If Every Day Was Like Today...

Scripture:

“This is the day that the Lord has made; let us rejoice and be glad in it.” - Psalm 118:24

Thought for the Day: 

So I have this app downloaded on my phone that works in conjunction with my running app to count calories ingested and expended everyday.

When I finished my first day of calorie counting, the app told me that: “If every day is like today... you will gain 10 lbs at the end of 5 weeks.” I have to tell you that was not what I was expecting! 

Have you ever gotten to the end of a long day and thought: “If everyday were like today...” How would that sentence end for you? 

“If everyday were like today, I’d be on cloud nine forever!” 
“If everyday were like today, I’d be miserable for the rest of my life!”
“If everyday were like today, I’d be perfected in God’s love in this lifetime!”
“If everyday were like today, I’d be competing for the devil’s job!”
“If everyday were like today....”

Wouldn’t it be cool if there were a spiritual app that we could use to accurately measure how many spiritual calories we were ingesting and expending everyday? Wouldn’t it be great to end the day with a spiritual assessment that told us that: “If everyday were like today... you would be perfected in faith at the end of 5 weeks.” 

Obviously we don’t know exactly how each day will pan out but we can choose to assess ourselves. Regardless of how well we feel about our walk with God, if we honestly assess our spiritual health we might find something we were not expecting. If you want to get started on a spiritual assessment, check out the following passages and then ask yourself: “If everyday were like today, how did I do?”

1. Matthew 5-7

2. Matthew 22:36-40

3. Deuteronomy 5:1-21

4. 1 Corinthians 13:4-8

5. Ephesians 5:1-21

6. Philippians 2:1-18

Prayer for the day:

Thank you God for a desire to grow closer to you. Allow me to constantly assess how my faith relationships are doing and when I need help, grant it. Amen.

A Good Front

Scripture:

“Create in me a clean heart, O God, and put a new and right spirit within me. Do not cast me away from your presence, and do not take your holy spirit from me. Restore to me the joy of your salvation, and sustain in me a willing spirit.” - Psalm 51:10-12

Thought for the Day: 

I’m sitting in my living room and I am positioned to look out into the back yard as well as the front yard. 

As I gaze out the front window, I am able to see my freshly freshly cut lawn. It wasn’t long ago that I was ashamed of myself because the grass was growing out of control. Now, I feel a sense of satisfaction because it looks the yard looks nice, not perfect, but nice. 

And then I look out the back window and there is a mess! The grass still isn’t cut. The bushes that were overgrown and hacked down are now attempting to regrow but honestly, they look horrid. And lurking around the corner, just out of eye-site is some severely overgrown spearmint burying the sidewalk on one side and a wealth of unrelenting, always returning, weeds blocking the steps down to the garage on the other side.

Why am I ratting myself out like this? Well, because I see an analogy that rings all too true in our lives. 

So many of us are great at keeping up a good front. The person in us that others get to see is nice, not perfect, but nice. Our days are always going good, our problems are few… We tend to convey the tag line from the “Old Milwaukee” beer commercials: “It doesn’t get any better than this!” 

However, we know that if people could see inside of us, there is a mess. Proverbs 20:9-10 asks, “Who can say, ‘I have made my heart clean; I am pure from my sin’?”  

How often we are inundated with grudges that we can’t dismiss, affronts that we won’t let go, injustices that we cling to, and hurts that fester. We may look good on the outside, but we are racked with sin on the inside and it makes a mess of things in our lives. 

“Create in me a clean heart, O God, and put a new and right spirit within me. Do not cast me away from your presence, and do not take your holy spirit from me. Restore to me the joy of your salvation, and sustain in me a willing spirit.” - Psalm 51:10-12

When the messy inside is cleaned up and cleaned out to match our approachable outside, when we become fully authentic in who we are before God and others… then life truly “doesn’t get any better!” 

I pray that life for all of us! 

Prayer for the day: Create in me a clean heart, O God! Empower me to be fully authentic, so that my thoughts and my actions are one before you and others. Amen. 

All Tucked Away...

Scripture:

“You are the light of the world. A city built on a hill cannot be hid. No one after lighting a lamp puts it under the bushel basket, but on the lamp-stand, and it gives light to all in the house. In the same way, let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father in heaven.” - Matthew 5:14

Thought for the day:

Not all churches care for their property as well as Grace UMC. I remember one time, years ago, we had water throughout the laundry room every time the clothes were washed. Each time it happened, my wife told me about it. But it wasn’t until she said, “ED! I’M NOT MOPPING THE FLOOR AGAIN AND THERE WILL BE NO CLEAN CLOTHES UNTIL THIS IS FIXED!” I found time to go down and look at the washer. Long story short, I found the leak and got the Trustees of the church to fix it. But this story isn’t really about the leak, it is about the water on floor.

