29 Feb Sunday Video Preview – March 4, 2012
Due to tomorrow's early appointment with the doctors and the no doubt hectic schedule, I decided to post this week's Sunday preview on Wednesday...
February 2012
29 Feb Devotional Thought – When The Will Surrenders
"I have glorified You on the earth. I have finished the work which You have given Me to do." John 17:4
How could Jesus make such a statement? How could He say that He had finished the Father's work? Wasn't that more than a bit premature? Wasn't that in fact a statement of something that was indeed unfinished? Wasn't the triumph still ahead? Wasn't the victory yet to be won? Had he not yet a great burden to bear up Golgotha? Didn't He still have a date with death on Calvary's hill?
How then, under the trees of Gethsemane, could He say - could He even think - that His life's work had been "finished"? It is because Jesus knew something that many have yet to learn. He knew that it is when the will is fully surrendered that the battle is suddenly ended.
27 Feb Devotional Thought – When Christ Calls
"And when she had said these things, she went her way and secretly called Mary her sister, saying, "The Teacher has come and is calling for you." John 11:28
This seems to have been a strange time for Jesus to call for Martha. It came when there was no longer any need for her common, workaday practicality and she was about to sit down. He called for her when the work that she was gifted and experienced to do had come to an end. The need for the work of her hands no longer existed and a time of waiting was about to begin. He called to her in a moment when it would have been very easy for Martha to say to herself, "I no longer have any work to do. The tables have all been served, the guests have all been seen, I don't have to tend my sick brother or take care of any further funeral arrangements - my work is done. It was at that moment that the call from Christ came to Martha. It was at the end of her day that the Lord's day for her began. It was just when the need for her unique gifting had become settled and still that Jesus knocked.
24 Feb Fridays Are For Family – What Do You Do With A Bully?
When I came home from the office the other day my three year old son, Jack, met me at the back door and told me about another little boy who had been "ugly" to him at the local playground. He went into as much detail as his three year old vocabulary would allow - with additional clarification and information coming from a very elaborate demonstration of the incident. I may not have understood everything, but it was abundantly clear that some other little boy had hit him.
20 Feb Devotional Thought – Morning Prayers
"My voice You shall hear in the morning, O LORD; In the morning I will direct it to You, And I will look up." Psalm 5:3
Why does David say that "in the morning" he will "look up"? Is it said in earnest expectation? Does he mean to say that he lifts his eyes in hopes of an answer from Heaven? I don't think so. I think that what David is saying isn't that he looks up with expectation, but rather in confidence. He lifts his eyes with the assurance of a man who daily walks with God. He's saying that when he prays he can do so with an unrestrained confidence and an unashamed countenance. He can look into the perfectly pure face of God because he has nothing of which to be ashamed. He may not receive what he requests, but he doesn't have to be ashamed for asking.