Psalm 123:1-4
1 I lift up my eyes to you,
to you whose throne is in heaven.
2 As the eyes of slaves look to the hand of their master,
as the eyes of a maid look to the hand of her mistress,
so our eyes look to the LORD our God,
till he shows us his mercy.
3 Have mercy on us, O LORD, have mercy on us,
for we have endured much contempt.
4 We have endured much ridicule from the proud,
much contempt from the arrogant.

Jehovah was one of the common names used for God in the Old Testament times. Jehovah was referred to as God’s personal name. The name Jehovah is actually the English word used to translate and pronounce God’s Hebrew name: YHWH. Depending on which translation of the Bible you have, you might see YHWH pop up here and there in the Old Testament. And in some translations, they use an all caps spelling of the word LORD, which signifies this personal name of God. If you take a look at YHWH, you will notice there aren’t any vowels. It’s normally pronounced Yahweh (sounds like Yah – Way).

God is referred to by several names throughout the Bible. Lord, God, Father, Counselor, King . . . Although the usage of His names might change from time to time, His character, His abilities, and the way in which He loves His creation will always stay consistent. Always has, always will. His mercy is amazing, and His love abounds. That truth is worthy of our celebration today!

Related Text:
Ephesians 2:1-5
“As for you, you were dead in your transgressions and sins, in which you used to live when you followed the ways of this world and of the ruler of the kingdom of the air, the spirit who is now at work in those who are disobedient. All of us also lived among them at one time, gratifying the cravings of our sinful nature and following its desires and thoughts. Like the rest, we were by nature objects of wrath. But because of his great love for us, God, who is rich in mercy, made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in transgressions—it is by grace you have been saved.”

Acts 17:5-7 – But the Jews became jealous, and when they had brought together some scoundrels from the marketplace and formed a mob, they set the city in an uproar. Attacking Jason’s house, they searched for them to bring them out to the public assembly. When they did not find them, they dragged Jason and some of the brothers before the city officials, shouting, “These men who have turned the world upside down have come here too, and Jason has received them as guests! They are all acting contrary to Caesar’s decrees, saying that there is another king—Jesus!”

At this point in the book of Acts, Paul and Silas were on a missionary journey spreading the news that Jesus was the Messiah and that He died for the sins of the world so that everyone who believed in Him could have everlasting life with God in Heaven. They were turning their world upside down by preaching that Jesus is the King of Kings, that there is only One True God, that Jesus is the only way to Heaven, and that love, joy, peace, and humility are greater than accumulation of wealth or power.

Take the truth of the Gospel to the people around you and rock their world! Go read the Sermon on the Mount starting in Matthew 5 and see how Jesus flipped this world on it’s head. Black is white, right is left, weak is strong, meek is powerful, humble is great, first is last.

Related Text:
Matthew 5:5-9 – “Blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the earth. Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled. Blessed are the merciful, for they will be shown mercy. Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God. Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called sons of God.”

Check out the Grace Project for some great music and free downloads. Here is an excerpt from their website:

“Welcome to The Grace Project’s home on the web. What is The Grace Project, you ask? Well, it’s the culmination of a 15-year dream to try something fairly unusual in the musical world: to create music based strictly around the songs, rather than to be confined within the limitations of a band. The first product from this band was released in 1998 by Grandma Katherine’s Music. The album is called The Big Love! (check out the cover below) and that’s the theme of the album: God’s love for mankind.”

Grace Project

Deuteronomy 1:21
“Do not be afraid; do not be discouraged.”

If you’ve ever had a loved one or close friend pass away, it gets you thinking. Especially if they passed away too early, before “their time”, you begin to think more about the loss and sometimes even project the experience onto yourself. You might think, “If it happened to them, it could happen to me.” You might become fearful or discouraged, or have feelings of weakness and sadness, or you may feel like you just can’t cope anymore. If that’s ever happened to you, then Keep Reading:

When we are feeling fearful or discouraged, God Word says to us:
“. . . fear not: stand firm and witness the salvation of the Lord, which He will work for you today.” (Exodus 14:13)

When we are weak, cowardly, or feel alone, God’s Word says to us:
“So be strong and courageous! Do not be afraid and do not panic before them. For the Lord your God will personally go ahead of you. He will neither fail you nor abandon you.” (Deuteronomy 31:6)

When we feel like we just can’t cope with the situation, God’s Word says to us:
“So do not fear, for I am with you;
do not be dismayed, for I am your God.
I will strengthen you and help you;
I will uphold you with my righteous right hand.” (Isaiah 41:10)

When we long for peace of mind, God’s Word says t us:
“Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.” (Philippians 4:6-7)

Remember that God has everything under control, no matter how we may feel about a given situation.

