Valued.

By: Monique Smith

I was listening to the radio earlier and wanted to share with you the revelation I received from that listening session.

The radio personality shared the following story:

There was a family who had two pet guinea pigs and they thought both were boys. Lo and behold, there was one boy and a girl. The obvious happens next, they reproduced and now many guinea pigs came into existence.  The family didn’t want all the new pigs, so they took them in a cage to a local pet store and put a “FREE” sign in front of the cage. For a solid week, the man took the pigs to the pet store and no one took them. Finally, the owner of the store encouraged him to put “$1” on the sign in front of the cage. The next person that walked into the pet store, bought the pigs.

Interesting right? Here is the revelation I got from that. In life, if we don’t place value on our abilities, belongings, our dreams, or ourselves, no one will appreciate or recognize those things. No one wants anything that is valueless.  It was not until a value was placed on the pigs that someone became interested. Friends, are you placing value on things in your life? Are you selling yourself and your morals short just to be in a relationship? From this story we realize if we do that, we are doing ourselves a huge disserve and actually not attracting anyone.  Are you second-guessing your abilities? Everyone else will also. Many times we may suffer from not wanting to seem cocky or boastful in ourselves, but having a confidence and sense of pride in our abilities encourage others to do the same. Why would anyone buy your music if you didn’t promote yourself with confidence? Are you rocking your fake Jordan’s like they are fake? Walking around looking sad and tacky. Put on some nice pants and a shirt with them and be confident in your swag. Others may not even notice they are fake if you rock them with confidence.  Lastly, are there dreams or visions you don’t fully believe? Of course if you doubt those things, others will as well. How will anyone ever believe you will open your own business when you can’t even talk about the idea confidently?

Friends, lets place value on things with our names on it. Don’t belittle anything. Value yourself. Value your dreams. Value your future.

Prayer: Hey Dad! Thank you for this great day! Everything worked according to your plan today and I am thankful for that! God thank you for reminding me to value things in my life. Please help me identify and correct areas in my life that I have deemed valueless. God, I want to look at these things the way you see them, with value. However God, help me in keeping a good balance when I begin placing more value on things. Help me not become vain or boastful or “cocky” with anything in my life. I do not want to be prideful, so help me keep pride at bay. Lord, I thank you for your loving kindness that is better than life! Hug brother Jesus for me! In Jesus name, amen.

Accusations: “How you gon’ act”

By: Monique Smith

Hey friends! In my study time, I’ve been reading Daniel and I am fascinated by this book thus far. It’s really cool to read the stories we learned about as a kid, as an adult and truly understand the context! I have so many devotional ideas blubbing on the inside but I wanted to share this quick thought with you.

If we are followers of Christ, we will be accused of doing things or being involved in something where the ultimate purpose of the accusations is to see us defeated or humiliated.

Let’s look at Daniel 6. In this chapter King Darius appoints 120 leaders over the kingdom.  Over them 3 administrators were named. Of those three, Daniel was one. However, Daniel was distinguished because he had the spirit of God in him. All of the leaders were beyond jealous of Daniel. The Bible didn’t say Daniel carried himself in a arrogant way or anything, so the people were jealous for no reason.  They kept trying to find fault in his lifestyle, but could come up with nothing. So they took it a step further. The leaders went to the King and encouraged him to make a decree that anyone who prays to any god, God, or anything other than the king for 30 days would be put in the lion’s den.

Everyone knew Daniel prayed to God daily so they encouraged the decree to get Daniel killed. Long story short, they found Daniel praying, King Darius tossed him in the lion’s den, and the next day Daniel was still alive because the angel of God shut the lion’s mouth.

When the King went to check on Daniel the next day, he called out to Daniel to see if he was alive. Daniel responded “May the king live forever…. I was found innocent before God…..and did not commit a crime against you, my king”.

Daniel’s response is the focus of this devotional. The bible tells us in Colossians 4:6- “Let your conversation be always full of grace, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how to answer everyone.”  Daniel could have fussed the King out, told him “Ahhhaha! Sucka, can’t kill me!”, and said all kinds of reckless out of control things, but He chose to be Christ like and respond with grace.

So to you friends, how you gon’ act when false accusations come your way? How did Jesus act? Let’s continually be mindful of our Father and Brother’s characteristics. : )

Prayer: God, I love you! You are the apple of my eye. The only true lover of my soul. God I appreciate your presence and the favor you have over my life. God, help me, my speech, and my thoughts when I am faced with false accusations.  God I don’t understand sometimes why I am picked on or called out, but help me control my flesh and not retaliate the way I want to. I want to be more like you, each and every day. I love you and praise you. In Jesus name, Amen.

