November 13, 2010 (James 1-5, Acts 15-16)

Wow, now we're getting into the books where there is so much to blog about I'll just have to pick a few things. I have to trust God when He says His word will not return void. I continue to read it, hoping it will continue to infuse my life and "change the way I think". Here's just one little section in James that is packed full of truth:

^1:19 Understand this, my dear brothers and sisters: You must all be quick to listen, slow to speak, and slow to get angry.²⁰ Human anger does not produce the righteousness God desires. ²¹ So get rid of all the filth and evil in your lives, and humbly accept the word God has planted in your hearts, for it has the power to save your souls.

²² But don’t just listen to God’s word. You must do what it says. Otherwise, you are only fooling yourselves. ²³ For if you listen to the word and don’t obey, it is like glancing at your face in a mirror. ²⁴ You see yourself, walk away, and forget what you look like. ²⁵ But if you keep looking steadily into God's perfect law - the law that sets you free- and if you do what it says and don’t forget what you heard, then God will bless you for doing it.

²⁶ If you claim to be religious but don’t control your tongue, you are fooling yourself, and your religion is worthless. ²⁷Pure and genuine religion in the sight of God the Father means caring for orphans and widows in their distress and refusing to let the world corrupt you.

Just that one verse that I've bolded - if all of us could just do that one little verse, just do the things we know to do, the 'church' and the 'world' would be a different place.

And the last verse - another one that brings to mind all the families in our church that are adopting orphans - that is pure and lasting religion in God's sight. Maybe we can't all adopt (or can we?), but we can all refuse to allow the world to corrupt us.

And now, for a long section - so very convicting on all levels.

James 4

Drawing Close to God

¹ What is causing the quarrels and fights among you? Don’t they come from the evil desires at war within you? ² You want what you don’t have, so you scheme and kill to get it. You are jealous of what others have, but you can’t get it, so you fight and wage war to take it away from them. Yet you don’t have what you want because you don’t ask God for it. ³ And even when you ask, you don’t get it because your motives are all wrong—you want only what will give you pleasure.

⁴ You adulterers! Don’t you realize that friendship with the world makes you an enemy of God? I say it again: If you want to be a friend of the world, you make yourself an enemy of God. ⁵ What do you think the Scriptures mean when they say that the spirit God has placed within us is filled with envy? ⁶ But he gives us even more grace to stand against such evil desires. As the Scriptures say,

“God opposes the proud
but favors the humble.”

⁷ So humble yourselves before God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. ⁸ Come close to God, and God will come close to you. Wash your hands, you sinners; purify your hearts, for your loyalty is divided between God and the world. ⁹ Let there be tears for what you have done. Let there be sorrow and deep grief. Let there be sadness instead of laughter, and gloom instead of joy. ¹⁰ Humble yourselves before the Lord, and he will lift you up in honor.

Warning against Judging Others

¹¹ Don’t speak evil against each other, dear brothers and sisters. If you criticize and judge each other, then you are criticizing and judging God’s law. But your job is to obey the law, not to judge whether it applies to you. ¹² God alone, who gave the law, is the Judge. He alone has the power to save or to destroy. So what right do you have to judge your neighbor?

November 12, 2010 (Acts 11-14)

Do we really believe God's hears our prayers? I think we probably don't, otherwise we would spend more time in prayer to Him. That is shown in the story in Acts 12. Peter was imprisoned and verse 5 says "But while Peter was in prison, the church prayed very earnestly for him." Long story short, an angel came and miraculously freed Peter from prison:

6 The night before Peter was to be placed on trial, he was asleep, fastened with two chains between two soldiers. Others stood guard at the prison gate. 7 Suddenly, there was a bright light in the cell, and an angel of the Lord stood before Peter. The angel struck him on the side to awaken him and said, “Quick! Get up!” And the chains fell off his wrists. 8 Then the angel told him, “Get dressed and put on your sandals.” And he did. “Now put on your coat and follow me,” the angel ordered.
9 So Peter left the cell, following the angel. But all the time he thought it was a vision. He didn’t realize it was actually happening. 10 They passed the first and second guard posts and came to the iron gate leading to the city, and this opened for them all by itself. So they passed through and started walking down the street, and then the angel suddenly left him.

