A Prelude to Future Glory - Psalm 16:8-11

"I know the Lord is always with me. I will not be shaken, for he is right beside me. No wonder my heart is glad, and I rejoice. My body rests in safety. For you will not leave my soul among the dead or allow your holy one to rot in the grave. You will show me the way of life, granting me the the joy of your presence and the pleasures of living with you forever." These verses are referenced by Peter in his sermon on the day of Pentecost (Acts 2:25-28) and Paul in a sermon in the synagogue at Antioch of Pisidia (Acts 13:35). In both cases the apostles were applying the reference to the resurrection of Jesus. We can anticipate living in the presence and pleasures of God forever because the resurrected Messiah gives us hope and assurance for our own resurrection: "Just as everyone dies because we all belong to Adam, everyone who belongs to Christ will be given new life. But there is an order to this resurrection: Christ was raised as the first of the harvest; then all who belong to Christ will be raised when he comes back" (I Corinthians 15:22-23). It's interesting that Peter quotes these verses on the day of Pentecost when the powerful presence of God was experienced by the disciples when the Holy Spirit came upon them. The presence of God in our lives by the Holy Spirit links our present life with resurrection and future life: "And we believers also groan, even though we have the Holy Spirit within us as a foretaste of future glory, for we long for our bodies to be released from sin and suffering. We, too, wait with eager hope for the day when God will give us our full rights as his adopted children, including the new bodies he has promised us" (Romans 8:23). The indwelling Holy Spirit, the presence of God with us, is but a prelude to a future glorious life where we live fully in God's presence in resurrection bodies and we will enjoy the pleasures of living with God forever!

The Mark of Leadership - Matthew 20:26-27

"Whoever wants to be a leader among you must be your servant, and whoever wants to be first among you must become your slave." Jesus had just told His disciples in private of His impending death and resurrection. In Matthew each prediction of Jesus’ suffering is connected to instruction about discipleship in light of suffering. After the private meeting with His disciples, the mother of James and John came to Jesus and requested that her sons sit at Jesus' right and left hands in His Kingdom. Jesus replied that was a decision made by the Heavenly Father. When the other disciples heard of the request, they were indignant and probably argued among themselves. Jesus then called them together and defined the primary qualification for leadership in His Kingdom: a leader must be a servant. Jesus told them to look at the example He had set for them. He, the Messiah who called Himself the Son of Man, came to this earth to serve others and His example of servanthood would culminate in the sacrifice of His own life for the redemption of all humanity (vs. 28). According to Jesus, sacrificial service is the mark of true leadership. In God's Kingdom, leading people is equivalent to serving people--the path to leadership is paved with service and sacrifice.

Mustard Seed Faith - Matthew 17:19-20

"Afterward the disciples asked Jesus privately, Why couldn’t we cast out that demon? You don’t have enough faith, Jesus told them. I tell you the truth, if you had faith even as small as a mustard seed, you could say to this mountain, 'Move from here to there,' and it would move. Nothing would be impossible."

A man with a demon-possessed son came to Jesus and asked Him to cast out the demon. The man explained that he had brought his son to Jesus' disciples but they couldn't cast out the demon.

Jesus rebuked His disciples’ for their failure to trust Him and his saving and healing power (vs. 17).

Later the disciples asked Jesus why they couldn't cast out the demon.

The expression, "You don't have enough faith," basically meant they had a complete lack of faith.

Contrast Jesus' declaration of the "no faith" of His disciples with the "great faith" of the Roman officer with a sick servant (8:10) and the Gentile woman with a possessed daughter (15:28).

Jesus reinforced His claim that the disciples had no faith by describing their faith as being smaller than even the tiny mustard seed.

In fact, if they had even a tiny bit of faith they could accomplish great things--even move mountains.

Sometimes the obstacles in life that stand in our way can seem so big that we fall into unbelief and despair.

Fortunately, all you need is a tiny bit of faith in Jesus--mustard seed faith--to overcome the obstacles that prevent you from living for God and fulfilling His plans and purposes for your life.

