The Plumbline

Give justice to the poor and the orphan; uphold the rights of the oppressed and the destitute. Rescue the poor and helpless; deliver them from the grasp of evil people. (Psalm 82:3-4 NLT) Edwin Markham said, "There is a destiny which makes us brothers; none goes his way alone. All that we send into the lives of others comes back into our own." We can look on as others suffer, or we can step in, help out, find a way. The more we sit back and just watch, the more the suffering is allowed to continue. Rescue the poor and helpless has actions defined as "delivering them from the grasp of evil people". We might not understand their plight fully, but it doesn't give us any less of a commission to be of aid wherever and whenever we are able. We aren't living life on this earth in solitude, my friends. All of us breathe the same air! None of us is without need at some point in our lives. Any form of social injustice is certainly on a different level from being ou...

But the fruit of the Spirit [the result of His presence within us] is love [unselfish concern for others], joy, [inner] peace, patience [not the ability to wait, but how we act while waiting], kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control. Against such things there is no law. And those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the sinful nature together with its passions and appetites. (Galatians 5:22-24 AMP) The result of God's presence within us is always going to produce 'fruit' that is different than the way we were living prior to saying yes to Jesus. The sinful nature (with all of its passions and appetites) need no longer control the way we live. The choices we make each and every day are the result of the 'new fruit' that is being produced within. One of the 'fruits' that popped out at me this morning while reading through this passage was PATIENCE. I put that in all-caps because we often pray for it like it is an emergency situation ra...