When I finally acknowledged the problem, I picked everything up off the floor to keep it dry, well, almost everything. There were a couple of boxes and foot locker tucked back in the corner that weren’t easy to reach and it didn’t look too wet over there so I didn’t bother to dig them out. I figured that the walls of the foot locker would protect the contents and the boxes didn’t have anything all that valuable within in them. BAD DECISION!

Once the leak was fixed, I realized that there was more water in the corner than I anticipated. So, I pulled everything out of the corner. When I opened the foot locker I found that, while the walls of the foot locker kept the flood out, the moisture creeped in and created enough humidity that mold had taken its toll on the contents which included a large Bible.


Sometimes we have a tendency to lock our faith away believing it to be safe, protected from the destructive effects our world showers upon us only to find that when we pull it out, it has nothing left of value to offer us. We find that, as protected as we think we are, the evils of the world can still seep in and destroy our closely guarded faith.

It is important to realize that the word of God tucked away for our own private enrichment, will always rot away into words totally devoid of power because that is not what the word of God was intended to do! God’s word is intended to be transformative. It’s power is in it’s daily presence. Let’s resolve never to tuck our faith away trusting that it will survive in solitude.


Prayer for the day:

Lord, when the problems of life flood my heart and soul, help me move towards the higher ground found in the transformative power of your daily presence. Amen.

Worry Not!

Scripture:

“Do not worry about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.” - Phillipians 4:6-7

Thought for the day:

I was remembering an article sent to me by my mother-in-law a few years back, when she was living in New Hampshire. It was written by Larry Chase for the Concord Monitor newspaper. The article was about the lack of worry among children today. In his article, Chase recalls a day spent with his grandchildren where he accompanied them throughout the day from one outrageous activity to another while noticing that the children hadn’t a “worry in the world.” He then recalled a litany of worry that this parents constantly placed upon him:

Accidents can and will happen.
Candy can rot your teeth.
Don’t pick at that. It’ll get infected
Get your clothes dirty and you’ll be sorry.
Turn that down. You could burst an eardrum.
Keep reading that stuff and you’ll rot your brain.
If you don’t brush your teeth right, they’ll all fall out.
If you don’t go to sleep right now, the bogeyman will get you.
If you go swimming right after lunch, you’ll get cramps and drown.
Keep picking your nose like that and some day your finger will get stuck up there.

These are just a few of the worries listed in the article that Mr. Chase remembers being cautioned of as a child and I actually remember a few of them myself! At any rate, the article concludes with a lament about how his grandson is living a worry-free life and he is not.

Perhaps the reason that there is so much worry in the world is because the older we get, the less we trust.

“Do not worry about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.” - Phillipians 4:6-7

Maybe if we would remember the resurrection and allow it’s celebration to linger a bit longer in our lives, we would prayerfully gain confidence in the power of the risen Lord. “Fear not! For I am with you!” says the Lord.” We all know that accidents can and will happen, but for those who believe in the one who has conquered sin and death...there is simply not much left to worry about. The assurance of our Risen Lord be with you all!

Prayer for the day:

Dear Lord, grant me so much confidence in the power of your resurrection that I am set free from the worries that imprison my heart and mind. Amen.

Is Today the Day?

Scripture:

“Bear with each other and forgive one another if any of you has a grievance against someone. Forgive as the Lord forgave you.” - Colossians 3:13

Thought for the day:

Have you been slighted? Betrayed? Read on…

“Two devoted friends and brilliant minds—John Adams and Thomas Jefferson—fell out with each other over politics, personal slights, and both feeling betrayed by the other. The feud not only embittered both, causing them to abandon all correspondence and relationship of any kind for many years, but it troubled their closest companions who could not imagine these giants of the Revolution becoming estranged for the rest of their lives.

In 1809 a mutual signer of the Declaration of Independence, Dr. Benjamin Rush, had a dream about the two former Presidents, wrote it down, and sent it to both men. In the dream he saw the alienated statesmen renew their friendship and begin corresponding with each other. John Adams, again in the dream, addressed a short letter to Thomas Jefferson, and Jefferson responded. These two brief letters were "followed by a correspondence of several years in which they mutually reviewed the scenes of business in which they had been engaged, and candidly acknowledged to each other all the errors of opinion and conduct into which they had fallen during the time they filled the same station in the service of their country." Both Jefferson and Adams politely but separately acknowledged their friend's account of the dream and thought no more about it.

Three years later, at Rush's urging, Thomas Jefferson sent a very tentative letter to John Adams who responded with a guarded reply. One letter followed another until John Adams wrote to Jefferson on July 15, 1813: "Never mind it, my dear Sir, if I write four letters to your one; your one is worth more than my four … You and I ought not to die, before we have explained ourselves to each other.”

