Scripture:
Exodus 4

THE BATON OF DISOBEDIENCE Have you ever been faced with a serious setback along the
road of obedience? You are following God and seeking His will, then
bang!--disaster strikes. It happened to Moses. He was on his way back to Egypt
with his wife and family, and all set to confront Pharaoh, when he became so
ill he thought he would die. In Moses' case (and sometimes in ours, too) the
problem was an old sin that hadn't been addressed. He had been so busy gearing
up for God's program that he had neglected a matter of obedience in his own
family. He had failed to circumcise his son. Does that seem petty? Does it seem
like a little thing? It was not little in the sight of God. If you make up your
mind that you want God's best for your life, if you commit to seek and follow
His will, if God's blessing matters more to you than anything, God will hold
you to it. And He'll take you back every time to the place you got off track
and give you the chance to begin again. Moses dropped the baton of obedience by
failing to circumcise his son. He thought he was ready to do God's bidding, and
to face the leaders of the most powerful nation on earth, but first there was a
small matter of obedience to rectify at home. Have you ever watched a relay
race in a track meet? A baton is passed from runner to runner, and the exchange
can add or subtract vital seconds to the runners' score. If the baton is
dropped, it must be picked up. The runner who finishes the race without
it--even if he finishes first--is disqualified. When a sin of omission or
commission blocks your progress, if you have the human power to do so, you must
go back and get it right. Only when you have done so are you ready to move on
and be blessed by God in the race of life.

 

TIMING
Timing is so important. It is the common denominator of every great comedian
from Red Skelton and Jack Benny to Bill Cosby and Jerry Seinfeld. It is the
secret of so many things, from cooking to commodities trading, and it can be
the difference between success and failure in any endeavor. Did you know that
you can do the right thing at the wrong time and it will end up being the wrong
thing? Ask Moses. Timing is critical. The number one enemy of God's timing is
impatience. His plan is best, and His timing is perfect, but we often get
impatient. My friend Jeannette Clift George likes to say with a chuckle that
God has never been late, although He has missed many good opportunities to come
early! I can identify with that sentiment. We have the mistaken idea that to be
impatient is a show of strength--but just the opposite is true. When you see
someone walking a dog that is straining on the leash, bucking and snorting and
choking--do you think the problem is that his master is moving too slowly, or
that the dog has not learned to heel? It is a great day when a man or woman
decides to put their talents and abilities and passions to work for God's
cause. It is a greater day when that same person waits for God to say how and
where and when.

 

Scripture:
Exodus 2

TRUST OBEY AND FOLLOW The Dreamworks team in Hollywood has discovered a new star.
They've packaged him as the Prince of Egypt - but we've known him for a long
time now as simply Moses. His story is full of drama and action and conflict,
and has been the subject of more than one movie. But at its core, it is a very
basic story of one man learning to follow, trust and obey God. Moses had a
rocky start. He was nearly lost at birth, but was adopted into Pharaoh's
household instead. He grew up an Egyptian prince, but he was really the son of
a Hebrew slave. He lived in two worlds until he was forty, then decided to cast
his lot with his own people - but that quickly backfired. His intentions were
good--but Moses tried to do what he believed was God's work his own way. Sound
familiar to anyone? He killed an Egyptian who was beating a Hebrew, then buried
his body in the sand. He thought no one saw, but he was found out. Maybe he
didn't dig deep enough, and as those desert winds blew, his victim's toes were
soon sticking up out of the sand! When we take our evil and sin and try to bury
it, we're never successful. It keeps coming back up. We're forced to lie more,
deceive more, if we want to cover our original sin. Then fear comes in. Let sin
come into your life and fear will quickly follow. A man told me once,
 "I never knew gut-wrenching, paralyzing fear until I began to cheat
on my wife. Then I lived every day in sheer terror of being found out."
When Moses struck and killed the Egyptian, he looked east and west - but he
didn't look up. He was concerned about what men might see, but hadn't
considered the eyes of God. Confronted with his sin and rejected by his people,
he did the only thing he knew to do: he ran. Until we are ready to trust, obey
and follow God, we are not ready to be used by God, no matter how good our
credentials or our intentions!

