Devotions

TIE THEM AS SYMBOLS ON YOUR HANDS... ...Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength. These commandments that I give you today are to be upon your hearts. Impress them on your children. Talk about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up. Tie them as symbols on your hands and bind them on your foreheads. Write them on the doorframes of your houses and on your gates. Deuteronomy 6:5-9 NIV I'm sure you've heard the first part of the passage I posted above. "Love the Lord your God with all your heart..." etc. What do you think of when you hear this? It sounds pretty simple, right? It's actually quite difficult. Perhaps something that has been attempted many times, and only achieved once. A friend I was talking to was teaching me about the many things we as Christians face: the challenges that get between us and God... sin, the world, and Satan. Sin and ...

A good friend of mine told me that he really liked lights. You know, Christmas lights, streetlights, and starry nights. But I remember he said something about really liking the concept of light, too. Like a light shining among sheer darkness. We all know the analogy that Jesus makes in the book of John: Dispute Over Jesus’ Testimony When Jesus spoke again to the people, he said, “I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will never walk in darkness, but will have the light of life.” The Pharisees challenged him, “Here you are, appearing as your own witness; your testimony is not valid.” Jesus answered, “Even if I testify on my own behalf, my testimony is valid, for I know where I came from and where I am going. But you have no idea where I come from or where I am going. You judge by human standards; I pass judgment on no one. But if I do judge, my decisions are true, because I am not alone. I stand with the Father, who sent me. In your own Law it is written that th...

The Powerful Words of Jesus Oftentimes we hear John 3:16 and don't even pay attention to it, like we have SUCH a better understanding of the Bible that we don't ever need to hear that beginners' verse again. That's for new believers. That's outdated. Maybe you have never thought that, ever , and the fact that I'm thinking like that disgusts you. But I'm not going to lie, sometimes I overlook verses like that, like the Lord's prayer, like Psalm 23, "the Lord is my shepherd..." And sometimes, at least for me, anyway, I focus so much on the interesting, new, rarely heard pieces of scripture instead of focusing on the core of my faith-- the words Jesus himself spoke. So, that's what I'm going to try to do-- focus on Jesus. Listen to HIS message for my life instead of searching for my own comforting words. Maybe His words will be uncomfortable to hear sometimes, because listening to them might mean I have to change some parts of my ...