Devotion

Is the Word of Christ Dwelling in You?

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This is a reference to Christ’s teachings, the Gospel message, and/or the Bible as a whole. “Let the Word of Christ dwell in you richly”, I believe this to be a call to allow the Word of God to be the most evident influence in the dish of your life! When we do allow this to influence everything about us, we will inevitably be a much more “tasty” treat for others to be around. The smell and taste of your life will begin to show forth fruits such as the ingredients that we have been discussing for the past several posts, such as; a heart of mercy, kindness, humility, gentleness, patience, forgiving, etc. (I have been using a clothing analogy in previous points, but think of all of those virtues as ingredients to the dish of your life). This kind of a life is certainly a sweet smelling offering to the Lord and to the people around us!

Are You Enjoying Life with Your Spouse?

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When Chasidy and I spend time together, we usually try to enrich ourselves with study and devotion to the Lord, as well as each other. We both understand the need for us to individually be healthy in our faith and connection with God, so we encourage that each and every day (even when we are on vacation!). I love to read to my wife and then discuss what we studied together. I love to hear her pray! What I have found is that when we take that time to connect with the Lord, our connection becomes so much stronger as a result. There is no greater feeling than to be at peace with the Lord and in harmony with your spouse! It is precious and I hope that all people will be able to experience this great treasure in life!

Pleasing God

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I recognize the importance of speaking out affirmation to my wife. I can watch her face light up when I say something about her that I love. I can see the love in her eyes when I seek to please her with words of affirmation. The encouragement from the author is to “let us continually offer up a sacrifice of praise to God.” (through him, Jesus). God loves to hear from our mouths what makes Him special, set apart, what makes us love Him, what excites us about Him, etc. I love this about God! Let’s not forget that He is worthy to receive such affirmation too, right? So let’s please Him by spending much of our time offering up words from our heart that affirm who He is and what He has done for us.

Loyalty

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I believe that each of us has an Egypt and a Promised land. I believe that we are all tempted to create, or assign, god figures into our lives that we end up worshiping because we believe that they will give us comfort, provision, peace, etc. Before we know it, we are gathering all of the gold around us and making a golden calf – just like the children of Israel did after Moses didn’t come down from the mountain where he met with God. When God doesn’t meet our timeline expectation, or doesn’t give us the answer we are looking for, or we don’t know where else to turn, we will be tempted to shift our commitment, or allegiance, to someone or something that seems to be the answer/solution to our problem.