Keys Of Heaven

“Rejoice always, pray without ceasing,  give thanks in all circumstances; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you (1 Thessalonians 5:16-18).”

There is no set of circumstances that does not require prayer. Whether we are distressed, at our wits end, crushed, stressed, happy, sad, in good health or bad, it is always the right time to pray. But prayer is more than just offering up a quick thank you for what God has done for us, and more than asking for a new job, house, car, or health for our kids or spouse. Prayer is to be an intimate part of our daily lives where we seek God not for what He can do for us, but for what He has already done; for our very lives; for Jesus Christ’s work on the Cross; for waking up every morning drawing a new breath; and for His tender mercies, which are new every day. We are to pray in all circumstances, at all times, without ceasing.

But how do we get to the point where prayer is natural and comes without effort? There is one main idea, and that is to know Jesus Christ as our personal Savior. Until we have made that decision, our prayers are fleeting and without meaning. We have to understand the person of Jesus Christ, who He is and what He’s done for us before we can fully understand the intimacy of prayer. We have to first accept Christ as our Savior, ask Him to forgive our sins and to live in our hearts; when that prayer is finished, we are forgiven immediately and the Holy Spirit is given to us as our guide to show us the way to walk. But that doesn’t mean we don’t have to study the Bible, go to church, and learn as much as we can. Salvation is an ongoing process that requires us to put effort into our Christian walk so that we grow and mature in the Word of God. One way we grow closer to God is by learning His Word, committing verses to memory, and knowing where to turn to in the Bible when we need words of encouragement.

“For the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and of spirit, of joints and of marrow, and discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart (Hebrews 4:12).”

Praying according to the Word of God is essential to a successful prayer life. “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God (John 1:1).” When Jesus spoke, He quoted Scripture. When He was tempted in the desert, He quoted Scripture in response to everything the devil offered Him. When He spoke in the Temple, He quoted Scripture. Even though He was God incarnate, and He could call down the angels from Heaven, Jesus quoted Scripture. When Jesus prayed, He addressed God as “Father” and thanked Him for all circumstances. When Jesus was crucified, He did not ask God to get even or to punish those who had beaten him and hung Him on the Cross. Instead, He asked God to forgive them. Jesus was never selfish in His prayer life. Everything He asked God for was to benefit mankind, which includes you and me.

^“In Him you also, when you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation, and believed in Him, were sealed with the promised Holy Spirit, who is the guarantee of our inheritance until we acquire possession of it to the praise of His glory. For this reason, because I have heard of your faith in the Lord Jesus and your love toward all the saints, I do not cease to give thanks for you, remembering you in my prayers (Ephesians 1:13-16).”

(Excerpt from Keys Of Heaven by Marie McGaha ©2018; Coming from Dancing With Bear Publishing, Fall 2018)

Read 2 Chronicles 26-30

When God Hears Me

“We know that God does not listen to sinners, but if anyone is a worshiper of God and does his will, God listens to him.”
~John 9:31

While researching today’s topic, I ran across a post by a young lady who read this verse and said she was now “scared” because everything she had read about God was that He loves us, so if this verse is true, she didn’t know what would happen to her soul when she died. Honestly, I kind of chuckled over the post but as I began to think about her words, it occurred to me that she’s really confused over who God is, what He’s all about and why Jesus came to earth. Many years ago, someone told me of a vision (attributed to Rick Joyner, however, I can’t confirm) about prayers being arrows shot toward Heaven. The prayers of the saints (those who know Jesus as their Savior) were collected by an angel and put into his quiver, but those prayed by sinners where deflected by the angel’s shield and sent hurling into space. That analogy has stuck with me all this time, and it illustrates the verse in John.  God hears our prayers when we 1) have accepted Christ as our Savior 2) pray with right motives 3) pray according to His will 4) our prayers line up with Scripture.

“You desire and do not have, so you murder. You covet and cannot obtain, so you fight and quarrel. You do not have, because you do not ask. You ask and do not receive, because you ask wrongly, to spend it on your passions. You adulterous people! Do you not know that friendship with the world is enmity with God? Therefore, whoever wishes to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God (James 4:2-4).”

It’s been my experience that enemies don’t want to do things for you. In fact, enemies don’t want you involved in their lives in any way at all. When we choose to live in the world, with all it’s corruption, we are telling God that we choose to be His enemies. Yet, when things go wrong, we still want God to fix it for us, or we want to blame Him. You can’t ride two horses with one saddle, folks. You either choose the world and all its lusts, or you choose God and all His blessings. You can’t have it both ways. When you choose an action, you are also choosing the consequences. Follow the ways of this world, you go to hell. Follow Jesus Christ and you reap His many blessings, including Heaven.

