The Wake-Up Call

Baptizing with the Holy Spirit, communicating the very presence of the Most High to the hearts and minds of those who are baptized, now that’s something only God can do.

The Almighty is an evocative God, the one who calls forth, who addresses those in relation to him to follow in obedience the divine will and design.

Wherever Jesus is, there is light, revelation, and unveiling.

[Jesus], and [Jesus] alone, is the true light that illuminates all of humanity whether he is celebrated or not or even recognized or not.

Might Jesus be saying he will take care of expanding his kingdom in the world if we will focus on seeking his kingdom within our relationships in the body of Christ?

The impulse of false holiness is to protect oneself from the world. The instincts of true holiness is to trust God for protection in the world.

"But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.”

We need to make the shift from the whole idea of a better prayer life to the consuming reality of a life of prayer.

Though you are tired, weak, and utterly incapable of facing the looming crosses ahead, you are a champion by the grace of God and the cross of Jesus.

Forsakenness is a real experience and it can be occasioned by very real conditions. To be forsaken by God, however, is not possible.

Unforgiveness creates a barrier not only in our relationships with other people, but in our relationship with God. In fact, according to Jesus, our peace with God depends on our peace with other people.

It is more common to hear people lift up their hopes in their prayers. Jesus begins by lifting up his faith.

Our crosses come to us in those places where the ways of the kingdom clash with the ways of the world and call on us to make difficult decisions.

The penitential psalms are the basic grammar of the repentant life, which should be one of the deepest marks or badges of the Christian life.

In the largest way and with the fewest words, the cross is the weight of the glory of the love of God for the whole world, beginning with me.

The secret to life, according to Jesus, is to die before you die.

Love is greater than faith and until our love is greater than our faith, we are destined for far lesser things than the greater things Jesus promised we would do.

The Lord’s Prayer is more about reminding ourselves of our real needs and who can be trusted to meet those needs.

Grace is never about measuring up. It's the reverse. Grace is about measuring down. God's ways are hidden from the proud and revealed to the humble.

God comes to earth in the form of a first-century Jewish peasant. He lives out before our very eyes a revolutionary life behind which is an extravagant life of prayer.

God promises great things to the one whose trust and desires are oriented towards him.

"But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.”

With each new turn of the soil, we dig deeper into the sanctifying grace of his love and his plan for us.

Once we accept and awaken to Christ, our eternal life begins.

God’s infinite, eternal, omnipotent being recognizes and accommodates, to some degree, our frail, finite, temporal, and limited nature as a human on this planet.

Trying to locate the limit of God’s removal of our sins, would be like trying to locate the west by heading east—it can never be found.

Righteousness is built, bit by painstaking bit, over many choices, over many directions, over much time.

The contours of the wicked should contrast sharply with the character of those who live under the covenant with God.

"But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.”

And this is what his unfailing love does for us: it stands between us and any accuser that we face, whether internal or external.

Each day we lean into the solid, trustworthy nature of God to pull us through inevitable trials and suffering.

As Jesus pronounced upon his last breath on the cross, “It is finished.” His work was done and he became free to retire to somewhere he loves: our hearts.

Who we believe God to be often reveals more about us than about God.

Let this desire to know him and be known by him become, like the psalmist declares, an offering of total praise and total worship.

The Psalms cannot imagine a world where the people of God do not see themselves engaged in conflict of some sort.

"But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.”

Only when we actually do God's Word does it become enfleshed in our own lives.

I read the Bible in order to search for and grasp the revealed wisdom of God.

Memorization requires brain activity; rememberizing requires soul engagement.

Delighting in the Word of God leads to the deepest desire of our hearts in its outcome.

Cast all your anxiety on him because he cares for you.

God is our refuge and protector even in the fiercest trial.

"But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.”

When we turn our eyes upon Jesus, beholding him, he takes the veil away.

The rule of God's immeasurably-more-than-all-we-ask-or-imagine-according-to-his-power-that-is-at-work—is done within us.

When our quest shifts from trying to know the plans to seeking the one who says "I know," we discover the one who holds the plans is the plan.

If we forget who we are and who we belong to, we will quickly lose our way in the wilderness of this world.

GRACE IS WORKING FOR ME!

If you feel powerless today, or that the purposes of God are somehow being thwarted in the world, then take heart. God is in control of human history.

"But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.”