This and That

I am so glad that I live under the New Covenant with God. In my daily devotional readings through the Chronological One Year Bible these past few weeks, I have been going through the tumultuous history of Israel and Judah under kings who failed to follow God with all their hearts. As I started reading in the book of Amos it struck me that God says your sins will not be ignored. When I think of the sins in my life, I am so glad that God doesn't ignore them. Because of Jesus, my sins are forgiven and forgotten by the Creator of the universe!

Father's Day, 2009 fell on June 21st. That makes Ian and Emily 11 years old spiritually on Father's Day! I had the privilege of baptizing them into Christ on June 21, 1998, and to this day that is by far the BEST Father's Day I have ever had. However, this year comes in at a close 2nd. Elliott preached at First Christian Church Clearwater, it was his first sermon ever! I had the honor of being there to hear him preach! Along with my Bride, Ian, Emily and my Dad! Afterwords, Elliott, Abi, Ian, Emily Dad, Peggy and I went to Moes Southwest Grill for a Father's Day Feast! Yes, it WAS a great day.

I've been having an interesting Twitter conversation with Robin Sigars lately on doctrine, obedience and love. We are both of the opinion that the former receives too much emphasis to the detriment of the latter two. I maintain that if we obey God's Word and love people the way God intends, our doctrine will be right. After all, how can we obey God's Word if we are not obey it fully (see my comments on Israel and Judah at the beginning of this blog)? Those who do not fully obey the Gospel may love, but they are not obedient. Those who obey the Gospel but don't love, well, resounding gongs come to mind. Lord, I pray that You will help me lovingly obey Your Gospel so that my life will draw others to Jesus.

Did I mention that I was like a kid on Christmas morning yesterday? Well, the new microphones are in, and I cannot wait for this Sunday's Celebration Services! Big Dogg Audio RAWKS!!!

With the afternoon Thunderstorms rolling in, I should end this for now, with the desire to do this more often and to even try to be deep enough on occasion that someone might actually get something out of my rambling posts on this blog site.

Be God's,
Scott

My Responsibility

I am reading the Chronological One Year Bible this year, just to mix up my daily devotional reading a bit. I've done the one year Bible reading plan each year for over a decade now, and decided to change things up a bit this year. From today's reading in Genesis 17 (New Living Translation), I saw this: 9 Then God said to Abraham, “Your responsibility is to obey the terms of the covenant. You and all your descendants have this continual responsibility." It has me thinking about my responsibility as a child of Abraham (spiritually). The New Covenant is summed up by Jesus when He said that we should love God with all we are and all we have AND we should love people the way God loves them (love your neighbor as yourself). My responsibility is live that way. It isn't easy, but it is my responsibility as a child of God. I often fail to live up to my responsibility, but it is my responsibility nonetheless.

May 2009 be one of accepting my responsibility, embracing it, and running headlong to Jesus with it. May this be the year that you do the same.