Calculate your worth

“For God chose to save us through our Lord Jesus Christ, not to pour out his anger on us. Christ died for us so that, whether we are dead or alive when he returns, we can live with him forever. So encourage each other and build each other up, just as you are already doing.”

‭‭1 Thessalonians‬ ‭5:9-11‬ ‭NLT‬‬

I love the movie iRobot with Will Smith. It’s a movie about a man who is a cop and he damaged his arm in an attempt to save a little girl from drowning. But in this instance he was saved from saving the little girl. The robot did a calculation to see who had the most likely chance of surviving and he had the best chance of surviving. This hurt him because he would have rather gave the girl who was 11 than himself.

HERE IT IS…

Could you imagine being picked to be saved rather than being saved? God is so gracious and he is so loving that there was no calculation of who would have the best chance of survival. God looked at you and knew you were worth saving. No calculation. No wondering of if it’s the right choice or not. He did it because he loves you and your worth it. Now that your saved you have the assurance of knowing that if you live or die you will be with him for ever.

Now

“Now all glory to God, who is able to keep you from falling away and will bring you with great joy into his glorious presence without a single fault. All glory to him who alone is God, our Savior through Jesus Christ our Lord. All glory, majesty, power, and authority are his before all time, and in the present, and beyond all time! Amen.”

‭‭Jude‬ ‭1:24-25‬ ‭NLT‬‬

NOW! Immediately! Words that say that something is happening with no waiting. Have you ever had to wait? Have you ever had to hold on for something? Like going to the doctor and have to be in the waiting room. Or in line having to wait your turn. We have to wait for a lot of things in our life. We have to wait till our money is right! We have to wait on a decision from a place. We have to wait for delivery.

HERE IT IS…

Do you make God wait? Do you put God in a proverbial line and making him wait. Once I get right I’ll go. Once I get my life right I’ll go to church. We don’t have to wait to give him glory. We don’t have to wait to praise his name. Truth is he has already blessed enough to where we can praise him now. Now unto him. Because he is able to keep you from falling and to present you without fault. Stop waiting do it NOW! Without one worry!

Building

“And now, just as you accepted Christ Jesus as your Lord, you must continue to follow him. Let your roots grow down into him, and let your lives be built on him. Then your faith will grow strong in the truth you were taught, and you will overflow with thankfulness.”

‭‭Colossians‬ ‭2:6-7‬ ‭NLT‬‬

I love watching something grow or be constructed from the ground up. It’s amazing to see just how much detail and dedication it takes to erect or grow something from the ground up. However as time has went on and technology has progressed it seems that the same detail and dedication to building something is not the same. I have seen house take a year or two to be built. Now! A house will be erected and ready to move into in 3 months. It seems to me that when quantity is better than quality you lose out in the long run.

HERE IT IS…

What does your faith look like? What does your relationship with Christ look like? Is it something that is erected quickly and has no quality time spent building it? Is it something that has pre-made pieces and has no real thought into it? Or is it something that is built on a solid foundation. Labored with time and thought and detail. Mapping out the paths and sometimes coming with broken pieces that only he can replace? If you take your time and get to know God then will your life be filled with overflowing blessings.

Trust the process

“He generously poured out the Spirit upon us through Jesus Christ our Savior. Because of his grace he made us right in his sight and gave us confidence that we will inherit eternal life. This is a trustworthy saying, and I want you to insist on these teachings so that all who trust in God will devote themselves to doing good. These teachings are good and beneficial for everyone.”

‭‭Titus‬ ‭3:6-8‬ ‭NLT‬‬

I remember the job searching process that I had to go through when I was out of work. All the different websites and calls and countless resumes sent. When the offers came in there was a choice that we had to make. This was a choice that we would have to live with for a while. The way that we made that decision was how it was going to benefit us and our families. Benefits, pay, hours, shifts. All those things had to be taken into account in order to make the decision that we were going to make.

HERE IT IS…

By accepting this job your devoting yourselves to that place for the time being. It was the way the benefits would help your family. Have you chosen God? Have you looked at all the benefits of his work? Have you seen the training manual? Have you noticed the others who work for him? His record speaks for itself. Trust in him who will not leave you and follow his manual. And your benefits will never expire.

Great God

“Your unfailing love, O Lord, is as vast as the heavens; your faithfulness reaches beyond the clouds. Your righteousness is like the mighty mountains, your justice like the ocean depths. You care for people and animals alike, O Lord. How precious is your unfailing love, O God! All humanity finds shelter in the shadow of your wings.”

‭‭Psalms‬ ‭36:5-7‬ ‭NLT‬‬

What can you compare to God? What can you actually use as a example of how great God is? Even if we tried it still wouldn’t compare to just how great God is and has been. I do like how the psalmist puts it. He compares God to the heavens. He compares God to the clouds. The mountains and the oceans. It’s amazing because this is all things that he created. These are all things that God has masterfully sculpted and designed to look the way it does. And even though humans have explored the mountains. The clouds. The sky and space. This one thing remains that we have not been able to see it all and there are places where we don’t have the capability to go.

HERE IT IS…

This comparison of of God is great and vast and enormous but the truth of the matter is that we still haven’t even scratched the surface of how great and amazing God is. We can talk about how great God has been to us. We can talk about how he has kept us. How he has protected us and how he has covered us. Truth of the matter is that we haven’t seen it all. His love for us is deeper than the ocean and we haven’t even seen how deep it is. We have been to the top of mountains but haven’t been able to experience how amazing how high he is. How great is our God.

