Tag Archives: christian living

June 30, 2020 · 5:56 AM

Defeating Hidden Sins

Nearly twenty years ago, I found myself sitting on the edge of my bed with a shotgun on my lap. Thoughts were racing through my head. I had been hurt badly and wanted revenge. I knew that the people were meeting at Target in about an hour. My heart was racing as I played out the scenario in my head. I thought about where I could run to or where I could hide out. Then I started thinking about what it would be like to spend the rest of my life in prison. I started to put the gun back up, but all those thoughts of pain came rushing back. “They deserve it,” I reasoned with myself. The argument went back and forth. In a split second, I put the gun in the closet, ran to my car and drove an hour away. I called a friend to meet me, gave him my keys and told him not to give them back no matter what I said.

That night scared me to death. It’s the night I realized that every sin lies within me dormant waiting for the right circumstances to bring it out. I never thought I was capable of such a thing, but that mental battle was real and it was all I could do to keep from committing it. That night I began to pay more attention to my thoughts and where I let them go. I also started to keep myself from certain situations that I thought I was immune to. Guarding my heart became something I did rather than just something I read about in the Bible. If every sin was hiding in my heart, waiting for the right moment and circumstances to align, I needed to be more cautious.

David must have had one of those moments too. In Psalm 19:12, he prayed, “How can I know all the sins lurking in my heart? Cleanse me from these hidden faults” (NLT). He found out that every one of us are capable of any sin, but he also knew that the remedy was knowing God’s Word and seeking Him for help. In verse 11, referencing God’s Word, he wrote, “They are a warning to your servant, a great reward for those who obey them.” The Bible is a lamp and a light (Psalm 119:105). It exposes hidden sins, faults and thoughts, as well as it shows you what to do. Jesus used the Word of God to keep from sinning as He was tempted. It’s a powerful weapon in our arsenal against sin, but you can only be equipped with it if you know it. Don’t fall prey to the hidden sins in your heart. Be proactive by putting God’s Word in your heart so that you won’t sin against Him (Psalm 119:11).

Photo by Kelly Sikkema on Unsplash

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June 17, 2020 · 5:51 AM

Becoming Christlike

A book on spiritual growth that I’m reading discusses the different stages we go through as believers. There are two different places that mature believers fall into. Both look very similar on paper and in actions, but there is a huge gap between them. In both stages the believer has the spiritual disciplines of reading the Bible, praying, fasting, sharing their faith, serving others, seeking God and hearing His voice. However, the thing that creates the biggest gap between a person who is close to Christ and Christlike is how they run their life. A person who is close to Christ seeks God for direction in their life, but is still at the steering wheel determining to obey or not. The person who is Christ-like gets out of the driver’s seat and fully trusts God to guide their life. On paper it looks like a minimal difference, but in reality, it’s a huge gap.

In Mark 8:34 Jesus said, “Anyone who intends to come with me has to let me lead. You’re not in the driver’s seat; I am” (MSG). It’s a pretty serious statement He made to us, but it’s what He desires from each of us. He’s not going to come in and wreck your life, but He is going to want full control of it. He made this statement immediately after having to rebuke Peter. A few verses before, Peter famously declared that he understood Jesus was the Messiah and savior. He was a believer, but then when Jesus talked about being killed, Peter took Him aside and reprimanded Jesus because that’s not the way he thought things should go. Peter is representative of those who are close to Christ in this incident. We argue with Jesus when His plan doesn’t make sense and then choose to do our own thing. Think about that. He knew Jesus was God the Messiah, yet he reprimanded Him.

Just like a Peter, you and I must get to the place where we quit trying to call the shots for our lives. We can’t be the ones who reprimand and argue with a God when we don’t like what He’s asking of us. If we find ourselves in that position, we haven’t fully let Jesus get in the driver’s seat. It doesn’t mean we’re not moving in that direction or we’re bad people. It just means there’s room for growth. Each one of us are called to continue moving and growing into a person that fully trusts God with our lives. It’s a hard thing to do, but it’s also what He’s asking of us. Don’t let fear of the unknown keep you from knowing God more. When we accept Jesus, we begin the process of letting go of what’s important to us and begin to embrace what’s important to God. Just like Peter, we’re going to experience some bumps along the road, but if we keep moving closer to Jesus, we will become more and more Christlike.

