Tag Archives: living

Meet Jesus: Blessor Matthew 5:1

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meetjesusblessorMatthew 5: 1: And seeing the multitudes, he went up into a mountain: and when he was set, his disciples came unto him: 2: And he opened his mouth, and taught them, saying, 3: Blessed are the poor in spirit: for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. 4: Blessed are they that mourn: for they shall be comforted. 5: Blessed are the meek: for they shall inherit the earth. 6: Blessed are they which do hunger and thirst after righteousness: for they shall be filled. 7: Blessed are the merciful: for they shall obtain mercy. 8: Blessed are the pure in heart: for they shall see God. 9: Blessed are the peacemakers: for they shall be called the children of God. 10: Blessed are they which are persecuted for righteousness’ sake: for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. 11: Blessed are ye, when men shall revile you, and persecute you, and shall say all manner of evil against you falsely, for my sake. 12: Rejoice, and be exceeding glad: for great is your reward in heaven: for so persecuted they the prophets which were before you.

 When you meet Jesus, you meet blessing.  Pure and simple, He is a blessor, especially of the underdog.

I remember my 50th birthday.  Hey, it wasn’t that long ago, give me a break.  So many blessings were received.   A business trip to a great site coincided the week before.  A group at work attended an NBA game.  My youngest son and I attended a hockey game.  Family celebrated at home.  My oldest son was able to be here, though for another reason.  My pastor and others called and encouraged, “Disfutas cumpleaños.”  (Enjoy your birthday.)

All of this was in the middle of a horrible and tragic sickness and rapid death of a family member living in my home.  While my home was grieving it was celebrating.  Daily the situation of the family member became worse.  Daily, my Father pulled out another blessing to make sure his son had a good birthday week.  While that grief sat heavy, the blessings were rich.  In the middle of our mourning, God is faithful to bless us unrelentingly.  These verses hold daily and moment by moment meaning.

It is an honor to attend a loved one in the process of death.  Yet, it is tough.  Receiving special touches from the heart of Jesus give life and strength and blessing for the moments.  Appreciate those blessings no matter the struggle.

¡Bendiciones!  (Blessings!)

 ACT!  Find somebody who needs a blessing today and give them one.  You may be holding the exact blessing from the Father that can turn the tide of pain for them.  Release it.

PRAY! Father, I receive Your blessing from Jesus to me.

Meet Jesus: Influencer Matthew 4:25

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meetjesusinfluencerMatthew 4: 25: And there followed him great multitudes of people from Galilee, and from Decapolis, and from Jerusalem, and from Judaea, and from beyond Jordan

Today’s writers, students, and speakers on influence will tell you to work on your immediate circle of people.  From that, your circle will begin to grow.  Jesus’ circle moved with lightning speed.  In short time people were coming from miles away in every direction.  North, East, South, and West they came.  From outside Israel they came.  From inside Israel they came.  They came by foot mostly.  They crossed rivers.  They came.

Babs really did not know what to think of this day.  She started out at the coffee shop and met a pastor, who wanted to know what she thought about the recent changes in city government.  Then she bumped into a woman from a sister congregation that asked her to tell her friends about an upcoming seminar.  Later, some business associates asked her to join them for a round of golf.  The same day, the waitress at the restaurant just opened up and began to tell her about her needs at home and her stress in her marriage.  All of this seemed too much like a God day.  How interesting that He could give acceptance and influence among so many types of people.

ACT!  What boundary of thought will you cross today to meet Jesus?  Do it!

PRAY!  Father, people are willing to cross any boundary to get to Jesus.  His influence moves quickly when we expose Him and His love and His power.  Help me to show Jesus to my circle of friends today so that others will come.  Help me to just stretch out to those around me so that others will cross boundaries to get to the Jesus I have to offer them. 

Meet Jesus: Healer Matthew 4:23

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meetjesushealerMatthew 4: 23: And Jesus went about all Galilee, teaching in their synagogues, and preaching the gospel of the kingdom, and healing all manner of sickness and all manner of disease among the people.

 If anything, Jesus is a healer.  When you connect with Him, you connect with solutions for sickness, peace for pain, and elimination of disease.  All of that stuff is decidedly a curse on us due to our sin condition.  Jesus came to remove the curse.  All descriptions, forms, and expressions of destruction flee in His presence.

