GraceCreates

By Jon Walker

We are from God, and whoever knows God listens to us; but whoever is not from God does not listen to us. This is how we recognize the Spirit of truth and the spirit of falsehood. 1 John 4:6 (NIV)

My mother gave me a great gift and that is sensitivity about giving gifts. She taught me giving a gift is an opportunity to show you’ve thought about the person, taking time to discover likes and needs.

What this translates into is you don’t use a birthday to give a household item you were going to purchase anyway: “Gee, honey, thanks for the vacuum cleaner.” Or, you don’t give your eighty-year-old aunt a power drill (unless that’s what she really wants!). The fact that there are so many returns after Christmas and so many gift cards purchased (okay, I buy them too) shows we’re not taking the time to make gifts personal.

Here’s the thing: just like gifts, love operates as personal. Jesus came in person. He didn’t come to us as a religion, a set of laws, or merely as an ideal; he came in person. Through his death and resurrection he brings us into the personal embrace of a passionate and loving relationship.

We live in an increasingly impersonal world where “don’t call us until you’ve read through all the frequently asked questions” is the norm, and when we finally do call, we get a recorded voice. We live as if somehow better organization, perfect efficiency, and instant acquisition will deliver us from our meaninglessness and hopelessness.

Yet, Jesus-one, we are from God, the Creator and Protector of all that is personal. Through our personalized expression of love for each other we proclaim: “Do you want to see who the person of God is and how he personally loves us? Watch how we love one another.”

If you’d like to receive these devotionals regularly, you can sign-up at www.gracecreates.com/subscribe/. Jon Walker writes from www.gracecreates.com. He is a Zondervan author, and the former writer/editor of the Purpose Driven Life On-Line Devotionals. This devotional is copyrighted 2008 by Jon Walker. Used by permission.

By Jon Walker

You, dear children, are from God and have overcome them, because the one who is in you is greater than the one who is in the world. 1 John 4:4 (NIV)

Fear, she walks with grief and mourning. She comes in without warning, and I dread the price of her presence. What will she take? What loss will she demand? What penalty, what pain sent her here?

With fear in the room, I fear you and your intention; I fear for myself and what you may cost me. With fear in the room, I stay on my side and refuse to move toward you.

When fear reigns, I can’t reveal who I am and I’m so concerned about protecting my goods that I’m afraid to give anything to you.

When God walks in, I lay down my fears; I give up my self-absorption. Jesus clears my fears by offering an uncommon safety to be me—to be real, to be sad, to be messed up and confused, yet, to be loved—and as that safety saturates the room, I can offer it to you because my faith in God is stronger than my faith in fear. God is stronger than my fear.

The world accommodates fear because it does not know God, but we are children of God, lavished with our Father’s love (1 John 3). When fear knocks at the door, we fall on the faith that “the one who is in you is greater than the one who is in the world” (1 John 4:4 NIV).

If you’d like to receive these devotionals regularly, you can sign-up at www.gracecreates.com/subscribe/. Jon Walker writes from www.gracecreates.com. He is a Zondervan author, and the former writer/editor of the Purpose Driven Life On-Line Devotionals. This devotional is copyrighted 2008 by Jon Walker. Used by permission.

By Jon Walker

His divine power has given us everything we need for life and godliness through our knowledge of him who called us by his own glory and goodness. Through these he has given us his very great and precious promises, so that through them you may participate in the divine nature and escape the corruption in the world caused by evil desires. 2 Peter 1:3–4 (NIV)

God Almighty! He lives, he lives, Christ Jesus lives in you today! The “wow!” is with you always and forever, yesterday today and tomorrow, forever and again, amen (Galatians 2:20). Wow!
 
What does this mean?

• Keep your heart and mind on the “wow!” Make it your objective-in-Jesus to stay intentionally and consistently focused on the “wow!”: “Set your hearts on things above, where Christ is seated at the right hand of God. Set your minds on things above, not on earthly things” (Colossians 3:1b–2 NIV).
• Stay intimate with the “wow!” Intentional intimacy with the “wow!” does not suggest the how is unimportant; rather, it agrees that Jesus is “the way and the truth and the life” (John 14:6 NIV, italics added).
• Understand no commandment is harmed. No commandment is harmed by focusing on the “wow!” We’re to seek the “wow!” first and foremost (Matthew 6:33). The fulfillment of the law comes through Jesus (Matthew 5:17), and, therefore, Paul adds, “Love is the fulfillment of the law” (Romans 13:10 NIV).
• The good news of the gospel is the “wow!” We proclaim without shame that the “wow!” is in our hearts, and the “wow!” will come into any heart that confesses Jesus Christ as Lord.

Father, renew and maintain in us your steadfast spirit (Psalm 51:10). Shape us by your “wow!” and let it flow through us like living water from the eternal springs of heaven.

If you’d like to receive these devotionals regularly, you can sign-up at www.gracecreates.com/subscribe/. Jon Walker writes from www.gracecreates.com. He is a Zondervan author, and the former writer/editor of the Purpose Driven Life On-Line Devotionals. This devotional is copyrighted 2008 by Jon Walker. Used by permission.

By Jon Walker

On one occasion an expert in the law stood up to test Jesus. “Teacher,” he asked, “what must I do to inherit eternal life?” Luke 10:25 (NIV)
 
If Jesus appeared on CNN tonight and was asked what it would take to inherit eternal life, the sound bite would be: “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind’; and, ‘Love your neighbor as yourself’” (Luke 10:27 NIV).
 
A lawyer once asked Jesus this question, and, like a prosecutor, he insisted on drilling for minutely detailed definitions, such as, “Who is my neighbor?” (Luke 10:29).

Jesus, a gentle teacher with a gentle yoke, did not answer directly (or even crack any lawyer jokes). Instead, he told a story about a man beaten and left for dead on the road to Jericho.

First, a priest walked by, and seeing the injured man, he quietly crossed to the other side of the road.

Then, an assistant at the Temple, one in charge of purity and tithing walked by, but seeing the injured man, he, too, crossed to the other side of the road.
 
Finally, a man from a despised race, a Samaritan, walked by and stopped. He treated the man’s injuries and took him to a nearby inn, paying for the injured man’s care and lodging until he could get back on his feet.
 
Who, Jesus asked, was the injured man’s neighbor?
 
The lawyer responded, “The one who showed him mercy.”

“That’s right,” Jesus said, “Now go and do the same” (Luke 10:37, based on NLT).
 
Compassion is as compassion does.

If you’d like to receive these devotionals regularly, you can sign-up at www.gracecreates.com/subscribe/. Jon Walker writes from www.gracecreates.com. He is a Zondervan author, and the former writer/editor of the Purpose Driven Life On-Line Devotionals. This devotional is copyrighted 2008 by Jon Walker. Used by permission.