Category Archives: pefectionism

Control Your Mind, Body, and Time to Be in Control of Self from the 25 Biblical Laws of Success

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I recently read the, “25 Biblical Laws of Success” by William Douglas and Rubens Teixeira.

To be honest, I usually avoid these types of books because “success” books from scripture often horribly misuse the bible to meet the modern day expectations of business and life.  But I was challenged on this approach, and I will be honest, I loved this book.

While it is not completely free of the aforementioned trappings, it does a good job of looking at the biblical principals of work and effort (there are many) and appropriates them well.  I was specifically struck by the simplicity and practicality of one well-known passage.

1 Corinthians 9:24 Do you not know that in a race all the runners run, but only one receives the prize? So run that you may obtain it. 25 Every athlete exercises self-control in all things. They do it to receive a perishable wreath, but we an imperishable. 26 So I do not run aimlessly; I do not box as one beating the air. 27 But I discipline my body and keep it under control, lest after preaching to others I myself should be disqualified.

Douglas and Teixeira make these observations about how we approach work, life, and serving God.  To accomplish that which we are called to…

Run like a winner (“in such a way to get the prize”)

Make sacrifices (go into “strict training”)

Have faith and trust (“not running aimlessly”)

Behave in an intelligent and objective way (“not fight like a boxer beating the air”)

Take charge of yourself and have self-control (“strike a blow to my body and make it my slave”).

They go on to say:

“Learning to control your mind, your body, and your time is to be in control of yourself.  Those who don’t control themselves first are in no condition to control anything else.” (108, “25 Biblical Laws of Success).

How true are these principals?  They are true in our service to Jesus and gifted through the Holy Spirit (Galatians 5:22-23).  They are true in athletic training.  They are true in marriage, parenting, and the workplace.

Our goal in these things?  Trust our security and power in Jesus as we seek to honor Him in all things.  If you get a chance, check out the “25 Laws”, and let me know what you think.

Gordon Duncan

Gospel Rich Books

If you would like to learn more about Gospel Rich books, we offer a host of challenging and encouraging resources.  You can find them below:

Gospel Rich Books Amazon Catalog

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Solitude is the Fear of the Human Heart

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Solitude is the fear of the human heart.

In the midst of celebration, our hearts want someone to hug, sing with, drink with, or even high five.

In mourning, we need everything from the hand that hands us a cloth to wipe our tear to people willing to sit with us in silence.

But what we want is presence.  And in presence, we find love.

When Jesus enjoyed His last meal with His friends, He told them that He was headed off to die. 

He told them that people were going to hate them. 

He told them that people were going to want to kill them.

But…

He promised that they would not be alone. 

Jesus promised them that He would give them that Holy Spirit.  They would never be alone.

This is the story of many people who love God.  In fact, this is the story of all who love God. 

Moses walked with God.

Joshua walked with God just as Moses did.

The disciples walked with Jesus.

And you have the Holy Spirit.

So, today, you are free to love God.  You are free to love others as you love yourself. 

And through the wonderful presence of the Holy Spirit, you are free not to be alone.

Gordon

Gospel Rich Books

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Deepen Your Faith Through a Devotional Commentary

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What is a devotional commentary? 

A devotional commentary is a brief (25 pages or less) devotion that is based on the line by line interpretation of a text, and Gospel Rich Books has dozens of them on Amazon. 

Culled from sermon notes, some of them do contain typo’s but the central meaning of most remains intact.  If you search Amazon for “Gordon Duncan” and the following books (Ephesians, Joel, and Galatians), you will find them.

Each is only $.99.  To help you get started, we’ve included the links to every devotional commentary from the book of Joel.  Taken together, these make the foundation of a book one day, but right now, enjoy them one by one. 

Happy Reading!

Joel 1:1-12

Joel 1:13-20  

Joel 2:1-11

Joel 2:12-17  

Joel 2:18-27

Joel 2:28-32

Joel 3:1-8

Joel 3:9-16

Joel 3:17-21

Gospel Rich Books

If you would like to learn more about Gospel Rich books, we offer a host of challenging and encouraging resources.  You can find them below:

Gospel Rich Books Amazon Catalog

Gospel Rich Books Blog

 

5 Steps to Build a Better Legalist

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Jesus directed a large percentage of his teachings in the Gospels against the legalism of the Pharisees and other religious teachers of the day. A legalist is a person who thinks they have earned God’s love and affection based upon either how much they know, how many good things they do, or how many bad things they don’t do.

Now, legalism is the human heart’s problem.  Non-Christians can be legalists but unfortunately Christians are the worst legalists.

Despite the definition of a relationship with God as salvation by faith alone, human hearts are always going to be tempted to look at how good they think they are and think that even if God’s not impressed at least, everyone else should be.  The alternative to the life of legalism of course would be making your lone hope for forgiveness the work of Jesus, trusting only His righteousness and His goodness.

Now, when hearing the two side by side (trusting your goodness or trusting Jesus’) you might ask, “Why would anyone trust their goodness when Jesus’ life of love and perfection is so infinitely better?”

Simply:  we don’t see as God sees.  God sees our heart clearly, and we don’t.

He sees our sinful motives clearly, and we don’t.

And He sees Jesus’ work on our behalf constantly, and we don’t.

You would think that the church would fight harder against legalism, especially when Jesus uses such harsh language against legalists, calling them “a brood of vipers” (Matthew 23:33) and “white washed tombs” (Matthew 23:27).

But I’m afraid the church in America is a legalist factory.  We just keep churning them out.  In fact, we are good at it.  Let me show you it’s done.

Here is the 5-point plan for building a better legalist.

One:  Withhold affection when someone sins or makes a mistake.

Two:  Invent rules for Godliness without either the desire to explain your reasoning or explain their benefit.

Three:  Care more about other’s opinion of your performance than you do God’s opinion.

Four:  Assume what you say or what you do gives you a place of superiority or authority.

Five:  Speak often of others who used to be really good but aren’t any more.

We are so prone to these 5 things, we often don’t see that those types of actions actually blind us from grace and inhibit compassion towards other.  We don’t see that those types of actions are traps that lead to self-righteousness, Christian ghettos, and hardness of heart.  Unfortunately, we are all susceptible to these types of thoughts and actions because we just don’t see our hearts and the hearts of others like God does.

1 Samuel 16:7 For the Lord sees not as man sees: man looks on the outward appearance, but the Lord looks on the heart

Thankfully, God sees differently than you and I see.  That means that God not only knows the things we think and do in secret, but He can also see all the great things that He is going to do in our lives.

So, when we are discouraged or sad, we can trust that God sees things and knows things that we don’t, and that gives us a great hope as we have faith in Jesus for the forgiveness of our sins.