and puts them into practice

Opening Prayer: Lord Jesus, help me to encounter you today, and not just read about or think about or talk about you.  Help me to know you like you know me.   

Scripture: Luke 6:46-49

Journal: How and where is Jesus calling you to put into practice what you have heard?  How and where is that not happening?

Reflection: “I will show you what he is like who comes to me and hears my words and puts them into practice.  He is like a man building a house, who dug down deep and laid the foundation on a rock.  When a flood came, the torrent struck that house but could not shake it, because it was well built.  But the one who hears my words and does not put them into practice is like a man who built a house on the ground without a foundation.” (Luke 6:47-49)

Thomas Kelly once said that “Practice comes first in religion, not theory or dogma.”  Jesus would certainly seem to agree.  It is not just the hearing of his word that counts, but also the doing of it.  We typically encounter God through the avenue of the spiritual practices.  The only problem with the spiritual practices is that in order for them to work, you actually have to do them.  You can think about them and talk about them all you want, but they will really never do you any good until you start doing them. 

As G. K. Chesterton once said, “The difference between talking about prayer and praying is the same as the difference between blowing a kiss and kissing.”  The spiritual practices are the way we make time and space to encounter God, and unless we actually do them, chances are that blowing a kiss is as far as we’ll ever get.  Is that okay with you?

Prayer

Closing Prayer: Lord Jesus, how and where are you calling me to put into practice what I have heard?  Help me to hear you and to do what you say.  Amen.

trajectory

Opening Prayer: O Lord, help me never to get too full of myself.  Help me to stop trying to climb higher and become bigger.  Those are not the things of your kingdom, but the things of this world.  And I want to be like you, not like them.  Have mercy on me, O Lord, and give me the courage to join you on the downward journey.  Amen.

Scripture: Psalm 131:1-3

Journal: What is the typical trajectory of your life?  What is the trajectory of Jesus?  How will you change your trajectory to match his?

Reflection: “My heart is not lifted up, O Lord, my eyes are not raised too high.  I do not occupy myself with great matters or things too wonderful for me.  But I have stilled and quieted my soul, like a weaned child with its mother; like a weaned child is my soul within me. O Israel, put your hope in the Lord, both now and forevermore.” (Psalm 131:1-3)

The great temptation of our culture is to move “up and to the right.”  The only problem with that is that Jesus calls us to do the direct opposite.  While we are more concerned with up, high, and great; he is more concerned with down, low, and least.  Life in the kingdom is about the trajectory of our lives matching the trajectory of his, yet few seem willing to really do that.

How do we wean our souls from this obsession to being bigger and greater and more?  Maybe the same way King David did it—by prayer.  Maybe when we let the words to this ancient prayer seeps down into the core of our being, it changes us.  It makes us want the things God wants and makes us pursue the things that he pursues.  For only then can we ever hope to be set free from acting out of ambition and need, and be able, instead, to begin acting out of humility and love.

Prayer

Closing Prayer:  Forgive me, O Lord, when I begin to act as if the world can’t survive without me or begin to live terrified that it can.  Both end up in the same place, with a life that is all about me instead of about you.  Wean me, O Lord, from the need for attention and affirmation and applause, so that I can actually still and quiet my soul and find my hope in you.  Amen.

so we actually can make this stuff up

Opening Prayer: Lord Jesus, help me to realize that the storms and chaos of this life can keep me from seeing and recognizing you.  They can even cause me to make up stories about myself and others that are simply not true.  Help me, Lord Jesus, to live in your truth, because it is your truth that sets me free.  Amen.

Scripture: Matthew 14:26-27

Journal: Where have you created a story (for yourself or for others) that is not really there?  What is that story?  What is the truth?  Where and how have circumstances kept you from being able to recognize Jesus?

Reflection: “But when the disciples saw him walking on the sea, they were terrified and said, ‘It is a ghost!’ and cried out in fear.  But immediately Jesus spoke to them, saying, ‘Take courage; it is I.  Do not be afraid.’” (Matthew 14:26-27)

So the disciples had convinced themselves that Jesus was a ghost.  Interesting.  They had created a story that was not even there.  Circumstances clouded their vision, producing fear and keeping them from being able to recognize that it was actually Jesus who was standing out there on the sea.  I wonder how often this is the case with us. 

I wonder how often we allow our response to circumstances to create a narrative that simply doesn’t exist.  I wonder how often we create stories for ourselves and for others that are only the creation of our own fearful minds and insecure hearts.  Because of sin, we are prone, like the disciples, to misinterpretation.  We create stories for ourselves and for others that are not even there.  In other words, because of sin we have become unreliable narrators, even of our own story.  Sin has kept us from being able to see clearly. 

Which makes me ask, what is the story I am telling myself right now?  And is it even true?  Where have I convinced myself that something is true, when it is really not?  Where have I allowed circumstances to keep me from recognizing Jesus? 

Lord Jesus, give me the eyes to see you clearly, even in the midst of the storms and chaos. 

Prayer

Closing Prayer: Lord Jesus, give me the eyes to see you clearly, even in the midst of the storms and chaos. 

i deserve better

Opening Prayer: Thank you, O Lord, that you do not give us what we deserve.  We deserve Divine justice, and yet you give us your mercy.  Thus, help us to live our lives from the place of deep gratitude, rather than out of a spirit of entitlement.  Lord, have mercy!  Amen.

Scripture: Luke 7:1-10

Journal:  What do you really believe you deserve?  How does that affect the way you live your life?  Do you live more with a heart of gratitude, or a spirit of entitlement?  What can you do to cultivate gratitude?

