4.7.13

Luke 12:29-32 "And don't be concerned about what to eat and what to drink.  Don't worry about such things.  These things dominate the thoughts of unbelievers all over the world, but your Father already knows your needs.  Seek the Kingdom of God above all else, and he will give you everything you need.

 

So don't be afraid, little flock. For it gives your Father great happiness to give you the Kingdom.

 

My Thoughts

I love this!!  We so often go about worrying about life...about our houses being perfect... about waring perfect clothes... we worry about what we are going to eat... and how we are going to fit in... if we are good enough for the world.  We worry and worry and worry.  We each have our own things that we worry about. 

 

If we seek after God, all our needs will follow, God will take care of all of our needs.  But it is our job to seek after God.  Oh and when we do seek Him life will change in amazing ways!! 

 

I use to worry about everything, EVERYTHING. I worried constantly.  I lived in a state of anxiety and often felt panic about anything and everything.  It was like if I worried enough that act itself would make things okay.  When I started reading my Bible every day... and learned to love knowing all that I could about God's word... my panic went away and my anxiety went away. I feel so safe these days.  I know that seeking God is what changed me.  Every once in a while I will feel that old anxious feeling and then I stop and ask myself, "What have I not given to God? Is there a sin that I have not asked forgiveness for?" as soon as I figure out the answer and talk to God about it that peace that passes all understanding takes over again. It is amazing how God takes care of us, and He wants to!!  He wants to give us all of His Kingdom!  I am learning that the more I grow, the more of His Kingdom He trust me with!! 

4.6.13

Deuteronomy 30:19-20 "Today I have given you a choice between life and death, between blessings and curses.  Now I call on heaven and earth to witness the choice you make.  Oh, that you would choose life, so that you and your descendants might live! You can make this choice by loving the Lord your God, obeying him, and committing yourself firmly to him.  This is the key to your life.  And if you love and obey the Lord, you will live long in the land the Lord swore to give your ancestors Abraham, Issac, and Jacob.

 

My Thoughts

First we have a choice...but we have to make that choice.  When we make the choice to love God and follow his way we not only choose God, we choose blessings.  We have this choice as individuals... but we also have this choice as a whole, as a country.  If our country makes the wrong choice, everybody suffers the curses of not living a life that is pleasing to God.  Our sins effect the lives of others.  

 

Look at this part of the verse, now I call on heaven and earth to witness the choice you make.  We had a visiting pastor once that said the earth itself is effected by our sins, that it morns when we life outside of God's will. This verse tells us that the earth knows when we choose blessings or when we choose curses. 

 

We as a country have the opportunity to choose the blessings of God.  But we have to make choices that please God.  That is why it is so very important to put godly men, men that love God with all their hearts in office, so that they will make good choices. So that they will make good laws, so that they will make decisions based on the word of God.  When we do this, when our leaders do this our country will prosper, and out earth will quit having mourning pains... our whole land, our whole country will reap the benefits of the blessings of God. 

 

 

4.5.13

Deuteronomy 28:1-2  "If you fully obey the Lord your God an d carefully keep all his commands that I am giving you today, the Lord your God will set you high above all the nations of the world.  You will experience all these blessings  if you obey the Lord your God.

 

My Thoughts

The next several paragraphs set out the blessings God will send down on a nation that love and obeys him.  They are wonderful... towns and fields will be blessed, crops and herds, fruit baskets and breadboards. It says that whatever you do will be blessed.  God will conquer nations that come against a country that obeys Him.  There will be prosperity... a country that loves and obeys God will be the head and not the tail. 

 

When we listen to the news, when we get discouraged with our government, don't dare think for one moment that you can't do anything to make it better!  We can each do our part, we can each love and obey God.  The more of us that love and obey God, the better off our country will be.  God keeps his word.  We have to do our part. 

Luke 8:38-42 As Jesus and the disciples continued on their way to Jerusalem, they came to a certain village where a woman named Martha welcomed him into her home.  Her sister, Mary, sat at the Lord's feet, listening to what he taught.  But Martha was distracted by the big dinner she was preparing.  She came to Jesus and said, "Lord, doesn't it seem unfair to you that my sister just sits here while I do all the work? Tell her to come and help me."

