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Praise Thursday

Unconditional Love is the Only Option & A Leader’s Stress Test

Today Todd and I got the spring semester off to a great start with Praise Thursdays!

Here are our devotionals from “Time with God for Fathers” by Jack Countryman for today:

Unconditional Love is the Only Option

“In this same way, husbands ought to love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself.” – Ephesians 5:28

“Fathers, do not provoke your children to anger by the way you treat them. Rather, bring them up with the discipline and instruction that comes from the Lord.” – Ephesians 6:4 

The Lord speaks directly to husbands and fathers about the love and conduct that is so important to both roles. When you choose to love your wife as you love yourself, the consideration you give her will deeply affect your relationship. You, In turn, will receive the respect every man wants from his wife. Similarly, When you showed the same unconditional love for your children that the father extends to you, your children will learn to honor you. The atmosphere of unconditional love is contagious, and the security it builds within the home for your wife and your children will reap great rewards.

A Father’s Stress Test

“Search me, O God, and know my heart; try me, and know my anxieties”. – Psalms 139:23

There will be times in a father’s life when the stress of work, health, family, and friends will test your resolve. Do not make the mistake of thinking you can handle everything by yourself. You are not called to walk through this life alone. The Bible reminds you, “I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me ” (Philippians 4:13). Allow Christ to strengthen you. Rest in his word, “Casting all your cares upon Him, for He cares for you” (1 Peter 5:7). Seek the Lord, and let the holy spirit guide you in every stressful situation.

If you want to see more of what WNZR is up too, check our website! 

– Hannah and Todd
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Perspectives on the Golden Rule and finances

Today we get back to our leadership devotionals from the book, Time With God For Fathers, by Jack Countryman.  We have some good reminders for leaders as we start the New Year!

#1 The Golden Rule for Leaders
Luke 6:31
“Do to others as you would have them do to you.”

Sometimes people twist the Golden Rule this way: “Do unto others before they do it unto you.” Our selfish desires to have our own way in life can create a wall between us and God.

The Lord encourages us to love our enemies, do good, and lend, hoping for nothing in return and our reward will be great. That’s Jesus speaking in Luke 6:35.

The attitude with which we embrace life will determine the leader that we become! God knows us from the inside out. Let the chief desire of our hearts be to please Him; and by doing so, the way that we walk and talk will help others see the love of Christ through us. Living to please God changes everything.

#2 Money Isn’t Everything
Proverbs 16:16
“How much better to get wisdom than gold, to get insight rather than silver!”

The love of money touches everyone in life. We often spend most of our working hours trying to get more. The more we get…well…maybe the more we want.

We can sometimes gain an appetite for material possessions we do not necessarily need. 1st Timothy 6: 9 says, “Those who want to get rich fall into temptation and a trap and into many foolish and harmful desires that plunge people into ruin and destruction.”

The Bible cautions and even condemns the desire to get rich; not because money is a sin, but because money makes a terrible master. People whose primary goal is to get rich end up serving money; and therefore, cannot serve God.

Your leadership perspective about money with your family, friends and co-workers will make a difference!

Thanks for listening!
– Joe and Todd

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Joseph’s example

Matthew 1:18-25 (NIV)

18 This is how the birth of Jesus the Messiah came about[a]: His mother Mary was pledged to be married to Joseph, but before they came together, she was found to be pregnant through the Holy Spirit. 19 Because Joseph her husband was faithful to the law, and yet[b] did not want to expose her to public disgrace, he had in mind to divorce her quietly.

20 But after he had considered this, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream and said, “Joseph son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary home as your wife, because what is conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. 21 She will give birth to a son, and you are to give him the name Jesus,[c] because he will save his people from their sins.”

22 All this took place to fulfill what the Lord had said through the prophet: 23 “The virgin will conceive and give birth to a son, and they will call him Immanuel” (which means “God with us”).