Photo by Giorgio Trovato on Unsplash

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June 10, 2020 · 5:54 AM

Taking A Break

Ever since I was a kid, I’ve been a person on the go. I didn’t like naps then, and I don’t like them now. Instead of forcing me to take a nap, my mom would have me come inside each day between 1-3. It was her way of getting me out of the heat and forcing me to sit down. These days, that’s my wife’s job. She tells me when I’m too busy or when I need to take a break. I giver her push back like i gave it to my mom. Taking breaks and naps just seem so unproductive and and feel like a waste of time to me. The truth is that they are probably the most productive because they reenergize, refresh and refocus me. In the moment I can’t see that, but it’s true.

When I take what John wrote about Jesus saying that all the books in the world couldn’t contain all the things He did during those three years of ministry, and I read how the crowds constantly followed Him seeking healing, I know He was busy about His Father’s business. From sun up to sun down, day in and day out, Jesus was followed by crowds seeking something from Him. They followed Him in boats, walked miles around the Sea of Galilee just to meet Him on the other side. He was busy, busy, busy, but He also took time to rest. Even when the disciples came back after being sent out to preach, He made them rest. Mark 6:31 says, “There was such a swirl of activity around Jesus, with so many people coming and going, that they were unable to even eat a meal. So Jesus said to his disciples, ‘Come, let’s take a break and find a secluded place where you can rest a while’” (TPT).

When’s the last time you took a break? I mean a real break where you stepped aside, quit thinking and worrying about everything and just rested? If you can’t think of it, that’s been too long. God designed your body and your brain to need a break. Jesus constantly took them and He was still productive. God took a break after creating everything just to show us we need one. The word “Sabbath” means “to stop”. It’s not that the things you’re doing aren’t important. It’s that it’s more important to stop often. Your life and health are more important than the things you’re doing. If you’re busy like me, you’ll need to schedule your break and put it on your calendar. Taking a break is just as godly as being busy.

Photo by Jeremy Bishop on Unsplash

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June 9, 2020 · 5:46 AM

Curing Sin

People will often ask me, “Why would you drive six hours one way to go to the doctor?” It’s a legitimate question. My answer is always the same, “He is interested in curing me instead of treating me.” There’s a big difference between the two. Most of the American system of healthcare is designed to treat the symptoms of a disease instead of attacking it at its root because the money is in treating it rather than curing it. Think of all the over the counter medicine we buy. We’re reading the symptoms on the box that it treats so that we can be relieved of them for about four hours. Then, we have to take that medicine again just to get rid of the symptoms again. We go back and buy a new bottle when we run out. What if there was a medicine that stopped what was causing the symptoms with one dose? Would you rather take that? That’s the difference in treating diseases versus curing them.

That same line of thinking that treats the symptoms creeps into our Christianity. We look at the symptoms of our brokenness and try to treat them. Each of us have certain propensities to sin based on the way we’re broken inside. We get mad at ourselves for falling for the same temptations over and over and vow not to commit that particular sin again. We try to remove the triggers, we try to make sure we’re not in those situations again or we think we somehow have the willpower to beat it. None of those work because they’re dealing with the fruit of the sin rather than the root of it. As long as we do that, we will continue to commit the same sins over and over. We’re been conditioned to think our salvation is based on our behavior rather than God’s grace.

In Mark 2, Jesus was addressing the same thinking in the Pharisees. Some friends lowered a guy through a ceiling to be healed by Jesus. The first thing Jesus told him was that his sins were forgiven. Why? Because that was his greatest need. His physical condition was a result of the fall of man. He then healed the man, but the Pharisees got angry. Jesus later called Matthew and then went to his house for dinner. The Pharisees couldn’t believe Jesus’ behavior because their relationship with God was based on symptoms and behaviors rather than grace. I’m verse 17, Jesus replied, “Who goes to the doctor for a cure? Those who are well or those who are sick? I have not come to call the ‘righteous,’ but to call those who are sinners and bring them to repentance” (TPT). Jesus didn’t die to relieve the symptoms of a fallen world. He died to make you whole and to cure the disease of sin within you.

