Category Archives: Life

Devotions, Kingdom of God, Life, Motivation, PINOGAM

Grassy Hillside thought Who, Why, What

Hillside Thoughts for Monday – Day 287 of the year 2024 – October 14

Matthew 6:9-13 “This then is how you should pray: Our Father in Heaven, hollowed be your name, your kingdom come, you will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.  Give us today our daily bread. And forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors. And lead us not into temptation but deliver us from the evil one.”

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Jesus considers three things: character, conscience, and conduct.  When we establish an equilibrium between these three things of “Who am I”, “Why I do”, and “What I do”, then we will have a balanced life.

When we set our lives in order before God, we have a new character, the “Who am I” for me is a Child of God. Once my character has been set, then my motive, my “why I do”, becomes clear. My motivation in life is to conform to God’s will.  My why must conform to my who. Finally, and only when my character defines my conscience, then and only then can I do. Actions speak louder than words, but both must conform to the who and the why.  The “What I do” must align with the “Why I do.”

Seeing ourselves as children of God, conforming to His image, will result in doing. When all three are in line, can we live valiantly, peacefully, joyously, and lovingly in the Kingdom of Heaven.  We can have our bread, we can forgive, we can resist temptation and we can be delivered.  That is enough.

# Just Larry

Culture, Devotions, Justice, Life

Going one step further to grace and mercy

Matthew 5:38-42 “You have heard that it was said, ‘Eye for eye, and tooth for tooth.’ But I tell you, do not resist an evil person. If anyone slaps you on the right cheek, turn to them the other cheek also. And if anyone wants to sue you and take your shirt, hand over your coat as well. If anyone forces you to go one mile, go with them two miles. Give to the one who asks you, and do not turn away from the one who wants to borrow from you.”

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    Another remarkable teaching from Jesus on the grassy hillside. I have taken my place near the front that I might not miss anything. Every phrase, every thought is filled with both mystery and conviction.

But now Jesus is suggesting that I must allow the evil in this world to triumph. Am I to assume the role of victim in any encounter with someone who would do me harm? Is all that I own subject to anyone who wants to borrow it? This teaching of Rabbi Jesus is tough.  I don’t want my cheek slapped. I don’t want to give my shirt away.  I don’t want to go the extra mile.  I don’t want to lend my favorite fishing pole to a clutz. Jesus must be telling me something more here than a radical reaction to an offense.

     The culture in which we live remains resolute in its ability to accomplish much. There are many things the secular world can do better than the church. There is a place for government to do things the individual cannot.  Industry can build a car without being Christian. But there is one thing the world cannot do.  That thing is the offer of grace. Jesus was saying we are to be different from our culture, government, or industry.  We can look beyond the requirements and go a little further and become grace and mercy to all the world.

Just Larry

Assurance, Devotions, Life, Preaching

Blessed are…

Matthew 5:3-12 The beatitudes. Blessed are….

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Nine attitudes of the Christian life. Attitudes that find their source in Jesus. Attitudes that make Christians different. Attitudes which describe expectations and acceptance. Attitudes when all tallied up make a difference in my life. Today I must circle back to one word that begins each. What is this blessing? What is this favoritism, this acknowledgment of my worth which is pointed to those who have these attitudes? How do I understand, experience, and feel this blessing? How is my being conformed to each called-out attitude a blessing?

There has always been a dichotomy, a struggle between two points of view. One side was saying they were led by the spiritual and didn’t need any other guide. The other was extolling the merits of keeping every law, precept, tradition, and cultural norm. The spiritual and the law have always been a center of argument and division. The law demands conformance, yet these gifts of grace are offered as free and abundant.

As I sit on the grassy hillside, I listen carefully to hear and understand how I shall live. I hear these nine characteristics of faith. Each is a gift is determined by my relationship to God. I do not hear commandments but blessings. Blessings, not because of what I do, but for what I am. Blessings to empower life. Blessings to overcome. Blessings to be more than a set of rules and regulations. Blessings to strengthen. Blessings to live a life full of love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and control. (Galatians 5:22,23). What a blessing! Nine reasons for nine attitudes. Gifted to become and to be.

# Just Larry

Culture, Devotions, Life

Blessed are the Meek

Matthew 5:5 “Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth.”

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Third on the list of attitudes of belief given in Jesus’s sermon is translated either as “meekness” or “gentleness”.

This disturbs me because occasionally I am impatient when I am trying to get something done and there is some competition distracting me.  I do not tolerate interruptions well.  For me, there is no such thing as multitasking. I must admit there are times when it is difficult to walk and chew gum. Similarly, the multitude could not walk along the paths of life and learn from Him at the same time. The time and effort to switch from walking to learning lent itself to errors due to insufficient attention.  Jesus stopped on the grassy hillside because he knew well that life often interrupts change.

Patient endurance of life is an activity of distraction.  Endurance is something that must be done. It was a “keep calm and carry on” type of thing. All the energy of putting up a good face, living life amid turmoil, and getting your just rewards prevent the attainment of something better.  This something better was simply relaxing and letting God sort it out. It is being meek.  It is being gentle.  It is stopping what I am doing and facing interruption as an opportunity for learning.  Why?  Because I already have an inheritance of focus. Blessed are they who are interrupted and relishing the moment because it is all good. I can stop in the middle of thousands of competing attention grabbers and simply listen.

