What's in your hand

Exodus 4:2

What is that in your hand?

Many sermons have been shared about this verse. I has a lot of meaning for me because when I look at myself, it challenges me to always commit what I have for God: Time.

I can't play instruments to save my life, I'm not keen to be a missionary or work full time, but I do have time to serve the purposes of God.  Sure, it can also be used for my own personal pleasure and I can do "better" things such as live my own life. But when I stare at the lines on my palms, I know I'm better off giving away the time I am given. 

When God never asks this question, I'm sure he already knows the answer of what we hold deepest to us. So we can learn to surrender and be purposefully transformed.

Yet, I answer this question differently today. I hold in my hand a few lives that are of utmost importance to me. So important they are that I hold tighter than anything I possess. Much like a child who catches a small grasshopper in his hands and goes to show his father, I often bring it to show God that this is what I have in my hands because I want Him to see, acknowledge and bless. 

Time that I possess of this life, I've given. Today I have individuals that I hold tightly in my hands. I commit and let them go in Your presence like Moses did with his rod because what is dead will be made alive.

M.

Hold fast

Deuteronomy 13:4

It is the LORD your God you must follow, and him you must revere. Keep his commands and obey him; serve him and hold fast to him.

Life sometimes feels like this to me; I'm a swimmer kept afloat by the life vest around my neck and as I'm tossed about by the waves. I'm unable and yet somehow unwilling to die. So I do what I only can and continue to hang onto the life vest and hope for the waves to calm and for respite to arrive.

In all the must do's of the verse above, what strikes me most is the needs to hold fast to God. Everything else is of obedience and servanthood. However, as we swing back and forth with life's challenges and our emotions sometimes taking precedence over our discipline, if we learn how to hold fast to God, it'll see us through the crest and trough of every wave that buffets us.

As I state this in words, may my heart, mind and soul also absorb it and follow what my head has expressed.

M.

Bad Company

1 Corinthians 15: 33

Do not be misled: “Bad company corrupts good character.”

I stopped in my tracks (in the rain!) when I heard this on my podcast today. Really? I never knew this simple truth existed in the bible.

So I searched it out and there it is! Simple common statement which says it all and I never saw it and I'm amazed to find it in its point blank simplicity.

In my life, I've taken much pains to distance myself from childhood friends and peers who are a lot of fun simply because some chose to live alternative lifestyles or simply enjoy secular enjoyments that I condone. Fun and exciting as they are as companions, I've learned to protect myself and withdraw, even to the extent of cutting friendship ties.

Strong as I think I am, I'm not. No one is. For this is a fact of life and something clearly documented in the bible; bad company corrupts good character. 

M.

Honest standards

Leviticus 19: 35-36

Do not use dishonest standards when measuring length, weight or quantity. Use honest scales and honest weights, an honest ephah and an honest hin.

I'm very easily annoyed when someone takes stuff from me without informing me, more annoyed if a person takes without even recognising the fault of being dishonest. So imagine how very annoyed I was to find out that someone wore back a pair of slippers that has been given to me and that I had placed in church for common use every Sunday. Moreover, the individually did not even have the decency to return them and many were clueless trying to hunt for it to use.

In many ways, I'm not an easy person to work with and I imagine that I'll be a terrible boss to many. I have exacting standards of what I expect to be done and because I work fast, I expect people to be responsible and to work with an equivalent amounts of finesse. Based on the many I interact with at church, there are few I would ever employ or recommend for a job. For the honest salary that we earn, we need to be accountable for handling great work and setting even higher standards than non-christians. For the lack of salary that christian volunteers volunteer, I expect equally high standards, if not higher, because they serve God!

However, it is tragic when many Christians are often the worst to employ because their attitudes suck. I find it to be a reasonable gauge to look at an individuals attitude at doing any task in church and extrapolating it to how they will do work in the secular. Afterall, it is only a marginal difference of change because it'll take too much effort to have differing standards in different places, unless one has multiple personality disorder. Thus, when I look around at the standards of many in church, I often frown because it's a laid back, rotten attitude that I know speaks of the worst of a person's behavior at the secular place.

