Jesus Is Lord

The Forever Things

Jesus Is Lord, Sanctification

“The grass withers, the flower fades, but the word of our God will stand forever,” Isaiah 40:8

Several months ago, while washing dishes, I noticed a small hairline crack in the granite countertop behind my kitchen faucet. It alarmed me. Having been built in 2019, my house is still new in my mind. As the months passed, the crack spread and deepened. Recently, my husband and I purchased a granite repair kit and worked together to fill and paint over the very noticeable crack.

As we worked, I kept thinking about the fact that nothing remains the same. Obviously, I know this. But my mind was pondering about so many things. My car, which was also purchased in 2019, is having issues. The exterior of our house needs scrubbing. The once beautiful lawn has been invaded with stickers. The trampoline is rusting. My 37-year-old hair is changing and sprouting tiny greys. My lower back feels like it’s 60. Slight wrinkles are developing near my eyes. We build things with our own hands, and our work will inevitably face wilt or decay. Our minds absorb, learn, and then flesh out what we’ve learned, then our work is forgotten.

You get the point because you have your own list culminating in your mind.

My list is soft, normal, and definitely first-world problems. I have no room for complaints, yet I complain.

Things in this life fade. We wither away with age.

It’s actually pretty depressing to think about. I can see where a perspective of hopelessness could overtake one’s mind.

But, as Christ followers, a hopeless perspective shouldn’t be our permanent residence.

Because we know that our hope is not bound in the work of our hands, the longevity of our homes and vehicles, or our own young and healthy bodies.

Life would be hopeless if those are the things we are placing our hope in. Because they will never last nor will they satisfy us for long.

Nothing in this world lasts forever.

The only reasonable response would be for us to hope in something not bound to this world.

The only thing not bound to this world is THE Creator of this world. Our holy and good God.

In Isaiah chapter 40, God is comforting His people that have been in exile. Part of God’s perfect comforting is His declarative promise that only He can be utterly and completely trusted. Because He is the only true and trusted One, His words are infallible and remain forever as infallible and cannot decay or be void of truth.

“The grass withers, the flower fades when the breath of the LORD blows on it; surely the people are grass. The grass withers, the flower fades, but the word of our God will stand forever,” (Isaiah 40:7-8 ESV).

I want the forever things.

I want my hope to remain on the only thing that will stand forever…The Word of our God.

Isaiah 55:10-11 says,

“For as the rain and the snow come down from heaven and do not return there but water the earth making it bring forth and sprout, giving seed to the sower and bread to the eater, so shall my word be that goes out from my mouth; it shall not return to me empty, but it shall accomplish that which I purpose, and shall succeed in the thing for which I sent it.”

Our purposes go unaccomplished often and are filled with emptiness that evoke hopelessness apart from God. As Believers our hope should be intertwined in the character and promises of God, not that of our own human motives and accomplishments. It should thrill us to serve a God Who is unchanged by His changing world corrupted by the sin of man.

I do not like change. I enjoy and thrive in order, schedules, and well-made and kept plans. This dislike of change has become a big area of sanctification for me over the last decade. What a gift this specific area of sanctification has been in growing me closer to my Holy and good God. He has brought to the center of my heart and my perspective His sovereignty and His perfect reign as my life has experienced seasons of intense changes.

He has made it a solid truth in my soul and spirit that I cannot look to anything in this world to place my faith or hope in or seek comfort from as I attempt to avoid or surrender to the many changes of life.

There have been seasons that many things in this world have given me false securities of hope and comfort. Like the list above—Having a beautiful home, a reliable vehicle, a well-paying job, a healthy body, a mind that thinks and creates, hands that accomplish work, pretty things, a husband, wonderful children, church, ministry, goals, past accomplishments and the pursuit of future ones. None of these things are inherently wrong. But they all have one thing in common… They will not last forever.

Decay, wilt, deterioration, inevitable change, age, and death will happen. All things in this world will succumb to an unavoidable end. They will not last forever, ever.

I want the forever things.

If the Word of God is the forever thing, then everything in His Word should be worth our attention and seeking. We should feed on His Word like it were food, because it is. Jesus says this in His human hunger as He was being tempted by the devil in the wilderness forty days and forty nights.

“Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God,” (Matthew 4:4 ESV).

