Author: Allen Forte

Your Moment at the Well

The Lord’s insight. Listen for what God says, not for what you want to hear.

1 Kings 22:5: Also, Jehoshaphat said to the king of Israel, please inquire for the Word of the Lord today.

John 2:5: His mother said to the servants, whatever He says to you, do it.

We must be careful not to speak for the Lord when He does not speak to us. Jehoshaphat was King of Judah.  Ahab was king of Israel.  Israel had fallen away from the Lord.  They did as they pleased.  Judah was still obedient to God.  They did as He commanded.

Jehoshaphat wanted to know if God wanted the two kings to join together to fight against Syria.  They asked 400 prophets from Israel if they should go to war with Syria.  The prophets all said “yes, go up. God will be with you.”  But Jehoshaphat was skeptical.  So, he asked if there was really anyone there who still heard the Word of God.

When God stopped speaking to Israel, they started speaking for Him to themselves. They listened only for what they wanted to hear, not for what God wanted to say. The two kings joined forces and went to battle.  Jehoshaphat lived because he sought the Lord’s desire.  Ahab was killed because he followed his desire.

We do this today, especially when we are faced with what seems like a difficult situation. We set our hearts on our wants before we seek the Lord for His desires for us. We must learn to pray and to listen for what we should say and do, not for what we want to say and do.

Jesus’s mother informed Him that the hosts of the wedding were out of wine. She was not like the Israelites.  She told the servants to do whatever Jesus said to do. Her desire was to hear Him and to accept what He said to do.  He turned water into wine.

Sometimes, we pray for the Lord’s blessings on the things we set our hearts to do even if they are things we know we shouldn’t do. When we do this, it is more likely we will hear what we want to hear than to hear what He really says.

Learn to walk with and to live with the Lord more than to walk ahead of Him and to live with Him as a guest in your life. When you do this, you will hear His voice before you hear your own.

Choose not to worry about the things you face. Whether it is something of the flesh or of the spirit. Learn to stay with the Lord. Then He will choose to fight the battles you face so that you do not have to fight on your own. Allow Him fight for you.

Learn to keep your eyes focused on the Lord more than on your problems. You will come to see the things you face the way He sees what you face. When your eyes are on Him, His eyes will be on the things you face.

Learn to listen for what you ought to say and not for what you want to say. Have nothing that you want to do that is greater than what you ought to do.  When you choose to live by your ought to, you will learn to hear Him before you hear yourself. You will hear what He says about what you want to do.

We live in a world that seemingly wants to be sympathetic to all things and to all people.  To many of us this sounds like something we believe our God would want for us since we all know God is good. But we must be careful never to allow our wants to change what God’s says we ought to be and to do.

If you are going to hear what you want to hear from the Lord, you will almost never hear what you ought to hear from Him. The opinions and views we form about what we want in our flesh will almost always be contrary to the insight God’s give us about how we ought to think about our fleshly wants and desires.

Live A Delivered Life.

Your Moment at the Well

The Lord’s insight. Don’t listen to anyone who doesn’t listen to the Lord.

Luke 4:31-32: “Then He went down to Capernaum – and was teaching them – And they were astonished at His teaching, for His word was with authority”.

This is a fundamental Truth.  The things God wants us to hear we will find reason to reject.  The things of the world we want to hear God will reject. Jesus had been teaching the people many things, but He was rejected by those in His home of Nazareth.

It is said that all those in the synagogue, were filled with wrath with the things He taught.  They sought to throw Him out of the city to rid themselves of His teachings.  They rejected Jesus and they rejected His teachings.

But Jesus taught then as His word now teaches with the divine backing of God the Father. He teaches not by the authority of man; not by the certification of man; but the by the power; the will; the divine plan of God. God will never stop trying to teach us with the Word that we would reject.

The people rejected that Jesus said the Spirit of the Lord was upon Him, because He was anointed to preach the gospel to the poor.  The people didn’t want the people to have hope in anything but the things they taught.

