Weekly Devotional "Laying Down Our Idols" - 3/17

from Lenae, GEMS Training Manager

 

Laying Down Our Idols

Those who cling to worthless idols turn away from God’s love for them.

Jonah 2:8

She only had seven minutes to talk, but it was enough. I needed her help with a project and in less time than was available she gave me what would’ve taken hours to gather on my own.

I gushed gratefulness. She said how good it felt to be needed. The transition from full-time youth ministry to stay-at-home mom had left her feeling useless in the church and empty in her own skin. Not that she doesn’t love being a mom, she does! It’s just all so different.

“What God showed me is that I had made being needed my idol,” she said. “It feels good to be needed, but it’s my idol!” During our brief phone call packed with raw honesty and joy, she laid down her idol again.

Serving wholeheartedly, being a go-to person for others, and a mom are all good things! What we do within GEMS and as leaders is good! Until it’s not.

Q: What would make a good thing bad?

A: When it becomes an idol. When it takes priority over God. When we live for it instead of our Father.

Throughout Scripture God reveals His greatness and makes known the position that He is to have in our hearts. I am the LORD, and there is no other (Isaiah 45:6b). You shall have no other gods before me (Exodus 20:3).

Have you ever set your heart idols in a neat row next to God? The Philistines tried. They were all about worshipping other gods so bringing the ark of God into Dagon’s temple and setting it next to Dagon, their chief god, was common practice. The next day they witnessed the power and greatness of God. Dagon was prostrate before the Ark in a worship position. He had fallen on his face before the ark of the LORD!

So they propped him up again. Can anyone identify? Have you ever realized your idol was an idol, and instead of laying it down, you readjusted it? Making it and yourself a little more comfortable. How’s that working out for you?

It didn’t go well for Dagon. The next morning not only had Dagon fallen face down before God again, his head and hands were broken off as well. The Philistines still didn’t get it. Do we? (1 Samuel 5)

HE>i: Do you have an idol or more that you have set beside God? If so, will you make the choice today to lay it down?

The greatest danger is not atheism, but that we ask God to co-exist with idols.

Tim Keller 

Saying Goodbye

A letter from Kathryn Miller as she follows God's new call for her life. We pray continued blessings for her and also for the GEMS Ministry as we seek God's next Executive Director for GEMS Girls Clubs.  The entire GEMS sisterhood wishes Kathryn Miller and her family all the best!

As I sit at my desk watching it snow, I am contemplating all the wonderful, challenging, and exciting things that God has been completing throughout this last year with GEMS Girls’ Clubs. It has truly been my delight to be a part of the GEMS sisterhood. Which reminds me of a quote by Steve Maraboli: “It’s funny how, in this journey of life, even though we may begin at different times and places, our paths cross with others so that we may share our love, compassion, and hope. This is a design of God that I appreciate and cherish.” I have truly cherished the opportunity to serve alongside each of you in spreading the Good News of Jesus Christ. Even though we come from different backgrounds and places, God has woven us together into a beautiful tapestry.

Many of you know by now that God is sending my family and me on a new journey. While we are excited and filled with great anticipation for this next journey with God, we are also sad and will miss serving alongside each of you. My family and I have met so many amazing followers of Christ and we can see God moving and changing lives because of you.

I am confident that God’s plan for GEMS’ future is found in His Word. I cannot think of any greater honor as a woman than to share with a girl about our loving and caring Father. As a Club Coordinator or Counselor you are given the opportunity to paint a gorgeous picture of God’s pure love for them and His willingness to claim victory over sin by allowing Jesus to be crucified and resurrected, in order that each of them can live victorious with Him. This is truly the most beautiful and powerful message to share with girls everywhere.

May the Lord bless you richly with His love this upcoming year.

In Him,
Kathryn Miller

GEMS Annual Leadership Conference

It's time to start planning for the 2014 GEMS Annual Leadership Conference!  Conference information will be arriving in your mailbox very shortly and information can also be found online RIGHT HERE.  Register by February 20 to take advantage of the special Early Bird registration fee.

God's Great Reputation - Weekly Devotional

from Lenae, GEMS Training Manager 

 

God’s Great Reputation

I was ashamed to ask the king for soldiers and horsemen to protect us from enemies on the road, because we had told the king, “The gracious hand of our God is on everyone who looks to him, but his great anger is against all who forsake him.”

Ezra 8:22 

Ezra was a man of God’s Word. He knew God’s Word, believed God’s Word, and obeyed it. So when Ezra told the king of Persia that God would provide all that they needed for their 900-mile trip back to Jerusalem, he didn’t go back on his word. Ezra refused to compromise God’s reputation by boasting about His gracious protection in the safety of Artaxerxes’ palace and then running back for the King’s Cavalry when the trip threatened to turn treacherous.

By the Ahava Canal he proclaimed a fast, so that we might humble ourselves before our God and ask him for a safe journey for us and our children, with all our possessions (Ezra 8:21). They fasted, they prayed, and in His great power and provision, God answered.

At the beginning of our journey into a new year do we have Ezra’s mindset to rightly live what we know and have testified about God’s greatness? Over the past week I’ve wrestled that through with ten questions posed by Don Whitney. The list includes this: What’s the most humanly impossible thing you will ask God to do this year?

