Devotional Song: … GO TO THIS LINK … Please take the time to take in a You Tube video of the group Unspoken singing … Call It Grace, powerfully declaring the truth of the amazing grace which turns hearts from dead to live … and resurrects the lost to be found and transformed in Christ.
Highlight Passage: Exodus 17:11-12 [NKJV] …
8 For bodily exercise profits a little, but godliness is profitable for all things, having promise of the life that now is and of that which is to come.
… Exercising the heart with God’s grace is so much more powerful than physical exercise.
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Highlight Context – 1st Timothy 4:6-11 [NKJV] … USE THIS LINK …
… God promises Timothy, from Paul, the power which comes when the heart is transformed by God’s enlightening, enabling, empowering grace.
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Reference Passage #1 … 2nd Corinthians 12: 9 [NKJV] …
9 And He said to me [Jesus to Paul], “My grace is sufficient for you, for My strength is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore most gladly I will rather boast in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may rest upon me.
… God’s strength, through His empowering grace, is always there to cover our weakness.
Reference Passage #2 … Philippians 1: 6 [NKJV] … USE THIS LINK …
6 … being confident of this very thing, that He who has begun a good work in you will complete it until the day of Jesus Christ; …
… If we’re willing to use God’s empowering grace, He is willing - and most able - to transform our hearts into His image …
Reference Passage #3 …Hebrews 13: 5, 9 [NKJV] … USE THIS LINK …
… God’s promise to never forsake us and to let us use His grace to transform our hearts.
My Journal for Today: … Our Daily Bread author, David Roper, used a very human illustration to teach about the application of God’s grace to our hearts. He wrote: The neighborhood fitness center where I have worked out for years closed down last month, and I had to join a new gym. The former place was a warm, friendly facility, patronized by those who liked to socialize while they worked out. We hardly ever broke a sweat. The new gym is a hard-core facility filled with serious men and women, earnestly invested in building better bodies. I watch these people strain and toil. Their bodies look strong, but I wonder if their hearts are being strengthened with grace.
The Apostle Paul, when he was mentoring the young church minister in Ephesus, … Timothy, wondered much the same thing about his protege. And he wanted to make sure that Timothy had experienced all the young pastor could in/thru his relationship with Christ. So, in the highlight passage above, we read Paul exhorting Timothy (and all Christians alike) to utilize the power of God’s grace when we use it to exercise our hearts in the disciplines of the faith and with the power of God’s Spirit.
As anyone with me here today hears the group, Unspoken, singing their song linked above and we think of being disciplined in the physical disciplines of cardio-exercise, … we need to be reminded that thought that is important, using God’s grace to energize our hearts in Christ is SO MUCH MORE IMPORTANT. So, let’s ask ourselves how we’re using the disciplines of the faith in accord with the power of God’s Spirit to build up and reshape our hearts in Christ.
Personally, that’s why you find me here every day, digging into God’s word and letting the truth from God’s Spirit give me His power in/thru Christ. And I’m glad you’re here working out with me.
My Prayer Today: O, Heavenly Father, … Strengthen my heart, dear Lord, with your empowering grace. Amen
Blogger Note: Everyday during this year, my daily devotional blogs are influenced by the reading and study of the online devotional blog entitled Our Daily Bread, distributed online via email by RBC Ministries. If you GO TO THIS LINK on the date of my blog, you can read/study the ODB blogs; or you can subscribe to the blog via email at that site.
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