No Regrets: Why Be A Christian?: Including Authentic Christianity: A Thirty-one Day Devotional

By Miles Nishikawa

Have you ever asked yourself, why does anyone want to be a Christian? What is it that God wants us to do while here on this earth? For many years, Miles Nishikawa had struggled to answer these questions, and though the answer could have been on the tip of his tongue, he had danced around answering these questions directly. It was in 2017, four years after his father passed away, that the author was confronted with the truth that he needed to get his life in order now. Unflinchingly, without reservations, the author was faced with the truth of God’s Word, while the Holy Spirit directed him to use whatever truth and revelation he had gathered through life’s ups and downs and compile them into a book. Here is the result of the years and even decades of Bible study, prayer, meditation, reflection, crying out to God, and even times of direct downloads of lyrics and melodies flowing freely from the throne room of God. It is the author’s gift to the Body of Christ, in general, and to the local churches, in particular, to save, heal, deliver, and restore that you may stand mature and complete in the will of God and to be all that He has called and appointed you to be, in Jesus’s name. There are no regrets.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Christian Faith Publishing, Inc.
• Release date: Jul 25, 2022
• ISBN: 9781685178918

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No Regrets

Why Be A Christian?: Including Authentic Christianity: A Thirty-one Day Devotional

Miles Nishikawa

Copyright © 2022 by Miles Nishikawa

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods without the prior written permission of the publisher. For permission requests, solicit the publisher via the address below.

Christian Faith Publishing

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Meadville, PA 16335

www.christianfaithpublishing.com

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(ISV) International Standard Version. Copyright © 1995-2014 by ISV Foundation. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED INTERNATIONALLY. Used by permission of Davidson Press, LLC.

(Phillips) J.B. Phillips New Testament. The New Testament in Modern English by J.B Phillips copyright © 1960, 1972 J. B. Phillips. Administered by The Archbishops’ Council of the Church of England. Used by Permission.

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(Mirror) Mirror Bible: A selection of key New Testament texts paraphrased from the Greek. Francois du Toit. Copyright © 2012. All rights reserved.

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Printed in the United States of America

Table of Contents

Preface

Introduction

Knowing the Father

Knowing His Goodness

Exposing Satanic Weapons and Tactics

Upgrade Your Property

Our Exceedingly Great Reward

I Am Not a Miles Gloriosus

My Battle against Encroachment

The Provision That Sustains the Vision

Letting Go

Calling and Separation

Saturation and Satiation

Intertwined

Disciplinary Dealings

Arise to Your Rest

Afterword

Scriptural Index

Authentic Christianity Thirty-One-Day Devotional and Workbook

About the Author

No Regrets will encourage and inspire you to live a life beyond all challenges, personal failures, and demonic attacks. Miles’s revelation of the goodness of God will establish hope in your heart, strengthening your walk with Christ and your confidence in who He has made you to be.

—Joshua Marocco

Senior Pastor, Kings Chapel Oahu

TN whose last words to me were of disgust and whose spirit evoked distance more than a father’s love.

KN who demonstrated to me how regret turns to disappointment and how disappointment gives birth to a root of bitterness.

EH my sixth-grade teacher who demonstrated what it feels like to be blamed and shamed.

RD who showed me what it is like to be the most unlikeable person in the world.

The boys in elementary school who would hijack me for my lunch money, then called me a fag, when I had no clue whatsoever as to what that name meant or inferred.

The teachers who made me sit on the bench after everyone else had been assigned to their respective teams during PE.

BA-H who led me down a road of debauchery and self-destruction during the summer of 1985.

BY, the academic dean who suspended me from the university and told me that I was not welcomed back until I could clearly demonstrate that I had gotten my life in order.

GB who compared me to his former partner who committed suicide and told me that everything I had done up to that point turned to s——.

DR who showed me what it was like to go from worst to first and who gave me the nickname Mighty Mo.

This manuscript is dedicated to you.

The author has chosen to use uppercase first letters for pronouns referring to the Godhead. However, in reference to the devil, lowercase first letters are used. The author has also chosen to use uppercase first letters to denote specific attributes to the Godhead, such as the Blood of Jesus or the Spirit of God.

Preface

A book such as this is predicated upon the premise that God speaks to us in many ways. Just as each student may rely upon different modes of learning to acquire a new skill, God speaks to us in various forms, yet expresses the same message. Today’s multimedia platforms provide the reader with a gamut of Bible translations, revised versions, and paraphrases. But which one do we choose, for the all-encompassing question must be, through all this information, how does God best speak to me? With the influx of knowledge and technology, there is a need to cut through the clutter by allowing God, through reading the Bible and time spent communicating with Him in prayer, to show us answers. The solution is to provide you with as much of a variety that is allowed, to present to you a banqueting table where you may be able to hear God speak to you personally, intimately, and confidently, with the knowing assurance that this indeed is His voice speaking to you today. He is speaking to you right now. Can you hear Him?