The forever things are found in God’s Word.

The forever things are bound up in seeking God. We cannot truly seek the One True God without seeking Him first and foremost in His Holy Word.

The forever things are bound up in knowing God. We cannot truly know the God of the Bible without knowing His beautiful, all-powerful, life-giving, Holy Word.

The forever things are bound up in loving God. We know from His Word that we only love because He first loved us (1 John 4:19). We know as Believer’s, His ardent love for us is a gift rooted in His wonderful mercy that will always be undeserved on our part.

The forever things are bound up in trusting God. When God has drawn us to faith and repentance, we are made justified before Him through the ordained, perfect work of His Son, Jesus, at the Cross of Calvary. We are made alive and a new creation in Christ Jesus! (Ephesians 2:1-10). How could we not find Him trustworthy in all matters of our life? We should trust unwaveringly, but we don’t. But we get to spend our earthly lives practicing our trust through continually seeking and knowing more of who God is through His Word. We get to study how much He loves us. Because He is faithful, He will grow our trust in Him.

The forever things are what our holy and good God says are essential and imperative for His children: picking up our cross, and following Him (Matthew 16:24-28), keeping His commandments (John 14:15-17), abiding in Him (John 15:4-5), loving one another as He has loved us (John 15:12-13), bearing fruit that abides (John 15:16), loving our enemies and praying for those who persecute us (Matthew 5:44), going and making disciples of all nations (Matthew 28:19), being holy for He is holy (1 Peter 1:13-16), rejoicing always, praying without ceasing, giving thanks in all circumstances (1 Thessalonians 5:16-18).

This list is inexhaustive, but it’s a good start for us to submerge our thoughts and affections for the forever things.

I pray you have an urgency rooted in God’s grace to be a continual student of His scriptures. I pray you love the wisdom that consumes His Word. I pray you love His commands and boundaries laid out for His children. I pray you humbly recognize His sovereignty on display from eternity past, present, and eternity future. I pray you are stirred to submit under His wonderful and perfect authority in all things, knowing that He is the only One that is immutable and all-sufficient.

The grass withers, as we all will do in this life. The flower fades, as do all things in this life.

I pray you joyfully seek the forever things… the life-giving, sustaining, unfading, imperishable, permanent, immutable, all-sufficient, infallible, inherent Word of God.  

“All scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work,” (2 Timothy 3:16-17 ESV),  

I Trust my God, I Trust my God, I Trust my God

Ardently His,
Jess

Be A Truth Teller

Jesus Is Lord, Trusting God

“But our citizenship is in heaven, and from it we await a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, who will transform our lowly body to be like his glorious body, by the power that enables him even to subject all things to himself. Therefore, my brothers, whom I love and long for, my joy and crown, stand firm thus in the Lord, my beloved,” (Philippians 3:20-4:1 ESV).

In a world full of sinful delusions masked as “love,” be a Truth teller.

We are in a war for truth. As a redeemed believer and follower of Jesus Christ, we are commanded to speak the truth of His Holy Word and share the gospel—the literal Good News of Jesus SAVING people who fall short of the glory of God. Reality check—WE ALL fall short of His glory everyday of our lives, hence why we ALL need the Savior, Jesus Christ. (Romans 3:23)

My feelings can’t save me. My good deeds can’t save me. My “good person” status can’t save me. My mom can’t save me. The government can’t save me. My bank account can’t save me. My health can’t save me. My strong will can’t save me. My college education can’t save me. My husband can’t save me. My children can’t save me.

Jesus saves me.

In the Gospel of John, he records Jesus’ words, “… I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me,” (John 14:6 ESV).

Jesus is the way. Jesus is the truth. Jesus is the life.

End of the story.

Jesus is truth. He is the standard of truth. He is the standard of goodness. He is the standard of righteousness. He is the standard of holiness. Any other “truth” or standard is rubbish, foolish, and fades.

In other words of Jesus, He tells His disciples a truth that is overwhelmingly unpopular to the world. “…If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me,” (Matthew 16:24 ESV).  

Deny himself. Ouch. We are living in a cowardly culture that has zero concept of what it means to deny fleshly appetites. One wakes up and feels a certain way—that then becomes their twisted version of truth and reality. It’s madness. It’s no less than the days of Sodom and Gomorrah.

