For His Honor

“Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother’s eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own eye?” Matthew 7:3 NIV

This verse has always been an interesting verse to me. Human nature is interesting to me. Very few people want to be held accountable for their actions and most people do not like to admit when they are wrong, but it is in our nature to call others out. Why do we judge? The answer is quite simple, we would rather look at others actions than have to admit our actions and make changes. We don’t like change, we like things to remain the same, to be constant. However, the only constant in our world IS change.

Why is it so hard for us to acknowledge our behaviors? If we did, then we would have to admit that we are not perfect. Our pride, a characteristic we sometimes don’t like to admit we have, could be harmed. This verse is part of the Sermon on the Mount where Jesus has been talking about how to live life by modeling it after Him. As I read this verse I usually only see part of the meaning, but after doing some research in commentaries and other translations, I learned that there is another way of looking at this verse.

We should not judge, that is simple, I see that in this verse but what I didn’t see was the idea of looking at others and then comparing them to yourself. It sits in the background of the meaning. Obviously when we are judging others we are looking at them and then comparing them to ourselves to show that we are “not as bad” or our sin isn’t “as big of a sin”. However, the mere act of looking at someone else and then comparing them to ourselves can also become a behavior that may lead us to sin.

We should all be held accountable for our own actions, but that is for God to do, not those around us and not us in regards to others. When we focus solely on others and believe that we have to make sure that we are not like this person, which is called judging, or focus on looking at others to see how much we don’t measure up to that person, which can lead to feeling inferior, we are not living the way Jesus wants us to live.

We are placing a lot pf pressure on ourselves to behave in such a way as to be like or not be like someone else. The only ‘Being’ that we should be focused on being like is Jesus. Judging others and comparing ourselves to others are both hard behaviors to stop, but when we do, we can experience peace because we are not focused on others any longer and we can focus on Jesus more.

“But Jesus knew what they were thinking and said to the man with the shriveled hand, “Get up and stand in front of everyone.” So he got up and stood there.” Luke 6:8 NIV

Jesus knew what they were thinking. Do you ever think about what you are thinking about during the day? It is an interesting activity to sit back and examine your thoughts. Are they positive in nature, negative in nature? Are they about work more than fun? Do you think about problems and solutions or just the problems?

What we value tends to be what we think about and what we think about is what our heart is truly focused on. The nice thing about thoughts are that they are yours and yours alone, no one else is able to have your thoughts or even know what you are thinking until you tell them. No one that is except God, He already knows them. He knew them before you thought them.

That can be a scary idea, that God knows my thoughts and that He knows them before I think them. I used to believe that it was scary, but realizing that He knows my thoughts has made me work to capture them. When I capture them, I examine them against God’s word. Is what I am thinking in line with what I believe God thinks about me or how I believe God thinks about the situation that I am facing.

This is done by going to God’s word and looking up what it says about the thought or situation. I was not very good at this for a long time, I would think something negative and then I would get stuck on it, thinking about it for days. Thankfully over time, with a lot of prayer and unfortunately a lot of practice, I moved to maybe thinking about it for a day and now it is even less.

We don’t have to think about everything that comes into our minds. We can acknowledge that it arrived, examine it and if it is not a thought we should be having, we can dismiss it. Our enemy wants us to think that we are helpless when it comes to our thoughts, that we can do nothing about what we think but think it. That is not the truth, the truth is that we have control over everything we think, it is our job to exercise that control more often than we probably do.

“I tell you that in the same way there will be more rejoicing in heaven over one sinner who repents than over ninety-nine righteous persons who do not need to repent.” Luke 15:7 NIV

The parable of the lost sheep is among one of my favorite parables because it reminds me that God is never going to leave me and He loves me so much that if I were to ever get lost or wander off, He will come looking for me. If you don’t know the parable, the concept is that a shepherd has 100 sheep and when he loses one, he will leave the 99 sheep to find the lost one. Sheep wander off and are usually not able to find their way back without some assistance.

