DHD: Six Bible Verses with Commentary

by Chris Doyle | Feb 22, 2019

Greetings!

For this week’s DHD I decided to share six of my favorite Bible verses with commentary from the Life Application Study Bible. I hope these passages encourage you!

1. Prov. 17:17 – “A friend loves at all times, and a brother is born for adversity.”

“What kind of a friend are you? There is a vast difference between knowing someone well and being a true friend. The greatest evidence of true friendship is loyalty—being available to help in times of distress or personal struggle. Too many people are fair-weather friends. They stick around when the friendship helps them and leave when they’re not getting anything out of the relationship. Think of your friends and assess your loyalty to them. Be the kind of true friend the Bible encourages.”

2. James 1:19 – “…But everyone must be quick to hear, slow to speak and slow to anger;”

“When we talk too much and listen too little, we communicate to others that we think our ideas are much more important than theirs. James wisely advises us to reverse this process. Put a mental stopwatch on your conversations, and keep track of how much you talk and how much you listen. When people talk with you, do they feel that their viewpoints and ideas have value?”

3. Prov. 3:5-6 – “Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and do not lean on your own understanding. In all your ways acknowledge Him, and He will make your paths straight.”

“When we have an important decision to make, we sometimes feel that we can’t trust anyone—not even God. But God knows what is best for us. He is a better judge of what we want than we are! We must trust Him completely in every choice we make. We should not omit careful thinking or belittle our God-given ability to reason, but we should not trust our own ideas to the exclusion of all others. We must not be wise in our own eyes, but be willing to listen to and be corrected by God’s Word and wise counselors. Bring your decisions to God in prayer; use the Bible as your guide; and then follow God’s leading. He will direct your paths by both guiding and protecting you.”

4. Matt. 6:33 – “But seek first His kingdom and His righteousness, and all these things will be added to you.”

“To make the Kingdom of God your primary concern means to put God first in your life, to fill your thoughts with His desires, to take His character for your pattern, and to serve and obey Him in everything. What is really important to you? People, objects, goals and other desires all compete for priority. Any of these can quickly bump God out of first place if you don’t actively choose to give Him first place in every area of your life.”

5. Psalm 34:8 – “Taste and see that the Lord is good. How blessed in the man who takes refuge in Him!”

“Taste and see” does not mean, “Check out God’s credentials.” Instead, it is a warm invitation, “Try this; I know you’ll like it.” When we take that first step of obedience in following God, we cannot help discovering that He is good and kind. When we begin the Christian life, our knowledge of God is partial and incomplete. As we trust Him daily, we experience how good He is.”

6. Rom. 8:28 – “And we know that God causes all things to work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose.”

God works in “everything”—not just isolated incidents—for our good. This does not mean that all that happens to us is good. Evil is prevalent in our fallen world, but God is able to turn every circumstance around for our long-range good. Note that God is not working to make us happy but to fulfill His purpose. Note also that this promise is not for everybody. It can be claimed only by those who love God and are called by Him, that is, those whom the Holy Spirit convinces to receive Christ. Such people have a new perspective, a new mindset. They trust God, not in worldly treasures; their security is in heaven, not on earth. Their faith in God does not waver in pain and persecution because they know God is with them.

Pray For Pain

by Caleb Moore | Feb 19, 2019

Often when we pray, we pray for relief. We pray for financial relief, emotional relief and physical relief. Most of us have never prayed for pain, at least not directly, but pain is often a result of our prayer life.

Any time you want to grow spiritually you can be sure that pain will play a part. If I were to ask you in what seasons of life do you grow the most spiritually, many of you would talk about a difficult circumstance you went through.

Maybe it was the sickness of a loved one where you had to learn to trust God. Maybe it was loosing a job, where again, you had to learn to trust God for provision. In all of my biggest leaps of spiritual growth, pain played a big part.

The question isn’t, “Will there be pain?” The question is, which kind of pain will you choose? Sometimes I grow because I suffer the consequence of my own actions. This is self-inflected pain that God uses to grow me. Other times, the pain is found when I am following God’s commands, and the situation gets really difficult.

In the Old Testament, Elijah experiences good growth through pain. He stands before Ahab and proclaims that it will not rain until he decides that it is time. Elijah got to be the mouth of God before an evil and powerful man. He got the chance to really make a difference and to stand on the greatest stage where he spoke boldly for God.

Then God leads him to a stream where ravens bring him his food, and he drinks from the water. However, over time the stream begins to go dry. Why? Because that is exactly what Elijah prayed for. Pretty soon Elijah gets thirsty, and the water is all gone. His pain was a direct result of his prayer life.

I would argue that God was using that time to prepare Elijah for what comes next. It’s hard to see when you are in the midst of a struggle, but sometimes that pain is a blessing, especially if it is the result of obedience.