The Coming Kingdom - Matthew 15:30-31

"A vast crowd brought to him people who were lame, blind, crippled, those who couldn’t speak, and many others. They laid them before Jesus, and he healed them all. The crowd was amazed! Those who hadn’t been able to speak were talking, the crippled were made well, the lame were walking, and the blind could see again!" Jesus returned to a predominantly Gentile area and performed many miracles. Though Jesus was sent primarily for Israel’s sake, His coming inaugurated the Kingdom of God and also the beginning of Gentile salvation. These healings were evidence that the Kingdom of God had broken into history through Jesus’ ministry and that it was available and accessible to everyone. The Kingdom of God is a Kingdom that has come and is coming. Jesus came to this world not only to die for our sins, but also to teach us how to live in this present and future Kingdom. The Kingdom of God is a spiritual nation that is active in this world now to prepare its citizens for a heavenly Kingdom that is to come. As a citizen of God's Kingdom, what you do today and everyday in this world, in this present life, in this Kingdom that has come, is preparation for eternal life in God's Coming Kingdom.

Why Things Happen Like They Do - Job 37:13

"He makes these things happen either to punish people or to show his unfailing love." During Elihu's discourse to Job, Elihu counseled Job to proclaim God's majesty and the greatness of God's providential action in His creation rather than questioning God's judgment and justice by proclaiming his own righteousness. God is sovereign and He wants His good plans and purposes to be accomplished. God is greater than evil and can even use the evil actions of Satan and human beings to accomplish His good purposes. So the same act by God can serve multiple causes--judgment and love. God's redemptive action in His creation and in our individual lives may provide for our correction; it may enable his plans and purposes; or maybe it's just because God is good to us that He causes things to happen the way they do! If you are a child of God, you can be assured that God is working His will for your good and your good for His will: "And we know that God causes everything to work together for the good of those who love God and are called according to his purpose for them" (Romans 8:28).

The Godlessness of Compromise - Genesis 25:33-34

"So Esau swore an oath, thereby selling all his rights as the firstborn to his brother, Jacob. Then Jacob gave Esau some bread and lentil stew. Esau ate the meal, then got up and left. He showed contempt for his rights as the firstborn." Esau and Jacob were twin sons of Isaac. As they grew up, Esau, the firstborn of the twins, was an outdoorsman and preferred by his father, Isaac. Jacob was a homebody and preferred by his mother, Rebekah. We see these personality traits on display in this story for Esau had been out in the woods, possibly hunting, while Jacob was at home cooking. When Esau came home exhausted and hungry, he asked Jacob for some stew. Jacob said he would trade Esau some stew for Esau's rights as the firstborn son. Esau swore an oath selling his birthright to his brother for the price of a meal. The birthright that Jacob usurped from Esau and Esau gave away is what is paramount to this story because it represented the covenant with God--God's promise to Abraham and Isaac and their heirs. Therefore, it was not insignificant on the part of Esau that he was willing to trade his future inheritance from his father (and God) for a meal to satisfy his immediate hunger. Undoubtedly, Jacob took advantage of the desperation of Esau to acquire his birthright. However, Esau held God's promise in contempt and bargained it away. That is why the Hebrews writer considered Esau's behavior godless and immoral: "Make sure that no one is immoral or godless like Esau, who traded his birthright as the firstborn son for a single meal." (Hebrews 12:16). While Jacob's bad behavior demonstrated a desire to obtain God's promise, Esau's bad behavior showed contempt for God's promise. Recipients of God's promises should be people of conviction and not compromise. Your birthright--the grace that God has given you--should never be compromised to gratify a personal need or pleasure. "Don’t you realize that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit, who lives in you and was given to you by God?" (I Corinthians 6:19). Such compromise shows contempt for the grace and promises of God and by biblical standards is godless and immoral behavior.

God Provides--the Basis of Faith - Genesis 22:14

"Abraham named the place Yahweh-Yireh (which means 'the Lord will provide')." God told Abraham to take his son Isaac to a mountain in the land of Moriah and sacrifice him as a burnt offering (vs. 3). (Incidentally, this mountain was later the location of the Temple in Jerusalem.) As Abraham and Isaac walked up the mountain, Isaac asked his father where was the sheep for the burnt offering. Abraham answered Isaac: "God will provide a sheep for the burnt offering, my son" (vs. 8). Just as Abraham was about to sacrifice Isaac, an angel of the Lord called out for Abraham not to kill the boy. When Abraham looked around, he saw a ram caught in a thicket by its horns and Abraham took the ram and sacrificed it. As was common with the patriarchs, the commemorative naming of the location recalled the nature of the encounter with God. Abraham named the place "the Lord will provide." God tested Abraham's faith and Abraham memorialized the test of his faith not as "I passed the test" but as "the Lord will provide." Abraham's faith in God was not based on how much or how hard he could believe but on the stedfast confidence of what God had promised him and was able to do:" Abraham reasoned that if Isaac died, God was able to bring him back to life again" (Hebrews 11:19). The Hebrews writer says that faith is the confidence that what we hope for will actually happen and gives us an assurance about things we cannot see (Hebrews 11:1). Faith allows us to look into the unseen world where God abides and apply what we see and hear to this physical world in which we live. Listen to what God is promising you and risk everything to apply it to your life!

