This people honors me with their lips, but their heart is far from me;
Matthew 15:8 ESV
According to Merriam-Websters dictionary, lip service is a noun, “an avowal of advocacy, adherence, or allegiance expressed in words but not backed by deeds.”
This Easter season is a perfect time to really evaluate if your belief in Jesus is just “lip service.”
Does your heart truly belong to Jesus Christ?
Do your daily deeds match the faith you profess?
Let’s pray.
Heavenly Father, Give me clean hands and a pure heart. Let me worship You in Spirit and truth each and every day. Keep me from the sins of hypocrisy and pride. May my heart be true and my life be authentic and Your praise be on my lips. In the name of Christ Jesus I pray, Amen
“Again, the kingdom of heaven is like a net that was thrown into the sea and gathered fish of every kind. When it was full, men drew it ashore and sat down and sorted the good into containers but threw away the bad. So it will be at the end of the age. The angels will come out and separate the evil from the righteous and throw them into the fiery furnace. In that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.”
Matthew 13:47-50
From beginning to end of Matthew 13, Jesus was faithful to tell the whole truth, not just half the truth, for half the truth isn’t really the truth. If you only say “When you die the angels will come and take you to heaven,” but you don’t also explain that all the evil people (that’s me apart from my faith in Christ!) will be thrown into the fiery furnace, you are not really telling the truth.
Friends, please know that I’m writing these words to myself, because I need to hear them, but I hope they will encourage you as well. I want so desperately for people to be saved, that sometimes I only want to tell them the “Happy News about Eternal Life” … but the truth is that no one can fully appreciate the good news of the gospel until they’ve understood that every single one of us are sinners who deserve hell apart from the saving work of Jesus Christ.
So long as you think that you are a good person, and that you are going to heaven by your own merit, then, who needs Jesus?
May the words of Christ fall on fertile soil and bear much fruit! Let’s pray.
Heavenly Father, thank You for Your grace in telling us the whole truth and nothing but the truth. Thank You for explaining to us that every one of us is a sinner deserving of hell. Thank You for the best news I’ve ever heard – that Jesus Christ paid the price for my sin by His death on the cross, and that by believing in Him I have been saved from the fiery furnace of hell and will live with You in heaven for all eternity. This is truly the most awesome, wonderful, fantastic, marvelous news I could ever hear! May we share this truth every day of the year, but especially this weekend as we remember the crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus Christ. In the name of Jesus, my Savior, I pray, Amen.
As Jesus passed on from there, he saw a man called Matthew sitting at the tax booth, and he said to him, “Follow me.” And he rose and followed him.
Matthew 9:9 ESV
When you read that verse, Matthew 9:9, did you consider its author? This is Matthew’s own testimony. Matthew is saying, “This is me. I am that man. I am the one who was sitting at the tax booth. I am the one who Jesus called.”
The very next verse, Matthew 9:10 says that “Jesus reclined at table in the house,” but Matthew doesn’t tell you whose house it is. You have to read Luke 5:29 to discover that it was Matthew’s own house. Matthew has opened his own house and many tax collectors and sinners had come to eat and spend time with Jesus and his disciples.
How awesome is that! I wish that I had been quick to introduce my friends to Jesus. If you have someone in your life that you are discipling, or if you yourself are a new believer, please don’t wait until you have all the answers to invite your friends to meet Jesus.
But the Pharisees didn’t like it. They thought you needed to clean yourself up before coming to Jesus, but I’m here to tell you: You don’t!
Jesus says, “Come as you are… And leave new. I will make you new. I will change you. I am the one who heals and saves. I am the great physician of the body and the soul. Come to me! Today! Don’t wait!”
Heavenly Father, I pray for each one reading this, those who are new in their faith to share their faith today; for those who have been Christians for years, not to look down their nose at unbelievers and new believers who don’t know how to behave; and for those who don’t know you yet that they will come to you today and not delay. Your arms are open wide. Thank you. Thank you for calling Matthew while he was working in that text booth and thank you for calling me while I was running headlong away from You.
In God’s incredible providence, Matthew 7 was my scripture memory passage to practice yesterday in my Bible Memory app. My oldest two children and I initially memorized this passage (all 29 verses!) more than 16 years ago – when my oldest two children were about 7 and 10. I love the Bible Memory app because it prompts me to continue to practice passages that I have memorized in the past. I hope you’ll check it out! Here’s a link to learn more or download it. Here’s a link to a video I made about how to use it. And here’s a link to my Teach What Is Good Bible Memory group You can join for free for some encouragement and accountability — don’t we all need that!