24 When Joseph woke up, he did what the angel of the Lord had commanded him and took Mary home as his wife. 25 But he did not consummate their marriage until she gave birth to a son. And he gave him the name Jesus.

Matthew 2:13-15 (NIV)

13 When they had gone, an angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream. “Get up,” he said, “take the child and his mother and escape to Egypt. Stay there until I tell you, for Herod is going to search for the child to kill him.”

14 So he got up, took the child and his mother during the night and left for Egypt, 15 where he stayed until the death of Herod. And so was fulfilled what the Lord had said through the prophet: “Out of Egypt I called my son.”

In both of these passages, we learn about Joseph’s character, specifically his obedience. Upon receiving a command from God concerning taking Mary as his wife… and then later taking the child out of danger…he obeyed.

These short passages communicate a lot about Joseph. He receives a command and he obeys. No debating. No delaying. Just immediate and complete obedience. Would Joseph’s obedience bring hardship? Probably. And danger? No doubt. But still, he obeyed. And so must we when we commit to listening to God and following his commands.

Joseph was obedient, but he was also a loyal man. When he made his decision to wed Mary, he knew he would face public ridicule. After all, how could he explain the situation? And who would believe the story anyway? But Joseph was willing to face the critics. If people condemned Mary, they would have to condemn him as well.

Think about this, too: Joseph was also careful to take Mary with him when he went to Bethlehem to register and pay his taxes. He could have gone alone. Her presence wasn’t required. But, Joseph knew that if he left her behind, he would not be able to protect her from further ridicule.

Obedience and loyalty was a way of life for Joseph. So, what can we learn from these passages?  We can start by asking ourselves some questions:

Am I caring and sensitive? Do I only look out for myself, or do I have concern about the needs of others?

Am I obedient? Do I seek after the things of God?

Am I loyal? Do I stick by my family and friends during the tough times? Even maybe to suffer ridicule for their sake?

Do I look out for those who are weaker than I am?  Do I have a positive moral code?

Learning to do these things will take work.  But Joseph gives us a great example. We can only do this through asking God every day for wisdom and for strength.

Thanks for listening!
– Joe and Todd

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Praise Thursday – God with Us!

The word Immanuel means, as we learn in Matthew 1:23, “God with us.”  The coming of the Christ child fulfilled what Isaiah wrote in chapter 7, verse 14: “the virgin will conceive and give birth to a son, and will call him Immanuel.”

In his book Hidden Christmas, Pastor Timothy Keller shares that for centuries, the Jewish religious leaders and scholars had known that prophecy, but did not think that it should be taken literally. They thought it was simply predicting the coming or arrival of some great leader through whose work, God would be present with his people.

However, Matthew writes that this promise is greater than anyone imagined!  It did not come true figuratively, but literally. Jesus Christ is “God with us” because the human life in Mary’s womb was a miracle performed by God himself.  Then Jesus, with his life, his claims and his resurrection, convinced his closest followers that he was not just a prophet telling them how to find God, but God himself coming to find us.

Keller writes that this claim, that Jesus is God, gives us the greatest possible hope.  Why?  Because it means this world is not all that there is…it means that there is life and love after death and it means that evil and suffering will one day end.

And it is not just hope for the world, but hope for you and me personally. A God who was only holy would have not come to us in Jesus.  He would have just demanded that we pull ourselves together and be moral and holy enough to be worthy of relationship with him. But our God is fully holy and fully human – so he doesn’t send someone else – he comes himself!  Jesus is one of us – and that should give us all hope!

So what is the purpose of “God with us?” What does “with him” mean? Pastor Keller writes that the purpose of the incarnation is that we would have relationship with him. In Jesus, the unapproachable God of the Old Testament becomes a human being who can be known and loved. Through faith, we can know this love.

