Friends and Enemies

I ran today... I don't run. I don't like running. Being out of breath and feeling my heart go way too fast is just not my idea of fun. I wish it was! I wish I liked running... but I don't. But I feel better now and maybe I'll do it again.

Something God is teaching me lately is how important it is to have godly friends who go through life with you. With friends who confess that they have the same struggles I do, life is easier. When close friends share what God is teaching them, it encourages me to get in the word and see what God is teaching them and find something that God leads me to read and then God teaches me too.

In the last couple days I've been meditating on 2 main themes... 1 - how to treat unbelievers (believers too) 2 - how powerful words are.

My intent for this blog is for my own looking back on and reflecting at what God has done, so I won't make it long.

1- How to treat unbelievers

Romans 12:14-21
*Bless them and don't harm them.
*Be there for them in happy times and hard times.
*Get along - display harmony, complement each other's weaknesses and strengths
*Don't be prideful, but humble.
*Never be wise in your own sight.
*Give thought to do what is honorable - THINK!
*Live at peace
*Don't get even.
*Serve your enemies.

These things are not natural... but the verse I'm memorizing this week in the very next chapter, Romans 13:14 says we're not supposed to do only things that feel natural. "But put on the Lord Jesus Christ and make no provision for the flesh to gratify its desires."

2- How powerful words are

Proverbs 16:24
Proverbs 17:27-28
Proverbs 18:2
Proverbs 18:21

I also learned that James is the "Proverbs of the New Testament"

James has so many wonderful truths and bits of wisdom that it would take a lot of space to share them all.

James 5:16
Therefore confess your sins to one another and pray for one another, that you may be healed. They prayer of a righteous person has great power as it is working.