I am a Christian, a retired teacher, a mother and a grandmother. I love to read and I love the Lord Jesus Christ! Unless otherwise specified ,all visual illustrations are from the YOU VERSION APP of the Bible.
We were created by God to be noticed by others, especially non-believers. Our witness to them should stick out, so much so that they want to know why we are “different.” If we are just like everyone else in the world, then how do we convince others that they should be like us and follow Jesus? The answer is that we are living in this world, but we are called to separate ourselves from it. We are called to be different, the spokespeople of the Lord of the Universe.
We are not created to be like a chain of paper dolls, all looking and sounding the same. We each have our own distinct physical features and we are all called to share our own unique testimony about the Lord and His gift of salvation to us personally. God doesn’t want robots; He desires the people whom He created to have a relationship with Him, the Creator. Then, He wants us to share the relationship we have with others so that they can come to know Him, too.
Can you see it? There is a chameleon in this photo. We are not supposed to blend in like this so others don’t notice us at all. We are people, created in God’s image, to represent Him to the world. We aren’t trying to hide from the dangers the world presents, although that might not be a bad idea sometimes. We aren’t supposed to blend in with the sinful people, but rather, we should be representatives of the One who has called us to be holy. We are supposed to be so different that others want to know why we are filled with joy during challenging times, not cursing God because of the weather and giving God the credit for all of our blessings instead on insisting that our own effort brought our success. There is only one me, only one you. And that was planned by our loving Heavenly Father.
If you want to have a relationship with our Creator, it is imperative that you spend time with Him. One of the best ways to do that is to spend time reading and studying His Word. That is where you find out about His love and His promises to each of us. It is hard for us finite beings to conceive of an infinite God, One who is not restrained by time and who set the whole world into motion. In reading His Word, we get a small understanding of who He is, more and more each day we spend time with Him. He shows us who He is, what His plan for the world is, and what His purpose for us is, all through His Word.
When you sign a contract, you think that it will all be carried out. But sometimes, that just doesn’t happen. Marriage comes to mind. Most of us enter into marriage with the idea that it is for life. Then, problems come up and one or both of you decide to “void the contract” and start a new life without that other person. I have never suffered that break in a contract, but I have had numerous friends and family members who have. Divorce is not an easy thing to go through because promises were made and then somehow broken. Sometimes our experiences in life keep us from wanting to have a close relationship with God because we don’t really trust someone we can’t see. After all, those we see are constantly disappointing us.
God is different in a way that is almost impossible to describe because each individual has to have a personal relationship with Him in order to get to know Him. And you cannot get to know Him without starting with faith and a belief that He will do just as He has said in His Word. The ironic thing is that you won’t know what is in His Word unless you read and study it. So, we have come full circle. Why read God’s Word? The short answer is to know Him. The real answer is to know who you are meant to be in relationship with Him. We were never meant to travel this world with unfurled sails and without a rudder or compass. God provides both in His Word, both the power and the direction we need to go. I hope that if you have not started already, you will begin a daily journey of getting to know the One who knows you best and loves you most. Just pick up a Bible and read God’s love story to you. I recommend that you start with the Book of John. Find a Bible plan online and stick to it. Get together with a friend or a group of friends to discuss what you have discovered about God each week. Establish a firm foundation with the One whose word never fails.
I don’t know about you, but sometimes I start a project and then I get tired of doing it and I put it aside. I have every good intention to go back to the project at a different time, perhaps when my arthritis is not so bad or my eyes aren’t so tired, but the truth is that I don’t always finish what I start. I am so thankful that God always finishes what He starts. I am a work in progress, and He did not put to the side, saying that He will get back to me later and then forget about me. Not at all! God works on my daily to help me to be more like His Son. His plan for me is a good one and He methodically and purposefully is finishing what He started in me.
He Started It
When the Apostle Paul was locked in a Roman prison for telling people about Jesus, he sent a letter of hope to his friends back in Philippi. A portion of it said: “And I am certain that God, who began the good work within you, will continue his work until it is finally finished on the day when Christ Jesus returns.” Philippians 1:6 NLT Though Paul was writing to specific people in the first-century Church, his words are just as true for the global Church today. Think about it: Who started this thing we call life? Who made this world and everything in it? Who fine-tuned the universe to actually make sense? Who put you here—at this specific time in history? Who handcrafted your body, your mind, your strengths, and your unique-to-you personality? Who began this good work? Before you were ever born, God already had you in mind. Before you could even walk or talk or have dreams for yourself, God already had a plan. Before you knew to look to Him or to follow Him or to worship Him, God was already at work—in you, around you, and through you. Sometimes it feels like we’re just wasting time and taking up space, without real purpose. But—it turns out—God is intentional and He makes no mistakes. To top it off… God always finishes what He starts. The story isn’t over. When Christ returns once and for all, the work of God through His people will finally be complete. Until then, let’s commit to God’s good work inside of us. Let’s magnify Him in everything we do. Let’s believe that He’ll finish what He has begun.
