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Time and Truth

Published by S.M. Wibberley on May 29, 2019
 
Time is going by so rapidly. Thank you, Lord, that our times are in your hands and that you move us along as is best, whether we feel good about it or not. Praise you that the measure is not our feelings but your perspective, which is Truth.
 
Praise you for your power with which you arrange and lead in our days. You are my light and my salvation, the stronghold of my life. Whatever comes is a gift from you, an opportunity to live by faith, to respond with trust, to dwell in truth, to walk in the light.
 
I give you praise and honor because you are a strong, wise, gracious God, firm and loving, One who would allow a test like Job’s so that he might become a beacon of hope and wisdom to many, giving glory to you.
 
Lord, help us, help me to remember that each incident, each happening, each chance to react is an opportunity to be a grace receiver and a glory giver–offering the sacrifice of thanksgiving so that I may give you honor, and your deliverance can flow into my life. Help me to remember that each event is an opportunity to live in the unseen and eternal, rather than in just the tangible and temporary.
 
An example is the nearly disastrous happening a couple of years back when the brakes on my tractor gave way and it careened backwards over a bank, ending up at a dangerous tilt. You enabled me to just step off the tractor as it went over the bank and walk away, avoiding any harm. You kept it from turning over and pinning me under it. You displayed your power, your protection and your provision.
 
In the light of your goodness, thank you now for this new day, for what you will allow or bring, for the uncertainties before us, for Barbara’s continuing illness, for the need to make difficult choices.
 
Help me, Lord, to do what is best in each situation. Help me to speak into messy relationships with grace and gentleness, with wisdom and wit, with truth and tolerance, that you may be honored before men and angels.
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Psalm 28:7b2

Published by S.M. Wibberley on May 28, 2019
Psalm 28:7b “…my heart trusts in him, and I am helped. My heart leaps for joy”
 
[To trust you, Lord Jesus, and thereby see you in your grandness, power, glory and wisdom, to understand your carefulness and consistency, your cherishing and constant care in our lives—this leads us to respond with joy.
 
Your rich love and warm acceptance, granting us honor and security, significance and protection in your Kingdom—these are just what we desire, they are exactly what we were made for in having such a relationship with you! To know you is certainly enough for joy, period!]
 
“and I will give thanks to him in song.”
 
[Deep, full, genuine trust leads to rejoicing, to thanksgiving and praise with songs. You, Lord God, are the source of joy, of song, of music, of gladness–so you have planted in us this response of love to your poured-out grace.]
 
I praise you now, Lord Jesus, my Good Shepherd, for the day you have prepared before us, for the things you are going to do and bring, for the activities, the failures, the weakness and difficulties, the joys and pleasures that will come–each an opportunity to live for you, to give you glory, to rest in you.
 
I praise you, Lord Jesus, for the wonder of knowing you, of living with you, of being called to join you in what you are doing, of being equipped, empowered and protected by you, of being useful for you, an effective instrument in your hand.
 
May you be pleased and honored today by my trust and obedience. May your name be lifted up and exalted as your Spirit works in and through me, O Lord God, King of Glory, Ruler of all, Shepherd of the weak. Amen.
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Psalm 28:7b

Published by S.M. Wibberley on May 27, 2019
Psalm 28:7b “…my heart trusts in him, and I am helped.”
 
[Without trust, much good is forfeited as we hold back and live in anxiety, fear, worry and fretting. With trust, we can praise our mighty and sovereign God in faith before we understand what He’s doing with the difficulties in our lives, before we get an answer, before relief comes.
 
Trust comes from being in the Word, and trust is strengthened as we offer the sacrifice of thanksgiving, giving thanks for what we would normally complain about (Ps. 50:23).
 
We can rest in you, Lord God, because we know that you are the good One who is committed to our good and are certain to guide and protect us through any unwanted circumstance that comes from the world, our flesh or the devil.
 
As we trust, you give us peace, wisdom, guidance and provision. And in trusting you, we give you glory and honor before all, both the seen and unseen.
 
As we trust we open the way so that your deliverance for this moment may come through. Paul declared this in 2 Corinthians 12:9, “…I will boast all the more gladly in my weaknesses SO THAT the power of Christ may rest on me.”
 
