It's Always Too Soon to Quit

For it is the God who commanded light to shine out of darkness, who has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. 2 Corinthians 4:6

I wish that I could have been there, you know, when God created the world.

What did it look like before He first spoke? All we know is that it was empty and void, filled with nothing and completely dark. Yet there He was, moving over the waters, and then He spoke-Let there be light!-and BOOM, light flooded the darkness and it was no longer empty. My eyes can't even stand turning on the bathroom light in the middle of the night, so I don't know how I'd handle it, but I'd just love to see the glorious scene of when God created light.

Thankfully, God gives each and every one of us the chance to have this very scene recreated in us. And thankfully all the more because so many of us these days feel like the darkness is so present in our own lives.

But here's the thing about darkness-it's a matter of perception. We know that we're surrounded by darkness when our senses perceive that it's dark, right? Well, if you're going to drive at night, when it's dark, then what do you do? You turn on your headlights. Or if you take a walk in the dark, what do you take with you? You bring along a flashlight.

And why do you use lights when it's dark? Because you know that as soon as you turn on the light, the darkness goes away. Darkness doesn't stand a chance against light! So then it's not dark anymore, at least not where you are, and your perception of things is quite different than just a moment before. In fact, your perception is so different that you can bring your light to everyone else who still thinks it's dark.

Your car has headlights, your lamp has light bulbs, but your light is none other than Jesus Himself. When you know the glory of God in Jesus Christ, then our verse today is clear that His light is already, right now shining inside of you.

Does seeing your life with the light of Jesus immediately change your circumstances? No, more often than not, it doesn't. However, it does give you light by which you can begin working with confidence to change them, which is a drastic improvement over life in the dark.

Most importantly, life in the light of Jesus means that you're never alone. And when you have Jesus with you, you can always say that it's way too soon to quit.

Prayer Lord Jesus,

Thank You for shining Your light in me, and thank You that I'm never alone! Thank You that I don't face the dark circumstances of my life by myself. I choose to look at my life through Your light so that I can have the strength to begin working my way up again.

Amen

A Better Day Ahead

I have loved you,' says the LORD. Yet you say, In what way have You loved us? Was not Esau Jacob's brother?' says the LORD. Yet Jacob I have loved; but Esau I have hated.' Malachi 1:2-3

If you don't want to go deep in a relationship, then you won't. It's true! If you don't want to have a relationship with someone, you can cut them out.

What's interesting in this is that a lot of people feel distant from God, like He's holding something back from them. But the reality is that God's not holding anything back. I mean, He gave His Son to die for us. So let's debunk this lie that so many of us have believed against God, reminding ourselves of a few things about how dearly God desires real relationship with us.

First, remember that God is the one who initiates. He has proven this first by creating us, which He didn't need to do, but did because He wanted to show us His love. Then He did it again by redeeming us through Jesus' death, which He didn't have to do, but chose to because He loved us.

Second, remember that God is the one who communicates. Now, you can't really know a person unless they communicate, right? Well, it just so happens that our God is the only god who speaks. In fact, He is the word made flesh, so we can see that communicating is at the very core of who He is.

Third, remember that God is the one who cooperates. What I mean by that is that He's not the one hindering the relationship. He comes close to us, and He's here to bless. He's here to serve. He's here to minister.

Fourth, remember that God is the one who associates. This is what Calvary is all about. This is our God, who took on human flesh so that He could associate with us, connect with us, unite with us, and partner with us, demonstrating in every way that He is a God who cares.

If God were to come to us today, there is nothing we could say that would somehow prove Him negligent toward our relationship with Him. Instead, He's the one who is always initiating, always communicating, always cooperating, always associating, and always loving.

God is continually calling us deeper into Himself and all He created us to be. The only question is whether we will answer Him.

Prayer Father God,

Thank You for loving me and being so steady in our relationship! I'm sorry for any way that I have doubted You, but I choose to believe You today. Please help me to be dependable for You, always loving You and growing into deeper relationship with You!

Amen

Sign Language

Therefore the Lord Himself will give you a sign: behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a Son, and shall call His name Immanuel. Isaiah 7:14

Have you ever seen a sign?

Of course you have; they're all over the place when you drive down the road, but that's not what I mean. I mean, have you seen a sign from God?

God does send signs to us, and they're purpose is to get our attention. To help us out with God's sign language, here are three ways that spell it all out for us:

Stop Imagining that God Never Signals to us. Stop thinking He doesn't care about your marriage, about your job, about the way you live your life. Stop thinking He's some distant deity who doesn't care. He does care, and He is always sending you signs saying, I'm over here, come follow me.

