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I love to see kids worshipping God. Seeing kids on their knees, with lifted hands, and tears running down their faces is one of the most beautiful sights on the earth. It feels like what we will experience in heaven. I have even seen tiny babies find a way to lift their little hands in worship. What it shows is that they have seen their parents or grandparents worshipping God, because babies imitate what they see. What kind of worshipper are you? Do you fold your hands and sing softly? Do you open wide your mouth, but keep your hands in your pockets? Do you just stand there with mouth closed and a grimace on your face? Or do you unabashedly sing from the top of your lungs, and lift your hands high as you worship? Can we let the little children lead us? Let’s be like a child, go all out in worship, not caring about what anybody else thinks of us, but thinking only of giving God our best, because He is our audience of one. Let’s make it our goal to worship like a child and continue to make extravagant worship a priority in our day.

As big as I am on making things look good on the outside, that certainly isn’t the heart of the issue. The heart is the most important issue. We all know that just changing outward circumstances doesn’t make a change on the inside. Real, lasting, effective change happens from the inside out. That usually means making some adjustments, changing our thinking, controlling our thought life, and making the decision to live and serve others with excellence many times a day. What happens on the inside, will dramatically change what people see on the outside.

If we want quality on the highest level – the treasure on the inside of us needs to be expressed. Paul said hold a treasure in an earthen vessel. That’s the KJV way for saying that Christ lives in people, who are simply cracked pots! It doesn’t sound very flattering, but when you think that a King would want to take up residency in you, it makes you feel like royalty. It makes me want to clean up the earthen vessel, make it as beautiful for the King as possible. It also makes me want to use the gifts and talents He gave specifically to me to the best of my ability, because they are the stamp of God in my life.

Are you willing to step up a notch? Are you ready to get bigger and expand on the inside so God’s glory can show up on the outside? I hope you are ready, because God wants to use you for His glory! Let’s be our best for the King of Majesty

Anything worth doing is worth doing right. I’m not sure where that quote is from, but my Dad gets credit for saying it millions of times while I was growing up. Whether it was cleaning my room, arranging some flowers, or mowing a lawn, you do it right the first time, and do it with excellence, because Dad said so!

Since we’ve been talking about excellence this week, and how important it is to do things well, as believers we need to realize that we represent Christ on the earth. We are his ambassadors, and when the world, those who don’t know Christ yet, look at us, they should see a good facsimile of who Jesus is. That kind of puts the pressure on – but in this case, it is good pressure! We should be much more than mediocre. We should be much more committed than average. We should be people of impeccable integrity and character. We should be trustworthy, loyal, helpful, not only when people are watching, but every moment of every day.

God is working in you. His power is being manifested through you as we cooperate with Him. God uses us as a conduit through which His power can flow. Because of that, the second great thought is that He will use us to carry out His purpose – when we align ourselves with His will, we don’t have to wonder if He will bless it, He will! That should make us want to be about His business and His purpose on the earth. The third thought is that then He will do way more than we could ever desire. His plans for us are so much bigger than we have for ourselves. God wants more for us than even our best imagination could fathom. The fourth great thought it is all done to bring glory in the church. When He is lifted up, all men will be drawn unto Himself. That brings honor and glory to His name.

Let’s not settle for average, mediocre Christianity. Let’s go for God all the way. He’s 100% committed to us, let’s be 100% committed to Him. He is More than Enough to meet all of my needs, and to go beyond and do exceedingly abundantly above all we could ask or think Let’s believe right, live right, talk right, walk right, act right, and be right for God. Let’s be the real thing. Let’s contend for the authentic in every area of our life. As you do, be prepared! Because He is a rewarder of those who diligently seek Him, you may have some positive surprises coming in your life!

We want it to be easy for those who don’t know Jesus yet to find and follow God. Here are some ways that we can help to make that happen. In Col 4:5-6, Paul shares four ways we can become intentional about introducing others to Jesus.
1) Be wise in how you act. Actions really do speak louder than words. I know all of you are polite, patient, optimistic and encouraging all the time – it is just others we know who are judgmental, frustrated, arrogant, irritated and rude. People are always watching you!
2) Make the most of every opportunity – each day you have opportunities for divine appointments, so, make yourself available to God daily. When you see someone who is ripe for the gospel, be ready and willing to share your faith.
3) Make our words kind and pleasant. People are attracted to love, and love is like honey – besides attracting things, it makes things sticky. We want those who come to Christ to stick. We want lasting fruit, the kind that remains.
4) Give a good answer. People are looking for answers, and we may not know them all, but we have access to the One who does. As we share Christ we can do it in a manner that propels them toward Christ, instead of repels them. Remember it is the goodness of God that draws people to salvation, and we are sharing good news!

Have you noticed how much better we are together? We are commissioned by God to reach the world, and it is much easier when we do it together. As we strive for excellence individually, we have to remember that working with others of like belief, toward a goal, helps us achieve our goals more effectively. We need to stretch to reach out to others. We find it usually pretty easy to love other believers. We are not just called to love those who already know and love God, we are called to love those who haven’t found Christ yet.. Love cares about the destiny of others. We say it often and loudly that we want no one from our world to go to hell. We want to make it easy for them to get to heaven. When it comes to sharing the gospel, there is no more powerful tool than hospitality. From the Old Testament example of Abraham welcoming the 3 holy visitors, to Paul’s admonition in the New Testament, we are commanded to be hospitable. What comes naturally to some, is work for many, but should be a natural part of our lives as believers. Entertaining is different from hospitality. We are not inviting people over to impress them, or to make them feel obligated to reciprocate, but merely to show the love of God. It is a great way to make friendships and show acceptance to those who don’t know Christ yet. We are on this earth representing Jesus, and hospitality is a great way to get to know people, and to have them in a home filled with peace, so that the love of God in us, can draw them to the feet of Jesus. Invite them in!

