The battle against BITTERNESS in the midst of life’s furnace trial is all about our UNBELIEF. A question of our faith in God’s sovereignty. A matter of believing vengeance is in God’s hand, not ours. God demands forgiveness from us because he knew our lives would include people and situations where peace and comfort were totally absent (Ephesians 4:32).    That is why our battle with bitterness...

Thanking God in advance is faith at its strongest and most glorious point. Jehoshaphat put the choir in front of his men and sang praises to God when the army from Edom was marching toward him from beyond the Dead Sea (2 Chronicles).    He was not intimidated; he was motivated to pray and seek God for wisdom and not rely on his own power.    He remembered what God had promised.    He...

We are living today on the front-lines of a dangerous battlefield that compels us to PRAY and call on God’s power to unleash the ultimate WEAPON—his Word. That’s why we desperately need to connect with God’s Command Central Headquarters through prayer so he can arm us with the power of his Word. Doing that makes us part of God’s victory so we can praise him and let others see his goodness.    Our...

When I hit the bumpy parts of life and start veering off the road, I immediately turn to Psalm 37:4.  Of course I love the notion of God giving me the desires of my heart, but I always remember that his promise is conditional on me delighting in him.    The way to delight in the Lord is to do what pleases him and install his Word in our hearts. Then and only then are we sanctified...

Early in my faith walk I took responsibility for every battle myself with a perfunctory and shallow prayer to God through in for “insurance.” Ridiculous. Looking back on the countless battlefields of my defeats drives home God’s immutable truth that the battles of life are not mine to fight. Never. (See below 2 Chronicles 20:17.)    I spent yesterday in a hospital emergency room with a dear...

Living in the now has always been tough. It was tough when Jesus walked the earth and it’s certainly tough today as we absorb myriad assaults of sound and sight. This thought hit me hard yesterday when I was looking at family videos from the now-distant past. Those images captured every moment of extreme bliss and joy. It was incredible. And I remembered NONE OF IT.    That hurt a lot,...

The predilection to be selfish, seemingly hard-wired into us, makes us vulnerable to slip into that state at any time. Our degree of selfishness is determined by the underlying beliefs and attitudes that determine our behavior across the myriad roles we play in life–parent, spouse, sibling, son or daughter, worker…all of them.    Our degree of surrender to God dictates the depth and...

Most believers have felt God’s warm and soothing rays of light as they wash our life with joy. Of course that coin has a flip side when an ominous darkness envelopes our soul and blows a fierce wind through our hopes and dreams. All of God’s saints have been, and will always be, led into this barren and painful desert. But spiritual silence is not real, only perceived.  I think of it as the...

The express elevator promises to zoom us to the 50th floor in seconds and we think: “Stairs or Elevator?” “Stairs? Are you kidding me!? That’s an easy answer—I’m taking the ELEVATOR.”    If you connect this metaphor with our Christian life, taking spiritual stairs is often the only way to reach our full potential in Christ. There are no shortcuts to spiritual growth and maturity.    Taking...

The exact moment we start praying, God answers because he loves us very much. Daniel gives us that incredible promise…       “…Daniel, I have now come to give you insight and understanding. As soon as you began to pray, a word went out, which I have come to tell you, for God loves you very much.” Daniel 9:22-23    This immediate and powerful answer to Daniel’s prayer...