Posted on Friday, September 20, 2024

Recalibrate

Perfect Alignment with God’s Purposes

PREVIEW: How do we get God on our side? Simple: we get on God’s side! And what is the best way to ensure the Lord’s help? Not just to get the Lord on your side—that can be tricky business, given the exceeding craftiness of our own humanistic motives (“The heart is hopelessly dark and deceitful, a puzzle that no one can figure out” Jer 17:9). Rather, the only surefire guarantee of the Lord’s help is to get on God’s side—and stay there—by maintaining God-honoring goals, focusing my interest on God’s purposes, setting my family apart for his glory, and exerting all my energies “as unto the Lord” (Col 3:17, 23). If you are like me, achieving that will require a good deal of recalibrating your life so that from the center to the circumference, you are aligned with God’s will.

A Journey of Worship // Psalm 127:1-2

Unless the LORD builds the house, its builders labor in vain. Unless the LORD watches over the city, the watchmen stand guard in vain. In vain you rise early and stay up late, toiling for food to eat—for he grants sleep to those he loves.

During the Civil war, President Lincoln was asked if God was on his side. His reply was, “It is not is God on my side, but am I on God’s side?”

That’s a great question to ask yourself in any of life’s endeavors. Whether it is in pursuing your personal goals (“Unless the LORD builds the house, its builders labor in vain”), protecting your interests (“Unless the LORD watches over the city, the watchmen stand guard in vain”), producing a good living (“In vain you rise early and stay up late, toiling for food to eat”), practicing a life of tranquility (“he grants sleep to those he loves”) or planning for a happy family (“how blessed are you parents, with your quivers full of children” Psalm 127:3), at the end of all your efforts, nothing of lasting value and eternal consequence will have been accomplished if the Lord has not helped.

And what is the best way to ensure the Lord’s help? Not just to get the Lord on your side—that can be tricky business, given the exceeding craftiness of our own humanistic motives (“The heart is hopelessly dark and deceitful, a puzzle that no one can figure out” Jeremiah 17:9). Rather, the only surefire guarantee of the Lord’s help is to get on God’s side—and stay there.

Perhaps Lincoln’s question is a good one to ask yourself today: “Am I on God’s side?” Are my goals God-honoring? Are my interests dedicated to his purpose? Is my work his work? Is my family set apart for his glory? Are all my efforts done “as unto the Lord” (Colossians 3:17, 23)?

If you are nervous about answering those questions as if you were giving account to God himself, then wouldn’t you say it is time to recalibrate your life so that from the center to the circumference, you are aligned with God’s purposes?

I hope you will join me today for a little recalibration. If we can pull that off, we will be in good standing to get the Lord’s help. And, like the Apostle Paul, the testimony of our life will be, “But I have had God’s help to this very day, and so I stand here and testify to small and great alike.” (Acts 26:22)

My Offering of Worship: A powerful and penetrating chapter on what a recalibrated life should look like is Colossians 3. Read that entire chapter, perhaps several times, and pray through each piece of evidence of a life that is fully recalibrated to God’s purposes.

Posted on Monday, September 16, 2024

For Desert Dwellers

Your Armload of Blessing is Coming

PREVIEW: As is true for every Christian, you, too, will get a season in what seems to be a wasteland, what we might call a desert experience. It is a barren place that is bordering your life physically, emotionally, financially, relationally, or spiritually, seemingly preventing you from moving into the place of fruitfulness that God intends for you. But don’t forget: God specializes in creating streams in the desert, turning bareness into fruitfulness, and birthing life from death. So, dear desert dweller, get ready to laugh. God is about to end your stream of tears and send you a stream of restoration.

A Journey of Worship // Psalm 126:4

Restore our fortunes, O LORD, like streams in the Negev.

You’ve got a Negev; so do I. Everybody gets a Negev at some point in their life. Spending time there just seems to be core curriculum for Christians.

