Matthew 23:12 And whosoever shall exalt himself shall be abased; and he that shall humble himself shall be exalted.
Jesus began His earthly ministry by being baptized in the Jordan river. The word Jordan in Hebrew is “Yarden” and its root is “yarad”. It literally means to descend, which would make sense being that the Jordan descends more than any river on earth.
If we truly want to walk in the fullness of the Lord, we have to follow the example that Jesus set before us. Jesus descended from Heaven, He descended from glory, was baptized in the Jordan and fulfilled the calling that the Father bestowed upon Him by being our perfect sacrifice on Calvary. Jesus totally and completely surrendered Himself to do His Father’s will.
We too must descend and surrender all that we are and all we have been given. We must truly give our lives, not for our own glory, but for His. Until we do that, we’ll never be able to see all the blessings and opportunities the Lord has prepared for us since the foundation of the world.
Let’s learn a lesson from the Yarden today. When we descend, we’ll be lifted up! We’ll see the blessings freely flow from a Heavenly source which will never run dry!
Matthew 6:4 That thine alms may be in secret: and thy Father which seeth in secret himself shall reward thee openly.
I came across this very powerful story about one of the most influential men of God in my life, D.L.Moody, in a book named A Call to Excellence by Gary Inrig.
A large group of European pastors came to one of D. L. Moody’s Northfield Bible Conferences in Massachusetts in the late 1800s. Following the European custom of the time, each guest put his shoes outside his room to be cleaned by the hall servants overnight. But of course this was America and there were no hall servants.
Walking the dormitory halls that night, Moody saw the shoes and determined not to embarrass his brothers. He mentioned the need to some ministerial students who were there, but met with only silence or pious excuses. Moody returned to the dorm, gathered up the shoes, and, alone in his room, the world’s only famous evangelist began to clean and polish the shoes. Only the unexpected arrival of a friend in the midst of the work revealed the secret.
When the foreign visitors opened their doors the next morning, their shoes were shined. They never knew by whom. Moody told no one, but his friend told a few people, and during the rest of the conference, different men volunteered to shine the shoes in secret.
Wow. I’m humbled, how about you? Many of us want to be great ministers for the Lord. We want our names and our works to be remembered. But let’s never forget the true ministry of the Lord. Not only would have Jesus shined those shoes in secret, He would have returned to wash their feet too!
Have you been asking the Lord to use you? Here you have it! Shine some one’s dingy shoes, give a gift to someone in need, love on someone hard to love — but don’t tell the world — do it in secret! You can be sure that the Lord sees these things! And He will open up more opportunities for you to do even greater things for Him! Guess what — there’s so much work to be done!
Matthew 7:9-11 Or what man is there of you, whom if his son ask bread, will he give him a stone? Or if he ask a fish, will he give him a serpent? If ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children, how much more shall your Father which is in heaven give good things to them that ask him?
Another great preacher whose writings I love to read is John R. Rice. He wrote, “I once imagined I was in Heaven, walking along with the Angel Gabriel. I said, “Gabe, what is that big building over there?”
“You’ll be disappointed,” he answered. “I don’t think you want to see it.” But I insisted, and he proceeded to show me floor after floor of beautiful gifts, all wrapped and ready to be sent.
“Gabriel, what are all of these?”
He said, I thought rather sadly, “We wrapped all these things, but people never called for them.”
There are gifts and an abundance of blessings to be received from heaven — but we need to claim them as our own! We receive not because we’ve asked not.
When we ask the Lord in humility and expectation for His goodness, He will answer! Then we’ll be better equipped to do the great things He has in store for us. There’s so much work to be done!
James 4:6b Wherefore he saith, God resisteth the proud, but giveth grace unto the humble.
Corrie Ten Boom tells this story in her book, Each New Day. “When I saw Sadhu Sundar Singh in Europe, he had completed a tour around the world. People asked him, Doesn’t it do harm, your getting so much honor?” The Sadhu’s answer was: “No. The donkey went into Jerusalem, and they put garments on the ground before him. He was not proud. He knew it was not done to honor him, but for Jesus, who was sitting on his back. When people honor me, I know it is not me, but the Lord, who does the job.”
Another wise person once said, “I believe the first test of a truly great man is his humility. I do not mean by humility, doubt of his own power, or hesitation in speaking his opinion. But really great men have a … feeling that the greatness is not in them but through them; that they could not do or be anything else than God made them.”
We too, should strive to live knowing that the greatness is through us and give God all the glory He deserves! Lord, help us! We want to empty ourselves of our desires and our agendas, and be available for all the works you want to do through us! And Lord, we want to live a life of honoring You for every work! Thank you for loving us and helping us along the way — in the Name of Jesus, Amen!
You know we love D.L. Moody around here. Well, I’ll tell you why. Simply because God used this man with only an 8th grade education to change the world for the better. Thousands have come to the Lord through his ministry and the fruit has remained much after his passing.
Some of you have heard of R.A. Torrey, an equally anointed man who worked closely with Moody and knew him well. He gave a sermon illustrating the seven reasons for Moody’s great anointing and success for the Lord and I wanted to share these with you. My wife was moved to tears of conviction when we read them last night.
1. Moody was a fully surrendered man, he held nothing back from the Lord (…they loved not their lives unto the death. — Revelation 12:11).
2. He was a man of much prayer (Pray without ceasing. — 1 Thes. 5:17).
3. He was a deep and practical student of the Bible (Study to shew thyself approved unto God… — 2 Timothy 2:15).
4. He was a humble man (Be not wise in your own conceits… — Romans 12:16).
5. He was not a lover of money (For the love of money is the root of all evil… — 1 Timothy 6:10).
6. He had a consuming passion for the salvation of the lost (Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel to every creature.
– Mark 16:15).
7. And he was endued with Power from on High (… until ye be endued with power from on high. — Luke 24:49).
If we want to bear much lasting fruit for the Lord, I think this is a surefire way to go about it. I know my heart is convicted, how about yours?
Let’s strive to look at these areas of our lives and ask the Lord to empower us to make good changes! There’s so much work to be done!!
Increase
Decrease