PRAYER - "Plan to Pray’ plus audio message

On your TO-DO list, prayer should have top priority among all the things you plan to do. If prayer is not a high priority on your daily schedule, it will almost certainly get bumped off the list entirely by the end of the day. For many years, I have forced myself to maintain a certain amount of prayer time daily. If I miss the mark, I compensate the next time.

 

Psalm 5:3 - "My voice shalt thou hear in the morning, O LORD; in the morning will I direct my prayer unto thee."

 

PRINCIPALS -"Arphaxad"

 

Born two years after Noah's flood, Arphaxad was the father of Ura and Kesed who founded the ancient city of Ur of the Chaldees (according to an ancient extra-biblical source found among the Dead Sea Scrolls). In 1927, Britisharchaeologist Leonard Woolley discovered the ancient ruins of Ur between Basra and Nasiriyah, Iraq, near Kuwait. Abraham came from there. Discoveries included vast riches of Sumerian artifacts, and ruins from the days of Belshazzar and Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon.

 

Genesis 11:10  - "Shem was an hundred years old, and begat Arphaxad two years after the flood."

 

PRINCIPLES - "Appointed Seasons"

 

Seasons of life run in cycles. Spring, Summer, Winter and Fall. Then they repeat. The Word speaks of "due" season and "appointed" seasons. The cold death of winter is no tragic curse. It is appointed. Some think spring's warmth causes sap to rise in dormant trees, but actually it is the cold of winter that triggers the hormones that cause sap to rise. All seasons are good. Rejoice in whatever season you are.

 

Galatians 6:9: "...let us not be weary in well doing: for in due season we shall reap, if we faint not."

 

PROPHECIES - "Thine Only Son Isaac"

 

For twenty-five years Abraham waited on the prophecy to be fulfilled. Finally, at the age of 100, Isaac was born. The episode with Hagar and Ishmael were completely impertinent to the prophecy. God wrote them out of the story line. Abraham's posterity and blessing would only be in Isaac. Today, Ishmael's descendants are fighting viciously for Isaac's inheritance. Only God can and will see to its fulfillment.

 

Genesis 22:2 - "And he said, Take now thy son, thine only son Isaac, whom thou lovest, and get thee into the land of Moriah.

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A Covenant of Love

For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son.

– John 3:16

For God so loved the world that He gave...and He gave...and He gave.

That is the message the Bible brings us from beginning to end. It sounds simple enough. Yet few of us really comprehend it.

We can understand the idea of a God of power. We can understand a God who desires to be served. But an Almighty God who loves us so much that He desires, above all, to give to us? That can be hard to believe.

For thousands of years, God has been working to drop the revelation of His love into the hearts of men. He's made loving promises of blessing and protection. But He's always faced that same obstacle—human beings who just couldn't bring themselves to believe those promises were true.

The story of Abram is a perfect example. He wasn't accustomed to the idea of a God who gives. After all, he'd grown up as a worshiper of the moon, and the moon had certainly never seemed interested in doing anything for him. Then he encountered El Shaddai, the greatest Being of all. The one Almighty God. And the first thing this El Shaddai wanted to do was give to him.

God's promises so astounded Abram that he couldn't believe them. "Lord," he asked, "how can I know I'm really going to receive these things?" (See Genesis 15:8.)

Do you know how God answered him? By cutting a blood covenant with him. That covenant settled forever any question Abram could ever have about God's love and loyalty. Once blood had been shed, he knew God meant what He said.

God did the same thing for you. He cut a blood covenant with you. And He sacrificed His own Son to do it. Jesus' broken body and shed blood have become the eternal proof of God's love for you. Through Communion, He's urged you to remember them again and again so that when your faith in His promises begins to waver, you "might have a strong consolation" (Hebrews 6:18).

Get a revelation of God's love for you by meditating on the covenant He's made with you. Get out the bread and the cup. Go before the Lord with them and take Communion. Think about the body and blood of Jesus that enables you to be a blood-covenant member of the family of Almighty God. Let them settle forever the question of God's love for you. You'll never again have to doubt His promises once you believe in His love.