Today’s verses are John 7:45,46: “The officers then came to the chief priests and Pharisees, who said to them, ‘Why did you not bring him?’  The officers answered, ‘No one ever spoke like this man!’”

My child, the chief priests and the Pharisees, representing the governing body of the Jews called the Sanhedrin, had deployed the temple police to arrest me.  But they did not.  Upon their return to the chief priests and the Pharisees, they were questioned whey they did not arrest me.  They could not understand their apparent disobedience.

Their response to the religious leaders is telling and profoundly true: “No one has ever spoke this this man!”  They were giving their listeners, and all of us, another reason to believe my claims to deity to be true.  No other person in all of human history is God in human flesh.  No other man in human history is fully God and fully human at the same time.  Therefore, when I spoke, I spoke with the authority of my Father in heaven.  When I spoke, I spoke with the insights of heaven itself.  When I spoke, I spoke with total truth, wisdom and insight.

This is what the officers heard.  This is what confounded them.  This is why they couldn’t arrest me.  My teachings pointed to my identity.  Deep inside, they knew they could not arrest God in human flesh.

My child, read carefully my teachings in my Word.  Let them all be carefully imbibed into your heart and soul.  Feel the authority of God himself speaking to you.  When I say that no one but God is good, see yourself in that light.  Know the depth of the depravity of your sin and your need for a Savior.  When I say that I came to seek and save that which was lost, I’m speaking to you.  I came to seek and save you!  When I tell the story of a wandering son welcomed home by his unconditionally loving Father, see yourself as the wandering son wanting to return home.  When I tell of one among ninety-nine sheep leaving the fold and the shepherd leaves the ninety-nine to find the one lost sheep, see yourself as that sheep.  When I tell the story of a lost coin, carelessly dropped by its owner, only to have the entire house turned over until it’s found in a dark corner, see yourself as that coin in the dark corner and me tirelessly and relentlessly turning over the universe until I find you.  When you read about a pearl being purchased by a merchant no matter what the cost, see yourself as that pearl of great price and my willingness to purchase you at all costs, even death on a cross.

My love for you could not be greater.  There is nothing that could ever separate you from my life.  I taught you all these things.  These teachings should overwhelm you with who I am and how much I care for you.  My teachings should drive you to faith in me.

You can trust me today.

Every single one of us desires to succeed in life.  It’s natural to want to do so.

Therefore, let me share with you something I learned long ago that is an absolute necessity in life for success to occur.  It’s simply this truth: hard work and perseverance is the natural bridge from a goal becoming a successful goal. 

Whenever you are trying to achieve something, there will most always be resistance. There will be obstacles that will come in your way.  There will be times you want to give up.  But don’t.  Keep on trying. Keep persevering.  Keep struggling.  Keep moving forward.  Keep working hard.  Most often, the breakthrough will come.  Most often, the victory will happen.  It may take time, more than you expected. But keep working.  Keep trying.  Don’t give up!

Victory and a positive outcome most often come after much hard work and perseverance. They are necessary for success in life.

Most all successful people know what I’m talking about, right?

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Today’s verses are John 7:43,44: “So there was a division among the people over him.  Some of them wanted to arrest him, but no one laid hands on him.”

My child, I often bring division among people, as is seen here.  The most important question in life is, “Who is Jesus?”  If you decide that I am the Christ, the Son of the living God, others, who don’t believe in me, will reject you.  Fathers and mothers will hate children and have them arrested because of me.  Children will rise against parents and have them put to death because they carry my name.  Brothers will deliver brothers and sisters will deliver sisters over to the authorities because of me.  Friends will become divided because they have decided to follow me.  In many families and areas of the world, I will bring division because of my identity.  It has been this way for the past two thousand years.  It will continue until I come back again.

When people carry my name, the antagonism and hatred people feel toward me will be forced upon them.  People will be hated for my name’s sake.  A disciple is not above the teacher.  But that is the ultimate goal of a follower of mine: to emulate the master.  This is not unique to me.  It is a truth in Judaism, Roman teaching and throughout the world.  I experienced hatred and antagonism here with the Jews.  So will my followers, for all times, at some level or another.  Don’t be surprised when it comes.  It most assuredly will.

But note here that no one laid a hand on me.  Though antagonism and hatred for me was ever increasing, no one laid a hand on me.  Why?  Because my time had not yet come.  My Father’s time for me to go the cross, his appointed time, had not yet arrived.  It was all in his hands.