Photo by Adam Nieścioruk on Unsplash

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June 3, 2020 · 6:00 AM

The Master’s Hand

I’ve been thinking of an old poem by Myra Brooks Welch turned into song and sung by Wayne Watson. It’s called, “The Old Violin: The Touch Of The Master’s Hand”. It starts off, “’Twas battered and scarred, and the auctioneer thought it hardly worth his while, to waste his time on the old violin, but he held it up with a smile.” He asked for a dollar for it, maybe two. Then an old man came up, tuned it and played a beautiful melody. The auctioneer then asked for $1,000. It then switches and says, “And many a man with life out of tune, all battered and bruised with hardship, is auctioned cheap to a thoughtless crowd, much like that old violin…But the Master comes, and the foolish crowd never can understand, the worth of a soul and the change that is wrought by the touch of the Master’s hand.”

In Matthew 14, Jesus is grieving John the Baptist’s death and just wants to be alone. He gets in a boat and sails to the middle of the Sea of Galilee, but the crowds follow His every move from the shore. He goes to the shore and heals the sick all day long. By late afternoon, the disciples catch up and presume to tell Jesus what to do. “You should send the crowds away to the nearby villages to buy themselves some food.” But Jesus has other plans and told them to feed the crowd. They answered in verse 17, “But all we have is five barley loaves and two fish.” “Let me have them,” Jesus replied” (TPT). He then fed the 5,000+ crowd with so little.

If you’re like me, you look at your life and say, “God, how can use you me? I have so little to offer.” But going back to the poem and the story in the Bible, value is measured based on whose hands something is in. You and I can only do so much with what I have to maximize our potential. The exponential change and growth happens when we surrender our lives to Him and place them in His hands. Your background, past and brokenness limit you in your own hands, but becomes limitless in His. Where you disqualify yourself, He tunes up and plays a beautiful melody that touches others. Submitting our life to Him is the greatest thing any one of us can do because that’s when we place it in the Master’s Hands.

Photo by Kenny Luo on Unsplash

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June 2, 2020 · 5:56 AM

Motives Matter

In one of the sales psychology courses I took and later trained, there was an assessment you had to take beforehand. In the class, we read through 12 types of individuals and their accompanying behaviors, then we got our results. Mine said I was a Hyper Pro. I took it as a badge of honor when I saw the title. Who wouldn’t want to be hyper professional? Then I started reading the description, the behaviors and how it was holding me back. One of the things it said was that I project success in order to attain success, meaning I care more about my outward appearance hoping it would influence the buyer. In my mind, it was questioning my motives and I took offense to the assessment. That night I was discussing the results with my wife and how upset it made me. She listened to me vent, then simply asked, “But is it true?”

No one likes to have their motives questioned, but it’s something good to examine constantly. The answer to her question changed my life and how I live it. I realized I needed other people’s approval and it was driving so many areas of my life. My motives for how I dressed, what I drove, where I lived were for others. God challenged me that night to get to the root of my need in doing things. While man looks at outward appearances, God looks at our heart and motives. Are we doing things so that we look good and get the accolades? Are we trying to impress others, influence them, get “likes” or shares so that our name is magnified? Those are tough questions to sit down and answer as you look in the mirror.

Matthew 6:1 says, “Examine your motives to make sure you’re not showing off when you do your good deeds, only to be admired by others; otherwise, you will lose the reward of your Heavenly Father” (TPT). Each of us are to examine our motives in all areas of our lives, but especially those where we are representing God. If we’re doing it so people will think better of us, we’ve got our reward. Verse 3 tells us how to keep things in check. “But when you demonstrate generosity, do it with pure motives and without drawing attention to yourself.” Can you give, help or represent God without trying to show the world to garner “likes” or accolades? I’m not saying we shouldn’t record, post or promote what we’re doing. I’m saying, we need to check our motives first. Motives matter to God.

