“Praise ye the LORD. Sing unto the LORD a new song, And his praise in the congregation of saints. Let Israel rejoice in him that made him: Let the children of Zion be joyful in their King. Let them praise his name in the dance: Let them sing praises unto him with the timbrel and harp. For the LORD taketh pleasure in his people: He will beautify the meek with salvation. Let the saints be joyful in glory: Let them sing aloud upon their beds. Let the high praises of God be in their mouth, And a twoedged sword in their hand; To execute vengeance upon the heathen, And punishments upon the people; To bind their kings with chains, And their nobles with fetters of iron; To execute upon them the judgment written: This honour have all his saints. Praise ye the LORD.”
Psalm 149:1-9 KJV
https://bible.com/bible/1/psa.149.1-9.KJV
Power, Love, and Discipline
One of the miracles of salvation is that when we have faith in Christ, God not only saves us—He also gives us the power to live according to His will. Your life in Christ is one that is empowered by the Holy Spirit living within you.
This is a great gift, but a big shift. It often takes time to change how we think and act. We may have bad habits that take hard work to correct, or patterns of thought that are challenging to break.
Thankfully, God promises to be with us and to empower us to make these changes in our life. When Paul is writing to his mentee Timothy, he encourages him to continue to develop the gift that God has given to him. While we are saved in an instant, it takes a lifetime to develop and work out what God is doing inside of us.
Paul reminds Timothy that God’s Spirit does not give us fear or cowardice. Those things are tools of the devil who is trying to keep us from God. But the Spirit of God empowers us with confidence in Him. He gives us the ...