Video Bible Lesson - A Prayer for When You Fear Dying By Rick Warren

1/2 Hour of God’s Power with Scott Ralls

4/26/2020

A Prayer for When You Fear Dying
By Rick Warren

“For only as a human being could he die, and only by dying could he break the power of the devil, who had the power of death. Only in this way could he set free all who have lived their lives as slaves to the fear of dying” (Hebrews 2:14b-15 NLT, second edition).
One of the things Jesus came to Earth to do is take away your fear of death. How? By dying on the cross and being resurrected to show that there is life after death.
The Bible says in Hebrews 2:14-15, “For only as a human being could he die, and only by dying could he break the power of the devil, who had the power of death. Only in this way could he set free all who have lived their lives as slaves to the fear of dying” (NLT, second edition).
God wants to break the fear of dying in your life. Instead of looking to your pain here on Earth, God wants you to look to him and the hope of Heaven. And, he wants you to help those who are dying to do the same.
When someone is dying, you need to encourage him to do what David did: “Death laid a trap in my path. But in my distress I cried out to the Lord” (Psalm 18:5b-6a). Have you ever done that? Have you cried out to the Lord for his grace and mercy and accepted his offer of salvation? You can’t offer to other people what you haven’t received yourself. If you haven’t settled the issue of your salvation, you’re gambling with your eternity.
If you were to die today, are you absolutely certain that you would go to Heaven? If you’re not sure or answered “no,” you need to settle the issue right now so that you can be assured of life after death and point your friends to the hope of Heaven.
Pray this prayer today:
"Dear God, you are God, and I’m not. You sent Jesus to be my Savior, so I must need to be saved. I need you to forgive the things I’ve done wrong in life. I need you to give me a fresh start in life. I need you to help me know my purpose. I want to begin a relationship with you. I ask you to come into my life. I want to learn to trust you. I want to learn to love you. I want to learn to love other people the way you want me to. So I ask you today with humility and honesty and sincerity to please save me as I put my trust in you. I pray this prayer in Jesus’ Name. Amen."

#Jesus, #Christian, #Bible, #Salvation, #Heaven, #God, #HolySpirit

Streams in the Desert

Streams in the Desert

More than that, I now regard all things as liabilities compared to the far greater value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things – indeed, I regard them as dung! – that I may gain Christ (Phil 3:8)

Shining is always costly. Light comes only at the cost of that which produces it. An unlit candle does no shining. Burning must come before shining. We cannot be of great use to others without cost to ourselves. Burning suggests suffering. We shrink from pain.

We are apt to feel that we are doing the greatest good in the world when we are strong, and able for active duty, and when the heart and hands are full of kindly service.

When we are called aside and can only suffer; when we are sick; when we are consumed with pain; when all our activities have been dropped, we feel that we are no longer of use, that we are not doing anything.

But, if we are patient and submissive, it is almost certain that we are a greater blessing to the world in our time of suffering and pain than we were in the days when we thought we were doing the most of our work. We are burning now, and shining because we are burning.
—Evening Thoughts

“The glory of tomorrow is rooted in the drudgery of today.”

Many want the glory without the cross, the shining without the burning, but crucifixion comes before coronation.

Have you heard the tale of the aloe plant,
Away in the sunny clime?
By humble growth of a hundred years
It reaches its blooming time;
And then a wondrous bud at its crown
Breaks into a thousand flowers;
This floral queen, in its blooming seen,
Is the pride of the tropical bowers,
But the plant to the flower is sacrifice,
For it blooms but once, and it dies.

Have you further heard of the aloe plant,
That grows in the sunny clime;
How every one of its thousand flowers,
As they drop in the blooming time,
Is an infant plant that fastens its roots
In the place where it falls on the ground,
And as fast as they drop from the dying stem,
Grow lively and lovely around?
By dying, it liveth a thousand-fold
In the young that spring from the death of the old.

Have you heard the tale of the pelican,
The Arabs’ Gimel el Bahr,
That lives in the African solitudes,
Where the birds that live lonely are?
Have you heard how it loves its tender young,
And cares and toils for their good,
It brings them water from mountain far,
And fishes the seas for their food.
In famine it feeds them—what love can devise!
The blood of its bosom—and, feeding them, dies.

Have you heard this tale—the best of them all—
The tale of the Holy and True,
He dies, but His life, in untold souls
Lives on in the world anew;
His seed prevails, and is filling the earth,
As the stars fill the sky above.
He taught us to yield up the love of life,
For the sake of the life of love.
His death is our life, His loss is our gain;
The joy for the tear, the peace for the pain.
—Selected

The Perverse Generation

The Perverse Generation
Sarah Phillips

"O unbelieving and perverse generation," Jesus replied, "how long shall I stay with you and put up with you?" Luke 9:41

There is much written today about how the world has lost touch with God and morality. It's easy to view the past with rose-tinted glasses, to believe in "the good old days" or reminisce about a golden era.  We do this in the Church all the time, often pointing to one practice that, if resurrected, would surely turn this generation around.