So, what’s a Negev? The Negev was the desert that sat on Israel’s southern border, and it was an inhospitable, intimidating, and impossible place. It was a borderline of barrenness. Israel had a physical Negev, but your Negev is not geographical; you may very well be living with a barren place that is bordering your life physically, emotionally, financially, relationally, or spiritually. And your desert experience is likely preventing, or so you think, from moving into your Promised Land, a land flowing with milk and honey, a place of fruitfulness that God intends for you.

And here’s the deal with deserts: To the natural eye, there is no quick way out or easy way through. To the natural mind, there is nothing but barrenness, with no hope for life, and no prospects for change. The desert represents death—the end of a dream, the end of the line, the end of the story.

But God specializes in creating streams in the desert, turning bareness into fruitfulness, and birthing life from death. God brought the Israelites through the desert to the Promised Land, David out of the wilderness into the palace, Israel back from Babylonian exile to rebuild Jerusalem, and Jesus from death’s tomb to eternal glory. As you can see, deserts—physical, emotional, financial, relational, spiritual—are no big deal to God; some of his best work is done there.

Your Negev may look like the end of the road for you but don’t lose hope. Though you may weep tears of sorrow or tears of repentance or tears of intercession over your desert (“those who planted their crops in despair will shout “Yes!” at the harvest,” Psalm 126:5). You see, God will water your Negev with those tears and in the proper time, bring forth so much abundance (“And now, God, do it again—bring rains to our drought-stricken lives,” Psalm 126:6). And when, not if, but when that happens, you will have to pinch yourself to make sure it is not a dream (“those who went off with heavy hearts will come home laughing, with armloads of blessing,” Psalm 126:1).

So, dear desert dweller, get ready to laugh. God is about to end your stream of tears and send you a stream of restoration.

My Offering of Worship: Select two or three different Bible translations and read slowly, carefully, and prayerfully the six verses of Psalm 126. Pour out your heart to God, claim his promises from this song for your own life, and offer a sacrifice of gratitude in advance for your coming stream of restoration.

Posted on Friday, September 13, 2024

Do Good

O God, Keep Me Pure and Keep Me Prosperous

PREVIEW: God sometimes uses difficult trials to purify our faith and evil times to bring a better kind of prosperity than mere temporal stuff to our lives. But in a sense, when the psalmist prays, “Do good, O Lord,” he is foreshadowing the very prayer Jesus taught his disciples to pray in Matthew 6:13, “Lead us not into temptation.” The Message captures the psalmist thoughts when it translates that line in the Lord’s Prayer, “Keep us safe from ourselves and the Devil.” That’s not a bad prayer to pray, I’d say. Given the choice between tough times and good times, I will pray for the latter, following both the psalmist’s and the Lord’s examples.

A Journey of Worship // Psalm 125:4

Do good, O LORD, to those who are good, to those who are upright in heart.

God is good—all the time! That isn’t just modern American “Christianese.” No, that is biblical truth.

The fact is, God is all wise, fundamentally good, and always in charge! That never changes, even in tough times, which is likely the setting for this psalm. Some Bible scholars believe Psalm 125 was written during the time of foreign domination—perhaps at the hands of the uber-wicked Assyrians—or at least during a time when it seemed likely that Jerusalem would be overrun by the godless.

This is yet another Psalm of Assent, and the writer penned the song for people to sing on their way to worship in Jerusalem. It prompted them to call upon God for two things:

First, to keep Jerusalem pure: “The scepter of the wicked will not remain over the land allotted to the righteous, for then the righteous might use their hands to do evil.” (Psalm 125:3)

Second, to keep Jerusalem prosperous: “Lord, do good to those who are good, to those who are upright in heart”. (Psalm 125:4)

The writer recognized that people were seriously tempted to fall away from God when times were tough—either by giving in to the godless culture that had swallowed the land or by abandoning their trust in the God who seemed to withhold much-needed provision.

Of course, we recognize that God sometimes uses trials to purify our faith and tough times to bring a better kind of prosperity to our lives. But in a sense, the psalmist here foreshadows the very prayer Jesus taught his disciples to pray in Matthew 6:13, “Lead us not into temptation.” The Message captures the psalmist’s thoughts when it translates that line in the Lord’s Prayer,

“Keep us safe from ourselves and the Devil.”