My child, please know again today that all times and seasons are in my Father’s hands.  If you are committed to me, everything in your life has its appointed time.  You must learn to wait on me and trust me.  As you persevere in waiting, don’t weary in well-doing.  Persevere in caring for others.  Be relentless in love.  Though you will face most assuredly face rejection and persecution, love one another.  Love this dying world, with all that is within you.  Even love your enemies.  Forgive those who have hurt you.  Care for those who are less fortunate.  Give generously to those who are in need.  Faithfully trust my appointed time.

You can trust me today.

Here is a simple way to become discouraged and depressed.  It’s a sure fire formula that has never failed to work.  Would you like to know what it is?  

Ok, here’s the solemn truth: if you want to become discouraged and depressed (and most certainly stay that way for a long time), try to please everyone around you.  Try to keep everyone around you happy. Assume the responsibility of everyone’s happiness in your life.

It’s impossibility.  You can’t keep everyone happy.  Why?  Because you can’t choose another’s happiness.  It’s something each one of us individually must work toward.  Working hard to keep everyone happy is a control mechanism worthy only for God himself.  And last time I checked, neither you nor I is God!

So do your best.  Give God the rest.  Be responsible for your life.  Don’t be responsible for the lives of those around you.  Life is too short to stay discouraged and depressed for too long.

It’s the only way you can live sanely on this side of eternity!

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Today’s verses are John 7:40-42: “When they heard these words, some of the people said, ‘This really is the Prophet.’  Others said, ‘This is the Christ.’  But some said, ‘Is the Christ to come from Galilee?  Has not the Scripture said that the Christ comes from  the offspring of David, and comes from Bethlehem, the village where David was?’”

My child, when people then heard my teaching about me giving them eternal, rivers of living water, available deep within their hearts and souls every day if they just believe in me, they began debating among themselves regarding who I am.  They were essentially asking the right question: “Who has the right to teach such things?”

Some said I was the Prophet.  It’s a reference to Deuteronomy 18:15-18, verses where Moses predicted a mighty person would one day come to lead the Jews.  In my days on earth, some people thought the Prophet and the Christ would be two separate people.  I am both.  Others said I was the Christ, the Messiah, the Anointed One from God.  Others objected saying that I was from Nazareth and the Christ had to be born in Bethlehem, in fulfillment of the prophecy in Micah 5:2.  They said the Christ also had to be in the lineage of King David.  Ironically, these people did not know that I was born in Bethlehem! They didn’t know I was in the lineage of King David, through my earthly father, Joseph.  I perfectly fulfilled all the hundreds of prophecies about me in every perfect way!

It’s another reason people should believe in me.  If you look at the probability factor of me fulfilling the hundreds of Old Testament prophecies about me, it would border on the impossible.  Yet I did so in perfect specificity.

My child, I am the Christ, the long-awaited Messiah of the Jews, the Son of the Living God.  I was sent to earth by my Father to live the righteous requirements of the Law you cannot live.  I then went to the cross and paid the penalty for your sins myself.  I had to be a perfect human, totally righteous under the Law, to be an acceptable sacrifice for my Father in heaven.  Yet I also had to be perfectly God, his only Son, to pay the price for your sins.  Only the offended party can pay the price for the forgiveness of your sins.  Your sins were a holy offense against me!  But because of my love for you I was willing to pay the price.  Because of my love for you I gladly, joyfully went to the cross!

My child, believe in me today.  Receive my rivers of living water in your heart.  Rest in my complete love for you.  My cross is the proof of the extent to which I would go to claim you as my own.  Whatever you face today, do so with my love in you today.  Whatever confronts you today, confront it with my love in you.  Know my love in you is the most powerful force in the world.  Love overcame my hideous death on the cross with my resurrection.  Love will conquer your problems.  One day, love will conquer all.  Believe it.  Know it’s true.  My abiding love is with you.

You can trust me today.

I recently heard this leadership truth and thought it valuable.  I wanted to share it with you today. It’s simple but profound.

“Instead of striving for success, strive for influence.”  That’s an entirely different leadership paradigm, isn’t it?  Most leaders, myself included, think that we should daily strive for success. We need to make sure our numbers increase and we daily meet the bottom line.

That’s certainly not unimportant.  All of us have people, boards, bosses to whom we may be answerable.  But maybe there is a better, different paradigm to help us meet the bottom line better.  What could that be? That daily we strive for influence, not success.  

No leader can accomplish the task alone.  All of us need people with whom we work to help us accomplish daily bottom lines.  Therefore, if leaders are influencing those around them rightly, then they will all work together better that, in turn, produces a better bottom line than could have been achieved alone!

Simple, yet true: all leaders should daily strive for influence, not success.  

Then more success actually comes.  A strange but true paradox!

