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As the Christmas Season approaches our thoughts turn to celebrating the birth of Christ and showing our love to those we cherish the most! \u00a0Of course the most cherished person in my life is my Heavenly Father! \u00a0I wonder what I would give Him if I had the chance to lay a present under His tree? \u00a0I doubt that any material thing would ever be adequate, after all, He made it all, owns it all and I’m sure His needs are not for physical things.<\/p>\n
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The more I pondered this idea, the more I turned to scripture to see what He had to say about what He wants the most from us. \u00a0He has given us free will and I know what He wants the most from us is a decision only we can make, He doesn’t demand it, He patiently waits for us to discover His desires for us.<\/p>\n
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I believe that the Holy Spirit has guided me to the scriptural evidence of what He desires most!<\/p>\n
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First I know He wants us to Love Him.<\/strong><\/p>\n <\/p>\n Mark 12: 29-30<\/strong><\/p>\n 29 Jesus replied, \u201cThe most important commandment is this; Listen, O\u2019Israel! The Lord our God is the one and only Lord, 30 And you must love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, all your mind, and all your strength.\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n <\/p>\n John 13: 34<\/strong><\/p>\n 34 \u201cSo now I am giving you a new commandment:<\/strong> <\/p>\n Ephesians 3: 18<\/strong><\/p>\n 18 And may you have the power to understand, as all God\u2019s people should, how wide, how long, how high, and how deep His love is.<\/strong><\/p>\n <\/p>\n 2 John 1: 5<\/strong><\/p>\n 5 I am writing to remind you, dear fiends, that we should love one another. This is not a new commandment, but one we have had from the beginning.<\/strong><\/p>\n <\/p>\n Next I believe He wants us to have complete FAITH in Him.<\/strong><\/p>\n FAITH<\/strong><\/p>\n Romans 5:1<\/strong><\/p>\n 1 Therefore, since we have been made right in God\u2019s sight by faith, we have peace with God because of what Jesus Christ our Lord has done for us.<\/strong><\/p>\n <\/p>\n It is deep faith in Him that allows us to rest in the knowledge that He will always be with us, never forsake us and bring us through all trials to where He wants us to be.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Lastly, I know He desires us to be OBEDIENT<\/strong> to His word, His direction and His words He speaks to our hearts through the Holy Spirit.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n OBEDIENCE<\/strong><\/p>\n 1 John 2: 5-6<\/strong><\/p>\n 5 But those who obey God\u2019s word truly show how completely they love Him. The is how we know we are living in Him. 6 Those who say they love God should live their lives as Jesus did.<\/strong><\/p>\n <\/p>\n My dear brother and friend Dr. Charles Stanley has taught me often that God desires our Obedience rather than sacrifice. \u00a0We can only give Him our complete obedience when we Trust Him without doubts, knowing He is faithful to His word.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n So these are the three things God wants from us, that only we can willingly give to Him;<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Love \u00a0 – \u00a0 Faith \u00a0 – \u00a0 Obedience<\/strong><\/p>\n <\/p>\n My Christmas prayer, for all of us, is that we will give to God what He so richly deserves and desires this Christmas, our hearts, our undying Faith in Him and the courage to always say, “Yes Sir” when He asks anything of us.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Let me be the first to wish you a Blessed Christmas,<\/p>\n <\/p>\n In Him<\/p>\n <\/p>\n the pilgrim<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" As the Christmas Season approaches our thoughts turn to celebrating the birth of Christ and showing our love to those we cherish the most! \u00a0Of course the most cherished person in my life is my Heavenly Father! \u00a0I wonder what I would give Him if I had the chance to lay a present under […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-25876","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-blog"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/billfortney.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25876","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/billfortney.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/billfortney.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/billfortney.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/billfortney.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=25876"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/billfortney.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25876\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":25880,"href":"https:\/\/billfortney.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25876\/revisions\/25880"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/billfortney.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=25876"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/billfortney.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=25876"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/billfortney.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=25876"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\nLove each other. Just I have loved you, you should love each other.\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n