August 30, 2024
“But those who wait on the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings as eagles…” (Isaiah 40:31)
The Golden Eagle in the Mediterranean referenced in the Bible likes to build its nest at least ten thousand feet above sea level, preferably in a Craig near the top of a cliff. From that elevation the eagle can see a storm approaching while the storm is still far off.
With great patience the eagle waits until the winds of that storm reach a high velocity and engulf the eagle and its nest. The eagle then leaps fifteen feet from its nest directly into the adverse wind of that storm. This adverse wind gives the eagle the lift and aerodynamics it needs to soar over the storm.
When the prophet Isaiah exhorts the people of God to mount up with wings as eagles, he is referring to this storm strategy of the eagle. When a storm comes into our lives, our reflex response should not always be to ask God to deliver us from the storm. We should consider applying this exhortation of Isaiah. We can wait on the Lord until God shows us it is the right time. Then we can leap into the adverse winds and find in them the spiritual aerodynamics to soar over the storm.
When the Church was born at Pentecost the great miracle happened after the apostles had waited on the Lord for forty days. The apostles found miraculous spiritual aerodynamics by moving out against severe persecution, obeying the Great Commission, and making disciples for Jesus Christ.
When God permits or directs a storm into your life and mine, are we willing to wait on the Lord until God gives us the power to soar over the storm?
Dick Woodward, 29 August 2011
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Posted by Dick Woodward
August 27, 2024
“The lamp of the body is the eye. If therefore your eye is good, your whole body will be full of light. But if your eye is bad, your whole body will be full of darkness.” (Matthew 6:22)
The way we see things can be the difference between a life filled with light and happiness, and a life filled with darkness, unhappiness and depression. Jesus and the entire Word of God consistently challenge our mindsets and show us how we should see things.
Have you as a believer ever found yourself in a funk and realized that you need to have an attitude adjustment? I certainly have. I have learned there are times when an attitude adjustment can pull me out of what I label a “pit fit.” Sometimes we need to make attitude adjustments to get out of our pit fits.
There are other times when the best defense is a good offense. That is especially true when it comes to attitudes. Instead of erecting strong defensive attitude adjustments, the better part of wisdom is to put in place a strong offense of God ordained positive attitudes that will lift us above the devastating effects of “stinkin thinkin.”
In the Sermon on the Mount Jesus taught us that if we want to be part of His solution, the salt of the earth and the light of the world, we must begin by having eight attitude adjustments. In your Bible look up Chapter Five of the Gospel of Matthew and study closely what we call the eight blessed attitudes – the beatitudes of Jesus.
When you understand and apply them, they will make your life the light of the world!
Dick Woodward, 25 August 2011
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Posted by Dick Woodward
August 23, 2024
When the foundations are being destroyed, what can the righteous do?” (Psalm 11:3)
One of the words we use most often in this life is, “Why?” But I think the word we will use most in the next world will be, “Oh!” The Providence of God is like a Hebrew word, we must read it backwards. By the Providence of God, I mean the events of our lives have meaning.
Sometimes it’s like we are on the inside of a woven basket. All the threads that come up on the inside of the basket represent the way we see the things that happen to us, which seem to have no meaning or pattern at all. If we get out of that basket, on the outside we will see beautiful woven patterns.
Job is the biblical example of a man who tried to sort out, by looking inside the basket, what appeared to be the tragic meaninglessness of his life. It was not until he looked up and saw all his tragic circumstances from God’s perspective that he was moved from asking, “Why?” to exclaiming, “Oh!” (Job 35: 1-7; 40-42)
In Psalm 11:3, the Psalmist asks a question: “If the foundations be destroyed, what shall the righteous do?” One version suggests this alternate reading: “When the foundations of your life are breaking up, what is the Righteous One doing?”
My wife and I have made that question a knee jerk reaction to the events of our lives as they happen. As a result, although we’re not on the other side yet we are already saying, “Oh!” Will you confront the challenges you encounter daily with that same question?
Dick Woodward, 25 August 2012
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August 20, 2024
“But when he came to himself, he said, ‘How many of my father’s hired servants have bread enough and to spare, and I perish with hunger! I will arise and go to my father…” (Luke 16:17-18)
The dictionary defines self as “the uniqueness, the individuality of any given person, which makes them distinct from every other living person.” In all its forms “self” emphasizes the sacred individuality God intended for every human being.
