Tag: faith

Sword Fighting Class – Victory

On By Judy GlasserIn Sword Fighting ClassLeave a comment

“Consider it pure joy, my brothers and sisters, whenever you face trials of many kinds because you know that the testing of your faith develops perseverance.  Perseverance must finish its work so that you may be complete and mature, not lacking anything.  If any of you lacks wisdom, he should ask God who gives generously to all without fault, and it will be given to him.James 1 1 - 9

“But when he asks, he must believe and not doubt, because he who doubts is like a wave of the sea, blown and tossed by the wind.  That man should not think he will receive anything from the Lord: he is a double-minded man, unstable in all he does.”

The brother in humble circumstances ought to take pride in his high position.  But the one who is rich should take pride in his low position, because he will pass away like a wildflower.  The sun rises with scorching heat and the plant withers; it’s blossom falls and its beauty is destroyed.  In the same way, a rich man fades away even while he goes about his business.”James 1, 9-12

Wow!  We are doing great at memorizing James 1!  Keep it up!  Here’s the next verse:

“Blessed is the man who perseveres under trial, because when he has stood the test, he will receive the crown of life that God has promised to those who love him.”

When we persevere in our faith through trials, we grow closer to God.  We have victory over the trials and sufferings of this world.

Victory.  A great word.  An even better feeling of accomplishment.  God gives us victory which helps us find meaning and purpose to our trials.

What a great way to show God we love him – by standing the test of the trials that come our way and remaining faithful.  Obedient.

We love you, Abba Father.

They were Both Adam

On By Judy GlasserIn JanuaryLeave a comment

In Genesis 3:20 we read that Adam names his wife Eve.

Up to that point, they were both Adam.Genesis 2 2015 they were both Adam

Male and female.  Both parts of Adam.  Each part made in God’s image.

What a striking picture of what God created marriage to be!

They shared the same name because they were 2 parts of the same being.

Sin changed that.

Just like sin creates the marriage issues we see all around us today.

We marry the wrong person for the wrong reasons at the wrong time.

The grass always looks greener on the other side – because we’re too selfish to fertilize our side.

Temporary lusts fueled by sinful pleasures become marriages that fail while hurting everyone involved ……especially the children.

Our picture of marriage is so different from what God created it to be.

Two bodies making one complete being.

Even in today’s world saturated with sin, a marriage like this is still possible if God is in the middle.  He promises to work all things out for the good of those who love him.  Our marriages are one of those things.  He has promised.  We just need to trust him.  And do our part by obeying.

He will always do his part.

Thank you, dear Father.

In the Beginning

On By Judy GlasserIn JanuaryLeave a comment

The Spirit of God hovered over a formless, dark, and empty world.

Then God created light.  The sky.  The land and the sea.  Plants and trees.  The sun.  The moon.  All living creatures – on the land and in the water.Genesis 1 2015 in the beginning

And he saw that it was good.

Then God created male and female in his own image.

He created US.

He was looking forward to the relationship he would have with Adam and Eve – walking through his beautiful garden with them every day.

He knew they would eat the apple – in defiance of his one restriction to their use of his garden.

God knew Cain would kill his brother.

He knew he would destroy all of the rebellious people with a flood, saving Noah and his family to repopulate the earth.

God knew he was going to grow Abraham into a Father of Faith.

He knew Joseph needed to go to Egypt to save multitudes of people including his family from starvation.

He knew that his people would be enslaved and would need a reluctant hero – Moses – to set them free.

God knew all about the whining Israelites wandering through the desert.  And brave Joshua who would step up to lead them into the Promised Land.

God knew about all of the issues with idols and other gods.  Of sins heaped upon sins.

He knew about David, a man after his own heart, who would be a beacon of light in the darkness even while battling with his own sins.

He knew that his prophets saying his words to his people would be ignored….ridiculed…..killed.

He knew about the heart-breaking exile that would happen to his people and their struggles to rebuild Jerusalem and the temple.

God already knew he was going to have to send his son in order to save the people he had created in his own image.

He knew that this son he dearly loved would have to die an excruciatingly painful death on the cross as the sins of all the world were placed on him.

God knew that the worst part would be when he had to turn away, separating himself from the sin….while his son cried, “Father, why have you forsaken me?”

God knew all of this before he created us.

And he did it anyway.

Because he thinks we’re worth it.

For God so loved the world…..

 

Coming Soon

On By Judy GlasserIn January3 Comments

“I am coming soon”, Jesus says to us in Revelations 22 as God’s holy word to us comes to completion.