 

Scripture:
Romans 14

FREEDOM
AND RESPONSIBILITY We are free in Christ. Free from sin and death. Free from
legalistic rule-keeping. But we are not free from responsibility--and part of
our responsibility is to nurture those who are younger and weaker in the faith,
even at the cost of our own personal liberty. My friend Johnny Baker tells a
story that illustrates this beautifully. Johnny was an all-American football
player for Mississippi State who went on to play for the Houston Oilers. One
Saturday Mississippi State played, and defeated, the University of Houston,
which was no small accomplishment. Some alumni at the game passed out cigars to
the winning team, and Johnny stuck his in his pocket during the trip home. The
next day, back in Meridian, Johnny was sitting on the front porch at his folk's
house, by himself. He felt in his pocket, and noticed the cigar, opened it, and
put it in his mouth. Johnny didn't smoke, but he said he sort of shifted it
around in his mouth, and thought about that big win the day before. In a little
while, a young boy walked up to the porch.  "How 'ya doin'?"
Johnny said.  "Come on up here and sit by me a minute." And the
boy climbed up to sit next to his big, football-playing neighbor. Johnny and
the boy began to talk, and he said in a few minutes, he noticed the boy had a
stick in his mouth. Then he remembered the cigar in his. Johnny talked a little
more, then reached up, took the cigar out of his mouth, broke it in half, threw
it down, and said,  "You know, I think I'll quit smoking." The
boy took the stick out of his mouth, broke it, threw it down and said,
 "Yeah. Me, too." Our liberty in Christ extends only as far as
it does not cause a brother or sister in Christ to stumble. When it does,
responsibility supercedes freedom.

 

Scripture:
Psalm 149

GOD-PLEASING
WORSHIP One of the major problems with our worship is that we evaluate it by
asking the wrong question.  "Did you enjoy worship?" we might
ask someone who's just attended a church service. But the point of worship is
not that we enjoy it (although certainly we should), but that God is pleased by
it and honored through it. A better question would be,  "Did God
enjoy your worship?" I've enjoyed the few Broadway shows I've seen. I once
tried to get tickets to My Fair Lady and could not--and ended up seeing a new
show called Funny Girl with an unknown actress named Barbra Streisand. (I guess
you could say I fell uphill.) In theater, you have the actors, the audience,
and an unseen assistant called the prompter--whose job is to whisper cues to
the actors when they forget their lines. Most of us have the idea when we
worship in church that the preacher is the actor, God is the prompter telling
him what to say, and the congregation is the audience. But this is wrong. In
worship, God is the audience, and the congregation is on stage. The preacher is
simply a prompter, helping the people focus their attention on God. If worship
is true and God-honoring, He is blessed by every hymn sung, every word
proclaimed, every gift given and every testimony spoken. It is all about Him -
and all for Him.

 

LET'S TALK TREES The righteous man, the Bible says, will flourish, while the wicked
man will be destroyed. If a wicked man is like grass, the psalmist writes, a
righteous man is like a tree. And not just any tree. A palm tree. What's so
special about a palm tree? Well, first of all, it grows upright, in harmony
with the pull of gravity. A righteous man is upright, too, and his life is in
harmony with the moral universe in which he lives. The palm tree also grows in
unlikely environments - places where no other tree will grow. It even grows in
the desert, its roots reaching down deep for nourishment. In the same way, a
spirit filled Christian can thrive in a spiritual desert. Palm trees grow from
the center out, not adding external layers, but being renewed from within. A
righteous man may show signs of age or wear externally, but he is constantly
being renewed from within by the Holy Spirit who dwells in him. Finally, the
palm tree is evergreen. It never loses its leaves or turns brown and brittle.
It is always in season. The righteous man is full of life, too. As the years go
by he grows in grace, always vibrant, always valuable, always flourishing. The
promise of God for the righteous man or woman is that there will be life and
sweetness and produce and growth, not just for a brief season, but for an
entire lifetime! The wicked have their day - but it is fleeting. The righteous
endure, and their productivity only increases as the years go by.

