Faith Capsule: God sees the inside more than the outside.

Matthew 23

When it was time for Jesus to clean the temple Bible records, “Then He went into the temple and began to drive out those who bought and sold in it, saying to them, “It is written, ‘My house is a house of prayer,’ but you have made it a ‘den of thieves.’” (Luke 19:45-46) Cleaning of the temple was not from outside to inside it was from the inside to outside.
God does not look from outside to inside but looks from inside to outside.
As a temple of God, how clean is your inside compared to your outside?
All should know that what is present on the outside is not as important to God as what is inside.
The Pharisees were one of the sects among the Jews during the days of the New Testament.
Pharisees, meaning separated ones, believed that religious rituals and separation from sinners were the way to please God.
Matters such as the laws of tithing and ritual purity were to the Pharisees.
Jesus referred to them as hypocrites. He said in Matthew 23:25, “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you cleanse the outside of the cup and dish, but inside they are full of extortion and self-indulgence.”
As a temple of God, there is a need to take a close look from the inside to know if you are a Pharisee of the modern day.
Is it your desire to shine on the outside while the inside is dull and not before the Lord?
Are you a modern-day Pharisee that offers more than what is requested for the outside while the inside gets no attention?
Interestingly, man is deceiveable because man looks from the outside, but God is not because He looks from the inside.
God sees all, and that demands from all to come out of self-deception to remain clean before God.
Live right before God.
Know that God only looks at your ways of living life.
When Jesus went into the temple to clean, nothing on the outside could impress Him enough not to start cleaning from the inside.
God cleaned the inside.
Today, no title is enough to impress Jesus.
As a believer, do not be deceived by your title.
God is only interested in how one is living life for His glory.
It is a clean temple from inside to outside that will answer God’s expectations for all.
Jesus cleaned the temple and was able to teach and get the attention of the people in the temple.
Jesus cleaned the temple to make it a house of prayer, and it no longer answers as a den of thieves.
Make yourself available for Jesus to clean you.

Prayer for today: Ask God to cleanse you and make you become a prayer house.

FAITH CAPSULE: Doing according to the word of God is dwelling and abiding in the secret of God.

Judges 16

The testimonies of God are rooted in His word.
The word of God is the strength, the secret for anyone who hears and does according to the word of God.
The word of God will come to locate one not to become a failure in the calling for the assignment of God.
At the time Samson’s parent was barren with no child, the word of God, that is strength, secret, came to the parents of Samson (Manoah and his wife) saying, “Now there was a certain man from Zorah, of the family of the Danites, whose name was Manoah; and his wife was barren and had no children. And the Angel of the Lord appeared to the woman and said to her, “Indeed now, you are barren and have borne no children, but you shall conceive and bear a son. Now, therefore, please be careful not to drink wine or similar drink, and not to eat anything unclean. For behold, you shall conceive and bear a son. And no razor shall come upon his head, for the child shall be a Nazirite to God from the womb; and he shall begin to deliver Israel out of the hand of the Philistines.” (Judges 13:2-5)
The word of God visits the parents of Samson because they dwell in the secret (word) to be engaged, to avoid failure in the purpose of the calling of God.
Samson’s wife (Delilah) knows about the strength of Samson but does not know the secret of his God-given strength. Judges 16:6 records, “So Delilah said to Samson, “Please tell me where your great strength lies, and with what you may be bound to afflict you.”
In the documentation of the secret revealed to the parent, doing according to the word is abiding.
Dwelling is getting to know the secret while doing according to the word is abiding in the secret.
Samson did not abide by the secret.
Samson, positioned himself outside of the word by not living by the word (secret) of God.
Judges 16:15-17 documents how Delilah pressed Samson to reveal the secret of his strength: “Then she said to him, “How can you say, ‘I love you,’ when your heart is not with me? You have mocked me these three times, and have not told me where your great strength lies.” And it came to pass when she pestered him daily with her words and pressed him, so that his soul was vexed to death, that he told her all his heart, and said to her, “No razor has ever come upon my head, for I have been a Nazirite to God from my mother’s womb. If I am shaven, then my strength will leave me, and I shall become weak, and be like any other man.”
To know the secret belongs to be dwelling but not do according to the secret is evidence of not abiding.

Prayer for today: Ask that you will not be a victim of not dwelling and abiding in the secret of God.

FAITH CAPSULE: Living for God is giving self to the word of God.

