What Does it Mean to Obey God? By Emily Saxe

Since we often struggle with what it really means to obey God, I’m happy to introduce my guest, Emily Saxe. Emily and I connected online several years ago, and participate in many of the same writing and blogging circles. And she just released a Bible study on obedience.

I fear obeying God. 

There. I said it. 

My days fill with what feels like endless demands. I work a writing and editing job I began in obedience to God. My husband and I spend countless weekends renovating our home — a home we bought knowing God desired our hospitality. When the world wasn’t at war against a virus, I spent many Sundays serving at church.

So you see, every time I obey God, He asks me to add something new to my already-overflowing plate.

At least, that’s what I used to think obedience meant.

What Do You Fear?

I recently published a three-week Bible study on the little book of the Bible called Haggai. The first time I studied Haggai, God blew me away with some truth about obedience. Truth I simply cannot keep to myself. Because I know if I struggle with the fear of believing obedience means adding more to my schedule, then I’m guessing I’m not the only one.

God took my fear of obedience and placed me beside the returned exiles in Jerusalem. These families spent years ignoring God’s command to rebuild His temple, which lay in ruins. They started out in obedience, but then fear of neighboring bullies put a stop to their efforts.

So they settled into a routine of comfort. Of padding their own lives with finished homes and planted crops. All while God’s temple remained in ruins. 

They feared obeying God during those years. They feared for their safety, but they also feared obeying God would mean adding too much to their already-full plates. Walking by the temple ruins, they closed their eyes and hardened their hearts toward what they knew God had asked of them.

What it Actually Means to Obey God

But then something incredible happened. God used Haggai to knock some sense into these exiles. They realized the error of their actions, and they began rebuilding the temple (you can read all about this in Haggai 1). Here’s where God knocked some sense into me, too.

Despite the actions that looked just like obedience, God spoke again to the people, calling them out for their misplaced priorities. And that’s when I realized this truth: Obeying God is not about adding more obedient-looking tasks to my to do list — it’s about the priorities of my heart.

We place far too much weight behind getting all our Christian gold stars each week. We focus on reading our Bibles each day, volunteering our time to help those in need, serving in church, and the list goes on.

How to Live the Bible as it Lives in Us

The Bible is alive—the living Word of God. Yet, how does it live in me? And how do I live it? 

I wanna take Your word and shine it all around

But first help me just to live it Lord

In his day, Christian singer and songwriter, Keith Green, was considered a man of No Compromise (album title and book about his life).

So these lyrics from his song, Oh Lord, You’re Beautiful, carry a powerful message. 

Perhaps we also desire to shine God’s Word all around. Maybe we want to live a life of no compromise.

The only way to strive for this kind of life? The Word living in us and us living the Word.

Living Scripture in our daily lives equates with a life of no compromise. Because our goals, desires, values, morals, decisions, relationships, lifestyle, worldview, heart, mind, and so on, stay bent toward scriptural truths. 

Then, we really live the Bible that lives in us.

Here are some ways to L.I.V.E. God’s Word.

L-Lighting Our Path With God’s Word Helps Live it

Psalm 119:105 says, “Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path.” Verse 130 continues, “The unfolding of your words gives light; it imparts understanding to the simple.” 

Even though we may not carry lamps to see where we’re going, we’re all familiar with needing light to find our way in the darkness. Whether it’s a candle, flashlight, or nightlight, they dispel enough of the dark to keep us from tripping.

Likewise, lighting our path with the Word keeps us from spiritually tripping. Through understanding, it drives away the darkness of the evil one, deception, and false beliefs. 

Christians: Living Billboards for Heaven on Earth

Whether it’s a local business, restuarant, medical group, smiling real estate agent, or even a marriage proposal, billboards dot our highways and roadsides.

Teresa, my friend since high school, enjoyed a successful sales career with a major advertising firm that displayed customer ads on billboards.

Perhaps, we’ve seen some fun and memorable ones that captured our attention. Maybe we purchased the services or product or changed our perspective on something.

Because we liked or needed what we saw.

Likewise, God’s children become walking billboards for heaven on earth. Breathing and living beings who represent a picture of the Creator and our future, eternal home.

We desire for others to see God in us and realize they need Him too. We are living billboards, “The same God who lives and reigns in heaven, lives and reigns in me.”

Billboards Displaying Jesus’ Blood

But we aren’t marketing heaven or advertising Christianity like some commodity or service purchased with money.