As a side note, I believe the Bible - in it's entirety. God can do anything at all. He can make a locked gate swing open, and then go back to a locked state. He can feed 5,000 people with just a few fish and a few loaves of bread. He can sustain His people in the wilderness for 40 years, showing grace to a disobedient people. Why do we not trust Him? Why are we so foolish? God help us to live as children that believe in a miracle working God.

So, back to the part about them not believing that God heard their prayers. When Peter arrived at the very place where they were praying for him, here's what happened:

¹³ He knocked at the door in the gate, and a servant girl named Rhoda came to open it. ¹⁴ When she recognized Peter’s voice, she was so overjoyed that, instead of opening the door, she ran back inside and told everyone, “Peter is standing at the door!”

¹⁵ “You’re out of your mind!” they said. When she insisted, they decided, “It must be his angel.”

¹⁶ Meanwhile, Peter continued knocking. When they finally opened the door and saw him, they were amazed.

I fear we do the same. We pray, not expecting an answer from God. I'm thankful He answers in spite of our unbelief, but I have to wonder what we would see if we would truly believe.

The message that Paul gave in Acts 13 is pretty much the same message that Peter gave. He recounted the history of Israel and the prophecies and then told them of Jesus. Again, the message is the same today:

^13:38 “Brothers, listen! We are here to proclaim that through this man Jesus there is forgiveness for your sins. ³⁹ Everyone who believes in him is declared right with God—something the law of Moses could never do.

And as Paul and Barnabas left they said these pertinent words "By God's grace, remain faithful."

The following verse was the "life verse" of the Adopt a Soldier program several months into the program:

^14:23 Paul and Barnabas also appointed elders in every church and prayed for them with fasting, turning them over to the care of the Lord, in whom they had put their trust.

After the horrific day when eight soldiers from the Unit we supported were killed in an attack, we began meeting weekly to fast and pray, turning them over to the care of the Lord. What if we would have believed from the outset that our prayers would make a difference? What if the entire church would have supported these efforts in prayer? What if we would have met weekly right from the very beginning? I guess we won't know this side of eternity, but God continues to work on my heart - challenging me to a deeper walk with Him. God help me, by the power of Your Spirit to follow where You lead.

November 11, 2010 (Acts 1-10)

I love the book of Acts. It talks of how the early church was formed, as well as describes the boldness of the disciples. Chapter 2 is Peter and the apostles addressing the crowd after the Holy Spirit came and allowed all the different nationalities of people to hear the apostles speak in their native languages. The scoffers said they were drunk, so Peter addressed the crowd. The first 'funny' thing to me was that he said, "It's much too early for that. People don't get drunk by nine o'clock in the morning." So I'm glad that happened in the morning - otherwise, if it would have happened in the evening, there would have not been such a convincing rebuttal for being drunk. But the main thing I got out of this section was that during his explanation of what happened, he referenced scripture and prophecy three times. He also minced no words as shown below in his closing statement. Nothing like pointing the finger at them!

³⁶ “So let everyone in Israel know for certain that God has made this Jesus, whom you crucified, to be both Lord and Messiah!”

Peter's words convicted them, and they asked, "What should we do?" - And Peter's answer would have been the same today:

³⁸ Peter replied, “Each of you must turn from your sins and turn to God, and be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins. Then you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. ³⁹ This promise is to you, and to your children, and even to the Gentiles—all who have been called by the Lord our God.” ⁴⁰ Then Peter continued preaching for a long time, strongly urging all his listeners, “Save yourselves from this generation that has gone astray!”

And what was the result? An astounding amount of new believers who were devoted.

