Daily Bible Readings YLT March 23rd

When we have chosen to love the Lord our God with all our heart and with all our soul and with all our mind and with all our strength and we follow Jesus through baptism into the land which He brings us into which we are going in to possess, then God will cast out many nations from our presence.This is not a physical taking of land nor dispossessing of nations in the world, but is a spiritual truth. These are the lies, abominations, false worship and evil carried out in our world. There are those in our world who spiritually sacrifice their own children in their pursuit of the gods they have made to be gods in this life: which are not gods but idols and invented things which draw us away from the holiness of God.God will cast them out but we have to smite them: it has to be our determination to root out of ourselves everything that is not of God and to follow Him and Him only.Do not make any covenant nor favour those who follow a different way. Do not marry another of a different belief nor any person who follows a different god for they will draw you away from the God who created the heavens and the earth. Him only shall you serve."For a holy people [art] thou to Jehovah thy God; on thee hath Jehovah thy God fixed, to be to HIm for a peculiar (set apart) people, out of all the peoples who {are] on the face of the ground."This was not because we had any merit of ourselves but "because of God loving you, and because of His keeping the oath which He hath sworn to our fathers,"God brings us out with a strong hand and ransoms us "from a house of servants, from the hand of Pharoah king of Egypt."When we are baptised, a spiritual separation takes place which God alone carries out, with a strong hand and with a declaration to the powers of darkness, that the ransom of the life of Jesus, who is killed for our sake, has been paid so that the Pharoah, who represents Satan, the deceiver, the thief and the murderer, can no longer control us, nor command our lives, nor lord it over us, nor make us slaves with no right to choose for ourselves our path.For before we are baptised, we are controlled by invisible forces of evil, though we are unaware of it, and deceived, considering life to be sweet and under our control and consider ourselves free but we are not.In our baptism, we are cut off from this spiritual power over our lives and rise to new life in Christ.'What must we do?' the people cried out to the apostle Peter at the first Pentecost after Jesus had been crucified, being convicted by the Holy Spirit of sin, of righteousness and of judgment.Repent and be baptised. Turn from your wickedness and live.Do not make light of our sinfulness, thinking that we have not done any wrong in our lives, for our eyes are blinkered, blinded to the truth by the prince of this world, the deceiver, and only a willingness to know that there is One who is greater than you, who is the true judge, to humble ourselves before Him and throw ourselves on His mercy which He readily gives to us, and cry out to Him to deliver us from the control of the Pharoah, who is Satan.There is a better way to live. Choose life. Jesus gives you life in all its fullness. He gives you the promise that He is always with you and will never leave you nor forsake you.Baptiism is not optional. If we are to be freed, we must let Jesus lead us out of darkness and into His glorious light, we must let Him open the waters before us and go through in His death the separation from our former life and enter into resurrected life in Him."And thou has known that Jehovah thy God, He [is] God, the faithful God, keeping the covenant, and the kindness, to those loving Him and to those keeping His commands" Deuteronomy 7:9