Search me, O God, and know my heart; test me and know my anxious thoughts. Point out anything in me that offends you, and lead me along the path of everlasting life. (Psalm 139:23-24 NLT) Know my anxious thoughts. Are you one of the many who actually get a little 'twitterpated' when life gets tough? No, the meaning of that word isn't 'upset', 'in a tizzy', or even anxious. It means that you are 'infatuated' or 'obsessed' with the 'toughness' of the moment. There aren't many of you out there that actually face 'anxious moments' with such enjoyment, but anyone who subjects themselves to those huge rollercoaster rides or those 'spin till you pass out' ones might just thrive on that level of anxiety. The rest of us don't actually face anxious moments with a sense of 'infatuation' with whatever is occurring! The rest of the world faces those anxious moments with a little bit of fear, mistrust, or the initia...
O Lord, I will honor and praise your name, for you are my God. You do such wonderful things! You planned them long ago, and now you have accomplished them. (Isaiah 25:1 NLT) Do you celebrate God in your life? Do you celebrate his goodness as well as his correction? It is an easy thing to celebrate him when he does something spectacular in your life, blessings abounding in every way. It is another thing to celebrate him when he identifies something within you that needs to change, bringing both the conviction and the grace to accomplish that change, isn't it? We might look toward heaven when all is going well, but do we tend to look inward at our failures when things didn't go so well? The more God corrects both the big and little things in our lives, the more we can be assured we are moving in the right direction with him. We should not fear his correction because it is essentially another 'blessing' from his throne! Salvation was a 'one-time' deal. Sanctificat...