Innocent when the Claims are Guilty

Blogging is like prayer journaling. I tend to only write when struggling to push off that dark cloud of depression lurking over me. This morning, I found myself reading through some of the Psalms like 55-58. David expresses that people were against him and he was alone. He continued to say “I will put my trust in You.” In Psalm 56, he even said, “What can man do to me?” 

The words and actions of man are more tangible and physical than the awesome awareness and presence of God most times. Hurting People hurt people. And that hurt is manifested through actions like jealousy, gossip, anger and the list goes on. Because we are also flesh and blood, it is difficult to discern if the hurting person who is successfully hurting you has any validity. I frequently wonder “if I deserve this.” How are we to really know that we are innocent?

Reading the Psalms this morning, I saw how David confidently proclaimed to the Lord that he was innocent. The litmus test of truth must be in the ability to represent yourself before the Lord. When we come to the Lord in prayer and your spirit understands that you are exposing your heart before a Holy, Blameless and All Powerful God, our tendency would be to confess sins. However, if instead we honestly can say before God, “I have not sinned and I am innocent in this matter,” then our inner soul needs to confidently stand tall knowing that God knows and you can trust Him regardless of the words, actions and emotions of man.

By coming to God, either way–guilty or innocent, we will change. In the guilt of wrong behavior, confessing sin gets us back on track and the Lord will lead us also. It is wonderful to know that the answer consistently lies in returning to the Lord. He alone can be trusted and only He can truly pierce your heart to bring about change for the better. When it is all said and done, it only matters what God thinks about us any way. We stand before Him alone some day and I am thankful that He is a God of love and forgiveness who helps the innocent as well as the guilty.

Christians and Technology

God is amazing and all knowing. I have always prayed that we could learn how to use the resources available to promote the Gospel and God’s Word. Several years ago, we founded Daily Disciples Ministries and began writing Bible studies. We had no idea what God would lead us to do using technology. We had no idea how to use the Internet and at that time, social media had not been born yet. But God led us to build a website, way back in 2003; then, put the Bible studies that we were teaching on that website as an mp3 file. We videotaped our Spiritual Warfare study in 2006, which are still being sold to this day. I remember the comments from those who thought we were a bit crazy….at that time, these types of things were not that prevalent in Christian activities and not many people seemed to care.

The biggest comment we received during our early technology ideas involved our decision to start writing “daily devotions” to post on our new website. We were told that we would not be able to keep writing them…that we would eventually stop…that it would never last. Well, that was about 8 years ago and over 400 devotions ago. The daily devotions have several thousand subscribers as well as are posted on Crosswalk.com and are passed around the world daily. This past week, we took technology to the next step in our ministry and launched our first App. We thought it was appropriate that it be for our daily devotions. The Daily Disciples Devotions App is available on the iTunes store and App store, one of a few that are actually an App.

God has given all of us the power to learn and to grow. Pray and ask for Him to show you things and how to use these latest technologies. Our voice for Christ needs to be out there in every place and the online world is growing with the voice of the world. Let’s do everything we can as Christians to use technology to spread the message of the Good News. From Apps to online video teachings to anything you can imagine. With God all things are possible.

Our latest Bible study currently going is on the Book of Exodus. We are teaching in person but are videotaping the sessions for anyone to join us, anywhere in the world. Check it out and join us. Visit our new online store at http://www.DailyDisciplesStore.com. Keep in touch and keep the faith!

Spiritual Warfare Bible Study

Are you experiencing confusion, frustration, restlessness or worry? Are you getting tired of trying so hard but feel like you are losing so easily?

As I was heading to a prayer meeting last night, I asked the Lord, “When can the verse ‘You have the mind of Christ’ become my covering and mindset instead of ‘your ways are not My Ways and your thoughts are not My Thoughts’? I felt stuck with a defeated Old Testament mentality instead sensing the power of the Holy Spirit in my life like in the New Testament.  When, Lord, when will it change? Why, Lord, why has it not changed?

