What Are You Seeking First?

When I was first learning to walk with the Lord, I struggled to maintain a good connection with Him.

Life and the things in it kept getting in the way.

Kids, work, laundry, even church commitments consumed me.

It wasn’t that I wasn’t trying.

I was.

It’s that there was just so much going on that I felt like I was drowning.

Then I saw this verse:

33 But seek first His kingdom and His righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. Matthew 6:33 NIV

It really got my attention, but it took a while for me to understand it.

 

I finally realized that I was seeking the kingdom, and the Father, second.

Yes I was praying and studying – a lot.

But I was cramming it into whatever spare time I had.

Reading a bit here and there.

 

Most of my prayers were, “:please help me to get to work on time,”, as I ran out the door, breakfast in one hand, a to-do list in the other.

I would pray and go over my church’s prayer list while washing dishes.

Even my quiet times were overshadowed by my long list of to-dos and the struggles of the day.

Then one day the Lord showed me it was because I was doing it backwards.

 

Instead of reaching out through all the pressures and demands of life to try to reach Him, I needed to set all of that down, step aside from them, and just get alone with God.

No agenda.

No prayer list.

Just one-on-one time with Him, sitting in His presence and soaking up His love.

Just the two of us, to get me back on the path.

 

Standing with Him as I looked at my life and began to focus on it from His perspective, I realized that I had things a bit askew.

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The Power of Example

The other night while sitting in a fast food restaurant a family came in.

Because they were sitting close to me I couldn’t help but hear their conversation.

The daughter, about 10, mistakenly thought she didn’t get her drink so she went up to the counter to ask for it.

When she returned with her drink, her mother pointed out the girl’s drink had been sitting on the table all along.

Pointing to the new drink in the girl’s hand, she added, “We were dishonest. That’s not our drink.” She went on to explain to the girl what the error was and why it was wrong.

 

I was impressed.

 

Most people wouldn’t have given it a second thought and would have either consumed or thrown away the extra drink.

Not this mom.

When this mom noticed the error she pointed it out and went the extra mile to make sure her daughter understood.

 

She realized the importance of being faithful in the little things.

 

It made me think about my own life.

Am I faithful in the little things?

Do I take care of the details?

Do I cheat others without meaning to because I’m not paying attention or think it’s no big deal?

 

To God it is a big deal.

We’re called to be faithful in the small things as well as the big ones.

Jesus said:
“Whoever can be trusted with very little can also be trusted with much, and whoever is dishonest with very little will also be dishonest with much.” ~ Luke 16:10

 

I doubt the mom realized what an impact her actions made not just on her family but on those around her.

I’m guessing she was solely focused on honoring God with her actions and parenting, but I heard and saw her witness loudly and clearly.

 

There’s a lesson there.

I need to pay more attention to the seemingly minor details because they truly matter, not just to me but to those around me as well.

As I go through the next week I will be paying careful attention to details to make sure I am faithful in the little things.

I hope you will, too.

 

(This post first appeared on my now defunct blog).

 

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Prisoner Alert

One of my personal prayer focuses is Christians imprisoned around the world for the cause of Christ.

Currently, there are 23 known men around the world who are in prison for sharing their love of Jesus with others.

 

The website, PrisonerAlert, a ministry of the Voice of the Martyrs, lists these men by name and gives a brief biography of each as well as listing where they are held.

By clicking on the individual prisoner’s profile you can find a place where you can write them a letter of encouragement and/or petition a government official to ask them to release that prisoner.

 

Will you please pray for these men and ask God to strengthen, empower, embolden, and comfort them?

Will you also pray for their release?

 

It is my hope that through their experiences others will be drawn to a relationship with God and that rather than squashing faith in Christ, their imprisonment will cause the love of Jesus to spread far and wide as these men stand strong for what they believe in.

 

 

For more information, please visit the website PrisonerAlert.com.

 

For information on countries which restrict Christianity or the sharing of the gospel, please visit The Voice of the Martyrs.

 

Continue to remember those in prison as if you were together with them in prison, and those who are mistreated as if you yourselves were suffering. –Hebrews 13:3

 

 

 

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He Who Began A Perfect Work…

When my kids were young I taught them about Jesus as best as I could.

All 3 got saved and baptized at a fairly young age.

As they got older and started going out on their own and were exposed to the world a bit – school, friends’ houses, the mall, the movies, etc. – then later college – they began to witness and experience bad things..

Things people typically witness or experience in a broken world.

Painful things.

 

Before long they struggled with their faith as society bombarded them with all sorts of lies that downplayed God and emphasized self.

Lies that characterized God in false, disrespectful ways.

 

They weren’t always obvious.

