Tag: disciple

When the gospel is faithfully preached, taught, and lived, its your affections that restrict you

On By Dr. Casey LewisIn DevotionalsLeave a comment

“You are not restricted by us, but you are restricted in your own affections.” (2 Cor 6:12)

When the gospel is faithfully proclaimed, taught, and lived it’s not the person proclaiming, teaching, and living that restricts others from following God’s Word. Instead, it is the person’s affections that restrict them from turning to the Lord.

Affections refer to what we love. They determine what we are drawn to and what captures our attention. When we refuse to turn to the Lord, our affections are captured by something or someone else.

If we claim to be Christian, we must allow Jesus and Jesus alone to capture our attention. We shouldn’t be drawn to anyone or anything else but Him.

When the gospel is being faithfully proclaimed, taught, and lived, that which restricts someone from coming to Christ or following Him in obedience is their own affections. To what are your affections given? Are they given to the world? Are they given to something or someone more than to Jesus? God desires our heart, our affections, our love.

Be a minister of reconciliation in the power of the Spirit.

On By Dr. Casey LewisIn DevotionalsLeave a comment

“Not that we are sufficient in ourselves to claim anything as coming from us, but our sufficiency is from God,” (2 Cor 3:5)

We think a lot of ourselves, but should we? Are we solely responsible for our accomplishments? Especially our accomplishments as it relates to the kingdom of God?

Paul, writing to the Corinthians, has a different take than many of us. He didn’t believe himself to be sufficient for the task of winning people to Christ. He was not eloquent like the Super Apostles. He didn’t have a huge following. He didn’t have wealth or status. By all accounts he was inadequate for the task. Paul knew he was inadequate. He knew he didn’t have what it takes in and of himself.

But Paul was sufficient for the task. He was sufficient because God made him sufficient. In verse 6, he goes on to say,

“who has made us sufficient to be ministers of a new covenant, not of the letter but of the Spirit. For the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life.” (2 Cor 3:6)

He is sufficient because the Lord made him sufficient. Sufficient for the task of changing people, not from the outside in, but from the inside out. In order for true heart change to occur, the Spirit must be at work in the individual. We can’t manufacture heart change. But the Spirit can. He will and does use us for the task at hand.

As we approach the New Year, make it a point to reach out to others. But don’t do so in your own strength. Instead, trust in the Lord. Allow Him to empower and use you for the task at hand. You are not sufficient in and of yourself, but you are sufficient as the Spirit empowers you. Depend on Him in prayer, asking that He direct and guide your path to those He would like to reach with the good news of Jesus. Be a minister of reconciliation in the power of the Spirit. He makes you sufficient.

What is God’s purpose in allowing us to suffer and face difficulties?

On By Dr. Casey LewisIn DevotionalsLeave a comment

“Indeed, we felt that we had received the sentence of death. But that was to make us rely not on ourselves but on God who raises the dead.” (2 Cor 1:9)

Why doesn’t God take the pain away? Why doesn’t He free us from all difficulties? Is it because we don’t have enough faith? Some would want you to believe your difficulties are correlated with your lack of faith, but that is not the biblical answer.

Paul had faith. He worked for the Lord tirelessly, traveling around the known world at the time preaching the gospel. He, however, was ridiculed, arrested, beaten, and left for dead. He experienced difficulty not in one city but in several. In the verse preceding the above Paul relays to the Corinthians that he was “so utterly burdened beyond [his] strength that [he] despaired of life itself.” (2 Cor 1:8).

What was God’s purpose in allowing Paul to suffer? What is God’s purpose in allowing us to suffer and face difficulties?

Deep down we believe we can do life on our own. That we are capable of handling anything that comes at us. Our culture — the books we read and the movies we watch — drill that idea into our heads. We are told we can be like Mike. No mountain is to high for us to climb. No task to difficult. That we need only to pull up our boot straps and get to work. We are the master of our own ship. We can sail that ship wherever we want in our own strength and ingenuity.

While these mantras are popular, they aren’t true. Life doesn’t work that way. Most all of us will never play like Mike. There will be mountains too high to climb and tasks too difficult for us to do. While we might be able to sail some places in our ship, we can’t sail around the world. Sometimes our boot straps break!