“So put away all malice and all deceit and hypocrisy and envy and all slander. Like newborn infants, long for the pure spiritual milk, that by it you may grow up into salvation—if indeed you have tasted that the Lord is good.  As you come to him, a living stone rejected by men but in the sight of God chosen and precious, you yourselves like living stones are being built up as a spiritual house, to be a holy priesthood, to offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ (1 Peter 2:1-5).”

1) Accept Christ as your Savior
2) Pray with right motives
3) Pray according to God’s will
4) Align your heart with Scripture, the heart of God

When people try to walk the fence between this world and a life with Christ, they are going to fall, and usually, it’s on the side of the world. We have to make choices in life every single day, and that includes life and death, Heaven or hell, Jesus or satan. When you choose the world, you are choosing death, hell, and satan. God loves us, He is always waiting on us to choose Him, but until we do, our prayers will not be answered.

Read 2 Chronicles 16-20
Weekend Reading 2 Chronicles 21-25

©2018 Marie McGaha

Old Cars

“For thus says the High and Lofty One Who inhabits eternity, whose name is Holy: ‘I dwell in the high and holy place, with him who has a contrite and humble spirit, to revive the spirit of the humble, and to revive the heart of the contrite ones.’”

~Psalm 57:15

I love old cars. There’s just something about the rounded fenders, bulky bodies, roomy interiors that appeals to me. Unlike today’s cars that are all so generic you can’t tell one model from another. My favorite car is a 1957 Chevy. I often see old cars sitting in yards or lots, they’re rusted out with flat tires and oxidized paint. They look terrible and it makes me sad because I know what they looked like when they came off the assembly line. But every now and then, I’ll see one on blocks in someone’s driveway that’s being restored, and it gives me a thrill to know that car is going to be shiny and beautiful again. We’re kind of like those old cars—no matter how we exercise or eat right, we still age and our bodies break down. We’re really just a bunch of old Chevy’s in the junkyard of life. But we have an advantage, we don’t have to sit and rust, we can be recycled into someone shiny and new too.

There’s a lot of stress and pressure in today’s world, and it’s easy to feel like a generic model that looks, dresses, and acts like every other model around us. Striving to be noticed can be a lot of unnecessary work when our goal is to impress someone like a boss or someone else that we feel has a higher station in life than we do. On every level, the world says we have to be better than someone else, we have to earn more, have more, be more, do more, and if we don’t, there’s something wrong with us and we’re not worth noticing. We even get caught up with that idea in our own heads, setting goals that we can’t attain and then beat ourselves up because we can’t. It causes discourse in every area of life and leads to a myriad of health problems like high blood pressure, but it also leads to mental health problems like depression and suicide. A recent report states that 13% of the population ages 12 and over is taking antidepressants, and 68% of those have taken the drugs for ten years or longer. However, that number is small compared to the 94% of the population who report having stress related health problems.

^“Come to Me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take My yoke upon you, and learn from Me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For My yoke is easy, and My burden is light (Matthew 11:28-30).”

Yokes aren’t used much these days but in ancient times, they were heavy wooden implements that were used to team up oxen for heavy work, like plowing, pulling wagons, and other work that was too much for a human being. Stress and worry are a yoke that is too much for humans to bear. We all need rest, not just physical rest but mental rest. When we get mentally weary, we begin to lose hope and that’s when depression sets in. It can come from doing too much, worrying too much, berating ourselves for not achieving what we think we should, from taking the words of others to heart, and from having unrealistic expectations. But Jesus says if we come to Him, He will give us that rest. First, we must come to Him. That means we accept who He is as being absolute truth. Second, we take His yoke upon us, or we exchange yokes. Ours is heavy and wearisome, His is light and easy. Third, we learn from Him. Exchanging our knowledge of this life for His knowledge is a burden-lifting, stress-reducing, spirit-elevating event that leaves us feeling freer than we ever have before. Jesus can take any old jalopy and make it brand new again!

“Peace I leave with you; My peace I give to you. Not as the world gives do I give to you. Let not your hearts be troubled, neither let them be afraid (John 14:27).”

Read 2 Chronicles 11-15 

©2018 Marie McGaha

Crossing Lines

“If then you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. Set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on earth. For you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God. When Christ who is your life appears, then you also will appear with Him in glory.”

~Colossians 3:1-4

I was thinking about lines the other day while driving down the road on the big truck with my husband. Our entire lives are dictated by lines—lines on the roads we drive, lines at the business we patronize, lines we can see and those we can’t. “Girl, you’ve crossed the line this time,” was my dad’s favorite saying. When I was younger, that always confused me because I had no idea what line he was talking about. However, as I got older, I crossed so many lines that if they were visible, the path behind me would look like some artist went crazy! 

