The Pastor’s Pen

I encourage you to be diligent in recovery from failure before God Major or repeated sinful failure in the Christian life is an effective tool in the hands of Satan. He uses temptation to lure us into sin; he then uses our sinful stumblings to instil a sense of uselessness and hopelessness. If he can…

Be encouraged, never accept temptation; fight it until victorious for Jesus Christ We typically wish that temptation would simply go away. We get tired and frustrated by its constant attempts to wear us down. You see, the severity of temptation is not determined by the discomfort experienced at the time. Rather, the measure is the…

I encourage you to watch for the subtle nature of temptation All of us who have fallen to temptation would have noticed how subtle it often is. Sometimes it’s brazen and in your face. Sometimes it stealthily sneaks up, surprising you in ways you never expected. Other times it comes in the most innocently attractive…

I encourage you to understand the most seductive temptation of all. The temptation which carries the greatest consequences, and could well be the most difficult to reason through due to its seductive nature, is that of thinking you’re OK without Jesus Christ being Lord of your life.    We learned from Jesus time of temptation…

I encourage you to see temptation for what it really is Temptation in and of itself is neutral. However, its desire to lead you away from God is far from neutral.  Temptation is heavily weighted by all our spiritual enemies against both the Christian and God. Universally, temptation has simple objectives. First, it seeks to…

I encourage you to consider Holy Spirit conviction The conscience and beliefs are both important, but we would be severely debilitated without the Holy Spirit’s work of conviction. He picks up where conscience and belief fall short in delivering the compelling persuasion of God, employing our inner senses to plead His case in alignment with…

I encourage you to develop biblical convictions in place of personal preferences While the conscience is our internal moral and spiritual warning mechanism gifted by God, He has also granted mankind the ability to consciously prioritise beliefs. We call the strongest of these beliefs convictions. Once again, there are two levels of conviction, the natural,…

Be encouraged to educate your conscience rightly Growing a God honouring conscience, and responding to the Holy Spirit’s conviction, are two facets of Christian living worthy of your attention. Today we shall consider the conscience. We usually think of the conscience in negative terms, however, it’s designed to function equally as a positive affirming mechanism;…

I encourage you to be people who listen to conviction for Jesus Christ The subject of conviction is spoken of little now-a-days. Never-the-less, conviction remains a primary activity of the Holy Spirit, whether recognised and acknowledged or not. Jesus, explaining to the disciples about the workings of the Holy Spirit said; “he will convict the…

I encourage you to embrace change for God’s purposes While we believers stand secure in God’s unchanging character, we need to deal with the reality of change in the world and within our personal lives. One of the many ironies of life is that while we may require others to change, we often think of…