DEEP // WIDE // LIGHT

Sanctification : being made holy, or being set apart It happens every time we attend a Jesus conference or camp! We are reminded of the bad news of sin and the good news of forgiveness and love, and we turn back to God. Time after time, students experience this phenomenon. Praise God for his working! And yet… The next question on their young hearts is always the same:  “What can I do to feel this close to God back home?”  The frequent concern in the older hearts of adults is similar:  “Why do I not always feel close to God?”  There is a single answer to both questions – sanctification. The words of John the Baptizer ( John 3:30 ) fit quite nicely here to explain it succinctly: “He must increase, but I must decrease.” The first time we claim that Jesus has become our Master, the first time we ask forgiveness of a holy God, we are set free from sin’s chains; we are saved from sin. Because the perfection of Jesus has been exchanged with our ...

You might have a need that seems entirely too big to fill. You might have a situation that seems positively too impossible to solve. What if God were ALREADY at work setting up just the help you need for just the time you will need it? There is an impossible need right now for the International Mission Board . They are doing a right thing, while doing a heart-wrenching thing. They are required to reduce the number of missionaries and workers in numbers as large as 600 - 800 people in order to be good stewards of God's blessings of financial receipts and of manpower. ( See the story here. ) This situation is in spite of an increase in annual receipts from their annual Lottie Moon Offering for International Missions . I want to tell you an inspiring story. In the tiny town of Philadelphia, Mississippi, a high school senior, who is a leader in his church youth group, wanted to plan a 3 on 3 basketball tournament for his community. The church leadership here at First Baptist Ch...

“It hurts, God. Please make it stop.”   Have you said those words? I know I have. If you have been thinking through theological matters for very long at all, you have probably considered the metaphor that God is chiseling away at you, an ordinary stone, until you become the work of art he sees in you. We tend not to like this metaphor. Being chiseled is an act of pain, and we do NOT like pain!  I came across a poem in the devotional book StreamsIn The Desert, on the day of September 1 . This poem is a request to God for him to not stop chiseling, but to finish his work.  In the still air the music lies unheard; In the rough marble beauty hides unseen; To make the music and the beauty needs The master's touch, the sculptor's chisel keen. Great Master, touch us with Your skillful hands; Let not the music that is in us die! Great Sculptor, hew and polish us; nor let,  Hidden and lost, Your form within us lie! I want to have sufficient fai...

Prayer is a private practice, but not one we should keep for ourselves.  Jesus said in Matthew 6:9 , “Therefore, you should pray like this…” Adults, may I ask a difficult question of us? If I am charged with making followers ( Matthew28:19-20 ), and if I am charged with passing on my faith to the next generation ( Deuteronomy 6:4-7 ), then am I passing on my thoughts on prayer? If Jesus taught his followers, am I not to teach others as well?  Most of our young people learn prayer from sermons and lessons they only partially listen to, and from the public prayers they hear in worship. I believe that is insufficient. You might believe you do not know enough to teach. I would suggest not that you teach necessarily, but that you  pray with them.  Educators understand the principle of teaching by doing. I encourage you to use the recommendations of Deuteronomy 6:7 . Pray with them at home, on the road, at nighttime, and in the morning. Turn off the radio while drivi...

Have you ever f elt blah?   The Christmas holidays are ove r .  School and work routines are back in full swing.  The holiday food left behind an extra pound or two.  Your new ye ar's resolutions are already broken - multiple times over.  Eli jah also felt something akin to this post-h oliday drudgery. In 1 Kings 18 , h e was on top of the world as he watched God answer his prayers and rain down fire . He saw God bring rain to end a dry spel l, too .  However, immediately after this, in 1 Kings 19, he recei ved a death threat , and all of his recent t riumph ant feelings left in a hurry, taking with them his will to live . Yet even in these moments of depression, he found that God was just as ever-present in the problems as He had been in the triu mphs . God fed him, rested h im, an d spoke to him .  Is your faith only fair-weather ? Do you stop believing in God or do you get angry with Him when t hings don't happen as...

God blew me away recently (in several ways, but I will only bore you with one today). After our church's recent excellent Easter worship, I ran across a news article with some disturbing and yet not surprising statistics. Apparently, 9 out of 10 American homes have a Bible in them. However, only 16 percent of American churchgoers read the Bible daily and 25 percent of churchgoers don't read the Bible at all. The mental picture of the dusty Bible on the shelves of most American homes is not surprising in the least to me. It is, however, a grave concern of mine. It is most especially disconcerting when I notice that elsewhere on planet Earth, believers are using their Bible to stand up for their right to worship. Hundreds of believers were arrested in China on Easter Sunday (this link is working as of 04/29/2011) during a government crackdown on an unregistered church. The pastor's response is straight from God's Word. Read this for yourself, and be amazed. While we in t...

I was in Genesis 2 this morning, and was struck with a new thought. (Actually, I was struck with three thoughts, but I'll only mention one here.) In Genesis 2:17 , God says to Adam, " but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die. " Now, I don't know about you, but I have always been VERY curious what in the world was so different about this one tree. And why is knowing right from wrong a bad thing for Adam, and later Eve? And it struck me this morning -- there should only be ONE thing that consumes our life. Adam and Eve walked with God in Eden and talked to Him face to face. The only things on their mind and heart were the tasks God had given, the things God had made, their spouse that God had provided, and conversations with God Himself. There was no wrong. There was only God. But knowing right from wrong introduced a second option. Satan, as a serpent, told Eve that it would make her lik...