Quiet Moments with God
Day 4: Proverbs 4:17, 23
They do evil just as easily as they eat food. They hurt others as easily as they drink wine.
Above everything else, guard your heart. It is where your life comes from.
So many verses in this chapter spoke to me, but these were the two that the Holy Spirit kept bringing me back to over and over.
As I read verse 17 over and over, I could not help but ask myself, "Linda, do you do good just as easily as you eat food? Do you love others as easily as you drink sweet tea (since I don't drink wine!) This was very convicting. I want to say absolutely yes I do, but the reality is I often fail. Sometimes, more than I want to admit, I have to work really hard at doing good and loving others. My first instincts are not always those that would be pleasing to God. I have to work hard at not giving into first instincts. I don't want to give in and I don't want it to be so hard. I want to be so close to God that His ways are my first instincts.
Then it dawned on me (ha dawned on me, right, love how the Holy Spirit connects seemingly unconnected thoughts!) that if I want His ways to be my first instincts that verse 23 gives me the formula - guard my heart. It is where my life comes from. Guarding it means to protect it. Protect it from the things that will rip it away or slowly tear it away from God. Protect it from the evil of this world, from the darkness of this world. I need to protect it from things that are seemingly good but take my focus away from God and the things that He wants for me.
Friday, June 19, 2015
Thursday, June 18, 2015
Quiet Moments With God
Day 3: Proverbs 3:5-6
Trust in the Lord with all your heart. Do not depend on your own understanding. In all your ways remember Him. Then He will make your paths smooth and straight.
I like how it reads in the Message:
Trust God from the bottom of your heart. don't try to figure everything out on your own. Listen for God's voice in everything you do, everywhere you go; He's the one who will keep you on track.
It goes on to say: Don't assume that you know it all. Run to God! Run from evil!
"Trust God from the bottom of your heart." This is not just a trusting God when it makes sense. This is trusting God with every part of you. Knowing without hesitation that He will be there, He will protect you, strengthen you, take care of you. That He is all you need!
"Don't try to figure everything out on your own." Even the easy stuff He wants us to bring to Him. We often mess things up because we try to figure things out on our own first and only turn to God when we have made such a mess of things we don't have any idea what to do to fix it. God wants to be the first one we turn to with the good, bad and the ugly!
"Listen for God's voice in everything you do, everywhere you go; He's the one who will keep you on track." As written in the first translation, I always read this and said to myself, "I must be doing something wrong because my path is not smooth or straight." But really that is not what this verse is saying. Thus I like the way the Message says it, Listen for His voice and He will keep you on track! It won't always be easy, in fact the closer we get to His return we can count on it not being easy at all, but when we listen for His voice and follow its leading, we will stay on the track that leads us straight to Heaven!
So, I have the head knowledge. Now to apply it to my heart. To Run to God in everything first before I panic, before I have a melt down. This is my work in progress!
Day 3: Proverbs 3:5-6
Trust in the Lord with all your heart. Do not depend on your own understanding. In all your ways remember Him. Then He will make your paths smooth and straight.
I like how it reads in the Message:
Trust God from the bottom of your heart. don't try to figure everything out on your own. Listen for God's voice in everything you do, everywhere you go; He's the one who will keep you on track.
It goes on to say: Don't assume that you know it all. Run to God! Run from evil!
"Trust God from the bottom of your heart." This is not just a trusting God when it makes sense. This is trusting God with every part of you. Knowing without hesitation that He will be there, He will protect you, strengthen you, take care of you. That He is all you need!
"Don't try to figure everything out on your own." Even the easy stuff He wants us to bring to Him. We often mess things up because we try to figure things out on our own first and only turn to God when we have made such a mess of things we don't have any idea what to do to fix it. God wants to be the first one we turn to with the good, bad and the ugly!
"Listen for God's voice in everything you do, everywhere you go; He's the one who will keep you on track." As written in the first translation, I always read this and said to myself, "I must be doing something wrong because my path is not smooth or straight." But really that is not what this verse is saying. Thus I like the way the Message says it, Listen for His voice and He will keep you on track! It won't always be easy, in fact the closer we get to His return we can count on it not being easy at all, but when we listen for His voice and follow its leading, we will stay on the track that leads us straight to Heaven!
So, I have the head knowledge. Now to apply it to my heart. To Run to God in everything first before I panic, before I have a melt down. This is my work in progress!