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1 John 3:16-20
“This is how we know what love is: Jesus Christ laid down his life for us. And we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers. If anyone has material possessions and sees his brother in need but has no pity on him, how can the love of God be in him? Dear children, let us not love with words or tongue but with actions and in truth. This then is how we know that we belong to the truth, and how we set our hearts at rest in his presence whenever our hearts condemn us. For God is greater than our hearts, and he knows everything.”

John 15:9-15
“I have loved you even as the Father has loved me. Remain in my love. When you obey my commandments, you remain in my love, just as I obey my Father’s commandments and remain in his love. I have told you these things so that you will be filled with my joy. Yes, your joy will overflow! This is my commandment: Love each other in the same way I have loved you. There is no greater love than to lay down one’s life for one’s friends. You are my friends if you do what I command. I no longer call you slaves, because a master doesn’t confide in his slaves. Now you are my friends, since I have told you everything the Father told me. ”

True love requires sacrifice. It’s true. To truly give love, you must be willing to sacrifice for it. According to the dictionary, the word sacrifice means “destruction or surrender of something for the sake of something else”. In Other words, to give up something.

Sacrifice, that’s kind of a hard word for most of us. Really, it’s a word we don’t like to use all that often.To truly understand what sacrifice is, and what it would look like in our lives, we have to consider what God sacrificed for us. Stop and think for a moment. Stop and just thank God for being the ultimate sacrifice for us. Without Christ, we are nothing (John 15:6). He paid it all so we could be free. Take time right now to praise and worship Him for His most excellent sacrifice.

Ezekiel 36:25-27
“I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you will be clean; I will cleanse you from all your impurities and from all your idols. I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you; I will remove from you your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh. And I will put my Spirit in you and move you to follow my decrees and be careful to keep my laws.”

Whatever takes God’s place in your life is an idol. Whenever I hear the word “idol”, I think of the small golden statue from Indiana Jones. But I’m guessing that 99.9% of us don’t have little golden statues in our houses that hinder our worship of God. Move past the stereotypical idol and realize that an idol is anything that causes you to place God on the back-burner of your life.

When Gideon tore down the family altar his father had built to pagan gods, his family wanted to kill him. Why? Because he was upsetting the way things had been done in his family. He as trying to change things up, and no one in the family wanted change. Sound familiar? In your family, if the phrase “that’s just the way it’s always been in our family” excludes God, then it has to be changed.

The rich young ruler wasn’t lost because he had money . . . he was lost because money had such a tight hold on him, he couldn’t see God.

God wants to cleanse us from all of our idols – cleanse us from everything that we put in front of God. Because the more things we have in our lives that we place in front of God, eventually we won’t be able to see Him. The weaning process may be difficult and painful at times, because we are humans and we still want what WE want and WHEN we want it. It takes true faith that whatever we give up for God, He will replace with something so much better.

Whether it’s a job, a relationship, a ministry, or a poor career choice . . . our Father wants to wean us from the lesser and give us the greater. His plans are so much better than ours, whatever it costs, it is worth the pain to get rid of our idols.

Related Text:
Exodus 20:3-5
“You shall have no other gods before me. You shall not make for yourself an idol in the form of anything in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the waters below. You shall not bow down to them or worship them; for I, the LORD your God, am a jealous God . . .”

John 4:13-14
“Jesus answered, ‘Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again, but whoever drinks the water I give him will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life.’”

Isaiah 61:3
“To all who mourn in Israel,
he will give a crown of beauty for ashes,
a joyous blessing instead of mourning,
festive praise instead of despair.
In their righteousness, they will be like great oaks
that the Lord has planted for his own glory.”

Surviving a crisis and turning it into a growth experience takes an attitude adjustment and the adoption of a new perspective. It may be painful to delve into the facts of the crisis, but facing the facts is the first step toward becoming whole again. To ignore the facts of a crisis situation only lengthens the negativity of the crisis.

Often, a crisis leaves us with the feeling that “nothing will ever be the same again.” That’s a normal feeling. A crisis can force us to make adjustments in how we work, how we spend our free time, how we handle difficulties, and how we relate to family and friends.

The nature of a crisis is that it shakes up our seemingly stable world. But a crisis also forces us to look deep within ourselves to find streams of hidden strength, courage, and hope that we never knew existed. You may not feel courageous or hopeful at the point of the crisis impact, but that doesn’t mean those things aren’t just waiting below the surface just waiting to be tapped. As Christians, we don’t just have to rely on ourselves, because we can call on the One who is the author of all strength. God also gave us the Holy Spirit to be with us during the physical absence of Jesus. The Spirit is our counselor, our comforter, and our guide.