Jesus told them He was there to heal the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives and to bring sight to the blind, and to set at liberty those who are oppressed.  The people of the synagogue rejected His words because it was counter to their words.

But to those who heard His word, they were astonished.  And we should be astonished too for God teaches of Himself, not of mathematical functions or scientific principles, but of the essence of His truth.  Therein is the authority we should behold; Jesus teaches us of the essence of who He is through His word. He doesn’t teach us about something; He teaches us of something.

We need to be careful where and from whom we receive our teaching.  Luke 4 is telling us it is in Capernaum that we can hear the Truth of the Word of God.  Is what you are being taught delivered to you from Capernaum?  Is it from someone who rambles on about worldly principles and views but they have no real authority behind them?

What the folks at Capernaum learned and what you and I can learn today is that knowledge of natural things; knowledge to run our government; our schools; our homes; all things – all authoritative knowledge comes first through He who teaches with authority.

We are Christ’s home; we are His children; we are His government; we are His all, so there is no real knowledge or authority about anything on earth apart from that found through Him. The question then for you and I is this.  Are we individually people of the city of Capernaum who are taught by Christ to live in Christ by the word of Christ on the power and divine authority on Christ can give?

Be careful that in hearing and learning from places that are not from the Lord that you don’t come to reject the Word of God for the word of man.  The Lord will always reject that which is contrary to Him.  If you listen to the foolishness of the world God will reject your knowledge and count you as one of the many unlearned and misguided by what the world wants.

Be careful who you listen to.  Make sure you accept what God says about what He says so that you are not rejected by Him for what you want Him to believe.  God is not here to have you change what He believes.  He is here to change what we believe.

Live A Delivered Life.

Your Moment at the Well

The Lord’s insight. The more of life’s pleasures you deny yourself, the more pleasure of life you can enjoy.

Mark 6:31: “And Jesus said to them, come aside by yourselves to a deserted place and rest for a while.”

Ephesians 4:22-24: “Put off, concerning your former conduct, the old man which grows corrupt according to the deceitful lusts, and be renewed in the Spirit of your mind, and that you put on the new man which was created according to God, in true righteousness and holiness.”

A few years ago, I decided to deny myself the pleasure of an ice-cold Dr Pepper.  I did this for 40 days. Now, I love Dr Peppers.  Everyone who really know me knows that. So, denying myself my favorite drink was no easy thing. After just a few days, I thought my desire to have one would kill me.

It wasn’t easy for me, but I made it through those 40 days of denial. And when I finally had another Dr Pepper, it wasn’t the same as before.  I have not gone back to the way it was before. While I still love a Dr Pepper, my favorite drink is no longer the same to me.

I’m sure many of you have had similar experiences in life. You have been able to deny yourself the pleasure of doing or of having something that you enjoyed a lot. I hope that like me, your life is not the same. I was dying to enjoy the pleasure of a Dr Pepper only to find that I could have pleasure in life without it.

Our carnal lives can never be satisfied by the pleasures of life.  The more we want the more we will want.  The more you drink, the more you will drink.  The more you eat, the more you will eat.  Our old life is never being renewed, it is always being strengthened.  There is no rest in our old life.  In our carnality we will die to keep enjoying ourselves while we live.

Jesus knows that life needs rest.  To rest, He knows that we must learn to live a renewed life daily.  He told his disciples to take a break from the work they had been doing.  They needed rest as they left the old life to have new life He offered.

Sometimes we hang onto the old persons of our carnal lives so tightly that we fail to fully put on the new life Christ has for us.  We hang onto the old so we cannot grab hold of the new.  Ephesians 4 is encouraging us to let go of our old selves and of our desires for pleasure so that we can have more of the pleasures available to us.

We must learn there is no pleasure in anger.  There is no pleasure in selfishness.  There is no pleasure in pride.  There is no pleasure in condemnation, in accusation, in having abundance, in gluttony and in many things like these.  The more we allow these pleasures, the less pleasure we will have in life.

