Seeing Worth in Bible Reading

  
 
We don’t know what’s good for us. Really, we don’t. We drink substances that increase our heart rate and blood pressure, but we find it trendy on Instagram and what is delicious in our fast food restaurants. We watch programs that endorse murder, rape and violence and then pull our hairs when we see it manifested through the headlines. 

When did it feel good to be bad become acceptable? Since when did it become appopriate to justify evil? He was selling drugs and even murdered some people but it was to save his family because he was dying of cancer. 

I’m looking at the man in the mirror and realizing that what he enjoys is not healthy. 

What I delight in is not only bad, but it is also short-sighted. It’s Sam posting a picture of her daughter playing with a box disregarding all the toys she has in her room. Or the child I saw in her Sunday dress wallowing in the dirt in front of a playground. 

Our pleasures are not just bad in most cases but just sad and pathetic. C.S. Lewis calls us “half-hearted creatures” because he understood the truth that “the Lord finds our desires not too strong, but too weak“. We live our lives, “fooling about with drink and sex and ambition when infinite joy [that is Jesus] is offered us, like an ignorant child who wants to go on making mud pies in a slum because he cannot imagine what is meant by the offer of a holiday at the sea. We are far too easily pleased” ( C.S. Lewis, Weight of Glory and Others Addresses (New York: Collier Books, Macmillan Publishing Company), 3-4).

I jumped between Facebook and SMS one night, because I didn’t desire God, then I fancied myself in opening a book called When I Don’t Desire God. Fancy that. 

I streamed through the pages halfheartedly thinking reading it would justify my apathy. Then I stumbled on Psalms 19:10 which speaks of God’s Word: 

“More to be desired are they than gold, Yea, than much fine gold; Sweeter also than honey and the honeycomb” (Psalms‬ ‭19:10‬ ‭NKJV‬‬)

Then it dawned on me: My desire for the Scriptures is pitifully small compared to its true worth. God said of His Word that is it more desirable than precious metals. My eyes drew from the pages towards the ceiling as almost it had rolled back and I was gazing at the beauty of Christ. 

Could I have been someone that has been spectating the glorious splendor of God through a keyhole? 

The Bible, if you let it speak for itself will reveal to you that beyond the collection of grand and captivating pleasures we relish, Christ is the epitome of all that is treasured because He is the ultimate Treasure. 

Upon returning to Israel from exile and 70 year captivity in Babylon, rebuilding the temple was a momentous yet extraordinary task. The older generation compared the restored Temple to the grand splendor of Solomon’s Temple and were downcast.They were downcast at the pale sight of the temple, so God had Haggai prophecy to encourage them that this will not be the permanent face of their sanctuary. One day it will indeed shine in glorious array. 

God commissions Haggai the prophet at that time to call the nation to take courage and depend on God, for though the Temple was unsightly, they must look forward to when the place will be filled with glorious array at the coming of “the Desire of all nations”: 

“For thus says the LORD of hosts: ‘Once more (it is a little while) I will shake heaven and earth, the sea and dry land; and I will shake all nations, and they shall come to the Desire of All Nations, and I will fill this temple with glory,’ says the LORD of hosts” (‭‭Haggai‬ ‭2:6-7‬ ‭NKJV‬‬)

God promises to shake the heavens and earth. Judah had experienced the shaking of the earth before at the voice of God on Mount Sinai (Hebrews 12:25). God promises they will experience the shaking of the heavens and the earth by the voice of God’s Son at His coming (Hebrews 12:26). Following the shaking of the nations comes the desire of all the nations. If you let yourself, your spirit almost frolicks within this jar of skin at hearing the desire of all nations, like this anticipation has been inside us the whole time anxiously waiting for this desire which will satisfy us completely. 

This desire answered not acutally by something but in someone. 

A desire in Whom all the nations will be blessed (Genesis 12:1). A desire that will endure forever  as a holy mountain that will not fall but cover the enitre face of the earth, shadowing it with awe and glory (Daniel 2:35). A desire that Whose presence is fullness of joy (Psalms 16:11) and will satisfy every heart with His abundance (Psalms 36:8). A desire that has all creation panting and groaning with impatience for His arrival (Romans 8:19-22). A fortune that unfolds in the sincere pondering of His name. 

