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A very special good morning to you my “Walking with Jesus” friends.
Today is New Year’s Eve 2019… within a few hours all the books close on this amazing year.
I’ve just spent a few moments reviewing the statistics of “Walking with Jesus”. Today is day #245 since we began this journey on May 1, 2019. Wow!
“Walking with Jesus” was birthed in response to a request from several of you to me, that I would develop some type of daily spiritual journey, that we could walk together with Jesus. It has been our desire that each day, as we look into God’s Word, and seek to immerse ourselves into the Scripture to both understand and experience it, we will actually have an encounter with Jesus, through the power of His Holy Spirit. Has that happened for you, several times this year, through “Walking with Jesus”?
This has been far more than a simple exercise of reading a few verses and a few nice comments written by me. Oh no my friends, this has been an effort to draw all of us into an encounter with God . . .everyday!
We now have about 350 of us receiving this daily email, and in 2020 several of our friends are taking it overseas, to Christians in the Philippines, and in Africa to Liberia, and possibly Kenya and Uganda... all places where English is spoken and people just like you and me, are hungry for a ‘walk with Jesus’.
Tomorrow, the first day of 2020, I’ll share with you some of our “WWJ Vision 2020”. . .what we believe God wants to accomplish in & through “Walking with Jesus” in 2020.
OK my “Walking with Jesus” friends, let’s together open God’s Word for an encounter with Jesus, this last day of 2019.
Let’s look at a powerful Old Testament verse that seems to fit so well with New Year’s Eve. It’s found in Jeremiah 6:16. The prophet Jeremiah had the difficult task of speaking God’s disappointment, even God’s heartbreak to His people Israel. Over and over God had spoken to Israel through His prophets, calling them back to God from their idol worship, their immoral behavior, their spiritual apathy. They had repeatedly ignored God’s messengers. Now it was Jeremiah’s turn to bring God’s warning. . .
Look at Jeremiah 6:16 with me…“This is what the LORD says: ‘Stand at the crossroads and look; ask for the ancient paths, ask where the good way is and walk in it, and you will find rest for your souls...” Well that sounds like great advice, doesn’t it? Do you see this is God’s strategic invitation to His people in every generation? On days like New Year’s Eve, God invites us to stand on the threshold of a new year and look back, and ask for wisdom from the past. The price of ignoring God’s invitation may be disaster!
History is a great teacher, do you agree? There is so much to learn from our past. That’s why, since the day after Christmas, I’ve been urging you to spend some time everyday reflecting on 2019. The worst thing any of us can do is to rush forward, headlong into 2020, disregarding the experiences, the lessons of 2019.
So, what have you seen as you’ve looked back on YOUR 2019? What was God trying to teach you through your relationships, events and decisions… especially the painful times? In the difficult times, did you cry out to God asking Him to teach you His perspective on the situation? Or did you simply beg God to get you out of the pain as quickly as possible? Did you learn important lessons and have you shared them with others, especially your children & grandchildren? Wisdom unheeded, unshared, is one of the great tragedies of the human journey.
Do you see the words “ancient paths” in Jeremiah 6:16?
God asks us to look much further back than just this past year. I find many places in the Bible, God challenged His people to look back decades, even generations… and ask for wisdom from the distant past. That’s the focus of Psalm 78:1-7 and each generation teaching the next. It’s the purpose for Joshua piling up 12 big rocks on the Jordan river bank as soon as they crossed over on dry ground (Joshua 4:24), remember? And it was Joshua’s challenge at the end of his life, remember this powerful statement of his: “Choose you this day whom you will serve, as for me and my household, we will serve the LORD.” (Joshua 24:15)
It’s the reason Samuel poured oil on a stone pillar and called it “Ebenezer” declaring “Thus far the LORD has helped us” (1 Samuel 7). Now those are just a few of many, but they are why, as most of you know, I’m a stone collector… so I won’t forget what God has done, and I will share the lessons with my family.
So… as you look back, way back, as far back in your family heritage as you can look, what wisdom will guide you forward into 2020? From whom have you or will you gain that wisdom? With whom will you share that wisdom so they too can make wise choices in 2020?
