Wednesday, January 29, 2014
Sunday, January 26, 2014
Saturday, January 25, 2014
Introducing our online webzine for leaders: Purpose Tools
Purpose Tools is an online webzine designed to equip, encourage, and invigorate leaders in ministry.
Wednesday, January 22, 2014
Saturday, January 18, 2014
Purpose Kids: In the Beginning
Click Below to listen Do it as a family and discuss. The family that prays together...Stays together.
Thursday, January 16, 2014
The Great House of God
The Great House of God
“You are one step away from the house of God. Wherever you are. Whatever time it is. Whether in the office on Thursday or at soccer practice on Saturday, you are only a decision away from the presence of your Father … all you need to change is your perception.”
1. What does it mean to you to be in the presence of God?
Remember, this is no house of stone. You won’t find it on a map. You won’t find it described in a realtor journal.
But you will find it in the Bible. You’ve seen the blueprint before. You’ve read the names of the rooms and recited the layout. You’re familiar with the design. But chances are you never considered it to be a house plan. You viewed the verses as a prayer.
Indeed they are. The Lord’s Prayer. It would be difficult to find someone who hasn’t quoted the prayer or read the words. Children memorize it. Parishioners recite it. Students study it … but I want to challenge us to do something different. I want us to live in it … to view it as the floor plan to our spiritual house. In these verses Christ has provided more than a model for prayer, he has provided a model for living. These words do more than tell us what to say to God; they tell us how to exist with God. These words describe a grand house in which God’s children were intended to live … with him, forever.
2. What part of the Lord’s Prayer means the most to you?
3. How would you describe someone who lives close to God?
24 The God who made the whole world and everything in it is the Lord of the land and the sky. He does not live in temples built by human hands.
25 This God is the One who gives life, breath, and everything else to people. He does not need any help from them; he has everything he needs. 26 God began by making one person, and from him came all the different people who live everywhere in the world. God decided exactly when and where they must live. 27 God wanted them to look for him and perhaps search all around for him and find him, though he is not far from any of us: 28 ‘We live in him. We walk in him. We are in him.’ Some of your own poets have said: ‘For we are his children.’ ”
Acts 17:24–28
4. How do people reach out to God?
5. How would you describe God’s dwelling place?
6. If God is not far away from us, what causes us to feel so removed from him at times?
9 So when you pray, you should pray like this:
‘Our Father in heaven,
may your name always be kept holy.
10 May your kingdom come
and what you want be done,
here on earth as it is in heaven.
11 Give us the food we need for each day.
12 Forgive us for our sins,
just as we have forgiven those who sinned against us.
13 And do not cause us to be tempted,
but save us from the Evil One.’
Matthew 6:9–13
7. What phrase of this prayer is particularly meaningful to you today?
8. In what ways does God provide your daily bread?
9. What does this prayer say to you about dwelling in God’s presence?
“You were intended to live in your Father’s house. Any place less than his is insufficient. Any place far from his is dangerous. Only the home built for your heart can protect your heart. And your Father wants you to dwell in him …. Your Father doesn’t just ask you to live with him, he asks you to live in him.”
Journal
In what ways do I live outside of God’s presence?
For Further Study
To study more about dwelling in God’s presence read Psalm 23:1–6; 27:4–5; 90:1–2; 139:7–12; John 14:23.
Additional Questions
10. If God’s house were a house in your city, what would it look like?
11. What do you think are the significant rooms in the house of God?
12. How does prayer give someone access to the dwelling place of God Almighty?
Wednesday, January 15, 2014
How to deal with Fear: Loss
DEDICATE YOUR LIFE TO THE LORD
Commit your way to the LORD,
Trust also in Him,
And He shall bring it to pass.
PSALM 37:5
Having found our deepest delight in God, we realize that we must give all of our lives to Him. This isn’t a temporary commitment, a halfway intention, or the feeling of a moment. It’s a choice and a contract of the heart. As in marriage, we commit ourselves to that partnership for the rest of our lives.
How does committing to the Lord help us in times of material loss? In committing to Him, we cast all our burdens upon Him. He becomes our life—the place where we bring our problems, our joys, our marriages, our families, our careers. Life and happiness are no longer dependent on financial success or material possessions. It’s now all about Him.
The verse above ends with the phrase “And He shall bring it to pass.” When we trust Him, depend on Him, and respond to Him in faith, He will make our greatest dreams come true by elevating them from the material to the eternal.
God is also the answer when our losses leave us unable to help ourselves:
The helpless commits himself to You;
You are the helper of the fatherless.
PSALM 10:14
When we dedicate ourselves to God, helpless becomes a word without meaning. When we’ve lost our jobs, our houses, or our savings, and debt or bankruptcy stares us in the face, it’s as if we’re crushed under the weight of an enormous sack filled with every problem facing us. It’s a burden too heavy to bear. We can’t take another step. We can’t lift it—but God can. He gently says, “May I take that upon Myself? My shoulders are stronger.” As we say yes, life brightens and becomes joyful.
Cast your burden on the LORD,
And He shall sustain you;
He shall never permit the righteous to be moved.
PSALM 55:22
[Cast] all your care upon Him, for He cares for you.
1 PETER 5:7
Why keep struggling with your losses on your own? Why not give the burden to Him? Nothing could be more liberating.
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