As we trust we are changed, you are lifted up, others are blessed and unbelieving sinners see your glory.
 
As I trust in you, I can reject impatience, worry, fear, anxiety, greed and over eagerness; therefore, instead of being caught up in the tyranny of the urgent and the power of fretting, I can rest in you in peace and joy and confidence.
 
Praise you that in trust, I can take up your patience, your grace, your wisdom, your strength, your calmness, and your light so that I can live today in your power, protection and peace. Truly, knowing Jesus is enough for joy.]
 
Help me, Lord, to so trust you today that you will be honored before all around me for your marvelous character, for your mighty strength, magnificent goodness, majestic greatness and magnanimous graciousness.
Picture of trust: Nat and his little friends
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More lessons

Published by S.M. Wibberley on May 26, 2019
Lessons from the 1980s
 
The Lord has interesting ways of exposing the next area of sin He wants to deal with in my life. One day when I was coming home from teaching, I walked up the driveway to our house and noticed that there was something different about our car. I looked more closely and saw that the pinstripes I’d bought a few days before had been put on.
 
Deep inside me the heat of anger began to rise. I had been looking forward to putting these pinstripes on the car myself, and now that pleasure had been taken from me. Plus it hadn’t been done that well; some of the stripes were a bit wavy.
I stormed into the house, “Who put those pinstripes on the car?!!!” I demanded loudly.
 
“I did,” said Josh, cringing a bit, surprised at my anger. “Don’t they look nice?”
 
“Yes they do, but I wanted to put them on! And they’re not straight!” I was now shouting. “When are you going to learn to ask before doing things?” I said, shaking my finger at Josh.
Poor Josh had inadvertently tapped into my reservoir of anger, stored up from all my frustrations, disappointments, unpleasant encounters, worry, tiredness and pride. He unknowingly pushed the button and out it all came.
 
This was not the first time such angry outbursts had happened in our home; they were all too frequent in my life. Sometimes I took out my frustration on things. I’d demolished more than one basket by punching it, and had ruined Barbara’s iron by slamming it down on the table.
 
Now it was time to deal with my anger. The Lord knew that difficult times lay ahead and He needed to prepare me for them. He was ready to free me from the grip that anger had on my life and this “pinstripe” incident was just the thing He used to pin me down.
 
After I had calmed down and apologized to Josh, he said, “That’s ok, Dad, we all make mistakes!” Here he was, being the adult while I was playing the child’s role in venting my selfish emotions! That brought me up short.
 
I thought of how often I’ve said to someone, “You made me angry!” But the reality is that the other person simply revealed my own selfish, idol-worshiping, ungodly heart. I had already “made myself angry” with a wrong response to previous situations, and now it had leaked over into this one.
 
The Lord used several things to rescue me from this pit of anger. First, He gave me a mental picture, a metaphor of how I ended up with these outbursts of anger. My soul is like a clear, empty tea glass. As I go through my day, negative events put in drops of disappointment, frustration, unhappiness and impatience into that glass.
 
Soon it is full of acidic self-centered, unprocessed anger. So when someone “bumps” into me by doing something I don’t like, what spills over onto them from the glass is this acid. They get a reaction much bigger than the situation warrants.
Some people are better than others at balancing their tea glass to keep it from spilling: hiding their anger, stuffing it, or denying it. But it eventually comes out in some way. I was not good at keeping it balanced and tended to spill it over on others too often.
 
However, the Lord showed me that if, at the end of the day, I take the tea glass of my soul and pour out all the anger acid that has accumulated, it is then clean and empty, ready to be filled with the Holy Spirit for a new day
 
The Lord taught me to do this through journaling, lifting my soul to God. Often I did not know what was bothering me when I felt negative and pressured, but as I began to write about my emotions in my journal, out came things that I’d forgotten, or hadn’t realized were affecting me.
 
Sometimes a chance word from someone had hurt me and I needed to go to the Lord about that, first expressing my anger in my journal, and then going on to process my anger. This meant forgiving the person, praising God for allowing the incident and applying some Scripture that brought me both comfort and perspective. After that, with my soul empty of resentment, I would be ready for a good night’s sleep.
 