The Kingdom Unemployment Rate - Matthew 9:35-38

"Jesus traveled through all the towns and villages of that area, teaching in the synagogues and announcing the Good News about the Kingdom. And he healed every kind of disease and illness. When he saw the crowds, he had compassion on them because they were confused and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd. He said to his disciples, The harvest is great, but the workers are few. So pray to the Lord who is in charge of the harvest; ask him to send more workers into his fields."

Jesus came to Planet Earth proclaiming the good news that the Kingdom of God has come to people.

By His own proclamation and through His healing ministry, Jesus made God's Kingdom available and accessible to everyone, especially to those in this world who had been marginalized.

What Jesus said and did was the Supreme Example of what His disciples should be saying and doing.

Unfortunately, there is a high unemployment rate in the Kingdom of God! 

Those that do the work of the Kingdom of God are still few in number compared to the greatness of the need.

But if all of Jesus' disciples are gainfully employed in proclaiming the good news of the Kingdom of God, then productivity will be increased.

Pray and ask God to use you today to proclaim the healing and redemptive power of His Kingdom to someone in need.

The One Who Sees and Hears You- Genesis 16:11,13

"And the angel also said, You are now pregnant and will give birth to a son. You are to name him Ishmael (which means God hears), for the Lord has heard your cry of distress...Thereafter, Hagar used another name to refer to the Lord, who had spoken to her. She said, You are the God who sees me." Sarah, Abraham's wife, gave Hagar, her servant, to Abraham as a concubine so that she would have Abraham's child as was the social custom for a barren wife. God had promised Abraham and Sarah they would have a son and and the number of their descendants would be as numerous as the stars (vs. 15:5). Because they were both elderly (Abraham was 99 and Sarah was ten years younger), they were skeptical that God's promise could be fulfilled through them so they tried to work it out themselves. When Hagar became pregnant, she began to treat Sarah with contempt. In return Sarah treated Hagar harshly and Hagar ran away. Hagar was beside a spring of water when an angel of the Lord appeared to her and told her to return and submit to Sarah and promised that her son, whom she would name Ishmael, would also have more descendants than she could count (vs. 15:9). Hagar named the well Beer-lahai-roi, which means "well of the Living One who sees me." The name of the well and the name, Ishmael, which means "God hears" were reminders to Abraham and Sarah that God sees affliction and hears the cries of those in need. Sarah and Abraham should have asked God for help (as did their son Isaac in Genesis 25:21) rather than taking the fulfillment of God's promise into their own hands. What seems like impossible difficulties can be resolved through God's intervention. God sees the difficulties and hears the cry of the afflicted and can miraculously resolve the problem. God is the One Who Sees and Hears you. He sees your difficulty and hears your cries for help and He will answer and intervene on your behalf.

Great Faith, Miracles Occur - Matthew 8:10

"When Jesus heard this, he was amazed. Turning to those who were following him, he said, "I tell you the truth, I haven't seen faith like this in all Israel." Jesus was amazed because a Roman army officer requested Him simply to speak words of healing for his servant from where He was at rather than coming to the sick servant. While the officer's faith was pretty amazing, so was his perception of Jesus. The Roman officer recognized that Jesus had the power and authority of God. Jesus recognized that the officer had the prerequisite faith to receive God's help. This faith had a certain quality/quantity because it is the kind of faith that sets in motion the power of God. It is great faith; it is supernatural power-activating faith! In addition to the great faith of the Roman officer with a sick servant there are several examples of people who exercised great, supernatural power-activating faith:

• a woman who had suffered with constant bleeding for twelve years ("Your faith has made you well." - Matthew 9:22)
• two blind men who followed Jesus and shouted out for Him to heal them ("Because of your faith, it will happen." - Matthew 9:29)
• a Gentile woman with a possessed daughter ("Your faith is great.” - Matthew 15:28)
• some men who let down a paralytic man on a mat through the roof of a building where Jesus was teaching ("Seeing their faith..." - Luke 5:20)

These all did something and/or said something that demonstrated a level of faith that caused Jesus to acknowledge their faith and take supernatural action in response to their faith. When you have faith that can be seen, it commands God's attention. And when there is great faith, miracles occur!

