Choose Wise

Let's talk about growing faith. How do we encourage faith to flourish in our lives? I give practical tools that I use myself. Read the Bible. Turn off the noise. Don't speak negativity. Speak life. Be faithful. Sing, Keep a notebook. Read the notebook. Focus on someone else.Praise the Lord.

The fruit of goodness is very flexible. It evades a legalistic definition. Why do we like rules? So, we can get around them. If we know what is allowed or what is not allowed it gives us the knowledge of how to achieve our goal legally. But when we have such a flexible rule like if you know it is good to do, do it. Well, that takes away all our evasive techniques.

Kindness or gentleness need no explanation. This podcast will have practical tips for growing the fruit of kindness. There are several suggested scriptures to pray that will help us grow in this area.

There is that joke among Christians don’t pray for patience because bad things are going to happen to you. This is a rooted in truth. A joke is one thing, but some elder Christians actually advice against praying for patience. This is bad advice. We shouldn’t avoid doing hard things because we want to avoid pain.

Romans 12 and 13 give practival tips for bearing peace. We are going to exlore those today.

Come with me as we explore Joy, the second fruit of the Spirit.

Love is the sugar that can be found in the rest of the fruit of the Spirit. It is the thing that makes the other fruit sweet. The reason we love fruit more then vegetables are because they are sweeter.

Today, I want to give you some practical strategies to be in a place of contentment. We know we should be content. We know discontent is a spiritual place we don’t want to be in. We know it isn’t an emotional place we want to live in. So how do we stay content?Practical strategies for contentmentPraise and thanksgivingWhat you consumeWhat you talk aboutGiving generously

We have increased goods and blessings for the purpose of blessing which produces thanksgiving to God! Think about a fellow believers response when you supply a need. You bring them groceries, repair their car, mow their grass and they say Praise God!Motivation matters. Paul says giving out of bounty and abundance verses taking because you want what someone has is what matters. The NLT says willing gift not grudging. If you are not content you will never have enough left to give. If you are not at a place of sufficiency you will never have enough to spare. However, if you are looking around at your bounty you can always find something to give.

Contentment allows us to pursue the right goals, God’s goals, our own goals, not our neighbor’s goals.Contentment allows us to make long term choices, instead of short sighted choices. Contentment allows us to choose wisely. It is the foundation that helps us do hard things to accomplish important goals. One of the enemies of contentment is coveting.

Jesus is always trying to get us to live for eternity. He wants us to live with God in mind. We are always getting sidetracked trying to make heaven right here. I think that is particularly true for us as Americans. We have this thing called the American Dream. We spend our lives building our ideal here and forget our true destination is heaven. And so, we are working to make more money, or spend more time or build more of this or that because we are looking to build that perfect life. Live for the weekend, live for retirement.It is a misallocation of time and resources. This man’s time and resources was focused on being comfortable and getting to a point where he could relax. But God wanted him to use is time and resources for the kingdom of God. This man would have made his decisions differently if he knew he was going to die that night. He would have done something else than build a barn and plan for retirement.Our decisions are based on a false premise. I will be content if… I will be happy when… God calls this foolish. He says this is the wrong goal.

Discontent is a misallocation of effort and desire. We are aiming toward making wise decisions from a foundation of contentment. How do we build and maintain contentment in our lives? Contentment is being satisfied that all my needs are met and now I can go and do the things that God has put into me to do. Discontent is a misallocation of effort and desire. Contentment and discontent are a heart issue that affect our efforts and desires. When we are discontent we are focused on something other than what is God is trying to do in us and through us.Contentment is being satisfied within what God has provided. For the record, contentment is not laziness, apathy, indifference, or despondent. We have lots of direct scripture asking us to cry out when we are in trouble and many examples of God coming to the rescue of those in need. It is clear, we are to make our requests known to God and He is happy to respond to us.

Making wise choices from a foundation of contentment. Contentment is a spiritual state.Discontent is also a spiritual state. We know contentment is universally a good thing. We know it is something for which to aspire. We know that it is better for us psychologically. However, contentment and for that matter discontentment is deeper than that. It is a spiritual state.What does that mean “spiritual state.” What we are really getting at is that contentment says something about our relationship with God. Discontentment says something about our relationship with God.

Learn how to identify and avoid what is foolish. We discuss what the Bible says about sexual appeal and how to identify and avoid its harmful affects on our lives. Proverbs 9 shows us how we can build our house in a way that gives us a fulfilling life.

I see the Lord blessing people at the age of 16 and 17 because of wise choices they made when they were 9. I see people in their 20s being blessed because of choices they made when they were in their teens. I have seen woman make changes in their 30s and 40s and watched as their lives started overflowing with blessing. We can follow the call of the Wise Woman at any time. Though the call of the Foolish Woman sounds similar we can discern the difference and make better choices that will pay off in the years to come.

Wisdom has built a house in Proverbs 9. She is described as a builder. She is industrious. She is prepared. We are also building a house. The house is a analogy for our lives. Right now you are building your house. You may not think you are doing anything important right now. But actually, you are currently building your house. You are building your foundation now.

How do we build things that last in this life? When life seems hopeless, how do we find purpose. We long for the eternal, how do we build eternal things?

Solomon wrote the book of Proverbs and he wrote it with his son’s life in mind. He wanted his son to have the best life possible.Often parents want to give their children the best life possible, so they try and give them material things, opportunities for advancement through skills and education. However, none of these will actually make a good life without the character that fuels a truly successful life.Solomon the wisest man, a father who loves his son is sharing instructions for life. Even more, as we view the word of God as a letter from our Heavenly Father, it is a written with an eye to our best life.

Proverbs says that discretion shall preserve you. One of the distinguishing characteristics between a foolish person and a wise person is a plan. Discretion is a plan and it will keep us from following the ways of the evil man and the strange woman. Studing Proverbs Chapter 2.

Culturally we have a crises among women because we have been taught by our society (marketing) that 1) family and relationship building (especially children) are not fulfilling and 2) we can never do it well because it requires a beautifully organized closet with color coordinating labels on matching boxes, clean faced children with eco friendly, high end, beautifully designed ___________ (fill in the blank) and a picture to document it all.Here in lies the problem. We have been given a false goal and then feel like we can’t achieve it. So, woman are responding by burning themselves out trying to achieve and compete, feeling anxiety and depression because they can’t achieve and a growing number are deciding they are going to quit and not even going to try this whole female thing because it is impossible. We are going to talk about the truth. We are talking about every wise woman.