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Today’s verses are John 7:39: “Now this he said about the Spirit, whom those who believed in him were to receive, for as yet the Spirit had not been given, because Jesus was not yet glorified.

My child, I had just taught that whoever believes in me that out of his heart will flow rivers of living water.  When anyone believes that I am God’s Son who died for his sins, my Holy Spirit eternally enters his heart and dwells there.  Note that my presence isn’t like a stream of water.  It is like rivers of water, gushing, flowing, to give living water.

This powerful presence had not yet been given then, for I had not gone to the cross and been raised from the dead.  Only after having been glorified in my resurrection and ascended state before my Father in heaven could the Holy Spirit be sent and poured out on my children everywhere.  Only after my work of salvation had been completed, presented to my Father in heaven after my resurrection and ascension, could the overflowing life of the Holy Spirit be given to my children who believe.

Please note this does not mean the Holy Spirit was not at work before my resurrection and ascenstion.  The Holy Spirit was at creation, brooding over the waters, forming this world to his intent.  The Holy Spirit was also present in the lives of God-followers before I came to earth.  However, it was most often to help empower these people to a specific task to which they’d been called by my Father.  He was not permanently given to them.

My child, it’s different for those who believe in me.  If you trust me, I’ve entered your heart, permanently and powerfully.  I have baptized you with fire, burning away your sins.  Inwardly, I am conforming you to my image, making your life look like mine.  Love replaces apathy.  Forgiveness replaces bitterness.  Patience replaces anger.  Kindness replaces being on edge.  Gentleness replaces pride.  Joy replaces discouragement.  Courage replaces timidity.  Faith replaces fear.  Hope replaces despair.  Peace replaces anxiety.  Self-control replaces self-indulgence.  Cooperation replaces strife.  The focus on me is replaced by a focus on others.

My child, I came to give you life and to give it to you abundantly.  My very life indwells your heart like rivers of living water.  If your soul feels parched today, I will flow my living water to you.  I want to overflow your life’s boundaries with who I am!  I will give you everything you need today to face whatever problem you may be facing.  Don’t fear anything.  My powerful presence is available to you through the Holy Spirit.  He is your guide and counselor today.  Because of him, believe that I am with you.

You can trust me today.

Today’s verses are John 7:37,38: “On the last day of the feast, the great day, Jesus stood up and cried out, ‘If anyone thirsts, let him come to me and drink.  Whoever believes in me, as the Scripture has said, ‘Out of his heart will flow rivers of living water.’”

My child, I want you today to hear one of my most important teachings.  I am not only the source of all life, I am the only one who can continue to give you a meaningful life.  From your relationship with me, you will be able to live and move and have your being.  You will never spiritually thirst again!

How?  You need to drink from me.  The prophet Isaiah had the same idea when he said of God, “Come, everyone who thirsts, come to the waters; and he who has no money, come, buy and eat!” (Isaiah 55:1).  What I offer every human being cannot be purchased for money.  The invitation is for all who have deep spiritual longings in their hearts to come to me.  You receive this gift by grace through faith.

What does it mean to come to me and drink from me?  It means to believe in me.  It means to enter into a personal, living, trusting, ongoing, eternal relationship with me.  You not only come to me in this personal relationship, as you do any person with whom you desire closeness, but you drink from me.

This is not mere intellectual assent but an inextricable, life-giving, eternal connection between the two of us.  I live in you.  You live in me.  I become a constant source of life and hope for you.  Daily, regularly, you drink from my grace, love, mercy and kindness.  Daily, with whatever is going on in your life, you come to me and drink from me.

My water from which you drink is inexhaustible.  If will flow from within your own heart.  Your heart is its source.  Note it will “flow.”  It’s not a trickle, or even a casual stream.  It is a gushing flow of constant grace and kindness.  It is also “living water.”  It is not stagnant or brackish.  It is pure, fresh and flowing.  No germs or parasites can live in it!  It gives life to you and gives it to you abundantly.

Believe that I have forgiven your sins.  Come to me today with all your burdens and problems.  Make sure you are connected to your life source, deep inside, your relationship with me.  Let me do my inward work of life within you.  Let me overcome your discouragements.  Let me fill you anew with my life.  Let me give you hope again!  I promised never to leave you or forsake you.  I gave you my word that I’d never leave you as a mere orphan.

My promises are true.  Let me pour out my internal, eternal blessings upon you so you can be my blessing to others in this decaying and dying world.

You can trust me today.

Today’s verses are John 7:35,36: “The Jews said to one another, ‘Where does this man intend to go that we will not find him?  Does he intend to go to the Dispersion among the Greeks and teach the Greeks?  What does he mean by saying, ‘You will seek me and you will not find me, and, ‘Where I am you cannot come’?”

