6 Quotes From “Joy To Your World”

In Joy To Your World, T.M. Moore encourages Christians to view joy as the fuel for their testimony to others about their vibrant relationship with Jesus. Check out my book review by clicking here.

“The Christian life is joy, the joy Jesus glimpsed as He went to the Cross, that sustained Him through all His betrayal and suffering, and in which He now dwells, at the right hand of God.”

“The joy which infects those who receive the gift of eternal life in Jesus Christ causes them to see creation and all culture in an entirely new light. Whereas formally such things were merely taken for granted and used as we saw fit, now they are received as gifts and servants of the joy-giving God, to be redeemed, renewed, and redeployed with joy to the praise of His glorious grace.”

“First, we need to make sure our own lives makes sense, that the way we live supports the reasons we might give for why we live this way. … Second, we must make sure that we know the Gospel. … Finally, we need to make sure we can explain the Gospel’s impact on our own lives. How has the Gospel brought new hope, new purpose, new direction, and new life to us?”

“It is not our task to convert those who ask a reason for the hope that is within us. It is our task to make sure, to the best of our ability, that we have explained the Good News of Jesus as clearly as we can.”

“Joy is not determined by what we can see in our immediate environment. Instead, joy is a condition that attaches to knowing the Lord and being able to see past or through what is seen to engage what is not seen (Hebrews 12:1).”

“When, because of our knowledge of God, the joy that fills our souls comes to expression as joy lived, then our lives will make sense, our salvation will be visible to the watching world, and we can offer any who may ask, sound reasons for how that joy can be theirs as well.”

Relationship Builders And Killers

C.S. Lewis reminds us that there is no such thing as a neutral encounter with other people…

“It is a serious thing to live in a society of possible gods and goddesses, to remember that the dullest and most uninteresting person you talk to may one day be a creature which, if you saw it now, you would be strongly tempted to worship, or else a horror and a corruption such as you now meet, if at all, only in a nightmare. All day long we are, in some degree, helping each other to one of these destinations.” —C.S. Lewis

Wow! Think about it: Relationships with other people are what helps us and others grow toward heaven or shrink toward hell.

Fortunately the Bible has a lot to say to us about relationship builders and relationship killers. The builders help us form and nurture relationships that honor God and move others forward, and the killers destroy potentially life-giving relationships while dishonoring God’s design for us.

I hope you will join me this Sunday at Calvary Assembly of God as we begin to identify both the relationship builders that can help us grow, and the relationship killers that are holding us back. It’s going to be an eye-opening journey!

If you missed any of the messages in this series, you can check them out here:

Joy To Your World (book review)

“Joy To The World” is a Christmas song, right? Well, we do often sing it during the Advent season, but T.M. Moore persuasively makes the case in his book Joy To Your World that this message is a year-round blessing.

Quite simply, Moore reminds us that “the Christian life is joy.” Joy is what distinguishes the Christians from others, and joy is what attracts others to the Christian faith more than anything else.

Jesus sent His followers out to make disciples, and the empowering force behind the Christian’s testimony is the joy that Jesus is the One who has conquered hell, death, and the grave. So of all people, Christians should be brimming over with joy.

T.M. Moore writes: “When, because of our knowledge of God, the joy that fills our souls comes to expression as joy lived, then our lives will make sense, our salvation will be visible to the watching world, and we can offer any who may ask, sound reasons for how that joy can be theirs as well.”

This is an excellent message to be read at anytime, not just at Christmas.

Speak Life

“It is so easy to be harsh and sharp with your words. Speak optimistic words, life-giving words, bold words, healing words and words of comfort.

“Speak about the good things of life and declare life. Make it a point to say nothing negative at all. If/when you fail, be quick to repent and rephrase! Give each other grace because this is going to be a challenge for all of us!

“Pray that God will help you and empower you to speak life and blessing. Pray that God helps you to be a carrier of peace amidst the chaos of our world.” —Matt Kladnik

Five Women; One Amazing Story!

For some of you, it’s hard to put the word “happy” in front of Mother’s Day.

One definition of happy is “favored by fortune; lucky.” In other words, we’re happy IF things happen to be going our way. But we don’t know how things are going to turn out?

In the last Super Bowl, the New England Patriots were down by 25 points early in the 3rd quarter. It didn’t appear that things were going the Patriots’ way … except they won!

So don’t judge “happy” or “not happy” by how things are going in the middle of the story! 

To God, all of History is His Story. He knows every move, every hurt, every fumble, every betrayal, every noble deed, every evil deed … nothing escapes His notice. And it all fits into His Story—We are assured and know that God being a partner in their labor ALL THINGS work together and are fitting into a plan for good… (Romans 8:28).

Check out the stories of these five women—

Tamar had to pretend to be a prostitute in order to get her father-in-law to followthrough on his commitment. As a result, she became pregnant by him and was almost burned at the stake.

