Embracing the Lean Times

Embracing the Lean Times
TGIF Today God Is First Volume 1, by Os Hillman
03-30-2012

"But blessed is the man who trusts in the Lord, whose confidence is in Him." - Jeremiah 17:7

Have you ever considered at what point a test becomes so difficult that you decide you can no longer trust in God and you must take over to solve the problem? The prophet Jeremiah describes a situation in which the temptation to solve a financial problem can become so great that we trust in man's way to solve it.


This is what the Lord says: "Cursed is the one who trusts in man, who depends on flesh for his strength and whose heart turns away from the Lord. He will be like a bush in the wastelands; he will not see prosperity when it comes. He will dwell in the parched places of the desert, in a salt land where no one lives. But blessed is the man who trusts in the Lord, whose confidence is in Him. He will be like a tree planted by the water that sends out its roots by the stream. It does not fear when heat comes; its leaves are always green. It has no worries in a year of drought and never fails to bear fruit" (Jeremiah 17:5-8).


Jeremiah drew a sharp comparison between the man who trusts in his own effort to solve his problem and the man who trusts in God when he cannot see the outcome. The man who trusts in God bears fruit despite the circumstances in his life. He does not shrivel when the heat comes; in fact, his roots go deeper into God's grace. He continues to bear fruit in spite of his circumstances.


Recently, a friend from South Africa explained to me that whenever a plant lives in an arid climate, the roots drive deeper and deeper into the soil to get the water they need. This forces the plant to develop a root system that is far beyond the normal plant because it is forced to go deeper to gain the water it needs. Sometimes God forces us to go deeper into the grace of His love in order to build a greater foundation in our own lives. These lean times are designed to accomplish this in us. If you find yourself in this condition, ask the Lord who provides the water for our soul for the grace you need today to continue to bear fruit in the desert. 

"Praise be to the Lord my Rock, who trains my hands for war, my fingers for battle."

The Training Ground of God
03-21-2012

"Praise be to the Lord my Rock, who trains my hands for war, my fingers for battle." - Psalm 144:1

David was a man skilled in war. From his days as a shepherd boy to the days of serving in Saul's army to leading his own army, David learned to be a skillful warrior. How does one become a skillful warrior?


The only way one can become a skillful warrior is to be trained and placed in the middle of the battle. It is only when we are placed in the furnace of battle that we truly learn to fight the real battles. Practice doesn't make you battle ready. War games won't prepare you for facing your real enemy in the battlefield. The stark reality of being in the midst of the battle makes us effective warriors.


Simply reading your Bible will not make you a warrior for the Kingdom. Knowledge without experience is mere folly. Only when you are placed in situations where there is nothing or no one who can save you but God will you learn the lessons of warrior faith. This is the training ground of God, which will make you into a soldier for Christ in the workplace. Consider it to be suicidal faith - faith that says I want to be dead to anything that keeps me from fulfilling God's purposes for my life. It is when your efforts can do nothing to change your circumstance and you are at the mercy of God. These are the real training grounds of God. Do not shrink back from the battle that God may be leading you to today. It may be a training ground that is necessary for the calling He has on your life.


If you can trust Him in these times, you'll know that you have gained a faith that will move mountains and will sustain you in the most difficult of circumstances. "Praise be to the Lord my Rock, who trains my hands for war, my fingers for battle." 

April 7: KEO DAY!!! Live Rap, Skate Prizes, F-F-Fun!!!

10AM-3PM 

April 7 2012

$kate Decks, Free Pizza, Loud Music!

Todays Devo: "The First Requirement of Ministry"

The First Requirement of Ministry
03-14-2012

"The priests are in mourning, those who minister before the Lord." - Joel 1:9

The first requirement for being used by God in the life of others is to mourn on their behalf. We must identify with their pain and suffering. Each of us must be broken for others first.

In order to be fully used by God in the workplace, we need to understand what breaks God's heart. When we understand what breaks God's heart, we are able to mourn on behalf of a grieving person, or a nation we are called to serve. What breaks God's heart? When we begin to answer this question, we begin the first step to becoming instruments of change for those things that are important to God.

Perhaps it is an overemphasis in our own talent and abilities, or lack of complete trust in Jesus. Perhaps it is the lack of respect for human life that leads to the killing of innocent babies. Perhaps it is the deceit and pride that often rule the workplace of commerce. Or perhaps it is the strife and divisions among His own Body that grieve Him most. When we begin to mourn over our own sins in these areas, God begins to use us as instruments of righteousness to affect these things. It was only when God let me see my own sins in the workplace and how they broke His heart that I began to be an instrument for His purposes.

Today, ask God to show you what things in your world are breaking His heart. Then see how He might want you to be the priest to affect for Him. The first step is identification with what breaks God's heart. 

March 7 2012 Devo

Today we find many Christian workplace believers living a status quo relationship with God that is more characterized as "business as usual" than a life demonstrating God's power. Our focus is often more concerned with improving our standard of living than improving the Kingdom of God through our circle of influence. While this takes place, millions upon millions die without the saving grace of Christ. Many other Christians die never experiencing the freedom in Christ that His blood paid for. God has called each of us to live for a cause greater than ourselves - a life that is dependent on His grace and power to achieve things we never thought possible through our lives. This is His plan for your life. The apostle Paul prayed that He might experience the power of the resurrection in his life. This power is available to you and me to live for a cause greater than ourselves. Ask God what He wants to achieve through your life today. And consider yourself dead already to the consequences of what that might mean for you.

