Has God rescued you out of deep waters? Has God pulled you out of chaos? Has Jesus saved your life? Do you still remember the awesome feeling of being pulled out of darkness? Or have you forgotten all the good God has done to you? Forgetfulness is one of the dangers in our relationship with God. Too often we are thankful for all the good when we are just out of deep waters. But then we go on with our…
“We have learned to live with unholiness and have come to look upon it as the natural and expected thing.” wrote A.W. Tozer. I find this to be too true these days. Anyone who tries to lead a holy lifestyle seems to be ridiculed. But Tozer died almost 50 years ago! We tend to think this unholy living is recent history. But no. Tozer talked about this and the Bible talked about it all the time. Just think of King…
Whenever you feel small… …remind yourself that God thinks the world of you. Whenever you feel down… ….remind yourself that God things you are to die for. Literally. God sent his own son to die for your so you had a way to spend eternity with him. Joyfully. God did not save you grudgingly. He saved you in his joy. Lovingly. God loves you. He is not going to take his love back. There’s nothing you can or leave undone…
There is a fine line between being totally surrendered to God and letting lazily go. I always struggle when a person tells me that they don’t need to plan anything ahead because God will guide them. Don’t get me wrong. I truly believe in God’s guidance. I truly believe in surrendering to God. I truly believe in doing God’s will. But… Faith does not mean letting the world decide for us. We need to be purposeful. We are on our…
Did you know that because of Christ you are free to change? Any time, anywhere. God is personally calling you to follow Him and he has a ready-made plan for you to blossom in his care. Whenever you crave change, cry out to God and be ready to be empowered by the Holy Spirit. Surrender yourself to God and he will continue his work in you. Christ has set us free to live a free life. (Gal. 5:1, MSG) Did…
Rest assured, God really knows you inside out. He knows what you need before you do. Are you open to God’s care? Or do you insist on going all the way alone? Today I’ve been reading about Elijah (1 Kings 17-21) and I am in awe of God’s gentle care of him. After Elijah delivered a message to King Ahab God sends him to rest in solitude. God knew Elijah needed the time away. God made sure that all his…
Some people assume that God tries to take our freedom and restrict our joy. But they’ve bought the lies of the devil and they could not be further from the truth. Because God made us free. But we have been abusing the freedom by making bad choices from the start. Like Philip Yancey has said “God’s terrible insistence on human freedom is so absolute that he granted us the power to live as though He did not exist, to spit…
Are you marked by joy? Is it evident in your life that Christ lives in you? If he lives in you, your life should be brimming with joy. Because God is joy. God is indeed the source of joy. All joy comes from him. When we stick close to God, joy is present in our lives no matter how dark the world around is. When we dare to embrace the cross of Christ, we are filled with overflowing joy. And…
We can’t force holiness on people. No matter how we would like to do it. There’s no way we can dictate how people should act. That’s not how grace works. That’s law all over again. That’s living like Christ had not died for our sins. That’s like saying Christ died in vain. When we force outwardly changes on ourselves or others, we have not truly understood grace. If we could create a living relationship with God by good behavior, then…
Do you take God seriously? Do you trust God to fulfill his promises? If you do….then be jubilant! Be exuberant! Our God is an awesome God! Why do we then drag along without joy? We forget to remember the good deeds God has done in our lives. We forget to praise God and worship him. But if we do not worship we are “swept into a vast restlessness, epidemic in the world, with no steady direction and no sustaining purpose“,…
