Author: Matt
Condescending Love, Pt. 2
And going a little farther he fell on his face and prayed, saying, “My Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me; nevertheless, not as I will, but as you will.” … Again, for the second time, he went away and prayed, “My Father, if this cannot pass unless I drink it, your will be done.” … So, leaving them again, he went away and prayed for the third time, saying the same words again. → Read more...
Condescending Love, Pt. 1
And those who passed by derided him, wagging their heads and saying, “You who would destroy the temple and rebuild it in three days, save yourself! If you are the Son of God, come down from the cross.” So also the chief priests, with the scribes and elders, mocked him, saying, “He saved others; he cannot save himself. He is the King of Israel; let him come down now from the cross, and we will believe in him. → Read more...
A Dripping, Soaking Wet Offering
With the stones he built an altar in the name of the Lord, and he dug a trench around it large enough to hold two seahs of seed. He arranged the wood, cut the bull into pieces and laid it on the wood. Then he said to them, “Fill four large jars with water and pour it on the offering and on the wood.”
“Do it again,” he said, and they did it again.
“Do it a third time,” he ordered, and they did it the third time. → Read more...
A Journey Always Begins With a Single Step
The human experience is rife of many wonderful, scary, intoxicating, boring, daunting and mystifying events. It’s been my experience that many things that we go through do not lend themselves to easy classification of one simple emotion. For instance, the birth of my oldest child, Caleb, was an experience that was simultaneously exhilarating, terrifying, sublime and bewildering. It was an amazing goop of emotions that were mixed inseparably with each other. Such was my experience becoming a parent for the first time. → Read more...
Assured For Eternity
For does not my house stand so with God? For he has made with me an everlasting covenant, ordered in all things and secure. For will he not cause to prosper all my help and my desire? – 2 Samuel 23:5 (ESV) I love reading about King David. I just finished the story of his life, and the passage I have highlighted above is the recorded last words of David, probably written close to the time he passed the torch of his kingdom on to his son, Solomon. → Read more...
Praising God Any Time
Have you ever been in the place where you had nowhere else to go, where you were stuck in a corner with no way out? On Sunday Pastor Ron talked about the woman who was sick for twelve years and who desperately reached out to Jesus for help because she had nowhere else to turn to. Another person that came to mind as I listened to Pastor Ron was King David since I am knee-deep in studying the second book of Samuel in the Bible. → Read more...
Followers vs. Admirers
No, there’s absolutely nothing to admire in Jesus, unless you want to admire poverty, misery and contempt. -Søren Kierkegaard I don’t know about you, but Pastor Dave’s sermon last Sunday really struck a chord deep within myself. For those of you who weren’t present, it was an examination of Jesus’ words said in Matthew 16, that we had to take up our own cross in order to follow him and that we had to lose our life in order to find it. → Read more...
Praying For Our Daily Bread
God promises to take care of our basic needs. This is something that we tend to forget – often. Jesus points this out in several places, most prominently when he tells us not to worry in Matthew 6, “So do not worry, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’ For the pagans run after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them.” I was reminded by this when I heard Pastor Ron’s Sunday sermon on the Lord’s Prayer taught by Jesus, especially the line, “Give us this day our daily bread.” → Read more...
Mortification
I hope you have been enjoying Pastor Ron’s CENTERED sermon series for the past few Sundays. I know I have been challenged by the truth he has been sharing from the book of Colossians. There is one truth that I have been especially grappling with these past few days, and it’s from Colossians 3:5, “Put to death therefore what is earthly in you: sexual immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire, and covetousness, which is idolatry.” In his discussion of this passage, he called this process mortification, which is defined as “practicing ascetic discipline or self-denial of the body and its appetites.” → Read more...
A Slice of Truth: Being Good
January 21, 2015
A Slice of Truth, Devotionals
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Matt
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