Devotional for friends // Devocional para as amigas

  Some people may not like to read the Bible because of its stories. There are all kinds of stories. Love stories, war stories, adultery, violence… you name it.  We like to judge ourselves. Sometimes there are some of us who likes to think of themselves as good, beautiful, smart, wise… others not so much; there are those who look at themselves badly as weak, ugly, dumb, incompetent etc.  God doesn’t take any of that into consideration when He wants to use someone. Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come (2 Corinthians 5:17), meaning that none of that needs to keep being a reality. Jesus transforms and reforms. But there is one thing that hinders the work of God the most: pride. With pride comes all the rest. Pride makes you lie; Pride makes you trump over people; Pride is the opposite of forgiveness because if you want to forgive, you need to humble yourself and give in to the other person. Pride make...

  Have you heard about Adam and Eve? I believe so. If you have, you also know that they ate from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. I bet you also realized that they  chose  to do so. They decided to eat from that tree together. They decided to go against the will of God. They decided that they deserved to know what good and evil are from their perspective. They doubted God. They didn’t trust God enough to obey his command. Cain, the firstborn of Adam and Eve, when they were outside the garden of Eden. He was tempted with anger. Anger grew inside of him, a struggle many of us can relate to. God warned him that he should rule over that because if he gave in, he knew something not good, therefore evil, would happen.  Abraham and Sara also  decided  that God was delayed to fulfill His own promise and abused a foreigner to go on with their own plan in order to fulfill God’s promise. (Crazy much?) They thought they were helping God, but in reality, they...

  I like sharing things, especially things that I like. When something is important to me, and I think it is worth sharing, I share it.   You know something about me. I found out that I like cooking. But I don’t like cooking for myself. Eating alone is no fun. I think when God created food, He made it thinking about sharing. That is why when we are happy, we share our happiness with others, often over some food. We share things that make us happy, too. We share good news. When something good has happened to us, we share it with others. God is pleased with a generous heart.   I read it, and I liked it. I am sharing it now. So here is a story from the Bible study book. The author named it “Love’s Extravagance.”   “ A great king was riding in his carriage through the forest. As the carriage passed a humble farm cottage, the king happened to look out and see a beautiful girl. She was obviously one of the poorest commoners in his kingdom. Yet, none of that mattered. The k...

"I will most gladly spend and be spent for your souls. If  I love you more, am I to be loved less?"   "Assim, de boa vontade, por amor de vocês, gastarei tudo o que tenho e também me desgastarei pessoalmente. Visto que os amo tanto, devo ser menos amado?" 2 Corinthians 2:15// 2 Coríntios 12:15 I was listening to the #BibleProject Podcast today, and all the clarification was awesome. But one phrase that the woman said stuck in my mind. Maybe, how I am going to develop the text here has nothing to do with the context that she said, but I hope it also applies.  The phrase was: “I want you to think better of me”. Isn’t it what we all want that the person we love or the person we are trying to communicate with thinks of us? You would say, Yes, yes, yes. How many times do we get discouraged because we can’t be understood? How many times can’t we understand or even accept what the other person is trying to communicate because, in our head, it doesn’t make sense?   How many...

 Hebreus 9:22/ Levitico 17:11 Precious love of Jesus.   We are never tired of talking about it. You may not understand why. But I’m going to try my best.   Tell me what the difference is between all other religions. You might have questioned it once in your life…   All the prophets and philosophers and whoever title the person held. Who is still alive? All of them have died. They might have written something you think is interesting or worthy of following.     Who among them claims to have died for you? What religion among all suggests that your life will not be easy or that you will be persecuted? Which one of them says that you must love your neighbor as you love yourself up to be willing to die for him, too, because that is what we should expect from another person?    Anyway…   In Christianity, our Lord says that the love for us (mere, feeble, violent, fragile human beings) is worthy to leave His kingdom behind, become one of us, and...