Good day dear friends.
We rejoice in knowing Phyllis Gaddie and Milton Hughes have gone home to recover after their hospital stays. Both are doing much better and we continue to pray for their complete recovery. Dee Dee Murdoch is recovering at Seton Hospital in Austin and should be home by Sunday. We pray for the biopsy being done on her lymph node, that it show no futher spread of the cancer. Let us also pray for those looking for employment. There are many in our midst who seek meaningful and gainful employment.
We continue to affirm our belief in God's word as being His word for our lives. Here is our study guide for today:
Thursday: 2 Timothy 3:16-17 speaks of how we should perceive the Word of God. Read this passage and let it speak to your life. Let it be truth for how you live your life from this point on.
Here is that passage from 2 Timothy 3:16 All scripture is inspired by God and is useful for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, 17 so that everyone who belongs to God may be proficient, equipped for every good work.
"Inspired by God" is how this version approaches the work we call The Bible. The Spirit of God moved the writers to sit down and write the words that they had lived and experienced or received from Him so that we might have scripture. These writers knew the power of the printed word and how important it would be to have as a record of God moving among us. This particular writer of 2 Timothy is one who knew it could be used to teach with it, for there are countless lessons on life found in it. There is the story of how God has shared love with us. There is the hope found in the gospel message. The writer also knew that in scripture there is also found that which allows us to know what is good and what is not so good for our daily life. The word is "reproof" and the NIV calls it "rebuke." Nonetheless, it is that which allows us to better our lives in our relationship with God. As I mentioned Sunday in my sermon, the Bible sometimes acts as a mirror as we read it for we find our very lives being described in some of the stories or teachings and correction seems to be the message we hear as we honestly evaluate our lives. Training in righteousness is being prepared to seek and do God's good in the world The teaching of verse seventeen echos that: We must be well-trained and prepared to do God's good work.
It doesn't come easy and it certainly won't come at all if we don't read the Bible as we should. The Bible is not a magical book that by holding it or putting it in the same room with us will bring us good fortune. Its power lies within its pages and the relationship to God that it offers to us. To receive its blessing it must be opened. Back in the days when people still wrote letters, I remembered my college days and how I thought I had misspent whatever money I had paid for my mailbox. The greatest treats and more so now that both are gone, were letters from my mother and grandmother. Both had little, but each would send at least five dollars for "gum" they would write. Can you imagine what I would ahve missed out on had I just left the letters in that mailbox without opening them? Or pulling them out of the box and taking them with me but placing them aside with no desire to open them? Such is the missed blessing of not opening and receiving God's message for us.
PRAYER: God of the powerful word, speak a blessing to me as I seek You in Your word today. Let me know of that which I lack and need and help me seek it. Let me serve you by doing good. I pray in Jesus' name, amen.
Have a great and blessed day!
e.v.