The same can be said about us at times. There are times when we wander away from Jesus and need help getting back. The wonderful news that Jesus taught those around Him was that we all have the help we need to get back. God doesn’t just let us wander until we come to our senses and decide to find our way back to Him, He actively pursues us. He doesn’t bring us back kicking and screaming but He doesn’t leave us alone or without a way back either.

When we decide to return to God or begin to follow His will, there is rejoicing in heaven because that means there is one more who will be able to spend eternity in heaven. God does not want anyone, not one of us, to be left behind and miss out on living with Him for all of eternity.

God cares about us that much, that He comes for us, not to scold us, but to bring us back to Him. Those in heaven care that much about our salvation that they rejoice when a “lost sinner” repents and comes back to live their life in accordance with God’s will. Unlike the world attitude, as Christians we are to want to help others especially help them to come to Jesus and be genuinely thankful when it happens.

Do you know someone who needs to ‘come back home’ or ‘be found’ that has wandered away? Have you wandered away and are looking for a way back? The solution to both situations is prayer. Praying to God for direction and assistance.

Dear Heavenly Father, we thank You for always wanting us to be close to You. Thank You for actively pursuing us and not just letting us remain lost. I pray that if there is anyone who is reading this that needs brought back to You or needs to come to You for the first time, that they will seek You out knowing that You will not turn Your back on them. I pray that they would know that You will welcome them with open arms. If there is anyone reading this that has a loved one who needs to return or come to You for the first time, that You will give this person the strength to continue praying for their loved one. For the loved one, Lord I pray that You will place obstacles in their way so that the road they are traveling on leads to You and not to the enemy. Lord, we rejoice along with everyone in heaven when a person has come to know You or has returned back to You. Thank You for never giving up on us. We pray this all in Jesus’s most precious name. Amen

“Which of these three do you think was a neighbor to the man who fell into the hands of robbers?” The expert in the law replied, “The one who had mercy on him.” Jesus told him, “Go and do likewise.” Luke 10:36-37

These are the last 2 verses of the parable about the good Samaritan. Jesus told this parable because an expert in the law wanted to test Him. The interaction between the expert and Jesus started out as a test and ended in a lesson for the expert. That seems to be how most of the conversations surrounding parables in the Bible end, and this one is no different. There are several lessons that are contained in this parable, but I only want to look at one during this post.

The expert asks Jesus 2 different questions, the first one was a question that the expert hoped was going to catch Jesus off guard but it didn’t. After the expert then answered a question from Jesus, he goes on to ask a second one because he was feeling like he had to justify himself to Jesus. He was looking to figure out a way that he could get around what the law says, justify why he didn’t have to really do what the law was saying he had to do.

I know I have tried to justify myself to Jesus before by giving reasons that I haven’t done something that He has been leading me to do as well as reasons as to why I did what He asks but only partly. I have tried to justify what I have done, but there is no justification because I have none.

The one lesson I wish to look at is that we can’t justify ourselves to God. We can’t try and limit what God wants us to do only to the things that we want to do or feel comfortable doing and expect God to be ok with that. As Christians who have read the Bible and studied God’s word, we know what God wants, He wants us to do His will.

In the end of the parable, Jesus was talking about showing real love. Love that isn’t controlled by a law or social custom but love that is from deep in our hearts. Love that is so deep and pure that we can’t help ourselves but express it. Love that no law or custom could stop us from showing. God wants all of us to show this kind of love to everyone including those we have deemed to be our enemies. There is no justification for not following through.

We have no justification for not doing what God wills for us to do and we have no reason to not show the kind of love to others that Jesus has shown to us when He died a horrific death on the cross so that we wouldn’t have to experience Hell.

