Devotional for Tuesday December 31st

Good Morning Everyone,
Our theme for this month: “Celebration”
Our Bible verse for today: “For I know the plans I have for you, declares the Lord, plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.” Jeremiah 29:11 (NIV)
Our thought for today: “Knowing that God has a great plan for you is a good reason to celebrate”
As I write this it is the morning of New Year’s Eve 2013.  Traditionally most of us use this time of year to review the old year, and to make plans for the new one. Taking stock of where we’ve been and where we’re heading is actually a helpful exercise. There are a couple of old, time-honored sayings that come to mind and which apply here. One is, “If you keep doing what you’ve always done you will keep getting what you’ve always gotten.” And, “If you aim at nothing you’re sure to hit it every time.”
So, it’s helpful to reflect on the old year. Did you have goals you wanted to achieve in 2013? Did you achieve them? Why or why not? What were some of your best moments in 2013? What were some of your worst? And, what actions did you take that brought those good or bad things to pass? (We are all responsible for the consequences of our choices be they good consequences or bad. Going through life with a victim mentality and trying to blame others for your problems is a sure path to sorrow and failure.)
Now, what about 2014? Have you set realistic goals? Do you have a plan for achieving those goals? Again, if you aim at nothing then that’s probably what you’ll accomplish – nothing.
It’s true that God has a wonderful plan for your life and that He is in the process of bringing that plan to fruition. However, don’t neglect your personal responsibility. The burden is not all on God. He expects us to cooperate with Him. We are partners with Him in this. So I encourage you to prayerfully ask God to help you set goals. Ask Him to guide you as you make plans for 2014, and then ask Him to help you be diligent and persistent in walking them out.
On this New Years Eve I hope you are thankful for 2013 and find yourself celebrating what God has done in your life. I also hope you’re looking forward to 2014 with eagerness and anticipation. I pray all the best for you in the New Year.
God Bless,
Pastor Jim

Devotional for Monday December 30th

Good Morning Everyone,
 
Our theme for this month: “Celebration”
 
Our Bible verse for today: “A joyful heart is good medicine, but a broken spirit dries up the bones.” Proverbs 17:22
 
Our thought for today: “Laughing is good for you.”
 
I love the sound of laughter – especially in the church. I think God’s people should be the happiest people on earth and the church should be the happiest place on earth. I know, I know, you thought that was Disneyland but no, it’s actually the church that should be that happy place. To this pastor’s ears there isn’t a sweeter sound than to hear the people of the church laughing and enjoying themselves. I often wish I had a greater gift for humor just so I could make people laugh more. Stuffy straight-laced religious people make me nervous.
 
Richard Foster once wrote, “So poke fun at yourself. Enjoy wholesome jokes and clever puns. Relish good comedy. Learn to laugh; it is a discipline to be mastered … Only those who are insecure about their own maturity will fear such a delightful form of celebration.”
 
My advice to you today? Laugh. Laugh a lot. And after that, laugh some more.
 
God Bless,
Pastor Jim

Devotional for Saturday and Sunday December 28-29

Good Morning Everyone,
 
Our theme for this month: “Celebration”
 
Our Bible verse for today: “How good and pleasant it is when brothers live together in harmony!” Psalm 133:1 (HCSB)
 
Our thought for today: “Peace within the family of God is a reason to celebrate.”
 
Last Sunday night in our Bible study group there was a comment made about how little conflict or dissension we experience in our church family at Oak Hill Baptist, and how pleasant it is to be part of a group of mature believers who love each other and who get along well. It’s what King David was writing about in Psalm 133:1.
 
I personally believe that how easily a person is offended is a measure of the depth of their spiritual maturity. The more spiritually mature an individual is the more likely they are to just shrug things off. Potential offenses to them are like water on a ducks back – it just rolls right off. But when a person is thin-skinned and easily takes offense, that’s an indication of spiritual immaturity. Get a few of those individuals in a church and it won’t be long before people are yipping and yapping and snapping at one another.
 
