“Day after day, in the temple courts and from house to house, they never stopped teaching and proclaiming the good news that Jesus is the Messiah.” Acts 5:42 NIV
Today is Acts 5.
Can’t stop talking!!
What the disciples had experienced with Jesus was real. They were willing to stand boldly and proclaim it. Even in the midst of threats by the authorities, prison, and beatings, they could not stop talking about Jesus.
When they were told to stop, Peter replied, “We must obey God rather than men…” God had given them a command, “Go…and tell the people all about this new life.”(verse 20 ESV) They obeyed!
When we have a real encounter with Jesus and experience the Holy Spirit living inside of us, we are changed. We can’t stop talking about all that He has done! “Every day… from house to house” everywhere we go, we cannot stop “teaching and preaching” who Jesus is!
“By faith in the name of Jesus, this man whom you see and know was made strong. It is Jesus’ name and the faith that comes through him that has completely healed him, as you can all see… Repent, then, and turn to God, so that your sins may be wiped out, that times of refreshing may come from the Lord,” Acts 3:16, 19 NIV
Today is Acts 3.
Miracle! A lame man, who was well known for begging at the gate of the temple, was healed in Jesus name as Peter and John spoke to him! He began to leap and jump and praise God. Crowds started to gather. Peter, once again, testified of Jesus and His resurrection. He spoke of the power of Jesus name and having faith in His name. This power “completely healed” the man.
Peter speaks to the greatest need of the crowd, their spiritual hearts. Wholeness starts there. The people were sick with sin. “Repent, then, and turn to God, so that your sins may be wiped out, that times of refreshing may come from the Lord.”
God never changes. He is still the God of miracles. I have seen more than one miracle in my own life. These miracles testify to us of a God who is able to bring complete healing not only to us physically, but spiritually. Our hearts have been darkened, diseased by our own sin and selfishness. We are burdened by the weight of our guilt. But God offers us a New Beginning. Our sins can be blotted out and “times of refreshing may come from the Lord.”
Repent and turn back to the God! He longs to live connected to us in a deep and intimate relationship where we receive His life, wholeness, and healing. moment by moment of each day.
“The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the one and only Son, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth.”John 1:14 NIV
When I was engaged to my husband Rich, he lived in a small apartment in St. Charles, Missouri. It held his bed and his clothes. It was a place he landed on occasion after work or school. It really was not his home. Cleaning it, decorating it, and making meals there was not a thing of concern to him. He was too busy with working full time and going to school full time. However, all this changed when we got married and I moved in. I did my best to give the apartment and his new life a woman’s touch. It went from a dirty bachelor pad to a cleaned-up home. It went from plain white walls to decorations and pictures. Rich went from his nightly dinner of McDonald’s cheeseburgers to home cooked meals. He went from sitting alone each night to companionship. I had come and turned a place he used only to sleep in, to a place where he abided with affection and found refuge and rest. With he and I together in that little apartment, we experienced home.
This month at WOW our verses are about a special relationship of oneness with God – home. Our spiritual hearts experience their true home as we live attached, connected, united, indivisible, and inseparable with God. It is God in man and man in God. As we have faith in Him, loving and obeying His Word, desiring to delight to do His will, we will experience this relationship with God. We will be led home to the heart of God expressed in His Word, knowing Him and all His goodness.
This week’s WOW verse speaks of this expression of God’s heart. “The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory…” Jesus is the Word made flesh. He came to dwell with us. Not only did He dwell with us, but He died on the cross so that the heart of God could once again dwell in the hearts of men like it was in the beginning before sin entered our world. This is the relationship of oneness with God that He desires for us to experience with Him.
In a small way, this relationship of oneness is similar to the relationship Rich and I experienced when we were married, and I moved into his apartment. When I came to dwell with Rich, our lives changed for the better as we have experienced home together. Jesus, the Word of God, came to establish a relationship of home with us, a place of intimate relationship. He has come to dwell within us through His Word. When we receive the Word into our lives, understanding what He desires to do within us, and believing every Word He is speaking, we will obey Him. We will truly experience Him and His love. We will know Him as our true spiritual home.
Perhaps as you read this, you realize that your heart has been empty and void of its true spiritual home? The Word, Jesus, is longing to come and reside inside of you. The Word wants to clean up the mess that sin has left behind in your spiritual heart. He wants to make Himself at home in your heart filling you with His love. He wants to change your heart into His image so that you can experience Him fully. May we receive the Word, understanding and believing Him. May we obey what He says! May our hearts experience this beautiful relationship of oneness, home, – attached, connected, united, indivisible, and inseparable – with Jesus, the Word!
“Jesus knew that the Father had put all things under his power, and that he had come from God and was returning to God; so he got up from the meal, took off his outer clothing, and wrapped a towel around his waist. After that, he poured water into a basin and began to wash his disciples’ feet, drying them with the towel that was wrapped around him.” John 13:3-5 NIV
“Having loved his own who were in the world, he loved them to the end.” John 13:1 NIV
When I was a kid I had to wear prescription orthopedic shoes. I had foot issues and my feet often hurt. Often there were times that my mom would sit by me on the couch in the evening and ask me if I would like for her to rub my feet. It always felt so good. She loved me and offered herself as a servant to me not only by rubbing my feet but all the other sacrifices she did.
Jesus loved His own. He wanted to teach them a very important lesson — to serve. Why? Because living our lives as a servant focused not on ourselves but on God and His will is the way to a blessed life. (Verse 17) So Jesus washed feet. He displayed humility and love to His disciples.
