Thursday, March 17, 2016

What Happens When You Worry


BIBLE MEDITATION:
Casting all your care upon Him; for He careth for you.” 1 Peter 5:7

DEVOTIONAL THOUGHT:
What happens when you worry? You bring tomorrow’s difficulty into today.

God didn’t give you grace for tomorrow’s difficulties. He only gives you grace for today.

When you reach into tomorrow’s troubles, you overload today’s circuit. Worry doesn’t take the sorrow out of tomorrow, it takes the strength out of today. When you meet tomorrow, you’re out of breath because you’re already overloaded from today. Worry, therefore, does not make you ready for the future, it really makes you unready.

Yesterday is just a canceled check. Tomorrow is a promissory note. Today has all the cash you can handle. Spend it wisely.

ACTION POINT:
Worry will eat your lunch! It’ll eat your breakfast and dinner, too! Confess your worries as sin (because they are). Put your concerns at the throne of Almighty God, trusting Him to provide.


LWF Dr. Adrian Rogers

Letting Go


I have seen death, up close.
My brother died of cancer.
It is ugly and it is brutal.
I bet you know someone who is dying.
I mean really at deaths door.
In our foolish hearts, we are not planning for eternity.
Do you know the reason we are dying?
Sin!

So teach us to number our days that we may get a heart of wisdom.  - Psalm 90:12

4 "O LORD, make me know my end and what is the measure of my days; let me know how fleeting I am! 
5 Behold, you have made my days a few handbreadths, and my lifetime is as nothing before you. Surely all mankind stands as a mere breath! Selah 
6 Surely a man goes about as a shadow! Surely for nothing they are in turmoil; man heaps up wealth and does not know who will gather! 
7 "And now, O Lord, for what do I wait? My hope is in you.  - Psalm 39:4-7


If you stop and think, we all live like we have unlimited time.
Never mind the fact that we are all dying, a little each day. 
The minute we are born, we begin to die.


47 Remember how short my time is! For what vanity you have created all the children of man! 
48 What man can live and never see death? Who can deliver his soul from the power of Sheol? Selah  - Psalm 89:47-48


Your eyes saw my unformed substance; in your book were written, every one of them, the days that were formed for me, when as yet there was none of them.  - Psalm 139:16


So, how do we let go?
We hold onto God's words about eternity and what He has promised through His Son, Jesus.
He tells us He is making plans for us to join Him!
He tell us how to join Him!
He tells us we will know each other just as we do here on Earth.
You ask, how do I know these things? 
God has left us encouragement in the Bible.
God has left us warnings in the Bible.
God has commanded we tell others!!
God warns, Satan will do everything in his power to keep you from the truth, that Jesus has the authority to save you from Hell.


17 When I saw him, I fell at his feet as though dead. But he laid his right hand on me, saying, "Fear not, I am the first and the last,
18 and the living one. I died, and behold I am alive forevermore, and I have the keys of Death and Hades. - Revelation 1:17-18


16 So we do not lose heart. Though our outer self is wasting away, our inner self is being renewed day by day.
17 For this light momentary affliction is preparing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison,
18 as we look not to the things that are seen but to the things that are unseen. For the things that are seen are transient, but the things that are unseen are eternal. - 2 Corinthians 4:16-18


knowing that he who raised the Lord Jesus will raise us also with Jesus and bring us with you into his presence. - 2 Corinthians 4:14


"'See now that I, even I, am he, and there is no god beside me; I kill and I make alive; I wound and I heal; and there is none that can deliver out of my hand.  - Deuteronomy 32:39

Wednesday, March 16, 2016

Equal Parts of Difficulty and Grace


BIBLE MEDITATION:
“Take therefore no thought for the morrow: for the morrow shall take thought for the things of itself.” Matthew 6:34 

DEVOTIONAL THOUGHT:
In the crucible of His wisdom and the ecology of His grace, God has ordered some trouble for you today. And every day of your life. 

We’ve been blessed with difficulties. Yes, you read right—blessed! The worst thing that could happen to us would be not to have any difficulties. If that were the case, we’d never know our need of the Lord. So God in essence says, “I’m going to give you sufficient difficulty for the day.” 

God gives you enough difficulty to draw you close to Him, but then God gives you enough grace to meet those difficulties every day. 

ACTION POINT:
Is there a difficult circumstance in your life? If so, thank God for sending it your way to make you more like Jesus. Now ask for His grace to be victorious through it!


LWF Dr. Adrian Rogers

Tuesday, March 15, 2016

Free from the Ghost of Guilt!

BIBLE MEDITATION:
“As far as the east is from the west, so far hath He removed our transgressions from us.” Psalm 103:12 

DEVOTIONAL THOUGHT:
There are two days that can steal the joy from today. One is yesterday and the other is tomorrow. 

Paul exhorts in Philippians 3:13-14, “Brethren, I count not myself to have apprehended: but this one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind, and reaching forth unto those things which are before, I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus.” 

We are to forget the past—the guilt, the glory, the grief, and the grudges. Paul was one who was guilty, along with others, for the stoning of Stephen. He said he was the “chiefest of sinners” (1 Timothy 1:15). But Paul buried that guilt in the grave of God’s forgetfulness. 

Maybe you’ve done something so horrible that you’re gripped with fear to think someone would find out what you’ve done. Have you repented? Then don’t be haunted by the ghost of guilt. 

ACTION POINT:
Have you done something worse than being an accessory to the murder of one of the leaders of the New Testament Church? If Paul can be forgiven, my friend, you can be forgiven!


