I will share about Christian books I have read or listened to.
I will be sharing about my life before and after Christ. I will include stories about my pet and other pets I have encountered.
An Abundance of Blessing
Do you pray for God to bless you? We probably spend most of our time in prayer, asking for God to bless things in our life or asking God for something we need. And we should. Jesus even tells us we should.
We know that all good things come from God. That means that we don't truly own anything we possess. It's all a gift from God and ultimately should be used for Him. Our money, talents, and resources are opportunities to give back to God and others.
2 Corinthians 9:8 says that God is able to abundantly bless those who are generous in using their time and resources to do good things for others. This verse isn't saying that God will bless us unconditionally. The two verses before this one, in 2 Corinthians 9:6-7, talk about how we should be cheerful givers in everything we do.
Paul is saying that God blesses us—not so we might have comfortable lives—but so that we would be selfless in giving back to God and others.
There are many ways we can give back to God and others. We can start by regularly tithing to our local church, which is an investment in the kingdom work God is doing through local believers. We can give generously to those who are in financial need. We can also be generous with our time, talents, resources, and anything else we can use to serve God and others.
Next time you pray for God to bless you, take some time first to think about how you are helping others. If giving feels more like an obligation and not like an opportunity, consider how you can take steps to change that perspective and give regularly. And then—watch how God honors your joyful generosity.
“For we know that if our earthly house, this tent, is destroyed, we have a building from God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens. For in this we groan, earnestly desiring to be clothed with our habitation which is from heaven, if indeed, having been clothed, we shall not be found naked. For we who are in this tent groan, being burdened, not because we want to be unclothed, but further clothed, that mortality may be swallowed up by life. Now He who has prepared us for this very thing is God, who also has given us the Spirit as a guarantee. So we are always confident, knowing that while we are at home in the body we are absent from the Lord. For we walk by faith, not by sight. We are confident, yes, well pleased rather to be absent from the body and to be present with the Lord. Therefore we make it our aim, whether present or absent, to be well pleasing to Him. For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, that each one may receive the things done in the ...
“Concerning the Ammonites, thus saith the LORD; Hath Israel no sons? hath he no heir? why then doth their king inherit Gad, and his people dwell in his cities? Therefore, behold, the days come, saith the LORD, that I will cause an alarm of war to be heard in Rabbah of the Ammonites; and it shall be a desolate heap, and her daughters shall be burned with fire: then shall Israel be heir unto them that were his heirs, saith the LORD. Howl, O Heshbon, for Ai is spoiled: cry, ye daughters of Rabbah, gird you with sackcloth; lament, and run to and fro by the hedges; for their king shall go into captivity, and his priests and his princes together. Wherefore gloriest thou in the valleys, thy flowing valley, O backsliding daughter? that trusted in her treasures, saying, Who shall come unto me? Behold, I will bring a fear upon thee, saith the Lord GOD of hosts, from all those that be about thee; and ye shall be driven out every man right forth; and none shall gather up him that wandereth. And ...
