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MEDITATION:

Written by Wendy Miller, a contemporary author and teacher. This is an excerpt from her book “Learning to Listen.”

Much of our world’s noise and activity seems designed to silence the hungers and longings of our heart. Maybe we are unaware of these deep, inner hungers. They are there, but perhaps no one has encouraged us to pay attention. Jesus speaks to the hungers of our heart, to our inner longings. If we listen to Jesus, we will discover that these longings are the doorways through which we come to God and through which God comes to us. Jesus says that the people with these longings are “blessed” – are welcomed into God’s family, are brought into God’s kind and gracious presence, are connected to one another.

PRAYER:

Written Mark Roberts, a contemporary author and speaker.  

God, you know I struggle sometimes with letting go, quieting my heart, and knowing you. Help me, I pray, to be so convinced of your goodness and faithfulness that I can indeed let go of all that belongs to you. Show me, Lord, what I am to carry. And even then, may I carry it by your grace and for your glory. Amen.

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MEDITATION:

Written by Richard Rohr, a contemporary American Franciscan priest and writer on spirituality. This is an excerpt from his book “Everything Belongs.”

It should be the work of Christians who believe in the paschal mystery to help people when they are being led into the darkness and the void. The believer has to tell those in pain that this is not forever; there is a light and you will see it. This isn’t all there is. Trust it. Don’t try to rush through it. We can’t leap over our grief work. Nor can we skip over our despair work. We have to feel it. That means that in our life we have some blue days or dark days. Historic cultures saw it as the time of incubation, transformation, and necessary hibernation. It becomes sacred space, and yet this is the very space we avoid. When we avoid darkness, we avoid tension, spiritual creativity, and finally transformation. We avoid God who works in the darkness-where we are not in control! Maybe that is the secret.

PRAYER:

Written by the Benedictine Nuns at Kylemore Abbey, Galway, Ireland.

O Holy Spirit, replace the tension within me with Holy relaxation.

Replace the turbulence within me with a sacred calm.

Replace the anxiety within me with a quiet confidence.

Replace the fear within me with a strong faith.

Replace the bitterness within me with the sweetness of your grace.

Replace the darkness within me with a gentle light.

Replace the coldness within me with a gentle warmth.

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MEDITATION:

This meditation is written by Lauren Frazier, a contemporary author.

It can be easy to think that the work we do earns us right standing with God. It is even fair to think this way, as in this world, working earns us money and status. Working is a requirement of this world to have most things. However, this is not so for our eternal life. The only work we need to do is to surrender to the one that has done everything already. In our surrendering, we give Him the recognition for all that our life is and becomes. This is the purpose of our lives and in that, we find an abundance of joy. Unfortunately, because the world seems to reward pride and selfish behavior, surrender can feel hard.  We must never forget that Christ has walked in our shoes. He has weathered our experiences of temptation. In surrendering, we must release ourselves from our pride and ask for help. Temptation surrounds us. To walk a life of surrender means that our dependence on God must be in every moment. This includes accepting His grace and mercy when we fall short. Which we inevitably will fall short. We can be incredibly hard on ourselves. This is what can make surrender feel so hard. Understanding that we need to depend on God for guidance but recognizing that we are not perfect and His grace is sufficient for us is how we gain freedom and move with more ease.

PRAYER:

Written by James Taiwo, a contemporary American author.

Dear heavenly Father, please make me an obedient child. Let me listen and obey your instructions. Give me the ability to do whatever you ask me to do. Do not let me provoke your judgment with disobedience. Enable me to always be conscious that “you see all things and you will appropriately judge all things – either with blessings or disciplines.” For in the name of Jesus Christ I pray. Amen.

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MEDITATION:

This meditation is written by Donald McCullough, a contemporary retired pastor and former President of San Francisco Theological Seminary. This is an excerpt from his book “The Trivialization of God.”

