by Dan | Jan 16, 2013 | Devotional
I was sick and you visited Me
Life can get hectic and we can easily forget those that are sick around us. We stop only long enough to tell them we hope they feel better and maybe say a little prayer in passing or thanksgiving for our own health. What a great opportunity we are missing to serve others! Whether we simply take soup to a friend with a cold or sit with someone who is facing a major illness- the opportunity to be a blessing is all around us. Physically, we all get sick from time to time, but many people around us are hurting both spiritually and emotionally. These can be feelings of loneliness, or questions of self- worth. Sometimes, all it takes is an encouraging word to put someone back on track. This week open your eyes the people that are closest to you and see were you can lend an encouraging word or deed!
by Dan | Dec 28, 2012 | Devotional
How time seems to fly around the holidays. It would seem that I have missed a couple of weeks of posting. I can’t give you a specific success story this week but I can tell you that the last couple of weeks I have been more aware of the people around me and have tried to watch for new faces at church and make them feel welcome. It is always amazing to me how easy it is to get into our own little rut and forget to reach out to people we meet each day. We have talked about this in our Saturday men’s group, how easy it is to hit the garage door opener pull into the garage and close the door and never need to deal with our neighbors. Point being touch peoples lives!
Challenge #4:
I was naked and you clothed Me.
I am not sure about you but I typically do not see a lot of naked people in my daily activities. What I do know is that as Tina and I prepare to sell the house and down size we have hauled countless bags of clothing from our over-stuffed closet to Savers or Goodwill making it once again hard to imagine that there are people that do not have enough. So as you go through your week take a look in your closet and see what there is that is just like new that you really don’t need ad pass it on to someone else, and again if you are in our church look up Ken Dean and see what he can use for winter coats in the ministry that he is involved in. Chose to be aware of this need so that you will be able to bless others when the need arises!
by Dan | Dec 11, 2012 | Devotional
Kind of a tough one, where do we encounter people that are thirsty? Saturday Morning, Tina and I went to Caribou coffee and anonymously purchased coffee for several people. It was great to just watch faces of people as they received their “Free Coffee.”
Challenge #3:
I was a stranger and you took Me in
They don’t get any easier.
I think that most times when we read this passage we think of the homeless. Homeless World Cup reports that in 2005, the United Nations Commission on Human Rights estimated there are 100 Million homeless people worldwide. They also report, by 2015 there will be 24.4 million in Nigeria alone. The estimated homeless figures in the United States range from 600,000 to 2.5 million. Either way- this is a lot of people that have no place to go.
This week I would like to propose that you look at this a little differently. Look around you for strangersin the places that you go to. How about in church next Sunday? Make them feel welcome and at home. Do you think that this week you can find a stranger and “take them in?”
by Dan | Dec 3, 2012 | Devotional
Humm, No comments, did no one take on this challenge? Each day, 18,000 children die from hunger-related causes.
We took our entire office to Feed my Starving Children (FMSC) this week, we packed almost 10,000 meals in the 2 hours that we were there. In 2012, FMSC passed a milestone: 600 million meals produced over our history.
On to challenge number 2, I was thirsty and you gave Me drink.
The Water Project says that there are 800 million people have no access to safe drinking water. Give a Drop says that 2,000,000 people die each year from water related illness. So those are some really, really big numbers especially when we sit in our homes with such easy access to clean water. I know in our house we have no less than 10 spigots that I could go to and fill a glass and not even think twice about it. That does not take into consideration that we may have bottled water of a few varieties and flavors in our fridge, which in itself boggles my mind, but that is a completely different topic. With all of this so very far away from touching our lives it becomes very hard to grasp how big of an issue this is, how do I begin to understand that 4 people die every minute because they have bad water when I sit here with my fresh brewed cup of coffee with fresh water right out of the faucet?
So this week your challenge is to become involved some way in giving people a drink. This may be a little more challenging to make this a going opportunity. You may want to take this outside of the literal interpretation of this challenge. Our lives are certainly filled with people that are spiritually thirsty. Look for that person that is thirsty for love or encouragement or ??? You have the ability to quench their thirst. So go, and give a drink in Jesus name.
by Dan | Nov 26, 2012 | Devotional
Do you remember our passage from Matthew?
