from the section on Comfort.

Revelation 21:1-4 (NASB)
¹  Then I saw a new heaven and
a new earth; for the first heaven and the first earth passed away, and there is
no longer any sea.
²  And I saw the holy city,
new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, made ready as a bride
adorned for her husband.
³  And I heard a loud voice
from the throne, saying, “Behold, the tabernacle of God is among men, and
He will dwell among them, and they shall be His people, and God Himself will be
among them,
⁴  and He will wipe away every
tear from their eyes; and there will no longer be any death; there will
no longer be any mourning, or crying, or pain; the first things have
passed away.”

Today’s
verses fall under the 15th point of our counseling reference guide resource’s
section on Comfort.

15. One day this life of
suffering will be over and all will be made new.

 

Today’s verses tell us
about the culmination of the coming of God’s kingdom in the future and it
speaks of a hope that we can hardly imagine. 
No death, no mourning, no crying, and no pain – how can this be?  God the creator of all things – who has
always existed – will make it so and only those who have been blessed by His
grace to put their faith in Jesus as Lord and Savior will experience the eternal
glory of life with Him. How’s that for a vision?  

I don’t know what its
going to be like but I have had some close encounters with the manifest
presence of the Lord with the baptism of the Holy Spirit and His Spirit’s
infilling at times and I can tell you that a few moments in His presence where
heavy with the abundance of His love and filled me with euphoric experiences of
joy that have been unmatched by anything this world has to offer.  Scripture gives us scenes of God’s throne
room in Revelation 4 and the creatures and people there are depicted as giving
God continuous praise with the resounding chorus that proclaims:

Revelation 4:8 (NLT2)
⁸  … “Holy, holy, holy is the
Lord God, the Almighty— the one who always was, who is, and who is still to
come.”

And

Revelation
4:11 (NLT2)
¹¹  “You are worthy,
O Lord our God, to receive glory and honor and power.
For you created all things, and
they exist because you created what you pleased.”

No pain, no death, and
eternal glory with the Lord is the destiny of all who put their faith in Jesus –
so let us rejoice now because our names are written in heaven and no matter
what trials we may face on earth, God is with us and nothing can separate us
from His love and His plan to give us a new, eternal, and abundant life. Praise
God for He is worthy, He is holy, and He is SO good!

——————————————————————–

As always, I invite all to go to mt4christ.org where I
always share insights from prominent Christian theologians and counselors to
assist my brothers and sisters in Christ with their walk.

Today we continue sharing from “According to Your
Word: Morning and Evening Through the New Testament” By Stephen F. Olford – A
Collection of Devotional Journals: 1940-1941.

As always, I share this information for educational
purposes and encourage you all to purchase Olford’s books for your own
private study and to support his work.  This resource is available online
for less than $10 at many sites.

EVENING READING: MATTHEW 4

“It is written …” – Matthew 4:4, 7,
10

How wonderfully the Lord Jesus wielded the sword of the
Spirit on this occasion!

There is obviously great significance in the fact that
Christ met this temptation (and the tempter) with the Word of God.

The apostle John, in his first epistle, writes to the
young men because they were strong, the Word of God abode in them, and they had
overcome the wicked one.

Revelation 12:11 says, “They overcame him [the Devil] by
the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their testimony.”

Here, in Matthew, are three instances at least where the
Word of God is definitely regarded as the only successful weapon against the
Devil (notice also Ephesians 6).

The blood of the Lamb, of course, is the only basis upon
which the Word can be rightly used.

 

Lord, may the Word abide in me.
Amen.^[1]

—————————more
tomorrow————————

Join our “Victory over the Darkness”, “The Bondage
Breaker”, “Freedom in Christ” series of Discipleship Classes via the
mt4christ247 podcast!

at https://mt4christ247.podbean.com, You can also find it on Apple podcasts

(https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-mt4christ247s-podcast/id1551615154). The mt4christ247 podcast is also available
on Google Podcasts, Amazon Podcasts, Spotify, iHeartradio, and
Audible.com. 

These teachings are also available on the
MT4Christ247 YouTube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/@MT4Christ247

Email me at mt4christ247@gmail.com to receive the class materials, share your progress, and
to be encouraged.

My wife, TammyLyn, also offers Christian
encouragement via her Ask Seek Knock blog (https://tammylynask.blogspot.com/ ),  her
Facebook Group: Ask, Seek, Knock (https://www.facebook.com/groups/529047851449098 ) and her podcast Ask, Seek, and Knock on
Podbean (https://feed.podbean.com/tammalyn78/feed.xml)

“The views, opinions, and commentary of this
publication are those of the author, M.T. Clark, only, and do not purport to
reflect the opinions or views of any of the photographers, artists, ministries,
or other authors of the other works that may be included in this publication,
and do not necessarily reflect the views or positions of any entities the
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Encouragement
for the Path of Christian Discipleship