Spiritual Food for Women

Part 3- Waiting on the Lord

Lamentations 3:21-26

21  This I recall to my mind,
Therefore I have hope.

22  Through the Lord’s mercies we are not consumed,
Because His compassions fail not.

23  They are new every morning;
Great is Your faithfulness.

24  “The Lord is my portion,” says my soul,
“Therefore I hope in Him!”

25  The Lord is good to those who wait for Him,
To the soul who seeks Him.

26  It is good that one should hope and wait quietly
For the salvation of the Lord.

In part one, I focused on verse 21 and the hope that Jeremiah found in God when he was in terrible grief. Last week in part two, I looked at verses 22 and 23 at God’s mercy, compassion and faithfulness. The hope that I find in Jesus Christ is new every morning as I continue in my daily Christian walk. God’s mercy, compassion and faithfulness are new every morning as I am given another day to serve Him and give my life to Him. Now I would like to look at verses 24 through 26 and begin with “The Lord is my portion, says my soul, Therefore I hope in Him!” Look at the expression that Jeremiah uses at the end of this verse. An exclamation mark shows Jeremiah’s excitement and true hope in his God and Creator!!

So what does Jeremiah mean when he says that the lord is his portion? Jeremiah is counting on God to be his “portion”. In the old testament everyone got a portion of the inheritance except for the tribe of Levi. They were the tribe of the priesthood and were not a part of the inheritance divided between the tribes, however their needs were taken care of by all the other tribes put together. Jeremiah was of the priesthood so he did not have an earthly inheritance so to speak. And since God’s people were either killed or taken into captivity by the Babylonians at this time, there was no one left to take care of the needs of anyone much less the priests. Jeremiah is again reaffirming his hope in God. His portion is God and he remembers this at his low point. His remembrance of this fact begins to bring him out of his depression. Deuteronomy 10:9 reminds us that “Levi has no portion nor inheritance with his brethren; the Lord is his inheritance, just as the Lord your God promised him.” We can apply this concept to us today. We have a spiritual portion if we are in Christ. We are joint heirs with Christ which is an amazing thought to me!! It’s hard for me to wrap my head around that!! We are children of God. Jesus was God’s son so that makes us joint heirs to all God’s blessings with Christ. Listen to Romans 8:16-17, “The Spirit Himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God. and if children, then heirs—heirs of God and joint heirs with Christ, if indeed we suffer with Him, that we may also be glorified together.” And I have to mention Galatians 3:26-29 which explains this beautifully, “For you are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus. For as many of you as were baptized into Christ have put on Christ. There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is neither male nor female; for you are all one in Christ Jesus. And if you are Christ’s, then you are Abraham’s seed, and heirs according to the promise.” If we are in Christ, we are heirs with God’s Son, Jesus Christ!! We are in Christ if we have been baptized into Him for the remission of our sins. So just like Jeremiah, God is my portion!! And He is my hope through Jesus Christ because I am in Him. What a blessing! How absolutely perfect!

In verse 25, Jeremiah continues to reassure himself that God is good. He tells himself that if He seeks God and waits patiently for His will, that everything will work out for the good. It’s like he is saying, “God is with me. I got this. I will get through this.” It’s hard to wait on something that we want so badly though, isn’t it? We want all the good things to happen just when we want them to happen. However, nothing in this world is on our timetable. It’s God’s timetable that everything is based on and has been since the beginning of time itself. We always need to remember that God’s timetable is perfect. He allows His will to unfold according to his eternal plan. Our minds can’t comprehend his timetable. Jesus himself said in Acts 1:7 before His ascension into heaven, “It is not for you to know times or seasons which the Father has put in His own authority.” This was after Jesus had been asked by His disciples if He would at that time restore the kingdom to Israel. (Acts 1:6) So even at that time, they were not told everything. They were told only what God deemed important for them to know. It is this way with us. We don’t know what the future holds, but we know God holds the future. And as we wait on the Lord we just have to remember Romans 8:28. “And we know that all things work together for good to those who love God, to those who are the called according to His purpose.” This verse is one that helps me let go of worry and anxiety about the future. It also helps me to know that everything is in God’s control and if I just love and obey God, then I can get through any trial that I have to face. This is what Jeremiah is saying also. He knows that God is good to those who seek Him and wait on Him. In order to wait on the Lord, we have to have faith. Hebrews 11:6 says this so beautifully, “But without faith it is impossible to please Him, for he who comes to God must believe that He is, and that He is a rewarder of those who diligently seek Him.” To wait on Him means that we have faith that He will do everything He promises, and that He will make everything work out for the good no matter what happens. But we can’t ever forget that we have to seek Him. How do we do that? Romans 12:2 tells us how to do that. We “renew our minds” with God’s word daily. We are not seeking Him if we are not in His word. I remind myself of this all the time. We find God in His Holy Word. Jeremiah 29:13 says it all, “You will seek Me and find Me, when you search for me with all your heart.” Whoa!! Now I ask myself, am I seeking Him with ALL my heart? Jesus says in Matthew 7:7-8, “Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and it will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives, and he who seeks finds, and to him who knocks it will be opened.” But we have to seek Him with all our heart and soul! (Deuteronomy 4:29) I can say I am seeking God, but am I truly seeking Him? And if I am seeking God through His word, then I can’t forget the verse in Matthew 6:33 that tells me to seek first the kingdom of God which means seek first His church, Jesus’ church, the one He died for. Seeking God cannot be taken lightly friends. I am soooo a work in progress in all of this! On a side note, let’s think about this question. When are we closest to God? I believe that we can all agree that we are closest to God when we are going through trials. It is natural for us as humans to cling to God in our deepest despair and darkest times. Look at Jeremiah. He was clinging to God for dear life during this time in his life. Look at David in Psalm 51. He was on his knees praying for forgiveness, begging God to forgive him and to spare the life of his child that he had with Bathsheba. I have done the same thing in my own life. When I have lost loved ones or when I have gone through times of depression when dealing with something difficult, I have looked to God’s word to comfort me. I think of the times I have gotten myself caught up in the world and in sin and had to ask for forgiveness privately and publicly. I was holding on to my Father in heaven for dear life during those times. But what about in the good times? Do we give God as much attention during our happy times when everything is smooth sailing in our lives? I really am working on this because I feel like I have fallen short in this terribly. Let’s ask ourselves why we are having happy times? Why are things going so smoothly in our lives? It’s because of God. God is allowing us to have these good times and we need to make sure we cling to Him in those moments as well. We need to have a heart filled with gratitude every day that we live, in good times and in bad. We cling to Him for comfort in hard times, but we should also cling to Him during the good times because we know they come from Him. Ecclesiastes 7:14 (NKJV) says, “In the day of prosperity be joyful, but in the day of adversity consider: Surely God has appointed the one as well as the other, so that man can find out nothing that will come after him.” I really like the way the New Living Translation says it, “Enjoy prosperity while you can, but when hard times strike, realize that both come from God. Remember that nothing is certain in this life.” This is basically saying that we should never take anything that God has done for us for granted. We need to cling to God in one way or another every day that we live. And remember that we do not know our future here on this earth. We can’t know it. This is why we cling to Him in both prosperity and adversity. This is what He wants from us.

 However, we CAN KNOW our eternal future if we have obeyed Him and if we are being faithful in our daily Christian walk. Our eternal future is really all that matters. Our eternal soul is precious to God and He wants us with Him. Christian friends, let’s cling to Him every day that we live. Just think about all He has done for us. And just think about how well He knows each one of us. Our very hairs are numbered! (Matthew 10:30) That just boggles my mind, friends! He knew us before we were conceived, when we were “yet unformed”! (Psalm 139:16) Go read all of Psalm 139 and you will see how intimately God knows us. So if He knows us so intimately and personally, isn’t it only natural that He would want a close relationship with each one of us? That He would want us to cling to Him in times of trouble and cling to Him in gratitude for all the good things in our lives? This is just something I thought of while studying these verses, food for thought!!

Let’s move on to verse 26 which talks about waiting quietly. Jeremiah says that it is good that we should hope and wait quietly for the salvation of the Lord. The hope that Jeremiah has in God and His promises is the reason why Jeremiah is able to wait on the Lord. The verse says to wait quietly. This means that I should wait without complaining. This is a gut punch because I am not good at waiting without complaining. I am working on this as well. What good does it do for me to appear to be waiting on the Lord if I am complaining about every little thing that doesn’t go my way while I am waiting? I certainly don’t want to be like the Israelites and be a complainer and a whiner, but let’s face it, sometimes I am! So how can I fix this problem of complaining? How can I learn to wait quietly on the Lord? Wow, I love the perfection of God’s word and how everything fits together so beautifully and perfectly. I know what to do to fix it. I have written about it. I need to be in God’s word. I need to pray to God for strength in times when I feel like complaining. I need to become the “living sacrifice” that Romans 12:1-2 calls me to be and “transform” myself by the “renewing of my mind” so that I can “prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God.” Complaining goes against everything we read in the Bible. We are told to be content and how can we be content if we are complaining and having a negative attitude? Complaining is conforming to this world which we are told not to do in Romans 12:2. Now don’t get me wrong. When I say complain, I am not talking about expressing our feelings in a constructive and helpful way. We can talk about our feelings as long we do it and still remain Christ-like. Look how Christ expressed His feelings of anguish in the Garden of Gethsemane before He was taken to be crucified. He knew what was going to happen to Him. He prayed to God, His father, for Him to let this cup pass from Him if it was possible, but then we know what He said next, “nevertheless, not as I will, but as You will”. (Matthew 26:39) Jesus wasn’t complaining! He was venting His feelings to His father! There is a difference between complaining and simply venting about something that may be stressful, scary, or just plain annoying. We have to vent sometimes to let our feelings out. Our mental state has to have this type of venting to remain healthy. However, there is a fine line and we have to guard against complaining in an unproductive way. Unproductive complaining includes placing blame for things that happen on someone else whether it be on other people or on God. It is when we don’t take responsibility for our own actions. It is when we are never content with anything we have or anything that is done for us. Everything is always someone else’s fault. Does this sound like the children of Israel? And yes, I have to ask myself, do I do this sometimes? Does my venting go too far and turn into complaining, placing blame, or being ungrateful for what I have? 

