Category: Miscellaneous

Father’s Day…Please Don’t Forget Our Heavenly Father!

On By Jarrett Ray FletcherIn MiscellaneousLeave a comment

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Today people all around the country wake up to face father’s day with many different circumstances. Some wake up fatherless, and they have been so every since they could remember. Some wake up with a father who has left them, been absent, abused them, or just not cared about them. Some arise to face their first father’s day without their father, and to the people facing all these different circumstances, my heart goes out to you.

Some of us wake up to a kind, loving, father; and if that is you, make sure you tell him how much you love him. Over and over again. My father has been one of the biggest influences in my life, and I have been very blessed to have such a loving, caring, God-fearing man to lead me the first twenty years of my life. Dads like these are not the norm in our culture anymore, so if you have one, thank them and tell them you love them over 15 times today-the challenge is on! In our culture today, 43% of kids grow up fatherless. And to those without, I can’t understand how that has impacted you or how it must feel, but I want to draw the attention of both ends of the spectrum to our perfect heavenly father.

He is perfect. He created us to have perfect union and relationship with him, but it was broken by sin in the Garden of Eden. However, this did not surprise our all-knowing Father. He loved us so much that he was willing to give up his ONLY son that we may be given back the ability to have a relationship with him. He did this because he is perfectly just and holy yet completely loving and merciful. We can now be restored to an incredible love relationship with him…all because we meant enough to him that he was willing to give up the one thing that he loved the most. My friends, this Father is waiting for you!

This father’s day, make a commitment to live under his perfect fatherhood. He wants to show you what a perfect father is like. He looks down on us thinking, “You mean so much to me. I gave up my only Son and delivered him be tortured, spit on, and hung on a tree, and I had to turn my back on Him, the hardest and most painful thing that I have ever done, all so I could have a relationship with you. Please, come to me, I am the perfect Father, and I will love you and care for you, for all of your days.” If you are reading this post this morning, this is what God is saying to you! He watched his Son be brutally crucified and poured his wrath out on Jesus so that WE could have a relationship with him, free from the bonds of sin and death! He so desperately desires for you to believe in his Son and his sacrifice for your sins so that he can show you what it is like to live with a perfect father! He wants to love, care, help, provide, support, give, and simply do life with you. Its why he created you!

Some of us have great earthly fathers, and some of us don’t, but our heavenly Father is so much more loving and caring than any of the best earthly fathers could ever be! If you have a great earthly father, well, you also have access to one that is much greater than him, and if you have no earthly father, or one with some issues, you have access to a perfect heavenly Father that will love you and care for you much more than any man ever will.

So thank and love on your earthly fathers, but please, please remember your heavenly Father! No dad in all the earth could sacrifice what our heavenly father sacrificed for us! And he did it because he loves us perfectly and desperately desires to have a relationship with us. We are his passion. So pray to him today, read his Word today. Start a new relationship with him, or make the choice to go deeper into the one you already have. Earthly fathers who don’t make time to spend with their children cause their relationship to crumble, and likewise we can cause our relationship with our heavenly father to regress if we don’t make the time to spend with Him!

He delights when we come to Him, He is so passionate about us that when we cut our eyes toward Him his heart beats faster and faster. He so desperately wants to show us how great of a Father he really is as we walk with him throughout our life. Look at the picture above; This is exactly how he wants to do all of life with us, right by our side, holding our hand, comforting us and leading us! How beautiful a Father we have access to!

Spend time with him today, thanking him, telling him how much you love him and appreciate what he has done for you. Surrender to Him by asking Him to Father you!

Happy Father’s Day Everyone!

 

“You are altogether beautiful, my darling.” -God

On By Jarrett Ray FletcherIn Miscellaneous3 Comments

“You are altogether beautiful, my darling, And there is no blemish in you.” Song of Solomon 4:7

“The greatest task of the believer is to seek out and try to discover how much God loves them.” -Paul Washer

The hardest thing to believe is the way that our God loves us. He loves us with a pure and perfect love, and when he looks on us, he says, “You are altogether beautiful, my darling.” It is so hard to believe it, because our culture gives us such a shallow definition of love. But oh, this love, we have never seen anything like it! Think about it, the God who created ENTIRE UNIVERSE looks on US, and says, “You are beautiful, my darling.”

Why does he view us as beautiful? Because Christ is beautiful! We are told that any good thing we do as an unbeliever is nothing but “filthy rags” (Isaiah 64:6). Picture yourself, before you come to Christ, standing, wearing nothing but filthy, dirty rags. You see, Jesus also wears a garment, it is a cloak of perfect righteousness, and it is utterly beautiful. When we lay everything at the cross and come to Jesus to save us from our sin, he strips us of our filthy rags, and he places HIS cloak of righteousness over us, and WE are made righteous. When God looks upon us, he doesn’t see the old, wicked, rebellious sinner. He sees his Son’s cloak of righteousness, his Son’s beauty, and he regards US as beautiful.

