Daily Devotional From We The Kingdom

 Day 1 You’ve heard it from the pulpit a million times. You’ve heard it another million sitting on that pew beside your mom. You’ve seen it under Tim Tebow’s eyes and by this point you probably have it written in sharpie on the back of your hand. [John 3:16](. But why do we neglect the power and impact of a message or phrase based on its increasing occurrence? "For God so loved the world, that He gave His only Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life." If I’m being honest, I have always thought of and interpreted this verse as it pertains to me because it’s what’s familiar. "God so loved America" or "God so loved the town I grew up in" or "God so loved my high school." It’s all I’ve ever known. However, the amazing thing is that he actually loves you enough to love the whole world because it gives you a context for your identity. The fact that He loves you amongst the entirety of the globe must mean two things. One, that you are incredibly special and worth loving. And two, you aren’t isolated. It’s one thing to love a single particular color on its own like blue or green, but when you see that color incorporated onto a beautiful masterpiece of a canvas, all of a sudden it has an identity that, in turn, enhances its character. [Get Song Resources](  Day 2 [Ephesians 2:4-5]( "But God is so rich in mercy, and he loved us so much, that even when we were dead because of our sins, he gave us life when he raised Christ from the dead. (It is only by God’s grace that you have been saved!)" There have been a few times in my life when I have felt totally and entirely numb. Whether is was something terrible I had done or something terrible that had been done to me, I have been so broken that I have felt nothing. I remember sitting in chapel during my senior year of High School and the speaker asked us to anonymously write down our dead honest feeling at that time. I had never had anyone ask me to write down my honest feelings about something. I had always felt that people viewed me as that fun-loving girl and only wanted me to report joy and happiness. It was a room full of girls, so I hid my card and discreetly wrote "numb" on it. We all folded our cards and passed them up front. The speaker pulled out a few and listed them off, "stressed", "excited"…. "numb" and the room went silent. Or maybe it was just the sound of holding my breath and my blank brain frozen in fear. I thought everyone could see it was me. She wanted to prove the point that we all are human, we all feel painful emotions and God is not daunted by our darkness. Admitting my numbness was the first step for me in voicing my need for God and my need for something better. God’s presence in our lives is one that is so strong, so vibrant, and so loving  that it de-thaws our frozen hearts, heals us, and brings our senses back. It is not instantaneous but He is always moving in our lives. His heart is to revive us. This song "Holy Water" is a celebration of feeling alive again. ‘When we were dead in our sins, He gave us life!’ ‘Like sweet, sweet honey on my lips, like the sound of a symphony to my ears, like Holy Water on my skin.’ Whether you feel numb, sad angry, hurt or alive, joyful and free, God’s heart for you is to revive you. He will finish the good work that He started in your heart. Admit your honest feelings and brokenness to Him and that will clear the way for you to realize His revival at work in your life.  He will take care of you. He forgives you, He cares deeply for you and He unconditionally loves you. [Get Song Resources](  Day 3 [Psalms 139:7]( "Where can I go from Your Spirit? ... If I go up to the heavens, You are there; if I make my bed in the depths, You are there. If I rise on the wings of the dawn, if I settle on the far side of the sea, even there Your hand will guide me, Your right hand will hold me fast." It was 8am in the North Carolina mountains where I woke up 30 minutes before a gathering of 500 Young Life high school kids at Windy Gap camp.  I was foggy eyed from having been to bed around 2:30 am.  The speaker was going to be talking about sin that morning. There in my bed I was taken back in a vision to my high school days. The pain, confusion and misery were so real it was almost as if I was 17 again. God dropped this song on my heart, and it was written in 15-20 minutes before I was fully awake.  I sang it for those kids shortly after that morning and many of them, including me, were in tears.  There was a time in my life that I did my best to hide from the presence and Spirit of God. I ran as hard and far as I could.  But even on the far side of the sea, in the absolute pit of despair, strung out from addiction, God ran to me as I cried out to Him for help.  There’s something about being raw and honest and vulnerable that sets the table for the Spirit of God to move in a powerful way. He saved me. And He saves me. Every day.  He saves me from my sin, from my selfish ways. He hears my cries for help, and He is swift to come running. Even still there are those moments where I’m aware that my heart is prone to wander when I cry "Lord! Save me I’m sinking".   And when I reach out, there is ALWAYS a Hand ready to pull me up. I think one of the greatest dangers for me is to think that I’m any less utterly desperate for God on sunny days than stormy ones.  I need Him now like I needed Him then.  Yes, some days are sunny and some stormy, but HE is the Lord of them all! I like that this song doesn’t wrap up in a pretty bow.  It leaves off at the cry for help.  The answer to this song can be found in many of our other songs and even more in the Word of God. But one thing is for sure - "Draw near you God (which this song does) and HE will draw near to you"!  I thank God that He didn’t leave me in my despair.  These past 2 weeks have been really difficult.  