What‘s more important than getting a life-changing handle on what God has promised you specifically? Expect this podcast to help you know who you are...REALLY & to help you live fully believing God‘s promises to you...REALLY.
Episodes
Wednesday Aug 28, 2024
Wednesday Aug 28, 2024
Do you need some hope today?
Hope for restoration of things long since lost, devoured, or delayed?
Then this episode is for you!
Be encouraged, take hope in the Lord, and remember, He who promised is faithful!
The Power of God's Will - 40 Days of God's Promises Devotional available on Amazon
The Lord’s Promise of Restoration
18 Then the Lord will pity his people
and jealously guard the honor of his land.
19 The Lord will reply,
“Look! I am sending you grain and new wine and olive oil,
enough to satisfy your needs.
You will no longer be an object of mockery
among the surrounding nations.
20 I will drive away these armies from the north.
I will send them into the parched wastelands.
Those in the front will be driven into the Dead Sea,
and those at the rear into the Mediterranean.[c]
The stench of their rotting bodies will rise over the land.”
Surely the Lord has done great things!
21 Don’t be afraid, O land.
Be glad now and rejoice,
for the Lord has done great things.
22 Don’t be afraid, you animals of the field,
for the wilderness pastures will soon be green.
The trees will again be filled with fruit;
fig trees and grapevines will be loaded down once more.
23 Rejoice, you people of Jerusalem!
Rejoice in the Lord your God!
For the rain he sends demonstrates his faithfulness.
Once more the autumn rains will come,
as well as the rains of spring.
24 The threshing floors will again be piled high with grain,
and the presses will overflow with new wine and olive oil.
25 The Lord says, “I will give you back what you lost
to the swarming locusts, the hopping locusts,
the stripping locusts, and the cutting locusts.[d]
It was I who sent this great destroying army against you.
26 Once again you will have all the food you want,
and you will praise the Lord your God,
who does these miracles for you.
Never again will my people be disgraced.
27 Then you will know that I am among my people Israel,
that I am the Lord your God, and there is no other.
Never again will my people be disgraced.
The Lord’s Promise of His Spirit
28 [e]“Then, after doing all those things,
I will pour out my Spirit upon all people.
Your sons and daughters will prophesy.
Your old men will dream dreams,
and your young men will see visions.
29 In those days I will pour out my Spirit
even on servants—men and women alike.
30 And I will cause wonders in the heavens and on the earth—
blood and fire and columns of smoke.
31 The sun will become dark,
and the moon will turn blood red
before that great and terrible[f] day of the Lord arrives.
32 But everyone who calls on the name of the Lord
will be saved
Monday Aug 26, 2024
Monday Aug 26, 2024
Welcome to this BONUS episode of The Burt (Not Ernie) Show!
In this episode you'll hear an excerpt from The Prayer Podcast as we take a look at Romans 12 verse 1 and learn some things about prayer.
I pray this bonus episode will be encouraging for you.
Remember, when you know God's promises and you pray boldly based on those promises, you'll see mountains move in your life and in your heart.
Be sure to subscribe to the podcast so you don't miss any bonus or regular episodes!
Next time we will take a look at Joel chapter 2 as we continue the series, "Every Book a Promise".
Thanks for listening and as always, you can reach out to me with questions or prayer requests via my website, JanLBurt.com, which has a text / chat bubble that makes it super easy to reach me!
Thursday Aug 15, 2024
Thursday Aug 15, 2024
In this episode, we're taking a look at a portion of Luke chapter 8.
This passage challenges us, but it also encourages us to go all-in with Jesus, trusting Him utterly & completely, believing that He is who He says He is and that He does exactly what He has promised to do.
This episode sponsored by Heather Creekmore's book Aging Gratefully, available on Amazon.
Jesus Calms the Storm
22 One day Jesus said to his disciples, “Let’s cross to the other side of the lake.” So they got into a boat and started out. 23 As they sailed across, Jesus settled down for a nap. But soon a fierce storm came down on the lake. The boat was filling with water, and they were in real danger.
24 The disciples went and woke him up, shouting, “Master, Master, we’re going to drown!”
When Jesus woke up, he rebuked the wind and the raging waves. Suddenly the storm stopped and all was calm. 25 Then he asked them, “Where is your faith?”
The disciples were terrified and amazed. “Who is this man?” they asked each other. “When he gives a command, even the wind and waves obey him!”
Thanks for listening to the podcast & I hope it has been encouraging for you!
Friday Aug 09, 2024
Friday Aug 09, 2024
Well hey there! Hello to you today! So glad to be able to talk about God’s promises today - the freedom to share the truth of God’s Word is something I am so very thankful for. And I’m also very thankful for you.
You’re listening to The Burt (Not Ernie) Show, part of the Spark Network, playing in the Edifi app. This is episode number 188, and we’re taking a look at some promises from the Old Testament Book of Hosea. Let’s jump in.
Working our way through the Bible, one book at a time, and finding promises God has made to His people in each book is pretty amazing. It’s like a treasure hunt that never stops yielding huge treasure.
Hosea chapter one, verse seven in the New Living Translation says, “But I will show love to the people of Judah. I will free them from their enemies - not with weapons and armies and horses and charioteers, but by My power as the LORD their God.”
God’s not promising no struggles or difficulties.
God’s not asking His people to live in denial about their hardships and their enemies.
You know, it’s passages like this that come to mind when people have said to me that my “religion” is just a crutch to keep me from facing reality. I don’t have a religion. I have a Living Savior and I have a daily relationship with Him. And Hosea 1:7, well, this is a verse for the times that are so tough in life, no crutch would do. Any crutch that we try to use, as believers, that is anything outside of leaning fully upon Him and relying on His strength alone, well, any other kind of leaning on a crutch ends up being a flimsy reed that breaks and then stabs us in the hand, ya know? It does not work! The only thing that works is actually putting the entirety of our hope in Him alone.
And this verse is a great reminder of that hope, that truth. There is a great big promise here for us, but only if we choose to believe it!
Are you facing an enemy right now?
Can I encourage you to seek the Lord for His favor, asking Him to pour out His love on you, to free you from your enemies, and not with some means that you can figure out on your own, but by His power alone as the Lord your God?
Sure, it’s a big, bold prayer to pray and it can feel kind of risky or even presumptuous to pray like this…but when we pray based on what we read in God’s word, I don’t think that is the same thing as presuming upon the Lord. When we ask for things He freely gives all over the pages of the Bible, I think we asking well.
In chapter three of Hosea, we find a verse that stands as a firm reminder of what will happen in the last days. Verse 5 says, In the last days they will tremble in awe of the Lord and His goodness.