Loose Your Donkey

Loose Your Donkey
TGIF Today God Is First Volume 1, by Os Hillman
02-21-2012

..."Go to the village ahead of you, and at once you will find a donkey tied there, with her colt by her. Untie them and bring them to Me. If anyone says anything to you, tell him that the Lord needs them...." - Matthew 21:2-3

A donkey was an animal of commerce in Jesus' day. It was used to carry great burdens of goods from place to place and it was known as the "beast of the burden." The donkey in Matthew 21 was surely owned by a village workplace believer. But Jesus told His disciples to fetch the donkey for "He had need of it." This donkey played an important part in Jesus' triumphal entry into Jerusalem. It was a day that was the culmination of three years of ministry. Jesus chose to use a vehicle of commerce to bring Him into His most important public display.
We are entering a time in our own history in which God is saying to workplace believers, "Loose your donkey for My purposes. I have need of it." God is preparing His Church to be a vessel for ushering in a great harvest of souls. He is preparing His remnant of workplace believers, who are like a tribe within the Church, to be a major force in this great harvest.

"He will tether his donkey to a vine, his colt to the choicest branch; he will wash his garments in wine, his robes in the blood of grapes. His eyes will be darker than wine, his teeth whiter than milk" (Gen. 49:11-12). Is your donkey tied to the living Vine, the choicest branch of Jesus Himself? When we are tied to the living Vine, designed for His use, we will be useful in God's Kingdom. Jesus wants to free us from the bondage of work slavery; He wants us to walk in freedom so that others may see God's grace flowing through us and our place in the work world. Is your donkey available for His use?

Today, ask Jesus to allow the Vine to flow through you in every area of your life. 

Todays Devo: Feb 18, 2012

Weapons of Warfare
TGIF Today God Is First Volume 1, by Os Hillman
02-18-2012

"Beat your plowshares into swords and your pruning hooks into spears." - Joel 3:10a In this third chapter of Joel, we hear the prophet describe a time yet to come. It will be a time of great harvest on the earth, and this verse describes the catalyst. A plowshare is an agricultural instrument used to till the soil. At this point in history, it was a tool that spoke of one's vocation. However, the prophet was speaking of a time yet to come. The prophet described the plowshare as an instrument that will be turned into a sword. The sword is often used in the Bible to describe God's Word. The only way a plowshare can be turned into a sword is for it to go through extreme heat, and then the blacksmith must beat that plowshare into shape. Heat and punishment of the metal turns that plowshare into an instrument of battle. God must do this in each of our lives in order for us to be useable as a worthy sword. We are all in a battle - a spiritual battle. Paul describes our battle as one against the principalities of the unseen world. I believe God is going to raise up many in the workplace to use their plowshare as a weapon of righteousness in these last days. That weapon won't be used for destruction, but as a weapon of love. That weapon of love will yield a great harvest in our lifetime. But this is only part of the story.

God is also going to turn our pruning hooks into spears. A pruning hook is used in two ways. First, it is used to prune a tree for greater growth and productivity. It is also used to cut the fruit from taller trees in which one cannot reach the fruit. This fruit from our vocation is going to be cast forth like a spear, but even more as seed planted to bring the harvest of which Joel speaks. Fruit from our work life is often the financial rewards generated. God wants to use our finances and everything else for His purposes. We must use our vocations and the fruit that comes from them as seed to bring the great harvest that God is planning.

How are you using your plowshare and your pruning hook for God's glory today? Ask God to show you how He wants to use your skills, resources, and relationships to prepare for the great harvest He has planned.

Todays Devo:

Jesus Was A Workplace Minister
TGIF Today God Is First Volume 2, by Os Hillman

"Isn't this the carpenter? Isn't this Mary's son and the brother of James, Joseph, Judas and Simon? Aren't his sisters here with us?" And they took offense at him (Mark 6:3).
  In 2005, a movie entitled The Passion was released that chronicled the last twenty-four hours of Jesus' life. During a flashback scene, Jesus was seen in his carpentry shop making a table with his mother standing by playfully observing. It was a very beautiful scene that reminds us that Jesus was a carpenter for most of his adult life. In fact, Jesus was more qualified to be a carpenter than the Son of God in the eyes of the people because that is the history they knew of this young working class man from Nazareth.

Consider that in the New Testament of Jesus' 132 public appearances, 122 were in the marketplace. Of 52 parables Jesus told, 45 had a workplace context. Of 40 miracles in the book of Acts, 39 were in the marketplace. Jesus spent his adult life as a carpenter until age 30 before he went into a preaching ministry in the workplace. And, 54% of Jesus' reported teaching ministry arose out of issues posed by others in the scope of daily life experience. Saint Bonaventure said, "His doing nothing 'wonderful' (his first 30-years) was in itself a kind of wonder."
Work, in its different forms, is mentioned more than 800 times in the Bible -more than all the words used to express worship, music, praise, and singing combined. God created work and He is a worker. "My father is always at his work to this very day, and I too, am working" (John 5:17).

So, the next time you are tempted to minimize your daily work as anything less than a holy calling, remember that Jesus was a workplace minister as a carpenter in his community. He has called you and I to reflect His glory in our work.