Acknowledging God

Acknowledging God

Dear Champions,

The short excerpt is by Ron Hutchcraft, and the Scripture is in the excerpt.     

 

Proverbs 3:5 says, "Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding." Notice what's the opposite of trusting in the Lord with all your own heart--trying to figure it out for yourself, doing what you think is best...leaning on your own understanding.

 

Verse 6 says, "In all your ways acknowledge Him, and He will direct your paths."  The other day I was really blessed in a place not normally associated with blessing—the dentist's office. I was in the waiting room and I saw an old friend with his wife--they're both in their 90s. He's working hard to care for his wife because her health is really deteriorating. Because it had been raining when they came in, my friend asked the dentist if he could help him get his wife out to the car. My dentist came back in, really touched by what had happened in those two minutes--so touched that he brought it up two more times. He said, "When I went out with George and his wife, it wasn't raining. And George said, 'Isn't it great that the Lord stopped the rain long enough for us to get out to the car?' Then he just looked heavenward and said, 'Thanks, Father.'"

 

Now that's acknowledging Him. That's noticing God's working in the details of your day. And that's where praise comes from...where joy comes from...where a victorious attitude comes from in the toughest of times. But you have to go into your day looking for God at work. If you don't, you'll miss God and you'll miss the joy.

 

If you haven't been seeing God a lot lately, you may have been focused on your circumstances...other people...or yourself--you've missed the fingerprints of God all over your day. The little mercies, the small miracles, the interventions, the encouraging surprises, the bad things that didn't happen. I know there's never a day where He doesn't show up because His "mercies are new every morning!"  You'll see God all over your day--if you're looking for Him.

 

Champions, have a great week!-David Vining

Promise Keeping & Sacrifice

Promise Keeping & Sacrifice

Dear Champions,

 

The following is from Stu Webber, and the verses are as follows:  Ecclesiastes 5:5 It is better not to vow than to make a vow and not fulfill it.  

 

Promise making and keeping is at the heart of godliness.  At the heart of God-at the very core of His nature-is the making and keeping of promises.  All the Scripture hangs on a promise-a series of covenants.

 

Linda (Stu Weber's wife) and I married just over a quarter century ago.  Out of the whole world, we chose each other.  The power of that choice, that promise, has kept us.  There is no question in either of our minds that we could find a "better mate."  There is always someone out there better than you.  There will always be someone more beautiful, intelligent, wealthy, witty, competent, sensitive, or sensual.  That's a nonissue to Linda and me.  The toxin of comparison has been utterly neutralized and washed away by the sacred anti-toxin of a promise.

 

Understand that the heart of staying power is SACRIFICE-giving one's self up for the good of another.  For the ultimate example of staying power, our eyes have only to lock in on the Lord Jesus Christ.  When He could have turned away from the cross, He stayed on course, setting His face like a flint, all the way to Calvary.  When He could have come down from the cross and sidestepped the suffering, He stayed.  When He could have summoned armies of angels to deliver Him and called down divine air strikes on His adversaries, He stayed.  He persevered and "stayed under" all the way until that moment came when He could cry out, "It is finished!"

 

Champions, have a great week!-David Vining

The Blessings of a Better Live or Jesus

The Blessings of a Better Life or Jesus

Dear Champions,
The short excerpt is by Heather Brown Holleman in the first paragraph and Larry Crabb in the second paragraph.
Rick Hove said, "Do we pursue Jesus as ameans to something more beautiful?"  In other words, many times I see my relationship with Jesus as the way to find health, happiness, or prosperity.  But really, Jesus Himself is the thing I want.  He is not a means to something else.  He is the Something Else.
We approach Jesus the way a child approaches a weary Santa Claus in the mall, who for the hundredth time asks, "What do you want for Christmas?"  I wager no child has ever pressed close to Santa's chest, looked up into his eyes, and said, "You!  I want only you."  No child believes having Santa join him for dinner could bring more joy than watching Santa stack presents beneath the tree.  Do we want the blessing of a better life more than we desire to draw near to Jesus?
May our hearts become like Psalm 27: 4 One thing I ask of the LORD, this is what I seek: that I may dwell in the house of the LORD all the days of my life, to gaze upon the beauty of the LORD and to seek him in his temple.
 
Champions, have a great week!-David Vining

Evil and Loved

Evil and Loved

Dear Champions,

The short excerpt is by Tim Keller, and the short excerpt is Luke 11:11-13 "Which of you fathers, if your son asks for a fish, will give him a snake instead?  Or if he asks for an egg, will give him a scorpion?  If you then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him!"

Our understanding of sin is most likely breaking the rules.   If I keep the rules, don't cheat on income taxes, don't kill people, don't steal, and if I obey the Ten Commandments, then I'm not sinning.  But sin is really self-salvation.  It's trying to be your own Savior instead of letting Him be Savior.  When you realize that, you suddenly begin to realize that everybody is sinning.  You have to destroy your whole old idea of sin and realize you are a sinner – you are evil.  Then, you receive God's mercy, and that makes you evil and yet a beloved child. 

