from Prepare Yourself for Worship

2017-11-10 Devotional with Hymn, Prepare Yourself for Worship No comments

Longing for God

Father, as I live here in Your presence,
every connection with You,
every word from You,
every sense of You
feeds a deep longing to be fully one with You.

Every time Your Spirit touches
my heart or
mind,
I am overwhelmed with Your reality.
I yearn to know You
without the dimness,
without the distance,
without the distraction.
I yearn to know You
for all You are,
without interruption,
forever.

I know that day will come, Father, and
when it does,
let that deep, unbroken knowing
call from me
all the worship,
all the praise,
all the living, loving response
that is possible from
a small, unworthy creature like myself.

O Living God, I long
to see You,
to know You,
to praise You. 

Listen and sing:
Hymn: O Living God
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Run with Endurance

2017-11-08 Devotional with Hymn No comments

Acts 20:24; 1 Corinthians 9:24-27; 2 Timothy 2:3-6; 4:7-8

Therefore, since we have so great a cloud of witnesses surrounding us, let us also lay aside every encumbrance and the sin which so easily entangles us, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us. (Hebrews 12:1, NASB)

Picture a stadium. We living believers are the athletes, in the midst of a long and grueling race. At times we glance up and all around us. Who fills the stands in this immense stadium? It is the witness of all the heroes of the faith listed in Hebrews 11…plus so many more.

Are all those believers who have left this world actually watching us now? We don’t know. Their witness is what’s in view in Hebrews 12. Their example encourages us and urges us on. If they could speak to us right now, what would they say? Or to phrase it another way, what is their example shouting to us?

“God is always, always, ALWAYS faithful!”
“Just keep trusting Him!”
“The hardship lasts only a short time. It will soon be over. Hold steady!”
“Your obedience and faithfulness will bear fruit far beyond what you can imagine!”
“Rejoice!”
“Don’t let anything hinder you!”

That last statement is what the scripture emphasizes here: let nothing hinder you…absolutely nothing! This is a long and demanding race. Top marathon runners ruthlessly shed anything that will weigh them down. They get rid of everything that will hold them back in any way. Their clothing, their own body weight, their diet, their daily habits—every aspect of their lives is examined in detail. Anything that’s a hindrance, even to the slightest degree, must go.

Consider this: even the marathon is short in comparison to life. The struggles of life are so much greater, and its stakes are infinitely higher. Our rewards are deeper, richer, and forever. If a marathon runner must exercise such self-discipline and ruthlessly shed all hindrances, how much more should we who are racing for our eternal destiny?

I do all things for the sake of the gospel, so that I may become a fellow partaker of it. Do you not know that those who run in a race all run, but only one receives the prize? Run in such a way that you may win. Everyone who competes in the games exercises self-control in all things. They then do it to receive a perishable wreath, but we an imperishable. (1 Corinthians 9:23-25, NASB)

Honestly examine your life for anything that hinders your race. What about that small sin? What about that small distraction that eats into your time, energy, or devotion? Ask a marathon runner if there are any small irritants or small encumbrances. By the end of a long run, they all loom large. Shed them now! God will be glad to help you.

Then you will be prepared to run with endurance the race that is set before you.

Father, help me lay aside everything that is
weighing me down and
holding me back.
Everything, Lord.
Every habit,
every false and fuzzy way of thinking,
every misplaced priority,
every laziness.
Fix my eyes on Jesus—
His life,
His holiness,
His complete devotion to You. 

Listen and sing:
Hymn: We Fix Our Eyes on Jesus Christ
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The Joy of Your Presence

2017-11-06 Devotional with Hymn No comments

Inspired by Psalm 84

O Father, how I love being in Your presence!
When I realize that I am with You,
all I am sings for joy,
body,
mind, and
spirit.

You are infinitely above me
in excellence,
in power, and
in holiness.
Yet when I am with You, I sense that
this is where I belong.
I know a freedom,
a rightness,
a rest in You.

This life is not easy, Father.
The needs never end.
There is weariness,
darkness, and
deep sorrow.
But when I realize that all of life is a journey to You,
everything changes!
Weariness turns to praise.
Darkness shines with Your unfailing goodness.
Sorrow is matched with an inexpressible joy.
Your presence lights my pathway every day.
But what is more,
You Yourself are the heaven toward which I travel.

O Father, absorb my
every thought and
every desire.
You are my joy,
now and forever!

