Category: May

Proverbs 2 – Our Prayer

On By Judy GlasserIn MayLeave a comment

Dear Father,

We thank you for the understanding you give us as we read your word – your direction feeds our souls.

We open our ears to hear your wisdom, we seek understanding.

We call out to you – please give us insight!

We cry aloud for more understanding!

We seek out wisdom – it is more precious to us than silver.

We search for wisdom – it is a hidden treasure of understanding and knowledge of you, dear God.

All wisdom comes from you, Father.

You give success to us as we seek you.  You shield us as we walk closely with you.  You guard us when with act with integrity and you protect our way when we are faithful.

We desire to now what is right for us – the good path which you have planned out for each one of us.

We ask for wisdom to fill our hearts.  May our souls be complete with knowledge of you.

Please teach us to use discretion as protection and to use our understanding to guard our hearts.

Thank you, dear Father.

How much more…….

On By Judy GlasserIn May1 Comment

Solomon didn’t ask God for wealth or a long life.  He didn’t ask God to kill his enemies.

Solomon asked for wisdom.  And God was very pleased by his request so he gave him a wise and discerning heart.

AND he made Solomon the richest man on earth.

So I wonder if God is pleased with my requests?  Or are my requests self-centered?  Are they based more on worry than trust?  Do I sound like I’m sitting on Santa’s lap sometimes with my long list of wishes?

I know God tells us again and again in the Bible to pray to him about everything and anything.  And I have learned to do that – it’s where I find peace.

But is he pleased with the tone and character of my requests like he was with Solomon’s?

Do I want the same things for others that God wants for them?  Am I asking for things that God wants to give them?

How much more is God wanting to give me…….if I would just ask?

How much wider and deeper could the flow of blessings from heaven flow down into my life if I asked for the right things?

How much more love, joy and peace is waiting……stored…..ready for me when I ask for it?

Dear Father, please give me a wise and discerning heart.

 

 

Psalm 4, 2013

On By Judy GlasserIn MayLeave a comment

I know you answer me when I call to you, my righteous God.

You give me peace when I am stressed;

You have mercy on me and you always hear my prayers.

Why do we, your people, turn away from having a glorious relationship with you?

May 6 Psalm 4Why do we constantly try to control the world ourselves when we’re obviously so terrible at it?

How long will we love the delusion that we can know the truth apart from you?  How long will we love the delusion that we’ll ever be happy doing what we want while disregarding what you want?  How long will we seek happiness through money and possessions?

We have been set apart for you – you always hear when we call to you.

When we lay down at night and review the day, help us confess our sins

and make a commitment to walk closer to you……tomorrow and every day.

We trust you, dear Father.

Let your light shine on us, dear God!  You bring prosperity!  You bring joy!

Because of you I have peace.

Because of you, I can lie down at night at sleep.

I am safe within your arms.

Thank you, dear Father.

Psalm 136, 2013

On By Judy GlasserIn MayLeave a comment

Give thanks to the Lord, for he is good.

                                                                                                               His love endures forever.

He alone deserves our worship and our praise.

                                                                                                               His love endures forever.

Because of his will, the sun rises every morning.

Because of his will, I will take my next breathe.

                                                                                                               His love endures forever.

He planned a life of faithfulness for me when he gifted me with a family rich with generations of believers.

                                                                                                                 His love endures forever.

He formed a long-lasting union when he blessed me with my husband

He created my son’s tall, strong body and my daughter’s beautiful smile.

                                                                                                                 His love endures forever.

I continue to be showered with his blessings as I look into the big blue eyes of my grandson who loves to dance for God.

                                                                                                                 His love endures forever.

He has been my rock and my salvation for all of my life.

                                                                                                                  He love endures forever.

I give thanks to the God of Heaven.

                                                                                                                  His love endures forever.

Psalm 91, 2013

On By Judy GlasserIn MayLeave a comment

He is my refuge, my God, in whom I trust.

Surely he will save me from believing the lies that swirl around me every day.April 24 Psalm 91

Surely he will save me from the guilt and pain that comes from remembering and reliving old mistakes.

Surely he will save me from the terror of nights filled with worry and wanting to be in control.

Surely he will save me from problems that fly at me like arrows all through the day.

Surely he will save me from the things that take bites out of me in the darkness – jealousy, malice, and anger.

Surely he will save me from the disease of negativity in my brain – failures, regrets and unforgiveness.

People all around me will become victims of these things, but not me.

Because I know God and he loves me.

He is my refuge, my God, in whom I trust.

For Us

On By Judy GlasserIn MayLeave a comment

Jesus is praying in the garden.  He is preparing for a brutal death on the cross for our sins.  He is spending some extra time talking with his Father because he knows that his time of separation is coming.  He dreads that part….more than anything.

