A French proverb says, "Forty is the old age of youth and fifty is the youth of old age." So according to the French, I am still a young person, relatively speaking.
However, my wife and I went to a movie theater the other day, where I noticed they give discounts to seniors. So I asked for one regular and one senior admission, expecting to be questioned about it. But without any hesitation, the young employee just gave me my ticket.
I am at a point in my life called "middle age," which I wouldn't mind so much if I only knew a few more 100-year-olds. When you are middle-aged, you begin to wonder who put the quicksand in the hourglass of time, because your days, months, and years go by so quickly.
So let me ask you, what story is your life telling? My story is a simple one: God can take a mess of a life with the deck stacked against it and redeem it. That is my story. What is yours? We all have a story to tell. And we all need to take stock of our lives and ask, "What is my life all about? What is the legacy that I will leave? How will I be remembered?"
It is really important to not only think of this as you are getting older, but it is also crucial to think about when you are young, because that is when you are charting the course your life will take. That is when you are developing habits and making decisions like the career path you will follow and the person you will marry.
You will decide the evening of your life by the morning of it, or the end by the beginning. So make the right choices.
BE BLESSED & BE A BLESSING TO ONE ANOTHER!
DAWN
Friday, September 11, 2009
Wednesday, September 9, 2009
God's Sufficient Grace
I'm not much of an "original language" teacher. But once in a while in my study of a passage, I am rocked by some nuance of meaning I learn from the Bible's original language. I love the Greek word order of 2 Corinthians 12:9: "Sufficient for you is the grace of Me." That is an incredible promise! Sufficient for you is the grace of Me.
Think for a moment about the place where you meet with God. Your regular place. Is it a chair in your bedroom? Or at the kitchen table? Or as a father of five small children told me this week, is it the backseat of your car in the garage?
I can picture the place where I met with God years ago in my dorm room at college; I can picture where I met with God in the apartment where we lived in seminary; I can picture the little blue love seat that I used to sit on in our first house. I can picture my chair back at home right now where I meet with the Lord every day.
I find myself wondering, how many times have I gotten up from that place and left God's sufficient grace there? The Lord was there with me - holding out to me the grace for the trial I was going to face that day even as my mind was drifting off to my own plan. How many days did I run down the hall and off to my car and out to a busy day and leave Him sitting there with His sufficient grace?
"Sufficient for today is the grace of Me," God says. If I'm going to live by that sufficient grace, I'm not going to catch it falling from the sky as I run to my next appointment. I've got to go to the fountain and drink deeply. He is the One who quenches my thirst. He is the One who fills up what's missing. He is the One who satisfies my deepest longings. He is the One who brings and sustains a continuous revival in my life.
BE BLESSED & BE A BLESSING TO ONE ANOTHER!
DAWN
Think for a moment about the place where you meet with God. Your regular place. Is it a chair in your bedroom? Or at the kitchen table? Or as a father of five small children told me this week, is it the backseat of your car in the garage?
I can picture the place where I met with God years ago in my dorm room at college; I can picture where I met with God in the apartment where we lived in seminary; I can picture the little blue love seat that I used to sit on in our first house. I can picture my chair back at home right now where I meet with the Lord every day.
I find myself wondering, how many times have I gotten up from that place and left God's sufficient grace there? The Lord was there with me - holding out to me the grace for the trial I was going to face that day even as my mind was drifting off to my own plan. How many days did I run down the hall and off to my car and out to a busy day and leave Him sitting there with His sufficient grace?
"Sufficient for today is the grace of Me," God says. If I'm going to live by that sufficient grace, I'm not going to catch it falling from the sky as I run to my next appointment. I've got to go to the fountain and drink deeply. He is the One who quenches my thirst. He is the One who fills up what's missing. He is the One who satisfies my deepest longings. He is the One who brings and sustains a continuous revival in my life.
BE BLESSED & BE A BLESSING TO ONE ANOTHER!
DAWN
Tuesday, September 8, 2009
Reprogramming Our Thinking
But that's no life for you. You learned Christ! My assumption is that you have paid careful attention to him, been well instructed in the truth precisely as we have it in Jesus. Since, then, we do not have the excuse of ignorance, everything—and I do mean everything—connected with that old way of life has to go. It's rotten through and through.
Get rid of it! And then take on an entirely new way of life—a God-fashioned life, a life renewed from the inside and working itself into your conduct as God accurately reproduces his character in you. Eph.4: 20-24 (MSG)
We are the product of our thinking, so it is important that we choose carefully where to focus our mental energy. We can cling to our old flesh patterns and consequently find ourselves tripping over impulses and attitudes like bitterness, pride, and discontent. The wise alternative is to reprogram our thinking to match that of Jesus Christ.
