Thoughts From the Bible

  Luke 20: 39- 47-   Jesus continued His teaching of the disciples and He did this publicly. Jesus was drawing their attention to those who lived false godly lives. In verse 46 and 47 we read this, "(46) Beware of the scribes, who desire to go around in long robes, love greetings in the marketplaces, the best seats in the synagogues, and the best places at feasts, (47) who devour widows' houses and for a pretense make long prayers, these will receive greater condemnation."  Jesus wants to see our belief in Him and our worship of Him to be as pure as humanly possible. He does not want to see us using ulterior motives in our worship of Him. We need to learn the principle of servanthood and servant leadership and unde rstand our rewards rest in His Heaven and not in the eyes of men here on earth.    Proverbs 16: 19- Better to be of a humble spirit with the lowly , than to divide the spoil with the proud.    

Mark 14: 22- 25-   (22) And as they were  eating, Jesus took bread, blessed and broke it, and gave it to them and said, “Take, eat, this is My body. (23) Then He took the cup, and when He had given  thanks,  He gave it to them, and they all drank from it. (24) And He said to them , “This   is  my  blood of the new covenant, which is shed for many. (25) Assuredly, I say to you, I will no longer drink of the fruit of the vine until that day when I drink it new in the kingdom of God. ”   Many churches routinely  observe  The Lord’s Supper. This is simply a moment taken to symbolically remember the price Jesus Christ paid for each of us.  We need to see this moment and this act as a simple moment of worship of Jesus Christ as He displayed His love for all of us. A moment of reverence but also a moment of worship to the Lord of the universe.   Proverbs  10:30-   The righteous will never be removed, but the wicked will not ...

Read Matthew 4: 5- 11- Jesus is in a weakened physical state and Satan continues to tempt him. We need to know Satan will do the same to us.  He will tempt us and attack when we are weak so He can win in our lives and point to our failures hoping our faith in God will weaken. Again, we see Jesus living out a lesson we need to learn. In verse 10, ‘Then Jesus said to him, “Be gone, Satan! For it is written, “’You shall worship the Lord your God and Him only shall you serve.’” ’   We need to guard very carefully who w e actually serve but we also need to be bold, even in our weakness, and tell Satan to who we serve.  We also need to be bold enough to tell Satan to leav e in the name of Jesus. Jesus will continue preserve us in our battles against Satan just as God preserved Jesus.

Read Revelation 19: 6- 10- This is an exciting passage that again emphasizes the worship of God over all that has happened in the world. The world is beginning to see the return of Jesus Christ to rule and reign supreme . This passage shows us where our priority should be.  We should be focused on God and the person of Jesus Christ above all of the miraculous and heavenly things that exist. Verse s 9 and 10 say, ‘And the angel said to me, “Write this; blessed are those who are invited to the marriage supper of the Lamb.” And he said to me, “These are t he true words of God.” Then I fell down at his feet to worship him, but he said to me, “You must not do that! I am a fellow servant with you and your brothers who hold to the testimony of Jesus. Worship God.” For the testimony of Jesus is the spirit of prophecy. ’   As we should do during each and every day of our lives, we should continue to focus on who Jesus is and praise Him in our work and how we live our lives. As we...

Read Revelation 19: 1- 5- This is a chapter of praise and triumph.  This chapter starts with prais e to God for His hand on the people and the events of this world.  This is a good example of how we should be working to develop a heart of praise that is a persistent state with us, not an event that we assume on Sundays or at time when Christians gather together.   Verses 4 and 5 says, “And the twenty-four elder s and the four living creatures fell down and worshipped God who was seated on the throne, saying, ‘Amen, Hallelujah!’ And from the thron e came a voice saying, “Praise our God, all you His servants, you who fear Him small and great.”   Much like this chapter, when we praise and worship God, our lives get better and our minds more focused on the proper things of life.  This chapter gets better as will our lives aft er we worship God.