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Spirit Reign Communication - Alicia Jones

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34 pages

English

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God is good, He's not mad at you and His love for you is undying, unfailing, and unrelenting. Regardless of where life's road has taken you or the mistakes you may have made, God's heart for you is good and He will lead you along the best pathway for your life. Like any good parent, God delights in you and wants you to experience a life full of love, joy, and peace.In Finally Persuaded, author Alicia Jones takes you on a journey to rediscover the depths of God's love for you. Through scriptural principles, inspirational stories, and personal narratives, Alicia illustrates the richness of God's heart and His willingness to transform you.If you've ever questioned God's love for you or ever wondered if He really cared, you can be sure that God's love for you is immoveable, unshakeable, and unconditional. Today, you can be Finally Persuaded.

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Philosophie et théologie

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Publié par	Spirit Reign Communication
Date de parution	22 avril 2014
Nombre de lectures	0
EAN13	9781940002514
Langue	English

Informations légales : prix de location à la page 0,0300€. Cette information est donnée uniquement à titre indicatif conformément à la législation en vigueur.

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A Journey to Rediscovering God s Love
Author: Alicia Jones The author assumes full responsibility for the accuracy of facts and quotations as cited in this book.
Editor: Spring Hawk Publications, LLC
Cover Design: David Anderson Text Design: Daryl S. Anderson Sr.
Printed in the United States of America.
Copyright 2014 Alicia Jones. All rights reserved.
ISBN: 978-1-940002-50-7 (PB) ISBN: 978-1-940002-51-4 (ePUB) ISBN: 978-1-940002-52-1 (ePDF)
A Journey to Rediscovering God s Love