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What Is Palm Sunday?

Palm Sunday is the holiday we celebrate the Sunday before Easter.

It is the day we remember and celebrate when Jesus made His triumphant entry into Jerusalem.

 

Here’s what happened:

When Jesus and His disciples were traveling toward Jerusalem they stopped at a nearby village.

Jesus sent two of His disciples to the village to locate and bring back a young donkey that was tied up but had never been ridden.

He told them if anyone asked what they were doing to tell them it was for Him and that He would send it back shortly. (Mark 11:1-3 NIV)

When they went into the village they found the donkey there, just like He’d said.

Someone did ask about it and the disciples did tell them why they were taking it. They were then allowed to leave with it.

The disciples brought the donkey to Jesus and laid their cloaks on it for Him to sit on.

 

Jesus rode the donkey into the town of Jerusalem.

As He did so, the crowds that were with Jesus when He arrived as well as many of the people in the town laid their cloaks or palm and tree branches down on the ground in front of Him.

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Belonging to God

I was reading a bible study book and it mentioned Psalm 100:3, which says:

Know that the Lord is God.
    It is He who made us, and we are His;
    we are His people, the sheep of His pasture. (NIV)

 

There’s a lot of good stuff in this verse, but what really stuck out to me was the second line –

It is He who made us, and we are His,

 

According to this verse, it is God who made us.

We weren’t made by accident. We didn’t suddenly just exist.

We didn’t evolve from slime somewhere.

God made us.

On purpose.

He meant to do it.

 

Because God has made us, we belong to Him.

We are His people.

This means we aren’t our own.

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Count It All Joy…

One bible passage I used to really struggle with comes from the book of James.

It says,

Consider it pure joy, my brothers, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith develops perseverance. Perseverance must finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything. –James 1:2-4

So, according to this verse, we are supposed to be joyful over the trials of life?!?

In a way that seems far-fetched.

 

But look closer…

First, James is talking to other Christians.

We know this because he calls them his brothers.

As Christians, we live within the boundaries of God’s economy, not man’s.

This means that the reasoning and morals of God are what we adhere to.

They are different than the world’s and are often complete opposites to each other.

As Christians we cannot look at things from the world’s point of view.

We must look at things from God’s perspective.

 

Next, notice he says to consider it joy.

He doesn’t say the trial should be joyful in and of itself.

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International Day of Prayer for the Persecuted Church 2020

Tomorrow is International Day of Prayer for the Persecuted Church.

Traditionally celebrated on the first Sunday of November, it’s purpose is to highlight the need to pray for our Christian Brothers and Sisters around the world who are not free to openly worship Christ.

Please spend some time this weekend praying for the Persecuted Church.

More information may be found at Voice of the Martyrs.

They have information on ways to pray as well as opportunities to write to Christians inprisoned for their faith.

They also have a phone app called, Pray Today. This app offers a daily prayer prompt for people groups and countries in need of prayer due to the religious persecution they face.

It can be found in your app store or visit their website by clicking here.

 

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Spiritual Warfare Armor, Pt. 1 – Sunday School Outline

Last week we talked about Spiritual Warfare.

We have an enemy who is like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour (1 Peter 5:8)

He hates us because he hates Christ and wants to destroy us.

Thankfully, Christ beat him once and for all at Calvary with His death, burial, and resurrection.

He’s a defeated foe.

As Christians we’ve been given weapons of warfare to fight against the enemy and his schemes.

These weapons are called the armor of God.

So, today we’re going to look at some of the pieces of that armor.

 

We are still in the book of Ephesians, chapter 6.

Ephesians 6:14 –

Stand firm then, with the belt of truth buckled around our waist, with the breastplate of righteousness in place – NIV

Let’s look first at the belt of truth –

Or, as the KJV calls it – having your loins girt about with truth

I went to BlueLetterBible.org and looked this word up in the original Greek.

It had 3 definitions –

What is true in any matter under consideration; in reality; in fact; certainty.

So, this would mean whatever is true of a situation; what’s really going on.

The literal truth of it.

 

The second definition was:

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He Will Supply All My Needs

I was in a Bible Study recently where the verse Philippians 4:19 came up.

It’s a very popular verse.

It says:

And my God will meet all your needs according to the riches of His glory in Christ Jesus. (NIV)

It’s reassurance that all our needs will be met.

It’s a good reminder that God is Yahweh Yireh – the God who provides.

People commonly recite this verse when they are concerned about material needs such as rent, utilities, groceries, etc.

That’s a valid and important part of it.

God does supply for all our material needs.

But – there are other aspects to it.

Ones we don’t always stop to realize and appreciate.

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