Believer, what then should we do with all these delusions of reality that invoke such gross evil and attempts to smother the truth of Jesus and His Word?

We set like flint and follow after Jesus in every aspect of our lives. We take up our cross, daily. We armor ourselves with the Holy scriptures. We share the gospel. We do not grow weary of doing good. We persevere until the end, like so many of our brothers and sisters in Christ have done before us. We take up the torch of truth daily, shine it, and light others torches around us. We can’t sit down. We can’t slumber. We can’t silence.  

Like so many across our country, my heart is devasted over the senseless, evil, assassination of a brilliant, wise, TRUTH-telling, husband, father, and Brother-in-Christ, Charlie Kirk. He encouraged countless with the Word of God. He stood firm on Biblical principles. He boldly pointed others to the truth of Who Jesus is—Savior. He not only stood on Biblical principles but also stood for the United States Constitution and what our Founding Fathers built.

What a loss for our country.

But what rejoicing he is doing in Heaven at this very moment. He won.

He was taken down by the schemes of satan, but ultimately our sovereign and perfect God allowed it. Somehow, my God gets the glory, every time. Even when we can’t see it or do not understand it.

Jesus said, “For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will find it,” (Matthew 16:25 ESV).

Are you willing to lose your life for the Truth of Jesus?

Martyrdom isn’t something our country faces daily. But what if it was? Is your following after Jesus whimsical and wavering? Or are the seeds of the Truths of Jesus and God’s Holy Word so richly planted in you, that without a doubt you would have His truth on your lips until your final breath, even if you’re threatened to stop speaking Jesus’ truth?

This is a wake-up call, Believer. I pray you seek God so intensely and have a holy conviction to be rooted in His Word that there is no second guessing your stance.

Believer, we must tell the truth of Jesus. Wherever the Lord has ordered you in this life—tell His truth. Whether it’s at your seemingly boring 8-5 job—tell His truth. Whether it’s a platform that garners the attention of thousands or millions—tell His truth. Whether it’s in your living room to the young hearts the Lord has entrusted to you during your time on earth—tell His truth.

What do we have to lose?

Our lives?

Not really.

In the words of the late John MacArthur, “All death can do to the believer is deliver him to Jesus.” Charlie Kirk has been reported to have spoken these same words. The beautiful irony.

As followers of Jesus, we should have this same boldness surrounding our thoughts of an earthly death. This boldness should stoke a fire so bright to LIVE for Christ and His glory.

Paul writes about this truth to the church at Philippi, “as it is my eager expectation and hope that I will not be at all ashamed, but that with full courage now as always Christ will be honored in my body whether by life or death. For me to live is Christ, and to die is gain,” (Philippians 1:20-21 ESV).

I challenge you, Believer, not to embody a mindset of flesh-fueled anger, but one of deep sorrow over the sin that is rampart around our nation and world. I pray it brings us to our knees. Do you realize that among these current scoffers of Jesus, there are some that are still yet to be called as Child of God? But, make no mistake, if they belong to Christ, He will get them. (John 10:14-16). What a beautiful thing that the Lord has graciously allowed us to be a part of… sharing the gospel of His Truth to help bring the lost to salvation and repentance.

I want to conclude with a beautiful exhortation written by Paul to the Church at Philippi that is still for the believer today,

“Not that I have already obtained this or am already perfect, but I press on to make it my own, because Christ Jesus has made me his own. Brothers, I do not consider that I have made it my own. But one thing I do: forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus. Let those of us who are mature think this way, and if in anything you think otherwise, God will reveal that also to you. Only let us hold true to what we have attained. Brothers, join in imitating me, keep your eyes on those who walk according to the example you have in us. For many, of whom I have often told you and now tell you even with tears, walk as enemies of the cross of Christ. Their end is destruction, their god is their belly, and they glory in their shame, with minds set on earthly things. But our citizenship is in heaven, and from it we await a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, who will transform our lowly body to be like his glorious body, by the power that enables him even to subject all things to himself. Therefore, my brothers, whom I love and long for, my joy and crown, stand firm thus in the Lord, my beloved,” (Philippians 3:12-4:1 ESV).

Be a Truth teller until the end.

I Trust my God, I Trust my God, I Trust my God

Ardently His,

Jess