Store up treasure value

Storing up what you Treasure Pt. 2

Don’t you know God knows?

That was the somewhat impromptu theme of the message today. As we are encouraged by Jesus Himself to keep our focus on God, on the furtherance of His kingdom in our hearts and rightstanding with Him in our actions – all those things which often draw our attention and affections away form Him will be added to us, because He knows what we have need of.

Don’t you know God knows?

Continue reading
Whiter Snow

Whiter than Snow

These Psalms are intense! We begin in Psalm 50 where Israel begins to be confronted regarding their nations sins. This is the judgment leading to the 400 years of silence and culminates in their eventual rejection of their Messiah. This warning is very somber!

Psalm 51 is one of the most heart felt examples of an inwardly defeated man who has come to face the absolute worst within him. The words themselves are practically wet with sweat, as David turns to God for either forgiveness or rejection. The response of David when confronted by Nathan offers one of the most stark comparisons between a genuine heart of repentance and a heart of religious pretense when compared with the heart response of Saul when confronted about his sin by Samuel.

Comparatively Saul’s sins seem almost trivial in that they were able to be righted, while the actions and results of David’s sins were perminent. Yet, God forgives David and rejects Saul. There is MUCH in this Psalm that offers instruction to us in our sin and about God Who alone can forgive.

Psalms 52 and 53 address the beginning of Saul’s unjust pursuit of David’ life and it’s perils and a contemplation of David regarding the heart of the aethiest.

These are no lightweight topics and are worth much more than the hour we placed into their examination tonight, but will hopefully bait all who listen to continue in their study.

Continue reading
Store up treasure value

Storing up what you Treasure Pt. 1

Today we continued our teachings about pursuing the inward work of the Holy Spirit in our lives.

We have so far studied loving the Lord our God with all we are, Fearing the Lord, Acknowledging Him and this week we are focused upon valuing and treasuring.

Now really we are looking at treasuring, but valuing is included in this concept. The English translations of the scriptures use the word treasure for several concepts, but in the scriptures we will be looking at today, the word treasure means to “store up”.

In the end, we store up what we immediately value.

Storing something up just because it possesses value isn’t enough. Storing it up because it has immediate value to YOU is another matter entirely and doing this evokes actions out of us which God rewards.

Continue reading
Acknowledge Him

In all our ways… Acknowledge Him

This is nothing more than the next step or the “how to” if you will, of the last few previous messages on Loving the Lord our God and fearing Him.

Proverbs 3 encourages us to “Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not to your own understanding. In ALL YOUR WAY Acknowledge Him and He will direct your paths.”

The way we acknowledge God is very practical. It is no different than the way a married couple thinks on one another. In every arena of life – work, friendships, worship, purchases, where and what they eat… all of these are ways in which we know our spouce and deliberately make choices with THEM IN MIND.

In doing this there are certain things we leave behind when we get married, certain activities, certain habits and sometimes even certain friends because they are NOT conducive with the one we have chosen to live our lives with.

When we think on, defer to, honor and respect our spouces in the decisions we make we are ACHKNOWLEDGING THEM in all our ways and it is in this relational way in which we keep this command with our Father!

Continue reading