We need both - holiness and love.

Jesus calls us to be both holy and loving. We need both - holiness and love. We're not to be hypocrites who've given up on holiness. We're not to be content with keeping up appearances. We're to seek holiness of heart. This is the heart of holiness. We're not to be hypocrites who show no love for other people. How can we have much love for God if we don't have much love for other people? A life that's centred on ourselves is very different from a life that's centred on Christ. A life that's being shaped by Christ's love will be a life of receiving His love and sharing His love. He's teaching us how much He loves us. He's helping us to show His love to other people.

What Matters Most To You?

The values of our Lord Jesus Christ, Gospel values, Kingdom values are very different from the world's values. It's the difference between "treasures on earth" and "treasures in heaven" (Matthew 6:19-20). When we treasure the things of earth, we will worry about the things of earth. Jesus says that we are not to worry about these things. We are to have a higher priority than 'looking after No. 1'. We're to be concerned about "God's Kingdom and what has His approval"  (Matthew 6:33). When the things that matter most to God are not the things that matter most to us, other things will take over our lives. What matters most to you? This is what Jesus is asking us. Are the things that matter most to God becoming the things that matter most to us?

Jesus Won The Victory For Us.

Jesus' victory over Satan in the wilderness (Matthew 4) must be seen in the broader context of His work of salvation. This was more than just a personal victory - a victory for Jesus. It was a victory for us. Jesus won the victory for us. He walked in the way of victory so that we might live in the power of His victory. After Jesus had won the victory over Satan, He called His disciples to Him - "Come, follow Me!" - and He sent them out from Him, empowered by Him, to be witnesses for Him - "fishers of men" (Matthew 4:19). His victory was more than a victory for His first disciples. It was a victory for all would become believers through their witness. This includes all of us, since each one of us has come to faith in Christ through the testimony of His apostles. When Jesus sent them out, He did more than send them. He showed them what they were to do (Matthew 4:23-25).

We need both truth and holiness.

We need both truth and holiness (Zechariah 8:3). Truth is not just something to be believed. Truth changes us. Truth leads us into the pathways of holiness. We need both "truth and peace" (Zechariah 8:19). When truth changes us, it leads us into the paths of peace. The holy life is not to be a life of pride. That is Pharisaism. We think that holiness is all our own doing. The way of true holiness is also the way of peace. We seek to show, by our way of living, that we have been saved by the Lord and changed by Him. We show that the Lord is working in us, when we learn to walk in the way of peace. We are not to be like the Pharisee who looks down his nose at other people. We are to reach out to them in peace. At the Cross, we have learned that we are loved. At the Cross, we learn to hold out the love of Christ to other people.

We dare not attach so much importance to the externals of religion that we forget about the presence of the Lord.

The Lord is "the glory within" Jerusalem (Zechariah 2:5). He is "the glory within" His Church. We dare not attach so much importance to the externals of religion that we forget about the presence of the Lord. To make secondary things more important than they really are is to miss the most important thing - the Lord is "the glory within" His Church. To His people, in Old Testament times and today, God says, "I'm going to come and live among you" (Zechariah 2:10).

The work of God is not done in our own strength.

The work of God is not done in our own strength. We need the superior power of God's Spirit (Zechariah 4:6). The power of the Spirit comes to us as the power of love, the power of Christ, the power of the Gospel. This is the power that reaches us and changes us. There  is no power like the power  of God's Spirit. The power of God's Spirit does not come in an entirely supernatural way. It comes to us through people:. "Zerubbabel's hands have laid the foundation of this House, and his hands will finish it" (Zechariah 4:9). It is the Lord who uses us in His service. We must never forget that the real power comes from Him: "Then you will know that the Lord of Armies has sent me to you" (Zechariah 4:9). This supernatural dimension is at the heart of every real work of God. When we emphasize this supernatural dimension. This something that we must never forget - if we are to honour the Lord, truly and fully. God works through ordinary people, who give themselves to Him, the extraordinary God. God is looking for people who will say to Him, "Here am I, send me" (Isaiah 6:8).

"The devil ... was thrown into the lake of fire ... " (Revelation 20:10).

The time will come when God will say to Satan, “Enough! No more!”