God's Top 10!

For Tuesday, February 17, 2026:

Romans 7:1 NLT: “Now, dear brothers and sisters—you who are familiar with the law—don’t you know that the law applies only while a person is living?”

God gave us laws, sometimes called commandments. They are not optional. God’s laws define sin, and help us get along with God and with one another. Laws are for the living. There may be other laws when we reach the next reality of heaven. We’ll find out on a need-to-know basis.

There are 613 commandments in scripture, things God said we should do. Some are to honor God, while others keep us safe and healthy. Some help us interact with others. A few laws were given from the start, from creation. Others were added along the way. Moses received the 10 Commandments on Mt. Sinai as the Jews were relocating from Egypt to the Promised Land. Most Christians only know about God’s Top 10! It’s not a bad start!

A lot of what we call commandments are really common sense nowadays. If we’d stop and think a situation through to it’s logical conclusion, we’d already know the best way to proceed. The New Covenant gave mankind a conscience, so that we’d instinctively know right from wrong. God’s laws are written on our hearts so we can’t forget or lose them. We advise people to “do the next right thing.” You should already know what it is!

If you’re alive, you’re living under God’s laws. As we counsel others to follow Jesus, they too need to know about God’s laws. Once everyone understands that the words in the Bible are God-inspired and are the true, obeying His commandments will make a lot of sense!

Pastor Norton Lawellin

Jesus In the City Fellowship

The Father’s House

Truth and Freedom Church

Value System!

For Tuesday, August 26, 2025:

Mark 14:1b NLT: “The leading priests and the teachers of religious law were still looking for an opportunity to capture Jesus secretly and kill him.”

It was two days before Pasach, the Passover, the Festival of Unleavened Bread. The men behind the conspiracy against Jesus were priests and Jewish teachers of religious law. They should have known better.

On one hand, their religious beliefs taught that murder is wrong. Their parents and schools taught that murder is wrong. They teach others their deep-rooted moral belief that murder is wrong. And here they all are, plotting a murder, in direct conflict with their own value system, their own beliefs. Listen to this: Anyone who is doing what they would counsel others to NOT do is caught up in a big mental mess. In this case, perpetuating their religion had taken precedence over the religion’s fundamental principles, and that’s backwards. The priests believed Jesus was threatening their religion, and suddenly, plotting a murder became acceptable to them. They were wrong.

The priests and religious teachers didn’t want this event to happen on a holy day. The people might rebel! This tells us that, deep down, they knew the whole affair was wrong. If this secret were exposed, people could lose confidence in their religion.

With Jesus, God gave us the New Covenant. Believers have God’s Laws written on their hearts. In other words, God gave us a conscience. We should instinctively know right from wrong. So when a question arises, we should ask ourselves, “Is this good, is this right, is it fair, is it honest – should we be doing this thing?” With our God-inspired internal value system, we already know the right answer!

Pastor Norton Lawellin

Jesus In the City Fellowship

New Covenant!

August 11, 2025, Monday Message:

Hebrews 8:8 NLT: “When God found fault with the people, he said: ‘The day is coming when I will make a new covenant with the people of Israel and Judah.’”

Let’s be clear about this. The fault wasn’t God’s. Mankind was the problem. If God erred in any way, it would be underestimating the sinful propensity of mankind.

The Old Covenant was like a pass/fail system. Do everything correctly and you advance to the eternal Kingdom. Disobey and it’s the lake of fire. There was no middle ground. This resulted in very few joining the Creator in the hereafter.

But God’s desire is that none would perish. So he decided it was time for a new deal, a New Covenant. With the New Covenant, no one can say they didn’t know the rules, because God will “put my laws in their minds and write them on their hearts.” In other words, we now instinctively know right from wrong. With the New Covenant, God gave everyone a conscience! He added, “I will be their God, and they will be my people. They will no longer need to teach their neighbors, nor will they need to teach their relatives, saying, ‘You should know the Lord.’ For everyone, from the least to the greatest, will know me already.”

Our reconciliation with the Lord didn’t happen because mankind became perfect. We’re still flawed sinners. What changed is that God expanded his forgiveness. He sent Jesus to earth as the propitiation for the sins of the world. Those who repent and believe in Jesus, the Son of God, will be forgiven. That’s what the Bible says!

Pastor Norton Lawellin

Jesus In the City Fellowship

New Covenant!

For Thursday, September 12, 2024:

1 John 2:27 NLT: “But you have received the Holy Spirit, and he lives within you, so you don’t need anyone to teach you what is true. For the Spirit teaches you everything you need to know, and what he teaches is true—it is not a lie. So just as he has taught you, remain in fellowship with Christ.”

Believers no longer have to memorize long lists of complicated laws and strive to obey them all. That’s the Old Covenant. But Jesus gave us the New Covenant. (Hebrews 10:16) “This is the new covenant I will make with my people on that day, says the LORD: I will put my laws in their hearts, and I will write them on their minds.” (Romans 2:15) “They demonstrate that God’s law is written in their hearts, for their own conscience and thoughts either accuse them or tell them they are doing right.”

You might say that Jesus invented our conscience, our inherent sense of knowing right from wrong. We receive that gift when we are filled with the Holy Spirit. And since the Spirit is our triune God (Father, Son, Holy Spirit), he cannot lie. He cannot send us in a bad direction. God is our Father, and believers are his children, and parents only want the best for their progeny.