Tuesday, June 16, 2015
Quiet Moments With God
Day 2: Proverbs 2
Scripture: Proverbs 2: 1-6
My son, accept my words. Store up my commands inside you. Let your ears listen to wisdom. Apply your heart to understanding. Call out for the ability to be wise. Cry out for understanding. Look for it as you would search for silver. Search for it as you would search for hidden treasure. Then you will understand how to have respect for the Lord. You will find out how to know God. The Lord gives wisdom. Knowledge and understanding come from his mouth.
Observation/Application: One of my favorite verses is Jeremiah 29: 13 When you look for Me with all your heart, you will find me.
Proverbs 2:1-6, I believe helps clarify exactly what Jeremiah 29:13 is talking about. The key here is looking for Him with your whole heart. It's not just a "I've lost me shoe" type searching. No, it is a "I've got a treasure map to the world's largest, most valuable treasure and the first person who finds it gets to keep it all to themselves with no taxes" type searching! These verses promise if I seek Him like that I will find out how to know God! More than anything in this world, that is my hearts desire - to know God. I feel like I have only barely scratched the surface of Him. I want to know Him more. I want to know Him so deeply that I don't think I just do what I know God would do.
Day 2: Proverbs 2
Scripture: Proverbs 2: 1-6
My son, accept my words. Store up my commands inside you. Let your ears listen to wisdom. Apply your heart to understanding. Call out for the ability to be wise. Cry out for understanding. Look for it as you would search for silver. Search for it as you would search for hidden treasure. Then you will understand how to have respect for the Lord. You will find out how to know God. The Lord gives wisdom. Knowledge and understanding come from his mouth.
Observation/Application: One of my favorite verses is Jeremiah 29: 13 When you look for Me with all your heart, you will find me.
Proverbs 2:1-6, I believe helps clarify exactly what Jeremiah 29:13 is talking about. The key here is looking for Him with your whole heart. It's not just a "I've lost me shoe" type searching. No, it is a "I've got a treasure map to the world's largest, most valuable treasure and the first person who finds it gets to keep it all to themselves with no taxes" type searching! These verses promise if I seek Him like that I will find out how to know God! More than anything in this world, that is my hearts desire - to know God. I feel like I have only barely scratched the surface of Him. I want to know Him more. I want to know Him so deeply that I don't think I just do what I know God would do.
Quiet Moments with God
Day 1: Proverbs 1
Scripture:
Proverbs 1: 32-33
Childish people go down the wrong path. They will die. Foolish people are satisfied with the way they live. The will be destroyed. But those who listen to me will live in safety. The will not worry. The won't be afraid of getting hurt.
Observation: These verses offer a wonderful promise from God. As with all promises, there is a condition. It is the "if you... then I will..." pattern that is so often present in the Bible.
If you are childish you will go down the wrong path. Your soul will die apart from God and be in Hell for eternity.
But the good news is:
If you listen to God, you will live in safety. Why because your soul belongs to the creator of this world!
God takes care of His children. In this day and age, I can't think of a better reality to live in. As the world darkens around me, I don't have to be afraid. No matter what the world throws my way, I am in the safe hand of God.
As I sit here typing this, I am listening to the baby birds sing right outside my front door. They are sitting high in their nest that sits about two feet from my front door. They don't have jobs, cars, clothes, refridgerators, walmart for birds. None of these conveniences we have yet they sing. How much more should we His children made in His likeness do the same!
Application: As I read over and over these verses, I hear God saying to me, "Linda, are you listening to Me? Are you striving daily to live in the way I have instructed? Then why are you worried. You see, I know God will take care of me. My heart reminds me of this all the time, but sometimes, a lot lately my mind gets stuck on the stress of all that is going on around me. This was just another reminder to me to keep focused on Him not on the circumstances around me.
Day 1: Proverbs 1
Scripture:
Proverbs 1: 32-33
Childish people go down the wrong path. They will die. Foolish people are satisfied with the way they live. The will be destroyed. But those who listen to me will live in safety. The will not worry. The won't be afraid of getting hurt.
Observation: These verses offer a wonderful promise from God. As with all promises, there is a condition. It is the "if you... then I will..." pattern that is so often present in the Bible.
If you are childish you will go down the wrong path. Your soul will die apart from God and be in Hell for eternity.
But the good news is:
If you listen to God, you will live in safety. Why because your soul belongs to the creator of this world!
God takes care of His children. In this day and age, I can't think of a better reality to live in. As the world darkens around me, I don't have to be afraid. No matter what the world throws my way, I am in the safe hand of God.