On the flip-side, sometimes our complaints are warranted and productive. This is minor but here is an example. I go to a restaurant and I ask for my steak to be well-done and it comes out rare. I politely give a complaint to the waitress and she takes it back and corrects the order. This is a warranted and productive complaint. My feelings are acknowledged and the problem is resolved. In everyday life sometimes there are honest mistakes that need to be corrected. And then sometimes we need to voice our feelings when we are truly being treated unfairly, but we must do this in the right way, with the right attitude, in a Christian way, with honesty, integrity and class. We have the right to defend our Lord and Savior, ourselves, our loved ones, and our beliefs. However, we don’t have the right to complain about everything we don’t get our way about and act in a way that is not Christ-like. If we are Christians, we should definitely not be complainers. Complaining is worldly. Paul tells the Christians at Philippi in Philippians 2:14-15, “Do all things without complaining and disputing, that you may become blameless and harmless, children of God without fault in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation, among whom you shine as lights in the world….” If we want to “shine as lights” in this dark world, we have to do things without complaining. 

So what was Jeremiah waiting quietly for? Christian friends, what are we waiting quietly for? I know that when I pray for things, I have to wait on God’s timetable for the answers. I have to wait without complaining and wait in contentment. But what am I ultimately waiting for? I am waiting on the same thing Jeremiah was waiting for, Jesus Christ. Jeremiah knew someone was coming to bring salvation to the world. Anytime salvation is discussed in the old testament, this is a messianic prophecy. Jeremiah was waiting for God to bring salvation into the world through Jesus Christ. He knew that God would preserve His people. He knew that God would keep that promise no matter what terrible things were happening at that time. Is that not what we all are waiting for? The only difference between us and Jeremiah is that we are waiting for Jesus Christ to come back a second time and take us home to heaven with God our Father. If we are in Christ and are living faithful, then we have nothing to fear! 

To sum up this series of lessons, we should always remember that God is our spiritual portion through Jesus Christ. We have a portion of a spiritual inheritance with Christ. Let’s never forget that our hope is a living hope through Jesus Christ. Let’s always remember that God’s mercy, compassion, and faithfulness are infinite and they are new every morning. And finally, let’s use Jeremiah’s example and remember to wait quietly on the salvation of the Lord. Christian friends, Isaiah 40:31 is such a beautiful verse of hope as we wait on the Lord, “But those who wait on the Lord shall renew their strength; They shall mount up with wings like eagles, they shall run and not be weary, they shall walk and not faint.” This paints such a beautiful picture of us, God’s children, as we wait on God’s timetable. 

I’m asking myself these questions as I end, do I feel the way the apostle Paul felt? That to live is Christ and to die is gain? (Philippians 1:21) Do I truly know that nothing on this earth can ever compare to heaven? And while I am here, is my purpose to do my best to help others know how to get to heaven?

Friends, I hope this helps in your Christian walk this week. Everything that I write is always written straight to myself first because I am such a work in progress and have so much I need to work in my Christian walk. I am so thankful for those of you who take the time to read my articles. It is so encouraging to me. Hope everyone has a wonderful Lord’s Day and a blessed week ahead!

Friends, here is God’s plan of salvation for anyone who needs to hear it:

• We have to hear His word. (Romans 10:17) 
• Upon hearing the message of Jesus, we believe it. (Mark 16:16) 
• Then, we confess Jesus’ name before men. (Matthew 10:32) 
• Next, we repent of our sins. (Acts 2:38, Acts 3:19) 
• Finally, we are baptized into Christ for the remission of our sins. (Acts 2:38, Matthew 28:18-20, Mark 16:16, Romans 6:3-4, Acts 22:16, 1 Corinthians 12:13, Galatians 3:26-27) 
• Then, we remain faithful in our commitment to Christ until death. (Revelation 2:10, 2 Peter 2:20-22)

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Part 2- God’s mercies, compassion, and faithfulness

Lamentations 3:21-26

21  This I recall to my mind,
Therefore I have hope.

22  Through the Lord’s mercies we are not consumed,
Because His compassions fail not.

23  They are new every morning;
Great is Your faithfulness.

24  “The Lord is my portion,” says my soul,
“Therefore I hope in Him!”

25  The Lord is good to those who wait for Him,
To the soul who seeks Him.

26  It is good that one should hope and wait quietly
For the salvation of the Lord.

In my last post, we looked at the hope Jeremiah found in God in such a dark time in His life. In verse 21, we see him finally seeing some hope, some light, in the darkness of this time in biblical history. So……..why do you think that Jeremiah was able to find hope? What did he know about God that gave him hope? How does God give us hope? 

Verse 22 tells us why Jeremiah could find hope. “Through the Lord’s mercies we are not consumed, because His compassions fail not.” This is why Jeremiah had hope. He had seen God show mercy and forgive His people over and over. God took them back every time they repented. Look at all the times the people turned away from God to worship idols and our great God just kept forgiving them. Now let me be clear, this wasn’t without consequences. The people still had to face the consequences of their sin. Sin brought consequences on the people. Sin brings consequences on us today. But……God will forgive us of our sin. Jeremiah knew about the covenant God had with the descendants of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. (Jeremiah 33:26) He knew about God’s covenant with Israel when they were in Egyptian bondage. (Jeremiah 34:13) He knew the history of God’s people and how often God had shown mercy on them. God was dedicated to preserving His people so that Jesus Christ could be born from this lineage. God has been dedicated to preserving US through His Son!! Jeremiah 33:14-16 are prophetic verses promising the coming Messiah, “Behold, the days are coming,’ says the Lord, ‘that I will perform that good thing which I have promised to the house of Israel and to the house of Judah: In those days and at that time I will cause to grow up to David, a branch of righteousness; He shall execute judgment and righteousness in the earth. In those days Judah will be saved, and Jerusalem will dwell safely. And this is the name by which she will be called: The Lord Our Righteousness.’” God had said that Jerusalem would dwell safely. So even though things were terrible at the time of Jeremiah’s distress, he knew that God would keep that promise. He also knew from those same verses that someone was coming to “execute judgment and righteousness in the earth.” He didn’t know who was coming, but he knew God was sending someone to set things in order on earth. In Isaiah 55:7 we read, “Let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts. Let him return to the Lord, and he will have mercy on him, and to our God, for He will abundantly pardon.” This verse plainly says that God will have mercy on the wicked and pardon them if they will turn to Him and obey Him. All they had to do in Jeremiah’s day was turn to Him with a sincere heart. As Christians, that is all we have to do today. We have to turn to Him AND obey him. In times of distress for us, we can know that God is still in control and will keep his promises to us. Like the verse above says, His mercies will not allow us to be consumed. As Christians, no matter what happens in our lives on this earth and no matter how many times we fall short, as long as we turn to God with a sincere heart and ask for forgiveness, everything will work out according to His will someday. When we ask Him for forgiveness, we are admitting that we are sinners and that we need our savior, Jesus Christ.

Isn’t it wonderful that we can go to God anytime? What a blessing!! Hebrews 4:16 assures us that we can go to God anytime we need him. ANYTIME! Listen to these words, “Let us therefore come boldly to the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy and find grace to help in time of need.” We get to not only come, but come boldly, with confidence that we will be heard and listened intently to!! God wants to listen to us. We are not insignificant to God! Our concerns, problems, needs, heartaches, etc. are never insignificant to God! He cares about all of it! Just like He cared for Jeremiah when He was in such grief, He cares for us in ours. We can be in a horrible place in our own personal lives like David was at one time. David had hit rock bottom when he wrote Psalm 51. He had committed adultery and murder. David was away from God, but He came back on his knees begging God to forgive him. Psalms 51 has been a go-to chapter for me to pray through at times when I have not been right with God. This chapter helps us know, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that we can go to God with anything. In Psalms 51:1-2 David writes, “Have mercy upon me, O God, according to Your lovingkindness; According to the multitude of Your tender mercies, blot out my transgressions. Wash me thoroughly from my iniquity, and cleanse me from my sin.” Skip down to Psalm 51:10-11 and it reads, “Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right spirit within me. Do not cast me away from Your presence, and do not take Your Holy Spirit from me.” God knew David’s weaknesses and He knows ours today. If God forgave David, then He will forgive us when we fall short. Jeremiah and David were both lamenting. They were both in anguish. Their reasons were very different. Jeremiah was in anguish over failing to get the people to repent. David was in anguish over his own sin. The point is, it doesn’t matter what we come to God with, He will be there for us. We can lay it at His feet. AND……… if we look to His word, we will find the solution to whatever our problem is or we will find comfort in whatever is grieving us. 

The only reason, and I mean the ONLY reason, our world is still standing today is because of the mercy and compassion of God. Because of His mercy in preserving His people and sending His son, we are here today, we are called Christians today and we are His church today. We have today to live right before God, ONLY because of God’s mercy. If we haven’t obeyed the gospel yet or if we are not living up to our commitment to Christ by living faithful, we have today, ONLY because of God’s mercy. We are not promised tomorrow. I have learned from my daddy to pray for time in my personal prayers. He has always prayed for time for more people to be saved, for more people to see the truth. I have started doing this as well. I pray for time for as many people as possible to see what they need to do to gain eternity with God and His Son. The thought of anyone, especially those I love so much, being lost just hurts me to my core.

Are compassion and mercy the same thing? The verse also says that “His compassions fail not”. Mercy and compassion are different. When God shows mercy on us, it means He forgives us when we fall short. He tells us to forgive others if we want Him to forgive us. God has compassion on us when we are struggling in our lives with sickness, problems at work, problems with our children or in our marriage. He is concerned about us. This is compassion. We can know His compassion when we open His word and read about it and we can feel that compassion towards us. We know what it feels like to show compassion to others. God feels that same compassion for us. Think about all the times that God showed compassion on the children of Israel when they were wandering in the wilderness and they were some pretty ungrateful people. He sent manna and quail from heaven for them to eat. (Exodus 16) He brought water from a rock twice when they were thirsty. (Exodus 17:1-7, Numbers 20:2-13) This is only a couple of examples of the compassion He showed His people. 

Jesus was God in the flesh and we saw Him showing unlimited compassion for people when He was on earth. The Bible says that Jesus had compassion on them and healed their sick. (Matthew 14:14) Jesus also was moved with compassion on people at one time because they were weary and scattered, like sheep having no shepherd. (Matthew 9:36) Jesus is our ultimate shepherd. And let’s not forget when Jesus had compassion on the multitude because they had been with Him for three days and had no food. This is when Jesus performed the miracle of the loaves and fish. (Matthew 15:32) God and his Son have unlimited compassion and mercy on us when we obey them, when we lean on them, and when we make them the center of our lives. 

