Category: Uncategorized

On the Way to Jerusalem

Luke 18:31
And taking the twelve, he said to them, “See, we are going up to Jerusalem, and everything that is written about the Son of Man by the prophets will be accomplished.

Jesus was perfectly attuned to the work that He was called to do.  He spent His entire time on earth completely focused on doing the will of His Father.  He did not care if He preached to one or to ten thousand.  He was not seeking recognition for the good work that He was doing in the sense that we would seek recognition for ourselves.  

Jesus was only concerned with pleasing the Father.  Nothing could discourage Our Lord on His way to Jerusalem to meet His fate at Calvary.  No amount of suffering could deter Him.  No distraction could lead Him to hurry to the next task.  The only task that Jesus was concerned with was the one that the Father put before Him.  

It is important that we tune into the voice of the Holy Spirit in our lives so that we can learn to align our personal plans with the plans that God has for our lives.   We must find our way to our Jerusalem.  We must let nothing take us off our path.

Prayer
Heavenly Father, we thank You for providing for our eternal resting place in the New Jerusalem.  We praise Our Savior, Jesus, for clearing our path to get there.  We ask for the Holy Spirit to direct us to our path and prepare us for the journey.  We pray that we may be strengthened so that we may be steadfast in doing only the things that are pleasing to You, Father.  May all the glory be Yours.

My Lord, My Master and My King

John 13:13
You call me Teacher and Lord, and you are right, for so I am.

In every other religion in the world, the final goal is to have done enough to satisfy a god who provides eternal rewards for those who fulfill the demands.  The followers of these gods live under a task master who has nothing to offer to those who bow before him.

For followers of Jesus Christ, the servitude to the Master is totally different.  The Master has taken care of everything that is necessary for the servant to be worthy of eternal reward with Almighty God.  The Master promises to perfect His strength in the weaknesses of every follower so that they are healed of their wounds, redeemed from their transgressions and made holy and worthy to stand before The Father for all eternity.

Sitting under this Teacher and Lord, Jesus Christ, means that we have someone who knows us better than ourselves, who is closer to us than our friends and family, who understands the deepest desires of our hearts and fulfills them.  Through this Master, the Son of God, we have the security that our eternal destination is settled.  There is no need to question whether we have done enough.  In the words of Jesus himself, “It is finished.”

Prayer
Heavenly Father, we thank You that everything that needed to done for us to meet You in heaven for all eternity was finished on the Cross.  We bless the name of Jesus, Our Master and Our King, who completed it all on our behalf.  We pray, Lord, that we may sit humbly at the feet of Our Master and surrender to the way, the truth and the life that is in Him.  May we become vessels of His perfect love and forgiveness.  May we become instruments of His good work.

For the Glory of Almighty God

Isaiah 49:5
And now the LORD speaks–the one who formed me in my mother’s womb to be his servant, who commissioned me to bring Israel back to him. The LORD has honored me, and my God has given me strength.

We learn three important things from the prophet Isaiah that pertains to each of us:  
1) God created us.
2) He called us to serve Him.
3) He will give us all we need to fulfill our calling.

The entire human race was created to serve and glorify God forever.  We cannot fulfill our responsibility to glorify God if we live in darkness.  We must live in The Light.

Christ dwelling in us and reigning in us is our hope for living a life that glorifies Almighty God.  Through the presence of Jesus Christ our calling to serve God will be revealed to us.  Through the presence of Jesus, all the mysteries of heaven will be revealed to us.  We will not be shortchanged in any manner when it comes to us being able to glorify God.

As we surrender to the direction of the Holy Spirit in our lives, we will fulfill everything that the Lord has prepared for us.  We will receive all of God’s loving kindness, mercy and grace.  We will be given all the tolerance, patience, discernment, wisdom and strength that we need to fulfill God’s creative purposes for our lives.  Through it all, we will glorify Our Heavenly Father.

Prayer
Heavenly Father, we thank You for the loving kindness, the mercy and the grace that You have bestowed upon us through Your Son, Jesus.  We rejoice in knowing that You have a wonderful plan for our lives that will bring glory to You forever.  We pray, Lord, that You bring us to a place of repentance so that we may turn away from all that displeases You and turn toward every good thing that You have set aside for us.  May it all be for your eternal glory.

Reflecting His Grace and Holiness

Matthew 5:48
You therefore must be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect.

