Author: David Short

1 John 3:16 NIV

This is how we know what love is: Jesus Christ laid down his life for us. And we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers.

Personal Challenge…

What does it mean to lay down my life for another? For Jesus it meant giving up His place in the heavenly realms and coming to earth to be born in a stable in an oppressive time and place. For Him it was to live an incarnate life of poverty and hard work so that He could be with the very people that He wanted to rescue from death. For Him it was to be betrayed, ridiculed, spit on, beaten and crucified so that the bondage of death would be broken for eternity. For Him it was to return back to His followers who abandoned Him after He was resurrected so that He could love, comfort and teach them. Should laying down my life for a brother be any less for me…if I claim to be His child?

Colossians 2:6-7 NASB

Therefore as you have received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in Him, having been firmly rooted and now being built up in Him and established in your faith, just as you were instructed, and overflowing with gratitude.

Personal Challenge…

“So walk in Him…” Another passage that is a reminder that our relationship with Christ, our salvation in Christ, is not a passive, one-time event, but an ongoing, active response to God reaching into our lives and saving us from the grip of death. We must surround ourselves with opportunities to be constantly reminded of God’s work in our lives, whether it be worship that is steeped in His calling to us to follow and obey Him, or time in His scripture and other teachings that feed our understanding of Him, or relationships within His community that revolve around Him, or the practices of traditions that have withstood the tests of time. Allow Him to continue to firmly root you and build you up in Him so that your faith can be established in Him.

Luke 11:9-10 NLT

“And so I tell you, keep on asking, and you will be given what you ask for. Keep on looking, and you will find. Keep on knocking, and the door will be opened. For everyone who asks, receives. Everyone who seeks, finds. And the door is opened to everyone who knocks.

Command with a Promise…

The life of a believer is not a passive life, but an active life. We are told to ask, look, and knock. This is an active, ongoing life of pursuing Christ and what He has in store for us. If we follow these commands He promises that He will give us what we ask for, that we will find what we are looking for, and that the doors will be opened. This is not some kind of prosperity gospel, because if we are truly pursuing Christ then the things that we are asking for, the things that we are looking for, and the doors that we are knocking on will be those things that God desires for us.

Joel 2:12-13 NASB

“Yet even now,” declares the LORD, “Return to Me with all your heart, And with fasting, weeping and mourning; And rend your heart and not your garments.” Now return to the LORD your God, For He is gracious and compassionate, Slow to anger, abounding in lovingkindness And relenting of evil.

Personal Challenge…

God wants our hearts, but He also wants us to fast and weep and mourn for Him, for His presence, for His return. He wants to pour out His compassion and lovingkindness upon His children. I find that I must ask myself, “Has my heart changed with the recent celebration of Christ’s life, death, burial and resurrection, or has this event just passed like one more holiday?”

Proverbs 23:18 NIV

There is surely a future hope for you, and your hope will not be cut off.

Encouraging Words…
Once again it appears that God is taking us down a new path, a path that can be both challenging and rewarding at the same time. It is times like these that I find myself reviewing those verses that offer hope and promise. Our God is the God of the past, the present, and the future. He is here with us as we begin this journey just as He is already at the destination of this journey waiting to receive us. I am also at a place now where I am being blessed by prayers and guidance of the fathers of our faith that have gone before us…often dealing with their own challenging and rewarding journeys. We are not alone…Praise God!!!

Ephesians 5:25-28 NASB

Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ also loved the church and gave Himself up for her, so that He might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word, that He might present to Himself the church in all her glory, having no spot or wrinkle or any such thing; but that she would be holy and blameless. So husbands ought also to love their own wives as their own bodies. He who loves his own wife loves himself;

Encouraging Words…

It is much easier to follow this command when God has blessed you with a wonderful, godly wife. Happy Birthday to my Beautiful Bride!

Psalm 33:18 NLT

But the LORD watches over those who fear him, those who rely on his unfailing love.

Encouraging Words…

What a wonderful joy it is to be coming out of the Pascha (Easter) celebration with such glorious reminders of how much our Father loves His children. As today’s verse says…the Lord watches over His children and His love is unfailing.

2 Peter 1:3 NIV

His divine power has given us everything we need for life and godliness through our knowledge of him who called us by his own glory and goodness.

Encouraging Words…

Not only is it (life and everything in it) not about me and all that I can do, but is also not about everyone else in my life and what they think they can do. It is by His divine power that I receive everything that I need for a full life and godliness.

Galatians 5:13 NASB
For you were called to freedom, brethren; only do not turn your freedom into an opportunity for the flesh, but through love serve one another.

Encouraging Words…
We are called to freedom! Our Lord died so that we might be set free…free from death, free from sin, free from the oppressions of the world, free to be His salt and light to the world. Why is it then that many Christian organizations choose to turn this freedom into authoritarianism? Even in the days of Paul he was constantly rebuking the leaders in churches to stop lording it over their membership and implementing manmade rules and requirements. I have been recently told by a leader in an organization that I have loved dearly for many years that this is just how our local leaders choose to lead their area of responsibility and the only choice I have is to submit. Huh!!! Actually I do have another choice…I can choose to walk away and not compromise my freedom in Christ. Jesus did not die to have me put back into bondage.

John 11:25-26 NIV

Jesus said to her, “I am the resurrection and the life. He who believes in me will live, even though he dies; and whoever lives and believes in me will never die. Do you believe this?”

Command with a Promise…

If we believe in Jesus the Lord of resurrection and life then He will give us life. Isn’t this what we are remembering and celebrating each year as we observe Easter? That Jesus, God who entered the human race, gave up His seat on the throne in heaven to come to earth and be born by a virgin, to grow up as a human and then to give His life so that the grip of death could be broken forever. This is a promise worth holding on to.