First Fruits

By: Fred Reid

      Surprisingly this one isn’t about tithes and offering! Gotcha!! Instead it’s about your responsibility and the command we have to be fruitful. The title better reads, First, Fruits! The first thing you must do is learn to be fruitful. Thus scripture the for this devotional comes from Genesis 1:28:

“And God blessed them and God said unto them Be fruitful and multiply and replenish the earth and subdue it and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the fowl of the air and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth”

      At this point God is speaking to Adam and Eve and His first command (not suggestion) is to be fruitful then multiply. Now I feel it is important to recognize that the game has changed since then in the fact that we are originally born in sin and must be saved first before this becomes our primary commandment; now back to our regularly scheduled programming already in session J.

      The sequential order of the commandment is paramount! We must be FRUTIFUL before we began to multiply; otherwise we will be passing on corruptible seeds that will only worsen with each generation and thus put us further and further away from the original plan of the seed. For instance, if an apple seed produced apples that were a little bit poisonous and people ignored that and kept replanting the seeds, the poison would increase with each germination and eventually we end up with a weapon instead of a delicious snack. Similarly, whatever you are doing that carries God’s name and thus His kingdom must be fruitful before He will allow it to multiply. Before you get the “well done my good and faithful servant” speech you have to properly take care of the few; then He will elevate you to ruler over many. That’s just simply how it works.

       What’s the contrast to this plan? If you skip over the fruitful part and just begin multiplying? There’s a scripture for that. Mark 11:12-14:

“And on the morrow when they were come from Bethany he was hungry ¹³ And seeing a fig tree afar off having leaves he came if haply he might find anything thereon and when he came to it he found nothing but leaves for the time of figs was not yet ¹⁴ And Jesus answered and said unto it, “No man eat fruit of thee hereafter forever.” And his disciples heard it.”

      So, Jesus cursed this fig tree because it was not fruitful. Notice the damage of fruitlessness, when people come looking for you to serve your purpose you are unable to; you have nothing to offer. Next, notice that it was not time YET for the figs to be produced. One of the key factors of fruitlessness is being out of season. Out of order, usually in my case, rushing. This was for/about me before I could ever tell anybody else about it. There is so much I want to do, and I’m looking for God to make a way and I get frustrated sometimes like this isn’t going the way I expected but He has shown me that I have not begun to be fruitful with what I have already. How can I be given increase; when there is no return on what I have? Instead the increase is IN me using what I currently have. There’s a scripture for that!

Matthew 25:14-30 is the story of the talents. I’ll allow you to look back over it real slow on your own time but a quick summary is, one servant was given 5 talents he invested and returned with 5 more talents (10 talents good business), another received 2 talents flipped those into 2 more (4 talents good bidness) a final servant got one talent and hid it and thus only had one talent when the ruler came back for a return (bad business, no business). These talents were given based on ability, this was the best they could handle. So we see the person that was already not able to hold/be trusted with as much talent proved it by hiding the one talent he did have! In the end his one talent was taken away and given to the one that had ten talents. Makes sense right? He’ll prolly turn that 11 into even more.

Anyways how does this relate? If you are asking God for more but still haven’t figured out how to work with what you already have to make THAT fruitful, how would you randomly make the increase He gives you fruitful? That’s not how the kingdom works. Jesus specifically says  the parable about the talents is about the kingdom of God. I don’t want anyone to feel discouraged though because there is ALWAYS ALWAYS ALWAYS hope in Christ. So, what do you do if you are the one talent having mug and you looking for more? There’s s scripture for that!

2 Kings 4:1-7. This scripture is about a woman that was behind in her finances and the tax folk were coming to take her sons, so she needed some increase for family! Elisha asked her WHAT DID SHE HAVE?! All she had was a little oil for a cake so she made it for him. As a result there was so much oil in her house that she could sell it to pay her debt. This serves as an example that whatever you DO have, find a way to give it to God and He will work it for an increase. Maybe you don’t have the job you want, but you have plenty of time on your hands, instead of spending ALL your time looking for jobs and feeling sad, find some time for God. Both praying, reading and singing, as well as helping other people around you. You will be surprised who he can connect you with and you’ll end up with a job you don’t even have to apply for. Maybe your money isn’t as swole as you would like, but you have great writing skills or organizational skills, PLANT THEM!! DON’T HIDE THEM!! Write stories for little kids, practice writing books, help organize church and community events! If you don’t use what you have God will give it to someone who will!

Over and out J