The trivialization of God inevitably leads to the trivialization of worship. The gods of our own creation – fitting neatly within the borders of our cause or understanding or experience and serving well our comfort or nation or success—in no way transcend us, and for this reason, they neither terrify nor attract us. Reverence can be recovered only in repentance. To repent, in the language of the Bible, means to turn around, to turn away from one thing and toward another. The good news of Jesus Christ calls us to turn from false gods toward the holy God. And this demands a constant turning—we are never finished with the movement of repentance!—in which we consciously let go of the gods of our creation and re-orient ourselves toward the God of all creation…the self-centeredness at the core of our being is tenacious. Sin will continue to rear its ugly head until the day Christ returns and brings to fulfillment the salvation we now experience only in part. Thus, we keep turning toward the light at the center the holy God of grace…When we gather for worship, whether we are immediately aware of it or not, we’re about to meet the Wholly Other…we must find ways of encouraging quiet reflection at the start of our services to enable us to remember that an august Presence is very, very near…Christian worship must say “God is everything, everything, everything.” … must always point to God, must reinforce that God has taken the initiative and called us together, that God’s grace is more important than our sin, that God’s will is more important than our edification. This God-at-the-center worship happens only as we acknowledge another priority: God’s Word is more important than our words. This Word alone—as it comes to us in Scripture, sermon, and sacrament—has the power to turn us toward God.

PRAYER:

Written by Michael Saward (1932-2015), an English chaplain,  journalist, broadcaster, and hymnwriter.

O God our Father, we thank you that you have called us to worship you and learn of you. You alone know our needs. Satisfy them with your unchanging love. In your presence may we find comfort in sorrow, guidance in perplexity, strength to meet temptation, grace to overcome the fascination of disobedience, and courage to face up to the hostility of this rebellious world. Above all, may we meet Jesus and go out from our worship indwelt by his spirit. This prayer we ask to your glory and in his name. Amen.

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MEDITATION:

This meditation is from “A Valentine’s Devotional” from The Skitguys blog.

There are a lot of expectations for Valentine’s Day. Someone, probably a Hallmark employee, decided that February 14^th would be the day to declare and demonstrate your love to that special someone. Cards, flowers, and chocolates caught on quickly and became a near requirement even for preschool children. But what gets lost in finding the perfect card or gift is the very essence of what love is and how we can best share that with those around us. 1 Corinthians 13 is the famous biblical love chapter in Christian circles and beyond. It’s beautiful because it describes the kind of perfect love that God has for us and through Him, we are able to love our spouses, children, extended family, co-workers, and neighbors this same way. It’s an active love; a love that is more committed to that person than our own feelings at the time. Gift-giving isn’t even mentioned because this love, God’s perfect love, is worth so much more than anything money could ever buy. Sometimes a gift is a hit and sometimes it’s a miss. In any case, as either the giver or recipient, let’s not fool ourselves into thinking the gift is the sum of how much we love or are loved. We can enjoy Valentine’s Day as a good excuse to spoil the ones we love and share God’s love in a special way with those who are lonely and hurting. But let’s stay focused: no material thing or sentimental card can ever replace the simple gestures of God’s love expressed every day.

PRAYER:

Written by Gregory Coles, a contemporary author and English instructor.

Dear God, help me today to understand what love really means. I need a love that’s big enough to include all of us. Big enough for the dating and engaged couples, of course, with their giddy daydreams of a future together. But also, big enough for the married folks, whether their passion for each other is still blazing brightly or barely more than a smoldering wick. Big enough for the singles toasting their independence, and for the singles wishing someone would come along and make that independence disappear. For the lonely and widowed and brokenhearted, I need a love that understands, a love that welcomes in hurt and sorrow instead of excluding them. The love I need more than anything is Your love. Without Your love, no other love will ever be sufficient. And with it, every other love becomes richer and truer and more life-giving than it could have been otherwise. We have learned all our best loves from You: the love of faithful friends, of spouses and significant others, of parents and siblings and children. Love that commits. Love that sacrifices. Love that lays down its life. You authored each of these loves, taught us how to recognize them and long for them and give them away. Our best efforts at Valentine’s Day are just a fraction of the wholeness of love. Today, let everything I see remind me of Your love. Let today be a day for love. Real love. Big love. Your love. Amen.

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MEDITATION:

Written by Kelly Givens, a contemporary author and editor.

We are called to rejoice with those who rejoice and weep with those who weep. Pretty simple…except when it isn’t…I’ve thought of some scenarios that may indicate we’re failing at this:  1) instead of rejoicing at someone’s news, we immediately begin to compare how our circumstances measure up 2) We’re quick to say “Oh yes, that happened to me once, too” instead of silently listening and acknowledging the hurt of others. 3) We try to come to the rescue in every situation, rather than acknowledging that some suffering isn’t solvable or explainable (think Job and his friends). 4) We brush off the pain of others because we think they are “taking things too hard.” 5) We’re quick to say, “Well at least you’ve never experienced this” (insert whatever horrible thing we’ve experienced). 6) We think they cheated their way to the blessings, just got lucky, or don’t deserve the good thing they received.

