James Moran - Examine Ourselves

James Moran, reminding us that we should live a life of repentance and change, warns that often we find ourselves in areas of denial, oblivious of the real underlying causes. When we examine ourselves, we should be aware of secret sins or faults in our thinking, speaking, and doing, notably in areas of priorities, relationships, and denial. We must prioritize our relationships in a descending order, beginning with loving God and seeking His Kingdom, our family, our church family, our employer, our enemies, esteeming everybody above ourselves. Our society in which we live could be characterized as an upholstered sewer, inviting victims into pornography, premarital sex, drugs, and other forms of immorality. While people fall into sin, they inevitably justify themselves, blame others, taking away all sense of responsibility. When people in the world have problems, they try to escape through drugs or alcohol, refusing to turn to God. God’s called out ones need to take their problems to God as they walk through the valley of the shadow of death in order to develop Christ-like character, entering at the straight gate. We need to strive to bear Godly fruit, vigorously doing the will of God in both the Spirit and letter.

Abiding in the Word * Addiction * Alcohol * Baggage from our past * Bathsheba * Blaming others * Building on the rock * David * Denial * Examining ourselves * Gossip * Make God the center of your universe * Habits * John 1:1; 8:31 * John 15 * Matthew 5:21-27; 6:33; 7:26 * Nathan * Others * Presumptuous * Priorities * Psalm 19:7; 23:1 * Relationships * Revelation 4 * Salvation Army * II Samuel * 11 Secret faults * Shadow of death * Sins in our behavior * Sins in our speaking * Spiritual healing * Stress * Traumatic incidents * Upholstered sewer * Velvet frog