In the beginning, God created our first parents, and brought them together to meet. For Eve, it was a big day. She had just been created, met God, and was going to her first “date” —her wedding. Upon seeing his wife for the first time, Adam was overwhelmed and uttered first recorded human words in all history in the form of a song, which explains why guys with a guitar will always have an advantage.
God brought Eve to Adam as her Father. And as their pastor, he officiated the first wedding ceremony, declaring them husband and wife.
God blessed them, invited our first parents to steward creation, make a culture that reflected his glory for our good, and make some babies. Sex was good. God was glorified.
Then something terrible happened. God’s enemy, and ours, shows up, twisting God’s words. Our mother Eve’s sin of commission was, in a proud effort to become like God, partaking of that which God had forbidden. Our father Adam’s sin of omission was failing to intervene as he sat by quietly, idly, and timidly watching the enemy, Satan, deceive his wife as so many of his cowardly, passive, silent sons have done ever since. Rather than living as one, they separated as two sinners.
This fall of humanity into sin has infected, polluted, and corrupted literally every aspect of life on the earth, including sex. As a result people tend to think that sex is god or gross, rather than a gift.
Sex as god
Sex is deeply spiritual.
In the days of the Old Testament, most religions taught that God was to be experienced through nature, particularly through sexuality. Because of this thinking, many of these religions had sexuality and temple prostitution as integral components of their spirituality and religious ceremonies. In contrast, God’s people were strongly opposed to such thinking because they held that God could not be reduced to something he had created.
Today, the worship of sex as god is as passionate as ever. Our culture celebrates sex through movies, music, and television. Women’s magazines scream sex at our children as we stand in the grocery store line. And some people are so enslaved to sex that they do horrific things to others such as rape, abuse, pedophilia, and more.
Sex as gross
Often as an overreaction to sex as god, people adopt the position of sex as gross. As such, sex is viewed as a sort of necessary evil for procreation, but otherwise a rather vulgar, repulsive, and off-putting act. This is unfortunately common in the church, leading many godly men and women to look outside the church for wrong answers to their sex questions from culture.
Sex as a gift
The reality is that sex is not gross, but for many it is perverted. The goal should not be to reject sex but rather to redeem it as God intended it, a loving act between a husband and wife that binds them together as one flesh.
Contrary to sex as god or gross, the Bible teaches that sex can be redeemed as a gift. Because sex is a gift that God gave, it is his intent that we steward and enjoy that gift, like every gift he gives, in such a way that is glorious to him, and good for our marriages.
Here are six benefits of having sex with your spouse that my wife Grace and I identify in our book, Real Marriage: The Truth About Sex, Friendship, & Life Together.
Sex is for pleasure.
Throughout the most erotic book in the Bible, the 3,000-year-old Song of Songs, children are never mentioned, as the entire focus of the book is simply marital passion and pleasure. The book is frank without being crass. And, it is the wife who speaks first and speaks most about exactly what she enjoys sexually. Without getting into the specifics here as we do in the book, single Jewish men were forbidden from reading the book because it was simply too hot to handle.
Sex is for creating children.
Children are repeatedly considered a blessing throughout Scripture. God created a husband and wife to conceive children at the moment of deepest connection. (In chapter 10, we address birth control use, too.)
Sex is for oneness.
A faithfully married couple with a free and frequent sex life is literally bonded together as one, physically and chemically by God’s design. This oneness is expressed in such things as having one last name, living in one house, sleeping in one bed, attending one church, sharing one bank account, and worshiping one God.
Sex is for knowledge.
In the act of sex, and the related intimacy that surrounds it, a couple learns to know each other in a way that they are not known by anyone else. This sacred and experiential knowledge means that a faithfully married couple has an intimacy and connection that is not only exclusive but also unprecedented in all their other relationships.
Sex is for protection.
