Finally, brethren, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is of good repute, if there is any excellence and if anything worthy of praise, dwell on these things. Philippians 4:8

These traits (in bold) are faith’s focus. To “dwell” means, in this context, to “take inventory.” In Philippians 4:6-7, Paul writes that we are to “be anxious for nothing” and then, in verse 8, he gives the very steps and cure for worry: Dwell on or take inventory of these eight attributes. Imagine two shelves: one shelf full of anxiety-producing items and one full of peace-producing things. Don’t keep examining the peace-stealers—hurtful things people have done, shortcomings of the past, regretted actions. Instead, constantly write down and think about the incredible acts God has done in your life.

in•ven•to•ry – noun
A detailed, itemized list, report, or record of things in one’s possession, especially a periodic survey of all goods and materials in stock.*

Have you noticed that when you start worrying, your incentive to pray declines? Dwelling on the good equips you to avoid the pitfalls of worry, and when you trust God, His peace can guard your heart and mind (Philippians 4:8). That’s why Paul emphatically writes, “Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, rejoice!” (Philippians 4:4). In Numbers 13, the Israelites murmured and chose to focus on the giants in the land, but Joshua and Caleb took account of the good report and held to the way of faith. Because of their faith, they saw the Promised Land. Anyone can shoot out words of doubt, but it’s a special individual who can speak faith in an overwhelming situation. That’s a person who has taken inventory of the faithfulness of God.

If you’re taking a worrisome approach to life, step back to a place of faith. The position of the believer is to forgive, forget what is behind, and move forward. Surround yourself with testimonies. Say, “God, You’re faithful; You will see me through.” This is not naïve optimism but courage because we know that He has overcome the world (John 16:33). As you meditate on God’s faithfulness, “The peace of God, which surpasses all comprehension, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus” (Philippians 4:7).

Remembering God’s goodness,
Pastor Jeff Perry
St. Louis Family Church®

Copyright © 2011 St. Louis Family Church. All rights reserved. No part of this article may be reprinted or distributed in any form without prior written permission of St. Louis Family Church. Unless otherwise noted, all Scripture references are from the New American Standard Bible (NASB) Copyright © 1960, 1962, 1963, 1968, 1971, 1972, 1973, 1975, 1977, 1995 by The Lockman Foundation. *The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition.

Do you see what this means—all these pioneers who blazed the way, all these veterans cheering us on? It means we’d better get on with it. Strip down, start running—and never quit! No extra spiritual fat, no parasitic sins.

When you find yourselves flagging in your faith, go over that story again, item by item, that long litany of hostility He plowed through. That will shoot adrenaline into your souls! Hebrews 12:1-3 The Message*

God cares for you infinitely more than you realize. Even if you have become melancholy to the point where you are numb, there is still fight on your insides that God put in you! The way you offset discouragement is to get your eyes on Jesus and receive encouragement and strength from what the Word declares—that will “shoot adrenaline into your soul.” Mind-renewal is not automatic. We have to deliberately feed our faith and starve our doubts.

The sower sows the word . . . the ones on whom seed was sown among the thorns; these are the ones who have heard the word, but the worries of the world, and the deceitfulness of riches, and the desires for other things enter in and choke the word, and it becomes unfruitful. And those are the ones on whom seed was sown on the good soil; and they hear the word and accept it and bear fruit, thirty, sixty, and a hundredfold. Mark 4:14, 18-20

It’s absolutely imperative that you fend off the worries and cares and hold up your shield long enough to realize the full potential on your life. So, instead of breakdown, you will have breakthrough! As you root out the cares of this world and let the Word take hold in your heart and germinate, you’ll reap the fruit of effectiveness—thirty, sixty, and a hundredfold. God is able to keep you from stumbling and make you stand! (Jude 24).

You can trust Him!
Pastor Jeff Perry
St. Louis Family Church®

Copyright © 2011 St. Louis Family Church. All rights reserved. No part of this article may be reprinted or distributed in any form without prior written permission of St. Louis Family Church. Unless otherwise noted, all Scripture references are from the New American Standard Bible (NASB) Copyright © 1960, 1962, 1963, 1968, 1971, 1972, 1973, 1975, 1977, 1995 by The Lockman Foundation. *Scripture taken from The Message. Copyright © 1993, 1994, 1995, 1996, 2000, 2001, 2002. Used by permission of NavPress Publishing Group.

