Category: October

It’s Real!

On By Judy GlasserIn OctoberLeave a comment

The remains of the City of David are in Jerusalem ( Pic 2).  The remains of many of the things we read about in the Bible can still be seen in Israel today.ddddddddddddddddDSC_0315

Archeologists continue to uncover physical proof of the various historical events we read about in the Bible.

Yet, I still sometimes hear that there are people who think that the Bible is just folklore or fables.

To believe that, you have to discount innumerable dddddddddddddDSC_0331eeeeeecDSC_0452archeological findings and half of the historical documentation of that time!

God gave me the awesome privilege of visiting Israel earlier this year.  We walked where Jesus walked.  It’s a total game-changer!

We’re currently reading about Ezra and Nehemiah’s Journeys toward the Truth.  We also walked where they walked!

As we read about the dedication of the newly-completed wall around Jerusalem in Nehemiah 12, I can see it.  The Jerusalem wall I saw was not the same one, but it looked a lot like it did back then.(Pic 3 is a model of what Jerusalem looked like when Jesus was alive).

I can visualize it.  Two choirs processing in opposite directions on the top of the wall – singing praises to God.  What an awesome sight!  Praises of thanksgiving rising to the heavens from the top of the wall.  Rising up to the same God we praise today.

Because God is real.

God’s word is real.

It’s true.  It all happened.  And it all has meaning for us – that’s why God gave his Word to us.  We study it, meditate on it and memorize it so we can know the Truth.

Thank you, dear Father!

Always Ready……

On By Judy GlasserIn OctoberLeave a comment

to fight the enemy.Oct 9 2014 Always Ready

Prepared.

Equipped.

Because our enemies are plotting against us every day – watching for the weaknesses in our defense.

When we read about the Israelites in Nehemiah, they were prepared for a battle.  They were also rebuilding the wall around Jerusalem.   Half of them did the rebuilding while the other half stood with their spears, shields and armor ready.

They had heavy, bulky, real armor.

We have real armor as well.  It isn’t as heavy as what the Israelites had but it’s much more effective.  Paul gives us the details of our spiritual armor in Ephesians 6:

The Belt of Truth is buckled around our waist.  This is what we’re working on right now as we read God’s word – knowing and living the truth.

The Breastplate of Righteousness is in place – protecting our hearts.

We wear the sandals of peace – always ready to share the Good News of Salvation.

Our Shield of Faith helps us everyday to deflect the flaming arrows coming at us from Satan and his army.

The Helmet of Salvation protects our minds from the lies which surround us.

The Sword of the Spirit is the only offensive weapon we need.  Satan has already lost the war.  And when we know and live and use the Word of God, Satan is reminded of his defeat and he retreats.  Every time.

Thank you for your perfect armor, dear Father.

Robbing God

On By Judy GlasserIn OctoberLeave a comment

“Test me in this.”  There is only one place in the Bible where God says this.Oct 5 Robbing God 2014

He’s talking about his directions to us to give him back a small piece of everything he has given us.

When we are faithful in tithing, God throws open the floodgates of heaven and pours out his blessings upon us.

God challenges us to test him because he always responds.

He challenges us to give back a portion because our trust in him needs to grow to the point where being faithful is more important to us than the money.  God needs to be a higher priority in our hearts than what this money could buy.

This is important for our happiness.  We won’t have the peace, contentment and joy that God wants for us until we can gladly give back a portion.

I have to admit – it took God and my husband awhile to convince me of this.  I always felt that we didn’t have enough money to tithe.  Other people who had a lot more money could tithe – but not us.  When the topic came up, I always hoped that someday we would make enough money so we could tithe.

Foolish thinking!

I have realized a very crucial truth in this area – if it’s all about having enough money, there will never be enough.

God tells us in Luke – if we’re not faithful with a little, there is no way we’ll be faithful with a lot.

God wants us to find peace and contentment with what he has already given us.  When we are faithful, he pours out the blessings that money can’t buy.

