Tag: plans

“Go Out and Win Souls” is Not in the Bible

Matthew 28:19
Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.

How many did you win? How many did you sell? How much profit did you make? These are the clamorings of men and women who trying to measure their success against their perceived plans.

Sometimes it pours over into the things we do in service to Our Lord. How many attended the 11am service? How much did we collect at the offering? How many responded to the altar call? How many were baptized? Man’s desire to satisfy/gratify his own need is insatiable.

Man’s desire to convert God’s work to his own plan is a common practice. Our Heavenly Father has a different plan. Almighty God does not call us to results. Jesus did not tell His disciples to go out and win souls. He asked them to go out and teach the people about having a relationship with Him.

Jesus did not give His disciples a quota, nor does He give us one. He simply asks that we teach the world around us about the relationship that we have with Him.

Let us go out and develop relationships with others so that they will be interested in knowing our story. Let us be prepared to tell them about Our King and His saving grace. Let us trust in the Lord to inspire our listeners to receive His eternal gift.

Prayer
Heavenly Father, we rejoice in knowing that it is Your will that no man shall perish. We thank You for providing the way, the truth and the life that is in Your Son, Jesus. We pray, Father, that You will use us to teach the world about Your wonderful salvation plan. We ask for the grace to set aside our own personal desires and plans so that we may fully submit to the perfect will and plan that You have for our lives. Through the presence and power of Jesus in our lives, may we make disciples of others. We ask all these things in the name of the One who shall have dominion, Jesus Christ.

Adopting an Eternal Perspective

Revelation 21:2
And I saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband.

Most of us were taught to set goals and to develop step-by-step plans to reach our goals, so that the end of our lives will be joyful and satisfying. For many of us, attaining the goals that we set for ourselves has become the driving force that directs the course of our lives. Thus are the ways of man.

In God’s supernatural world, things are totally different. Goals are not set for this world, because God did not create this world to be about our accomplishments. God created this world to prepare us for the eternal life that we will spend in heaven for all eternity. Everything we go through here on earth is part of the process that God puts us through or allows us to go through in order to prepare us for life in new Jerusalem.

We go up to new Jerusalem, not to fulfill our own purposes, but to fulfill the purposes that Almighty God has for us. We are being prepared to go to a place where all things are new. There will be no trouble or tumult. The new Jerusalem is the church of God in its new and perfect state. It is a holy church without blemish and we will be there fully prepared for our place at the wedding feast of the Lamb.

Let us prepare ourselves for our new lives in the kingdom of God. Let us surrender to the work that the Holy Spirit is doing in our lives. Let us repent of the things that the Holy Spirit reveals to us. Let us be obedient to the things that the Holy Spirit urges us to do. Let us rejoice in our new lives in Jesus Christ.

Prayer
Heavenly Father, we thank You for preparing a place for us at the wedding feast of the Lamb. We praise You and worship You for providing a way for us to be made acceptable to take our place at this great banquet. Father, open our eyes that we may see Your perspective of what our lives are meant to be. We pray that you show us how to set aside all that this world offers in exchange for the eternal life that we will spend with You for all eternity. We ask all these things in the name of the True Bread of Heaven, Jesus Christ.

Real Productivity Comes When We Wait on the Lord

Psalm 130:5
I wait for the Lord, my whole being waits, and in his word I put my hope.

In our society, patience is a lost virtue. Everybody wants satisfaction instantly. Nobody is willing to wait on anything. This may be especially true at the start of a new year as many of us have such strong intentions of getting our new year off to a good start. Each of us is anxious to jump into the new year to get on with our perceived new paths to being more productive and more prosperous.

This rush to get things done is in direct opposition to how Our Heavenly Father works. No single thing is done in His kingdom until everything is in perfect order for the perfect result. This is especially true in our lives. The Lord does not want us to advance until He has prepared us and our surroundings properly. If we try to move ahead of God’s plan, we will meet heartbreak and disappointment.

From a human perspective, we can make a lot of good decisions in our lives without God. We can also accomplish a lot things deemed good by the world without God. We cannot, however, accomplish anything of real kingdom value without placing our reliance on Our Heavenly Father and waiting on Him to direct us through His Holy Spirit. In order to be deemed good and faithful servants, we must learn to wait on the Lord in all things. We must learn to wait on His grace and the working of His power in our lives.

