Vaccine Against Such Hostility

[S] Hebrews 12:3 --
 ³For consider Him who has endured such hostility by sinners against Himself, so that you will not grow weary and lose heart.

[O] This is a very powerful statement because I'm bound grow weary in this life on earth and what Jesus bore on the Cross is like the immunization shot against all weariness I will face.  As it says, weariness leads to discouragement which will lead to powerless life unable to live out to bear the fruits God desires.  So, this is definitely another potent weapon the enemy uses against us to veer away from God's path.

[A] Jesus paid the price by enduring hostility he did not deserve in order to provide the "vaccine" for us.  Now I have to take the vaccine to protect myself against the virus of weariness and discouragements.  I feel that virus is knocking at my door right now so I need to soak up more of His wonderful protection from the Cross he bore and realize I also need to endure various hostility because that is one way I can encourage other Brothers and Sisters in Christ around me.

[P] Dear God, I can see that the model Jesus set before us is the model we also need to live out in our own community.  Please grant me Your strength to endure the hostile environment I live in to shine a bit of the light that I received from Jesus.  In His name.  Amen.

Floating Out Of Circumstances

[S] Hebrews 11:23 --
 ²³By faith Moses, when he was born, was hidden for three months by his parents, because they saw he was a beautiful child; and they were not afraid of the king's edict.

[O] Parents of Moses risked their lives to save their newborn son because he was a beautiful child.  I mean, which parent is not going to say their newborn is the most beautiful child?  Even though newborns pretty much look about the same, the parents think theirs is the most beautiful one, right?  Well, Moses' parents went a step further than that and really believed there was something special about their son.  So, they hid him for three months and then let him float down the Nile River in a water-proofed basket (Exodus 2:3) when they could no longer keep him in secret.  As he was named Moses (which means "drew him out of the water" -- Exodus 2:10) I am wondering what would take for people to go out of their ways for something they really believed in.  The analogy here is as how Moses floated on the water without sinking because someone believed in him, I should also be believing something God has instilled in me to a point of rising above the situation I'm bombarded with.

[A] I feel like I am sinking in the current state of small group ministry after about 11 months since the inception, however, because I believe in the small group ministry to be the foundation of our church's spiritual growth toward God's purpose for reaching out to those desiring to make greater commitment to God here in the Bay Area.  It's quite challenging at the moment and I need to remember how God floated Moses out of the sinking waters of the Nile River.

[P] Dear God, draw me out of the water like Moses.  I can only turn to You now and lean on You as I pray in Jesus' name.  Amen.

Sin Eliminator

[S] Hebrews 10:18 --
 ¹⁸Now where there is forgiveness of these things, there is no longer any offering for sin.

[O] The sin offering is needed because we sin. If we do not sin then there is no need for such an offering.  In that train of thought, this verse tells me forgiveness creates such an environment where there is no need for sin offering which implies where there is forgiveness there is no room for any sin.  The forgiveness is one of the disciplines of my walk with Jesus that is still very difficult for me to obey completely.  I realized that opens up the opportunity for me or others to sin and I need to take this verse to heart.

[A] The most challenging part about forgiving someone who's offended me is my emotions and feelings telling me I have all the right not to forgive them since I was the one who was offended.  I want to claim my own right.  But in light of what Jesus our High Priest did to get rid of sin, I need to follow that model and forgive despite my rights.

[P] Dear God, You know which part of my life needs more obedience in forgiveness.  It still does not come naturally but have to struggle with it.  I need to reflect more on how You, Jesus, had forgiven us when You had all the rights not to and You did this in order to accomplish God's plan and purpose.  I would like to do this not just to become a better person but so I may fulfill Your purpose and plan through my obedience.  In Jesus' name.  Amen.

Perfect Blood for Perfect Covenant

[S] Hebrews 9:13-14 --
 ¹³For if the blood of goats and bulls and the ashes of a heifer sprinkling those who have been defiled sanctify for the cleansing of the flesh, ¹⁴how much more will the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered Himself without blemish to God, cleanse your conscience from dead works to serve the living God?

[O] If an animal's blood was used to cleanse people's sin in the first covenant with God, Jesus' own blood will definitely cleanse and then some my sin in His new covenant.  His perfectly pure life was used by God to offer up as a sacrifice for an unworthy life of mine (and the rest of mankind).  This new covenant is a perfect covenant because a perfect sacrifice was used to make it.  Why would God do such a thing?  I believe His purpose was for me to walk away from my own dead works in order to serve the God who lives now and forever.  I need to keep reminding myself how significant this needs to be in my every day life because as I take it for granted my life's purpose becomes more blurry.  God's new covenant is what gave me the new life and that's not a small matter.

[A] I need to take a break from all the busyness of small group ministry and have a retreat of my own to praise God for His perfect and new covenant which is the reason for why I get myself involved in His ministry in the first place.  I have to avoid getting myself too wrapped up in "doing" the ministry.