The truth is you and I are by nature selfish and self focused. When we come to Jesus and ask Him for a heart that is like His, He gives us a new heart. This heart enables us to become more and more like Jesus. It gives us the desire to be humble and loving as He is. He empowers us to no longer be focused on ourselves, but focused on God and pleasing Him.
In this life, there will be many who we encounter that come to us with dirty, stinky, hurting feet. May our hearts desire be as Jesus desired on that night. May we love, bow down onto our knees, and wash the feet — meet the needs — of those around us.
Jesus help me to wash the feet of others so I can be like you.
“To the Jews who had believed him, Jesus said, “If you hold to my teaching, you are really my disciples. Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.”” John 8:31-32 NIV
“If you hold…”. Continue, abide, dwell to Jesus’s teachings/ Word. That is the mark of a true disciple. It is impossible to pattern our lives after, give our lives to, and follow closely someone we do not know or relate to on a moment by moment basis.
Jesus warned that it is possible to encounter Him, but to not allow Him to dwell in our hearts. He told those listening to Him. “…you have no room for my word.” We can fill our lives with all kinds of ideas, passions, and pursuits and yet miss the most important pursuit of all, knowing God and His Word.
There is only one way to true freedom and to fulfillment. It is to make room for Jesus in our lives.
Jesus and God the Father are one. Jesus said that He did what He saw the Father doing. “The Son is the radiance of God’s glory and the exact representation of his being.” Hebrews 1:3. When we see Jesus, we see God the Father.
Jesus repeatedly spoke about “the one who sent” him. He wanted us to understand that He was not working on His own. He was connected in a real and intimate relationship with His Heavenly Father. Jesus said, “… but I know Him because I am from Him and he sent me.” Jesus had and still has an intimate relationship with God the Father and the Holy Spirit. They are one.
Jesus came to show us what our Heavenly Father is like. He revealed God to us. He also came to restore the relationship mankind lost long ago in the Garden of Eden. He came to restore our connection to Him through the Holy Spirit, who we can now receive to live within us.
When the Holy Spirit lives within us, we are able to identify with Jesus in His own words, “My teaching is not my own. It comes from the one who sent me.” May this be our desire. That we do nothing from ourselves and for our own ambitions, but that we live for the glory of God. That He is lifted up in our lives, and that we will display God as His visible representation — Image Bearer — to the World around us.
Today is Mark 14:32-72 ❤️🙌🔥 for the “Bible Book of the Month Club — The Gospel of Mark”
What seemed to be Peter’s entire world was falling apart right in front of him. The One he left everything to follow, Jesus, had been arrested and wasn’t even trying to defend Himself. I can imagine the dismay and unbelief the enemy was enticing Peter with.
Denying Jesus was one thing, but trying to prove you have had nothing to do with by cursing and swearing was another. Then the rooster crowed and Peter remembered what Jesus had told him. “He broke down and wept.”
I have been where Peter was and I can identify. Things weren’t going my way. God wasn’t doing what I wanted Him to. So I decided to do things my way… I tried to distance myself from Him, but keeping just enough of Jesus to “keep my fire insurance current.” What a miserable way to live. Especially if you have had an authentic relationship with Jesus, but have drifted away. I’m pretty sure this is why Peter wept. Once you have tasted and seen the goodness of God, everything else is empty.
Thankfully Peter’s story does not end at the end of Mark 15. Jesus restored his relationship. Thankfully my story did not end with me adrift, living my life my ways…not God’s. Jesus restored my relationship.
How about you? Can you relate to Peter and me? Your story does not have to end in sorrow! Surrender to God is the pathway to peace. Come to Him!
Today is Mark 14:1-31 ❤️🙌🔥 for the “Bible Book of the Month Club — The Gospel of Mark”
The thing that stands out to me the most in this passage of scripture is the intimacy in relationship that Jesus had with His disciples. Jesus spent time with them eating meals.
Some of the most intimate times I have with my kids are our family dinners. When the food has been eaten, we remain at the table talking, laughing, and enjoying each others company. They are beautiful times.
I can imagine dinner with Jesus being the same. However the accounts of this passage have a more serious note. Jesus tells His best friends, those closest to Him, what is to come. He wants them to understand what happens when it does. What a beautiful Savior we have!
Jesus is the same yesterday, today, and forever! He still wants to have that intimate fellowship with us. We are invited to His table where we can spend time with Him. He has sent that invitation to us! (Revelations 3:20) Our role is to come to Him and open the door of our hearts.
Today is Mark 12:18-44 ❤️🙌🔥 for the “Bible Book of the Month Club — The Gospel of Mark”
How much is enough? This is the tendency of our fleshly hearts. We want enough of Jesus to make us comfortable with our lives, but we come without a desire to fully surrender. However, God doesn’t want a half-hearted devotion to Him. Jesus, Himself, tells us the greatest command:
“Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.’” Mark 12:30 NIV
Love God with ALL!
There have been many times I have approached God with part of me… offering pieces of my time, my thoughts, my desires. That is such a miserable way to live.
If we love God with all of our heart, soul, mind, and strength, we are able to experience Him and His goodness fully. Anything short of wholehearted devotion to Him is a shallow relationship with God.
God desires for us to know Him intimately and experience Him moment by moment of every day. He wants us to give Him all of us because He is offering all of Him!
What is God saying to you today? Post it below 👇👇👇
Your Love 