That’s not a bad prayer to pray, I’d say. Given the choice between tough times and good times, I will pray for the latter, following both the psalmist’s and the Lord’s examples. Sure, I am willing to embrace trial as a necessary friend (James 1:2, MSG), but my first choice is to hold hands with the goodness of God.

Yes, do good, dear God, and keep me safe from myself and the Devil!

My Offering of Worship: Where in your life are you giving into fear are seeking escape by temporal means? Stop! Go to God. Tell him your need—and be very specific. Then don’t neglect to offer him thanksgiving in advance, which is absolutely the key to his all-surpassing peace ruling in your heart.

Posted on Monday, September 9, 2024

Help Wanted

There is No Better Helper Than God

PREVIEW: Who better to have helping you than the God who created everything and who, by his power, sustains everything he has created. All other helpers will fall short and will ultimately fail, but there is One who never fails. And best of all, he is yours, and you are his. Better yet, he needs no convincing to act on your behalf. By virtue of you being his child, he not only stands at the ready to help you, he actually goes ahead of you and prepares the way before you get there. Yes, the Lord is our helper!

A Journey of Worship // Psalm 124:8

Our help is in the name of the LORD, the Maker of heaven and earth.

Let’s add a bit more context to our verse. The psalmist writes, “If the Lord had not been on our side when people attacked us, they would have swallowed us alive when their anger flared against us; the flood would have engulfed us, the torrent would have swept over us, the raging waters would have swept us away. Praise be to the Lord, who has not let us be torn by their teeth. We have escaped like a bird from the fowler’s snare; the snare has been broken, and we have escaped.”

He is throwing a lot of analogies at us to describe not just the rough spots that we find ourselves in from time to time, but this is a desperate situation that we are not sure we can survive. We find ourselves in deep weeds with no help, no human escape, no remedy. We despair of life, if not physically, then emotionally, relationally, financially, or spiritually.

Then the psalmist declares those words that we depend on for our very life, breath, well-being, meaning in life, and joy: “Our help is in the name of the Lord, the Maker of heaven and earth.” (v. 8). Or as the Message puts it, “God’s strong name is our help, the same God who made heaven and earth.”

Who better to have helping you than the God who created everything and who, by his power, sustains it? All other helpers will fall short and will ultimately fail, but there is One who never fails. And best of all, he is yours, and you are his.

Better yet, he needs no convincing to act on your behalf. By virtue of being his child, he not only stands at the ready to help you, but he also actually goes ahead of you and prepares the way before you get there. (Isaiah 45:2) He commands you not to fear, for he will lead you and guide you into good success wherever you go. (Joshua 1:3,7-9) He has promised you health and prosperity, joy and purpose, righteousness and wisdom. (Proverbs 3:5-6; 4:11) He says he will stand beside you and walk with you—especially when the going gets rough. (Isaiah 43:2) He will even be your rearguard—he’s got you covered. (Isaiah 58:8).

What an incredible reality—God is on your side, and therefore, as you stay on God’s side, you cannot fail. So many people place their trust in people and institutions, in politicians and political systems, in bankers, coaches, parents, and preachers, which are at best very flawed and quite temporal. But those who trust in the Lord for his help will not be disappointed.

Isaiah 49:23 says of those who find their help in the Lord, “Kings will be your foster fathers, and their queens your nursing mothers. They will bow down before you with their faces to the ground; they will lick the dust at your feet. Then you will know that I am the LORD; those who hope in me will not be disappointed.”

Hallelujah, with God as your God, help wanted is help received!

Posted on Friday, September 6, 2024

Confidence In The Un-Random God

God’s Got A Plan

THE BIG IDEA: Nothing is random about God; nothing is left up to chance. The God of the Bible is the sovereign Lord of the universe and is ruling over the details of history to bring about his perfect plan. What may seem like happenstance or coincidence, God has foreordained, caused, or permitted in his perfect will. Coincidence is simply a sovereign act of God for which he chooses to remain unseen, a miracle for which he prefers anonymity. God is in control of all things, and that includes your life.