There are moments where I’ve felt like running and hiding. It’s really hard to just sit in pain and feel it and let the Lord minister to your heart rather than finding a way to medicate the pain, but He’s teaching me how to do that and to trust Him, and I’m learning every day to trust Him more.  3 steps forward, 1 step back, 3 steps forward, 1 step back ... over time that’s a lot of steps forward :). I’ll focus on that and NOT the shame that wants to tell me I’m no good and focus on the steps back that are part of being human.  God is kind and loving and gracious. If He can show me mercy, and He lives in me, maybe I can show myself a little more mercy.  I won’t stop seeking Him.  Man, I love Him!!!! [Get Song Resources](  Day 4 [Philippians 4:6-7]( Don’t worry about anything; instead, pray about everything. Tell God what you need and thank Him for all He has done. Then you will experience God’s peace, which exceeds anything we can understand. His peace will guard your hearts and minds as you live in Christ Jesus. Don’t worry?! For someone who has been a chronic worrier those words are hard to hear.  I’ve spent so much of my life allowing fear and anxiety to dictate my decisions and control my mind. I’ve wanted to surrender control to God, but I’ve been reluctant to let go. I thank God for His incredible patience as I have walked out this journey. The irony is the more I surrender control and cast my cares onto Him – the less anxiety and worry I experience.  But I have found that it is easier said than done.  It’s a daily practice. A daily surrender. A daily picking up of my cross. A daily dying to my flesh. And His mercy is ever ready to gently (and sometimes less gently - He knows best :)) usher me down the aisle towards the marriage supper of the Lamb.  He’s always preparing His bride to be ready for Him in eternal matrimony where fear will NEVER be allowed. Peace is a Person.  His Name is Jesus. His Name is God the Father. His Name is the Holy Spirit. This song came to me at a time where I was really fighting anxiety. I love how honest David is in the Psalms, yet always giving God the honor, He alone deserves ... "How long oh Lord?! Where are You God - have You forgotten about me? ... (then) - I will trust in Your unfailing love".  Man, there’s beautiful tension in that. And in that tension is where the cross comes all the more alive. He alone is able to meet us in the mess and deliver us - either out of the fire or bringing peace smack in the middle of it. When my mind is like a battlefield And my heart is overcome by fear And hope seems like a ship that’s lost at sea My enemies on every side And I’m tempted to run and hide Your gentle whisper reaches out to me Peace that holds me when I’m broken Peace that passes understanding When the whole wide world is crashing down I fall to my knees And breathe in Your peace If ever there was a time, we needed the peace of God, it is now. Peace is part of the fruit of His Spirit. Peace is a promise to God’s children - The blessed assurance that no matter what fiery trial we are walking through, we can truly rest in the profound TRUTH that we are deeply loved by the Creator of the universe, and He is holding us in His embrace both now and forever! Come Lord Jesus, Prince of Peace. [Get Song Resources](  Day 5 [1 John 4:7-10]( "Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God, and whoever loves has been born of God and knows God. Anyone who does not love does not now God, because God is love. In this the love of God was made manifest among us, that God sent his only Son into the world, so that we might live through him. In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins." I’ve heard it said that we spend most of our adult years trying to get back to the purity of the childlike place when we were young, before we were confused by the brokenness of our influences and our darkened world. We are born with brokenness inside of us and look to thousands of different things to fill our void, most of which leave us more broken than before. We are looking for someone or something who will heal us and unveil truth to us. We learn from our parents. Oftentimes, we find ourselves regurgitating the very words or the very things they said or did first to us. We learn how to walk, to talk, to act, to hate, to love, to gossip, to rejoice, to put down, to build up, to abandon, to abuse, to fight, to make decisions and to decide what to believe. We learn very good, beautiful things from our parents and we also learn detrimental, destructive things.  Even if our parents were wonderful, they were still broken too. We still continue on our search for how to live and how to be. As we grow older and become adults, we learn we are responsible for our actions and we experience the painful consequences. We run into walls, we bleed, we toil, we strive and yet we’re still broken. The beautiful thing is, that oftentimes the more broken we are, the clearer we are able to see past all the false fillers and we can see that the love of God is the only thing that will fill the void in our soul. We quit trying to keep up our pretenses, we quit trying to elevate ourselves to feel better, we quit running to cheap things to fill ourselves.  We meet our true Parent, our true Father, the Perfect One Who has been loving us all the while and patiently waiting for us to realize that He is ready to fill us with Himself and help us relearn life through the lenses of Love. Our guard comes crashing down when we see that it’s not about how cleaned up, nor how rebellious we can be to get attention. We have been loved all the while. We come to know God and understand Him as His love takes control and fills our souls and runs over into the lives of those around us. God is Love, in Him there is no darkness. We are His children and we belong to Love. [Get Song Resources](     mailto:feedback@worshiptogether.com Sent to: {EMAIL} [Unsubscribe]( Worship Together, PO Box 5084, Brentwood, TN 37024, United States