Listen and sing:
Hymn: Psalm 84
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2017-11-03 Devotional with Hymn, Prepare Yourself for Worship No comments

Prepare for All Saints Day

Father, thank You for uniting us with Jesus, Your holy Son.
In Him, we are one with You
through the Spirit we share.
And as we are all one with Jesus,
we are one with each other as well.
We are one in Him with all God’s children of every
language,
culture, and
personality, of
every time and place.
By being one with Him in the Spirit,
we all become one in Him with each other.
Our oneness
with You and
with every other believer
is in Jesus Christ.

All this is Your doing, loving Father, and
we praise You!
We are in the early stages of this wonderful unity, and
we are just beginning to understand what it will mean.
We are warmed as Jesus speaks of us so glowingly as
His friends,
His family,
His body, and
His bride.
It seems that no one image can fully express His desire
for all of us to be together in Him
in the fullest possible sense.

Father of all,
help us to grow in this marvelous and mysterious unity.
We know it is Your loving desire for
each of us and
all of us,
so it is our desire as well.
More and more one in Christ,
and in Him,
more and more one with each other –
that is our prayer, Father.
One with You. 

Listen and sing:
Hymn: Christ and His Bride
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All Saints Day

2017-11-01 Devotional with Hymn No comments

Each year the Christian calendar takes us on a journey with Christ. We anticipate His coming during Advent and celebrate His arrival at Christmas. During Epiphany we receive Him as the Light of the World that has entered our darkness. Through Lent we walk with Him on His road to the cross. We witness His triumphal entry, His crucifixion, and His glorious resurrection during Holy Week and Easter.  We stand with His disciples as they watch Him return to His Father on Ascension Day. We are among them as the Holy Spirit gives birth to the Church on Pentecost.

Then during Ordinary Time, this Spirit patiently forms us into the people of God. Near the end of that time, only weeks before we crown Jesus as King of all Kings, we are given a glorious overview of what it means to be His Church, His Body, His Bride. This is the purpose of All Saints Day. “Saints” literally means “the holy ones”. On All Saints Day we consider what it means to be “the holy ones,” members of the Church Universal spanning all ages, nations, and human divisions.

On All Saints Day we read Isaiah’s description of the great banquet where all God’s people will feast together and death is destroyed forever (25:6-9). We share Daniel’s vision of the coming and goings of the various earthly kingdoms, culminating in God’s saints possessing His eternal Kingdom (Daniel 7:1-18). We are given a foretaste of our destiny as we welcome the King of Glory into His holy temple (Psalm 24) and as we watch Jesus raise Lazarus (John 11).

We sit on the mountainside and listen to Jesus describe what it means to live in the Father’s presence, now and for all eternity (the Beatitudes, Matthew 5:1-12). And with John we watch as Christ’s pure and lovely Bride descends for unending union with her Husband (John 21:1-6).

All Saints Day is a chance to revel in our oneness with Christ and all His holy people. In this dark and difficult world, it is a reminder of who we are even now and who we are surely becoming in Him. 

Listen and sing:
Hymn: Revelation 21
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Cross Every Barrier

2017-10-30 Devotional with Hymn No comments

Transcendent God,
unseen God,
high and holy God,
You have broken down every barrier between
You and
us.
You have come to us and
made Yourself
fully,
humbly,
humanly one with us.

As You are now one with us,
we are one with You.
We share Your life.
We share Your love.
Within our hearts is the love that
breaks down every barrier and
crosses every boundary.
No human being is off-limits to Your great compassion.
No one is too unlovely.
No one is too sinful.
No one is too needy.

Father, live that love through us.
You have broken down every barrier.
May we let none of those old barriers stand in our way –
not race or religion,
not language or geography,
not culture or education,
not sexual orientation or social status,
not comfort, self-centeredness, or fear.
You are the Father of us all, and
Your almighty love respects no boundaries.
Make us bold in You,
loving in You,
joyful in You,
ever sacrificing ourselves freely, completely to You.

O great Father of all,
lead us everywhere Your love longs to go.

Listen and sing:
Hymn: Beyond All Barriers
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2017-10-27 Devotional with Hymn, Prepare Yourself for Worship No comments

We Come and Go as Your People

Father, we come because You call us.
You call us together
as Your children,
as Your people.
You gather us to Yourself.

When our brief gathering is ended,
we go because You send us.
You send us
as Your children,
as Your people.
You send us out into our individual
homes,
neighborhoods,
communities,
schools,
work places,
social groups, and
circles of friends.
You scatter Your people into every corner where
people are,
people whom You long to know You.