He prays for all who will ever believe in him because of the disciple’s message – that’ us!  We have heard about Jesus because the disciples were faithful in sharing their witness of Christ’s life, death and resurrection.

He prays that we will all be one.  I think of this whenever I hear about people putting down other churches just because they do things differently.  If it’s biblical, we can support and encourage them even though we choose to follow Christ in other ways.  The only person who wins when churches pick on each other is Satan.  That’s really sad, isn’t it?

Jesus didn’t want that.  He knows that the world will notice when we put aside our differences and unite in our devotion to Christ.

So he prayed for us then and he prays for us now.

Please give us unity, dear Father!

Let’s Walk

On By Judy GlasserIn MayLeave a comment

Visualize Jesus walking through a vineyard with his disciples.  They aren’t ‘getting it’ yet so he decides he’s going to make it as plain as he can using the example of a vine.  I love this illustration of how we are supposed to live our lives as Christ-followers:

Jesus is the vine.

We need to stay attached to Jesus like a branch is attached to the vine.

We don’t produce fruit just like a branch doesn’t produce fruit. 

We bear fruit that Jesus produces through us if we stay attached to him.

Without this strong connection to Jesus, we won’t bear fruit.

God is the gardener.  He prunes branches that bear fruit so they can bear more fruit.  Pruning is often as painful as it sounds. I think we sometimes see pruning as problems in our lives because pruning causes changes in direction – we thought we were going one place but now we need to go somewhere else.  Pruning usually requires a big step of faith because the path ahead is not clear.  Pruning can mean turning away from a good thing in order to move ahead to God’s best for us. 

Being pruned is easier if we stay closely attached to Jesus, too.  He can guide us through the turmoil and help us stay strong in our faith.

So we stay attached, we bear fruit, we obey through the pruning………

And we come to a place of Joy!

Thank you, dear Father!

With Shouts of Joy!

On By Judy GlasserIn MayLeave a comment

David danced!

He danced before the Lord with all of his might.

He was so full of joy that he forgot to worry about what other people thought and celebrated the return of the Ark of the Lord with all of his heart.

I find this story intriguing because his wife, Michal, judges what she sees and she feels contempt for David. Later, he returns home ready to bless his own family and Michal tells him she is disgusted with his behavior.

She’s trying to make him feel ashamed, she’s trying to make him feel foolish, she’s trying very hard to burst his big bubble of joy.

But he doesn’t back down. He was celebrating for the right reason and he knows it. He can’t control her behavior but he can choose his reaction. And he doesn’t choose guilt or shame – he chooses to worship God with all his heart. And he chooses to let other people see him worship God with all the joy and excitement that he is feeling even though they may not understand.
What’s important is that God understands and approves. That’s all that David cares about.

Dear Father, help us worship you with all of our hearts like David did.

Breaking Through

On By Judy GlasserIn May2 Comments

Have you wondered how people can say they heard God tell them something?

Do you know what it sounds like when Jesus talks to you?

This passage in John 10 tells us how to hear God’s voice.  Jesus tells us that he is the shepherd who calls his sheep by name and they follow him because they know his voice.

And how do we know his voice?  Because we know him.

We know his perspectives on things because we have studied them.   Some of them we have memorized.  Those are the easiest ones to remember because they are etched upon our hearts.

We know what he values because we have read those things over and over and are constantly trying to apply those same values to our own lives.   We know what’s important to him because we have meditated on his Word.  So when he speaks, his voice breaks through the cacophony of our lives and hits our hearts. 

We know what he says because we know him and we know his voice.

Thank you, dear Father, for calling us by name and making yourself known to us.

Growing his Fungus

On By Judy GlasserIn MayLeave a comment

Jesus is talking about Satan in John 8 and he calls Satan the Father of Lies.

That is just so spot-on with my experience with Satan.  He takes the truth and twists it so that it sounds like it could ALMOST be true.

It’s the almost that we need to be aware of.

But he entices us with this ‘almost truth’, doesn’t he?  He can make his lies sound so close to the truth in our heads that it doesn’t take much energy for us to rationalize away that last little bit.  We can make it all sound ok in our minds by stretching the truth just a l.i.t.t.l.e bit more.

And then we’re caught in his web.  And now we’re owning his lies.  We might even tell others his lies because we’ve made them all ok in our mind. 

This is one of the huge values of reading God’s word regularly.  By reading and contemplating and applying his Truth to our lives, the lies become very evident.  The rationalizations become a joke because they are so blatantly false when  held up to the light of his Word.  The dark corners of our minds are revealed and Satan has to go somewhere else to grow the fungus of his lies – our mind and hearts aren’t available.

Thank you, God!