Distant Shores, and the Ripples of Miracles

Richard Forbes
Christian, Daily Devotional, Power of Christ

Do we look to Jesus for healing? Do we depend upon Him to come to us in our times of illness and to lay His healing hand upon our head? Do we wait for Him to say rise and walk, to return our eyesight, or to restore our hearing with a bold touch? Well sometimes His healing comes when we go secretly to Him, because He is more than just a healer... even in His unawares He demonstrated that He is the essence of healing itself, and all that needs to happen for this to occur is for us to be near Him. And what’s more, it goes beyond healing… it’s the power of God in Him that allows Him to feed the many, raise the dead, and turn water into wine.

Do we Lean on our own Understanding?

Richard Forbes
Christian, Daily Devotional, God’s Understanding

How do we come to understand the Word of God, and His will for us? Is it by our own intellect, and through diligent study that we are able to piece it together like a puzzle? Do we somehow find the hidden key within it that allows everything to fall into place so that we can stand back from it and marvel at our ingenuity? No, we understand with our hearts, and not our minds. Our minds barely scratch the surface, but our hearts use the keys of our spirits like a scalpel.

Our Love and Trust as Surrogate Parents

Richard Forbes
Christian, Daily Devotional, Salvation and Parenthood

Do you bless your family as a parent? Are you more than a sire, or a dame who brought forth children from the womb? There is so much involved in raising a family, and each of our children is as different as Jacob’s; each needing special handling and a special blessing from us. Not all of them are born good or easily trained, but each one needs to know the Lord, and this requires our prayers, our attention, and a unique blessing as we wait upon God to call them and lead them towards salvation. This is our calling in parenthood, and the will of God for us, but in the end we can’t actually save them ourselves.

Losing our Speech and our Hearing to be despised by the World

Richard Forbes
Christian, Daily Devotional, Humility and Love

If we are Christians, and true believers, then those in the world will hate us. They will dislike us because we are different... because we are new creations, but most of all because we are like Jesus Christ, and by that I mean “not of this world.” We know this to be the case because we hear it in our daily lives and in the conversation (prayer) between Jesus and God Himself.

Are we Royalty or Paupers as we Walk the Streets of Heaven?

Richard Forbes
Christian, Daily Devotional, Heaven

Have you ever been to heaven? Perhaps you don’t feel that you have walked its streets, but have you ever stood atop a mountain or hill and looked out over the surroundings below? Could you hear the wind and the sounds of life there? Right now, many of you are probably thinking that I have lost my mind, but others are envisioning this scene as they hear the sounds of life, and see the heavenly scene surrounding them. Can you step into heaven and capture this moment of realized faith and glory? The problem with most of us is that we don’t stop living our busy lives long enough to look around, hear the singing, smell the fragrance, and understand where we are… friends, we are in the presence of God and that is heaven!

Unanswered Prayer can it lead us to Question our Faith?

Richard Forbes
Christian, Daily Devotional, Praying in God’s Will

Jesus said that whatever we ask for in His name He will do, so why is it that we can find ourselves praying and Him not immediately responding to what we are asking? This is a common question asked about prayer, and one that causes many pastors to begin making excuses for the inaction of Jesus or silence of God. The inability to understand prayer and the fulness of the Lord’s promise based on one verse of scripture, which we often take out of context, leads to the spiritual downfall of many.

Communion; It’s more than just a taste of Wine

Richard Forbes
Christian, Daily Devotional, Communion

There is great mystery in the blood of Jesus, a newness that isn’t seen anywhere else in the Bible. The symbolism in the blood of communion is beyond rich, and gives us more than purification and forgiveness... it changes our lives completely, and cuts us off from the old life we were once living. The blood of Jesus requires that we make a choice to continue on as we have been, or to drink of it and be called out of the worldly life we have been living... made new in Him.

Is Our Faith locked behind closed Doors?

Richard Forbes
Christian, Daily Devotional, Hidden Faith

We say we love the Lord, but do we really love Him, or do we simply love studying and reading about Him? Do we really love Him or do we love talking to others about our biblical knowledge of Him? Do we really love Him, or do we just want to believe that He performs miracles in case of an emergency? Does any of this sound familiar, if so then maybe our relationship with Him might be dysfunctional in some other way. Knowing who God is isn’t faith; reciting a children’s prayer we learned a lifetime ago isn’t the prayer He expects from us. Let’s open the door of our heart to Him and love as He does.

Taking Pride in Humility... are we the Greatest of the Least?

Richard Forbes
Christian, Daily Devotional, Humility

When we look at Jesus we see a humble man, and yet at the Last Supper His disciples argued over which of them would be considered the best, or the greatest. This is an oxymoron... how can they want to be the greatest follower of a man of absolute humility? Do they desire to be the first and foremost of the least? It is human nature to want to be the best at what we do... even if it is being humble. Is humility something you struggle with? Is placing your pride and conceit under subjugation impossible? Then let’s turn again to Jesus for help.

The Call, The Table, and our Wandering Minds

Richard Forbes
Christian, Daily Devotional, Focusing on God

Sometimes, when we have been serving the LORD for a while, we find ourselves going about the things He has called us to do without keeping in mind that this is the will of the LORD. When we fall victim to this snare of familiarity, it will bring discipline upon us. Going through the motions of our calling without honoring God, and seeing the blessings He intends to bestow on us as we do His will, is placing our desires before His.

One spirit, Church, and flesh; are we really One in covenant with God?

Richard Forbes
Christian, Daily Devotional, One Church

How many churches are there within your congregation? How many groups with different mindsets, and various agendas are milling about one another, and often find themselves at loggerheads? This is what happens when we lose focus on maintaining ourselves in the image of Jesus Christ. This is what occurs when a marriage ceases to be of one flesh and reverts to two individuals.

Knowing the Fullness of God beyond the Classroom of Theology

Richard Forbes
Christian, Daily Devotional, Knowing God Intimately

What do we know about Jesus, God, and our faith? Have we read the Bible cover to cover, and memorized key scriptures? Have we taught Sunday school lessons, or preached God’s Word and the Gospel of Jesus Christ from the pulpit? Perhaps we have studied theology, spoken on the subject of Church history, or become conversant in all the councils and creeds... but does our intellectual pursuit of God bring us an inch closer to knowing Him? My real question this morning is this... “Do we know God, or do we simply know of Him?”

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