If you are dying to enjoy life, you must stop allowing your old life to live each day.  So, learn that the greatest pleasure in life is the one you experience when you deny your old self so a new you can come to life. There is great pleasure to go from corrupt words to words of life, from hate to love, from working deceit to working what is well and good, from having much to giving much and from being unlearned to being taught by the Word of God.

When we continue to live for and to seek pleasures for our lives, nothing about our lives will change. That life will be strengthened. When we find that we are denying ourselves the pleasures of life we will know that the new life is alive and working in us daily.  Nothing changes about the old you; that old person you were yesterday wakes up every new day.

Everything changes about the new you all the time. The same you never returns tomorrow to live again.  A new you wakes up every new day when you allow that new person to live.

Pleasure in life comes to you most assuredly when you die to the pleasure of living your old life.  Are you dying to enjoy life.  Real enjoyment comes only to the new person you can be, never to the person you have always been.

Live a Delivered Life.

Your Moment at the Well

The Lord’s insight. Your faith and your belief will bring you understanding that cannot be understood.

Daniel 3:18: “But if not, let be known to you, O king, that we do not serve your gods, nor will we worship the gold image which you have set up.”

Hebrews 11:3: “By faith we understand that the worlds were framed by the Word of God, so that the things which are seen were not made of the things which are visible.”

Three Jewish men had defied an order of the king to worship the king’s god.  The penalty was death by being thrown into a hot furnace. When the king mocked them by asking who would deliver them from his hands, they did not respond to him.

They said God, Whom they served was able to deliver them, but even if He did not, they would not worship any other god. I wonder if we would choose to remain faithful even if the Lord does not answer our prayers the way we want?  We need faithful understanding even if we do not understand our circumstances.

Would you still choose to serve the Lord if He chooses not to heal you or someone you love, if He chooses not to move your mountain, if He does not restore you when you have been accused or condemned, if He seems silent and you don’t hear His voice in your life? Will you still choose to serve Him?

It is by faithful understanding that we can come to understand the impossible. Hebrews is telling us we may not understand the thing we face but our faith brings to us the understanding we need to stay strong in our belief and in our trust.

Sometimes we don’t get the things we want because the Lord wants us to understand the power of faithful understanding. Your faith doesn’t need to see what you ask for, it needs to trust and keep praying a prayer of faith so that the miracle of faith is made visible through the presence of what seems impossible.

So, stand on Lord and on His Word.  Even if your circumstances do not change, remember He promises never to leave you or to forsake you.  Do you have faith like those young men in Daniel? Will you choose to believe what He can do even if He does nothing?

After they were thrown into the furnace, the king went to see what happened to them.  He looked into the furnace and saw four figures – one of them he said – was like the Son of God. The king couldn’t understand what he saw. How could he know what the Son of God looked like?

When it is hard to see or to understand how to get through what we face, our response should be to wait for the miracle of faithful understanding. When it seems like things will overtake you, pray and keep moving ahead knowing that things may not change but that which does not change for you will not change your faith.

Trust the Lord no matter what.  Trust Him when you cannot see.  Trust Him when you are accused. Trust Him when you are weaker than the things that come at you.

Learn to stand strong in your faith.  Scripture tells us to pray always and to ask the Lord for the things we want.  Let’s make sure we do that.  But when it seems like we cannot see a way out of what we face or we won’t get the miracle we need, stand strong and wait. When the impossible seems impossible, the Lord will give you the unimaginable understanding to keep moving you on.

Lord I may not understand what is happening, but I still trust You. You are still working. You are still mightier than anything.  You are still there in my darkest moments so I will send this prayer of faith into the dark because You still see what I cannot see.  You are the second Man in the circumstances where I feel I’m all alone.

Live a Delivered Life.

