LET YOUR TESTIMONY RING OUT - Sept 26 Today's Perspective

PERSPECTIVES FROM DAVID’S 7 SECRETS

Chapter Eight, “You Can Do This” p. 140

CAN’T STOP THE MUSIC         

                      

 About the Thessalonians in I:8, Paul said, “The Lord’s message ‘rang out’ from you… your faith in God has become known everywhere.”  That reminds me of a Lanny Wolfe song we used to sing called, “Can’t Stop the Music”.   When it’s in there, you just can’t stop it!

The thing is, the message needs to be really clear.  Peter said in Acts 4:12, “Salvation is found in No One else, for there is no other Name under heaven given to men by which we must be saved.”  Remember that great song?  “No Other Name”? Both Sandi Patty and Steve Green brought us to the heights with that one in the 80’s.

When told he must stop using the name Jesus, Peter instead  declared, “For we cannot help speaking about what we have seen and heard.” Acts, 4:20

David said similar things in Psalm 40: 9-10. “I do not seal my lips, as You know O Lord… I speak of Your faithfulness and salvation….”

It is a fact that most people come to the Lord through someone’s personal testimony.  We have to make sure most of it is about what Jesus has done for and through us, not the “I have done” of our testimony.

The bottom line is bigger than we can even know or guess. At the very end of this age, when the Lord returns, and His followers are being killed and hounded by Satan, the accuser, the Bible declares in Revelation 12:11 about those Christians being persecuted, “They overcame him by the blood of the Lamb and the word of their testimony.”

Your testimony today in our confused and needy world is essential for people to find the Lord, so…

                     LET YOUR TESTIMONY RING OUT

BIRTHDAY BLESSINGS

SEPTEMBER 22

BIRTHDAY BLOG

PERSPECTIVES FROM DAVID’S 7 SECRETS

Chapter Two, “Sit at God’s Round Table.” 

BIRTHDAY BLESSINGS…MANY THANKS

Truly, thank all of you for your FaceBook messages today.  I am so blessed!  Wishes from around the Globe… awesome!

It wasn’t his birthday, but when David wrote Psalm 8, “How majestic is Your name in all the earth!”, he had just killed Goliath, and yup, he was thankful!  Michael W. liked it as well!

I have loved my life in music.  God’s calling is the best!  And throughout my life, I really had no choice but to follow His plan. Often, I really did not know where the next step would go, but I took it anyway.  Such is His leading.  I’ve been thinking today of so many songs and one that sticks out this morning is Andrae Crouch’s, “It Won’t Be Long.” We recorded it in 1979… here’s some lyrics…

“Count the years as months, count the months as weeks.  Count the weeks as days, any day now, we’ll be going home.”

Andrae is home now.  And I just praise God for good health, and hope to hang around here a little longer, but time is zipping by, just like the song says.

From my early days with Thurlow Spurr, I actually sing these lyrics every day, at sunset time, standing or sitting on the cliffs with my dog, Maverick, and looking out at the very big ocean, and magnificent sky filled with all kinds of colored clouds.

“How big is God, how big and wide His vast domain! To try to tell these lips can only start.  He’s big enough to rule His mighty universe, yet small enough to live within my heart.”  

Then right away I think of Nichole Nordeman’s song, “Small Enough”.

“There have been moments when I could not face Goliath on my own.  And how could I forget, we marched around our share of Jerichos.  But I will not be setting out a fleece for You tonight, just want to know that everything will be all right.  Oh Great God, be close enough to feel you now”.

I received a sweet message from Greg Nelson this morning who said, “Today I’m celebrating the day you were born.  Yep, that was a Great day.”  And let’s all remember 1985 when we first heard Steve Green sing Greg’s great song, “People Need the Lord.” As we sent off 15 Continental tours that summer, that song was our calling and our invitation, too.  

“We are called to take His light,  To a world where wrong seems right. What could be too great a cost for sharing life with one who’s lost? For People Need the Lord…”

That’s who we are, and that’s what we do…

THANKS FOR MY BIRTHDAY BLESSINGS… ALL OF YOU

TAKE HEART - Sept 14 Today's Perspective

PERSPECTIVES FROM DAVID’S 7 SECRETS

Chapter 3, “Live in the Moment” p. 49

JOY                                                   

I had a long talk with a good friend today who has, as she said, “cancer everywhere.”   There was such a beautiful spirit full of joy as she shared with me how the Lord as given her such a peace and joy.  “He’s so close” she says, “I’m not afraid anymore.  I’m proud of how I brought up my children.  They are all doing so great and I asked the Lord for the privilege of seeing my grandchild this summer and He answered my prayer.”

