Good Morning Everyone,

Our theme for this month: “Confidence”

Our Bible verse for today: “Therefore, brothers, select from among you seven men of good reputation, full of the Spirit and wisdom, who we can appoint to this duty.” Acts 6:3 (HCSB)

Our thought for today: “It takes confidence to serve humbly.”

Soon we will be celebrating Easter. For many people Easter, like at Thanksgiving and Christmas, there is an extra emphasis on serving others – especially those in great need.

This Easter, since we’re also gearing-up for another election cycle, we will soon be seeing stories on the television news of high profile politicians with their sleeves rolled up, on the serving line at a Rescue Mission, serving dinner to homeless people. At best these scenes remind us of the importance of service. At worst it’s a staged photo op for a politician trolling for votes. They’re doing it for the attention it gets them.

However in the scene described in Acts 6:3 we find another standard for service. In this case there were widows in the early church who needed special attention. The Apostles were concerned about it, but tending to that need themselves took them away from their primary roles of prayer and preaching and teaching. So they needed dependable men to assume responsibility for ensuring the widows were properly cared for.

Now look at the qualifications they felt were necessary for those who would fulfill this ministry role of mercy and compassion. They were to be of good reputation, full of the Spirit, and wise. As we read on we come to realize that each of these godly men could probably just as easily have filled the role of Apostle, or preacher or teacher or elder. But instead they gladly assumed the responsibility of distributing food to widows.

I personally believe it takes spiritual maturity and confidence for a person to serve in a low profile ministry and to do it humbly, joyfully, and with a commitment to excellence. People like that serve in those ministry positions, and with that attitude, out of great love for the Lord and for His people. Such servants are a joy and a blessing to any church.

As a pastor I am very thankful for the faithful saints who serve in the multitude of low profile, but essential, ministry positions in the church. Without their service the church will be very ineffective. The widows would go hungry, the children would not be cared for, and the Pastor would be a worn-out wreck. Thanks for all you do!

God Bless,
Pastor Jim

Good Morning Everyone,

Our theme for this month: “Confidence”

Our Bible verse for today: “Ananias, why has Satan filled your heart to lie to the Holy Spirit and keep back part of the proceeds from the field? … You have not lied to men but to God!” Acts 5:3; 4 (HCSB)

Our thought for today: “Have the confidence to be honest with people.”

This morning I was reading in Acts chapter five and once again came upon that odd and disturbing story of Ananias and his wife Sapphira. They were part of the early church in Jerusalem. In chapters three and four we read about the great spirit of fellowship, compassion, love, and generosity which prevailed in that church. All the members were making great sacrifices on behalf of others; many were selling their possessions and bringing the proceeds to the Apostles to be used for the benefit of everyone.

Ananias and Sapphria saw the selfless sacrifices and the joyful giving that others were engaged in, and they saw the high esteem the most generous givers were held in by the rest of the congregation, and they wanted some of it for themselves.

So they sold a field they owned but then, they gave only part of the proceeds while attempting to convince everyone that they were giving it all – and they got caught. Peter made it clear that it would have been perfectly fine for them to have kept all or part of the proceeds for themselves. Their sin was not keeping some of it for their own use; their sin was the sin of deception. They lied about it and they deceived others.

Why did Ananias and Sapphria do that? Obviously it was because they were jealous for the praise other people were getting. They were so concerned with what other people thought of them, and so eager to be held in high esteem by the group, that they engaged in a despicable act of religious deception. However, we cannot sin against the people of God without also sinning against God. That’s the lesson we learn from the example of Ananias and Sapphria.

Public praise can be an addictive thing. The strong desire for approval and acclaim can drive us to present ourselves and our motives in dishonest and deceptive ways. It’s essential that we have the confidence to be completely open and honest with God – and with God’s people. Resist the temptation to deceive or mislead people in an attempt to get them to think more highly of you. Be honest and let your words and actions speak for themselves. Just be you.

God Bless,

Pastor Jim

Good Morning Everyone,

 

Our theme for this month: “Confidence”

 

Our Bible verse for today: “God, you are my God, earnestly I seek you; my soul thirsts for you, my body longs for you, in a dry and weary land where there is no water.” Psalm 63:1 (NLT)

 

Our thought for today: “God will give you the confidence you need to face the day.”

