Do you believe?

John 3:16

For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.

I’m sure all of you saw my prayer request yesterday about my son’s classmate passing away on Wednesday.  The loss of a young life is always so tragic.  The thing is, this little boy’s life is not over, it has just begun.  Right before Dylan collapsed and died at school, the class was working on their “poem” for the week.  It was John 3:16.  Monday when I picked my son up, he was so excited to share with me his poem. He and Dylan were in the same circle time group that day. 

Yesterday, the pastor came into the classroom and talked to the boys and girls about how Dylan was now with Jesus and how because Dylan knew the promise of John 3:16, that while he may have died here on earth, he will live an eternal life in heaven. 

This is a promise that has been offered to every single one of us.  The wages of sin are death.  Eternal death.  A death that we all deserve.  However, the ultimate payment was made on our behalf with the death of Jesus.  He was without sin and yet died to pay for our sin.  That alone is amazing.  However, that is not the end of the story.  Jesus didn’t just die.  He rose again!  He conquered death so that life would win.  Life in Jesus wins.  Eternal life. 

Do you believe?  My son is a huge fan of the movie Polar Express.  If you know the story, the silver bell is broken according to the parents because it won’t ring.  Yet the children who believe can hear it ring. 

Do you believe?  I do!  I can hear the bell ring.  I know that while death here on earth may come, I will hear the bells of heaven ringing.  Because of that, I do not fear death.

Thursday Devotional - Give Over

A couple weeks ago we talked about how we can glorify God instead of exchanging it for glorifying mortal things. As Paul continues in Romans chapter 1, he explains what happens when someone chooses to glorify mortal things versus God.

Romans 1:24-32     “²⁴ Therefore God gave them over in the sinful desires of their hearts to sexual impurity for the degrading of their bodies with one another. ²⁵ They exchanged the truth about God for a lie, and worshiped and served created things rather than the Creator—who is forever praised. Amen.

²⁶ Because of this, God gave them over to shameful lusts. Even their women exchanged natural sexual relations for unnatural ones. ²⁷ In the same way the men also abandoned natural relations with women and were inflamed with lust for one another. Men committed shameful acts with other men, and received in themselves the due penalty for their error.

²⁸ Furthermore, just as they did not think it worthwhile to retain the knowledge of God, so God gave them over to a depraved mind, so that they do what ought not to be done. ²⁹ They have become filled with every kind of wickedness, evil, greed and depravity. They are full of envy, murder, strife, deceit and malice. They are gossips, ³⁰ slanderers, God-haters, insolent, arrogant and boastful; they invent ways of doing evil; they disobey their parents; ³¹ they have no understanding, no fidelity, no love, no mercy. ³² Although they know God’s righteous decree that those who do such things deserve death, they not only continue to do these very things but also approve of those who practice them.” Romans 1:24-32

It’s not enough to know God’s righteous decrees. We must retain them, believe them, want them and live by them. It’s a dangerous place to be when we continue in a sin to the point that God gives us over to it.

What sin do you and I need to give over to God so He doesn’t give us over to it? He wants to help us overcome!

Alice

Tues Devo: Intentional creation

Hello,

I was contemplating this past weekend about the coming Christmas season and about our relationship with God. I was reminded that we as humans were an intentional choice by God. We see in Genesis 1:26-27 “Then God said, ‘Let Us make man in Our image, according to Our likeness; and let them rule over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the sky and over the cattle and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.’ God created man in His own image, in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them.” (NASB)

Now, while the familiarity of those verses to many of us may not feel too impressive, it was us (mankind) that He chose to have a relationship with. We see in chapter 3 after Adam and Eve made their choice to sin that “they heard the sound of the Lord God walking in the garden in the cool of the day…” and realize that Adam and Eve knew the sound of the presence of God. It was familiar, they shared together on a regular basis.

God desires that relationship and fellowship with us. As we head towards Christmas, please keep this in mind. Be thankful for your relationship with Him, seek to draw closer in fellowship with Him and eradicate the things that get in the way of that fellowship.

Have a blessed day,

Will Hill