Tag Archives: Devotional

February 20, 2013 · 8:19 AM

God’s Golden Scepter

I love the story of Esther. There are so many old things in that book that I could go on and on for days. If you aren’t familiar with her story, the king had a beautiful wife and wanted to show her off after partying for seven days. When she refused to be shown off, he killed her. He then held a beauty pageant to find a new queen. Enter Esther. She was an orphan who was raised by her cousin Mordecai. The king loved her more than the others and made her queen.

After some time the king promoted a man named Haman. He was prideful and arrogant. He wanted people to bow to him as he paraded through the streets. Everyone did except Mordecai. Haman was upset, talked to the king and got him to agree to kill all of Mordecai’s race. Mordecai sent word to Esther to see if she could go to the king for help since she was the queen. Esther’s response is what I want to discuss today. She said, “All the king’s officials and even the people in the provinces know that anyone who appears before the king in his inner court without being invited is doomed to die unless he holds out his golden scepter.”

The God we serve is the King of Kings. He is above all others who are here on this earth. He does not behave like earthly kings though. We don’t have to be afraid to go into His inner court. We do not have to worry about Him killing us if we go before Him without an invitation. In fact, He encourages it. There is nothing that God wants more than for you to pray and go before His throne.

Hebrews 4:16 says, “So let us come boldly to the throne of our gracious God. There we will receive His mercy, and we will find grace to help us when we need it most (NLT).” We don’t have to be afraid to enter the throne room of the King of Kings. The scripture says we’ll find both grace and mercy when we do! Esther didn’t think she would receive either when she went before the king. In fact, later on in her conversation, she knew she had to go in there to do something. She said, “Although it is against the law, I will go in to see the king. If I must die, I must die.”

When is the last time you went to God that determined with your needs? When is the last time you were willing to risk everything by going to God and entering into His presence to the point that you were willing to die? I think if our prayers had that kind of guts, that kind of determination and that kind of boldness we’d see a lot more answered. Instead our prayers are weak, timid and frail. I’m putting myself in the mix with you. I’m guilty of offering timid prayers.

God honors bold prayers. He honors us if we are willing to go beyond the outer courts of His presence and enter into the inner courts. Hebrews 4:16 ends with “we will find grace when we need it most.” When we need something most, we don’t let barricades stand in our way. We don’t let what others will think of us sway us. We don’t let tradition stop us. We go to God in desperate need with boldness to present our needs. When we do that, He will raise His golden scepter and we will receive mercy.

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February 18, 2013 · 7:04 AM

Stop. Breathe. Pray.

I, like you, have a pretty busy day and week ahead of me. From the moment I woke up I started thinking of all the things I need to do to accomplish everything today. My mind races to find solutions to scheduling conflicts, deadlines and how to be in two places at once. I’ve got a to-do list a mile long and a very short time to accomplish it. I’ve got a presentation today to give at 9, but I’ve got several hours of work that need to be done before I start it. With all of that happening, do I have time for God?

It’s tough not to put God on a back burner on a day like today. He’s the easiest one to “reschedule”, but He’s the last one I need to reschedule. “He’ll understand”, I reason in my mind. “I’ll read my Bible and pray later”, I tell myself. The truth is that I won’t have the time later either. If I don’t make Him a priority right now, I won’t make Him one later. If I don’t slow down now and take time to reflect on Him and His Word, I won’t do it.

God told David, “Be still and know that I am God.” David was a king and I’m sure he had a lot on his plate too. He would cry out to God in times of need and celebration. He would throw those 911 prayers up to Heaven like you and I often do. “God, I have a lot to do today. Help me to get it all done”, is what we pray. God wants more than that. He wants us to stop, take a moment and spend some time with Him.

The subject of “The Passion of the Christ” movie came up in our class yesterday. Those vivid images portrayed in the movie of what Jesus did on the cross came back to my mind. Then I thought, “Think of what Christ went through and what He did for us. What does He ask of us in return? It’s not as much as what He did.” He took time out of His eternity to come into our temporary. He went to the cross to suffer and die so that I could spend time with Him. Until the cross, we were separated. We couldn’t have the personal time that we now enjoy.

