God Filter
Philippians 4:8 And now, dear brothers and sisters, one final thing. Fix your thoughts on what is true, and honorable, and right, and pure, and lovely, and admirable. Think about things that are excellent and worthy of praise.9 Keep putting into practice all you learned and received from me—everything you heard from me and saw me doing. Then the God of peace will be with you.
All of us know what filters do. If you don't change the filter for your hvac systems, after a while it will not operate properly. And when you do change it out for a new one generally you have a very dirty filter. Once changed, the unit begins to work like new. I changed out our filter a few weeks ago and was astonished, yes astonished, at how much dirt was in the filter. My wife is the best housekeeper and cleaner in the history of housekeepers and I could easily eat off our floors (not going to though). I say all of that to emphasize that there is a great amount of dirt in the air and we become used to it and miss it. The filter stops it from getting into our system and shutting it down and for that I am thankful.
Paul wrote to the church at Philippi with a lifestyle filter included. First off Paul says to fix your thoughts on what is true, and honorable. Then right and pure and lovely, and admirable. Paul goes on to mention many other things we should do to keep our thoughts, and our lives, in a good working order or Clean. For this blog's sake I will call those things he mentioned the fiber of the filter. Then in verse 9 Paul says put into practice all you learned from me. So I would designate putting into practice, "putting in a new filter!" At the end of the verses Paul adds what happens when we put in the God element. " vs.9 Then the God of peace will be with you." God activates the filter when it is put in our life and a whole new process of staying current in our life will kick in and keep our life clean. It is necessary to have the God filter in to make sure the dirty elements of life are stopped from killing our whole system or life. Of course, the unit could be called HVAC or His Victory Activates Commitment. Because a renewed life is committed to following the One who cleans us up and gives us a pure and clean outlook on our life. This is made possible by the filter maker giving us GRACE. Oh sweet grace. We could not go on without it, but because of it we not only go one, but soar!!
This is the part where a clean running unit really purrs as we get everything in place and this is called the life of a disciple. Seems easy when you write it down, but we are in a constant battle with the enemy and it is his mission to get more dirt in us so he can get more dirt on us!! As you grow in your walk with God be sure and stay in God's Word so He can apply the filter to your life and it will protect your mind, your heart, and your soul. God's filter is the best filter and the following scripture is so applicable to this blog post, I will just get out of the way and let God's Word finish this blog. Isaiah 55:6 Seek the Lord while he may be found; call on him while he is near. 7 Let the wicked forsake their ways and the unrighteous their thoughts. Let them turn to the Lord, and he will have mercy on them, and to our God, for he will freely pardon. 8 “For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways,” declares the Lord. 9 “As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways. NUFF SAID....
The Pilgrimage continues....
David Warren