This is a complete shift from the Old Testament. Think about this: anytime anyone drew near to God in the Old Testament, it was terrifying! God appears to Abraham as a smoking furnace; to Israel as a pillar of fire; to Job, as a hurricane or tornado. When Moses asks to see the face of God in Exodus 33, he was told what?  That it would kill him…that he could only get close to God’s back.  When Moses came down off the mountain in Exodus 34, his face was SO BRIGHT with radiance that the people could not look at him!

So Pastor Keller asks this: can you imagine if Moses were alive today and heard the message of Christmas? What would he say?  How would he react? What if Moses heard John 1:14 “the Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us – we have seen his glory, the glory of the one and only Son?”

Keller thinks Moses would say, “Do you know what this means? This is the very thing I was denied! Through Jesus, you can meet God. You can know him personally and without terror.  Do you realize what’s going on? Where’s your joy?  Where’s your amazement? This should be the driving force of your life!”

And why did God show up this time in the form of a baby instead of fire? Because this time He has come not to bring judgment but to bear it; to take away the barrier between humanity and God. Jesus is God with us!

Thanks for listening!
– Joe and Todd

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Praise Thursday: Matthew 1 – The Genealogy of Jesus

The New Testament begins in Matthew 1 with what’s called ” the genealogy of Jesus the Messiah.” Have you ever wondered why?

Matthew’s gospel doesn’t begin with the Nativity itself… The star, the shepherds in the manger. Instead, It begins with a long list of ancestry. And let’s be honest – how many times have we skipped through this?

In his book, Hidden Christmas, Pastor Timothy Keller gives us perspective on why Matthew started the story of Jesus this way. He reminds us that Christmas is not just about a birth, it is about a coming.

The birth of the Son of God into the world is a gospel, a good news, an announcements that says, you don’t have to save yourself – God has come to save you. Of course, Christmas is just the beginning of the story of how God came to save us. Jesus will have to go to the Cross. But you begin with Christ by reading this report about what has happened in history. Matthew tells here that this story is no fairy tale – Jesus is real!

Matthew doesn’t start his book with “Once Upon a Time.” That is the way fairy tales or legendary fantasy stories begin. Matthew is grounding who Jesus Christ is and what he does in history with the genealogy. Keller reminds us in Matthew 1, we learn that Jesus is not a metaphor – he is real. This all happened!

In this genealogy at the beginning of the New Testament, what else is Matthew saying? Pastor Keller writes that the list of Jesus’ genealogy is also a type of resume. In those times, your family, pedigree, and clan made up your resume. Therefore, this list is really saying, “This is who Jesus is.”

Matthew’s genealogy is shockingly different from the other ones of his time. First, there are five women in the list. Three of them. Tamar, Rahab, and Ruth are Gentiles. The Jews would have considered them unclean. In fact, Tamar was a prostitute. He also refers to “Uriah’s wife,”  who you may know as Bathsheba. These names recall some of the most difficult stories is in the Old Testament. Yet, they are in Jesus’s genealogy. Why?

But wait, in verse 6 we have the name King David. So, we might think “now there is somebody we want in out genealogy!” David, after all, was the boy who killed Goliath, favored by Saul, anointed as king, and the man who conquers Jerusalem.  David also was a flawed man, who arranged the killing of his friend Uriah and whose son Solomon was the result of an affair with Bathsheba. Yet out of that deeply flawed man, the Messiah came.  These people are all acknowledged in Matthew 1 as the ancestors of Jesus.

 So what does that mean? Tim Keller asks us to think about it this way :

 It means that people who are excluded by culture, society and even by the laws God can be brought into Jesus’s family. If you repent and believe in him, the grace of Jesus covers your sin and unites you with him.

Moreover, with King David, it means even the powerful and great are still in need of the grace of Christ. It is not what you have done; it is what Christ has done for you!

God is not ashamed of us. We are all in his family.

Copy of Mystery Monday xmas

Congratulations to Becky from Fredericktown who won the Jordan Feliz “The River” CD and Amy from Mount Vernon who won a Rend Collective CD called “Good News”. If you want to know more about the WNZR Christmas Gift Exchange click HERE.