When we follow God’s directions for our lives, we are putting ourselves under the umbrella of his blessing.  If we don’t follow his directions to us in the area of money, we are holding our wallets out from under the umbrella of his blessing.  The result is that God will not bless our finances.  We will have constant money issues until we bring our wallet back under the umbrella by getting in line with God’s direction for this area of our lives.  His direction is to sacrificially tithe and to give offerings above our tithe.

Because we love God.  He’s more important than the money.

And we trust him.  God’s got this.  We can even test him.

Thank you, dear Father.

Sleepless in Susa

On By Judy GlasserIn OctoberLeave a comment

Sometimes God wakes us up – both literally and figuratively.

Sometimes God wants a little extra amount of our attention given to him and to his plan so he wakes us up in the middle of the night.Oct 4 2014 Sleepliess in Susa

And we can’t get back to sleep.

Other times, it may be something we ate for dinner that’s keeping us up. 🙂

But it could be God.

So my go-to solution for these sleepless nights (if the problem isn’t my stomach), is to pray and listen.  I meditate on what God has been saying to me lately…and pray….and listen…and pray….and fall asleep.

The next morning I often wake up with a new understanding about what God is doing or directions for the next step in his plan for my life.

God did this same thing with King Xerxes and we read about it in the book of Esther.  The king couldn’t sleep so he asked for the record of his reign to be read to him.   (This sounds like a real snoozer!)  And God reminded the king that nothing had been done to honor Mordecai who had exposed a conspiracy to assassinate the king.  The king wanted to take care of this situation and so the plot of the story thickens.

Has God woken you up lately?

Try the ‘pray….. listen….meditate…..pray’ thing and let me know how it works.

Thank you, dear Father, for the guidance you give us….in the middle of the night.

 

He Moves……

On By Judy GlasserIn OctoberLeave a comment

and we follow.

He directs……DSC_0175

and we obey.

He organizes……

and we show up.

He plans…….

and we pray.

He makes it happen……

as we watch and join him in what he’s doing.

He rustles through the leaves of the tree of our life.  We hear him.  We see him.

He is always moving among us,

turning on light bulbs in our heads as we suddenly understand something for the first time.  He’s great at orchestrating epiphanies!

He knows us and loves us and intercedes for us when we don’t know what to say.

He leads us to the truth.

But he doesn’t let us stay there……because there is more truth.

And then more.

He convicts us when we are straying from the truth.  This doesn’t feel good…..

until later, after we have repented and turned back to God,

and we realize we’re a giant step closer to God.  That feels GREAT!

He is the Holy Spirit of God………and he lives within us.

Thank you, dear Holy Spirit!

 

If You Believed

On By Judy GlasserIn OctoberLeave a comment

The Jewish leaders are persecuting Jesus in  book of John chapter 5 because they think he is breaking the laws that God gave to Moses.

Jesus responds to them, telling them that he is just doing what his Father does and  his Father is the same God that gave the laws to Moses,  Then he says that, if they really believed in Moses, they would believe in jesus.  Because Moses wrote about Jesus.

The Jewish leaders still refused to believe.Oct 25 2013

Their minds were closed and their hearts were hard.  The Messiah they were waiting for stood before them but they wouldn’t believe.

It appears like the only things they truly believed in were themselves and their rules and their status.

Such a sad thing.  They were committed whole-heartedly to the wrong things.

It is my hope and prayer that many of these Jewish leaders came to believe and trust in Jesus before it was too late for them.  I like to think that Nicodemus and his buddies were part of the 3000 who believed when Peter preached at Pentecost.

It would be such a tragedy for them to have known it all in their heads but then miss it with their hearts.

Dear Father, please help us keep our minds and hearts open to you.

I Am Well Pleased

On By Judy GlasserIn OctoberLeave a comment

These  were the words of God coming out of the heavens during Jesus’ baptism.

This is one of my favorite moments in the New Testament because Jesus hadn’t started his ministry yet.  He hadn’t DONE anything yet to earn God’s favor.October 22 2

He just ‘was’.

He was God’s son and God was pleased with him.

Just like God is pleased with me because I am his daughter.  Through Christ’s sacrifice on the cross, he made it possible for you and me to become children of God just like he was.

When we accept Jesus as our Savior, God adopts us as his own – his precious child – in whom he is well pleased.

