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Written by Charles Spurgeon (1834-1892), an English preacher.

What is your season today? Are you experiencing a season of drought? If so then it is the season for showers. Are you going through a season of great heaviness with dark clouds? Then that too is the season for showers. “Your strength will equal your days” (Deuteronomy 33:25). “I will send… showers of blessing.” Notice that the word ‘showers’ is plural. God will send all kinds of blessings. And all His blessings go together like links in a golden chain. If He gives you saving grace, He will also give you comforting grace. God will send “showers of blessings.” Look up today, you who are dried and withered plants. Open your leaves and flowers and receive God’s heavenly watering.

I will send down showers in season; there will be showers of blessing ([Ezekiel 34:26]

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Written by Ines Velasquez-McBryde, a contemporary chaplain, pastor, preacher, and speaker.

In a recently published children’s book, “What is GOD Like?” Rachel Held Evans and Matthew Paul Turner touched my soul with their own various interpretations of what God could be like. Utilizing biblical imagery with tender grace, artistic creativity, and joyful imagination, they show us that the Father is not just one thing, but inhabits God’s very own creation through stories, images, metaphors, and analogies. Here are some renditions of “What is God like?”: “God is like a river, constant and life-giving. When you grow near God, you’ll sprout up strong as a tree;” “God is like the flame of a candle, warm and inviting. With God close by, you can look to the light and see through the darkest of night;”  “God is like a shepherd, brave and good, a protector who loves her sheep so much that she watches over all of them and knows each of their names by heart;” “God is like three dancers, graceful and precise. They move to the same music in very different ways, showcasing all of God’s elegance and rhythm in your life;” and, God is like a best friend, faithful and true, closer to you than even your brothers or sisters. And because we know what God is like, we know that…God is kind. God is forgiving. God is slow to get angry. God is quick to be glad. God is happy when you tell the truth and sad when things are unfair. May we, with childlike curiosity, continue to ask God to show us what God is like.

Lord, show us the Father, and we will be satisfied. [John 14:8]

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Written by Clarence Haynes, Jr., a contemporary speaker, writer, and teacher.

Spiritual maturity is about having the right perspective in life, andthe way you think is evidence of your maturity in Christ. Your outlook regarding the situations in life you face speak volumes as to whether you are approaching them from a place of maturity or immaturity. However, it is not just about looking at life situations with the right mindset. You must also view yourself from the right perspective. This requires you to not just think about what you do, but who you are in Christ. Too often in life we have the tendency to define ourselves by what we do. It is very common to ask someone, especially when you first meet them, “What do you do for a living?” While this is a conversation starter, sometimes we can’t get past defining ourselves in this fashion. If you are going to have a mature perspective, you need to define yourself not simply by what you do, because that can change. You need to define yourself by who you are in Christ, because that doesn’t change. This doesn’t mean you have achieved all you are in Christ, but it does mean you are striving toward it. The more you begin to see yourself and define yourself the way God sees you, the more maturity you are developing.

As a prisoner for the Lord, then, I urge you to live a life worthy of the calling you have received. [Ephesians 4:1]

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Written by Ann Voskamp, a contemporary author.  This is an excerpt from her book “Sacred Prayer.”

The way to always begin anything is to begin to still everything. Stillness is your strength. In a wild, wearying world, this is the realest reality: The only way to still stay standing is to make time to stand still. This is what your soul needs to know in this moment: You don’t need to strive, you don’t need to strain, you simply need to still. Because your stillness says you’re trusting Him still. This art of being still is hard. Stillness may be the most difficult to learn, and it takes time and prayerful practice. As the theologian of old, F. B. Meyer, wrote, “We must cultivate the habit of stillness in our lives, if we would detect and know God.”¹ This habit, this way of life, of interior soul stillness — this will take time to learn. But we absolutely must learn the spiritual practice of stillness if we want to know God. This matters: No stillness — no God. But know stillness — know God.

Be still and know that I am God. [Psalm 46:10]

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Today’s meditation is from The Navigators, a ministry that shares the Gospel and helps people grow in relationship with Jesus. This is an excerpt from their work “Five Traits of a Disciple maker.”

