Sometimes waking up to another day is difficult. We have problems leftover from the day before (and maybe you don’t even like leftovers in the frig), and we know we will have to face them and deal with them. Add to that we don’t know what a new day is going to bring. What crisis will we have to face personally? What tragedy will we have to help someone we love get through? What unexpected phone call, email, or text will we get that puts another heaping of trouble on our already full plate? Yeah, sometimes we don’t think it’s worth the effort to even get out of bed.

However, I think that is a wrong way for us to be thinking about each new day that God gives us. God will certainly allow us to face each new day like the gloomy Eeyore character in Winnie the Pooh, but the Bible is pretty clear how we should look at each new day:

“The steadfast love of the LORD never ceases; his mercies never come to an end; they are new every morning; great is your faithfulness. ‘The LORD is my portion,’ says my soul, ‘therefore I will hope in him.’” (Lamentations 3:22-24)

Mornings are God’s reminders that we get a new start with a fresh set of invigorating God-sent mercies! I know that I need this reminder every now and then because I get into a habit of being pessimistic about a new day; those are days when I am cynical and looking for the next “bad” thing to happen. But just think what would happen if everyone reading this decided to wake up every morning thanking God for the mercies He guarantees for the day. Take this challenge: write out Lamentations 3:22-24, put it in a place where it will be the first thing you see and therefore think about each morning, do this for 40 days, and then start talking about how God changed your days by thinking of His never-ending supply of mercy for each day.

Grace & Peace,

Are we a refreshing oasis in the middle of a dry and hot desert? Or, are we a disappointing soda machine on the side of a long stretch of road with an “Out of Order” sign? This is something I just can’t shake this week. It is something I spoke about Sunday morning from Philemon. It was sort of a passing thought, but it was one truth that I’ve been thinking about constantly. Let me explain…

If you don’t remember that’s ok (maybe you weren’t even here), I said that Paul was grateful for Philemon because he was refreshing to the saints in Colossae.

“For I have derived much joy and comfort from your love, my brother, because the hearts of the saints have been refreshed through you.” (Philemon 7)

Do I leave people refreshed or drained? We have to make a choice here. We can’t make excuses like, “I’m just not an outgoing person” or “I’m shy.” That really doesn’t resonate with God.

You see, I want to be that guy that people love to talk to because I leave their hearts refreshed. I want to direct the conversation in a way that would magnify God and lift the spirits of the person to whom I’m talking. I want to leave people wanting more, not less. I don’t want people to feel critiqued and miserable because they stopped me and talked with me.

How about you? Do you want to be that refreshing bottle of water on a hot day? Do you want people to avoid you because they know they are going to come away from you discouraged, confused and criticized?

We can become a source of refreshment if we remember what flowed out of Philemon – love and joy. People need a break. We all have been in a battle this week and need someone to refresh us with love and joy. We need to feel that someone genuinely, biblically, foundationally loves us. And we need to talk to someone who sees life from God’s perspective, not the media’s. We need to hear some good news of great joy!

My prayer is that people look for you to be refreshed.

Grace & Peace,

William Shakespeare wrote a play called “All’s Well that Ends Well.” In other words, if the story ends well then living the story is good too.

After reading the last five chapters of Revelation I couldn’t help but come to the conclusion that everything is going to end well for believers. Those ending chapters not only close out a great prophetic book of the Bible but they are also a divine exclamation point on human history. Yes, for believers it ends very well indeed.

Actually the story of human history has a beautiful beginning as well. Reading the opening chapters of Genesis inspires us to adore a God who intimately constructed the universe. He created a perfect place where the human race would not just survive, but thrive. He places the first couple in an extravagant garden and gives them a great big “YES” – “enjoy it all and honor Me through your enjoyment.” And He only gives them a little “no” – “don’t go there, stay away from that which I know will destroy you.”

It’s neither the beginning nor the ending that causes us trouble, it’s the middle. We quickly discover in Genesis that every thing goes south in paradise for Adam and Eve (Genesis 3). No, it didn’t take them long at all. And this is where all of us live – in the middle. We’ve lost our enjoyment of God, we mess up living with others, we’re depressed more than we’re happy, we fight, struggle and just muddle through life hoping to make it to the next fun event. We mark off time hoping retirement will bring us the joy we lost. What a miserable existence.

You see, the problem is that we’ve allowed today’s circumstances to rob us of today’s joy. Bad things dictate our joy when it should be God’s promises found in the Bible that bring us joy. To change the trend we must saturate ourselves with the promises of the gospel we find in God’s Word every day. Yes, every day. The battle for our joy in God is an every day battle, so we must drink deeply of God’s Word every day to refresh our souls.

I’m not worried about the end; remember it ends well for all God’s children. And if it ends well then shouldn’t today be a good day as well? Yes it should. Let’s take our cue from the Psalmist,

This is the day the LORD has made; let us rejoice and be glad in it. (Psalm 118:24)

Grace & Peace,