Meditation // Matthew 2:5,15,18,23

For thus it is written in the prophets…

The birth and life of Jesus Christ, the Son of God and Savior of the world, was not the product of random events. It was the direct result of prophetic fulfillment. Thus the phrase linking Christ’s life to Old Testament prophecy is repeated four times here in this second chapter of Matthew’s Gospel.

Those details of Jesus’ life had been laid out in the mind of God from eternity past and had been written down in the inspired utterances of the prophets of old hundreds of years before Christ was born. The fulfillment of scores of prophecies in minute detail of the birth, life, death, and resurrection Jesus leaves us with a pretty amazing track record of prophetic accuracy…leaving no doubt that those prophecies detailing his second coming will most certainly be fulfilled, too.

There is nothing random about God; nothing is left up to chance. The God of the Bible is the sovereign Lord of the universe, and is ruling over the details of history to bring about his perfect plan. What may seem like happenstance or coincidence, God has foreordained, caused, or permitted in his perfect will. Coincidence is simply a sovereign act of God for which he chooses to remain unseen, a miracle for which he prefers anonymity.

God is in control of all things, and that includes your life. David wrote in Psalm 139:16,

You saw me before I was born.
Every day of my life was recorded in your book.
Every moment was laid out before a single day had passed.

God’s Word invites you to live with amazing confidence today, knowing that he is in control of all things, including even the smallest details of your life. Therefore, you can say, “all things will work together for my good and his glory.”

What Now? Offer this prayer of confidence to God: Lord, I will live confidently and expectantly this day, and this year, knowing that my life is a part of your greater plan. Take over my life completely, and may every detail of my existence serve your purposes perfectly and bring great glory to your name.”

Posted on Monday, September 2, 2024

You’re Worth It

For The Joy Set Before Him

THE BIG IDEA: “For the joy set before him he endured the cross, scorning its shame.” What was the “joy” that so motivated Jesus to go through such a humiliating and torturous death? I’m convinced, my friend, that you were the joy Jesus saw as he hung there on the cross. And when he saw that you would one day stand with him as one of the redeemed before his Father’s throne, his heart swelled even as the life drained from his body, and he said, “It’s worth it!” All the suffering and humiliation of the cross was worth it to Jesus because you’re worth it!

Meditation // Mark 15:24

Then the soldiers nailed him to the cross.

Mark’s account of Jesus’s betrayal, arrest, trial, suffering, and crucifixion is moving beyond words. As you read in the paragraph below his description of what Jesus went through, I would encourage you to remember that Jesus didn’t have to go through this. But he did—and the reason was you.

The soldiers took Jesus into the courtyard of the governor’s headquarters (called the Praetorium) and called out the entire regiment. They dressed him in a purple robe, and they wove thorn branches into a crown and put it on his head. Then they saluted him and taunted, “Hail! King of the Jews!” And they struck him on the head with a reed stick, spit on him, and dropped to their knees in mock worship. When they were finally tired of mocking him, they took off the purple robe and put his own clothes on him again. Then, they led him away to be crucified. (Mark 15:16-20)

Trumped-up charges, the mockery of a trial, public humiliation, mental and physical torture, and rejection—the Second Person of the Trinity, the Agent of Creation, the Messiah of God’s chosen people, suffered beyond description at the hands of the people he loved. Yet he chose to endure it. Why? He did it for you! Hebrews 12:2 says,

For the joy set before him he endured the cross, scorning its shame.

What was the “joy” that so motivated Jesus to go through such a humiliating, torturous death? I am convinced, my friend, that you were the joy Jesus saw as he hung there on the cross. And when he saw that you would one day stand with him as one of the redeemed before his Father’s throne, his heart swelled even as the life drained from his body, and he said, “it’s worth it!”

All the suffering and humiliation of the cross was worth it to Jesus because you’re worth it!

What Now? Just take a minute before you do anything else today and offer your heartfelt thanks to God yet again for what he did by placing Jesus on the cross in your stead.

