day no. 12,761: in the heat of the day where the high life can't reach‏

Chambers brought an important point to light this morning when he said:

 

If we are going to be ready for Jesus Christ, we have to stop being religious. In other words, we must stop using religion as if it were some kind of a lofty lifestyle - we must be spiritually real.

If you are avoiding the call of the religious thinking of today’s world, and instead are “looking unto Jesus” (Hebrews 12:2), setting your heart on what He wants, and thinking His thoughts, you will be considered impractical and a daydreamer. But when He suddenly appears in the work of the heat of the day, you will be the only one who is ready. You should trust no one, and even ignore the finest saint on earth if he blocks your sight of Jesus Christ.

When the heat of the day is upon you and you are up against it, you will fall away from Christ if you are not connected to Christ.

If we are connected to ideas about Jesus and desires we wish Jesus to fulfill for us rather than communion with Himself, the struggles of earning, eating, preparing and cleaning up after daily bread will exhaust our ability to will ourselves gracefully and respectfully through it. 

We cannot navigate life successfully for Christ without Christ.

There is not a culture on earth that can satisfy God.

Only Jesus provides, establishes, secures and confirms right standing before God legally and positionally. 

If we are found anywhere else, we are found there as fallen short.

Repent of living for Jesus without Him.

Receive Jesus' life, livelihood and living on your behalf as acceptable before God. Then turn around and delightfully devote yourself to good works to your good, God's glory and your neighbor's exhortation.

day no. 12,758 continued... daily bread and communion with Christ

Luke 24:30-31

³⁰ When he was at table with them, he took the bread and blessed and broke it and gave it to them. ³¹ And their eyes were opened, and they recognized him. And he vanished from their sight.

AND

Luke 24:35

Then they told what had happened on the road, and how he was known to them in the breaking of the bread.

Something in the breaking of bread was used by God to reveal Himself more fully to those who were already interested, familiar, associated, etc.. with Him.

He is good to reveal Himself at all.

He shows His sense of humor in being revealed in something as simple and available and everyday as daily bread.

The body of Christ, the bread of Heaven.

Amen!

day no. 12, 758: jesus loves me‏

I recently downloaded a lot of PAGE CXVI’s music.

 

I have found particular joy and peace in listening to their take on the lullaby“Jesus Loves Me”

 

You can listen to it HERE.

 

Rest in Christ.

day no. 12,757: we walk by faith and not by sight‏

My morning mate,Oswald, dropped this gem this AM:

 

I know when the instructions have come from God because of their quiet persistence. But when I begin to weigh the pros and cons, and doubt and debate enter into my mind, I am bringing in an element that is not of God. This will only result in my concluding that His instructions to me were not right. Many of us are faithful to our ideas about Jesus Christ, but how many of us are faithful to Jesus Himself? Faithfulness to Jesus means that I must step out even when and where I can’t see anything (see Matthew 14:29). But faithfulness to my own ideas means that I first clear the way mentally. Faith, however, is not intellectual understanding; faith is a deliberate commitment to the Person of Jesus Christ, even when I can’t see the way ahead.

 

I love being wise.

I hate being foolish.

It makes me feel…. like a fool.

Following Jesus may involve feeling foolish in light of your desire to protect yourself from shame.

 

Following Jesus may cost you your opinion of yourself.

 

1 Corinthians 1:19-29

¹⁹ For it is written,

 

“I will destroy the wisdom of the wise,
and the discernment of the discerning I will thwart.”

 

²⁰ Where is the one who is wise? Where is the scribe? Where is the debater of this age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world?²¹ For since, in the wisdom of God, the world did not know God through wisdom, it pleased God through the folly of what we preach to save those who believe.²² For Jews demand signs and Greeks seek wisdom,²³ but we preach Christ crucified, a stumbling block to Jews and folly to Gentiles,²⁴ but to those who are called, both Jews and Greeks,Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God. ²⁵ For the foolishness of God is wiser than men, and the weakness of God is stronger than men.

²⁶ For consider your calling, brothers: not many of you were wise according to worldly standards, not many were powerful, not many were of noble birth.²⁷ But God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise; God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong;²⁸ God chose what is low and despised in the world, even things that are not, to bring to nothing things that are,²⁹ so that no human being might boast in the presence of God.

Conventional American proverbial wisdom persuades us to, “never give up!”

The Bible urges exactly the opposite.

 

2 Corinthians 5:6-7

 

⁶ So we are always of good courage. We know that while we are at home in the body we are away from the Lord,⁷ for we walk by faith, not by sight.

 

Faith is not shutting your eyes.

Faith is walking when you’re unable to see.

Not because you won’t see, but because it’s difficult to see.

 

Faith is walking while trusting in what you’ve seen, not refusing to walk until you can again see.

day no, 12, 756 continued... baptism or bathtism?

Have you been dunked after believing?

Do you know what baptism represents?

Do you know what the Bible says about who, what, when and where people should be baptized?

Listen HERE.

day no. 12,756: a surprise party!

Being immersed into Jesus is not as much about a "how-to" as much as it is about a "how about that?"

 

1 Corinthians 1:21

 

For since, in the wisdom of God, the world did not know God through wisdom, it pleased God through the folly of what we preach to save those who believe.

 

Practical wisdom can practically guide you through most things.

But it is powerless to save.

 

The Gospel surprises us.

 

“Well, would you look at that?”

 

God paid it all.

Acts 20:28
 
^…care for the church of God, which he obtained with his own blood.

day no. 12,755: remember, request and relay if you lead a small group