“Rend your heart and not your garments.”

-This call is for genuine repentance and inner humility rather than just a superficial outward display of remorse.

-Tearing one’s clothes was a traditional sign of mourning or repentance in past cultures.

-But God desires heartfelt repentance and sincere change of heart over any external gesture.

-The call is for inner transformation over superficial acts.

Faith in God is insatiable.

If you’re not left always wanting for more, you’re doing it wrong.

Return to the Lord your God, for he is gracious and compassionate, slow to anger and abounding in love, and he relents from sending calamity.

‭‭Joel‬ ‭2‬:‭13‬ ‭NIV‬‬

Sow righteousness for yourselves, reap the fruit of unfailing love, and break up your unplowed ground; for it is time to seek the Lord, until he comes and showers his righteousness on you.

‭‭Hosea‬ ‭10‬:‭12‬ ‭NIV‬‬

There are fewer logical examples more sensible than sowing and reaping.

The principle permeates all categories of human existence.

But daily, we try to dodge it and prove it wrong as if it was some surmountable truth.

Silly humans.

Some calculations are as predictable as the rising of the morning sun, yet for generations we defy the math in search of exceptions that simply don’t exist.

Even the simplest truths revealed since the garden are symptomatic of our rebelliousness in battles we will never win.

Sow a righteous life and reap God’s unfailing love is a premise and conclusion as sensible as life itself.

Give up your battle and give in to what is an inevitable and life-changing truth and watch things change.

Give faith a chance.

Spoiler alert:

At that time Michael, the great prince who protects your people, will arise.

There will be a time of distress such as has not happened from the beginning of nations.

But at that time your people—everyone whose name is found written in the book of life—will be delivered.

Multitudes who sleep in the dust of the earth will awake: some to everlasting life, others to shame and everlasting contempt.

‭‭Daniel‬ ‭12‬:‭1‬-‭2‬ ‭NIV‬‬

Everyone’s seen some version of it before.

The closing credits will be the final scene for some and the beginning for others.

Nothing else will matter. Not the good things you did. Not your generosity or your kindnesses. Not even the best clips compiled from all your years.

Only your conviction and belief that a baby born in a manger long ago was who he said he was and who he came to be was the fulfillment of your hope while visiting this brief chapter of the world.

And the final credits will roll with your name in lights.

I, Daniel, was worn out. I lay exhausted for several days. Then I got up and went about the king’s business. I was appalled by the vision; it was beyond understanding.

‭‭Daniel‬ ‭8‬:‭27‬ ‭NIV‬‬

Daniel was gifted in the supernatural.

Most of us are exhausted just dealing with understanding the natural world.

We may desire the greater gifts and to be used in ways and circumstances explainable only by divine action, but we either fail to equip or avail ourselves for such appointments or worse, simply settle for a mediocre faith.

I never met a sold-out follower of Christ who didn’t yearn and strive for a more effective Christian life.

Hold on to that desire. Nurture it with every thing you do, every thing you have, and every thing you are.

Your time is coming.

After Daniel both accurately recited and interpreted the king’s dream, the king honored and acknowledged the God of Shadrach, Meschach and Abed Nego.

Then King Nebuchadnezzar fell prostrate before Daniel and paid him honor and ordered that an offering and incense be presented to him. The king said to Daniel, “Surely your God is the God of gods and the Lord of kings and a revealer of mysteries, for you were able to reveal this mystery.
‭‭Daniel‬ ‭2‬:‭46‬-‭47‬ ‭NIV‬‬

But that honor was short-lived as the king’s later demand of them to worship the idol he had made was refused and they were thrown into a blazing furnace, only to survive there in the company of God as man, Jesus.

Then Nebuchadnezzar said, “Praise be to the God of Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego, who has sent his angel and rescued his servants! They trusted in him and defied the king’s command and were willing to give up their lives rather than serve or worship any god except their own God.
‭‭Daniel‬ ‭3‬:‭28‬ ‭NIV‬‬

Their faith and courage served as testimony to the power of their one true God.

Yet even miracles were no match for the king’s pride as we find out later.

Focusing on your past is ego. Focusing on your future is pride. Focusing on your present is humility.

“Generosity is Power.”

At first, I didn’t understand it.

Not until my afternoon encounter with a family newly ejected to the street.

Panicked at the task of surviving and helpless at their prospects, I explained where I work and what we do.

This is their first experience at homelessness as is the same for thousands more when for many, finances and recovery fail to keep pace as prices for everything skyrocket.

As homeless first-timers, this family—fully self-sufficient for the past decade—had no idea that a place like HopeLink of Southern Nevada even existed.

They never needed help before.

Generosity is Power.

It’s why you donate to places like HopeLink—for your generosity to empower the powerless with assistance and resources for a hand-up in moments of crisis like these and for those still to come.

In a million years, they never imagined this day would arrive, nor that people whose goal it is to get them back on track even exist in real life.

They are humbled but ready and so are we—and it’s only because of you.

We give because you give.

#KeepNevadaHoused

www.link2hope.

Say to them, ‘As surely as I live, declares the Sovereign Lord, I take no pleasure in the death of the wicked, but rather that they turn from their ways and live. Turn! Turn from your evil ways!
‭‭Ezekiel‬ ‭33‬:‭11‬ ‭NIV‬‬

Wickedness and evil reside in all of us.

While certain death awaits those unreconciled to God, his greatest desire is for all in his creation to live.

Turning requires acknowledgement of a condition much more desirable and a willingness to make the switch on faith alone that it’s your destiny.

But addiction to wickedness and evil is much like salvation. Whether it’s one day, year, or hour, clean is clean in the eyes and intentions of God.

God provides the opportunity and invitation. It’s up to you to take your turn. 

We will certainly do everything we said we would: We will burn incense to the Queen of Heaven and will pour out drink offerings to her just as we and our ancestors, our kings and our officials did in the towns of Judah and in the streets of Jerusalem.

Stubborn to say the least.

Despite warnings, prophecies, billboards and Facebook posts of that age, nothing changes the minds and hearts of people clearly on a mission to failure.

At that time we had plenty of food and were well off and suffered no harm. But ever since we stopped burning incense to the Queen of Heaven and pouring out drink offerings to her, we have had nothing and have been perishing by sword and famine.

‭‭Jeremiah‬ ‭44‬:‭17‬-‭18‬ ‭NIV‬‬

We all seem to find the reasonings and evidences our prideful hearts seek, despite the truth from experience that stares us in the face.

Rebellion has consequences and for these people, they are dire.

Read all the preceding passages and count the warnings.

God goes to great lengths to curb our enthusiasm for a bad outcome.

It’s like we never grow up, never get beyond ourselves as the center of the universe, always thinking we are right, that ours is the better way.

History, experience, and humility are great teachers.