Your Moment at the Well

The Lord’s insight. Knowing about the Lord is not the same as being known by the Lord.

Acts 19:2: “He said to them, did you receive the Holy Spirit when you believed? So, they said to him, we have not so much has heard whether there is a Holy Spirit.”

John 14:23: “Jesus answered and said to him, If anyone loves Me, he will keep My Word; and My Father will love him and We will come to him and make Our home with him.”

There was a time as a believer I lived just like I did before I believed. I believed what I knew about the Lord but I didn’t know how to stop living an unbelieving life. I was ignorant. I knew better, but I didn’t know how to be better. How could I become someone I didn’t know when I couldn’t stop being who I was?

The believers in the book of Acts tell Paul, how can we know if we have the Holy Spirit when we don’t know anything about the Holy Spirit?  I was like that.  I didn’t know how to not be the person I was because I didn’t know how to be someone that I wasn’t.

I imagine there are many more people like me. We have difficulty living by anything but our flesh because that is all we will allow ourselves to know. When our relationship with the Lord is built more on our knowledge of Him than on submission to Him, we are slow to understand the Power we can have to live by Him and by His Spirit.

Paul explained to the people in Acts how their belief got them into the arena to watch the game, but their obedience got them into the game so that the Holy Spirit could help them win. Many of us are like this; we can get to a place of belief, but our place of belief doesn’t take us to a place of obedience.  But now you know. We live powerless lives even with the Power of God within us.

A mature believer knows that it is better for the Lord to come into our hearts and for us to come to live out our lives in Him. That is God’s design for us.  To be one in Him rather than to be ourselves with knowledge of Him. It is in Him that we can receive understanding around the presence and the work of the Holy Spirit in our lives.

When we wake up each day and find our lives in the life of Christ, the Holy Spirit will help us to put to death more of the person we were yesterday so that more of the person we should be in Him can live today.  Now you know. Jesus is amazing! Before He was betrayed, He prayed that His disciples and all believers would become one in Christ and God. He wanted us to be unified as one just as He and God are one.

The Lord does not want us to be like the believers in Acts who knew nothing of the Holy Spirit. If you don’t feel like you are living a new life in Christ each day, you probably are not.  If you can remember more of your old life than a new life, more of your old life is probably living than it is dead.  Now you know.

Don’t allow believing to be nothing more than an intellectual understanding that Jesus is our Savior. Life with knowledge of Christ is not the same as Life where Christ has knowledge of you. Believing also means we die to an old life in ourselves as we accept a new life in Christ. To many of us we want to have a life of knowing Him; but when our belief in Him makes us give in to Him, we can have a life where He knows us.

Now you have heard; now you know; now you can let go; now you can have all that the Holy Spirit can help you to have. If you never stop living like you did, you make it difficult to live the way you can with Christ. Now you know; let your life be home to God the Father and to the Lord Jesus Christ.  Your life; Their home.

Live a Delivered Life.

Your Moment at the Well

The Lord’s insight. Never give to a man that thing which you should only give to the Lord.

Proverbs 29:25: “The fear of man brings a snare.  But whoever trusts in the Lord shall be safe.”

Psalm 27:1: “The Lord is my light and my Salvation; whom shall I fear? The Lord is the strength of my life; of whom shall I be afraid?”

I have always known but recently I came to understand even more clearly that the Lord never threatens us with harm or to do harm to us. He never says if you don’t do this for Me, I will not do this for you?  The Lord always works to make sure we find Him to be someone whom we can Trust, Believe and Love.

Man is not this way towards us. Man is often the opposite.  He uses his power and position and anything else to make sure that we fear him. Man wants our fear because it is how he controls our actions and behaviors. Sometimes our fear of man teaches us to be overly concerned with what others think about us.

This fear of man and lack of confidence and value in ourselves can trap us and lead us to become anxious, to make poor decisions, or to compromise the values the Lord wants us to live each day. Yes, this is how fearing man can become a snare to us.