Prayer and praise

“Are any of you suffering hardships? You should pray. Are any of you happy? You should sing praises. Are any of you sick? You should call for the elders of the church to come and pray over you, anointing you with oil in the name of the Lord. Such a prayer offered in faith will heal the sick, and the Lord will make you well. And if you have committed any sins, you will be forgiven.”

‭‭James‬ ‭5:13-15‬ ‭NLT‬‬

On what do you pray about? Is it just the “big stuff”? I’m sick. My family member in jail. I need a new car. Or do you pray about everything? We tend to only turn over the big stuff to God that we feel we can’t handle when our God is the one who created the smallest thing to the biggest. Remember we were created from dust and when you see a dust particle it’s actually pretty big because you can see it. All the other dust particles you can’t see are still there.

HERE IT IS…

Praying over all these things God will handle the smallest situation to the biggest ones. Pray over it all and watch what he does. And once you finish hearing from God get up and praise him for what he is about to do. Praise him for what he has already done. Then praise him for how he is moving right now. Prayer and praise go together. Use them both to honor God in everything that you do.

Just be patient

“Dear brothers and sisters, be patient as you wait for the Lord’s return. Consider the farmers who patiently wait for the rains in the fall and in the spring. They eagerly look for the valuable harvest to ripen. You, too, must be patient. Take courage, for the coming of the Lord is near. Don’t grumble about each other, brothers and sisters, or you will be judged. For look—the Judge is standing at the door!”

‭‭James‬ ‭5:7-9‬ ‭NLT‬‬

When I was in the 3rd grade I was given a small pine tree to take home and plant and to help grow. It was Christmas time in Illinois so the ground was hard and snow was everywhere. So I kept it inside and watered it and tried to keep it near the window for sun light. Being a child there was not a lot of patience in watching a tree grow. So in my Impatience I took it outside and tried to place it in a spot that I thought it would thrive.

HERE IT IS…

Sometimes we will take what gave us and think that what he gave us is supposed to be activated and going right away. Sometimes what God gives us will be ready to go immediately. Then their are times where God will give us things that we have to hold on to until we receive everything we need or until it has grown to maturity. We being who we are can get so impatient that we end up taking what he gave us and putting it where we think it would be best suited when God just wants us to hold on to it. Protect it. Until the time comes. Be patient he will make it worth your while.

Unconditional

“Clearly, God’s promise to give the whole earth to Abraham and his descendants was based not on his obedience to God’s law, but on a right relationship with God that comes by faith. If God’s promise is only for those who obey the law, then faith is not necessary and the promise is pointless.”

‭‭Romans‬ ‭4:13-14‬ ‭NLT‬‬

Unconditional;

not subject to any conditions.

That is the definition of unconditional according to google. Meaning that there is no reason to stop it. But, how many of us know that we all have placed conditions on different things in our life? We put conditions on our job. “They don’t pay me enough to do that”. We place conditions on our kids. “If you don’t clean your room your not going no where”. We place conditions on our marriage. “If he loved me he or she would do this for me”. We have even tried to place conditions on God.

HERE IT IS…

What if God placed conditions on his love to you? What if God said to you” you said you wouldn’t do this the last time”. What if he said that you had to complete certain things before you got what you asked for. Or healed you. Or taken you out of that situation. Or blessed you. He has no conditions on his love for us. So what makes you greater than God to set conditions. You cheated on God and he still loved you. You stole from God and he still provided. You have denied God and he still claimed you. Unconditional love is not a condition set on conditions.

Push

“God’s way is perfect. All the Lord’s promises prove true. He is a shield for all who look to him for protection. For who is God except the Lord? Who but our God is a solid rock?”

‭‭Psalms‬ ‭18:30-31‬ ‭NLT‬‬

There is a story of a man who was sick and just couldn’t get right. Went to all the specialist and all the doctors. Until he met one doctor who gave him and unconventional way to get better. The doctor told him to take only one medication and go push on a humongous rock in his yard 2 times a day. The man did it but unwilling. As he pushed for months he felt himself getting stronger and feeling better. The rock didn’t move. As he went for his follow up the doctor asked him how he was feeling and the man said great and he was off the medication. He asked the doctor why he had him push on the rock

HERE IT IS…

The doctor told him that pushing on the rock helped him take his focus off of what was wrong with him and concentrate on moving the rock. Isn’t that just like God? When you take your focus off the problem and focus on the rock of our salvation. Take your focus off of what your going through and push on God. You may not move him physically but you allow God to take care of everything else that is wrong and he will heal you. He will deliver you. He will change you. He will cause all things to move. Push until God moves in your life.

Friends

“Then Eliphaz the Temanite replied: “Can a person do anything to help God? Can even a wise person be helpful to him? Is it any advantage to the Almighty if you are righteous? Would it be any gain to him if you were perfect?”

‭‭Job‬ ‭22:1-3‬ ‭NLT‬‬

There is a saying that you always want to watch the person who tells you who to watch out for. Then there is a older saying that says; every dog that brings a bone will take a bone. Meaning the people who will come and listen will also take what you told them somewhere else. It’s hard to find a good friend to be there with you through it all. A friend that will help you and encourage you through it. That’s what Job has here. A person that is trying to tell him to give up on God. The person who tells him to just stop living a godly life because of what has happen to him.

HERE IT IS…

We don’t know what the future holds and we don’t know what will happen from day to day. The the fact remains is that the God that we serve is able to change our situations and circumstances in an instant. Do allow the people around you to encourage to leave the one that’s been there longer than anyone else. Even if your situation has changed. Even if your in a tight spot right now. The facts remain that God is the one who has and will change it for you. Don’t get caught up in what is. Instead declare that it will get better.