Then the King will say to those on His right hand, ‘Come, you blessed of My Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world: for I was hungry and you gave Me food; I was thirsty and you gave Me drink; I was a stranger and you took Me in; I was naked and you clothed Me; I was sick and you visited Me; I was in prison and you came to Me.’ “Then the righteous will answer Him, saying, ‘Lord, when did we see You hungry and feed You, or thirsty and give You drink? When did we see You a stranger and take You in, or naked and clothe You? Or when did we see You sick, or in prison, and come to You?’ And the King will answer and say to them, ‘Assuredly, I say to you, in as much as you did it to one of the least of these My brethren, you did it to Me.’ (Matthew 25:34-40 NKJV)
Here we go! Our first opportunity in this passage: I was hungry and you gave me food. Ok let’s face it most of us don’t know what it is like to be hungry. In our house, it would be extremely rare to go to the fridge and not find food for several meals- not to mention the freezer or pantry where we could most likely feed a small army for a month. This makes it easy to forget how many go hungry. According to Feeding America, one in six Americans does not have enough to eat 1 in 6! I!f you break that down to just children it is one in five. Take a look at your hand, if your fingers were children one of them would be going hungry. That is just in America! The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations said in 2010 “925 million people do not have enough to eat — more than the populations of USA, Canada and the European Union combined.” That is truly more than my wee brain can comprehend. So here is your challenge this week – become involved some way in satisfying our worldwide hunger issue. Remember as much as we possibly can, let’s make this a Going Opportunity. Need some ideas? How about working at a local soup kitchen or packing meals for Feed My Starving Children. Maybe, take it to the next level and ask around and find out who are friends of your friends that are struggling financially and take them a bag of food. If you attend Edinbrook Church, look up Ken Dean and go out with him to feed people right in our city that need a good meal. At the very least, if you cannot make it a going opportunity make it a sending opportunity, go buy a big bag of groceries and take it to your local food shelf or make a contribution to Converge Worldwide’s world relief Sunday.
If you want to make a wider application, think of the people that you encounter each day that are starving spiritually, how can you reach out and touch their lives? What can you do to feed them?
Now GO! Come back and tell us what you did and the impact it made!
by Dan | Nov 19, 2012 | Devotional
Over the next 6 weeks I want to take a close look at what Jesus left us with in Mathew 25:34-40. Hopefully I can present us with a challenge to carry out each week as we look at the passage that has been called “The Great Compassion.” To help you understand how large of a challenge this is for me we need to step back a few months to the MAC (Missionary Assessment Center) that we attended in January. In preparation for this Converge Worldwide had us prepare several personal assessments to be reviewed while at the MAC. A couple of the areas that we were evaluated on were Compassion and Empathy. On a scale of 1 to 100 in the category of empathy my wonderful wife scored 100 I did not do so well I scored a 0. I think that I have always had that “Walk it off” attitude, I know that my kids have loved that. Dad, I think I sprained my ankle, me – walk it off. Dad, I have diarrhea, me – walk it off. But I digress, I score slightly better in the Compassion area but still needing improvement. So that brings us to our passage in Mathew and my attempt to put feet to Jesus words. So, your assignment this week is to simply read this passage and come back next week for our journey together in Compassion applied. Each week we will take one of the opportunities that Jesus has laid out for us and apply it. We will find that some of these opportunities are what I will call “going” opportunities and some will be “sending” opportunities. Sometimes it is easier to just make everyone a sending opportunity, my challenge is to make everyone that you can a GOING OPPORTUNITY!
Matthew 25:34-40 NKJV
Then the King will say to those on His right hand, ‘Come, you blessed of My Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world: for I was hungry and you gave Me food; I was thirsty and you gave Me drink; I was a stranger and you took Me in; I was naked and you clothed Me; I was sick and you visited Me; I was in prison and you came to Me.’ “Then the righteous will answer Him, saying, ‘Lord, when did we see You hungry and feed You, or thirsty and give You drink? When did we see You a stranger and take You in, or naked and clothe You? Or when did we see You sick, or in prison, and come to You?’ And the King will answer and say to them, ‘Assuredly, I say to you, in as much as you did it to one of the least of these My brethren, you did it to Me.’
Do you feel the love that is communicated through this passage?
One more thing, as you apply the opportunity each week come back and make a comment on the blog, I would love to hear what you experienced.
Get ready to be blessed!
Recent Comments