Don’t Miss This

“The Lord said to Moses, “Why do you cry to me? Tell the people of Israel to
go forward” (Exodus 14:15, ESV).

The children of Israel were facing a dilemma. The army of Pharaoh behind
them and the Red Sea in front of them. The mountains flanked them. What
would they do?

God said to Moses to take the children of Israel forward. “Go forward” the
Lord God said. Moses did not choose to be nostalgic about the past to what
God has already done.  He could have prayed and not listened to God. After
whining Moses could have said, “You are on your own.” Moses could have
disobeyed God.

Moses led the children of Israel forward into a massive sea. In that moment
of crisis he led them forward. This is a Red Sea Rule. Quit marinating on
the ups and downs of your life. Fix your gaze on the present and look to the
future and go forward. Do what God has said to do.

Solomon says, “Let your eyes look forward; fix your gaze straight ahead.
Carefully consider the path for your feet, and all your ways will be
established. Don’t turn to the right or to the left; keep your feet away
from evil” (Proverbs 4:25-27).

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  • Whiners or Workers?

    “Do everything without complaining and arguing, so that you may become
    blameless and pure, children of God without fault in a crooked and depraved
    generation, in which you shine like stars in the universe as you hold out
    the word of life” (Philippians 2:14-16).

    J.B. Philipps translates this verse: “Do all you have to do without
    grumbling or arguing.” Don’t be a whiner. Kim and I went to the library
    years ago and found a video entitled “Wendy the Whiner.” We showed it to our
    oldest and every time she felt like whining we would remind her of the cloud
    that came from Wendy’s mouth when she whined.

    It is not fair to ask others to do something that you and I would not do by
    ourself. If it is leading a family, a Sunday School class, a youth group, a
    group of deacons, a small group, or in any situation or group, the one who
    leads will lead out front without grumbling. This is not to show off or to
    pour on guilt, but it is to grow oneself for the glory of God personally and
    socially.

    It has been said that most of the significant things done in the world were
    done by persons who were either too busy or too sick. There are few ideal
    and leisurely settings for the disciplines of growth. Unity and harmony in
    the home and the church home is paramount to the glory of God!

  • Serving a Friend for God

    “Elisha the son of Shaphat is here, who poured water on the hands of Elijah” (2 Kings 3:11).

    Everyone needs a friend who is true. But what we need more is to be a friend who is true. Elijah had a friend in Elisha. Elisha was chosen by God to become a friend of Elijah. Though Elijah found Elisha and threw his mantle over him for the purpose that he might train him, prepare him, and lift him to the office of a prophet, Elijah’s training led to a deep friendship.

    Are you a true friend? Do you serve your friend in the Lord with compassion, prayer, and love? Will you miss this friend when he or she is gone from earth? Today in our society many people are “thankful for us” but are you “thankful for a friend.” Elisha poured his life into his aging friend. Why did he pour water into the hands of Elijah? Is this symbolism for serving Elijah? Did Elijah’s hands carry arthritis? Did the warm water help?
     
    The Master’s yoke is to led  and taught by God to become a true friend to others.     God needs you and wants you to surrender to Him so that you may encourage and build others up. We all need a friend but we need to become a friend first of all.

  • Not Knowing Enough To Talk Sense

    “Then He commanded His disciples that they should tell no one that He was Jesus the Christ” (Matthew 16:20).

    “Tell the vision to no one until the Son of Man is risen from the dead”          (Matthew 17:9).

    There were times when the Lord Jesus told his disciples not to speak to anyone about what they saw or heard.  Why? They did not know enough to talk sense about what was before them.

    Unless we know Jesus as the risen, living, and indwelling Savior, as a present-tense reality in our hearts and life, then the Lord Jesus wants our mouth to be kept closed. Why?  Because we will not know enough about Him worth saying.

    God wants us to know Him through His Son by an ever-present reality.   When life becomes an adventure in dependence upon His life in us, dead to yourself and alive to God, you and I will share the Life of Jesus Christ and we will share His victory, though a thousand or more temptations assail us.  Then we will have something to tell.  And something to see.  And someone to love.

    It is not a matter of our doing our best for Him, but of Christ being His best in us.  This is the Good News that is ours to tell!

  • Mirror, Mirror, on the Wall

    “But be ye doers of the word and not hearers only, deceiving your own selves” (James 1:22).