While there is no excuse for sexual sin, there are factors that can increase the temptation for sexual sin. Perhaps chief among them is a marriage in which at least one of the people is sexually dissatisfied because the sex is not free or frequent enough. If one person feels sexually denied and discouraged, it increases the temptation to wander outside the marriage for sexual satisfaction. But free and frequent sex within marriage helps safeguard and protect the marriage from such sins as bitterness, adultery, and pornography.
Sex is for comfort.
We knew a couple who suffered the death of their young child. They were understandably devastated.
The husband was unsure what to say or do to comfort his grieving wife, and so he simply asked what she needed. She told him that she wanted to go away for a few days to a quiet bed and breakfast, lie unclothed together, visit, pray, weep, and make love so that she did not feel alone in any way. They reported that being able to physically comfort each other at that time was a vital part of their healing and grieving process.
There are seasons in life when nothing can be said or done to comfort a suffering spouse. In those moments, it is the ministry of touch that allows us to connect with our spouses in a way that lovingly serves them and binds us together in the suffering.
It is our prayer that you and your spouse would see sex as a gift from God.
A gift to be stewarded.
A gift to be guarded.
A gift to be enjoyed.
And a gift to be shared together for God’s glory and you.
Its a new year of greatness, God has prepared goodness for us this year. For every year the devil as also set goals for the year as God has plans for us. Its going to be disastrous for you not to set your plans for the year in God “Psalm 91 vs 1”, for he that sits in the secret place of the most high shall abide under the shadow of the almighty.
Alone side with the merry of the season set goals for yourself, create a check mate for yourself and write your vision make it plan “Habb 2vs3”.
VITAL KEYS TO HELP YOU.
1. PRAYER: Pray along side with your visions.
2. PRAISE: Praise answers to all things. Acts 16 vs 25 and 26
3. FAITH: in faith create an image seeing yourself accomplishing your set goals.
4. DECLARE THE WORD: With your mouth declare the word of God, don’t just read the word of God proclaim the word of God. Joshua 1:8
5. CREATE A DAILY BALANCE CHECK: On all your written goals mark out the accomplished ones and proceed ahead.
God bless you ..
psalmeben cares.
Join me every morning as we prophesy into the day.
John Newton’s hymn “Amazing Grace” is the most famous New Year’s Day hymn in church history, first unveiled to his rural congregation on January 1, 1773.
The entire hymn is closely modeled after 1 Chronicles 17, a chapter that speaks of King David’s past, present, and future. Newton does the same, reflecting on past grace, present grace, and the hope of future grace. It was a fitting way to bring in the New Year, and it was his annual pattern.
At the start of every year, Newton set aside a day to reflect on life. He was at one time a hardened sailor in the slave trade. He was broken and humbled and redeemed. And he was aware of the ongoing grace upholding his life. And his future was completely in the hands of God’s mercy, too. Like David, Newton saw grace in 3D — past, present, and future.
New Year’s was a special time of reflection and worship, and the practice was embedded into his personal disciplines. It became a hallmark of his pastoral work. He penned new hymns and sermons and personal letters every year to urge his friends to take time at the unveiling of a new year to stop and reflect on grace. He would tell us to do the same at the start of 2017.
Past, Present, Future Grace
Newton’s most famous hymn “Amazing Grace” is the best example of this reflection. The hymn was first unveiled in his church on New Year’s Day (1773), and it’s a reflection on the new year: a look back on his past deliverances, a look around on his present deliverances, and a look forward to his future deliverances in Christ.
As each New Year approached, Newton patterned his thinking along this reflective triplet.
In one letter to a friend, Newton explained the discipline,
New Years finds me employed. I compare it to a hill on the road, from the top of which I endeavor to look back on the way that the Lord has led me thus far through the wilderness (past). I look around to contemplate the difference his goodness has made between my situation, and that of thousands of my fellow creatures (present). I then look forward, and perceive that I am drawing apace to my journey’s end. I shall soon be at home (future).
At the time he wrote this, John Newton, the wretched sinner, had been saved from his sin and judgment. John Newton, the folly-prone Christian, was being saved. And John Newton, the glorified and perfected man in Christ, would be saved in the end.