Robert Lewis Stephenson wrote: “Soon or late, every person must sit down to a banquet of consequences.” In the parable of the prodigal son, the banquet of consequences the son sat down to was the slop he was feeding hogs in a hog pen. That was just about as low as a Jewish boy could sink in this life. (Luke 15:11-24)
In the hog pen the prodigal son made the decision many people make while they are living in the hog pens of this world. He decided that he was not a hog. He might look, and even smell, like a hog. He might wish he could eat the slop he was feeding the hogs. But he was not a hog. He was a son, and he did not belong there, he belonged in his father’s house. He therefore made the deliberate decision to leave the hog pen and return to his father’s house and his father’s love.
Jesus described the decision of the prodigal son this way: “when he came to himself…” He came back to his self when he decided to return to his father’s love where he could be in the process of perceiving, believing and becoming the unique person his father wanted him to be.
Dick Woodward, from A Prescription for Your Self
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Posted by Dick Woodward
August 16, 2024
“I must work the works of Him who sent Me while it is day. The night is coming when no one can work.” (John 9:4)
The Gospel of John gives us another window into the way Jesus felt about the work God wanted Him to do. According to this vision statement of Jesus He knew the reality that He had less than three years to do His work.
In 1956 the famous missionary Jim Elliot and four colleagues were speared to death by the tribal people they were trying to reach with the Gospel. Jim was a passionate follower of Jesus Christ. About four years before he died, he wrote this in his journal, “When it comes time to die, make sure all you have to do is die.”
We can’t understand how God decides the day of our death. We don’t know when our own finish line will come. But we should all live in such a way that when we come to the finish line of our lives there will be no unfinished business, no works our Heavenly Father assigned to us that we’ve left undone.
Do you have the magnificent obsession of Jesus to work the works God has assigned to you while it is day not knowing when the night is coming and you cannot work anymore? Can you accept the challenge of being like Jesus in your attitude toward the work God wants you to do?
Dick Woodward, 18 August 2009
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Posted by Dick Woodward
August 13, 2024
The Lord is my Shepherd, I shall not want…” (Psalm 23)
These are some of the most familiar words in the Bible beloved by devout people everywhere. According to this Shepherd Psalm of David, the key to the real blessings of this life and the next is a relationship with God. The green pastures, still waters, table of provision, God’s blessing of anointing oil and cup that runs over all the time are all conditioned on our relationship with God. That relationship is established in the second verse of Psalm 23 when David writes, “He makes me to lie down.”
However, the spirit in which we recall these words is often something like this: “The Lord is my Shepherd — but I have a health problem.” Or, “The Lord is my Shepherd — but I have marriage problems!” Or, “The Lord is my Shepherd — but I cannot control my children.”
When we say, “The Lord is my Shepherd — but” we are putting our “but” in the wrong place. We need to get our “but” in the right place and recall the precious promise of these words this way: “I have a health problem, BUT the Lord is my Shepherd! I have marriage problems, BUT the Lord is my Shepherd! I cannot control my children, BUT the Lord is my Shepherd!”
One way the Lord makes us lie down is to use all kinds of problems to teach us about the relationship with God which is key to all the blessings profiled in Psalm 23.
Will you let the Great Shepherd use whatever challenges you are facing to establish the deeper relationship with God David described so beautifully three thousand years ago?
Dick Woodward, 14 August 2008
Editor’s Note: This was the first Four Spiritual Secrets blog put out in the blogosphere back in 2008! The blog posting elf has fond memories of working with her Papa every week to put blogs up from that time until he passed in March of 2014. Today this blog turns 16!
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Posted by Dick Woodward
August 9, 2024
“Delight yourselves in the Lord; yes, find your joy in Him at all times.” Philippians 4:4
“Misery is optional even though pain and suffering are inevitable.” Those words were written by a man who lives with excruciating pain every day. How can misery be optional for someone in pain? How is it Paul mentions joy seventeen times in a short letter he wrote from prison?
For those who experience and express the fruit of the Holy Spirit, who have a relationship with the risen, living Christ, there is a joy that is not controlled by circumstances.
The peace Paul experienced and prescribes for you and me can be called the peace that doesn’t make sense. It is a peace that “transcends all understanding.” (Philippians 4:7) The joy of which Paul writes can be called “the happiness that doesn’t make sense.” This is true because this peace and joy are the fruit and evidence of the Holy Spirit Who lives in us. This peace and joy are not controlled by our circumstances.