Rahab didn’t pretend to be a prostitute; she was a prostitute. She lived in an important city that was about to be defeated by the Israelites. Instead of trying to make things easier on herself, she trusted God and put herself in a very dangerous position.

Ruth was a non-Israelite married to an Israelite man. But when her husband, her brother-in-law, and her father-in-law all died, she took a huge risk in staying with her mother-in-law. She could have moved in with her family in a country she knew, but she went where she was an alien, a widow, and dirt poor.

Bathsheba was married to Uriah, who was a member of the king’s inner circle. But the king took advantage of her when Uriah was away at war, impregnated her, killed her husband, and then married her. Their son from that union died shortly after being born, but Bathsheba trusted God to make something good of her tragedy.

Mary was engaged to be married when she was found to be pregnant. Society could have shunned her, her fiancé could have had her killed for her unfaithfulness, but she trusted God to keep His word.

These five mothers are the ONLY women mentioned in the genealogy of Jesus (Matthew 1:1-6, 16)

God used all of these women. Despite the way they were treated or mistreated; despite their own mistakes; despite the injustices committed against them. God used all of them as irreplaceable parts of His Story.

To God, all of History is His Story! He’s doing things through your life that you can’t possibly imagine. Trust Him—if you do, your name will also be recorded in the best “His Story” ever recorded! 

Whenever you don’t know what’s going on, lean into Him, cry out to Him. But then say with Mary, “I am the Lord’s servant. May it be to me as you have said.” And what does God say? “I am working ALL THINGS together to tell My Story through your life!”

Poetry Saturday—Mother, Home, Heaven

Three words fall sweetly on my soul,
As music from an angel’s lyre,
That bid my spirit spurn control, 
And upward to its source aspire;
The sweetest sounds to mortals given
Are heard in Mother, Home, and Heaven. 

Dear Mother!—ne’er shall I forget
Thy brow, thine eye, thy pleasant smile; 
Though in the sea of death hath set
Thy star of life, my guide awhile, 
Oh, never shall thy form depart
From the bright pictures in my heart.

And like a bird that from the flowers,
Wing-weary seeks her wonted nest, 
My spirit, e’en in manhood’s hours,
Turns back in childhood’s Home to rest; 
The cottage, garden, hill, and stream,
Still linger like a pleasant dream.

And while to one engulfing grave
By Time’s swift tide we’re driven, 
How sweet the thought that every wave
But bears us nearer Heaven! 
There we shall meet, when life is o’er,
In that blest Home, to part no more. —William Goldsmith Brown

12 Quotes For Mother’s Day

“All I am, or can be, I owe to my angel mother.” —Abraham Lincoln

“My mother was the most beautiful woman I ever saw. All I am I owe to my mother. I attribute all my success in life to the moral, intellectual and physical education I received from her.” —George Washington

“I remember my mother’s prayers and they have always followed me. They have clung to me all my life.” —Abraham Lincoln

“The foundations of national morality must be laid in private families. In vain are schools, academies, and universities, instituted, if loose principles and licentious habits are impressed upon children in their earliest years. The mothers are the earliest and most important instructors of youth.” —John Adams

“The fundamental truths reported in the four gospels as from the lips of Jesus Christ, and that I first heard from the lips of my mother, are settled and fixed moral precepts with me.” —Abraham Lincoln

“The devil never reckons a man to be lost so long as he has a good mother alive. O woman, great is thy power!” ―Charles Spurgeon

“I learned more about Christianity from my mother than from all the theologians in England.” ―John Wesley

“Your motherhood is in God’s sight holier and more blessed than you realize.” —Andrew Murray

“God could not be everywhere, and therefore He made mothers.” —Jewish Proverb

“An ounce of mother is worth a ton of priest.” —Spanish Proverb

“To be a mother is the greatest vocation in the world. No being has a position of such great power and influence. She holds in her hands the destiny of nations, for to her is necessarily committed the making of the nation’s citizens.” —Hannah Whitall Smith

“Youth fades, love droops, the leaves of friendship fall; a mother’s secret hope outlives them all.” —Oliver Wendell Holmes

Thursdays With Oswald—The Enormous Need To Be A Christian

Oswald ChambersThis is a weekly series with things I’m reading and pondering from Oswald Chambers. You can read the original seed thought here, or type “Thursdays With Oswald” in the search box to read more entries.