"If only the women still wore head coverings in church… "

"If only we sang ancient hymns… "

"If only young men and women got married earlier… "

Don't read me wrong here… these issues are important. But the stark reality is, every generation has fallen short of God's glory. Every generation has sinned. Does this sound familiar?

"The children now love luxury; they have bad manners, contempt for authority; they show disrespect for elders and love chatter in place of exercise. Children are now tyrants, not the servants of their households. They no longer rise when elders enter the room. They contradict their parents, chatter before company, gobble up dainties at the table, cross their legs, and tyrannize their teachers."

How often have I been tempted to mutter these words when encountering today's teenagers? But this quote is attributed to Socrates by Plato. Apparently teens weren't doing so well in the ancient world either. The fallen nature of man has followed us through the ages, plaguing the youth and old alike. Our broken nature manifests itself in so many ways… from the darkest sins to our lack of basic manners and courtesy.

Jesus himself seemed to grow weary of the sins of his own day. I imagine the opening scripture was expressed with a mix of sadness and righteous anger.

But what is the rest of the story? Even as his sinful followers surrounded him, Jesus healed the spiritual and physical afflictions of a possessed boy. We see here that going back to the "good old days" doesn't have the power to save us. It's the person of Jesus Christ who saves. This is the miracle of Easter: The incredible mercy of a God who would be justified in staying angry forever after the golden era of Eden went terribly wrong. He hears our cries for redemption - weak though they may be - and saves us.

Is the world worse today than it was yesterday? Does it matter? God's patience and mercy for our "perverse and unbelieving generation" reveal the depths of his divine love. And those forgiven the most sins have the greatest number of reasons to rejoice.

Intersecting Faith & Life:  Have you ever felt so deeply ashamed of your sins that you thought no one could be as bad as you? Take heart. Some of the greatest saints were the worst of sinners. All sins can be forgiven when we call out to the Holy Spirit and ask for mercy. Rejoice in the second chances that come with Easter.

Further Reading

Luke 7:47

Romans 3:23

The Purpose of the Old Testament Scapegoat

The Purpose of the Old Testament Scapegoat
by Jennifer Waddle

Aaron shall lay both his hands on the head of the live goat, confess over it all the iniquities of the children of Israel, and all their transgressions, concerning all their sins, putting them on the head of the goat, and shall send it away into the wilderness by the hand of a suitable man. The goat shall bear on itself all their iniquities to an uninhabited land; and he shall release the goat in the wilderness. - Leviticus 16:21-22

I first heard of the Old Testament scapegoat about ten years ago when my pastor taught about the Jewish day of atonement. Once a year, the priest would make atonement for the children of Israel by confessing the sins of the people and symbolically putting them on the head of a sacrificial goat. The goat would then be sent into the wilderness never to return. Jewish tradition even says that the goat was led to high, rocky places where it would face certain death. After all, they didn’t want the goat wandering back into town, along with all of their sins!

Praise the Lord, there is no longer a need for a scapegoat. Jesus bore the weight of every sin on His shoulders. It wasn’t a symbolic act, but rather a literal bearing of sin and shame for the entire world. Christ’s death on the cross and His resurrection established the final and complete sacrifice.

“Sacrifice and offering, burnt offerings, and offerings for sin You did not desire, nor had pleasure in them” (which are offered according to the law), then He said, “Behold, I have come to do Your will, O God.” He takes away the first that He may establish the second. By that will we have been sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all.

Hebrews 10:8-10

There is no more waiting for a yearly ceremony to cleanse us. There is no guess-work when it comes to our sanctification. We have been redeemed by the blood of the Lamb. And the sins He bore, once and for all, will not “wander back into town.” For He has removed them as far as the east is from the west.

As far as the east is from the west, so far has He removed our transgressions from us.

Psalm 103:12

A Prayer for Trust

A Prayer for TrustBy Ron Moore

Trust in the LORD with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding. – Proverbs 3:5

On one hand, we know that God's promises are true. On the other hand, we know that our challenges are real. Sometimes it's so hard to see how these two can work together. That's what the psalmist was struggling with in this portion of his writing.

God had promised that King David's line would last as long as the heavens endure. God said, "I will maintain my love to him forever, and my covenant with him will never fail." However, here it seemed that God had "rejected" and "renounced" the promise. Enemies had come and "reduced his strongholds to ruins." How could God's promised faithfulness to his people be possible when it seemed that God had not supported them when they needed him most?

This apparent conflict is something we still struggle with today. When illness strikes, discouragement hits, the unwanted divorce occurs, the job goes away, we have to make a move... again, we wonder if God has not supported us in our battles. Let's be honest, some days it may feel like that; but God never leaves us. He is always at work behind the scenes weaving a beautiful masterpiece. Someday it will all make sense. Today we continue to trust in the midst of our questions.

Father, sometimes it does feel that you have left us in the battle. We know that you are with us, but so are our feelings of aloneness. The Enemy seems to be taking ground. Our crying out to you seems to go unanswered. We know you are at work, but help us trust you in the midst of our questions. In Jesus' Name, Amen.