Reflection:

i deserve better

luke 7:2-10

i deserve better

is the ultimate deception

poison to the soul

for it produces a

spirit of entitlement

rather than a

heart of gratitude

it erodes joy

and befriends bitterness

it chooses pride

over humility

it abides in darkness

rather than light

it feeds on lies

rather than the truth

leading to bondage

rather than freedom

it is the broad road

that leads to destruction

avoid it at all costs

Prayer

Closing Prayer: Thank you, O Lord, for your mercy and your grace.  I do not deserve them, but I am incredibly grateful for them.  Help me to live like I am.  Amen.

lies

Opening Prayer: O Lord, our souls will never be able to find rest in you alone as long as we continue to buy into the lies of the culture and the enemy.  Help us to identify these lies and to fight them with your truth, for the truth will always set us free.  Amen.

Scripture: Psalm 62:1-8

Journal: What lies of the enemy are you most susceptible to?  Which ones do you constantly battle against?  How are those lies related to a resistance to rest? 

Reflection: “How long will you assault a man?  Would you all throw him down—this leaning wall, this tottering fence?  They fully intend to topple him from his lofty place; they take delight in lies. With their mouths they bless, but in their hearts they curse.  Find rest, O my soul, in God alone; my hope comes from him.” (Psalm 62:3-5)

The number one assault on our soul’s ability to find rest in God alone comes from the lies of the enemy.  Somehow, we have bought into the notions that: God’s love must be earned, and our worth must be achieved.  So much so, in fact, that it has made rest an impossibility.  If our salvation and our honor depend on us, instead of on God alone, then we will go through life desperately trying to prove to ourselves, to our world, and even to our God, that we are worth loving.  And that definitely doesn’t lead to rest.

In fact, the enemy has done such a masterful job of convincing us of this fallacy that we even experience a good amount of shame over the idea of rest.  Can you believe that?  Feeling shame about something God has actually commanded us to do.  How messed up is that?

Thus, it is extremely important in the spiritual life to pay careful attention to the lies we are buying in to.  How do we do this?  One way is by constantly meditating on the truth.  When we know the truth of God to the depths of our being, then we will be able to spot even the most subtle lies when they rear their ugly heads.  And once we recognize the lies, we will be able to fight them.  We will be able to respond to the lies with the truth, which is the only thing that can set us free.  If we are not free, it is because we are believing something that is not true.

Prayer

Closing Prayer: O Lord, help me to know you, and your truth, so well that I will be able to recognize the lies when the rear their ugly heads, and I will be able to live in your truth, which always sets me free.  Amen.

living in the light of truth

Opening Prayer:  Thank you, Lord Jesus, that you are the light of the world and when we walk with you, we walk in the light of truth.  Therefore, help us to do just that.  Help us to never live in the shadows, trying to make people think that we are better than we really are.  Help us, instead, to live openly and honestly before you and each other—never covering or posturing or pretending.  Just give us the courage and the grace and the strength to live authentically, so that way everyone will always know that anything good that they see in us is only because of you.

Scripture: John 3:21

Journal: What does it meant to walk in the light of truth?  How is God inviting you to do that?

Reflection: Living in the light means walking in the light of truth.  It means leaving behind all that is dark and hidden and false.  It involves not trying to make people think I am better than I am.  If I can somehow resist the tendency to hide my warts and my wounds and my deficiencies, then I can live a life that truly reveals God’s power and his love.  I can live a life that glorifies him, rather than one that glorifies myself.  Thus, my inadequacies highlight his adequacy, my weaknesses highlight his strength, and my deficiencies highlight his sufficiency. 

Lord Jesus, help me to live in the light of your truth, so that everyone can see that the only good in me is because of who you are.

Prayer

Closing Prayer: Shine your light, Lord Jesus, into our dark places, so that everyone can see the truth, about us and about you.  Amen.

left behind

Opening Prayer: Lord Jesus, it is so easy to “leave you behind” if we are not careful.  Help us to never get so consumed with ourselves that we lose track of you.  Amen.

Scripture: Luke 2:43-49

Journal: How do you tend to leave Jesus behind?  Typically, what is the result?  How will you live in such a way that that will not happen?

Reflection: 

     left behind

so they were the ones

who left him behind

and then they complained,

“why have you treated us like this?” 

interesting. 

shouldn’t he have

been the one

asking that question? 

i guess not much has changed

in the last two thousand years. 

Prayer

Closing Prayer: Forgive us, Lord Jesus, when we get so caught up in our own plans and our own agendas that we simply leave you behind.  Help us to allow you to be the one who sets the pace and the tone and the agenda for our lives and ministries.  Amen.

new wine in the new year

Opening Prayer: “See, I am doing a new thing!  Now it springs up; do you not perceive it?” (Isaiah 43:19) 

Scripture: Matthew 9:17

Journal: What new thing is God doing in and through you?  How will you nurture it?  What old wineskins will you need to let go of?

Reflection: “Neither do men pour new wine into old wineskins.  If they do, the skins will burst the wine will run out and the wineskins will be ruined.  No, they pour new wine into new wineskins, and both are preserved.” (Matthew 9:17)

Thank you, O Lord, that in this New Year you long to do something new and beautiful in us.  Help us to have the wisdom and the courage and the grace to receive that “new wine” and to nurture it and give it the space and the time in needs to grow and take root within us.  Forgive us for our tendency to try and put this new wine into the same old wineskins.  Amen.

Prayer

Closing Prayer: “He who was seated on the throne said, ‘I am making everything new!’” (Revelation 21:5)