At the beginning of the each day, during my quiet time, I could fill the clean and emptied tea glass of my soul with the Word and the Holy Spirit. Then, when I was “bumped” by others during the day, what would spill over on them was the grace of God. I was slow at learning this, but continual journaling took me step by step in the right direction.
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Psalm 28:6-7

Published by S.M. Wibberley on May 25, 2019
 
 
Psalm 28:6 “Praise be to the LORD, for he has heard my cry for mercy.”
 
[LORD, YAHWEH, you are the great and Triune God, persistently merciful, purely holy, powerfully high, perfectly heavenly—therefore to you belongs all praise.
 
You are the prayer-hearing, prayer-answering God, stooping down from your Heavenly throne to hear and help us, to comfort and support us with your gracious right hand. Therefore, you are worthy of all exaltation.
 
I think of your mercy on one Sunday as we traveled to speak in a distant church: an accident on the other side of the freeway caused a huge traffic jam, backing things up on that side for miles, while on our side we could move right along and arrive in time for the meeting.
 
Then on the way back, there was another traffic jam, again on the other side, this time from all the people returning home on Sunday evening. However, again we were able to zoom right along and make it home in good time. You are the provider and protector, the merciful One who watches over us in the way we need it. I thank you for your practical and personal care.]
 
Psalm 28:7 “The LORD is my strength and my shield;”
 
[I am so weak, so vulnerable, naturally so easily defeated by the devil’s deceit and demons, as well as the people they use. But you, Lord Jesus, as the Victor, the Most High, the Almighty, the undefeatable Defeater, you tower over time and eternity, giving your strength to your children, making yourself our Rock, our Fortress, our Defender, our Stronghold.
 
You give us your shield of victory, you support us with your right hand. You stoop down to make us great. You reach down from on high and draw us out of deep waters, you rescue us from our powerful enemies, from our foes too strong for us, you save us because you delight in us and bring us into a spacious place (Ps. 18:16-19).
 
I give you praise and honor, glory and exaltation for the daily demonstration and revelation of your great goodness, Lord Jesus, as you work powerfully and personally in my life. Like yesterday you prevented an accident I almost caused. Thank you so much!
 
Forgive me for taking so much of your goodness for granted. Every time I arrive home safely, have enough to eat, experience peaceful sleep and awake to safety and beauty, I have experienced your mercy and kindness. Help me to note these God sightings every day and thereby grow in faith and praise so I can give you more honor. Amen.]
 
Picture: our granddaughter, Anna
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Looking Up

Published by S.M. Wibberley on May 24, 2019
 
Reminder: all these devotionals I originally wrote in my worship journal for myself, to nurture my first love for Jesus and to practice thinking Truth. May the do the same for you!
                                    —————–
Praise you, Lord God, for a new day, a fresh gift from your hand, toasty warm with grace, steaming with potential, deliciously spiced with your presence. As someone said, every day is a gift, that’s why we call it “the present!”
 
I praise you, Lord Jesus, my Good and Great Shepherd, for all that you will give today: your provision, protection, presence and preparation in all that will come.
 
Praise you for the privilege of nurturing my first love for you, worshiping you, praising you, focusing on you, accompanying you through the day, joining you in what you are doing and checking in with you on what my role is.
 
May there be no sneakiness on my part, doing what I’m not sure you would want, instead of looking to you for guidance. I confess my sin of doing that, of ignoring you in making decisions, of setting my heart on gaudy baubles of pleasure rather than on your kind eyes of wisdom. I confess my double-mindedness, my half-heartedness, my rebellion and unbelief.
 
Forgive me for these serious, glory-stealing sins. It is not worth it to try and do things I’d like without checking in with you; I only end up with a mouthful of gravel! Help me instead to be open to you in all things, so that I may live in the light of your presence, of your Truth, of your wisdom, of your grace.
 
Praise be to you, Lord Jesus, for your efficacious sacrifice, your great forgiveness, your powerful cleansing, your consistent application of discipline, and your persistent patience with me in my failures.
 
You are Great, you are Good, you are Gracious and thereby worthy of praise, honor, worship and obedience both today and forever. May you be honored in all I do today. Amen.
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Psalm 28:3-5

Published by S.M. Wibberley on May 23, 2019
 
Psalm 28:3 “Do not drag me away with the wicked, with those who do evil, who speak cordially with their neighbors but harbor malice in their hearts.”
 