The Food For the Hungry broadcast is this Saturday!  If you want to find out more information or get involved click HERE! 

Thanks for checking out the blog!

-Hannah and Todd

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Praise Thursday: Strive for excellence in serving God’s purpose & What to do when you don’t know what to do.

Today Joe and I had the chance to not only share some incredible devotionals we also had a chance to talk to Todd who is on his way, along with 6 of our students and Marcy, to CMB University! We would deeply appreciate prayers for safe travels and a good time for those students and for those of us who are holding down the fort!

Strive for excellence in serving God’s purpose

2 Chronicles 31: 21 – “ In everything that he undertook in the service of God’s temple and in obedience to the law and the commands, he sought his God and worked wholeheartedly. And so he prospered.” 

Excellence in our spiritual lives begins with a true devotion to God. That changes you from the inside out. When the heart changes and pleasing God becomes a priority, your behavior will also change. And despite what the world tells you, obedience to the Lord brings more pleasure than sin does. When you seek the Lord with all of your heart you will find him, and the natural result is joyful and earnest obedience to his will. That obedience will bring you God’s blessing and the peace that passes all understanding.

 

What to do when you don’t know what to do

Micah 6:8 – ” He has shown you, O mortal, what is good. And what does the Lord require of you? To act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God.” 

Run to the word when you don’t know what to do. Seek his direction for anything and everything. As Christians, we are called to be different from the world in the way we live and the way we do business. There should be a clear difference in the way we raise our kids. our marriages should testify to the love of Christ and those outside the church should be powerfully attracted to the unity and love they see in you and your family. As a Believer, we have the responsibility to live in a way that others see Christ in us. As the body of Christ, we are his hands and feet, we are his Masterpiece. We also may be the only Jesus some people will ever know.

Thanks for checking out our blog!

-Hannah and Joe

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Praise Thursday: You are not the Lone Ranger and Let go of the past and live for today  

You are not the Lone Ranger  

Proverbs 22:17-19 –  Pay attention and turn your ear to the sayings of the wise;   apply your heart to what I teach,  for it is pleasing when you keep them in your heart and have all of them ready on your lips. So that your trust may be in the Lord,   I teach you today, even you. In this way, you may know the truth and take an accurate report to those who sent you.

As leaders, sometimes it is so hard to accept that we don’t know everything, and the world does not rest solely on our shoulders. God openly invites us to listen to His word and open our hearts to His knowledge. It’s been a recurring theme in this devotional that God stands ready to give you counsel. Proverbs 4:10-13 says, “Hear, my son, and receive my sayings. And the years of your life will be many. I have taught you in the way of wisdom; I have led you down the right paths. When you walk, your steps will not be hindered, And when you run, you will not stumble. Take firm hold of instruction, do not let go; Keep her, for she is your life,” We all need the Lord, no one can do it alone.

Let go of the past and live for today 

Isaiah 43:18-19 – “Forget the former things; do not dwell on the past. See, I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not perceive it? I am making a way in the wilderness and streams in the wasteland.

Bad memories belong in your garbage can. You can’t change them and stewing on them will only keep you stuck up in the past. God invites you to live for today and for every day in your future. When you have  Jesus in your heart, He promises “if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new. (2nd Corinthians 5:17). God does not care about what happened in the past. He also doesn’t really care about any material thing you can offer him. He wants your heart and he wants it gladdened and full of his love and mercy. Don’t weigh your heart down with trivial shame of the past.

Do you want to let your pastor know that you appreciate him or her? Click HERE to nominate your pastor for Clergy Appreciation Month!

 

Toby Mac’s oldest son, Truett, passed away on Wednesday morning. He was 21 years old. A rep issued a statement saying that the cause of death has not yet been determined and said that Toby canceled his concerts in Canada and is traveling back to be with his family. The rep also asked that everyone be respectful of their privacy and allow them to grieve. We will share more information as it becomes available. Please keep Toby Mac and his family in your prayers.