“Jesus”. 

I looked at a commentary by Bible professor Walter Kaiser on this passage and what I glean from his observation is that Jesus is the desire of the nations as He is the Source of everything, therefore He will be most precious of all that the world holds as valuable. He will answer the desire of the nations by being the what they actually longed for. 

One way God is magnified is how He appears to our understanding. Because God’s “thoughts are not our thoughts ” (Isaiah 55:8), it can then become difficult for us as finite beings with finite minds to comprehend God. God ordained for the earth to be full of the knowledge of God (Isaiah 11:9); therefore, God reveals Himself in various times and various ways to us and communicate to us.  A very special way God has God revealed Himself to us is through the Bible. 

The Scriptures were written so that real and eternal life may be accessible to man through faith in Christ (John 20:31). It produces and preserves life, because it produces faith so that man is capable to live. All life depends on the Word of God. All life was created by it (Psalms 33:6). Life is sustained by it (Hebrew 11:3). The new life (spiritual regeneration) is produced by it (James 1:18) and is accessed by it (1 Peter 1:23). Interpretation is very important, because life depends on it to live (Matthew 4:4). 

His words should not be sweet perfume we take in and regard, but oxygen we take in and depend to live. 

The life that inhabits Him is the light of men. “In Him was life, and the life was the light of men” (‭‭John‬ ‭1:4‬ ‭NKJV‬‬). His light shines as a hope that penetrates the darkness that wants to swallow us in its doom. He is the light of the world. He who follows Him shall not walk in darkness but have the light of life” (John 8:12 NKJV). He is the Word that reveals to us God and He immortalizes His words in a collection of 66 books for them to be a “a lamp to my feet And a light to my path.” (‭‭Psalms‬ ‭119:105‬ ‭NKJV‬‬). 

It’s almost like God’s Word is one delicious, filling meal before you and Jesus bellows, “Taste and see that the Lord is good” (Psalms 34:8 NKJV)!!!

It’s His Word that purifies us of sin (John 15:3; Ephesians 5:26). It’s His Word that protects us from sin (Psalms 119:11), that which will result being ashamed of things. It’s His Word that leads us to true delight (Psalms 1119:174). 

Surveying these words, I see more sharply that my appetites need to change. The lenses that are distracting my vision from enjoying what is really worth my time and behold the wondrous truths in God’s instructions (Psalms 1119:18). 

Behold these words of life and be won over to delighting in Christ as true life. Let your appetites be wet to want to see and savor Jesus and testify: “How sweet are Your words to my taste, Sweeter than honey to my mouth” (Psalms‬ ‭119:103‬ ‭NKJV‬‬)! 

Or go back to sharing with the world what you had to drink today. That never gets old. 

Try One Thing

 Smart phones have completely changed my life. 

I’ve been empowered to do many things at the same time: I can listen to music and text while I’m talking to someone as I’m finishing my lunch. 

While I can do more at once is amazing, I can’t say that it always produces my best work. I have several shirt stains to prove it. 

I can listen to music, text, while I’m talking to someone as I’m finishing my lunch, but does my friend really have my full attention and is he or she convinced that they have my attention as I am staring mostly at my “black wife” aka my iPhone? 

One of Jesus’ close friends, Martha, was busy making everything around the room pretty and welcoming for Jesus but was it the best thing to do at that moment? Honestly I don’t come down on Martha; I mean if you had God sitting in your living room wouldn’t you want to tidy up? 

But while Martha preoccupied herself with “many things”  (Luke 10:41 NKJV), she missed a priceless moment with Jesus. I’m sure she had future opportunities to be with God, but that single opportunity where Jesus physically sat in her living room and spoke the Word (v.39) was lost forever, never to be regained. 

Should there be a time to multitask? Yes, but I feel certain that focusing on one thing is becoming increasingly a lost art. 

While my phone is great, it does rob me of moments to completely engage and enjoy it. I see it worse in my spending time with Jesus. 

