Becoming Wine

Colossians 1:24

For this study today I will use the devotional writing of Oswald Chambers. He had brilliant insight and I find my reading today quite inspiring and thought provoking.
" We take our own spiritual consecration and try to make it into a call of God, but when we get right with Him He brushes all this aside. Then He gives us tremedous, riveting pain to fasten our attention on something that we never even dreamed could be His call for us. And for one radiant, flashing moment we see His purpose and we say "Here am I Send Me". This call has nothing to do with sanctification, but with being made broken bread and poured out wine. Yet God can never make us into wine if we object to the fingers He chooses to us to crush us. ...He uses someone we dislike, or some set of circumstances to which we said we would never submit, to crush us....If we are going to be made into wine, we will have to be crushed - you cannot drink grapes. Grapes become wine when they are squeezed. I wonder what finger and thumb God has been using to squeeze you? Have you been hard as a marble and escaped? If you are not ripe yet, the wine would have been remarkably bitter.....Stay with God and let Him do as he likes, and you will find that He is producing the kind of bread and wine that will benefit His other children."
Blessings to you and yours.

Awareness of Your Call

"...for necessity is laid upon me, yes woe is me if I do not preach the gospel!" I Cor 9:16

Today's reading was concerning one's personal "call" from God, the awareness of it and the complete surrender to it. Paul's calling was to preach, as read here in Corinthians. To point of this verse is that nothing else should compete for your strength once your "call" is recognized it should be a pull, a drive in you and you be made miserable if you are not serving and following your personal "call" from God. We each have one..the key is knowing it and not being jealous of someone else's call. Too often we wish we could preach, teach , sing, etc... the more"in view" calls from God. But there are so many different ways He can call you to serve and use your gifts He has given you. Each is as important as the other if they are used in the right way and in harmony. If you are serving and following your "call", the rest of your life will be in harmony as well.
Have you struggled with this? I know I have. I would love to share and to hear your experiences.
Blessings to you and yours.

Ready, Willing, NO Hesitation

My passage for today is Luke 57-62. In this passage Jesus is speaking to several men bidding them to come and follow him. Each expresses that he will follow Jesus wherever He goes, but when Jesus says "Ok Lets Go"...they have excuses to wait. One wants to say goodbye to his family and friends etc.... another wants to wait until his brother is buried. The Lord then says to them that if you are called to Go, then you are to Go without hesitation or reservation, never questioning or looking back.
If you are anything like me...this sounds harsh, even hurtful. One guy wants to go to his brothers funeral and another wants to say goodbye to his loved ones. These sound like quite reasonable and sincere request. I think the Lord God allowed these examples to be placed in the Bible for a reason, of course. It is to let us know that nothing and no one are to come between us and Him and His calling for us. Neither family nor friends, no matter how deep our loyalty lies with a relationship here on earth, our relationship with Him should always take priority. This will be hurtful at times, to ourselves and others we love however in the end ALL things work together for our good. That is a promise from God. This lesson can be a hard one to learn. Have you had an experience with this? I would love to hear about it and how you felt, what you did???
Blessings to you and yours.

LIstening to the tiny Conviction

Matthew 5:23-24

These verse state that if you go to give an offering to the Lord but you have a conflict in your heart, go and fix that problem, then come and give your offering. We often look to give up a BIG something in our lives, or do a BIG work, a BIG display of faith, a BIG sacrifice. However it is the tiny things that the Lord most often convicts us of and often we are unwilling to admit and confess those sins. We want to maintain control over our own self. To surrender ALL of us is the key to continual growth in Christian life. Too often we are satisfied with where we are in our relationship with God. Let us strive to not be satisfied.
blessings to you and yours