 

Well, welcome to Monday. How are you doing today? Did you pop out of bed this morning like a piece of toast out of a toaster? Are you bright and chipper, eagerly anticipating the start of a new week?

 

Or maybe you’re feeling like David was in Psalm 63:1, thirsty, longing, weary, like you’re trudging through a dry land where there is no water. (I hope that doesn’t describe your job!)

 

David was just being honest. We all have days like that. But don’t stop reading at verse 1, continue on in the Psalm and see what David did about those feelings. In verse two he recounted some of his best moments in church. “I have seen you in the sanctuary and beheld your power and your glory.”

 

In verses 3-4 he savored God’s love and gave Him praise. In verse 5 he considered how deeply satisfying his relationship with God is, “My soul will be satisfied as with the richest of foods.”

 

He goes on from there and dwells on times of rich prayer (verse 6); he gives thought to how much he relies on God (verses 7-8); and in verses 9-11 he records his memories of previous times when he was faced with enemies and difficulties and found himself feeling like he did in verse 1, but God delivered him then too.

 

All of this was a shot in the arm for David. He went from trudging, grudging, despair and depression, to tip-toeing through the tulips as he sang the Lord’s praises.

 

I don’t mean to suggest that you should now be prancing around your workplace doing the Snoopy Happy Dance, but turning your thoughts to the Lord will certainly lift your spirits and give you a better perspective about the day and the upcoming week.

 

Start your day with Him; give careful thought to His glory, to His majesty, and to His great love for you; think about His watch-care over you; and you will find renewed confidence to deal with whatever it is you’re facing today.

 

God Bless,

Pastor Jim

 

Good Morning Everyone,

Our theme for this month: “Confidence”

Our Bible verse for today: “Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways acknowledge him and he will make your paths straight.” Proverbs 3:5-6 (NIV)

Our thought for today: “If your heart is right, you can have confidence that God will guide you.”

I want to return to the question we considered in yesterday’s devotional, “How can I have confidence that I’m doing the things that God wants me to do?” For the serious disciple of Jesus, it’s an important question, and the answer almost always comes in subtle ways that require spiritual discernment. Seldom does God peel back the clouds, poke His head through, and say “Hey Jim, take a left at the next light.”

So how do we know, especially when it comes to the big things in life? Unfortunately there is no simple five-step formula we can apply for discerning the will of God. As has already been noted, knowing when God is speaking, and understanding what He is saying, is a subtle thing that comes with spiritual maturity. But there are many principles and patterns given to us in the Bible that are intended to guide us in spiritual growth, and help us to better understand God and His ways and His desires for us as individuals.

One lesson that comes through loud and clear in the Bible is that God wants to be understood by us so that He can then be obeyed. We also see on the pages of Scripture that God goes to extraordinary lengths to communicate His will to His people.

Although God can communicate with us in an infinite number of ways, in our age He typically does so in five basic ways: through the Bible, through prayer, through the circumstances of our lives, through the counsel of other mature Christians, and sometimes through the testimony of the church as a body.

As we learn in Proverbs 3:5-6, the starting place for understanding and obeying God is to have a heart that is fully surrendered to Him. If you are determined to trust in Him rather than in yourself, and your desire is to honor Him with your choices, you can then trust Him to guide you in the way He wants you to go. That then gives you the confidence to just begin moving forward the best way you know how, trusting that He is guiding you.

We will consider this subject in much greater detail in our Sunday night Bible Study, “What on Earth am I Here For?” which begins at Oak Hill Baptist on Sunday March 22nd, at 6:00. I encourage you to join us.

God Bless,
Pastor Jim

Good Morning Everyone,

Our theme for this month: “Confidence”

Our Bible verse for today: “I am the vine; you are the branches. He who abides in Me, and I in him, bears much fruit; for without Me you can do nothing.” John 15:5 (NKJV)

Our thought for today: “Abide in Jesus; be confident in God.”