Posted on Friday, August 30, 2024

If You Play With Fire…

Things That Can Burn Us Beyond Remedy

THE BIG IDEA: “Adultery will reduce you to a loaf of bread; sexual indiscretion will prey upon your very life,” according to Proverbs 6:26. In other words, you mess around with sexual immorality (or any immorality for that matter), you’re toast! God never intended for our sexual needs to be in the driver’s seat of our lives. Our brain was meant to occupy that position, and our moral core was meant to be our navigator.

Meditation // Proverbs 6:27

Can a man scoop fire into his lap without his clothes being burned?

“If you play with fire, you’re going to get burned!” That’s what my father used to say to me, and I’m sure his father said to him, and his father said to him. The reason fathers the world over have to say that is that it seems there is just an innate curiosity little boys seem to have with fire. I’m sure even before matches were invented, back when man lived in caves, wore animal skins and first discovered fire, some troglodyte dad was telling his son, “Trog, you poke fire with stick, you get bad burn!”

Okay, maybe it didn’t happen quite that way, but around 3,000 years ago Solomon mused in Proverbs 6:27, “Can a man scoop fire into his lap without his clothes being burned?” Of course, Solomon’s point is that what is true of physical fire is also true in the spiritual realm—we’re drawn to the very things that can burn us beyond remedy. This chapter in Proverbs mentions three of the biggies:

An unspiritual pursuit of wealth: Specifically, Proverbs 6:1-5 warns us about one of the riskiest, and therefore worst kinds of financial transactions of all: entering into a business partnership without prayerful and careful planning. Solomon doesn’t care whether the business opportunity has great potential or not, he just says agreeing to it apart from God’s wisdom is the height of foolishness. This is particularly true if the business deal is a get rich quick scheme, which seems to be the implication here.

If you’ve entered into a deal without doing due spiritual diligence, chances are, you’re going to get yourself burned! The wisest thing you could do would be to quickly and graciously extract yourself from your foolish partnership and chalk it up to a lesson learned the hard way.

If you’ve gone into hock with your neighbor or locked yourself into a deal with a stranger…Don’t waste a minute, get yourself out of that mess!

An irresponsible approach to success: Perhaps the most common way we play with fire is by rejecting the common sense approach to work and wealth that simply rolls up its sleeves, sees the responsibilities before it, doesn’t over-think what needs to be done, just seizes the day and gets after it.

Solomon describes this approach to life in Proverbs 6:6-11 by illustrating the work ethic, of all things, the ubiquitous ant. More success stories are birthed from the ant’s I-work-hard-for-the-money life philosophy than any other. Far too many people in our day, lured by lust for quick fame and easy fortune, are waiting for their ship to come in. The problem is, they’ve never put their ship out to sea. God will reward you with the good life, but he expects you to get up in the morning, grab your lunch pail, put on your hard hat, and get to work!

A day off here, a day off there, sit back and take it easy—Do you know what comes next? Just this: You can look forward to a dirt-poor life!

An uncontrolled sexual appetite: Need I say more? Solomon knew from first-hand experience what we have observed in the lives of countless high-profile people—men and women—in our lifetime who have crashed once promising careers and have burned sterling reputations by allowing their sexual drives to do just that: Drive their behavior.

God never intended for our sexual needs to be in the driver’s seat of our lives. Our brain was meant to occupy that position, and our moral core was meant to be our navigator. As strong as our sexual drive is and as susceptible as it is to temptation, just mark this down: If you give in to your sexual desires apart from God’s plan for sexual satisfaction within marriage, you’re toast, man! That’s what Proverbs 6:26 says,

The adulteress will reduce you to a loaf of bread, sexual indiscretion will prey upon your very life.

Well, there you have it. You keep poking your stick in those three fires, and eventually, you’re going to get burned. There’s nothing really profound about Solomon’s teaching here; he’s just telling it like it is. And like that little ant in verses 6-8, which doesn’t need anyone to help it discover the deeper, hidden meaning of life, neither do you. The ant just does the right thing. I hope you will, too!

Now, as someone famous has said, go do the right thing.

What Now Think carefully about this and answer honestly: Are you playing with fire by the unspiritual pursuit of wealth, an irresponsible approach to success, or an uncontrolled sexual appetite? Being truthful and accountable in these three areas may mean the difference between a blessed or a cursed life.