Too many times we pray for God to ease the pain of our own mistakes. If pain is inevitable, then it would be best to experience the growth that comes from obedience.

So this is the choice we as Christians have to make. What kind of pain do you want? Do you want the pain of consequences or the pain of obeying your calling? When we follow the example of Elijah, or even Jesus himself who chose the pain of the cross, God uses that obedience in mighty ways.

This week, I ask that you pray a dangerous prayer. Pray for pain, but pray for the pain that comes from trusting God. If we are to mature, we must trust, and trust is always scary. But I would rather suffer from obedience than have to suffer one more time for the same old mistakes of my past.

Pray for one another

by Caleb Gordon | Feb 14, 2019

I personally think that we are on the edge of something really big in the church world. 

For the past 70 to 80 years, we’ve done our dead-level best to make Christianity look polished and slick. When you ask the average church-goer how life is, the standard response is, “NO problems here, we’re good.” 

We have preachers who “look” like they have everything figured out. Their families are perfect; no struggles or problems, so, therefore, it’s tough to approach leaders and talk about our everyday problems. So, instead of following the mandate of James 5:16, we build a wall of isolation in the attempts to be perceived as having it all figured out. 

This is why we are seeing 50 percent of Christian marriage falling apart because we don’t have real community. We don’t have a safe place to sit down and talk through our struggles and problems. We don’t have a place to get real answers. 

Let’s be honest. When someone asks ‘How are you doing?’ If someone actually starts to unpack the messy, we get a little freaked out, and we want our cell phone to ring, so we can avoid the actual conversation. Because we don’t actually want to get involved, we just want to have the perception of being involved. 

My friends, there would be so much freedom if we as Christians just followed this one verse.  

“Therefore, confess your sins to one another and pray for one another, that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous person has great power as it is working” (James 5:16).

I need you to see what just got unpacked there. James did not say confess and gossip to one another. He said confess and PRAY FOR one another!   

If Christians would just take the time to actually care about one another, we just might see a body of people who could shake the planet for the mission of the Gospel. If we had a group of people who understood we were all flawed, but in Christ we were by no means failures, it just might generate a revival in the church.  

What we need are people in the church who want to see others succeed in Christ. We don’t need to pile drive one another into the pavement. We need to encourage each other to find Christ as our perfect Savior, who has already rescued and redeemed us from the horridness of sin and self, and simply rest in His finished work that he did on the cross on our behalf.  

I think we are so close to seeing this in the American church world. And I think that’s going to happen because of persecution. If you look at the church in Middle Eastern and European countries, this is what’s happening, and as a result, the church is growing. We are seeing authentic communities of Gospel-centered faith that are activated for the cause and mission of Jesus Christ. These people are not star struck by some preacher. They are not building a castle. They are focused on seeing the Kingdom of God built.  

“The Spirit himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God, and if children, then heirs—heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ, provided we suffer with him in order that we may also be glorified with him” (Rom. 8:16-17).

When people suffer for the cause of the Gospel, their mindset changes. It’s no longer how they can advance their agenda, get ahead, or tear one another down. Rather, they look for ways to advance the Kingdom, win souls for Christ and sacrifice for each other. 

I think that if a bulk of people in the American church would adopt this mindset we would see a complete transformation and a spirit-filled revival.   

Book Review: The Gospel Comes with a House Key by Rosaria Butterfield

by Karen Kinnaird | Feb 12, 2019

Eager to immerse myself into a book that has caused quite a buzz in recent months, I settled into my recliner with a blanket and cup of tea, ready to be entertained and inspired. Shortly after, glancing down at only page number 43 I had to close the book. I thought to myself, “I can’t do this. I can’t live like this.”

Published by Crossway in 2018, The Gospel Comes with a House Key – Practicing Radically Ordinary Hospitality in Our Post-Christian World isn’t just about hosting the monthly Sunday School fellowship. Butterfield writes about “radically ordinary hospitality” where people “see their homes not as theirs at all but as God’s gift to use for the furtherance of His kingdom.” Resembling homes of first century Christians, this type of hospitality views “houses as hospitals and incubators” and where one “risks getting close enough to people to get hurt.”

The type of daily, radical hospitality that Rosaria Butterfield writes about is completely out of my comfort zone. Sensing conviction, my conscience was soon relieved as I rationalized two dates scheduled on my calendar to open my home—one to host an overnight retreat for the young women in my home church and another to host church planting wives in my area. This, however, is not exactly what Rosaria Butterfield is referring to.