Are you doing the things God wants you to do with your life? Are you sure? A better question would be “how” can you be sure? I speak with people all the time who are not sure they’re doing the things God wants them to do. Many Christians live with a deep-seated sense of guilt that God wants and expects more from them than they’re giving. “Am I supposed to be a Sunday school teacher; a street evangelist; a missionary to Timbuktu?” “Is God disappointed with me because I’m not doing those things?”

In John 15:5 Jesus gave us some crucial insight into this question. He compared Himself to a grape vine and us to the branches that grow from the vine. Just as the life of the vine flows out through the branches, and the fruit of the vine is then produced through the branches, so too the life of Jesus flows through us and the fruit of Jesus (works) is produced through us. All the branch has to do is remain firmly attached to the vine. It is the vine that actually produces the fruit.

So the key then is to “abide” in Jesus and He then will produce the fruit He desires through us. To “abide” means to stay with, to live with. To abide “in” Jesus suggests that our life exists within Him. He is our life. To remain firmly attached to Him is accomplished by means of a daily practice of the basic spiritual disciplines of prayer, Bible study, worship, meditation, fellowship, service, etc.

When we do those things, the life of Jesus flows in us and through us, and the fruit of Jesus gets produced in our lives. That fruit could take the form of teaching Sunday school, or preaching on a street corner, or caring for lepers in the slums of Calcutta. But whatever form it takes, Jesus will be the one to decide that. He is the branch, and it is His fruit not yours. It’s not up to you to decide what kind of fruit you “want” to produce, or you think you “should” be producing. It is up to you to abide in Jesus and then let Him produce in your life whatever it is He wants to produce.

This can be a difficult concept for us to grasp and therefore it’s one we need to spend time with. On Sunday evening March 22nd at 6:00 at Oak Hill Baptist Church we will begin a six week Bible study by Rick Warren entitled, “What in the World Am I Here For?” This study will go a long way towards helping us to understand how Jesus works in our lives and it will help us to gain the confidence to simply relax and let Him do what it is He wants to do. I invite you to join us.

God Bless,
Pastor Jim

Good Morning Everyone,

Our theme for this month: “Confidence”

Our Bible verse for today: “For you did not receive a spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you received the Spirit of adoption, by whom we cry out, ‘Abba, Father!” Romans 8:15 (HCSB)

Our thought for today: “We can approach God with confidence.”

Author Philip Yancey frequently refers to himself as a “recovering fundamentalist”. It’s a reference to his childhood. Right on up through his High School years, Philip was raised in a very strict fundamentalist home and church. Therefore he grew-up knowing God as a stern taskmaster and disciplinarian. There were long lists of rules to follow, “church police” to monitor your behavior, and public discipline and shaming for when you violated the rules.

I find it hard to picture Philip in such a setting because all of the best-selling books he has written over the last four decades have been grace-based. They have included titles like “What’s So Amazing about Grace?”, and “The Jesus I Never Knew”, and “Where is God When It Hurts?” among many others. From Philip’s writings I have learned much about the grace of God, and the freedom we have to enter His presence with joy and thanksgiving and confidence, rather than in fear, trembling, and uncertainty.

This was a lesson the Apostle Paul learned too, and he too, like Philip Yancey, lived the rest of his life as a “recovering fundamentalist”. As a leading Pharisee Paul was one of those fundamentalists of his day. He was the stern taskmaster, the church police, and the disciplinarian. Paul’s God was a fearsome and righteous Judge who had to be approached with trembling and uncertainty.

But then Paul met Jesus and everything changed. Jesus introduced Paul to God the Father as He really is. Soon Paul came to know God as good and gracious and merciful, a loving heavenly Father. It wasn’t long before Paul the recovering fundamentalist was calling God “Abba” (which essentially means “Daddy”), and climbing into his lap. Jesus makes this possible.

In Hebrews 4:16 the writer urges us, “Therefore let us approach the throne of grace with boldness, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us at the proper time.”

You see, we don’t have to be afraid of God and we don’t need to doubt whether He welcomes us into His presence. Jesus and Paul both taught us to think of Him as “Abba, Daddy”, and then to approach Him with joy, thanksgiving, eagerness, confidence, and even boldness.

Thanks to Jesus we can always go to the Father with the confidence of knowing not only does He welcome us, but it brings Him great joy that we have come to Him.

