Category Archives: General Thoughts

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Walking With Christ—Where Are You Going In 2012?

Discipleship is a relational journey—a daily walk with Jesus empowered by the indwelling Holy Spirit—taking us more deeply into a love relationship with the Heavenly Father, a more compassionate love for our fellow man, and increasing likeness, in sum and substance, to the Son, Jesus Christ.

It is also an intentional and strategic activity on our part.  There are certain things that disciples actively do to grow—it doesn’t just happen passively. And nothing is more vital to a growing discipleship than reading and reflecting on the Word of God in a deliberate and consistent way.

I hope you have a plan for that in 2012.  I do…as does the fellowship where I serve as pastor.  I want to invite you to adopt the plan that I will use this year, and join me in this exciting journey of growth.

The plan calls for weekly, intentional and strategic engagement in the Bible…and it is two-fold.  It calls for reading key passages and memorizing key verses.  Here is how it will unfold:

The Essential 100

The Essential 100 Challenge (E100) helps you get an overview of the Bible… without getting bogged down. The Plan guides you through 50 Old Testament passages and 50 New Testament passages — The Essential 100 — so you can see the big picture of God’s Word, and form a daily Bible reading habit in the process. Below is the link to this creative plan:

http://www.pcctoday.com/life-learning/bible-reading-plan/

You can take the challenge and read these passages during the first hundred days of 2012.  Or you can slow it down a bit and work through these 100 passages at a pace of two per week, enabling you to complete this challenge in one year. That’s what I plan to do.  And if you like, you can link your reading to this blog, which will follow the plan throughout 2012.  Two blogs will appear each week, one on Wednesday and one on Friday, as I work my way through the Essential 100.

Project 52

Project 52 will help you to hide one key verse from God’s living and active Word in your heart each week during 2012.  Imagine that … 52 verses committed to memory this year!  Sounds like an elephant-sized task; but as the old saying goes, you can eat an elephant—one bite at a time.

Join me in committing these verses to memory.  And to get them rooted deeply in our hearts, I will write a devotional blog each Monday on the selected verse for that week. I am looking forward to this project—and to doing it in partnership with you!

You can find the verses we will be memorizing in the same location as the reading plan:

http://www.pcctoday.com/life-learning/bible-reading-plan/

You can also grab a Memory Verse Desktop Wallpaper each week for your computer to help you meditate each day on the scheduled verse. Check here to see our first screensaver verse: http://www.pcctoday.com/_img/wp/Desk_1024_768.jpg

I am stoked about my walk with Jesus in 2012.  With the ever-present help of the Holy Spirit and a few intentional practices on my part, I plan on looking a little (hopefully a lot) more like Jesus by the end of next year.

Happy New Year!  May God perfect everything that concerns you in 2012.

Ray

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Ponder Anew What The Almighty Can Do

Today’s Reflection:

“What, then, shall we say in response to this? If God is for us, who can be against us? He who did not spare his own Son, but gave him up for us all—how will he not also, along with him, graciously give us all things?” (Romans 8:31-32).”

One of my favorite hymns — yeah, I still love them — was written by the German composer, Joachim Neander, in the 1600’s.  It still resonates with worshipers of all ages some 400 years later.  I particularly relish this line in the fourth verse,

Ponder anew what the Almighty can do,
If with His love He befriends thee.

Think about that for a moment — it will change your day, not to mention your entire life.  The only thing I would change in this otherwise magnificent hymn is the one little word in the second line, “if”.  For me, and anyone else who has been redeemed my God’s marvelous grace, that word should rather be, “since”! “If” speaks of possibility, “since” reflects reality!

God has indeed befriended us, amazing as that sounds.  And since we are friends of the Almighty, the realities of blessing, protection, provision success and satisfaction in the days, months, years and eternity to come are unlimited — limited only by our unbelief.

So, indeed, take a moment to ponder again what it means to walk in moment-by-moment friendship with your Almighty Father.  I guarantee you this, it will make the moments ahead a whole lot brighter.

Praise to the Lord,
The Almighty, the King of creation!
O my soul, praise Him,
For He is thy health and salvation!
All ye who hear,
Now to His temple draw near;
Praise Him in glad adoration.

Praise to the Lord,
Who over all things so wondrously reigneth,
Shelters thee under His wings,
Yea, so gently sustaineth!
Hast thou not seen
How all your longings have been
Granted in what He ordaineth?

Praise to the Lord,
Who doth prosper thy work and defend thee;
Surely His goodness
And mercy here daily attend thee.
Ponder anew
What the Almighty can do,
If with His love He befriend thee.

Praise to the Lord,
O let all that is in me adore Him!
All that hath life and breath,
Come now with praises before Him.
Let the Amen
Sound from His people again,
Gladly for aye we adore Him.

Yes, for gladly we adore Him.  How could we not!

Something To Think About
“Christian contentment is that sweet, inward, quiet, gracious frame of spirit, which freely submits to and delights in God’s wise and fatherly disposal in every condition.” ~Jeremiah Burroughs

 

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The Grinch You Will Always Have

Today’s Reflection:

After the wise men were gone, an angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream. “Get up! Flee to Egypt with the child and his mother,” the angel said. “Stay there until I tell you to return, because Herod is going to search for the child to kill him.” (Matthew 2:13, NLT)

The renowned 19th century Bible expositor J. C. Ryle said, “The rulers of this world are seldom friendly to the cause of God.”

How true!  And nowhere is that truth more evident than in Matthew 2 when King Herod tried to kill God’s greatest cause, the infant Jesus. This is the original story of the real Grinch who didn’t just try to steal Christmas, he tried to kill Christmas.