These things I have spoken to you, so that in Me you may have peace. In the world you have tribulation, but take courage; I have overcome the world. John 16:33

God doesn’t just tell us to “take courage” without showing why we don’t have to fear. The reason we can take courage is because He has overcome the world. Yes, life’s tough—we don’t have to idealize it—but because of Jesus we can have peace even in the middle of a challenge.

Peace comes when you know the stabilizing promises from the Word that reveal God’s never-ending faithfulness. That is how you develop the abiding conviction that God is going to see you through.

Do not fear, for I am with you; do not anxiously look about you, for I am your God I will strengthen you, surely I will help you, surely I will uphold you with my righteous right hand. Isaiah 41:10

The Lord is my light and my salvation; whom shall I fear? The Lord is the defense of my life; whom shall I dread? Psalm 27:1

Where can I go from Your Spirit? Or where can I flee from Your presence? If I ascend to heaven, You are there; if I make my bed in Sheol, behold, You are there. If I take the wings of the dawn, if I dwell in the remotest part of the sea, even there Your hand will lead me, and Your right hand will lay hold of me. Psalm 139:7-10

Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I fear no evil, for You are with me; Your rod and Your staff, they comfort me. Psalm 23:4

But in all these things we overwhelmingly conquer through Him who loved us. For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor any other created thing, will be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord. Romans 8:37-39

Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, rejoice! . . . The Lord is near. Be anxious for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses all comprehension, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.
Philippians 4:4-7

We cannot even fathom how fantastically faithful God is. When you know someone is with you and has your back, fear has to leave. In its place you have faith: a peaceful confidence produced by the stabilizing promises of God.

God bless you!
Pastor Jeff Perry
St. Louis Family Church®

Copyright © 2011 St. Louis Family Church. All rights reserved. No part of this article may be reprinted or distributed in any form without prior written permission of St. Louis Family Church. Unless otherwise noted, all Scripture references are from the New American Standard Bible (NASB) Copyright © 1960, 1962, 1963, 1968, 1971, 1972, 1973, 1975, 1977, 1995 by The Lockman Foundation.*

Now may the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, so that you will abound in hope by the power of the Holy Spirit. Romans 15:13

God fills you with joy and peace. The Bible describes the pre-salvation position as “having no hope and without God in the world” (Ephesians 2:12). But the lost-ness of a fallen world has forever changed because Jesus who never sinned became sin for broken humanity (2 Corinthians 5:21). He left the splendor of heaven and came on a rescue mission for us. Joy to the world, the Savior has come!

He is the God of hope. Biblical hope is based on the integrity of God’s faithfulness—His character, performance, and nature—and differs greatly from the baseless optimism that the world calls hope. Hope in God springs from knowing His well-documented track record in the Scriptures and in people’s lives: “For whatever was written in earlier times was written for our instruction, so that through perseverance and the encouragement of the Scriptures we might have hope” (Romans 15:4). The faithful God in the Bible is the same God who will help you in your situation. Even if you fall, God is there to lift you back up (Proverbs 24:16; Psalm 145:14).

Be strong and let your heart take courage, all you who hope in the Lord. Psalm 31:24

Be a carrier of hope. God wants to use you to offset the incredible negativity and pessimism in the world. Hope should be something you carry—something that gets in your vocabulary when everybody else is complaining, that flares up when all the circumstances go the opposite way, that adjusts your thinking to keep your dreams and hopes from getting dashed. Get tenacious! Be confident that God will cause all things to work together for good (Romans 8:28). You will see the goodness of God in this life (Psalm 27:13-14).

. . . We have fixed our hope on the living God, who is the Savior of all men . . . 1 Timothy 4:10

Merry Christmas!
Pastor Jeff Perry
St. Louis Family Church®

Copyright © 2010 St. Louis Family Church. All rights reserved. No part of this article may be reprinted or distributed in any form without prior written permission of St. Louis Family Church. Unless otherwise noted, all Scripture references are from the New American Standard Bible (NASB) Copyright © 1960, 1962, 1963, 1968, 1971, 1972, 1973, 1975, 1977, 1995 by The Lockman Foundation.