On this earth, God’s compassion falls on the just and the unjust according to Matthew 5:45. He takes care of all of us regardless of what we believe or how we act which says a lot about God’s character. He loves every soul He ever created, born and unborn, and wants all to be saved.  However, on judgment day, His mercy/forgiveness will only be on ones who are in Christ and have remained faithful until death. (Romans 6:3-4, Revelation 2:10) We have to be in Christ for Him to be our mediator for us with God the Father at the judgment day. (1 Timothy 2:5) Paul does a beautiful job of explaining baptism in Romans chapter 6. To be in Christ, we have to have been baptized into Him through water baptism for the remission of our sins. (Acts 2:38) Acts chapter 2 is where the gospel was preached for the first time and the church was established for the first time. People were only added by God to the church after they gladly received the words that the apostles preached. (Acts 2:47) What were those words? Look back at Acts 2:38 to see how Peter answered the people whose hearts were pricked after they heard about what happened to Jesus. They asked in verse 37 “what shall we do?”. They were pricked in their hearts. But more had to be done. If those people at that time were commanded to be baptized to have sins forgiven, then why wouldn’t this commandment be the same for us today? This is not me saying this to offend anyone who believes differently about baptism. I’m simply saying what the Bible says verbatim, because I love all people’s souls too much to say anything else. According to God’s word, we have to come into contact with the blood of Christ to have remission of sins. Acts 22:16 says that plainly as Ananias tells Paul what to do to wash away his ugly past. With an open heart I ask you to listen to the scriptures, not me. I talk about baptism more in depth in another article I wrote a couple of weeks ago. I ask you to be like the Bereans in Acts 17:11. Paul bragged about them because they searched the scriptures of old to see if the things Paul and Silas were preaching to them about Christ were true or not. Never take my word for it in these articles I write. Please go look in the Bible at the verses I provide and make sure I’m right in what I’m saying. I would never want to say anything other than the truth and I am only human. Let’s all be careful to listen to God’s word and make sure that what someone is telling us lines up with God’s word. Why take chances? Why not just do what the Bible tells us to do? This is just food for thought. 

And now comes the most beautiful thought that Jeremiah had as he looked up into heaven and realized that God was still there…….in control. He says that God’s mercy and compassion are “new every morning”. What a beautiful thought!! Every morning when we open our eyes, God’s mercy has given us another day of life, another chance to serve Him, another chance to help someone else on their journey. Every morning God’s compassion allows us to have everything we need to survive the day. We all have struggles in our lives, but we are taken care of by God. Our physical needs are met for the most part. We have to work to make money to buy what we need. But who gave us the health, ability, and talents to work and do the specific jobs we do? And then the work that we do, in turn, helps other people in their lives to have the things they need to survive. I’m a teacher and I hope that I have used my talent to help children in their school journey so that they can grow into confident, productive, hard-working adults who contribute to society. But God is the reason that I have the ability to teach. He gave me the calling to do the job I do. We are all able to survive because God gave us all unique abilities to help each other make it through this life. It is amazing when you think about it. God’s mercy and compassion are new every morning. I love it. 

So Jeremiah then exalts God by saying, “Great is Your faithfulness”. Jeremiah is simply recognizing God for being so faithful to His people throughout all their ups and downs. What does it mean to be faithful? Let’s use marriage as an example. In a marriage, we vow to be faithful to our spouse for the rest of our lives. Husband and wife are loyal to each other and trust each other completely. You are one with each other when you are joined together in holy matrimony. Song of Solomon 2:16 says this beautifully, “My beloved is mine, and I am his.” You belong to each other.  Each person puts the other person’s needs ahead of his/her own needs and is dedicated to their spouse for a lifetime. The wife is to submit to the husband and the husband is to love his wife as Christ loved the church and gave himself for her. (Ephesians 5: 22-25) I can guarantee that no woman would ever have trouble submitting to her husband if the husband loved her like Christ loved the church. Let that sink in. Christ gave up His life for the church. This is how a man should take care of His wife. He should be willing to give up His life for her. Life I said before, submission would never be a problem if all husbands would put their wives ahead of themselves. And we wives should show respect and love to our husbands and put them ahead of ourselves. Our number one goal in our marriages should be to help each other get to heaven and to serve God together. We might not need divorce lawyers anymore if we would follow these simple verses in God’s word and keep our marriages Christ-centered. So how is God faithful to us today? Well for one thing, He gave us Jesus. He made a promise that Jesus would be born of a virgin, grow into a man, go about preaching and performing miracles, be rejected by mankind, be beaten and humiliated, and finally crucified and killed on a tree. And all of this happened just like God foretold through the prophets in the old testament. Isaiah 53 tells all about Jesus Christ and what he would go through for us. But that is not all!! God also promised that Jesus would not stay in the grave, but that He would rise from the dead to conquer death and Satan. And He did!! David prophesied about it in Psalm 16:8-11. And Jesus himself told of His own death and resurrection in Mark 9:31. I encourage you to go read those verses. God has kept every promise that He ever made to us, except one. He has promised that His Son would come back to earth someday and take home the faithful that are in Christ Jesus.  1 Thessalonians 4:16-17 explains it so beautifully, “For the Lord Himself will descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of an archangel, and with the trumpet of God. And the dead in Christ will rise first.  Then we who are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. And thus we shall always be with the Lord.” This is the promise that we who are in Christ are waiting for, and we fully believe in the faithfulness of our great God just like Jeremiah did when he spoke of it in Lamentations many years before. The faithfulness of God is everlasting. I’ll end with Psalm 36:5, “Your mercy, O Lord, is in the heavens; Your faithfulness reaches to the clouds.” 

Always remember the mercy, compassion, and faithfulness of God. We are so lucky to have an almighty Creator who cares so deeply for us and desires to have us with Him for eternity. All we have to do is follow His plan found in His word. His plan is simple. It starts with hearing. We have to hear His word. (Romans 10:17) Upon hearing the message of Jesus, we believe it. (Mark 16:16) Then, we confess Jesus’ name before men. (Matthew 10:32) Next, we repent of our sins. (Acts 2:38, Acts 3:19) Finally, we are baptized into Christ for the remission of our sins. (Acts 2:38, Matthew 28:18-20, Mark 16:16, Romans 6:3-4, Acts 22:16, 1 Corinthians 12:13, Galatians 3:26-27) After baptism, God adds us to His church. (Acts 2:47) Lastly, we remain faithful in our commitment to Christ and His church until death. (Revelation 2:10, 2 Peter 2:20-22)

I am really enjoying the blessings I am finding in God’s word through this blog! The treasures in God’s word are new every morning for me. I hope this helps everyone who reads it want to search the scriptures daily. I hope everyone has a blessed Mother’s Day tomorrow and a wonderful week ahead!! I will post part 3 on these verses next week. 

Copyright 2023, all rights reserved.

Part 1- Hope

Lamentations 3:21-26

21  This I recall to my mind,
Therefore I have hope.

22  Through the Lord’s mercies we are not consumed,
Because His compassions fail not.

23  They are new every morning;
Great is Your faithfulness.

24  “The Lord is my portion,” says my soul,
“Therefore I hope in Him!”

25  The Lord is good to those who wait for Him,
To the soul who seeks Him.

26  It is good that one should hope and wait quietly
For the salvation of the Lord.

Lamentations is a book of grief and anguish. It is about the anguish of a man who had done all He could to warn God’s people against coming judgment, but to no avail. They had not listened to him. By not listening to him, they in turn were not listening to God. Jeremiah was called by God to warn the people. He was given a job to do and I’m sure he felt like he had failed. These verses in the middle of the book of Lamentations are so beautiful and comforting, especially considering what the author, Jeremiah, was going through during this time in history. Most of the book of Lamentations is very sad and you can tell that Jeremiah is as depressed as he can be throughout it. He had tried so hard to warn God’s people of His coming judgment if they didn’t repent and turn back to Him…….and they didn’t. This led to God bringing judgment on the city of Jerusalem by allowing its destruction. Many were killed and the ones who lived were carried away into Babylonian captivity. Jeremiah laments throughout the whole book. The word lamentation means the passionate expression of grief or sorrow. It is expressing grief, not holding it inside in the least. However, we see some light in the darkness in these verses. We see a glimpse of the future for God’s people in these verses and we know that God did preserve His people through all the turmoil they brought on themselves. Through all the ups and downs of God’s chosen people, the Israelites, God kept His promises to them and showed mercy on them when they repented. God had a plan for His Son to be born from this line of people at the time of His perfect will. He did this so that all people everywhere could have the opportunity to be saved. This time in biblical history is dark, but Jeremiah had not lost his faith that God would make a way for His people. Let’s look at Jeremiah’s words in the above verses and see how we can relate these to our lives today. 

Imagine a dark room with no light at all, so dark that we can’t see our hand in front of our face. Then we light a candle with this tiny flame. It’s tiny, but it allows us to see. This is what our life may feel like sometimes when we go through hard times. Everyone’s hard times are different. Each one of us knows what this feels like in one way or another. At the time, it seems like nothing will ever get better. Time goes by so slowly in those moments. Then…….we decide to get on our knees in prayer, and open God’s word and suddenly we have some hope……some light, like a candle in a dark room. Once Jeremiah had gotten through some grief and possibly even some anger over all that had taken place, we see him finding that little bit of hope, that light in all that darkness. These verses give me so much hope. Hope in his Creator kept him from giving up. That same hope keeps us from giving up. Remember my last post, AT HIS FEET? Because of our hope in Christ, we can lay everything at His feet.

In verse 21, after Jeremiah had been in darkness and had wept and lamented for a time, he allowed God to shed some light on the situation and give him some hope. It is like he couldn’t see any hope for a time. He was going through a grieving process so to speak. Jeremiah was human just like us. We do the same thing. Sometimes something is so traumatic/upsetting/annoying, whatever the emotion is, that it brings on a reaction so suddenly that we can’t even get our thoughts together to turn to God in that moment. But when we finally get to where we can process, we turn to God and He begins the healing process. Now I have no idea what Jeremiah’s physical appearance was, but I can picture him raising his eyes to heaven in the midst of all this grief and thinking, but………..”This I recall to my mind, therefore I have hope.” He finds hope in God. This is what we as Christians have to always remember. In all our turmoil, whatever it is, God is with us with the candle burning, with our hope for the future when we are ready to see it. Jeremiah 29:11 reminds us what God’s thoughts were toward his people and what they are toward us today, “For I know the thoughts that I think toward you, says the Lord, thoughts of peace and not of evil, to give you a future and a hope.” Does this sound like God wants bad things to happen to us? Of course he doesn’t. Sometimes others’ bad choices can cause trials for us. But that does not mean that we lose hope in God and His promises. His plan for us never changes. We may do things that change the course of our own lives, but His ultimate plan for us will never change.

