Author: Norm

SCRIPTURE: Mark 10:24-31 What do you sense the Lord saying to you? PRAYER

SCRIPTURE: Mark 10:17-23 Why is it hard to enter God’s kingdom… its not hard because God makes it hard, but because we do. The door to God’s kingdom is open wide, but not everyone wants the life that kingdom represents. God’s kingdom (the only truly happy, fulfilling, joyful and peaceable way to live) can’t make allowance…

SCRIPTURE: Psalm 55 This is more like a Journal entry than a song. David is enduring the bitterness of betrayal, and He is venting with God. There is so much turmoil going on in his head and heart, his pen and prayer becomes his outlet. I have had Journal entries that have had similar raw, emotional…

SCRIPTURE: 1 Chronicles 23-29 What do you sense the Lord saying to you? PRAYER

SCRIPTURE: Mark 10:13-16 I see this as a present issue still today: people want what Jesus represents (God’s blessing), but Jesus’ followers make it hard for them. So many people are turned off by Jesus’ followers, some of them for good reasons. History provides many sad examples of Jesus’ followers doing un-Jesus-like things. True, they’re not…

SCRIPTURE: Mark 10:1-12 Our sinful human nature looks for loopholes and escapes, driven by the need to serve and protect itself. God created us to live in joy, freedom, peace, with our primary focus on serving and protecting others. We’ve moved from thriving for all to surviving of the fittest… and marriage has become a liability….

SCRIPTURE: Mark 9:42-50 Sin (evil, injustice, immorality, cruelty, greed, lust, pride, selfishness, murder, rage, etc.) is serious. We all sense that there is ‘good’ and ‘evil’, we just don’t like it when others tell us which is which. We all sense that there ought to be justice, but we don’t want anyone else to Judge us….

SCRIPTURE: Mark 9:38-41 Whose team are you on: Christian Reformed, Baptist, Presbyterian, Pentecostal, Lutheran, Associated Gospel? Too often we divide into camps, and treat others as if they are not one of us. Jesus points out that it is not our differences that divide us, but our connection to Jesus that unites us. This reminds me…

SCRIPTURE: Psalm 54 The background to this Psalm is 1 Samuel 26, where David has a chance to kill Saul, but doesn’t. David is on the run, and his own neighbours are reporting on his whereabouts, trying to get him killed. Even though God has promised him that he would one day be king, he refuses to kill…

SCRIPTURE: 1 Chronicles 17-22 What do you sense the Lord saying to you? PRAYER