My child, the people then continually misunderstood my teachings.  In this Gospel writing alone, it happened over and over again (3:4;4:15;6:52).  Here, when I referred to the fact that I was going to a place where they could not find me, to a place to where they could not go, they were confused.  They asked if I was going to the Dispersion, a common Jewish expression to refer to the scattered Jews throughout the Roman Empire and beyond its borders, those not living inside of Palestine.

But I was speaking in terms of spiritual truth.  I was addressing a spiritual reality.  After my death, I was to be raised from the dead and then ascended into heaven.  They would not be able to follow me there unless they believed in my gift of eternal life, by grace through faith.  I was referring to my eternal home.

My child, spiritual truth can only be seen through spiritual eyes.  Spiritual insights can only be gleaned by spiritual understanding.  The Holy Spirit must dwell in your heart to glean spiritual truth.  When he does, he guides you and is your earthly GPS system.  He leads you into all truth, convicting you of sin.  He shows you the path of righteousness for my name’s sake.  He conforms you into my image, daily giving you my eternal fruit, my Christlike character.  He shows you my will and purposes for your life.  Ultimately, he gives you your way home to me.

That’s what was wrong with my listeners then.  They only had earthly understanding, an earthly vision.  They could not understand the spiritual realities of what I was trying to teach them.

But when you are born again, born of the Holy Spirit, his powerful presence indwelling you, you know spiritual reality.  You have spiritual discernment.  You know the true meaning of my teachings.  You know my spiritual promptings and impressions.  You are led by my Spirit, not by human flesh.

Listen to my leading today.  Listen to my voice.  Discern what I am trying to teach you.  Read my Word with spiritual eyes.  Hear my voice.

You will then know the depth of my love for you.  You will see, discern and appreciate my eternal purposes for you.  You will know that I am more concerned for your eternal development than your momentary satisfaction.  I am making you into an eternal creature, for my Father’s glory.  Though you can’t see it now, I am using everything for your good and my Father’s glory.  Not one thing is beyond the scope of my Father’s plan for your life.  But you must be able to look at all that happens to you through spiritual eyes.  Only then can eternal discernment be given to you.

You can trust me today.

Today’s verses are John 7:32-34: “The Pharisees heard the crowd muttering these things about him, and the chief priests and Pharisees sent officers to arrest him.  Jesus then said, ‘I will be with you a little longer, and then I am going to him who sent me.  You will see me and you will not find me.  Where I am you cannot come.’”

My child, if you don’t like a message, kill the messenger!  That was the view of the chief priests and Pharisees, representing the ruling body of the Jews, the Sanhedrin.  After they heard my teaching, they deployed the temple police to arrest me.  Their job was to maintain order in the different areas of the temple, though I had done nothing to cause disorder.  The crowds clamored to follow me because of the grace, mercy and healing I granted them.

I knew what was going to happen next.  They would come after me, seek me to arrest me.  But they would not find me.  They would only find me at the appointed time, when my Father in heaven chose me to go to the cross.

But this is also an illusion to my ascension to heaven.  In the time to follow, I would be crucified, then raised from the dead by the power of my Father in heaven.  After forty days of resurrection appearances to my disciples, teaching them about the kingdom of God, I would then ascend to heaven.  There I now rest at the right hand of my Father, with all power and authority to rule over this world and all the people in it.  One day, I will return to this world to judge the living and the dead, some to eternal life, others to eternal separation from me.

I was telling these listeners that when I ascended to heaven, I was going to a place where they cannot come.  They did not believe in me.  They did not trust in me.  Conversely, they wanted to kill me.  If they wanted me dead, how could they believe that my cross was sufficient for entrance into eternity?

If you have faith in me, if you believe that my death was sufficient to forgive your sins, you have eternal life.  It is a free gift guaranteed you, by grace through faith, not of your works, or it would be something about which you’d boast forever.  I knew you could never become perfectly righteous before my Father by your works.  It is an impossibility.  Therefore, I took the death you deserved, and gave you my forgiveness you don’t deserve.  I took the punishment for your sins you deserved, and gave you my righteousness you don’t deserve.

Why?  All because of love.  It was solely because of my profound love for you.

My child, live in that love today.  Be consumed by my unconditional favor for you today.  There is no work you could ever perform that would force me to love you more than I do today.  Grab hold of my grace.  Have peace in my profound care for you.  If you believe in me, by grace through faith, you will go to the place where I am.  If it were not so, I wouldn’t have told you!

You can trust me today.