I want to dispense my prayers, break the silence with my worship playlist, have my bible app open, listen to a sermon podcast, quickly answer a text, stop that itch in the middle of my back, and somewhere at the bottom of this “to do” list: be still for the quiet voice of God. 

How much of your life is passing away while I swipe through your newsfeed? 

May be the best resolve is to see the possibility of each moment especially with God as irreplaceable; therefore urgently be all there. 

Try one thing. 

Not only can it be stress relieving and stain free, but it can also be rewarding. 

I forgot how cool the ocean was until I was taken out to surf. While I spend most of my time under the board, I was enjoying every minute of the clear water, the soft sand, the bright sun and deep ocean bottom. 

When King David realize how fully satisfied and joyful one can be with God he exclaimed, “You have put gladness in my heart, More than in the season that their grain and wine increased” (‭‭Psalms‬ ‭4:7‬ ‭NKJV‬‬). With all the demands of being king, David took time alone to be with God (Psalms 27:4). 

Is me being always busy really that urgent? 

Should seeing and savoring Jesus be the center drive of my day because it is what completely satisfies me? 

How many of us have yet to relish this encounter? 

I made an excellent discovery: the best way I found to save battery life for my iPhone is to turn it off and let it sit there for a while. 
Why take some time and unplug and tune-in  to what’s around you and (more importantly) Who is in you. 

Answering Why am I Here?

Problem with us today is not that we are perturbed waiting on the “Next Big Thing”.

The problem is that the “Big Thing” has happened but we looking for something else. 

A thing about us humans is that we are never satisfied. 

I have a new iPhone and I want the Apple Watch. I have a cookie but I want two. Well eight. I have a girlfriend, but I want her to give me more thrill in the relationship. I have a job, but I want high pay grade and a better office space. And a Ferrari. 

It’s like we are born with a void, a chasm inside our souls that never can be filled. Or that it can be filled but not with what we are filling it with. 

What happens when I kept my dog Sharp in a bird cage for a week. Well, he starts tearing everything inside the cage, barking at every two feet that passes by him, and poor him spinning in circles until he spills his water bowl and then falls into a “doggy depression”. 

He is a dog. While I had him in there to protect him from the poison that had been placed in the yard that would kill him, he wasn’t made to live in a bird cage. He was made to bark, frolic and run, and slobber my face with his wet licks. 

Maybe the problem in your life is not that you’ve grown tired barking at squirrels but that you are in the bird cage trying to squawk. 

We’ve have been pitched by books, speakers and speakers with books to live life on purpose, but how can I live a “purpose driven life” if I don’t know what my purpose in life is? 

Have you asked yourself yet: “Why am I here?” 

Even if you were made by a cosmic accident, what reason do you have to roll out of bed and make most of the day? 

I don’t know about you but it is bothersome to dress differently each day just to quiet the noise of bothersome people who noticed I wore the same pants twice. 

The one great thing about college is that your “Monday, Wednesday and Friday” class doesn’t know what you wore on “Tuesday and Thursday”. I did take this advantage. 

What is your reason for living today? 

Can I say that I don’t have the faith that I am an accident and therefore life is really meaningless. What meaning is there if your origin was meaningless? 

I grew up in church, and I never asked these questions, because theology just has this “God is” answers to my internal curiosity. 

It wasn’t until one day in high school that my art teacher kept me in class to finish a project. While we sat in silence, we attempted to break the sound barrier. Soon enough she asked me about my life and being a son of a pastor, religion instantaneously became a centerpiece in the conversation. 

She wasn’t rude but very perturbed. She was perturbed that most my answers to her questions was “because”. 

“Why are you living in Antigua?”

“Because my family were called to be missionaries” 

“How do you know you were called?” 

“Because God told my parents to leave America to serve here in Antigua.” 

I stood behind my answers until she asked me what I wanted to do with my life. 

I told her a pastor. She asked why and I told her because I always wanted to be pastor “because” my dad was a pastor and “because God called me”. 

She turned from me and  watched the sun beams glare from off the table. It seemed she was gathering energy from that beam, because she brought her eyes up and then gazed deeply into my eyes. She pierced into the window of my soul with her sharp blue eyes. 

