Brought out of Egypt

 This story starts with God who heard saw the of the oppression of His people.

Exodus 3:7-8

⁷ And the Lord said: “I have surely seen the oppression of My people who are in Egypt, and have heard their cry because of their taskmasters, for I know their ^[a]sorrows. ⁸ So I have come down to deliver them out of the hand of the Egyptians, and to bring them up from that land to a good and large land, to a land flowing with milk and honey, to the place of the Canaanites and the Hittites and the Amorites and the Perizzites and the Hivites and the Jebusites. 

As with most of my posts they are very personal and based on what I am going through. This one started at the beginning of this year when I began to feel the need to pray for God to open a door to move me from one job to another. We prayed and prayed, this was not the best place for me, it was if you will my Egypt, a place that was not good but comfortable because I knew pretty much what to expect everyday. In praying for God to open the door He sure did, He moved me out of our Egypt and on the journey towards our promised land. Where that land is I have an idea but there is a journey that goes along with it and this is where I am at right now on that journey.

Exodus 14:10-12

¹⁰ And when Pharaoh drew near, the children of Israel lifted their eyes, and behold, the Egyptians marched after them. So they were very afraid, and the children of Israel cried out to the Lord. ¹¹ Then they said to Moses, “Because there were no graves in Egypt, have you taken us away to die in the wilderness? Why have you so dealt with us, to bring us up out of Egypt? ¹² Is this not the word that we told you in Egypt, saying, ‘Let us alone that we may serve the Egyptians’? For it would have been better for us to serve the Egyptians than that we should die in the wilderness.”

You see it would be really easy for me and it has been to complain about God moving me from that comfortable place of hurt and pain, I had grown so used to. Why Lord would you move me out of this job/ Why into this wilderness where I don't know where my next paycheck is coming from? There are many reasons as to why God brings us out of a particular place, the biggest one is for HIS glory. You see God does not work in a vacuum, He knows exactly what He is doing. For me there are a number of reasons as to why I believe God moved me from my last job, ultimately, I truly don't know, but what it boils down to is God's ways are not my ways and He has a plan that is going to cause Him to get the glory, it will cause us and others to worship Him.

 Exodus 14:13-15

¹³ And Moses said to the people, “Do not be afraid. Stand still, and see the salvation^[b] of the Lord, which He will accomplish for you today. For the Egyptians whom you see today, you shall see again no more forever. ¹⁴ The Lord will fight for you, and you shall hold^[c] your peace.” ¹⁵ And the Lord said to Moses, “Why do you cry to Me? Tell the children of Israel to go forward. ¹⁶ But lift up your rod, and stretch out your hand over the sea and divide it. And the children of Israel shall go on dry ground through the midst of the sea.

 You see as with the people of Israel, God had to take them to the end of themselves, God does the same thing with us, when there could be any sort of claim that we did something God won't get the glory, over and over again we see this throughout the bible. Here as we are discussing in Exodus, the people were locked in and couldn't go forward or back, Joshua at Jericho (Joshua 6), Gideon and God's defeat of the Midaneites (Judges 6-7), probably the most well known story of being saved, the virgin birth of Jesus (Luke 2), there are even more stories, the Apostles walking out of Jail, Jesus feeding the 5000. Do you see where I am going? God wants all of the glory. Here is the best part of this story, when God came to save His people He was right on time, not late but look at something here really closely, they walked through on DRY GROUND! you see God cared about them so much He even made the ground dry, they could have I'm sure walked through on muddy ground, or even damp sand (dirt) but they didn't THE GROUND WAS DRY!  don't miss that part, because in all my years of studying these verses I've missed that part. When God comes to save us He doesn't just save us halfway, He does so beyond all that we can ask or think (Ephesians 3:20-21). 

As I was praying this past week I really felt the Lord impress upon my heart to seek Him first, but not just the first part of Matthew 6:33 Seek first the Kingdom of God... but the second half as well and all these things will be added to you. Throughout the bible over and over God promises to take care of us. We are to seek His kingdom first, and let God worry about the rest. Easier said than done. I pray that for those of us reading this, including myself, that I would trust that when God parts the Red Sea that He will give us dry ground to walk on.

Blessings,

Nick

 

Everyone deserves a participation Trophy

But it's not what your thinking...

 Some years ago my daughter played T-Ball, growing up playing sports I felt that it was important for her to learn to win graciously and when she lost to learn to work harder to improve and give it her all. She loved being on the field and cheering on her team...and the other team too. We quickly realized that maybe sports wasn't for her. At the end of the season all the teams got together and had a valley wide pizza party where everyone got a participation trophy. It's the proverbial thanks for showing up there's no reason they deserved one, they didn't do anything to earn it, if I remember correctly they didn't even keep score, and at that age I don't think they should, but to get a prize just for showing up? 

 

But that's not what this post is about. I want to share with you a couple of verses from the Bible that give us some insight why we all deserve a different kind of participation trophy.

