This Present War

 Greetings to you in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ,

     Romans 7:16-18 says, “If then I do that which I would not, I consent unto the law that it is good.  Now then it is no more I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me.  For I know that in me (that is, in my flesh,) dwelleth no good thing: for to will is present with me; but how to perform that which is good I find not.  For the good that I would I do not: but the evil which I would not, that I do.”

     I make a video update every now and then to let most of you know how things are going  with us here at the assisted living facility and as you may have gathered  things have been rather difficult lately in some areas of my life.  It is a personal thing in that my patience with others  was prompting me to quit preaching.  I mentioned that in the last video and asked for prayer in that  regard.  As usual, the replies that  I got back  reminded me of my ministry here over the past  couple of years and even over the past forty years.  One dear lady made mention of the fact of my humanness, that is, the difficulties that I face day to day  and so do you.  To put it mildly, I was not a happy camper.  I did spend a fair amount of time in Psalm 51 seeking God’s forgiveness for losing my temper.  The “sister in the Lord” pointed out the difficulties that we all face in living the Christian life. There was a popular statement that went, “As a believer in Christ, I am not perfect, just forgiven.”  I praised  God for my fellow believers who have been most  encouraging in this last  spell of difficulty.  I will keep on preaching  and doing the best  that I can even  while I am living in this human body that  seems to be more inclined to the things that I do not want to do rather than doing the things that I am supposed to do.  Paul says that in our flesh, there is not one thing that  is good.  We are, however, stuck in our fleshly bodies even as we strive to grow spiritually from day to day.  Paul says that there are things he knows he should do, but does not do them.  He also states that there are things he knows he should not do,  but ends up doing t hose things which makes him miserable.  We can say  that because to end up doing the  things you don’t want to do is still sin and needs to be confessed as according to First John 1:9.   In our  humanness we can still continue to encourage and exhort  one another knowing that a great disciple like the Apostle Paul had the things in his life that were frustrating him.  We can praise God for many things today such as our brothers and sisters in the Lord Jesus Christ and God’s faithfulness to us in every situation.