While sitting in the room, I sensed that the Lord was not pleased with the distractions and restlessness and worries of my mind in the day to day. It is not about salvation but every day victory. I knew better. There is a battle waging in our minds between good and evil and we are accountable to fight in this war.

The answer is to learn, train and study God’s word. There is a great Spiritual Warfare Study that has changed my life. It is really a Spiritual Warfare Bible Study that teaches you how to eliminate your fears and experience the abundant life God has for you. In addition, the Spiritual Warfare Bible Study has teaching CDs and DVDs to reinforce how to break bad habits and become victorious to live the Christian life in power. It is time to pick it up and apply the principles again especially since the internet makes it easy for me to start. There is a Spiritual Warfare Bible Study Online. Go to http://spiritualwarfarestudy.org and like me, let’s change our lives today.  Spiritual Warfare: The Truth Cries Out

For other Christian resources, visit our new Daily Disciples Store online. Join our new study in the book of Exodus and move forward with God’s power as you journey through life in faith.

“I Will Trust You”

Like many of us, there is situation in my life that I desperately want to change. As a result, my mind takes me down a variety of routes to find hope for it to work out or be different. Each time, I come up with the same answer: a dead end. I have sought the Lord on this topic and sense His silence. Continually wrestling with this issue has done nothing for me except quench my peace and steal my joy. I also have come to realize that I am becoming stumbled in my own faith (or lack of it).  I am now praying that I can read the dead end sign at the beginning of the cul-de-sac and just believe it to be true instead of needing to drive down the street to prove it to myself.

Our God does things in His timing and answers our prayers according to His will. Jesus knew the Lord’s will when He asked, “Not my will but Yours.” God’s will is not our own and we should not kick against to goads. When we do challenge His will, we find a lack of peace in our lives and we find ourselves fighting against God instead of trusting in God. I need to get back to the basic… “Lord, You heard me the very first time I prayed about this situation. I have beseeched You and truly do desire Your will to be done over my own desire. So today, I will resolve myself to say, “Yes, Lord, I will trust You.”

A Future Hope

Daily Disciples Ministries hosted a retreat last weekend called A Future Hope. If you have followed Bobbye and Tonilee within the last two years, you would already know that they have many different kinds of outreaches. Real Issues Real Answers Power of Hope Conference was an outreach to the community focusing on women’s issues as Sharp Healthcare was the primary sponsor. Then there is Media 4 Women which was raised up as a result of the Daily Disciples message. Women came to them asking for help…help to get the message God placed on their hearts out to the world in a similar way that Bobbye and Tonilee had learned. This business grew to both men and women and now they have clients throughout the United States.

The Daily Disciples Retreat was a weekend focused on the Bible. They opened Friday night with worship and went through chapter by chapter, verse to verse through Genesis 1-11. On Saturday, they picked up their teaching in Genesis 12 discussing the struggles of Abram as our father of faith. By Sunday morning, the life changing testimonies of how the Lord touched the lives of each woman throughout the weekend was incredible. God is still in the business of performing miracles! God is on the throne regardless of the past we have lived and the present we face daily. He is God and has a future Hope for anyone who will come to Him regardless of our state of mind or present condition. God desires to restore the years the locust have eaten (Saturday night’s message).

Thank You Lord for the work You performed. We also thank You for the promise that if we search for You, we will find You if we search for You with all our hearts. Please let it continue daily as we continue to seek Your face and yearn to hear Your voice over all the other noises around us.

No Good Luck Charms

Reading 1 Samuel 4-6 this morning, I noticed how similar we are today to the people of Israel. They were in conflict, so they decided to do something about it They went to war against the Philistines. They lost 4,000 men in battle and lost that battle. Returning home depressed and defeated, the men of Israel came up with a plan and mustered enough emotional support to make a statement to themselves as well as the Philistines. The Israelites decided to take the ark of the Covenant as a good luck charm into the next battle. They rallied together and shouted so loudly that the ground shook and the Philistines were made aware of the unity the ark of Covenant brought to its people.