The Psalms have many wonderful verses about hope. Psalm 33:22 says, “Let your mercy, O Lord, be upon us, just as we hope in you.” This verse ties God’s mercy to our hope. Because of God’s mercy, we have hope, just like Jeremiah did in the verses above. Psalm 71:14 ties hope with our praise to God. Because of the hope we have, we praise and exalt God, “But I will hope continually, and will praise You yet more and more.” In Romans 12:12 the apostle Paul instructs Christians to rejoice in hope, be patient in tribulation, and be constant in prayer. Do you think God wanted to let Israel be taken into captivity by Babylon? Of course not. But God had to get their attention! In order for His plan to save mankind to unfold at the proper time, He had to allow these things to happen. He didn’t want to!! Remember Deuteronomy 5:29? This is one of my favorite verses that shows the personality of God toward His creation, “Oh, that they had such a heart in them that they would fear Me and always keep all My commandments, that it might be well with them and with their children forever!” This is it! This is why He allowed them to be taken into captivity. It was a wake up call!! Don’t we realize that all of His people were not doing evil. Think about the children (young men) that were carried away that stayed faithful to God while in captivity, Daniel, Shadrach, Meshach and Abednigo. They did not deserve this, but God used them while in captivity as examples for us today in keeping the faith and standing up for the truth of the gospel. Remember the lions’ den and the fiery furnace? These are stories from our childhood Sunday school classes, but they are just as important for us to remember as adults. God also worked through Daniel and gave prophecy about the coming kingdom (the church) in Daniel 2:44, “And in the days of these kings (kings of the Roman Empire) shall the God of heaven set up a kingdom, which shall never be destroyed: and the kingdom shall not be left to other people, but it shall break in pieces and consume all these kingdoms, and it shall stand forever.” God’s kingdom is here today. In the midst of all the religious confusion in the world, the Lord’s church is still standing. I love that I can go into any assembly of the Lord’s church and there is no division. The truth is being taught and glory is being given to God. We are all of one accord everywhere the world over. (Philippians 2:2) This is why God kept on punishing and forgiving His people over and over in the old testament. He had to bring about the establishment of His kingdom here on earth, the church, through His Son at the perfect time. This was his plan from the beginning.

God’s timing is perfect. It was perfect during the time of Jeremiah and it is today. Jeremiah had hope in God’s promises in the darkest of times and we can too. In the old covenant, God exercised His judgment immediately and there was no mediator between man and God. In the new covenant, God will exercise judgment at Christ’s second coming. There will be a separation between the sheep and goats. (Matthew 25:31-33) The sheep will be His followers who worship Him in both spirit and truth. God is looking for His people who do this. John 4:23-24 says, “But the hour is coming, and now is, when the true worshippers will worship the Father in spirit and truth; for the Father is seeking such to worship Him.” And we now have Christ as our mediator between us and God if we are in Him. (1 Timothy 2:5, Hebrews 9:15)  His sacrifice on the cross made this possible. This is why we and our future generations and generations past have hope. Without Him as our intercessor, we would have no hope. This is to my fellow Christians, never forget that our hope is new every morning in Jesus, no matter what we have to face each day. As I have said in my earlier posts, be in God’s word daily and pray daily and our Father will keep our hope alive if we abide in Him.

Hope this helps us in our Christian walk friends. I write because it helps me study. It is how I study best. Blessings to everyone in the coming week!!

Copyright 2023, all rights reserved.

At His Feet

Do you ever feel overwhelmed to the point where you don’t know where to start? Do you ever feel down on yourself because you feel like you have let things in your life pile up and you feel like you are drowning? Or maybe you just feel like you are not doing enough spiritually, but you don’t know what to do to change it? You feel spread so thin that one more thing might break you. You are in a rut and you want to get out of it so bad!! This has been me more times than I can count. I have been a roller coaster in my life. Some days I feel like I can accomplish anything and other days I do good to get my shoes tied. I just roll through my day doing everything I have to do and at the end of the day I am thinking………what did I do today to take care of myself? Did I connect with my heavenly father today? What did I do today to feed myself spiritually? And the answer was nothing. I didn’t do anything for myself spiritually today. And after several days of this, I begin to feel insignificant no matter what I’ve done. It’s because I begin to feel disconnected from God. And this feeling carries over into every other facet of my life. I don’t feel like I am the wife or mother or any of the other hats I wear daily, that I should be. Most of all I don’t feel like I’m the Christian that I should be. We all have days where we just don’t feel motivated. We feel so far behind that we think we will never get caught up. Physically and mentally, we may be drained. It may be stress at work, stress at home, or it could be our hormone changes ladies. From taking care of young children, to chauffeuring older children for all their activities,  to taking care of elderly parents and other family members, to keeping our home somewhat in order, to juggling our careers if we have a secular job, we women are multitaskers. God made us this way because He knows we can handle doing more than five things at one time!! However, when things get too overwhelming, we can feel powerless and out of control. We may simply have too much on us at times. We may need to take something off of our plate if that is possible. But……sometimes that is just not a possibility. We often probably wish we could clone ourselves. We may have people depending on us for a number of reasons and we feel paralyzed and wonder………where do I even begin?  

Well friends, we begin by dropping to our knees in prayer and laying everything that is overwhelming us, everything that is worrying us, everything that has hurt us, everything that is causing us to feel out of control at God’s feet. That has become my mantra recently………at His feet. Saying this to myself over and over some days is what gets me through tough days. I simply pray in my mind to my heavenly Father and say to Him, “Father, I am leaving this at Your feet. I trust you to work your will with this situation. I know that everything happens in your time, not mine, and I’ll try my best to wait and be patient for your perfect will. Whatever your will is for this, I accept it.” Then I take a deep breath and I feel better for a while. It’s not a one-time thing though. Like I said, sometimes it is a constant recording on repeat in my brain when I am really struggling. Jesus said in Matthew 11:28-30, “Come to Me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.” Before we turn to anything or anyone else to help us cope with anything in our lives, let’s immediately remember these verses from Jesus and connect with our Father in prayer. God will strengthen us and will never put more on us than we can handle. He knows our strength. In Isaiah 41:10, God says, “Fear not, for I am with you; be not dismayed, for I am your God; I will strengthen you, Yes, I will help you, I will uphold you with My righteous right hand.” But if we never open God’s word for guidance or never go to Him sincerely in prayer, then He can’t help us. We tie God’s hands when we turn to worldly ways to cope. 

So what about coping mechanisms? There are many unhealthy ways to cope. Some obvious ones are alcohol and drugs. I think we all realize the dangers of alcohol and drugs as coping mechanisms. Destruction of marriages and families, health problems, addictions, and untimely deaths have stemmed from using alcohol and drugs to cope with problems. From my experience, the majority of the time when people abuse these substances, it is because they are trying to forget something unpleasant/traumatic, relieve stress and anxiety, or both. They are trying to numb the pain through self-medication. As Christians, using any of these substances instead of going to our Creator is definitely not going to help us. It will harm us physically and harm our relationship with God. Not to mention, it is not glorifying to God, and makes us look like we belong to the world, which at that point we do belong to the world. However, there are other unhealthy coping mechanisms that are more subtle. Overeating and bingeing-eating have always been one of my unhealthy coping mechanisms. It’s harmful to me and in no way glorifies God when I do it. It’s a struggle that I’m continually fighting daily and with God’s help I will win the battle!! 1 Corinthians 6:19-20 reminds me, “Or do you not know that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God, and you are not your own? For you were bought at a price; therefore glorify God in your body and in your spirit, which are God’s.” God has given me this body and I should be a good steward of it. Turning tothings other than God, especially behaviors that are unhealthy, can turn into really bad habits or even addictions. And let me just say, even seemingly healthy things for us can interfere with our relationship with God if we turn to them instead of God. Exercise can be one of those things. I speak from experience with this. Of course I firmly believe in exercise for our physical and mental health. It is so good for us if it is not turned into an idol. Exercise used to be something I really overdid, and put as my top priority every day. Nothing else mattered more to me than getting that workout done. It was my main focus at one time in my life when I was much younger. I used to beat myself up terribly if I ever missed a day. Exercise in itself is a wonderful thing and I try to make it a priority for my physical health, but my daily Bible study and prayer have to be my top priority every day for my spiritual health. My physical or mental health won’t get better until I am healthy spiritually. I realize that now. I wish I had figured this out a long time ago when I was much younger. Hint, hint to my younger readers. However, it is never to late to turn things around and get things in order no matter what age you are. I am 52 and I am trying to turn certain aspects of my life around. We can do it with God’s help!! I also tend to turn to television shows or movies to take my mind off of troubles and trials. Personally I really have to fight this. Some turn to social media. In themselves, these are not wrong, but if we do these activities in place of or ahead of Bible study and prayer, then they can become wrong. We must have balance. These activities are entertaining and enjoyable but they do not help our problems go away or help us deal with them, any more than drinking alcohol or taking drugs or overeating/bingeing, or exercising until we drop, or anything else. These are all just bandaids, not cures. Our Savior, the Great Physician is the only “cure”. Now, don’t misunderstand me. Let me repeat, I’m not saying that watching movies, TV shows, or looking at social media is wrong in itself. I love movies and shows as long as they do not influence me in a negative way and affect my Christian walk. However, anything that we turn to in order to cope with our trials in this life other than God is only a quick fix. Our trials will still be there and we will feel even worse because we haven’t turned to our Creator and our Father to help us. We will have a void in our lives that we will never fill with earthly activities or things. God has to fill our void or we will always be searching for a way to fill it. Whether it is healthy or not, it is still a quick fix and will not fill our void. There will always be times when we will feel physically and mentally drained. But if we are spiritually alive with God through prayer and through His word, then that feeling of being drained is so much easier to handle. God wants us to put everything weighing us down on Him. He wants us to trust Him with our lives. Just listen to Ephesians 2:4-5……..”But God, who is rich in mercy, because of His great love with which He loved us, even when we were dead in trespasses, made us alive together with Christ (by grace you have been saved)……” He is telling the Christians at Ephesus, who had already fully obeyed the gospel in baptism, that He loved them when they were sinners…..dead in their sin and He made them alive when they made the choice to be baptized and have their sins washed away. God still feels this way about us and has that same  great love for us today. If he loves us so very much, why would we want to turn anywhere else for help or comfort if we are Christians? He’s got us!!  

