The GT Weekend! ~ Lowly, Week 3
December 28, 2024
Rest your soul through reflective journaling,
praying Scripture,
and worshiping the Creator who
longs for intimacy with each of us!
John 15:12-17
15 I do not call you servants anymore, because a servant doesn’t know what his master is doing. I have called you friends, because I have made known to you everything I have heard from my Father.
16 You did not choose me, but I chose you. I appointed you to go and produce fruit and that your fruit should remain, so that whatever you ask the Father in my name, He will give you. 17 “This is what I command you: Love one another.
Reflective Prayer
But I did not yet know Your wonderful love that breaks all human definitions. I did not yet understand that when I learn to love You as You have so wondrously loved me, I want to be just like You. Your Spirit runs free in me and changes my appetite so that I love life instead of death through sin. I actually want Your commands for I begin to see how deeply precious they are.
When I walk in these, Your wonderful, marvelous, commands, I discover the rich beauty of being Your friend. Priceless jewel, Oh Lord my God! What joy to run in the ways of Your righteousness! I praise Your Name for coming low, for coming to meet me in my mess, for breaking down all my misunderstandings of who You are, and drawing me close to sit beside You, learn from You, and trust You all the more!
*written by Rebecca Adams
Worship Through Song
Reflection One
While the death penalty may seem strong when we read Achan’s story, when we consider the holiness of God and His gracious warning, Achan’s sin becomes utter foolishness. How could he mock God and choose his own way, believing his “little sin” to be worth the value of a beautiful cloak and some silver and gold. How often do we think the same?!
Scripture tells us, “For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.” (Romans 3:23) The price we pay for falling short of God’s glorious holiness is death. Physical, emotional, and spiritual. “For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.” (Romans 6:23)
God knows mankind, you and I, are sinful beings, yet He still wanted us to have a chance at the fullness of eternal life with Him. He chose to pay the penalty for our sins by His death to offer us a choice. We don’t need to remain in our sin or stay stuck in our debt to the Holy God!
We can live holy unto the Lord by accepting and declaring Jesus Christ as our own Savior, then allowing His Spirit in us to teach us to pray, worship, and repent.
Jesus said, “No one has greater love than this: to lay down his life for his friends.” (John 15:13)
You, dear sister, can be His daughter. You are His friend when you trust Him; He gave His life for your friendship!
Reflection Two
God speaks in many ways as recorded in Scripture, and this translates into His communication with His people today through His Word and by His Spirit. The voice of the Lord communicates with gentleness, chastisement, or with commands to name a few.
Have you heard the voice of the Lord? I haven’t audibly heard Him, but I have known His voice in my spirit, leading me and comforting me, or convicting me. As quickly as we attune to the Lord’s voice, we begin to train ourselves to close our ears to the enemy’s voice of deception and shame, feeding us doubt and leading us to disobedience.
Like the choice to trust Jesus for our complete forgiveness, so we have a choice, every moment of every day, on whose voice we will listen to and follow responsively.
To think that God who spoke Creation into existence, talked to Adam and Eve, and then cried with a newborn’s first breath chooses to speak with us today blows my mind. How eager we ought to be to learn His voice and obey! How great must His desire for fellowship be for each of us.
Do we desire to hear Him?
Can we prove it by stilling ourselves long enough to quietly listen?
Reflection Three
In the Garden, Eve was given the promise of a coming Messiah, and her seed would possess it one far off day in a Bethlehem manger when God wrapped Himself in flesh.
Moses was tasked with shepherding the Israelites, a promised people, to Canaan, the Promised Land. After Moses’ death, Joshua was equipped to lead Israel across the Jordan and finally possess the Promise.
Veiled within Joshua’s own name, the Lord was faithfully revealing one more step toward the Promise of all Promises: Christ Jesus Himself, the Messiah.
Joshua’s name, Yehoshua in Hebrew, means “Yahweh Is Salvation”. The same name was foretold to be given to Jesus, Yeshua, whose name declared the same promise Joshua had. “Yahweh Is Salvation”.
“…There is no other Name under heaven given to people by which we must be saved.” (Acts 4:12)
It wasn’t Joshua’s abilities enabling Israel to possess the Promised Land, it was Yahweh, the giver of Salvation. Thousands of years later, it would become perfectly clear on the lips of Jesus Himself, “I am the way, the truth, and the life, no one comes to the Father except through Me.” (John 14:6, emphasis mine) Yahweh is the only way of salvation.
All who trust in Yeshua Jesus for their salvation are covered in the promise of Christ, and we are given this grand gift to share with others. Just as the shepherds could not contain their excitement in seeing the newly birthed Savior, neither must we! We are commanded to “go and tell” of the promise of sins forgiven and life everlasting.
This Week's Journeys
Remade Day 15
The Remade Life
We’ve talked a lot during this Journey Theme about what it means to live this redeemed life that Jesus has so richly given us, but what does the “box top” look like? What does my everyday look like as I’m chasing after this God who longs to continuously remake me
Remade Day 14
The Law of Love: Digging Deeper
The pharisees asked a lot of questions, but they didn’t truly want to know Jesus’s heart. When we study the Bible or look for answers to our questions, let’s not go looking for evidence to support our pre-determined ideas, rather let’s seek to understand the original intent of the Scriptures,
Remade Day 13
The Law of Love
If we really are living out and doing exactly what Jesus tells us are the two most important commandments, then everything else He tells us to do will fall into place… because, by living out these commandments, we are allowing transformation.
When our minds are transformed, then our actions
Remade Day 12
No Going Back: Digging Deeper
Are you stuck in the past, attached and grasping for things leading to death, or are you clinging onto and sinking into the things of life? God is a good God, even on days when our past stops us in our tracks or a situation cements our feet. Be reminded
Remade Day 11
No Going Back
As fun as it is to “remember when”, there’s danger there too. Either we can romanticize the past and wish for it all over again, or we begin to drown in its sorrows and become perpetually stuck in its cycle. God wants neither for us!
God told Lot’s family
The GT Weekend – Remade Week Two
Lord, You have provided perfectly for us. You have given us a means for relationship with You through Jesus. You’ve given the Holy Spirit to keep us walking in step with You, yet I still think I can hide the real me from Your face. Father, forgive me for putting
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