It’s true……..and its a miracle!

Thanks you, dear Father!

Prepare the Way!

On By Judy GlasserIn October1 Comment

The voice of one calling in the wilderness.  Prepare the way for the Lord!

John the Baptist spoke truth into people’s lives and helped prepare their hearts and minds for the time when they would meet their Savior.

Whose voice is calling out now?  Who is speaking to the wilderness of lonely, broken and lost people all around us?

Who is preparing the way so that the Spirit of God can touch these people with the truth?

This is supposed to us …….our voice.October 22 c2013

God has called us to be his witnesses on our block, in our neighborhood, in our city and where ever we go.

He has lavished his love upon us so that it can overflow to everyone around us.

He has given us the opportunity to hear and believe the truth and it’s not just for us.  We need to share it.

He has washed us clean with his mercy and grace.  We know it, we feel it.  Now we need to share it.

Let every valley be raised up and filled with His Light!

And our mountains of problems and issues leveled out by God’s hands.

Our crooked and confused paths made straight.

The love of God will smooth the rough road ahead of us.

And ALL people will see and understand God’s Salvation!

Amen!

Hello, Wise Men!

On By Judy GlasserIn OctoberLeave a comment

We’ve read through the Old Testament – congratulations!

I’ve met many Christians who have told me that they avoid reading and studying the Old Testament and they have a variety of reason for this.  I have only one thing to say about that – they are missing out!

As we just witnessed, God has a lot to teach us in the Old Testament.  The treasure is plentiful.  And it’s obviously important to God because 3/4 of his entire revelation to us is in the Old Testament.

Chronologically, biblical history is silent for about 400 hears between the OT and the NT.  A lot of things were happening during this time but God must have decided that those things were not an integral part of his love story to us so they weren’t included in his word.

The New Testament begins with the four gospels and the story of Jesus’ birth.  Angels filled the sky as they announced the birth of the newborn king to the shepherds.  Simeon and Anna were blessed for their faithfulness by having the opportunity to personally meet the Baby Jesus.October 21 2013

And the Wise Men made a very long journey following a star – they knew something big was up.  When they saw Jesus they were overjoyed.  They laid down their treasure before him and worshipped him.

Everytime I read this, I am amazed once again at how the religious people of the time totally missed the whole thing.  The Pharisees and Sadducees were so wrapped up in all of their laws that they missed the fulfillment of prophecies made 700 years before.  We know they knew the scriptures – that was their life work!  They had all the head knowledge but they couldn’t see what was happening right in front of them because their eyes and hearts weren’t open to God.   If they knew God as well as they knew the scriptures, they would have been worshipping Jesus right along with the Wise Men.

They had it all wrong – knowing the scriptures but not knowing God is meaningless.  Our goal is to know and experience God through his word. 

Dear Father, please help us keep our eyes and our hearts open to you!

A Test……

On By Judy GlasserIn October, UncategorizedLeave a comment

that God always passes.

God tells us in Malachi 3 that, when we bring our whole tithe to him, he will throw open the floodgates of heaven and pour out so much blessing that there won’t be enough room to store it.

Have you tested him?

If you have, then I’m sure you’ve experienced the same thing that the rest of us who have done this have experienced.

God always keeps his word.  The blessings start rolling in, pouring out and multiplying.

Sometimes its actual money – an unexpected check, rebate or promotion.October 5 2013

Most of the time the blessings are things that money just can’t buy.  Things like joy, contentment, improved relationships with family and friends, a clear sense of direction and purpose.

And there’s an additional blessing of knowing that we are handling our finances in a way that honors and pleases God.

This is the only place in the Bible where God challenges us to test him.

He knows that it’s so easy for us to want to be in control of our money – even when it’s clear that we’re really messing it up.  Money can quickly become the god we are slaves to as the debt rises and the god of ‘more’ takes control.

God doesn’t want that for us.  He wants us to live a life filled with joy and freedom – freedom to serve him.  We can’t do that when we’re slaves to money.

So he challenges us to let him take control.  Because he loves us and he wants the best for us.

Thank you, dear Father.