I will share about Christian books I have read or listened to.
I will be sharing about my life before and after Christ. I will include stories about my pet and other pets I have encountered.
Our Daily Bread
In Matthew 6, Jesus’ disciples ask Him how they should pray. So Jesus teaches them a very simple prayer that covers the basic areas of life. Jesus’ model for prayer orients our hearts toward God and His kingdom work on earth. And in the middle of that prayer, Jesus prays, “Give us today our daily bread.”
What Jesus is showing us is this: God wants us to bring everything to Him in prayer—even the small things. God cares about us and our needs.
This prayer also points out that it is God who gives us good things and provides for us. While it may seem like we earn our own basic necessities, it is actually God who gives us our breath and our ability to work and earn a wage. God even created the very food that we eat.
Everything we have comes from God. That means we can spend time in prayer thanking Him for what He has given us, and talking to Him about our needs.
What’s significant is that Jesus doesn’t ask for God to provide His needs for tomorrow or next week —He only asks for His needs today. Our whole life can change in an instant, and things we’ve stored up for years can be taken away. But Jesus teaches us to depend on God to meet our needs day by day. Dependence on God takes trust—but when we trust in Him, we end up living by God’s power and provision rather than our own.
Take some time today and thank God for what He has given you. Thank Him for taking care of your basic needs each and every day, and ask God to continue to meet your needs each and every day. Consider how you can live with an increasing awareness of God as your provider. He loves you and cares for you.
His Pain, Our Gain
Isaiah 53 is a stunning chapter in the Bible—in what is now commonly referred to as the “Old Testament.”
Approximately 700 years before Jesus walked the earth, Isaiah prophesied about a suffering servant who would also, somehow and in some way, be exalted. A coming Savior, a future Redeemer, the long-awaited Messiah—whose death would ultimately bring life.
A portion of Isaiah 53 says this:
“But he was pierced for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was on him, and by his wounds we are healed.”
Isaiah 53:5 NIV
So, who was this man who would be pierced, crushed, and wounded because of someone else’s sins? Whose undeserved punishment would be the catalyst for healing? Whose life would be given as an offering—so that others might live?
Jesus Christ not only fits the description of the suffering servant who paid the ultimate price to buy His people back, redeem them, and set them free—He ...
“Go to now, ye rich men, weep and howl for your miseries that shall come upon you. Your riches are corrupted, and your garments are motheaten. Your gold and silver is cankered; and the rust of them shall be a witness against you, and shall eat your flesh as it were fire. Ye have heaped treasure together for the last days. Behold, the hire of the labourers who have reaped down your fields, which is of you kept back by fraud, crieth: and the cries of them which have reaped are entered into the ears of the Lord of sabaoth. Ye have lived in pleasure on the earth, and been wanton; ye have nourished your hearts, as in a day of slaughter. Ye have condemned and killed the just; and he doth not resist you. Be patient therefore, brethren, unto the coming of the Lord. Behold, the husbandman waiteth for the precious fruit of the earth, and hath long patience for it, until he receive the early and latter rain. Be ye also patient; stablish your hearts: for the coming of the Lord draweth nigh. Grudge...
