Awake At 30

Through God We Will Do Valiantly " Give us help from trouble,  For the help of man  is  useless.  Through God we will do valiantly,  For  it is  He  who  shall tread down our enemies. " Psalm 60:11-12 NKJV Do you know what it is to be delivered by God? If you're a Christian, that answer is "Yes!" and you know the beauty of being delivered out of the hand of your adversary. You have your own battles and I have mine. Some may have battled addictions, others a lifestyle, while others deal with various other sins which gets its claws into you and refuses to let go. Perhaps you're currently enslaved to a sin and think there's no way out. There is only one sure way out of our sin, and that is with the Lord. Make no mistake, our adversary is strong, he is a mighty foe, yet our Lord is stronger and mightier than all. With the Lord is deliverance, hope, strength, trust, joy, and life. With our adversary is certain death, destruction, sorrow, fear, lies, an

What About This Man "...And when He had spoken this, He said to him, “Follow Me.” Then Peter, turning around, saw the disciple whom Jesus loved following...Peter, seeing him, said to Jesus, “But Lord, what about this man?” Jesus said to him, “If I will that he remain till I come, what is that to you? You follow Me.” John 21:19-22 NKJV How often do we look around us and ask, "But what about..." rather than obey the Lord? We pose questions to God, which seem reasonable at the time, when what we're really doing is drawing our minds away from what the Lord commanded us to do. The fact of the matter is that the Lord desires of us all the same thing, follow Jesus. We read in God's word how we are to do that, for what we read is the gospel of Christ, yet how many people look to man's wisdom and his words over what the Lord directs? How often does man take the simplicity of God's word and seek to insert something with a "But what about..." somehow thi

Men: Are You A Spiritual Sissy? [I got this idea from a book I'm reading and thought it deserved some attention. It's challenged me so hopefully I can relay the thought accurately, while adding my own thoughts of course, to where it will benefit others.] When we open God's word and look to our examples of men in the Bible, I'm afraid many of us come up lacking. Whether in our minds as to what constitutes a man, our perception of what a "real" man is, or our image of what a "real" man does. The problem for us many times, I believe, is that we have clouded our minds with the world's view of what a real man truly is. We've allowed the world's standards (if we could go so far as to call them that) to be mingled with God's standards, and so we arrive at some hybrid definition of what men are supposed to be. But when we really think about this, I don't know a man alive who would claim that those in Scripture weren't "real men

Heart of Josiah What is our reaction to God's word? How is our heart and soul's reaction to what He has commanded? When Josiah heard the word of the Lord read, recognized that they were not following it, he tore his robes as a sign of grief and despair, he immediately sought out what should be done so as to escape the wrath of Almighty God for their failure to follow His law (2Chron.34). His reaction was to remedy the error, get right before God, truly and humbly repent and lead others in the same. Here was God's response to his servant Josiah: "...because your heart was tender, and you humbled yourself before God when you heard His words against this place and against its inhabitants, and you humbled yourself before Me, and you tore your clothes and wept before Me, I also have heard you, ” says the Lord." 2 Chronicles 34:27 NKJV God was surely going to punish His people for their error and utter disregard for Him and His law, that much was surely coming. How

Until... I didn't appreciate my legs until I met a man who had none. I didn't appreciate my ability to walk until I met someone who couldn't. I didn't appreciate my ability to see until I met a blind man. I didn't appreciate my ability to hear until I met someone who couldn't. I didn't appreciate my lungs and ability to breathe on my own until I met someone who lost their ability to breathe without a machine. I didn't appreciate my healthy heart until I met people whose hearts were failing. I didn't realize I couldnt walk, my own lameness, until i finally let Jesus carry me; until He restored my legs, taught me to number my steps, and showed me how to walk properly. I didn't realize my blindness, until God opened my eyes through His holy Word; not until Jesus restored my sight, gave me new eyes to see, and illuminated my path and life. I didn't realize my deafness until God's word was spoken, not until Jesus Christ healed and tune

Barriers "...you have put off the old man with his deeds, and have put on the new man who is renewed in knowledge according to the image of Him who created him, where there is neither Greek nor Jew, circumcised nor uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave nor free, but Christ is all and in all." (Col.3:9-11 NKJV) How often do you and I put up barriers in our lives? How often do we read God's word, nod our heads, perhaps even audibly confirm our agreement, and then go about our days with little concern for others, choosing instead to cast off the manner and spirit of our Savior we call ourselves after? I'll admit that this has been the case in my own life, perhaps more often than I've realized before. How often do we allow prejudices to guide our lives rather than casting down those walls which we build up? For instance, we deem someone unworthy: whether that be of our time, our courtesy, our good will and common decency, simple kindness, or most tragically we

Jesus Christ Arose! "He is not here; for He is risen, as He said..." Matthew 28:6 NKJV Friend, are you aware that Jesus Christ arose? I'm pretty confident that among Christians this is an understood fact. However, sometimes we live and act as if Jesus is still in the grave, like He died and never arose. I'm sure that you're asking, "ok but in what way do we live like this?" That is certainly a logical question, so let's investigate that. Perhaps the best way to answer this is to discuss the significance of His resurrection. And for that topic, there is truly nothing I can say that would explain the resurrection better than 1 Corinthians 15 , but we can briefly summarize what is stated there. Let's look at the text: "But if there is no resurrection of the dead, then Christ is not risen. And if Christ is not risen, then our preaching is empty and your faith is also empty. Yes, and we are found false witnesses of God, becaus