live2bless

In explaining my podcast title, allow me to highlight two things.   First that I realize I’m on earth for one double tiered reason.  The bottom or supporting tier is to be always walking in friendship with Jesus.   That means sharing all of myself with him and in turn seeking to receive all that he would share of himself with me.  The second tier has to do with extending the offer of that same fri...

James 4:7,8a (NET) “…Submit to God. But resist the devil and he will flee from you. Draw near to God and he will draw near to you.” First, submit to God. Here’s one way we can test the extent of our submission to God: Ask yourself the question, how honestly I can look at any prospective activity on any given day and say, “If God isn’t in it, if he’s not guiding me, I don’t want anything to do with...

1. Take full ownership and responsibility for your every thought, word, action, and reaction. Otherwise in the face of disagreeable behaviors in others or unpleasant circumstances, you are saying — and here fill in the pause in my voice with a person or circumstance — “I am blaming __________ for my reaction to __________.” Consider how delusional that sounds. It could serve as a definition for th...

In Matthew 7:15-16 (NET) Jesus taught: 15 “Watch out for false prophets, who come to you in sheep’s clothing but inwardly are voracious wolves. 16 You will recognize them by their fruit. Grapes are not gathered from thorns or figs from thistles, are they?” Everyone of us has at our immediate disposal a way whereby we can judge our beliefs. We can instantly know if we are believing truth or lies. T...

Perhaps we need to redefine the purpose of prayer. Instead of thinking about it in terms of getting God's attention, what would happen if we saw it more as giving God our attention. In so doing we come face to face with his infinite wisdom, goodness, and power. And coupled with the fact that we are dear to him, wouldn’t that have quite an impact on how and what we pray?

In Isaiah 5:7 the Lord refers to his people with what I suggest is one of the most endearing expressions in the entire Bible. We read, “The vineyard of the LORD of Armies is the nation of Israel, and the people of Judah are the garden of his delight.” How beautiful is that? It seems to speak to what is on God's heart of hearts for us. Once he calls us to himself and we yield to his ownership,...

Luke 12:4-7 (NIV) 4 “I tell you, my friends, do not be afraid of those who kill the body and after that can do no more. 5 But I will show you whom you should fear: Fear him who, after your body has been killed, has authority to throw you into hell. Yes, I tell you, fear him. 6 Are not five sparrows sold for two pennies? Yet not one of them is forgotten by God. 7 Indeed, the very hairs of your head...

Hell is the place people go to who make a friendship with God impossible because their helpfulness is selective and conditional. And that’s because they live alone in the driver’s seat of their lives. Heaven is where people go who are God’s friend because they help everyone no matter how they are treated by anybody. And that’s because they live in the passenger’s seat of their lives with Jesus at...

Why does the Bible put such stress on the importance of our personal trials and adversities? I suggest it is because — cheerfully responded to — they lay the foundation of what makes us increasingly useful to God. When we respond well to them they help us devalue transitory blessings and value the enduring realities of life such as loyalty, humility, compassion, kindness, gentleness. This world wi...

God is absolute in all his characteristics and attributes. In other words, he is absolutely good, absolutely just and fair, absolutely faithful, absolutely wise, and so on. He’s never just partially this or that. This even applies to the fact that he is personal. He is maximally personal — thinking, feeling, choosing, and self-aware to the nth degree. But regarding the aforementioned qualities, it...

There is no greater affirmation of how valuable every man, woman, and child is to God than Jesus’ death on the cross. Giving up his own life was how far God was willing to go to let us know we are exceedingly precious to him. He could not have gone any further. But perhaps next to that — albeit in negative terms — comes Jesus teaching regarding what stands to happen to us if we even speak disparag...

What is to be the net effect of all my influence in the lives of others?  Why on earth am I here?  Isn’t it to help others respond positively to God’s 24/7 work in their lives? How do I do that ?  By loving them.  Which is to say, by helping them grow in an awareness of how precious they are to God.   What do they need to know ?   (1) That he created them for his personal enjoyment of their one-of...

