Father God, in the 23rd Psalm we read. The LORD is my shepherd, I lack nothing. He makes me lie down in green
pastures, he leads me beside quiet waters, he refreshes my soul. He guides me along the right paths for his
name’s sake. Even though I walk through the darkest valley, I will fear no evil, for you are with me; your rod
and your staff, they comfort me. You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies. You anoint my
head with oil; my cup overflows. Surely your goodness and love will follow me all the days of my life, and I
will dwell in the house of the LORD forever.
Father, in this short Psalm we see your promises, your provision, your sovereignty. We see that no matter what may
be going in the worldly valleys of life we have the promise of your very presence, your comfort, your love and grace and
mercy and as if it could get any better we will dwell with you for all eternity.
Father, we come confessing that in this world so busy, so full of distractions, so full of noise that we sometimes forget, we
sometimes take for granted your amazing grace. Father forgive us and help us to take heart as the good news is
that by the finished work of Christ we are forgiven, we are restored, our very souls are refreshed.
How amazing you are that we can come to you as broken and messed up as we are, that we can come knowing
and experiencing your grace, that we can come knowing and experiencing your love and as such we are truly free; free to
offer grace and love to others.
Father, you are truly wonderful beyond words and as such we thank you, we turn our adoration and worship to you, our
Father in heaven, this day we celebrate our very relationship with you.
Abba Father, we love you and pray these many things in the most beautiful name of Jesus...Amen!
I don’t know about you, but this season in history has left me stunned, confused, frustrated....dare I say
near tears. I am torn by the divided nature of this country and it occurs to me there is a
hardening that has taken place which prevents us from seeing any good or all that we have in common. We
are blind to paths forward unless it is our path. I am sick of advice, tired of biased journalism, astonished at the so-called experts of this age. I am so
exhausted by the politics and culture of “I’m right and your stupid.”
Not sure if you have heard, but we have an election coming up; an election to the highest office in the
land and if you are following this election, it only highlights the divided nature of this nation. The debates left me
shaking my head and wondering/praying/crying out about this choice or lack thereof.
There are plenty of places to look for guidance...evangelicals; theologians, media, social media, your
neighbors, there are polls and surveys and the list and opinions go on.
So you might ask what is a person (like me) to do? Well it took the birth of my first grandchild for me to
see a little more clearly. It took me holding that child in my arms (yes, with tears in my eyes) realizing
how much I loved this little man. It took me seeing a choice – I could become frozen with doubt, worry
and frustration about the mess or I could love...I could love God, my family, my friends and neighbors
with all my heart, soul and mind. The choice is so clear.
And as a Christian, I can do one more thing I can trust. Yes, I still plan to vote and honestly I still don’t
have clarity on that vote...I have heard all I really want to hear and now I plan to search...search my
heart, search the Word of God, I plan to make up my mind on my knees praying to my ever-loving, ever-
faithful God. I plan ask God; “what would you have me do?”
And then I will trust! Brennan Manning wrote an incredible book titled “Ruthless Trust” and in it he
says; “Ruthless Trust is an unerring sense, way down deep, that beneath the surface agitation, boredom,
and insecurity of life, it’s gonna be all right. Ill winds may blow...character defects may surface...but a
stubborn, irrefutable certainty persists that God is with us and loves us in our struggle...”
Psalm 22:28 reminds us that “kingship belongs to the LORD, and he rules over all nations.” Job (Job
42:2) says to God; “I know that you can do all things and that no purpose of yours can be thwarted.”
Jeremiah 17:7 tells us; “Blessed is the man who trusts in the LORD, whose trust is the LORD.
I don’t know about you but my trust is the LORD. Trust; my friends trust.
Grace and Peace!
Even though things have slowed way down for me (a good thing) and I find myself
happier and way less stressed, there are times. This morning I found myself heading
out on a great journey to the fitness center and as I was driving along in morning traffic someone in front of me decided to turn without using a
turn signal.
Now I had plenty of space to slow down so there was no real issue, but I could feel
the rage coming on because this person interfered with my smooth and expert
driving skills. My “Peaceful Easy Feeling” (our Pastor uses numerous musical
references so it must be contagious) was gone and it had been replaced by “Highway
to Hell”.
As my temper was about to exceed the boiling point, something grabbed my
attention. It was the clear blue Florida sky and the beautiful sun climbing mid
morning. Something whispered to me do you really want to be that angry?
Something else came to mind – What if Jesus got that angry with me every time I
made a mistake. Do I really want to be overcome by anger? Or do I want to be
overcome with joy and happiness realizing all Christ has done; all Christ has secured
for me.
As joy began to clear my “Angry Eyes” I was able to begin to pray. I think I will use a part of that prayer for a while as part of my morning prayer or a devotional or simply a reminder
of how to approach my day...
Abba Father,
Help me this day to be of good spirit knowing the Holy Spirit is with me;
Help me to overflow with joy amazed by all Christ has done for me;
And help me to love because you first loved me...
Amen and Amen.
Grace and Peace!
So I will confess, I am not huge into social media – in fact I feel it is like the old
commercial – social media is the next best thing to being there. I am sure there are
many positive things about social media and I must admit that I do have a Twitter
account.
I find this to be a good way to journal, share thoughts and ideas all within 140
characters – short is good. Anyway, there are statistics and it is so tempting to get
drawn into a mode of saying something – I mean tweeting something and then sitting back and watching to see just
how popular that becomes. So for me it could be very easy to begin thinking a lot of my abilities and my popularity; to become proud of my tweet-worthiness...
There is this term; going viral. Urban Dictionary (which I do not necessarily
recommend without caution) defines going viral as when “an idea, concept, product,
video or other cultural meme exponentially increases in popularity.”
I suppose in the sphere of social media this is the mark of success. At the risk of
causing much laughter, my best tweets typically get between 40 and 50 views; so
yes I do keep track. Recently, however I crafted a tweet and my truly artistic efforts
went viral; over 500 views. I must also admit that I started feeling pretty good
about my abilities as a master tweeter. As I started to think I had truly arrived in the
realm of social media, something started tugging at me.
Here is my tweet:
@Scobb8Cobb
Ps 100:5
For the Lord is good; his steadfast love endures forever, and his faithfulness to
all generations.
#goodnewsday
So you see, all I did was send out a Verse from the Bible. And then it hit me, it wasn’t me,
it is not my wisdom, it was not my twitter expertise. It was the Word of God...and I
knew at that very moment God was teaching me a lesson in humility. It wasn’t a
harsh lesson; it was filled with grace, which impacted me even more; just a gentle
and loving reminder.
Ephesians 2:8-9
For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own
doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast.
Grace and Peace!