This is going to happen. God says will in this verse, and He actually means will.
I think it would be very wise for us to acknowledge that this is going to happen, that everyone will tremble in awe of Him and His goodness. I’d like to start trembling in awe of Him and His goodness right now, and not wait for the time when everyone can’t help but stand in awe. I’d like to honor Him in my awe of Him, if that makes sense. And I’d like to do that today.
Hosea 14-8-9 says: “O Israel, stay away from idols! I am the One who answers your prayers and cares for you. I am like a tree that is always green, all your fruit comes from Me. Let those who are wise understand these things. Let those with discernment listen carefully. The paths of the LORD are true and right, and righteous people live by walking in them. But in those paths sinners stumble and fall.
We see a lot in these two verses.
First, God wants His people to stay away from idols.
Sure, it says Israel, but we can know for certain that Christians also need to stay away from idols. And an idol is anything that pulls at our hearts and gets us focused on something other than God. Yes, lots of bad bad things are idols. And also, lots of things that aren’t inherently good or bad in and of themselves are also idols. Food can be an idol. Our appearance can be an idol. Our followers on social media, stats, can be an idol. Our children can become what we idolize most in this life. Possessions, big and small..our health, our athleticism, our intellect, our job title, our list of achievements, our degrees, who we rub shoulders with, our address, where we vacation…the list goes on and on.
Idol worship is what God says we are to stay away from. Stay away from idols. This doesn't sound like a request. It sounds like God is serious, and states this very plainly. We have no excuse for our idols. And we all deal with this issue, so we may as well be honest with the Lord about it and seek His help with whatever or whomever the idols are in our own hearts and lives.
God is the One who answers our prayers and cares for us.
So why are we to stay away from idols? Because we get ensnared, drawn into the trap of thinking these things will deliver something that we are seeking. Security, status, any number of things. But they can’t deliver. They aren’t gods at all, they’re not real like the One True God is, and we need to continually check our hearts to see if we are making some desire, something we want to see fulfilled, into a form of idol. This is a personal heart check, not a fix your spouse or your sibling or your child, but personal.
Idols keep us from living like the One who answers our prayers and cares for us is the One who answers our prayers and cares for us. They rob His glory, and they rob from us as His children. We get stressed out, we worry and fret, we moan and groan and complain. All while God is the One taking care of us, never forgetting us since He has engraved us on the very palms of His hands. He is the only One capable of answering our prayers. We pray to Him and in the next breath we try to find another option, a solution for the things we just prayed about. Idol worship does this to us, dimming our eyes of faith and darkening our hearts of trust. It’s a way of dethroning God in our lives. Stay away from idols, regularly ask the Holy Spirit to show you idols that are in your heart, repent, turn away from those things, and keep on renewing your daily and constant trust in the Lord.
Remember, He cares for you you and He answers your prayers.
He says that He is like a tree that is always green. Never barren or brown. Always green, and all our fruit comes from Him. Something good in your life? Something fruitful? Then it comes from Him. Period. He doesn’t give any other options here, because there are no other options. Is it good and fruitful and full of life and joy? Then it comes from God.
Let those who are wise understand these things.
Let those with discernment listen carefully.
Let’s pray for discernment to be able to listen carefully when God speaks, and let’s ask Him to give us wisdom and understanding. We need to be wise, discerning, and understanding in this season of our world. Let’s ask God to give us what we need!
The paths of the LORD are true and right, and righteous people live by walking in them. But in those paths sinners stumble and fall.
Ah, well here we have the hard truth.
We can evaluate our own lives based on this text, and we can notice other people’s lives and apply wisdom and discernment.
Think of it this way - if Biblical truth and wisdom cause people to balk, to get stiff necked and angry, argumentative, overly frustrated, rebellious…if God’s word is causing that reaction, they are likely stumbling and falling in the paths of the Lord. Not throwing stones by saying that - just stating what God’s Word says.
You can and should pray for people who react that way. But you don’t want to do daily life hand in hand with them. Remember what Psalm 1 says about walking with the wrong people…first we are walking with them, then we stop walking and are standing with them, like conversing with them in a more focused manner, listening to them intently…and then, next thing you know, we’re sitting with them, doing life with them, in agreement with them. Can two walk together unless they agree? No, they cannot. Same for sitting and standing. We don’t want to walk, stand, sit with those who become angry, agitated, argumentative, irritated by God’s wisdom in His Word. Because, as God says in Hosea, they will stumble and fall. And we are meant to live, not fall, not stumble, but live in the paths of the Lord, which are true and right, live by walking in them. You can’t walk on bad paths and on God’s paths at the same time. And those who stumble and fall on God’s paths are not ones you can do life with, they can’t keep walking with you because they will absolutely stumble and fall. So if you are walking with those who you know don’t really adhere to or accept God’s word, think about that and pray about it. You may need to check yourself and make sure you are on the Lord’s paths, the ones that are true and right, and live there.
If that seems like a harsh message, it actually isn’t. I promise. It’s just an honest one based on Hosea in the Old Testament. We want to have the hope come to fruition for us, what’s promised here in the 14th chapter. And we will, so long as we heed God’s words to us and don’t stick our heads in the sand and live in denial.
God has good for you, my friend. Answered prayers and blessings untold and uncountable. Good things, and good fruit. Grab hold of all of it with great gusto, in total faith, being unwilling to walk anywhere other than in his paths of peace and righteousness!
Wednesday Jul 24, 2024
Wednesday Jul 24, 2024
Praying Psalm 91 course
Philippians 1:6
Amplified Bible
6 I am convinced and confident of this very thing, that He who has begun a good work in you will [continue to] perfect and complete it until the day of Christ Jesus [the time of His return].
Philippians 3:20
Amplified Bible
20 But [we are different, because] our citizenship is in heaven. And from there we eagerly await [the coming of] the Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ;
2 Peter 3
Amplified Bible
The Coming Day of the Lord
3 First of all, know [without any doubt] that mockers will come in the last days with their mocking, following after their own human desires 4 and saying, “Where is the promise of His coming [what has become of it]? For ever since the fathers fell asleep [in death], all things have continued [exactly] as they did from the beginning of creation.” 5 For they willingly forget [the fact] that the heavens existed long ago by the word of God, and the earth was formed [a]out of water and by water, 6 through which the world at that time was destroyed by being flooded with water. 7 But by His word the present heavens and earth are being reserved for fire, being kept for the day of judgment and destruction of the ungodly people.