Such confidence in grace was synonymous with his confidence in the all-sufficient Christ.
To another friend, Newton wrote, “I hope this New Year will bring many new blessings to you. The Lord is good. He has delivered (past) — he does deliver (present) — he will deliver (future). Oh, what an Altar, Atonement, Temple, Priest! What a Sun and Shield! What a Savior and what a Shepherd have we!”
The New Year afforded Newton the reminder to meditate on the grace of Christ.
Amazing Grace
Knowing how Newton processed the New Year — and knowing he wrote “Amazing Grace” for a New Year’s Day service in his church — take a moment now to read the hymn as it originally appeared. Read it slowly, meditatively, as you reflect on how God has delivered, is delivering, and will finally deliver his children.
The hymn opens with a reminder of God’s past grace:
Amazing grace! (how sweet the sound)
That sav’d a wretch like me!
I once was lost, but now am found,
Was blind, but now I see.
‘Twas grace that taught my heart to fear,
And grace my fears reliev’d;
How precious did that grace appear
The hour I first believ’d!
Now note the transition to God’s present grace:
Through many dangers, toils, and snares,
I have already come;
‘Tis grace has brought me safe thus far,
And grace will lead me home.
Finally, Newton concludes with confidence in God’s future grace:
The Lord has promis’d good to me,
His word my hope secures:
He will my shield and portion be,
As long as life endures.
Yes, when this flesh and heart shall fail,
And mortal life shall cease,
I shall possess, within the veil,
A life of joy and peace.
The earth shall soon dissolve like snow,
The sun forbear to shine;
But God, who call’d me here below,
Will be forever mine.
New Year, New Mercies
Wrote Newton in another letter to a friend, “With new years, new mercies.”
Yes, because we are in the middle of a storyline of grace, a new year brings new anticipation of new mercies from Christ.
The new year is an opportunity to pause on the path and to stand humbly on the hilltop of time to look back on grace received, to cherish the sustaining grace of God upholding us now, and to anticipate future graces yet to come in 2017.
It might happen when you hear your parents’ favorite Christmas carol. Immediately the song transports you out of your sterile workday back to your childhood, to a living room bursting with tinsel, gifts, and anticipation.
Or maybe it happens when you smell the spices of cider moving through your house this Christmas and you half-expect the memory of your grandfather to be standing in your kitchen, bragging about his perfect recipe, through his playful grin.
Worship with All Five Senses
Of course, the memories aren’t always that idyllic. For some, they’re unwelcome intrusions into a life under construction. Good or bad, sweet or bitter, the memories still come each Christmas. Just one small trigger, and everything we’ve loved, lost, and treasured seems to swell up in our hearts.
Nostalgia arrives through our senses. What we hear, see, taste, touch, and smell is the ink we use to write our mental autobiographies. We cannot escape our memories, because we cannot escape our senses, just like we cannot escape ourselves.
This is beautiful because we were created this way for a purpose. God gives us five senses to help us worship him: the sights, sounds, smells, textures, and tastes testify to the diversity of God’s gifts and to the depth of worship God deserves.
But in our pursuit to conform our hearts and minds to Christ, we often forget the physical elements in worship. When we lose this dimension, we often lose what it means to be altogether human, and ironically we lose a principal way God means to transform our hearts and minds. Our Lord consistently builds worship around our senses.
Remember the Passover
Standing on the precipice of Israel’s chaotic redemption, God commands his people to sit down for a meal — a directive that may seem slightly out of place and misguided. But when we see this scene in light of the whole drama, God’s instructions are perfect. The exodus is not just about God leading Israel out of Egypt; it is about God leading Israel into lifelong worship.
Passover is theological nostalgia. It defines the redemptive experience of a whole generation, so much so that God commanded an encore performance every year (Exodus 12:14). With every lamb, they smelled redemption. When they tasted bitter herbs, they tasted God’s goodness. When they fastened their sandals, every step reminded them of his grace. Every time they dipped hyssop into blood, they painted their theology.
