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Jesus was constantly cognizant of His mission. We see it at the beginning of His ministry and all the way through to the very end. At the beginning, He makes a decision where to live and base His ministry “to fulfill what was said through the prophet Isaiah” (Matthew 4:12-16). At the end, He knows “that everything had now been finished, and so that Scripture would be fulfilled” He makes a final request (John 19:28).
So “when Jesus heard that John had been put in prison, He withdrew to Galilee…and lived in Capernaum…in the area of Zebulun and Naphtali.” This residency fulfilled Isaiah’s prophetic word.
Jesus knew He had to go to this region. The event of John’s imprisonment prompted His move to Capernaum.
My sovereign God makes no mistakes; nothing is random nor inconsequential. I should develop the habit of praying, “Now that this has happened, what would You have me do?” I believe this is how Jesus lived.
My life, just like Jesus’ life, has a purpose. Just as the Holy Spirit directed the movements of Jesus, He will direct my steps as well, if I will only listen for His voice.
I think we would be wise to form a daily prayer something along these lines—
Father, in my heart I may have planned a course for today, but I trust You to direct my steps. I will not stubbornly nor thoughtlessly lean on my own understanding, but at every moment I will listen for Your wise and perfect counsel. Jesus, just as You lived dependent on the Holy Spirit, I want to live this way as well. In Jesus’ name, Amen. (see Proverbs 16:9, 3:5-6; James 4:13-15)
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There is a sportswear company called ActiveFaith. I have a warmup shirt I wear sometimes in preparing for my workout. The front of the shirt says, “I can do all things,” and on the back it says, “through Christ.” I think that phrase is supposed to help me muscle through when I want to back off in my workouts. Perhaps reminding myself, “I can do all things through Christ” will help me persevere.
As we continue our series asking, “Is that in the Bible?” we have come to statement #8—I can do everything through Christ. Is that in the Bible? Yes, but.…
Yes, this verse is in the Bible in Philippians 4:13, but we need to as what exactly is the “everything” Paul is referencing.
Remember that context is king, so we need to look at this whole letter to the church at Philippi, and especially the verses surrounding this statement. Let’s consider verses 10-19.
In verse 10, Paul says he is glad that the Philippian Christians have had an opportunity to meet his material and financial needs again. This church was famous for its generosity (see 2 Corinthians 8:1-4), and when they heard Paul was in prison, they wanted to help.
Prison was actually house arrest for Paul. He wasn’t allowed to leave the house, but he was responsible for all of his living expenses. Quite simply put: no money, no food. Epaphroditus brought the necessary funds from Philippi to Rome. He so invested himself in this mission to help Paul that he nearly died in the process (Philippians 2:25-30).
Paul expresses his gratitude for the way these friends supplied for his needs, and he tells them twice that he has learned contentment during this ordeal. He says that he knows what it is to have plenty, and he knows what it is to have nothing.
Did you catch that: Paul says that contentment is a learned attitude. It is learned through appetites satisfied and appetites thwarted, it is learned by looking back to recall God’s past mercies and then reassuring an anxious mind—that may become a discontented mind—that God is still God and that His future grace has not diminished one iota (see Philippians 4:4-7).
Bottom line: Contentment is learned by being assured (or reassured) that I can get through this season of life by my unwavering faith in Christ’s ability to supply my needs. So Paul concludes, “I can do everything through Him who gives me strength.”
I like the way the Amplified Bible translates this verse: I have strength for all things in Christ Who empowers me—I am ready for anything and equal to anything through Him Who infuses inner strength into me; I am self-sufficient in Christ’s sufficiency.
Contentment is keeping my eyes on Jesus regardless of the circumstances. Contentment brings an assurance to my heart to keep trusting God regardless of my circumstances. And contentment then helps me pray for others.
How does contentment help us pray—or intercede—for others?
Before I answer that, let me have you consider another “Is that in the Bible” statement. Statement #9—My God will meet all my needs according to His glorious riches in Christ Jesus. Is that in the Bible? No!
Paul is not praying for himself, but for his friends. Listen carefully to the pronouns in this verse: And my God will meet all YOUR needs according to the riches of His glory in Christ Jesus (Philippians 4:19).
So back to my earlier question: How does contentment help us intercede for others?
It’s hard for me to pray for others to be blessed and have their needs supplied when my heart is discontented, isn’t it? When I have learned contentment—especially when I learned it by having all my needs supplied in a time of want—then I know how to both empathize with my friends who are in need and how to intercede for them.
To the church at Corinth Paul said, “Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of compassion and the God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our troubles, SO THAT we can comfort those in any trouble with the comfort we ourselves receive from God” (2 Corinthians 1:3-4).
