BVOV Magazine 2013 - present

SALVATION PRAYER If you do not know Jesus as your Savior and Lord, simply pray the following prayer in faith, and Jesus will be your Lord! Heavenly Father, I come to You in the Name of Jesus. Your Word says, “Whosoever shall call on the name of the Lord shall be saved” and “If thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved” (Acts 2:21; Romans 10:9). You said my salvation would be the result of Your Holy Spirit giving me new birth by coming to live in me (John 3:5-6, 15-16; Romans 8:9-11) and that if I would ask, You would fill me with Your Spirit and give me the ability to speak with other tongues (Luke 11:13; Acts 2:4). I take You at Your Word. I confess that Jesus is Lord. And I believe in my heart that You raised Him from the dead. Thank You for coming into my heart, for giving me Your Holy Spirit as You have promised, and for being Lord over my life. Amen. CONNECT WITH US If you have just prayed this prayer, please let us know of your decision. We have a Free Gift to help you begin your new life in Jesus! kcm.org/salvation PRAYER IS OUR PRIORITY. +1-817-852-6000 7 days a week es Hablamos Español Ruby M., prayer minister * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * article from p. 17 continues * * * * I’m talking about any attitude you have that falls short of the full light and love of God Himself. Some people don’t want to give up those kinds of things. They’ll say, “I love God. Glory! Hallelujah! My fellowship with Him is fine. I’m just having a tough time fellowshiping with Sister So-and-So. But after what she did to me, I just can’t help it.” According to the Bible, people who say things like that are lying. They’re trying to walk in darkness and light at the same time, and 1 John 1 tells us it can’t be done: “This then is the message which we have heard of him, and declare unto you, that God is light, and in him is no darkness at all. If we say that we have fellowship with him, and walk in darkness, we lie, and do not the truth” (verses 5-6). Notice John didn’t stutter there. He didn’t say, “Well, bless your heart. Unforgiveness is a sin, but I know how hard these things can be sometimes.” No, he said bluntly: “If you walk in darkness and say you have partnership with God, you’re lying about it.” The sad thing is many Christians who are walking in unforgiveness don’t know they’re in darkness. They think that because they read their Bible and say “Amen” at church they’re in fellowship with God. But 1 John 2:11 says, “But he that hateth his brother is in darkness, and walketh in darkness, and knoweth not whither he goeth, because that darkness hath blinded his eyes.” A man who does not forgive is hating his brother. “I don’t hate him,” you may say. “I just don’t like him very much!” How far outside of love do you have to go before it can be called hate? As far as God is concerned, just one step outside of love is hate. To Him there are no shades of gray. In His eyes, anything less than love is sin. Let me show you something that will mark your thinking. We’ve already read that God is light and in Him is no darkness at all. If you’ll look at 1 John 4:8, you’ll find that “God is love.” Add to that the fact we learned in 1 John 2:11 about hate being darkness. Put that all together and you can paraphrase 1 John 1:5 and say, “This then is the message which we have heard of Him, and declare unto you, that God is love, and in Him is no hate at all.” No Whining, Please What I’m saying is simply this: We need to face up to the fact that we can’t walk with God and be even a little unforgiving or a little offended. If we’re going to walk with God, we must allow His love to drive out every trace of any kind of unforgiveness. “But you just don’t know how badly they treated me!” Has God forgiven your sin? “Yes.” Then you forgive them. Period. End of discussion. Quit crying and whining about how hurt you are. Maybe you have been mistreated, but if so—get over it! Everyone has been mistreated in some form or another. The reason I can talk so straight to you about this is that God has already said these things to me. I remember one day when I was moping around at home. I’d just come in from preaching on the road and it seemed that as soon as I got there I had to start fighting the devil. I was whining around about it when Gloria said something to me I didn’t like. “Oh, she doesn’t care about me anyway,” I muttered in self-pity. Right then, The LORD spoke up in my heart and said, 'It isn’t any of your business whether she cares for you or not. It’s your business to care for her.' Then, He added something I’ll never forget. He said, 'I’m the One Who cares whether you hurt or not. Your hurts mean everything in the world to Me, but they ought to mean little or nothing to you.' As a Church we need to learn that today. We need to quit paying so much attention to our own hurts and cast them over on God. We need to take a lesson from the pioneers of the faith. People like Peter and John and those Pentecostal old-timers years ago would walk into the very jaws of hell. They’d go through persecutions that make the things we face look like child’s play. They didn’t come out crying about how they’d been hurt either. They came out saying, “Glory to God! We’re getting an opportunity to suffer for His Name. What a privilege!” 18 : BVOV

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