Psalms 5:11-12 (5:12-13 LXX)

But let all who hope in You be glad;
They will greatly rejoice forever,
For You will dwell in them;
And all who love Your name will boast in You.
For You will bless the righteous;
O Lord, You crowned us with the shield of Your goodwill.

Encouraging Words

Contrary to what a lot of people may think, God does truly exist and He does love us, His creation. That is why the psalmist, and those of who believe as he did, know that we can put our hope in our God and greatly rejoice forever. We believe that not only does He dwell amongst us, but thanks to the incarnation of His Son, He also dwells within us. We do not boast on any of things in our lives as if we are responsible for them, but because we know that all glory and honor belong to Him. It is through Him, and His work within our lives that we can ever hope to be righteous, and through that righteousness receive His blessings. He and He alone has crowned us with His shield of goodwill and guards and protects us throughout our lives. This is who I put my hope in! Glory be to God!

Genesis 5:2-3

He made them male and female, and blessed them; and the day He made them He called his name Adam. Now Adam lived two hundred and thirty years, and begot a son according to his form and image, and named him Seth.

Encouraging Words

The scripture is clear that mankind was, and is created in the image of God. This is always thought of as meaning our form. But according to the teachings of the Orthodox Church, this image goes all the way to the image of the Holy Trinity. Check out this note from the Orthodox study Bible…

Seth was begotten from Adam and Eve. This threefold relationship illustrates, to a certain extent, the Holy Trinity. Adam had no human father. He was begotten by no one. Thus, he was unbegotten. Seth was begotten from Adam. Eve was neither unbegotten nor begotten. Instead she proceeded from Adam (2:21). Therefore, Eve and Seth were related to the unbegotten Adam, but each in a unique manner—Eve proceeded from Adam, but Seth was begotten from him. Each person had his or her own distinct and unique properties—unbegotten, begotten, and proceeding—but all three possessed the same human nature.Similarly, the manner in which these three existed images the Holy Trinity. God the Father is Unbegotten; God the Son is Begotten from the Father; and God the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father. These distinct and unique properties—unbegotten, begotten, and proceeding—distinguish each of the individual Persons of the Holy Trinity from each other; yet, They are one in nature (St. John of Damascus).

This is so exciting to me because it shows that God goes to every extent to show us His love for us. Glory be to God?

Matthew 5:16

Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works and glorify your Father in heaven.

Personal Challenge

I have often heard how important it is for me as a Christian to let my light shine so that others might glorify God, This can be challenging on several fronts. First, we are told to do this so that people may see our good works being done for God and then glorify Hm. Am I doing good works for God? Is it obvious that they are for Him and not so that I look good? Second, what about the works that I am doing that are not glorifying to God? What do people think about God when they see me doing these? Third, what about this light that I am shining before men? Is it a good light, a bright light, an encouraging light? Or is it a light that shows the glory of my God dimly? Fourth, what about my propensity to pride. Do I seek to let my light shine before my fellow man, pretending that it is pointing to God so that I look good? This is perhaps the worst of the cases from this list, God gives me the ability to do good works for Him. He creates the opportunities and then gives me what I need to do them. He is the one who should be at the center of these activities and not me. Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, the sinner!

Psalms 5:3 (5:4 LXX)

In the morning You shall hear my voice;
In the morning I will stand before You,
And I will watch.

Personal Challenge

The psalmist has come to a place in his life where he clearly begins each day, each morning, calling out to his Lord and awaiting His response. My life is so full, so busy, so demanding, that it takes everything that I can do to muster up that extra half hour in the morning to squeeze in my prayer rule and a little bit of scripture or early church fathers study. I am sure that this is not how my Lord intended for our lives to be. I also know that He did not intend for me to sit around and do nothing, letting everyone else around me do all the work that needs to be done. Part of the journey of life, the pursuit of theosis, is learning how to balance life. I must learn, first and foremost, how to be in constant prayer and communion with my Lord. This can be done by embedding the Jesus Prayer, “Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me the sinner!” into my every thought and action. Then with that as my foundation, I can begin to learn how to balance that which is going on in my life without it taking control of me. We live in busy times, but I can learn to navigate them with a calm and focused pace. Lord, help me!

Genesis 4:25

Again Adam knew his wife Eve, and she conceived and bore a son, and he named him Seth, saying, “God has appointed another seed for me instead of Abel, whom Cain killed.”

Encouraging Words

No matter how much I mess up in this life, no matter how much I Sin, God is there for me. Not only is He there for me, but He is ready for me to be reconciled to Him. This does not mean that the consequences of my sin will immediately go away. I will always have to accept the consequences as I pay my dues. Many times, if not most of the times that I go through this process of confession, repentance, and acceptance of the consequences, I will come away farther along in my journey of becoming like Christ. This is God’s redemptive power working in my life. Glory be to God!