Her wrinkled lips drew opened. Drawing a breath, she calmed the frightening silence but yet stirred what will be a tempest in my heart. 
“But what do you want to do?”
Her simple question complicated my life. I confidently knew what I want to do in life and still today I am still want to pastor. 

It’s wasnt what she said but what she meant by what she said. 

My high school art teacher struck an unsung cord in me, for the first time in my life, I challenged my beliefs. 
Let pause to say this: If you have beliefs and cannot challenge them, then they aren’t worth believing. 
Even the Bible says test what you hear. Her question wasn’t divine inspiration, but I did began testing my belief. 

I openly questioned the inconsistencies I saw in church. My pastor thought I was being defiant, but I recognized a frailty that did not match their convictions which they were persuading people to adhere to. 

I did ask myself that question “why am I here?” 

Last year in high school was complied with depression and apathy. My parents saw it best that I changed my geography for a little bit. 

A cruise is a good idea. Being clergy, I was sent to a Christian ship. But this ship carried a genre of Christian that most of us in the world have yet to encounter. 

Day one, my brother and I learned that ties and a tucked in shirts weren’t not the symbols of a righteous person. Love was the shirt men and women wore. 

Men like Alex from Uruguay who at the break down of our faithful ice cream machine, stilled the angry mob with a ray of unearthly compassion. The forecast of their faces turned with burning red to beaming as they clustered around him as he laughed, apologized and touched them with a warmth of sincerity. 

I lost my composure, because I never spectated such compassion all in one being at one moment. Besides mother of course, that’s a given. 

I grew up impressing people with my theology on Sunday morning then fighting with my siblings on Sunday night. I boarded that ship with the demand to be on the fore front of ministry. 

“I want to preach to the people” but they sent me to their little snack booth. I stood mystified in my little red uniformed shirt at Alex, because I had earlier yelled at some customers. 

He received the same harsh words and rude language that I received, but he responded differently. He didn’t fight for his right to be treated properly. He humbled himself and made the word “love” into an action. 

I cried in my cabin, beating my chest while I chanted “I want that. I want that. I want that.” 

He has something that I don’t see much on our planet. 

Could one posses something more pure than  religious piety and ceremonial ritual?

Is there something underneath the surface of human harmony that is deeper and more sincere than social tolerance? 

I realized for him to live this way he had some purpose to his life. I wish I can say that in my search to find his purpose I did so in a “piteous manner” (Christian way). 

I attempted to get him angry, make him stumble. I wore the devilish horns for a week, but he always maintained this gracious responsive manner. 

Then I threw down my hands and stopped “barking” and just watched him. 

I watched him play football (soccer) and when he was fouled though angry he reacted positively. I watched him converse with his friends, and he always seemed to me to be the central figure, because he lived in this constant loving way that drew people around him. 

I coveted his life and soon enough he started to answer my question. Providentially, he started to work more with me. There I saw his humanness. He did “sinned” like he lose his patience, and few days didn’t pull his share of the work, but what I didn’t see him was his gracious behavior. 

It came out in him saying, “John, I’m sorry”, and “John, you’re right”. I’m not trying to make him a deity but there was something internally differently about him. He was graciously kind enough to share it with me. 

It was Jesus. I worked for him the next month and saw he was just as human as I was but there was like two Persons living inside him. There was Alex and there was this Jesus. 

Jesus would come out of every time he apologized. He would come out every time work was hard, but there he would burst into a joyful rave and inspire us to push the day through. He would come out of his conversations where at the sound of his name, his eyes would expand with such delight and thrill like “this Guy is amazing John, I’m telling you”. 

Some nights, I stayed up under a light and read the books that talked about Jesus. The more I read the more I saw that this Man had some purpose that outlived His work and earthly life. A purpose that endured the rejection, the scorn and persecution. A purpose while he hung accused, sentenced, left to die, He could look at each person that unjustly kill Him and say “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do”
I dived deeper into the Bible, and I saw that I was closer to the Truth than I thought but yet still far off. I realized that we all have a purpose but it isn’t found in ourselves. It’s found in God. 