He paid a huge price. The least I can do is sacrifice a few minutes with Him in a jam packed day. To be still and know that He is God. To rest in His presence and to concentrate on Him. To reflect on the sacrifice He made for me. The other things on my schedule can wait. My phone has already begun to make noises reminding me of appointments. My email is coming through asking for answers. Silencing it is more important right now to me so that I can know Him more.

In the world we live in, it’s easy to mix up the temporary with the eternal. It’s easy to reverse their importance. Today, stop. Breathe. Meditate on His Word. Thank Him. Rest in His arms before you do anything else. Give Him more than a 911 prayer and truly thank Him for another day of life. Thank Him that you have things on your schedule. Know that He is God and really that’s what matters more than anything else I’ll accomplish today.

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February 15, 2013 · 8:11 AM

Your Soul Purpose

I heard the story of a rich man who was very ill. He was intent on taking His wealth to Heaven with him when he died. He cried out to Peter and begged him if he could bring his wealth to Heaven. Peter finally relented, but told him he could only bring what he could fit in a suitcase. The man bought the biggest suitcase he could find and converted his wealth to gold. As the time came near to his death, he loaded the suitcase with his gold.

When he died, he took the suitcase with him to the Pearly Gates. An angel saw him with the suitcase and stopped him. He was told he couldn’t bring anything to Heaven. He replied that he had spoken to Peter about it and assured the angel it was all right. The angel was curious what he could possibly have that was so valuable that he needed to bring it to Heaven. He asked the man if he could see what was in the case. When the man opened the suitcase, the puzzled angel asked, “Why did you need to bring these street paving stones to Heaven? We have plenty.”

We often put our value on things that are of no value to God. We forget that we are not of this world and allow our minds to be transformed into the thinking of this world. The world says, “Make as much money as you can as fast as you can.” Why? You can’t take it with you. It has no eternal value. The money you make here will be left behind for someone else to spend.

I’m not against making money. I’m against that being the sole purpose of our lives. Jesus said, “I must be about my Father’s business.” What was the Father’s business? Making sure that none would perish. Jesus spent His entire ministry helping the poor, the sick and the oppressed. He was concerned about the souls of men rather than getting wealthy. Winning the lost should be our soul purpose not accumulating wealth.

In Philippians 3:8, Paul says, “Everything else is worthless when compared with the infinite value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord (NLT).” Everything else. Not some things. Everything else is worthless compared to knowing Christ. This kind of thinking doesn’t make sense in the eyes of the world. In fact, I Corinthians 1:18 says, “The message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing.” It is opposite of their thinking.

We need to be about the Father’s business and increase the knowledge of Him in others. In truth, a soul lasts forever, not your bank account. Jesus said, “Where your treasure is, there will your heart be also.” What do you treasure? Do you look at the lives and souls of others as a treasure worth investing in or do you look at the stock market and accumulating wealth as worth investing in? Do your actions show that? I’ll leave you with Romans 12:2 from the Message to think about.

Don’t become so well-adjusted to your culture that you fit into it without even thinking. Instead, fix your attention on God. You’ll be changed from the inside out. Readily recognize what he wants from you, and quickly respond to it. (Romans 12:2a MSG)

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February 13, 2013 · 9:21 AM

Foggy Vision

It’s often foggy when I drive to work in the mornings. It gets so thick I can hardly see very far in front of me. I know where I’m headed, but the exits and interchanges are difficult to see in the fog. I typically have to drive slower on days like that to make sure I don’t wreck or miss an exit. As the sun comes up, the fog begins to dissipate and my vision becomes clearer.

I think it’s a lot like that for most of us when it comes to God’s plan and vision for our life. We might know where God has us going in this life, but we can’t see very far into the future. When we look down the road of our life, all we see is cloudiness and very few street signs. It’s hard to know which way to go, where to turn or when to brake. Others pass us as if the fog doesn’t exist. Are they being careless or is their vision somehow more clear than our own?