Remember the Temple
The temple is the instrument God uses to overwhelm his people from the outside in. Its worship patterns shock each of the physical senses to press his purposes into his people. God tuned Israel and her priests to his presence and praise through the taste of showbread, the heat of the burnt offerings, the scent of cedar and incense, the gloss of gold, and the echoes of prayers. The temple’s multi-sensory experience brought the whole person before the presence and glory of God (2 Chronicles 7:1–2).
Like the Passover, every visit to the temple etched smells, touches, tastes, sounds, and sights into the worshiper’s consciousness. After leaving the temple, when a familiar scent or sound broke their routine, they were pulled back in memory to the place where God was present, where their sins went to die, and where God’s promises were on full display.
Remember the Incarnation
In Christ, God took on flesh and tabernacled in the midst of his people (John 1:14). In Christ, we see God and, simultaneously, what it means to be truly human.
This is why Jesus’s ministry invades every part of us, including our senses. Through mud-caked eyes, the blind can see. Through a touch of his garment, he heals the broken. Through voicing a simple prayer, the multitudes taste bread and fish without end.
In Jesus, the one who created our senses entered his world to redeem them. He comes to touch, smell, hear, see, and taste death for his people so that you and I may do what we were made to do: worship him with every part of our being (Romans 12:1).
We were made for this. God calls us to taste this Bread of Life, to drink this life-giving water, to see this light of the world, to smell the sheep on our Good Shepherd, to hear his question, “Who do you say that I am?” We were made to touch his nail-scarred hands and see him standing outside the empty tomb (John 20:27).
Remember the Good News
We need to hear and experience the gospel over and over again. God has made a way for this. Jesus gives us new-covenant nostalgia in the bread and wine of the Lord’s Supper. And through the waters of baptism, we see, taste, hear, smell, and feel what it means to move from death to life.
God saves all of us — redeeming and reinterpreting our senses, too — so that we can worship him more fully. So, taste and see — and touch, hear, and smell — that the Lord is good (Psalm 34:8). You were made for this — every part of you.
There’s a clip recently posted on Instagram by Jackie Hill Perry, who is a wife and a mom, a poet and a hip-hop artist, and a guest writer for us. We’re fans of her work. The clip she posted is a really bold and insightful word to married couples. I’ll play the audio, Pastor John, and then get your thoughts. Here’s the clip.
Question: How often are you honest with your spouse about your lustful temptation? When it comes to men, I think it might be two reasons why they might be unwilling to share with their wives about their struggle.
They like it. They enjoy entertaining the fact that other women want them or the ideas that pop up in their minds about what they could do with other women. That is a heart issue.
You women are too insecure to take it! Every time this man wants to let you in on what he is struggling with, you want to get in your feeling. “So, what you are trying to say? You were thinking about another woman and she was in your dreams? You’re telling me I am not worth dreaming about now?”
Girl, calm down. You should let the fact that he let you into his heart give you security and the reassurance that he loves you. Letting our spouses in our issues gives them the opportunity to hold us accountable and pray for us. And it uproots any opportunity for Satan to wreak havoc on our marriages through secrets. So, be honest with your spouse.
She gets to the point, doesn’t she? Pastor John, any thoughts you’d add?
“Men, is your wife the only woman that you desire?” Tweet Share on Facebook
Jackie Hill Perry is very thoughtful. She is a thoughtful young woman and it is manifest in this penetrating analysis into a man’s love affair with lust and a woman’s fears of letting her man talk to her about it. She isn’t just blowing steam here. She is seeing — seeing through and seeing into — and that is a great gift that every Christian should aspire to.
Another thing as I listen that makes these couple of minutes compelling is that she is balanced. She goes after both men and women in their respective sins and weaknesses. She is not just harping on the man or harping on the woman. It takes two to tango, and it takes two to play hide and seek — especially hide. And she gets that right.