As I sit here typing this, I am listening to the baby birds sing right outside my front door. They are sitting high in their nest that sits about two feet from my front door. They don't have jobs, cars, clothes, refridgerators, walmart for birds. None of these conveniences we have yet they sing. How much more should we His children made in His likeness do the same!
Application: As I read over and over these verses, I hear God saying to me, "Linda, are you listening to Me? Are you striving daily to live in the way I have instructed? Then why are you worried. You see, I know God will take care of me. My heart reminds me of this all the time, but sometimes, a lot lately my mind gets stuck on the stress of all that is going on around me. This was just another reminder to me to keep focused on Him not on the circumstances around me.
Saturday, June 6, 2015
God Size Faith
I've been thinking and praying a lot about our church and its future. As I have been thinking about our future, I find myself dwelling on what seems to be a huge, impossible task. It is overwhelming. Anyone else feel overwhelmed at the thought of trying to grow our church? As I continue to pray about it God has impressed upon me over and over that it is a matter of faith. So my first question for you today is, what is faith? Faith is the persuasion of the mind that something is true.
Matthew 9:29 says, "According to your faith, let it be done to you." I think this is the key for our church. He will grow our church according to or faith. It has nothing to do with how many we have here now. It has nothing to do with how much money we do or don't have. What it comes down to is how much do we want it; how much faith do we have that it will happen? Faith is like a muscle. What happens to a muscle that is never used?(it gets weak) So what do you do to strengthen a muscle? (you use it) So as individuals and as a church we need to be exercising our faith if we want to rebuild our church. God has His ways of strengthening our faith and that is what we are going to look at today.
First, God gives you a dream. Let's pull over and park here. Tell me about your dreams for our church. These are definitely God sized dreams. We can't achieve them on our own. They require that we have faith in Him to fulfill those dreams. As a church, the first thing we need to do is spend time in prayer asking God to reveal to us His dream for our church. We are here for a purpose. God will reveal that purpose to us if we care enough to seek Him. Ephesians 3:20 says: God is able to do far more than we could ever ask for or imagine. He does everything by His power that is working in us.
Next, we need to claim it. No matter how big the dream is He has for us; no matter how unobtainable it seems, if God gives us the dream, we will be able to see it fulfilled if we just have faith in Him! Mark 9:23 says, "Everything is possible for the person who has faith." Here is God's message for today, "Monroe, First Church of the Nazarene, you get to choose how much I bless your church. If you believe, I will do it! If you believe, I will bless!" James 1:5-8 says: If any of you need wisdom, ask God for it. He will give it to you. God gives freely to everyone. He doesn't find fault. But when you ask, you must believe. You must not doubt. People who doubt are like waves of the sea. The wind blows and tosses them around. A man like that should't expect to receive anything from the Lord. He can't make up his mind. He can never decide what to do.
Perhaps the hardest part of dreaming big with God is the waiting! What happens when we have to wait for God's promises? Often we either give up or like Abraham and Sarah we take matters into our own hands. As we look around the world today, I think we can all agree that taking matters into our own hands can have serious long term affects. Habakkuk 2:3 says: (the message) This vision(dream) is a witness to what's coming. It aches for the coming - it can hardly wait! And it doesn't lie. If it seems slow in coming, wait. It's on its way. It will come right on time.
We may run into difficult times as we go down this journey of building our church, but God's message is clear - Hang on! Don't give up! 1 Peter 1 6-7 : I know how great this makes you feel even though you have to put up with every kind of aggravation in the meantime. Pure gold put in the fire comes out of it proved pure; genuine faith put through this suffering comes out proved genuine. When Jesus wraps this all up, its your faith, not your gold, that God will have on display as evidence of his victory. Rest assured, if we dream big with God, if we claim His dream for us as a church, Satan will fight us. As long as we continue the way we are, just existing, we are not a threat to Satan. When we start dreaming big with God, we become a threat and he will fight. But if we hold onto our faith we will not just survive, we will thrive!
I would like to share the words to a song I learned one year in vacation Bible school. God brought this song into my life during a very trying time and it was what helped me get through. I believe its words, its message is exactly what we need right now for our church.
It seems like there's so much to hope for, so many dreams I wish they all could come true. When I think about your ways Lord, it gives me so much faith in all that You do.
Faith to see beyond what I can see. Faith to know that You will do great things. I will trust you Lord, I'll always believe. As I hold onto my faith, Jesus You are holding onto me.