We ought not to only say, “Christ died for us.” You see, Christ also lived for us! He stepped down from his heavenly throne and lived a perfect life, full of good works, filled with love, mercy, and grace! He lived this life so that by going to the cross and being crushed for our sin (Isaiah 53:5) God the Father’s wrath would be taken out on him, and that we, by believing in him, may be given his perfect obedience as our own. This is what the second part of the Song of Solomon verse is referring to when it says, “and there is no blemish in you.” ! How amazing is this! That when the God of the universe looks on us, he loves us and sees us as beautiful, because we have Christ’s perfect obedience and life laid over our own lives. He sees us as PERFECT! He sees no blemish in us! This is how he can love us so much and be so passionate about a relationship with us!

God pursues his children. Constantly. He loves them so much! He is always calling them, “Come, come, come” and he makes sure that they will. This is why someone who says they were saved twenty something years ago by saying a prayer but have never grown, they have not come to love God’s people, and they have never encountered God, probably are misunderstanding salvation..and have not truly been saved…because God PURSUES his children! Oh, that you would not experience a life without the Father’s love! He desperately wants you to come to him and seek him and love him! When we focus our eyes on heaven, when look to Jesus, when we pray with a pure heart, his heart beats faster and faster. That’s how much he loves us, he PASSIONATELY desires you! Our God is such a lover. Our love for him, regardless of how small it may be, is cherished by him! Paul Washer says that,”Every time that we cut our eyes to heaven, it is as if the heart of deity beats faster!” Oh, how God loves his children coming to them in prayer!

True religion is not trying to do better or doing the right thing, the real religion is, “He saved me, I want to know Him, I want to please Him, I want to love Him!” He loves us this much! This will drive the unconverted, falsely assured “Christian” to think that this gives him the license to sin, because he will simply be forgiven. Oh, how wrong he is! This truth of how much our God loves us will drive the converted, genuine Christian to say, “If he loves me this much, I want to be for him all that he wants me to be!,” which will ultimately cultivate obedience.

If you are in Christ, God really does love you this much. He sees his only begotten Son, whom he so desperately loved, every time that he looks at you. His righteousness is yours. I plead with you to come to him! This love relationship is unlike any other you will ever experience on this earth. It is so hard for us to fathom because we have never seen anything like it. Come to Him, pray to Him, seek Him, love Him, cut your eyes to heaven and make His heart beat faster! He is longing to hear from YOU!

Anxiety: Responding Biblically

On By Jarrett Ray FletcherIn Miscellaneous2 Comments

As I have experience plenty of anxiety with regards with what to do about future opportunities, jobs, ministry, I’ve decided to look back at God’s Word to see how He tells me to deal with anxiety.

Do you ever lie awake at night, worrying about a situation, or ever feel paralyzed by anxiety? Although we all (including myself) experience moments of anxiety, we don’t have to let fear control our lives. The scriptures actually teach us that we can acquire peace in the middle of these stressful circumstances.

1.) We must carefully watch our thought lives.

Philippians 4:8 says, ” Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things.”  In the last part of the next verse ends with the tagline “-and the God of peace will be with you.”

Dr. Charles Stanley says that, “anxiety is an emotion caused by fearful thoughts.” Changing our pattern of thinking generally causes anxiety to go away. When your thought life becomes negative or counterproductive, deliberately choose to set your mind on something else; something true, honorable, just, pure, lovely, commendable. For instance, you can praise the Lord and thank Him, think about your beautiful children, family, or even the opportunity to know where your next meal is coming from!But perhaps the best way is to meet God in prayer and focus on biblical truths- and the one truth we get from Philippians 4:8 promises that if we focus on our mind on the things listed, the God of peace will be with us!

2.) Set your mind on scripture

It will benefit you to remember certain promises that our Lord makes through his Word. A couple of my favorites are:

“Our heavenly Father is sovereign and in control over all situations.” (Ps. 91) and, “He lovingly provides for the needs of His children” (Matt. 6:25-34).

I had a conversation with a coworker yesterday at my place of employment about anxiety and God’s provision. He was telling me how he was wondering what God was even doing with him in his job, but he reminded himself of a promise in scripture and told me, “ I just stopped thinking about it. He promises me that I don’t have to worry about it. He’s got it!” I was able to also encourage him of the passage in Matthew 6:26, “Look at the birds of the air: they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they?“It is so true that we are much more valuable than birds, he created US to have a relationship with him, so why would he not care for us more than the birds!
Also, for a cool little side note, birds are chosen because they pretty much inhabit all areas of the earth. So Jesus uses them with the idea of, every time we see a bird, we could be reminded of his sovereign provision and promise to take care of us! I encourage you to think of this every time you see a bird this week!

3.) Turn your anxieties into prayers.

