Praise

The Devil's Death Knell    

Our Lord, we praise Thee.                                 

Praise is the devil's death knell.  Resignation, acceptance of My Will, obedience to it, have not the power to vanquish evil that praise has.

The joyful heart is my best weapon against all evil.  Oh! pray and praise.

You are learning your lesson.  You are being led out into a large place.  Go with songs of rejoicing.  Rejoice evermore.  Happy indeed if each day has its thrill of joy.

Talk to Me more during the day.  Look up into My Face - a look of Love, a feeling of security, a thrill of Joy at the sense of the nearness of My Presence - these are your best prayers.

Let these smooth the day's work, then fear will vanish, and fear is the grim figure that turns aside success.

Whoso offereth praise glorifieth me. Psalm 50:23

Forget

Today's devo from God Calling really spoke to me, so I wanted to share!

Forget 

Regret nothing. Not even the sins and failures.  When a man views earth's wonders from some mountain height he does not spend his time in dwelling on the stones and stumbles, the faints and failures, that marked his upward path.

So with you.  Breathe in the rich blessings of each new day - forget all that lies behind you.

Man is so made that he can carry the weight of twenty-four hours, no more.  Directly he weighs down with the years behind, and the days ahead, his back breaks.  I have promised to help you with the burden of today only, the past I have taken from you and if you, foolish hearts, choose to gather again that burden and bear it, then, indeed, you mock Me to expect Me to share it.

For weal or woe each day is ended.  What remains to be lived, the coming twenty-four hours, you must face as you awake.

A man on a march on earth carries only what he needs for that march.  Would you pity him if you saw him bearing too the overwhelming weight of the worn-out shoes and uniforms of past marches and years?  And yet, in the mental and spiritual life, man does these things.  Small wonder My poor world is heartsick and weary.

Not so must you act.

This one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind ...
I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of
God in Christ Jesus.  Philippians 3:13,14

Fighter Verse

"Even youths will become weak and tired, and young men will fall in exhaustion. But those who trust in the Lord will find new strength. They will soar high on wings like eagles. They will run and now grow weary. They will walk and not faint."    Isaiah 40:30-31

A Radical Experiment

I just finished reading Radical by David Platt. It is about "taking back your faith from the American Dream." It was a great read; I highly recommend it. Seriously: summer reading list. I was so challenged in my way of thinking and living. Platt opened my eyes to how my Christian life has been shaped by our American culture and its beliefs and values. It was shocking and sobering. I am excited to be praying about how God wants me to start making changes in my life and how he wants to transform my way of thinking, so that it might be better aligned with the teaching of the Bible and not of the world. And I have found the next big step I want to make. Perhaps you will want to join me as well.

At the end of Radical Platt poses a challenge to take on "The Radical Experiment" for one year. Motivation behind committing to this experiment is found in so many of the promises we can claim from the Bible. "Real success is found in radical sacrifice. Ultimate satisfaction is found not in making much of ourselves but in making much of God. The purpose of our lives transcends the country and culture in which we live. Meaning is found in community, no individualism; joy is found in generosity, no materialism; and truth is found in Christ, not universalism. Ultimately, Jesus is a reward worth risking everything to know, experience and enjoy." 


The challenge involves five parts:

1. pray for the entire world;
2. read through the entire Word;
3. sacrifice your money for a specific purpose;
4. spend your time in another context; 
5. commit your life to a multiplying community


Pray for the entire world.
"The harvest is plentiful but the workers are few. Ask the Lord of the harvest, therefore, to send out workers into his harvest field" (Matt. 9:37-38). More than a billion people around the world have never heard the gospel. At the core of this heartbreaking truth is yet another heartbreaking truth: we must not be praying. Jesus told the disciples to pray that God would send out workers to reap the harvest. He didn't start delegating tasks to each disciple; he instructed them to PRAY. So I am committing for the next to praying that God would raise up and send disciples to the unreached. I am praying for the entire world.

Read through the entire Word.
"If we want to know the glory of God, if we want to experience the beauty of God, and if we want to be used by the hand of God, then we must live in the Word of God." I have committed to reading through the entire Bible in the next year, following a chronological reading plan-- I am so interested in the historical progression of the Bible and its events!

Sacrifice your money for a specific purpose.
"Our hearts follow our money." 


This challenge doesn't just mean that we give away our excesses. "Sacrifice is giving away what it hurts to give. Sacrifice is not giving according to your ability; it's giving beyond your ability." This is definitely going to be a challenge for me, but one I feel like God has really laid upon my heart.

A few tips Platt gives for how we spend our money:

• spend your money on something that is gospel-centered
• give in a way that is church focused
• give to a specific, tangible need
• give to someone or something you can personally serve alongside
• give to someone or something you can trust
• give in sustainable ways

Spend time in another context.

Our presence is needed. "If we are going to accomplish the global purpose of God, it will not be primarily through giving our money, as important as that is. It will happen primarily through giving ourselves. This is what the gospel represents, and it's what the gospel requires." We are commanded to go; Christians cannot feign ignorance of the Great Commission. "The point is not where we go, how we get there, or even how long we stay. The point is simply that we go." I am spending six months of this next year in another context--and I CAN'T WAIT for God to rock my world.

Commit your life to a multiplying community.

We cannot go it alone. We were made to be in relationship, and the fellowship that Christian community provides is of infinite worth. I can personally attest to this, because my time spent at Tech in the most wonderful Christian fellowship showed me the inexpressible value of community. We need others to encourage us, to spur us on, challenge us, grow with us, pray with us; and we need to have the responsibility and opportunity to do those things for our fellow believers as well. It is how we sharpen one another. 