[This is not what most people think of as evil—appearing to be cordial–but would label as goodness! Yet you, Lord, look beyond appearances to the motives, at the intent of the heart and label this fake cordialness as sin. Lord, help us to also be intent on seeing our sins as you view them, and being harsh with the evil in our motives, rejecting it and living instead with love and grace in our hearts towards our neighbors.]
 
Psalm 28:4 “Repay them for their deeds and for their evil work; repay them for what their hands have done and bring back upon them what they deserve.”
 
[You, Lord God are a righteous and loving God, therefore you deal with what is evil. You, Lord Jesus, will come as judge and bring clear, just, right condemnation on those who have refused to believe in you, on those who refuse the truth and live according to their own ideas.
 
Praise you, Heavenly Father, that you do not allow evil to go unchecked now and unjudged in the future. I can trust you fully to do what is righteous and merciful, as you have made it possible for everyone to have their record of evil wiped clean with the blood of Christ–if only they will believe in Him.]
 
Psalm 28:5 “Since they show no regard for the works of the LORD and what his hands have done,”
 
[This is a description of selfish independence from God, a rejection of His values, His work, His Word. They do not acknowledge Truth, God, His divinity or His marvelous accomplishments. All is natural, all is science, all is man-centered. And all who live so will fail.]
 
“he will tear them down and never build them up again.”
 
[They are fighting God, and it is futile. He will win in the end in righteousness. They will fail in rebellion. They will fail both in this world and in the judgment to come, because you, Lord God, are sovereign, the One to be obeyed, revered, glorified and honored. I praise you for your goodness and purity, your hatred of evil and love of righteousness. In you we can trust!
 
As you have, in your mercy and grace, clothed me in the righteousness of Christ, may, by your power, my life be the opposite of those described above, so that you may be honored in my words, revered in my actions, exalted in my reactions, and praised in my relationships.]
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God is our sun and shield

Published by S.M. Wibberley on May 22, 2019
Another good one from EDIFIED!
 
“My soul yearns, even faints for the courts of the Lord; my heart and my flesh cry out for the living God.” Psalm 84:2
 
There is in each of us that deep longing for something more than this earth can give. As one friend said recently, “There is a question that keeps coming up inside, ‘Is this all there is?’”
God has given us a yearning for Him, a gift we often don’t recognize. This longing can be disguised as an undercurrent of dissatisfaction, or a realization that no matter how well things go, there is still some emptiness inside.
 
We tend to confuse this longing for God with our desires for material things, accomplishment or human relationships. However, no matter what we do about it, this longing is there, showing us the emptiness of life without Him, pulling us towards Him.
 
If we pay attention to, and cultivate this longing, it can become a positive passion, the burning “first love” that draws us deeper into our relationship with Christ. Ignoring this yearning means we will be like the Ephesians who, Christ said in Revelation 2, would be judged for losing their first love and falling from the high place God had for them.
 
Part of cultivating that passion is consistently looking to see who God is. Psalm 84:11 gives us two pictures of our wonderful God: “…the Lord God is a sun and a shield….” Think about what the sun does for us. It gives warmth without which life can’t exist. It is the source of light so we can see, and it makes many other things possible including food (light interacting with chlorophyll), energy (all usable energy has sun light as its ultimate source), clean water (the weather cycle providing clean rain comes from evaporation), the rhythm of the seasons (regulated by our distance from the sun), variety in weather (sunny days and cloudy days, calm and storm), direction (the sun rises in the East and sets in the West), discipline and rest (night and day), beauty (sunrise and sunsets, shadows to highlight the landscape), and consistency (it comes up every day).
 
Our God is like this, providing all this and more for us. We are surrounded by His love and provision, but sadly take most of it for granted.
 
God is also our shield, like the atmosphere, filtering out what will harm us, such as negative rays and meteorites. There are many promises in Scripture of His protecting us from what is harmful (e.g., Ps. 23, 1 Pet. 1:5). He knows what is good for us and lets the pleasant and the painful positives come through while keeping out that which will damage us spiritually.
 
I am tempted to complain at some of what He allows to come through the filter of His love, but must come back to His shielding us from all that is truly evil with wisdom and power, and in praise bow before His will.
 