He made us for us as His masterpiece, intended to live a life of doing good things he planned for us long ago (‭Ephesians‬ ‭2‬:‭10‬). He planned a life for me and you that wasn’t disastrous, but it had a future and a hope that was worth living (Jeremiah‬ ‭29‬:‭11‬). 
I realized my depression in high school that climaxed in not graduating was just a moment that did not define my life. I realized on that old rusty ship that I wasn’t made to be somebody but to know somebody. 
You can say Jesus is some kind of thought up idea to control society, but I say seek Him for yourself.

I had to listen to atheistic art teacher and question my beliefs enough to see the purpose to why I build my life around them. 
Maybe you can’t see yourself walking into a church building. Maybe that’s too much. 

But Jesus isn’t a steeple with a cross. He is a Person that relates to all our weaknesses, for He faced all the same hardships as we as humans face (Hebrews 4:16); yet He is also God Who made a life for you that outlives the useless pursuits of happiness in a life that on average ends at 75. 

And He is the purpose that filled the chasm of that Urguain man. 
What if today you gave in to my appeal and just looked for Jesus? 

What if you for one day diverted from your regular routine and charted a different course? A course that led into the presence of Jesus. 
Sounds wild. Maybe not yet. 

Maybe this whole time God has been Someone behind the door at the end of the hall that you only knew as much as you can see through the little keyhole. 
Maybe you just needed an opportunity such as this and be invited to open the door and see Him fuller. 

Maybe it will be end of how you live life and what you call freedom. But what if losing yourself you found a greater gain? 
A purpose that fulfills you. Someone that completes you. A life that satisfies you. 
A book in the Bible says: 
“Oh, taste and see that the LORD is good; Blessed is the man who trusts in Him!” (Psalms‬ ‭34‬:‭8‬ NKJV)
Give God a chance to give you His promise to completely satisfy you. 
He has promised to direct to a life that will bring meaning and joy to you. 
“You will show me the path of life; In Your presence is fullness of joy; At Your right hand are pleasures forevermore.” (Psalms‬ ‭16‬:‭11‬ NKJV)
If Jesus does exist as God that makes Him the source of life and pretty everything. And if that’s our conclusion doesn’t that make Him the source of all pleasure? 
And if He is the Source of all pleasure, what meaning is there for us to be content with a life that is short of this experience?

Your purpose in life includes a plan that will satisfy you. 

And you know what? If you really look for it, I think you will find the “Next Big Thing”. 

Seeking Jesus for the first time, read the Gospel of Mark. Meet a Man that wasn’t just a Man. 

Seeking Him again? I invite you to read the book of Philippians. Encounter a joy that cannot be robbed by bad days, a joy found in being with Jesus. 

God’s Pleasure: He Wants You

  We aspire to answer the question: am I wanted? Too often our heart strings are racing to be  entangled with whatever hope of someone possibly loving us. We relish at any attention we’re given, either negative or postive, because we are captivated by the thought that someone desires us. 

The long fall back to earth happens at the reality we attained less of our sense of self worth. Wounds cut deep to realize someone we assume cared about us only acted in such a way for their own selfish gain. 

Trust is hard earned today. Honestly, why should we blame anyone for keeping such a guard? We can’t see sincerity in face value as much anymore.

But as cliché as it sounds: God wants us…for us

“Having predestined us to adoption as sons by Jesus Christ to Himself, according to the good pleasure of His will, to the praise of the glory of His grace, by which He made us accepted in the Beloved.” (Ephesians 1:5, 6 NKJV)

God determined beforehand by Jesus Christ to adopt you. He decided that when at your coming to Him to be saved from all wrong that would destroy you, He was going to bring you into His family. And he did for the praise of the glory: He did it because He was pleased to do it. 

Being belonged to God is something that makes Him happy! 

How unfathomable is that? It’s inconceivable enough that God would want to save us in the first place.

It was justice for the terrorist Osama Bin Laden to die, because of he was responsible for the death of countless thousands that are still piling today. What scares me is that God sees it justice by sending everyone to Hell. 