Everyone has their own trials. Trials are meant to draw us closer to Him if we let them. James 1:2-4 says “My brethren, count it all joy when you fall into various trials, knowing that the testing of your faith produces patience. But let patience have its perfect work, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking nothing.” It’s really hard to find joy in trials, isn’t it? God knows we are human and He knows that trials do not make us happy, however we can still find joy because we know that God has got us in the palm of His hand if we are turning to Him. Let’s not forget that being happy and having joy are two separate things though. There is no place in God’s word where God tells us we will be happy all the time. But He does promise us joy, but only if we are abiding in Him. If we abide in Him always, we will find joy no matter what is going on in our lives. How do we abide in Him and find joy? Jesus tells us plainly how we abide in Him in John 15:10-11, “If you keep My commandments, you will abide in My love, just as I have kept My Father’s commandments and abide in His love. These things I have spoken to you, that my joy may remain in you, and that your joy may be full.” 

We will find joy in trials if we truly lay everything at Jesus’ feet. Let’s do that friends. Life will still be hard at times, but laying our trials at our Savior’s feet and then going to His word for guidance will help us navigate through them in a healthy way and will help us grow as Christians.

I hope everyone has a wonderful Saturday and blessed week to come!! Thank you for reading!!

Copyright 2023, all rights reserved.

Part 3- Transforming and Renewing Our Minds and Lives

Two of my favorite verses in the Bible are Romans 12:1-2. 

1. “I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, which is your reasonable service. 
2. And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God.”

In my last post, I looked at the first part of Romans 12:2 where we are told not to conform to the world. If we are Christians, we are to be conformed to God’s purpose for our lives, not the world. Let’s continue on from last week’s post and finish up Romans 12:2. 

Before I dive into the rest of Romans 12:2, I want to remind everyone that this letter is written to the members of the Lord’s church in Rome. (Romans 1:7) These are people who have already obeyed the gospel and become Christians. They have repented, confessed, and been baptized for the remission of their sins and been added by God to the church of Christ. (Acts 2:47)
The first thing that we are told in Romans 12:2 is “do not be conformed to this world”. We cannot present our bodies as a “living sacrifice” as Romans 12:1 tells us to, unless we do this. Instead of conforming to the world, the verse says we are to “be transformed”. So this means we have to change, or go through a metamorphosis like a caterpillar transforms into a butterfly. The word transformation means a dramatic or radical change. And this is not a one time thing. When it says “be transformed” it means continually “be transformed”……stay “transformed” because remember, Paul is talking to Christians who had already begun their transformation when they obeyed the gospel. But I need to continually transform daily after I obey the gospel. And that takes effort on my part every single day to stay transformed into the image of Christ. I fall short so often in this, but I will never stop trying until my last breath.

Before I go further into the verse, I would like to go a little deeper into the transformation process for those who need to hear this information. So the question is…..how did these Christians to whom Paul is talking in Romans “transform” to begin with? How do we? Well, first we have to repent. (Matthew 4:17, Acts 2:38, Acts 3:19) When we repent of sin we are deciding at that point that we want to transform or change. We are not just saying we are sorry only to turn around and go back to the sin we were in. We actually want to go through a metamorphosis and leave our life of sin forever. Then we confess Jesus’ name before men. (Matthew 10:32) We are confessing the name of who we want to transform into the likeness of which is Jesus Christ, our Savior. We are telling everyone that we believe that Jesus is the Son of God. Then, we are buried with Christ in baptism. (Romans 6:4, Colossians 2:12) When we are baptized, we bury our “caterpillar”, our old and sinful self and we leave the world behind. We come into contact with Christ’s blood through baptism and our sins are washed away. (Acts 2:38, Acts 22:16)  Baptism is how we “call on the name of the Lord”. (Acts 22:16) Ananias told Paul in the verse I just referenced to “arise and be baptized, and wash away your sins, calling on the name of the Lord.” After baptism, we don’t belong to the world anymore. We belong to Christ. We cannot belong to both the world and Christ. We come up out of the waters of baptism and we are a beautiful butterfly so to speak, a new creature in Christ who is walking in newness of life. (Romans 6:3-4, 2 Corinthians 5:17)  Is there magic in the water? No, the water is not magic. It is the obedient act of baptism that puts us in Christ and at that point, our transformation has begun, not before. We are not saved until we come up out of the water a new creature. Christ commanded his disciples in Matthew 28:18-20 to “go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all things that I have commanded you.” How do we become a disciple of Christ? We are baptized into Him.  I am reminded of the account of Naaman in 2 Kings 5:1-19. Was it the muddy water of the Jordan River that cured Naaman of his leprosy? No, it was the obedient act of washing in the river seven times that caused Naaman’s transformation from being sick to being well. In the same way, the obedient act of baptism begins our transformation. It is obedience, not the water!! Naaman would not have been saved from his leprosy had he not obeyed and we will not be saved from sin if we don’t obey. Baptism saves us from our sins (Mark 16:16) and God adds us to His church after we are baptized. (Acts 2:47) 

So……….are we through when we come up out of the water? Are we completely transformed when we are first baptized? No, we are new babes in Christ. If we were finished after baptism, we would not need Paul’s message in Romans 12:1-2. We have to grow into maturity and we continue to grow every day that we are physically alive. And as I said before, it is different for everyone. Sometimes we let our old “caterpillar” show through and we have to get ourselves back on track. It is tough out there in the world with all those temptations that Satan throws at us. We are bombarded every day. So…..how do I get back on track and cover that caterpillar that is trying to show through? Because, I definitely cannot look and act like the world and still transform myself into the image of Christ. So how do I continue to transform after I’m baptized into Christ? How do I stay a beautiful butterfly? How do I keep my old sinful self, or as our comparison is, our “caterpillar” from coming back?  The next part of the verse tells us that we are transformed “by the renewing of your mind”. But what does that mean? It means that we renew our minds with God’s word. The more we renew our minds with God’s word, the more we will transform into the image of Christ. If we don’t renew our minds with God’s word after we are baptized, then we won’t continue to transform. We won’t grow. We will look more like the world than Christ, and our beautiful butterfly will eventually be gone. We will belong to the world again, because we have not let Christ continue to transform us through His word. If we want the blessing of being in heaven with God and His Son someday and have that crown of life, we must be faithful until death. (Revelation 2:10) To truly be faithful, we must transform and renew with God’s word. We must seek first the kingdom of God which means we must seek first His church and things pertaining to it. (Matthew 6:33) His church consists of His people. We are to put God and our brothers and sisters in Christ first in our lives.

If I have the right mindset and attitude, worship and Bible study attendance will help me to grow and stay transformed into the image of Christ. My attendance also helps my brothers and sisters in Christ to grow and stay transformed which goes back to Matthew 6:33, seeking God’s kingdom, aka, the church, aka, my brothers and sisters in Christ first. Do we see the connection? It is encouraging to others if I am there at every service. And vice versa, it is encouraging to me to see others at every service. Hebrews 10:23-25 says very plainly, “Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for He who promised is faithful. And let us consider one another in order to stir up love and good works, not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as is the manner of some, but exhorting one another, and so much the more as you see the Day approaching.” Regardless of what the world tells us, assembling for worship is a command. But what about Sunday night service? What about Bible study on Sunday morning and Wednesday night? In the Lord’s church, we normally have two worship services on Sunday. We also assemble for Bible study on Sunday mornings and Wednesday nights. Hebrews 10:25 says, not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together. It does not specify whether it is assembling for worship or Bible study. The way that I take this verse is that if our congregation is assembling, we should be there if at all possible. We should want to be there. It will be uplifting to us and to our brothers and sisters in Christ. Sometimes we have circumstances out of our control that keep us from coming and I’m in no way talking about those types of things. Evidently, according to Hebrews 10:25, there were Christians who were “forsaking the assembly” back at that time just like we sometimes do today. It must have been a problem because the Hebrew writer felt it necessary to tell the Christians back during the time this was written and, in turn, tell Christians today not to be people who forsake the assembly. I know that I have fallen short in this area at times in the past, but I am striving very hard to do better. I don’t want to ever let the words come out of my mouth again or have this thought enter my mind again…….. “I don’t have to go on Sunday night or Wednesday night because I went Sunday morning”. I am not punching a clock. I am ashamed to say that I have had that attitude in the past. Let’s ask ourselves, would we miss anything happening on any other night of the week? My kids were heavily into basketball and sometimes we would have basketball games a couple of nights a week. Then, Wednesday night bible study rolls around and we are all a little tired. I had to ask myself a question. Would I miss my kid’s game just because I’m a little tired? Do I want to teach my kids that we can make it to everything else during the week except Bible study and worship? No matter what our congregation is assembling for, whether it’s worship, Bible study, gospel meeting, vacation bible school, or anything else that we have the opportunity to attend, let’s all make the effort to be there and support each other and support the wonderful work being done by our bible class teachers and our preachers. Not to mention, with our attendance and focus while we are there, we are letting our Creator know that He is number one in our lives and we want to know more about Him. I know that I can’t earn my way into heaven with attendance at Bible study and worship. Jesus has made the way for us to get there. I know that with all my heart. But, because of what God has done for me through Jesus, I want to be there. I can’t tell you all how bad I have fallen short in this in my life at different times. I never missed anything that my children were ever involved in. I was there if at all possible, because I loved them so much. I should feel this way about the church that Christ died for. I love God and His kingdom here on earth so much that I don’t want to miss anything if at all possible. I have grown to love Wednesday night Bible study. In a busy work week, it keeps me grounded in what is truly important and “renews my mind” so that I can make it through the rest of the week. It is great to be with my brothers and sisters in Christ who are “of the same mind” in the middle of my work week. (Philippians 2:2)

However, even if we are going to worship and Bible study every Sunday morning, Sunday night, and Wednesday night, our growth can still be stunted if we are not living out our faith daily, doing our own personal Bible study, and praying to God each day. I know from personal experience that you can be at services every time the doors are open, yet be disconnected from God and feel lost. I was simply going through the motions and that is just as bad as not being there at all. I wasn’t studying on my own. My prayer life needed major help. Until I started making time for Him every day, I struggled to stay on track spiritually. And we all struggle some days, simply because we are human and life can be overwhelming. But what better way to deal with being overwhelmed with life than to pray to God and ask Him to help us, tell Him everything going on that is overwhelming us, and then open God’s word and let Him soothe our souls? And Christians, even though we lead busy lives, let’s not lose sight of our purpose on this earth which is to bear fruit for God, to help teach others how to be saved. And how can I fulfill my purpose to teach others if I don’t study myself? It’s not easy some days. Some days we have more time than other days. It is about putting forth effort and putting Bible study and prayer as a top priority each day. We can do it my friends!! It is soooo worth it!!

