Encouragement

Our Lord will gaze upon us and say, “Well done, my good and faithful servant…enter into the joy of your master.” (Matthew 25:23) Once again, the easy yoke of Christ has reigned in our hearts.

When the Roman proconsul threatened Polycarp with fire, the saint said, “You threaten me with fire which burns for an hour, and is then extinguished. But you know nothing of the fire of the coming judgment and eternal punishment, reserved for the ungodly. Why are you waiting? Bring on whatever you want.”

The bull hippo can only wish for that kind of day. That burly fellow spends every hour warding off challenges to his rule and protecting his domain. The poor guy can never leave his self-centeredness behind for even a moment. It’s exhausting. It’s definitely not the life of the ‘easy yoke.’

God desires a relationship with each one of us. The Creator of all, the One who is timeless, the One who bestows eternal life, that Person desires to know me. Hard to believe I know.

Imagine if God had said to the Israelites (and also to us), “I will remain on my throne high in Heaven. To reach me, you must attain the perfect holiness that I am. I have established all the procedures you need to follow in order to accomplish this. Follow them perfectly and you can join me here. Good luck. Also, no collect calls please.”

God’s holiness potentially prevents the entirety of mankind from having a relationship with Him. A mere man cannot stand in front of an on-rushing locomotive and live.

The manifestation of gnats in your ears and atop your balding head cause your thoughts to go elsewhere, leading to the ultimate question: Why gnats?

When Jesus tells us to come to Him, the foundational quality He’s offering is peace with Him. Without peace with God, there can be no other peace anywhere else in our lives. Absent peace with Him, we will never experience His brand of love, joy and goodness.

The Voice from the box at Wendy’s freaks me out.  I don’t know that voice.  I don’t know what that voice might say. I certainly don’t trust that voice.  But I know the voice of my God through His Word.

If a person’s joy is God’s version of joy rather than his own, then how can it be destroyed? It cannot. If the Spirit grows His version of joy within us, will He ever remove it from us? He will not. If we possess God’s joy within us, will it be superior to human-produced joy? It will be.