8 Nevertheless, do not let this one fact escape your notice, beloved, that with the Lord one day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years is like one day. 9 The Lord does not delay [as though He were unable to act] and is not slow about His promise, as some count slowness, but is [extraordinarily] patient toward you, not wishing for any to perish but for all to come to repentance.
A New Heaven and Earth
10 But the day of the Lord will come like a thief, and then the heavens will vanish with a [mighty and thunderous] roar, and the [material] elements will be destroyed with intense heat, and the earth and the works that are on it will be [b]burned up.
11 Since all these things are to be destroyed in this way, what kind of people ought you to be [in the meantime] in holy behavior [that is, in a pattern of daily life that sets you apart as a believer] and in godliness [displaying profound reverence toward our awesome God], 12 [while you earnestly] look for and await the coming of the day of God. For on this day the heavens will be destroyed by burning, and the [material] elements will melt with intense heat! 13 But in accordance with His promise we expectantly await new heavens and a new earth, in which righteousness dwells.
14 So, beloved, since you are looking forward to these things, be diligent and make every effort to be found by Him [at His return] spotless and blameless, in peace [that is, inwardly calm with a sense of spiritual well-being and confidence, having lived a life of obedience to Him]. 15 And consider the patience of our Lord [His delay in judging and avenging wrongs] as salvation [that is, allowing time for more to be saved]; just as our beloved brother Paul also wrote to you according to the wisdom given to him [by God], 16 speaking about these things as he does in all of his letters. In which there are some things that are difficult to understand, which the untaught and unstable [who have fallen into error] twist and misinterpret, just as they do the rest of the Scriptures, to their own destruction. 17 Therefore, [let me warn you] beloved, knowing these things beforehand, be on your guard so that you are not carried away by the error of [c]unprincipled men [who distort doctrine] and fall from your own steadfastness [of mind, knowledge, truth, and faith], 18 but grow [spiritually mature] in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. To Him be glory (honor, majesty, splendor), both now and to the day of eternity. Amen.
Hebrews 4:16
Amplified Bible
16 Therefore let us [with privilege] approach the throne of grace [that is, the throne of God’s gracious favor] with confidence and without fear, so that we may receive mercy [for our failures] and find [His amazing] grace to help in time of need [an appropriate blessing, coming just at the right moment].
Saturday Jul 13, 2024
Saturday Jul 13, 2024
Well hey there! Hello to you today and welcome to this episode of The Burt (Not Ernie) Show. God’s promises are to be believed. We can rely on them, leaning the full weight of our concerns upon them, because they come from our God who is unchanging in His keeping of His word. Today I have some verses to share that will encourage you to fully believe all of God’s promises.
Kerry Beck's Homeschool Summit - Free Ticket Available Here
Psalm 91 Course from Jan L. Burt available here
You’re listening to The Burt (Not Ernie) Show, part of the Spark Network, playing in the Edifi app. This episode is sponsored by Kerry Beck and her summit for homeschool families - Homeschool Superheros. For information about the summit or for a free ticket, click the link in the show notes. This is episode number 186.
Let’s look at a handful of verses today that are going to perhaps challenge us in our belief, or lack of belief, as it comes to God’s promises, and they will also spur us on to even great belief. You know, we don’t trust in just any old book, or in mere words, but in God’s very word, penned by men at the leading of the Holy Spirit. This is good news for us, because we don’t rely on something vague, artificial, or temporary (in fact Jesus said that the earth and all that is in it will pass away, but His words will never pass away). We are in a good place, in our sweet spot, when we fully believe God’s promises and apply them to our lives.
One way to apply God’s promises to our life is to take a particular promise and pray that promise about an exact situation or problem or relationship or issue we are facing. When we do that, we are literally applying the promises of God to our life and we can expect to see God’s movement in those parts of our lives.
1 Samuel 22 verses 2 and 3 say this
The Lord is my rock and my fortress and my deliverer, my God, my rock, in whom I take refuge, my shield, and the horn of my salvation, my stronghold and my refuge, my savior; You save me from violence.
What has God promised to be for you in these verses? Let me recap: your rock, your fortress, your deliverer, your God, the one in whom you need to take refuge, your shield, the horn of your salvation, your stronghold and your refuge, your savior. He promises to save you from violence. The definition of violence is this: physical force to injure or abuse, damage or destroy - intense, turbulent, or furious and often destructive action or force - vehement feeling or expression-a clashing or jarring quality
This is what God is promising to save you from. Violence isn’t just a punch to the face or a pile drive to the face. Violence can be, and often is, much more than a physical blow. Believe that He is going to keep this promise to you. Won’t He do it?
Psalm 28:8 a - The LORD is the strength of His people
Psalm 46:1 - God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble.
Psalm 34:8 - Oh, taste and see that the LORD is good! Blessed is the man who takes refuge in Him!
Psalm 91:1-2 - He who dwells in the shelter of the Most High will abide in the shadow of the Almighty. I will say to the LORD, “My refuge and my fortress, my God, in whom I trust.”
Let me read to you words in red, words Jesus spoke, and let me remind you somewhat sternly that these words are meant for you to know only hear, but to believe, and to make your very own. Take them personally. These words, they are personal if you will believe that they are for you, personally.
John 8, verses 31 and 32 and then skipping down to verse 38 say:
If you abide in My word, you are truly My disciples, and you will know the truth and the truth will set you free…So if the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed.
Are you truly free today? Free because the Son has set you free?
If not, do you want this freedom? And for God’s promises, all of them, every single one, to be true for you? It’s actually quite simple and quite hard, all wrapped up together, this gift of salvation Jesus offers. It demands allegiance to Him alone as your one true King, and it comes with a repentant heart, actually repenting to the Lord for your sins, and receiving the total forgiveness Jesus won for us on the cross. And then the followers of Jesus must actually follow Him on the narrow road that constitutes our life from this point forward. Simple and hard all at the same time, but the right decision for you and for me, to be sure.
Be sure to share this episode if it has been helpful to you, and thanks so much for listening to the podcast. God bless you, see you next time. Bye bye.
Wednesday Jul 03, 2024
Wednesday Jul 03, 2024
Well, hey there, hello to ya and welcome to episode number 185 of The Burt (Not Ernie) Show, getting the promises of God into the people of God so that we can live in a state of belief, knowing and trusting that all God’s promises prove true.
Today we are taking a look at Psalm 145, from the New Living Translation.
Let’s start by reading verses 3 and 4, since they give us a solid foundation to start with.
Great is the LORD! He is most worthy of praise! No one can measure His greatness.
Let each generation tell its children of Your mighty acts; let them proclaim Your power.