We can count on the guidance of the Holy Spirit!

Pastor Norton Lawellin

Jesus In the City Fellowship

Faith Response!

For Wednesday, July 24, 2024:

2 Peter 1:5b-8 NLT: “Supplement your faith with a generous provision of moral excellence, and moral excellence with knowledge, and knowledge with self-control, and self-control with patient endurance, and patient endurance with godliness, and godliness with brotherly affection, and brotherly affection with love for everyone.”

Faith is trust in an eyewitness’ testimony, and this scripture details what our response should be now that we know that faith. Being on the “Jesus Team” demands high morals, knowledge, self-control, endurance and brotherly love. This is not an exhaustive list, and we don’t need one. With the New Covenant, God has already written his laws on our hearts. He gave us a conscience, so we instinctively know right from wrong.

So continue doing the right things for the right reasons. If you’re good with your behavior and God is good with your behavior, stop worrying about what others think! Just love the Lord and love your neighbor. Life can be that simple!

"The more you grow like this, the more productive and useful you will be in your knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ.”

Pastor Norton Lawellin

Jesus In the City Fellowship

Trust!

For Tuesday, July 16, 2024:

1 Peter 4:19 NLT: “If you are suffering in a manner that pleases God, keep on doing what is right, and trust your lives to the God who created you, for he will never fail you.”

If you are suffering, that isn’t from God. Sin runs rampant in the human race, and those doing good, those obeying God’s instructions are often criticized out of jealousy, greed or narcissism. God wants us to continue doing right whether criticized or not, whether suffering or not.

Doing the right things for the right reasons is a worthy goal. We already know what to do because, with the New Covenant, God wrote his laws on our hearts. He gave us a conscience. And God gave us the gift of discernment. We don’t need to waste time looking things up in a book. Now we instinctively know right from wrong!

Trust in the Lord with all your heart! He will never fail you!

Pastor Norton Lawellin

Jesus In the City Fellowship

Hopelessly Confused!

For Saturday, May 11, 2024:

Ephesians 4:17 NLT: “With the Lord’s authority I say this: Live no longer as the Gentiles do, for they are hopelessly confused.”

When reading your Bibles, one of the most important things to remember is “context.” The same words can have different meanings in different situations. Paul is not condemning all Gentiles any more than he would exalt all Jews. There are, after all, good Gentiles and bad Jews!

Who Paul is condemning are those living a wild and sinful life, living only for their own pleasure, living only for the world. Do not emulate those who are hopelessly confused. We already know right from wrong, since God’s New Covenant writes God’s Laws on our hearts. God has given each of us his value system. We call it a conscience! If we stop and think for a minute, we already know when we shouldn’t do something.

Many in the world nowadays are “hopelessly confused.” Wars are being fought, and entire races of people are falling victim to genocide. As followers of Jesus, we have been given a higher standard. Live like the Lord says in his Bible!

Norton Lawellin

Jesus In the City Fellowship

New Covenant!

For Friday, July 21, 2023:

Romans 2:14-15 NLT: “Even Gentiles, who do not have God’s written law, show that they know his law when they instinctively obey it, even without having heard it. They demonstrate that God’s law is written in their hearts, for their own conscience and thoughts either accuse them or tell them they are doing right.”

This is the heart of the New Covenant. The Jews had been trying to remember and obey the 613 things God said to do, whereas after Jesus the laws are written on our hearts. We already know right from wrong instinctively. We have a conscience. A preacher doesn’t have to tell us to not murder our neighbor. Even if it wasn’t the law of the land, we already know that taking someone’s life would be a bad idea, a sin.

At the last supper, Jesus said, “This is my blood of the New Covenant, shed for you and for many.” His blood would take away the sins of the world, so we could stop counting laws and use our conscience to focus on being a good person. Jesus gave us the simplified version: “Love God and love your neighbor.”

Trust your God-given conscience!

Pastor Norton Lawellin

Jesus in the City Fellowship

New Covenant!

May 23, 2022 Monday Message:

Jeremiah 31:33-34 NLT: “This is the new covenant I will make with the people of Israel after those days,” says the Lord. “I will put my instructions deep within them, and I will write them on their hearts. I will be their God, and they will be my people. And they will not need to teach their neighbors, nor will they need to teach their relatives, saying, ‘You should know the Lord.’ For everyone, from the least to the greatest, will know me already,” says the Lord. “And I will forgive their wickedness, and I will never again remember their sins.”

Under this New Covenant, God gave us three things: common sense, a conscience and forgiveness. A simple look around should let you know that there is a God, an Intelligent Designer. It’s springtime, and I look at the variety of trees all getting new leaves in just the proper amount, magically recovering from the winter. It’s no accident! We were recently blessed with a new grandson, ever so tiny, but with all the necessary parts! It’s no accident! There IS a God!

God also wrote his value system on our hearts. He gave us a conscience. Everyone knows it’s wrong to lie, to steal and to murder. You can check the Commandments or examine the laws of our land, but everyone already knows we shouldn’t do certain things. We instinctively know how to treat our families and our neighbors.

It was Jesus who brought the New Covenant to the rest of us, to the Gentiles! Our faith is rewarded with forgiveness and a place in God’s eternal Kingdom!

Pastor Norton Lawellin

Jesus in the City Fellowship, 3249 30th Ave. S., Minneapolis, MN 55406