2 Peter 1: 3-4 according as His divine power hath given unto us all things that pertain unto life and godliness, through the knowledge of him that hath called us to glory and virtue:  (4) whereby are given unto us exceeding great and precious promises: that by these ye might be partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is in the world through lust.  (NKJV)

 

Did you see that? Let's go a little deeper...and dive in to

 

v 3. talks about a Divine power that has been given to us, it includes all things that are associated with life and godliness, through the knowledge of Him. Let's start with the Him, who is that? verse 2 tells that that He is Jesus. Let's look a little deeper here, we see that all things that pertain to life and godliness. You see when we accept Jesus as our Lord and Savior we are saying that we commit our living our life for Him and His glory. We no longer live for ourselves. We need to remember that it is not because of anything that we do but that redemption comes from Jesus alone. When we try to be godly on our own we can't it only comes from Jesus. He called us. The Bible says that He knew us before we were even born.

 

Let's now look at what has been given to us that allows us righteousness. Divine Power the word that was used in the Greek for Divine is Theios~ the meaning of this word is of Christ, the Holy Spirit, or the Father.  It is referring to our God, it's not saying that we're going to become gods but we get to participate in His power. Let's look at what happened when Jesus sent the disciples out. Matthew 10:8 Heal the sick, raise the dead, cleanse lepers, cast out demons. You received without paying; give without pay. The disciples of Jesus were able to do the same things He did, but that's not completely what Peter is referring to here, it's eternal. This divine power Peter is referring to is the same eternal life we receive when we follow Christ.

 

How does that sound? Salvation isn't just about fire insurance, what it is about is spending eternity with Jesus

 

Here is the good part. Verse 4 is where we learn how to get that participation trophy. Let me let you in on a little secret...it is FREE! We so often go through life trying to do things on our own, as Christians there are times that others will tell us that if we are not good or mess up that we will lose our salvation, this couldn’t be further from the truth. The first part of this verse confirms this, our salvation is granted by Jesus, it’s nothing that we can get apart from God. It is a promise as written in the Gospel of John 3:16-18.

¹⁶ “For God so loved the world,^[a] that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life. ¹⁷ For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him. ¹⁸ Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only Son of God.

 

Being a Christian isn’t just about being a good person, that is a byproduct, but it is about being able to spend eternity with Christ, there are several things that happen when we accept Jesus as our Savior, the first thing is we get that participation trophy, that is the Divine nature that allows us to escape the corruption that our sin brings. The second is that when the time happens, we get to partake in the glory of a redeemed body and spend eternity with Jesus, I can tell you this I don’t want the alternative. I love that when we receive the divine nature that we are freed from the sin and corruption of sin in this world. 

 

In closing let’s review.

 

·      Divine Power-In all things

·      Called by Him-Who? Jesus

·      To what? His own glory and excellence

·      Who gave us our trophy? Jesus

·      Are we able to earn it? Nope, its free can’t do anything to get it and can’t do anything to lose it

·      What does it bring us? The ability to live in the new life that Jesus has given us freed from the bondage of sin and in the peace of God. That’s something that I want to shout from the rooftops!

 

Blessings,

 

Nick

 

 

He is risen!!!

Matthew 28:1-10 ESV

 Now after the Sabbath, toward the dawn of the first day of the week, Mary Magdalene and the other Mary went to see the tomb. ² And behold, there was a great earthquake, for an angel of the Lord descended from heaven and came and rolled back the stone and sat on it. ³ His appearance was like lightning, and his clothing white as snow. ⁴ And for fear of him the guards trembled and became like dead men. ⁵ But the angel said to the women, “Do not be afraid, for I know that you seek Jesus who was crucified. ⁶ He is not here, for he has risen, as he said. Come, see the place where he^[a] lay. ⁷ Then go quickly and tell his disciples that he has risen from the dead, and behold, he is going before you to Galilee; there you will see him. See, I have told you.” ⁸ So they departed quickly from the tomb with fear and great joy, and ran to tell his disciples. ⁹ And behold, Jesus met them and said, “Greetings!” And they came up and took hold of his feet and worshiped him. ¹⁰ Then Jesus said to them, “Do not be afraid; go and tell my brothers to go to Galilee, and there they will see me.”

Wow! What a thing to witness, the Apostle Peter outran the beloved Apostle John to the tomb, but the first to see Jesus was Mary Magdalene who along with the other Mary went to the tomb to put spices on the body of Jesus. There was an earthquake and the angel of the Lord appeared rolled away  the stone then told them what was happening. I'm sure that they were pretty scared since the guards fainted, passed out, looked like they had died and this angel was in pure white and I'm sure pretty intimidating. The angel told them that Jesus had risen and to go find Peter and the rest of the disciples.

You're probably wondering why this was significant...During this time, women were not considered to be the same standard or rank as men, lame I know but the fact that they were told to go to get the disciples is super important. Jesus chooses to use things that the world considers foolish to accomplish His tasks, 1 Corinthians 1:27-31. God uses those things that people aren't ready for. Why? The 31st verse here gives the reason. "Let the one who boasts, boast in the Lord". No one would have expected Mary to be the first one Jesus appeared to, He could have appeared to the Pharisee's and said, Look you killed me but now I'm alive, you should believe those things I told you but you didn't. Jesus chose Mary because He has/had a plan. God can and will use you in the same why. Mary watched Jesus die she also saw Him first after He rose. Don't ever think that God can't use you because He can and if you'll let Him, He will.