Tag: Morning Musings

Morning Musing: Matthew 5:44

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“But I tell you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you.” (CSB – Read the chapter)

Have you ever tried to count all the commands in the Bible? You could probably google it. I’m sure someone has made at least a good faith effort at figuring out the number. I suppose it could also be a bad faith effort as well where a critic is trying to justify their criticism, but you get a count all the same. Why all the commands? I mean, God is God, but why can He just let us figure things out and live our lives on our own? It gets frustrating to run into one of His commands every time we start running down a particular road. Does it really even matter if we try? Let’s take a few minutes this morning to think about it.

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Morning Musing: 2 Chronicles 7:14

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“and my people, who bear my name, humble themselves, pray and seek my face, and turn from their evil ways, then I will hear from heaven, forgive their sin, and heal their land.” (CSB – Read the chapter)

There is perhaps no verse claimed as a mantle for American exceptionalism and a guarantee of God’s blessing for our nation than this one. Politically conservative Christians have claimed this verse as a cherished promise for many years. Whenever the culture wars begin to intensify, or some moral tragedy begins to unfold, we are told that if we will just get on our knees and seek God again like we did in some nostalgia-tinged fantasy image from our past, everything will be better. God will make everything better. But what if we’re wrong? Let’s talk this morning about the uncomfortable truth of this verse and what is real.

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Morning Musing: Ecclesiastes 5:1-2

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“Guard your steps when you go to the house of God. Better to approach in obedience than to offer the sacrifice as fools do, for they ignorantly do wrong. Do not be hasty to speak, and do not be impulsive to make a speech before God. God is in heaven and you are on earth, so let your words be few.” (CSB – Read the chapter)

How do you approach worship? Is it something you pretty much just do each week? Or, do you put more into it than that? In a book rife with cynicism about the world as it is, Solomon offers some reflections about the attitude with which we should approach the throne of God that should make us think twice about going to worship anything less than fully prepared for what we might experience there. It is a good reminder of not so much what we are doing as it is before whom we are doing it. Let’s talk for a few minutes this morning about getting worship right.

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Morning Musing: John 12:24

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“Truly I tell you, unless a grain of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains by itself. But if it dies, it produces much fruit.” (CSB – Read the chapter)

How is it that we manage to figure out who we are? More than that, how do we manage to become that person? There’s something inside of all of us that longs to be fully ourselves. The trouble is, most of us don’t really know who that is or how to get there if we do. There are all kinds of obstacles in the way. These appear in our path both internally and externally. Externally, some of the people around us don’t want us to become fully who we were made to be because they want us to be conformed to their own image for us. Maybe this is a parent in your life, but it could also be a sibling or a friend or a boss or a coworker. Many of our obstacles, though, are internal. We are afraid of the journey to reach that point. We don’t want to give up all of the things that will have to go for us to get there. We want to have options and not be fully committed to any one thing. The result here is often a mess. Jesus gave us a way to get there though. It is a way that was accidentally captured in the final episode of Titans season three. I know I did a review of the series a few weeks ago, but having just finished it at last, there’s one more thing we need to talk about. Let’s get to it.

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Morning Musing: Acts 1:14

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“They were all continually united in prayer, along with the women, including Mary the mother of Jesus, and his brothers.” (CSB – Read the chapter)

What do we do when we don’t know what do to? There are seasons in life when the path forward from where we are to where we want to be isn’t at all clear. The reasons for this are many, but the result is the same: we feel lost and alone and confused and anxious and we don’t know what to do about it. What we see here in the beginning of Acts offers us a good way forward for moments just like this. Let’s take a look at what these folks did when they didn’t know the way forward.

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