The wicked flee when no one is pursuing, but the righteous are bold as a lion. Proverbs 28:1

“BOLD” – adjective: Fearless and daring; courageous.

Boldness is not an appeal to our own personality and doesn’t emanate from our humanity. The apostle Paul told Timothy to be strong in the grace that is Christ Jesus (2 Timothy 2:1). Joshua Chapter 1 says four times, “Only be strong and very courageous.” Boldness is not a suggestion: it’s a commandment!

Righteousness will make you bold! When you are moving in sin, it hampers your confidence, causing you to be insecure. But when you are filled with the awareness that you are made right with God, you become bold, knowing that the worst condition of your life—sin—has been resolved!

Courage. Have you ever seen a zombie movie? The goal is to avoid becoming one. Instead of responding to crisis or challenge by entering denial or becoming numb and paralyzed with fear, we are called to respond proactively with boldness. When David
faced Goliath, the entire Israelite army, including King Saul, had become numb with fear. But David, drawing on past breakthroughs where he had seen God’s faithfulness, chose to boldly face the impossible and watch God turn things around!

You come to me with a sword, a spear, and a javelin, but I come to you in the name of the Lord of hosts, the God of the armies of Israel, whom you have taunted. 1 Samuel 17:45

Trust. “When I am afraid, I will put my trust in You” (Psalm 56:3). True boldness is not baseless optimism or a loud personality; it is a courageous faith that God will come through for you every time!

“Go at it boldly and you’ll find unexpected forces closing around you and coming to your aid.” –Basil King, author

God bless you!
Pastor Jeff Perry
St. Louis Family Church®

Copyright ©2010 St. Louis Family Church. All rights reserved. No part of this article may be reprinted or distributed in any form without prior written permission of St. Louis Family Church. Unless otherwise noted, all Scripture references are from the New American Standard Bible (NASB) Copyright ©1960, 1962, 1963, 1968, 1971, 1972, 1973, 1975, 1977, 1995 by The Lockman Foundation.

Therefore, since we have so great a cloud of witnesses surrounding us, let us also lay aside every encumbrance and the sin which so easily entangles us, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us. Hebrews 12:1

God has called us out of darkness and into this wonderful life (1 Peter 2:9). The Christian life is one of victory and supernatural strength. God wants us to succeed and to win the race He’s set before us. “Run in such a way that you may win” (1 Corinthians 9:24b).

You came to see a race today. To see someone win . . . But how long does that last? You go home. Maybe your dinner’s burnt. Maybe you haven’t got a job. So who am I to say, “Believe, have faith,” in the face of life’s realities? . . . I have no formula for winning the race. Everyone runs in her own way, or his own way. And where does the power come from, to see the race to its end? From within. Jesus said, “Behold, the Kingdom of God is within you. If with all your hearts, you truly seek Me, you shall ever surely find Me.” If you commit yourself to the love of Christ, then that is how you run a straight race. –Eric Liddell, “Chariots of Fire”

We serve a God Who fed Elijah during times of famine; Who first gave the power of the Holy Spirit to the early church, and those people revolutionized the world. “These things I have spoken to you, so that in Me you may have peace. In the world you have tribulation, but take courage; I have overcome the world” (John 16:33). We can glory in tribulation because we have the answer that “in all these things we overwhelmingly conquer through Him who loved us” (Romans 8:37).

Your life is not over. The future is more flexible than some have tried to tell you. Get out of a fatalistic attitude and call out to God. Remember God’s faithfulness and speak out what the Word says about your life. The God who rescued people in the Bible is the same God who wants to help you in your situation today.

Finish the Race!
Pastor Jeff Perry
St. Louis Family Church®

Copyright © 2009 St. Louis Family Church. All rights reserved. No part of this article may be reprinted or distributed in any form without prior written permission of St. Louis Family Church. Unless otherwise noted, all Scripture references are from the New American Standard Bible (NASB) Copyright © 1960, 1962, 1963, 1968, 1971, 1972, 1973, 1975, 1977, 1995 by The Lockman Foundation.