 

Scripture
: Psalm

ON BORROWED TIME There will be a day of reckoning for all - and that includes the
wicked who seem to be managing quite well at present. God is just, and men reap
what they sow. Mark it down: anyone who is living in defiance of Almighty God
is living on borrowed time. To test this, I did a little experiment. I put
together a list of five guys who were real troublemakers back when we were in
high school in Laurel, Mississippi. I tried to pick out the worst offenders I
could think of: guys who were profane, who were immoral and just out and out
rebellious. Then I tried to find out what had happened to them in the years
since we were in school together. One died of complications related to
alcoholism. Two others were addicted to drugs and alcohol, and had several
marriages between them. Their children and their children's children were
having problems similar to their own. The fourth one just disappeared. No one
knew what had happened to him, or if he were dead or alive. The fifth guy I
checked on was working for the government in Jackson, Mississippi. I called him
to say hello, and he told me that God had changed his life. (He even told me he
was attending church on Wednesday nights!) The wicked may seem to prosper for a
time, but they do not prosper indefinitely. They are like grass. They have
their day in the sun, then they wither and perish.

 

Scripture:Psalm 8

THE CHAMPION
Goliath was the Philistine champion who walked the no man's land between the
camp of the Israelites and the camp of the Philistines. Goliath ruled that real
estate without dispute until a little shepherd guy named David challenged him,
saying  "I come to you in the name of the Lord of hosts, the God of
the armies of Israel, whom you have taunted." And then out-weighed,
inexperienced David issued to Goliath what must have seemed like the most
ridiculous death threat ever:  "I'm going to come down there and take
your head off!" And he did! David took Goliath's title as champion, but
his victory was simply a foreshadowing of the one that would be won by the real
champion, the Lord Jesus Christ. Jesus is the champion's champion who stepped
into the no man's land between holy God and sinful man, and bridged the gap
with His own blood. When you are in God's camp, and Jesus is in your heart and
life, you too can walk between the lines of God's kingdom and this world with
assurance and humility. Knowing that the champion's champion is on your side
should give you the confidence to risk and love and grow here in no man's land.
There are giants in the land, it's true, but our Lord is majestic and powerful,
and His love for His children is stronger than any foe that challenges us.

 

Scripture
: Psalm 8

THE
MAJESTY AND GLORY God doesn't just have name recognition - He has name respect.
David penned these words of praise following his victory in God's name over the
Philistine giant Goliath. No doubt God's name was majestic in Israel on that
day - but what about today? Is the Lord's name excellent over all the earth? A
half billion Buddhists would say no. A quarter billion Hindus would say no.
Millions of atheists and agnostics would say no. But there are also millions
who would say  "O Lord, our Lord, how majestic is Thy name in all the
earth." And the day will come when every knee shall bow and every tongue
shall confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to God's great glory!  "How
could God's name be majestic today," some might ask,  "if there
are no more giants to kill?" Is it possible for God to be glorified in our
day and age through the lives of ordinary believers like you and me? It is! In
fact, our ordinary-ness is His natural avenue for glory.  "When we
are weak," the apostle Paul said,  "He is strong." This has
been God's way throughout history. Moses--the baby in the bullrushes-- eventually
overthrew Pharaoh and his kingdom. God Himself became a baby in Bethlehem and
turned our world  "right side up" with His coming. It is almost
as if the limitations of His people are a perfect background to display His
brilliance. Have you ever bought a diamond? If you have, the jeweler probably
showed it to you on a piece of dark velvet. The dark, dull velvet sets off the
facets of a diamond beautifully. Can God's majesty and glory shine in our dark
world? Yes it can - and does - and will.

 

Scripture:
Psalm 90

NUMBER
YOUR DAYS    "One life to live, soon will be past. Only
what's done for God will last." Fame, power, popularity, riches and
influence will be a memory one day - but the things we do for God and Christ
will last forever. With that in mind, we are to number, or measure our days, so
that we can present to God a heart of wisdom and a life of meaning. John was a
fellow in a church I pastored years ago. He accepted Christ in his sixties, and
when he did, he became a regular at every church service, event and meeting. He
was at the church so often that someone suggested I speak to him, so I did.
 "John," I said,  "you know church is church, but
you're up here all the time. Don't you think you could miss a meeting or
two?" He said,  "Pastor, I've been away from the Lord for 64
years, and now that I have found Christ, I want all of Him I can possibly
get." John was making up for lost time--for the years that passed without
peace and salvation and fullness. But each one of us needs to measure our days.
Do you number yours? If the average life expectancy is 80 years, is it noon in
your life? Or 6:00 p.m., or 8:00 p.m.? Take note of the time, and remember that
only what's done for him will stand its test.