Our God is great, He truly is. And He acts in greatness, doing great things and moving in great ways. He is most worthy of praise - literally, the most worthy of our praise and our time and our focus and our hearts. No one can measure His greatness. That is indeed a true statement. God’s greatness cannot be measured.
Are we telling the next generation about God’s mighty acts? I mean, you could say this podcast has that express purpose, since I’m Generation X and many podcast listeners are from younger generations. When we pass along what we know about our God, talk about His mighty acts, what He has done in our lives, what we know about Him, and what the Bible says, then we make way for the next generation to proclaim His power.
Let’s jump down to verses 8-9.
The LORD is merciful and compassionate, slow to get angry and filled with unfailing love. The LORD is good to everyone. He showers compassion on all His creation.
Here we find some promises, and these promises bring me hope and peace right now, in the place I’m living out my life. Let me speak these promises over you and your life today. The Lord is merciful and compassionate to you, He is slow to get angry with you, and He is filled with unfailing love for you. The Lord is good to everyone - and that includes you! He showers compassion on you.
Your promises today are right here: God is merciful and compassionate to you, He is slow to get angry with you, He is filled with unfailing love for you, He is good to you, He showers, not sprinkles, but showers compassion on you.
Verse 13 says this: For Your kingdom is an everlasting kingdom. You rule throughout all generations. The LORD always keeps His promises; He is gracious in all He does.
His kingdom is everlasting - so no matter what you feel like you are up against in this life, doesn’t it put things into perspective to remember that God’s kingdom is everlasting and all the drama, stress, darkness, evil, nonsense, junk in this life is very, very temporary. And knowing that our God rules always, throughout every and all generations, that is big comfort for us. He has not and will never abdicate His throne or His rule. Yes, there is one who rules this world, the prince of the power of the air, satan, that old devil, but his rule is truly miniscule as compared to the eternal rule of our God. For those who don’t know Jesus as their Lord, who are not living as disciples of Jesus, both knowing what He said and obeying what He said - John 14:15 and 1 John 2:3 are the Bible verses I’m referencing when I say that - this is not their promise. They are at the mercy of the evil one, and this life is the best it will ever be for them, because eternity without Jesus is actually hell, contrary to what a lot of people seem to choose to believe to their own detriment. He rules in this generation right now, and if He is your God, you love Him, you know Him, you serve Him, you obey Him, Jesus is the Way, the Truth and the Life for you, well, then these promises are your promises and you ought to believe them.
It says God always keeps His promises.
Is there any room in that sentence for you to say, “Well, He doesn’t always keep His promises…” without being basically on the verge of blasphemy? I’m pretty serious about this. What is it, when we say or think or believe things like that, in direct contradiction and opposition to the very word of God, the Bible, what is it if it isn’t calling God a liar, basically? Now I know you don’t think that’s what you’re doing, but nevertheless, that is what you’re saying. And He is not a liar, the devil is the liar and as Jesus said, the truth is not in him. Let’s not attribute to God what belongs only to Satan. I am pretty serious when I say that any implication that God is not who He says He is and has repeatedly down through the ages proven He is, any implication is bordering on blasphemy. Could it be that satan the liar tries to convince us to think that God is lying to us, holding on us? He isn’t. Even when we cannot begin to understand what is going on, God is still never lying to us and satan is still always, only lying to us. Jesus said lying is satan's native tongue (see John 8:44). He’s not going to tell you the truth, my friend. Not ever. He speaks his native language, so says Jesus, and what Jesus said, those words in red on the pages of the New Testament, that’s what I choose to believe. The Lord always keeps His promises, Psalm 145:13 tells us, and He is gracious in all He does. And that is simply the unadulterated truth. We need to hang on to this truth, the promise that God always keeps His promises. In good times, in bad times, we need to hang on to this!
Let’s end this episode with verse 18, because I think it will be encouraging for you today.
The Lord is close to all who call on Him, yes, to all who call on Him in truth.
Want to be closer to the Lord? Call on Him. Spend time in prayer.
And really, at this stage of the game, at this moment in time, can you think of a better use of your time than to spend it praying? Isn’t it just like our God to tell us that the way to be closer to Him is to call out to Him? He is telling us that He wants to be close to us.
I’m going to leave you with that today, and hey, maybe read Psalm 145 sometime soon, because it will certainly encourage you.
Also, I wanted to let you know a couple of things. Soon there will be some extra or bonus episodes of The Burt (Not Ernie) Show, because it’s a lot to host two podcasts and I have some writing I need to be working on, namely finishing the Bible study I’m working on titled Biblical Motherhood - Encouragement from God’s Word. So I am going to drop episodes of The Prayer Podcast as bonus content for this show and will likely phase out The Prayer Podcast sometime soon-ish. And I’m so blessed to be the prayer coordinator for an upcoming online event, a homeschool conference, so I’m going to put the link to that, which has a free ticket option as well as paid tickets that come with a bit more than the free ticket of course, but I’ll put that link in the show notes and even if you don’t homeschool, if you know any homeschoolers, would you pass the info that link on to them? It’s a great event and the fact that the host has a prayer room for the attendees and makes prayer for those who join her conference a priority, that’s not the norm at summits and conferences, and I have spoken at a number of them, so I speak from experience. Share that info with those who might be blessed and encouraged by it, and I’m so honored to be part of this event as a speaker but mainly as the prayer coordinator. And I have a new product launching for homeschoolers super soon…it’s all ready to go, but there is some kind of nutty glitch with my email that is associated with my website and it isn’t sending out emails properly so when someone purchases Homeschool Planning Made Simple, they may not get an email about their purchase. If you have purchased it and did not get a follow up email, would you let me know? Reach me anytime at JanLBurt@outlook.com and I will get back to you as quickly as possible. Thanks for listening today, and remember, the Lord always keeps his promises to you, my friend. See you next time. Bye bye.
Thursday Jun 20, 2024
Thursday Jun 20, 2024
Hey there! Welcome to episode number 187 of The Burt (Not Ernie) Show. Today we are discussing some promises from the book of Daniel. Now, Daniel is a complex book, in my opinion. True story of exile and the greatest king to ever rule, visions of the future and of the end times, dramatic answers to prayers, miracles, just wow from start to finish, that’s the book of Daniel in a nutshell. A documentation of God working over the entire course of a man’s life. And a bold reminder of what a life lived all-in with the Lord can look like, and the mark it can make for the good of others and the glory of God.
A 60-Day Prayer Journal for Parents
Let’s start by reading Daniel 2:21 from the Amplified.
It says: It is He who changes the times and the seasons; He removes kings and establishes kings. He gives wisdom to the wise and (greater) knowledge to those who have understanding! Verse 22: It is He who reveals the profound and hidden things; He knows what is in the darkness, and the light dwells with Him.