Philippians 4:6-7 tells us to let all of our requests be made known to God with an attitude of thanksgiving. Take some time at first to thank him for the things that you do have, (because you might even need to be thankful for the ability to even have the issue your dealing with!) Then place your worry on him. What works best for me is to get down on my knees and try to tell my Father everything that’s weighing heavy on me. Or, write him a letter containing your present worries. Let him know that your giving him control and transferring your anxieties to him! Again, he makes another promise in the same verse –and the peace of God, which surpasses all  understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.” (Phil. 4:7)

4.) Fulfill our responsibilities

When we fail to perform our duties, we sometimes end up with anxiety-causing situations. For example, a person who fails to maintain his car will typically end up with a vehicle that doesn’t work properly.

Those who neglect their responsibilities will face many unnecessary hardships in life. Let’s look at this biblical principle as it relates to money. In Matthew 6:25-34, Jesus promises that the Father will provide for our basic needs. But Scripture also teaches that in most cases, believers have a role to play in meeting financial commitments (2 Thess. 3:10).

  • Proverbs 10:4 tells us that “A slack hand causes poverty, but the hands of the diligent makes rich.”
  • The Apostle Paul also had an outside job for a living so that he would not be a burden on anyone, and he encourages us to do our work quietly and earn our own living.  (2 Thess. 3:7-9)

Taking responsibility doesn’t guarantee a resolution to the problem. If the situation doesn’t resolve, you can still find supernatural peace by applying the concepts in the rest of this study.

Worry can cripple us emotionally and hinder our productivity. OR it can drive us to prayer and prompt our spiritual growth. Choose to respond to worry in a way that aligns with scripture. Not only will the Lord be glorified, but you will be set free from anxiety’s paralyzing grip!

Gospel Call: “Come to me….and I will give you rest.” -Jesus

On By Jarrett Ray FletcherIn Miscellaneous4 Comments

We read Jesus’ words in Matthew 11:28, “Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.”  This is one of my favorite verses of scripture because it depicts the call to salvation, a demonstration of what saving faith looks like, and the promise of rest that Jesus intends for us to live with! So, let’s unpack it:

First, Jesus issues a command: “Come.” It’s a simple term, but can mean so much. How do we come to him? Well, we can’t come to him with the idea that he will just be the cherry on top of our lives. That’s not coming to him. We don’t just need Jesus as another component to our lives to just complete our lives, we have to come to him with the intent of making him the center of our life, laying everything down at the feet of the cross. “I am the bread of life,” Jesus declared; “he who comes to Me shall not hunger, and he who believes in Me shall never thirst” (John 6:35).

Jesus issues the command to “Come” to those who labor and are heavy laden. The Pharisee’s at the time were imposing so many religious laws, acts, and rituals on the Jew’s at the time, that if they made even a small error they were counted unrighteous and unfit for heaven. Jesus is saying, “Are you tired of working for salvation? Are you tired of worrying if you’ve done enough to get into heaven? Are you tired of trying hard to be good enough to please my Father? Good, you should be, because you can’t please him…on your own. ” If anyone at the time felt like this, they were personally encouraged by Jesus to come to him. Although the term itself is not used in the text, Jesus gives a call to repent, to turn away from the self-centered and works-centered life and come to Him. The person who is weary and heavy-laden despairs of his own ability to please God. He comes to the end of his own resources and turns to Christ. Desperation is a part of true salvation, because a person does not come to Christ as long as he has confidence in himself. To repent is to make a 180-degree turn from the burden of the old life to the restfulness of the new. If a person does this, Jesus promises them rest.

So, what is the rest that Jesus promises?

The dictionary gives several definitions of rest that remarkably parallel the spiritual rest God offers those who trust in His Son. First, the dictionary describes rest as cessation from action, motion, labor, or exertion. In a similar way, to enter God’s rest is to cease from all efforts at self-help in trying to earn salvation. Second, the dictionary defines rest as something that is fixed and settled. Similarly, to be in God’s rest is to have the wonderful assurance that our eternal destiny is secure in Jesus Christ, our Lord and Savior. If we back up to verse 11, Jesus says that there is no one on earth who is greater than John the Baptist, yet the person who is least in the kingdom of heaven is greater than he! Guys, we have such an amazing glory awaiting us in heaven. Jesus promises us that even the person who is the least in heaven, is considered much greater than the best person who lived on earth! And if we come to Jesus, he promises that this glory awaits us! At the end of our lives, if we are in the faith, we are not rewarded for what we have done, we are rewarded for what Christ has done! And how much glory and praise does He deserve!?- So much that there cannot even be a time frame on it, because it would not be enough-it has to be eternal!

Third, rest is defined as being confident and trustful. When we enter God’s rest we are given the assurance that “He who began a good work in [us] will perfect it until the day of Christ Jesus” (Philippians 1:6). Finally, the dictionary describes rest as leaning, reposing, or depending on. As children of God, we can depend with utter certainty that our heavenly Father will “supply all [our] needs according to His riches in glory in Christ Jesus” (Philippians 4:19).

My friends, you are invited to this eternal rest. Hebrews 7:25 says, “Therefore he is able to save completely those who come to God through him, because he always lives to intercede for them.”

He promises rest, and so much more. It’s up to you to go to him!