For God is working in you, giving you the desire and the power to do what pleases him. – Phil 2:13 (NLT)

Many people believe that following God takes a lot of willpower. However, this Bible verse states that God is able to work in you and gives you both the desire and the power to do what pleases Him. That means you don’t have to do it on your own. God helps you live the Christian life.

In the same way, many people think that following God means doing things you don’t want to do. As you follow Jesus and get into God’s word, He places His desires in you. That makes following God easier because it isn’t hard work, it’s something you desire to do as you get close to Him.

Following Jesus isn’t scary or hard work. It’s simply a choice you make. As you choose to follow after Him and His word your desires will line up with His. It isn’t hard work because you want to do things that please Him.

Today be encouraged. You can follow God. It doesn’t matter how many times you’ve messed up or done the wrong thing. You can always find a fresh start in Jesus.

Do you ever question God’s love for you? Do you ever wonder if He really cares? Perhaps you think, God has so many people to be concerned about, does He really have time to help me with my math class that I’m struggling in? It’s easy to think that perhaps God is too busy for you. Or maybe because you’ve messed up, or not been the perfect Christian, He will skip over you and go to someone else that seems more “worthy”.

Here’s the truth. God loves you. He cares about you, and thankfully that love and care has absolutely nothing to do with how good you are. Not that you shouldn’t try to be good, of course, you should be living your life to please Jesus. But His care for you is totally separate from your performance.

He cares for you and sees you through Jesus. It’s the perfection of Jesus that God sees when He looks at us. So it doesn’t matter if you’ve been perfect, it doesn’t matter if you’ve made all the right choices. What matters is that what Jesus did was enough. And God said it was.

 Jesus understands every weakness of ours, because he was tempted in every way that we are. But he did not sin! ¹⁶ So whenever we are in need, we should come bravely before the throne of our merciful God. There we will be treated with undeserved grace, and we will find help. – Hebrews 4:15-16 (CEV)

That’s good news for you. That means that God hears you. He sees you, He feels your pain and understands it completely. So know that you are loved much more than you can ever know or imagine. You are so important to God and His plan on the earth.

Today’s Truth: God Knows What You’re Going Through and He Cares About You.

Regardless of the things you’re going through and how difficult they might feel, don’t believe the lie that God doesn’t care. He’s there and He’s walking with you through it one day at a time.

“God did not send his Son into the world to judge and condemn the world, but to be its Savior and rescue it! – John 3:17 (TPT)

The gospel is good news. Jesus wasn’t sent to condemn you. He came to rescue you. That means you have value to God. To God, it doesn’t matter the sin you’ve committed, your upbringing, or social status. God loves you and sent His son to be your savior.

Don’t allow yourself to believe the lie that you don’t matter. God sees you as important and your life has a purpose. In the midst of all of the challenges of life, keep your focus on Jesus. Let His value and opinion of you be the one that counts.

Jesus came to rescue you. So today choose to see the value he sees in you and in others. Know that you are vital to God’s plan on the earth!

Today’s Truth: You are vital to God’s Plan on Earth.

Can you remember back to your first day of class? That was probably a long time ago. But a lot of the time, on your first day of class, you get some sort of a syllabus. That document helps you know what’s expected of you for the class, and also when many of the major assignments are due.

When it comes to the things of God, we have a document too. It’s the Bible. And in it we can see ways that God wants us to live our lives and learn many great things.

One of the things that we see taught in the Bible is relationship with God. Over and over again, we see verses that speak of spending time with God. We see people who spent time in prayer and God’s Prescence. Often, we can see that when a culture or person reads the Bible or scriptures, they are wise, and prosperous.

If you remain in me and my words remain in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be done for you. – John 15:7

In today’s verse, we see that it talks about remaining in God. When we remain in His Prescence, we learn about Him. We learn who He is. And in those times we spend with Him, we begin to see God’s nature and character.

So no matter how busy you get, no matter how successful you are, life is really meant to be spent remaining in God. So determine to get to know Him. Determine to know who He is and what He has for you. As you do, you’ll find purpose, meaning and contentment in Him.

Today’s Truth: It’s all about spending time with God.

We all understand that good diet help us to become physically strong. Most of us wouldn’t consider not eating every day because we feel so weak when we don’t eat and can’t perform very well. And then we understand that if we don’t exercise we just get fat and muscles get flabby.

In the same way- you are more than just a body and a mind. You also have a spirit to feed- and it eats God’s Word. It too needs to be fed daily to be strong. But simply reading God’s Word isn’t enough to be strong either.

You exercise your spirit as you pray and obey the things the Word of God says to do. For example forgiving others who hurt you or loving and praying.

1Timothy 4:8 in The Message Bible states “Exercise daily in God- no spiritual flabbiness, please! Workouts in the gymnasium are useful, but a disciplined life in God is far more so, making you fit both today and forever.”

A disciplined spiritual life feeds on God’s Word then exercises what it hears. The rewards for working out in a gym are a toned body. The rewards of godly living are both in this life and in the life to come. God always rewards when we come to Him. The rewards can be direction or wisdom or peace or joy. When you are spiritually in shape, you will draw people to Jesus. And that is definitely an eternal reward!

But Jesus told him, “No! The Scriptures say, ‘People do not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God.’ – Matthew 4:4

I love food. There are very few reasons that I miss a meal. When I do, I get really grumpy and angry. And, I’d guess that most of us put a high priority on eating. We make sure that we eat several times a day, hit those snacks between classes, and maybe even eat some junk food before bed. Eating is a big part of our lives. If we didn’t eat, we’d be grumpy, lack energy, and just be no fun to be around.

In today’s Bible verse, it compares natural food, or bread to spiritual food. It tells us that we shouldn’t just live to eat, but rather we should live to spend time with God. It shows us that our time with God should be a priority in our lives. Just like we wouldn’t go too long without eating, we shouldn’t go long without spending time with God.

Today’s Truth: Don’t go too long without spending time with God.

If you’ve noticed that it’s been awhile since you spent some time in the Bible, challenge yourself today to take more time to spend with God. You can let the Bible App read it to you while you do your homework, or first thing when you get up in the morning. You could get your copy of the Bible out and read in before bed. Whatever seems to work best for you. The goal is to simply make spending time with God a priority in your life today!