Frankly, an honest standard is very lacking in today's working world. Attitudes have gone down such that many just do what they think is their requirement. So many complain that they are overworked, yet, often I find them to be inefficient because they don't work fast or hard at the right moment. Look around in churches and you see people coming late and expecting to leave early. Even those who are serving, no doubt we are all volunteers, put in sloppy standards because they aren't measured by a salary scale.

This guide of honesty was given when the people were in the wilderness, and barter trade was the order of the day. Honesty, sets us apart. When our hands are clean and conscience clear, we become people who are distinguished. People can't help but give glory to God for what we do reflect an exacting standard that most don't possess.

May you live with honest standards. 
M.

Return to give thanks.

Luke 17: 15-18

One of them, when he saw he was healed, came back, praising God in a loud voice. He threw himself at Jesus’ feet and thanked him—and he was a Samaritan. Jesus asked, “Were not all ten cleansed? Where are the other nine? Has no one returned to give praise to God except this foreigner?”

When someone does something nice for me, I am grateful. When I receive a gift, I treat it as a bonus.  If a life grows up well, I'm blessed, but I take no credit for it. Over the years, I've hardened myself to recognise that there will never be nine others who will return out of the ten helped. Honestly, people don't owe me an iota of thanks because lives rarely turn out exactly the way I've dreamt it to be. Moreover, all that transpires is by the very grace and blessings of God. 

I've been brokenhearted too much to expect much and therefore, I do not bother to cling onto beautiful dreams. I've witnessed enough people who are disillusioned/bitter with God or their life and decide to give up on doing what was right because what they hoped and assumed never came to pass. When what doesn’t appear, disappointment sets in. frustrations and anger emerges. Then, it is often left in a feeling of bitterness and offense. God and anything Godly is discarded because it serves no purpose. With lesser expectations, I've learnt self-preservation, even though it inevitably makes me colder and distanced. 

However, as I stand by in the sidelines more often than not broken and spent, I encourage myself to cling to hope, a hope in how God's grace will always be more than I ever imagine. I trust in God not just because I have to, but because I need to. Faith is more than what I feel and know. Therefore, I commit myself, like a blind man with nothing to rely on but his stick, I trust in an unseen God that I've professed to trust and will follow. 

Life has often taken its toll on me, but I continue to do what I must do to handle those in my charge. I know that, even though people will eventually stumble, drop out and break the exposed parts of my heart, they possess some good inside of them that must be nurtured and influenced. Even if none return, I must continue to do what my God will expect of me till the day I see Him and be accountable for the breathe that I was given.I pray you will do likewise too. 

M.

What will people say of you

Luke 23:47
The centurion, seeing what had happened, praised God and said, "Surely this was a righteous man."

The Roman centurion never knew Jesus, all he witness was how He suffered and died.  But that was enough for him to declare that He was a righteous man. That really says a lot of our Saviour.

People often say that genuineness and character are unveiled in misfortune. When crisis hits us and we are crushed in spirit, how many of us can look upwards towards God and still live in obedience? How many of us can live in the turbulence that life brings us and reflect a sober, kind countenance that would make those around acknowledge that God is present  in our lives?

M.   

Seeing fulfillment

Psalms 27:13 (NIV)

I am still confident of this: I will see the goodness of the LORD in the land of the living.

Psalms 27:13 (NASB)

I would have despaired unless I had believed that I would see the goodness of the LORD In the land of the living.

Ps Rick Warren's devotional sharing today ended off with this statement; "A God-given vision will always be fulfilled." My daily psalm calendar has Psalms 27:13 and it sits staring at me as I work today.

The NASB version of this verse is a song I know well and love to sing as it will go on to declare about the testimony of my faithful God. I know that I find my rest in the faithfulness of God, even when I'm unable to be as faithful to He would like or have the faith that would drive me on like an duracell bunny.

Wait for the LORD; be strong and take heart for we will see the fulfillment of God's goodness.

M.