Last year was another learning experience for me.  After six months of sickness, the Healer appeared.   Really, I was looking for Him not healing, when He came.

For six months, I had suffered acid reflux.  For six months, I had not slept a full night.  For six months, I had altered eating, resting, and other habits.  For six months, I had followed the doctor’s orders and taken my pills.  Nothing worked.

While going through scripture in my personal study, I noticed the condition was gone.  For four days, I had slept with no problems.  While looking for Him in the scripture instead of looking for healing, I had found both.  He removed my curse while looking to Him the author and finisher of my faith.

ACT!  What dis-ease has attached itself to you?  Name it.  Don’t be afraid.  He is present to heal. Give it to Him for solution.

 PRAY!  Father, all descriptions, forms, and expressions of destruction must flee in the presence of Your Incredible Son, Jesus.  Jesus, You are here.  You are my master, my Lord, my Savior, my soon coming King.  I submit myself and my dis-eases to the healing of Your presence.  Jesus, meet me in the chamber of healing.  Friend and brother, release me from my pain.

Meet Jesus: Worth Following

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meetjesusfollowMatthew 4: 21: And going on from thence, he saw other two brethren, James the son of Zebedee, and John his brother, in a ship with Zebedee their father, mending their nets; and he called them.  22: And they immediately left the ship and their father, and followed him.

 The daily drudge can easily cause us to miss opportunity presented.  Jesus is such an opportunity.  It takes guts to break the daily drudge and follow Him.

He is worth following.  He is worth more than our business and busyness.  He is worth more than our blood family.  He is worth more than any occupying of our time and life.  Jesus is just worth following.

In a business meeting recently, it struck me how many originally did not want to be a part of this team.  In the beginning, they had resisted and fumed and made noise in private and openly.  We persisted together.  Now, they were all enjoying prosperity and the team.

One colleague new to the company especially persisted.  She continued to present the positive and the pressing needs.  She continued to follow up with each team member.  What did we need to communicate?  How could she help?  She had been following.  Others followed her following our department’s direction following the executives following the business needs of our customers.   What could happen if we fell in line following Jesus like that?

 ACT!  Follow Him today.  Stop the daily drudge for 2 minutes and see if you can hear Him call.

PRAY!  Father, I’m listening.  I’ve put down my daily drudge, and am listening.  Call me.  Call me to follow Jesus.

Meet Jesus: Sorting Matthew 4:12

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meetjesussortMatthew 4: 12 When Jesus heard that John had been put in prison, he returned to Galilee. 13 Leaving Nazareth, he went and lived in Capernaum, which was by the lake in the area of Zebulun and Naphtali

Bad news can put a hard spin on life.  Each of us has places to go and things to do.  Jesus is no different.

John was Jesus’ cousin.  He was the first recorded to rejoice at the coming King.  He leapt in his mother’s womb when Mary approached for a visit.  No one knew Jesus was coming.  John knew.  That is an early praise.

John prepared people for the coming of Jesus.  He was ahead of Him getting the people ready.

News about John in prison was not good for Jesus.  Scripture doesn’t say why he went to Galilee.  Knowing the affinity Jesus had for John and the respect He had for him, it seems he needed time away to sort it out.  He went where it was quiet and familiar.  He went away.  He did not despair.  He did not become discouraged.  He met the news with an action plan.  He kept His confidence and went to people He knew.

This scripture coming up today is interesting.  All week I have been taking in good news in multiple areas.  Sometimes much good news can be as stressful as bad news.  Family, friends, work, community, and other areas have been full of blessed news.  The consulting business is prospering.  The work on fathering is prospering.  Many people want to meet and talk.  At the same time, this coming week, I have some time away to write and reflect.  I’ll be in my quiet spot at the lake.  It is timely to go sort out the news and make plans.  God is faithful.  He gives us space.

ACT!  Bad news?  Much good news?  How did you respond?  Did you respond with faith and joy in Christ?  Do you need time to sort out the next steps?  Let Him give you a respite.  He is faithful.  It may only be a few minutes or a few hours, but He is faithful.  He will not push you beyond His ability in you.

