dailywordofdestiny

• Christ is no longer the central focus in your life.
• You neglect your relationship with the Lord and spend less time in prayer, worship and the Word.
• You allow family, friends, job and your own desires to come between you and your relationship with God.
• There is a loss of intimacy in your relationship with God.
• You are caught in a cycle of dead works
• You are more tolerant of sin
• You will no longer have a burning passion for the lost

Your works were motivated by intense love and devotion to the Lord. Compare your love for the Lord today with what it was then.

Has your love grown deeper or has it lost its fervency?
Are your works motivated by a passionate love for God or are you doing them merely out of a sense of duty?
If so, ask the Lord to forgive you for leaving your first love. Begin to do your first works again. Make a new commitment to the basics of prayer, worship, and the Word. Fan the flame of the dying embers of your first love through renewed communion with the Lord. This fervent love is required of all those who belong to the Lord. Jesus called this the first and great commandment:

“Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. This is the first and great commandment” (Matthew 22: 37, 38).

‘But this thou hast, that thou hatest the deeds of the Nicolaitans, which I also hate’ (Revelation 2: 6).

Notice that Jesus (as did the church of Ephesus) hates sin and not the sinner. The deeds are hated, not the doer. It is possible to hate evil and still not be living a pleasing life in God’s sight. Worldliness is something we must avoid entirely.

The doctrine of Baalam, Nicaulous, and the Jezebel church thought that being Christians freed them from the moral law. They believed that idolatry and fleshly things would not be held against them, because they had been set free by Christ. Some of the liberalism we see in the churches today stem from this very belief.

Many are trying to bring Jesus down to our level, or to elevate us up to His level. This is a very dangerous doctrine that tends to promote ourselves as gods; it is why Lucifer was thrown out of heaven. Worldliness must not be mingled in with worship of God. We must not only not participate in this, but actually hate this practice.

‘He that hath an ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith unto the churches; To him that overcometh will I give to eat of the tree of life, which is in the midst of the paradise of God’ (Revelation 2: 7).

We all have ears, but this is speaking of that inner ear of the heart that receives God’s truth. Note that Spirit is capitalized meaning God’s Spirit. This is not just any spirit, but the Holy Spirit of God. We also see that He is speaking to the churches, and then suddenly jumps to individuals in the church when He says, “to him that overcometh”.

We are not saved collectively but as individuals. We as individuals must decide who we will follow. We notice here also that there is something to overcome. We must overcome lustful temptations of the flesh.

All believers in Jesus will eat of the tree of life. Jesus is the Tree of Life. Paradise is heaven, not hell, as many believe today. When Jesus told the thief on the cross, “Verily I say unto thee, today shalt thou be with me in paradise” (Luke 23:43). Many have tried to make it fit with Jesus’ body being in the grave but Jesus’ Spirit went to heaven directly from the cross, as our spirit will leave our body the instant we die.
Jesus said, “Father, into thy hands I commend my spirit:” Luke 23:46. The Spirit of Jesus went to God immediately. His Spirit rejoined His body three days later. Forty days later Jesus’ body and Spirit were taken to heaven on a cloud.

God is a Spirit; Jesus is Spirit Who was housed in a body for His stay on earth. We are spirit as well; housed in a body. If we are a believer, our spirit will immediately go to heaven when it leaves our body. The body will rise at resurrection and rejoin our spirit.. This is like a heavenly restoration of the Garden of Eden; the heavenly being far more wonderful. What a glorious day that will be!