You see, this is exactly what I propose we need - this kind of faith. The kind of faith that stays focused on the dream God gives us. The kind of faith that sees past our lack of workers, our lack of money our lack of whatever obstacles Satan will undoubtedly throw our way and simply know that God will do great things in our church if we just stay focused on Him. Will you trust Him today? Will you believe? Will you hold onto the faith and allow Him to hold onto you?
Here is my challenge to you - This week I want you to be in prayer for our church. I want you specifically to pray that God will give you His dream for our church. Come prepared next week. I am going to have a poster board to hang up for us to write the dreams God reveals to us. That way we have something to look at, to pray over, to help keep us focused.
Matthew 9:29 says, "According to your faith, let it be done to you." I think this is the key for our church. He will grow our church according to or faith. It has nothing to do with how many we have here now. It has nothing to do with how much money we do or don't have. What it comes down to is how much do we want it; how much faith do we have that it will happen? Faith is like a muscle. What happens to a muscle that is never used?(it gets weak) So what do you do to strengthen a muscle? (you use it) So as individuals and as a church we need to be exercising our faith if we want to rebuild our church. God has His ways of strengthening our faith and that is what we are going to look at today.
First, God gives you a dream. Let's pull over and park here. Tell me about your dreams for our church. These are definitely God sized dreams. We can't achieve them on our own. They require that we have faith in Him to fulfill those dreams. As a church, the first thing we need to do is spend time in prayer asking God to reveal to us His dream for our church. We are here for a purpose. God will reveal that purpose to us if we care enough to seek Him. Ephesians 3:20 says: God is able to do far more than we could ever ask for or imagine. He does everything by His power that is working in us.
Next, we need to claim it. No matter how big the dream is He has for us; no matter how unobtainable it seems, if God gives us the dream, we will be able to see it fulfilled if we just have faith in Him! Mark 9:23 says, "Everything is possible for the person who has faith." Here is God's message for today, "Monroe, First Church of the Nazarene, you get to choose how much I bless your church. If you believe, I will do it! If you believe, I will bless!" James 1:5-8 says: If any of you need wisdom, ask God for it. He will give it to you. God gives freely to everyone. He doesn't find fault. But when you ask, you must believe. You must not doubt. People who doubt are like waves of the sea. The wind blows and tosses them around. A man like that should't expect to receive anything from the Lord. He can't make up his mind. He can never decide what to do.
Perhaps the hardest part of dreaming big with God is the waiting! What happens when we have to wait for God's promises? Often we either give up or like Abraham and Sarah we take matters into our own hands. As we look around the world today, I think we can all agree that taking matters into our own hands can have serious long term affects. Habakkuk 2:3 says: (the message) This vision(dream) is a witness to what's coming. It aches for the coming - it can hardly wait! And it doesn't lie. If it seems slow in coming, wait. It's on its way. It will come right on time.
We may run into difficult times as we go down this journey of building our church, but God's message is clear - Hang on! Don't give up! 1 Peter 1 6-7 : I know how great this makes you feel even though you have to put up with every kind of aggravation in the meantime. Pure gold put in the fire comes out of it proved pure; genuine faith put through this suffering comes out proved genuine. When Jesus wraps this all up, its your faith, not your gold, that God will have on display as evidence of his victory. Rest assured, if we dream big with God, if we claim His dream for us as a church, Satan will fight us. As long as we continue the way we are, just existing, we are not a threat to Satan. When we start dreaming big with God, we become a threat and he will fight. But if we hold onto our faith we will not just survive, we will thrive!
I would like to share the words to a song I learned one year in vacation Bible school. God brought this song into my life during a very trying time and it was what helped me get through. I believe its words, its message is exactly what we need right now for our church.
It seems like there's so much to hope for, so many dreams I wish they all could come true. When I think about your ways Lord, it gives me so much faith in all that You do.
Faith to see beyond what I can see. Faith to know that You will do great things. I will trust you Lord, I'll always believe. As I hold onto my faith, Jesus You are holding onto me.
You see, this is exactly what I propose we need - this kind of faith. The kind of faith that stays focused on the dream God gives us. The kind of faith that sees past our lack of workers, our lack of money our lack of whatever obstacles Satan will undoubtedly throw our way and simply know that God will do great things in our church if we just stay focused on Him. Will you trust Him today? Will you believe? Will you hold onto the faith and allow Him to hold onto you?
Here is my challenge to you - This week I want you to be in prayer for our church. I want you specifically to pray that God will give you His dream for our church. Come prepared next week. I am going to have a poster board to hang up for us to write the dreams God reveals to us. That way we have something to look at, to pray over, to help keep us focused.
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