Our current thought processes—such as the way we view ourselves and others, and how we approach problems—have been programmed by authority figures, church, friends, and even enemies. We can select some of our mind’s influences (e.g., the media) but not all (e.g., our parents). Yet we can choose what input will shape our mind by believing and dwelling on that material.
Reprogramming the mind is a matter of choosing to believe and meditate upon God’s truth. When you receive Jesus Christ as Savior, your mind is renewed with a capacity for godly thought. It might not seem different at first. But the longer you live the Christian life and apply biblical principles, the more you’ll find old habits and modes of thinking will be choked out. However, anytime you yield to temptation, you allow old thought patterns an opportunity to rise up and dominate first your mind, and then your mouth and hands.
The way to strangle fleshly thoughts and attitudes is to pour Scripture into the mind regularly and frequently (Ps. 119:11). When we allow our thinking to be directed by the thoughts of God—which is what the Bible is made of—we will think, speak, and act according to His will.
BE BLESSED & BE A BLESSING TO ONE ANOTHER!
DAWN
Get rid of it! And then take on an entirely new way of life—a God-fashioned life, a life renewed from the inside and working itself into your conduct as God accurately reproduces his character in you. Eph.4: 20-24 (MSG)
We are the product of our thinking, so it is important that we choose carefully where to focus our mental energy. We can cling to our old flesh patterns and consequently find ourselves tripping over impulses and attitudes like bitterness, pride, and discontent. The wise alternative is to reprogram our thinking to match that of Jesus Christ.
Our current thought processes—such as the way we view ourselves and others, and how we approach problems—have been programmed by authority figures, church, friends, and even enemies. We can select some of our mind’s influences (e.g., the media) but not all (e.g., our parents). Yet we can choose what input will shape our mind by believing and dwelling on that material.
Reprogramming the mind is a matter of choosing to believe and meditate upon God’s truth. When you receive Jesus Christ as Savior, your mind is renewed with a capacity for godly thought. It might not seem different at first. But the longer you live the Christian life and apply biblical principles, the more you’ll find old habits and modes of thinking will be choked out. However, anytime you yield to temptation, you allow old thought patterns an opportunity to rise up and dominate first your mind, and then your mouth and hands.
The way to strangle fleshly thoughts and attitudes is to pour Scripture into the mind regularly and frequently (Ps. 119:11). When we allow our thinking to be directed by the thoughts of God—which is what the Bible is made of—we will think, speak, and act according to His will.
BE BLESSED & BE A BLESSING TO ONE ANOTHER!
DAWN
Monday, September 7, 2009
Sinning Against the Spirit
Do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, by whom you
were sealed for the day of redemption."
— Ephesians 4:30
— Ephesians 4:30
Sometimes we may think of the Holy Spirit as being more of an "it" than a Him. But Jesus said of the Holy Spirit, "And when He has come, He will convict the world of sin, and of righteousness, and of judgment" (John 16:8). The Holy Spirit is God, and He can be specifically sinned against.One way a believer can sin against the Holy Spirit is by grieving Him. Ephesians 4:30 says,
Do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, by whom you were sealed for the day of redemption." The word "grieve" means "to make sad or sorrowful." And when we allow bitterness, rage, anger, harsh words, or slander to be a part of our lives, then we are bringing sorrow to the Holy Spirit.We can also sin against the Holy Spirit by quenching Him. The apostle Paul wrote to the believers in Thessalonica, "Do not quench the Spirit" (1 Thessalonians 5:19).
The word "quench" conveys the idea of extinguishing a fire. It is possible for us to seek to extinguish or quench the work the Holy Spirit is doing in our lives. And when God wants to work but finds unbelief, it hinders the work He wants to do, because God works through faith in our lives when we believe Him.Are you harboring a grudge against someone right now? Have you been slandering someone or even passing on information that you have heard and yet don't even know if it is really true? Have you been flying into fits of rage? Have you been saying, "Well, God could never use a person like me," or "God would never answer my prayers"? According to Scripture, that is grieving the Holy Spirit. So if you are grieving the Holy Spirit today, it's time to stop. It's time to come clean.
BE BLESSED & BE A BLESSING TO ONE ANOTHER!
DAWN
Sunday, September 6, 2009
THE UNPARDONABLE SIN
From time to time, I am asked about the meaning of "the blasphemy of the Holy Spirit," because Jesus said it was an unpardonable sin. He said, "Every sin or blasphemy can be forgiven—except blasphemy against the Holy Spirit, which can never be forgiven" (Matthew 12:31).