However, for the past 30+ years, I’ve walked a relatively straight line, doing what I’m supposed to do and being the kind of woman that makes God proud. Don’t get me wrong, I still cross lines that perhaps other people don’t approve of, and I say things that tend to shock people, but I’m a plain-spoken person. I don’t mince words or say things just to make people feel better. And mostly, I do not care what people think about me; I am not in this world to please people. I am here to please God by serving others, which I sincerely try to do every single day. Do I feel as if I do that every day? Absolutely not. But I get up every morning and start over again because my hope lies within Jesus Christ, not within my own capabilities.

“Put to death therefore what is earthly in you: sexual immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire, and covetousness, which is idolatry. On account of these the wrath of God is coming. In these you too once walked, when you were living in them. But now you must put them all away: anger, wrath, malice, slander, and obscene talk from your mouth. Do not lie to one another, seeing that you have put off the old self with its practices and have put on the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge after the image of its Creator.  Here there is not Greek and Jew, circumcised and uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave, free; but Christ is all, and in all (Colossians 3:5-11).”

“In these too you once walked…” We all walk in evil ways until we come to the knowledge of who Christ is and what He can do to change our lives, and then we put off “the old self,” which is our sinful ways, and “put on the new self,” which is Christ in us. It doesn’t seem possible at times that Christ could possibly love us even in our sins and want us to be part of His heavenly Kingdom. When we know how wrong our lives are, how wrong our thinking is, how wrong our hearts are, it seems impossible that life can change into something wonderful and worthwhile.

I think about Christ on the Cross and the moment everything went dark for three hours (Mark 15:33). That was the moment Father God turned away. That was the moment Christ knew what it was like to be a sinner because every sin that could ever be committed was fully on Him. Christ, the perfect, sinless Lamb of God, knew exactly what it was like to cross every line we could ever imagine, and some we can’t. God cannot look on sin, and because His Son was covered in our filth, He looked away and darkness fell. That’s what sin is—pure darkness. It covers our hearts and minds and prevents us from seeing that which is pure light.

Imagine life as a two-lane road, with a broken white line down the middle. Anyone who’s ever driven a car knows that a solid line is one you can’t cross to pass other cars, you have to wait for the broken line. Our lives are one big line too, and we choose which lane we’re going to travel in. Sin is the solid line that keeps us in one lane but when we are broken and come to the knowledge that sin is killing us, it’s then that we can cross that line into the arms of Jesus Christ.

^“Put on then, as God's chosen ones, holy and beloved, compassionate hearts, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience, bearing with one another and, if one has a complaint against another, forgiving each other; as the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive. And above all these, put on love, which binds everything together in perfect harmony. And let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, to which indeed you were called in one body. And be thankful. Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly, teaching and admonishing one another in all wisdom, singing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, with thankfulness in your hearts to God. And whatever you do, in word or deed, do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through Him (Colossians 3:12-17).”

Read 2 Chronicles 6-10

© 2018 Marie McGaha

Rich Man vs. Poor Man

“But Abraham said, ‘Child, remember that you in your lifetime received your good things, and Lazarus in like manner bad things; but now he is comforted here, and you are in anguish.”

~Luke 16:25

Luke 16:19-31 tells the story of “a certain” rich man, and Lazarus, a poor man who both died. The rich man had a life of luxury, while Lazarus suffered his entire life with some sort of disease that made him unable to work and had to beg for food. They both died and verse 22 says that Lazarus was carried away by angels, while the rich man was buried and tormented in Hades. Lazarus, on the other hand, was comforted by Abraham. The rich man could see that Lazarus and Abraham had quite a different afterlife than he did, but no matter how he tried to bargain, the rich man could not cross over to Abraham. He could not change his fate. He finally tried to convince Abraham to allow Lazarus to be raised from the dead in order to tell the rich man’s five brothers what awaited them in death but that wasn’t allowed either. “He said to him, ‘If they do not hear Moses and the Prophets, neither will they be convinced if someone should rise from the dead (v. 31).’”

Although wealth does not preclude one from going to Heaven, and poverty does not guarantee Heaven for anyone; I was struck by verse 31 for one reason, someone did rise from the dead—Jesus Christ. He was seen by hundreds of people and walked the earth for 40 days after He rose from the dead, yet people still refuse to believe the Bible as truth for their lives, both then and now. We have the evidence of Creation all around us. We have the Word of God, we have churches everywhere, and TV and radio stations full of gospel broadcasts, yet people continue to scoff at the idea Jesus Christ can change their lives and eternal destiny.

“For since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities—His eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that people are without excuse (Romans 1:20).”

