The Plumbline

So you must continue to live in a way that gives meaning to your salvation. Do this with fear and respect for God. Yes, it is God who is working in you. He helps you want to do what pleases him, and he gives you the power to do it. (Philippians 3:12-13) Sin has a way of wearing a path in our lives. We don't even realize it, but there is a 'groove' worn as we continue to follow the same old patterns. Much like the elephant pegged to the ground, sin wears away a groove we seem to just contentedly walk around within. We allow a worn path in our lives when we go through the process of the repetitive actions of a particular habit or sin. It may take a little effort to get out of the rut if we have been traveling in that rutted path for a long time. But...Jesus doesn't leave us in the rut, nor does he limit us in anyway. He totally removes all the reminders of the bondage - but we have to change our thought pattern about our bondage. We need to realize we are free!  The el...

The world breaks everyone, and afterward, some are strong at the broken places. (Ernest Hemingway) What are some of your worst 'broken places'? Maybe you have been 'broken' in the place we call the 'heart' - someone disappointing you so badly that you just have never fully healed. Perhaps it is in the place we call the 'spirit of man' - something occurring that just shredded your confidence and left you not wanting to ever try again. You and I both have broken places, but they don't have to be places where brokenness remains. There is hope for restoration beyond what we imagine possible when Jesus touches those places. The Lord hears his people when they call to him for help. He rescues them from all their troubles. The Lord is close to the brokenhearted; he rescues those whose spirits are crushed. The righteous person faces many troubles, but the Lord comes to the rescue each time. For the Lord protects the bones of the righteous; not one of them i...

Let's be frank here - we need to learn to walk together in unity. I think we all know how truly difficult it is to actually be and stay in unity. Deep, intimate relationships require a different commitment than mere acquaintances. Friendships help to sustain us and keep us on track. How we view each relationship tells us a little bit about what we may actually invest into and take away from those relationships. We may find some actually are an ordeal for us because they demand more than we want to really put into them, but does that make them unnecessary relationships? Some may seem like a big deal to us, but does that make them worthy of special attention while neglecting others? Other relationships seem like they are kind of ideal, almost making us want to be exclusionary within those relationships, but doesn't that isolate us from the other types of relationships which might actually help us chip away some of the rough edges in our character? I think we might just nee...

The journey you travel - what does it look like for you today? Some of us have been on a dead-end journey for a while, kind of just going along, but not really getting to anywhere worth all the effort. It is indeed hard to correct a course when it has been going along for quite some time, even when it is not getting us to where we want to be, isn't it? It is like we get way too comfortable just plodding along on that journey - not really satisfied, but comfortable because we 'know' the course well. When we say 'yes' to Jesus, we find ourselves making some immediate course corrections, and others come along the way that we didn't even know we'd be asked to make, but we make them. The first ones may be a little easier than the latter - maybe because we are experiencing God's grace and redeeming power in a very special way at that point in our lives. When the latter course corrections have to come, we may not be as excited about them because they will be a ...

Have you ever thought of your heart as a vault of sorts? It is more like a vault than anything else, because we oftentimes hide things away there forever and ever - our special treasures and sometimes our 'special non-treasures' that we might not really want to let go of! Look at what God's Word does when it enters our hearts. I think we often don't give credit to God for the work he does in the "changing" of our hearts - through his Word and times with him. We sometimes just think he is "mending" our hearts, but as you soon come to realize, simple mending by anyone other than a skilled surgeon leaves us leaking! He replaces those hard hearts with pliable ones, diseased with healthy, and empties those that need a little 'cleaning out' in order to be whole. I've banked your promises in the vault of my heart so I won't sin myself bankrupt.  (Psalm 119:11) Today I might focus on the importance of allowing the Word to affect our heart (mi...