Still, we were bought with a price. The blood of Jesus. And it spilled out on a cross for everyone we meet, come in contact with, know personally, and in our sphere of influence. And the friends and family we love.

7 Biblical Promises for Walking in Humility

Humility. 

A characteristic missing from a “me” culture. A trait often overlooked when climbing the corporate ladder—any ladder going to the top.

And a powerful attribute underestimated for leaders in ministry, coaching, business, and more. It’s usually misunderstood in our present world. Even tossed to the side.

But God calls His people to put on, walk in, and practice humility in every area of our lives.

Because even becoming Christ-followers starts with recognizing Jesus as Lord and Savior. We’re not our own lord or savior.

So the Bible has much to say about the subject and the promises surrounding it.

(1.) God Hears Humble Pleas

King Josiah is spared from disaster for those who didn’t keep God’s law. “Because your heart was tender…and you have humbled yourself before me…and wept before me, I also have heard you, declares the Lord” (2 Chronicles 34:27).

Jesus told this parable. “Two men went up into the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector. The Pharisee, standing by himself, prayed thus: ‘God, I thank you that I am not like other men, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even like this tax collector. I fast twice a week; I give tithes of all that I get.’ But the tax collector, standing far off, would not even lift up his eyes to heaven, but beat his breast, saying, ‘God, be merciful to me, a sinner!’ But I tell you, this man went down to his house justified, rather than the other. For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, but the one who humbles himself will be exalted” (Luke 18:9-14).

(2.) God Heals Contrite Hearts and Nations

Faces: Stories They Tell And How Love Matters

Love whispers, Look deeply and intently at faces. Gaze into their eyes. They’re faces with a story and the people God loves.

There’s more to a face than meets the eye. Aesthetics present features in color and shape, and how they lay between the forehead and chin.

Yet, much more is seen. So consider the variant qualities of faces: beckoning, engaging, enchanting, yearning, magnetic, and stolid.

Faces are Storytellers

Narratives of gladness, sadness, loneliness, heroism, defeat, victory, or captivity dwell behind a face. And other chapters waiting to be written. Every human longs to share one story of magnitude. A story of real love.

God calls us to love the people in our home and family, in our neighborhood, in the workplace, in a local church, and so on. And loving in a broader sense in our community and world.

But how do we love others well? Can we love all people? And is it possible to simultaneously love people under our roof, those in our backyard, and people on the other side of an issue, a hurt, our town, and the world?

Perhaps the answer is found in an attempt to grasp how God sees and loves people.

See the Way God Sees

God sees every person as someone who needs a story of love. Because God loves each of us with a steadfast love like no one else.

His love story was already written on Calvary’s cross and an empty tomb. It becomes our personal love story if we let God write it on our hearts when we accept His salvation.

But other stories of love are waiting for us to pen in people’s lives.

The Voice of Hope: 6 Mic-drop Messages

Maybe you are familiar with the voice of reason. The adage means a person’s communication toward a particular issue is level-headed and reasonable. 

Or, the voice of truth. Also a song title for the Christian band, Casting Crowns.

For believers, the voice of truth comes directly from God and His Word.

So let me introduce you to the Voice of Hope.  

Like every other guest who’s shared a message here, I pray we listen carefully to her words.

And we welcome Hope’s message into our heart to live forever.

Finally, let Hope’s voice override every hopeless thought.

Without further ado, here’s the Voice of Hope.

Unwavering Hope

God’s child, 

The heavenly Father gave me to you as a gift; a stable, certain, and secure hope. I never waver based on circumstances, people, or opinions. You see, in an uncertain world, I’m an undeniable hope, an unshakable anchor for your soul. 

But you possess the choice to hold fast to the confession of your hope without wavering, for God who promised is faithful (Hebrews 10:23). Because Christ lives in you, a glorious hope also resides in you (Colossians 1:27).

Sincerely, the Voice of Hope

25 Soul-stirring Journal Entries During Covid-19

Earlier this year, I shared life-giving thoughts from my journal. But many of the entries came from my own personal crisis, penned before Covid-19. 

Whether it’s a personal or world crisis, suffering, loss, or the unknown, journal entries stir our souls.

Journaling pens messages on our hearts.

So, I’m opening my journal again with entries for such a time as this.

Home and Church Entries

(1.) Staying home more reacquaints us with “home.” Such as, There’s no place like home. Or, Home is where your heart is. It’s an opportunity to spend quality time with people under our roof. And a reminder our eternal home is where our spiritual heart is.

