Richard Ellis Talks

When you take "the high road", it's usually far less crowded. That's because it's not easy to admit fault and ask for forgiveness -- but when we offend someone else, that's exactly what we need to do. If we choose to follow Christ, God's grace abounds when we confess our sins to Him with a repentant heart. But if we continue to deliberately sin, we have to be prepared to face the lasting consequences of our choices.

God doesn't just use all of us to make a difference -- He uses each of us to make a difference. Individually, we make up different parts of the Body of Christ, and together, we make up the whole of His Church. And He wants His Church to be united in one accord -- each part working as they were designed and called -- in order to have Kingdom impact in this world.

The promise of God's love for us is greater than any love we could find on this earth. When we chase after Him with all of our heart, soul, mind, and strength, we become rightly aligned in relationship with Him. And in some cases, not only do we experience the power of His finding love -- we also find relationship with another believer when they're rightly pursuing the Lord, too.  

The Bible says that we're dead to sin -- yet we don't live that way. On the contrary, there are certain sins that ensnare and entangle us in the traps of the enemy. Instead of sinning as much as we want to because we know that God will forgive us, we need to acknowledge that there are consequences to our choices -- and that our best life is lived in obedience to Him.

There's an old Bedouin story about "the sin of the desert": knowing where water is, but refusing to tell anybody where to find it. The Gospel is spiritual water in a spiritual desert. As Christians, we not only have the road map to Jesus, the Living Water -- we may very well be part of the road map God will use to lead someone else to His oasis.

When we ask God to give us wisdom or clarity, what we're often really saying is that we want Him to give us a "yes" to our request. But sometimes, the answer is "no" -- and that's a good thing. When we fail to seek His direction, or when we seek it and then do our own thing anyway, we often find ourselves facing a world of hurt and trouble that could have otherwise been avoided.

God has picked you to be His child -- a prince or a princess in His Kingdom! He equips you with what you need in order to accomplish His purpose for your life. He chose you because He wants you -- so rest in that truth today.

There's a story in Scripture about a man who was born blind. God ultimately used his difficult circumstances to be glorified by revealing Himself through Jesus' restoration of the man's sight. God can use the struggles that you and I face for His purpose, too -- and in response, we have to be willing to take a stand and proclaim His goodness in all things.

Matthew 12:34 tells us, "Out of the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaks", and that's especially true when it comes to how we pray. The closer we are to someone, the more comfortable we are having honest conversations with them. The question is: how comfortable are we with God?

There's a constant war going on within each of us, with both sides vying for our attention; on one side is the Holy Spirit, and on the other side is our own flesh. The flesh goes along with any temptation that comes our way, and tries to convince us that it's something we need. The Holy Spirit, however, gives us the strength to resist temptation, and to strive for a holy life -- the only kind worth living.

The enemy uses every single opportunity this world presents to pull our attention away from God and distract us with our own selfish desires -- and sometimes, it doesn't take much for him to succeed. We have to always on guard not to let ourselves become content here at the cost of living for the Lord, and to keep our focus on heaven.

Matthew 7:14 tells us, "Narrow is the gate and difficult is the way which leads to life, and there are few who find it." Most people will journey through this life choosing the broad and easy path that's based on serving themselves and their desires. But only the narrow path leads to Christ and the fullness of life that He offers.

The Old Testament is filled with laws, rituals, traditions, and sacrifices that God commanded His people to obey then, but that often make little sense to us now. Yet those very commands formed the path that would ultimately lead to Jesus -- to His life, His death, and His resurrection, all so that we could be saved.

This one's for the ladies: Have you ever found yourself wishing you could find the "right" kind of man? Men are naturally attracted to physical beauty, but the right kind of man will be able to overlook sexual temptation and hold out for a beauty of far greater value that can only exist when a woman allows God to refine her on the inside. What would it look like to spend more time beautifying the heart than the body?

The story of Rahab shows us a woman who seemed like a "nobody" -- yet her faith in God (and His promise through a couple of spies) saved her and her entire family. Rahab's testimony is a reminder that God can use any one of us, regardless of our background, to reach others and extend His promise of salvation to all who are willing to believe.