⁴¹ Those who believed what Peter said were baptized and added to the church that day—about 3,000 in all.

⁴² All the believers devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching, and to fellowship, and to sharing in meals (including the Lord’s Supper), and to prayer.

Then Peter healed a man who was lame from birth. And as the people stood there in awe of what had just happened, I loved Peter's response:

¹² Peter saw his opportunity and addressed the crowd. “People of Israel,” he said, “what is so surprising about this? And why stare at us as though we had made this man walk by our own power or godliness? ¹³ For it is the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob—the God of all our ancestors—who has brought glory to his servant Jesus by doing this. This is the same Jesus whom you handed over and rejected before Pilate, despite Pilate’s decision to release him. ¹⁴ You rejected this holy, righteous one and instead demanded the release of a murderer. ¹⁵ You killed the author of life, but God raised him from the dead. And we are witnesses of this fact!

¹⁶ “Through faith in the name of Jesus, this man was healed—and you know how crippled he was before. Faith in Jesus’ name has healed him before your very eyes.

I'll end with one of my favorite passages in the Bible:

^4:13 The members of the council were amazed when they saw the boldness of Peter and John, for they could see that they were ordinary men with no special training in the Scriptures. They also recognized them as men who had been with Jesus.

I'd love to be recognized as a woman who has been with Jesus.

November 10, 2010 (Mark 15-16, Matthew 27-28, Luke 22-24, John 18-21)

Today's reading was the crucifixion, burial and ressurection of Jesus. I saw a few things I had never seen/thought of before.

Some things never change - some people are convinced more by money, than by truth. The guards placed outside the tomb witnessed the angel rolling away the stone, and reported it to the officials. I have to imagine they were overwhelmed by what they had seen. But, they were convinced by a bribe of money to lie. Human nature has not changed. Bribes worked back then, they still work now.

^{Matthew 28:11} As the women were on their way, some of the guards went into the city and told the leading priests what had happened. ¹² A meeting with the elders was called, and they decided to give the soldiers a large bribe. ¹³ They told the soldiers, “You must say, ‘Jesus’ disciples came during the night while we were sleeping, and they stole his body.’¹⁴ If the governor hears about it, we’ll stand up for you so you won’t get in trouble.” ¹⁵So the guards accepted the bribe and said what they were told to say. Their story spread widely among the Jews, and they still tell it today.

Then in Mark I came across the passage I was aware of from before - the one where the angel said the following:

^{Mark 16:5} When they entered the tomb, they saw a young man clothed in a white robe sitting on the right side. The women were shocked, ⁶ but the angel said, “Don’t be alarmed. You are looking for Jesus of Nazareth, who was crucified. He isn’t here! He is risen from the dead! Look, this is where they laid his body. ⁷ Now go and tell his disciples, including Peter, that Jesus is going ahead of you to Galilee. You will see him there, just as he told you before he died.”

God knew that Peter, because of his failure, would no longer feel like a disciple and would no longer feel worthy. But a passage I had never seen before was this:

^{LUK3 24:33} And within the hour they were on their way back to Jerusalem. There they found the eleven disciples and the others who had gathered with them, ³⁴ who said, “The Lord has really risen! He appeared to Peter.”

Jesus Himself paid a special visit to Peter. This is the only mention of it - so we don't know what was said. But from personal experience I know that after failure, the only way to truly forgive oneself is to personally hear from God.

This next passage reminded me of things that are happening today in the realm of politics. It seems the loudest voices are the ones that are heard. And the outcome was the death of an innocent man, but that was in fulfillment of Scripture. Perhaps the same is happening today in our time - the loudest voices are the ones that are being heard, but is that in fulfillment of Scripture as well?

^{lUKE 23:23} But the mob shouted louder and louder, demanding that Jesus be crucified, and their voices prevailed. ²⁴ So Pilate sentenced Jesus to die as they demanded.