Setting goals is a spiritual principle that makes sense. The Bible tells us to write the vision down and make it plain, so that those who read it can run with it as it says in Habakkuk 2:2. So here are some steps from that scripture for setting and accomplishing goals, one at a time.
1) Write it down – Just use you pen or keyboard to express what you want to accomplish. Small goals are as important as the large ones!
2) Make it plain – Keep it simple. Enough of life is complicated. Keep it easy to read and easy to understand.
3) Read it – Keep it in front of you – on your dashboard in your car, or on your mirror in your bathroom, or on your screen of your computer. Phones have easy reminders too. Read it as a reminder and as an encouragement to yourself.
4) Run with it – Be a doer! Don’t just think about it, put it into action. Don’t put it off until tomorrow, begin today and do it now.
There is a great sense of accomplishment that comes when you achieve your goals. I am a firm believer in lists, and I even get satisfaction from checking off each item as the day goes by. If we really want to achieve our goals, let’s make a clear plan to get us where we want to be.

This is the week when we have celebrated romantic love. It’s it amazing that we use the same word in so many different ways. You can love chocolate ice cream, love you bike, love your I Phone, love pizza and you love your parents. We also use that same word when we talk about God. We love God. God loves us. God is Love (I John 4:16). You can see that not only is love a noun, it is also a verb. (I bet you noticed that!) Because love is a noun, it is something that we want to attain. But because love is a verb, it is an action word. That means that if you really love someone, you get to prove it by your actions. (That can definitely be taken the wrong way, because a carnal person can say if you love me, you will do this or that for me, and it may be something that you know is wrong, or don’t want to do. But in the right context, it is totally godly.) If you love your mom, you will tell her, but you’ll also show her by how you act. If you want to show love to your friends (phileo love is friendship love), you can be kind, and not talk behind their back, and make a choice to help them and encourage them . If you love God, you will obey His commandments (I John 5:3). If you need a reminder of what God’s Commandment’s are, they are really simply summed up in two things and encompass all of life. Love God with all your heart, mind and strength, and love your neighbor (everybody else) as yourself. So remember to love God with all you are, and love someone around you through your actions!

Here is a hard question. Is there enough evidence to convict you? Most of the time, those wouldn’t be very good words to hear. In this instance, I’m wondering if there is enough proof in your life to prove you are a true disciple of Jesus Christ? Can the world see the love of God in you? I hope you haven’t ever been in a real trial where you had to find evidence to prove your innocence. It sounds like God is looking for the opposite kind of evidence in John 13:35. He wants to see something in you, worthy of “convicting” you of being a Christian. The evidence He is looking for is His very own love demonstrated through you. All this week we are talking about love, and it is a huge issue to God. Not only is He the essence of Love, He asks us to walk in love, abound in love, be fervent in love, manifest self-sacrificing love, and love Him and our neighbor like we love ourselves. It sounds like a big task, but it doesn’t have to be hard. Just let the love that He’s shed abroad in your heart, shine through you, and love one another. Love is more than the ooey, gooey, warm and cozy, syrupy sweet , whipped cream topped concoction that we see in some chick flick. God’s love is sincere and deep, and it comes from the heart as it says in I John 4:7. One of the most wonderful things about love is that it gives us the power to say we’re sorry when we are wrong, and gives us the ability to forgive those who have wronged us. Walking in forgiveness and saying we’re sorry isn’t easy when we are operating in the flesh. (Just look at how often “Committed relationships” dissolve after a short matter of time.) But if we follow the way of love, and walk in the Spirit, we won’t fulfill our fleshly desires, and we will do what is right. We can make lasting, sincere, deep commitments that will stand the test of time. We can say we are sorry, and we can learn to forgive. And we can do that, because we have known the love and forgiveness of Christ.

Today, I want to direct my words toward those who are married. Are you as emotionally connected as you would like to be to your spouse? I know there are plenty of good marriages out there, where both mates feel loved, supported and valued. I also know that there are plenty of struggling marriages where the opposite is true. There are questions of how long you will last together, were you right for each other to begin with, and can you face another day of the pain and struggle? If you are in the second category, there is hope for a better marriage, and for those who already have a good one, it can become great. I John 4 is a beautiful chapter expressing God’s love and giving the reason that God loves us…. that we might live (an abundant life) through Him (vs 9). When we live through Him, we can love like He loves, and that is when His love is perfected in us (vs 12). His Spirit in us is evidence of His perfect love dwelling in us! Our love is made perfect when we walk in boldness demonstrating God’s love, by being and living like Him in this world (vs17). We can be a conduit of God’s love to our spouse! Love is the complete fulfillment of the Law of God. Romans 13:8 tells us that we will fulfill the law by loving our fellow man and our spouses if we are married. As we clothe ourselves in Christ, we are fulfilling the law of love, and letting love be perfected in us. Are you letting love have it’s perfect work? Today, you can! Demonstrate the love of God to your mate! You can reflect God’s life-giving, loving nature through your words and actions. You’ve heard it said that faith without works is dead. The same can be said for love, love without corresponding action is empty. We can, through our words and deeds, obey the command of Christ to walk in love. Show some love to your spouse today!