It is good to remember that our God is our sun and our shield, to note what He does for us every day, and to cultivate the deep yearning of our souls for His presence and grace by spending time with Him, in worship, in the Word, in intercession.
 
Prayer: “Lord, help me to recognize your work in my life as my sun and shield, to be thankful, to give praise in all, to cultivate the relationship you have for me, for your glory and for the growth of all those around me. Amen.”
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King of Kings

Published by S.M. Wibberley on May 21, 2019
“The King is mighty; he loves justice—you have established equity;”
Psalm 99:4a
 
Praise be to you, Lord Jesus, King of Kings, Lord of Lords, Ruler of the universe, Creator and Sustainer of all. You are the star-Breather, the atom Keeper, the earth Spinner, and the dawn Bringer. I exalt you, King Jesus, for you are mighty and powerful, the Most High, the immeasurably strong, majestically great and eternal God.
 
You are undefeatable, unconquerable, unlimited, unending. You are the Source of all strength, the Provider of all power, the Author of all authority. You are the Ruler who reigns in all regions of life. No bird flies without your knowledge, no man sins without your grief, no person acts without your seeing, and no evil is allowed that cannot be woven into your plan of redemption and revival.
 
Before you, we all are judged by the same great and sinless standard, for you are the perfect, holy and righteous Judge. You know all our thoughts, all our motives, all our secret acts, all our manipulations, all our rebellion against your standard of perfect goodness. You can, without dispute, pronounce what is evil, punish what is sin, banish what is wrong.
 
You, the sinless, pure, untainted and perfect God, will remove sin from your presence. And you will purify from sin all those who come into your shelter of salvation so we may live forever in holy and harmonious relation with you, eternally giving glory to you.
 
Lord, “…you have done what is just and right.” Therefore, we will “Exalt the LORD our God and worship at his footstool; he is holy” (Ps. 99:4b,5). We praise you, Lord God that we can bow before your footstool, that you allow us entrance into your presence, that as we come in the blood of Christ, that our worship is acceptable to you.
 
I exalt you Lord God for what you are: pure and powerful, good and gracious, mighty and magnificent, wise and wonderful, holy and happy, eternal and ever-present, all seeing and all knowing, intimate and involved, caring and consistent, loving and lavish, rich and real, forgiving and forever.
 
You, Lord God—Father, Son and Holy Spirit—are Triune and total in yourself; you are worthy of worship without considering how your qualities benefit me—and they certainly do!
 
Prayer: “To you be glory and honor today in my life as I live under the hand of your love and protection, deeply satisfied in you, Lord God, the great Shepherd and King of my life. Amen.”
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Wow, what a God!

Published by S.M. Wibberley on May 19, 2019

I awoke with somewhat negative feelings this morning, perhaps from thinking too much about my books and or on the problems I’m having with my workers. But my feelings are not the measure of reality. Your the measure. So instead focusing on these very temporary matters, I want to be thinking on you, Lord Jesus, to be rejoicing in you and who you are throughout the day.

And who are you? You are the eternal One, always there; the Righteous One, always doing what is best; the Holy One, always working from right motives; the Mighty One, towering over every creature; the Glorious, doing mighty and magnificent works; and the Beautiful One, infusing your creation with your stunning beauty.

You only deserve our love, our devotion, our worship, our obedience, our fervor, our focus.

I praise you that you consistently work to lift our eyes from the temporary to the Timeless, from the minuscule to the Majestic, from the created to the Creator.

You are the One to be worshiped and I repent of thinking so much about sales and success., the lies and laziness around me.

Guide me in being balanced in a biblical way, in approaching all work in partnership with you, doing all Ain your time, in your wisdom, in your power. I thank you for all you will do in response to my prayers.

Again I praise you, for you are my Lord, standing against the enemy as my Refuge, my Fortress, my Stronghold, my Shield, my Protector. In addition, you are my Provider, my Shepherd, my Guide., leading me on the path you have prepared. And you are my King and my God., my final authority

To you be glory in this day. Help me to be a glory giver at each step, at each juncture, offering praise for the pleasant and the sacrifice of thanksgiving in every problem, difficulty and disappointment, thereby honoring you.

You are the One whom I am to follow, to gaze upon, to focus on, to worship, to love. Help me to do that so that you may receive continual exaltation before humans and angels.

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