Our theme for this month: “Mistakes”

Our Bible verse for today: “How can a young man keep his way pure? By keeping your word. I have sought You will all my heart; don’t let me wander from Your commands. I have treasured Your word in my heart so that I may not sin against You.” Psalm 119:9-11 (HCSB)

Our thought for today: “Trust the Lord to guide you.”

As a Pastor I frequently have discussions with well-meaning Christians who are faced with tough decisions and they’re not sure what to do. They love the Lord and they have a genuine desire to understand His will and to be obedient to it, but with respect to the decision they’re faced with, they’re not sure what to do and they’re afraid of making a mistake.

Such times are often confusing, frustrating, and sometimes even a little scary – especially if we’ve come to the point that a decision has to be made and we’re still not sure what to do. They last thing we want to do is to mistakenly make the wrong choice and end up far from where God wanted us to be. So what do we do? Although there are no pat answers or Biblical formulas, there are some general rules of thumb that apply.

First of all, if you’re not sure what God wants you to do next, then just keep doing the last thing you are sure He told you to do.

Second, invest the time needed to discern His will. Be patient and give Him lots of time to speak to you about it. Although God can speak to us in an infinite number of ways, the ways He most commonly speaks to us in this day is through prayer, through the Bible, through the circumstances of our lives, through the counsel of close and trusted Christian friends, and through the testimony of the church. But seeking God in that manner takes time. Just keep doing that, and keep being patient, until you have clear direction from Him.

However, and finally, if the circumstances are such that you have done due diligence in patiently seeking the Lord but you have now arrived at the point when a decision has to be made and a path has to be chosen, and yet you are still uncertain but you simply cannot delay any longer, then what? Well, you make the best decision you can and you trust the Lord to guide you step-by-step and moment-by-moment.

This is what the Psalmist was referring to in Psalm 119:9-11. He explained that he loves the Lord and His word, and to the best of his ability he is trying to be obedient (verses 9 and 11). But in the middle of that (verse 10), he is trusting in the Lord to guide his steps (I have sought you with all my heart; (so) don’t let me wander from Your commands.)

If you’ve done everything you can do to place yourself in a position before Him whereby He can speak to you and make His will clear to you; and you have patiently waited on Him; but circumstances now mandate that you do something; then you can trust the Lord to guide. Remember, He wants to be understood by you and He wants to be obeyed. It is in His own interest and in accordance with His own plan for you that you be enabled to understand and that you walk the path He has established for you. So after having done all that you can do to discern and obey, then in faith you simply make the best decision you can. You can trust Him to guide you.

God Bless,

Our theme for this month: “Mistakes”

Our Bible verse for today: “Woe to those who call evil good and good evil, who substitute darkness for light and light for darkness, who substitute bitter for sweet and sweet for bitter.” Isaiah 5:20 (HCSB)

Our thought for today: “It’s a serious mistake to call evil good.”

The other day I read an article in the newspaper which quoted a representative from a well know national organization regarding a sex education program being used by one school district in Texas. It seems the offending school district was actually teaching the students that the best and safest approach to sexual activity is abstinence until marriage. The quoted representative of this national organization was appalled at the narrow-minded irresponsibility being demonstrated by the school board for teaching students such nonsense. In her opinion it is unreasonable and unfair to expect teenagers to abstain from sexual activity and therefore the only responsible course of action is to teach them how to have sex safely.

Despite the fact that the standards being promoted by the school board in question were time honored, proven to be successful, and Biblical, this spokesperson and her organization claim that such policies are deeply wrong and harmful. They’ve done exactly what Isaiah was warning against in Isaiah 5:20, they have labeled good as evil and evil as good. They have substituted the darkness of satanically inspired thinking for the light that comes from the Word of God; they have substituted the sweetness of sexual morality for the bitterness of a sexual lie.

We live in a culture today that is upside down and backwards in its thinking and perceptions. Good is evil, evil is good, black is white, up is down, and don’t you dare claim otherwise or you will be ostracized, criticized, and perhaps even persecuted.