“Be to me a rock of refuge, to which I may continually come; you have given the command to save me, for you are my rock and my fortress.” Psalm 71:3 ESV

Unlike other psalms, this psalm is writing anonymously. We are not sure the author’s situation as to why he wrote it however, that doesn’t mean we can’t learn from it. The author is praying to God asking that He be a place of safety. To us, a rock feels almost unbreakable, a place where we could find safety from severe weather or hide from others. It is no coincidence that God is compared to a rock because He is the ultimate place of safety, a place where we can hide and recharge ourselves.

The next part of the verse says that the author wants to be able to come to the Lord on a continuous basis which is the premise of a relationship, being able to come to and rely on the other person. Since Jesus introduced a new way of having a relationship with God and paid for our sins on the cross, we are able to come to God individually without ceremonial preparations. Throughout this psalm the author has talked about his long relationship with God and how he has relied on God and come to Him over the years.

As the author has had a long relationship with God, it makes sense that he is going to God to find comfort, safety and a place to rest. Even though we don’t know what the situation is that the author is in, we know that God has given the command to save him, God is watching over him. Again, in this verse, the author compares God to a rock, where he can find safety, but this time he adds fortress. Fortresses were known for being places where a person could hide from attack and be safe.

This verse does not give us any new information, it reaffirms for us what we already know but may have forgotten. God is the ultimate Being to go to for safety and refuge, for eternal salvation. There is no where we can go that is better than coming to God, the Author and Maintainer of our faith.

This is a wonderful reminder of where we should be at all times, in the safety of God, in the fortress of His arms, in the refuge of His rest. So many times we forget that God is always there for us, always available to us, always wanting to hear from us. When we make it part of our day to communicate with God, spend time in His presence, we are demonstrating our faith in Him, our desire to be in a relationship with Him.

Are you spending time with God each and every day or only when the world gets to be too much and you need a rock of refuge or a fortress of safety?

“No one lights a lamp and hides it in a clay jar or puts it under a bed. Instead, they put it on a stand, so that those who come in can see the light.” Luke 8:16 NIV

This is one of Jesus’s parables and although it is a short one, it still has a powerful message. Again, Jesus used parable about everyday things, ways of life, to communicate harder spiritual truths to the people He was ministering to so that they could understand them. On the surface this does not appear to be a very hard spiritual truth to understand, don’t hide the wonderful news of the gospel and let everyone know that you know Who is The Truth, The Life, and The Way, Jesus.

So, I wonder why then that Jesus, who had more difficult spiritual truths to talk about with the people who were following Him, would take time to discuss a lamp. I believe that even though this is not a difficult spiritual truth, it is an extremely important one. I want to state now that this is how I have interpretated this parable.

First, the light in this parable is Jesus, He is the Light of the world, bringing the gospel to us so we can know how to have a personal relationship with God. Second, the lamp represents our lives which He has provided the light for by teaching us how to be in communication with God. Third, the clay jar or bed represents our ability to have and keep secrets in our lives.

When we learn about Jesus and the gospel, it fills our souls with great news, with light so we are not walking in darkness any longer. This is wonderful and you would think that most people would simply not be able to contain this new information they have received inside and would want everyone to know about it as well. As the parable says when your lamp has been provided light, you put it out so that it can be a light to everyone around it, not hide it so that only you have it.

It is important for us to share the gospel, the truth we have been given and not to keep it for ourselves. Jesus said in Matthew 10:32-33, that if we acknowledge that we know Jesus to other people, then He will acknowledge that He knows us to His father, but if we deny that we know Jesus, are too embarrassed to say that we have a personal relationship with Him, then He will deny us to His father in heaven.

If we hide the light that has been given to our lamp, under a bed or in a clay jar because we don’t know what others in our lives will say about the decision we have made to show that light, then we are living in fear of what others believe and say about us more than we care what Jesus believes and says about us, more than we care about our eternal salvation.

Today, please think about this….are you showing off the Light that has been given to you to light your path in this world or are you hiding it from those around you?