The Holy Spirit teaches me contentment through these difficult circumstances SO THAT I am strong, and SO THAT I can pray for that strength for others in their difficult circumstances. My contentment helps me empathize and intercede for my brothers and sisters.
“…and let us all hasten to approach to perfect manhood, to the measure of the completed growth of the fullness of Jesus Christ, in Whom let us love one another, praise one another, correct one another, encourage one another, pray for one another, that with Him in one another we may reign and triumph.” —Columbanus, Letter to Certain Bishops, Irish, early 7th century
Have you ever wondered how the laws of the Old Testament era should be applied to New Testament Christians? Theologian T.M. Moore has an excellent series of articles on this, but I think his post The Church is not Ancient Israel is especially informative.
Here is one way the Holy Spirit can speak to us—
“It is not the body of truth that enlightens; it is the Spirit of truth who enlightens. If you are willing to obey the Lord Jesus, He will illuminate your spirit. He will inwardly enlighten you. The truth you have known intellectually will now be known spiritually. Power will begin to flow up and out, and you will find yourself changed—marvelously changed.” —A.W. Tozer
“The greatest tragedy of life is not unanswered prayer, but unoffered prayer.” —F.B. Meyer
This is pretty cool: some fossilized human footprints in the salt flats of Utah. “Both creationist and uniformitarian scientists agree that these tracks were made during the Ice Age, although they disagree about when the Ice Age occurred. Creationists think these footprints are just a few thousand years old. However, evolutionists think the tracks are more than 10,000 years old, because they believe the wet conditions needed to form and preserve the footprints have been absent from the Great Salt Lake area for at least that long. … wet Ice Age deserts are extremely difficult for evolutionary scientists to convincingly explain. However, the Bible’s real history makes much better sense of both these wet deserts and preserved Ice Age footprints.”
Don’t cut corners to get more. Instead, be faithful, do your best work, and the “more” will follow at the right time—
According to 1 Corinthians 12-14, the Holy Spirit operates in nine different gifts to both evangelize the sinner and edify the saints. The apostle Paul says that these gifts are available to all Christians who will allow the Holy Spirit to operate through them.
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A meme that makes me chuckle every time I see it is a “quote” attributed to Abraham Lincoln in which he says, “The problem with quotes found on the internet is that they are often not true.”
(Not to spoil the joke for you, but unless Lincoln knew how to time travel to the future, I don’t think he knew about the modern internet! 😂)
I love this meme because it captures something that so many people fall into: a quick acceptance of a statement without verifying its source or thinking through the implications of the statement’s truthfulness.
Some insightful comments sound Shakespearean, but William never wrote them.
Some pieces of wisdom sound Socratic, but Socrates never taught them.
Some religious maxims sound godly, but the Bible never recorded them.
I would like to invite you to join me as we relaunch this series called Is That In The Bible? I think you may be surprised to discover just how many phrases we call biblical aren’t, and how many phrases there are that we never realized are actually in the Bible.
By the way, if you have a phrase that you would like to have us explore in this series, please leave it in a comment below. You may want to check out the questions we addressed in both the first installment and second installment of this series.
In this installment of this series, we asked: Is this in the Bible…
This is a weekly series with things I’m reading and pondering from Charles Spurgeon. You can read the original seed thought here, or type “Thursdays With Spurgeon” in the search box to read more entries.
Listen to the podcast of this post by clicking on the player below, and you can also subscribe on Apple, Spotify, or Audible.
Blessed Discipline
Blessed is the man whom You instruct, O Lord, and teach out of Your law, that You may give him rest from the days of adversity, until the pit is dug for the wicked. For the Lord will not cast off His people, nor will He forsake His inheritance. But judgment will return to righteousness, and all the upright in heart will follow it. (Psalm 94:12-15)
First, I will ask you to notice that God’s children are under instruction. Other children may run about and take holiday. They may wander into the woods, gather the flowers, and do very much what they like, but God’s own children have to go to school. This is a great privilege for them, although they do not always think so. Children are not often good judges of what is best for themselves. …
Some of us have learned much from the Lord’s chastening rod! For instance, we have learned the evil of sin. ‘Before I was afflicted I went astray, but now I keep Your Word’ (Psalm 119:67). … Do we not also learn by affliction our own frailty and our own impatience? We are wonderfully patient when we have nothing to suffer, and we are all great heroes and very courageous when there is no fighting to be done. …
Do we not, then, learn also the value of prayer? … Do we ever pray in such dead earnest as when everything seems to be sinking from under our feet and our sweetest cups are full of bitterness? … And then how precious the promises become! As we only see the stars when the shadows gather at night, so the promises shine out like newly kindled stars when we get into the night of affliction! …
And, oh, dear friends, how should we ever know the faithfulness of God if it were not for affliction? We might talk about it and theoretically understand it, but to try to prove the greatness of Jehovah’s love and the absolute certainty of His eternal faithfulness—this comes not except by the way of affliction and trial! …
O Lord, still use the rod if You see that it is necessary. But go on teaching us out of Your Word! We are slow to learn and poor scholars at best, but You may yet make something of us.