When God is trying to bring a person to faith and he or she says no, that is resisting the Holy Spirit. This is a sin that only an unbeliever could commit. The work of the Spirit, as Jesus said, is to "convict the world of sin, and of righteousness, and of judgment" (John 16:8). And when someone refuses to accept Christ, they are denying the very mission of the Holy Spirit when they say they don't need salvation, when they say, "Not only am I saying no to this, but I am saying that I don't care if Jesus died. And if He did die, then His death was a waste. I don't care if He shed His blood. It means nothing to me." That insults the Holy Spirit, because the Bible says, "Of how much worse punishment, do you suppose, will he be thought worthy who have trampled the Son of God underfoot, counted the blood of the covenant by which he was sanctified a common thing, and insulted the Spirit of grace?" (Hebrews 10:29).
Therefore, the blasphemy of the Holy Spirit is when unbelievers say no to the Spirit's work of showing them their need for Jesus and bringing them to faith. By resisting and turning their back on God's gracious offer of forgiveness, they can ultimately insult—and even blaspheme—the Holy Spirit and go beyond a point of no return. To resist the Holy Spirit's appeal is to insult God and to effectively cut off hope of all salvation.
BE BLESSED & BE A BLESSING TO ONE ANOTHER!
DAWN
When God is trying to bring a person to faith and he or she says no, that is resisting the Holy Spirit. This is a sin that only an unbeliever could commit. The work of the Spirit, as Jesus said, is to "convict the world of sin, and of righteousness, and of judgment" (John 16:8). And when someone refuses to accept Christ, they are denying the very mission of the Holy Spirit when they say they don't need salvation, when they say, "Not only am I saying no to this, but I am saying that I don't care if Jesus died. And if He did die, then His death was a waste. I don't care if He shed His blood. It means nothing to me." That insults the Holy Spirit, because the Bible says, "Of how much worse punishment, do you suppose, will he be thought worthy who have trampled the Son of God underfoot, counted the blood of the covenant by which he was sanctified a common thing, and insulted the Spirit of grace?" (Hebrews 10:29).
Therefore, the blasphemy of the Holy Spirit is when unbelievers say no to the Spirit's work of showing them their need for Jesus and bringing them to faith. By resisting and turning their back on God's gracious offer of forgiveness, they can ultimately insult—and even blaspheme—the Holy Spirit and go beyond a point of no return. To resist the Holy Spirit's appeal is to insult God and to effectively cut off hope of all salvation.
How shall we escape if we neglect so great a salvation,
which at the first began to be spoken by the Lord, and was
confirmed to us by those who heard Him, God also bearing witness both with signs and wonders, with variousmiracles, and gifts of the Holy Spirit, according to His own will? Hebrews 2:3–4
BE BLESSED & BE A BLESSING TO ONE ANOTHER!
DAWN
Saturday, September 5, 2009
GOD'S PLAN FOR SUCCESS
5 Trust in the Lord with all your heart; do not depend on your own understanding.
6 Seek his will in all you do, and he will show you which path to take. 7 Don’t be impressed with your own wisdom. Instead, fear the Lord and turn away from evil. 8 Then you will have healing for your body and strength for your bones. 9 Honor the Lord with your wealth and with the best part of everything you produce. 10 Then he will fill your barns with grain, and your vats will overflow with good wine. 11 My child, don’t reject the Lord’s discipline, and don’t be upset when he corrects you. 12 For the Lord corrects those he loves, just as a father corrects a child in whom he delights.[a] Proverbs 3: 5-11 (NLT) Anytime I say that the Lord desires success for His children, someone tries to contradict me. A man or woman sitting in the congregation takes a look at him- or herself and thinks, Not me! I’m not winning at anything! I have two responses to help that person get a proper mindset. First, as yesterday’s devotion noted, we must define success as God does. And second, we must follow His plan for triumphant living.
Step 1. Set goals according to God’s will. The Father has a tailor-made plan for every believer. Following it requires regular prayer and Scripture meditation. Only when our minds are focused upon Him can we discern the proper course for our lives.
Step Step 2. Walk obediently before God. The Bible is packed with workable principles, because the Lord expects His people to use them. When we are applying His Word to our daily life, we cannot help living victoriously, even in times of trial and “defeat.” Step 3. Use gifts for God’s glory. Every believer is given the Holy Spirit as a Helper and Guide (John 14:16-17). Furthermore, when a person is saved, he or she receives one or more spiritual gifts (Rom. 12:6-8). God provides the Spirit and our gifts to aid in accomplishing the tasks He sets before us. Succes is conditional. God won’t help us achieve goals that are outside His will. His ultimate plan is to transform you into the image of Jesus Christ, which is a rare kind of success indeed. He has already mapped out the perfect plan to get you from where you are to a flourishing spiritual life.