Ok…..on to the last part of the verse, “ that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God.” This means that through renewing our minds with God’s word, we will learn what is good and acceptable to God. We learn that God’s will for our lives is perfect simply because He is God. We may not always understand God’s will but this is where trust comes in. We just have to trust Him. Romans 8:28 assures us with these words, “And we know that all things work together for good to those who love God, to those who are the called according to His purpose.” May we never forget that his ways and thoughts are higher than our ways and thoughts. (Isaiah 55:8-9) How would we ever know what is good and acceptable to God without renewing our minds with His word? How would we know his perfect will for our lives without studying His word? Obviously, we can’t know every detail of God’s will for our lives. It wouldn’t be good for us if we knew everything that was going to happen to us. God knows what we need to know and He has given us all we need in His word. Some things are just not meant for us to know right now. However, we can know God’s ultimate will for us and that is a home in heaven with Him and His Son. We just have to sincerely dive into God’s word and follow His plan to get there. 

Transformation does not happen overnight and it is different for every person, because we all have different life experiences, different upbringings, different things that tempt us, etc. God never promised us that it would be easy. In fact, Jesus told us in Matthew 10:22 that we would be hated by all (meaning the world) for His name’s sake, but He also assured us that if we endure to the end we will be saved. What a comforting statement from our Savior!! So we run the race with endurance and never give up. (Hebrews 12:1) God never gives up on us as long as we are enduring in the faith and when we do fall, and we all do, He is there with open arms to take us back if we only take that first step towards Him. We gain more and more endurance the more we give of ourselves to Him through forming good habits of worship and Bible study attendance, daily Bible study, and daily prayer. Transformation is a process that we all continually work on. I am a work in progress. And I have a long way to go. We all do actually. I have been a teacher for thirty years. As an educator, I have always set the bar high for my students, because I want them to have something to strive for, and I want them to know that I believe they can accomplish anything they want in this life. I want them to have the confidence to try and reach that bar. Setting the bar low does not challenge anyone. My students will not grow with low expectations. I did the same with my own children. I set the bar high because I wanted them to know that I loved them and I believed they could achieve anything. Well God does this same thing with all of us. His expectations of us are high. Is it even logical that He wouldn’t set a high bar for His children? He’s God, our heavenly Father. He knows what each of us need individually to make us better people if we will truly trust Him and let His word guide every aspect of our lives. He knows that without a high bar to strive for, we would not be the kind of people He wants in heaven with Him. We can never reach that bar, but God expects us to strive for it. The world makes it out like God has set the bar low, or that there isn’t even a bar at all, and that we don’t really have to put forth any effort and it is really sad. That is how Satan has twisted people’s minds through false teaching. I pray every day for more people to see the truth and for doors to open so that I can help others. Friends, I know I have spent lots of time on Romans 12:1-2, but I found so much inspiration from diving into just those two verses. Just think about how much inspiration we can get from the entire Bible!! It is a book of endless inspiration. I pray that we all continue to transform and renew daily through God’s word and strive to reach the bar that God has set for us………which is to be like our savior, Jesus Christ. 

Have a blessed week ahead and thank you for reading my blog!!

Copyright 2023, all rights reserved.

Part 2- We Can Not Conform to This World

Two of my favorite verses in the Bible are Romans 12:1-2. 

1. “I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, which is your reasonable service. 
2. And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God.”

In my last post, I had planned to break down Romans 12:1-2, but the depth that I found in verse one alone prompted me to turn last week’s post into two parts, possibly three. I would like to pick up where I left off and dive into Romans 12:2.
After telling us in verse one that we, as Christians, are to present our bodies as living sacrifices that are holy and pleasing to God, verse two expounds on this and tells us how to accomplish this. Where do we start? After we are baptized into Christ, we have to pull away from worldliness, as it says in verse two, “do not be conformed to this world”. 1 John 2:15-16 ties in with this idea very well, “Do not love the world or the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world–the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life–is not of the Father but is of the world.” Obviously, if you love the world, you will most likely conform to the world. This statement to not conform to the world may seem plain and simple on the surface, but it is difficult to do and something we all have to continuously guard against. It takes spiritual maturity and training of the brain to do this and everyone’s maturity timeline is different depending on their individual circumstances and life experiences. Just as we don’t all physically mature at the same rate, we don’t all spiritually mature at the same rate. There isn’t a magic number or age when we just all of the sudden become spiritually mature. Some of us, like myself, are late bloomers. But let’s not ever forget that we are to never stop growing and maturing spiritually for as long as we live. And obviously, if we are faithful in worship and Bible study attendance, in daily Bible study, and in prayer, we will get closer to spiritual maturity than someone who is not doing these things faithfully. Being in God’s word on a daily basis is going to help us mature and then, in turn, help us to conform to God’s purpose for our lives instead of what the world thinks our purpose should be, which is living for the moment and living for self. But wherever we are in our spiritual journey, let’s always remember this, that God loves us and wants to perform a good work in us and complete it until the day of Jesus Christ. (Philippians 1:6) 

Let’s compare our dedication to God’s word with the dedication that the sports of basketball and tennis require. These are my two absolute favorite sports. Let’s start with basketball. I grew up playing basketball. I practiced every day. Because of this, I matured as a player. I got better every year that I played. It took dedication and training on my part to become a solid, intelligent player. It was the sport of my youth and I still love it up to this day. I also coached basketball for many years and I took the time to study the game more in depth so that I could teach the kids on my team (and my own two children) the fundamentals of the sport and help them grow as players. I bought books to read about coaching and researched offensive and defensive sets to see what would work best for my teams. I sought out new drills to keep my practices fresh and new for the kids. I put a lot of time into coaching and I wouldn’t take back a minute of it. It was so much fun watching the kids grow and develop and improve. It took dedication and training on my part, as a coach, to help my team develop and succeed. Tennis is my new sport that I play in my “older” age. I absolutely love it. I played a little in my younger days, but I didn’t really have any dedication to the sport or training in it back then. My best friend and I try to play as much as our busy lives will let us, usually a couple of times a week. I also watch videos to learn more about how to be a better tennis player. It’s good exercise and it makes me feel great to be involved in a sport again as a player, and I have improved a great deal since I started playing a few months ago. I have dedicated myself to training and improving in the sport. So, if dedication and training help us mature in things such as sports, then think about what dedication and training in God’s word will do for our spiritual maturity. Let that sink in, because I sure am!! I am stepping on my own toes here!! We are told so many times in the Bible to meditate on God’s word. Joshua 1:8 says “This Book of the Law shall not depart from your mouth, but you shall meditate in it day and night, that you may observe to do according to all that is written in it. For then you will make your way prosperous, and then you will have good success.” Meditation means to think deeply or carefully about something. The Psalmist says it this way in chapter 119, verses 15 and 16, “I will meditate on Your precepts, and contemplate (think profoundly and at length) Your ways. I will delight myself in Your statutes; I will not forget Your word.” How do we not forget God’s word? Study and meditate!! Studying (2 Tim. 2:15) is a commandment for a reason. God knows that being in His word and applying His word to our lives will help keep us out of the world and out of trouble!! 
Something else that helps us to “not be conformed to this world” is to surround ourselves with people who will help us in our spiritual walk. Proverbs 13:20 says, “He who walks with wise men will be wise, but the companion of fools will be destroyed.” We have to watch who we are spending our time with. 1 Corinthians 15:33 reminds us, “Do not be deceived: Evil company corrupts good habits.” We want to have people in our lives who want to help us get to heaven and who encourage us in our talents for the Lord. We don’t want to spend our time with people who feed on our weaknesses. They only want to be around us when we are at our rock bottom weakest and they don’t want us to try and better ourselves spiritually. So let’s all be careful and on guard. Satan can get to us through people who we think are our friends. Let’s remember what Proverbs 12:26 tells us, “The righteous should choose his friends carefully, for the way of the wicked leads them astray.” Whether they are members of the Lord’s church or not, the friends we choose to spend time with should be a positive influence in our lives. I have wonderful friends that are members of the Lord’s church and wonderful friends that are not. And they are all such a blessing to my life and I hope that I am a blessing to them as well. Actually, I have two sisters in Christ who encouraged me to do something more with my writing. I have always loved to write and journal, but never had the confidence to put my writing out there for everyone to read. I wrote things for my husband and children to encourage them, but no one else. I let these two precious sisters in Christ read some things I had written and now I am writing for anyone who wants to read it. Through these two sisters in Christ and the encouraging feedback they gave me, I have grown spiritually through this blog and my hope is that, with God’s increase, others will be encouraged by it. Honestly, it’s the beauty of God’s word that is behind it all. It is all because of Him!! I wouldn’t have anything to write about if I wasn’t writing about God’s word!! The more that I am in it, the more beauty I find!! Psalms 119:105 says that, “Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path.” That is so comforting to me. I picture the paths in my brain just lighting up when I am reading and studying God’s word. To sum this part of the verse up, if we discipline ourselves to be in God’s word daily and be in prayer daily, and we surround ourselves with good people who are positive influences, we will be less likely to conform to the world. We won’t want to!! 

 So…….if I am a Christian, I am not going to conform to the world’s standards of how to be saved, how to live, how to worship, how to be a good wife, how to raise my kids, and the list goes on and on. God’s word and God’s word only will be my standard.