These two verses give sort of an overview of the entire book, and they stand as a bold reminder to us that God really is in control. Of all of it, whatever that “it” might be in your own life and the greater “it” in the world at large.
In those things in your family that are head scratchers, and in those things on the other side of the world that are gut wrenchers.
God has not abdicated His throne. Daniel is a book that proves this to be true in so many ways. Just think about the prophetic role this book of the Bible has played down through the centuries, and how it has proven true again and again. Think of Alexander the Great, think of the Roman empire…those have proved true per the book of Daniel. Think of the things Daniel was shown in a vision, that were to do with the last days, and which distressed him so much that he was physically ill after receiving this information … when is the last time you had an experience with the Lord that left you so unwell that you could not get out of bed for days, for weeks even? I’m guessing the answer is never. And I’m not sure that, per Acts chapter 2, that we might not be missing something in the modern church as a whole, and as individual disciples of Jesus.
We’re seeing things happening in the western church, meaning the American church to be exact, that should make us realize we’ve put too much on men in the pulpit…to much focus, too much value, too much loyalty, too much power, too much expectation, too much “let that go…it doesn’t mean what it seems like it means…” and too little accountability, too little first century church way of living (not way of going to church or being part of churchianity, but of living because it was their whole way of life, not just 90 minutes a week). Pastors are stepping down, resigning, and not because they repented for their sins, but because they got caught. Come at me, bro, if you want to, but I’m not incorrect on this. It is the issue of the day within the church culture in America, and so it is worth talking about and viewing through the lens of the Bible, not the lens of churches being run like a business, but through the very Word of God. What’s God’s standard for those who shepherd His flock? What’s God’s definition of repentance? It’s not “old sin” that “wasn’t a crime”, and it’s not a 12-year-old child being described as a “young lady”, or to blame the girl who was A CHILD…this nonsense is so far out in left field, and the fact that people within the church are saying these things and thinking they’re right in the Lord’s sight for their opinion? Oh my… oh my, we have all but lost any semblance of a fear of the Lord. And so, as we see these things taking place, if we believe that the book of Daniel proves that God is totally in control, then we have to believe that this is the time for uncovering what’s been hidden, for bringing things into the light, and for knowing that the words Peter penned, when he said that judgment begins with the house of the Lord, that being His church, well, it’s happening right now. We must stop calling God’s judgment on His house an attack orchestrated by Satan. That kind of thinking means you’re either far too accustomed to automatically defending people rather than letting God be God, or it means you have not opened your Bible and read it well enough to know what it says about things like this. Gotta be in the Word in these dark days, my friends. If you aren’t, you are going to be duped and tricked and deceived and manipulated and confused and on the struggle bus unable to pull the cord to get off at the right stop, just stuck on the struggle bus riding along and riding along with no God-given destination on your route.
God is in control today, and He is doing a cleaning out, cleaning up, bring into the light work in the church. And why wouldn’t He? When Jesus returns, it is to be for a pure, spotless bride. Does that describe the church in America to you? Watching the garbage we watch on our streaming accounts, making excuses for sexual immorality, neglecting to lead our children in the ways of the Lord, hardly praying ever except when we need or want something, leaving our Bibles to collect dust on the end table and somehow thinking reading the verse of the day is daily Bible study…but huh, does that sound like the kind of studying that enables you to pass the final in college and get your degree? One verse a day? If we were quizzed on the series we binged versus passages of the Bible, how would we do? Pass one, fail the other? If you and I don’t know what God says about all the things, how can we possibly make a right judgment about serious situations in the world or in the church? Do we need to get serious about the Lord? Or is this all just fire insurance? Where are we at? What are we doing? When will we stop playing pat-a-cake with the world when the Bible says not to love the world nor the things in or of the world?
We cannot experience a life even remotely like Daniel’s with our lukewarm version of Christianity. Do you practice Christianity or churchianity? Food for thought. Digest that. Work out your salvation with fear and trembling, as Paul said. Not enough time left in this life for us to mess around with the truly important things.
So if I haven’t lost you yet, haven’t offended you or ticked you off or something of that nature, by daring to be as bold as I’ve been on this episode, let’s look at some other portions of the book of Daniel.
Remember the story of Daniel's three friends and the fiery furnace? They refused to bow down and worship the golden statue of Nebuchadnezzar and they were thrown into a lit furnace that had been heated seven times hotter than usual. And they walked out of that furnace without a single burnt hair - they did not even smell like smoke. Daniel chapter 3 tells this true story, and you likely already know this true story but I’d encourage you to read it again. It’s miraculous! But the miracle didn’t come from lukewarm faith, from trying to find a way to keep the peace with this particular regime and ruler, or from compromise. They expected to be thrown into the fire and burned alive. They also expected God to preserve them. Which He did, but they were willing to go all the way to death rather than even hint at dishonoring the Lord.
Do we live like that? Even remotely? Is our fear of God such that we can say, “Toss me in, burn me alive, do whatever you gonna do but I’m not bowing down to whatever it is society or government or whatever says I have to bow down to cuz if I don’t I am gonna pay. Well, lemme pay, then! Hand me my bill, let’s get this thing paid already, and then I’ll need receipts cuz I am determined to stand before the Lord fearing only Him, and Him alone. So, that’s that.” Once the fear of anyone or anything other than God is settled in us, those hard decisions are no longer hard because the decisions have already been made when we chose to fear God and nobody and nothing else.
Are you afraid of health problems? Don’t be! It’s not so bad, even the worst of it, in comparison to eternity in a perfect body with perfect health! And if health stuff has made you step further away from Jesus, can I encourage you to get honest about why that is the case? Jesus never promised us an easy life, but in some ways, the modern western church did, and that simply is not biblical. If people let you down, and boy oh boy can they ever let you down, did that move you closer to the Lord who loves you so much that He laid down His very life for you, or move you away from Him? Can you be brutally honest about why these kinds of hardships have moved us away from Him? And can we ponder Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego being tied and bound and chucked straight into the flames rather than bow down to a gold statue and dishonor the Lord, can we ponder why we don’t have that kind of loyalty to the Lord? Hard questions because they force us to be honest and not sugar coat things. Important questions that we need to ask ourselves. This isn’t for you to go ask your spouse. This is about you and your fear of God, or lack thereof.