Oh my friends, it’s important we pay attention to the rest of Jeremiah 6:16, and God’s tragic warning which follows: “But you said ‘We will not walk in it.’ I appointed watchmen over you and said ‘Listen to the sound of the trumpet!’ But you said, “we will not listen.” Therefore hear, O nations; observe, O witnesses, what will happen to them… I am bringing disaster on this people, the fruit of their schemes, because they have not listened to My words and have rejected My law.” (Jer. 6:17-19)
Almighty God is loving but He is also Holy and Justice. He will not be mocked by His people, without response.
Finally, God had to announce to His people through Jeremiah, that His patience was running out and He was going to actually allow a foreign army to invade and decimate His people Israel. God would remove His hand of protection and allow that invasion to serve as His punishment for Israel’s rebellion against Him! And it did happen, and my friends it was horrible... King Nebuchadnezzar and the Babylonian army invaded, and when finished, they left Jerusalem in shambles, the great Temple of God destroyed, burned to the ground, the great wall of protection surrounding Jerusalem destroyed, and thousands of Jews led off in shackles, like animals, to slavery.
You’ll find the description of this actual historical event in 2 Chronicles 36:15-20. Here is a little of it: “The LORD, the God of their fathers, sent word to them through His messengers again and again, because He had pity on His people and on His dwelling place. But they mocked God’s messengers, despised His words and scoffed at His prophets, until the wrath of the LORD was aroused against His people and there was no remedy. He brought up against them the king of the Babylonians who killed their young men with the sword in the sanctuary and spared neither young man nor young woman, old man or aged. God handed all of them over to Nebuchadnezzar…”
Most of us are parents or grandparents. We understand the pain of watching children and grandchildren disregard the wisdom and instruction offered them by the adults who love them. We understand the inner turmoil when parents and grandparents agonize over their discipline options. To do nothing in response to self-destructive rebellion is not love, it only invites future failure, pain and shame.
Perhaps in 2019 your heart was broken as you watched your children or grandchildren rejecting the wisdom you’ve learned in your life journey and you tried to offer them. Or worse, perhaps you watched them reject the spiritual help you tried to offer, as they pushed God away, refusing to respond to Jesus’ reach to them and His offer of help. God understands your pain my dear friends, and I believe the story of the Bible shows us God grieves as He considers the fruit that rejection will bear in their lives.
On this New Year’s Eve I beg all of us to spend some extended time praying for our kids and grandkids, where-ever they are geographically all around the world, and especially where-ever they are spiritually. God knows them and loves them even more than we do… He created them, and Jesus paid with His life, so they might have an abundant life relationship with God. And God won’t give up on them, He’ll keep reaching to them… let’s keep holding them up before Him.
Sadly, all of us, regardless of our political persuasion, have watched most of our elected national leaders embroiled in accusations and angry confrontation in 2019. On this New Year’s Eve 2019, what do you suppose God’s assessment of America is, my friends? Can you hear God saying these words of Jeremiah 6:16-19 to all in America who claim to be Christians?
Is it possible that while we rejoice in a year of remarkable economic bounty for America, we have drifted even further into the darkness of immoral wickedness as a society? Let’s be sure to spend some time praying for our nation and all those in positions of making the decisions which affect the moral path of our society and shape our culture.
Finally… May I invite you my “Walking with Jesus” friends to spend some time alone with Jesus, fully yielding your life to Him and His Lordship in 2020? Fully committing yourself to whatever He would like to accomplish in and through you where-ever His path for you in 2020 will lead you. May I suggest you write a prayer of commitment to Jesus this New Year’s Eve, as you look ahead to 2020, and put that piece of paper in your Bible so you’ll see it from time to time.
May I leave you with a song which has powerfully impacted my life this year? It is my commitment for 2020 and may it be yours too? “Shepherd of my Soul” by Marty Nystrom. Just sit back with your eyes closed and let this song bring you into a prayer conversation of commitment with Jesus. . .
Oh Lord Jesus I lift these my “Walking with Jesus” friends to you on this last day of 2019!
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Pastor Doug Anderson 262.441.8785
“Let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us, with our eyes fixed on Jesus…” (Heb. 12:1,2)
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