In one of my darkest times of affliction, I stumbled upon this poem from Robert Browning Hamilton:
I walked a mile with Pleasure—
She chattered all the way
But left me none the wiser
For all she had to say.
I walked a mile with Sorrow
And ne’er a word said she,
But, oh, the things I learned from her
When Sorrow walked with me.
If you’re going through a difficult time, don’t try to get out of it, but get closer into God’s presence. He is teaching you invaluable lessons during this trial.
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I have been involved in church ministry in one form or another for most of my life. Even when I was involved in the business world, I frequently helped non-profit organizations, offering my time, finances, and wisdom.
To this day, I remain a huge supporter of what our front-lines non-profit organizations are doing, especially our local churches.
However, there is often a fundamental disconnect between the board of these ministries and the director or pastor. This disconnect can easily escalate into a full-blown clash—believe me, I’ve seen it firsthand when I’ve been called in as a consultant—if this issue isn’t quickly addressed.
The main issue is the mindset of measuring success by quality or by quantity. Both have their place, but often times the board members are thinking primarily in terms of quantity while the director or pastor is thinking primarily in terms of quality.
Here’s how I addressed this topic when I taught a group of ministry interns…
This is a common disconnect in nonprofit organizations and churches. Many of the boards of these organizations are wonderful, godly people who fully believe in the mission of the organization. These board members are often successful business people who have both wisdom and wealth to contribute to the organization. But here’s the problem: the way we define success in a for-profit organization isn’t the same way we define success in a nonprofit organization. And often the way we define success in any of our ministries doesn’t line up with the Bible’s definition.
For both pastors of churches and directors of non-profit organizations, and for their respective board members, I would recommend using Shepherd Leadership as a discussion-starter to address this potentially ministry-derailing topic. Shepherd Leadership: The Metrics That Really Matter is available in print or ebook, and in audiobook through either Audible or Apple.
Listen to the podcast of this post by clicking on the player below, and you can also subscribe on Apple, Spotify, or Audible.
Ever since the Boundaries book by Drs. Henry Cloud and John Townsend came to my attention, I have always tried to get my hands on anything these psychologists write. The most recent read for me is John Townsend’s Who’s Pushing Your Buttons?
We all have experienced button pushers in our life—those folks who seem to always know how to get us riled up. Maybe you even have a button pusher or two in your life right now. Dr. Townsend’s book is not to help us avoid these people, nor even to navigate around them, but to get to a place where our relationship with these folks can become productive and healthy.
The book begins with an inside look at what makes button pushers button pushers. In order words, there is more below the surface than we can see, and we have to begin to understand more if we are ever going to move forward. Dr. Townsend also holds up a mirror to his readers to help us realize if our button pushers are pushing our buttons because we pushed theirs first.
Next, Dr. Townsend helps us change our paradigm toward our button pushers. It’s likely that you have already tried to deal with this relationship. The results may have been mixed or they may have been wholly unsuccessful. Dr. Townsend wants to help us move beyond the past to get a clearer vision of what could be.
The bulk of this book is comprised of seven resources to which we all have access, and which can help us be successful in our button-pushing relationships. This is not wishful thinking, but it is the firm belief of Dr. Townsend that God can help you employ these resources to truly turn a difficult relationship into a productive relationship.
This book is filled with enough practical insights, actual stories from Dr. Townsend’s counseling practice, and biblical principles to fortify your prayer life and personal involvement that can lead to newfound success in these difficult relationships.
For all of us who live or work with people who push our buttons, Who’s Pushing Your Buttons? is a wonderful resource.
Tomorrow I will release a new full-length video exclusively for my Patreon supporters. This video will tell us how and why we can live as peaceful influencers in a culture that is dark and confused.
For just $5 per month, you can have access to all of my exclusive content as well. Get all the details here.
Jesus was constantly cognizant of His mission. We see it at the beginning of His ministry and all the way through to the very end. At the beginning, He makes a decision where to live and base His ministry “to fulfill what was said through the prophet Isaiah” (Matthew 4:12-16). At the end, He knows “that everything had now been finished, and so that Scripture would be fulfilled” He makes a final request (John 19:28). 
Craig T. Owens 