Love Your Neighbour

Spiritual Assessment

2022 will soon say goodbye and we will never see it again.  For many companies, this is the time they do their end of year assessment to see the performance of their workers. 

What was my performance be this year?  What have I accomplished for God or for myself and for those surrounding me since the beginning of the year?  How important is a self-assessment and spiritual assessment to think about our coming Kingdom of God.

One time, I visited a family and this man was quite large and he stood on the scales to weigh himself around the end of the year.  He was trying to suck in his stomach and his wife said, that won’t help it won’t change anything.  He said, “I’m sucking my stomach so I can see the numbers on the scale”.

In life, what we see is not necessarily what others see and what they think may be different to our thoughts. People will judge us.  The end of the year means we will finish the race for this year but we can come back to God to say thanks to God, challenges were there.

Phil 3:13-14,

According to writer of Philippians, it is important to focus all energies on one thing…forget the past but look forward to what lies ahead.  The past is covered with a lot of things, battles, crying, challenges.  That past is gone and has good/bad memories, it is now time to focus on what lies ahead.

What are your projects for the coming year?  What are you planning for next year?

My mum used to say, one year older.  She was afraid of getting older.  She says, “When I get to 90, I will lose my strength, mental capacity and joy for living”.  That is what she projects for the coming year.  I tell her to have a good perspective, you are getting close to Jesus.  Forget about your body and feelings that try to pull you back.

I’ve never seen a woman who tries to fight getting old like my mum.  If my son says grandmother, she will say, “I’m not your grandmother” because she wants to say she is younger.  Blessed if you are young in Jesus so you can serve him, obey him.

Phil 4:6-7, don’t worry about anything.  What makes you worry in your life?  Why bother to worry?  Why be shaken for things that will pass.  Sometimes we fear what we shouldn’t and worry about things that we shouldn’t but we stop ourselves from worrying about eternal life that is coming.

Instead of worry, pray.  Tell God about your problems, your ups and downs.  Pray means to speak to God.  According to my life, when I worry too much, I lose.  That is the principle.  You lose your joy, strength and ability to do things.  Some feel they can’t make it and start to search for people to intervene.

If you think of all the negativities, you will lose your mind.  When you worry, you think about all the negatives and not the positives.  When you worry you lose trust in God.  Can God allow this?  Can such a thing happen in my life?

The Word of God says to tell God what you need and thank him for all he has done for you.  Sometimes we don’t know our needs.  If can pray from morning to evening to be tall, even if I pray for 50 years, it will never happen.  “God make me white”, it will never happen.

Do you know your needs?  Do you know what your heart, body, or thoughts need?  If you don’t it will be impossible to tell God your needs.  Our repetitive prayers are not our needs.  Identify our needs first and tell God about it.

After knowing your needs, think about what God has done for you.

Once in my class, as kids, our teacher told us to say 10 things of what God has done for us.  We were all unable to find 10 things.  When you pray every day, do you count all that God has done for you throughout the day or do you just say, thank you God for everything.  Take your time and thank God one by one.  E.g. I woke up this morning, you gave me strength, you gave me sleep, I rested, it was so good, thank you for nice dreams,

Children can wake you up but another thing to be grateful for, I have children, they woke up, they speak to me.  Levi will come to me first thing in the morning and he will want to speak to me.  Sometimes I feel like saying “go away” but it is so nice.  When children grow up, they won’t have time for their parents anymore.

Every time we must glorify God and there are millions of things that you can bring in front of God.  You can easily pray for 2 hours.

Phil 4:6-7, then you experience God’s peace.  To get God’s peace is so simple, it’s just to come to God and tell him everything.  I don’t have to worry, tell God what I need and then thank him.  That is the formula for peace of God.  If you didn’t have peace, it is maybe because you worried, you didn’t tell God your need.

“Exceeds everything you can understand” and “guard your heart and mind as you live in Jesus”.  What can guard your mind?  According to Bible, you need peace of God which is like the watchman of your heart & mind, it will guard and protect you.