Symptoms Indicate Gross Negligence-Separates us from God. When God sent the prophet Isaiah to the kings of Israel, the people were severely out of step with God. Every single one of us has gone our own way at some point in our lives, and most of us do every day. We cannot allow ourselves to neglect our relationship with God and become separated from Him.

Savior Immanuel, God Now Supplies. This is the greatest sign that mankind has ever been given. A virgin conceived-impossible without God-and bore a son whose name was Immanuel, which means, God with us. God promised this sign during one of the most wicked times in Judah's history, sending a crystal clear signal, calling them to restoration, calling them to come back to Him, declaring His faithful love and that He still wanted them. This sign of Jesus-Immanuel, God with us-is still for us today, calling us and telling us how much God loves us.

God wants to give us mercy, and His signs testify to this desire in His heart. He points out to us, Wrong way, road closed, hoping that we will turn back to Him and embrace the ultimate sign of His Son, Immanuel.

It all comes down to whether we ignore the signs, or whether we want God with us in life.

Prayer Lord Jesus,

I want You with me every day! I want to know that You really are Immanuel, my God who is with me. Give me eyes to see the signs that You give me and a heart to understand them so that I can follow You!

Amen

Click Refresh

Then I turned to see...One like the Son of Man, clothed with a garment down to the feet and girded about the chest with a golden band. His head and hair were white like wool, white as snow, and His eyes like a flame of fire; His feet were like fine brass, as if refined in a furnace, and His voice as the sound of many waters; he had in His right hand seven stars, out of His mouth went a sharp two-edged sword, and His countenance was like the sun shining in its strength. And when I saw Him, I fell at His feet as dead. Revelation 1:12-17

We live in a casual culture. More and more I hear young people refer to their elders by first name. Many things have become so easy that we forget to respect those who paid a price to be where they are.

I have seen this in the Church, too, as families come in late to the service. Sometimes they skip the worship time altogether and only come for the teaching, or they leave right after worship and skip the teaching. It just doesn't fit their style, they say.

It's like people have forgotten why we come to church in the first place. Do you remember Who it is you come to worship? Do you know the One proclaimed in the sermon? It is time to refresh our vision of Jesus Christ.

All too often when we become friends with someone, we get lazy in the relationship. We begin to take one another for granted. We work hard to win our spouse before we get married by making time for dates, buying special gifts, calling at all the right times, and all that. But then after we get married, we act like we don't have to keep winning each other's hearts. We become familiar and forget to take each other seriously.

When you came to Jesus, chances are pretty good that it happened in a moment of need. You truly felt the weight of your sin and your need for a Savior, so you asked Jesus to come into heart and forgive you. You fell on your face before God and entered eternal life, seeing the revelation of Jesus as your Savior.

Can you still see Him? Or has the clutter of life crowded Him out of your vision? We need to hit the refresh button and see Him clearly. When we do, we will fall on our faces again and truly worship Him.

Prayer Lord Jesus,

I need a fresh revelation of You! I need to see You so that my heart will not grow cold and hard towards You. Please reveal Yourself to me as I choose to worship You.

Amen

This Changes Everything

That which we have seen and heard we declare to you, that you also may have fellowship with us; and truly our fellowship is with the Father and with His Son Jesus Christ. And these things we write to you that your joy may be full. 1 John 1:3-4

What kind of light do you have shining in your life? Is it the light that says your tank is on E, or is it the light of understanding?

You know, I think this time of year, it's really easy to start running on E. It's busier and higher pressure than any other time of year, cramming in Thanksgiving, Christmas, and New Years, and all the shopping and all the parties and all the events and all the programs and on and on and on.

For the disciples, the highest pressure moment of their lives happened at Easter time, not Christmas time, but it was the very first Easter and Jesus was dead. Or at least that's what they thought. But when Jesus appeared to them and proved His resurrection, He gave them something that lit them up and took away all the gloom. He gave them the light of understanding.

Then He said to them, These are the words which I spoke to you while I was still with you, that all things must be fulfilled which were written in the Law of Moses and the prophets and the Psalms concerning Me.' And He opened their understanding, that they might comprehend the Scriptures. (Luke 24:44-45)

When the disciples got the light of understanding, it changed everything for them. Never again is it said of them that they were fearful or doubting, caving in to their high-pressure stressful situation. Ever after that moment, they charged ahead as hard as they could with nothing holding them back.

