Belong To God and in Community

BELONGING NOT BASED ON CIRCUMSTANCES

 

Where do I belong? Am I living where I should be or should I find something different? How do I know if I am in the right place? Does my geographical location determine whether or not I am happy?

If I base my life on circumstances or my social status or how I feel, I would have a hard time finding my place. I would not be happy, because all these things constantly change.

 

There is someone who never changes, and because I belong to Him, I need not worry.

 

Romans 8:14-16

 For all who are led by the Spirit of God are children of God.

So you have not received a spirit that makes you fearful slaves. Instead, you received God’s Spirit when he adopted you as his own children. 

 Now we call him, “Abba, Father.”  For his Spirit joins with our spirit to affirm that we are God’s children. 

 

This is good news. I have been adopted into God’s family. I can make my home anywhere knowing that He is always with me, and I will belong. There is freedom to use my talents, to live life fully, to use what I learn to encourage others along the way.

 

 

WE BELONG TO GOD

 

For those of us who trust Jesus as our Savior and Lord, we have God as our Father. Our circumstances may be hard; we may become ill; people may disappoint; we might feel like we don’t fit in. But we can take comfort in the fact that we belong to God. Nothing can separate us from Him. No one can take us away from His love and mercy.

 

John 10:27-30 (CSB)

My sheep hear my voice, I know them, and they follow me. I give them eternal life, and they will never perish. No one will snatch them out of my hand. My Father, who has given them to me, is greater than all. No one is able to snatch them out of the Father’s hand. I and the Father are one.” 

 

This song reminds us that we belong to God.

 

 

COMBAT DOUBTS WITH TRUTH

 

Sometimes we may have doubts about our place in the world and in God’s kingdom. We start to doubt that Jesus really loves and cares for us. The lies tell us we are not good enough so we might as well give up. But the truth is that Jesus knows our weaknesses and He still loves us. So we can combat those lies by believing that what God says is true.

 

1 John 3:18-20 (CSB)

Little children, let us not love in word or speech, but in action and in truth. This is how we will know that we belong to the truth and will reassure our hearts before him whenever our hearts condemn us; for God is greater than our hearts, and he knows all things.

 

Sometimes we fail to forgive ourselves and keep heaping guilt when God has already forgiven us. When our own hearts try to bring up the past and say we are unworthy, we need to take action. We remind ourselves that God is greater. He made us worthy. We can celebrate life and hold our heads up high, knowing we are beloved children of God.

 

Along the way we can join hands with others and rejoice that we are made new by the power of God. 

 

 

This is Day 5 of Five Minute Friday 31 Days of Free Writes, and the prompt word is belong.

(Confession: This post was hard to write. I spent a lot of time thinking about it, starting to write, then stopping. After chatting with a couple of friends and praying, I finally thought I knew what needed to be written. So the actual writing probably didn’t take more than 5 minutes, but the overall time was much more.)

 

To read the other posts in this series click on: 31 Days of Encouragement 

 

I am linking up with: #Let’sHaveCoffee, #porchstories, #TellHisStory

 

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