"You're evil, and yet you're His beloved child."  Is there any other religion or philosophy that says, "You are evil, and yet you are utterly loved – a beloved child of God?"  Common sense says you're either evil, or you're His beloved child."  You cannot be both.  But Christianity, the Gospel, says you are both.

Champions, have a great week!-David Vining

It's All Pointing to Jesus

It's All Pointing To Jesus

Dear Champions, 

The short excerpt is by Tim Keller, and the scripture is 2 Timothy 3:16-17 All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, so that the man of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work. 

The Scripture isn't man's reaching up for God; It is God's reaching down to us.  When people went to John the Baptist and asked, "Are you the one," he kept saying, "I'm not the One.  I'm testifying to the One.  I'm pointing to Something beyond me.  I bear witness to the One.

Every law, rule, text, and passage as pointing beyond itself to Jesus Christ. 

Let's look at the story of Joseph.  Joseph is sold into slavery by his brothers.  He's betrayed, and they basically try to kill him.  They sell him into a life of misery and suffering, but he triumphs through it because he trusts in God.  And finally in the end he's ascended to the right hand of the throne.  When his brothers are dying of a famine, he could use his power to save his family and forgive them.  If you read 90% of the commentaries, they see it pointing to Joseph and say, "If I try hard, no matter how much I'm suffering or how much people have betrayed me, I can get through.  If I just believe in God, I can do anything.  If I try hard enough I can forgive." 

If you read it that way, then you will either become smug and self-righteous, or you'll become absolutely crushed with despair.  You'll say, "I'll never be able to do that."

Every part of the Bible is saying just what John the Baptist said:  "I'm not the One!  I'm pointing to Someone else!"

The real Joseph (Jesus) was sold and betrayed by the people who should have loved Him, yet He brought about redemption through His suffering.  Now He's seated at the right hand of the Father, and He has forgiven us.  Until you see yourself as the recipient of what Jesus Christ has done (as the true Joseph) you'll never have the melted heart necessary to forgive other people.  If Joseph is an example, he'll just crush you!  But if he's pointing to Jesus Christ, then suddenly there's freedom. 

Champions, have a great week!-David Vining

The Great Paradox

The Great Paradox

Dear Champions,

The short excerpt is by the late Chuck Colson and is found in Joe Gibbs book Game Plan for Life. Early in his career Colson was special counsel to President Richard Nixon, and he served prison time for obstruction of justice related to the Watergate scandal.  Colson founded Prison Fellowship Ministries after he was released from prison, and the Scripture is Luke 9:23-23 Then Jesus said to them all: If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me. For whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for me will save it.
Looking back, I can now see clearly the two great lessons from my life.  The first was the paradox I discovered in prison: If you really want to find your life, you have to lose it for Christ's sake.  After years of success and power, clawing my way to the top, I ended up empty and desperate.  But when I surrendered my life to Christ, I found in prison real peace, joy and purpose.

The second great lesson is also a paradox. God did not choose to use me when I was at the top.  He used me when I was broken at the bottom.  What I did not understand was that nothing is beyond the power of God.  In fact, God chose me precisely when I was weakest and most broken.  Why? Because then my own pride was out of the way and I could never glory in anything I did in the future. And I have not. God has used my life for His much greater purpose-to spread prison ministries around the world, far beyond anything I could ever dream of.  Indeed, He uses the weak and broken to shame the wise and mighty.

This former Marine captain and powerful White House aide thought he did not need God; the convict washing socks in a prison laundry knew how wrong he was.  The great paradox is that God will use your weakness, not your strength.
Champions, have a great week!-David Vining

 

God Is Bigger Than Your Problems

God Is Bigger Than Your Problems

Dear Champions,

The short excerpt is by Max Lucado and the Scripture is Numbers 13:30-32 Then Caleb quieted the people before Moses, and said, Let us go up at once and take possession, for we are well able to overcome it. But the men who had gone up with him said, We can't attack those people; they are stronger than we are. And they spread among the Israelites a bad report about the land they had explored.

It helps for us to see God as the one in whom all the affairs of our life fit.  For instance, when the twelve spies went up from Kadesh Barnea to check out the Promised Land, ten of them saw only the size of the giants in the land. They did not see God looming larger than the giants. David, on the other hand, when he saw the giant Goliath, was not afraid of being smaller than the giant because he saw the giant as being smaller than God. If we look hard enough in this life, we will always find a problem bigger than our current one. But if we look with spiritual eyes, we will always see that God is bigger than them all. If you are facing a problem right now that is bigger than you are, look again. That problem nests inside Gods purposes for your life. The problem is larger than you, but God is larger than the problem.

Keep stepping back until God, not your problem, fills your vision.

Champions, have a great week!-David Vining