And why were they able to run ahead with so much strength? Because their joy had been made full in fellowship with the Father and His Son Jesus Christ, and the joy of the Lord became their strength. When they had joy in God's presence, nothing on Earth could shake them. Nothing could move them. Nothing could sway them. They were resolute and firm about the purpose of their lives to serve Christ and Christ alone.

Don't let yourself live in the light that's warning you that your tank is empty. Instead, live in the light of understanding so that your joy may be full in the fellowship of God's presence.

Prayer Lord Jesus,

Thank You for opening the disciples' eyes so they could be filled with Your joy! As You gave that to them, would You please also give that to me, so that I could have that same joy, fellowshipping with You in Your presence?

Amen

The Christmas War

Now a great sign appeared in heaven: a woman clothed with the sun, with the moon under her feet, and on her head a garland of twelve stars...And another sign appeared in heaven: behold, a great, fiery red dragon having seven heads and ten horns, and seven diadems on his heads...And the dragon stood before the woman who was ready to give birth, to devour her Child as soon as it was born. Revelation 12:1,3-4

Some days I just feel like Israel, don't you? Oh, you don't know what I mean? Well, let me tell you.

What you need to know about Israel is that the devil has been trying to kill them for as long as they've existed, and even before then! In fact, we see a picture of this in our verses today, that the devil, the great dragon, has always been the enemy of the woman Israel and the One who would come from her.

That dragon was there when Abraham tried to pass off Sarah as his sister instead of his wife. He was there when Pharaoh tried to kill every infant male Jew. He was there when Saul tried to kill David, when the wicked queen Athaliah tried to kill the Davidic line that would lead to Jesus, and when Haman incited the Persian emperor to attempt genocide against the Jews only to be thwarted by Esther. He was even there when Herod had all Jewish boys two years old and under killed and when Jesus gave His first message only to be escorted by the crowd to the edge of a cliff.

That dragon's done absolutely everything to try to destroy Israel and is still working to do so today. He's also working to destroy every memory of that Child-Jesus-from our cultural memory. But the existence of Israel simply continues to testify of God's miraculous covering of protection that He gives to them.

I like to think about these things on days when I feel like Israel, on those days when just nothing is going right. I think about Israel and remember that they have wrestled with that dragon devil for thousands of years, and that through it all God has faithfully protected and preserved them to stand firm at the end of every trial.

That's just who God is. It's who He has always been for Israel, and it's who He'll be for you.

Prayer Lord God,

Thank You for showing me how faithful You have always been to Israel so that I can know You will always be faithful to me! No matter how bad things get for me, I will choose to look to You for help to stand firm till the end!

Amen

The Best Is Yet Ahead

Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies and God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our tribulation, that we may be able to comfort those who are in any trouble, with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God. 2 Corinthians 1:3-4

You got a problem? Yeah, a lot of us do, especially these days. But it's important for us to not just see our problem. We need to see the purpose behind the problem.

This is really something we need to know, that all of it-all of it!-not just the fun stuff, not just the easy stuff, even the hard, difficult trials and sufferings and pains, all of it is for a purpose. And more than that, we see from today's verses and the rest of that passage that, while Paul describes five different ways in which we can suffer, he also uses the word comfort ten times. He's doubling down on the comfort of God for every trial and tribulation and suffering and difficulty that we have.

We also know that we're not alone. It might be easy for us to think that Paul, because he teaches us so much of what we hold as truth today, that he had everything figured out and didn't go through the suffering that we experience today, but that simply isn't true.

In fact, he tells us in this passage that his troubles went beyond his strength, that he did not have enough strength to overcome or endure the troubles that were overwhelming his life, so much so that he despaired of life. But he thanked God for all this because it forced him to trust in the God who raises the dead. He knew that his strength was not enough, but that God would still raise him from the dead and help him overcome his troubles.

He's saying that it isn't over. No matter what you're facing today, it's not over. It isn't the end! He's saying, Hold tight, because you might be in tribulation right now, but God's deliverance is coming. His promises are true. He will be faithful to His Word. And more than anything else, you are sealed with the guarantee of His Spirit.

That means that God has you taken care of. He has a plan, and He sees you on the other side of what you're going through.

Here's the good news today: You don't have to have the strength; you just have to have the faith and hope to stick with God and follow Him through the trial till His promises come to pass.

Prayer Lord God,

Thank You that You are Lord over everything that I am facing right now! My circumstances may feel as hopeless as death, but You are the God who raises the dead, and You will help me overcome. I let go of my own strength and I rest in You today!

Amen