Do You Really Know How Much He Loves You?

Eph 3:17-19 That Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith; that ye, being rooted and grounded in love, (18) May be able to comprehend with all saints what is the breadth, and length, and depth, and height;(19) And to know the love of Christ, which passeth knowledge, that ye might be filled with all the fulness of God.

How wide is the love of God?  It is wide enough to encompass the whole world and everyone that has ever inhabited or will inhabit it.  How long is His love?  It is an eternal never ending love, not on again and off again but continuous.  How deep is His love?  It is deep enough to reach the vilest sinner in the depths of his sins and rescue him and embrace him with love everlasting. How high is His love?  It reaches to the very Heaven from where He sent His son to pay our sin debt and give us eternal life.

 

When we dwell in Christ we should know that He dwells in us and that His love should flow forth from us to all those around us.

 

It is when we finally get to know the love of God that we getting a glimpse of the majesty of God. There is no way we can every fully comprehend how much God loves us until we receive our glorified bodies because it passes our knowledge.

 

When we begin to comprehend His love we then become filled with the fullness of God.

Email us at
shilohkosciusko@gmail.com with questions, comments or even suggestions for further devotional studies.

If you know of someone new to the Kosciusko area and would like for our church to visit them please let us know.  Our prayers are that this devotional ministry will be an outreach to bring people into a closer relationship with Jesus.  I do appreciate you taking the time to read these devotionals and please keep us in your prayers.

Is This All?

John 10:10 The thief cometh not, but for to steal, and to kill, and to destroy: I am come that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly.

 

Several years ago I went to a museum not far from where I live.  I won't mention the name.  I had passed the signs, I had heard of it even before I moved to the area, and I had heard people talking about it.  I went with a group of senior citizens, before I became one I drove the bus.

It took us only about half an hour to see everything they had of interest and even though I didn't say it my thought was "Is this all?".  Needless to say it was a big disappointment to me.  I had expected more.

 

I think many people today are disappointed with life because they expected more.  Shouldn't life be more than the same old mundane tasks every workday and trying to squeeze all the fun out of the weekend.  For some it is a vicious cycle that leaves them asking "Is this all there is?"

 

Even Christians who never strive to get closer to Jesus and to learn more about Him and walk closer to Him find themselves feeling let down.  They are looking for an emotional experience instead of realizing that the depth and abundance of our walk with Jesus depends upon our submitting ourselves to Him.  If when you look at your life and ask "Is that all?", it is time to look at your daily walk with Jesus and let Him take charge of it.

 

Many people who have eternal life never really experience the Joy of the abundant life that we can have in Jesus.

 

Email us atshilohkosciusko@gmail.com with questions, comments or even suggestions for further devotional studies.

If you know of someone new to the Kosciusko area and would like for our church to visit them please let us know.  Our prayers are that this devotional ministry will be an outreach to bring people into a closer relationship with Jesus.  I do appreciate you taking the time to read these devotionals and please keep us in your prayers.

CALLING ON GOD

Jermiah 33:3 Call unto me, and I will answer thee, and show thee great and mighty things, which thou knowest not.

 

I have to make a confession.  I am an independent person and sometimes when I should ask others for help I am too stubborn to do it.  I don't know if it is pride or that I just don't like to bother anyone but I have been that way just as long as I can remember.

 

Maybe I think that I should be the one helping others.  Sometimes I even feel like I shouldn't be bothering God with my prayer request.  I know I should pray but isn't it much better to thank God for what we already have and to intercede for others than to ask God to help us?

 

In all honesty I am sure I miss a lot of blessings simply because I try to accomplish things on my own instead of calling out to God for the help that I know He can and is willing to give me.

 

Sometimes we are too stubborn and independent for our own good.  God wants us to call on Him and He wants to bless us yet we constantly fail to seek His help and blessings.

 

Email us atshilohkosciusko@gmail.com with questions, comments or even suggestions for further devotional studies.

If you know of someone new to the Kosciusko area and would like for our church to visit them please let us know.  Our prayers are that this devotional ministry will be an outreach to bring people into a closer relationship with Jesus.  I do appreciate you taking the time to read these devotionals and please keep us in your prayers.

DON'T STAGNATE

John 7:38 He that believeth on me, as the scripture hath said, out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water.

 

In two previous devotionals I wrote about cisterns and how they become stagnant.  When we ask Jesus into our lives we then have the living waters within us.  Did you know that when rivers have no outlet they can also become stagnant. The Dead Sea in the middle east are examples of this. The water just evaporates leaving all the minerals in the water until nothing can grow or live there.

 

We are not really alive in Jesus Christ unless we are letting the rivers of living water flow through us.  We have the rivers of living water because Jesus loves us.  We share the rivers of Living Water when we share that love with others.

 

Sharing that love does not just mean telling people that Jesus loves them.  I read an article yesterday that really brought that point home. It was about being loved and not loving others.  We will stagnate if we don't love others.  We must share the love of Jesus for sure, but we can not do that well until we learn to love others ourselves.  We don't have to know people or particularly care for people to share the love of Jesus.  If we love them the way He loved us we will love them whether they deserve loving or not.  I know I did not deserve His love but He offered it to me anyway.

 shilohkosciusko@gmail.com with questions, comments or even suggestions for further devotional studies.

