Learn To Do Well

This topic may appear to be very simple, but it incorporates practically all of the Word of God. As some of you may know, I have been focusing on the basics of God’s Word. And I have stated previously, that once we lose the basics, we have lost everything. We are going to discuss how we learn to do well according to God’s Word.

Learn to do well; seek judgment, relieve the oppressed, judge the fatherless, plead for the widow. -- Isaiah 1: 17

Doing well is obviously doing the Word of God. Let’s take a look at the reason we are on this earth which is our blueprint for living.

Let us hear the conclusion of the whole matter: Fear [respect] God, and keep his commandments: for this is the whole duty of man. For God shall bring every work into judgment, with every secret thing, whether it be good or whether it be evil. -- Ecclesiastes 12: 13, 14

Obviously, it is the true God’s Will for man to do well. But it is not exactly that easy. The topic of the teaching is “Learn To Do Well”. The key word here is ‘learn’. The above verse in Ecclesiastes tells us how we are to do this. We are to respect God and we are to keep His commandments. Again and very obviously, to keep His commandments means we must study His commandments and not only study them, but applied them. It’s really very simple to understand, but taking action on what we should do is another thing in itself. If we do not learn to do well, verse 14 warns us that God shall bring every work into judgment and every secret thing whether it be good or evil. So if we are doing evil, God surely sees what we’re doing and we are going to pay for that evil. That great and simple law of giving equals receiving always comes into play.

There is only one thing in this world that will last and endure forever and that is the Word of God.

But the word of the Lord endureth for ever. And this is the word which by the gospel is preached unto you. -- I Peter 1: 25

So how do we learn the Word of God so that we can learn to live well? It is preached unto us. That is what I’m doing right now. We can never go beyond what we are taught. We may come up with new ideas but they are always a combination of other ideas. The point again is that we cannot go beyond what we are taught. This is how we learn to live well. Someone teaches us the Word of God and we apply what we learned and our life improves. This is referred to as the renewed mind and we should get to that Scripture quickly. But first I would like to go into I John and take a look at a very interesting verse of Scripture.

And the world passeth away, and the lust thereof: but he that doeth [practices] the will of God abideth for ever. -- I John 2: 17

Here God explains Himself even more so pertaining to the subject of doing the right thing and learning to live life according to the way God wants us to live it. God is telling us that this world in which we live will eventually pass away and all the lust, which is over desire, will pass away with it. But, which sets in contrast that which is said before, he that does or practices the Will of God will live forever. That’s really some great promise and if you believe the Word of God and it will help to motivate you to deal with the negatives of this present world. Now, how does someone practice the Will of God?

I Beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service. And be not conformed to this world: but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, that ye may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect, will of God. -- Romans 12: 1, 2

Sacrifice your life for God’s service and He will meet your every need and many of your desires. When you do this, you become holy and acceptable to God which is your reasonable or logical service. You are not to be conformed to this world but you are to be transformed or transfigured by the renewing of your mind. This is referring to learning to live life well. You change your thinking according to what God says and then you act on it in your life. This is what it means to renew your mind. This principle is so important that it can be stated with 100% accuracy that the renewing of the mind is your key to power. If you do not renew your mind, you will have no spiritual power in your life and God will not be able to protect you and to bless you like He wants to. So you must remember these two Scriptures and you should know them by heart – that’s how important they are. Now you may ask the obvious question. What details do I need to know to renew my mind? God’s Word tells you exactly what you need to know and what to do. You should do this every day whether it’s for five minutes or for an hour.

Study to shew thyself approved unto God, a workman that needeth not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth. [emphasis added] -- II Timothy 2: 15

You have to study the Word of God to be able to renew your mind. It’s just plain old common sense. And you need to study the rightly divided Word of truth. I may sound like I’m boasting, but I am not. As far as I know, you are only going to find the accurate Word of God on this website. If there were other websites that rightly divided God’s Word, don’t you think I would tell you? I have yet to find one. They are all off in left field and if you want to study those sites, it’s your free will. I have studied from the ministry that initially taught me for about 40 years now. If I found something wrong, don’t you think I would’ve left a long time ago? Remember, you cannot go beyond what you are taught. I paid to take many of the classes that I took, if not all of them. I couldn’t care less about the money. I present these teachings to you on a silver platter for absolutely nothing because I care that somebody will believe and act upon them.