The third thing that I thought of as I listened that adds depth to what she says is that she takes Satan seriously. There are a lot of people who don’t even believe in Satan, and they are Christians who never give serious thought to how deceptive and destructive his designs are. Jackie draws our attention to the truth that Satan works in the dark. He is like roaches. You turn the light on, it goes away. You keep the light off, he might run right up your leg.
“Satan gets the upper hand in our relationships when there is unconfessed sin we don’t even know about.” Tweet Share on Facebook
When Paul says in 2 Corinthians 2:11 that we are not ignorant of Satan’s designs, he was referring to the unwillingness to forgive. That is a field day. That is a dark kitchen for the roach of Satan. Maybe there is, however, a kitchen that is darker than the kitchen of unforgiveness, and that would be the kitchen that is so dark nobody even knows there is a need to be forgiven. “At one time you were darkness, but now you are light in the Lord. Walk as children of light” (Ephesians 5:8).
Or, as James says, “Confess your sins to one another” (James 5:16). Surely Jackie is onto something with husbands and wives here in applying it to that relationship. “Confess your sins to one another . . . that you may be healed” (James 5:16). And she would add and I would add that Satan might get the upper hand in your relationship through all the darkness of unconfessed sin that you don’t even know about.
If I would add anything to what Jackie says, I might say to the guys: Jackie stressed lustful thoughts in which you think about doing things with other women. Don’t let yourself off the hook if you say, “Well, I don’t fantasize about doing things with other women. I just fantasize about seeing things.” Jesus said, “Everyone who looks at a woman to desire her has already committed adultery in his heart” (Matthew 5:28, my translation). So, the question is: Is that woman in your head your wife? That is the question.
“Our marriages need a blood-bought, Spirit-dependent, Bible-saturated commitment to never divorce.” Tweet Share on Facebook
And the last thing that I would add is this. If there is going to be enough deep security and strength in this woman’s heart and the man’s heart, I would say, to welcome this kind of honesty that she is commending, then both of them will need to lay some pretty massive foundations of Christ-centered commitment before him. And I mean like rock-solid, unshakable, blood-bought, Spirit-dependent, Bible-saturated commitment; namely, divorce by either one of us is not an option.
Noël and I, my wife and I, said divorce is not an option to each other over the last 47 years many times, and in our darkest, stormiest seasons we knew there was hope to get through the storm, because we had promised nobody is jumping out of this plane.
So thank you, Jackie, for wise and penetrating words. I hope they bear much fruit.
He was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities: the chastisement of our peace was upon him; and with his stripes we are healed.
Isaiah 53:5
Jesus came to earth and gave Himself as a sacrifice for sin in order to buy back for you everything that Adam lost. He came to destroy all the works of the devil…sickness and disease included. Once you receive Him as Lord of your life, all the rights and privileges God originally intended you to have (the right to things like fellowship with God, health and prosperity) are restored.
But you are the one who has to exercise those rights!
You see, the devil is an outlaw and even though Jesus has taken away his authority in the earth, even though he has no legal right to kill or steal from the children of God, he’ll do it anyway…as long as you’ll let him get away with it.
You must enforce his defeat by speaking the Word of God in faith. Act on His Word now. Demand that sickness and disease leave you in the Name of Jesus. Then refuse to back off that demand. Resist the devil with all you’ve got. He might fight you for a while, but sooner or later, he will have to flee from you!
And he said, Whereunto shall we liken the kingdom of God? or with what comparison shall we compare it? It is like a grain of mustard seed, which, when it is sown in the earth, is less than all the seeds that be in the earth: But when it is sown, it groweth up, and becometh greater than all herbs, and shooteth out great branches; so that the fowls of the air may lodge under the shadow of it.
Mark 4:30-32
Jesus compares the workings of the kingdom of God to planting seeds in the earth. “When the seed is sown,” He said, “it grows up….”
Notice He didn’t say that it would occasionally grow up. Or it grows up if it’s God’s will. He said, “It grows up and becomes greater.” Period.