There is so much wisdom in all of Matthew 7, but today what I was especially thinking about were verses 21-23 and 24-27. These two passages are deeply interconnected.
“Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but the one who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. On that day many will say to me, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and cast out demons in your name, and do many mighty works in your name?’ And then will I declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from me, you workers of lawlessness.’ Matthew 7:21-23 ESV
“Everyone then who hears these words of mine and does them will be like a wise man who built his house on the rock. And the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew and beat on that house, but it did not fall, because it had been founded on the rock. And everyone who hears these words of mine and does not do them will be like a foolish man who built his house on the sand. And the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew and beat against that house, and it fell, and great was the fall of it.” Matthew 7:24-27 ESV
Notice that connection word “then” in verse 24. Many people say they’re Christians, listening to God’s Word, even saying “Lord, Lord,” and doing Christian things — yet they are not doing God’s will. They are not putting into practice what it is that they keep hearing about.
This reminded me of some other passages I’ve memorized – James 1:22 and 1 Corinthians 13:1-3
But be doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves.
James 1:22 ESV
If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. If I give away all I have, and if I deliver up my body to be burned, but have not love, I gain nothing.
1 Corinthians 13:1-3 ESV
Let’s be faithful to store up God’s word in our heart (like Psalm 119:11 says), but let’s be just as faithful to put it into practice!
This is what differentiates students from disciples: Students learn and study and listen … but disciples put into practice the words of their teacher, modeling their own lives after their master’s.
Heavenly Father, we don’t want to merely listen to your Word, thus deceiving ourselves. We want to do what it says. Help us to be faithful disciples of Jesus Christ, modeling our lives after His, loving and serving others, doing good to them and forgiving them, as Jesus Christ perfectly modeled for us. And help us to be faithful disciple-makers, telling others the good news of salvation through Jesus Christ, and teaching them all that You have commanded us, remembering that You are always with us even to the end of the age! In the mighty name of Jesus we pray, Amen.
Have you ever overheard someone slander or misrepresent your mom or dad, your brother or sister, or your husband or child? Did you speak up to defend them or to correct the false information?
That is kinda the situation that Elihu is in here, except this time the person being misrepresented is God Himself. Elihu has listened carefully and patiently long enough and now he’s got to speak up.
For I am full of words; the spirit within me constrains me. Behold, my belly is like wine that has no vent; like new wineskins ready to burst. I must speak, that I may find relief; I must open my lips and answer.
Job 32:18-20 ESV
Like Elihu we must know when to be patient or wait in silence, but we must also know when to speak up! We must not give way to cowardice under the guise of humility. Rather, we must courageously speak the words that the Spirit gives us to speak with gentleness and respect.
As a child of God, we should feel compelled to speak up when our Heavenly Father’s character or His Word are misrepresented. How dare we stand idly by and let our Lord’s Name be sullied or spoiled! Like Peter and John said when they were commanded to stop telling people about the risen Christ, “we cannot but speak of what we have seen and heard.” (Acts 4:20)
Truly, my love for Christ – and His love for me – compels, controls, constrains me to implore others to be reconciled to God. I hope you feel the same way. Let me encourage you to take a few minutes of your time right now to read 2 Corinthians 5:11-21 to learn more about being an ambassador for Christ.
Let’s pray.
Heavenly Father, Thank You for Your loving kindness and mercy towards me, a sinner. I pray that I would be an ambassador for Your kingdom, sharing the good news of reconciliation that Your Son made possible by His blood. Help me to be gentle, respectful, humble, and patient… And help me to be bold and courageous, not giving way to fear and cowardice. May my love for You compel me to speak up when You are slandered and may my love for others compel me to tell them their desperate need for a Savior. In the Name of Jesus Christ my Savior and Lord I pray, Amen.
Read through the Bible in 2 years: Job 26-27, Psalm 150
With whose help have you uttered words, and whose breath has come out from you?
Job 26:4 ESV
Let’s just ponder this one verse from today’s reading.
On the sixth day of creation, the Lord breathed into the first man, Adam, the breath of life (Genesis 2:7) and He’s been doing it ever since. Why are we so prideful, so self-sufficient, thinking that we are independent creatures who don’t need God? Truly, what do I have that I haven’t been given? Even the very breath in my lungs is a gift from God.
