All Things For God's Glory

Jonathan’s sermon Sunday was jam-packed with Scripture truth about life as exiles and strangers as we are traveling toward our eternal Homeland—the New Earth where Righteousness will dwell. I would like to drill down into the aspect of “laying aside every weight and the sin that clings so closely”. For context, please read Hebrews 12:1-15. "Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses [men and women throughout all of redemptive history, who have walked by faith in God’s unfolding promises and revelation of Himself, despite having not yet received God’s promise of the Genesis 3:15 Deliverer], let us also lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God. “Consider him who endured from sinners such hostili...

As our pastor is preaching through the book of Exodus, it has been amazing to me how much application there has been to church discipleship! I will list six of these applications that I heard Sunday:    In the OT, God revealed Himself to mankind in an unfolding, progressive kind of way. But now He has fully revealed Himself in His Son, Jesus Christ, who is the Living Word of God, through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us  (Heb. 1:1-4). The extent to which we know Him, believe Him, and trust Him, is the extent to which we will worship, fear, love, and obey Him.  God's revelation through the Son and the written Word of God gives us the true measure of ourselves - a measure that falls woefully short of the glory of God (Rom. 3:23). We need deliverance on a daily basis from the grip of indwelling sin! (Rom. 7:21-25). Hebrews 3 calls us to listen to and hear Him today (not a passive hearing, but an active one) and don't harden our hearts against Him, but to exhort ...

As Pastor Rob is preaching interpretation, and pastorally shepherding us applicationally through the book of Exodus, Dave and I have been so blessed to have so much to talk about throughout the week as we’re seeking to be doers of the Word and not merely hearers, and it has also given us much to talk about with others. Exodus 4:18-31 was last week’s passage, and the section on Zipporah was very surprising to me and will be the scope of this article. So, to back it up, Rob brought out how God revealed Himself in three ways to Moses:   as a Father who assuaged Moses’   fears regarding the men who has sought his life in Egypt as the covenant-keeper who would go with Moses as he went back to Egypt; and as the faithful God who would always keep His promises to His covenant people, the physical sign of circumcision being the mark God required. God then told Moses that it would not be his ability to deliver Israel from slavery, and as a matter of fact, God would further...

  As I've been thinking about the Sunday sermon from Exodus 2, it's amazing to me the powerful intricacy with which God has orchestrated human history. It gives me immense comfort to know that nothing can thwart the sovereign plan of God to bring the God/man into the world, not even the trillions of human decisions along the way. And that God will ultimately live eternally with his redeemed mankind—not merely on a tiny patch of land that He would temporarily give to a very small people group known as Israel—but on the re-created Earth, the expanded Eden! And no longer with only the small people group of just Israel, but where there will be a magnificently multiplied amount of people (remember “70 souls went down to Egypt” becoming “600,000 men, plus women and children”, plus a mixed multitude from Egypt who were delivered from slavery there). These are all the people whom Revelation 7:9 says God the Father has chosen from among "every trible, and peoples, and languages...

T hese verses in 2 Corinthians have been a precious reminder to me that my current pain and suffering (and yours as well!) is all for God's good purposes not only for me and Dave and our kids, but also for God's church, which means the church we are members of and all its members. And because of that, He is giving all the grace and blessing needed to sustain me on my "sick bed" so I don't have to sin as I suffer; nor do I have to complain or fear or have anxiety or just live with the attitude that, "I just wish it would all go away." And when I do these things, I have access to the powerful perfection of Jesus Christ and can repent, turn my heart and attitudes and words around and get back in alignment with the Spirit of God.  2 Corinthians 4:5-18 says, " For what we proclaim is not ourselves, but Jesus Christ as Lord, with ourselves as your servants for Jesus' sake.   For God, who said, “Let light shine out of darkness,” has shone in our hearts...

I want to encourage you to pray and not faint if the Lord has you in a season of waiting (Luke 18:1). I have cucumber plants in my little front garden, and I couldn't figure out why it was taking so long to produce cukes because I couldn't see them under the vines, primarily because I can't bend over to look. But them my sister came and looked under there and found a whole bag full of very large cucumbers under those vines!  Oh, my friends! God is always growing fruit on His vines because we are rooted in Jesus Christ His Precious Son, the Vine's lifesource; and He says He will bring to fruition and completion what He has started when He chose to give us life in His Son (Eph. 1:1-6; Phil. 1:6; Rom. 8:27-29). We often cannot see even the tiniest fruit but that's when faith in God's Word and promises must kick in and grow roots downward even as it's God's job to grow fruit upward, ever flowing in the powerful Ocean of His grace which ends in the very thr...

I 've been thinking about the process of pruning today.  As I was meeting with ladies this morning on the front porch, I noticed how overgrown my tomatoes and cucumbers have become with lots  of lush greenery way above the tomato cages, but few blossoms or tomatoes setting.  So after my sweet Mama's left, I got my walker into the patch so I wouldn't fall over pulling weeds and pruning and went at the tomato plants with a vengeance, removing all the green stems that were not putting on blossoms, and now I have a huge pile of stuff to be burned or trashed. John 15:1-2 says that Jesus is the Vine and the Father is the vinedresser. "Every branch that does not bear fruit He takes away, and every branch that does bear fruit he prunes, that it may bear more  fruit." Verse 5b says, "for apart from me, you can do nothing ." And nothing means nothing...not even just a little.  The warning then sounds forth loud and clear: "If anyone  does not abide in me he ...