Again, I have found so much inspiration in these verses. I decided to break the post I had written about Romans 12:2 into two posts because it was extra long. Thanks to everyone for reading my blog! I hope everyone has a blessed coming week!! 

Romans 12:2 Part 3 –

Transforming and Renewing Our Minds and Lives coming next week!!

Copyright 2023, all rights reserved.

Part 1- We are Living Sacrifices

Two of my favorite verses in the Bible are Romans 12:1-2. 

1. “I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, which is your reasonable service. 
2. And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God.”

Wow, such a wealth of spiritual guidance packed into these two verses. These two verses actually sum up the Christian life and how we are to live it. Let’s dive into these treasures from God’s word and break down verse one to start with.

First of all, in verse one Paul, the apostle,  says “I beseech you therefore, brethren”. Beseech is a powerful word in itself. It means to beg and plead!! It means to ask someone to do something with urgency!! So Paul is begging and pleading in verse one. Who is Paul pleading with? He is pleading with his brothers and sisters in Christ, hence the term “brethren”. Paul is writing to Christians, people who are members of the Lord’s church in Rome, who have repented of their sins and been baptized for the remission of their sins. (Romans 1:7) (Repentance and Baptism-Acts 2:38) 

Up until this point in Romans, Paul has been focusing more on what God has done for his people, but in Romans 12, he begins to move into discussing what God expects of his people. Most of the world believes that God doesn’t really expect anything from his people, but if we believe His word to be true, we can’t escape the fact that God has expectations of us and He sets the bar high. Honestly, the bar that God set is Jesus Christ. How He lived when He was on this earth is our bar that we are always striving to reach. And let’s always remember that Jesus knows how we feel as Hebrews 4:15 tells us, “For we do not have a High Priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but was in all points tempted as we are, yet without sin”.  Of course, we can never reach that bar of living a sinless life, and that is why Jesus sacrificed His life for us. Paul tells us to “present our bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God”. How can we read this verse and still think that we can just live however we want to live? Christ was the ultimate sacrifice as He shed His blood for us on the cross, but in this verse I am called to be a “living sacrifice”. That means I am to live my life or as it says sacrifice my life for Christ. Paul says in Philippians 1:21 that, “to live is Christ, to die is gain”. I think we can all agree that Paul’s life was a “living sacrifice” to God. Earlier in the book of Romans in chapter 6, verses 12 and 13, he uses some of this same type of language by saying, “Therefore do not let sin reign in your mortal body, that you should obey it in its lusts. And do not present your members as instruments of unrighteousness to sin, but present yourselves to God as being alive from the dead, and your members as instruments of righteousness to God.” I have to give up some things after I become a Christian if I want to be “holy, acceptable unto God” like the verse says. 1 Peter 1:15-16 says it this way, “but as He who called you is holy, you also be holy in all your conduct, because it is written, ‘Be holy, for I am holy’”. I have to live a holy and sacrificial life that is pleasing to God for the world to see. When people see the word holy, they tend to shy away from it. The word holy simply means dedicated to God or sacred. We are sacred if we are in Christ. Are we supposed to act “holier than thou” because we belong to Christ? Absolutely not! Not if we want to be Christ-like. We should never look down on others or be puffed up because of who we are. We do not want to be like the scribes and Pharisees of Jesus’ day. We will never fulfill our commission to bring others to Christ if we act in this way. We must love the lost and never forget that we were once lost. I am an imperfect sinner, no different from anyone, and I mean anyone else in this world. God is no respecter of persons (Romans 2:11) and all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. (Romans 3:23) The only difference is that I belong to Christ. I am in Christ. I have given my life over to Him including all my imperfections, and there are many! We are not spiritually dead in our sins anymore after we are baptized. We are spiritually alive in Christ!! This is what sets us apart. 

On a personal note, I am so grateful that I was born into a family with parents who raised me to know the truth. So many are not this fortunate. Did I fall away? Yes I did. I have made a wealth of mistakes. More than once, I have had to come crawling back and ask God and my brothers and sisters in Christ to forgive me and pray for me. When I was younger, I know I didn’t truly appreciate my upbringing the way that I should have and I took it for granted. Everyone doesn’t have parents and grandparents who always try to put God first and who set a good example for them. We all mature spiritually in our own time, and we have such a patient and loving Father. I am so thankful for God’s patience with me. I need it daily. I am definitely a work in progress.

Why should we offer our lives as a living sacrifice that is pleasing to God? “By the mercies of God” is the reason Paul gives for exhorting us to live a sacrificial life that is pleasing to God. God has been so merciful to us and shown so much love for us by sending His Son as a sacrifice for our sins. I think Titus 3:4-6 explains God’s mercy so beautifully, “But when the kindness and the love of God our Savior toward man appeared, not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to His mercy He saved us, through the washing of regeneration and renewing of the Holy Spirit, whom He poured out on us abundantly through Jesus Christ our Savior”. So it’s not anything we have done to deserve it. We will never deserve it. But God loves us anyway and has shown abundant mercy to us through His Son. God made the way for us to be saved through His plan, not man’s ideas. Without following God’s plan, we are dead spiritually and lost for eternity. 

So is it even a question that we should live for Him?  Absolutely, we should! As the verse says, it is our “reasonable service”. It is only logical that a creation will submit and obey its creator simply because He created us. But He did not only create us. He didn’t just leave us here to die in our sins and be lost. He created a way for us to be saved. Why would we want to listen to anything the world says is acceptable? What other way is there to really live? God created everything and everyone. He created the Bible through inspired writers so we could know His will for our lives. Contrary to what the world thinks, God only created one way to be saved. It is through Jesus Christ. Ephesians 4:4-6 is clear as it says, “There is one body and one spirit, just as you were called in one hope of your calling; one Lord, one faith, one baptism; one God and Father of all, who is above all, and through all, and in you all.” How many times does Paul say the word “one” in those verses? God decided how we are to be saved and live for Him, not the world. AND God dictated what behaviors and actions He considers to be sin, not the world. So….it is a reasonable request that I live this kind of life and be this “living sacrifice” that my Creator has asked me to be. Is it easy? No, it is not an easy thing to do. And I fall short on a daily basis, however, God expects me to keep trying. The Bible is clear on that. God sees every effort I put forth and He sees every time I slack. I leave you with two verses that I think will encourage all of us to stay the course in our Christian lives and be the “living sacrifices” that God wants us to be. Hebrews 12:1-2 sums it up so beautifully, “Therefore we also, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight, and the sin that so easily ensnares us, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith, who for the joy that was set before Him endured the cross despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.” Our life is a race. 1 Corinthians 9:24 says we all need to run our race “in such a way as to get the prize”.  That prize is to be in heaven with God and His Son. What other prize is worth more than that?

When I started writing about these two verses, I realized that I needed to make this a post into two parts because there was so much I wanted to say after I got started. But that is how the Bible is, isn’t it? I love how deep I can go with one verse. This post is about Romans 12:1. I will continue with Romans 12:2 next week!! Thanks so much to everyone who is supporting my blog and please share it with your friends!!

Every time I sit down to write, it is always because I have been convicted in some way and my heart has been pricked or my toes have been stepped on by something I have read in the scriptures or heard in a sermon or Bible class. I was asking myself a question today. Actually two questions. 

First, is Jesus truly my first love?

Second, how do I keep all things new in my life spiritually?

Revelation 2 talks about a church who had left its first love. The church is made up of people,  right? So therefore the people had left their first love…..Jesus. They were doing everything right from the outside looking in, but it had become a checklist that they were following. They were playing church just like kids play house or play school. They were going through the motions of worship but their hearts were not in it. We can’t ever forget that Jesus knows our hearts and minds. He knows if we don’t really want to be there. He knows if we are doing things for him just out of our duty and not true desire and zeal for His purpose. We cannot fool God no matter how many good works we do. Our love for Him, our love for our brothers and sisters in Christ and our love for the lost has to be our reason for everything we do. 

It’s easy to say that Jesus is our first love, but does our life show that he actually is number one? Do we listen to God/Christ by reading his word each day? Do we talk to Him in prayer every day throughout our day? Do we think of Him before we make big decisions? Do we uplift and build up our spiritual family by being at worship services and Bible study services?  Do we make our plans around our congregation’s church services, Bible study services, gospel meeting, VBS, etc. as best we can? Are we living out our faith in our everyday life? When a door opens with an opportunity to help someone understand the gospel, do we take that opportunity or are we afraid to stand up for the One we say is our first love? Do we see people outside of Christ the way Jesus sees them, as someone who is spiritually sick and in need of the Great Physician? All these are questions that I thought of under the heading, “is Jesus truly my first love?”. It hit me this morning. I would stand up for my husband and my children and give my life for them. What about Christ? Is he more important to me than those closest to me? My thought was, “he better be ” because He is the reason I have my precious husband and my precious children (all 4 of them). He has blessed my life and been so patient with me at times when I wasn’t giving Him a second thought, I’m ashamed to say. Sometimes we get caught up in life and we get numb in our spiritual lives. I know I have many times. Life is hard and busy and disappointing (and tragic) sometimes. But Jesus knows our struggles and He knows everything we go through because He went through the same things as a human walking on this earth. The only difference is He was without sin. (Hebrews 4:15) He is our ultimate example that we strive to follow. 

Now, second question, how do we keep things new in our spiritual lives? We make all things new when we are baptized, but how do we keep our heart new and humble. Paul said in Philippians 4:11-12 that he learned to be content in all things and in all situations that life threw his way. He trained himself to be content with wherever he was, including prison, and whatever he was going through, including being stoned and left for dead. The point is, we have the greatest gift right now because we are in Christ’s kingdom on earth and the most glorious reward coming later if we are in Christ and being found faithful to Him when we pass away or when He returns, whichever happens first. In Revelation 2:10 Jesus makes this promise, “Be faithful until death, and I will give you the crown of life.”  He’s our Savior. He gave up everything for us. Let that sink in. Our Creator gave up everything for us. He came down from His glorious home in heaven with his father, was born in a stable, walked on earth, became a lowly servant, was beaten beyond recognition and then died the most shameful and painful death imaginable….. for us! (Philippians 2:6-8) So yes, we can be content if we truly have Him as our first love…..for real. We won’t be worried so much about material things in this life if Christ is our first love. 