And to think of the gift of language, of thinking and speaking and communicating – with God and with others – oh, what a gift! As an educator for the deaf, I witnessed first-hand how desperately children and parents desire to communicate, whether using gestures or sounds or facial expressions. My 100-lb Aussie-Labradoodle is about as smart as animals come, but he can’t communicate nearly so well as my 20-month old granddaughter. God has given mankind a unique gift in the gift of language, so that we can hear from Him and speak to Him like none of the other creatures He has made on earth.
The final psalm, Psalm 150, is a psalm of praise, praising God with trumpets and harps and strings and pipes, praising Him with dancing and loud crashing cymbals, but oh the gift of singing words of praise and making declarations of spoken praise, telling of His mighty deeds! The Lord has put breath in my lungs and with it I will praise Him! As the final verse of the final psalm says, “Let everything that has breath praise the Lord!” (Psalm 150:6) Will you join me in declaring aloud His greatness?!
Almighty God, Creator of heaven and earth, giver of life and breath, You are worthy of all our praise! You created the sun and moon and stars by Your will and by Your word. You hung the earth on nothing. You created the seas and everything in them. You created the earth and the sky and everything that fills them. What is man that you are mindful of us?
You are worthy of every word of worship, every song of praise, every beat of the drum, every blast of the trumpet, every clang of the cymbal. You are worthy! You are holy and mighty and good. All your ways are right and all Your ways are just.
We worship You in the glory of Your presence. We ask that You would make us vessels of Your glory and grace. We ask that You would make us declarers of Your praise! Use us, Lord! By the sacrifice of Your Son, we have been made temples of Your Holy Spirit. Make us pure and holy vessels for You.
In the name of Jesus Christ, our Savior and our Lord, we pray. Amen.
Read through the Bible in 2 years: Psalm 22, Job 15
There is so much prophecy about Christ in Psalm 22. The Roman soldiers divided up Jesus’s clothes and cast lots for his garments like David wrote a thousand years earlier in Psalm 22:18. Jesus spoke the very words of Psalm 22:1 as He hung on the cross, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” (Matthew 27:46)
My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? Why are you so far from saving me, from the words of my groaning?
Psalm 22:1 ESV
Have you ever felt like God has forgotten you, abandoned you, deserted you?
Sisters, when we find ourselves in that pit of despair, we must speak truth into our hearts, like David did in this psalm.
For he has not despised or abhorred the affliction of the afflicted, and he has not hidden his face from him, but has heard, when he cried to him.
Psalm 22:24 ESV
Here is the truth:
Deuteronomy 31:8 ESV — “It is the LORD who goes before you. He will be with you; he will not leave you or forsake you. Do not fear or be dismayed.”
Psalm 9:10 ESV — “And those who know your name put their trust in you, for you, O LORD, have not forsaken those who seek you.”
2 Corinthians 4:8-9 ESV — “We are afflicted in every way, but not crushed; perplexed, but not driven to despair; persecuted, but not forsaken; struck down, but not destroyed.”
Let’s encourage one another with these words and pray to the Father together. Will you join me in praying?
In Christ, we are the recipient of God’s grace, hidden behind the cross where Jesus absorbed the Father’s wrath that we so deeply deserved. Jesus took the Father’s scorn in our place. Jesus paid the death price, so we don’t have to.
Heavenly Father,
You are worthy of our full trust. Thank You for the sacrifice of Christ who has paid the price for my sin so that I don’t have to. My debt has been paid in full by my Savior, Christ Jesus, my Lord.
Thank You for Your faithful, steadfast love. I can trust without doubting that You will never leave me or forsake me. You are true, though every man be a liar. My own parents might even abandon me, turn away from me in shame, forsake me, but You never will.
In Jesus, You have made me Your child and put Your seal upon me, filling me with Your Holy Spirit, making me Your temple. What purpose and hope and peace there is in that!
Before going any further in our study in the book of Job, I want you to know that I’m actually finding it really weird to invest time reading through Job verse by verse and sharing my thoughts with you, because many of the ideas contained here simply aren’t good theology. No one should base their ideas about God and man on the grief-stricken meditations of Job, like “Why did you bring me out from the womb? Would that I had died before any eye had seen me and were as though I had not been, carried from the womb to the grave.” (Job 10:18-19) But on the other hand, it’s actually really cool to mine for truth in this book. Like you can find truth in secular books and movies, you can find truth in the words of Job and his friends, though I still caution you from using them as the foundation for your theological beliefs.