Years ago author John Bevere wrote a wonderful book entitled “The Bait of Satan”. The premise is that Satan uses the potential for offense as “bait” to try to turn an individual Christian into a self-absorbed whiny little snot with a victim mentality; someone who is always finding fault and who expects to always have things go their way. A person like that can wreck havoc in a church fellowship. A spiritually mature person will simply refuse to take that bait.
 
King David recognized and savored the wonderful experience of living in harmony with a spiritually mature group of God’s people. As the pastor of a small, but mature and peaceful church family, I can join with David in saying “Amen!”
 
God Bless,
Pastor Jim

Devotional for Thursday December 26th

Good Morning Everyone,
 
Our theme for this month: “Celebration”
 
Our Bible verse for today: “Don’t work only while being watched, in order to please men, but work wholeheartedly, fearing the Lord. Whatever you do, do it enthusiastically, as something done for the Lord and not for men.” Colossians 3:22-23 (HCSB)
 
Our thought for today: “A job well done is reason to celebrate”
 
God expects us to live productive lives that make a meaningful contribution to society. A job well done provides a sense of fulfillment and it is a good reason to celebrate. Some of the happiest people I know are those who are fortunate enough to work in a profession they truly love and which provides them with a great sense of fulfillment and accomplishment. It’s a wonderful thing to spend your days doing something you love and getting paid for it as well!
 
However, many others aren’t as fortunate. Many people have to simply take whatever job they can get just so they can put bread on the table for their family. Still, the Lord expects us to work hard and well, as if we are performing that task for Him. We’ve all had the misfortunate of having to work with slackers who don’t enjoy their work and therefore don’t do it well. It’s an especially bad testimony if they profess to be followers of Christ but they perform poorly at work.
 
Those folks seem to always be scheming to find ways to get out of work and they’re always making excuses. Nobody is fooled by their excuses, it’s hard to have respect for someone who acts that way, and such behavior certainly does not honor God. But for those who approach a disagreeable task with a good attitude and therefore do it well, we do respect them, we do enjoy working with them, and their conduct honors the God whom they profess to follow.
 
Whether you love your job or not, the Lord wants you to do it well. A job well done honors Him, gives you a sense of accomplishment, and it is a good reason to celebrate. For an expanded teaching on this subject refer to chapter thirteen of my book “Walking with Paul”. You can get a copy at http://www.JimMersereauBooks.com.
 
God Bless,
Pastor Jim

Devotional for Tuesday December 24th

Good Morning Everyone,
 
Our theme for this month: “Celebration”
 
Our Bible verse for today: “I proclaim to you good news of great joy that will be for all the people: Today a Savior, who is Messiah the Lord, was born for you in the city of David.” Luke 2:10-11
 
Our thought for today: “Christmas is a celebration of Christ.”
 
This morning, on this Christmas Eve morning, I want to share with you some thoughts from Billy Graham about Christmas:
 
“Christmas is a time of joy, but we must make sure that it is not pagan joy generated by the expectation of receiving gifts or engaging in revelry. The real happiness of Christmas is in the fact of the Incarnation, that God was in Christ, reconciling the world unto Himself.”
 
Even as Christians we can easily get caught-up in the secular aspects of this season that have little if anything to do with Christ. Santa Claus, Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer, Frosty the Snowman, eggnog, Christmas cookies, frenzied Christmas Eve price-slashing at the local WalMart … you know what I mean. It’s busy, loud, obnoxious, and Christ-less.
 
Tonight at 5:30 at Oak Hill Baptist Church we will celebrate our annual Christmas Eve Candlelight service. Frosty the Snowman won’t be there – but Jesus will be. It will all be about Him. I want to invite you to join us if you’re close by. If you’re not, then I encourage you to attend a similar service in your own town.
 
Here’s another thought from Billy:
 
“Christmas is not a myth, not a tradition, not a dream – it is a glorious reality. For from that manager came a Man who not only taught us a new way of life, but brought us into a new relationship with our Creator.”
 
