Our theme for this month: “Mistakes”

Our Bible verse for today: “As the Father has sent Me, I also send you.” John 20:21 (HCSB)

Our thought for today: “Many Christians mistakenly forget that we are to be on-mission with Jesus.”

As I write this a group from our church is preparing to go on a short mission trip to eastern Kentucky. We partner with a small church in a remote region of coal mining country as they work to serve some of the most impoverished people in that region. New Beginnings is a small church, even smaller than ours, but they have a great heart for serving the people of their community and it is a joy for us to be able to work alongside of them when we go up there three times per year. We do that in addition to our other regular ministry activities in our own community, and in also in the state of Tennessee as well. 

On this trip we will bring a trailer full of food and clothes. Our folks have prepared fifty-two food boxes, each one containing enough food to provide six meals for a family of four. Together with our friends from New Beginnings, our group will meet with fifty-two of the neediest families in the community – some at the church and others in their homes. We will pray with them, share Christ, and distribute the food and clothes.

A mistake that many, many Christians make is they forget that we are called to be on-mission with Jesus out in the world. For the vast majority of churches in the USA probably more than 90% of their time, energy, focus and resources, are directed inward rather than outward. We tend to circle the wagons, hunker down in our little Baptist forts, and focus almost entirely on our worship services, our Sunday school classes, our fellowship events, our building maintenance projects, our ice cream socials, etc. In the average church today very little of the focus is outward. But that’s exactly opposite of the example Jesus set for us. Jesus was constantly out among the people. He was all about ministering to the sick, feeding the hungry, comforting the hurting, and preaching to the crowds in the highways and byways of the world. Yes He did spend some time circled-up around the campfire teaching His closets followers. But that was so He could prepare them so they could join Him in the external ministry out in the world.

I know that pride is a sin and so I hope I’m not being “prideful”, but I am proud of our folks at Oak Hill Baptist. They are a wonderful group of Christ followers who have a great heart for serving others. It’s a privilege to be their pastor. I’m also grateful to the Lord for allowing us to develop a partnership with like-minded Christians up in eastern Kentucky. This is the kind of thing Jesus called all of us to do. It’s the example He set for us.

It’s a great mistake for individual Christians, and for churches, to miss the fact that we are called to be on-mission with Jesus out in the world. He said, “As the Father has sent Me, I also send you.”

God Bless,

Our theme for this month: “Mistakes”

Our Bible verse for today: “Finally, Samson shared his secret with her. So the Philistines captured him and gouged out his eyes. Then Samson prayed to the Lord, “Sovereign Lord, remember me again.” Judges 16:17, 21, 28 (NLT)

Our thought for today: “Our mistakes can be costly”

Have you ever had your eyes gouged out by a ruthless Philistine jailer? No, me neither. But I have suffered other consequences from my mistakes that while not quite that harsh, they have carried with them a big cost. I’ll bet you have experienced that too.

Samson was a man who had been called by God to play a special role in the history of the nation of Israel. He was set aside from birth as a Nazirite and his life was intended to be a holy one that brought honor and glory to the One True God. Boy did he stray from his calling! If you know the story than you know that Samson was bull-headed, self-absorbed, impetuous, and he was a hedonist (he lived to satisfy his pleasures). That wasn’t even close to the life God wanted him to lead.

As a result, Samson suffered. His was an unstable life that caused pain and anguish for himself and for others. At the end he found himself in a Philistine prison, eyes gouged out, being led around by a young man, and on display in the city arena for the amusement of the citizens – kind of like a dancing bear. What a wasted life! But the story ends with Samson finally calling out to God and much to his amazement God was still there for him. In fact, God had always been there for him and He would have gladly accepted Samson back, if only he had gone to Him. Once Samson did return to God, God used him to accomplish one final great act.

Samson’s story is also the story of many of our own lives. Most of us don’t fail in as spectacular a fashion as Samson did, and most of us don’t suffer consequences quite that severe, but we do have plenty of failures of our own, and they each do carry a cost. What are the lessons we can learn from Samson’s sad story? There are at least three:

1. Just as God had a good plan for Samson’s life, so too He has a good plan for yours and mine. However unlike Samson, we just need to pursue God’s plan instead of our own.

2. Just as God had always been there for Samson and would gladly have accepted him back and blessed his life again if Samson had only returned to Him, the same is true for you and me. God will take us back any time we’re ready and willing to return to Him.

3. Just as God was prepared to use Samson once again once he did repent and return, so too He will use each of us again if we will just come back to him.