With that out of the way, let me ask you a question – Have you ever greeted someone with the very standard question, “How are you today?” and received the unexpected reply, “Better than I deserve”? There’s TRUTH in those words. All of us are better than we deserve. Like Romans 6:23a says, “The wages of sin is death.”
So, today, let’s ponder these words spoken to Job by his friend, Zophar,
Know then that God exacts of you less than your guilt deserves.
Job 11:6
Dear friends, I don’t know about you, but I know that I have broken God’s law more times than I can count. I have used His name in vain. I have blasphemed the Almighty Creator of the Universe. I have mocked and criticized His Son and His children. I have hated and dishonored God and His creation.
God would be totally just to spit in my face, call me unspeakable names, slap me across both my cheeks, and apply two-dozen lashings across my back. I deserve to be hung and shot and burned. I deserve it. God has exacted from me much less than my guilt deserves.
Truly, God has had mercy on me, a sinner. God pours out His grace on me and calls me His child. God sent His Own Son, Jesus Christ, to pay the price for my sins – making a way for me to not only NOT be punished, but to receive EVERLASTING LIFE!
I’m not worthy. I’m not worthy. But He has made me worthy. That is indeed Amazing GRACE.
Let’s pray.
Heavenly Father,
Oh the Grace of our Lord God! The matchless, unfathomable GRACE of God! Not only have You not given us what we deserve, but You have given us that which we do not deserve – boundless, eternal abundant life, the riches of glory with You.
Thank You!
Lord, please help us to understand how great is Your goodness, that we will shout from the mountaintops, “Christ the Lord is Risen! Hallelujah! Come to Him! Come to Him!” We have found a goldmine with limitless gold. We have found the living water that never ceases. We have found the bread that is indeed new every morning. May Your love compel us to share this good news with others. Let us not keep these wonders to ourselves. Your love is boundless – it grows as it is shared. Let us share it! Give us ears to hear and eyes to see and mouths to proclaim Your mercy and grace and power and might and goodness!
In the Name of Jesus I pray, Amen.
My Worth is Not in What I Own – Fernando Ortega, Keith Getty, Kristyn Getty
“If I wash myself with snow and cleanse my hands with lye, yet you will plunge me into a pit, and my own clothes will abhor me.”
Job 9:30-31 ESV
I feel Job’s pain. Job wants to be right with God. Job desperately wants the Lord to bless him and look well on him, and he can’t understand why He won’t. It reminds me of when Esau cried out bitterly to his father, Isaac, “Bless me, even me also, O my father!”” – Genesis 27:34 ESV
When I first heard and believed the gospel, I went from trying my hardest to obey my own made-up rules in my own strength, to trying my hardest to obey my own made-up rules PLUS God’s rules … still in my own strength. All that did was leave me exhausted and more depressed than ever. I could never keep my own rules, not to mention God’s rules, on my own. Like the Lord spoke through His prophet Jeremiah, “Though you wash yourself with lye and use much soap, the stain of your guilt is still before me.” (Jeremiah 2:22 ESV)
Let me encourage you, friends, this is not the incredible good news of the gospel. Jesus Christ didn’t die on the cross so you could keep more rules. Jesus died to cleanse you fully of every sin you have ever committed and will ever commit and to give you the power by His Holy Spirit and through faith in Him to go and sin no more. As born again followers of Jesus Christ, we can now work out our own salvation with fear and trembling, “for it is God who works in you, both to will and to work for his good pleasure.” – Philippians 2:12-13 ESV
I hope you will take some time today to ponder the finished work of Jesus Christ, what He has done for you, that you can be fully cleansed by the blood of the Lamb and the word of your testimony (Revelation 12:11).
“Come now, let us reason together, says the LORD: though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they are red like crimson, they shall become like wool.”
Isaiah 1:18 ESV
Will you please pray with me?
Heavenly Father,
You alone are holy, holy, holy. You dwell in unapproachable light. You are perfect in thought and word and deed. All Your ways are right. You are the very definition of perfect purity.
Thank You, thank You, thank You for the almighty cleansing power of the blood of Jesus, the only blood that can wash us clean, once and for all. Like Your Word says, it is impossible for the blood of bulls and goats to take away sins, but when Christ had offered for all time a single sacrifice for sins, He took His place, sitting at Your right hand, for His work was finished.
I pray for each person reading this who is still trying to make themselves clean by their own works. Teach them, Father, that their own good deeds are nothing but filthy rags in Your sight, that even the most righteous man is nowhere near the level of perfection that You demand. I pray that they will be washed in the blood of Jesus today, that You will plunge them in that fountain full of scarlet red blood, that they may come out spotless and pure, that they will have the power of the Holy Spirit coursing through their veins, giving them new desires and new power to walk in the righteousness of faith, turning away day after day from their sin, and turning toward Your perfect light.