Psalm 18

God magnified His word above all His name. (Psalm 138:2)
How are you giving yourself to the word of God?
The word of God is God. (John 1:1)
Sincerely, do you know that the word of God is God?
God speaks His word to one who will hear Him.
Psalm 143:8 testifies, “Cause me to hear Your lovingkindness in the morning. For in You do I trust; Cause me to know the way in which I should walk for I lift up my soul to You.”
Hearing and observing will obey God in the morning to make a difference in the day.
Make provision for hearing the word of God first in the morning.
Trust and hope in God for daily endeavors.
Also, what man hears will be like a compass for navigation through the challenges of life. 
Give yourself to the word of God to lead you with deliverance.
Know and be prepared to know that there is labor in the word of God to find God.
Affliction is challenging.
Labor the word of God to deny doubt in your thoughts or actions.
Doubting is the avenue to self-destruction. Do not doubt, do not limit, or despise the power of the word of God. Proverbs 13:13 warns, “He who despises the word will be destroyed, but he who fears the commandment will be rewarded.”  
The word of God is a live-wire for one who knows and understands the word of God that can terminate struggle or challenge in any area of life. Psalm 34:19 buttresses, “Many are the afflictions of the righteous, But the Lord delivers him out of them all.” 
Do not doubt the word of God!
Think of it and know that the word of God is God. (John 1:1)
The presence of God is the word of God that led the Israelites in the wilderness journey to the Promised Land. The presence of God answered for the direction and leadership of Moses.
Give yourself to the word of God to gain His rest that leads without fail.
All God did to lead was send His word through Moses. Psalm 103:7 records, “He made known His ways to Moses, His acts to the children of Israel.” 
The word of God is His ways that provoke the acts of God, His testimony.
Without a doubt, the presence of God is the word of God.
Do not doubt when the word of God locates you for your deliverance and preservation.
Also, do not be one that assumes, in the place to resume, as the word answers for you.
Proverbs 14:12 warns, “There is a way that seems right to a man, But its end is the way of death.”
Know to give yourself to the word of God to find God that is not far from all.
The word of God is near to all every time.

Prayer for today: Ask that you be enabled to live by the word of God.

FAITH CAPSULE: Dwelling and abiding in the secret place of God.

Psalm 91

The word of God does not return void.
Dwell in His word (His presence, His secret), live by His word to abide and not become a victim of a wicked world.
The character of those who dwell and abide in the secret place of God will not run where to walk or walk when to run the evidence of one that trusts God. Also, it is the evidence of engaging the direction of God to be delivered.
One that dwells and abides in the secret of God is evidence of one that sees the move of God by His word.
The word of God is God.
His word is His presence.
One who hears the word of God will see to receive, gain, and retain the presence of God.
Retaining the presence of God is hidden in God not to live a life of waste.
Do you know God (the word of God, His secret) to recognize and acknowledge dwelling and abiding in God?
One who only knows about God lacks the understanding of dwelling and abiding in the secret place of God.
When the servant of Elisha was around Elisha, dwelling along with Elisha in the presence of God, in times of challenges, he lacked the understanding not to know that he was abiding in the secret place of God.
Are you dwelling with but not knowing abiding?
One who claims to be a believer but lacks the knowledge of dwelling and abiding in God (His secret) takes to become perish.
The servant of Elisha was an example of one dwelling in the presence of God because Elisha, the prophet of God, was with him, but he failed to know abiding in the presence of God.
The servant of Elisha was consumed in fear of the wicked world before him, not knowing the abiding in the presence of God.
The servant with Elisha cried out, but Elisha knew his dwelling and abided in the word of God and reacted to His servant: “Do not fear, for those who are with us are more than those who are with them. And Elisha prayed, and said, Lord, I pray, open his eyes that he may see. Then the Lord opened the eyes of the young man, and he saw. And behold, the mountain was full of horses and chariots of fire all around Elisha. So when the Syrians came down to him, Elisha prayed to the Lord and said, Strike this people, I pray, with blindness. And He struck them with blindness according to the word of Elisha.” (2 Kings:16-18)
No one who dwells in the word of God by the mouth will see enough to abide in the secret of God.
Following word in the mouth of this world, not hearing to see in the word of God is not dwelling and abiding in the Lord God.

Prayer for today: Pray that dwelling and abiding in the secret place of God shall constantly and consistently be your way of life.

FAITH CAPSULE: Dwelling and abiding in the secret place of God.

Psalm 91

The grace of God has brought you this far.
It is worth knowing and living by the word of God.
Let your prayer to God for this month be that dwelling and abiding in the secret place of God shall be your portion.
Prayer with desire delivers, unlike having determination.
Determination failed Peter to deny Jesus.
However, when desire is in place, God deposits manifestation of expectation.
What you think is what you ask, and what you ask is what you think.
Ephesians 3:20 emphasizes, “Now to Him who is able to do exceedingly abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that works in us.”
God gives attention to what one thinks or asks.
Why not prayerfully have the desire to dwell and abide in God?
Psalm 91:1 records, “He who dwells in the secret place of the Most High Shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty.”
One praying or claiming, with a lack of understanding, is marked as a talk active with words not rooted in the heart but in the mouth.
God promises anyone to abide when one knows to dwell in His secret place.
What God says is a done deal.
The word of God is His promise.
To claim the promise of God comes with conditions.
One claiming the promise of God must engage the condition to claim.
One who dwells in the secret of God shall abide in the presence of God.
The presence of God is His secret.
The secret is His word.
Psalm 25:14 states, “The secret of the Lord is with those who fear Him…”
Do you live life to fear God?
Psalm 31:20 records, “You shall hide them in the secret place of Your presence From the plots of man…”
The secret place is in the presence of God.
His presence is a secure place from the wicked world.
Isaiah 45:19, “I have not spoken in secret, In a dark place of the earth; I did not say to the seed of Jacob, ‘Seek Me in vain’; I, the Lord, speak righteousness, I declare things that are right.”
Why not give yourself to the spoken word of God that is secret to make it hibernation, abiding constantly in the word of God?
Prayer for today:
Ask that dwelling and abiding in the secret place of God shall constantly and consistently be your way of life.
Ask that wisdom, knowledge, and understanding to make the secret place of God become your portion from this moment.
Ask that distraction and other forces of the wicked world that deny one not to dwell and abide in the secret place of God shall not have a place in your life.
Ask that dwelling and abiding in the secret place of God shall be your way of life.