The Lord designed us to walk with Him in community with others. Disciple makers will be intentional to seek, pursue and create community among believers to spur each other toward love and good deeds. Biblical community includes family as well as extended communities of followers of Christ. Biblical community also draws those without Christ to the Lord.

 And let us consider how we may spur one another on toward love and good deeds, not giving up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing, but encouraging one another—and all the more as you see the Day approaching. [Hebrews 10:24-25]

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Written by Max Lucado, a contemporary pastor and author.

His [Jesus’] call to courage is not a call to naïveté or ignorance. We aren’t to be oblivious to the overwhelming challenges that life brings. We’re to counterbalance them with long looks at God’s accomplishments… Jesus could have calmed your storm long ago. But He hasn’t. Does He want to teach you a lesson? Could that lesson read something like this: “Storms are not an option, but fear is”?… He’s the commander of every storm. Are you scared in yours? Then stare at Him.

Do not fear, for I have redeemed you; I have summoned you by name; you are mine. When you pass through the waters, I will be with you; and when you pass through the rivers, they will not sweep over you. When you walk through the fire, you will not be burned; the flames will not set you ablaze. For I am the Lord your God, the Holy One of Israel, your Savior [Isaiah 43:1-3]

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Written by Ray Stedman (1917-1992), an American pastor and author.

Remember what the scripture says is the condition of man without Christ? Dead! How far would you get if you took a sales course and went to graveyards to sell your product to corpses? When scripture says that men and women are dead in trespasses and sins, it isn’t just using language lightly. That is exactly the condition they are in, and every attempt to try to argue or reason a person into salvation apart from the Holy Spirit is like arguing with a corpse. A corpse has only one great need, and that is life.

When you were dead in your sins and in the uncircumcision of your flesh, God made you alive with Christ. He forgave us all our sins [Colossians 2:13]

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Written by the Lead Like Jesus team, an organization founded by Ken Blanchard and Phil Hodges that promotes a transformational leadership model based on following Jesus

Correction doesn’t always feel like a gift. Given in the wrong attitude, it can shame and dishonor people. But when correction is given with concern for others and in pursuit of mutual goals, it helps us avoid errors, correct mistakes, and improve results and relationships. To put it into perspective, how many of us have benefited personally from God’s loving correction? He is direct yet compassionate, motivated by love, and always solution-oriented.

Whoever loves discipline loves knowledge, but whoever hates correction is stupid. [Proverbs 12:1]

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From the Book of Common Prayer

Almighty and eternal God, so draw our hearts to you, so guide our minds, so fill our imaginations, so control our wills, that we may be wholly yours, utterly dedicated unto you; and then use us, we pray you, as you will, and always to your glory and the welfare of your people; through our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen.

For you are great and do marvelous deeds; you alone are God. [Psalm 86:10]

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Written by Brian Morykon, a contemporary writer.

To listen is to love. To be heard and understood is to experience love. When you know you won’t be interrupted, questioned, or judged, you speak differently. When someone’s tuned in, you turn up your heart’s transmission signal. Most listeners allocate half their attention to their own thoughts and responses. When someone gives you and your words full attention—total presence—the air is charged with eternity. Surely God is in this place. Someone listens to me this way for an hour each Wednesday. Honestly, it’s hard to take. I want to turn the tables and ask questions, but that’s not what we’re there for. So I talk till the words name something in my soul that hasn’t been named before—or maybe it has, and I’ve forgotten and need to name it again. I talk and pause and talk again and notice my eyes are wet. I look up to find a face accepting me, the face of Christ in my friend. And my tears are like living water to some parched part of my heart that I’d long given up on as dead. Our session ends and it occurs to me that I’m no longer in the irritable rush I was in an hour ago. We don’t understand the power of listening or its centrality to spiritual growth. We underestimate the immense treasures we can give and receive through listening—to each other, to God, and to our own hearts. Thank God listening is learnable. There are spaces we can practice—formal spaces with others like listening groups and cohort programs (some of these are listed below) and informal spaces like a prayer chair or dinner table. I’m quite sure Jesus would be delighted to teach us how to listen if we ask.

If one gives an answer before he hears, it is his folly and shame  [Proverbs 18:13]

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