Be the Blessing - Genesis 12:1-2

"Leave your native country, your relatives, and your father's family and go to the land that I will show you. I will make you into a great nation. I will bless you and make you a great nation. I will bless you and make you famous and you will be a blessing to others." God called Abraham from Mesopotamia to a new land to become the patriarch of God's people. God gave Abraham two commands: 1) leave your native country; and 2) be a blessing to others. Abraham obeyed God in both cases. Abraham moved with his family from Ur to Haran and he eventually departed from Haran for the land of Canaan. Abraham traveled from one end of Canaan to the other, built altars to God, and proclaimed the Lord's name in a pagan land. The command of God to Abraham to be a blessing to others was also a promise: "You will be a blessing." In other words, God wanted Abraham to be the blessing. God wanted Abraham to be the means through which He could bless (or not bless) others. In the same way, God wants you to be the blessing by the way you live your life and by proclaiming the name of the Lord so that others will be blessed by God.

The Secret Practice of Discipleship - Matthew 6:1-18

When we practice the spiritual disciplines of giving, praying, and fasting we are cultivating a quality of life that helps us develop an authentic relationship with God. Jesus' disciples who are growing spiritually through the regular practice of the spiritual disciplines have to be especially careful not to show-off or flaunt their spirituality. Therefore, Jesus recommended these practices be undertaken in secret so that only God knows that you are giving, praying, or fasting. Jesus warned you to practice them privately so that your desire to have the approval of others does not impede your spiritual growth and development. When we serve God without the approbation of people, then it is a genuine fellowship with God. And fellowship with God without pretense allows the Holy Spirit to work God's perfecting process in us: “Through him you are also being made part of this dwelling where God lives by His Spirit” (Ephesians 2:22).

This Little Light of Mine

"You are the light of the world—like a city on a hilltop that cannot be hidden. No one lights a lamp and then puts it under a basket. Instead, a lamp is placed on a stand, where it gives light to everyone in the house. In the same way, let your good deeds shine out for all to see, so that everyone will praise your heavenly Father" (Matthew 5:14-16, NLT)

We have all heard this familiar saying of Jesus sung about in children's songs in Sunday School, preached about in evangelistic sermons, and used to admonish others, particularly our children.

But stop and ponder it for a few moments and see what it is saying to you.

If I walk around my house at night in the darkness, I bump into furniture and trip over shoes or toys that have not been put away as I stumble my way to the nearest light source, usually a lamp.

When I turn on the lamp, I can clearly see where I am going.

Living for the Future in the Present - Matthew 4:17

"From then on Jesus began to preach, Repent of your sins and turn to God, for the Kingdom of Heaven is near." When the ministry of Jesus formally inaugurated the Kingdom of God on Earth as described in this verse, what was formerly distant, far away, or out of reach to humanity came close, intimate, and available to every individual human being. Jesus declared that God's Kingdom is so close one can personally encounter it. Jesus taught that the Kingdom of God is a spiritual nation that is active in this world to prepare His disciples for a heavenly Kingdom coming in the future. Many Christians struggle with how to prepare for their eternal future in the present. When you become a citizen or subject of God's Kingdom, the old order of your life passes away and is displaced by God's Kingdom ruling over your life. The redemptive power of God’s rule and reign enables a new way of living where your hope for an eternal future impacts the way your live in the present reality.

A Helper Who is Just Right

"This explains why a man leaves his father and mother and is joined to his wife, and the two are united into one."  (Genesis 2:24, NLT)

In the Genesis account of the creation of woman God recognized that man needed companionship and determined to "make a helper who is just right for him" (vs. 18).

First, God formed all the wild animals and birds and brought them to the man (Adam) and he gave names to all of the species of animals.

Still, there was no helper who was just right for him. So God caused the man to fall into a deep sleep and formed a woman from a part of his side.

When God brought the woman to Adam, he compared her with all the other species of animals on earth that he had previously assessed and recognized that she was of the same essence: "This one is bone from my bone and flesh from my flesh" (vs. 23).

So, she was "just right" for him and him for her!

It is this unity between man and woman that forms the basis for the marriage union. The marriage union between a man and woman is not a human conception but is rooted and grounded in the created order; thus, it is God-ordained.

Marriage between a man and woman sustains the role of humanity in the created order and is the basic building block of human society. But, the institution of marriage is highly susceptible to attacks from Satan in his attempts to destroy or disrupt the created order.

So, recognize that your spouse is "just right" for you and continually pray for the preservation of your marriage.