What is God’s purpose in allowing us to suffer and face difficulties? It is so we might rely on God and not ourselves. God is all-powerful, all-capable, all-sovereign. There is nothing too much for God. We must depend on Him to accomplish what we can’t. To help us with our tasks. To use us to accomplish our mission and purpose in the world to make disciple-making disciples for His glory.

When we live in prayerful dependence on the Lord, we experience joy, meaning, and purpose.

Do you recognize you were bought with a price?

On By Dr. Casey LewisIn DevotionalsLeave a comment

“for you were bought with a price. So glorify God in your body.” (1 Cor 6:20)

We are to seek to glorify God daily by living according to His will. We should seek to glorify God, not to earn favor from Him, pay for our salvation, or pay Him back.

Instead, we are to align ourselves with His will out of gratitude for what He has done for us. Jesus, the Son of God, has come. He lived a perfect life, perfectly keeping the Law. He did not deserve death. He didn’t deserve the Father’s wrath. But He died and absorbed the Father’s wrath on our behalf in order to redeem us. He paid the ultimate price on our behalf, ransoming us from the wrath of God. As those who have been bought by Him, we should seek His glory.

As well as we are to align ourselves with God’s will seeking to glorify Him with our bodies because we have been freed from the grip of sin. We no longer have to live according to the flesh. We are no longer dominated by Satan. He is not our master. We have been transferred from the kingdom of darkness to the kingdom of light. We should use our bodies to glorify the one who has redeemed us.

Do you recognize you were bought with a price? Are you living for Christ? Do you follow Him?

God showers blessings on those who align with His will

On By Dr. Casey LewisIn DevotionalsLeave a comment

“Blessed is everyone who fears the LORD, who walks in his ways!” (Psalm 128:1)

Blessed means that God looks favorably on you. You experience divine favor. The psalm highlights God’s blessings. You are able to enjoy the fruit of your labor. Life goes well. You wife is fruitful and your children are like olive shoots. In other words, your family is growing and operating well. You experience prosperity and long life. Those who follow the Lord, who live aligned with His will experience peace and a good life as God showers His divine favor on you.

Aligning yourself with God’s will, then, not only pleases and glorifies God but we also experience benefits from God’s pleasure and glorification. These benefits are not earned per se. God is not in our debt because we align ourselves with His will. He instead willingly pours out blessings on our life at His pleasure and for our benefit.

Our God is a loving Heavenly Father who desires to give good gifts to His children. Those who desire Him live in a loving relationship with a generous and caring Heavenly Father, experiencing His blessings on their life.

Are you laboring in vain?

On By Dr. Casey LewisIn Devotionals, Uncategorized1 Comment

“Unless the LORD builds the house, those who build it labor in vain. Unless the LORD watches over the city, the watchman stays awake in vain. It is in vain that you rise up early and go late to rest, eating the bread of anxious toil; for he gives to his beloved sleep.” (Ps 127:1-2)

Are you anxious? Do you lay awake at night worrying? The psalmist reminds us this morning that we should not be anxious. If the Lord wants our project, our church, our (insert what you are fretting over) to work out, it will be successful.

James, one of the apostles, picks up on this idea 1000’s of years later in his letter when he says,

“Come now, you who say, “Today or tomorrow we will go into such and such a town and spend a year there and trade and make a profit”- yet you do not know what tomorrow will bring. What is your life? For you are a mist that appears for a little time and then vanishes. Instead you ought to say, “If the Lord wills, we will live and do this or that.” As it is, you boast in your arrogance. All such boasting is evil.” (James 4:13-16)

It is not our will that we seek to do but the Lord’s. It is His will that we should ask He do in our prayer closet (Mt 6:10). We know our God is a good God. He doesn’t desire our harm (Mt 6:25-34). We can and should trust the Lord rather than worrying. What the Lord desires to be built will be built.

In saying we must trust the Lord and that He will build what He desires, we must not believe we are absolved from activity. We must work, putting forth effort, using the talents and gifts the Lord has provided. As we walk step by step each day, we can trust that the Lord will provide for us, as well as He will build, if it be His will.

When, then, if at all possible through prayer and counsel, we need to find what the Lord is doing and join Him in it.