Iron Sharpens Iron
By Faith Alone
PROVERBS 27:17
“As iron sharpens iron, So a man sharpens the countenance of his friend.
”Proverbs 27:17 NKJV
https://www.bible.com/114/pro.27.17.nkj
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Spending time in fellowship with good people can sharpen our minds. Sharing our ideas with one another can help people to see their ideas with new clarity, shape and help to refine them into amazing insights.
This requires us to challenge and stimulate one another’s thoughts without involving their egos in the discussion.
The truth is, we need to be a people who are able to challenge others thoughts and ideas without attacking the thinker, but at the same time, be able to accept new ideas and criticism with an open heart without being offended.
Two friends who are able to bring their ideas together wisely can sharpen their thinking.
But greater sharpness comes from God’s word: “For the word of God is living and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing even to the division of soul and spirit, and of joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart.”
Hebrews 4:12 NKJV
God’s word is living and powerful, and can bring change into not only our circumstance, but the way in which we think and respond to trials and challenges; it can transform us into Christ like people that understand what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God with clarity (ROMANS 12:1-2).
However, it can only be active in your hearts and minds if you take it in, chew it over and digest it, gain understanding from it, and fall in line with it.
Regular study of God’s word is the ultimate tool to sharpen our hearts and minds.
By making time to study God’s Word together, sharing testimony and experiences, we shall grow together in knowledge, wisdom, faith, and unity. But while study increases knowledge, understanding and revelation can only come from God.
“”So I say to you, ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives, and he who seeks finds, and to him who knocks it will be opened.”
Luke 11:9-10 NKJV
But my brethren, without God’s Word feeding us, and the experience of service by God’s leading, we shall not grow nor produce good fruits.
But by actively assembling and serving together, whether in worship or study, or involving in discussions, or joining together on the streets evangelising, or coming together in prayer and using our spiritual gifts to edify one another, so we learn from one another through personal experience and the experience of others, and just as iron sharpens iron, our hearts and minds are sharpened.
But relationship with God is paramount to growth.
Good relationship comes from quality time spent together in productive conversation, as does trust which is the foundation of one’s faith.
The works of flesh produce only bad fruits, but the fruits of the Spirit produce good fruits (GALATIANS 5:16-26).
Therefore, without faith, we cannot do anything good, yet with a mustard seed of faith “you will say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there,’ and it will move; and nothing will be impossible for you.”
Matthew 17:20
“By faith Abel offered to God a more excellent sacrifice than Cain, through which he obtained witness that he was righteous, God testifying of his gifts; and through it he being dead still speaks. By faith Enoch was taken away so that he did not see death, “and was not found, because God had taken him”; for before he was taken he had this testimony, that he pleased God. But without faith it is impossible to please Him, for he who comes to God must believe that He is, and that He is a rewarder of those who diligently seek Him. By faith Noah, being divinely warned of things not yet seen, moved with godly fear, prepared an ark for the saving of his household, by which he condemned the world and became heir of the righteousness which is according to faith.”
Hebrews 11:4-7 NKJV
It is by faith alone that we are saved, “For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God, not of works, lest anyone should boast. For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them.”
Ephesians 2:8-10 NKJV
All glory to God forever and ever! Amen.