So we have a good pattern so far. We have structure and order in this teaching. Let’s continue by going to the book of Ephesians. Ephesians is the greatest revelation to the church of the body of Christ. If you are born again of God’s spirit, you are part of that body of Christ. Many times, I will wake up in the morning and I will read the book of Ephesians. What you should know by now is that this book is one of the church epistles that is written directly to you. God is going to show you from this great epistle what happens when we do not renew our minds to His Word.

And grieve not the holy Spirit of God, whereby ye are sealed unto [until] the day of redemption. – Ephesians 4: 30

When it says not to grieve the Holy Spirit of God, it is referring to not renewing the mind. It’s a figure of speech where the Holy Spirit of God is agitated and no profit is showing in your life because you, by your own free will, decided not to study God’s Word. We then have no power in our lives and we grieve (we cause grief) to that spirit of God in us and to ourselves. So even though we are sealed with that Spirit until the day of redemption when Jesus Christ returns the second time, we are living a defeated lifestyle, again because we will not renew our mind. We refuse to study and we refuse to pray and we refuse to keep God first. It amazes me many times in my life as to why God chose me. If you study the book of Ephesians, chapter 1, verse 4, you will see that God chose you before the foundations of the world. Let’s go to that verse.

According as he hath chosen us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame. [Note: The verse stops here. “In love” begins verse 5] -- Ephesians 1: 4

God has foreknowledge and he knew before you were even born that you were going to believe. Everyone has free will and I chose to believe. There are many things that I could be doing with my life. I have a college degree with honors – I am financially well off and I could be doing many other things with my life. But for some reason and that reason is the great profit that I experienced in my own life as a result of believing and acting on God’s Word, I choose to teach God’s Word. I find this type of lifestyle to be the most rewarding for me and it seems to come to me naturally. I do not struggle when I put a teaching together. But I do make sure that it is rightly divided and it is orderly and not full of errors especially typographical errors. I proofread these teachings sometimes at least three times so that they are decent and in order. That’s the way God wants things done. Attention to detail is the difference between success and failure.

And be renewed in the spirit of your mind; -- Ephesians 4: 23

There it is again. God tells us to be renewed in your mind. Do you think He is talking about renewing your mind to a certain magazine? Or to a certain sport? No, He wants you to renew your mind to what is written in His Word. And as I said before, you will have all the time you need for your extracurricular activities when you keep God first. It really amazes me that this is true, but when I get done with this section of teaching, I will have more time than I thought I had to get other things done. This especially relates to whatever type of work that you do. Now if you need to know specific details about the renewed mind, you should diligently study the rest of Ephesians chapter 4. There you will see all the things that you should be doing and all the things that you should not be doing. It talks about stealing and about lying and about being angry all the time and about corrupt communication.

I love to tell stories as you know that relate to the Word of God because they make the Word more living and real to you as they always did to me. This will be a quick story, but you may never forget it. Although the term ‘corrupt communication’ definitely refers to wrongly dividing and guessing what the Word says, it also refers to other situations like the one I am about to tell you.

Maybe some of you can identify with what I’m about to say and some of you may not have had this experience, but it is rather disgusting and nauseating in many ways, but you can learn from it. I had an older guy fix one of my cars at one time and I traveled far to get the car to him because he was very good at what he did. I also know he had a serious gambling problem. But the story involves his communication. He loved to tell dirty stories and he went on and on with me about someone he knew and that person’s girlfriend. It was absolutely pathetic some of the things that he told me. These were personal things that he said about this guy that I knew and extremely gross sexual innuendos about his girlfriend. Apparently this guy told him some stories and he told just about anyone he spoke to. After a few minutes, I really felt uncomfortable and wanted to get away from him because of the garbage that spewed out of his mouth. When you meet someone who complains and criticizes and condemns all of the time, you’re going to want to get away from that person. And you should as quickly as possible and as politely as possible. So we may read that Scripture in verse 29 and not give it too much thought. But I probably had this experience so that I can teach it to you. You should remember never to talk badly about anybody even though I know it is very difficult. The rule that I learned was to say something nice or to say nothing at all. If you can comply with this rule, you are doing very well because you are doing what the Word says that we should do. By the way, this man who always told dirty stories was inflicted by a perverse spirit – only one in Satan’s arsenal.