The plan however was not based on seeking the Lord. Chapter 4 opens up with Samuel speaking the words of God and then the chapter develops into what the men of Israel felt was best to do. There was no seeking of the Lord. There was no asking of Samuel. Funny thing is…after losing the first battle, they did decide to bring the “representation” of the Lord into battle but did not include Him personally. It would be like me driving my parents car to their church as if their car would give me credibility and strength without asking them for advice on how to handle the situation.

The Israelites lost the second battle terribly, and the ark of the Covenant was stolen by their enemies. No Good Luck charms to manipulate God to act or to give the people false strength. However, the ark did make a bad impression on the Philistines. As the Philistines returned the ark to the Israelites, then the people of God repented and turned back to the Lord.

Like us, the Israelites had to lose a lot personally and publicly to gain back the humility of seeking the Lord His way over their own. There is nothing wrong with the symbols of the Lord that we wear, put on our cars and carry in our purses to remind us to serve the Lord. However, we end up embarrassed, ashamed and defeated when we put our trust in those symbols instead in the Lord Himself.

What does it take to get us to seek Him first? Why is it so difficult to humble ourselves before the Lord before we make major decisions instead of after we have regrets? I am not naive and I do know that many times we quickly throw up a prayer to keep our bases covered. But that again is treating God like a lucky rabbit’s foot. To truly seek the Lord is like searching for a lost child. There is an all consuming longing to search for His will and to not settle until His peace floods our hearts. The peace becomes so loud that even if His answer contradicts our initial request, we submit to His will over our own.

More often than not, I have not embraced the will of the Lord as my first desire. Obedience is not a natural inclination. But God…loves us and knows the end from the beginning. But God…wants to be included. But God…will have the last word and should have the first in our lives. But God…is enough for any circumstance or crises we are facing today.

Am I too tired to quit?

Our conference is 2 days away. We have had 6 previous conferences so we have advertised it as our 7th annual conference. Tonight, however, I was thinking of all the years and all the changes that have come to us in the last 7 years of doing this. It has not been easy and not all the thoughts were good. God has been good and He has been faithful but He has a round about way of showing His purpose and faithfulness at times. As I sat…stapling papers together…I thought, “Am I too tired to quit?” Have you ever felt that way…like the pattern is so familiar that even though it exhausts you at times, it’s what you know and it’s what you do so you cannot change? As I started praying about that thought, I heard a still small voice say to me, “You really had 6 conferences. Then the 7th year, you rested. This is the 8th year. You are not quitting…it’s the year of new beginnings.” Wow. I didn’t expect to come to that conclusion.

Right now, my life is hard. I am personally struggling with many many things. Obviously the Lord knew that we needed to dedicate this conference and our March retreat with the themes of hope because I have been running low on it.

I have had to redefine hope to align up with the Lord. I have needed to lift up my eyes to see past the circumstances to focus on the heavens where God sits. There is my hope. There is my strength and it is because of the power of Hope in His Spirit I can keep going, keep changing, keep growing and HOPEfully not quit. Like my good and wise friend (Bobbye) has said to me many times, “Just take one day at time. It’s easier to get through life that way.”

I HOPE I meet you at the conference. I know that God is going to show up and show off! The conferences are amazing and the fruit seems to stay fresh forever. Thank you to all of you ladies who have never missed one of them and thank you to all of you who are willing to step out and attend this one.

It is a new beginning…and you know what… I can’t wait to get started!

Giving Up

As I wake up each morning, I have to make a choice. Do I continue to pursue something today that the Lord impressed upon my heart yesterday? If I truly believe that I have a relationship with the Lord and He speaks, convicts and leads me….then the answer is yes, I should not question or doubt.

Then how can I let the challenges of life distract me from the pursuit of God’s will? I really believe it’s because we sense God’s finger pointing us in a direction but we feel the responsibility of guessing which daily path will get us there. How much of God’s will rests on my decision making skills? Questions like: Do I embrace that thing or should I listen that that thing? Sometimes my questions become louder than His answers. And I find myself in a crises of faith.

