Pastor Stephen Dedman

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Every Detail Matters

Faith, Trust

“How great are your works, O Lord ! Your thoughts are very deep!”
Psalms 92:5

It doesn’t take much for someone to see that God’s works are wonderful. Wonderful doesn’t even begin to describe how great His works are. They are multitudinous. God made no mistakes from the time of creation nor has He held back any glorious design.

Think about the human body for a moment. How wonderful it is that the human body can heal itself. The earth is spinning in space at the exact speed and distance from the sun to sustain life. The stars in the heavens are so numerous they cannot all be identified. Consider the human brain. The storage capacity is an amount over 74 Terabytes (just in the cerebral cortex alone). That’s huge!

When we struggle with our faith or wonder if God cares we need to consider this verse as a reference that God knows and cares. He made us with much more detail than anything else. He loves us and cares for each and everyone of us. So when we consider His works and thoughts we may never comprehend the extent to His greatness. Maybe one day it will all be revealed to us when we get to Heaven.

If you are struggling today with the thought that you are not worthy or that God may not care about what you are going through, stop and consider what He has done for you. He sent His Son to die for you and to give you eternal life. He has prepared a way for you to spend eternity in His presence. That alone says enough.

Pray

Lord, help me to know that You care. As I face my struggles, give me comfort and peace that you are in control. I know you will work it all out.

Are You Aware Of Your Sin?

Salvation, Trust

“Have mercy on me, O God, according to your steadfast love; according to your abundant mercy blot out my transgressions. Wash me thoroughly from my iniquity, and cleanse me from my sin!”
Psalm 51:1-2

Psalm 51 gives us a glimpse of how David saw his sin. To fully understand this Psalm we must realize that God caused David to see his sin from His point of view.

God made him aware of his sin and gave him the understanding of it. Psalm 51 is ultimately David’s response to God once he gained the knowledge of how greatly he had sinned against God.

David committed adultery with Bathsheba and then one sin led to another. Bathsheba sent word that she was pregnant so David developed a scheme to minimize the seriousness of what he had done. David sent Bathsheba’s husband, Uriah, into a war zone to be certain that he would be killed and then David would take Bathsheba as his wife and everything would be alright. Not exactly.

God sent Nathan as a prophet to bring conviction to David’s heart. Sin spiritually blinded him and God had to intervene or else David would think he got away with it. David needed to be convicted of his sin and only God can do that. Once convicted, David realized the tragedy of his sin and needed God’s mercy.

How do you view your sin? Do you take it as serious as God does? God says the penalty of sin is death. That is serious business. God does not look lightly upon our sin and neither should we. If only we could see our sin as God sees it. We should never minimize the seriousness of our sin.

One of the works of the Holy Spirit is to convict the Believer of his or her wrongdoings. It’s not to shame you or embarrass you but to bring you to an understanding of what you did. You despised the truth of God. It is a great tragedy for a Christian to sin and not be brought to an understanding that we broke God’s commandment. It is up to us as to how we respond to the awareness and knowledge of our sin. Trust me, our sin is ever before us in our remembrance.

Will we continue in our sin or will we have an attitude of repentance? There are great consequences to those who do not repent.

Pray

Lord, will you bring me to the understanding and knowledge of my sin. Let me be aware of how I have sinned against You. Have mercy on me Lord, forgive me, and make me clean again.

The Place Of All Desires

Encouragement, Faith, Trust

“having the eyes of your hearts enlightened, that you may know what is the hope to which he has called you, what are the riches of his glorious inheritance in the saints,”
‭‭Ephesians‬ ‭1:18‬ ‭ESV‬‬

The Bible uses the word “heart” to refer to the center of the whole person, the place of all desires.  

The heart is seen as the seat of the will, intellect and feelings. “Character”, “personality” and “mind” are also terms used for the Bible’s meaning of heart. As you may have already discovered, the Bible has much to say about the heart.

“The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately sick; who can understand it?”
‭‭Jeremiah‬ ‭17:9‬ ‭ESV‬‬

“The good person out of the good treasure of his heart produces good, and the evil person out of his evil treasure produces evil, for out of the abundance of the heart his mouth speaks.”
‭‭Luke‬ ‭6:45‬ ‭ESV‬‬

“But the Lord said to Samuel, “Do not look on his appearance or on the height of his stature, because I have rejected him. For the Lord sees not as man sees: man looks on the outward appearance, but the Lord looks on the heart.””
‭‭1 Samuel‬ ‭16:7‬ ‭ESV‬‬

“Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right spirit within me.”
‭‭Psalms‬ ‭51:10‬ ‭ESV‬‬

“And I will give you a new heart, and a new spirit I will put within you. And I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh.”
‭‭Ezekiel‬ ‭36:26‬ ‭ESV‬‬

We must allow the eyes of our heart to be opened to the spiritual things of God. When our heart is set on God we see things in a spiritual realm and not physical. We need to allow God to speak to our heart so we can see who He is. Is your heart prepared to receive the riches of His glory?

Pray

Lord, open the eyes of my heart so that I may see You in all your glory. Fill my heart with joy and peace that I may have hope.