I think central to our failure to rejoice and weep with others is a preoccupation with self. We can’t step outside of ourselves long enough to truly step into both the blessings and sufferings of those around us. It’s taken me a while, but I’ve tried to make a habit of acknowledging the joys and sufferings of others without immediately inserting myself into the situation. This isn’t a natural inclination for me. Satan is the master of deception and loves to make us fall for one of the oldest tricks in the book: that everything is about us. People are most successful at eliminating bad behaviors or habits from their lives when they replace them with a good habit or behavior. So, I not only have to stop focusing on myself, but I have to replace all that time I spend thinking of myself with thinking of God. This is life-transforming; this is the key to killing pride – not simply humbling yourself, but exalting God – who is the only thing worthy of our exaltation.

PRAYER:

Written by Kevin Halloran, a contemporary pastor and author.

Merciful Father, while I aspire to a life of godly humility, the pull of pride seems too strong to overcome. I so often desire to sit on your throne instead of bowing before You as the only true Sovereign and Holy God. I think highly of myself and my accomplishments and forget I am a man made of dust who at best can be called a servant of a great God. I even diminish the offense of pride by holding it lightly; forgetting that pride cast Satan from Your presence and brought the corruption of your creation. Oh, Lord, rescue me from foolish pride and help me learn from Your gentle and humble heart!

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MEDITATION:

Written by Brian Tome, a contemporary American pastor.

To have a life of impact, I need to be three things: a fighter, a finisher, and faithful. This sound advice was written by Paul near the end of his life, in a letter to his young protégé. Paul elevated these three attributes as being honorable, achievable, and necessary. Church people are okay with “keeping the faith,” but they scratch their head at “fighting” and “finishing.” Fighting sounds too violent for the enlightened, soft American who has never been punched in the mouth. Finishing is a noble concept but not something we’re actually skilled at doing. We prefer the entrepreneurial buzz of starting something new to the labor of finishing strong — because finishing is a fight. A new relationship brings a buzz, but a long-term marriage is a bloody fight. “Keeping the faith” sounds serene and easy enough, but only because we don’t understand it.

Most of us believe faith is a mental checklist of things we agree on. But faith is not just a doctrine or creed. It’s not just giving mental assent. It’s not choosing to believe stupid things that science says aren’t true. Faith is choosing to move. It means taking a step forward without a guarantee that it’s going to work out the way you want. It means doing the things you know your God would approve of, even if other people question you. Paul never stopped moving. He never stopped improving. He never stopped chasing his goal of becoming more like Christ and introducing as many people as possible to Him. In reality, “keeping the faith” is just as backbreaking as fighting or finishing. It’s hard to fight, finish, and keep the faith. That’s why so few people do it. This time last year, a ministry hero of mine was publicly disgraced. I have no idea what his relationship with Christ is right now. What I do know is that he stopped fighting against his sinful urges. He didn’t finish strong for the thousands of people who looked up to him. He didn’t keep the faith of honestly admitting to his struggles and finding help. Decades in the same post and no warm farewell, no final words, no future contact with the next generation of leaders. So sad and so sobering. All because he stopped fighting, didn’t finish, and wasn’t faithful. Some types of sharks have to keep swimming in order to stay alive. Once they stop moving, they begin to suffocate. That’s also true for followers of Jesus. We have to keep moving to stay alive. We have to want more in our relationship with Christ. We have to want more for our future. We have to want to be different or we will be like everyone else who falters.

PRAYER:

Written by Brian Tome, the author of today’s meditation.

Father, I want to fight for the things that You care about. I want to finish the race that You’ve set before me. I want to keep the faith, continuing to move and grow no matter my age or stage of life. Thank You for the call and the challenge of this. Amen.  

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MEDITATION:

Written by Joni Eareckson Tada, a contemporary author. This is an excerpt from her book “Diamonds in the Dust.”

The Old Testament kingdom of Judah needed a kick in the pants, a shot in the arm, a knock on the head. They had rebelled against God, for which God plainly and directly judged through the prophet Isaiah and through foreign nations. They deserved to be scolded or punished, but God was as wise then as He is now. He simply opened their eyes. “Your vision is too small because of your pain,” He said, “You’ve focused on your lack—lack of a nation, lack of power, lack of unity, lack of an army. Hang it all! Expand your tent pegs out a few notches and live as if you have it all. Because you do! You have my prophecy of a mighty nation. You have my undying love. My forgiveness. My power. You have me!”