God commanded: The soul who sins shall die. The son shall not bear the guilt of the father, nor the father bear the guilt of the son. The righteousness of the righteous shall be upon himself, and the wickedness of the wicked shall be upon himself. (Ezekiel 18:20 NKJV)

That means that the person who sins will die. Sin is whenever you displease God. You displease God when you lie and you displease God for not thanking Him for life. Both are sin. It feels harsh but God made man to make Him happy. Not vice versa. 

He will be individually responsible for his wickedness against God and be punished. Romans 3:10 declares that there is none good. We have all missed the mark. 

The justice of a righteous God demands punishment for every crime against His precepts. The sentence God placed for our disobedience to His precepts is death.

At the shooting of Osama Bin Laden, could we imagine someone taking the bullet for him. No! We all wanted to see him die. He deserved to lose his life for taking so many others’ lives away. 

God is not a man. He looks at wrong differently from us. He doesn’t measure wrong. He sees a toddler throwing the pacifier across the room as bad as a terrorist planning to drive two planes into two skyscrapers to kill people. I lost an uncle at 9/11. He sees every wrong inexcusable and worthy of punishment.  

All that is within me cried for the head of Bin Laden, but at the same place when I first disobeyed God, all heaven cried for my death.

But God, who is rich in mercy, because of His great love with which He loved us, even when we were dead in trespasses, made us alive together with Christ (by grace you have been saved), (Ephesians 2:4, 5 NKJV)

God loved us so much that while we were dead because of our wrong, He gave us life through Christ. God wanted us. And how much: But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. (Romans 5:8 NKJV)

Its overwhelming to imagine all that it took for God to bring us to state of being clear of wrong. Christ became sin (2 Corinthians 5:21). Every nasty thing, every secret fault, every evil deed, every selfish motive- Christ became that so you could literally have a clean slate.

I have cried at this fact of Christ dying to save me from death because of my sin and to give me a right standing with God. What also causes my eyes to become teary is to see that God didn’t just saved me from sin but He also adopted me. He made me a part of His family.

But as many as received Him, to them He gave the right to become children of God, to those who believe in His name: (John 1:12 NKJV)

All who believe Christ, God decided to give them the right to be His children! We are born into this family not by human passions or plans that can later be regretted by a parent who has lost concern for his offspring. 

We are born into God’s family by God’s choice. This is what God wanted to do. According Ephesians 1:6 (see top), it gave Him great pleasure to do it.

Just allow your mind to entangle itself around the idea that God loved you at your worst and saved you with His best (the cost of Your Son) and then poured out His love on you by making you a part of His family. I leave you with a story that has impressed me gravely to understand God’s extravagant love.

Indeed if anyone has reason for justice it was Adele. At a genocide in Rwanda, Adele lost her husband. She saw as attackers came and flay his body with a machete. She saw as they slit his throat. As her husband fell to the ground that was a pool of his own blood, the pastor cried out to God to forgive his attackers. These men turned on Adele. They sliced her face deeply. Everyday a mirror shows her great scar. Adele was left among dead bleeding from her face, back and her wrist at the cuts of machetes. Three years it took her to recover. For many it would take a lifetime to even to consider forgiveness. Not Adele.

“I could be a bitter, angry, resentful old woman, but I’m not going to do that.”

Adele started going to the prisoners and mothered the very men who had attack her village. One day Adele met Luis. She met him prostrated before her, kissing her feet and crying bitterly. Adele examined the trembling man and saw that Luis was the man that had killed her beloved husband and the man that marked her face. A man’s love draws its limits at such a woeful event, but Adele was filled richly with a love we saw earlier in God.

Luis asked, “Adele, would you forgive me?”

Adele bent over as the Father did from the clouds of heaven and pulled Luis up as God did from our place of unwantedness. She looked into Luis’ eyes and said, “Luis, I forgive you.”

The story could end there, but it doesn’t. Luis was released for good behavior, but he entered society unwanted. Then entered Adele. Adele found Luis and she saw these words, “Luis, you come and I will adopt you as my son.”

How much does God love you? Enough so that He made death so that it would be difficult for you to remain in wrong. Enough that He made a way for you to escape punishment by the cost of His dear Son. Enough so that He decided to make you His child when you ask for His forgiveness. And it was His great pleasure.

You are wanted.

