Good Morning Everyone,

Our theme for this month: “Taking care of your soul”

Our Bible verse for today: “A word aptly spoken is like apples of gold in settings of silver.” Proverbs 25:11 (NIV)

Our thought to today: “Words nourish the soul”

Words are like food to the soul. Words communicate profound meaning and on the receiving side they impact us in the deepest place, the soul. That’s why Solomon portrays them as being as appealing as decorative apples made of gold and displayed in a silver setting. A kind word aptly spoken is beautiful and deeply pleasing; it has the capacity to warm the heart and bless the soul.

Not only do words come from the soul but they are also received in the soul. They come from deep within us, reveal our innermost thoughts, and are received by the hearer at that same deep level. This is what Jesus was referring to in Matthew 12:34-35 when He said that it is out of the overflow of our heart that our mouth speaks.

The impact words have on the soul is also what makes the reading, hearing, and studying of God’s Word so important. Psalm 19:7 tells us that the Word of God revives and refreshes the soul.

This Sunday you will be gathered with your church family and there will be many words spoken. Some of those words will be spoken in idle conversation; some may be shallow clichés; some of them may even be harsh words. But what if the words spoken in all our churches this Sunday are life-giving words? What if we were all intentional about speaking life and encouragement to one another and at deep levels – soul to soul? 

Your words come from your soul and the souls of those who hear those words will feed on them, good or bad. I encourage you to make it a point to speak words of life and encouragement and nurture.

God Bless,
Pastor Jim

Our Bible verse for today: “I have told you these things so that in Me you may have peace. You will have suffering in this world. Be courageous! I have conquered the world.” John 16:33 (HCSB)

Our thought for today: “Suffering strengthens the soul”

You may remember from previous devotionals this month that when this life is over, the only thing you get to take with you is your soul. Everything else gets left behind. Your house, your cars, your jewelry, your friends and family, even your physical body, it all stays behind and you go forward into eternity with only your soul. That being the case, the most important thing we can accomplish in this lifetime is the achievement of a healthy soul to take with us into eternity.

And so we come to the subject of suffering. Does suffering really strengthen the soul? Yes it does. Suffering draws us to Jesus. When we’re hurting it causes us to realize how much we need the Lord and it draws us to Him. I have known many people over the years who had to travel through the valley of serious illness only to find that in the middle of the pain and suffering they found comfort and assurance in the Lord. They came out of that time of sickness stronger in their faith. I’ve known others whose lives unexpectedly came crashing down around them as they lost a marriage, a job, a home, their savings, and were left with almost nothing. But they found solace and support in the Lord and in a good church family. They ended up coming through that time stronger in their faith than before that experience. C.S. Lewis once wrote, “God whispers to us in our pleasures but shouts to us in our pain.” Yes He does.

I can think of so many examples of sickness, suffering, and tragedy turning out to be life altering events for the better. That’s because when a tragic event cuts us right to the bone, the superfluous stuff of life falls away and all that’s left is that which really matters. Rick Warren wrote, “We are more likely to change because we felt the heat than because we saw the light!” That’s very true. It’s often in the furnace of adversity that we learn out greatest lessons.

Romans 8:28 assures us “We know that all things work together for the good of those who love God, those who are called according to His purpose.” (HCSB) That doesn’t mean that all things are good – obviously not all things are. But it does mean that God is at work on our behalf in the midst of tragic circumstances to bring some good thing out of it for us. One of those things can and often is a stronger, healthier, more mature soul. Suffering often strengthens the soul.

God Bless,

Our theme for this month: “Taking care of your soul”

Our Bible verse for today: “This is why I tell you: Don’t worry about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink; But seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness and all these things will be provided for you.” Matthew 6:25; 33 (HCSB) 

Recently I have been studying the writings of the great devotional writer Oswald Chambers. When referring to the passage above from the Sermon on the Mount, Chambers made an interesting observation about the person who has learned to rest and trust in the Lord. He wrote:

“The Christianity of Jesus Christ refuses to be careworn. Our Lord is indicating that we have to be carefully careless about everything saving our relationship with Him.” This is exactly what the Apostle Paul meant when he wrote in Philippians 4:11 “I have learned to be content in whatever circumstances I am.”