We are the culmination of God’s creative work. When the Lord God created earth and everything on it, mankind was His last and ultimate creation. About man, God said, “It is very good.”
On Monday night at Bible study, as our group waited for the lesson to begin, this photo was the view from the picture window. Isn’t is amazing? God’s creation never ceases to amaze me with its stunning display of color and how everything flows together beautifully. When I see a sunset like this, I am reminded of how very much God loves each of us. We are all special to Him, uniquely created to fulfill a purpose in His plan. I don’t know about you, but my reaction is one of awe and gratitude that the God of the Universe, the One who made this gorgeous sky for us to enjoy, knows me by name and loves me. And He loves you the same way!
I never thought about identity in this way, but it’s awe-inspiring to know that the more I know about Jesus, the more I discover about myself. Since my identity lies in my Savior, I can only truly know myself as I delve into knowing Jesus more. Personality tests don’t help much, but reading and studying God’s Word opens the world of possibilities to really know who God intends me to me and the purpose for which He created me. Food for thought.
Since Christ and His Word never changes, when our identity is rooted deeply in Him, then it does not change. We know who we are in Him because He doesn’t move or change. Circumstances change, the people around us shift, attitudes change, but Jesus doesn’t. His love for us never changes, the gift of salvation never goes away and God never moves away from us. Our identity is built on the firm foundation of the rock who created us to be just who He needs us to be in order to fulfill His purpose for our lives.
My big takeaway from the devotional today is that God is not finished with me until I draw my last breath here on earth. He is still writing my story, and it will have a happy ending. Each day is a new page in the book of my life and I want the new pages to be filled with gratitude and experiences that glorify God. It doesn’t matter what others say about you or what happened in the past; each day is a new day to make a difference in your world for Him. I am not who the world says I am or even who they think I am. I am exactly who my Heavenly Father created me to be. Like the rest of His creation, I am convinced that God looked at me and said, “It is good.” All that He does is good and created for a purpose, and I am happy to report that I continue to have a reason to live and to serve God every day as He writes new pages in my story.
Do we as members of God’s great church here on earth attract people to Him or chase them away? Do we get so involved in the sins of the world and our attempts to add our opinions and try to correct them instead of fulfilling our purpose of drawing people to God? This is definitely food for thought. May the church be a signpost pointing to God, not the judge of evil. That is God’s job and He does it perfectly. Our mission is one to lead people to reconciliation and restoration to a relationship with our Creator. As much as we want to condemn, shake our heads and walk away, that is not our purpose.
Some of us have been saved for many years but we are still not claiming all that is ours and living as if we have eternal life awaiting us. We trudge through life’s daily struggles and challenges, complaining some and wishing for the day to be over. Why are we doing that? I think that it’s because we were meant to have an HD (high definition) life and we are still using rabbit ears and getting a fuzzy picture.
When I was young, we had rabbit ears on the television in our den. We could see the picture on some channels better than on others and the picture came in better at nighttime than during the day. Then, we progressed and my dad put an antenna on the roof, with a little box on top of the TV that controlled it. That brought a much clearer and more stable picture, unless the antenna was being moved around a lot by wind or a storm. The picture was still in black and white but we could see Lucy, Desi and Lawrence Welk much more clearly.
A couple of years ago, our television that was a huge box suddenly quit working. It was old but we couldn’t afford a new one while it still functioned, and as long as it worked, we were okay with it. Sometimes the picture wasn’t as great as the ones we had seen at our children’s houses, but we just wanted a TV that would work so we could enjoy news and a few shows together. When it quit, I was upset but not desolate by any means. However, my generous brother decided to gift me with a new HD smart TV for my birthday. We couldn’t stream shows because we were on satellite at the time, but the picture that the TV has is amazing! Clarity, brightness and just really looks like the people can step off the screen into the den with us. A few months ago we got a fiber connection out here in the woods (amazing to me) and now we can stream. (I love the Pure Flix channel, by the way. Lots of movies about faith and all totally clean shows.) Streaming is like having a direct connection to God. Did you know that is exactly what we have? We can talk to Him anytime, anywhere and about anything. Jesus made that possible as part of our HD life.