We can read about Daniel in the lion’s den and we can read about Daniel and the writing on the wall (the saying oft used, “the writing’s on the wall” comes from Daniel chapter 5, and once God says this is it, times up, it’s done, the goose is cooked, well, that’s how it’s going to be. Daniel 5-22 - And you, his son, O Belshazzar, have not humbled your heart even though you knew all this.” What truth from the Word of God do you and I know but have still refused to humble our heart? Do we really understand that we do not get a pass for refusing the humble ourselves and obey what God has said? I don’t know that we do. But Daniel, he did. And he lived a life filled with miracles, depending on God alone, through kings and kingdoms, from young man to old man, and that is truly a life well-lived.
When we read Daniel 7 through 12, we find things that are incredible regarding the last days, and to think that one man, Daniel, was given such great revelations, is incredible. Do we take all of his life and all of the book of Daniel seriously, or just the parts that deal with end times and prophecies? I think we need to take all of it as crucial in this day and age, because when we read about a man like Daniel, his life and all he faced and the way he honored and trusted God fully, it gives us great hope and courage to advance day by day, walking with Jesus, depending on His Spirit, honoring the Father, knowing that one day soon our faith will be made sight. You and I are not living at this moment in time by accident or happenstance, any more than Daniel was in his day. God chooses the places we live and the times we live in. Do you know that’s true for you? Because it is. As it says in the book of Esther, perhaps you were born for such a time as this. No accidents, not for you, not for any of us, in terms of living in this current age. What will you do with what you’ve been given? Will you hide, tuck tail and run, ignore the writing on the wall, or will you square up, go all in with Jesus, and allow nothing but the fear of the Lord to strike fear in you? In chapter 9 we read Daniel’s prayer for his people. It’s powerful. The way he prays, the way he is so in line with the holiness of God and the unholiness of mankind, of his people, well, we don’t have enough of that today. And it shows. Verse 3 says: So I directed my attention to the Lord God to seek Him by prayer and supplications, with fasting, sackcloth and ashes. I can’t speak for you, but I don’t pray like this and in light of the state of the world and the state of this land I live in, the moral rot that has even gone so far as to trickle in, seep in, and permeate Jesus’ church, well, I need to get to praying the way that Daniel did. I’m going to close out this episode by reading a few more verses from Daniel’s prayer in chapter 9, as a reminder that God hears and answers prayer, and not just asking for what we want or need (although that is part of a healthy prayer life - if you never talk to God about things that are personal and near to your heart, that’s not healthy at all and is not part of the close personal relationship God desires to have with you). God does hear when we pray, and He does provide answers, and as we read in Daniel chapter 9, repentance is not a bad thing. The promise for us here is that we can be bold and fear God and not man or circumstances, and live a life full of God keeping all sorts of promises to us. And I don’t mean this is a works based salvation, that’s simply not what we find in the New Testament. But fear of man is a snare, and even in the early church, God did things that were miraculous when fear of God trumped all other fears. It’s all throughout the book of Acts, as just one place with many examples of this. Pray boldly today, expecting God to hear and answer, to do things in response to your praying, and make fear of the Lord and not of man a priority for your own personal life. We may not have lives like Daniel’s life, but we can expect to live lives that stand out, to look like a people who trust our God and see miracles happen in our day. Let’s be about going all in with the Lord, similar to the way Daniel was all-in.
Daniel 9:5-6: we have sinned and committed wrong, and have behaved wickedly and have rebelled, turning away from Your commandments and ordinances. Further, we have not listened to and heeded Your servants the prophets, who spoke in Your name to our kings, our princes and our fathers, and to all the people of the land. Verse 9: To the Lord our God belong mercy and loving kindness and forgiveness, for we have rebelled against Him. Verse 13: Yet we have not wholeheartedly begged for forgiveness and sought the favor of the LORD our God by turning from our wickedness and praying attention to and placing value in Your truth. Verse 14b: for the LORD our God is uncompromisingly righteous and openly just in all His works which He does - He keeps His word; and we have not obeyed His voice. Verse 17-19: Now therefore, our God, listen to (heed) the prayer of Your servant (Daniel) and his supplications, and for Your own sake let Your face shine on Your desolate sanctuary. O my God, incline Your ear and hear, open Your eyes and look at our desolations and the city which is called by Your name; for we are not presenting our supplications before YOu because of our own merits and righteousness, but because of YOur great mercy and compassion. O Lord, hear! O Lord, forgive! O Lord, listen and take action! Do not delay, for Your own sake, O my God, because Your city and Your people are called by Your name.
And how did God respond to this prayer?
Verses 22-26 tell us what the angel Gabriel said to Daniel when he appeared to him.
He instructed me and he talked with me and said, “O Daniel, I have now come to give you insight and wisdom and understanding. At the beginning of your supplications, the command (to give you an answer) was issued, and I have come to tell you, for you are highly regarded and greatly beloved. Therefore consider the message and begin to understand the (meaning of the) vision.”
How’s that for an answer to prayer? It’s something truly spectacular.
Hold on to the hope of an eternity with Jesus that is perfect through and through. Spend time with Him in prayer, sharing your heart and listening for His reply and receiving His love and comfort and His direction and wisdom. And stay in your Bibles, keep them open, read them and study them and believe what God has to say over and above what anyone else has to say. These can feel like perilous days, as we see things happening in the pulpits that shock us. But God has to clean His house first before He can do any other cleaning up of our society, and have we not prayed that He would do a work in our lost world? Be willing to be part of the pure and spotless bride Jesus is soon returning for, and don’t give in to fear of man…not any man, but fear the Lord and serve Him only.
I’ll see ya back here next time. (and if you’d like more Bible teaching like this, please check out the Psalm 91 audio course via the link in the show notes - for more on prayer, there is a link to A 60-Day Prayer Journal for Parents via Amazon). Feel free to share this episode with a friend! Thanks so much for listening! Bye bye.
Thursday Jun 13, 2024
Thursday Jun 13, 2024
Well hello and welcome to the podcast, thanks for listening. This week, just as warmer temps get closer to the 100 degree mark here in Kansas, we’re looking at a portion of the Bible that can bring some intensity and a tremendous reminder that every single thing God has promised always, absolutely, comes to pass.
You’re listening to The Burt (Not Ernie) Show Podcast, part of the Spark Network, and you can listen via the Edifi app for this podcast and many others with Biblical content. Today’s episode is sponsored by Growth Roots, the makers of my favorite linen covered journals themed with the Christian in mind. Learn more at GrowthRootsCo.com or follow them on Instagram @growthrootsco. This is episode number 183.
We’re moving along in our look at promises in every one of the 66 books of the Bible, and we are in the Old Testament book of Ezekial for this episode. It’s a hefty book, and so there were several promises and passages for me to choose from when I was preparing for this episode. I landed on chapter 36 because it is so fitting for the current moment in which we are living.