“Serve wholeheartedly, as if you were serving the Lord, not people,” Ephesians 6:7 NIV

In the passage that this verse is contained in, Paul talks with the Christians at Philippi about behaviors and attitudes. He is addressing a variety of areas from how children should respect their parents to how masters and slaves should interact with each other. The temporal world does things differently than the eternal world. For example, in the economy of God’s kingdom, service is valued higher than being served.

In verse 7, Paul is reminding us that as we perform any act of service in our lives, that we should do it with an attitude that would be pleasing to our Lord Jesus Christ. An attitude of grace, mercy, joy and love are important when we remember that we are representing Jesus here on earth. When we interact with others, believers or non-believers, we can keep this in mind.

However, having an attitude that is pleasing to God is not just for when we are interacting with others, but it is how we can live our lives. We can adopt attitudes of grace, mercy, joy and love and exhibit them every day in all situations we find ourselves. Our attitude about service, for example, can be an one of joy, remembering that Jesus Himself served others while He was ministering to them.

The act of service that you are performing does not have to be one that is particularly a joyous occasion but you can not allow that to influence the attitude you have about what you are doing. Keeping in mind that no matter what we are doing, we are not doing it to please those around us but to please our Lord and Savior. He is the ultimate Being we are working to please.

Heavenly Father, thank You for sending Jesus to earth to show us how to be people of service to others. We know this world believes that each person should be served by others and if you are the individual serving then you are being used or walked all over. This is a hard concept to defeat at times but please help us to remember that You have changed that idea. Please help us to have an attitude of joy, grace and love as we interact with those arounds us whether they are demonstrating the same attitude or not. We pray this in Jesus’s precious name. Amen

“‘If you can’?” said Jesus. “Everything is possible for one who believes.” Mark 9:23 NIV

In this chapter of Mark, the account of Jesus healing a boy from a demon is recorded. The father had come to the disciples to heal his son but they tried and couldn’t. When the father came to Jesus, he seemed to have tried everything. The father told Jesus that the demon had possessed his son since the boy was a child and it would send the boy into convulsions anytime it wanted. The father looked like he had no hope left.

The father said to Jesus, ‘But if you can do anything, take pity on us and help us.’. Clearly the father had no idea Who he was talking to because Jesus can do anything. In the 23rd verse Jesus says to the father, ‘If you can?’, acknowledging that the father is not aware of Who he is standing in front of and Who he is asking to help him.

Jesus tells the father and everyone around them that ‘everything is possible for one who believes’. The father then said to Jesus ‘I do believe; help me overcome my unbelief!’ The father was willing to admit that he had unbelief, which I feel is from all the time he spent trying to solve this problem on his own. Jesus then casts the demon out of the boy.

There are times in our lives when we also feel like we have tried ‘everything’ and nothing has worked out or at least not the way that we have planned for it to work. We have thrown every idea we can think of at a situation or problem and every tactic we have to hopefully make the ‘plan’ go the way we wanted, but they all fail. There are times when we feel like we have no hope. There are times when we have unbelief.

The difference between us, followers of Jesus, and the father, is that we know Who we are asking to help us. Yet there are times in our lives when we do what the father did, we try to solve a problem all by ourselves. We throw everything at the situation and hope something sticks. It is usually when nothing works that we turn to Jesus finally and say ‘if You can’ as if we don’t know that He can.

The devil is very crafty and he will fill our minds with doubt, doubt that God has time for some small problem we have going on, doubt that God loves us enough to listen to us and possibly resolve our situation, doubt that God can fix our problem because it is so big that no one can fix it. If we listen to these doubts then we end up turning to Jesus and saying “If You can?”

As Jesus says in the end of our verse for today, ‘Everything is possible for one who believes.’ The challenge we face is how long we want to try and resolve, solve, fix, deal with our problem or situation on our own before we turn to Jesus for the help that only He can provide. If you are a follower of Jesus, you already demonstrated your believe in Jesus when you accepted Him as your Savior. Whatever the situation that is occurring that has you momentarily believing that Jesus cannot deal with it, now is the time for you to exercise that original belief you placed in Jesus and go to the One who can help you.