Introduction

We hear a cacophony of voices daily—from people, from outside sources, and from our own minds—but which voice do we really key in to? Some of us have become all too familiar with the voice which comes to kill, steal, and destroy, intending to rob us of any true joy and meaningful life satisfaction. There may be those of you who, like me, have spent too many years squandering away precious moments, wasting time which we feel that we could never reclaim. Instead of focusing our thoughts upon the source of condemnation, guilt, and shame, however, we are now guided supernaturally so that secured opportunities of favor and grace are made available to us. It is the Father’s voice within you, speaking to you most assuredly, plainly, and unequivocally, This is the way, walk in it. Where God guides, He provides. It is the Father’s desire that He do the same for you.

Desire can be an interesting thing; how do we know what it is, and how do we know that it is even there? As an unmarried man in my midfifties, I had to question whether the desires I once had were nothing but passing fantasies. Perhaps there were times in your life when you too, like me, felt somewhat out of sync and pressured to just give up. Just as a jazz musician would improvise with horns, bass, and drums, the days and evenings spent each day create their own rhythm and vibe that to some may seem but discordant sounds, but in the ears of someone who is more attuned to music, each moment is abuzz with life. Moments, minutes, seconds may pass, but there is something about desire that remains resolute, unmoved, and unshaken. There is a verse in the Bible that says when we delight ourselves in the Lord, He also gives us the desires of our hearts. It is time to identify those desires and claim them as your own.

Despite moments of disappointment and disillusionment, do we really know what we want and what it is that we are truly longing for? Some of us seek the things that our parents wanted for us or that the world told us was good, yet we ourselves have felt beaten, chewed up, spit out, and treaded down upon. Or perhaps you were like me, having spent my life in mediocrity, in the humdrum and the ho-hum of the mundane. Instead of feeling confined, trapped, and boxed in, we long for access to a broad and spacious place. The Bible says that the thief comes but to kill, to steal, and to destroy, but there is One who comes that we may have life and life more abundantly. You and I no longer are bound to a lifestyle of meaningless repetition where the outcome of our lives is but vanity of vanities. What are we to show for our lives here on earth?

I do not know about you, but for me, I would like to leave behind a legacy, a testimony of how I lived my life here on earth. Contrary to what I may have thought or felt, yes, even what I may have convinced myself to adhere to and believe, there was a knowing within the inside of me that said it is okay, that life is worth living, and that I am going to make it after all. No, Solomon in the book of Ecclesiastes got it all wrong when he says that life is but vanity of vanities. Despite years of feeling that my life was insignificant and did not count for very much, contrary to what the wisdom of this world may have us think or what our own motivations, inclinations, and desires may have us feel, I knew that I am important and significant enough, that my life really does have meaning. My life does indeed count for something, and it is so much more worth living. Carpe diem! Seize the day! Let us be sure to make each day special; make it count!

I remember that day, for it serves as a memorial of something precious which died. A dream which I had long believed to have been gone forever had taken flight and in heaven’s shimmering light had been born anew. If my memory serves me well, it was a Sunday, the beginning of a new week and, for some, a new beginning when hope and dreams are reborn. As a boy, I had carried within my very being an inspiration to be a life changer and a history maker. Yes, the boy who was destined to be a king. If only the One called God could choose me. But what happens if God had already gotten a grip on me?

When God has gotten a grip on you, He does not let go. It was at that point that I decided—yes, decided—that I was sick and tired of being sick and tired. For a teen of perhaps fourteen or fifteen, like a ton of bricks upon my conscience, it was as if something within my brain just lit up like a megawatt light bulb. In the anguish of my very being, the very core of my heart, the real me was crying out. God, God, if You are really there, if You really hear, I need You. Now. Here. Not later. Not tomorrow. Just come to me… It was as if the world around me stayed the same, but I, myself, in the world changed—a new perspective, a new outlook, a new approach, a whole new…could I say it, me? He leaves it up to you and me to choose whether we want to get a grip on Him, just as He has a grip on us.

But what happens to childhood hopes, desires, plans, and aspirations which we no longer have a firm grip of? This means that something in our life dies. What we notice then is a pattern of life. Only after we had let go of those childhood plans could we even sense that our past was buried beneath the ground. Sometimes we need to release and let go so that we may receive everything that God has in store for us. Childhood dreams are like seeds which fall into the ground and die, but when it dies, it bears forth fruit. So the question is this, just how fruitful of a life have you and I been bearing?

The fruitful life is a life worth examining, especially when we remember that Jesus, the One we call Lord and Savior, was crucified, buried, but then resurrected and made alive by the power of the seed that had fallen to the earth and died. It is this same Jesus who has created the universe, Maker of heaven and earth, the sun, moon, and stars, who has breathed into you the newness of life, just as He has breathed into me. And just as He had done to Adam, He has given to you the breath of life. We have every reason to celebrate, for in Him we live and move and have our being. And it is in Christ that we grow in fellowship and in partnership with the One who has called us to become more and more like Him. When Jesus saves us, He initiates a relationship with us. As we will see, when Jesus initiates a relationship, it is not just societal; it is personal.

Both attention and affection represent unique levels of spiritual commitment and of our seeking after the things of God. This was what God was asking of me: Would I render my attention and affection to Him, and would I commit myself to serving Him? It was not just an acquaintance; it is a knowing. This can only come about when you willingly avail yourself by giving away your most prized and cherished possession, whatever it may be, so that you can spend time with Him. God has since unveiled my eyes so that I could at least