There is no mistake in life that God won’t forgive and which we cannot recover from. But how much we suffer, for how long, and how much recovery there will ultimately be, depends entirely on how far we drift from God, and how long we stay away from Him. The sooner we stop drifting and come back to Him, the less distance we will have to travel to get back on the path He has chosen for us. That then will minimize how much recovery will be needed, and it will mean more time left for us to enjoy life right in the center of God’s will (which is the best life any of us will ever have). Unfortunately for Samson, he waited until the end of his life before he corrected his mistake and came back to God. Therefore there was no time left to enjoy a life blessed by God. Let us not make that same sad mistake.

Our mistakes can be costly, but we can recover from them. But don’t be like Samson and wait too long. Return to God today.

God Bless,

Our theme for this month: “Mistakes”

Our Bible verse for today: “Did you eat from the tree I commanded you not to eat from? Then the man replied, “The woman You gave to be with me – she gave me some fruit from the tree, and I ate.” So the Lord God asked the woman, “What is this you have done?” And the woman said, “It was the serpent. He deceived me and I ate.” Genesis 3:11-13 (HCSB)

Our thought for today: “It is essential for us to take personal responsibility for our mistakes.”

This scene in Genesis chapter three would be comical if it wasn’t so sad and pathetic. Adam and Eve sinned. Period. They were told by God not to eat the fruit from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, but they did it anyway. It was nobody’s fault but their own. But when questioned about it by God, Adam claimed it was Eve’s fault because she gave him the fruit. He even suggested that God was complicit in the offense because He was the one who gave the woman to him to begin with. Never mind that Eve was a wonderful gift to him from a loving and gracious God. And never mind that Adam could easily have said “No thanks” when Eve offered the fruit to him. And never mind that Adam was the one who had actually received the command from God about not eating from that particular tree (at that point Eve hadn’t even been created yet). So Adam was the one with the greater responsibility for remaining obedient and for ensuring that Eve did too. But, he shucked and jived and did a little tap dance as he tried to shift the blame to Eve – and maybe even onto God Himself.

Then there was Eve. Her excuse was, “The devil made me do it.” But God wasn’t buying that either. Yes it was true that Satan, in the form of the serpent, did trick her into sinning – but he didn’t force her into sinning. Genesis 3:3 makes it clear that Eve knew full well that God said she was not to eat the fruit from that particular tree. Then in 3:6 we read that Eve allowed herself to gaze longingly at the very thing God had forbidden, and then she made a decision to give in and take it anyway. Nope, no excuse here either.

We live in a culture today where people commonly assume a victim mentality and they are unwilling to accept personal responsibility for their actions. There’s always an excuse and it’s always somebody else’s fault. That’s a loser’s mind set and it’s a guaranteed recipe for failure.

When we admit our mistakes and simply accept personal responsibility for them – no excuses, no rationalizing, and no whining – then we can learn from them and grow wiser and stronger. But when we refuse to simply accept responsibility for our actions and we begin rationalizing and attempting to shift the blame, we reinforce in our own minds the notion of being a helpless victim, and essentially surrender control of our fate to the actions of others.

Also, when we do that we may be fooling ourselves, but we’re not fooling anyone else who is close enough to the situation to know the truth. When it’s obvious that we have brought this situation on ourselves by our own bad choices, but we then do the “Adam shuffle” by tap dancing around the truth and attempting to shift the blame, we’re not fooling anybody. We just make ourselves look silly and weak. Other people know the truth, even if they don’t actually say it to you.

Both Adam and Eve responded to their mistakes by trying to shift the blame rather than taking responsibility for their own actions, and they suffered for it. We always do.  It is essential to take personal responsibility for our mistakes.

God Bless,

Our theme for this month: “Mistakes”

Our Bible verse for today: “Though I have fallen, I will stand up; though I sit in darkness, the Lord will be my light.” Micah 7:8 (HCSB)

Our thought for today: “God forgives our mistakes”

Have you made any mistakes lately? Ok, I guess a better question would be, “How many mistakes have you made lately, and how bad were they?” The fact is that we all make mistakes. Big ones and little ones, some of them inconsequential and some of them life changing, but life is full of mistakes. The key of course, is what we do about our mistakes. We can learn from them and grow better, stronger, and wiser, or we can be crushed by them. The question is not whether or not we make mistakes, we will. The question is how we handle the mistakes once we’ve made them.

