Wrong Motives Wreck Havoc (Daily Devotional)

Greetings and thank you for giving us this opportunity to come to you and spend a few moments in the word of God and prayer. God is calling us to go from glory to glory, from where we are to higher levels and higher realms in Him and we trust that you are continuing to make your spiritual journey moving from glory to glory in the Lord. This week, we're talking about motives, the motives of our hearts. What I want us to understand today is that wrong motives wreck havoc, that means they disturb things and they cause very, very bad things to happen. Many times, bad things happen in life and we wonder what is the cause for those things. Sometimes in churches there are divisions, there are splits, sometimes in families, there is a lot of problems that are happening inside the home, in other situations, there are all kinds of things happening and we wonder why is it happening? I want us to bring our attention to what the bible says in James chapter 3 verses 14 to 16, it says, ‘if you have bitter envy and self-seeking in your hearts, do not boast and lie against the truth. This wisdom does not descend from above, but is earthly, sensual, demonic. For where envy and self-seeking exist, confusion and every evil thing are there.’ The writer James, James-the half-brother of Jesus is writing here and he points to two things, he's speaking about envy, which is jealousy and self-seeking which is selfish desire, selfish ambition. He says, if that is there, then that is not from God, it's not from God, it's not from heaven, but its earthly, it is sensual, fleshly, and demonic and he says where such things are, there is confusion and every evil work, that means satan can come and do anything he wants. But what is he talking about? He's talking about motives, the motives of jealousy or selfish ambition. So, many times when there is disturbance, when there is division, when there's problems, the root cause is somewhere, somebody is operating out of jealousy or selfish ambition and because of that, satan gets an in road and James says there is every evil work, all kinds of evil things can take place because of jealousy and selfish ambition, that's wrong motivation. So, the motto of our heart, it's sometimes it seems very small, but actually it's the door by which satan can come in and cause havoc, do anything he wants according to what James says, that is why we must guard our hearts and make sure the motives of our hearts are pure. So, let us be careful and watchful about the motives of our hearts. Let's pray, Father, we ask that you will help us stay away from wrong motivations like envy and selfish ambition and help us to be purely motivated, let the motivations of our hearts be pure, we pray in Jesus’ name, Amen.

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