We all have our heartaches and tough times, and the Lord gives us strength to come through them if we ask Him.  He is so faithful, Praise Him!

David did, too, and he said it hundreds of times. Here are a couple examples, “Show me the wonder of your great love… Keep me as the apple of Your eye; hide me in the shadow of your wings” Ps 17: 7 and 8.

When we face the deepest and darkest times, He is there to show us the wonder of His love.  How great is that!  Our friend Andrae Croutch wrote, 

“Through it all, Through it all, I’ve learned to trust in Jesus, I’ve learned to trust in God.  Through it all, Through it all, I’ve learned to trust in His word”

And Jesus' words in John 16:33 are, “I have told you these things that in Me you might have peace.  In the world you will have trouble.  But take heart.  I have overcome the world.”

So no matter what…

TAKE HEART… HAVE JOY!

HOSPITALITY - Sept 12 Today's Perspective

PERSPECTIVES FROM DAVID’S 7 SECRETS

Chapter Six, “Be There, Like A Good Neighbor” p. 83

NO GRUMBLING    

We love our privacy, but there are times to open our hearts and arms to those around us.  Not the least of which is to simply be a friendly, good, Christian testimony, to see if the Lord opens the way for an honest witness to His love and grace.

Jesus spoke what is now called, “The Golden Rule”.   He said in Luke 6:31, “Do to others as you would have them do to you.” 

You may recall from one of my earlier blogs that David found a survivor of Jonathan, a close friend from his youth, who was actually the grandson of King Saul. His name was Mephibosheth.  David gave him a seat at his own table, a very hospitable act.

Later, David himself needed some hospitality when escaping from his own son, Absalom, who was trying to kill him and take the kingdom away from David.  When David crossed the Jordan with his large entourage, he was met with hospitality.  Shobi, Makir, Ammiel and his old friend, Barzillai, “brought bedding, and bowls and pottery, wheat and barley, flour and roasted grain, beans and lentils, honey and curds, sheep and cheese from cows’ milk for David and his people to eat.”  2 Sam. 17:28-29

Sometimes if we are asked to provide hospitality and it’s not our idea, we may not feel that open hearted. But, Peter

says in 1^st Peter 4:9, “offer hospitality to one another without grumbling.”

Some people are just not good at hospitality and for others it is their spiritual gift.  Paul said in Romans 12:13, “Share with God’s people who are in need. Practice hospitality.”  Either way we need to do our best at entertaining and giving of ourselves and our resources.

And remember, in Hebrews it talks about the possibility of entertaining angels without knowing it.  I love entertaining, but I have not seen any angels recently!   However, you never really know for sure, so just…

BE AN ANGEL YOURSELF

EXALT - Sept 1 Today's Perspective

PERSPECTIVES FROM DAVID’S 7 SECRETS

Chapter 7,  “Cry Out and Shout” p. 91

                             ISLAND EXALTATION

“They raise their voices, they shout for joy;

From the west they acclaim the Lord’s majesty.

Therefore in the east give glory to the Lord;

Exalt the Name of the Lord the God of Israel

          IN THE ISLANDS OF THE SEA.

From the ends of the earth we hear singing;

        ‘Glory to the Righteous One’”  

Isaiah 24:14-16

Wow, what a fabulous scripture!  It even asks us out here in the Islands to exalt the Name of the Lord.  How easy is that! So from my heart right now here it comes…

"I exalt You Lord.Your Name is great in all the earth 

and I exalt you now from out here 

on my Island in the Pacific.”

You can find yourself in there somewhere, yes?  Maybe in the west or the east or really just anywhere from the ends of the earth.  Can you hear the singing?  Are you listening?  Step outside and look around.  There is exaltation music everywhere, join in.