The editors of the Christian Arts Daily Planner offered some helpful insight when they wrote, “Although burning the breakfast toast is a mistake, it is trivial and leaves no lasting consequences. On the other hand, a doctor who misreads a chart and removes a kidney instead of an appendix has made a mistake of considerably greater implications. We all make mistakes. Some of our mistakes are accidental, while others are intentional and sinful. The Bible is full of stories about people who made mistakes, both trivial and catastrophic, and about the great God who forgives our wrongs.”

The wonderful truth is that God forgives our mistakes. But even more than that, He helps us to move past them. As the Old Testament prophet Micah expressed in Micah 7:8, even when we have fallen and find ourselves sitting in a dark place in life, God will be there for us and He will be our light so we can find our way out of that place. But in order for that to happen we have to admit the mistake, seek forgiveness, and then intentionally move forward with the Lord from there.

Whatever mistakes we have made, with God’s help we can recover from it. God forgives, forgets, and restores us.

God Bless

Pastor Jim

Our theme for this month: “Never forsaken, never abandoned.”

Our Bible verse for today: “Don’t let your hearts be troubled. Trust in God, and trust also in Me.” John 14:1 (NLT)

Our thought for today: “You can trust the Lord”

As we end our month of devotions on the theme of “Never forsaken, never abandoned”, I want us to consider two key New Testament verses. The first is John 14:1 cited above. Jesus said those words to His disciples on the night before He was crucified. He was speaking to those who were closest to Him, the ones who had come to rely on His physical presence the most. For three and one half years they had lived with Him, eaten with Him, ministered with Him, and learned from Him. But tomorrow He would be gone, and Jesus knew they were going to be devastated. So He urged them to not allow their hearts to be troubled. During their time with Jesus they had learned from personal experience that they could indeed trust both Father God and Jesus the Son, and Jesus wanted them to remember that great truth in the days ahead.

The second verse is found in Matthew 28:20. It is forty days after the resurrection. Jesus died on the cross, arose from the grave, and appeared to the disciples numerous times in His resurrection body. So once again they had Jesus actually with them – albeit only for short periods of time, and in a physical/spiritual resurrection body. But now that too was about to come to an end. In just a moment Jesus would ascend back into heaven to take His place at the right hand of the Father. From that moment forward the disciples would no longer have a visible Jesus with them in any form. And so the last words He speaks to them are “I am with you always, even to the end of the age.” Matthew 28:20 (NLT)

What the disciples would soon learn is the same lesson that you and I have had to learn, that Jesus is indeed with us – always. Now however, He is with us by means of the spiritual presence of His Holy Spirit in our hearts, and through the physical presence of other Christians.

It’s very true that Jesus has remained with us, and is always with us, but we have to learn to see and experience Him in the forms He uses to manifest that presence to us in this age in which we live. A well-developed life of practicing the basic spiritual disciplines of the Christian faith such as prayer, Bible study, worship, fasting, meditation, service, etc, help to place us in a position before God whereby the Holy Spirit truly can live and flourish in our lives. Then, lots of time spent with other mature Christians puts us in a position whereby Jesus can interact with us through them. (See John 15:5 to gain a better understanding of how that works).

It’s really true that He never forsakes us, and He never abandons us. Even in the worst of times He is there for us. Especially in the worst of times He is there for us.

God Bless,

Our theme for this month: “Never forsaken, never abandoned.”

Our Bible verse for today: “Carry one another’s burdens; in this way you will fulfill the law of Christ … Therefore, as we have opportunity, we must work for the good of all, especially for those who belong to the household of faith.” Galatians 6:2; 10

Our thought for today: “Taking care of each other helps to fulfill God’s plan.

As we approach the end of our month of devotionally considering the great Biblical truth that we are never forsaken and never abandoned by God, I want to return us to the idea of human instrumentality. Jesus lives and ministers and accomplishes His purposes through His people. That is especially true when a Christian is in need. Almost always it is the Lord’s desire that His blessings be delivered to the one in need through the faithful and obedient actions of other Christians. Love, mercy, kindness, compassion, provision, encouragement – it all gets delivered by means of one brother or sister reaching out to another in the Name of, and on the behalf of, our Lord Jesus Christ. That’s human instrumentality – the Lord using us as His instruments of ministry, and it’s the primary way in which He ensures we never are forsaken or abandoned.

As you gather with your church family this Sunday I want to encourage you to ask the Lord to show you a brother or sister you can minister to in His Name and on His behalf. There will be somebody in your fellowship feeling very alone and who just needs to know that someone cares. Give that person a hug and maybe even invite them to lunch. There will be someone else who is going through a difficult life situation (perhaps a struggling marriage, or a wayward child, or a health issue) and they will be encouraged by the fact that you stopped, put your hand on their shoulder, and prayed for them. There will probably be others who are struggling financially who aren’t sure how they will pay the rent, or even put dinner on the table.