Over time, as we consistently and persistently do the things necessary to properly care for our soul, not only do we mature in our relationship with Christ but we also become the kind of people who are relaxed and content. There is an unhurried air about us we navigate the turbulence of life with a quiet confidence in the Lord. It’s like Dallas Willard used to teach, “You must ruthlessly eliminate hurry and anxiety from your life.”

That doesn’t mean that we dismiss our problems and don’t do anything about them, it simply means that we trust in the Lord to help us deal with them. We know that He is Sovereign over all the situations of our lives, He has a perfect plan, and that He has the power to influence situations and people as needed. And so, we simply and confidently walk through the situations with Him.

This is what both Jesus and Paul were referring to. It is the fruit of a healthy soul that has learned to relax in the Lord.

God Bless,

Our theme for this month: “Taking care of your soul”

Our Bible verse for today: “Then, because so many people were coming and going that they did not even have a chance to eat, he said to them, ‘Come with me by yourselves to a quiet place and get some rest.’ So they went away by themselves in a boat to a solitary place.” Mark 6:31-32 (NIV)

When it comes to taking care of the soul, Jesus set a great example for us. Jesus – God in a human body – made it a point to take care of Himself spiritually, and then He instructed His followers to do likewise. Matthew 14:13, Mark 2:35, and Mark 6:46 are just a few of the passages which show us Jesus withdrawing for personal quiet time. Matthew 17:1-13, Mark 3:13, and Mark 6:31-32 are a few where we see Jesus including His closest followers in a sort of group retreat.  As author John Ortberg explained, the point is that Jesus set an example for us with respect to properly caring for the soul and He engaged in specific identifiable practices towards that end:

1. He prayed.

2. He had a close circle of devout friends who walked through life with Him.

The lesson we learn from Jesus’ example is that we need to engage in practices which connect us to God’s grace and energy and joy. In other words, we need to take care of our soul. I encourage you to follow Jesus’ example and to do some of those things today.

God Bless

Our theme for this month: “Taking care of your soul”

Our Bible verse for today: “Therefore anyone who hears these words of Mine and acts on them will be like a sensible man who built his house on the rock. The rain fell, the rivers rose, and the winds blew and pounded that house. Yet it didn’t collapse, because its foundation was on the rock.” Matthew 7:24-25 (HCSB)

Our thought for today: “The soul is the foundation upon which the rest of life rests.”

In the winter of 2013 there was a story in the news about a sinkhole that suddenly opened up in a neighborhood in Florida. Without warning the ground under a home suddenly gave way and the entire house was swallowed in an instant. One man inside the home was killed and they never recovered his body. It turned out that the ground under the house was made mostly of limestone. Over the years acidic rain seeping down from the surface had eaten away at the limestone until finally it simply gave way, the foundation collapsed, and the entire house was swallowed up.

The same thing happens in human lives. Author Gordon MacDonald once referred to it as “The Sinkhole Syndrome”.  It describes a life that is built upon a weak spiritual foundation. Over time the cares of life eat away at that foundation until one day the cares and pressures of work, and relationships, and financial concerns, criticism, etc, become too much and the foundation crumbles; the life is then swallowed up into a giant sinkhole of a nervous breakdown, or substance abuse, or a mid-life crisis. Because the inner life of the soul was built upon a weak foundation, it could not withstand the pressure from the outer life of cares and worries, and so it collapsed.

Jesus used a similar analogy in Matthew 7:24-27. In His example the life wasn’t swallowed up by the earth, it was blown away by a storm, but the same lesson is taught. The spiritual foundation was weak and therefore the life was eventually shattered and destroyed.

The soul is the foundation upon which the rest of life rests. If the soul is strong and healthy the person won’t be blown away by the storms of life, and they won’t be swallowed up as things collapse all around them. Take care of your soul. Make sure it is strong.

God Bless,

Our theme for this month: “Taking care of your soul”

Our Bible verse for today: “Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.” Matthew 11:28-30 (NIV)

Our thought for today: “The soul craves rest and renewal.”

