Pastor Stephen Dedman

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Praise The Lord With Every Breath

Encouragement

Let everything that has breath praise the Lord. Praise the Lord!
Psalm 150:6

It is estimated that the average person takes 23,000 breaths every day. Every breath you take matters. If we were to stop breathing… death is near.

A dear friend of mine got really sick with Covid at the beginning of this year. He told me he had a really hard time breathing. He said he had to think about each breath he took. He had to concentrate on inhaling and exhaling.

Sometimes we don’t consider the necessity of breathing until we can’t. Sometimes we don’t even realize that we are breathing because we don’t have to think about it. We just do it, naturally.

Here is the point of today’s message. We are given 23,000 opportunities to praise the Lord. We should praise God for every breath He gives us.

Let’s praise the Lord for every breath we take and with every breath let’s praise the Lord!

Do you praise the Lord 23,000 times a day? With the mindset of praising God for giving us our next breath we can. But don’t wait until you can’t breathe to be thankful for each breath.

Take a deep breath right now and consider what happens when your lungs fill with air (oxygen) and you exhale the converted air (carbon dioxide). The 3 to 5 seconds that it took to breathe in and breathe out is amazing. The oxygen you inhale contains vital nutrients for blood to carry nutrients throughout your body to live.

Interestingly enough, you exhale carbon dioxide that provides sufficient nutrients for plants to survive. And in return plants give off oxygen for humans to survive. God works in mysterious ways!

How many times you can praise the Lord today?

Pray

Lord, thank You for every breath I take. Thank You for the clean air that I breathe and the plants that provide oxygen for me to breathe. Help me to realize that every breath I take matters and is an opportunity to praise You.

Trust Jesus

Trust

‘For I have come down from heaven, not to do My own will, but the will of Him who sent Me. ‘
John 6:38

Right after Jesus fed the 5,000 men He gave a discourse about the Bread of Life. He wanted people to know that He was sent from God to do the will of the Father. He wanted them to know He was the Messiah, the Christ, in the flesh.

Jesus wanted to show His followers He could provide all their needs, from bodily sickness to spiritual brokenness of the soul. He used the natural to illustrate spiritual truths and miracles to demonstrate His power.

Many refused to believe in Jesus until He performed a miracle. They were seeking Him to satisfy their earthly appetites while He was trying to satisfy their spiritual poverty. He told them, “you have seen Me and yet do not believe.” (John 6:36)

May we never get caught up in trusting Jesus to solely meet our earthly desires only to miss out on the spiritual blessings that satisfy our soul. Just as we need bread and water to survive, we need Jesus for eternal life and joy. We never need to be so focussed on our earthly problems that we forfeit the joy and peace that Jesus brings into our life.

Do you trust Jesus to meet your needs? If so, why do you worry?

Do you believe Jesus can give you life and life more abundantly? If so, why not seek Him for spiritual blessings that nothing on this earth can satisfy.

Pray

Lord, thank You for sending Jesus to come and accomplish Your will on this earth. Keep me from earthly appetites and carnal desires so that I can be filled with the spiritual blessings from Heaven.

What Does Your Heart Look Like?

Encouragement, Trust

“Brood of vipers! How can you, being evil, speak good things? For out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks.”
‭‭Matthew‬ ‭12:34‬

Have you ever said something and the moment it came out of your mouth you regretted saying it? Yes, we all have. It’s because our hearts are deceitful. Jeremiah 17:9 says, “The heart is deceitful above all things, And desperately wicked; Who can know it?”

The truth behind Jesus’ teaching is not so much about watching what we say, but guarding and protecting the condition of our heart. Everything that comes out of our mouth springs forth from what is already in your heart.

A couple of chapters later, Jesus was answering criticism of the Pharisees about the Jewish custom of washing hands and He said, “Do you not yet understand that whatever enters the mouth goes into the stomach and is eliminated? But those things which proceed out of the mouth come from the heart, and they defile a man. For out of the heart proceed evil thoughts, murders, adulteries, fornications, thefts, false witness, blasphemies. These are the things which defile a man, but to eat with unwashed hands does not defile a man.” (‭‭Matthew‬ ‭15:17-20‬)

What you say is a reflection of the spiritual condition of your heart. When you speak kind words, it reveals a cheerful heart. On the contrary when you speak words that hurt others it’s because your heart is not in a good place.

The heart is a well and the mouth is the water pot that draws from that well. It’s not enough to simply “clean up” what you say. The mouth cannot draw up anything but what is already in the heart. That’s why we must guard and protect our heart.

Pray

Lord, protect my heart from evil. Help me to remain clean and pure. If I’m doing something I shouldn’t be doing, please convict my soul.