(2.) While churches are not allowed to gather, Scripture tells us people are the church. Men have constructed breath-taking churches and cathedrals. But what if I asked the Lord to make my life a breath-taking sanctuary for Him? 

(3.) The Holy Spirit is moving among us, using our present situation to draw people to God. He’s calling the church out of complacency to a spiritual awakening. An opportune time to pray for revival. Rise up, church!

(4.) Social distancing is a must right now. But I’m keeping Jesus near through walking closely with Him. Christ is in me, with me, and for me!  

(5.) People are searching for real hope. Hope found at Calvary’s cross and an empty tomb. Because Hope has a name. Jesus. Am I pointing others to Him, the cornerstone of the church?

Suffering and God Notes

The Sad Little Secret in Christian Circles

Please welcome my guest, Lori, to our blog community. We met at a writers conference in North Carolina. And Lori not only reveals the sad little secret in this article, but also discusses her new devotional book that released April 13.

Furthermore, besides telling us the secret, Lori’s new book, along with a fresh breath from the Holy Spirit, helps electrify our quiet times.

By Lori Hatcher

The sad little secret in Christian circles is that many of us are bored with our devotional time. We know we shouldn’t feel this way.

Because of the importance to read our Bibles every day. After all, it’s God’s Word, the source of truth, and life, and hope. 

While some successfully built the discipline of Bible reading into their lives, others struggle. Even those who regularly read their Bibles find it a bit dry at times.

Many of us also read devotionals, not to take the place of Bible reading, but to help us discover unfamiliar passages and stories and benefit from a godly writer’s perspective.

So I wrote Refresh Your Faith because I was frustrated by many of the devotionals I read. They seemed to focus on the same basic verses I’d memorized with my children twenty years ago. John 3:16, Romans 8:28, Psalm 23, Matthew 3:5-6. Same with the Bible passages and stories.

Don’t misunderstand me. I treasure the familiar verses and stories. I’ve held them close to my heart during some of the darkest times of my life. 

Help for this Secret

Celebration of the Resurrection’s Not Canceled

Celebration.

A word wiped from our vocabulary as events wiped clean from our calendars.

Because events worth celebrating disappeared from our day-timers and lives with little warning. Like weddings, graduations, sports championships, family gatherings/vacations, and church worship services—in person with our brothers and sisters in Christ.

“Celebration canceled” hoovers over our present world crisis and maybe some of our own personal ones. 

While we live in unprecedented and downright scary times. Although life seems less than stable and celebratory.

Even though we all took a crash course we never signed up for on how to manage current life. 

There’s no better time to deeply celebrate the resurrection of Jesus Christ. 

Celebration: God Bankrupted Heaven to Send a Rescuer

Those daydreams of shining knights coming to save the day and us. The people we hope will swoop in as a hero over our difficult circumstances and life’s unexpected curve balls. They all have cracks in their armor or holes in their capes. 

But Jesus steps in and rescues us from areas in our life marked: Rescue needed. 

These are our real needs. These are the areas where a true rescue needs to take place. Such as forgiveness, mercy, and grace for sin. Like unconditional love and real peace only found in our Savior.

“For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life” John 3:16 ESV.

Let’s celebrate how Jesus saves! 

Celebration: An Empty Tomb for Every Empty Place

Why “Full” Runs Out at the Bottom of Human Buckets

Human buckets run dry faster than we keep them full. Why?

Even though we are wired for God’s filling, we learn to self-fill. Labor that never gets to take a break. Since humans are never able to keep buckets full. 

So to continue our theme from last week, Keep Going Back to the Source, we transform our thinking about long-lasting satisfaction. 

You see, the two main ways we fill our buckets is with life’s stuff and substitutes for God. 

But here are the problems with our bucket-filling techniques. 

(1.) There are expiration dates on life’s stuff.

Maybe you or your church collects non-perishables for local food banks. Items with a long shelf life for the underprivileged. 

Poor in spirit, we have intangible needs that never expire. Like grace, love, mercy, joy, peace, and hope. Although they seem abstract, we actually take hold of them when we go to God. Because unlike things that expire, God manifests these characteristics in our lives. And they never run out. 

Yet, when our silent screams for attention remain unnoticed, we turn to life’s stuff to fill our buckets. Stuff with expiration dates such as the perfect body, aspirations, accolades, or material possessions.