(PART# 1 of the 7 `E’s” that lead to ESTEEMING God, ‘ESTEEM’)
1 Sam 2:30 for those who honor Me I will honor, and those who despise Me shall be lightly esteemed.
Honor, Respect, Value, and Esteem are pretty much the same thing. Disrespect, dishonor, not value and despise are the opposite. Honor God and He will honor you and all of your stuff. Take God for granted, and He’s not going to worry about you and your stuff as much. If you want to have an abundant and eternal life, make God your priority.
I think it’s interesting that I found 6 ‘I’ to despise God, and 7 ‘E’s to esteem Him. 6 is the number of men. 7 is the number of holiness. The opposite of despise is to esteem. When we esteem Jesus, truthfully, with our whole hearts, we get saved and are immediately holy. We are going to live forever with Jesus in heaven. To be holy is to be like Jesus. When we get saved, we´re not perfect, but we are on the road to becoming like Jesus. Lots of people, even pastors have rebuked me for trying to be like Jesus, but really, isn’t that the point?
God said ‘be ye holy as I am holy’. 1 Peter 1:16
As I said in the previous series, how you treat your fellowman is how you treat God. You could say that your holiness is shown externally by how you treat others. Do you think Jesus yelled at bums, or insulted people that did shoddy work? Your opinions, attitudes and gestures towards others directly reflects your true feelings about God. Despise God, despise people. Esteem God, esteem people. And visa-versa. We are filled with the Holy Spirit because we’ve esteemed God. A side benefit of that is that we esteem others. Esteem God and everything else falls into place.
1 John 4:20 If a man say, I love God, and hateth his brother, he is a liar: for he that loveth not his brother whom he hath seen, how can he love God whom he hath not seen?
Likewise, show me someone who loves everyone he meets, and it’s pretty safe to assume that her or she loves God as well. Esteeming others is the fruit of salvation. It’s the evidence.
Romans 5:5 the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost which is given unto us.
I am using the same opening verse as I did for the last series. I hope you aren´t insulted by this, but I want to get it into your soul. CAUTION! IF THIS VERSE IS APPLIED TO YOUR HEART, IT WILL DRASTICALLY CHANGE YOUR LIFE! This verse is critical to understanding our need to honor and esteem God.
The first ‘E’ in Esteeming God is the word itself, ESTEEM.
We are to esteem others if we esteem God. A secret to a better life is that we should never expect others to esteem us! We are to be givers of esteem, not demanders to be esteemed. Esteeming God and others first starts with how we live our own lives. Are we doing everything we can to live a life that is pleasing to God? In marriage counseling, which I am horrible at by the way, it’s always the same. Husbands want their wives to esteem them. The husband’s first complaint is that his wife doesn’t esteem him, or submit to him. They use Ephesians 5:5 like a sledgehammerWives, submit yourselves unto your own husbands, as unto the Lord. They don’t like it when I tell them that this verse was written to their wives, not to them. Submitting is a collateral effect of esteeming. It’s always an outward command, never should it be a command from you that people should esteem or submit to you. Husbands, if you esteem your wife more, she will esteem you more.
One person prayed, ‘Lord, use me, use me’. A pastor gave him a volunteer job in the church. A couple months later when asked how he liked his position, he said he didn’t like it because he felt like he was being used. haha. Christianity is being an out flowing conduit, one way. You pour yourself out to others, and God keeps giving you the stuff to pour out. If you`re a Christian, your job description is to be used. One of the ways we are to be used is by esteeming other people, because we esteemed God first.
Esteem means all 4 of the following things, with a little twist for each one. To value, honor, respect and admire all fall into the esteem category.
(A) Value – To value God is the priority, and as a result, you will value people. It is impossible to value God and not people. People who are important to your career, success or popularity, are easy to value. You go out of your way to listen to them. You give them the attention they deserve. (Everyone deserves attention btw, even the rich and famous, it doesn’t prove anything to be rude to anyone). But do you value people who can do absolutely nothing for you? I call them what my Lord Jesus calls them, the ‘least of these’ and the ‘whomsoevers’. How much we honestly value them, is how much we truly value the Lord. To value means to see as having worth. Jesus died for each and every person regardless of race, orientation, police record, or career. Size of bank accounts, health, appearances, nationality, belief system, political parties, intellectual abilities, opinions, mask wearers, mask scoffers, all of that stuff means absolutely nothing to Him. Jesus died for us all and we all have worth. God values us all. If you love God, and value Him, you will value everyone else too.
Matthew 10:29-31 Are not two sparrows sold for a farthing? and one of them shall not fall on the ground without your Father. But the very hairs of your head are all numbered. Fear ye not therefore, ye are of more value than many sparrows.
(B) Honor – Honor literally comes from the word weight. When people bought something in the olden days they used bags of heavy metal (silver or gold). The value was placed on something, and that value was measured on a scale by the weight of the valuable metal (honor). Value is backed by honor. The more valuable something was, the heavier the bag of precious metal had to be. Not much value meant not much weight was required. Lots of value, lots of weight, or honor. How much weight do we place on the value of a relationship with God? Is sleeping in or golfing more important than going to church on time? Binge Netflix instead of binge reading the Bible? Getting up and offering your seat to an elderly man on a crowded bus? (Offering your seat to a lady is a no-brainer, that’s just basic upbringing). Sharing your fast food lunch with a stinky bag lady even though you are famished? How much weight we give in honoring God is reflected directly in how much weight you give in honoring your fellow man. Honor is giving your all, to all, not just giving10% of our money, and an hour a week. I am convinced that if we worked as hard at honoring God as we do at our full time jobs (even ministry) our lives would be much richer, exciting, fulfilling and joyful!!