I’m A Tourist

 Germans love their German. Living in Germany for nearly a year, I learned quickly that Germans weren’t as tolerant with non-German speakers as most other countries were. I don’t blame them of their national pride. I have been asked since I lived in Germany for so long, why didn’t I learn German. Even among the volunteers I lived with, there were some who learned the language.

You know you’re pathetic when you have an answer five years later. Although, I lived a while in Germany and enjoyed my stay there a whole lot, I never saw myself living there; therefore I was content in not learning the language. I was a tourist that was passing through.

I thought of Germany because tonight Jesus refreshed my memory that to this world from His perspective, I am just a tourist. In the aftermath of my decision to surrender my life to Christ, I became a citizen of Heaven. This world is not my home. I’m a tourist.

Jesus sanctified all His own with His blood. We have become part of His country. We remain to offer others a change to join this kingdom. 

Hebrews exhorts us in chapter 13 to sojourn as traveller, enduring all trials because we aren’t trying to settle here. For we know we are not home yet. 

“For here we have no continuing city, but we seek the one to come. (Hebrews 13:14 NKJV)

We don’t have a home here. We are anticipating the Home of God that will soon come. So if that’s the case, why am I so entangled with the culture around me?

Like why am I so anxious in creating a wardrobe that expresses my personality when Jesus says:

By faith Abraham, when he was called to go out into a place which he should after receive for an inheritance, obeyed; and he went out, not knowing whither he went. For he looked for a city which hath foundations, whose builder and maker is God. (Hebrews 11:8, 10 KJV)

We should not adjust to this world that we fit right into it if we are soon to settle in a permanent residence.* We need to renew our minds so we can set our hearts on things above where Christ is (Col 3:1,2).

If Jesus is your King, if heaven is your home, you don’t live here. You are a tourist.

*And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God. (Romans 12:2 NKJV)

Marvel God with Your Faith

  “Only speak the word and my servant will be healed” (Matthew 8:8 NKJV) 

Knowing God is God and that He answers is the most essential factor for any miracle.

“Say the word”, the soldier thundered. 

It halted Jesus Who turned towards the man to go in motion to his home. This soldier interrupted Jesus’ way into the city, pleading to heal his servant. Moved with compassion, Jesus stilled the shaking of the soldier’s eye when He stared into them and noted that He will help him. 

“And Jesus said to him, ‘I will come and heal him.'”(‭Matthew‬ ‭8‬:‭7‬ NKJV)

This when the soldier stops Jesus and says:

“Lord, I am not worthy that You should come under my roof. But only speak a word, and my servant will be healed.” (Matthew‬ ‭8‬:‭8‬ NKJV)

Then he explained himself: 

“For I also am a man under authority, having soldiers under me. And I say to this one, ‘Go,’ and he goes; and to another, ‘Come,’ and he comes; and to my servant, ‘Do this,’ and he does it. ” (‭Matthew‬ ‭8‬:‭9‬ NKJV)

This soldier was an officer, a centurion in the Roman army who commanded a hundred men. Being one who takes orders and gives orders, this centurion understood authority. Amazed at the presence of Jesus, the soldier realized that this simple carpenter also spoke with authority. A stronger authority. 

Taken back, Jesus turned to those following Him: “Assuredly, I say to you, I have not found such great faith, not even in Israel!” (Matthew‬ ‭8‬:‭10‬ NKJV)

The faith of the centurion marveled God. He came to Jesus believing that He was God and that He would answer his request if he sincerely sought Him. 

Miracles happen in your life in the matter of Who you seek. 

No one can’t approach God without believing He is God! I believe a lot of my prayers hit the brass ceiling, because I forget Whom I’m talking to. I’m talking to God. 

We must approach God believing that He exists and that He cares enough to respond to us. 

“But without faith it is impossible to please Him, for he who comes to God must believe that He is, and that He is a rewarder of those who diligently seek Him.”(‭Hebrews‬ ‭11‬:‭6‬ NKJV)

Faith that marvels God is the confidence that when we come to Him, we will find the Source of all our wants and needs. “The assurance when we turn to Him”, adds Pastor John Piper, “we will find the all-satisfying Treasure”.* 

See God as God Who can and Who will. 