We are most comfortable in life when we are around people we like.  We also feel comfortable when we are asked to do things that we know that we are capable of doing successfully.  In these times of ease, our personality and our capabilities shine and our performance appears to be nearly perfect.  Unfortunately, this type of behavior, while pleasing to some, does not usually reflect the presence of the One who dwells within us and does not produce enough fruit to draw the world around us to Our Savior.  It truly affects little.
  
On the other hand, when we follow the perfect example of Jesus during times when we are challenged by our situations, we allow the fruits of the Holy Spirit to flow through us.  The world around us sees the modeling of Our Savior and is drawn to Him.  It is our duty as Christians to desire to press forward in grace and holiness, so that we may conform ourselves to the example of Jesus Christ under even the most difficult circumstances.  

Prayer
Heavenly Father, we thank You for providing Your Son, Jesus, to be our perfect model for life.  We thank You for providing the Holy Spirit to guide us to follow Jesus’ example.  We rejoice in knowing that our obedience will result in the gifts of the Holy Spirit being poured out on the world around us.  We pray that we may exhibit unusual grace, gentleness, faithfulness, loving kindness, patience, self-control and goodness as we are being taxed by our situations.  May You receive all the praise and glory, Lord.

Please excuse my absence

I will be unable to post May 15 – 19.  Please feel free to visit all my archived posts.  Below is a message from Charles Spurgeon.

Morning and Evening 9/15 AM

He shall not be afraid of evil tidings.

Christian, you ought not to dread the arrival of evil tidings; because if you are distressed by them, what do you more than other men? Other men have not your God to fly to; they have never proved His faithfulness as you have done, and it is no wonder if they are bowed down with alarm and cowed with fear: but you profess to be of another spirit; you have been begotten again unto a lively hope, and your heart lives in heaven and not on earthly things; now, if you are seen to be distracted as other men, what is the value of that grace which you profess to have received? Where is the dignity of that new nature which you claim to possess? Again, if you should be filled with alarm, as others are, you would, doubtless, be led into the sins so common to others under trying circumstances. The ungodly, when they are overtaken by evil tidings, rebel against God; they murmur, and think that God deals hardly with them. Will you fall into that same sin? Will you provoke the Lord as they do? Moreover, unconverted men often run to wrong means in order to escape from difficulties, and you will be sure to do the same if your mind yields to the present pressure. Trust in the Lord, and wait patiently for Him. Your wisest course is to do as Moses did at the Red Sea, “Stand still and see the salvation of God.” For if you give way to fear when you hear of evil tidings, you will be unable to meet the trouble with that calm composure which nerves for duty, and sustains under adversity. How can you glorify God if you play the coward? Saints have often sung God’s high praises in the fires, but will your doubting and desponding, as if you had none to help you, magnify the Most High? Then take courage, and relying in sure confidence upon the faithfulness of your covenant God, “let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid.”

Living a Simple Life

2 Corinthians 11:3
But I fear, lest by any means, as the serpent beguiled Eve through his subtilty, so your minds should be corrupted from the simplicity that is in Christ.

Satan’s fingerprints are all over the complexity of issues that we deal with daily in this world.  The tactic is simple.  The more stuff that we have to deal with the less time that we have to focus on Our Savior.

The tough part is that separating the stuff out of our lives is not always a black and white situation.  We are faced with many things that are covered in layers of grey.  Each layer is designed by Satan to confuse us, make us see evil as good and keep us under stress as we deal with all the clutter in our lives.

When our focus is in Jesus Christ, our lives become much simpler.  He that dwells within us is the essence of everything good and the absence of evil.  Simplicity in life is seeing, believing in and adhering to the black and white choices offered by the teachings of Jesus.

Prayer
Heavenly Father, we thank You for revealing the way, the truth and the life that is Your Son, Jesus.  We praise the name of Jesus for modeling the good and perfect life that we should strive for.  We rejoice in knowing that our choices in life are easy when we abide in Our Savior.  We pray, Father, that the Holy Spirit will provide the wisdom that we need to discern the proper choices that we need to make in life for ourselves and our families.  May we learn to live in the light and shut the door on the darkness that the world offers.

The Faithfulness of the Work of Jesus Christ

John 17:4
I glorified you on earth, having accomplished the work that you gave me to do.

There is no joy on earth that can compare to having full union with Jesus Christ.  We will not experience the complete fullness of this union until we meet Our Savior in heaven.  In the meantime, we can experience a joy here on earth through our union with Christ that will exceed any expectation that we could ever imagine. 