In the good and gracious name of Jesus we pray, Amen.
Joseph answered Pharaoh, “It is not in me; God will give Pharaoh a favorable answer.”
Genesis 41:16 ESV
I love how God works within space and time to reveal Himself to people. Shortly after reading Genesis 40-41 for my daily Bible reading, I received an email about an article that was published by Premier Unbelievable about my testimony of coming to faith in Christ out of atheism.
In reading Genesis 40-41, I was struck by Joseph’s humility, his insistence that it was God, not him, who revealed the meaning of dreams. Joseph easily could have become puffed up and patted himself on the back for his accomplishments, but he didn’t. You find this same humility in Daniel and Peter and John and Paul.
“Then the mystery was revealed to Daniel in a vision of the night. Then Daniel blessed the God of heaven. Daniel answered and said: “Blessed be the name of God forever and ever, to whom belong wisdom and might. He changes times and seasons; he removes kings and sets up kings; he gives wisdom to the wise and knowledge to those who have understanding; he reveals deep and hidden things; he knows what is in the darkness, and the light dwells with him. To you, O God of my fathers, I give thanks and praise, for you have given me wisdom and might, and have now made known to me what we asked of you, for you have made known to us the king’s matter.””
Daniel 2:19-23 ESV
“While he clung to Peter and John, all the people, utterly astounded, ran together to them in the portico called Solomon’s. And when Peter saw it he addressed the people: “Men of Israel, why do you wonder at this, or why do you stare at us, as though by our own power or piety we have made him walk? The God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, the God of our fathers, glorified his servant Jesus, whom you delivered over and denied in the presence of Pilate, when he had decided to release him. But you denied the Holy and Righteous One, and asked for a murderer to be granted to you, and you killed the Author of life, whom God raised from the dead. To this we are witnesses. And his name–by faith in his name–has made this man strong whom you see and know, and the faith that is through Jesus has given the man this perfect health in the presence of you all.”
Acts 3:11-16 ESV
“Now I would remind you, brothers, of the gospel I preached to you, which you received, in which you stand, and by which you are being saved, if you hold fast to the word I preached to you–unless you believed in vain. For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received: that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the Scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the Scriptures, and that he appeared to Cephas, then to the twelve. Then he appeared to more than five hundred brothers at one time, most of whom are still alive, though some have fallen asleep. Then he appeared to James, then to all the apostles. Last of all, as to one untimely born, he appeared also to me. For I am the least of the apostles, unworthy to be called an apostle, because I persecuted the church of God. But by the grace of God I am what I am, and his grace toward me was not in vain. On the contrary, I worked harder than any of them, though it was not I, but the grace of God that is with me. Whether then it was I or they, so we preach and so you believed.”
1 Corinthians 15:1-11 ESV
I pray that I would do likewise, that when the Lord opens a door for me to speak or serve or act for His glory that all the glory would go to Him and Him alone for He is the only one worthy. All that I am and all that I have is a direct result of His grace that He has lavished on me, a sinner.
I am a sinner saved by grace. I am just a beggar telling you where to find bread. It is only by God’s mercy that I can do anything. He has caused me to be born again to this living hope and I am eternally grateful. His grace compels me. His power gives me strength. His mercy allows me to be merciful.
Let’s pray together.
Oh, Heavenly Father,
Apart from Your grace, we are all just filthy rotten sinners. I remember who I was – I wanted to be good, I wanted to do right, but I could never do it. Everything I did was tainted by conceit and pride and selfishness. I was lost and without hope. I lived under a cloud of fear and darkness.
You have saved me by Your grace. You have taken what was dead and made it alive. You have taken my heart of stone and given me a heart of flesh. And all I can cry is HOLY! WORTHY! Worthy are You to receive all glory and honor and praise. Worthy is the Lamb. You are WORTHY!
My worth is not in myself – not in what I can say or do, not in what I have said or done – my worth is in YOU. You have made me worthy. You have called me YOURS. You have brought me into Your kingdom and set my feet on the rock. You have brought me to Your banqueting table and spread Your banner of love over me. Thank you, Father. Thank You.
In the Mighty and Merciful Name of Jesus I pray, Amen!
My Worth is Not in What I Own – Fernando Ortega & The Gettys
Teach What is Good 
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