Character & Trends!

For Thursday, June 20, 2024:

Luke 16:10 NLT: “If you are faithful in little things, you will be faithful in large ones. But if you are dishonest in little things, you won’t be honest with greater responsibilities.”

This goes to character, and we would all do well to listen to our Bibles! We all have a picture in our minds of how a person of good character should look and act, and the Bible says that if you’re not honorable concerning small things, you’ll most likely come up short on the larger things as well. Like I said, your behavior is a trend that comes down to character.

If you’re trending toward the lake of fire, there’s still time to repent and return. God and his Son Jesus offer unconditional love and forgiveness to those who return to the Lord. If you’ve been playing for the wrong team, you can undergo that radical transformation I talk about. That’s the amazing grace we sing about!

The Hebrew language has some unique twists you might not expect. For example, the word for ‘repent’ also means to turn or re-turn. If you were going north, you need to about-face and head south! In other words, change the direction of your life. And sinning equates to being ‘far from God,’ while repenting means returning, getting closer to God. Your life is continually critiqued since you are now a member of the Holy Family. Believers are Children of God!

Trend toward being faithful! Blessings as you go about His work today!

Norton Lawellin

Jesus In the City Fellowship

Re-turn to God!

For Tuesday, August 8, 2023:

Psalm 44:23-24 NLT: “Wake up, O Lord! Why do you sleep? Get up! Do not reject us forever. Why do you look the other way? Why do you ignore our suffering and oppression?”

This situation reminds me of one of my favorite analogies. Each day as evening comes, we say the sun sets. In fact the sun is right where it’s always been. It’s the earth that turned away from the sun!

Now pretend with me that the sun represents God, and we’re all on the earth. God never leaves us. God never sleeps. If mankind has trouble connecting with God, it may be that we turned away! Perhaps God lost his priority in our lives. Perhaps sin distracted us. Whatever the reason, the solution is to turn, to re-turn to God. Give him that place of honor in your life, like he deserves. Vow to never backslide again!

On a larger scale, consider our country. In the US, only 64% identify as Christian, and fewer than half of them bother to attend a church. NPR reports that America’s Christian majority is on track to end! In other words, more and more people in the US are turning away from the Lord. Yes, our country is in trouble. Yes, as a country we need to stop backsliding and give God the place of honor we promised, “One nation, under God!” Only the Lord can get our nation back on track.

God is right where he’s always been, waiting to hear from us!

Pastor Norton Lawellin

Jesus in the City Fellowship