But the Lord said to her, "My dear Martha, you are worried and upset over all these details! There is only one thing worth being concerned about, Mary has discovered it, and it will not be taken from her."

 

My Thoughts

This is a story that lots of us know...so much so that we don't often stop to think about it.  I remember thinking that if Jesus were in the room with me I would want to be like Mary and sit and listen to Jesus talk, too cooking just isn't my thing!!  But then I had to stop and think how is this story relevant to us today. 

 

We can get so busy with the details of life that we forget to take time with God.  We forget to read our Bibles and to pray.  We forget to stop and listen to the Holy Spirit direct our words and our actions.  No clean house, no perfect dinner, no perfect lawn or perfectly put together outfit is worth  not spending time with Jesus each day.  God is not going to ask me if my house was spotless, but He might just ask me if I spent time getting to know Him.  Do I want God to say, "I think I know her, she is that perfectly put together lady I saw in the mall." Or do I want to hear God say, "Jeannie! It's you!!  I have been waiting to have our conversations face to face!"

 

Pastor David told us a story Sunday about people's Bibles being taken away in Russia many years ago...the people were without the Bibles for something like 50 years.  When they were able to have Bibles again a team of people were going door to door handing out Bibles.  They knocked on one man's door. He said something like this, "I have been waiting on you, I have dreamed about you for years.  I had hidden away scriptures in my heart trying hard to always remember them. Now I can read them again."  Tears were streaming down this man's face.  Martha would not have had Jesus' words to remember and hold on to, Mary did.  What if we had our Bibles take from us, would you have those worlds, in your heart, to hold on to for fifty years? 

4.3.13

Acts 4:19-20 But Peter and John replied, "Do you think God wants us to obey you rather than him? We cannot stop telling about everything we have seen and heard.

 

My Thoughts

Wow!!  Let me set this up for you... the high council had just ordered Peter and John to quit spreading "propagnda" any further.  They were going about telling the Good New of Jesus.  Peter and John replied to them that they had to obey God and could not stop telling all they had seen and heard.  God protected them...the council were afraid of starting a riot so they had to let Peter and John go.  But they didn't want to!!

 

What this verse said to me is that we have to stop being politically correct!!  We have to stop keeping our mouths shut about God in fear of stepping on someone's toes!!  We have to go about telling the Good New of Jesus!!  If we can't do this in peaceful, "politically correct," times... how will we have the strength and courage to do it if we are the generation that live through end times? 

 

We can't stand by when people stand against God without standing for God.  In Matthew 12:30-32  Jesus says, "Anyone who isn't with me opposes me, and anyone who isn't working with me is actually working against me." And in Luke 11:23 Jesus says, "Anyone who isn't with me opposes me, and anyone who isn't working with me is actually working against me." This is written at least twice, it is important.

 

We can not stand by and let people trash the name of God, the name of Jesus.  In Acts 4:13 the members of the council were amazed when they saw the boldness of ordinary men with no special training in the scripture.  We are ordinary men, we do not have to be scolars...we just have to trust that God will give us the words to speak...then we need to speak, if we don't we stand with God, we stand against God. 

4.2.13

Luke 10:5-6 "Whenever you enter someone's home, first say, 'May God's peace be on this house.' If those who live there are peaceful, the blessing will stand; if they are not, the blessing will return to you.

 

My Thoughts

Look here, our words have such power.  We have the power to declare peace over a peaceful house.  How many times in a day do we miss out on blessing others because we just don't open our mouth and ask for a blessing over their life.  How many blessing do we miss out on ourselves because we didn't open our mouths and ask for blessings over someone else's life.  I really must get better at this!! 

4.1.13

Proverbs 12:10 The godly care for their animals, but the wicked are always cruel.

 

My Thoughts

Since I love my animals so much I really noticed this verse. What I ended up noticing about it was how God gives us ways to access a persons character.  We need to be conscious of this as we read our Bibles, and use it as a tool.  We can use this as a way to sum people up.  But more importantly we can use it to access our own character, to see if we are being godly... to see if we are acting in a way that when people access our character will we be summed up as godly.