Bitter enemies prodded by a friend's dream were brought back together for the last several years of their lives until they died—both on the same day and only three hours apart: July 4th, 1826, the 50th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence.” [by Fred Smith, Forgetting the Little that Divides, The Gathering blog (10-22-15)]

Perhaps today is the day to begin the journey in which you regain your freedom from estrangement and your friend?

Pray for the day:

Lord, where I am imprisoned by bitterness, blame, or betrayal, set me free for renewal and reunion with those who I have hurt or by whom I have been hurt. Amen.

Time to Mix It Up?

Scripture:

“Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles. And let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us, fixing our eyes on Jesus, the pioneer and perfecter of faith.” - Hebrews 12:1-2

Thought for the day:

So... I am more than half way through 2019 and still running with a passion and loving it. I even achieved my goal for the 2019 Pittsburgh Marathon this past May. Each time I lace up my shoes, I realize once again how much I missed running regularly these past couple of years. I also realize how much more prepared I am to handle life after a run.

If you are anything like me, there are times when life threatens to overwhelm you. You know deep in your heart that you have to do things a bit differently. For me, I allowed “differently” to be defined as “virtually not at all.” As a result, the one real outlet in my life, that one thing I needed most, I gave up...

That happens in our faith journey as well. Sometimes living our faith becomes difficult because life is so overwhelming. The job isn’t going so well, the bills are adding up, the family is fighting, friendships are faltering. You get the picture. We know that something has to give; something has to change. We have to do things a bit differently. Occasionally, if you’re like me, we allow “differently” to be defined as “not at all.” The one thing we need the most, connection and conversation with God and with other Christians, we allow to “fall by the wayside.”

I’m doing things a bit differently now; instead of just running the roads, instead of doing the same course day in and day out, I am mixing it up a bit. I have found trail running to be challenging because I have to watch where I’m going - stumbling blocks are everywhere. In fact, I ended up doing a “tuck and roll” when a tree root reached out to grab me during one run. But I’m  so much more engaged now. I have days when a simple, mindless long run is just what I need to refresh my mind, my soul, and my body... Other days, I need the added challenge of the trails or possibly speed work. Regardless, I’m gaining the physical, emotional, and spiritual benefits of running.

Perhaps, we would do well to approach our faith journey in the same way. Instead of just Sunday worship, mix it up a bit. Add in something to challenge your walk with God on a daily basis; maybe a different devotional. Try a Sunday school class or even a new Sunday school class. Perhaps participation in a small group will offer a different perspective.

If you really want to challenge yourself commit to reading a quality author who maintains a different Christian perspective than you are accustomed too. Change up your prayer life in subtle or significant ways or review the theology contained in your favorite hymns and praise songs. Allow your church family to help you grow.


The point is to get your faith flowing again. You can be sure that there will be stumbling blocks but approaching your faith differently will force you to engage God in a way that will enhance your connection and conversation, not just with God but with others as well! It will also make you much more prepared to handle life when it threatens to overwhelm you. 

Prayer for the day: Heavenly Father, life can be overwhelming. Help me to engage with you today in ways that enhance my connection and conversation with you and those around me. Amen.

Keeping His Kingdom First Place

Scripture:

“Someone will say, ‘You have faith and I have works,’ Show me your faith apart from your works, and I by my works will show you my faith.” (James 2:18)

Thought for the Day:

I participate in a fantasy baseball league with other pastors for bragging rights in the conference. My problem… I forgot draft night this year… Granted, the computer managed to get me a decent starting lineup, but I have no depth. I have been scrambling ever since in an attempt to upgrade my roster.  

It got me to thinking. I wonder how many times we have an opportunity to do something good for the Kingdom, but then we forget about it. Do you say, “Oh well!” and move on or do you scramble to make things right? 

“Someone will say, ‘You have faith and I have works,’ Show me your faith apart from your works, and I by my works will show you my faith.” (James 2:18)

As much as God loves us and cares for us, we are given the opportunity to practice the grace that love and care provides. Are we scrambling to do the good works of piety for the Kingdom by focusing on reading, meditating and studying the scriptures; through prayer, fasting, regularly attending worship, and sharing our faith with others? Are we scrambling to do the good works of mercy which includes doing good works, visiting the sick and those in prison, feeding the hungry, and giving generously to the needs of others?

God understands that we aren’t perfect and forgetfulness isn’t the end of the world! God understands that our high hopes and best intentions aren’t always realized and God is there to make sure that, even in the midst of our own failures, we have decent chance at the great life God intends for us. But sometimes we are going to have to scramble. Living in faith requires our active participation. We mustn’t forget that we are to be the ones adding depth to our relationship with God. 

May the depth of your relationship with God and others continue to develop, and through you, may the Kingdom grow for God.

Prayer: Dear God, please help guard me against any forgetfulness of faith. Amen.