I know personally how difficult it is to not be able to see very far ahead. I know I’m heading in the direction that God told me to go. I don’t want to end up like the Israelites where I’m wandering in the desert for 40 years. I want to know where the Jordan river in my life is and make my way to it. I want to be camped on its banks when God says, “It’s ok to cross it now. I have dammed the river up and you can cross on dry ground.”

There are choices we can make when dealing with the inability to see very far ahead in our lives. The first choice is to be frozen by fear of the unknown and to stay where we are. I’ve always heard people say, “If you aren’t moving forward, you’re moving backward.” The longer it takes me to move forward, the longer it will be until we get to where He wants us. What if Abraham had waited around when God said, “Go to the land that I will show you”? What would have happened if he had stayed where he was until God showed him where he wanted to go?

God simply said, “Go.” God can correct our direction and movement, but only if we’re moving. He can’t change our course if we are sitting around. That brings us to our next choice. We can move in the fog and deal with the limited sight distance. I’ve noticed that when I move forward in a fog, I can see a little further than I could from where I was. Each step forward reveals things I had not seen before. I begin to see the signs I couldn’t see before. Moving forward in faith reveals more of God’s plan.

The more time I spend with God, the more I allow His light to shine in my life. If I lift up the Son in all I do, I’ve found that my focus changes from the fog to pleasing Him. The fog is lifted because my faith has grown and my vision improves. I begin to see further down the road than I had. Jeremiah 29:11 tells us that God has plans for us. They are good plans and we need to trust Him one step at a time. He will reveal those plans for us as we move closer to Him and in the direction He is sending us.

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February 11, 2013 · 10:05 AM

The Domino Effect

Ten years ago today a friend and employee of mine died in a car crash. The crash killed her husband and daughter as well. Her two year old son survived, but was handicapped by the wreck and was in the hospital for a long time. Their deaths would be the first domino that would fall in my life and set off a chain reaction that wouldn’t stop until October of that same year.

While I would spend my spare time visiting their son in the ICU in downtown Houston, my wife would use her newly found free time to indulge deeper into a relationship she had started at work. I would then be brought into a custody battle for the son of my deceased friend and have to testify about people I had known for years. It was uncomfortable and not what I wanted. Not long after the custody battle I discovered my wife’s affair. That sent me deeper in depression.

One domino after another seemed to fall. While dealing with that, the landlord where I had my business decided not to renew my lease. The places where I kept trying to sign leases kept falling through. I finally found a place, but it would take a while to renovate. When I was almost done, the city inspector came in and made me tear it all down and start over. More money was lost. Time and energy that I didn’t have were being drained.

I had to take on a partner to help get the job done. While we were redoing everything, the IRS came and wanted back taxes I couldn’t pay. They threatened to take everything. The partner took over the business, but not my debts. The creditors called, knocked and harassed like they do. I ended up filing bankruptcy and losing everything. I started making half what I was and couldn’t afford my house or car. In October, my divorce was finalized and the last domino had fallen. I was tired, depressed and hopeless.

It took me a while before I started picking up the pieces of my life and began to put it back together. There aren’t many people actively involved in my life now who were there then. Everything in my life was turned over including friends. My life is not perfect, but I can tell you I’m a long way from where I was ten years ago. God has done some amazing things in my life and has restored to me more than what I lost. Enough had happened to me that I could have spent the rest of my life bitter, angry and depressed. I had every right to.

That’s not how God wants us to respond to adversity though. Those times in our lives build endurance. They build character. They leave scars and deep wounds too. I’m ten years out and I still break down when I think about the pain I suffered. It’s still real. I also am humbled when I look back and see that God never left me during that time. Even though I couldn’t see Him or feel Him then, I see now that He was working everything out for my good.