What is the foundation of that peace and joy? According to Paul, that foundation is the Lord Jesus Christ. We are to delight ourselves in the Lord and find our joy in Him at all times. What is the foundation of your serenity and joy?
When Paul writes his words about joy, he directs us here to a foundation for serenity and joy that is not fragile: “Delight yourselves in the Lord; yes, find your joy in Him at all times.”
Dick Woodward, from Marketplace Disciples
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August 6, 2024
“The race is not to the swift, nor the battle to the strong, nor bread to the wise, nor riches to men of understanding, nor favor to men of skill; but time and chance happen to them all.” (Ecclesiastes 9:11)
This verse is not teaching the random chaos of life. This verse instead parallels a truth emphasized in the Bible and expressed by the word grace. The truly significant events in the life of a believer are the result of grace and not the results of self-effort. The charisma of God upon the work of your hands will make the difference between your life having eternal significance and your life’s work amounting to wood, hay and stubble in the eternal state. (1Corinthians 3:12-15; Psalm 90:17)
The writings of the Apostle Paul are filled with an emphasis upon the concept of grace. The word grace means ‘unmerited favor.’ The blessing of God upon us is not won by a positive performance or lost by a negative performance. The grace of God and the love of God are unconditional.
When you understand the meaning of the word grace which is found in the Bible from Genesis to Revelation, it follows that the race is not to the swift or strong or wise or skilled…
“For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God, not of works, lest anyone should boast. For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them.” Ephesians 2:8-10
Dick Woodward, MBC Old Testament Handbook
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Posted by Dick Woodward
August 2, 2024
“Hear me when I call, O God of my righteousness: Thou hast enlarged me when I was in distress; have mercy upon me, and hear my prayer.” (Psalm 4:1)
One of my favorite Scripture verses is the first verse of Psalm 4. David is in a wringer, and he is talking to God about it. Almost parenthetically he drops this thought, “You have enlarged me when I was in distress.” As I reflect upon my wringer years of disability and I think of the growth I have experienced while in the wringer, that little phrase says it for me. Truly God has grown me in my time of distress.
Psalm 46 is also a great psalm that applies to servants of the Lord when they are living on the edge and the whole world seems to be coming unraveled like a cheap sweater.
The opening verse could be interpreted this way, “God is my refuge and strength. God is abundantly available for help in tight places.” It can be applied devotionally to believers who live in difficult contexts. The punch line comes when the Psalmist instructs the believer in the midst of chaos to “Be still and know that I am… and that I will be.”
In Psalm 143 David cries to God, “Answer me speedily because my spirit fails. Cause me to hear Your loving kindness in the morning. Cause me to know the way in which I should walk.” I like the last part when David prays, “Revive me.” The old King James reads “quicken me.” That word, quicken, means something like “give me a touch from You that will spring to life the work of the Spirit in my heart and life.”
…Recently I heard someone say, “When saying goodbye to a fellow soldier of Jesus Christ, we should never say, “Take it easy.” We should say, “Hang tough and fight the good fight.”
Hang in there!
Dick Woodward, (1997 fax)
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Posted by Dick Woodward
July 30, 2024
“Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil; for You are with me; Your rod and Your staff, they comfort me. You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies; You anoint my head with oil; my cup runs over.” (Psalm 23:4-5)
In your dark valleys, learn to pray in this manner:
“As I enter this valley, Lord, I will not be paralyzed by fear, because I believe You are with me. Your ability to protect me and lead me through this valley is a comfort to me. I know that in the darkest and scariest part of this valley, in the middle of life-threatening danger, You will spread a table of provision for me.
I am trusting You completely to anoint me with the oil of Your personalized, attentive care. I believe you will give me mercy for my failures and the grace I need to help in my time of need. You will also pursue me with Your goodness, unconditional love and acceptance, when I wander away from Your loving care.”
Finally, thank your Good Shepherd-God that you can trust Him to lead you through this life to unbroken fellowship with Him forever in Heaven: to green pastures that never turn brown, still waters that never become disturbed, and the cup that never empties.
Offer this prayer to “the God of peace, Who brought up from the dead that great Shepherd of sheep, Who through the blood of the everlasting covenant, can make you complete in every good work to do His will, working in you that which is well pleasing in His sight, through Jesus Christ, to Whom be glory forever and ever. Amen.” (Hebrews 13:20-21)
Dick Woodward, from Psalm 23 Sheep Talk
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Posted by Dick Woodward
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