Before I was saved, at the age of 36, I might have spent Saturday night at a bar or a pub. I had a blues band, and some Saturday nights I would have been playing out at a bar. I can remember looking from the stage in the middle of a song and thinking that I was part of the reason that many of the folks were there drinking and living in such a way. I did not feel good about that. Sunday mornings would have found me at a local restaurant eating breakfast and reading the Sunday paper. But now...That has all changed! I am born again!! Glory to God!

My Saturday nights are completely different now. I like to pray for the many pastor and preacher friends who God has brought into my life. I anticipate God doing a powerful work on Sunday. I anticipate God doing a mighty work across our nation and around the world! I am thankful that I am saved and no longer the ungodly fool being the main attraction at some bar or pub..

Take time, this evening, to consider who you once were before you were saved, and that you were dead in your trespasses and sins. Take time, to praise the Lord for His mercy and grace. Take time, to pray, and ask God to bless in a mighty way the services on Sunday. 

1. Blessed are the undefiled in the way, who walk in the law of the Lord. 2. Blessed are they that keep his testimonies and that seek him with the whole heart. 3. They also do no iniquity: they walk in his ways. 4. Thou hast commanded us to keep thy precepts diligently.
5. O that my ways were directed to keep thy statutes! 6. Then shall I not be ashamed, when I have respect unto all thy commandments.
7. I will praise thee with uprightness of heart, when I shall have learned thy righteous judgments. 8. I will keep thy statutes: O forsake me not utterly. –Psalm 119:1-8

Take time to meditate over our verses and allow the Holy Spirit to illuminate God's powerful truth. A Powerful Life will be lived and it will spring from a Powerful Plan from God.

Our Potential- verse 1
His Promise- verse 2a
Our Portion- verse 2b
Our Persistence- verse 4
Our Prayer- verse 5
Our Position- verse 6
Our Praise- verse 7
Our Promise verse 8a
Our Plea- verse 8b

Glory to God!!

“Be careful for nothing, but in everything, by supplication and prayer, with thanksgiving...let your requests be made known unto God." Philippians 4:6

"That is the Divine cure for all fear, anxiety, and undue concern of soul, all of which are closely akin to doubt and unbelief.”
― E.M. Bounds

I will extol thee, my God, O king; and I will bless thy name for ever and ever." Psalm 145:1

Praise is the suture that knits us closer to our Lord.  I pray that our fire will be kindled when it comes to praising the Lord! David is emphatic when he says, “I will extol thee.”  He makes it personal as he writes, “my God.” And better yet he gives prominence to his God with the title, “O king.”  David has a desire and puts legs on his desire with the purpose to praise highly and glorify continually the one true God.

When we make our praise personal we remind ourselves of all the provision, protection and power that the Lord has provided time after time after time.  When we remember those times our testimonies will be the basis of our praise. They will be the music and words that make up the praise that we send upward to our Lord and Saviour.  We should want to bless His name always.

“For the grace of God that bringeth salvation hath appeared to all men, Teaching us that, denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly, righteously, and godly, in this present world; Looking for that blessed hope, and the glorious appearing of the great God and our Saviour Jesus Christ; Who gave himself for us, that he might redeem us from all iniquity, and purify unto himself a peculiar people, zealous of good works.”  Titus 2:11-14
 
Our gratitude towards the Lord should grow greater and greater with each passing day.  One should cultivate gratitude in their heart and then that which is cultivated in their heart will shine like a flame upon their face that no veil could ever cover.  When gratitude is cultivated in one’s heart, it will be lived out in one’s life.  Where God’s grace is found, God’s mercy is seen.  This will be our motivation to please God with the new birth we have received in Christ Jesus.  It is God’s grace that disciplines us so that we can live lives that glorify Him.

So how should we live?  We are to deny ungodliness (That which is contrary to God) and worldly lusts; which has to do with the world system, or the ways of the world.  We are called to a threefold approach from our Scripture; live soberly (restraint or self-control), righteously and godly.  We are not to be conformed to this world (Romans 12:1-2); there should be a difference that is apparent to all of those around us.  If we are just blending in we need to examine our lives and if one is saved it will not take the Holy Spirit long to convict you of your sins.  A life that has been changed is evidence of the power of God on display.

I recently read, “Salvation is not only a change in position (set free from sin), but it is also a change in attitude, appetite, ambition, and action.”  How are you living your life?  Self-examination from time to time will be a sure fire way to know where you stand.  You will either be on the world’s road or the Lord’s path.  

“And Asa cried unto the Lord his God, and said, it is nothing with thee to help, whether with many, or with them that have no power: help us, O Lord our God; for we rest on thee, and in thy name we go against this multitude.  O Lord, thou art our God; let not man prevail against thee.  So the Lord smote the Ethiopians before Asa, and before Judah; and the Ethiopians fled.”
2 Chronicles 14:11-12
 
Asa has been an encouragement to me many times over.  The accounts of his faith early on in his reign as king have lifted me when I have been weary and down in the dust of discouragement.  I believe too many believers portray a false sense of never dealing with any type of discouragement.  You may be asking yourself, “Am I to spill my heart to everyone and anyone when I am in a season of discouragement.”  I am not saying that, but what I am saying is that from time to time we need to come along side another brother or sister in Christ and encourage them with our testimony of how the Lord has worked in our lives in seasons of discouragement.  It will bless them and God will get all the glory.

Zerah the Ethiopian came against Judah with, “An host of a thousand thousand and three hundred chariots” (2 Chronicles 14:9).  A mighty, massive war machine was staring down Asa and God’s people.  The enemy may have been plenty but Asa knew Who to turn to.  This is the prayer of a man who knew who to cry to and who to rest on.  One can know victory before the battle begins.  The steps we take towards the battle can be walked in victory when we trust and rely on the Lord our God.

Who or what is staring you down at this very moment?  Small or big, it does not matter!  The same God who was mighty in the battle field on that day so many years ago has not changed.  He is still our place of rest today.