In listening to a near death experience of someone who had attempted suicide, the author finished describing her encounter with Christ on the other side in these words, “My heart broke as I realized that I had been not only hurting my family who are beloved children of God, but also causing my Savior, who had such all-encompassing love and compassion for me to suffer all because I had allowed myse...

Have you ever wondered about the relationship between psychology and the teachings of the Bible? For the sake of clarity, psychology is defined as “the scientific study of the human mind and its functions, especially those affecting behavior in a given context.” I think we do well to respect psychological research insofar as it seeks to establish connections between things people experience and ho...

So what do you think? Does God have any limits on what he would like to give us? Is he interested in only sharing so much wisdom and no more? so much power and no more? What about guidance? Is he only going to give us so much guidance after which we are on your own? And what about qualities such as patience, kindness, goodness, or gentleness? Does he make only so much of these available after whic...

Suppose you are reading a historical novel. It is interesting enough to where you can hardly put it down. A trusted friend sees what you’re reading and says, “that’s a interesting book, a real page turner, but there is a monstrous lie woven into it towards the end.” Before your friend has time to explain, he has to leave. Think about this for a moment: I am quite certain that for the rest of the b...

In James 4:8 we read, “Draw near to God, and he will draw near to you.” What is it to draw near to God? I suppose some might answer with things such as read your Bible or go to church. We might say we need to take some time to pray. But there’s a problem: if that’s drawing near to God, how do we go about reading our Bibles all the time or attending church 24/7. We can’t do it. And even to constant...

In Matthew 17:20 we read of Jesus saying, “Truly I tell you, if you have faith as small as a mustard seed, you can say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there,’ and it will move. Nothing will be impossible for you.” I have shared the following quote a couple of times before on these podcasts, but today it occurred to me that it may be a key in helping us understand something of what Jesus meant...

Have you ever wondered why it is that, while Jesus reduced all the commandments down to two — love God and love your neighbor — he seems to have gone even further in revealing through the apostle Paul that the second commandment actually takes in the first? Here’s what we read in Romans 13:8-10 (GW) — 8 “Owe no one anything, except to love one another, for the one who loves his neighbor has fulfil...

Let’s take one more look at the questions, What is God’s perspective?   What does God see as being all-important? Here’s a forth proposition: 4) You share God’s perspective when you know that you are only as spiritually alive as you are spiritually helpful, and that the most helpful work you ever do for others is to keep yourself spiritually healthy.  The evidence that you know this? You constantl...

In this weeks’ podcasts I’ve been attempting to answer the questions, What is God’s perspective? What does God see as being all-important? Here’s a second proposition: 2) You share God’s perspective when you know his wisdom, guidance, and strength are all you need to avoid disaster or encourage what’s good. The evidence that you know this? You do nothing without relying on him for wisdom, guidance...

Matthew 16:21-23 (GW) 21 From that time on Jesus began to inform his disciples that he had to go to Jerusalem. There he would have to suffer a lot because of the leaders, the chief priests, and the experts in Moses’ Teachings. He would be killed, but on the third day he would be brought back to life. 22 Peter took him aside and objected to this. He said, “Heaven forbid, Lord! This must never happe...

Jesus taught that, “Whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will find it.” (Matthew 16:25) Years back I read the following amazing story from WWII.* I’ve been unable to collaborate it so here it is, as is. The man reporting it tells of meeting a pilot who flew laborers from China into Burma during World War II to work on jungle roads. The flight was long...

Romans 12:1-2 (NET) “Therefore I exhort you, brothers and sisters, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a sacrifice—alive, holy, and pleasing to God — which is your reasonable service. Do not be conformed to this present world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, so that you may test and approve what is the will of God—what is good and well-pleasing and perfect.” The goal...

No doubt you are familiar with the phrase, “laughter is the best medicine.”   There is evidently some truth to that.  A recent study “demonstrated that having a chuckle causes the tissue inside the heart to expand – and increases oxygen flow around the body.  Patients with coronary artery disease who engaged in a course of laughter therapy had reduced inflammation and better health, the research f...