We are without excuse when it comes to salvation and eternity. We have all the evidence necessary to know and understand who God is and what He did on the Cross through the body of Jesus Christ. We make the choice for Heaven or hell every day by choosing whether we will follow Christ or go our own way. For many of us, we were absolutely convinced that our way was not working, and we had only one choice, choose Jesus or die. For others, perhaps the choice is more difficult because they do have money that allows for their bad behavior, allows them to get out of whatever trouble they find, and allows them to go on through life as if their behavior has no real consequences. It does seem that way when we read the news about celebrities or politicians getting away with things that a normal person would be in prison for.

“Do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy and where thieves break in and steal, but lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also (Matthew 6:19-21).”

Our hearts are our moral compass. Whatever direction it’s pointed to is where our lives follow, and it’s sad to think that while Creation praises the work of God’s hand, His greatest Creation – us – continues to deny Him.

“He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation. For by Him all things were created, in Heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities—all things were created through Him and for Him. And He is before all things, and in Him all things hold together. And He is the head of the body, the church. He is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, that in everything He might be preeminent. For in Him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell, and through Him to reconcile to Himself all things, whether on earth or in Heaven, making peace by the blood of His cross (Colossians 1:15-20).”

Read 2 Chronicles 1-5

©2018 Marie McGaha

Memorial Day

“For one will scarcely die for a righteous person—though perhaps for a good person one would dare even to die— but God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.”

~Romans 5:7-8

I have been absent this past week because I went with my husband, who is a truck driver. We don’t get to spend a lot of time together, so I am always grateful for the times we do, and especially when I get to ride along with him; and now we are enjoying a great, albeit, busy, Memorial Day weekend together. However, I thought of the above verse and was prompted to post today despite the sunshine calling to me.

We live in the greatest country in the world because of the men and women who have given their lives to ensure our freedom. My own family history in America goes back to Captain John Files who fought, and died, in the American Revolution, along with his sons. Perhaps that is why I am such a huge American history buff. I am very proud of my family history and all the family members that includes my dad, brothers, youngest son, countless cousins, and grandparents, who have served in the different branches of the service. Freedom has never been free, it was bought with the blood of patriots who laid down their lives so that this country will remain the land of the free. While most of us will never know the sounds of battle or the horror of war, we can take a moment to be thankful for those who have taken that burden upon themselves, and be grateful that such men and women exist.

Remember those who gave their lives and pray for those who continue to serve.

God bless our military.

God bless America.

The Law of the Lord

“The law of the Lord is perfect, reviving the soul; the testimony of the Lord is sure, making wise the simple; the precepts of the Lord are right, rejoicing the heart; the commandment of the Lord is pure, enlightening the eyes; the fear of the Lord is clean, enduring forever; the rules of the Lord are true, and righteous altogether. More to be desired are they than gold, even much fine gold; sweeter also than honey and drippings of the honeycomb. Moreover, by them is your servant warned; in keeping them there is great reward.”

~ Psalm 19:7-11

I love these verses because of the way they separate God’s laws from the laws we currently have. The law of the Lord is perfect, sure, right, pure, clean, enduring, true, and righteous. I don’t think I would describe any of the laws we have right now by any of those words. While I don’t find it difficult to follow laws, after all, most are common sense and keep us from danger, but I do find there are way too many laws, and most are redundant. I don’t think I would describe any of our laws today as pure, clean or righteous, and I wouldn’t say they are desired more than gold or are they sweeter than honey. That’s the difference between God’s laws and man’s laws. Man’s laws are designed to be followed under penalty of fines or imprisonment, God’s laws are designed to be followed out of love and for blessings. However, I see the reasoning and necessity of man’s laws, and until everyone is under the subjection of Jesus Christ, those laws will continue to be a necessity.

“For this is the love of God, that we keep His commandments. And His commandments are not burdensome. For everyone who has been born of God overcomes the world. And this is the victory that has overcome the world—our faith (1 John 5:3-4).”

We don’t obey God because of fear of penalty but out of love for what He has done for us. Those of us who lived a life of sin, who have been on the wrong side of man’s law, know that following the Lord is easy in comparison. When we accept Christ as our Savior, His laws are written on our hearts and put into our minds by the Holy Spirit (Hebrews 10:16). We don’t have to try to obey, we don’t have to try and be “good”. We are brought into a life lived out of love and joy because we know where we were, and where we were headed, before we knew the love and peace of Christ. If you are having a hard time keeping up with the laws of man, give your life and heart over to the Lord, His burden is light and easy to bear (Matthew 11:30).

“For the kingdom of God is not a matter of eating and drinking but of righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit. Whoever thus serves Christ is acceptable to God and approved by men (Romans 14:17-18).”

Read 2 Kings 21-23

Weekend Reading 2 Kings 24-25

©2018 Marie McGaha