God Bless,
Pastor Jim

Devotional for Monday December 23rd

Good Morning Everyone,
 
Our theme for this month: “Celebration”
 
Our Bible verse for today: “Come, let us worship and bow down; let us kneel before the Lord our Maker.” Psalm 95:6 (HCSB)
 
Our thought for today: “Reverent worship is a form of celebration:
 
Psalm 95:6 is actually part of the lyrics from one of my favorite contemporary worship songs “Come let us worship and bow down, let us kneel before the Lord our God our Maker …” In this verse the psalmist does a good job of combining the ideas of worship as both celebration and reverence. This balance helps us to guard against becoming too restrained and subdued, or too superficial and cavalier.
 
As I write this we are deep into the Christmas season. Tomorrow night at Oak Hill Baptist we will have a Christmas Eve candlelight service. It will be a time of both celebration and reverence. We will recall that on the night Jesus was born a multitude of angels sang glorious hallelujahs – it was a great celebration, while the shepherds came to bow before the newborn King and to worship Him. Then there was more rejoicing and praising as the shepherds went on their way to spread the good news about all they had seen and heard.
 
I realize that many of you reading this are scattered around the country, but many others are right here in Crossville, TN. For those of you who are close, I invite you to join us for the Christmas Eve candlelight service at Oak Hill Baptist at 5:30 PM. For those of you who aren’t close enough to join us, I encourage you to find a similar service in your own town.
Celebration can include both reverent worship and joyful praising. Come, let us worship and bow down …
 
God Bless,
Pastor Jim

Devotional for Saturday and Sunday December 21-22

Good Morning Everyone,
 
Our theme for this month: “Celebration”
 
Our Bible verse for today: “Shout joyfully to God, all the earth! Sing about the glory of His name; make His praise glorious.” Psalm 66:1-2 (HCSB)
 
Our thought for today: “Celebration is often noisy.”
 
When God’s people celebrate together it can get noisy, and that’s a good thing. When the time of group worship truly assumes a spirit of celebration the singing is louder and more robust, hands are raised in the air, faces light up with smiles, and frequently there are hearty “amen’s!”. When the people of God are enjoying good fellowship there is commonly lots of laughing, animated conversations, plenty of good-natured kidding, and it can get pretty loud. All of that is a joyful noise unto the Lord.
 
Although I’m personally fairly quiet and a bit reserved in my own times of worship, I love being surrounded by a group of people who are animated and expressive. While you probably won’t see me dancing in the aisle with a tambourine, I don’t mind if others do. And as a Pastor I love it when our Fellowship Hall is packed with people enjoying a good meal, and each others company. I’ll often just stand back and survey the noisy scene and enjoy the sight.
 
This Sunday at Oak Hill Baptist we’ll be holding our annual Christmas worship service. It will include congregational singing of some of our old time favorite Christmas hymns; along with some special music from the choir; and a couple of numbers from our children as well. That will be followed by our annual Christmas dinner. And yup, it will be noisy. But it will be that joyful noise made unto the Lord. We would love to have you join us!
 
God Bless,
Pastor Jim

Devotional for Friday December 20th

Good Morning Everyone,
 
Our theme for this month: “Celebration”
 
Our Bible verse for today: “A joyful heart is good medicine, but a broken spirit dries up the bones.” Proverbs 17:22 (HCSB)
 
Our thought for today: “Celebration is good for you.”
 
I love what Richard Foster wrote about the value of celebration. In his book “Celebration of Discipline” he wrote, “Far and away the most important benefit of celebration is that it saves us from taking ourselves too seriously … It is an occupational hazard of devout folk to become stuffy bores. This should not be. Of all people, we should be the most free, alive, interesting. Celebration adds a note of gaiety, festivity, hilarity to our lives. After all, Jesus rejoiced so fully in life that he was accused of being a wine-bibber and a glutton. Many of us lead such sour lives that we cannot possibly be accused of such things.”
 
If we allow it to, life can become heavy, a burden. Even the practice of our faith can become a strain if it isn’t clothed in joy. Just as the physical body can become strained from overwork, so too the spirit can become strained from a sense of religious obligation and duty. Celebration helps us to lighten up, relax, and enjoy the good things in life. Participating in festive events and intentionally cultivating a spirit of joy and celebration is also an excellent antidote for depression.
 