In his book “Soul Keeping”, John Ortberg tells the story of a busy and self-important American traveler who was visiting remote regions of Africa. Although she wanted to see the countryside, she also wanted to make the journey quick and efficient. So she hired a group of local village men to be carriers and guides for her and off she went. The first day she pushed and pressured and urged the men to move quickly and to cover great distances. And they did. At the end of the day she was very pleased with how far and how fast they had traveled. However the next day she couldn’t get the village men to budge at all. They refused to even leave the campsite. In exasperation she demanded to know why. They patiently explained to her that on the first day they had traveled too far and too fast, and now they needed to wait for their souls to catch up.

Ouch. That sounds like my life. Do I travel so far and so fast through every day that my soul has to hurry to catch up with me? How about you? Do you ever feel like you need to slow down, sit down, catch your breath, and just give your soul some time to catch up with your body?

In Matthew 11:28-30 Jesus invited us to do exactly that. It was His whole point. We rush through life burdened and anxious to the point that our soul gets weary. Jesus knows this and so He invites us to come to Him, just sit and rest and enjoy His company while He ministers to and nurtures that weary soul of ours. 

It’s a compelling invitation and one that we need to accept. The truth is that the soul does get weary and it does get far too burdened. The image of a huffing and puffing soul rushing to keep up with a frantic and anxious body is humorous and yet sadly accurate. The soul craves rest and renewal. I encourage you to carve out some extra time this weekend to rest in the Lord.

God Bless,

Our theme for this month: “Taking care of your soul”

Our Bible verse for today: “I have loved you with an everlasting love; therefore, I have continued to extend faithful love to you.” Jeremiah 31:3 (HCSB)

Our thought for today: “God longs for deep fellowship with His people”

In our devotional a couple of days ago we spent some time considering the truth that not only does God bless us, but we in turn can bless Him. We can and should bring joy to the heart of God. Throughout the course of this month we’ve also focused on the truth that it is our soul which makes it possible for us interact with and to have fellowship with God.

An important truth we frequently forget is that God is a person, complete with feelings and emotions. Way too often we memorize facts about God, we consider great truths about Him such as His being omniscient, omnipresent, and omnipotent, but that doesn’t really make us feel any closer to Him. Such statements about God are cold and abstract. They’re little more than theological truths which we can read about in a textbook.

But from the first chapter of Genesis all the way through to the last chapter of Revelation, the Bible describes for us a God who feels and loves, who experiences joy and sorrow, a God who knows the full range of emotions which we as humans also experience. The great Christian writer A.W. Tozer once explained it like this, “In the deep of His mighty nature He thinks, wills, enjoys, feels, loves, desires and suffers as any other person may.”

In Jeremiah 31:3 we read of God’s everlasting love for His people. We read of how He continually reaches out and extends faithful love to those who are His. How do we get to know God like that? How do we learn to interact with Him on that emotional level, with both Him and us experiencing the full range of feelings and emotions in a two-way interactive relationship? That’s the job of the soul and it can only happen when the soul is healthy.

This brings us back to the classic disciplines of the Christian faith. There simply is no substitute for prayer, Bible study, worship, meditation, service, fellowship, and the other practices of the Christian faith, all of which place us in a position before God whereby He can nurture our soul and interact with us. There is no substitute.

When we read the Bible we need to stop approaching it like it’s a textbook which provides us with information, tips, and techniques. Instead we need to read it as a story about God the person. We need to note His feelings, His emotions, His joys and sorrows. We need to see Him longingly and continuously reaching out to people and drawing them into a deep relationship with Himself. And then we need to respond to Him on that level. This is the life of a healthy soul.

God Bless,

Our Bible verse for today: “Now may the God of peace Himself sanctify you completely. And may your spirit, soul, and body be kept sound and blameless for the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.” 1 Thessalonians 5:23-24 (HCSB)

Our thought for today: “We need to keep all parts of us healthy”

In her book “Captivating” Staci Eldredge writes of a time in her life when she was suffering from a deep depression. Her doctor felt that treating her with anti-depressants would resolve the issue. Some well-meaning friends were sure it was purely a spiritual issue that could be handled with prayer. Others advised extra sleep, more exercise, a better diet.

It turns out that they were all correct.