Related Text:
Psalm 18:2
“The LORD is my rock, my fortress and my deliverer;
my God is my rock, in whom I take refuge.
He is my shield and the horn of my salvation, my stronghold.”

John 14:16
“And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Comforter [the Holy Spirit] who will never leave you.”

click the shirt to see a larger image…………….

Devotional

Overthrow the Impact: In Romans 12, Paul encourages us to rise above the world’s impact on us and to live for God; offering our lives to God as a “living sacrifice”.

“So here’s what I want you to do, God helping you: Take your everyday, ordinary life—your sleeping, eating, going-to-work, and walking-around life—and place it before God as an offering. Embracing what God does for you is the best thing you can do for him. Don’t become so well-adjusted to your culture that you fit into it without even thinking. Instead, fix your attention on God. You’ll be changed from the inside out. Readily recognize what he wants from you, and quickly respond to it. Unlike the culture around you, always dragging you down to its level of immaturity, God brings the best out of you, develops well-formed maturity in you.” Romans 12:1-2 (MSG)

Go read Acts 17:6-7 and Colossians 3:10

Become a revolutionary for God. Turn your world upside down in the name of Jesus. Don’t just go with the flow around you, be different, let God’s glory be seen in your life. Stand firm against the walls of the world and sinful nature that seem to crash in on us and try to destroy us. Arm yourself with God’s Word. Overthrow the world’s impact and become a passionate, dedicated follower of Jesus. One who will flip this world on its head and turn its attention back to the One!

** I encourage you to use these passages from God’s word as a resource in your daily life. Don’t let this truth just rest on this tag or on this shirt. Use it! Let it become a part of you, let the scripture be written on your heart and move you to live your life in obedience to God out of love. Dive into God’s Word, spend time with Him in prayer, connect with other believers, live for Jesus who died for your sins and rose again! **

FYI – We have a Bible Study on Facebook.com and invite you to join. New Scripture is added daily. If you don’t have a Facebook Account, then you will need to create one to join the Bible Study. So, if you’re interested, sign into your Facebook Account and search “Facebook Bible Study – yes you can join!”

click the shirt to see a larger image…………….

Devotional

Bringin’ Humble Back: Matthew 18:4 – “Whoever humbles himself like this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven.”

As you read through the New Testament, you will begin to realize just how important humility is for us as Christians. Serving others in love (Galatians 5:13), loving your neighbor as yourself (Galatians 5:14), submitting to & sacrificially loving your spouse (Ephesians 5:22-33), following God and being obedient (John 14:15), submitting to God’s authority (Romans 8:6-10). I dare say that these things cannot be accomplished without a humble heart.

In the beginning of Matthew 18, Jesus teaches His disciples about humility because they ask Him which one of them will be the greatest in the kingdom of heaven. Seriously guys?!?! They are traveling around with the Messiah (the Savior of the whole world!) and at this moment with Him, they are more concerned about who will be the Big Dog when they get to heaven.

In response to their question, our Lord set a little child before them, solemnly assuring them that unless they were like little children, they could not enter His kingdom. Children, when very young, do not desire authority, do not regard outward distinctions, are free from malice, are teachable, and willingly dependent on their parents. These are characteristics of children, and Jesus is telling us that we too need to have these characteristics when following Him. Are you teachable or are you set in your ways? Are you willing to follow God, or do you have a white-knuckled death grip on your own selfish ambitions? Are you willing to love and serve others, or are you waiting for others to bow at YOUR feet?

Being humble goes against everything this world is telling us about having the best and most expensive stuff, looking better than everyone around us, and believing in that “it’s all about me” attitude. Remember that we are to follow Jesus. And His example showed us in Matthew 20:26-28, “Not so with you. Instead, whoever wants to become great among you must be your servant, and whoever wants to be first must be your slave—just as the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.”

There are many more passages about humility in the Bible. I encourage you to read them during your personal time with God, asking Him to renew your mind and create in you a humble, loving, and serving heart. You can start with these: John 13:1-17; Matthew 23:11-12; Ephesians 4:1-3; Philippians 2:5-11.

** I encourage you to use these passages from God’s Word as a resource in your daily life. Don’t let this truth just rest on this tag or on this shirt. Use it! Let it become a part of you, let the scripture be written on your heart and move you to live your life in obedience to God out of love. Dive into God’s Word, spend time with Him in prayer, connect with other believers, live for Jesus who died for your sins and rose again! **

FYI – We have a Bible Study on Facebook.com and invite you to join. New scripture is posted daily. If you don’t have a Facebook Account, then you will need to create one to join the Bible Study. So, if you’re interested, sign into your Facebook Account and search “Facebook Bible Study – yes you can join!”