Miracles happen when you start with a miracle of seeking God as God in your asking. 

*John Piper, Desiring God is (Colorado Springs, Colorado: Multnomah, 2013), 71. 

Matthew, 40 Days thru NT

  

Enter Jesus. A king without a crown. Born without a palace. Yet He comes with honor that breaks the heavens with angelic praise; comes with such authority that men are afraid to even loose His sandals; with such sovereignty that glory interrupted a water baptism to alert everyone that God was among them. 

This is Jesus. God and man. 

Reading into Matthew, I’ve taken a radical challenge to look at this Gospel with an attitude that I’m going to read like this is all new to me. Like its a new TV series. The “episodes” so far in Matthew have been wild and riveting.  I plan to share some more on what God has been showing me already from the first seven chapters I’ve read today. 

Welcome you to join our #The40DayNewTestamentChallenge. 40 days, 28 minutes each day reading through the 27 books of the New Testament. It’s going to be wild! Read or listen- let’s get fed! 

Please share what you’re reading here or Twitter: @johnbell360!  

Today Starts 40 Day NT Reading!

 

Today begins 40 day reading through the New Testament. You can read the Bible or listen to it.  I’m reading the @YouVersion plan ‘The 40-Day New Testament Challenge’. Check it out here: 

http://bible.com/r/Dz

Share what you learn either here in the comments below or on Twitter: @johnbell360!  Maybe you prefer evening than morning it doesn’t matter as long as we getting that food for the soul! 

“Oh, taste and see that the LORD is good! (‭Psalms‬ ‭34‬:‭8‬ NKJV)

Read Through the New Testament with Me!

  

Let’s be real: we are better together. Sharing the Gospel. Serving at church….pulling weeds. We are able to do great things as a body of believers. 

I struggle reading my Bible. It’s pretty hard for me to sit down and concentrate to do anything. Especially if there’s a butterfly outside or somebody is watching “Sherlock” in the next room. 

My friend David rallied me to join his challenge to read through the New Testament in 40 days. I’m passing the baton to you. 

Why don’t you join us! 

TOMORROW Read together through New Testament in 40 days. 

That’s roughly 28 minutes a day. You can read the Bible or listen to it. We can even share what we learn as we go along either here or on my Twitter feed @johnbell360! 

 I’ll be reading the @YouVersion plan ‘The 40-Day New Testament Challenge’. It will help me ignore the butterflies. Check it out here:

http://bible.com/r/Dz

Fatten by Future Joy

The joy that is set before us (in the presence of God) is beyond the delights of the present.

The eyes of those that desire God are satisfied in the life to come than the fleeting pleasures of the present.

In Psalms 17, David seeks the Lord for refuge from his encroaching enemies. He resorts to God to relieve him of their intents to prey on him. He protests his right to be preserved by listing his faithfulness to God. What speaks as the voice of delighting in future joy is the psalmist’s comparison of the wicked’s present appeasements and the righteous future joy.

He says -the wicked- they have their portion in this life. They can only advantage in preserving their gratifications by passing their treasures down to their children.

David’s response shows us where his eyes are. His delights is not in what’s around him. There are anticipating the complete satisfaction he will experience in God’s presence:

As for me, I will see Your face in righteousness; I shall be satisfied when I awake in Your likeness. (‭Psalms‬ ‭17‬:‭15‬ NKJV)

David confesses that he will be satisfied when he is eye to eye with God in his glorified body. This is the eyes of joy in God. When the seeker realizes that pleasures around him are not fulfilling.

They have their peaks, but they plateau eventually with their heart thirsting for more. They eventually reach an anti-climax at the seeker enjoying thoughts that their children will find similar excitement in their toys as they did as they pass away. This is vanity. To seek for joy only to die never to be full, only content to imagine others to meeting your “highs”.

There is fulfilling joy! It is in God whose “presence is fullness of joy” (Psalms 16:11). The heart of seeker in God sees this and is delighted. He knows that one day he is going to be fat with joy one day. One day, his joy will be full and never deplete. It will be a joy that will fill his eyes as he beholds the face of God.

The joy that is ahead of you is beyond what you can enjoy now!