Be Honest — Honest to God

Be Honest — Honest to God
by Max Lucado

Prayer really is simple. Resist the urge to complicate it. Don’t take pride in well-crafted prayers. Don’t apologize for incoherent prayers. No games. No cover-ups. Just be honest—honest to God.

Climb into His lap. Tell Him everything that’s on your heart. Or tell Him nothing at all. Just lift your heart to heaven and declare, "Father... Daddy." Stress. Fear. Guilt. Grief. Demands on all sides. And all we can summon is a plaintive, "Oh, Father." If so, that’s enough. Your heavenly Father will wrap you in His arms!

Breakfast with Jesus

Breakfast with Jesus ASHERITAH CIUCIU “When they landed, they saw a fire of burning coals there with fish on it, and some bread … Jesus said to them, ‘Come and have breakfast.’” John 21:9, 21:12a (NIV)  Breakfast is my favorite meal of the day. So when I read today’s key verse, I was delighted to peek into this intimate moment between Jesus and His disciples, but I never imagined how applicable it would be to us 2,000 years later. Let me set the scene. Jesus called a handful of fishermen to be His disciples, and for three years they enjoyed a close relationship with Him until He was betrayed and crucified. Their hopes had been dashed until Jesus surprised them all when He appeared to them in His resurrected body. Of course they were elated, but still a bit confused. Jesus was alive, but He wasn’t living with them anymore; they were disciples without a rabbi. He’d promised to send them His Spirit, but He hadn’t ascended to heaven yet, so they were men without a mission. They went out to fish, but caught nothing all night, and now they were fishermen who couldn’t even catch fish. We can’t know exactly why they reverted to their old occupation, but don’t we do the same thing? When we’re waiting for God to act, but He’s not doing what we expect, don’t we often try to distract ourselves to numb our discomfort? For me, it can look like shoveling spoonfuls of cookie dough ice cream while scrolling social media. Perhaps you turn to online shopping, a glass of rosé, a rom-com binge or a toxic relationship. Distractions promise momentary comfort, but they often fail to resolve our deeper issues, only serving to compound our problems. These men had been up all night and hadn’t caught anything. Now they were exhausted, famished and demoralized. It’s in this moment of desperation that Jesus entered the scene. As dawn lit the sky, He called out to them to let down their nets on the other side, and they miraculously filled with fish. Jesus accomplished for them in a moment what they’d failed to do on their own all night. It’s fascinating to me that Jesus didn’t berate them for going back to their old occupation. He didn’t admonish them for doubting His purpose for them. Instead, He sought them out, provided for their needs and invited them to join Him for breakfast. Breakfast. That most simple meal of the day for many of us, void of fancy silverware and linen napkins, is often shared with people who see you before you shower … and who love you anyway. It’s into this most intimate setting that Jesus invited His friends that morning. As they were toiling at their nets, Jesus was waiting for them, cooking their breakfast. And when they drew close to shore in defeat, Jesus invited them to abandon their distraction in order to come eat breakfast with Him. The conversations that followed that meal brought healing, life and joy to those disciples’ wounded hearts. (Read more in John 21:15-23 for the most touching breakfast conversation ever recorded.) And thankfully, that breakfast invitation is issued to each of us today too. If anyone understands our pain, it’s Jesus. Physical, emotional and relational? Yes — Jesus experienced it all, and He did it out of love for us. When we’re hurting, Jesus doesn’t send us away to get our act together. He invites us to find mercy and grace as we draw close to Him. Over breakfast? Yes. Morning breath and all. Lord, forgive me for the ways I’ve tried to numb my hurt with distractions. I want to turn to You instead. You’ve promised to never send away those who seek You wholeheartedly, so please help me seek You first each day. In Jesus’ Name, Amen. TRUTH FOR TODAY: Hebrews 4:15-16, “For we do not have a high priest who is unable to empathize with our weaknesses, but we have one who has been tempted in every way, just as we are — yet he did not sin. Let us then approach God’s throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need.” (NIV)

Spiritually Shortsighted

Spiritually Shortsighted

By Dr. Charles Stanley

Luke 16:19-31

In Luke 16, Jesus told a story about a rich man who lived for himself and ignored God. After death, he experienced the consequences of his choices—eternal separation from the Lord.

Jesus described him as one who lived in luxury every day (v. 19), providing for himself the best that money could buy but giving little to the poor at his gate. It is important to realize that this man wasn’t judged harshly by God because of his wealth. The heavenly Father is not opposed to our success. Nor was the man separated from the Lord because of his lack of charity toward others. He did not deliberately harm others but, rather, overlooked those in need and focused on himself.

The rich man’s mistake was that he prepared everything for the body but nothing for the soul. Our culture practices a similar style of living. Acquiring material riches and satisfying self is the primary pursuit of many in our world. Having what one wants seems to be the goal whether it’s a struggle to make ends meet or the bank account is overflowing.