Since all the parts of us are connected and since they all interact with each other, the health of each part affects all the others. If your body is unhealthy it will affect you not only physically, but also mentally, emotionally, and spiritually. Likewise if you are spiritually unhealthy, it will affect you in every other area of your life too. This is why it’s important for us to do our best to be balanced and healthy in every area of life. Yes we need to be practicing good spiritual disciplines every day. But we also need to be eating right and getting some exercise every day too. We also need to get enough sleep, manage our stress, and fill our minds with lots of good influences. In short, we have to take care of ourselves physically, mentally, emotionally, and spiritually.

In Staci’s case she had a chemical imbalance for which God provided some medicines. She also had friends join with her in prayer as they resisted Satan’s exploitation of the situation. Additionally she made it a point to take extra good care of herself physically. Soon she was back on the road to good health – in all areas of her life.

As human beings we are made up of body, soul, and spirit and therefore it’s important to do the things necessary to keep all the parts of us healthy. Sometimes that will include trips to the doctor and maybe some medication. It will always include prayer and Bible study, meditation, and worship, and we need to be eating well and exercising as well. I encourage you to consider how healthy you are in every area of your life and then make some adjustments as needed.

God Bless,

Our Bible verse for today: “For the mouth speaks from the overflow of the heart. A good man produces good things from his storeroom of good, and an evil man produces evil things from his storeroom of evil.” Matthew 12:34-35 (HCSB)

Our thought for today: “The condition of your soul determines everything else about you.”

What we allow our minds to dwell on is a crucial aspect of soul-care. When we mull something over and over again, chewing on it like a bull dog on a bone, that thought shapes our soul and becomes deeply imbedded. Then it will ultimately influence the decisions we make, the words we speak, and the actions we take. That’s what Jesus was talking about in Matthew 12:34-35. Whatever it is we have stored up in that innermost place will shape us as a person and ultimately show itself in words and actions.

The great Christian writer Oswald Chambers once explained it like this: “Beware what you brood on in secret, for the fateful opportunity will come when God and the Devil will meet in your soul, and you will do according to your brooding, swept beyond all control. This is a law as sure as God is God. Beware of saying, “Oh well, it doesn’t matter much what I think about in secret.” It does, for the time will come when what you think about in secret will find expression in an act.”

This is why in Philippians 4:8 the Apostle Paul instructed us, “Finally brothers, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable – if there is any moral excellence and if there is any praise – dwell on these things.” (HCSB)

The condition of your soul ultimately determines everything else about you, and your soul feeds on the things you choose to dwell on. Feed your soul with good things.

God Bless,

Our theme for this month: “Taking care of your soul”

Our Bible verse for today: “Bless the Lord, O my soul; And all that is within me, bless His holy name!” Psalm 103:1 (NKJV)

Our thought for today: “When your soul is healthy it blesses the Lord.”

We’re familiar with the idea of God blessing us and so it’s not difficult to understand how it is that our soul could feel blessed by God. But how is it that we can bless God? In Psalm 103:1 David plainly calls upon his soul, and all that is within him, to be a blessing to the Lord. So how does that work?

Remember that so far we’ve learned that not only is the soul the very breath of life within us, but it is also that thing which animates us and which unifies our parts. It brings our thoughts and emotions and spirit into a single, unified entity. It is the ultimate object of the soul for our entire being – all of the parts of us – to be working together in perfect harmony to please God and to bring Him honor and glory. This describes a healthy and well-ordered soul.

When David writes, “Bless the Lord O my soul, and all that is within me …” he’s talking about all the parts of his person functioning together in perfect harmony and in such a way that God is pleased. When that happens, God is blessed, He is happy.

Do you remember in Mark 12:30 when one of the scribes asked Jesus which of the commandments was the most important? Jesus replied, “And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind, and with all your strength. This is the first and great commandment.” It was no mistake that the first and greatest commandment includes all three essential parts of the human person. The heart includes your free will and your choices; your mind includes all your thoughts and desires; your body includes your physical strength; and it is your soul which ties them all together and which makes it possible for them to interact with God as a unified whole.

Jesus taught here that our ultimate objective should be to have a soul that is so healthy and strong that it brings all parts of us together in such a way that God is honored and blessed. “Bless the Lord, O, my soul; And all that is within me, bless his holy name!”

God Bless,