God Bless,
Pastor Jim

Good Morning Everyone,

Our theme for this month: “Confidence”

Our Bible verse for today: “The glory of young men is their strength, and the splendor of old men is their gray hair.” Proverbs 20:29

Our thought for today: “Have the confidence to age gracefully.”

She was a bar fly. The woman was in her mid-50s but was trying hard to look 30. Her short dress was way too tight, she wore an excessive amount of jewelry, and she used far too much make-up. Evidently she thought this made her attractive. She seemed oblivious to the fact that the excessive make-up made her look clownish, and the tight dress simply highlighted and revealed all the belly-rolls and varicose veins. Undeterred, she flirted shamelessly with men half her age.

Then there’s the guy, also in his 50s, dressed-out in the baggy pants, pony tail, ear ring, and ball cap on backwards. He’s a white man but he tries hard to act black. “Yo bro, you down with that?”

It’s always a sad spectacle when an older person hasn’t learned how to age gracefully. They look and act ridiculous and everybody knows it (everybody except them).

One of the things a mature Christian faith does for us is it gives us the confidence to embrace and enjoy all the seasons of life – maybe especially old age. While it’s true that as we age our physical body begins to break down and we therefore we experience aches and pains we probably didn’t have in younger years.  But it’s also true that the passing of the years brings with it many advantages and bonuses. For one thing, we should be much more spiritually mature, and therefore experiencing the fruits of the Spirit much more than when we were younger.

Old age also usually brings with it a transition from the working years into some kind of retirement, and that affords us new freedoms and flexibility which we didn’t have in other seasons of life.

And of course, if you are a Christian and you therefore have the promise of eternity in heaven, then each day of life brings you one day closer to your eventual eternal reward.

Many people never have the privilege of growing old. For those of us who do get that privilege, we should be thankful for it and we should learn to appreciate and enjoy it. I remember a line from a poem I read many years ago regarding aging. It went, “Come with me, the best is yet to be, the last of life, for which the first was made.”

I encourage you to age gracefully and with dignity. Thank God for the privilege of growing old and then fully embrace and enjoy it.

God Bless,
Pastor Jim

Good Morning Everyone,

Our theme for this month: “Confidence”

Our Bible verse for today: “Come away by yourselves to a remote place and rest for a while.” Mark 6:31 (HCSB)

Our thought for today: “We have to have the confidence to just stop and rest.”

Henri Nouwen was a Catholic priest whose work and ministry I have always admired. Henri was not your typical Catholic priest. He was a missionary priest who spent many years working in remote locations of Latin America. He was also a brilliant intellectual who taught philosophy and theology at Harvard. And he was an author of many best-selling books about living the deeper Christian life.

By his own admission Henri was a high-octane over-achiever who spent much of his life constantly on the go. However, he also admitted that all his life there were two competing voices inside his head. One urged him to succeed and achieve, but the other called him to simply rest in the presence of God. Henri said that it wasn’t until the later years of his life when he finally learned to pay more attention to the second voice rather than the first. And when he did, he discovered that resting in the Lord was a lot more fulfilling than constantly striving for achievement.

In Mark chapter six Jesus and his closest disciples were in the middle of an intense period of ministry activities. People were pressing in all around them presenting their needs, looking for help, and keeping them all very busy. In the middle of all that, Jesus suddenly calls a halt to it all, gathers his disciples around him, and takes them away from the crowds and activities to a remote and quiet place so they could simply rest. I’m sure some of the disciples looked at all the pressing ministry needs and felt as if they simply could not in good conscience walk away from it. But Jesus knew that what they needed was rest, and so that is what He called them to.

Many of us don’t have the confidence to simply call a halt to the all the activity and go off for a good rest. We convince ourselves that it’s just not practical, just not doable. There are too many pressing concerns, too many people depending on us. Well, the good news is that the world isn’t really going to end just because you or I check-out for a short time. God is God, and I am not. He can manage things just fine without my constant involvement, and that goes for you too.

No matter how many people might be depending on you, and no matter how many responsibilities you think you have, the truth is that if you don’t take care of yourself you won’t be of much good to anyone else anyway. Sometimes the most effective thing we can do is to simply go get some rest.