Go Up To Your Own Jerusalem

"He..said unto them, 'Behold, we are going up to Jerusalem'..." Luke 18:31

The devotion today is about each Christian having the same end goal of following God's perfect Will for their lives by going up to their own personal Jerusalem. As a follower of Christ we each have an individual journey to take on. The goal of a Christian is ultimately to follow God's Will. Just as Christ Jesus did. My readings state that Jesus kept on course. He did not tarry in villages that He was blessed in or hurry through those towns that cursed and persecuted Him. Christ sought God's guidance in His indisputable Will for the journey until the completion in Jerusalem. So we are all called to do. Our goal is not to be useful or to save the lost. It is to do God's will. Oswald Chambers stated " A missionary is usefuland he does win the lost, but that is not his goal. His goal is to do the will of his Lord."
This is challenging and puzzling to some especially young Christians who are excited and have fresh passion for their new found faith. If the useful works we attempt in our Lord's name are not His will, they will not be fruitful. If we force ourselves and the Gospel on a soul that is not ready, a soul that God has not prepared for our testimony before our arrival, this soul may be lost and deaf to our voice. We must seek God's Will and no matter how much we do not understand it, we must follow the map He laid out for our individual journey to our own Jerusalem. Constant prayer and seeking the moment to moment guiding hand of our Lord God is essential. How will we know His Will if we do not ask? This is where the personal relationship and friendship with Christ comes in to play. If you never speak earnestly with your best friend here on earth, how would you call them friend? It is exactly the same and vastly more important in our friendship and communion with Christ.
Let us each day strive to be closer, listen more carefully, and strive to know the Will of God for our journey to Jerusalem.
Blessings to you and yours.

Master and Teacher

"You call Me teacher and Lord, and you say well for so I am...I say to you a servant is not greater than his master.." John 13:13,16 "...for One is your Teacher, the Christ..." Matt23:8

We are to be the servant of God and the student of Christ Jesus. The nut shell meaning of Christianity is "Christ-like", as most of us already know. We say we understand the meaning of servant, to allow God to be our Master, but do we really? Having a master and teacher is different than being mastered and being taught. Allowing one to have a master/teacher is to know that the master knows you better than you know yourself, realizes your faults before you do, understands your frailty, and acknowledges your free will but despite all of his, still want to make your life better, bountiful and beautiful through His grace, mercy and power. Do we allow God to be all that He is perfectly able to be. He is able. Do we allow Christ to mold us and teach us how to be more like him in daily, simple life tasks? He is able. We only need to allow a Master and Teacher to enter our lives completely, and be so submissive to His Will that soon we do not have an awareness of it, we simply obey and bend our free will to His perfect Will.
Yes, this one was a bit hard to swallow I bet. It was for me. I realize that I can be quite stubborn at times, and silly me, I subconsciously think I know better that Almighty God???? Sounds ridiculous, but when I do not listen to His still small voice and I go about things my own way, that is exactly what I am saying to Him by my actions. Each painful time I try things my own way, He bandages my wounds, wipes away tears, brings me in close and says "Ok, ready to try it my way now hard head?". He picks me up, sets me on solid ground, reaches out His hand for me to take it, and we journey forward.
Blessings to you and yours.

God's Creative Purspose of Mankind

First of all, sorry for missing a few days. No real Excuse, just very busy., which should not be an excuse for not reading my devotion for the day and sharing it.
"Now the Lord says, who formed me from the womb, to be His servant..." Isaiah 49:5

Today I was reminded of the original purpose of the creation of mankind, which was to love, praise, worship and serve God by our own will and own desire. All other creations of heaven and earth praise God because they do not have a free will, they do not have a soul. We are to constantly and earnestly seek out God's purpose and meaning for our lives, but let us not forget the one purpose that is the same for us all: to serve and worship God through Jesus Christ.
Oswald Chambers said "The realization of our election by God is the most joyful on earth, and we must learn to rely on this tremendous creative purpose of God.....we must not cloud it with our own intentions...if we do God will have to force our intention aside no matter how much it may hurt..."
Let us not forget God's purpose for our lives. I will try harder now each day to recognize God's creative purpose and examine my daily life to make certain there is evidence of service, worship and praise. I encourage you to do the same. Will I fail daily...yes..but I will keep trying.
Give me your thoughts. I would love to hear someone's view on any of my posts.
Blessings to you and yours.