STRIFE

Strife takes life, it poisons peace, jacks joy supports sickness and ruins relationships. It attempts to annoy and anger to divide and destroy. It’s a fruit of fear, a companion of cowards, the way of the weak. Strife’s strategy is to stimulate animosity, to agitate and stir up hate. It will try to sneak in like a spy and subvert you conviction to keep the commandment of love. Since the “greatest commandment” is love, would not breaking it be the greatest sin? When you keep the commandment of love you fulfill them all, so when you break it, do you not break them all and begin to fall? When you enter into strife you sin and then - let the evil begin. “Where envying and strife is, there is confusion and EVERY EVIL WORK.” Strife is not an option. You don’t point a loaded gun at your spouse, children, friends, neighbors or yourself. But many still seem to be dying by “friendly fire.” And it’s possible to be in strife with about anything or anyone. Like the angry man working on his car or the “loving lady” lashing out in traffic. People are incensed at the government instead of being infatuated with God. But the wrath of man, peace can not produce; it harms others, and puts your own neck within a noose. If you focus on the wrong things you will be mad, but if you keep the commandment of love you will be glad. And if you enter into strife because you believe a lie, it will host all evil, until you die. Or something in your life dies. It’s absolutely unacceptable to break the commandment of love, when you do you mock and disrespect Almighty God above.

So what’s the answer? You can give what you haven’t received. So receive the love of God and learn to give it. He pours out His love into your heart and it’s perfected in you as you love others. When you receive His Love, you become a partaker of His nature. And you have to continually receive the good to resist the bad. Get your eyes off of yourself and everything else and get them on God. Worship Him in the glory of His majesty and let His love shine through. And it will bless and bring life in all you do.

James 3:16
16 For where envying and strife is, there is confusion and every evil work.
KJV

2 Tim 2:23-26
23 But avoid foolish and ignorant disputes, knowing that they generate strife. 24 And a servant of the Lord must not quarrel but be gentle to all, able to teach, patient, 25 in humility correcting those who are in opposition, if God perhaps will grant them repentance, so that they may know the truth, 26 and that they may come to their senses and escape the snare of the devil, having been taken captive by him to do his will.
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Prov 10:12
12 Hatred stirs up strife,
But love covers all sins.
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Prov 13:10
10 By pride comes nothing but strife,
But with the well-advised is wisdom.
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Prov 17:14
14 The beginning of strife is like releasing water;
Therefore stop contention before a quarrel starts.
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Prov 28:25
25 He who is of a proud heart stirs up strife,
But he who trusts in the Lord will be prospered.
NKJV

Prov 29:22
22 An angry man stirs up strife,
And a furious man abounds in transgression.
NKJV

Rom 12:21
21 Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.
NKJV

Matt 22:37-40
37 Jesus said to him, "'You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind.' 38 This is the first and great commandment. 39 And the second is like it: 'You shall love your neighbor as yourself.' 40 On these two commandments hang all the Law and the Prophets."
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Rom 13:8-14
8 Owe no one anything except to love one another, for he who loves another has fulfilled the law. 9 For the commandments, "You shall not commit adultery," "You shall not murder," "You shall not steal," "You shall not bear false witness," "You shall not covet," and if there is any other commandment, are all summed up in this saying, namely, "You shall love your neighbor as yourself." 10 Love does no harm to a neighbor; therefore love is the fulfillment of the law.

11 And do this, knowing the time, that now it is high time to awake out of sleep; for now our salvation is nearer than when we first believed. 12 The night is far spent, the day is at hand. Therefore let us cast off the works of darkness, and let us put on the armor of light. 13 Let us walk properly, as in the day, not in revelry and drunkenness, not in lewdness and lust, not in strife and envy. 14 But put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make no provision for the flesh, to fulfill its lusts.
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Deut 30:6
6 And the Lord your God will circumcise your heart and the heart of your descendants, to love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul, that you may live.
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Ezek 36:26
26 I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit within you; I will take the heart of stone out of your flesh and give you a heart of flesh.
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Luke 4:18
"The Spirit of the Lord is upon Me,
Because He has anointed Me
To preach the gospel to the poor;
He has sent Me to heal the brokenhearted,
To proclaim liberty to the captives
And recovery of sight to the blind,
To set at liberty those who are oppressed;
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Rom 5:5
5 Now hope does not disappoint, because the love of God has been poured out in our hearts by the Holy Spirit who was given to us.
NKJV

1 John 3:1
3 How great is the love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God! And that is what we are!
NIV

1 John 3:11-15
11 This is the message you heard from the beginning: We should love one another. 12 Do not be like Cain, who belonged to the evil one and murdered his brother. And why did he murder him? Because his own actions were evil and his brother's were righteous. 13 Do not be surprised, my brothers, if the world hates you. 14 We know that we have passed from death to life, because we love our brothers. Anyone who does not love remains in death. 15 Anyone who hates his brother is a murderer, and you know that no murderer has eternal life in him.
NIV

1 John 4:7-12
7 Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. 8 Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love. 9 This is how God showed his love among us: He sent his one and only Son into the world that we might live through him. 10 This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins. 11 Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. 12 No one has ever seen God; but if we love one another, God lives in us and his love is made complete in us.
NIV

1 John 4:16-21
6 And we have known and believed the love that God has for us. God is love, and he who abides in love abides in God, and God in him.

17 Love has been perfected among us in this: that we may have boldness in the day of judgment; because as He is, so are we in this world. 18 There is no fear in love; but perfect love casts out fear, because fear involves torment. But he who fears has not been made perfect in love. 19 We love Him because He first loved us.

20 If someone says, "I love God," and hates his brother, he is a liar; for he who does not love his brother whom he has seen, how can he love God whom he has not seen? 21 And this commandment we have from Him: that he who loves God must love his brother also.
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