My Favorite - Words

It's your heart, not the dictionary, that gives meaning to your words. A good person produces good deeds and words season after season. An evil person is a blight on the orchard. Let me tell you something: Every one of these careless words is going to come back to haunt you. There will be a time of Reckoning. Words are powerful; take them seriously. Words can be your salvation. Words can also be your damnation.

Matthew 12:34b-37 The Message

You know it's easier to clean when you don't drop stuff all over the place. You might be thinking to yourself, 'What does that have to do with our text for today?' Well, lots actually, depending on who you are.

Have you ever been flippant with someone in spite of the fact that you knew you should have kept your mouth shut? I hate it when that happens! No sooner than the words leave our mouth and in our mind, we can almost hear the imaginary PA system blaring, "Clean up in Aisle 6. Bring the bucket."

Tonight, as I sat here reflecting on the day, I got a mental picture of all my words in this day being gathered in a huge bowl and offered up to the Lord. What will be His reaction? Will He breathe deeply of the beautiful essence of love and care, encouragement and edification, hope and life contained in my spoken words? Or will He gag and hold His nose, turning away from the stench of hurt and hate, discouragement and insult, despair and death?

Words are powerful; take them seriously.

Prayer:

Father,
           According to Your Word in Psalm 19:14, May the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be pleasing to you, O Lord, my Rock and my Redeemer. In Jesus' Name we pray. Amen

* Heart Check

Listen to me! You can pray for anything, and if you believe, you have it; it’s yours!
Mark 11:24 The Living Bible

This was Jesus' response to Peter's being amazed at the fig tree being withered - the one Christ had cursed the day before. As Christians, we love to quote this Scripture! We like to just jump right in there and pray for anything and think we should get it. After all, isn't that what it says? Actually no, it isn't.

The spoken word is powerful, no doubt, but let's do a heart check on this. Knowing Christ for who He is, we know that everything He says and everything He does are always in the will of God. That's where we start.

What are we praying for? Does it line up with the Word of God? Does it oppose the Word of God in any manner? If whatever we're praying for does NOT line up with the Word of God, it definitely is not the will of God, so it's not happening. It doesn't matter how much you pray or how much you believe... which brings us to the next checkpoint.

Believing. He didn't say, "Pray for anything and think you should get it, and it's yours." He clarified BELIEVE. If it lines up with the Word of God, you pray for it and must believe. Not wait and see if it happens. Not wishing and hoping. Not crossing your fingers. Actually believing in faith that it is done!

That's not the end of it. Verse 24 is taken out of context when just uttered on its own. The whole reference includes verses 22-26 - the before and after factor I've mentioned in previous posts. Let's read it here:

In reply Jesus said to the disciples, “If you only have faith in God—this is the absolute truth—you can say to this Mount of Olives, ‘Rise up and fall into the Mediterranean,’ and your command will be obeyed. All that’s required is that you really believe and have no doubt! Listen to me! You can pray for anything, and if you believe, you have it; it’s yours! But when you are praying, first forgive anyone you are holding a grudge against, so that your Father in heaven will forgive you your sins too.”

Our faith must be in God. We must not doubt. Okay, so our petition lines up with the Word of God. We truly believe. Our faith is in God... what about verse 26? But when you are praying, first forgive... Heart check! Are we holding a grudge against anyone?

Unforgiveness is a deal-breaker. Not only are our prayers not answered, but we can't be forgiven of our sins, either. I don't know about you, but I need forgiveness on a daily basis. Dear Ones, let's check our hearts.

Father,
           Thank You for Your Word. Thank You for always making clear what it is You want us to know. Please give us wisdom, according to Your Word, so that we may understand You and all that You would have us do. Check our hearts, Father. Reveal to us the error of our ways. Remove that which alienates us from You. In Jesus' Name we pray. Amen

Family Resemblance *

God decided in advance to adopt us into his own family by bringing us to himself through Jesus Christ. This is what he wanted to do, and it gave him great pleasure. So we praise God for the glorious grace he has poured out on us who belong to his dear Son.

Ephesians 1:5-6 NLT

I'm sure we all know families that look so much alike, you could put them in a room with hundreds of people, and you would still be able to pick out who was in their gene pool. A long time ago, I used to work at an elementary school. As the registrar, I was often amazed by the younger siblings who would come to start school and they would be the spitting image of their older sibling at that age. Strong family genes.

How strong are our genes? 1st John 3:2 tells us, Dear friends, we are already God’s children, but he has not yet shown us what we will be like when Christ appears. But we do know that we will be like him, for we will see him as he really is.

What will we look like? Or more importantly - Who do we look like? I'm reminded of a time, several years ago - it was a gathering of friends at Gringo's with a new waiter who didn't know we'd ever been there. We straggled in, coming from all directions, and when we were finally gathered, the waiter looks at the 7 of us and says, Oh, I get it. It's a family meeting! We all smiled and said, Yup, that's it - a family meeting. Proof positive - adopted into the family of God through Jesus Christ. That's our common gene pool. And it's strong enough through Christ to see our Family Resemblance.

Praise His Holy Name!

Prayer:

Father,

          Thank You for adopting us into Your family and making us joint heirs with Your precious Son, Jesus. When we grow up, we want to be just like You. In Jesus' Name we pray. Amen

* No Less Love

“And so I tell you, keep on asking, and you will receive what you ask for. Keep on seeking, and you will find. Keep on knocking, and the door will be opened to you. For everyone who asks, receives. Everyone who seeks, finds. And to everyone who knocks, the door will be opened.

“You fathers—if your children ask for a fish, do you give them a snake instead? Or if they ask for an egg, do you give them a scorpion? Of course not! So if you sinful people know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him.”

Luke 11:9-12 NLT

I spent the entire day with my youngest granddaughter, Abby. They call it babysitting, daycare, whatever. I call it love in its purest form. It was the best day on several counts, but the two most important are; One - I love being with her. I don't care where it is or what we're doing, I just love being with Abby. And two - God illustrated some real truths for me.

This may be the most basic of understandings and you might wonder how I didn't get this until now, but maybe it's because someone else also needs the reminder of the basics...

I have discovered that my perfect little granddaughter is not perfect. She has a temper and a very strong will. That does NOT make me love her less. If anything, it allows me to love her more and prove it by guiding her in the right direction. She cannot purchase or prepare her own food or drink. She can only feed herself finger food snacks (if I get them from the pantry and dole them out for her). She makes a mess in her diapers and needs to be changed frequently. That does NOT make me love her less. She's still crawling. She can pull herself up on anything and climbs well. She has learned how to stand but will stumble or fall when she tries to walk alone. 

I must appoint times for her to rest and isolate her from distractions and the noise and cares of this world so she may do so. I comfort her even when it's me she's angry with (because I didn't answer her plea the way she wanted it to be answered). That does NOT make me love her less. 

She needs constant supervision because she will get into everything - and some of it even AFTER she's been told 'no'. That does NOT make me love her less, either. Nor does any of it make me want to spend less time with her. 

And if I - being sinful - know how to do these things for my granddaughter and still love her with a love that defies description, HOW MUCH MORE will our heavenly Father do all this and more for each of His children?

Prayer:

Father,
         Forgive us for all those times we didn't recognize Your love in action. Open our eyes to see, our ears to hear and our hearts to receive and believe Your love for us. In Jesus' Name we pray. Amen