Matthew 13:46 when he had found one pearl of great price, went and sold all that he had and bought it.
(C) Respect – How do you treat others? God is all powerful and all knowing. If you truly believe that about the Lord, you will handle others with kid gloves. You will keep peace with them as much as possible. You will be a good witness. You will be concerned about their souls and will testify to them with tact and kindness. You will be gentle. You won’t run roughshod over anyone. Respect God and you will treat others as you want to be treated. In respecting God you won’t argue with people. You will take the high road and back down, or back off (like someone wanting your parking space or pushing ahead of you in traffic). No one ever got saved or changed political parties over an argument. Respect is something you give to someone, because of who God is, and who they are, not because they’ve earned it. Bosses, leaders, authorities don’t have to earn your respect if you respect God. They have it by default. You honor people by paying what you owe, money, respect, anything, without quibbling. Romans 13:7 Render therefore to all their dues: tribute to whom tribute is due; custom to whom custom; fear to whom fear; honour to whom honour. Even if your mechanic did bad work, pay him! (You should have asked God which mechanic to use BEFORE you went to him). Owe taxes? Pay them, even if the IRS agent was snippy. See a policeman? Obey him. Your president? Pray for him, don’t talk bad about him.
Matthew 7:12 Therefore all things whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them: for this is the law and the prophets.
(D) Admire – Means to look at someone or something with approval. When you admire someone you approve of them. Many people won’t approve of someone until they’ve proven themselves. That is diabolical. You admire and approve of people because they are created in God’s image. You admire and approve of police and presidents and pastors because of their position, not because you have a good feeling about them. Admiration is way beyond respect. You admire something because it gives you pleasure to behold. Everyone has something to admire them about, if you take the time to find out. Everything about God is admirable, and His creations are admirable too.
2 Thessalonians 1:10 When he shall come to be glorified in his saints, and to be admired in all those that believe (because our testimony among you was believed) in that day.
Bottom line is that we esteem God, and by doing so, being filled with His Spirit, we will be esteeming others. As we esteem others, we are making the Gospel more palatable and believable to the lost. By doing so we give glory to God, and that is the only reason we are still here down here. Another benny to esteeming God and man, is that many times the people that you esteem will esteem you back.
Philippians 2:3 Let nothing be done through strife or vainglory; but in lowliness of mind let each esteem other better than themselves.
WHAT’S NEW AT PUREHEART?
COVID 19 UPDATE- STILL NOT ONE CASE OF COVID AMONG THE 300+ FAMILIES WE SERVE (APPROX 6000 PEOPLE, NOR AMONG OUR STAFF, NOR OUR EXTENDED FRIENDS AND FAMILY DOWN HERE WHERE WE SERVE). SCHOOL IS ON SUMMER VACATION. FEEDING CENTERS GOING ON AS USUAL. PSALM 91
PRAYER REQUESTS.
- We have paid all taxes, lawyers, fines and CPA, resubmitted all our packets, waiting for the next step.
- FOR OUR OWN HOME APART FROM THE MINISTRY. IT WILL BE CLOSE ENOUGH TO DIRECT AND OVERSEE EVERYTHING, BUT NOT INSIDE THE MINISTRY’S WALLS. IT’S NON STOP HERE AND WINNIE’S NOT WELL. SHE NEEDS A HAVE. I FOUND A HOUSE FOR 29K, we have almost 10k towards it.
- FOR THE ORPHANAGE THAT I KNOW IS IN OUR FUTURE. NOT ONLY AN ORPHANAGE, BUT AN OLD FOLKS HOME AS WELL. I THINK THE TWO CAN BE SIDE BY SIDE ON THE SAME PROPERTY, IT’S ONLY A MATTER OF MONEY. IT WOULD BE A BLESSING TO THE OLD FOLKS TO HEAR KIDS PLAYING, AND IT WOULD BE A BLESSING FOR THE KIDS TO HAVE ABUELAS AND ABUELOS.
- AMERICA!
- WINNIE`S HEALTH.
PRAISE REPORTS
- Summer vacation is here, much needed. Everyone is getting to relax. Winnie and I are only doing the feeding center in the dump until school starts again in Feb
- Since I have started tithing my retirement I have had no stress about finances.
- A much lighter atmosphere. We have been oppressed for a long time. Even though we have more problems and ever growing dynamics, there isn’t that horrible pressure. I think it was spiritual and your prayers are working. I feel victory.
- We are relaxing, just doing the feeding centers right now, summer vacation ends in a month
- Personally, I am healthy. Haven’t had so much as a cold in the past three years. When I hurt myself, I heal almost immediately. That’s good because I have to take care of Winnie. Please pray for her healing.
PLEASE KEEP ON!!! WHATEVER YOU’RE DOING, IT’S WORKING!! pray, donate, and spread the word about us, what we are doing and the needs here!
Please share this letter on FB and with your friends, churches & civic groups! Thank you!!!
Dean and Winnie Peters