Excellence and Integrity

Soldier of Christ is a non-profit, 501(c)(3) Christian Ministry, dedicated to outreach and spiritual growth. Our mission is to help in building an army of soldiers for Christ and His Kingdom, in order to advance His name and God's will throughout all nations. (Mark 16: 15 – 18)

As part of our ministry, we will provide weekly messages here on blogger.com. We hope that you will be encouraged, inspired and strengthened along with us in your walk with Jesus Christ, as you read these messages. The topic will change weekly. The Bible, as well as other Christian literature, will be used, in order to help us grow spiritually.

The topic for this week is “Excellence and Integrity.” In order to live our lives with excellence and integrity, then it is important for us to study and apply what God has to say on these matters. I am currently studying Joyce Meyer’s four part message, “Living with Excellence and Integrity.” I chose to buy this study because God revealed to me that as a woman of God, I am called to live a life of excellence. When I heard Joyce speaking on this topic, it was confirmation to me that this is in fact something that God revealed to me, and it is important to the Lord. In part one, Joyce preaches on “A Commitment to Excellence and Integrity.” She listed three thing’s God told her that she and her husband needed to do, in order to have a successful ministry and be successful in their walk with Him. 1.) Do what you do with excellence. 2) Be a person of integrity. 3.) Keep the strife out of your life and home.

As Christian’s, we need to strive for excellence, integrity, and peace. In her sermon, Joyce stated that being a person of excellence can sometimes be an uphill climb. However, people will learn more from what they see you do than what they hear you say. It’s important as believers that we fully commit our hearts and lives to Jesus Christ and make the choice not to be lukewarm. Joyce was wise in her estimation that the love walk is crucial among Christian’s, yet sadly, it is often missing. Walking in love is part of living a life of excellence. In 1 Corinthians 12:31, the apostle Paul says, “But eagerly desire the greater gifts. And now I will show you the most excellent way.” What was the most excellent way Paul was referring to? In 1 Corinthians 13 Paul goes on to show us “the most excellent way” and that is love. As Christian’s, we need to walk in love. The Bible tells us that we will be known by the fruit that we bear, so we need to walk in a manner that is worthy of God’s calling and bear good fruit. Walking in love is the best way to bear good fruit for the Lord. It’s our responsibility to be the light of the world and to love one another. The Bible tells us that if we say we know God, but we don’t love others, then we are liars. 1 John 4:7-8 says, “Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love.” It’s not always easy to walk in love, but Jesus never said life would be easy. As a matter of fact, Jesus said that in this life we will have many troubles, but take heart, because He has overcome the world. When someone hurts us, abuses us, uses us, or does evil to us, then it can be a challenge to love them and do good to them. However, Romans 12:21 says, “Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.” This does not mean that we should remain in fellowship with people who have mistreated us, but we are called to love them and forgive them.

As Joyce Meyer preached in the first part of “Living with Excellence and Integrity,” she went on to encourage Christian’s to make a decision to come up higher and not have a divided heart. Joyce stated, “we are called to be excellent and serve God with our whole heart. We can’t glorify God by being lukewarm. We need to press on and go beyond average.” Joyce was not only referring to the area of loving others as a way to live with excellence, but she encouraged that we live every area of our lives in this way. No matter what the circumstance, we should live our lives with excellence. If we can’t be faithful in little thing’s, then God will not trust us to be faithful in bigger things. Joyce went on to say that Christian’s need to be honorable and live their best life, even when no one is watching. In her sermon she reminds us that we need to remember that what God sees in secret, He will reward in the open. She also stated that we need to stop living to impress people and start living to please God, and I agree. We aren’t called to be people pleaser’s in this life. In her sermon, Joyce encouraged Christians to “make a decision not to float down stream with everyone else who is compromising.” It doesn’t matter what anyone else is doing or not doing who claims to be a follower of Christ. We should have high standards for the kind of people we want to be in Christ. We need to create boundaries, set limits, and be careful about what and who we let into our lives.

Just remember that you can live with excellence. God has given you and I everything that we need to live an excellent life. “His divine power has given us everything we need for life and godliness through our knowledge of him who called us by his own glory and goodness (2 Peter 1:3).”