There are days when I need such a vision. I tire easily at times. And when I tire, I want to go in my “tent” of pity and frustration and anger. My small tents are comfortable. Though it’s dark and cramped, I feel a sense of comfort. But not for long. God tells me in Isaiah 54:5 that my Maker is my husband, and He desires my company under a larger tent that I might expand His kingdom with Him. And as I do so, I find the fresh breeze of new strength to deal with my pity, frustration, and anger. I am renewed.

PRAYER:

Written by Joni Eareckson Tada, the author of today’s meditation.

Lord, expand my vision today. Let me see the light of day from Your perspective. Drive home the tent pegs of hope deep and far. Stretch my life to conform to the potential You see. Amen.

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MEDITATION:

Written by Rick Warren, a contemporary pastor, author, and speaker.

Learning to manage your emotions is the key to peace of mind. In other words, you need to learn to deal with what you feel! Here are four important reasons why you need to manage your emotions: 1) Emotions are often unreliable. Your gut is often wrong… Your intuition is often flawed. Your emotions often lead you down a blind alley. You can’t depend on everything you feel!  You don’t have to accept everything you feel, because not everything you feel is right or authentic or will lead you in the right direction. 2) You don’t want to be manipulated. If you don’t control your emotions, they will control you, and you will be manipulated by your moods. And if you’re always guided by your feelings, other people will take advantage of you. Worst of all, negative emotions are Satan’s favorite tool. He will use fear, resentment, and worry to wreak havoc in your life…3) You want to please God. God cannot rule your life if emotions rule your life. If you make your decisions based on how you feel, then you’ve made your feelings your god, and then God can’t be God in your life… 4) You want to succeed in life. Study after study has shown that your emotional quotient is far more important than your IQ when it comes to success. How many people do you know who ruined their reputation because of something said in anger? Or missed a job opportunity because of their lack of self-control? …When you choose to follow Jesus, that decision includes your emotions. Jesus wants to be Lord of how you feel, not just what you think and do. He wants to be Lord of your emotions.

PRAYER:

Written by Aaron Brown, a contemporary writer, teacher, and visual artist.

Lord, I know that today is for me and tomorrow is for you, but sometimes I can’t help but be afraid. I grow weary of wondering what will happen in the world, this country? What new calamity will we face tomorrow? This year has brought many unforeseen challenges to myself and others spiritually, emotionally, and physically. I’m afraid that life will get worse. I’m afraid that I have nothing to hope in anymore. Please help me to maintain my trust in you. Please help me to remember all the ways you have supported me throughout my life up until this point. Help me to not forget all that you have done. Lord, you are my refuge. Your love does not change even when my circumstances do. Help me to not forget…I can trust in you always. Amen.

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MEDITATION:

Written by Max Lucado, a contemporary pastor and author. This is an excerpt from his book “You Can Count on God.”

We did a lot of shouting on our elementary school playground. All the boys marched around the playground shouting, “Boys are better than girls!” In response, the girls paraded around the school announcing, “Girls are better than boys.” We were a happy campus. Shouting feels good. But does it do any good? It seems to me there is a lot of shouting going on. On the airwaves, on bumper stickers, on social media…It is one thing to have an opinion; it’s something else to have a fight. Let’s reason together. Let’s work together. And if discussion fails, let love succeed. If love covers a multitude of sins, can it not cover a multitude of opinions? Resist the urge to shout.

PRAYER:

Written by Debbie McDanniel, a contemporary Christian writer.

Dear God, we pray for your protection as one nation under God. We ask that you surround this country and cover us with your mighty hand. We pray for unity in our land, that in spite of our differences, we would be willing to stand strong together and live out our days with compassion and grace. We ask that no weapon formed against us will prosper and that you would thwart the attacks of the enemy hurled our way. Thank you that you are rich in mercy and full of grace. Thank you that you are forgiving and merciful. Thank you that you are strong and mighty. Thank you that you are for us and that you fight for us still today. Wake us up, Lord! Remind us to live aware, to redeem the time, listen to your words, and be willing to make a difference in this land. Give us courage to speak out. Help us not to stay silent but to do all things through your wisdom and love. We pray for your great healing on our land. Shine your face on us dear Lord. Give us courage to go into all the world and take the message of the Gospel of peace. We need you just as much now as we ever have before. Our times are in your hands. Bring honor to your Name today, for You alone are worthy. In Jesus’ Name, Amen.

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