 PRAY!  Father, it is comforting to know You care so much for me.  In the middle of the tempest, You cover.  In the face of bad news, You allow a breath to come to take it in.  How can I thank You enough?  Help me to face every bad news with joy and confidence in Your provision.  Help me to absorb the punches of life with joy and family and friends.

 

Meet Jesus: Served Matthew 4:9

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meetjesusservedMatthew 4:9: And saith unto him, All these things will I give thee, if thou wilt fall down and worship me. 10: Then saith Jesus unto him, Get thee hence, Satan: for it is written, Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God, and him only shalt thou serve. 11: Then the devil leaveth him, and, behold, angels came and ministered unto him.

 Angels minister to Jesus, and so should we minister to Jesus with our worship.  In Paul’s letter to the Romans he talks of a reasonable or rational service and worship done with presenting our bodies as living sacrifices.  This is our pleasure and our part.  Our worship of Jesus is to serve Him, to present ourselves totally to His selection for our life.  Satan had it backwards.  He forgot who was to serve whom.

Josue was determined to follow God this day.  Lately, he had been wandering from his relationship with Christ.  Over and over events just did not seem to go his way.  Something he had read before was now stirring in him.  There was something about praising God in everything.  He was ready to try it.  He was ready to try anything that would restore the warmth of the love of Jesus back in him.  As he lifted his voice in the quiet of his room late that night, something broke.  He began to weep.  He began to praise God out loud.  He began to know again the reassurance of the presence of the Holy Spirit.

ACT!  Where does Jesus need your active worship?  Take action this week on worshipping with real action where He needs you to serve another in the kingdom.

 PRAY!  Father, Jesus is the center of my worshipful services.  Help me connect with the right actions for which You created me.  I was created in Jesus for good works of  worship done unto You.  Enable me, Father, to find those works for which You created me and act on them.

 

Meet Jesus: Taken Matthew 4:5

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meetjesustakenMatthew 4:5 Then the devil taketh him up into the holy city, and setteth him on a pinnacle of the temple,

The fact that Jesus would allow himself to be taken anywhere by the devil astounds me.  What was going through His mind at those moments?  Here he was, led by His own Holy Spirit, to spend time with evil.   Here he was entering the beginning of His public ministry dealing with a defeatist devil.  Our present thinkers tell us to feel good and be happy and then minister.  Our present ideologies point to pleasure as the entry to ministry.  Jesus allowed himself to be taken into the presence of evil itself.  This was His entry point into public ministry.  He allowed testing.  He presented himself for inspection.  He was taken.

Pushed to the max, Jim was about to pop.  This was supposed to be his year to get the big promotion.  It began with pain.  Employees were livid with some decisions he had made.  Every emotion in him was twisted.  He had worked night and day and given himself totally on behalf of these.  They turned on him.  The year before, he had handled the torrents of accusations from a disturbed man.  The threats had been against these very employees that now turned on him.  For defending them, he now stood their accusations of being unfair and inequitable.  Was this how to start his big year?

He resigned himself to stand through the accusations.  He remembered that the name, Satan, really meant Accuser.  He remembered, Jesus had stood testing before His big year.  Surely, he could allow the Healer to live in and through him in this critical time.  “Father, forgive them”, he whispered, “They don’t know what they are doing.”

ACT! Testing is never fun.  When God has something big, He can allow life and, yes, even the devil a place to sort out our intentions and grace living.  Is there a place of testing in your life?  Is God preparing you, stabilizing you for the next big thing?  Submit to the test.  Let it prove you out.  Don’t fight.  Let God fight for you.  Take time to pray Psalm 35 and see what happens.

PRAY! Father, I am not my own defense.  When life and the enemy rise against me as a flood, You be the boat of my salvation.  Carry me away from that which is too strong for me.  Deliver me from the hand of my enemies.  Cause in me conviction to repent of those weaknesses in me that could have led to this situation.  Cause holiness to well up in me.  Cause me to crucify any flesh that needs changed.  Let these troubles be a directional that causes me to become closer to You in thought and word and deed.  Cause me to be more like You than ever before.  Then, in the next big thing, I will be able.  I will be founded.  I will be strengthened to do that to which You have called me.  I surrender myself to be taken.

Meet Jesus: Human Matthew 4:2

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meetjesusokMatthew 4: 2: And when he had fasted forty days and forty nights, he was afterward an hungred.

