with love ariel..... with love
(^w^)
i havent been keepin up with this thread
now i feel like i misread
and you were looking for somethin from the other side
haha
sorry
feel free to ignore my post
i know works are a gift from God to us
not us to him
Pleasing the Lord should be the great ambition of every believers heart. Pleasing the Lord is not only to be a primary aim of all of His Children, but something at which we should all seek to excel, not to be accepted (alone),but because we love the Lord and because of future rewards. Ability to please the Lord is ultimately the result of His work in our lives as the Great Shepard. But this is where it comes,and it flows thru by, but not where it ends, for in our New miraculously transformed Christ-like self we are to seek to please God by doing as He wills. The credit is always His but the results will be in us doing it in Him.
Pleasing the Lord begins in the heart or inner person (our spirit) for this is where we think, while the brain is the result of our spiritual communication between His Spirit and ours. Now, the brain is to work hard too, but from the premise, then, of the spirits input only and not our knowledge first. A key element in righteous living.Our minds must be placed by us in the Lord therefore. Thus, it is from spirit we gain knowledge and understanding to be able to please Him in all respects.
When we fail to please Him, therefore, we ultimately become hostile; or at least, useless not only to God, but to man. It is not selfish, as we are in Christ, to count on future rewards, after our first love of Christ, to be a constant source of motivation. We, actually, are warned of entanglements which would hinder our capacity to please God.
Finally then, brethren, we request and exhort you in the lord Jesus, that as you have received from us as to how you ought to walk and please God (just as you actually do walk), that you may excel still more......not in lustful passion like the Gentiles who do not know God. (1 Thess. 4:1,5).
...equip you in every good thing to do His will, working in us that which is pleasing in His sight, thru Jesus Christ to whom be the glory forever and ever. (Hebrews 13:21).
For you were formally Darkness; but now you are the light in the Lord, walk as Children of Light (for the fruit of the Light (consists) in all goodness and righteousness and truth, trying to learn (a change in behavior) what is pleasing to the Lord. (Ephesians 5:8-10).
For this reason, also, since the day we heard of it, we have not ceased to pray for you and to ask that you may be filled with the knowledge of His will in all spiritual Wisdom and Understanding, so that you (may) walk in a manner worthy of the Lord, to please Him in all respects, bearing fruit in every good work and increasing in knowledge of God. (Col. 1:9-10).
...and those who are in the flesh cannot please God. (Romans 8:8).
For the Kingdom of God is not eating and drinking, but righteousness (a right (properly aligned) relationship with God) and peace and joy
in the Holy Spirit (not simply
from the Holy Spirit). For he who is in this way serves Christ is acceptable to God and approved by men. (Romans 14:17-18).
Therefore also we have as our ambition (never self ambition, but our New Christ-like dispositional ambition) whether at home or absent, to be pleasing to God. (2 Corinthians 5:9).
..so that you may approve the things that are excellent, in order to be sincere and blameless until the days of Christ. (Philippians 1:10).