I’m going to be reading from the NLT today, chapter 36, starting in verse 8:
8 “But the mountains of Israel will produce heavy crops of fruit for my people—for they will be coming home again soon! 9 See, I care about you, and I will pay attention to you. Your ground will be plowed and your crops planted. 10 I will greatly increase the population of Israel, and the ruined cities will be rebuilt and filled with people. 11 I will increase not only the people, but also your animals. O mountains of Israel, I will bring people to live on you once again. I will make you even more prosperous than you were before. Then you will know that I am the Lord..
So Israel was a nation, think back to the promises God made to Abraham and his descendants, then Moses leading the people out of Egypt in the Exodus and then Joshua taking the lead as the people of Israel moved forward literally into that land that was promised to them. Move forward through the Bible and you see times of exile, destruction of Jerusalem, and eventually Israel was no longer the nation that it once was. For a long time, and the history is extensive of all that happened over the centuries, but Israel was not a nation for quite some time. And then in May of 1948, 76 years ago, they became a nation again. It’s an amazing thing to study how exactly that came about, but it really did happen just as God said it would when He asked the question, “Can a nation be born in a day?” You can find that verse in Isaiah 66.
Literally, the nation of Israel was born in a day. And so, very uniquely, when they celebrated their 76th birthday last month, they were actually celebrating it for the second time, because they’d been a nation before. God keeps all of His promises, and for this era we are currently in, I mean world wide, it behooves us to remember that God has made specific promises to Israel, to the people He chose to be His own possession, and when we read the news through the lens of God’s Word, we get the proper perspective.
And we truly do need the right perspective, or how can we endure all the things that we don’t fully understand? If we’re honest, there’s a lot that feels confusing and overwhelming. Standing on the solid rock of Jesus and the Word of God give us sure footing, hinds feet for high places, that we need. The Bible speaks into our circumstances today, right now, and that is comforting and it also reminds us, we need to be students of the Bible.
Verse 8 says the mountains of Israel will produce heavy crops, verse 10 says God will greatly increase the population of Israel and the ruined cities will be rebuilt and filled with people. Verse 11 says animals will increase, too, and that the nation will be more prosperous than it was before.
Israel has a population of around 9.8 million people. 36 Israelis are on the Forbes list of billionaires, with a b, for 2024. As far as millionaires go, Israel has about 131000 of them. Wheat, sorghum, corn, avocados, citrus, kiwi, guava, mangos, grapes, tomatoes, cucumbers, peppers, zucchine, melons, bananas, dates, apples, pears, cherries, wine, cotton, cows, milk, silver carp, grass carp, gray mullet, St Peter’s fish, rock bass, silver perch, Asian seabass, sea bream, trout, salmon, pomelo (a fruit they created), olives, figs, plums, strawberries, prickly pear, persimmon, pomegranates, almonds, around 90 million in annual flower exports, especially waxflower and roses, but also lilies and tulips, and I could go on.
Lest you think that this is not a big deal, that it’s just their GDP and hard work and not God keeping this specific promise that He made here in Ezekial, well, in the 1920s and 1930s, the land that is now Israel was a wasteland, basically a desert where not even cacti would grow, and it was malarial…which is interesting, isn’t it? A desert that gives you malaria? It was so bad, seemingly useless and place to go to lose your health, that only God could revive it and make it what it is now. He made promises, and He kept them with exacting precision.
So, let’s bring this home to roost for you, in your life. The same God that keeps all His promises to Israel is the God who is right now in the business of keeping every one of His promises to you.
Not to beat a dead horse here, but I have this podcast for the express purpose of reminding Christians that all of God’s promises are true, and He won’t forget about those promises, nor fail to bring them to pass. Now if you don’t believe them, you end up in the camp of the people Jesus encountered who did not believe He could do much, they had no faith, and among them He could do only a few miracles. So we can land there, we can end up not receiving what God wants us to have, solely because of our unbelief, our lack of faith. But God isn’t shoddy in His workmanship. He doesn’t make a promise with the intention of breaking it. He makes it so He can keep it, and He delights in our faith, our trust, our total belief and expectation that His promises to us will absolutely come to pass.
How’s your faith today? What would you say is a fair and accurate description of what you are believing God to do for you, for your loved ones? And does that line up with hard times and the lowering of expectations and the dimming of hope that we often give way to when life is rough…or does it line up with the truth of God’s Word? Only one of those is worthy of guiding or directing our faith. Which one is ruling the day in your life, right now?
God’s Word is going to prove true, 100 percent. Why not make the choice, by faith and in faith, to believe God for all His promises and be on the right side of history? One day all of this will be history, and we can choose today which side of history we’ll end up on. May as well be the right side, the winning team, am I right? Like, God’s going to win the whole ball game, so let’s get on His side and let’s live expecting to see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living even now. Grow your faith, maybe focus on that more than growing your bank account or your resume or closing the rings on your watch each day or whatever your big focus is.
My prayer for you today is that you will have such solid faith in the God who makes amazing promises that you’ll live each day, starting with this day right now, as if He has already kept them, just like Israel is living in those promises from Ezekiel 36. He’ll never fail in the keeping of His promises, not even a single one. Let’s never fail in believing Him and living in a state of chronic belief and expectation, knowing that our hope in Him will never disappoint us.
I’ll see you back here next time. Bye bye.
Thursday May 30, 2024
Thursday May 30, 2024
Have a prayer request? You can share it here & I will be praying!
Well hey there, hello to you today. Welcome to this episode of The Burt (Not Ernie) Show, getting the promises of God into the people of God. When we know what God has promised us and we live like all those promises are true, our lives change. Now I mean that literally! God’s Word is life-changing. And that’s awfully good news for us!
You’re listening to The Burt (Not Ernie) Show podcast, part of the Spark Network, playing via the Edifi app, which you can find in your app store. Today’s episode is brought to you by my very own Psalm 91 - Pray It and Believe Course, all twelve sessions with lifetime access and the bonus content for $35. The link is right here in the show notes! I’d love to have you join me in the course - because the promises of Psalm 91 are for you (which is why I created the course in the first place). And this is episode number 182.
