From “The Word For You Today” by Bruce Christian

PURPOSE

There’s an old saying: “If you love your job you’ll never work a day in your life.”  That’s not quite true.  Most people work hard.  But even when they love their job they still have to do things they don’t like to do.  They give effort above and beyond what’s comfortable.  It’s probably more accurate to say that if you’re doing something you believe in, the hard work you do will bring you deep satisfaction.  Novelist Ursula K. Le Guin stated, “It is good to have an end to journey toward, but it is the journey that matters in the end.”  Some folks suffer from “destination disease.”  They think that arriving at a certain place in the life will bring them happiness.  What a shame.  Because the reality is that many times when we arrive, we discover that it wasn’t what we expected.  If you become fixated on a destination you can miss the great things that happen along the way.  You miss the joy of today.  If you’re convinced that “someday” is going to be your best day, you won’t put enough into today-or get enough out of it.  If you’re not doing something significant with your life, it doesn’t mater how long it is.  It’s not enough just to survive you need a reason to live.  This is where Christ comes in: He will give you new life, and add purpose to your life-plus the power to fulfill that purpose.  D.L. Moody once said, “Let God have your life; He can do more with it than you can.

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From “The Word For You Today” by Bruce Christian

THE JOY IS IN THE JOURNEY

Sometimes when we achieve the things we strive for, we find they’re not very fulfilling.  As we look back we realize that our greatest joy was not in the goal we reached, but in the growth we experienced on the way to it.  Scientist Koichi Tanaka describes this phenomenon and how it can come about during the enjoyable pursuit of a dream.  As he worked on trying to create an ion with lasers, he says: “I failed for weeks and months before I succeeded in making an ion.  Why did I continue the experiment?  Because I enjoyed it.  It was fun for me to come to know something that I had never known before, and that fun enabled me to persist.”  That persistence helped him to win a Nobel Peace prize in chemistry.  You have the potential to make many wonderful discoveries in life, and none greater than what you discover about God, and yourself.

One leadership expert writes: “The pursuit of my dream has taken me out of my comfort zone, elevated my thinking, given me confidence, and confirmed my sense of purpose.  My pursuit of the dream and my personal growth have become so intertwined that I now ask myself, ‘Did I make the dream, or did the dream make me?’  When your mind accepts a new idea or learns a new truth, it’s forever changed.  And once stretched, it takes on a new shape and never goes back to its original form.  When that happens, you experience true fulfillment.  No wonder children’s book author Elizabeth Coatsworth said, ‘When I dream, I am ageless.”

Following “Don’t Test God, Trust Him!”

The following Don’t Test God, Trust Him! is the absolute unvarnished truth.  As Shenine says don’t click the ‘like’ button if you’re just going to read it and not be willing to apply it.  But expect miracles to happen if you do in your relationship with God and in your life.  No kidding, this is a great article, and I commend Shenine  for her faithful witness to Christ in carrying out what God laid on her heart to write.  I’m going to do this, and I’m going to share my experience with you as I do so.  I need the accountability doing so will give me, but I also want to encourage people in taking this step by knowing that I’ve made the same commitment to it and am living it out.  Perhaps you don’t need to do this, and if so I praise God for bringing you to this point in your relationship with Him.  I’m not a 100% to the point that Shenine writes about, but I long to be, and want to be with all my heart, and I’m going to trust Him to make it happen.

She gave a blueprint for how to do it, so I’m going to follow it exactly.  This: “Write all your concerns and problems down on paper, and read them to God, forget nothing and submit it and leave it (in bible). Continue to worship Him before getting out of bed and throughout your entire day. Every now and then go to the sheet in your bible and check it. You will see that God has been answering and solving your problems.  This will encourage you to continue to trust Him more and more. It is not to test God, but to trust Him.” is what she said to do.  So follow along and you can see along with me what happens as a result…..

The following is my list of concerns and problems:

I don’t want to feel like I’m always in a struggle in my prayer life.  I want to learn how to pray better.  To have more confidence in my prayer life.  I feel so inadequate when I pray.

I want to grow in the Grace and Knowledge of my Lord Jesus Christ, and “God’s Holy Word.”

I want to get to the point that I don’t doubt ever….that God loves Me, and that He has always loved Me.

I want to be able to live with the pain I experience with grace  and love and in a way that honors God and is a great witness to the grace and love He has shown me.