And to end, a verse that rings true today. We don't have the privilege to walk with the visible Christ, but we do have the privilege to walk with the Christ that is revealed to us through His Holy Spirit. May we continue to believe in His word as revealed to us.

^{John 20:29} Then Jesus told him, “You believe because you have seen me. Blessed are those who believe without seeing me.”

November 8, 2010 (Luke 22, John 13-17)

I'm thankful for a Savior who's praying for us. Although the following verses weren't in today's reading, they compliment what I just read:

^{Hebrews 7:23} There were many priests under the old system, for death prevented them from remaining in office. ²⁴ But because Jesus lives forever, his priesthood lasts forever. ²⁵ Therefore he is able, once and forever, to save those who come to God through him. He lives forever to intercede with God on their behalf.

First in Luke 22 Jesus tells Simon Peter that He has pleaded in prayer for him. And even though Peter's faith failed momentarily, because of Jesus' prayer for him, his faith did not fail permanently. Once Peter knew he was truly forgiven by Jesus, he was freed to serve from a life consumed by grace. That passage will be coming up in a future blog.

³¹ “Simon, Simon, Satan has asked to sift each of you like wheat. ³² But I have pleaded in prayer for you, Simon, that your faith should not fail. So when you have repented and turned to me again, strengthen your brothers.”

And then in John as Jesus gives his final "sermon" to His disciples, He again reiterates that He is not only praying for them, but for all who would believe through their ministry - (us). I don't know about you, but I am taking comfort today in the knowledge that Jesus is praying for me, that my faith will not fail and that the Father would continue to reveal Himself to me.

²⁰ “I am praying not only for these disciples but also for all who will ever believe in me through their message. ²¹ I pray that they will all be one, just as you and I are one—as you are in me, Father, and I am in you. And may they be in us so that the world will believe you sent me.

²² “I have given them the glory you gave me, so they may be one as we are one. ²³ I am in them and you are in me. May they experience such perfect unity that the world will know that you sent me and that you love them as much as you love me. ²⁴ Father, I want these whom you have given me to be with me where I am. Then they can see all the glory you gave me because you loved me even before the world began!

²⁵ “O righteous Father, the world doesn’t know you, but I do; and these disciples know you sent me. ²⁶ I have revealed you to them, and I will continue to do so. Then your love for me will be in them, and I will be in them.”

November 7, 2010 (Mark 12-14, Matthew 22-26, Luke 20-21)

Today's reading covered the last of Jesus' teachings before He was taken prisoner. And He used the illustration of the fig tree - telling the people that when you see it's buds become tender and it's leaves begin to sprout, you know summer is near. He gives warnings as to the signs that happen before He arrives. But He also gives this warning:

Matthew 24:37 “When the Son of Man returns, it will be like it was in Noah’s day. 38 In those days before the flood, the people were enjoying banquets and parties and weddings right up to the time Noah entered his boat. 39 People didn’t realize what was going to happen until the flood came and swept them all away. That is the way it will be when the Son of Man comes.

It reminds me of something I read previously where He said "When the Son of Man returns, will He find faith on the earth?" He also warns that in the end times there will be people coming and doing miraculous signs that will be so convincing they have the ability to fool even God's children. But we should not be persuaded because there will be no doubt at all about His coming back:

Luke 21:25 “And there will be strange signs in the sun, moon, and stars. And here on earth the nations will be in turmoil, perplexed by the roaring seas and strange tides. 26 People will be terrified at what they see coming upon the earth, for the powers in the heavens will be shaken. 27 Then everyone will see the Son of Man coming on a cloud with power and great glory. 28 So when all these things begin to happen, stand and look up, for your salvation is near!”