Here’s another quote from Foster’s book: “Another benefit of celebration is its ability to give us perspective. We can laugh at ourselves. We come to see that the causes we champion are not nearly so monumental as we would like to believe.” “Finally, an interesting characteristic of celebration is that it tends toward more celebration. Joy begets joy. Laughter begets laughter. It is one of the few things in life we multiply by giving.”
 
This Sunday at Oak Hill Baptist Church we will celebrate Christmas with a joy-filled worship service followed by a fun Christmas banquet. We invite you to come worship, sing, laugh and eat with us.
 
God Bless,
Pastor Jim

Devotional for Thursday December 19th

Good Morning Everyone,
 
Our theme for this month: “Celebration”
 
Our Bible verse for today: “Don’t worry about anything, but in everything, through prayer and petition with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses every thought, will guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus.” Philippians 4:6-7 (HCSB)
 
Our thought for today: “Trusting all things to God in prayer frees us to live with joy.”
 
Richard Foster once wrote, “The decision to set the mind on the higher things of life is an act of the will. That is why celebration is a discipline.” That’s the point Paul was making in Philipppians 4:6-7. When we trust all things to God in prayer we are affirming that we are relying entirely on Him for all our needs – especially for the most pressing ones. That then frees us from excessive worry and despair and paves the way for a spirit of carefree celebration.
 
Now realistically, that doesn’t mean that our problems will magically disappear just because we prayed about them or that we’re no longer concerned about the outcome. Paul wasn’t advocating an “ignorance is bliss” approach to life and he wasn’t calling for us to pretend that problems don’t exist. His point was that the more we learn to commit all things to the Lord and to rely on Him – really trusting Him – the more we will experience the settled peace of God deep within our hearts, even as we continue to navigate the current difficult circumstances.
 
Foster offers some practical advice along these lines: “But if we fill our lives with simple good things and constantly thank God for them, we will be joyful, that is, full of joy. And what about our problems? When we determine to dwell on the good and excellent things in life, we will be so full of those things that they will tend to swallow our problems.”
 
Paul went on in the passage above and in verse eight he said, “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.”
 
Maintaining a sense of joy and a spirit of celebration is largely a matter of what we choose to allow our mind to dwell on. Fill your life with simple good things – godly things – and dwell on them. Then trust the rest to God.
 
God Bless,
Pastor Jim

Devotional for Wednesday December 11th

Good Morning Everyone,

 Our theme for this month: “Celebration”

 Our Bible verse for today: “Therefore, as we have opportunity, we must work for the good of all, especially for those who belong to the household of faith.” Galatians 6:10 (HCSB)

 Our thought for today: “Good deeds are a cause for celebration”

 The other morning at church I was approached by one of our members who is going through a pretty rough season of life right now. Physically, emotionally, and financially this person is fighting through a tough time. Although this person has their hands full with their own issues, they handed me an envelope with some cash in it and asked me to give it as an anonymous gift to another church member who is also struggling.

 My first impulse was to give it back and tell them that they needed to keep it for their own needs. But of course, I caught myself. Who was I to deny this person the right to be a blessing to someone else? So I passed the gift along and as you would expect, the recipient of the gift was touched and blessed. That person had tears in their eyes as they humbly accepted this very kind and very generous gift that they really did need.

What does all of this have to do with our theme of “celebration”? A lot actually. There were no trumpets sounding in the hallway of our church buildings that morning. No balloons or ticker tape falling from the ceiling. But there was lots of quiet celebrating going on. The person who received the gift was grateful, blessed, and probably a little relieved that a pressing financial need had been met. The person who gave the gift surely walked away with a warm sense of having done something good (see Galatians 6:10 above). And as a Pastor my heart was touched to see my people taking care of each other like that.

 Oh, and I’ll bet there was some high-fiving going on in heaven too.

 In his book “Celebration of Discipline” Richard Foster wrote, “When the members of a (church) family are filled with love and compassion and a spirit of service to one another, that family has reason to celebrate.”

 Yes they do.

God Bless,

Pastor Jim