Tag Archives: tested in life

Devotion Strength of Heart and Portion- 7/23/21

Posted on by
Reply

God has us in His Will totally and fully. We might not feel He is here at times or struggle in life to the point we feel we don’t know if we are “worthy” as believers but He is there. Always.

It is through His Son that He saved us and we trust in Him for our day to day lives.

We must not think only of the worries of our lives but remember that He is there with us and will help us through everything we are going through. He gives us strength and joy and peace.

He is also praiseworthy. Check out this verse:

My flesh and my heart fail; But God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever. Psalms 73:26 NKJV

We might become so weak in our sin but He is there. We must depend on Him always but to follow Him is much more that that!

I looked up what the bible meant by the writer saying God is his “portion.” It is mentioned not just here but a few other times as well.

Here is what it said:

the writer means that God is the source of his happiness and blessing content with all that the Lord is and provides. partial source: http://www.gotquestions.org Answer to question: “What does it mean to say that God is my portion?”

So the writer’s portion means that God is all that the writer needs and is his joy and happiness. We must reflect that!

Though our hearts get distracted and our flesh leads us to sin we must depend on Him for all of our happiness.

His goodness, His holiness is the way to live. Sure we can have hobbies and even do things that involve passing the time (just to follow God doesn’t mean we must stay in all Christian things at all times) we can do all for the glory of God.

I pray dear reader you continue to or will follow the Lord with all your heart. To be in His love means to have a special one on one time, a spiritual intimacy with God in the relationship.

I’m learning more and more to be like Christ because my heart fails me if I’m not. My flesh does not lead to anything good or to be worth doing.

To be content on what God has given me should be enough. My flesh provides nothing. God amazes me and I am humbled Jesus has guided me all this time. Amen!

God is my portion and He leads me toward His way which is only to be glorified endlessly in this life.

Thank you reader I hope that you are blessed by this.

Devotions Psalm 3- 6/1/21

Posted on by
Reply

Salvation belongs to the LORD. Your blessing is upon Your people. Selah Psalm 3:8 NKJV

Here is the end of Psalm 3. (Wow, it’s really the end of 3..?? I will check to make sure… yep, haha!) It seems to give a beautiful send off to the “Song” or ‘Psalm’ which here it is about the Lord and tough stuff and just seeing the wonderful power and love from the Lord.

Have you ever seen police, firefighters, or just emergency workers in the middle of situations? In tough stuff, even in danger, but they were still out there in the “fire” or living against what even their selves would normally be against?

In so many ways, that is Jesus! It was Christ who went and died for not just people who were physically hurting but for altogether the sum of the people who would die with no hope.

No chance of being saved? For mankind if they were tested, there was a 0% chance of heaven. That is horrifying even if you even just start to think about it!

So Jesus was kind of like a firefighter. He saw no hope in the situation, saw that if He did nothing, people would perish in the fire (hell) and went in and saved.

Did Jesus die in that fire? No. He had the world’s evil laid on him and took the wrath of God on Himself. But then He rose again, showing that even in eternal punishment Jesus had power over death!

Did he rescue people from the fire? Yes He did. In two different ways though (maybe I will get tot hat part in a future article. Right now if I did this article would get theologically heavy and I want to keep it in simple words for this time) but before I digress, yes he pulled people from the fire.

The “fire” being eternal punishment. Eternal and the “Second Death,” which is if someone is eternally separate from God’s love.

To be like a loving female bird and try to draw all people towards the parent and yet be rejected by so many was heart-breaking to Jesus. He loved everyone! Yet people still rejected the love that existed not just in Himself but as he would say the “Father” who he always wanted to glorify, especially if He was praised for something Himself!

It is good to if you are a Christian to glorify God and Jesus and not yourself. Boy have I got stories about being prideful! Gosh… awful.

I once was writing a big movie project and kept saying over and over “It’s amazing what I will do for you…” Oh, man. That’s terrible.

