Includes...
Today's communion is a time to meditate on Psalm 34, which has some amazing promises. David wrote this Psalm during a very trying time when he was on the run from Saul and was fleeing the country to escape. This Psalm has some of our 4 fundamentals in them.
Psalm 34
Of David. When he pretended to be insane before Abimelek, who drove him away, and he left.
1 I will extol the Lord at all times; his praise will always be on my lips.
2 I will glory in the Lord; let the afflicted hear and rejoice.
3 Magnify the Lord with me; let us exalt his name together.
4 I sought the Lord, and he answered me; he delivered me from all my fears.
5 Those who look to him are radiant; their faces are never covered with shame.
6 This poor man called, and the Lord heard him; he saved him out of all his troubles.
7 The angel of the Lord encamps around those who fear him, and he delivers them.
8 Taste and see that the Lord is good; blessed...
Time is often the biggest source of pressure in our lives. Imagine you have a bill to pay or project to complete and it's due 5 years from now versus tomorrow. The difference in time creates much more pressure. To give someone extended time, is to give them grace. We even call it a grace period.
I believe God built time and change into the world because he loves us too much to let us stay the way we are right now. But, God gives us extended time to get things right. The other night I was reading in the gospels about the disciples asking Jesus when everything would be fulfilled in his kingdom. And Jesus told them, 'It's not for you to know the dates and times the Father has set."
This may be a silly question but why are we not supposed to know this? I think it is because God uses this principle of extended time, and if we knew the dates and times we would think they are too far out.
The gift of extended time is also something we can implement...
We are in a time of the year when God starts shifting things around. This is often a time of transition where people might be moving, changing roles, or other doors of opportunity may open. When these opportunities come they are good but the transitions can often be messy and disordered as our old rhythms and routines get disrupted.
Order is about positioning and when pieces are shifting around we have to recreate order. Order doesn't last... it's dynamic and must be flexible and adaptable.
When things shift and change we will have to find new rhythms, habits, and systems that work to create the new order. The old order won't work anymore because the pieces and environment are different so we must be diligent about making adjustments to put things back into position. With new changes and growth the initial disorder can seem overwhelming and stressful, but remember God is a God of order and he lives within you. He will help you get it all structured and...
Understanding God's grace with our hearts is a very important part of our walk with God.
Colossians 1:6 says the gospel bears fruit in our lives ever since the day we understood God's grace.
To truly understand something we must "get it," from all angles and perspectives. We often think of God's grace as his unmerited favor and him treating us better than we deserve. And this is a big part of grace but there are many more angles to consider.
Here are some additional angles of grace to meditate on today.
The other night my daughter said something very interesting...
She said, " When people are blind their ability to hear improves and I think since we can't see God it improves our ability to hear from him and grow our faith."
Then we began to discuss Romans 10:17 which says that faith comes by hearing and hearing by the word of God(some versions say the word of Christ).
Faith comes by hearing, but it is possible not to have ears that hear. This week in our Partner's Zoom we were discussing how we can hear the same things over and over and keep getting new things out of them. Sometimes our ears filter things out for whatever reason. I think that as our faith grows it opens up new dimensions of hearing, and we can hear things that we were deaf to before. But hearing comes by God's word and the anointed word of Christ. God's anointed word is what opens our ears to hear so that our faith increases.
A habit that I developed early in my walk with God is listening to...
When we lose something it is often more exciting to find it again than it was to have it the first time. I once had a time when some money fell out of my pocket. I searched and searched for the money but couldn't find it any where. A few hours later it finally turned up and it was more exciting to find it again than it was to receive it the first time.
In Luke 15 Jesus tells three lost and found stories... The parable of the shepherd who leaves the 99 sheep to find the one lost sheep, the parable of the woman who loses one of her ten coins, and the parable of the prodigal son.
In each instance when the lost was found it brought great joy and they celebrated with their neighbors and friends.
As we take communion today let it be a reminder of how much joy it brings God when any of us miss it but turn back to him. Let it also be a time to remember that God restores and when he restores something that was lost it is cherished even more.
I am...
During this time of the year many transitions happen and often we may find ourselves with new people in leadership roles around us. It is very important to God that we honor the people he has placed in authority and leadership in our lives. This means children honoring parents, spouses honoring one another, employees honoring bosses, honoring church leadership, honoring mentors and coaches, and honoring governmental leaders. We are supposed to outdo one another in showing honor. Honor has a lot to do with what we say and the tone in which we say it. Honor is also conveyed in our actions.
Honor is about the heart. You can be in total disagreement with someone but still honor them. When we get honor right it helps us stay positioned in the light. This was the original sin of Satan. He didn't have honor for God and thought he could do better, so he rebelled. When we step out of honor we step out of the light and shut off the flow of God's grace. A lack of...
When we feel insecure it causes us to turn inward and steals our presence, which is a big deal because I believe presence is one of the greatest keys to God's grace flowing. Insecurity usually causes us to get into our own head and magnify things that will probably never happen. And this robs our presence and awareness of what is happening around us in the present moment. Insecurity steals the gift of the present moment.
Our security is supposed to be found in God's unconditional and unfailing love for us. In perfect love there is no fear. But this does take trusting in him. When we trust in his unfailing love our security grows, and when security grows it leads to more presence, then presence causes joy to flow, and when joy flows God's grace and power flows with it. I like to think of joy as my indicator of presence. If I am lacking joy then I am probably not very present.
As we take communion today let it be a time of thankfulness for God's...
We are in a time of year where things are cooling off and many transitions happen. As we transition to the next level it will often seem like things slow down and during these transitions it's important to settle into new habits... Beautiful habits.
A beautiful habit is one that God prompts and helps to install in your life and it creates a virtuous cycle of good. In all of my books I tell of how our bodies are a form of a liquid crystal, think LCD display on your TV or phone screen. These LCD's have the amazing ability to adapt and create order. Our bodies and lives are like crystals and according to a book my daughter found at a book fair a few years ago every crystal has a unique set of habits.
As crystals are heated and cooled back down they settle into habits that are crystallized. The more slowly the crystals cool the more beautiful their habits become. Therefore cooling slowly and taking our time leads to more beautiful habits in our...
Last night my daughter was searching around on YouTube for new Christian songs and she came across a song by Aaron Cole called Right on Time. One of the lyrics in the song is...Love is always right on time.
God is love, and he is always right on time. A few years ago I was in a very stressful situation where I really needed God to come through and during that time he taught me that he is always on time. During that time my daughter was practicing the piano on an app that tracked her playing. She was playing the correct notes but she was playing them too early and the app wasn't giving her any credit for playing the correct note.
As this was happening God began to teach me that he is never early and never late... always right on time. He began to teach me that our lives are like a beautiful song and if he played the right note too early it wouldn't sound right. God has a perfect timing and rhythm for everything and it's still amazing too me that he gives us...
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