# Just Larry

Devotions, Life

My Peace Meter

Psalm 40:1-3 I waited patiently for the Lord; he turned to me and heard my cry. He lifted me out of the slimy pit, out of the mud and mire; he set my feet on a rock and gave me a firm place to stand. He put a new song in my mouth, a hymn of praise to our God. Many will see and fear the Lord and put their trust in him.
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The peace that comes from being in the right relationship with God is not the peace of this world. There have been times in my life when I have taken a step forward only to slide two steps in the opposite direction on my peace meter. Peace in our current culture is vastly inferior to God’s peace. To those who don’t have God in their lives, peace depends on having favorable circumstances: if things are going well, then we feel peaceful; when things go awry, the peace quickly dissipates. Jesus made the distinction between His peace and the world’s vacillating peace: “Peace I leave with you; my peace I give you. I do not give to you as the world gives.”
It is fundamentally a choice: peace with God through trust or to settle for the less, offered by the world through circumstance.
Just Larry

Devotions, Life, Mercy

Get my brakes fixed, second.

Matthew 6:25,26 “Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothes? Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they?”
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No one likes to be told what to do! Jesus, are you telling me about how I should live my life? “Do not worry about your life”, sounds like a command. I may not worry as much as others I may know, but there are times when an emotion that could well be characterized as worry does pop its head up in my life. But Jesus, does this mean that when my brakes on my old pickup start to grind and the pedal is as soft as an over-ripe peach, I should not worry about going down the interstate at 70 miles an hour in rush traffic?
Perchance, I think what he is really saying is “Don’t let worry become my conditioned and continual response to circumstances out of my control. I must rely moment by moment on his provision, promises, and plan. First, I must realize God is the source of my peace, and second, get my brakes fixed.
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Just Larry

Devotions, Forgiveness, Life, Mercy, PINOGAM

I need “IT”

Micah 7:18 “Who is a God like you, who pardons sin and forgives the transgression of the remnant of his inheritance? You do not stay angry forever but delight to show mercy.”

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We all have been there.  Thinking we have our lives in control and then something never even conceived in our worst nightmare happens.  And we fall on our faces in grief and regret. We come to a place where all the fixing and repairing will not work. The only solution is mercy.

I have been there. I have experienced it.  I have panted for it.  I have never deserved it.  My own weakness, foolishness, pride, personal independence, and simple rebellion have all been efforts to run away from it.  Mercy is the “IT” of my life. My life has tasted the power of God to forgive. “IT” is only when we get away from ourselves and we find God. Mercy is the only solution and path to peace, wisdom, completeness, delight, joy, and victory.

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Lord, as my day begins, I resign my own stubbornness to simply accept your mercy.

Assurance, Devotions, Life, Prayer

Trust Not Adjust

Colossians 3:2-3 “Set your mind on the things above, not on the things that on earth, for you have died and your life is hidden with Christ in God.”

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The world has drilled into our minds from early childhood a need for conformity. There is a “norm” to which we must conform. Our culture tells us that success and happiness depend upon how well we adjust to it.  And once we have God in our lives, this religious experience can become an add-on.

We must recognize one of the great problems in our modern Christianity: Those who come to Christ probably have their minds made up that to stay sane they must remain “adjusted” to the society around them.  We will add Jesus to our lives to the edge of our culture, but not an inch over. 

But the world does not have any idea where it is going.  Our society has never found its highest and best.  It is a life groping in the darkness dragging Jesus along the way.  All the while we are filled with puzzlement, fear, and frustration.

Thankfully, it was to this kind of world Jesus came. He died for its sin and now lives for the salvation of all who will trust and not adjust.

Assurance, Bible, Bible Study, Devotions, Life, Motivation, Ramblings

Today

Isaiah 55:6-7 Seek the LORD while he may be found; call on him while he is near. Let the wicked forsake their ways and the unrighteous their thoughts. Let them turn to the LORD, and he will have mercy on them, and to our God, for he will freely pardon.

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Discovering and doing the will of God is the “only” way to have a consistent experience of His abundant life.  I have but one simple decision every morning as I shake the sleep from my eyes.  That decision is how I shall live my life today.  Either I will let the world affect me or I will affect the world for God.  There are thousands of alternative paths to follow if the world is my choice.  But to choose Jesus there is only one.  Today I will seek.  Today I will find.  Today I will call upon Him. Today God will have mercy. Today God will be God in my life.  Today God will freely pardon. Today I will choose to glorify Him.  Today I will be the person God has intended me to be.  I will seek Him while He may be found.  I will call upon Him while I still have breath.  It may sound trite, but I say it again: today is the first day of the rest of my life.   

Assurance, Bible, Devotions, Life, Motivation, Personal

Living in the question!

I Peter 4:12-13 “Dear friends, do not be surprised at the fiery ordeal that has come on you to test you, as though something strange was happening to you. But rejoice since you participate in the sufferings of Christ, so that you may be overjoyed when his glory is revealed.”

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From these words from Peter spring two emotions.  One of fear of an impending trial of my faith, and second hope. These words tell me there is little to shadow my current joy. Yes, things happen. Yes, there will be events in my future that could well rock my belief in my fellow man. Peter tells me don’t be surprised at the inhumanity of man.  He tells me there will be events that could well steal away my personal peace and personal comfort. “It rains on the just and the unjust.” The manner in which I have become accustomed, can and will be disturbed. It will happen.  It may cause strange and disturbing thoughts and even actions. Nevertheless, when the skies seem to be falling and the enemy presses hard and heavily, I am called to reflect on the hope that never fails. I have an “inheritance incorruptible and is undefiled and will never fade.”  That is my peace.

“Have patience with everything that remains unsolved in my heart. I have learned to live in the question.”