87 TEMPERANCE
87 TEMPERANCE
The word ‘temperance’ in the old English and the way God wanted it understood in His word, means –moderation in actions, speech, habits, etc. That ‘etc.’ here means everything else.
Temperance is the ninth listing in the fruit of the Spirit’s. [Did you notice that, even though there are nine things listed they are considered one item by the bible?]
The fruit of the Spirit is a single thing with, at least, nine parts all working together at the same time to be one whole. Love joyfully, have peace while you are suffering long, be gentle while you are being good, be meek while you are exercising your faith and, with all the others use temperance.
God wants you to be in control of yourself. He wants you to control your thoughts, actions, lusts, wants, emotions, health, environment and anything else that He has put under your authority. That’s why, when Jesus died on the cross, it was to set you free. Free from the bonds of your lusts, your actions, your fear, your thoughts, your worry and your everything.
After setting you free, God wants you to, willingly, love Him enough to give your freedom to Him for His service and pleasure. As His creation, this is the proper, natural and right thing for us to do.
By giving Him our service, He becomes our master and, then, commands us, expecting us to obey Him. He will force no one to do anything that they don’t want to do. He has already told us what we can expect if we love and obey Him or if we decide to hate and disobey Him. His words are true and we will receive that judgement that we are living our lives out to receive.
Temperance is very important when it comes to living our lives for God. To use anything to excess is to overdo a thought, habit or action.
If you have to hit someone to teach them a lesson, then you decide how many hits it would take to complete the learning process in them and do not hit them past that number. To continue to hit them after the lesson is learned is abuse; an abuse of your authority in their life and a physical abuse of their bodies.
In today’s world, many people eat to excess; their bodies do not need all the food that they are consuming to function properly so it stores it as fat. Unless those people stop eating, their bodies keep getting heavier and heavier until it is carrying enough weight to make it work hard enough to burn the amount of food that they are putting into it.
Some people are so religious that they do not have time to exercise the lessons God has taught them and become pious and self-righteous. These do God more harm than good because they have not used the ‘temperance’ part of the Spirit that they were given.
God’s word command those that love and obey Him to only lust after their marriage partners and for those same partners to willingly take an active role in satisfying their partner’s hormonal and mental needs; wives to husbands and husbands to wives. To seek comfort and release with anyone or anything else is to go to excess and is not temperance.
Has God given you the freedom to control yourself and, do you love Him enough to use this control on yourself? Temperance- He is watching and hoping for you to succeed.