Nobody can meet every need for everyone. But everybody can meet some need for some one. There is something you could do for at least one brother or sister this Sunday which will make a meaningful difference. Pray and ask the Lord to show you who that person is and what you should do. Then go be the hands and feet, the kindness and compassion, the mercy and provision of Jesus in that person’s life.

God Bless,

Good Morning Everyone,

Our theme for this month: “Never forsaken, never abandoned.”

Our Bible verse for today: “Praise the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies and the God of all comfort. He comforts us in our affliction, so that we may be able to comfort those who are in any kind of affliction, through the comfort we ourselves receive from God.” 2 Corinthians 1:3-4 (HCSB)

Our thought for today: “Comfort others just as you have been comforted.”

Life is a series of peaks and valleys. We all experience our share of time on the mountaintops of life when the sun is shining, the birds are singing, the view is spectacular, and life is good. And we all have our times in the deep dark valleys where life is hard and the way forward is often uncertain.

All this month we’ve been learning that even in the most difficult of times God is still with us, He never forsakes us, He never abandons us. If you’re a mature Christian then you’ve discovered that to be true as you’ve walked through your own times in life’s valleys. So you know from personal experience that what Paul described in 2 Corinthians 1:3-4, that God is the Father of all mercies, the God of all comfort, and the one who comforts us in all of our afflictions, is true.

But Paul’s primary point in these verses is not just that God is merciful and that He comforts us, we already know that to be true, but that we are to now use those experiences from our own lives so that we can help others in similar circumstances to find God’s love and comfort and mercy in the middle of their own time in the valley. The Christian best equipped to comfort someone whose spouse has just died, is someone who has personally experienced that pain. The best substance abuse counselors are usually those who themselves have suffered through, and gained victory over, substance abuse. The list of possible examples is endless.

In verse 7 of that chapter Paul wrote, “And our hope for you is firm, because we know that as you share in the sufferings, so you will share in the comfort.” That right there is a big part of God’s plan for ministering to a lost and broken and bleeding world. Most of God’s blessings are delivered through His people. We are His instruments of ministry to others who are hurting. He works through us, and He uses our own personal experiences of Him, to prepare us to be of use to Him in the lives of other people.

You have experienced God in your own life. In the middle of your own times of trial, struggle, and despair He has been there for you and you have discovered that He truly is the Father of all mercies and the God of all comfort. Now use your experiences to share that good news with others going through something similar. You have been comforted, now go and comfort others.

God Bless,
Pastor Jim

Our Bible verse for today: “How precious to me are your thoughts, O God! How vast is the sum of them! Were I to count them, they would outnumber the grains of sand.” Psalm 139:17-18 (NIV)

Our thought for today: “You are never out of God’s thoughts.”

I love the beach. I was raised in central New Jersey, not far from the Jersey shore. As a young adult I spent twenty-one years in the Navy and therefore was always on or near the ocean. My family and I lived in Southern California for over twenty years, never far from the beach. To this day my wife and I spend our summer vacations at the beach. There’s nothing quite like the feel of warm sand between your toes. (My favorite is the sugar-white sand of the Florida gulf coast).

A grain of sand is a tiny thing, almost microscopic. It takes hundreds of billions of them just to cover a small portion of beach. In Psalm 139 David gives us a glimpse into the infinite mind of God by telling us that the thoughts of God exceed in number all the grains of sand on all the beaches of the world. That’s a lot of sand. And it’s a lot of thoughts in the infinite mind of God.

The interesting thing about Psalm 139 is that it’s all about God’s intimate awareness of the writer. David is writing about himself and he is describing how intimately he is known by God. In verses 2-3 David affirms that he is never out of God’s sight. In verse 4 he says that God is so aware of his (David’s) words, that God knows them before they even make it out of David’s mouth. In verses 7-10 David affirms that he is never out of God’s presence. In verses 13-15 David explains that God even knit him together in his mother’s womb. Verse 16 tells of how, even before the day of his birth God had already decided the total number of days of life David would have.

Within the context of all that intimacy and Godly awareness, in verse 17 David makes reference to the infinite mind of God. All of those Godly thoughts that exceed even the grains of sand? They include you. That was David’s point. You are included in the infinite mind of God. He knows you better than you know yourself, you are never out of His sight, and you are never out of His thoughts.