I guess it all gets summarized to a few statements:

1. I give You my life Lord.
2. I will keep quiet about the thing I have already presented over and over to You.
3. I will be patient as I remember You reward “persistence, perseverance, patience, endurance.”
4. I will wake up and choose to love, serve and follow You.
5. I will continue and I will learn to live by faith.

When it is all said and done, Habakkuk 3:17-19 says it best, “Though the fig tree should not blossom, and there be no fruit on the vines. Though the yield of the olive should fail, and the fields produce no food, though the flock should be cut off from the fold, and there be no cattle in the stalls, Yet I will exult in the Lord. I will rejoice in the God of my salvation. The Lord God is my strength , and He has made my feet like hinds’ feet, and makes me walk on my high places.”

If you are struggling, please feel free to send us your prayer requests and we hope to see you at the Power of Hope Conference. We are doing this conference because we understand. You can sign up at www.dailydisciples.org

Gluttony: One of the Seven Deadly Sins

Tonight we will be teaching on Gluttony. Tradition has labeled gluttony as a deadly sin but the Bible does not. It is evident from the silence in Scripture that God does not bless us according to our weight. However, Scripture does talk about food in a spiritual nature like:

• “Taste and see that the Lord is good.” (Psalm 34:8)
• “Desire the sincere spiritual milk of the word.” (1 Peter 2:2)
• “I am the bread of life. Come to me and you will not hunger.” (John 6:35)
• “Come, everyone who thirsts, come to the waters; and he who has no money, come, buy and eat! Come, buy wine and milk without money and without price. Why do you spend your money for that which is not bread, and your labor for that which does not satisfy? Listen diligently to me, and eat what is good, and delight yourselves in rich food.” (Isaiah 55:1-2)

1 Corinthians 6:12 summarizes God’s desire for us even when teaching on gluttony, “All things are lawful for me, but not all things are profitable. All things are lawful for me, but I will not be mastered by anything. Food is for the stomach and the stomach is for food, but God will do away with both of them.” We are to concentrate on pursuing the things of God. Food does not have to stand in the way of that pursuit. I really believe that our weight is more of a stumbling factor within our own minds than it is with the Lord.

Signs of the Times

I can still remember sermons from 1979 when I first came to Christ.  The Book of Revelation seemed like a Twilight  Zone episode as I heard Pastor Chuck Smith teach on the mark of the beast. He quoted from Revelation  13:16-17 referring to the antichrist,   “He also forced everyone, small and great, rich and poor, free and slave, to receive a mark on his right hand or on his forehead, so that no one could buy or sell unless he had the mark, which is the name of the beast or the number of his name.”  (NIV84)

He said that the mark of the beast would probably be like a small computer chip that would be placed under the skin of the hand or on the forehead. This chip would be the key to all sorts of buying and selling.

To embrace Pastor Chuck’s teaching at the time seemed like an act of faith. Today, we know that it is more like a fact. We already have seen commercials of these computer chips being placed in our pets or even our family members who suffer from Alzheimer’s disease. The chips are programmed to assist in finding  your lost pet or loved one. It is a wonderful invention.  This system makes sense as it also brings us a worldly peace of mind.  Although this new capability is not tied up with the antichrist at this present time, we can see the conditioning of adapting such a system or new way of life.  It moves our world to a cashless society as well as the convenience of having your belongings be a part of you. No more identity theft or the hassle of many credit cards and papers.

So what are we to do? Revolt, Rebel, Reject Change??? I don’t think so. My friend who has a down syndrome child is seriously considering purchasing this chip for her child who frequently escapes from the home regardless of the extent of locks and security.  Would any person today advice her against this? Is it wrong? Tell you the truth, I had to pray about it.

The antichrist is not in the public light as we know of yet so the chips are individually purchased through a variety of individual companies. Presently these chips are not a part of a One World Government. The stage is being set obviously.  However, according to God, that is the plan and the way of the future. God’s ways will be accomplished as well as His words fulfilled.

In summary, times are changing rapidly through technology.  We are not to be in fear of the change but to be looking for the return of  Christ and use the technology He has allowed to spread the word as He is our answer. He is our Hope and we do not need to be afraid.