[P] Dear God, You perfect and lovely plan of salvation is why I call myself Christian, or follower of Christ.  May I not forget that as I involve myself in Your ministry here on earth.  I want to do them not for achieving goals I set but because the joy overflows out of me for remembering the amazing sacrifice You provided for me.  In Jesus' name.  Amen.

Covenant Written On My Heart

[S] Hebrews 8:10 --
    ¹⁰"FOR THIS IS THE COVENANT THAT I WILL MAKE WITH THE HOUSE OF ISRAEL
         AFTER THOSE DAYS, SAYS THE LORD:
         I WILL PUT MY LAWS INTO THEIR MINDS,
         AND I WILL WRITE THEM ON THEIR HEARTS.
         AND I WILL BE THEIR GOD,
         AND THEY SHALL BE MY PEOPLE.

[O] The covenant God makes with the house of Israel is the ones that are permanently embedded into their minds and hearts first.  Unlike most of the contracts we make today with a whole bunch of conditional clauses, God's covenant is foremost targeted toward our minds and hearts such that we will be His people, acknowledging that He is our God.  So this is something much beyond a written contract because it is written on our hearts to establish such a covenant relationship with God.  He desires for me to call Him my God while submitting myself under His authority.

[A] One of the ways for me to gauge how well I am doing in this department of keeping the covenant God written on my heart is to ask the question of how hard I'm working to achieve my ministry goals because if my answer is yes, that indicates I am not acknowledging God of Heaven as my God and forgetting that I am part of His people.  Deep inside, I must first catch His peace of doing His ministry.  Once I sustain my right attitude, then yes I will strive for the highest excellence, but in the end I know God is the one who will achieve my ministry goals (which originated from Him in the first place).

[P] Dear God, You are my God, and I'm Your people.  May this covenant be alive in all I do for You.  In Jesus' name.  Amen.

The Anchor of My Soul

[S] Hebrews 6:19-20 --
 ¹⁹This hope we have as an anchor of the soul, a hope both sure and steadfast and one which enters within the veil,
 ²⁰where Jesus has entered as a forerunner for us, having become a high priest forever according to the order of Melchizedek.

[O] The anchor is used to stabilize a ship from floating or drifting away in ocean.  That picture applying to my soul was a great concept for me today as I thought about how easily my soul can wonder off in midst of all the events taking place in my life coming at me like the ocean waves.  Without any anchor my soul will wonder far away into the ocean getting lost as the waves get stronger and stronger.  This anchor is the hope Jesus gave me by through His life on earth living out the full purpose of God.  This anchor is the hope for any and all situations I am and will be in.  This anchor is what will sustain me through ups and downs of my life.

[A] Even though doing God's ministry is a joy, it was never meant to be easy, per se.  In fact, in some ways there is agony of building up a ministry from ground up.  Much like a start-up company requiring a lot of sweat hours to bootstrap a viable business from a mere concept (or a dream), I believe kick-starting a God-inspired ministry requires a lot of efforts, struggling through challenges to bring them into fruition God intended.  One of the major stumbling block in carrying out His ministry is discouragement, and a simple definition of discouragement is absence of hope, and just like verse 19 states, without hope my soul will be anchorless.  So, I want to reattach my soul to His Hope for me that He had paved the way for me to have a direct access to God who is almighty, all knowing, and all powerful.  How can I have discouragement when I can tap into such a wonderful God?

[P] Dear God, forgive me for feeling discouraged with so many things coming my way in life when I can cast all of my burdens on You.  I want to anchor my soul to Your hope, and through that I want to steadfastly and all-out serve You rain or shine and seek Your wisdom to carry me forward.  I surrender the small group ministry to You once again because it is Your ministry after all.  In Jesus' name.  Amen.

Daily Adjustments

[S] Hebrew 5:8 --
 ⁸Although He was a Son, He learned obedience from the things which He suffered.

[O] This verse encourages me because it implies obedience is not easy!  Even God's own Son had to learn obedience.  It is true that what Jesus had to obey was many orders of magnitude higher than what I would ever think of but the fact that obedience is not something you're born with encourages me to continue learning despite the number of failures before and still to come.  Now the end of this verse mentions the obedience of Christ included His suffering.  It was not merely getting up a little earlier to start the day with devotions, but the suffering of being detached from God the Father and then to bear the painful cross and humiliation and then to surrender His own Spirit into the hands of death.  Did He know He will rise again conquering the death?  Yes, but that does not make the process any less painful.

[A] Obedience is not about one day I will be up against an awesome opportunity where I will either obey and come through with flying colors, but it is about constantly making adjustments in my own life through daily devotions in God's word to learn from smaller things how to obey despite the sacrifices and suffering involved.  I must obey the calling of Jesus about taking up my cross daily, not weekly, monthly or yearly.

[P] Dear God, in the midst of so many distraction, I want to put the personal time I have with You foremost.  Please allow me to adjust my own schedules to do just that.  In Jesus' name.  Amen.