Let us believe God to be who He says He is. Let us learn to wait for God to open doors for us. Let us learn to rest until He puts things in perfect order for us.

Prayer
Heavenly Father, we thank You for working all things in our lives for our good when we trust in You. We thank You for providing the Holy Spirit to be with us always to remind us to lean on You and not on ourselves. We pray, Lord, that you will give us the patience to wait on you. We ask that You show us how to be still in the valley as you prepare the mountain top for us and those that You have given us to serve. We rejoice in Your faithfulness. We ask all these things in the name of the One who did nothing without knowing He was operating in Your will, Your Son, Jesus.

Putting Our Trust in Almighty God in the New Year

Jeremiah 29:11
For I know the plans I have for you, declares the LORD, plans for welfare and not for evil, to give you a future and a hope.

What better way to start the New Year than to proclaim our hope promised to us in Jeremiah 29:11. Hope in the promises of Our Savior will never fail us. Hope in Our Savior will never disappoint us. Hope in Our Savior will result in nothing short of us spending eternity in bliss under the glory of Almighty God in the company of the gathering of saints.

We should know that our hope and our future is not limited just to us as individuals. We should claim this hope for our nation as well. If we return to being a nation that puts its trust in God, as our currency declares for all to see, we will see our nation rise up once again to claim its seat as the most powerful nation on earth.

But it all depends on where we place our hope. Society would lead us to believe that our hope is rested in the men and women who are our elected officials. They certainly play a role. But as the promise of Jeremiah teaches, our hope is in the Lord who declares His good plans for us. Yet in our society today, we find it often regarded as shameful to proclaim hope in Jesus Christ. In Paul’s writings to the Romans, he prepares us for these times as he establishes that there is to be no shame in following and putting our eternal hope in Jesus Christ. Who could have ever imagined that there would be a time when this teaching would be relevant throughout most of the Western world. Yet here we are.

Christians are mocked daily on talk shows, news shows and entertainment shows. To publicly stand for the very truths given to us by Our Heavenly Father makes us bigots, haters, etc. Now more than ever, we are called to share our good news with the world around us. The hope that we have in Christ is the only hope left for our nations.

Let us wait not a minute longer to proclaim our personal and national hope in Jesus Christ. Let us boldly claim His promise for our welfare and our future.

Prayer
Heavenly Father, we thank You for this new year that You have given us. We thank You for providing the Holy Spirit to give us the wisdom we need to see through false teaching and the strength that we need to stand against the lies that this world is trying to get us to accept. We pray also, Father, that Your Holy Spirit will give us the courage we need to boldly present the “way, the truth and the life” that is in your Son, Jesus. We ask all these things in the precious, holy and mighty name of Jesus Christ.

The Best Plan for Our Life is God’s Plan

Proverbs 3:5
Trust in the LORD with all your heart, and do not lean on your own understanding.

Through His love, His grace and His mercy, we are called to be servants of Almighty God here on earth and in heaven for all eternity. We were created in His image for this purpose in order to bring Him praise and glory. Being conscious of our own weakness, we should wait on and look to Our Master for our direction and our strength.

Our focus needs to be on God at all times. We should be expectant that He will direct our ways and make provision for the fulfillment of our calling. We should understand that He will set the limits of how high He is ready for us to go and He will set the timing of when we will get there. We should recognize that He knows exactly what He has planned for our lives and the lives of those around us.

If we focus on our problems or our visions without including Our Heavenly Father in the process, we will set expectations for ourselves that are outside of God’s will for our lives. We will be setting ourselves up for burn out or for seeing results that are disappointing to us. It is almost certain that we will not go as high as God had planned for us or that we will give up on our calling before it is fulfilled because we are not in tune with God’s timing.

Let us make Jesus Christ the Master over our lives. Let us seek the will of Our Master in everything that we do. Let us lean not on our personal plans. Let us serve Our Lord and Our King in accordance with the perfectly timed, perfect plans that He has set aside for us.

Prayer
Heavenly Father, we thank You for allowing us to be Your servants. We rejoice in knowing that just as the slaves go to their master for their direction and all of their needs, we can go to You for everything in our lives. We pray, Lord, that just as the slaves wait on their master before they do anything, we will learn to wait on the direction of Your Holy Spirit before we take on anything. We ask that we learn to rely on Your hand, Almighty God. May we reach the fullness of service that You have planned for us. We ask all these things in the name of Our Lord, Our Master and Our King, Jesus Christ.