Matthew 5:3-12

“Blessed are the poor in spirit,
For theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
Blessed are those who mourn,
For they shall be comforted.
Blessed are the meek,
For they shall inherit the earth.
Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness,
For they shall be filled.
Blessed are the merciful,
For they shall obtain mercy.
Blessed are the pure in heart,
For they shall see God.
Blessed are the peacemakers,
For they shall be called sons of God.
Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness’ sake,
For theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
“Blessed are you when they revile and persecute you, and say all kinds of evil against you falsely for My sake. Rejoice and be exceedingly glad, for great is your reward in heaven, for so they persecuted the prophets who were before you.

Encouraging Words

What a powerful view into the economy of our God. If I want to be viewed as a blessed person in this temporal world I would not pursue any of the following:

• being poor in spirit
• mourning
• meekness
• hunger and thirst for righteousness
• mercifulness applied to others
• persecution

But here, in the Beatitudes, our Lord clearly describes for us how we should love our lives in our day to day temporal world if we would like to receive the following rewards in our spiritual world, both today and when we enter into heaven:

• having the kingdom of heaven
• inheritance of the earth
• mercy
• seeing God
• becoming a child of God

Psalms 4:8 (4:9 LXX)

I will both sleep and rest in peace,
For You alone, O Lord, cause me to dwell in hope.

Encouraging Words

Hope! What a wonderful and powerful thing hope is. Unfortunately, the world wants us to not have our God as the object of our hope. We are so often told that our only hope for joy, health, and posterity can be found in our government, so vote for the candidate that fulfills that hope the most. Or our only hope is in our wealth, the job that requires me to put others down or cheat my customer so that I can get paid more as my employer’s coffers grow. Or I should put my hope in my health, or the stuff that I own, or the knowledge that I have amassed. In the end, all of these things that are of this world that tries to entice me to put my hope into themselves will someday be gone. The only thing that will last through eternity, the only thing that is constant and True, the only thing worth putting my trust and my hope in, is my God, the Father, the Son, and the Holy spirit. Only in Him can I find rest, peace, and joy. Glory be to God for He is my fortress and foundation.

Genesis 3:11-13

Thus He said, “Who said you were naked? Have you eaten from the one tree from which I commanded you not to eat?” Then Adam said, “The woman You gave me, gave me of the tree, and I ate.” So the Lord God said to the woman, “What is this you have done?” The woman said, “The serpent deceived me, and I ate.”

Personal Challenge

Another response to sin (in addition to hiding from God) is that we immediately start pointing our fingers at everyone else and blame them for our transgression. God loves us so much that He does come to us in the midst of our sin to judge us and to chastise us, but to give us an opportunity to confess our sm, repent of it, and seek His comfort and acceptance. Deflecting to everyone and everything else just delays our opportunity to reconcile with God and our fellow human beings. God wants us in this state of reconciliation. Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, the sinner.

Matthew 4:1-6

Then Jesus was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil. And when He had fasted forty days and forty nights, afterward He was hungry. Now when the tempter came to Him, he said, “If You are the Son of God, command that these stones become bread.”

But He answered and said, “It is written, ‘Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God.’ ”

Then the devil took Him up into the holy city, set Him on the pinnacle of the temple, and said to Him, “If You are the Son of God, throw Yourself down. For it is written:

‘He shall give His angels charge over you,’and,
‘In their hands they shall bear you up,
Lest you dash your foot against a stone.’ ”

Jesus said to him, “It is written again, ‘You shall not tempt the Lord your God.’ ”

Again, the devil took Him up on an exceedingly high mountain, and showed Him all the kingdoms of the world and their glory. And he said to Him, “All these things I will give You if You will fall down and worship me.”

Then Jesus said to him, “Away with you, Satan! For it is written, ‘You shall worship the Lord your God, and Him only you shall serve.’ ”

Then the devil left Him, and behold, angels came and ministered to Him.

Encouraging Words

Sometimes people will ask why it is so important for us to recognize Jesus for being a human being as well as God Himself. This passage shows us so clearly why this is so important. When Jesus went out into the desert, He went there as a human being. He fasted for a long time. I think the longest that I have even done a total fast was somewhere between 30 and 40 hours. Believe me, your body starts feeling some strange things and your mind starts going to some weird places. Even when you do a fast where you can drink fluids and juices, your body and mind revolts. Jesus felt hunger pangs like you or I would. He felt alone in the desert like you or I would. His human nature was ripe for the enemy to confront Him and tempt Him. And it was His human nature that denied Satan in all of the temptations. He made it possible for me to do the same by becoming human and paving the way for people like me to also say “No!” to the enemy and his attempts to steer me away from God. Jesus exercised His free will as a human being showing me that I can strive to be like Him and do the same. Thank You, Lord Jesus Christ for showing me the way and giving me a Helper so that I could follow in your footsteps.