The Lord wants us to know that we cannot trust what we fear. So, if we fear man, we certainly should never trust man. Man wants us to fear him not to keep us safe but to keep us fearful. Fear of man keeps man safe from those of us who live by the overwhelming strength of the Lord.

So, Proverbs 29:25 warns us about fearing man. It tells us that we should trust the Lord Who will keep us safe.  Trusting the Lord is how we overcome the fear we may have of man. When we place our trust in God instead of seeking constant approval from people, we find true safety, and freedom, and peace.

You should never give your fear to the man who wants you to be fearful of him. Man may do a lot of things that are unfair and unwarranted. Those things you will have to deal with. But the man who wants you to fear him more than to fear anything else is like the devil. You should never give to a man that type fear.  It is only to be given to the Lord.

You can never trust a man who wants your fear. Such a man only wants your fear.  Trust means you know that you can rely on someone. The man who wants your fear does not want you to rely on him; he wants you to fear relying on anyone or anything else, even yourself.

You can never be saved by the man you fear. The man you fear wants you to always feel unsafe so that you will walk the way he wants you to walk. When you fear man, he keeps you from living free from being fearful and afraid of what man can do to you.

The man who wants your fear may threaten to do many things to you; to harm you; to take your job away from you; to break up your family; to take what you value most. But hold out and do not fear him. He may harm you, but the Lord can heal you; he may take your job, but the Lord has work for you; He may break up your family, but the Lord can restore your family.

Learn to give your fear only to the Lord. The fear of the Lord is the beginning of the knowledge and wisdom you need to live a saved life with the Lord. The fear of the Lord brings you to a place where you can believe in the Lord; it brings you to a place where you can have faith in the Lord; it brings you to a place where you can trust the Lord and; it brings you to a place where you can be saved by the Lord.

Live a Delivered Life.

Your Moment at the Well

The Lord’s insight. The Lord is Fair and Just but man wants equal.

Genesis 1:27: “So God created man in His own image, in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them.”

Proverbs 22:2: “The rich and the poor have this in common; The Lord is the maker of them all.”

No, God did not make a mistake when He made man – you and me. No matter who we are; no matter our race; no matter our sex.  We are all made in the image of God Himself. God took the same things from Himself to make each of us.  He did not make any one person with anything better than any other person.

We are already equal. Genesis 1:17 reminds us of this. There is nothing about one person that makes him or her inherently better or greater than any other person. We are inherently equal. We need to learn to accept that about ourselves and about others.

But we don’t accept it. We get it wrong because in our sinful nature we look for fairness and justice and equality from one another as the basis for believing what God has done. Well, God did not make a mistake. We make the mistake because we look at what you have that we do not have to decide if things are fair and just and equal for us.

We struggle with those who have and those who have not. We call it the “haves and the have nots.” Proverbs 22 tells us we will have some who are rich and we will have some who are poor. Still, we look at the status of others and wonder why we don’t have the same things that they have.

We wonder why some people are filthy rich and some people are filthy poor. We consider this to be an indication of what is unfair and unjust and unequal. We fail to see that even with this, God is still Fair and Just and Equal in how He treats us. He wants us to be fair and just in how we treat others.

Fair and Just and Equal are Truth statements about our God and they can be Truth statements about us. We ought to remember not to throw away these Truths about ourselves because of what we see in others or because of how we are treated by others.

When we see a difference in what some people have and what others do not have, we believe there is something inherently wrong that we must correct. Then man tries to make man treat man in ways that allow for equal outcomes in life because man sees this as fair and just for everyone. But equal outcomes do not define Fair and Just.

It would be easier for us to help the poor and the needy and the less fortunate if we viewed Fair and Just and Equal the way God does more than the way we do. God sees Fair and Just and Equal as the Ways we must be because they are inherently how He made us. To the Lord, Fair and Just and Equal are not outcomes to be had as much as they are conditions of our hearts that are to be given.