Father, as we come and
as we go,
help us come and go
in Your name,
in Your love, and
in the Spirit of Jesus Christ. 

Listen and sing:
Hymn: Come, Children, Come
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Wisdom Is More than Words

2017-10-25 Devotional, Pictures of God No comments

from the devotional book, PICTURES OF GOD
Read Exodus 35:10 – 36:2

We usually associate wisdom with kings and prophets, with preachers, teachers, and writers. They use words to share God’s wisdom.

But words are not the only medium for expressing God’s wisdom. In this physical world, the Creator communicates His wisdom to and through the five senses.

Between Egypt and the Promised Land lay a desert wilderness, vast and inhospitable. God chose this setting to reshape Israel from slaves into a holy nation, a people of His very own. His generous provision would stand out more vividly in a land that provided almost none of life’s necessities. He wanted His new nation to experience His love and His presence as physical realities.

That’s one reason He commanded Moses to build a portable tabernacle. This tabernacle was no haphazard affair. God gave Moses complete instructions as to how every detail was to be constructed. This earthly tabernacle, made with human hands, was to be a copy and shadow of a heavenly tabernacle (Exodus 25:40; Hebrews 8:5).

Since this physical tabernacle was to communicate the glory of the transcendent God to the human senses, it was to be artistic and beautiful down to the finest detail. It was to be constructed of all the best materials. Where would they get such materials, far from civilization? God had already provided them by prompting the Egyptians to lavish expensive gifts on the Israelites as they left Egypt. The gold, silver, precious stones, fine woods, expensive cloth, and exotic animal skins needed for the tabernacle were donated by God’s people, who had carried them out of Egypt.

God also provided the artistic and technical expertise that would be needed to pull off such a huge project. God’s Spirit gave two men, Bezalel and Oholiab, the “wisdom” (Exodus 35:31) and craftsmanship they would need to work with all these varied materials. What’s more, they were given the desire and ability to teach other willing learners so that together, they would finish the work.

In this physical world filled with physical beings, God needs more than people skilled with words. He also needs artists, crafts people, builders, designers, and dedicated laborers. He calls them. He equips them. He inspires them to glorify Him through what they hold in their hands.

God will use and equip anyone with a heart for exalting their Creator God.

God Keeps His Promises

2017-10-23 Devotional with Hymn No comments

During His final days on earth, Jesus told His disciples what was to come:

“All the nations of the earth… will see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of the sky, with power and great glory. And he will send his angels with a loud trumpet call, and they will gather his elect from the four winds, from one end of the heavens to the other.” (Matthew 24:30-31, NIV)

Every year Advent and Christmas shout this truth:
God keeps His promises.
Though the promises are ancient, and
the wait is long, and
the fulfillment seems so improbable,
God always keeps His promises.

For centuries God had spoken through His prophets,
telling in amazing detail of a coming Messiah.
Jesus Christ came exactly as prophesied.
The same God promises that
this same Jesus will come again.
He urges us to be watchful,
to be faithful,
for the Day will come when least expected.

Lord, we are watching.
We are waiting.
We are obeying.
Come, Lord Jesus!

Consider this:
The great drama of salvation,
with all its faithfulness and betrayal,
its patient endurance and apostasy,
its self-centeredness and self-sacrifice,
is going on right now.
Each of us is taking part day by day. 

Father, when Jesus returns,
may I be faithfully at my post,
trusting,
serving, and
eagerly expecting Him.

Listen and sing:
Hymn: The Trumpet Will Sound
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from Prepare Yourself for Worship

2017-10-20 Devotional with Hymn, Prepare Yourself for Worship One comment

Jesus Among Us

Jesus, You have promised to gather with us,
even though we be only two or three.
But will we recognize You there?

You taught us this:

“Whoever receives one child like this in My name
receives Me.” (Mark 9:37, NASB)

“Truly I say to you, to the extent that you did it to
one of these brothers of Mine,
even the least of them,
you did it to Me.” (Matthew 25:40, NASB)

Jesus, You are among us in
the neediest,
the weakest,
the smallest.
You arrive disguised as those easiest for
self-centered eyes to overlook.

As we gather together, give me
Your loving eyes,
Your loving heart, and
Your loving hands.
As You arrive among us
disguised as the needy,
help me to
welcome You and
serve You
with all the joyful love You deserve. 

Listen and sing:
Hymn: Welcome, Jesus Christ!
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