"Where your treasure is, there your heart will be also" - Matt. 6:21

Hope you are doing Bible study!  I just love our church's ladies Bible study, but when it's over I quickly start one on my own...it's the only way I know to grow in my faith.  I just finished Jennifer Rothschild's INVISIBLE: How You Feel is Not Who You Are. It's a chapter book but filled with Scriptures to study.

Much of her focus is on those things in our lives that we go to for satisfaction that never seem to satisfy.  She calls them "idoltrinkets".  They might be food, people, things, appearance and anything else we make more important than God.  It was very convicting and I guess you can guess that mine might be "treasures on earth" (from our pillow today!) that really aren't treasures at all.  They don't satisfy (for longer than a few seconds anyway)  - why I do I give them power to do something only God can do?  We become enslaved to whatever our minds long for.

Colossians 3:2 says:

"Set your affection on things above,

not on things on the earth".

The word for "set" is phroneo and it means to "direct one's mind to a thing, to seek or strive for".  Our mind is to be directed toward God.  Jennifer says:

When He is our treasure, our hearts will be

drawn toward Him, honoring Him.  When we keep our

minds on ourselves...we become our own

treasure and use our idoltrinkets only to

enrich ourselves.

John Piper says it this way:  "God is most glorified in us when we are most satisfied in Him."  What are you finding satisfaction in these days?  I'll have to spend some time thinking on that one.

For further study:  Jonah 2:8, Psalm 119:37, Proverbs 4:23, Isaiah 44:9, Matthew 16:26, Luke 18:22, 2 Cor. 10:5, 1 Timothy 6:7, Titus 2:12, Hebrews 13:5, 1 John 2:15-17.

Be blessed in your understanding of God's word.

Love,

Holly 

 

"Be strong and take heart and wait for the LORD" - Psalm 27:14

Psalm 27 reveals David's fears - fear of losing the battle, fear of losing family and friends and fear of being wrongly accused.  Tim Keller says "our fears...show us where we have really located our heart's treasure" (see next week's blog on Matt. 6:21). David recognized that in order for those fears not to rule his life, he would need to "gaze on the beauty of the Lord" (v. 4).  He knew the faithfulness of God and he chose to dwell on it.  

Lauren Daigle in "Trust in You" writes:

When You don't move the mountains I'm needing You to move;

When You don't part the waters I wish I could walk through;

When You don't give the answers as I cry out to You,

I will trust, I will trust, I will trust in You!

When you stand at a bus stop, you are confident a bus will arrive and take you where you want to go.  When we "wait for the Lord", we can be even more confident He will show up and if (and when) He shows up, He is able to guide us to where He wants us to go.  I want that! Trust, my friends, in the Only One worthy of trust.

For further study:  Deu. 30:15-16, Joshua 1:9, Psalm 31:6, Proverbs 3:5-6,  Isaiah 40:31 and 41:10, Matthew 21:22, Acts 16:31, Hebrews 13:6,, 1 John 4:18.

Be blessed in your understanding of God's Word.

Love,

Holly