I should have kept in mind it was the Lord that brought all those things together. I was the messenger to deliver a story. It was Jesus working though me, and not myself!

Over the years though I am slowly learning to be humble and not the opposite (though pride grows in me yet again and again).

One time I happened to be wearing a shirt at work that looked like I was a lifeguard. I said in sharing though a brief bit about the subject when asked about it “I am a Christian and this shirt means something like this: Jesus is my lifeguard.”.

Jesus can pull people out of horrible worlds. He can rescue people from lives of thievery, deep and self-abating from pornography, “unaccountable” lives, people who think the only thing they can do in life to “live” is to be on drugs, struggling ones who think God doesn’t love them because they simply struggle in general, the “criers”, the easily emotional, the ones hopelessly and seeming ceaselessly depressed, the ones in deep regret because they changed but realize the change was now permanent, the ones who not only can’t afford a home- but to live every day and have food…. God can bring people to a loving state in their lives and “rescue” those people spiritually!

God can and He does because He is awesome!

He not only loves and is love but He impacts lives so personally You will be surprised the day He does.

God is blessed if we have things to share with others especially if it is to tell others of the faith because of the giving of Christ’s life.

If you’re hurting because of mistakes you’ve made, know that no matter what God still loves you! He loves you no matter what has happened.

He loves you every day. All He asks is simply to know Him by an intimate relationship through Jesus Christ.

And He can save you from the “fire” today!

Pray like this if you feel led:

Lord, I am so sorry about what has happened in these past few days months, maybe more. I realize that God your love is deeper than I thought. You really gave Your life through Your Son so that You could place Your wrath onto Him? I realize that God sending His son to die from the world’s sins is such a huge thought. But I realize He died even for my sin as well! I thank You for the chance to know Him. I pray that I will experience this new life to follow You. Please be in my life and live in my for the rest of mine. Thank you for learning that Jesus really died and then He rose again. I want to experience that life in and through Christ.

Amen. Thank you for the privilege of prayer.

If you prayed I hope Jesus is now your lifeguard. And one day you will live for Him in ways you never thought possible!

—

Devotions Psalms 23

Posted on by
Reply

The famous Shepherd Psalm. What is so beautiful about this passage, the entirety of the chapter is it not only paints a beautiful picture of calmness and serenity in the peace of God but that it is written during times of trouble.

The writer David was being pursued to being murdered by King Saul. But in all of this he was at peace in knowing that his heart was with the Lord no matter what.

To live wholeheartedly for Christ isn’t just practice per se it’s actually not even “practice” in a way at all. It’s giving up on what we expect and putting complete and total faith in Jesus Christ. Trust and to remember He is good no matter what should happen even if it might end up tragic.

Let’s break it down verse by verse!

The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want. What could this mean??

It means to desire the world or at least desire things in the world at all times. We should even if we may or may not be believers not be enslaved to either our old selves and only want old sins or to live not in Christ but have a heart that reflects a person that is in the world.

We shall not want. We should desire at least wanting to live for the Lord.

He (has) me lie down in green pastures. Doesn’t that sound peaceful? It sounds like the pastures are almost like a calm bed to lie in after a day’s work and the lying down makes one feel so good. Like a bed of relief! Or a place of peace.

…”Leads me beside still waters.” In the original version of my text it says “the” still waters.

In case all of this imagery is making one wonder David was a shepherd. He here is talking about being like a sheep and all of these things being as if he is being guided by a “Shepherd’ only this Shepherd being described is God.

So much being described is what a shepherd does for not only the flock but the care towards each individual sheep of that flock.

Could these still waters mean that the great Shepherd is guiding people towards a peaceful place. A place to be restored by the water. The water that is needed for living life? Here it could be that not only is it good for physical restoration but spiritual.

“…restores my soul; (and) leads me in the paths of righteousness“

What is your belief in that? Can God actually take a person who merely believes with all their heart and lead them in righteousness. It can only be by one way!