Last time we looked at the book of Jeremiah, and today we will look at the book of Lamentations, which was also written by Jeremiah. And yes, it’s a book of lament, which means it isn’t all happy, happy, happy, but is a serious book of the Bible. Written by a man who lived a serious life. Jeremiah was not living on easy street! He had a unique calling and it wasn’t happy-go-lucky. And you know what? We find a lot of comfort in Jeremiah’s words, in how his life played out, when our own lives take a turn that is uncomfortable, when something truly terrible hits us right between the eyes. We live on every word that comes from God, to be sure - that’s Biblical and that’s what Jesus said to Satan when he was tempting the Lord in the desert. And every word of His, what we read in our Bibles, is most comforting to us when we are at our lowest. I’m guessing that you’ve found that to be true. It’s most comforting when we most need to be comforted. And that is why the book of Lamentations, being an actual lament, holds out so much hope to us. It’s here when we truly need it, and we truly need it when the going gets tough, not when everything is coming up roses.
So let’s take a look at a promise from Lamentations and let’s either apply it right now to the hard thing we’re facing in life, or store it up, hide it in our heart, so we can easily grab hold of this promise when we need it (so if you’re not dealing with something difficult right this very moment, you can keep this in mind for when you're facing something tough…and it may be something good to have on hand to share and encourage and bring comfort to someone you know in real life, or via social media, who is dealing with something difficult right now).
From the Amplified Bible, I’ll read Lamentations chapter 3, verses 57 and 58, and then I will move backward a bit in this chapter and read verses 24 and 25. But first, let me read verse 37, because it kind of jumped off the page at me - it just stood out to me as I was reading over this chapter and I want to share it so that it can be an encouragement for somebody today. It says this: “Who is there who speaks and it comes to pass, unless the Lord has authorized and commanded it?” (Now this may not seem like a verse that is relevant to this episode, but hang with me for a moment. This verse, Lamentations 3:37, is such a wonderful reminder that God is always completely in control. Please don’t forget that, my friend!)
Lam. 3:57-58: You drew near on the day I called to You, You said, “Do not fear.” O Lord, You have pleaded my soul’s cause (You have guided my way and protected me).
Lam. 3:24-25: “The LORD is my portion and my inheritance,” says my soul; “Therefore I have hope in Him and wait expectantly for Him.” The LORD is good to those who wait (confidently) for Him, to those who seek Him (on the authority of God’s word).
These four verses contain promises God gives His people from the book of Lamentations.
When you are in that terrible place in life, even if things are going well with your health, your finances, your job, your marriage, your friendships, and so on…but you are still struggling and feel a heaviness internally. Maybe one area is amiss, and it feels like you are drawing because of it. Even if it is just one part of life that’s not so good, even if (and that’s a big if, because most people I know are dealing with more than just one tough thing right now), but even if it’s just one area, one thing, just one…I have to ask this question: what are you doing about it? Are you worrying? Are you trying to find a way to handle it, to buck up, to get thicker skin? To deal with things in a healthier manner? To sugar coat it? Are you fretting, giving in to fear, losing sleep, going gray, mind wandering as you kick this thing around, trying to find a solution? Asking others to pray for you? Doing all the things…but what are you DOING about it? Remember the first verse I read, the reminder that God really is in total control? These verses go together, in a way. Verse 57 says that when Jeremiah called to God, the Lord responded with these words: “Do not fear.” It says God drew near on the day Jeremiah called to Him. So, whatcha doin? Are you calling to Him? What’s the one thing we really need, and likely want, to hear from God when something has gone so far south that we couldn’t locate North on a map with a compass glued to our nose. Call to Him. I do believe He wants to draw near and speak, “Do not fear.” to your heart. Verse 58, where it says God pleaded Jeremiah’s soul’s case…you know, Jesus secured our freedom and forgiveness and our eternity at Calvary, and He did indeed plead my soul’s case, and yours, too. He has guided our way and protected us, and we have no evidence to think He will stop doing so for us, for all our days. He is good, is He not?
Does your soul say that the Lord is your portion and your inheritance? Say it to yourself - preach this to yourself if you need to be reminded! What’s your portion? Not your bank account, your retirement plan, not your mid life crisis car, not your dress size, not even what your labs and bloodwork show, not your address, not your salary, your title, your name, your alma mater, your GPA, your vaca destination, carats on your ring finger, how many people know your name, if you are saluted or do the saluting, how many letters come after your last name, your merits, your accomplishments, the stories you tell to impress others…need I go on? I could, you and I both know this is real life, what we do and how we measure one another and how we give ourselves a pass or fail when we evaluate our own lives… But that’s not your portion! Let alone your inheritance! The Lord is both! The Lord is your portion, and if you have Him, you have the best thing, as Jesus said to Martha when Mary was sitting at His feet being taught by Him, the best thing and it will not be taken from you. Your inheritance is not safe on this earth, in this life. With Him, your inheritance is safe. He is the only safe place there is! And yes, I do know what C.S. Lewis wrote in The Chronicles of Narnia, and I do know it is quoted by pastors and Christians on the regular…and I also know it’s not true, that line about Aslan being good, but not being safe. Ha! What??? Man, if that’s what floats your boat and forms your theology, get and auger and drill a bunch of holes in your boat and sink it and get your theology in line with the Bible, because my life was very unsafe before Jesus pulled me out of the pit, and the only safe place I have ever found in this world is with Him. Ain’t nobody, C.S. Lewis included, gonna tell me convincingly that my God isn’t safe. He is my refuge - He is my fortress - He is my deliverer - He is my salvation - He is my peace - He is my hope - He is the Way, the Truth and the Life for me. And He is indeed safe.
When the Lord is our portion and our inheritance, we truly can say along with Jeremiah that we have hope in Him and wait expectantly for Him. Hope in Jesus is never misplaced! And He is always worth the wait!
The last portion of verse 25 says The LORD is good to those who wait (confidently) for Him, to those who seek Him (on the authority of God’s word). Man, that’s rich, isn’t it? I mean that seriously. This is gold, this is rich!
Can you wait not anxiously, gnawing on your thumbnail and holding your breath…but confidently? Knowing your God is going to show up. He’s got this, He’s got you. Nothing, not one hair on your head, is misplaced or overlooked. He is always in absolute control of the situation. What situation? Your situation!
Wait confidently for Him. Be one of those who seeks Him, and seek Him on the authority of His word. What does the Bible promise? Believe God for that exact thing. What does God’s Word tell you about who God is, His character, His ways, His faithfulness, His mighty deeds, His unending love and astounding mercies? Seek Him based on those truths. And you, my friend, will not be left abandoned but will be, like Jeremiah, guided and protected.
That’s it for this episode, and I’ll put the link to the Psalm 91 course here in the show notes and I’ll see you back here next time. Feel free to subscribe to the show and get new episodes as they release. Hang on to these promises and remember, they’re not just for everyone else…if you know Jesus, these promises are for you, right now, this very moment in time. Bye bye.