If you know of someone new to the Kosciusko area and would like for our church to visit them please let us know.  Our prayers are that this devotional ministry will be an outreach to bring people into a closer relationship with Jesus.  I do appreciate you taking the time to read these devotionals and please keep us in your prayers.

HOME SAFE

Matthew 18:12 How think ye? if a man have an hundred SHEEP, and one of them be gone astray, doth he not leave the ninety and nine, and goeth into the mountains, and seeketh that which is gone astray?

 

While my kids were growing up I was strict.  They had times to be home and if for some reason they could not make the curfew they had better call and have a very good reason.  If they had not called and were not home, five minutes after curfew I was in the car looking for them.  I only had to do that once for my son and I met him at the end of our street coming in.

 

I know a lot of people are thinking that is really too strict.  My daughter didn't think so.  She had a job in town that she worked some nights until ten.  She would call before she left work and let us know if she was going to be late.  We knew how long it took her to get home.  We lived about as far out in the country as you can get without being on your way back to town somewhere else.

 

One night she was late.  I got in my car and drove up the dark country road and there was her car on the side of the road.  There were no street lights and no lights on in the few houses that were within walking distance.  My daughter was not in the car.  I drove a little way past the car and turned around because there was an intersecting road in the other direction.

 

My heart leaped as I saw her come from that intersecting road walking toward me.  She had been looking for somewhere with lights on so she could call me. (This was before cell phones)  As she got in the car she started telling me how scared she was and that she had heard something growl at her in the dark and then she turned to me and said, "I am so glad I have parents that keep up with where I am.  I would have been scared to death if you had just gone to bed and not worried about me."

 

Even when we don't go astray intentionally we sometimes get sidetracked and stranded in bad places in this life.  I am glad that my Heavenly Father always keeps up with where I am and will always take me home safely.shilohkosciusko@gmail.com with questions, comments or even suggestions for further devotional studies.

If you know of someone new to the Kosciusko area and would like for our church to visit them please let us know.  Our prayers are that this devotional ministry will be an outreach to bring people into a closer relationship with Jesus.  I do appreciate you taking the time to read these devotionals and please keep us in your prayers.

Broken Cisterns 2

Jeremiah 2:13 For my people have committed two evils; they have forsaken me the fountain of living waters, and hewed them out cisterns, broken cisterns, that can hold no water.

 

INTRODUCTION:  Water is a symbol of life, both carnal and eternal. In these verses of scriptures God speaks to Israel and declares that they have forsaken Him, the fountain of living waters, and hewed them out cisterns.

 

I can remember when people caught their water in cisterns.  They would put gutters around the house and use them to direct the water from the house into the cistern.  It was a big old concrete jug in buried in the ground.

 

Most people did it because they didn't have a choice.  That was the only way they could store water.  The problem is that everything on that roof would wash down into their drinking water.  Anything that happened to climb or crawl in and fell in would stay right there in the water they drank.

 

Most people never thought of the impurities in their water.  It is kind of the same with Spiritual water.  Instead of getting spiritual refreshment directly from the Lord, all some people get is what comes from someone else that has caught something and stored it.  They too have no idea of the impurities that might be in it.

 

It is important for us to know Jesus as our Lord and Savior and go directly to His Word.  He is the living water and if we have Him we will never thirst.

 

Please feel free to contact me by email at

shilohkosciusko@gmail.com with questions, comments or even suggestions for further devotional studies.

If you know of someone new to the Kosciusko area and would like for our church to visit them please let us know.  Our prayers are that this devotional ministry will be an outreach to bring people into a closer relationship with Jesus.  I do appreciate you taking the time to read these devotionals and please keep us in your prayers.

Broken Cisterns 1

Jeremiah 2:13 For my people have committed two evils; they have forsaken me the fountain of living waters, and hewed them out cisterns, broken cisterns, that can hold no water.

 

INTRODUCTION:  Water is a symbol of life, both carnal and eternal. In these verses of scriptures God speaks to Israel and declares that they have forsaken Him, the fountain of living waters, and hewed them out cisterns.

 

The first evil the people committed was forsaking God.  We do that when we question the validity of the Bible.  We do that when we decide we must become tolerant of ideas and cultures that are contrary to His Word.

 

God's Word is eternal and it is not going to change with the styles.  I am afraid people have not only hewn out cisterns but they are broken cisterns.

 

Read tomorrows devotional for a lesson on cisterns.

 

Here is something to consider when we you begin to compromise the Word of God

NOTE:
 We wallow in the mire of mediocrity, muck through the mud of moderation, and our sleepy souls slovenly slop through the superficial sloughs of self satisfaction. And then we wonder why we don't feel as close to God as we should.
 

Please feel free to contact me by email at

shilohkosciusko@gmail.com with questions, comments or even suggestions for further devotional studies.

If you know of someone new to the Kosciusko area and would like for our church to visit them please let us know.  Our prayers are that this devotional ministry will be an outreach to bring people into a closer relationship with Jesus.  I do appreciate you taking the time to read these devotionals and please keep us in your prayers.