Thanks to @styleanthropy for making this photo available freely on @unsplash

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June 1, 2020 · 6:01 AM

Migration Season

One of the things we love to do is to sit at our table and watch the birds eat out of our feeders. There’s something mesmerizing about watching the different birds fly up, get a couple of seeds, then fly off into the trees. Recently my son asked me, “Why do you have to take down the feeders every year?” I explained, “Our feeders are an unnatural source of food for the birds. God designed them to find their own food. Normally, when their natural source of food dries up, the migrate south for the winter. If I keep this food out, they possibly won’t migrate like they’re supposed to and could die here.” My son was satisfied with the answer, but my wife said, “Did you hear the deep spiritual truth in there?”

In 1 Kings 17, Elijah declared there would be no rain in Israel until he said so. Then the Lord told him to go east to a certain brook where he would give him water from the brook and have ravens feed him. Verse 7 then tells us that the brook he had been drinking from dried up due to lack of rain. In verse 9, the Lord said to Elijah, “Now go to the town of Zarephath, near Sidon, and stay there. I have commanded a widow who lives there to feed you” (GNT). When he arrived, he found a widow collecting sticks so she could build a fire and have her last meal. Instead, she gave it to Elijah and God blessed her with a supernatural source of flour and oil.

I believe God is constantly migrating us from one place to another. We’ve all been through dry seasons where we seem to search for God and can’t find Him. I believe those are migration season where God is calling us into a deeper relationship with Him. We have a choice in those times. Are we going to stay put looking for unnatural food sources or are we going to follow where God is leading us? The Christian life is not a stagnant one. There’s always more for us to find and grow into. Even Paul said he had not yet attained perfection in Philippians 3. He followed that up with verse 14 saying, “So I run straight toward the goal in order to win the prize, which is God’s call through Christ Jesus to the life above.” He kept moving, and so should we. Where is God migrating you to next? It’s time to leave the unnatural sources of food.

Thanks to @inuetc for making this photo available freely on @unsplash

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May 21, 2020 · 5:30 AM

Prepare Today

I believe it was Coach Wooden who said, “When opportunity knocks, it’s too late to prepare.” The window for an opportunity that shows up in our life is usually very brief. You won’t have time to do all the prep work necessary and seize the opportunity in most cases. We should always be ready by doing the prep work ahead of time. The problem is that human nature doesn’t want to put in the work when there’s not even an opportunity on the horizon. Those who have done the work ahead of time are the ones who make the most of every opportunity that comes their way.

I believe that God presents every one of us with opportunities that we should be prepared for. How can we give to a need if we haven’t saved any money? How can we answer spiritual questions if we haven’t studied the Bible? How can we tear down strongholds if we haven’t fasted? How can we be prepared for His return if we don’t have enough oil in our lamps? There are so many things that I believe God can do through us if only we would spend the time laying the groundwork of preparation.

Proverbs 24:27 says, “First plant your fields; then build your barn” (MSG). We need to make sure we are doing things in the proper order in our life. Too many times we want the barn without taking time to til the soil and plant. That’s not how things work. If you want God to use you in a certain way, there are things you need to be doing today to prepare for it. Be faithful in the preparation and God will trust you with the opportunities that He has for you. Don’t delay. Start today.

Thanks to @JestNinja for making this photo available freely on @unsplash

Throwback Thursday is a feature I’m using to help build some margin into my schedule to pursue other writing ventures. Each Thursday I’ll be bringing you a previously written devotional that still speaks encouragement to us from God’s Word.

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May 19, 2020 · 6:00 AM

Becoming Spiritually Hungry

When I was in my early twenties, I lived in Cairo, Egypt. After being there a few months, I began to get hungry for some home cooking. I reached out to my mom and she sent me some recipes so I could have a taste of what I was missing. On other occasions, a few of us would sit around and talk about what we were hungry for. Then there were rumors that a Taco Bell was opening up in a certain part of the city. I would ask around to see if it was true. I even went down there a few times to look for it. I was hungry for more than what the country offered. In the process, I found some really great places to eat, but that hunger in me grew so much that I began to plan my first meal back in the States.