You will also see in verse 31 that we are not to be bitter or to be full of wrath. Wrath is anger with a desire for revenge and we are never to seek vengeance or revenge according to the book of Romans.

Dearly beloved, avenge not yourselves, but rather give place unto wrath [the wrath of God]: for it is written, Vengeance is mine; I will repay, saith the Lord. – Romans 12: 19

This is quite difficult for many people and has been difficult for me many years ago. But I learned that this is how you defeat your personal adversary. He is the one that will provoke you to anger and to seek revenge so that he can defeat you. Don’t fall for it. You should remember that God will repeat Himself many times because that is how we learn. If you notice in verse 31 He says we should not do any evil speaking and we should not be clamorous. Did you ever meet a person that never shuts up? This can be really annoying to others and they will do anything they can to get away from that person. God wants you to put away malice. What is malice? Malice is simply evil – to do things that are evil – to say things that are evil. That’s a simple definition of malice. God says in verse 32 that we are to be kind and tenderhearted and forgiving. These are all facets of the renewed mind and this chapter in Ephesians is a great chapter to master. This is how we renew our mind and then, in turn, we LEARN to do well.

Since this teaching is rather simple in many ways, however extremely important in many other ways, I again cannot see repeating myself over and over again and I’m sure you agree. I would like to conclude this teaching with what is actually a prayer in the book of Ephesians chapter 3. It is not only my wish and prayer that you renew your mind and learn to do well, but of course, it is God Almighty who wants you to do the right thing in your life and then he can bestow blessings upon you. It has been said that the renewed mind is a very difficult process. So just take it slowly. Think of a weakness that you have and work on that one weakness until you conquer and defeat it – until you have enough discipline so that it does not control you. This is how I went about renewing my mind in many areas. It takes time so do not be in a hurry. God never wants a believer or anyone to be anxious as He states in Philippians.

Be careful [anxious or distracted] for nothing; but in every thing by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known unto God. – Philippians 4: 6

Do not try to rush the renewed mind – you will not be successful. Take it one day at a time and one goal at a time and remember that every day gets a little bit better. Instead of being anxious or distracted, God would rather that you pray to Him and be specific in your prayers asking Him for help with your renewed mind.

Before I begin this prayer, I want to make sure that you understand that God has great rewards for those who do His Will. You will see some of those rewards, actually many of them, in the next five verses. I would also like you to know that these five verses are in parentheses which is a figure of speech which is the Holy Spirit’s markings as to what is important in the Bible.

That he would grant you, according to the riches of his glory, to be strengthened with might by his Spirit in the inner man;

Right here in this verse we see that God can only strengthen you with His Spirit in your inner man which is your spirit, which is Christ in you. He wants you to be strong in this area and as I said before, the renewed mind is your key to power. It is the Word of God that strengthens your mind. It is praying in the spirit which is also referred to as speaking in tongues that strengthens the spirit within you. We live in this world and we must strengthen our mind. That is our focus in this teaching. Strengthening our spirit is another subject.

That Christ may dwell [saturate] in your hearts by faith [believing]; that ye, being rooted and grounded in love,

There are two types of love in this world. One is worldly love which is called fileo and the other is the love of God which is called agape. God is saying that He wants Christ to be able to dwell or saturate your hearts by believing so that you can be rooted and grounded in the love of God in the renewed mind in manifestation. Now how are you going to saturate your hearts by believing which is action, when you are not renewing your mind? It is simply not possible.

May be able to comprehend with all saints what is the breadth, and length, and depth and height [of love];

By living the life that God plans for every believer, He sees to it that the believer is spiritually sharp and is able to comprehend or understand all the different facets of life and especially those that pertain to love.

And to know the love of Christ, which passeth knowledge, that ye might be filled with all the fulness of God.

Now are you going to tell me that you would not like to be filled with all the fullness of God? I know that you would or you wouldn’t be reading this. How are you going to know the love of Christ if you haven’t studied about Jesus Christ?

Now unto him that is able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that worketh in us, -- Ephesians 3: 16 – 20

Now here is the Scripture that blows many believers away especially when they experience it happening in their own life. God will not do above all that you ask or think, but He will do exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think. Now take a look at the last section of the verse. It says according to the power that worketh in us. That power is the power that results from the renewed mind.

So learn to do well by renewing your mind to the Word of God. It’s that simple, but it takes a free will effort every day. God says it – that settles it.

And ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free. – John 8: 32

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