BE BLESSED & BE A BLESSING TO ONE ANOTHER!
DAWN
6 Seek his will in all you do, and he will show you which path to take. 7 Don’t be impressed with your own wisdom. Instead, fear the Lord and turn away from evil. 8 Then you will have healing for your body and strength for your bones. 9 Honor the Lord with your wealth and with the best part of everything you produce. 10 Then he will fill your barns with grain, and your vats will overflow with good wine. 11 My child, don’t reject the Lord’s discipline, and don’t be upset when he corrects you. 12 For the Lord corrects those he loves, just as a father corrects a child in whom he delights.[a] Proverbs 3: 5-11 (NLT) Anytime I say that the Lord desires success for His children, someone tries to contradict me. A man or woman sitting in the congregation takes a look at him- or herself and thinks, Not me! I’m not winning at anything! I have two responses to help that person get a proper mindset. First, as yesterday’s devotion noted, we must define success as God does. And second, we must follow His plan for triumphant living.
Step 1. Set goals according to God’s will. The Father has a tailor-made plan for every believer. Following it requires regular prayer and Scripture meditation. Only when our minds are focused upon Him can we discern the proper course for our lives.
Step Step 2. Walk obediently before God. The Bible is packed with workable principles, because the Lord expects His people to use them. When we are applying His Word to our daily life, we cannot help living victoriously, even in times of trial and “defeat.” Step 3. Use gifts for God’s glory. Every believer is given the Holy Spirit as a Helper and Guide (John 14:16-17). Furthermore, when a person is saved, he or she receives one or more spiritual gifts (Rom. 12:6-8). God provides the Spirit and our gifts to aid in accomplishing the tasks He sets before us. Succes is conditional. God won’t help us achieve goals that are outside His will. His ultimate plan is to transform you into the image of Jesus Christ, which is a rare kind of success indeed. He has already mapped out the perfect plan to get you from where you are to a flourishing spiritual life.
BE BLESSED & BE A BLESSING TO ONE ANOTHER!
DAWN
Friday, September 4, 2009
OBEYING THE GOLDEN RULE
Most of us have known the Golden Rule since childhood: we are to treat others the way we want to be treated. And for young children, this standard seems to make sense. It is logical to share if you want others to share with you, and to avoid hitting because you wouldn’t like being on the receiving end.
But as life continues and relationships become more complicated, this simple ethical code doesn’t always seem to fit our circumstances. For instance, imagine being wronged by your business partner. How can you treat him respectfully when he has taken advantage? What if a kind, forgiving attitude opens the door for you to be hurt again?
God’s command nevertheless applies in this situation. However, obedience can be challenging, because when we are hurt or mistreated, our instinct is to retaliate. This might take the form of speaking badly behind a person’s back or showing subtle disrespect to his face. Human nature wants revenge for wrong. In fact, we are unable to do anything different on our own.
Thankfully, as believers, we are indwelt by the Holy Spirit, who enables us to forgive. So while our own strength is insufficient for a godly response, through the Spirit, we have the option to obey.
“The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, [and] self-control” (Gal. 5:22-23). Are these characteristics evident in your interactions—even with people who are difficult to love? Ask for God’s supernatural strength so you can respond correctly. READ Matthew 22:36-40
BE BLESSED & BE A BLESSING TO ONE ANOTHER!
DAWN
But as life continues and relationships become more complicated, this simple ethical code doesn’t always seem to fit our circumstances. For instance, imagine being wronged by your business partner. How can you treat him respectfully when he has taken advantage? What if a kind, forgiving attitude opens the door for you to be hurt again?
God’s command nevertheless applies in this situation. However, obedience can be challenging, because when we are hurt or mistreated, our instinct is to retaliate. This might take the form of speaking badly behind a person’s back or showing subtle disrespect to his face. Human nature wants revenge for wrong. In fact, we are unable to do anything different on our own.
Thankfully, as believers, we are indwelt by the Holy Spirit, who enables us to forgive. So while our own strength is insufficient for a godly response, through the Spirit, we have the option to obey.
“The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, [and] self-control” (Gal. 5:22-23). Are these characteristics evident in your interactions—even with people who are difficult to love? Ask for God’s supernatural strength so you can respond correctly. READ Matthew 22:36-40
BE BLESSED & BE A BLESSING TO ONE ANOTHER!
DAWN
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