Who is a guard?  Sometimes I see big people in this world who have people following them (security guards).  They will even spread throughout the crowd.  A few weeks ago, a man threw eggs at the king of England.  In less than 5 seconds, he was already caught and Charles carried on like nothing happened.  Different to George W Bush who dived when someone threw a shoe – he feared.

Charles knew that he was protected by guards and he let it go without getting angry.  No matter what hits your life or how people talk against you, the peace of God is there to guide you.  Don’t bother yourself and ask, how did they treat me like that?  That is not your job.  The guard that God has given you is peace.  Your mind needs to be protected to not react in a way that will harm you.

Luke 13: 6 (parable), God has given to us a lot of things but maybe he came last year to see what we produced but didn’t see any fruit.  Maybe he is like, “Jesus, you should cut down this tree.  I gave to him/her everything and they don’t produce”.  We have to pray and tell God everything.

Most of the time I pray to God and I encourage you to pray to God too,  “I don’t do all that you are expecting me to do, I need help, fertilise my body, mind, heart, desire.  Add some fertiliser in me so I can be productive.  If you don’t fertlise me, I won’t’ produce and I will be the same for 20 years.  Change me, transform me”.  Jesus will plead on your behalf to give one more year.  Tell God where you failed, if you didn’t have enough strength to read Bible or pray, tell God.  Tell God about your situation and where you had problems.

One year I was in a place where the only food they had was rice and snake.  I’ve never eaten a snake before.  I started to think about eating a snake and how they act.  It was a challenge.  I comforted myself, I will tell them to give me rice separate from the snake.  They mixed the whole thing together. because I was hungry, I had to shut my mind and just open my mouth.  To chew that food it was hard to swallow it but because or hunger, I had to accept.

Have you had a hard situation that you found hard to accept?  What do you do?  Do you give up? No, you can’t give up, it is a path of your life and without passing through there, you won’t make it.  E.g. Joseph without going to jail could not become who he was in Egypt.  When you cross a hard situation and you feel like you are incapable of continuing, come close to God and talk to him.

Everything will come to pass even your problems.  Focus on your present and future.  In a movie theatre, once you sit down and the movie starts, everyone will look to the screen and concentrate.  We avoid to listen to others in the room next to us.  The room can be dark but our eyes are focusing on the light.  If someone talks, you tell them be quiet.  You forget that you sat in the seat for 2 hours without moving. 

Do you look at the Kingdom of God coming in front of you without being distracted?  Tell God to give to you the ability to concentrate on the Kingdom of God that is coming.  Where are your eyes?  If your eyes are focusing on Jesus, then all that surrounds you, won’t bother you.

At the end of the movie, every person will give a different story of the movie.  When we don’t concentrate on what is important, we miss the opportunity and when the opportunity passes, that is all. 

When you are at the airport, you can be eating, talking, reading but as soon as you hear your flight number, you will listen.  Do you know your flight number with God?  Jesus is calling us to go to heaven and we are getting ready.  It is time for us to check in.  If you don’t know your flight number for God, you will miss your flight.  If you don’t show up on time, the flight will take off without you. 

How many times have you missed the blessings of God because you delayed or you were distracted?  E.g. my boy Ken.  He was traveling to US a few weeks ago.  We drove from home and just after Huntly I said to Ken, do you have your passport?  “Oh no.  I left it behind”.  We had to go back home.  Now we are in hurry.  Sometimes boys won’t leave behind their PlayStation but can leave their passport.

We got to the airport and he left.  Ken when you arrive, please send us a message and photos.  Nothing.  “Ken, did you arrive?”  “Oh yeah, I’m here”.  “Ken, take photos”.  He didn’t.  Sometimes we do the same to God.  We give promises.  He takes care of us and sends us somewhere with instructions but we don’t do it. 

When it was time to go to airport with Ken, he didn’t even plan how to get to airport.  How are you getting there?  “I never thought about that”.  “Who is picking you up from airport?”  “I don’t know”.  On his way back home, he didn’t even think about who will pick him up.

We spiritually are a new generation acting different to Moses and Abraham. Moses and Abraham would say we are mucking around with God and playing with God as a joke.  We are this careless generation.  We have our own priorities.

Let the end of the year be a good year for us and 2023 be a blessed year.