 There is a fallacy in meeting Jesus that bears great correction.   At times we approach Him as if He had some special advantage while He lived in that body born of Mary.  Jesus was fully human.  He got really hungry.  He dealt with conflicting emotions.  He lived as a human equipped with the Spirit of God even as He asks us to live.

In being human, Jesus sanctified humanity.  He made it okay to be fully human.  He made it a good thing to be all the human we could be, to live up to our human potential – with God.  Remember, while being fully human, He was fully God.  Our task is to work on being fully human, with God.

Being fully human, for us means being full of mistakes.  Being fully human, means being able to correct those mistakes.  Today I had a great opportunity to change my mistakes.  A co-worker was upset with me about my actions.  I had presumed what I did was okay with him instead of asking.  It was okay.  If I asked.  Not asking was presumptive.  It was inconsiderate.  By repenting and asking, my mistake was changed to okay.  He gave me that grace.  It was good.  Jesus helped me be human.

ACT!  Think of your most human moment this week.  Thank God for making you a human.

PRAY!  Father, thanks for making me a human like Jesus.  It must be really special to you, this human thing.  You sent Your own Son to be one, just to make it special.  Wow!  I really don’t deserve it, but I really appreciate it.  Thanks.

Meet Jesus: Mystical Matthew 3:16

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meetjesusMatthew 3: 16: And Jesus, when he was baptized, went up straightway out of the water: and, lo, the heavens were opened unto him, and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove, and lighting upon him: 17: And lo a voice from heaven, saying, This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.

 At times a relationship with Jesus can get a little mystical.  Doves, spirits, voices from heaven, and the heavens being opened all make for a mystical moment.  Jesus transcends what we see on a daily basis.  He operates in heaven and earth simultaneously.  That may throw our normal pattern, but be thankful that He is access to the Father in heaven and the Holy Spirit on earth at once to affect our lives.

Listening to the message of the moment from the pulpit, my life seemed to be the content.  The preaching pierced pointedly and profoundly into the core of that night’s dilemma.  All day, I had lived the problem being answered.  It was exhilarating.  God’s timing in bringing my pastor to the present point of my life is amazing.  There are too many times to tell of when this has happened.  The scriptures come alive with fire and stir me up to new levels of faith.  How could God care so much to make the message match my messes?  What an amazing God!

ACT!  Need anything from heaven?  Some things we need don’t exist right now on earth.  Jesus is access to heaven.  Ask the Father for the impossible in Jesus.  Go ahead and plan the rest of the day as if you had it.

 PRAY!  Our Father, who is in heaven, Holy is Your name.  Cause the heavens to open for me in my life.  Cause Your Holy Spirit to brood over my life and cause chaos to come to order.   Release all You are in heaven and earth in me that Your will would be done here even as it is there. 

Meet Jesus: Humility Matthew 3:13

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Matthew 3: 13: Then cometh Jesus from Galilee to Jordan unto John, to be baptized of him.

 Here is the Son of God, God in the flesh, submitting Himself to the gift and calling of another.  In most of our world, this is almost unthinkable.  The Master goes to the servant to be enabled for ministry.  It is so backward to our ego mindset that it almost hurts.  When you meet with Jesus, you will be asked to find Him in others and lay down ego.

There is nothing like being misunderstood to humble us.  Reading through a memo written by another staffer, I started to get upset.  It was evident that he really did not understand the conversation the day before.  How could he so misunderstand me?  Before I did something stupid, I opened the memo that had been sent by me after the conversation.  Taking a slow and deliberate look, it was easy to see how he was interpreting as my meaning.  He was simply walking out his understanding.  Humbled, I deleted my first response and crafted one more suitable and understanding to correct the confusion.

ACT! Think of a friend who has a gift you need.  Get with them and let them pray for you.

 PRAY! Whoops!  Father sometimes I miss it and mess it.  Sometimes You have sent Jesus to me in a wrapper that I did not receive.  Sometimes the unlikely has had the incredible for my life.  Help me find the some-times and receive from the gift of others in Him.

If we can pray for you regarding anything in your life, please let us know.  Our greatest blessing is to bless others in prayer.   www.prayermetro.com   Phil