God’s economy isn’t like ours. It isn’t up one day and down the other. It’s always the same and it always works perfectly. If you have good earth, good seed and good water, you’re going to have growth. It’s inevitable.
So, if you’re facing a need, don’t panic…plant a seed!
That seed may take the form of money or time or some other resources you have to give. But no matter what form it takes, make sure you put life in it by giving it in faith and surrounding it with praise and worship. Say, “Lord, as I bring You my goods, I bring myself. I give myself to You—spirit, soul and body.”
Pray over that seed. Fill it with faith, worship and the Word. Then plant it. You can rest assured—it will grow up and become greater!
And if ye be Christ’s, then are ye Abraham’s seed, and heirs according to the promise.
Galatians 3:29
One of the problems that hung around me for years was poverty. But I remember the day I decided I wasn’t going to be poor anymore. I was reading in the Word where it says that the blessing of Abraham has come upon the gentiles by Jesus Christ (Galatians 3:14). Then I got down to the 29th verse where it says, “If ye be Christ’s, then are ye Abraham’s seed, and heirs according to the promise.” Suddenly the truth hit me. I got so excited I could hardly stand myself.
I turned back over to Deuteronomy 28 and—line by line—I read those promised blessings. “Blessed in the city, blessed in the country. Blessed going out, blessed coming in. Blessed in your barns, blessed in your fields, blessed in all the works of your hands.” Man, I had struck it rich!
I’d been going to school in Tulsa, Oklahoma, and I was living in a dumpy little house no one would want to live in. But when I read those promises in the Word, I saw the light. I realized God had already redeemed me from the curse of poverty.
Well, that afternoon in my back bedroom, I took my Bible in my hand and I said: “I want to announce to Almighty God in heaven and to Jesus Christ of Nazareth, to all the angels of heaven, to all the demons of hell, and to anyone else who cares anything about hearing it, that from this day forward my needs are met according to God’s riches in glory by Christ Jesus.”
I told God, “I’m standing on Your Word, and I’m looking to You to take care of me. I’ll never ask a man for a dollar.”
That was many years ago and I never have. You know why? Because that decision connected me to the power of God. It’ll do the same for you.
One of the biggest scams Satan has running is the lie that reading the Bible is a chore.
The world, the flesh, and the devil himself muster their collective energies to deceive us into orienting on God’s word as some mere duty, rather than receiving it as the delight it is. We’re prone to take one of the single greatest gifts available to us and treat it as a life-sucking obligation rather than a life-giving opportunity.
We live in a day in which the very voice of God himself in the Scriptures is more readily available than ever before — in printed copies, in a rich plethora of translations and study Bibles, and in countless applications on computers we carry and smartphones we can tuck into our pockets. Yet we’re so prone to ignore and neglect his voice, and treat ourselves to just about anything else in its place.
“Don’t fool yourself into thinking there’s any virtue in making Bible time as unpleasant as possible.” Tweet Share
One of the most important actions we can take on any given day is to fight through the fog, against Satan’s great deception, and get our souls within earshot of God’s word. Cultivating the daily habit of enjoying “time alone with God” in the Scriptures feeds our souls and gives us our bearings for the rough and tumble of everyday life, whatever your vocation and slate of family, church, and community responsibilities.
How to Grow a Habit
But what goes into developing a solid, reliable habit? What steps can we take, apart from raw willpower, to foster the instinct and enflame the desire to hear from God daily in his inspired Book? Don’t fool yourself that there’s any virtue in making Bible time as unpleasant as possible. Mere duty will not suffice for long-term motivation or biblical obedience.
In seeking to set aside time to open the Bible and hear God speak, we cannot be content with just checking boxes and crossing the first item off the day’s to-do list. Rather, we can take little steps, that go a long way, to make our time in God’s word be among the most anticipated and delight-filled moments of each day.
