Faith isn’t knowing where you’re going, but in who you’re walking with.

A friend recently sent pictures of an island beach. The path to this beach could not be arrived at through driving a car or even riding a bike. Those kinds of roads led to places everyone could experience.

This path was muddy and rutted clay due to sporadic rain. It also wound through a tropical forest, which meant you couldn’t see the beach while walking and had exposed tree roots that ran both across and down it.

These conditions made for quite slippery and unstable footing. Falling on your backside was definitely a possible outcome.

Would you take the risk in order to experience this beautiful beach?

Faith is a risk not in walking on that obstacle filled path, but in the one telling you to take the path. Jesus calls you His friend and says He will walk with you on whatever path He has chosen for you.

Yeah, there are plenty of beautiful beaches where the path is easy; and, you can get there on your own.

Jesus, however, wants you to walk with Him where the potential to fall is greater. But while walking with Him, you will be experiencing who He is and what He can do. And He’s there to pick you up, if you fall, because He wants you to experience where He’s taking you!

That’s what faith is – choosing to walk with Jesus on the path of His choosing, known or unknown, challenging or stable. Your faith is in Him, not in you or in your abilities.

Guess what? There’s a beach out with your name it!

Faith doesn’t make life easier. It makes experiencing it possible.

In all his years of sailing, he never experienced a storm like this and was definitely scared. And if the storm wasn’t bad enough, along comes a ghost walking on the water that looks like Jesus. Peter and someone else were having a wonderful conversation in his head.

Peter, though, goes completely against conventional and cultural wisdom to get out of the boat. He was actually walking on the water…until the head noise got worse.

“I can’t do this! What was I thinking? Why did I even try? I would have been better off staying in the boat where it was ‘safe’ and known.”

As Peter starts to sink, the head noise got so loud that Peter chose to sink. “I’ve done a lot of stupid things in my life, but this tops them all. What made me think I could walk on water? I’m a failure. I’m going to die.”

Chose? It wasn’t like Peter hadn’t seen Jesus work miracles before. He saw what Jesus, who was standing right there, could do. The question was, would he have enough faith to stay on top of the water? Obviously, his faith was too small, which is what Jesus told him.

We all need more faith in and from Jesus. Lack of it is the root of all our failures when the head noise begins. You know, “I’m stupid. I can’t do this. I’ve made so many mistakes, why would God ever want me, let alone work in and through me?” And on and on it goes…if we let it.

Want to defeat it? Ask the Lord for help to stay focused on the truths He’s already given you and a faith boost to put what you know into action.

“Lord, we need more faith to choose to listen to the only voice that counts, Yours. Lord increase our faith so we can experience victory over what we are struggling with today. Let us soar through and above the challenges we’re facing today. Amen.”

Wherever you go there you are; and so is Jesus.

I woke up this past Monday with a song in my head that we sang on Sunday at our gathering of Jesus believers (aka church service).

The lyrics the Lord had going in my head was, “I am a flower quickly fading. Here today and gone tomorrow. A wave tossed in the ocean. A vapor in the wind.”

We all know this truth that people come and people go from this planet, just like the flowers – here today, gone tomorrow, which in some cases is only a few weeks.

Yet Isaiah contrasts the flower to the Word of God, which lives forever. Keep in mind that this is not only the written Word of God, but is Jesus as well (Rev. 19:13).

The Spirit was asking me, “Jesus is with you every step, but do you bring Him into your every step?” In other words, am I thinking and acting like I will last forever or do I bring the one who is from forever past to forever future into my present?

Will my choices as a flower (I love CA golden poppies) remain forever?

We can only live meaningful lives as we bring Jesus into every choice we make (see 1 Thess. 5:17). By doing so, we are living life each day, not existing to get through it. By doing so, we are using time to its fullest, not spending it wastefully.

Our thoughts, our words and our actions can leave positive eternal impressions on this planet, so long as we walk and talk with Jesus, who takes our existence and gives it eternal life.

“God does not guide those who want to run their own life.” Winkie Pratney

Psalm 7 starts with the phrase, “A shiggaion of David.” The word shiggaion has no English word equivalent. Thus, it is transliterated from Hebrew into English one letter at a time.

Therefore, what does “A shaggaion of David” mean? My best guess is this. The transliterated word comes from another Hebrew word that means to make a mistake, to stray from God through ignorance. Thus, this could read, “A mistake or sin of David.”

David goes onto to write that he was turning to God to save him from people that wanted to eat him alive. After which He pens, “O LORD my God, if I have done this and there is guilt on my hands…then let my enemy pursue and overtake me.”

David wasn’t going to play the victim card. He was asking, “Lord, did I bring this pain on by my own choices? If so, I own it. Let the consequences be what may.”

We must be honest with ourselves. Some of our challenges are brought on by our own choices, not life or someone else’s.

And the only way for the challenge to stop is to own our mistake/sin, ask God and maybe others to forgive us; and then, correct the mistake by doing what is right in the Spirit’s power.

Saying, “I’m sorry” is not enough. Fixing the problem is.

If you are going through a challenge today, ask the Lord, “Did I cause this?” If so, ask Him to give you the faith and strength to fix it.

If not, then run to the Lord as your refuge to weather the storm just as David did.

Either way, by owning it, you win.

“We do not need a church that will move with the world, but one that will move the world.” GK Chesterton

We can learn a lot about God from nature (Rom. 1:20). Take for example, the willow tree. It requires a tremendous amount of water to grow and stay healthy.

Besides growing near water, it also grows near other plants. In fact, the meaning of the Modern Hebrew word for willow is “mixture.” This hints to the fact that it needs to be attached to others.

Listen to the willows whisper: we need Jesus, the Living Water, who says we need others for us to love and become more like Him in a world who needs us to share Him with it.

There are far too many Christians who think the Church is irrelevant today to make any kind of commitment to being part of any gathering of it – small or large, building or not.

Want to move the world rather than be moved by it? One author put it this way, “Through the power of community and involvement, even someone who starts out as ordinary can become extraordinary!”

Walk in community with Jesus. Who is your community? Commit, thick and thin, and then grow with them to move the world!