Then there was the story of Mary pouring a bottle of expensive perfume over Jesus' head. Some complained that it should be sold and the money given to the poor, but Jesus rebuked them and told them they she had prepared His body for burial. As I read that, I thought of how the smell must have been with Jesus all through His trial and crucifixion, permeating all the fibers of his hair and beard. How during the tremendous pain and suffering that He went through, He always had with Him the reminder of one of His followers sacrificial love for Him, reminding Him of why He was now going through His act of sacrificial love for us. Through all the pain He was continually reminded of the worship and adoration of one of His followers. In His humanness, I would think He drew comfort from that. The Bible tells us that our prayers are a 'sweet smelling fragrance' to God. It's interesting to me to think that in these days, our worship and adoration of Him through prayer is like a wonderful perfume to Him. Jesus, may I continually offer to You the sacrifice of prayer.

November 4, 2010 (Luke 12-17:10)

Well, I skipped blogging for a while again. Vacations are now completely over, and hopefully I can get back into a routine.

Today was one of those days where there is a lot of instruction from Jesus for us - primarily it is more important to be 'rich in our relationship with Him' rather than 'rich in worldly wealth'.

^12:21 “Yes, a person is a fool to store up earthly wealth but not have a rich relationship with God.”

And He also tells us not to worry about our daily needs - He is fully aware of them and will provide them, IF we make the kingdom of God our primary concern.

^12:29 “And don’t be concerned about what to eat and what to drink. Don’t worry about such things. ³⁰ These things dominate the thoughts of unbelievers all over the world, but your Father already knows your needs.³¹ Seek the Kingdom of God above all else, and he will give you everything you need.

³² “So don’t be afraid, little flock. For it gives your Father great happiness to give you the Kingdom.

And then finally, He tells us to be watching and waiting for His return. If we could just keep that one simple thought in the forefront of our minds, how would it change what we do?

^12:35 “Be dressed for service and well prepared, ³⁶ as though you were waiting for your master to return from the wedding feast. Then you will be ready to open the door and let him in the moment he arrives and knocks. ³⁷ The servants who are ready and waiting for his return will be rewarded. I tell you the truth, he himself will seat them, put on an apron, and serve them as they sit and eat! ³⁸ He may come in the middle of the night or just before dawn. But whenever he comes, he will reward the servants who are ready.

³⁹ “Understand this: If a homeowner knew exactly when a burglar was coming, he would not permit his house to be broken into. ⁴⁰ You also must be ready all the time, for the Son of Man will come when least expected.”

And then as I read this next passage, I thought of yesterday and of a temptation I had. I was cleaning out the game cupboard and a Halloween card from last year fell out from the pile of games. It was for Cooper from his grandparents, and in the card was a $1 bill. I contemplated keeping it. I rationalized that I give so much to Cooper that I was justified, and that if he hadn't cared enough to take care of it a year ago, why should I bother giving it to him. But even though I wouldn't read the following passage until today, I have learned that I don't want anything to hinder my relationship with God. It was his money, and if I took it, no matter how much I rationalized it, I would be stealing. So when he came home from school I gave it too him, and showed him that it fell out of the game cupboard that I had just organized. God sees us - He knows everything we do. I desire to live a life that is obedient and pleasing to Him. There are areas of my attitude that are just as displeasing as stealing - those are the areas I need to surrender to Him. Jesus, please help me to honor You in that area of my life.

^16:10 “If you are faithful in little things, you will be faithful in large ones. But if you are dishonest in little things, you won’t be honest with greater responsibilities. ¹¹ And if you are untrustworthy about worldly wealth, who will trust you with the true riches of heaven? ¹² And if you are not faithful with other people’s things, why should you be trusted with things of your own?

And then, a reminder of how our attitude should be in serving Him:

^17:7 “When a servant comes in from plowing or taking care of sheep, does his master say, ‘Come in and eat with me’? ⁸ No, he says, ‘Prepare my meal, put on your apron, and serve me while I eat. Then you can eat later.’ ⁹ And does the master thank the servant for doing what he was told to do? Of course not. ¹⁰ In the same way, when you obey me you should say, ‘We are unworthy servants who have simply done our duty.’”