Being spiritually hungry is pretty similar. It’s a desire that’s inside of you that needs to be fostered. It starts with a thought, “I wish I could experience God like that person.” It could even be the desire to know God like you once did or to feel His presence when you’re missing it. That stirring should push you to move and do something different in order to experience it. Those thoughts should challenge you to seek others who are experiencing God in a way that you never have to find out what they’re doing, how they’re studying and what they’re reading. Spiritual hunger should motivate you to fill it much like hunger in your belly does. You don’t just sit around thinking, “I’m hungry.” Chances are, you get up, go to the pantry and start digging around for something to meet that need. God wants us to dig through His Word looking for sustenance.

Proverbs 18:15 says, “The spiritually hungry are always ready to learn more, for their hearts are eager to discover new truths” (TPT). There are depths of God that you and I have yet to experience and discover. The amount we will learn and know about God is in direct proportion to how much we hunger for Him. Are you satisfied with only a snack? Are you content to stay where you are? Do you feel like you know Him enough? Challenge yourself in these areas. Stir up that hunger within you to know and experience more of Him. That’s how you grow and mature in your faith. You feed the desire to know Him more and by praying for Him to reveal more of Himself to you. It requires effort on your part to get up earlier, to stay up later, to block out distractions, to read more, to listen more and to seek more than you have. God is willing and able to satisfy your spiritual hunger, but you must be ready to learn and discover more.

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May 15, 2020 · 6:08 AM

A Worthy Life

One of the most iconic scenes from the movie “Saving Private Ryan” comes when Tom Hanks character is dying. He looks at Private Ryan and whispers with his dying breath, “Earn this.” It’s a powerful scene that leaves an indelible mark on Private Ryan’s life. The movie fast forwards to the end of Ryan’s life where’s he’s in Arlington National Cemetery and he’s reminiscing. He looks at his wife, with desperation in his voice, he tells his wife, “Tell me I’ve led a great life. Tell me I’m a good man.” His sole desire in life was to live a life worthy of the sacrifice of the men who died to save him.

You and I are called to live a life that is worthy of the sacrifice that’s been made for us. We’re to constantly keep in mind what Jesus did for us so that we live in a manner that is fitting of His name. We don’t have to do it alone though. God has given us the Holy Spirit to guide us. He has also given us a robe of righteousness through Christ so that we don’t try to earn our salvation or think our actions make us right with God. To live a worthy life is to live in a manner consistent with what’s been done for us in appreciation. We take the elements of the last supper in remembrance so that we will keep in mind the sacrifice that was made and to lead us into lives worthy of His name through God’s enabling.

Here are some Bible verses on living a worthy life.

1. So we keep on praying for you, asking our God to enable you to live a life worthy of his call. May he give you the power to accomplish all the good things your faith prompts you to do.

2 Thessalonians 1:11 NLT

2. Therefore, we speak of you with pride among the churches of God for your steadfastness [your unflinching endurance, and patience] and your firm faith in the midst of all the persecution and [crushing] distress which you endure. This is a positive proof of the righteous judgment of God [a sign of His fair verdict], so that you will be considered worthy of His kingdom, for which indeed you are suffering.

2 Thessalonians 1:4-5 AMP

3. Your hearts can soar with joyful gratitude when you think of how God made you worthy to receive the glorious inheritance freely given to us by living in the light.

Colossians 1:12 TPT

4. Therefore I, a prisoner for serving the Lord, beg you to lead a life worthy of your calling, for you have been called by God.

Ephesians 4:1 NLT

5. Above all, you must live as citizens of heaven, conducting yourselves in a manner worthy of the Good News about Christ. Then, whether I come and see you again or only hear about you, I will know that you are standing together with one spirit and one purpose, fighting together for the faith, which is the Good News.

Philippians 1:27 NLT

Photo by Joshua Earle on Unsplash

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