Daily Wisdom

 Jer 31:3 “The LORD hath appeared of old unto me, saying, Yea, I have loved thee with an everlasting love: therefore with lovingkindness have I drawn thee.”

No sooner do we believe that God loves us that we can garner an impulse to believe that He does so, not because He is Love, but because we are intrinsically lovable.  Far be it from us to think that we have virtues for which God could love us. Bunyan says, "I thought there was no man in England that pleased God better than I with my service." Which often contributes and leads to our lack of humility in thinking that even in our times of repentance it somehow affords us God’s admiration. Yet, we must remember and acknowledge that we are mirrors whose brightness, if any, is wholly derived only from the Son that shines upon us.

Unconditional love is an illogical notion, but of the greatest of promises given… HSAY

Daily Wisdom

 Rev 3:20 “Behold, I stand at the door, and knock: if any man hear my voice, and open the door, I will come in to him, and will sup with him, and he with me.”

The movement in our relationship to Jesus is always from Jesus to us. Always! We can't, through our piety or goodness, move closer to Him. Jesus is always coming near to us, SoS 7:10 “I am my beloved’s, and his desire is for me.” Meaning, our success in moving closer to Jesus isn’t based on our love for Him, rather His greater love for us! To be able to affirm these words, “I am my beloved’s,” is to participate in the heights of Christology, and the riches of the gospel. Though the gospel cannot be privatized, it must definitely be personalized. We must answer and respond to His greater love that’s continually knocking on our heart. We must understand, Jesus isn’t breaking and entering, He’s knocking and waiting for our reception… He’s at the door!

Your relationship with Jesus isn’t based on your invitation, but rather your reception… HSAY

Daily Wisdom

Col 1:20a-21 “And, having made peace through the blood of his cross, by him to reconcile all things unto himself… And you, that were sometime alienated and enemies in your mind by wicked works, yet now hath he reconciled.”

God does not discipline us to subdue us but to prepare us for a life of purposefulness and blessedness. In His wisdom, He knows that an uncontrolled life is an unhappy life, so He puts reins on our wayward souls that they may be directed into the paths of righteousness. This is only done by reconciling us to Himself. Resist and retreat to your own paths, only refrains oneself from traversing paths of hope, promise, and protection in exchange for self-provision.

Short cuts often make for long delays… HSAY

Daily Wisdom

1 Col 1:18b “… that in all things he might have the preeminence.”

Jesus was not revolutionary because He said we should love God and each other. Moses said that first. So did countless other religious/spiritual leaders. The world is poignant about the importance of love. Christian leaders will tell us that the point of religion is to get us to love each other. "God loves you" doesn't stir the world's opposition. However, start talking about God's absolute authority, holiness, Christ's substitutionary atonement, justification apart from works, the necessity of a new birth, repentance, baptism, communion, and the future judgment, and the mood changes considerably. Even love is not true love if separated from the “preeminence” from Jesus’ authority, Jesus is to be given preeminence (total supremacy). All too often, however, believers give Jesus eminence (importance), but not preeminence (finale say).

You can give without loving, but you can’t truly love without sacrificial giving…  HSAY

Daily Wisdom

 1Pe 5:6 “Humble yourselves therefore under the mighty hand of God, that he may exalt you in due time:”

Every good thing in the Christian life grows in the soil of humility. Without humility, every virtue, and every grace withers. That’s why it’s said humility is first, second, and third in the Christian faith. It's not that God's help and presence must still be proved in our life; rather God's presence and help have been demonstrated for us in the life of Jesus. It’s in fact more important for us to know what God did for Israel through Jesus, than to discover what God intends for us today. The fact that Jesus died is more important than the fact that I will die. And the fact that Jesus was raised from the dead is the sole ground in which my hope and humility grow.

Daily our life testifies to and exalts one of two things - the Savior or self!… HSAY

Daily Wisdom

 Lk 9:24 “For whosoever will save his life shall lose it: but whosoever will lose his life for my sake, the same shall save it.”

We are settling for a Christianity that revolves around catering to ourselves when the central message of Christianity is actually about abandoning ourselves. God rewards those who seek Him. Not those who seek doctrine of religion or systems or creeds. Many settle for these lesser passions, but the reward goes to those who settle for nothing less than Jesus himself. Once you have surrendered yourself, you make your heart more receptive in receiving from God, you then become more perfected and completed.

Addition by subtraction, less of self-equals more of Christ. Learn that formula by faith… HSAY

Daily Wisdom

 1Jn 4:19 “We love because he first loved us.”

The Degree to which I am blessed staggers me... the degree to which I take that for granted shames me. In that my vision can be so limited I can hardly imagine a love that does not show itself in protection from suffering.... and yet it’s the same love of God didn’t protect His own Son.... He will not necessarily protect me - not from anything it takes to make me more like His Son. A lot of hammering and chiseling and purifying by fire will go into the process. But that’s a love worth pursuing and dying for.