God Bless,
Pastor Jim

Good Morning Everyone,

Our theme for this month: “Confidence”

Our Bible verse for today: “Be gracious to me, God, be gracious to me, for I take refuge in You. I will seek refuge in the shadow of Your wings until danger passes.” Psalm 57:1

Our thought for today: “Even in the worst of times, we can have confidence in God.”

When we think of King David, the greatest King the nation of Israel ever had, we commonly think of the boy who defeated the giant Goliath; or we remember “a man after God’s own heart.” We also remember “The sweet Psalmist of Israel” who wrote the vast majority of the Psalms. And we know him as a mighty warrior, as a very wise and beloved leader, as a talented musician and song writer.

What we sometimes forget is how many enemies David had and how much trouble they brought into his life. As a young man he was pursued and hunted for years by the armies of King Saul. Once he became King he still had many battles with the Philistines and with some of the other hostile nations surrounding the Jews. He was even deposed by his own son (Absalom) and had to flee for his life into the wilderness. And those are just the problems that other people brought into his life. We could spend a long time talking about David’s adultery with Bathsheba, his poor parenting skills which led to rebellion in his own family, the murder of his loyal servant Uriah, and much more.

So David had plenty of troubles in life and there were lots of times when he was faced with difficult and even dangerous situations. Psalm 57 records a time when he was forced to run for his life from King Saul and ended up hiding in a cave in the wilderness.

What we read here are the meditations of a man who had learned through long and hard experience that his only true source of refuge was in the Lord. David knew that his safety and his deliverance would have to come from God. And so, that is who he turned to.

Chances are you are not running for your life from a giant, an insane King, or from a rebellious son. You probably also haven’t arranged for the murder of the husband of your mistress, and you don’t have the armies of hostile nations bearing down on you. But you do have a whole host of other issues and challenges that you have to face (we all do), and just as was true for David, God is your only true source of safety and ultimate deliverance. He is Sovereign over all the situations in your life; He has complete knowledge and total control. And so, He is the one you need to turn to.

And once you do, you can sing with David, “He reaches down from heaven and saves me … My heart is confident, God, my heart is confident.” Psalm 57:3; 7

God Bless,
Pastor Jim

Good Morning Everyone,

 

Our theme for this month: “Confidence”

 

Our Bible verse for today: “Our actions will show that we belong to the truth, so we will be confident when we stand before God.” 1 John 3:19 (NLT)

 

Our thought for today: “We must walk the talk.”

 

I’ve known many professing Christians who talk a good game but whose actions are less than convincing when it comes to living the Christian life. If you ask them, they’ll profess to be a Christian based upon some childhood VBS experience, but there’s little evidence in their lives since then that the profession of faith was real.

 

Others have lived a genuine life of devotion and obedience in the past, but at this time in life are not involved in the life of a good church (despite the clear commands of Scripture to do so), and their walk gives all the appearance of having taken them far from God.

 

Still others do go through the motions of practicing the faith, and they do attend a worship service on a semi-regular basis, and therefore they do project some appearance of genuine faith when they’re at the gatherings of the church, but how they live Monday through Saturday paints a different picture. It’s like the singer Jimmy Buffet once observed, “There’s a fine line between Saturday night and Sunday morning!”

 

One thing most of those people have in common is that if asked, they’ll give you long and winding explanations designed to convince you that their faith is genuine and sincere even though their actions tell a different story.

 

Those long-winded explanations always remind of the famous line from William Shakespeare, “Me thinkest thou dost protest too much!” In other words, if you have to put that much effort into trying to convince others about the rightness of your choices, you’re probably fibbing.

 

What does all this have to do with our theme of “confidence”? John explained it well in 1 John 3:19. “Our actions will show that we belong to the truth, so we will be confident when we stand before God.” If our actions are right and just, if we truly are being obedient to God and living Biblically, we’ll have the confidence to simply stand before Him and we won’t feel the need to try to convince others. We won’t have to. Our actions will speak for themselves.

 

I encourage all of us to consider whether or not we are really walking the talk – are we really living what we profess to believe?

 

God Bless,

Pastor Jim