Thanks for checking out the blog!

-Hannah and Todd

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Praise Thursday: A leaders prayer changes everything & The God connection for leaders

A leader’s prayer changes everything

James 5:16 (NIV) –  “Therefore confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous person is powerful and effective.”

It’s often been said that prayer is like the breath of life, you can’t exist spiritually without it. It also offers a potent connection with our fellow brothers and sisters in Christ. God has designed this world in such a way that many of our needs are met only through interdependence on fellow believers and our singular dependence on God. When a leader earnestly comes to God in prayer for wisdom and direction, he will be blessed and God will be glorified.

The God connection for leaders

John 15:7-8 (NIV) –  “If you remain in me and my words remain in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be done for you. This is to my Father’s glory, that you bear much fruit, showing yourselves to be my disciples.”

The only way you can play a significant role in the kingdom of God is if you allow Him to live through you, or abide in you. It clearly says in John 15:5 that without Him you can do nothing, with him you can do anything. You can live out a godly life as an example to those you lead. You can also lead those around you how to love the Lord and each other. Jesus calls you to produce much fruit. To do that, you need only pray often and be in the word.

 

If you would like to take a guess at who is going to win the Dove Awards and maybe win in the process? Click HERE for more information!

Do you love your pastor – Then you should nominate them for Clergy Appreciation Month!  Each Friday, 5 local pastors will be honored on The Morning Thing (at approximately 7:30 am). Our morning show hosts will share their names and churches along with comments from their church family. Click HERE to nominate your pastor!

Thanks for checking out the blog!

– Hannah and Todd

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Legacy, the Big Picture and Avoiding Negativity.

Proverbs 20:7
The righteous lead blameless lives; blessed are their children after them.

Integrity- it’s a very important word. It’s helpful to describe who we are in the Lord and how our loved ones perceive us. It is a foundational element in the life we lead with our heavenly father.

The Lord calls us to do what is good and right, even when no one is looking. Now, why is that? Well, Godly living reflects His holy character in us; and in turn, glorifies Him.

By living with integrity, you give those who follow you a gift that will last a lifetime. What greater legacy could you leave than a personal record of godly living?

2nd Corinthians 4:18
18 So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen since what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal.

Sometimes we get so caught up in the day-to-day that we miss the big picture God has for our lives. God has given us the task of letting the world know about what Jesus has done for us. He made it possible for us to have an eternal life of intimacy with our heavenly father.

Our daily struggles are only temporary. We have to fight to maintain focus on the eternal. If we truly love God, then we should work every day to please him, and tell others about Him. You only have one life to live for eternity. Let it be your best life, starting now.

Here is that link to the Francis Chan Rope Illustration

 

 

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Avoid Negativity

Choosing to be happy at work means avoiding negative conversations, gossip, and unhappy people as much as possible. No matter how positively you feel, negative people have a profound impact on your psyche. Don’t let the negative nellies bring you down.

Therefore, since you have been raised with Christ, strive for the things above, where Christ is seated at the right hand of God. Set your minds on things above, not on earthly things. For you died, and your life is now hidden with Christ in God. When Christ, who is your life, appears, then you also will appear with Him in glory. – Colossians 3: 1-4

Do not be deceived: “Bad company ruins good morals.” – 1 Corinthians 15:33

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. – Philippians 4:8

If your enemy is hungry, give him food to eat, and if he is thirsty, give him water to drink. For in so doing, you will heap burning coals on his head, and the LORD will reward you. – Proverbs 25: 21 & 22

Whoever is patient has great understanding, but one who is quick-tempered displays folly.- Proverbs 14:29

Be completely humble and gentle; be patient, bearing with one another in love. -Ephesians 4:2

Thanks for listening!
– Hannah and Todd

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