Tuesday, September 30, 2008

True Love

In Elyse Fitzpatrick's book, Helper By Design,she describes how we are to love one another in our marriages. She states:

I am to love my husband the way that Jesus Christ, who died for me, has loved me. I am to lay down my life for my husband. I am to spend time meditating on the ways the Lord loves me, and then I am to follow in His footsteps. Ephesians 1:3-14 gives us a picture of Christ's love.

1) He blessed me with every spiritual blessing.

2) He chose me before the world was even founded.

3) He called me to holiness and blamelessness.

4) He predestined me to be adopted as His child.

5) The intention of His will was kind.

6) He freely bestowed grace on me through our Beloved.

7) He redeemed me by the shedding of His blood.

8) He forgave my trespasses.

9) He revealed His will and kind intentions to me.

10) He gave me an inheritance in Him.


Elyse Fitzpatrick encourages us by saying this:

What can I say about God's incredible love? This is true love--a love that persistently seeks to do good to the one who is loved. Do I love in the way that He does? Of course not. I can't love exactly like the Lord does because I don't elect people to salvation or redeem them with my shed blood. But I can seek to bless my brother-husband; to stand steadfastly by him in a committed relationship throughout our lives; to encourage him to live a godly life and satisfy God's calling; to accept him with grace and personal sacrifice; to be forgiving and open about my struggles; and to assist him in leaving an inheritance for the kingdom that will live on after us.

Sunday, September 14, 2008

Be Cheerful....

“Be cheerful, Jesus Christ makes you whole.”

“These troubles and distresses that you go through in these waters are no sign that God has forsaken you; but they are sent to test you, to see whether you will recall that goodness, which up to now, you have received from Him and if you will live upon Him in your distress. Be cheerful, Jesus Christ makes you whole.”


- John Bunyan, quoted by James W. Bruce in From Grief to Glory (Carlisle, Pa.: The Banner of Truth Trust, 2008), 34. (From Of First Importance)

Wednesday, September 10, 2008

Word For Wednesday

John 4:23-24: But the hour is coming, and is now here, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for the Father is seeking such people to worship him. God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth.

True Worship

“To worship God ‘in spirit and in truth’ is first and foremost a way of saying that we must worship God by means of Christ. In him the reality has dawned and the shadows are being swept away (Hebrews 8:13). Christian worship is new covenant worship; it is gospel-inspired worship; it is Christ-centered worship; it is cross-focused worship.”


- D.A. Carson, Worship by the Book (Grand Rapids, Mi.: Zondervan, 2002), 37.