I want to be able to show that Jesus is my first priority in how I live my life.

I want to live my life in such a way that no one has any reason to doubt that I’m a Christian in every sense of the word.

I want to get to the point where I don’t have any questions or doubts about how God is going to take care of me.

I want to have a greater love and desire to serve Christ than I do.

I need another vehicle so my wife can drive and I don’t have to drive her everywhere. (She can’t drive a standard, and driving for more than 30 minutes causes me incredible pain.”

I have house taxes and house insurance due, and haven’t worked since Aug of 2011.

I want to be healthy enough to be able to hold a job so that I can provide for my family.  I do NOT want to be on disability or be forced to draw SSI.  I want to work.

I want to be able to pay my bills.

I want to be a better father to my children.

I want to be a better Sunday School Teacher, and do a better job of ministering to those who have needs that I see around me.

I want to give all my energy to loving my Lord, to loving my family, and those around me instead of using so much of it to just deal with my life as it is.

So there it is.  I’ve probably said too much about myself, but how will you if I’m progressing if I don’t let you know something of what’s going on.  I invite you to pray for me, as I will for you.

I want to thank everyone for their encouragement and support and friendship.  It has meant a lot to me.

Your brother-in-Christ,
Wayne

 

 

 

 

 

 

From “Morning Thoughts” by Winslow

” For here have we no continuing city, but we seek one to come.” Hebrews 13:14

The true believer in Jesus is a traveler. He is journeying to a city of habitation, to the mount of God-and, blessed be God, he will soon be there! The apostle Peter dedicates his pastoral letter to the “strangers scattered” abroad-the people of God dispersed over the face of the earth. Such is the Church of Christ. It is sometimes incorrectly called “the visible Church.” The idea is unscriptural. Visible churches there may be, but a visible Church there is none. The saints of God are “strangers and pilgrims” scattered abroad. Here on earth they have no permanent abode, no certain resting-place. The Church is in the wilderness, journeying through it. The present is called the “time of our sojourning.” We are but wayfarers at an inn, abiding only for a night. “Here we have no continuing city.” We are strangers and sojourners, as all our fathers were. But this, beloved, is the reconciling, animating thought-we are journeying to the dwelling of God. We are on our way to the good land which the Lord our God has promised us; to the kingdom and the mansion which Jesus has gone to take possession of and to prepare for us. In a word-and this image is the climax of the blissful prospect-we are hastening to our “Father’s house,” the home of the whole family in heaven and in earth, the residence of Christ, the dwelling-place of God.

To this each believer in Jesus is journeying. The road is difficult, the desert is tedious-sometimes perilous from its smoothness, or painful from it roughness; its difficultness now wearying, its intricacy now embarrassing. But who will complain of the path that conducts him to his home? Who would yield to the sensation of fatigue, who is journeying to an eternal rest? Much of the disquietude and repining of spirit peculiar to the pilgrimage of the saints arises from the faint conceptions which the mind forms of the coming glory. We think too faintly and too seldom of heaven. The eye is bent downwards, and seldom do we “lift up our heads” in prospect of the “redemption that draws near.”

And yet how much there is in the thought of glory, in the anticipation of heaven-its nature and associations-calculated to stimulate, to cheer, and to allure us onwards! It is the place where we shall be sinless; it is the residence where we shall see God; it is the mansion where we shall be housed with Christ; it is the home where we shall dwell with all the saints; it is the point at which are collecting all the holy of earth, some of whom have already left our embrace for its holier and happier regions, and whom we shall meet again. Why, then, should we be cast down because of the difficulty of the way, or for one moment lose sight of the glory that awaits us, or cease to strive for the fitness essential to its enjoyment? In a little while-oh, how short the journey!-and we shall be there. Then we shall realize, to their fullest extent, the beauty and the sweetness of the description so often read and pondered with tears of hope- “You have come to Mount Zion, to the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, and to thousands of angels in joyful assembly. You have come to the assembly of God’s firstborn children, whose names are written in heaven. You have come to God himself, who is the judge of all people. And you have come to the spirits of the redeemed in heaven who have now been made perfect. You have come to Jesus, the one who mediates the new covenant between God and people, and to the sprinkled blood, which graciously forgives instead of crying out for vengeance as the blood of Abel did.” O my soul! will you not stretch every nerve, endure every privation, and relinquish every weight, thus to reach this glorious city of God?