Psalm 84:1-2Notes From the Pastor's Desk #notesfromthepastorsdesk 📖Psalm 84:1-2 (ESV) How lovely is your dwelling place, O Lord of hosts! 2 My soul longs, yes, faints for the courts of the Lord; my heart and flesh sing for joy to the living God. 📘Pastor's Note: The Book of Psalms could just as easily be called the Book of Hymns, containing some of the most beautiful songs of praise to our Lord. In this psalm, the choirmaster makes a definitive statement: "How lovely is your dwelling place, O Lord of hosts!" Heaven is a wonderful aspect to contemplate. We read about the realities of what it will be like when our time concludes in this life as Christians—streets of gold, no more pain or suffering, no more tears, new glorified bodies, and no more sin. Can you imagine? As amazing as all that will be, the best aspect of heaven, by far, will be our enjoyment of being in the physical presence of God for eternity. He is what makes heaven so glorious; it wouldn't be heaven without Him. He is the One who makes our hearts and flesh cry out in songs of joy. The day we see Him face to face in His dwelling place, my mind is too small to fathom the joy we will experience. Colossians 3:2 tells us to "set our minds on the things above." Day by day, we grow closer to the time when we will be with the Living God in heaven. Until then, let's strive to set our minds and affections on heavenly things, not earthly things. Have a blessed week. Know that you have been prayed for this day. Keep striving toward the goal in Christ Jesus our Lord. God bless. 🙏I'm praying for you always. ❤️ Pastor Jamie Read the Chapter: https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Psalm%2084&version=ESV Learn more about us: www.mygpchurch.com/whoweare  Isaiah 6:4-5Notes From the Pastor's Desk #notesfromthepastorsdesk 📖Isaiah 6:4-5 (ESV) 4 And the foundations of the thresholds shook at the voice of him who called, and the house was filled with smoke. 5 And I said: “Woe is me! For I am lost; for I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips; for my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts!” 📘Pastor's Note: This was Isaiah’s conclusion when he found himself before the holy God. He immediately recognized how sinful his actions were before the perfect and just Creator. He felt doomed, exclaiming, “Woe is me!” Understanding that we have all sinned and fallen short of the glory of God is crucial in realizing our absolute need for a Savior. Like Isaiah, we have rebelled against God, and from the fall of man until today, everyone born is tainted with sin, except Jesus. So, what does this mean for us? The penalty for sin is death, and there are only two options: either we pay for it ourselves, or we need someone else to pay for it. The Bible is clear—Jesus is the only one capable of paying the price for our rebellion against the holy God. It took the holy, blameless, spotless Lamb of God to atone for man’s sin. Fortunately, when we repent and trust in Him alone, He is willing to forgive us. This is the great doctrine of substitution. He does for us what God did for Isaiah—He cleanses and reconciles us unto Himself. In Isaiah’s case, an angel with tongs carried a hot coal to touch his mouth. Similarly, God cleanses us by sending His Son to touch our hearts, making us a new creation in Christ. The salvation offered to sinful man is incredibly great, even though we are undeserving. This is unmerited grace, and it's why we can experience absolute joy in His salvation. 🙏I'm praying for you always. ❤️ Pastor Jamie Read the Chapter: https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Isaiah%206&version=ESV Learn more about us: www.mygpchurch.com/whoweare  Luke 9:57-62Notes From the Pastor's Desk #notesfromthepastorsdesk 📖Luke 9:57-62 (ESV) 57 As they were going along the road, someone said to him, “I will follow you wherever you go.” 58 And Jesus said to him, “Foxes have holes, and birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay his head.” 59 To another he said, “Follow me.” But he said, “Lord, let me first go and bury my father.” 60 And Jesus said to him, “Leave the dead to bury their own dead. But as for you, go and proclaim the kingdom of God.” 61 Yet another said, “I will follow you, Lord, but let me first say farewell to those at my home.” 62 Jesus said to him, “No one who puts his hand to the plow and looks back is fit for the kingdom of God.” 