What about our focus? This has always been a tough one for me personally. It has taken me a long time to truly realize what my true purpose is on this earth…..what my main focus should be. Our life is so full of all kinds of things that don’t really matter in the end. Sometimes God/Christ gets lost in there among everything else. Just like in Matthew 13:22, the parable of the sower, the thorns which represent the cares of this world and materialism can choke out the gospel and blur our focus and we become of no use in God’s kingdom, the church. Our focus has to be sharp or Christ will be completely gone from our mind if we are not careful. We all get sidetracked sometimes. We have to try very hard to keep our focus on Jesus. Everything else in life will fall into place if our focus is Jesus, His word, and His church. This doesn’t mean we can’t have things, do fun things, strive for things we want, but we can’t let those things rule our hearts and become idols. So focusing on Jesus….is another thing that helps keep all things new. How do we stay focused? 2 Timothy 2:15 says we are to study. It’s a commandment. Hebrews 4:12 tells us that the “word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and of spirit, of joints and of marrow, discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart.” The Bible is powerful and will have an effect on us if we let it. Staying in God’s word daily as much as we can, even if it is just a few minutes, helps us keep our focus and stay grounded in the truth. 

Last is effort. We won’t be content and we won’t be focused without effort. If Jesus is truly our first love, then we will put forth effort in things that truly matter. It takes effort to study the Bible and to slow down enough to pray. It takes effort to get up every Sunday for Bible study and worship. It takes effort to make it to mid-week Bible study after working all day. Effort to be involved with our youth and help with youth activities such as VBS and other things. Effort to make food for someone who is sick or lost a loved one. Effort to send a card or call someone who is sick or bereaved. And the list goes on and on of ways we can show others Christ living in us. I’m guilty. I don’t put forth effort like I should. I’m not saying we can earn our way to heaven. Grace is what gets us there. (Ephesians 2:8-9) However, grace does not mean that we don’t have to do anything. We have to put forth effort. James 2:14-26 explains in detail that “Faith without works is dead”. Obviously, we can’t do everything, but we can try to do as much as we can. We can be content, stay focused on Jesus, and put forth our best effort toward His purpose. If we do these things, we will stay spiritually new. When we fall short, God is always ready to take us back and lift us up through His word. Let’s always remember “that all things work together for good to those who love God, to those who are the called according to His purpose.” We are the called if we have repented of our sins, confessed Jesus’ name before others, been baptized for the remission of our sins, and are living faithful to Him.

(Repentance and baptism, Acts 2:38 and Acts 22:16) (Confessing Jesus’ name, Matthew 10:32)

Deuteronomy 5:29

“Oh, that they had such a heart in them that they would fear Me and keep all of My commandments, that it might be well with them and with their children forever!

The more I open my Bible, the more treasures I find and the more I learn how much God loves me and all of us. This verse nearly jumped off the page for me when I read it recently. We are studying Deuteronomy in our Wednesday night Bible class. I had never taken notice of this verse before even though I have read the Bible through and been to church all my life. I had never considered the depth found in this verse until now and I just wanted to dive into it and see where it would take me.

To start with, the thought of my God, my Father, and my Creator agonizing over my bad decisions throughout my life brings me to tears. The thought of my Father in heaven above wanting so intensely for little ole me to get it together for my own good and the good of my family literally brings me to my knees.

First, let’s consider how God starts this verse….”Oh”. That small two letter expression reveals so much about our Father in heaven. He has a deep yearning for all of us to be saved. He desires so much to have a relationship with me, with all of us. When we use that word here on earth, it usually has strong feelings connected to it in one way or another. It’s either a happy “Oh” or a sad “Oh”, maybe even an angry or surprised “Oh”. In this verse, we see our God deeply anguished over His children not following Him, even after all He had done for them. Is this not also how he feels about us when we don’t follow Him and put Him first in our lives? We know this feeling. We feel this way when our own children disobey us. We agonize over it as parents. God agonizes over us also. We know that we can parallel this verse with our lives today because we know that God never changes. His feelings never change. In Malachi 3:6 God says, “I am the Lord; I change not.” You can’t get any more straightforward than that. In James 1:17, God is called “the Father of lights, with whom is no variableness, neither shadow of turning”. God will always be the same. We can depend on Him to never change His mind about what He expects from us, His creation. Jesus Christ is also mentioned as unchanging in Hebrews 13:8, “Jesus Christ the same yesterday, today and  forever.” Since God and Jesus are one, this concept of an unchanging God is confirmed even more. Most of the world today thinks that the Bible is an outdated book and doesn’t apply to our generation and future generations. For those who think that, I present to them from God’s word, Isaiah 40:8, “The grass withers, the flower fades, but the word of our God will stand forever.” If anyone needs a New Testament example of this concept, here is Matthew 24:35, “Heaven and Earth will pass away, but my words will not pass away.” So we have Holy Scriptures that tell us that God the Father has not changed and will not change, God the Son has not changed and will not change, and God the Holy Spirit, which today is the Bible, His written word, has not changed and will not change. I felt it necessary to clarify that fact before continuing to look at Deut. 5:29. God’s feelings then are God’s feelings today.So, to make my first point from this verse…..God has strong feelings of love for us just like He did for the children of Israel because He hasn’t changed and He won’t ever change.

The next part of the verse after “Oh” says, “that they had such a heart in them”. This part shows us that God can see our true feelings and knows us better than we know ourselves. The word heart here simply means our whole being, our mind, and our entire lifestyle. And not only does this mean our outward lifestyle that we show the world, but our inward self that no one else sees. Let’s never forget that our “very hairs are all numbered”. (Matt. 10:30) He knows us! He has always known us! Psalms 139:1 says, “O Lord, thou hast searched me, and known me.” And to add to that, He has known us from conception and even before that. Listen to Psalms 139:16 of NKJV, “Your eyes saw my substance, being yet unformed. And in Your book they all were written, the days fashioned for me, when as yet there were none of them.” He literally knew us before we were even conceived in our mother’s womb. So, point number two is that God knows our innermost thoughts and He has always known us. We cannot hide anything from Him.

The next part of the verse says, “that they would fear me”. This type of fear is two-fold. First, it should be a respect and a reverence and even an awe for who God is and all He has done for us. We are taught from a young age to respect our parents because of all they do for us in our lives. We are taught to respect elderly people because of their life’s accomplishments and experiences. If we are living our lives as faithful Christians, then this is the type of fear we have for God. The other type of fear is simply to be scared of what is going to happen to us, such as being scared of heights or storms. Honestly, if we aren’t in Christ or even if we are in Christ but aren’t living faithful, we should have this kind of fear of God. He can decide it is over here on this earth any time He chooses, and at that time there will be nothing we can do to make things right with Him. I’m so thankful that God has been patient and continues to be patient up to this moment in time, and I take comfort in 2 Peter 3:8-9, “The Lord is not slack concerning His promise, as some men count slackness; but is longsuffering to us-ward, not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance.” In this verse, God wanted His children to have both kinds of fear, respect for Him and fear of His judgment as well. So for point three, God wants us to fear Him as in to have respect and reverence for Him. To do this we have to be obedient to Him. If we do this, we should not have a reason to have a terrified kind of fear on judgment day.

The next part of the verse says, “and always keep all of my commandments”. I see  two key words in this part, “always” and “all”. We can’t just follow Him when it is convenient for us. It has to be all the time, convenient or not. And we can’t cherry pick what we want to obey and leave out what we don’t want to obey. We don’t make the Bible fit into our lives. We make our lives fit the Bible if that even makes sense grammatically. I think you get my meaning. If we look at Matthew 22:37-39, we see Jesus’ words after being asked what the greatest commandment in the law is. He pretty much summarized all the commandments into these verses. “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself.” If we are truly doing these two things, then we will always be at bible study and worship services. We will be at our gospel meeting. We will be involved in VBS to help our children learn the word. We will be there for our brothers and sisters in Christ. We will “do good unto all men, especially unto those of the household of faith”. (Gal. 6:10) We will be in the word and in prayer daily. We will live out our faith every day. Are we going to fail? Yes we will. But Jesus is there to lift us up just like He lifted Peter out of those crashing waves. We need only turn to Him. When talking about following God’s word, I also need to add that we can’t add to it or take away from it. Let’s just do all that He says to do, no more and no less. This must be important because the last verses of the entire Bible stress this. Revelation 22:18-20 stresses what will happen if we add to or take away from God’s word. Why take a chance? Let’s just do what the word says. So point number four, we are to do all that God has told us to do in His word whether it’s convenient or not. We are to center our lives on His word.

The next part of the verse really touches me. It says “that it might be well with them”. God wants things to be well with us. He desperately wants us to be saved and be in heaven with Him someday………all of us on this earth! He also wants us to have the best and most healthy life that we possibly can while we are here on this earth. Ok, let’s put it this way. Why do we have rules when we drive? They keep us safe right? Why do we give our kids boundaries and rules? Because we don’t want them to get hurt. We want to protect them. God only wants to protect us from ourselves. Jeremiah 10:23 says plainly, “It is not in man who walks to direct his own steps.” We can’t do this life on our own without God!  When we try to, we fail miserably. We also have Proverbs 3:5-6(NKJV) that tells us to “Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and do not lean on your own understanding. In all your ways acknowledge Him and He shall direct your paths.” This is the key to life. We get off-track sometimes but luckily God always helps us get back on track if we turn to Him. So point five, God knows what is best for his children and he wants the best for His children and that is a home in heaven with Him.

Speaking of children brings me to the last part of the verse, “and with their children forever!”. God wants future generations to be taught His word. If we fail to teach our children, then the future of the church is lost. Our children and grandchildren, nieces and nephews, and baby cousins are the church of tomorrow. God knows our children,  grandchildren, all of our physical family members and all of our future descendants. We want them all to be saved and in heaven with us and it all depends on our generation right now. Don’t let anything get in the way of or take precedence over God and His church. Jesus died for His church the world over……for all who have put on Christ in baptism. His blood flows backwards and forwards to past generations before Christianity and to future generations who will put on Christ in baptism someday. AND…… let’s not forget the exclamation point at the end of Deut. 5:29! It shows strong feelings! God was at His wits end often with the children of Israel and I know He has felt the same way about me sometimes and still does at times I’m sure. I’ve taken a lot of His patience over the years. Thank goodness He is overflowing with love and patience. I’m putting my name in this verse. You can do the same. God has probably said this about all of us.

Oh, that Greta had such a heart in her that she would fear Me and always keep all My commandments, that it might be well with her and with her children forever!