Make no mistake about it, when God said in Hebrews 13:5 “Never will I forsake you, never will I abandon you.” – He meant it. You are never even out of His thoughts.

God Bless,

Good Morning Everyone,

 

Our theme for this month: “Never forsaken, never abandoned.”

 

Our Bible verse for today: “Where were you when I established the earth? Tell Me, if you have understanding.” Job 38:4 (HCSB)

 

Our thought for today: “Don’t lose sight of God.”

 

As Job was going through his extended time of trials, he lost sight of God. He forgot who God is and what He is like. As his troubles multiplied and as his suffering continued, Job not only failed to remember God’s past faithfulness but worse, he gradually became less and less aware of God’s presence with him in the moment.

 

So in Job chapters 38-41 God shows up in a big way and helps to clarify Job’s perspective for him. God reminds Job that He is the Creator of all there is, including the earth (38:4). God affirms for Job that nothing is beyond His control or too difficult for Him, including controlling the seas, orchestrating each new dawn, and even positioning the stars in the sky (38:8, 38:12, 38:31). God reminded Job that there is nothing in all creation that escapes His attention, including when a mountain goat gives birth, when a raven is hungry, or when an eagle is soaring free across the sky (38:41, 39:1, 39:27). And just to emphasize His point, God reminds Job that He (God) has power and authority over the mightiest and most majestic creatures Job would have been aware of including the horse, the ox, and something God called “Leviathan”. As mighty as those creatures are, God is mightier.

 

The point was that as Job was enduring his difficult times, the evidence of God’s power and presence was all around him. The evidence was present in creation itself and all of life around Job was overflowing with the glory and majesty of God. God’s past power and faithfulness had been proven without question, and His presence in that moment was obvious and observable – if Job would only have opened his eyes and seen.

 

Finally, in 42:3, Job realized his foolishness in ever having doubted God and to have ever accused God of not caring. Job said, “Surely I spoke about things I did not understand, things too wonderful for me to know.” In other words, Job had been wrong about God.

 

God had been there for Job in the middle of it all. He never left him, He never abandoned him. That was true for Job and it’s true for us too. As dark and troubling as life can sometimes seem, God is still there with us. We need only recall His faithfulness and His provision and the many times He has delivered us in the past, to know that He is able and willing to deliver us now.

 

In the midst of your trials don’t lose sight of God. He’s still there. The evidence of His presence is all around you.

 

God Bless,

Pastor Jim

Good Morning Everyone,

Our theme for this month: “Never forsaken, never abandoned.”

Our Bible verse for today: “I had heard the rumors about You, but now my eyes have seen You. Therefore I take back my words and repent in dust and ashes.” Job 42:5-6 (HCSB)

Our thought for today: “When it’s all said and done we discover that God was faithful after all.”

Job tried, he really did. When a cascading series of disasters invaded his life he made a valiant effort to trust God and to remain faithful in all he said and did. And for the most part, he was successful – but not entirely. As the suffering wore on, and on, and on, Job faltered. There were moments when he cursed the day of his birth (3:3). There were other times when he decided that it was God Himself who was inflicting the pain and misery upon him (6:4). And there were times when he challenged God to explain and defend His actions (10:2).

As Job was going through this time of suffering he discovered that his conception of God – his preconceived notions of who God was and what He was like, were inaccurate and inadequate. In the end Job finally came to the realization that God had never forsaken him, never abandoned him, and through this time of terrible trial and suffering Job came to know God is a much deeper, more intimate way. The trials and tribulations actually became a period of tremendous spiritual growth for him. Before being comforted, healed, and restored, Job had to first hear from God. It was necessary for him to come to the end of his own resources and abilities in order to fully appreciate the sovereign goodness of God.

People suffer in this world because there is an evil adversary called Satan who wrecks lives and shatters hopes. But ultimately Satan is the loser. In the end God shows Himself to be not only the Creator, but also the Savior, the Redeemer, and the Sovereign Lord over all of life.

It has been said that in order to fully understand the lessons of Job we ourselves must have first gone through similar loss – or walked through such a time with someone we care about and love. During times like that there are no easy answers, there are no religious platitudes that make it all better, and we usually can’t see the way out. And so we walk through the darkness by faith, putting one foot in front of the other, trusting that nothing we’re experiencing is outside of God’s sovereign will. And in time, like Job, we discover that God was faithful after all. He never left us, He never abandoned us, and in His way and at His time, He brings us through it.

God Bless,

Pastor Jim