It’s a bizarre story when you think about it; it doesn’t seem to belong in the Christmas account. I’ll bet you won’t get a card next Christmas depicting Herod killing the babies of Bethlehem. While you might see the “Nutcracker Suite”, you’re not likely to attend the “Slaughter of the Innocents”. Your music director will likely lead the congregation to sing “Away In A Manger”, but not “Away With the Baby Jesus!”

It is a part of the story we would just as soon forget, but there it is, tucked into the Christmas story by God’s design for our benefit and encouragement. I think it’s there, in part, because Herod was just the first of a long line of Grinches right up to this day that are always trying to kill our Christmas and steal our joy and destroy the incarnational plan of God in our lives.  Jesus, who was obviously and personally familiar with “the Grinch”, said in John 10:10,

“The thief’s  purpose is to steal and kill and destroy. My purpose is to give them a rich and satisfying life.”

Here is one of the things I believe the Holy Spirit, who inspired at Mathew’s account, wanted you to know from this story: Back then, Herod couldn’t destroy Jesus, and right now, no ruler, no person, no force, no circumstance, no disappointment can stop the cause that God has birthed in you! God is committed to giving you “a rich and satisfying life”, both now and for all eternity!

What cause has God birthed in you?  Has some real life Grinch in the form of a person or a circumstance tried to steal it from you?  Take your concern to God and trust.  Memorize and pray back Psalm 138:8 to God all week long:

“The Lord will perfect that which concerns me!”

Something To Think About

“Walk boldly and wisely…There is a hand above that will help you on.” ~Philip James Bailey

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Proverbs, Here We Come!

If you are following the 2011 Bible Reading Plan I have promoted in my devotional blog, you have now finished your second cycle through the Gospels.  I trust that you are on a glorious journey that will lead you to a deeper and more rewarding relationship with Jesus than you have ever known before.

This plan calls for two more cycles through the Gospels this year, and I want to encourage you to continue on.  What a joy it is to saturate our spirits with the life and love, ministry and teaching, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ, Lord and Savior!

With that said, I will not be blogging on the Gospels for the time being.  Rather, since I will be preaching this summer in my church, Portland Christian Center, through the book of Proverbs, I will also be bringing devotionals each day during the months of July and August from this wonderful collection of God-breathed wise sayings .  So I would like to invite you to add to your daily Bible reading by including a chapter in Proverbs each day.

Proverbs has thirty-one chapters—one for each corresponding day of the month.  Beginning July 1, start with Proverbs 1, and allow the Holy Spirit inspired wisdom of King Solomon to fill your mind and inform your way.  Following this daily plan will take you through Proverbs twice, which I think will produce a delightful and unforgettable summer experience for you.

Soli Deo Gloria!

Ray

“The Word of God well understood and religiously obeyed is the shortest route to spiritual perfection. And we must not select a few favorite passages to the exclusion of others. Nothing less than a whole Bible can make a whole Christian.” ~A.W. Tozer

 

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Go Deep!

You Are Invited!

“Taste and see that the LORD is good. Oh, the joys of those who take refuge in him!” (Psalm 34:8)

Have you ever felt spiritually dry?  Have you given so much of yourself that there is nothing left to give?  If you have, you’re not alone.  In fact, your experience is quite common among believers, especially those who serve and lead.  This is especially true of those who minister to people in times of pain and crisis.  The sense of hopelessness they feel and the sense of helplessness you feel in easing their suffering can leave your spiritual and emotional well empty.

What can you do when you are bone dry?  Is the answer to withdraw?  Should you insulate yourself from the neediness of those around you? Is detaching from the pain others are enduring the way to go?  How about taking a vacation…or even a little nap? That sounds really good, but I can assure you, none of those actions will solve a thing. Let me suggest to you something else.

How about going deeper?

Phillip Yancey tells the story of his former pastor, Bill, who in the midst of a period of spiritual emptiness brought on by incessant draining ministry interactions, went on a spiritual retreat.  In this retreat setting, he bared his soul to the spiritual director assigned to him. He talked about his heavy ministry schedule, how he was spiritually depleted, emotionally dry and had nothing more to give.

Bill expected his spiritual director, who happened to be a nun, to offer soothing words about what a sacrificial, unselfish pastor he was, or perhaps even recommend that he take a sabbatical.  Instead she said, “Bill, there’s only one thing to do if your reservoir runs dry.  You’ve got to go deeper.”

Bill returned from his retreat with a profound understanding that his faith and emotional energy depended less on his outward interactions than on his inner journey toward spiritual depth.

I think that’s what the Psalmist is telling us in his very first song:  You’ve got to go deeper.  God doesn’t promise you perpetual springtime, where the rain falls and the waters flow and the blossoms continually dot your spiritual landscape.  Sometimes there is scorching summers and frigid winters.  That’s when you’ve got to have roots that go way down deep to the unseen waters.

Listen to how David said it in Psalm 1:1-3,

Blessed is the man who does not walk in the counsel of the wicked
or stand in the way of sinners or sit in the seat of mockers.
But his delight is in the law of the LORD,
and on his law he meditates day and night.
He is like a tree planted by streams of water, which yields its fruit in season and whose leaf does not wither.
Whatever he does prospers!

Go deeper with God!  Let your roots go so deep into the very source of life giving water and you will not only blossom in the springtime of God’s favor, but you will be nourished even in the summer of intense ministry heat and the frigid barrenness of spiritual winter.

“Let anyone who is thirsty come to me and drink. Whoever believes in me, as Scripture has said, rivers of living water will flow from within them.“ ~Jesus Christ