This manner of hospitality doesn’t worry about matching dishes, dirty windows or weeds in the garden. It’s the kind that is OK with not knowing how many will show up for a meal. It’s the kind that doesn’t care if someone else’s hairy dog sleeps on the couch. It’s the kind that gets up at 4:30 a.m. every day to start cooking or the kind that sacrifices luxuries to accommodate a higher grocery bill—every week. The meal may be beans and rice, or soup and fresh bread, but the focus is on relationships with people who may be different and hold different worldviews. It focuses on safe conversations with open Bibles, which build trust between skeptical unbelievers and authentic Christians.

Butterfield is a former tenured professor of English and women’s studies at Syracuse University. As a former atheist, LGBT advocate and feminist, she was dramatically converted by means of hospitality herself in 1999. Rosaria is married to Kent, a Reformed Presbyterian pastor in North Carolina, and is a homeschool mother, author and speaker. She is an advocate for adoption, foster care and SAFE Families for Children. Butterfield is one of the keynote speakers at the BGCO Women’s Retreat at Falls Creek in April.

The book is a blend of autobiography and theology. Butterfield writes in the first person and invites readers into her life as she shares her devotional life, her home life with her pastor husband and adopted children, and unique unconditional love for her neighbors. She writes about her difficult childhood, complicated relationship with her mother and her time in the LGBQ community. She writes skillfully about incidences requiring church discipline. The story of the reclusive next door neighbor Hank who gets busted for the meth lab in his basement is compassionately woven throughout the book.

I highly recommend The Gospel Comes with a House Key for both men and women, married and single. Warning: it will step on your toes. Butterfield doesn’t pull any punches. She is unrelenting in her stance on sin and repentance. The book will challenge your evangelistic efforts and cause you to examine your relationships with different and difficult people in your neighborhood and life.

Perhaps it is time to recognize the idols of comfort, control, safety and security that have subtly taken precedence over the Lord. Perhaps it is time to confess that we’ve made our homes private sanctuaries and stop using excuses of being incapable or too busy. 

In the end, I was entertained and inspired, but I was also convicted, challenged and called to action. Reality is, I really can’t do it. This is the fruit of a Spirit-filled life. My life won’t look just like Rosaria’s, but with God’s help I can do better—a lot better.

From the Heart: Loving That Person I Still Don’t Like

by Angela Sanders | Feb 6, 2019

I have to see so-and-so today, and I dread it. 

Not because I’m afraid of them. They aren’t in a position to hurt me anymore.

Not because I’m jealous of them. I don’t want anything they have. 

I dread seeing them because our interaction always reveals ugliness in me. I don’t ignore them.  I don’t say vindictive things. I don’t use body language to make them feel uncomfortable. In fact, I don’t think they even know I still struggle, but I do.

Over time, with God’s help, I have learned how to love them in practical ways for His sake, how to speak and demonstrate grace with sincerity, how to measure out mercy when they exhibit behaviors that bring up dark memories for me, and how to forgive completely, truly believing and acting as if they don’t owe me anything else for what happened. 

The thing is, I don’t care about them, not like I should.  I see the work God is doing in their life, but I don’t rejoice with them like I do with others. When they suffer, I don’t hurt for them like I’d hurt for someone else.  When they fail, I struggle not to feel gratified. 

Honestly? If you told me I’d never see them again, I wouldn’t be too sad. Curious, yes.  Regretful over what could have been, of course, but not really sad.

See? Ugly. Really ugly. Strong evidence that I’ve got a lot of growing to do, and I don’t like to be reminded. 

I may have beaten my body and made it my slave to a certain degree (1 Cor. 9:27), doing the right things by this person so as not to discredit the Gospel outwardly, but I have not allowed God to transform my mind where they are concerned (Rom. 12:2). 

If I had, I would feel compassion toward this spiritual sibling who struggles just like I do to keep moving forward in their faith. I would care less about the effects of their behavior on me and more about their behavior’s effect on Jesus’ reputation in the world. I wouldn’t keep congratulating myself for doing the bare minimum in this one relationship when Jesus gave His utmost for us all.

Hard truth? My obedience in this particular relationship has been superficial at best so far. It’s time to get serious about letting God demonstrate what He can do in and through a thoroughly surrendered heart. 

It’s time to turn my focus away from what’s temporary—myself, this person, and our mutual experience included—and fix it on the eternal—God, the Gospel, and His eternal purpose (2 Cor. 4:18). 

It’s time to recognize anew the Holy Spirit’s authority in my life and give Him jurisdiction not only over my behavior, but over my thoughts as well, allowing Him to take captive any and all that don’t please Him until I only see what He sees when looking upon this imperfect sibling of mine, the very same blood of Jesus that covers my own sin, no less offensive than theirs.

Okay, Lord. I’m ready. Teach me to love deeply, this time from the heart (1 Pet. 1:22).