As we surrender our lives to Jesus, just as He surrendered His life to The Father, we will experience through Our Savior the union that He has and that He had with The Father when He was on earth.  And just as Jesus was faithful in completing His work on earth, He will also be faithful in completing His work in us.  

Satan and our own flesh will come against us, but The Spirit of the Lord will insure that we overcome the work of the enemy.  We do not need to be concerned about our circumstances, Our Savior will be sufficient.  And it will all be for the glory of The Father.

Prayer
Heavenly Father, we thank You for the grace that You have given us through Your Son to overcome the world.  We bless the name of Jesus for His faithfulness in completing the good work that You gave Him to do.  We pray that the Holy Spirit will lead us and strengthen us so that we may fully surrender to Your will just as Your Son surrendered His all to You.  May it all be for the Your glory, for the glory of The Son and the glory of the Holy Spirit.

In the Sovereign Will of The Father

Matthew 20:23
He said to them, “You will drink my cup, but to sit at my right hand and at my left is not mine to grant, but it is for those for whom it has been prepared by my Father.”

We have been taught that we can ask anything in the name of Jesus and it will be granted to us.  This is true, but our solicitations can be granted only if what we ask is in the will of The Father.  This can cause spiritual confusion for us when our prayers are not answered or, more correctly, have not been answered according to the desires of our flesh.

God has been faithful in providing institutions on earth which can help us to understand how this precept works.  As parents, we can recall times that we withheld things from our children because we knew that is was not the right thing for them at the time.  What they were asking for did not fit in with the overall good that we were seeking for them.  As business leaders, we have denied the requests of good and faithful employees because it would not be beneficial to the company to grant their request.

Almighty God has prepared things for us that have been in place before the foundations of the earth were formed.  Everything that He grants us through His Son is in accordance with His good and perfect plan for our lives in His kingdom.

Prayer
Heavenly Father, we thank You for preparing a place for us in Your kingdom.  We bless the name of Your Son, who You have given us to be our mediator as we seek Your grace in our lives.  Teach us, Lord, to seek those things that are according to Your sovereign will and pleasure.  We pray that the Holy Spirit will redirect us when our petitions are of our flesh and not of the fullness of Jesus Christ who dwells within us.   

Drawing Near to the Lord

Revelation 1:17
When I saw him, I fell at his feet as though dead. Then he placed his right hand on me and said: “Do not be afraid. I am the First and the Last.

As we draw in closer to the Lord, His light will reveal every iniquity in us and His fire will begin to burn away that which offends Him.  As we draw even closer, the purification process will become even more intense.

The Lord will test us to see how difficult a journey we are willing to take to be close to Him.  He will send people into our lives who will be challenges for us.  He will ask us to serve them through the most menial and commonplace order.  He will ask us to wash their feet.  

Through it all, His divine presence will be with us.  May we listen to His voice and receive His perfect love.  We will not be able to bear the nearness if we are not fully submitted to His rule and reign in our lives.  May we give up ourselves wholly to Him.

Prayer
Heavenly Father, we thank You for the gift of Your presence in our lives.  We praise the name of Jesus who has made it possible for us to stand before You.  We ask forgiveness for all the things in our lives that have offended you.  We pray that the Light of Your Son will reveal the darkness in our lives.  We ask for the grace to be able to surrender to the good work that You are doing in us to prepare us to stand in Your presence for all eternity.  

The Breath of Life

Psalm 150:6
Let everything that has breath praise the LORD!  Praise the LORD!

Today’s world can literally take our breath away.  Our workplaces tend to be grueling places that are filled with stress.  Our families are ripe with ongoing calamity that can suck the life out of us.  The fear of evil in the world around us is now a constant burden.  At any moment, the world is ready to steal our peace.  

Fortunately, our peace is but a quiet prayer away.  A simple praise moment with the Lord and we are restored.  A few minutes in His Word and we are strengthened. 

Praise the Lord for He gave us the breath of life.  Praise the Lord for He sustains our every breath.  Praise the Lord for He takes away our breath when He is ready to receive us.  Praise the Lord for He provides the way that allows us to breath our last breath in the comfort, peace and confidence of our salvation.  May we use every breath we take to worship Him.

Prayer
Heavenly Father, we thank You for the breath of life that You have given us.  We thank You for sustaining our breath on earth.  We thank You for providing Your Son, Jesus, so that the breath of life will continue in us for all eternity.  We surrender our every breath to You, Father.  May each breath we take worship You.  May each breath we take praise You.  May each breath we take bring honor and glory to You, Your Son and the Holy Spirit.