    When you say you believe a biblical truth, where does that belief come from? Some might say:

    * My parents taught it to me.

    * It’s what my pastor believes.

    * I read it in a Christian book.

    * A famous Christian said it.

    * It just feels right.

    * It’s what I’ve always believed.

    * It gives me comfort to believe it.

    * It makes me happy.

    * It seems more inclusive.

    * I can’t imagine God behaving otherwise.

    * I seriously prayed about it.

    * It’s in the Bible.

    There is only one 100 per cent reliable source–the application of the Bible in daily life led and supplied by the Spirit of God. The bottom line of any belief we hold onto is if it can be backed up by Scripture. If the Word of God does not back that belief and that action then it is no more than wishful thinking, speculation, or a theory with no impetus of God’s power.

    Too many today do not live lives backed by the Word of God. Their plumbline is what they feel or think. It is not according to the Word of God. It causes disruptions in the body of Christ. Therefore we have a church and a nation that is run by our wants rather than by God’s will. The church has run amuck today because it does not run on the tracks of the Word of God led by the Spirit of the Living God. These are our beliefs and it is what we do to satisfy us.

    Only Scripture applied by discernment, led by the Holy Spirit, involving both the will and the mind, engaged by the study and application of the Word by faith, really works. Only then will the Word of God transform a person’s thinking, focusing the lens through which he or she sees God, life, others, the world, and reality itself. We have a generation of people doing what is right in their own eyes when they really believe they are doing it God’s way.

     

     

     

     

  • Momentary Marriage

    “When they rise from the dead, they neither marry nor or given in marriage, but are like angels in heaven” (Mark 12:25).

    There is no human marriage after death. The shadow of the covenant made before God turns into reality in the moment of death. It is the reality of marriage to Christ–the marriage of His glorified Church. Nothing is lost. The music of marriage is transposed into something much higher.

    Those who have departed this world are closer to each other in love than they were on earth. They “shine like the sun in the kingdom of their Father” (Matthew 13:43). They are perfect which points to the glory of Christ.

    Dietrich Bonhoeffer was engaged to Maria von Wedemeyer before he was hanged at dawn on April 9, 1945. He was a young pastor in Germany. He opposed Hitler and Nazism, and because of this he was arrested and assassinated. While in prison he wrote these words from the military section of the prison at Tegel, Berlin. He called it “A Wedding Sermon from a Prison Cell.”

     

    Marriage is more than your love for each other…in your love you see only the heaven of your own happiness, but in marriage you are placed at a post of responsibility towards the world and mankind. Your love is your own private possession, but marriage is more than something personal–it is status, and office. Just as it is the crown, and not merely the will to rule, that makes the king, so it is marriage, and not merely your love for each other, that joins you together in the sights of God and man.

     

    Marriage is more than your love for each other. Much more! The meaning of marriage is the display of the convent-keeping love between Christ and those who have been born from above. Romance, sex, and childbearing are temporary gifts of God. They are not part of the next life. And they are not even guaranteed for this life. May marriage be recognized “for the praise of his glory.” May we realize that marriage is more than about us but about Him.  Amen.

     

     

     

     

     

  • No Bones About It

    “The hand of the Lord was upon me, and carried me out in the spirit of the Lord, and set me down in the midst of the valley which was full of bones” (Ezekiel 37:1).

    Where are the young pastors and young people or old people who are captured and carried by God? Where are those in the church today who are set down right in the midst of dry bones? Where are the people of God that are not nodding in the pew but noticed by God and used by God?

    The blessing of dry bones has to begin with us being a blessing. We are to be captured by God, carried and set in the middle of the dry bones, and we are commanded to preach to the bones. Ezekiel was told to do the same. We are to “tell forth plainly.” Instead of being tossed on a dry dead bone heap, we are told to preach plainly to “them there bones.”

    When we listen and we tell plainly, then a miracle will happen. The dry bones began to find moisture, life, and begin to stand up. Instead of being famished, they become fat. They march around speaking of the resurrected Lord. Oh the sound of awakening will be heard in your village if you will listen and then tell. God specializes in graveyards. It is just a affirmation of allowing Him to capture us, then carry us, and command us to preach to the bones. Watch for the breath of God to blow!