Abounding in Christ • Deshen Daily

Therefore, as ye abound in every thing, in faith, and utterance, and knowledge, and in all diligence, and in your love to us, see that ye abound in this grace also (2 Corinthians 8:7, KJV)

Paul exhorts us to “abound in everything.” He then moves on to enlist a few things we should abound in: faith, utterance, knowledge, diligence, love. “To abound” means to increase or grow in something. The Lord is telling us here that faith can increase, the same as knowledge and love! It means spiritual virtues are quantifiable, meaning, there is an amount that is present and operating in your life at any time. There is a level of faith or knowledge of God you have right now. It can be small, somewhat average or great.

This might immediately raise some questions such as “are we complete in Christ or not?”. I have extensively reviewed this problem in our spirit-soul-body series. Your spirit is complete in Christ, but your soul is what lives here on the earth. Yes, your spirit is like Christ, but you sure do not act like Christ all the time, do you? Why not? It is the soul that lives on the earth!

God is commanding that the faith or knowledge which you have, experience, or express here and now abounds. Your knowledge of God today should not be the same as what you had five years ago. The amount of faith working in you now should not be the same that will be working in you next year. God says, “abound in everything”!

MEDITATE

Why is it that you can have love in your spirit and still not love people here and now? ( Hint: spirit and soul mechanics!)

APPLY THE WORD

I will be teaching tonight live on the practical application of spirit-soul-body knowledge we have discussed extensively over the past few months. You can always watch the free recordings on our website. Strive not to be a static Christian. Some believers spend 10, 25 or even 50 years in the faith, and the only thing that changes about them is that they have learned how the Church works with Christian routines. That is not what God has called us into. His command is to increase daily in faith, love, knowledge, power, wisdom, etc!