We cannot rightly define Fair and Just and Equal by what we see and believe to be unfair and unjust and unequal.  That is like defining something warm by saying it lacks something cold. Warm is warm and cold is cold.

If we then are made in the image of the things that inherently make our God Who He is, lets understand this.  There is nothing unfair or unjust or unequal about God so let’s not allow ourselves to believe there is anything unfair about who we are.

Instead, lets focus on our attitudes and make sure we live with hearts that are Fair and Just towards others. This way we will be equally the same towards everyone because God is that way with each of us. Just as there was enough manna to be had each day for each person to have all they needed, there is enough of God’s good in the earth for each of us to have enough good for our lives and to still leave some for others.

You don’t have to have so much more that you keep others from having just enough for themselves. There is nothing inherently better in you or nothing inherently less in others that can justify treating anyone without fairness and justness.

Let’s learn not to be greedy to have. But if we are going to be greedy, lets make sure it is to be greedy to give and to share and to help others. Man works really hard today make men equal to one another by legislating equal outcomes for each other. There can never be equal outcomes for men, only fair and just outcomes.

What we must do is to learn to be Fair and Just towards one another just as God is Fair and Just towards each of us. And remember, equal often is not Just and not Fair to some of us. But just as God is Fair and Just to each of us, when we are Fair and Just, it is always equally right for everyone.

Live a Delivered Life.

Your Moment at the Well

The Lord’s insight. People typically act according to what they see in you.

Genesis 20:10-11: “Then Abimelech said to Abraham, what did you see in me, that you have done this thing?”

Micah 7:2: “The faithful man has perished from the earth and there is no one upright among men. They all lie in wait for blood.”

The night Jesus was betrayed by Judas, He sat at dinner with His disciples.  He told them that one of them would betray Him.  Scripture says that each of them asked “is it I?”  Am I the one who will betray You? They wanted to know what Jesus saw in them that would make Him say that.

Abimelech was a king.  Abraham had settled in Abimelech’s land.  He told Abimelech that Sarah was his sister rather than telling him she was his wife.  He did this because he feared that Abimelech would take Sarah for himself, but if he did so, he would spare Abraham’s life because he was just her brother.

Abimelech did indeed take Sarah but before he did anything wrong with her, God intervened and told him that Sarah was Abraham’s wife. So, Abimelech asked Abraham, “what did you see in me that would cause you to hide the fact that Sarah was your wife?”

Abraham saw something in Abimelech that Abimelech did not see himself.  Abraham did not see a man who feared God. That was enough for Abraham to act with great caution around this man. Abraham said he did what he did because he thought that surely the fear of God was not in the land and that the people would kill him for his wife.

Abimelech was unaware of how he was perceived.  But he also cared about how he was perceived so he asked Abraham to tell him what he saw. Many of us are like Abimelech in one way.  We are unaware about how we are perceived by others. But today, many of us do not care about what others think about us because we like ourselves just as we are more than we care about how others see us.

So, I wondered about myself. What do people see in me or what is missing in me that would cause them to act the way they do when I am around? Do they see a healthy fear of God, or do they see a prideful confidence that I have in myself?

The people in the prophet Micah’s time had this problem too. He speaks in a time when things are difficult. The time between harvesting and planting.  The time between dry land and plentiful rain. These times are the reason many of us veer off on our own to make a way for ourselves.  We do what is right and best in our own eyes.

Micah 7:2 says “the faithful man has perished from the earth and there is no one upright among men. This is what Micah saw in people and so this is how people reacted and responded to one another.

When God is removed from our lives, we no longer have the ability and awareness to know who we are and what we are capable of being and doing.  We have no mirror in which to look into our own lives and see ourselves.  And worse, we have nothing inside us to make us care about the things that might be missing in our lives.

