Exploring Scripture

Today's thought: Living in a culture that finds difficulty with any form of long-term commitment, where will I be in my walk with Jesus in about twenty years from now?

Today's thought: Our attitudes and our responses to trials will tell the true story about the levels and the maturity of our faith. We cannot choose the circumstances, but we can choose our responses.

Today's thought: The Lord knows where he has placed us, and for what reason. His word can reach us wherever we are, and can nourish us in our faith.

Today's thought: The Bible teaches that “we have this treasure in jars of clay” (2 Cor 4:7). You, and your brothers and sisters in Christ, are all “jars of clay”, and yet within, there is the life of Christ. Don’t be caught up in seeing them in the natural. Can you see the life of Jesus within them?

The faith that James wrote about was a faith that is not merely a cerebral affair, but one that is to be believed, experienced and worked out in the nitty- gritty of life at ground-level. This series will take your time over one or two verses at a time, hopefully allowing them to sink deeply into your heart and spirit. May you pick up the heart of James as you spend time with him.

Today's thought: each day, a volume of songs and prayers sits on your shelf, inviting you to enter and experience the world of the kingdom of heaven. Will you respond?

Today's thought: when was the last time you somehow sensed what was happening in heaven?

Today's thought: choose well. Don’t let the wind blow you away

Thought for the day: Read Proverbs 24:11,12. Ignorance is unjustified.

Today's thought: if people need to be saved, should that affect the reason and the way we do evangelism? Do we have a responsibility?

Today's thought: when the storms of life hit us, will we stand firmly rooted in Christ, or will we be blown away?

Today's thought: the wisdom and ways of God are ageless and have no need to be adapted to modern cultural tastes.

Today's thought: of all the kinds of prosperity that are out there, what kind are you looking for?

Today's thought: am I in charge of my attitudes, or are they in charge of me?

Today's thought: someone once said that “we need to learn how to turn stumbling blocks into stepping stones”.

Today's thought: God is not in a hurry. It is not in his nature, and neither should it be in ours.

Today's thought: if you sit long enough in the presence of Christ, you will feel his heartbeat. It will not only be for you; it will also be for those who have never known him.

Today's thought: Our local church, although not perfect, is the very place where God wants to nurture us. Our brothers and sisters in the faith have been strategically placed to walk with us, the light of Christ shining through their weaknesses and imperfections.

Today's thought: "There is no such thing as a spiritual journey. If a little shocking, this is refreshing. If there were a spiritual journey, it would be only a quarter-inch long, though many miles deep." We are usually more concerned about the visibility of our ministry whereas God is more concerned with the depth of our ministry.

Today's thought: There was an ache in the soul of David. It could only be assuaged by the presence of God. Meditating in the Scriptures and subsequent worship took him there.

Today's thought: maybe we ought to think about getting some ‘duvet victories’ – where we are able to crawl out from underneath our duvets in the morning to seek the company of the one who deeply loves us, and desires to meet with us, in the quietness of the dawn.

Today's thought: Guigo II was a Carthusian monk and the 9th prior of the Grande Chartreuse monastery in the French Alps from 1174-80. He wrote: "...reading puts as it were whole food into your mouth; meditation chews it and breaks it down..."

Today's thought: a Bible that’s falling apart usually belongs to someone who isn’t.

Today's thought: The words that we speak to each other can have profound effects. Many of us remember the effects of words spoken at us or into us years ago. God’s words are deliberately and intentionally spoken into us to cleanse, heal, restore, challenge and grow us into maturity. We need to open our hearts up to them.

Today's thought: When you delight yourself in the Lord, His Word and His ways become the focus and foundation of your life.