You may be going through a lot worse today. I don’t know. What I do know is that God has not left you nor has He forsaken you. Don’t believe the lies that He left you alone to struggle as the dominos in your life fall. He is creating something beautiful in your life and is preparing you for what’s ahead. Don’t give up or quit because you think there is no end to the falling dominos. They will stop at some point and you’ll find God at the end where He is waiting to build again.

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February 8, 2013 · 10:42 AM

Joy in the Struggle

How do you find joy in the middle of a struggle? When your world is caving in on all sides, is it possible to still have peace and strength? I believe it is. We often confuse joy and happiness. They are completely different. Happiness is dependent on circumstances. Joy is not. It is something that lives in you and gives you strength to move forward when you don’t have the strength on your own. It is what keeps you going when everything tells you to quit.

I know what it’s like to struggle to find the will to live each day. I’ve faced things in my life that broke me. My brother would call me every hour just to make sure I was alive. I finally told him that I wasn’t going to give up or give in to everything that was coming against me. Each night as I laid in bed I would repeat Nehemiah 8:10. It says, “The joy of The Lord is your (my) strength.”

In our daily lives we have a choice to make. Are we going to let ourselves be destroyed by our circumstances or we going to endure them? None of us are exempt from having bad things happening to us. None of us are exempt from being dealt one bad thing after another until we reach our breaking point. Happiness will not help you get through them. If your strength is dependent on happiness, you will quickly crumble and fail. Depression will set in and your struggles will be compounded.

Great men of faith on the Bible endured their trials and tests because they kept in mind that the things that were coming against them were not an attack from God. They were tests to prove and strengthen their faith. Each person that endures hardships comes away with a deeper faith and is stronger for it. I found that what helped me was to keep in mind the promises that God had made to me. I think the people in the Bible did the same. They didn’t let their circumstances override what they knew about God. They hung on to the hope of better days ahead.

One of my favorite scriptures that helped me and still does when I go through struggles is Romans 5:3-5. It says, ” We can rejoice, too, when we run into problems and trials, for we know that they help us develop endurance. And endurance develops strength of character, and character strengthens our confident hope of salvation. And this hope will not lead to disappointment. For we know how dearly God loves us, because he has given us the Holy Spirit to fill our hearts with his love. (NLT)”

Whatever you’re going through today, the struggles, the fears, the stresses, God sees you and is building you up. A person who works out doesn’t grow unless they push themselves further than they can go. You cannot get to where God wants you without being stretched. It is tiring. It is painful. It is tearful. You can rejoice and have joy as the scripture says when you are going through things because it still means God is moving you to where He wants you and He knows you can do it.

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January 30, 2013 · 7:44 AM

Chopping Trees

I’m reading “Greater” by Steven Furtick right now. I’m only a few chapters in, but already I am being challenged. The premise of the book is to dream big, start small. I’ve had no problem dreaming. It’s the starting that is the problem. When you have a big dream, it’s natural to think you have to start big. In reality, you have to do the little things first.

Noah was called to build a big boat. His small start was chopping down the first tree. Think about that. He didn’t have a Home Depot to go to in order to buy the lumber he needed. He had to chop down trees, form them into lumber and then build the boat. That’s a lot of work. I think that my problem, as well as others, is that when God gives us a dream, we think He’s going to do everything and we forget we have to work towards that dream.

God plants the design and the desire in us, but we are the ones who have to walk by faith to make it happen. We have to chop down the trees and build what God has planted in us so that when the time comes for us to do what He called us to do, we’re ready. If Noah had waited until he saw a storm cloud to chop down the first tree, it would have been too late. The time to build an ark is while it’s sunny, not when the storm clouds are on the horizon.

It took Noah 120 years to build the ark. None of us have that kind of time, but it shows that just because God plants a dream in us, it doesn’t mean it’s going to happen overnight. We may have to chop trees for a while. We may even cut down an entire forest before that dream becomes a reality. In that time of preparation is when our faith is tested. Thoughts like “Did I really hear from God” and “What if I do all of this and nothing comes from it” pop in our head to challenge us and cause doubt.