So, I asked myself, do I look for ways to condemn and or bring my justice to my brother?  Am I ready to do evil and harm to those who I believe are against me? Do I look for others to give me more than I give them?  Am I easily persuaded to do something for personal gain?  Am I ready to get revenge against those who cross me? Do I dishonor my parents? Are my worst enemies those who are in my family?

I could go on but I can clearly see that I must be the type of person who does not just make room for the Lord to live in my life; that would be just saying what I don’t mean.  I must make sure the Lord has my life.  If I do that, then I will be aware of how I am perceived and what others see and don’t see in me.

And when I see that, then I know I have within me the ability to change my ways and my behaviors so that others are not fearful that the fear of God is not in me.

So, what about you?  Is the fear of the Lord alive and well in your life?  Look at how others respond to you.  You may see the answer there.

Live a Delivered Life.

Your Moment at the Well

The Lord’s insight. When we talk but we don’t know what we are talking about, we darken the things around us.

Isiah 55:3: “Incline your ear and come to Me. Hear and your soul shall live.”

In the book of Job, 42::3, God confronts Job because Job had spoken with conviction about things he did not understand. Job was smart enough to realize he didn’t really know what he was talking about.

Knowing this, the Lord said to Job, now prepare yourself like a man and I will question you and you shall answer Me. Job 38:3. What do you think it would be like if God said to you, prepare yourself.  I will see how much you really know and how much you really understand.

Let’s incline our ears to hear the Lord just for a moment.

Of all the people in the world at the time, God called Abraham to leave his family and his homeland and to go to the Promised Land. Abraham obeyed God and left without hesitation. Abraham didn’t understand but he obeyed and left his home with only his wife and his Lot and their servants.

In time, Abraham’s servants and Lots servants fought over the availability of sufficient feed grounds for their flocks. Abraham suggested they separate. Abraham allowed Lot to be first to choose the land he wanted.  Lot chose the lush green land around Sodom. Abraham went the other way. Why did Abraham give Lot first choice? I don’t know.

Sodom was green but full of evil. So, God destroyed Sodom. But before doing so, He allowed Lot to escape with his wife and their daughters. But only Lot and his two daughters escaped safely from Sodom. Why? I don’t know.

Lot settled on a mountain just a little way from Sodom.  His daughters tricked Lot to get them pregnant fearing they would have no children. Lot’s oldest daughter had a son.  His name was Moab.  He became father of the Moabites. They were relatives of Abraham’s Israelites.

Years later, an Israelite lady named Naomi, and her family left their homeland because of a famine. They went to the land of Moab. While in the land of Moab, Naomi’s husband and sons died.  But she had two daughters-in-law while there.  One of them was named Ruth. Ruth was a Moabite.

In time, Naomi returned to her homeland. She encouraged her daughters to stay in their homeland of Moab.  But Ruth decided she would leave her homeland and go with Naomi.  She said where Naomi went, she would go.  She would serve the God Naomi served. How come? I don’t know.

Back in Israel, Ruth met a man named Boaz. Boaz was a wealthy and righteous man. The two loved one another so they married. Boaz an Israelite and Ruth a former Moabite. They had a son whose name was Jesse. Jesse was from Bethlehem.

Jesse would go on to have seven sons.  His youngest son was named David. David became the first King of God’s choosing for His people. David was also a key ancestor of a man named Joseph who was born in Bethlehem.

Joseph lived in Nazareth and was espoused to be married to a young girl named Mary.  Mary and Joseph had to return to Bethlehem where they were born to comply with a census. While there Mary delivered a Son whose name was Jesus. Jesus was the Son of God and the Spiritual son of David.

Jesus left heaven to come to earth. He was the only Spiritual ancestor of King David. Jesus stripped Himself of all that He was so that He could become all that we needed. After He finished His work here on earth, He returned to heaven to sit at God’s right hand and to be an intercessor for you and for me.

All this was set in motion by the obedience of Abraham and by the decision Abraham and Lot made to separate from one another. Lot never returned to his homeland.  God knew that would happen.