David did all the time.  He praised in I Chronicles 29:10-11, “Praise be to You, O Lord, God of our father Israel,  from everlasting to everlasting.  Yours, O Lord, is the greatness and the power and the glory and the majesty and the splendor for everything in heaven and earth is yours.  Yours, O Lord, is the kingdom; You are exalted as head over all.”

Sing along right now with me -

I exalt Thee, I exalt Thee, I exalt Thee, O Lord

I exalt Thee, I exalt Thee, I exalt Thee, O Lord

We exalt Thee, We exalt Thee, We exalt Thee, O Lord

We exalt Thee, We exalt Thee, We exalt Thee, O Lord

What a great way to start any day or live any day or to close out any day…

              LORD, WE EXALT YOU!

WORTH DYING FOR!

AUGUST 30

WORTH DYING FOR

PERSPECTIVES FROM DAVID’S 7 SECRETS

Chapter One, “Bring on the Giants” p. 7

WORTH DYING FOR

Today’s youth, Millennials, are searching for something worth living for and when they find it, they are willing to die for it.  The problem is that in our secular society today, they are finding nothing worth living for.

The great Greek philosophers and thinkers of old had a similar issue.  Speaking to them, the Apostle Paul said to them in Acts 17:24-28, “The God who made the world and everything in it, is the Lord of heaven and earth and does not live in temples built by hands, as if He needed anything. Because He Himself gives all men life and breath and everything else.  From one man, He made every nation of men, that they should inhabit the whole earth; and He determined the times set for them and the exact places where they should live.  God did this so that men would seek Him and perhaps reach out for Him and find Him, though He is not far from each one of us.  For in Him, we live and move and have our being.  As some of your own poets have said, ‘we are His offspring.’”

David found that his goal was just that, to live with Him at all times. He said in Psalm 27:4, “One thing I ask of the Lord, this is what I seek: that I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life.”  Knowing that the Lord had “assigned him his portion and his cup” (Psalm 16:5) He tells us the secret of his strength in Psalm 16:7. He says, “I have set the Lord always before me.  Because He is at my right hand, I will not be shaken.”

If you are looking to give your life for something worthwhile that has forever implications and an eternal future, give it to Jesus.  He was serious when He told His disciples the kind of dedication He expected.  He says in Matthew 16:21-25 and 27, “If anyone would come after Me, he must deny himself and take up his cross and follow Me. For whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for Me will find it…

For the Son of Man is going to come in His Father’s glory with His angels, and then, He will reward each person according to what he has done.”

Do you want to REALLY LIVE and have your life count for something?  Then…

LIVE FOR CHRIST!

HE IS WORTH DYING FOR!

WISE GUY - Aug 22 Today's Perspective

PERSPECTIVES FROM DAVID’S 7 SECRETS

Chapter Two, “Sit At God’s Round Table” pp. 9-11

BE WISE                           

I couldn’t find “wisdom” in any of the great lists of virtues.  It’s because you just can’t decide one minute to be wise and the next not. It’s something you cultivate as you get to know things, experience life, grow up. When you finally make all of David’s virtues yours, you have most likely arrived at wisdom.

David said in Psalm 19:7, “…the statutes of the Lord are trustworthy, making wise the simple.”  That means, as we absorb the principles God has laid down for us, we become wise.

Solomon, the second born son of David and Bathsheba, was considered the wisest man who ever lived.  He said, “He who wins souls is wise.” Proverbs 11:30

Jesus was concerned about that very thing.  As He was sending out His disciples to win souls, He said, “I am sending you out like sheep among wolves.  Therefore, be as wise (shrewd) as serpents (snakes) and as innocent as doves.”  Matt 10:16

Peter, one of those being sent into the wolves’ den, wrote, “Always be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you have.” I Peter 3:15. It sounds like he is suggesting we should be wise in our responses.

The world we know is crumbling faster and faster, and the principles we grew up with are being eroded in a direction opposite of God’s statutes. The game of Chess comes to mind.  We need to anticipate the negative moves being made against contemporary Christianity and take the admonishing of James 1:5. “If any of you lacks wisdom, he should ask God, who gives generously to all, without finding fault, and it will be given to him.”

The bottom line is this. No matter what decisions our leaders, or our supreme court, entangle us with, remember that God is still in control and it is His plan that is being played out.  Think about that and…

BE WISE