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God is Love

God is Love

What would you do if someone asked you the same question three times?  This is exactly what happened to Simon Peter, Jesus’ disciple. Jesus asked him three times, “Do you love me?” as though to say, this is of utmost importance Simon. It is a question that is equally important and relevant for us today.  In the midst of a world filled with God and truth deniers, there is urgent Kingdom work to be done.  In the midst of a great falling away, Jesus is once again asking as he did back then, “Do you love me?”  If so, then, “Feed my sheep.”  And this is love as described in 1 Corinthians 13:1-13:

An Unpayable Debt

An Unpayable Debt

In 1864, while the American Civil War was still being fought, three young women, Emma Hunter, Sophie Keller and Elizabeth Myers began the custom of decorating soldiers’ graves at a cemetery in Boalsburg, Pennsylvania.  They wanted to recognize the contributions of these brave soldiers from the village who had paid the ultimate price.  Today it has become customary to decorate graves with flowers as a sign of our deep affection for those who sacrificed their lives for us, and for those whose lives have touched ours.

Outrageous Faith

Outrageous Faith

Do you live in a state of constant expectation that God is who he says he is and that he will do what he says, he will do?  This appears to be the way the disciples in Acts 9:37-38 lived. In the face of what most humans would consider IMPOSSIBLE, they exhibited outrageous faith; the kind of faith that anticipates the inevitable intervention of the Almighty God.  The kind of faith that is completely surrendered to the will of God, whatever that may be.  They displayed the kind of faith that invites ridicule.

Guard Your Body

Guard Your Body

Leon Morris, a New Testament scholar, once said: “There is no point in accepting Christian teaching if we refuse to let it shape our lives.”   The writer of the book of James is more direct.  He says, “Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves.  Do what it says (James 1:22).  And yet believers around the world have turned their backs on doing the word.  Instead of letting God’s word shape our lives, we have allowed the influences of our world to shape us.

Look Up!

Look Up!

Where do you turn to in times of trouble?  It’s quite a revelation to watch little children interact with their parents.  Whenever a little child is in distress, that child will turn towards a parent and look up with lifted arms, expectantly waiting to be picked up and comforted.  In such a case, the parent’s most eloquent response is to bend down, pick the child up and hold them close to reassure them.  It’s a beautiful picture of God’s love.

He's Making a Way!

He's Making a Way!

The children of Israel had been held captive in Babylon for 70 years (Jeremiah 29:10), when the word of God came to them declaring that God was “doing a new thing;” something they had never seen before.  God was doing this new thing right there in the wilderness; in that uncomfortable wasteland; a place where they did not want to be.  At the time they must have wondered what he meant. 

Incredible Love!

Incredible Love!

All around the world, millions of people are looking for love.  Some swipe right, others left. Unfortunately, as Johnny Lee reminds us in his song, Lookin’ for Love we often go “looking for love in all the wrong places.” What would you say if I told you there is no greater love than the love of God?  As a young child, I often sang a song in Sunday school that went something like this:

Run, Child Run!

Run, Child Run!

While visiting Kenya recently, I stopped by a local shopping center in the western part of the country.  As I looked around the shops, I observed a woman emerging from a tiny kiosk with a young girl, about five years old, carrying a book bag on her back.  As I watched them, the woman bent down and whispered something in the girl’s ear, simultaneously pointing towards a building which was about half a mile down the road.  With that, the little girl began to run.  I stood there glued to the scene, fascinated to see such a tiny child running such a long distance on her own.  I watched her frame grow smaller and smaller as the distance between her and her mother increased.  Occasionally, this precious child would slow down and begin to walk and her mother, who kept her eyes on her the whole time, would shout encouragingly, “Keep running, you’re almost there.”  With every shout, the young girl who never once looked back, would once again break into a jog.  Finally, she made it!   As she turned into the building that her mother had pointed out to her earlier, the woman went back into her kiosk to serve her customers.