You and I, by nature, are separated or have been separated from the home the Lord has prepared for us. We need a Spiritual place of birth like Bethlehem. We need a call to return home like Naomi.  We need a call to serve the One True God like Ruth.

We need an earthly but Spiritual ancestor like Abraham.  We need an earthly Spiritual father who loves the Lord, like David. And we still need a Savior who can make a way for us to get back home when our sinful eyes take us away like it happened with Lot.

Jesus made a way for us to return to our home with Him. He did this way long before we would ever think we needed a way back to anyplace. His knowledge of us is greater than our knowledge of ourselves.

If you think yourself to be knowledgeable, you should think again. We cannot know how things will end for us when we can’t even know how things began for us.

Thank the Lord, because with Him there is no beginning or ending only the here and the now and eternity. Quiet your talk and incline your ear – that means physically take your ear – and bend it towards the Word of God.

Hear all that He says and understand all that He means. You will be able to return to the home you didn’t know you had left for a life you didn’t know you could have. You don’t need to know very much when the Person who knows everything knows you.  Quiet yourself and learn to listen loudly to Him.

His ways are not our ways nor are our thoughts His thoughts.  Thanks be to God for that.

Live a Delivered Life.

Your Moment at the Well

The Lord’s insight. Belief and Trust. Belief confirms you; Trust transforms you.

Hebrews 11:6: “For without faith it is impossible to please Him, for he who comes to God must believe that He is.”

Proverbs 3:5-6: “Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding. In all your ways acknowledge Him and He shall direct your paths.”

Many of you may remember what the letters “WWJD” stand for – (What Would Jesus Do).  This little phrase became popular in faith circles some years ago back in the 1990’s.  Many of us may even have trinkets emboldened with WWJD letters. I am not personally a fan of such things, but we can use this one to help us see that as believers we must both believe in the Lord, and we must Trust in the Lord.

Belief and Trust are not the same.  To be saved we must first believe that the Lord is exactly Who He says He is. Any relationship with the Lord God starts with our belief in Him. This must be a convicting sense of knowledge deep down in our souls. This conviction says to us that we believe that He is, not because of anything He has done.

We must have a believing relationship because that is how we come to a saving relationship. We believe He is because He says He is. That is sufficient. But to enjoy a saving relationship with the Lord, we must come to a trusting relationship with Him.

Trust in the Lord is something we learn because we believe in the Lord. While believing says we know who He is and we believe that; trust says we place all our confidence in knowing that He can and He will do all that He says He will do.

Hebrews 11:6 reminds us that we must believe that He is God; Proverbs 3:5-6 encourages us to put our confidence in Him and not in anything else, especially ourselves.  While you can use WWJD as a reminder to try to make faith-based decisions about your life, it takes belief and trust to transform your life to a faith-based life where the things you do are simply a byproduct of who you are in Christ and Who He is in you.

So, learn not to be wise and knowledgeable in your own eyes and for your own life.  Do not use faith in the Lord to glorify your carnality. Even the devil knows about the Lord, but this doesn’t change who the devil is. Be careful not to lean to your own understanding and still remain unchanged by what you understand.

Fear the Lord and leave all the things that would make it difficult for you to believe in Him because you still believe more in yourself. Never allow yourself to confess a belief in the Lord because you believe it is fashionable to say you believe. When your belief is sure, your profession of belief will come from a new you.  It will be seen in you before it is professed by you.

It is a good thing to ask yourself WWJD in your circumstances.  This will help you learn how to think about what you face.  But perhaps more importantly, reflect on Who Would Jesus Be (WWJB) in any circumstance.  Then ask Him to help you to have the belief and the trust to be transformed from who you are to be more of who He wants you to be.

Belief gets you the relationship with the Lord that will save you.  Trust gets you the confidence in the Lord that will enrich you.  Who Would Jesus Be (WWJB) gets you the life of the Lord that can transform you.

Life a Delivered Life.