Unless we have something worth dying for, you've nothing worth living for; ask Paul... HSAY

Daily Wisdom

2Sa 14:25 “But in all Israel there was none to be so much praised as Absalom for his beauty…”

Nothing is said of Absalom's wisdom and piety. All that’s said of him is, that he was very handsome. A poor commendation for a man that had nothing else in him valuable. We should have a desire and intention to possess a beauty that is worth pursuing, worth fighting for, a beauty that is core to who we truly are in Christ Jesus. We want beauty that can be seen; beauty that can be felt; beauty that affects others. May we intently seek a beauty of holiness, and the adorning of a meek and quiet spirit! Only those who fear God are truly beautiful in His sight.

The beauty of man is found in his reflection of Jesus, not in the eyes of man… HSAY

Daily Wisdom

Jas 4:6 “But he giveth more grace. Wherefore he saith, God resisteth the proud, but giveth grace unto the humble.”

Criticism of others can often be an oblique spiritual form of self-commendation. We think we make the picture hang straight on our wall by telling another their picture is crooked. That’s the beauty of the gospel: we are all individually more sinful and flawed in ourselves than we ever dared believe, yet at the very same time we are more loved and accepted in Jesus Christ than we ever dared hope. Defining our worth by criticism/judgement of others is like boarding the wrong train, running along the corridor in the other direction does you no good.  

If you don’t behave as you believe, you’ll end up believing as you behaved… HSAY

Daily Wisdom

 Psa 119:15 “I will meditate on your precepts and fix my eyes on your ways.”

There are times when solitude is better than society, and silence is wiser than speech. The believer would be better served alone, waiting on God, gathering direction and strength in His Word for servitude and life to come. But this is often missed. Sermons are heard, yet spiritual growth is slow to show, because the believer doesn’t meditate on it. They love the fruit which hangs on the branches, but they refuse to pluck it, water flows at their feet, but they won’t stoop to drink it. And yet they long for and do without the very blessings they seek.

One can choose to look in a different direction of the truth, but they can never say they did not know… HSAY

Daily Wisdom

 2Co 5:21 “For he hath made him to be sin for us, who knew no sin; that we might be made the righteousness of God in him.”

The worth of oneself in Jesus is the essence of the whole moral problem and the epitome of a Christ honoring life. That I feed the hungry, forgive an insult, love my enemy - all these are great virtues. But what if I should discover that the least among them all, the poorest in spirit, the most impudent of all the offenders, the very enemy himself - is within me, and that I stand in need of my own kindness - that I am the enemy who must be loved, what then? As a rule, the Christian's attitude is then reversed. Yet, I hide it from the world; refusing to admit ever having met this least among the lowly in myself. The Bible is very easy to understand, but the Christians can be a scheming swindler. Pretending to be unable to understand it because they know very well that the minute it’s truly understood, they are obliged to the accountability to Jesus and self.

Nobody's perfect. Well, there was this one guy, but we killed him… HSAY 

Daily Wisdom

 Dan 9:23  “At the beginning of thy supplications the commandment came forth, and I am come to shew thee; for thou art greatly beloved…”

 Consider, the greatest trap in life is not success, popularity, or power, but self-rejection. Success, popularity, and power present a great temptation, but their seductive quality comes from a much larger temptation to self-rejection. When you believe the voices that call you unworthy and unlovable, then success, popularity, and power are then perceived as attractive solutions. The real trap, however, is self-rejection. Criticism can cause one to believe I deserve to be pushed aside, forgotten, rejected, and abandoned. Self-rejection is the greatest enemy of the spiritual life because it contradicts the sacred voice that calls you the "Beloved." Being the Beloved constitutes the core truth of your existence in Jesus; proven by the cross.

 Don’t accepted less than the love God has for you, because you believed man’s opinion of you… HSAY

Daily Wisdom

 1 Jn 2:6 “Whoever says he abides in him ought to walk in the same way in which he walked.”

God wants you to be something before He ever expects you to do something! Being rightly related accomplishes that. Meaning you’ll never reach your calling in Jesus without establishing and maintaining a right relationship w/Jesus. Paul stated in (1 Cor 11:1 “Be imitators of me, as I am of Christ.”) Paul knew that without a right standing in Jesus you have nothing to offer. It’s not what you have to offer God that’s important, but rather what God has for you. 1Pe 2:21 “For to this you have been called, because Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example, so that you might follow in his steps.” Big difference in what you follow verses who you follow.

Be cautious in what you’re following, you might end up where you’re headed… HSAY

Daily Wisdom

 “… there was silence, and I heard a voice. (Job 4:16; 1 Kgs 19:12)

Here we find Job, like Elijah, in a state of silence where there appears a still small voice. This hit home for me - just last night, late after church, I sat in the empty sanctuary alone in the dark with God. But no great revelation or peace came from it. Yet this morning I read (Job 4) and I realize why I didn’t experience God last night in the way I was longing - “I never shut my mouth.”  Instead, my inner voice was non-stop within me during this intimate time with God. I don’t know if I can speak for you as well,  but I believe/know many times I/we miss God’s voice because He can’t get a word in edgewise. “Be STILL and know that I am God” there’s the inner conflict, “be still” - that means shut up and listen. I was more intent on being sure God heard me, that I never heard Him! Turn life’s volume off and be still in silence, God’s not going to scream above your noise.

No surprise that I was able to hear from God this morning, once I shut up and used my eyes to hear His Words… HSAY