“…for His name’s sake.“ Wow this feel’s prophetic in a way! I don’t think I rarely ever hear a book of the Old Testament say that God has a name. That is astounding! But David probably didn’t know that that name was (Jesus. The good shepherd).

David was talking also about how He is restored in Him. But we could say we can apply this to now. Living for goodness that is God through the Lord.

“Truly, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death” Whoa, is this about hardships or is this just some imagery? “I won’t fear evil for You’re with me.”

Was David facing possible death from King Saul’s hands? Then why was he at such peace in the midst of all those circumstances?

I used to be afraid of many things. I didn’t know how to deal with them until I started to be a stronger person in faith. This was not really because of any specific ritual or thinking patterns… I started to pray to the Lord and then scares about things as seemingly little as very stormy weather had me over time experience the peace and living while keeping my soul focus off those storms and praying that He would keep me safe. That is kind of like Peter from the bible only he took his eyes off of someone to trust and then sunk like a stone in the water because of the stormy terrors around him.

Are you afraid of the circumstances going on around in this world? Pray. Maybe God will open something for you in your life.

Devotions- 5/20/21 Proverbs 1:7-9 and Psalm 7:9

Posted on by
Reply

The fear of the LORD is the beginning of knowledge, But fools despise wisdom and instruction. My son, hear the instruction of your father, And do not forsake the law of your mother; For they will be a graceful ornament on your head, And chains about your neck. Proverbs 1:7-9 NKJV

Sometimes instruction is very tough on us even if we know that people have the right heart in mind.

Anyone who has ever had tough yet dedicated parents in their lives in lifting up their “child” over the years (as in “you”) might think about them.

It is good to have parents who have the best intentions. Who hope the person in their life who they want success in life not only has knowledge but shows fear towards doing bad or having committed wrong and thinks what their parents might do to punish them. They may also hope you have that applied knowledge as a part of your own life.

But notice I said “best intentions” because I mean parents who aren’t the reflection of deep and harsh abuse. I digress so let me go back to what I said earlier.

It is actually good to fear parents who punish when you have done wrong. Or fear if they know their parents will do something that is normal in punishment if they got straight D’s or F’s in school!

I wonder if fear is something us as people had to learn after the fall: The fall of men (and through man, women).

After Adam and Eve we had to experience and still do an awful thing called Sin. Adam was completely responsible, a person to run things in life but instead of that, he chose to eat the fruit. He has had such an awful impact on this world that Eve isn’t even accounted, it seems, to sin entering the world. (“Sin entered the world through one man…” a paraphrase and part of beginning of Romans 5:12). What a sad legacy to leave the people following everyone who wants to worship something, let alone people who might have to live in God’s sight that sin is now a part of. To live for something but because of a tainted body, a sin-filled body, is now a part of people who were and are created, unfortunately.

Now that we are accountable to sin where death is spiritually an absolute for the physical body we need to fear God in order to live for goodness.

What can we do? We must follow His instruction. Either to be saved, to learn to fear Him about right and wrong, and also to live life since one day we won’t get the chance to live on in this earth but will be accountable at the end to how we have all these years lived!

That is a great reason to live for God through Christ.

And we should not forsake our parents or parent figures with good intentions’ “rules” to live life.

We must in life show love towards all people, not just the ones we already care about. Just be careful about the wicked because they have not good hearts even if we might witness or share things that are good with them with a good heart.

Here’s a partial verse, note some is paraphrased. It says basically: “Oh, let the wickedness of the wicked come to an end, But establish the just; God (in His righteousness) tests the hearts and minds.” Psalms 7:9.

Let us live wholeheartedly for goodness and love in Christ. Or live for ones who are hurting and needy. Let’s live for the goodness that Is God!

Let us live to be “tested” so that we will be without blame as we live in Jesus through the Holy Spirit as new creations.

Amen!