"No one who has left home or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or fields for me and the gospel will fail to receive a hundred times as much in this present age...and in the age to come, eternal life" (Mark 10:29-31).

I am undoubtedly seeking to be committed to a multiplying community. I want to know that I am investing in the lives of others within the body of the church I am a part of, and to also know that I am being invested in as well. What a joy and blessing it is to share our faith journeys with one another.

Sunshine On A Cloudy Day

"Arise, Jerusalem! Let your light shine for all to see. For the glory of the Lord rises to shine on you. Darkness as black as night covers all the nations of the earth, but the glory of the Lord rises and appears over you. All nations will come to your light; mighty kinds will come to see your radiance."


"No longer will you need the sun to shine by day, nor the moon to give its light by night, for the Lord your God will be your everlasting light, and God will be your glory. Your sun will never set; your moon will not go down. For the Lord will be your everlasting light. Your days of mourning will come to an end."
Isaiah 60:1-3, 19-20


Light makes things visible; it illuminates. To light something is to set it burning as a lamp, candle, or fire; to kindle or ignite. I love to find all the various synonyms that can be used to explain and define a word. It brings me greater understanding of the meaning that can be derived from a passage of scripture

In Isaiah 60, I loved the imagery of the light, because when I think of light, I equate it with the brightness of joy, happiness, goodness, and truth. The sunshine of life is the light of Christ within us. God brings to us eternal light, and makes it to dwell inside us. As believers we are forever in God's truth, sharing the resulting joy and happiness. We are no longer in the darkness where we were once so lost. And we don't ever have to go back. Praise God.

This everlasting light that we find with Christ should ignite or kindle a fire of passion in our hearts and souls to know Christ and to make him known. That is what Isaiah was referencing in verse 1 when he said, "Let your light shine for all to see." When we do let our light shine, the radiance of Christ will shine forth through us and draw people to him! I think it is a beautiful picture; to think that God designed it so that we would be his instruments of light in a dark world, bringing the light of day to those who are still lost in the darkness.

Those who feel stuck in an endless string of gray days of despair, pain, and desperation need not despair any longer, because God is our everlasting light. Sometimes when I feel like I am stuck in a string of gray days, I feel as though I am exuding the essence of a gray, rainy, miserable day. But Isaiah 60 gives me such joy and encouragement for those times. I have my own source of light and sunshine for those cloudy days-- it is Christ in me. Hallelujah! I can choose to tap into that light and never have a day completely overshadowed by inner emotional or spiritual dreariness. I want to choose Christ's everlasting light when I rise in the morning of every new day, knowing that  I have light inside me, and I just have to let it burst forth and shine like daylight.

Fighter Verse

"Have you never heard? Have you never understood? The Lord is the everlasting God, the Creator of all the earth. He never grows weak or weary. No one can measure the depths of his understanding. He gives power to the weak and strength to the powerless."   Isaiah 40:28-29

Relinquishing Control

As the time draws nearer and nearer for me to board the plane bound for Denver and begin my DTS, I find that support-raising is always in the forefront of my mind. Every day I ask myself what I could or should be doing to be getting more support to come in, so that I may ensure I will be able to actually go. The idea of raising $10,000 is baffling to me, and hence, extremely daunting. That's a big chunk of change. But guess what? I serve an even bigger God. I KNOW he will provide for me if it is his will. How easily I forget and take matters into my own hands. I go through this thought process cycle most days, and I almost have to laugh at how bent I am on needing to do something and thinking that my control of the situation will allow the details to work out. Wrong. God is in control, and I need to let him be in control. My faith in God is shown by my actions (or lack of them), and lately my actions have shown distrust, because I want to generate the support through my own efforts, when maybe I just need to step back and let God blow my mind.

This morning I had a great reminder of this from the daily devotional I read. It was so fitting; one of those moments when you know God has is addressing you directly as if he told the author to write you a little personal note.

Rest knowing all is so safe in My Hands. Rest is Trust. Ceaseless activity is distrust. Without the knowledge that I am working for you, you do not rest. Inaction then would be the outcome of despair.

My Hand is not shortened that it cannot save. Know that, repeat it, rely on it, welcome the knowledge, delight in it. Such a truth is a hope flung to a drowning man. Every repetition of it is one pull nearer shore and safety.

Let that illustration teach you a great truth.  Lay hold of the truth, pray it, affirm it, hold on to the rope.  How foolish are your attempts to save yourself, one hand on the  rope, and one making efforts to swim ashore!  You may relinquish your hold of the rope and hinder the rescuer - who has to act with the greater caution lest he lose you.

The storms and tempests are not all of life.  The Psalmist who said "All thy waves and thy billows are gone over me" wrote also "He brought me up also out of an horrible pit, out of the miry clay, and set my feet upon a rock, and established my goings."

Meditate upon that wonder - truth, the three steps safety, security, guidance.  (1) "He brought me up also out of an horrible pit" - Safety.  (2) "He set my feet upon a rock" - Security (3) "He established my goings" -Guidance. No. 3 is the final stage when the saved soul trusts Me so entirely it seeks no more its own way but leaves all future plans to Me its Rescuer.

The eternal God is thy refuge, and underneath are the everlasting arms.  Deuteronomy 33:27

Praise God I'm not in control.