It’s in the chopping of trees that our faith grows. It’s believing God when we can’t see ourselves getting closer to the dream. Faith is knowing we heard from God and continuing to work towards that dream even though we can’t see how it will ever happen. Hebrews 11:1 says, “Faith is the confidence that what we hope for will actually happen; it gives us assurance about things we cannot see.”

If I could see the entire road and how it would happen, it wouldn’t be faith. Faith is about believing God when all I see are trees. It’s about putting it all out there and trusting God with everything. Others may laugh, ridicule or even stand in your way, but you have to keep building. You have to keep chopping. You have to keep trusting so that when the time comes for the fulfillment of your dream, you’re ready.

Noah could have dreamed about the ark for 120 years and then prayed for a miracle once the storm clouds started rolling in. Thank God he didn’t. He would have been in disobedience if he had only dreamed and never picked up an ax. Because he took small steps toward his dream, his family and the animals were saved. There’s no telling how many will be saved by your obedience. You’ll never know unless you start chopping.

What dream has God placed in you? What trees do you need to start chopping?

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January 29, 2013 · 7:41 AM

When You Can’t Hear God

I heard a joke last night that I want to share. There was an older man who went to the doctor. He told the doctor that he thought his wife was going deaf. The doctor thought for a minute and then told him how to test it. So the man went home eager to try what the doctor had told him. He got about 20 feet away from his wife with her back to him and asked, “Honey, what’s for dinner?” She didn’t reply so he moved closer. He asked again and got the same result. He moved closer still and asked again. With no reply again, he moved about 5 feet away from her and asked. This time she answered in an agitated voice and said, “For the fourth time, we’re having lasagne!”

I think that’s how we are with God a lot of the time. We keep asking questions and think he is deaf to our prayers. We ask over and over again with no reply. We start to believe that God doesn’t hear us or that He doesn’t care. Neither is the case. Too often, we are the ones who are deaf (or blind) to His answers. We are the ones who are too far away to hear Him speaking to us. The problem is we don’t move closer to hear Him. We end up moving further away because we think He doesn’t care.

If you think God is deaf to your prayers or isn’t answering you, move closer and ask again. James 4:8 tells us, “Come close to God and God will come close to you.” It doesn’t say, “When God comes close to you, you come close to God.” The first move is yours. We are the ones who have to take a step closer to God first. So how do you do that? It’s the same way you would get closer to anyone else you have a relationship with.

The first thing you need to do is make time for Him and then spend time with Him. Anyone that you are close friends with, you spend time with. That’s how you get close with someone. You carve out time from your busy schedule according to how important they are to you. The more important it is to spend time getting to know them, the more time you will create for them. How important is God to you based on that? Have you given Him much time lately? The good news is you can start carving out time today.

Another thing you do with someone you want to be closer to is communicate with them. Communication with Him is as simple as talking. He’s with you wherever you are waiting to Hear from you. He doesn’t want to just hear all your requests. He wants you to open up and talk to Him. Share with Him your darkest secrets, hidden fears and unrealistic hopes. That’s a sign of being close with someone. He wants to listen and reply, but you need to move closer to hear Him.

I know these aren’t the only steps to moving closer to God, but if you do them, they will get you closer than you are now. The good news is that your moves toward God are doubled because He is moving closer to you. I like that. It’s a two for one deal and all you have to do is take a step. Soon enough you will hear (or see) His replies. He’s been talking this whole time, you just haven’t been close enough to hear.

What steps have you taken that others can take to move closer to God? I’d love to hear about them.

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January 28, 2013 · 7:57 AM

The “Why”

I’m the type of person who likes to know the “why” behind a task before I do it. It drives my wife crazy. Even yesterday she asked me, “Why can’t you just do what I asked without knowing why?” I like knowing the intention, purpose and final outcome before I do something so I know its importance and how to prioritize my time and effort towards it. It wouldn’t be bad if it were just a couple of things, but that thinking bleeds into every task including those God asks me to do.