LWF Dr. Adrian Rogers

Already There



1 "Let not your hearts be troubled. Believe in God; believe also in me.
2 In my Father's house are many rooms. If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you?
3 And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and will take you to myself, that where I am you may be also.
4 And you know the way to where I am going." - John 14:1-4


He is there already, waiting for His beloved, those who trust Him for salvation!!
He said, "if I go I'll prepare a place for you".
Can you believe it? 
The Christ cares for you, even in your flawed sinful state.


6 For while we were still weak, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly.
7 For one will scarcely die for a righteous person-though perhaps for a good person one would dare even to die-
8 but God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. - Romans 5:6-8


The perfect blameless One who is the Lamb that took away your sin and has granted salvation to those who humbly bow before His throne.
Not by your works, but only by His gift!


2 in which you once walked, following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience-
3 among whom we all once lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the body and the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, like the rest of mankind.
4 But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us,
5 even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ-by grace you have been saved-
6 and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus,
7 so that in the coming ages he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus.
8 For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God,
9 not a result of works, so that no one may boast. - Ephesians 2:2-9


It's a mystery, it's too wonderful, and it's beyond our human understanding.
It's God's richest sweetest mercy!!


3 This is good, and it is pleasing in the sight of God our Savior,
4 who desires all people to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth.
5 For there is one God, and there is one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus,
6 who gave himself as a ransom for all, which is the testimony given at the proper time. - 1 Timothy 2:3-6


Praise King Jesus who is our redemptive sacrifice to holy God.
Because of His mercy, we are forgiven for eternity!!!


4 For it is impossible for the blood of bulls and goats to take away sins.
5 Consequently, when Christ came into the world, he said, "Sacrifices and offerings you have not desired, but a body have you prepared for me; 
6 in burnt offerings and sin offerings you have taken no pleasure. 
7 Then I said, 'Behold, I have come to do your will, O God, as it is written of me in the scroll of the book.'" 
8 When he said above, "You have neither desired nor taken pleasure in sacrifices and offerings and burnt offerings and sin offerings" (these are offered according to the law),
9 then he added, "Behold, I have come to do your will." He does away with the first in order to establish the second.
10 And by that will we have been sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all.
11 And every priest stands daily at his service, offering repeatedly the same sacrifices, which can never take away sins.
12 But when Christ had offered for all time a single sacrifice for sins, he sat down at the right hand of God,
13 waiting from that time until his enemies should be made a footstool for his feet.
14 For by a single offering he has perfected for all time those who are being sanctified. - Hebrews 10:4-14


13 And you, who were dead in your trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh, God made alive together with him, having forgiven us all our trespasses,
14 by canceling the record of debt that stood against us with its legal demands. This he set aside, nailing it to the cross. - Colossians 2:13-14


21 But now the righteousness of God has been manifested apart from the law, although the Law and the Prophets bear witness to it-
22 the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ for all who believe. For there is no distinction:
23 for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God,
24 and are justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus,
25 whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood, to be received by faith. This was to show God's righteousness, because in his divine forbearance he had passed over former sins.
26 It was to show his righteousness at the present time, so that he might be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus. - Romans 3:21-26


Jesus said to him, "I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. - John 14:6


Time will end in judgement! 
Death ends this life but then eternity begins.
Are you trusting Christ and the power given Him?


30 The times of ignorance God overlooked, but now he commands all people everywhere to repent,
31 because he has fixed a day on which he will judge the world in righteousness by a man whom he has appointed; and of this he has given assurance to all by raising him from the dead." - Acts 17:30-31

Monday, March 14, 2016

Pass Along the Gift of Laughter

BIBLE MEDITATION:
“Be glad in the Lord, and rejoice, ye righteous: and shout for joy, all ye that are upright in heart.” Psalm 32:11 

DEVOTIONAL THOUGHT:
A merry heart is the ability to capture and enjoy those wonderful times of life and let it turn to laughter. 

Your sense of humor is a gift from God. Research studies have shown that laughter, along with a well-rounded sense of humor, is one of the sure signs of intelligence. It is also known to produce endorphins in your body that generate feelings of well-being. 

Good, wholesome laughter is a gift from God. Abraham Lincoln said, “God must have meant for us to laugh, or else he would not have made so many mules, parrots, monkeys and human beings. God wants us to laugh.” 

ACTION POINT:
Pass along the gift of laughter today to someone. Tell a good, wholesome joke. Send an email of a funny story to a friend you haven’t talked to in awhile.


LWF Dr. Adrian Rogers

Sunday, March 13, 2016

Don’t Forget to Wear It!


BIBLE MEDITATION:
“A merry heart maketh a cheerful countenance.” Proverbs 15:13 

DEVOTIONAL THOUGHT:
What is a smile? Someone once wrote: 

“A smile costs nothing, but creates much good. It enriches those who receive it without impoverishing those who give it away. It happens in a flash, but the memory of it can last forever. No one is so rich that he can get along without it. No one is too poor to feel rich when receiving it. It is rest to the weary, daylight to the discouraged, sunshine to the sad and nature’s best anecdote for trouble. Yet it cannot be bought, begged, borrowed or stolen.” 

ACTION POINT:
When you get dressed this morning, don’t forget to put on a smile. Wear a smile all day from the inner joy that only Jesus can bring to your heart. Don’t feel an inner joy? Then ask for one!


LWF Dr. Adrian Rogers