II Chronicles 7:14 "If My people who are called by my name will humble themselves, and pray and seek my face, and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin and heal their land..."
This verse speaks loud today! Where is America at today? How fixed on the cross are we?
Well, the Lord would encourage us to humble ourselves, and pray and seek Him. We as believers need to humbly come to the Lord and repent from our sinful ways. The Lord says, 'humble,' because He knows that it will take a lot out of us to carve out time to pray and seek Him! If we desire to see change in our own lives, families, churches, communities and nation, we must humble ourselves before the Lord and pray!
The Lord says that if we do these things He will hear and heal!
That is what we need in these last days, a healing! Our nation is so far from God today, how about you? Where are you at with the Lord?
Turn and seek the Lord!
Trust in the Lord with all of your heart and lean not on your own
understanding..."
Prov. 3:5-6
This is a classic verse! It is one of those verses that are in most
Christian houses, somewhere... What makes it so key though? Maybe it is
key because we so desperatley long to trust in someone other than
ourselves?
Maybe it is because we finally get to the point where we realize, wow,
this verse is true, absolutely true! I can't lean on my own
understanding, what is my understanding in comparison to the wisdom of
God!
As we grow in our relationships with the Lord we suddenly begin to
realize, hey, I can trust in the Lord! And it is so refreshing to know
that we can completely rely on Him! He is Faithful!
So what are you waiting for, "Trust in the Lord with all of your heart..."
Let everything that has breath praise the Lord."
Psalm 150:6
As you read Psalm 150 the word, 'praise,'(halal) is found 13 times. Praise is declaring God's glory, celebrating Him, it can be out loud and is definately gratitude or boasting towards something or someone. In the case of this Psalm, the word praise is linked to the word, "Him," nine times! The finally two praise instructions are to, "praise the Lord!" Otherwise know as Hallelujah! When is the last time you declared the great things of God, to Him, because he is worthy! We are instucted to praise HIM! Matter of fact at the close of this psalm it says "let everything that has breath praise the Lord," not "everything that has breath CAN praise the Lord," but God divinely put's the word "LET." Why? When we truly see the glory of the Lord, when we see that He is the creator, when we see Him die on the tree for us, when we sense His Spirit leading us and holding us, comforting us... what can we do but Praise the Lord! This Psalm reveals the great desire of our Lord, to spend time with Him, praising Him for His goodness! When we do praise Him, we are in His presence and in His presence is fullness of Joy (Ps.16:11)! Let's praise Him, because He is worthy and He let's us!!! Remember what Jesus said as he rolled in to Jerusalem on a donkey, "I tell you that if these should keep silent, the stones would immediately cry out." Luke 19:40 Let us praise Him continually, for He is God and He is good!
Call to me and I will answer you, and show you great and mighty things, which you do not know."
Jer. 33:3
I love this verse! Here we have an open invitation to call upon the Lord and He gives us a few promises! What are His promises? 1. I will answer you! Wow, that is a great promise... He will answer, this is wonderful to know! This means He is listening and desiring to respond! 2. Show you great and mighty things! When I call on Him, He promises to answer and He promises to show me things. Not just anything, but great and mighty things I don't even know! SO why not call upon the Lord today?
"Peter an Apostle of Jesus Christ, to the pilgrims..."
I Peter 1:1a
I would like to draw your attention to this great phrase, 'to the pilgrims.' Peter is intent on allowing the church to understand that we are just pilgrims. We are here for just a time. We are on a pilgrimage. As beleivers we need to understand that this earth and our time on it is absolutely temporary. Peter would also like us to understand that we need to have a pilgrim mentality. This way we will pour all our energies into that which is eternal and that which is furthering the kingdom of God! We can absolutely be a changing agent in our world as pilgrims passing through, trumping the love of Jesus to all those we come in contact with. So how about it? Are you a pilgrim? Ask the Lord how you can represent Him as you continue on your pilgrimage home, HEAVEN!