We have been gifted with an HD life when we accepted Jesus as our Lord and Savior. He has a plan for us, a purpose for us to fulfill. But we have to tune in to that HD life and stop living like we still get fuzzy pictures with rabbit ears. We can only tune in when we stay focused on His Word and listen to His voice as we spend time with Him. It does us no good to have an HD receiver and not to plug it in!
We need to start living like we have a promise from God for eternal life and a destiny to fulfill in Him!
Our connection to God is through His Only Son Jesus who died for us. Our HD life starts with accepting His sacrifice for us.
Like I said, some of us are still using rabbit ears and God has provided an HD life for us. Fuzzy picture in black and white or color, clarity and fulfillment? Not a hard choice, is it?
So, choose the HD Life…let God help you to be all He created you to be. Shine in a beautiful array of color into a world that is living in fuzzy, gray areas without purpose or a sense of direction. I choose the HD life that God wants me to have…filled to the brim and abundantly living for Him.
Every citizen of the United States has probably participated in a census at one time or another. An envelope comes in the mail and there are numerous questions for you to answer and return to the sender (the U.S. Census Bureau). The purposes of a government census are many: to make sure a state is represented correctly in the House of Representatives, to allocate funds to the states, and to see population trends, for examples.
But as I read the Book of Numbers, I have come across an interesting census. God ordered Moses to take a census of the people. So, I began to ponder why God who knows the number of hairs on our heads would want the people counted. I am sure that He knew exactly how many people were there in the desert traveling with Moses. But I am also sure that His census had a purpose.
Can you even fathom the fact that God knows your name, your age, and all of the other facts that the U.S. census asks you about and He never has to ask? I think one of the purposes of the census God asked for was to make sure that each individual knew without a doubt that they counted to the Lord. We matter to God! He doesn’t need to take a census for His benefit, but rather, He takes it for ours. Every single individual is important to God, our Creator who loves us and wants us to have a relationship with Him. Even as God ordered the census, He already had in mind every man, woman and child that stood before Him.
I think that another possible purpose of the census was to call on Moses to do something and then watch what happened. Have you heard from God lately? Or ever? Was He telling you to do something? The big question is: Did you do as He asked? Did you follow His instructions? I have found that when God asks me to do something, He only tells me one step at a time. Once I complete that step, He tells me the next step to take until my task is complete. When God told Moses to take a census, I can imagine how impatient the people may have been to just move on in the desert and get to where they were supposed to go. But God had a plan. He wanted to number the people and so He did. I recall later in the Bible when David did a census without God’s calling for one and God punished Him for it. Why? Because it was not God’s plan at the time. Sometimes we get ahead of God and sometimes we fall behind. His timing is what is perfect. So, God told Moses to complete a census. When Moses acted and obeyed, the census was completed and now there is a record for all to read of the tribes and the numbers in each of them. The first step was the obedience to count, a step that may have not made much sense to the people in the desert wasteland. But God had a plan and this was part of it. Like allocating resources with a current census, God had a plan. I don’t know all of it, but I know He had one. God never does anything without a reason and I’m pretty sure the reason had something to do with God making sure that individuals knew that they counted and they could count on God to include them in His plans.
What is God’s plan for you today? Or tomorrow? Or in the distant future? You know what? We don’t know. And that is okay because regardless of how ignorant we may be of what God is doing, He has a plan and He is working to carry it out.
I think it was also interesting that all of the members of all of the tribes were counted in the census except for the Levites. These were the priests, those who were anointed to take care of the tabernacle and to camp around it and protect it. So why were they not numbered? I don’t have an answer to that except that these men already knew how closely God watched over them, having received explicit instructions for their own cleansing and for the sacrifices they made for the people They were not a higher class of people, but they were already set aside for God’s purposes. They knew it and so did God, so I don’t think He had a reason to number them.
Listen for God to speak to you today, tomorrow and whenever He will. Then, be obedient and act on what He tells you to do. Like Moses, just start doing. You don’t have to understand everything. You just have to take that first step of obedient action and work with God in fulfilling His purpose for your life. You matter to God, and He has a good plan for you!
www.bible.com/reading-plans/39304/day/4
www.bible.com/reading-plans/39304/day/2
www.bible.com/reading-plans/9114/day/5
www.bible.com/reading-plans/13952/day/6
Vickie's Book Nook and Meditation Corner 