📘Pastor's Note: Counting the cost of following Jesus - The call to follow Christ is a call to die, to die to self. It's a call to pick up our cross and follow Him, to pick up an instrument of torture and follow Him. All too often, the Gospel is watered down to cheap grace or easy-believism, where it's presented as "Jesus loves you and wants you to have your best life now." Isn't that what Joel Osteen says? He suggests that God wants you to be healthy, wealthy, and prosperous, to have a mansion and an overflowing bank account, just like him. But is that what the Scriptures say? Here in Luke 9, three men approach Jesus, and it's clear that they have superficial requests. The first man says he wants to follow Him, but Jesus quickly opens his eyes to the fact that it won't be easy or comfortable. Even the Son of Man has no place to lay His head. The second man seems to have a reasonable excuse. He claims that his father isn't dead, and he wants to wait for his inheritance before following Jesus. Essentially, he's saying, "I'll follow you when I have enough money." Then the last man says, "Let me go and say farewell to my family." Initially, it seems fair, but the problem is that his family takes precedence over his commitment to Christ. Each of these men had excuses and higher priorities than following Jesus. The call to follow comes at a cost, and the question is, "Is having a relationship with Him, following Him, the most important priority in our lives?" He doesn't want a partial commitment; He desires wholehearted, total commitment at all costs. Does this challenge you? It certainly challenges me. It makes me contemplate whether my priorities are in order. Is my faith in Christ my highest priority? Am I willing to give up everything, including my comfort, security, family, and even my life, if He asks me to? 🙏I'm praying for you always. ❤️ Pastor Jamie Read the Chapter: https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Luke%209&version=ESV Learn more about us: www.mygpchurch.com/whoweare  Matthew 7:17Notes From the Pastor's Desk #notesfromthepastorsdesk 📖Matthew 7:17 (ESV) So, every healthy tree bears good fruit, but the diseased tree bears bad fruit. 📘Pastor's Note: Here, Jesus is teaching against false prophets. He’s teaching against ravenous wolves. Those who say they are believers but are not. He illustrates His point by using a good tree and a bad tree. His point is that something CANNOT produce fruit that violates their identity. A good tree will produce good fruit. A bad tree will produce bad fruit. I think where people get this wrong is that sometimes, people want to look at counterfeit fruit and claim it to be good. I’ve been looking closely at Andy Stanley, who claims to be a good tree. He thinks he is a good tree. He thinks he is producing good fruit. Unfortunately, many people are deceived in believing he is a good tree. Both he and many that follow him are deceived. Really sad. If you look closely, he is a very bad tree producing really bad fruit. He is a counterfeit, a child of Satan deceiving those that follow him. If he doesn’t repent and believe the Gospel, the Gospel that Paul preached, one day he will stand before God and be justly judged, cut off, and thrown into the lake of fire. That will happen because his true identity is that he is a bad tree. And let’s all be truthful. We were born with a sinful nature. Meaning we all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. We are bad trees by nature. Yet Jesus is willing and absolutely able to make us new! He can change us from a bad tree to a good tree. He does that at salvation. When we hear the Gospel, repent, and believe in Him alone, He changes a stone heart to a heart of flesh. He makes us a new creation in Christ, He gives us a new heart, and He transforms us from a bad tree to a good tree!! How glorious is our Savior? How deep, how wide, how vast are His ways!! Have you done this? How about those in your circle of influence? Here’s where I hope we are. That we, who were once bad trees but now are good trees, live to share the transforming, life giving, heart changing message of the Gospel with bad trees in hope that they too will have their identity forever changed in Christ Jesus our Lord! 🙏I'm praying for you always. ❤️ Pastor Jamie Read the Chapter: https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Matthew%207&version=ESV Learn more about us: www.mygpchurch.com/whoweare  |
AuthorPastor Jamie Payton 
Archives
October 2024
Categories |