Scripture says we were created to be in a relationship with the Father through faith in His Son. The rich man ignored God and paid the ultimate price. Our eternal destiny depends on our decision about Christ.

Despite what our culture thinks, life is not about us. It’s about having a relationship with the Lord. Whoever accepts Christ’s gift of salvation will live eternally with Him in heaven. Those who reject God will suffer. If you know any spiritually shortsighted people, pray that they will trust in Jesus.

The Integrity of Job

The Integrity of Job
by Bible Pathway

Job could have used all the things happening to him as an excuse to sin. Sometimes, in the reading of scripture, it would seem that the friends of Job might have been more content if they had found him in open sin. This would have justified the assault they had launched on him. They would not have had to speculate about any hidden sin that Job might be concealing.

When it came to matters such as sin, Job had taken the high road through all that had happened. He did not allow himself to go in that direction. He held true to his upright walk before God. Jesus answered, Are there not twelve hours in the day? If any man walk in the day, he stumbleth not, because he seeth the light of this world (John 11:9).

A careful look at Job 27:5-6 shows how serious Job is about maintaining his witness. He first calls out his friends that we spoke of before. Job tells them he would never do anything to allow their accusations to be truth. Neither yield ye your members as instruments of unrighteousness unto sin: but yield yourselves unto God, as those that are alive from the dead, and your members as instruments of righteousness unto God (Rom. 6:13).

Job spoke that he would not allow integrity to leave him. This is something that is truly lacking in the world today. It is not easy to find someone willing to hold so close to their integrity. In today's society, many compromise their integrity every day. There was a time when you might have heard the phrase "a man is only as good as his word". In those days, there was many a business deal conducted on a handshake alone. People of integrity could be trusted to do what they said they would do.

This is not to say there are not people today who value their reputation. There are many who do. However, you will find just as many who see no problem in telling a "little white lie" as long as it doesn't hurt anyone. The problem is deception is deception regardless of the size or value of it. Deception always harms someone. The character of the person telling the lie will be damaged for sure.

For kings, and for all that are in authority; that we may lead a quiet and peaceable life in all godliness and honesty (1 Tim. 2:2).

Thought for Today:
Although our flesh is weak, God gives strength during our times of testing.

The "Whys" of Life

The "Whys" of Life
by Kelly Givens

“He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away.” Revelation 21:4

Towards the end of work some weeks ago, our office was informed that a few cars in our parking deck had been broken into. The vandalism and robberies had been contained to Level 2—the level I had parked my car. Thankfully, my car had been left untouched. The SUV directly across from me, however, hadn’t fared so well- the shattered glass on the ground evidenced the vandals’ quick and effective work. As I began my drive home I prayed God would give the owners of the busted up cars a measure of his peace, mercy and patience.

Nearing my exit, I noticed cars slowing down, and around the bend in the road I saw why. A cop was getting out of his car; he had been called for a minor fender bender and traffic was slowing to accommodate. I inched past, glancing at the guy in truck that had been hit. He had his head in his hand and was looking up at the sky in exasperation. You could tell he was thinking, “I can’t believe this happened. Why me?! What did I do to deserve this?!” I thought back to the owners of the cars in the parking deck, knowing they would be asking those same questions when they discovered their vehicles had been broken into.

The “whys” of life point us to a story larger than our own. When we ask why bad things happen, we’re acknowledging that the way life is right now is not how it ought to be. Why is that significant? It’s significant because, in a world which wants us to believe we were created at random and have lived on through survival of the fittest or just good luck, our souls actually cry out against randomness and unjust advantage. We crave order, justice, and mercy, and we feel angry and sad when a seemingly arbitrary, awful thing in life happens. There’s a disconnect between what we believe should happen and what really does happen.  I find it interesting that my friends who believe in a random, chance creation still feel indignant when apparently random, chance events work against their lives. Their heads may believe one thing, but their hearts believe something else. As Christians, our heads and hearts are more aligned.  

At the beginning of Creation, we’re told “God saw all he had made, and it was very good” (Gen. 1:31). You were created to live in a perfect world, where the question of why bad things happen was never supposed to exist. But then man sinned and the world was corrupted (Gen. 3:6-7). Adam and Eve immediately recognized sin for what it was, and in their guilt hid from God (Gen. 3:10). In the same way, we recognize evil as evil because it goes against the very nature of our intended existence. We cry out against suffering because we were never meant to suffer. We are distraught over death because no one was ever supposed to die.  As believers, we can take encouragement from this gut reaction to pain and suffering. It reminds us we were created for a world absent of these things, and we can look forward to the day when Jesus comes back and takes away our tears and frustrations. We will never utter “Why me?” again.  Everything good that can be, will be. Everything evil will be undone. That is such good news; it fills me with joy and hope to think on it.

Are you experiencing seemingly random suffering and sorrow in your life? Cling to the comforting truth of your faith - all suffering is temporary, it is not random, and Jesus is coming soon to restore this world and everything in it - including you - to perfection.