As Christians we have to be careful we don’t make the mistake of going with the cultural flow. It’s so easy (and seemingly safe) to simply fit in and go along. It’s much harder to take your stand on Biblical truth and then weather the storm that may come upon you as a result. But that is what we must do. It is imperative that the people of God know the Word of God, and then stand on it with boldness, courage, and conviction.

My friends, it’s a serious mistake to call evil good and good evil. If you haven’t yet seen the movie “God’s Not Dead” I encourage you to do so. It teaches this very point in a dramatic and extremely effective way. It’s a great movie.

God Bless,

Our theme for this month: “Mistakes”

Our Bible verse for today: “Looking all around and seeing no one, he struck the Egyptian dead and hid him in the sand.” Exodus 2:12 (HCSB)

Our thought for today: “Our mistakes are not hidden from God.”

Moses thought he was being clever. Maybe he thought he had committed the perfect crime. He killed a man who he thought deserved to be killed, buried the body in the sand, and thought nobody knew about it. He was wrong. God knew. And as it turned out, so did others. He discovered that the next day when, apparently emboldened by his act of the previous day, Sheriff Moses attempts to bring a little law and order into the lives of the Hebrews – but they were having none of it. They let Moses know that they were fully aware of the crime he had committed the day before and that they had no intention of submitting to his authority. Scared now, Moses fled.

What we learn from Moses’ example is that our sins are never really committed in secret. Even if we think nobody else is aware of them, God is. And usually the sins will eventually become known to others as well.

But the good news is that God can and will forgive us. Again we see this in the life of Moses. If we follow his story through Exodus, we find that his big mistake chapter two was followed by forty years of isolation in the desert. It was during that time that God engaged in a little character formation with Moses. He had lots of time to think about the mistakes he had made and what he needed to do differently in the future. God used this time to mature him, and to sand off some of the rough spots of his personality, as well as bringing him to the point where he could eventually be used by God in a major way.

The same is true for us. Our mistakes are seldom fatal. As bad as they may seem at the moment of commission (and in the immediate aftermath), there is little in life that cannot be recovered from. Repent, submit to God, remain faithful over the long-term, let the weeks turn into months and the months turn into years, and watch how God uses your mistakes to correct you, change you, and mold you into a better person – the person He wants you to be.

It’s true that our mistakes are never hidden from God and that they will usually, eventually, become obvious to others as well. But the good news is that God can and will use those mistakes to transform us into a better person if we allow Him to.

God Bless,

Our theme for this month: “Mistakes”

Our Bible verse for today: “Jonah got up and went in the opposite direction to get away from the Lord.” Jonah 1:3 (NLT)

Our thought for today: “The worst mistake we can make is to run away from God.”

I know from personal experience (and you probably do too), that the best and safest place to be is right in the center of God’s will. Any place other than that takes us outside the boundaries within which God can and will bless us. This has often been a hard lesson for me. I can’t count the number of times in my life I made a choice that was clearly unbiblical and then lived to regret it.

Jonah of course, is an extreme case in point. God called Jonah to go to the evil city of Nineveh and to call the people to repent of their wicked ways. But Jonah didn’t want to go to Nineveh, so he ran away from God and from the calling. Instead of going to Nineveh like God said, he got on a ship and headed for Tarshish – about as far from Nineveh as he could get. And, well, you know the rest of the story. Jonah ended up with three days of time-out in the belly of a big fish followed by being washed up on the beach covered in whale puke. It was a fitting end to a brazen act of rebellion.

Fast forward to our day. How many people do we all know who have walked (or run) away from the Lord, lived well outside of His will, and essentially ended up washed up on some beach covered in whale puke (or drunk in the gutter, or in a homeless shelter, or in jail …). The point is that when we wander outside of God’s will it takes us outside the boundaries within which He can and will bless us. When that happens we have essentially made a choice to live without His blessings.

This life can be hard enough as it is even when we are obeying God. Jesus told us that even the most faithful of His followers will have trouble in this world. But how much worse is it when we intentionally decide to walk away from God and therefore live without His blessings? That’s right – we end up covered in whale puke.

The worst mistake any of us can ever make is to run away from God. The good news is that just like Jonah, God will be happy to take us back, clean us up, and get us moving in the right direction again. We just need to return to Him. I encourage you to do it today.

God Bless,

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,