Jesus is coming back soon.dec 31 2014 coming soon

And he has told us to ready because he can come anytime.  All of the predictions of man will be wrong because Jesus told us when he was here on earth that it’s not for us to know the date and time that the Father has chosen for his return.

So we focus on our preparation.  We prepare by reading and meditating on his Word.

And then we obey.

Today we celebrate as we begin another year of preparation.

What new adventures is God planning to take us on in 2015?

Who is he planning to bring into our lives so we can share the Good News?

How many opportunities will he be giving us to encourage others who are on this path of faith with us?

What awesome new thoughts and understandings is God going to reveal to us as we once again read through his Word to us?

I’m very excited to find out!

I’ve decided to read the chronological Bible again in 2015 – I really love how the historical context is so evident when we read God’s Word in chronological order.  And, I’ll admit it – I really like reading all the laws of Moses together just once along with some of the other sections that are repeated several times in the Old Testament.

Thanks to all of you who are taking this Journey Towards the Truth with me!

Happy New Year!  May God richly bless us in 2015!

With a smile and a growing feeling of anticipation of what God’s going to say, we flip back to page one and read,

“In the beginning……”

Sword Fighting Class – Don’t Fade Away

On By Judy GlasserIn Sword Fighting ClassLeave a comment

“Consider it pure joy, my brothers and sisters, when you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith develops perseverance.  Perseverance must finish its work so that you may be complete and mature, not lacking anything.James 1- 1-9

“If anyone lacks wisdom, he should ask God who gives generously to all with fault, and it will be given to him.  But when he asks, he must believe and not doubt, because he who doubts is like a wave of the sea, blown and tossed by the wind.  That man should not believe he will receive anything from the Lord, he is a double-minded man, unstable in all he does.’

‘The brother in humble circumstances ought to take pride in his high position.  But the one who is rich should take pride in his low position, because he will pass away like a wildflower.’

We are doing a great job of memorizing James 1!  We’re ready for verse 11:

‘ For the sun rises with scorching heat and withers the plant; its blossoms falls and its beauty is destroyed.  In the same way, the rich man will fade away even as he goes about his business.’

This is a poetic picture of what will happen to all of our worldly wealth.  It will be withered and destroyed.

If our identity is attached to what we own and the money we have, we will fade away into nothing along with our wealth.

How easy it is to get distracted by money and owning things, isn’t it?  Our world bombards us with this message constantly.  We step into the flow of our culture, focusing on more and better stuff and suddenly we find ourselves up to our eyebrows in debt with our stuff owning us.  When we look up, we wonder how we got there.

God tells us through James that all of our earthly riches will fade away and be destroyed.

Verse 12 is a good verse to repeat to ourselves when we feel that tug of ‘more, better, newer’ happening in our minds.

Thank you for your truth, dear Father.

 

This Is Why

On By Judy GlasserIn DecemberLeave a comment

“For the Word of God is alive and active.” Hebrews 4:12December 23b 2014 This is why

This is why we spend hours reading and meditating on God’s word to us.

He speaks.

He acts.

He penetrates our minds with his truth – rearranging some of our thoughts and shining a light on others so we can see the lies and discard them.  He adds his truth to our thinking and sets us free.

He judges the attitudes of our heart….

softening the places that have become hard,

opening the parts that have become closed,

bringing his light into the dark areas.

He gives us life, light, joy and peace!

Amen!  Hallelujah!

A Legacy

On By Judy GlasserIn DecemberLeave a comment

As Christmas cards rolled into my house this year, I became more and more aware of the strong Christian legacy my grandparents created in my mother’s family.Happy birthday Jesus

My grandparents had 16 children in a farm-house in Iowa.  They came over from Holland as teenagers and became homesteaders in Iowa – the original “Little House on the Prairie”.   I’m the youngest of I-forget-how-many grandchildren.  One time I tried to count my first cousins and there were over 50 of them.  I’ve never really figured out how many 2nd cousins I have.

All of my aunts and uncles as well as my parents have passed away.  Hebrews 12 talks about them – they are part of the great cloud of witnesses that cheer us on from heaven.  The fact that they all created a Christian legacy in their families was very evident by the stream of Christmas cards we received celebrating Jesus’ birth and praising our Father God who sent Jesus as a gift of grace to us.

There was not one mention of Santa Claus anywhere.  Not that Santa is bad – he’s just not the focus of Christmas in our family.