Treat Yourself
I’ve found it revolutionary over the years to recognize and own daily “time alone with God” as an opportunity to treat myself. God’s offer to us to hear his voice is not a call to austerity, but the invitation of Isaiah 55:1, “Come, everyone who thirsts, come to the waters.”
Consider what small supplemental steps you can take to cultivate eagerness and receptiveness to God’s word — to develop the mentality that a regular season of Bible intake and prayer is a joy to anticipate, a genuine chance to treat yourself in the best of senses.
EARLY BEDTIME
First, treat yourself to an earlier bedtime. The night before affects the next morning more than we often recognize. Even just half an hour earlier can make a big difference. Earlier to bed enables you to rise earlier in the morning, without being tired, to treat yourself to a more unhurried time of Bible intake and prayer. And the earlier you rise, the fewer distractions you will encounter. More people are still asleep. You’ll find less pressure to move into other activities.
“God’s offer to receive his word is not a call to austerity, but an invitation to feast.” Tweet Share
If you’ve never been a morning person, and have tried wedging in devotional time later in the day, I’d challenge you to give mornings a genuine try with a “treat yourself” mentality. Perhaps these ideas below will make a difference. God does not mandate that we have morning devotions — he doesn’t even command a daily “quiet time” — but he does offer his own self to us in his word, and the overwhelming testimony of God’s people throughout history has been that the first moments of the day are both fitting and practically beneficial for prioritizing the voice of first importance.
INVITING SPACE
Treat yourself to a setting you enjoy, and can easily access. Maybe it’s a comfy chair or the kitchen table or nearby coffee shop. For me, it can be any big, clear surface — all the better when facing a window with a nice view. Through the winter, it’s my desk in the basement, with natural light streaming in from the egress window above. It gets cold down there, so I treat myself to warm slippers and a small space heater under the desk. Whatever your setting, it can help to don comfortable clothes.
After a long Minnesota winter, my favorite spot in the summer becomes our front porch, which faces east, with the golden solstice sun cresting the tree line. I know people who prefer to walk, rather than sit, as they hold a Bible, or listen to an audio version. Find your contexts that inspire your soul to focus on God and gladly receive his word.
GOOD SMELLS
Treat yourself to good smells. This may seem silly and superfluous to some, but for others, good smells can go a long way. The expense of lighting candles or diffusing fragrant oils can add up over time, but Jesus himself applauded lavishness when expended toward appreciating him. Not only did Jesus commend Mary for choosing “the good portion” by sitting at his feet (Luke 10:38–42), but he also defended her lavishness when his disciples accused her of wasting money to anoint those same feet (John 12:3–8).
“Money invested in hearing from God is money well spent.” Tweet Share
Instead of treating yourself to nice restaurants, expensive entertainment, and new clothes, consider reallocating some of those resources to treat yourself to something of far greater importance: time alone with God. Perhaps that includes candles or furniture or something warm to drink. The principle is that, within reason, money invested in hearing from God is money well spent.
CONDUCIVE SOUNDS
Treat yourself to background music — or none. Some prefer silence; others, gospel choruses or hymns. Perhaps, like me, you find it’s not the same sound every day — sometimes silence, other times an epic Lord of the Rings soundtrack.
Monitor how music affects your Bible intake. Music is powerful — and can be a help or hindrance. Background music for Bible reading is one thing. Songs with words might distract your reading. But consider using hymns and choruses, after reading, to sing to God in a spirit of worship.
AMAZING OPPORTUNITY
Finally, treat yourself to prayer, which connects us to one of the most mind-boggling realities in the universe: the open ear of God. God not only speaks to us in his word, but he also gives us access to himself through his Son. He wants to hear from us.
Instead of jumping into prayer lists, or parroting the same old requests, treat yourself to a more relational engagement with God. Don’t ignore what he’s just said to you in the Bible and awkwardly change the subject, but respond in prayer with his word in view. Pray his word, and that he would do in your heart and life what his word commands and inspires. And pray it for your family and friends and co-workers and neighbors
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