I’m sure that He, like my wife, gets frustrated with me. Even when God asks me to do something, I still like to know the “why” and the final outcome. What I’ve found is that more often than not, God doesn’t give me those. He expects me to trust Him blindly and to do what He asked without question. That is tough for me because it goes against my very nature.

When I look at the Heroes of Faith in Scripture, I see men and women who trusted and followed God without knowing the “why” behind everything. When God said, “Go”, they went. When God said, “Speak”, they spoke. A couple of them might have argued because they didn’t want to do it, but they really didn’t ask why. They knew that when God asks for something, you do it. You don’t argue with the details. He knows them and will give them to you when you need them.

That’s what faith is. Doing what you’re asked to do without knowing why or what the outcome will be. If God shared with us the “why” and what the end result would be, we wouldn’t be acting in faith, we’d be acting on knowledge. God didn’t call us to walk by knowledge. He called us to walk by faith. He knows that when we know the outcome, we will try to do things in our own strength to affect the outcome to what we think He wants.

Look at Abraham. When God told him that he would have a son and that all nations would be blessed through his descendants, he took matters into his own hands. His “knowledge” said that his wife couldn’t have kids and so God must have meant to have a kid through her maid. Had he walked by faith, he would have trusted God to do what He said and had a kid with his wife. That mistake cost him 14 years before he saw the promise fulfilled in Isaac.

I don’t want my need to know the “why” to cost me years of wandering when I could be enjoying the blessings of obedience instead. I want to trust God without knowing the final outcome. I’ve got a long way to go in that area before I’m there. Until that time, I will take the small steps and trust His direction without knowing the “why’s” until my faith is strong enough to take the giant steps He wants me to take. I don’t want to hear God ask me like my wife did, “Why can’t you just do what I asked without knowing why?” I would rather hear Him say, “Thanks for obeying. Here’s what happened because you did…”

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January 25, 2013 · 7:39 AM

What are you Worth?

Do you feel unworthy or just not good enough? You aren’t alone. There are many who see themselves that way and never reach the full potential God has for them. It’s easy to know how great God is and see yourself as small and insignificant, but that’s not how God sees you or wants you to see yourself. Yes, we are to be humble, but we are also to know who we are in Christ.

There is a difference in being humble and feeling insignificant or worthless. Humility is something that God honors. It’s having a right perspective of who we are and that what we have is God’s. Worthlessness is not a trait from God. It is a tactic from the enemy to keep you from tapping into the power of God in you. It will destroy you from within through thoughts that change how you see yourself.

How you see yourself reflects in how you behave and act. If you feel worthless, you draw back from others and become isolated. I’ve watched enough Discovery channel to know that a predator’s first goal is to separate you from the heard. Once you are isolated, he attacks. I Peter 5:8 says, the devil “roams around like a lion roaring in fierce hunger, seeking someone to seize upon and devour.” He isn’t seeking a group, he’s seeking someONE.

If you struggle with those feelings that are isolating you, I’ve been where you are. You can beat it. It’s not easy, but you can. Start with reading God’s Word. A few verses I like to read when I feel that way are Matthew 6:25-34, Luke 12:6-7 and I Peter 5:7. These verses talk about how much God cares for you and how much He values you. You don’t have to be great in the eyes of people to be great in the eyes of God. You are more precious to God than you can even imagine.

Don’t let those thoughts consume you. When they come into your mind, you have to fight back immediately. When Jesus was fasting, He was attacked mentally and each time He fought back with the Word of God. Bring those thoughts captive and speak the truth to them. Tell them and yourself who you are in Christ. Don’t dwell on them because then you start to believe them. You can’t believe the attacks of the enemy, but you can believe God’s Word.

Don’t be a victim, be a victor. There is safety in numbers. Don’t allow yourself to be separated from those who love you and will lift you up in prayer. Share with someone what you are struggling with. They can help you through encouragement, prayer and accountability. It takes some honesty on your part, but that vulnerability is worth more than the cost of succumbing to those thoughts and being devoured. You are a child of God, worth more than anything in this world. When God looks at you, He sees His child, His creation and someone He loves deeper than you can imagine.

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