The Enormous Need To Be A Christian 

     All we can deal with in psychology is consciousness, but God does not limit our salvation by our consciousness. The need to be a Christian is not simply that Jesus Christ’s salvation may work on our conscious life, but that the unconscious realm of our personality may be protected from supernatural powers of which we know nothing. …  

     We are much more than we are conscious of, and if Jesus Christ only came to alter our conscious life, then the Redemption is “much ado about nothing.” But when we come to examine the New Testament we find that Redemption does infinitely more than alter our conscious life; it safeguards the unconscious realm which we cannot touch. … 

     Part of our personal life is conscious, but the greater part is unconscious, and every now and again the unconscious part emerges into the conscious and upsets us because we do not know where it comes from or where it leads to, and we get afraid of ourselves. … 

     There is only one Being Who understands us, and that is our Creator. … 

     Have we ever awakened to the fact that there are forces of evil around us greater than we can control? Jesus Christ by His Redemption not only saves us completely, but keeps us oblivious of the awful dangers there are outside. … 

     Unless we hand over the keeping of our personality to God to garrison, there are a hundred and one influences which can come into us which we never can control but which will soon control us. … 

     It is impossible to guard our spirit, the only One who can guard its entrances is God. If we hand ourselves over to His keeping we shall be kept not only from what we understand as dangers, but from dangers we have never even imagined. … 

      These aspects revealed the need to be a Christian as an enormous need. Thank God for the amazing security of His salvation! It keeps us not only in conscious life but from dangerous of which we know nothing, unseen and hidden dangers, subtle and desperate. 

From The Soul Of A Christian

Thank God for the amazing security of His salvation! Do you know this security? If not, don’t wait another day to invite Jesus Christ into your life.

Five Women

Five women. Only two of them knew one of the other women. Other than that, they were strangers. In fact, the timeline between them spans 2000 years.

Yet these five women are linked together in a way that literally impacts every person who has ever lived. 

At the time they were alive, no one would have seen them as world-changers.

  • One acted like a prostitute
  • One was a prostitute
  • One was widowed, abandoned and bankrupt
  • One was nearly divorced because it looked like she cheated
  • One was merely a pawn in an envious man’s twisted scheme

Yet all of them play roles in God’s story that cannot be replaced. If any one of these women failed to trust God, disaster would have befallen on all human beings.

All of them were mothers. And all of them still have something encouraging to say to today’s mothers.

Join me this Sunday morning at Calvary Assembly of God as we share this powerful message of hope with our moms.

11 Quotes From “Peace In The Face Of Cancer”

This book is a MUST READ for anyone who has been diagnosed with cancer, or is a caregiver to someone with cancer. Lynn Eib’s Peace In The Face Of Cancer will give you insight and encouragement for your journey. Check out my book review by clicking here, and then enjoy a few quotes below.

“We always want people to give us the benefit of the doubt or cut us some slack, but we have to admit, it’s not always easy to do the same for others—especially when our world as been rocked by something as life-threatening as cancer. Our emotions are fragile, our bodies are hurting, and our spirits can be wounded easily. … Nevertheless, if we want to find peace in the face of cancer, sometimes we will have to hear people’s hearts and ignore their words (and perhaps their actions, too).”

“There is a much more reliable source of truth and good news no matter what you’re facing. I guarantee it has the kinds of hopeful words you will want to reverberate through your brain. That source is the Word of God. (For example: Psalm 119:28; Proverbs 1:33)

“God designed us to need each other and to be able to offer one another our talents, our gifts, our insights, and our special brand of encouragement. Please don’t let those differences become a wedge in your relationships. One of the primary ways satan discourages families and friends facing cancer is to get us at odds with one another. Don’t let that deceiver win.”

“Be a friend. Be a shoulder. Be a hugger. Be an asset. Please just be there and God will be there.

If you do this you will be the giver of the greatest gift a suffering friend needs—presence without fixing; love without an agenda.”

“The most loving thing you may do for your loved one today is to be good to yourself. … Do something to lift your spirits so afterward you can once again lift someone else’s.”

“Please don’t surrender to cancer. Even if it ultimately takes your life or your loved one’s life, you never have to become submissive to it. Cancer is not in charge. Those errant cells are not calling the shots. This disease is not in control. God is.”

“Quit searching for life’s Ctrl+Z button and stop pretending you could be in charge of it all. Go ahead and give up the control stick and declare with the psalmist, ‘My future is in Your hands’ (Psalm 31:15). Trust the only One who is all-knowing, all-seeing, and all-powerful. He will lead you into all your tomorrows.”

“No matter what havoc cancer wreaks on your body, it does not have the final say. Those who have everlasting life never lose their battle with cancer because if God doesn’t take the cancer out of them on earth, He takes them out of the cancer and home to Heaven.” 

“Don’t fix your eyes on what is seen. Don’t fix them on pathology reports or CT scans or bloodwork or insurance bills or cancer statistics or anything else you can see. No matter what this life brings, fix your eyes on what is unseen.”

“Your purpose in life never changes. It is the same whether you or your loved one has a lot of cancer, a little cancer, or even no cancer. Your purpose in life—and mine—is to know God and love Him more, and to help others know God and love Him more.” 

I will be sharing more content from this phenomenal book soon. Stay tuned…