A legacy of strong faith in God runs deep in my family.  It’s a blessing that is being handed down from generation to generation – each generation personally accepting salvation and passing it along.  This family skipped the ‘handing down’ of silverware, furniture or jewelry.  They chose to pass along a most important family heirloom – how to live a life faithful to God.

I have been richly blessed by this legacy and continue to pass it along to my children and grandchildren. (The picture is from this Christmas – my grandchildren and I singing Happy Birthday to Jesus.)

If you weren’t born into a family legacy of faith, you have the awesome opportunity of starting one for your family.  They all started with someone –  you are it.

And our cloud of witnesses in heaven cheer us on as we throw off everything that hinders us from running the race of faith with perseverance.

Thank you, dear Father, for the legacy of faith in my family.

So Confusing

On By Judy GlasserIn DecemberLeave a comment

 

Our culture is filled with confusion.  That’s my favorite word for it.Dec 23 2014 So confusing

Lies are everywhere and large groups of people believe these lies.

Sometimes I’ll be in the midst of a large number of people when something really wrong happens and, when I look around, I realize that no one else looks like they think this is bad.  If its sexual in nature, people snicker and laugh, just like they did in Junior High.  I often feel like our culture is stuck in Junior High when it comes to sex.

People are so confused.

Even Christians.   We get distracted.  We get off-target.  We are never going to be perfect this side of heaven so we’re all hypocrites at times.  We say we are Christians but sometimes do very not-Christ-like things.

Hebrews 3 tells us the key to avoiding getting lost in this confusion.

Fix our thoughts on Jesus.

Jesus is our perfect role-model.  He was never a hypocrite.  He was God made flesh.

I have found this key to be extremely helpful to me.  Because the behavior of Christians can be very disappointing.  The things they say.   The things they do.  If I’m looking to them as role-models, I’m going to see the hypocrisy and I will be confused.

When I look to Jesus as my role-model, I find that I have a lot more understanding and grace for Christians who are on the path of faith like I am.  Jesus loved the broken and lost and confused.  He spoke truth and love.

He is the example of what God created us to be….before sin got in the way.

When we fix our thoughts on Jesus, our thoughts are in the right place.

Thank you, dear Father, for our perfect role-model – Jesus.

Contentment

On By Judy GlasserIn DecemberLeave a comment

Being content.

It’s an attribute rarely seen in our culture.

Paul says in Philippians 4 that he has learned to be content in whatever circumstance he is in.

Contentment is definitely a ‘learned’ feeling – it doesn’t come naturally to many of us.  We are surrounded by a gigantic marketing industry which constantly barrages us with ‘bigger, better & more’ messages.  We just lived through the largest marketing push of the year.  It’s very clear that we all need a new car, a new computer and a new cell phone.  And we need it now :)!Davey, Grandma and me at Christmas

Learning contentment is one of my goals and my mother was a great role model for me.  She didn’t have much worldly wealth but she was rich in happiness as she lived her life in close relationship with God. (The picture is one of my favorites – my son’s first Christmas.  He’s 33 years-old now.)

As I work on learning contentment, I remind myself that God has given me everything I have.  This is my portion and I need to be a great steward of it.  That’s how I can honor and delight my Father God.

When my thoughts are filled with counting my blessings, I feel that I have more than enough.  I have been abundantly blessed and I am content.

Unfortunately, I don’t always stay in the Land of Contentment…..but I know how to get back to it.  When I find myself straying down the ‘bigger, better, more’ aisle, I know I need to spend more time 1 – on – 1 with my Abba Father so he can get my desires lined up again with his.

And – poof!  I’m back in the Land of Contentment!

It’s supernatural!

It’s God!

Thank you, dear Father!

Our New Self

On By Judy GlasserIn December2 Comments

 

We need to put on our new self……

become the person God created us to be – righteous and holy.Dec 15 2014 our new self

New attitudes.

Different behaviors.

Take off our old, selfish, sinful thoughts.

“Be made new’, Paul tells us in Ephesians 4.

In our minds.

In our hearts.

This is a life-long process for all of us.

We each has a lot of ‘old’ that needs to be put off and ‘new’ that needs to be etched in our mind so that we can be transformed.

So we stay on this journey towards God, putting off the old and putting on the new.

We let God renew our minds with the truth.

And we become more and more like Christ everyday, every month, every year.

That’s the goal.  As we race into January of a new year, lets commit to letting the Holy Spirit shift our transformation into turbo gear next year.  Out with the old – in with the new!  2015, here we come!

Please guide us, dear Father.