SPIRIT REIGN PUBLISHING
A DIVISION OF SPIRIT REIGN COMMUNICATIONS
Table of Content
Table of Contents
Dedication
Introduction
Chapter 1-God is Good
Chapter 2-Doesn t Excuse the Guilty
Chapter 3-Knowing Our Enemy
Chapter 4-Exam Time
Chapter 5-Round Two
Chapter 6-Counterfeits
Chapter 7-Why Finally Persuaded?
Dedication
To My Love-My biggest fan and supporter Without you none of this would be possible To Isaiah-My Inspiration To Deja Janae-My Restoration
Introduction
Jesus, do You love me? Because I don t think You do. I think You used to love me, but I think You stopped. That was the opening of a letter I wrote the Lord when I was 20-years old during my junior year of college. I remember that it started out as a rant with the Lord, but I stopped talking and got out some paper. I wanted to remember that we had this conversation, so I wrote this letter to God letting Him know what I really thought. At the time, I thought that He was like everyone else who had disappointed me. Just in case my tearful complaint didn t make it pass the ceiling, I thought He could look back at my letter.
Those who knew me would have never imagined that was what I was really thinking and feeling about God. I was known for my spirituality and passionate pursuit of God on campus. In fact, I imagine most would have considered my letter irreverent or maybe even sacrilegious. My good Christian upbringing told me that you don t talk to God like that. The Bible says that Jesus loves you, so that should be enough. But, it wasn t enough for my heart.
That letter was my prayer and it was as honest as they come. It was stripped of all its religious garb and asked the naked truth, Jesus, do You love me? That is what I wanted to know more than anything else in the world. I was tired of going back and forth in my mind, feeling loved, feeling forsaken, feeling indifferent, feeling rejected. Clearly, I was hoping that God s feelings about me were more stable than my feelings about Him.
I m really glad that I wrote the letter because it opened the door for God to actually answer my question. God can handle the tough questions that come from a sincere heart. God didn t need my religious defenses and ideology to protect Him from the question that was burning in my heart. He was and is big enough, wise enough, and loving enough to answer.
It was three years later in the midst of writing God another letter that something clicked in my mind and heart and it hit me that Jesus loved me. I was sitting at my cubicle at work just weeping because I had this revelation of God s love. It was revolutionary to me. I was so excited that I told everyone around me, Jesus really loves me! I was working in Christian ministry and we talked about God s love all the time. So, as you could imagine, they all looked at me awkwardly like I had just stated the obvious, but it hadn t been that obvious to me.
As I was leaving work, the security guard stopped me and said, Keep your ears open. God has got something special for you today. With that, I zoomed away and headed to the mall to celebrate. When I got home, I squealed with excitement as I told my roommate, Jesus loves me! I got another awkward stare for stating the obvious. No one seemed to get it.
We went upstairs and I was standing in her room when she turned on the radio and tuned into the show Delilah. As soon as the static cleared, I heard Delilah say, So you finally figured out that God loves you, and He wants to bless you, and He does care for you. My eyes filled with tears and my roommate said, Wow!
I said to God, I didn t know that You loved me? Everything I did was church and ministry related so it didn t make sense that I didn t know I was loved. Then, two days later while going through some papers, I found the letter I d written in college. I had forgotten all about it and how I had so blatantly questioned God s love. It s funny that I had composed it to remember that conversation, and it truly jogged my memory. It reminded me how I asked because I truly didn t know.
I wish I could say that God told me He loved me that day at work and I believed it and never questioned again. But, that isn t the truth. God answered my initial uncertainty and that was the start of a journey to understanding God s heart. It took some time for me to be convinced that His answer was actually true.
This book is an invitation to take that voyage to rediscover God s heart. Maybe, you are like me and have been in church your whole life, but you haven t experienced the love that we talk about. Or, perhaps, your view of God has been shaped by the run-ins you ve had with the people who say they know Him. I imagine some of those encounters have been good, but others didn t go so well. Regardless, I want to invite you to delve into the ocean of God s heart and experience what He is really like.
Chapter
1 God is Good
Twenty-four is probably my favorite show of all time. I always enjoy watching Jack Bauer take on the terrorist by any means necessary. It is always interesting to see the tactics that terrorists would use to coerce anyone from an addict, scientist, or even a counter terrorist agent to do their biddings. Many would-be heroes and heroines were willing to die to defeat the terrorists. However, there is always one sure way to attack even the best hero; Jack Bauer himself has fallen prey to this-get to the one he loves. Heroes don t help terrorists to preserve their lives, but they will do almost anything to protect the ones they love. That s why the terrorists are always kidnapping someone s children or spouse. They can t defeat the hero, but taking out his loved ones seem to be the best way to get to him.
The great battle between good and evil, God and Satan is a lot like 24. Evil is trying to prevail against the greatest government the universe has ever known-God himself. Satan doesn t stand a chance in defeating God. He lost that battle in heaven a very long time ago and it got him and his friends kicked out. Since he lost the war against God in heaven, he s trying to get to God the best way he knows how-by fighting God s children on the earth.
Look at how many times the enemy comes into our lives, homes, marriages, finances, health and the like, and wreaks havoc all in an attempt to attack God. The worst part about these assaults is that most of us don t even know that the enemy is behind it. Instead, we are blaming God.
Imagine the pain you would feel as you watch your arch nemesis torture your children. Now, envision that same adversary, manipulator extraordinaire, convincing your children that you are the one behind their torment. Your babies start crying out to you for help and deliverance and while you are planning their escape, their hopes plummet as their view of you changes from a loving parent to a vengeful dictator whom they are now trying to appease just to find relief.
Somewhere on life s journey, many of us started believing the lie. The disappointments of life have started convincing us that God isn t the good Daddy and loving Father, but He s someone else-an abusive father with a lightning bolt, ready to strike us down whenever we make a mistake. Or, maybe we see Him as that absentee, deadbeat dad, the sperm donor with enough power to get us here, but who has no interest in the everyday happenings of our lives. Regardless of which version of the lies Satan has told you, it s a lie nonetheless.
God is an awesome Father with great plans for you. He promises, I will guide you along the best pathway for your life (Psalm 32:8). That s His heart for us all. He came to bless and not to curse. He has a hope and a future for us all, but with our distorted views of Him, many of us must meet God again for the first time.
God is Good
A true understanding of God must start with knowing that God is good. Many of us have attended church services where a worship leader chanted, God is good! Like a cheerleading squad on the sideline of a football game, the congregants respond, All the time! Then, God s cheerleading captain belts, And, all the time The worshipers yell, God is good! We re so well trained; we know exactly what to say. Believe me, we say it loud and we say it proud. But, I guess I should remind us that God s kingdom is about more than words we say. It s about believing the word enough to allow it to transform our lives. Goodness is a part of the essence of who God actually is.
Exodus 34 records God descending, cloaking Himself in a cloud, and declaring His name. As He spoke His name, He also proclaimed His character. He allowed His goodness to pass by Moses, as the prophet hid in the cleft of the rock.
The LORD passed in front of Moses, calling out, Yahweh! The LORD! The God of compassion and mercy! I am slow to anger and filled with unfailing love and faithfulness. I lavish unfailing love to a thousand generations. I forgive iniquity, rebellion, and sin. But I do not excuse the guilty. I lay the sins of the parents upon their children and grandchildren; the entire family is affected-even children in the third and fourth generations (Exodus 34:6-7).
Compassionate
The first attribute that God uses to describe Himself is compassionate. This word in the Hebrew refers to a deep love, mercy, and compassion rooted in a natural bond similar to that of a parent and a child. This word denotes God s natural affinity to us as His children and that it is based not in what we do, but who He is.
I rememb