Empowering Grace

Empowering Grace

Have you ever had moments in life when you have felt frail, weak, or distressed?  Have you gone through a season so dark, you felt there was nowhere to turn?  The truth is all humans, no matter their occupation or station in life, go through seasons of struggle and difficulty.   It is when we are at our most vulnerable that we can draw on God’s strength.

Wait for It

Wait for It

Many of us living in the US will fall back on time, this week (adjusting our clocks one hour back).  This practice can often make some people feel as though they have power over time, and this can lead into a pattern of thinking we can control the events of our lives and change the time when important things should happen.  The truth is, we can try but we will not succeed.  For as the Psalmist says, concerning God, “For a thousand years in your sight are but as yesterday when it is past, or as a watch in the night (Psalm 90:4).”

Faith in the Valley

Faith in the Valley

If you have ever said, “Yes!” to the call of God upon your life, you know that, that is only the beginning of the journey.  The path from here to there is often filled with the unexpected; with the extra details that God didn’t reveal to you at the beginning for fear that you would run.  Truthfully speaking, the work of the ministry, though fulfilling, is often hard and lonely.  In fact, expect it to be so, for God promised both blessings and persecutions (Mark 10:30) to all who follow him. 

Words Have Power!

Words Have Power!

Words have power.  In some cases, words influence who we are, and words are also the lens through which the world often judges us.  When life is calm, it is easy to find the right words for any occasion, but when we are under stress or trial, we sometimes feel less restrained in what we utter.  Consider times when you’ve said something you ought not to have said and then added sheepishly, “Pardon my French!” or “Oooops!  That was a slip of the tongue.” 

How Majestic is Your Name

How Majestic is Your Name

Does the thought of God the Father overwhelm you with a deep sense of awe and wonder?  Does the idea that he cares for you and loves you completely leave you overwhelmed with gratitude.  Does the realization that he knows every aspect of your life, past, present and future and that he has knit every event brilliantly for your good, flood your heart with humility?

Watch and Pray

Watch and Pray

There’s much happening in our world today, and a lot of it is frightening and disheartening.  It is easy to get distracted.  Jesus instructed his disciples to watch and pray so that they would not fall into temptation. It is tempting to spend time chatting idly about what is going on politically and socially; it is tempting to chit-chat about the financial issues affecting our nation; it is tempting to spend all our time pursuing those pleasures and activities that distract our minds from the frightening realities around us, but Jesus says, “watch and pray.”

What Do You See?

What Do You See?

Has life ever thrown you a curve ball?  If you are reading this, I bet you have experienced a down time at some stage of your life.  Desperate times in our lives come in all shapes and sizes: betrayal, rejection, divorce, illness, death, loss of employment, foreclosure, financial hardship, national upheaval and so on.  When the down times appear, what do you see?

Arise, Shine!

Arise, Shine!

A New Year is a great time to hit the restart button, and many of us do, but by the time April rolls around, the majority of us will have gone back to old habits.  Why?  Because we typically strive for improvement in our own strength, which fails us every time.  This is especially true of our spiritual lives.  As we are reminded in Zechariah 4:6, “Not by might, nor by power, but by my Spirit,” says the LORD Almighty.  Only God’s Spirit is able to replace the darkness in our lives with his light.

Thank you!

Thank you!

Esther’s Hope Ministries will take a pause this week to say, “Thank you to all of you who have made this ministry possible.  Thank you to all our prayer partners, donors, volunteers and well-wishers.  Most of all, we are deeply grateful to God; for his faithfulness to us, and to the young girls we serve in Kenya.  2018 brought us untold blessings, and we firmly believe, the best is yet to come.

The Unseen Guest

The Unseen Guest

In almost every culture, the birth of a child is marked with gifts and special ceremonies.  Things were no different when the baby Jesus was born.  The Magi came into the house where the baby lay.  They fell down and they worshipped him, and presented their gifts to him, gold, frankincense and myrrh.  The Magi presented the baby with the very best gifts they could find, because this was no ordinary child.  This was a special child, who would grow up to be the Savior of the world.