I have to confess that up until that question my goal setting was within the realm of the possible and practical. It skewed toward my abilities, realistic timeframes, and available resources. If God says that nothing is impossible for Him shouldn’t my prayers and plans expand to His gracious promise?

Ezra was ashamed to do anything that would diminish God’s reputation.  As women of the Word, who believe it, and obey it, do we share his shame at the thought of our testimony of God’s greatness not lining up to our lives?

Who or what do you trust? Christ alone? Or do you trust Christ plus your capabilities, or Christ plus your cash on hand, or Christ plus your ____________? Do you say God is gracious, but then lie awake at night worried that He won’t be enough for your need? Do you say that God is good, but then constantly complain about your circumstances?

By the Ahava Canal, Ezra did not put his trust in the king’s chariots or horses. He humbled himself and staked his life on the reputation of God’s great name.

HE>i: What is your life telling others about God?

Christians have God's reputation at the forefront of their minds. It's always risky to live in a way that makes God look great.

Phil Moore

from Lenae, GEMS Training Manager

Epic 

Make it your ambition to lead a quiet life: You should mind your own business and work with your hands, just as we told you, so that your daily life may win the respect of outsiders and so that you will not be dependent on anybody.

1 Thessalonians 4:11-12

ep·ic

• heroic; majestic; impressively great: the epic events of the war.
• of unusually great size or extent: a crime wave of epic proportions.
• Slang. spectacular; very impressive (from dictionary.com)

Our culture is into epic. That word is used all over the place these days. It describes everything from Ferraris to French Fries to Friday night. It’s the promise of marketers, and the goal of planners. Don’t settle for ordinary. Live epic!

In this season of glitter and glamor, in this chasing after all that is big and best, John 3:30 living can seem ordinary, even boring and blasé.

In his book, Boring: Finding an Extraordinary God in an Ordinary Life, Michael Kelley urges readers to be faithful to God’s call. Even if “everyone else is worshipping at the idols of more and excitement” you stay faithful to what God is calling you to do in this season of life.

Does your call involve diapers? Change them for the glory of God. Does it include caring for an elderly parent? Be kind, patient, and thoughtful. Care for her as if serving the Lord. Maybe it’s washing dishes, carpooling, filling out mounds of paperwork, or being the first and last person at GEMS Club each week. Do it quietly. Work hard. Be faithful. Let your daily life, even the tiniest task and most laborious chore, point to our extraordinary God.

Whatever you do–whether you eat or drink, whether you’re backstage or center stage, whether the task is wallpapered in boring or abuzz with epic–do all to the glory of God (1 Corinthians 10:31).

Kelley writes, “’Ordinary’ is a myth. The only reason we think of something as ordinary is because we fail to look for and then grasp the massive depth of the work and presence of God in our lives.”

Peter and John got that. When the people realized they were unschooled, ordinary men, they were astonished and they took note that these men had been with Jesus (Acts 4:13). When people met Peter and John, they didn’t see ordinary. They saw Jesus. They saw the work and presence of Jesus!

HE>i: Intentionally look for God’s extraordinary work and presence in your most ordinary tasks today.

If Jesus became incarnate to live among the ordinary, then what we call ordinary is really special to God.

Tim Keller

Weekly Devotional - 'Great Grace'

from Lenae, GEMS training manger

Great Grace

The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the one and only Son, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth.

John 1:14

There are many places where our sinful nature turns ugly. The toy aisle is one of them. Ever seen or been part of an ugly scene where a child is whining and wailing, “I want . . . I want . . . ” Some parents cave in and cash out. Others grasp their child’s hand and pull her out of there.

That’s exactly what happened to Lot when God’s judgment was about to fall on Sodom and Gomorrah. Although Lot urged his sons-in-law, who were pledged to marry his daughters, to hurry and get out of there, the reality is that he was reluctant to leave himself. He was comfortable there. So instead of hurrying, Lot hesitated. The men grasped his hand and the hands of his wife and daughters and pulled them safely out of the city (Genesis 19:16).

They didn’t leave because they wanted to, or even because it was the right thing to do. They expressed no gratitude for the advance warning of coming destruction or the rescue team sent in just for them. Only because God grasped their hands and pulled were they delivered.

This is our story, too. While we were still sinners, Christ died for us (Romans 5:8). We weren’t looking for saving or a Savior. There is no one who seeks God. All have turned away (Romans 3:11-12). Because God first loved us He sent a Rescuer to those who had no felt need or desire to be rescued. Jesus grasped our hand with his nail-scarred one and pulled. He pulled us from the pit, and set us on the Rock. He pulled us from the bondage of sin and death and set us free.

We would never choose God. All is grace. His grace turns us to Him. His Spirit works within our will and desires and stirs a love for God within. He opens eyes and ears and softens our hearts. 

All is grace. 

Jesus is a gift of God’s grace. Scripture says He was FULL of grace. This babe FULL of grace came to dwell among a people who are FULL of self. What great grace!

When we see the FULLness of His grace and experience the promise of its sufficiency, we will boast not in self, but in Christ. He will become greater; we will become less (John 3:30).

HE>i: Is the grace of Jesus evident in the way you’re preparing and celebrating Christmas?

Full. The Greek means not one grain more of truth or one drop more of grace could be fit into Him. Everything He is, everything He does, drips truth, exudes grace.

Mark Buchanan