So the question is ‘Do you have unbelief?’ If so, what are you going to do about it?

“So, because you are lukewarm—neither hot nor cold—I am about to spit you out of my mouth.” Revelation 3:16 NIV

As with any new relationship, the beginning always seems to be full of emotion. When we first enter a relationship we tend to be curious about the other person, we want to get to know them. We are deciding in those first several times of seeing each other whether we want to become more involved or not. If we decide to move further into the relationship, then we typically want to spend more time with them, learn new things about them, and we usually think about them more.

This level of emotional involvement can last for a long time depending on the type of relationship we are talking about. Friendships tend to develop a little slower than romantic relationships because there is not as high of a level of emotional involvement in the beginning. Another factor that can influence a relationship is the popularity of it. When we are beginning a friendship with someone who everyone else wants to be friends with as well, there is an attraction to that relationship, you want to know what everyone else sees that is drawing them to that person.

Most people do not rush to become friends with a person everyone else is ignoring. The same can be said about romantic relationships, our level of willingness to invest our time to get to know another person can depend on how our friends view this individual. This is also how we usually function when we are discussing our relationship with the Creator of the Universe.

When we first hear about Jesus, the emotional level of those around us can influence us in how we proceed in developing this relationship. Should it work this way, no, but it does. Once we decide to be a one of Jesus’s followers, we are thankfully filled with the Holy Spirit, Who is able to direct us in the growth of this relationship. As with any other relationship, new things excite us, our emotions are higher, we are all in and we focus a lot of our attention to that relationship.

However, that ‘fire’ we feel at the beginning of relationships can fade and the relationship with Jesus is no different. We can go from being hyper focused on the relationship to becoming comfortable in the relationship. When we become comfortable, we usually don’t give that relationship a lot of thought and sometimes our emotional investment decreases.

In our verse for today, Jesus is talking to the church at Laodicea because they have moved from being ‘on fire’ for Jesus and the advancement of the Church to being lukewarm. So they haven’t abandoned their relationship with Jesus, but they are not working to grow it either. They became comfortable in what they had and unfortunately when we become comfortable we usually stop putting effort into the relationship.

This upsets Jesus because He is ‘on fire’ for us and suffered a horrible death on the cross so that we could have that personal relationship with Him now and for all of eternity. In this verse, it feels to me like Jesus would rather they had decided they didn’t want to be in a relationship with Him and simply walked away than being in the relationship but not interested in growing it. The verse tells us that Jesus wanted to spit them out of His mouth because of their complacency.

My question for everyone today is…..Are you on fire for Jesus or are you lukewarm?

“Grace and peace to you from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.” Philippians 1:2 NIV

This greeting is in every letter Paul wrote that has been captured in the Bible. Paul wanted to extend the grace of God to the individuals he was writing to, the Christians at Philippi. Grace is receiving something that you do not deserve, therefore salvation from eternal damnation is grace as we can do nothing to earn our way out of what we deserve.

As grace comes from God and is what our salvation is built upon, Paul reminds the recipients of his letters that they have this grace from God already. When we accepted Jesus as our Lord and Savior, we were granted this grace, grace from not having to spend eternity in hell. Paul places grace before peace as it is difficult to have peace without grace, as peace is a product of grace. Once we receive the grace of sparing us from an eternity in hell, we are able to have peace about where we are going to spend eternity.

It is also important that we remember that because we have been shown grace, it is imperative that we show grace to others and by showing them what God has shown us, we are hopefully leading them to Jesus. So as Paul is expressing his wishes that God continues to give the people he is writing to even more grace and peace, we should also wish that for every person we have in our lives.

Do you extend grace to others?