Psalm 23 Are you following the leader?

Have you ever recieved a box of chocolates? The kind with all the different types and fillings? You start picking the ones you know you like then you are at the hit or miss stage, let's face it some fillings just don't go good with chocolate. Maybe it's just me! So toward the end of the box your guessing what might be a good one and sometimes you are taking the advice of someone as to which are the good ones; just to be disappointed. In life there is are lot of people giving advice and also a lot of people seeking advice. A lot of times this advice is like the advice with the box of chocolates, it's hit or miss. Psalm 23:3b " he leads me in paths of righteousness for his name's sake." You know what's so great about our God? His name and what is associated with His name. In this verse we are going to look at righteousness. That is doing right...let's break it down into 2 areas, the first with doing right and not sinning and the second as to making a right decision; more over a decision that is morally right...as compared to a decision where we benefit, and it's questionable and without honor or merit...You see it's not the outcome of the decision that is important but the motive behind the decision. Also it is not just doing the good in our actions but the why we are being good, the motivation to act good. As with both, our motivation should be our love to please our Lord... Now here's the important part. God always leads us in paths of righteousness, always. He is not a God who directs us to do evil. His leading is for good. Now let's not get caught up in when God used people to judge...or when God sends discipline on someone(s)....Remember sin has a hefty price and sometimes hefty consequences. When we are going astray, we must think who am I following? God? Myself? Satan? or the world? You see God wants to lead and He is leading, but think about it, it is so hard for us to follow. Just like playing follow the leader, we eventually want to lead. Or even playing Simon says, we eventually want to be Simon. Sometimes we need to stop, just stop and give the control back to God. Sometimes we need to stop believing the lie that certain things, questionable things are o.k. Paths of righteousness as to the super high ways of unrighteousness in this modern time. When you find yourself in a place or time when it seems questionable, just stop and think, am I following the Lord? Is there someone else leading? Or am I leading? When you are in a wrong place, for whatever reason, are you looking to be led out by the Lord? As men we tend to try to fix it or figure it out on our own; without the Lord. Let's begin to follow His lead.

Psalm 23 "He restores" five

Is something missing? Life is going good; you like your work, you have a nice family, you have a nice home, the bills are paid and there is even extra money for a lot more. But deep down there seems to be something amiss. Something is not right and you just can't explain it. Your happy, because of all that you have, but deep down there seems to be one more thing you need. You know for me that need, was there, but I didn't know what it was. Now I know what it was but, there was a time I didn't know what I needed or even what would fill that deep need and I was seeking different things to fill that need. Let me give you an example that might help us understand this. Have you ever received a gift from someone, father, mother, brother, sister...that you know they gave it because they had to? There was a friction there between you and that person. So you receive the gift but truly you are not as happy as you would have been if the friction...between you and the giver was not there or made it right before hand. You see the gift just doesn't have the meaning... You are not as appreciative as you should be. There is something amiss between the two of you, it might be you who was wronged or you might have been the one who wronged the other. Deep down you want the relationship to be restored. You want to be in a right standing with that person. Now to our text Psalm 23:3a "He restores my soul". The Lord restores my soul, that is the Lord Jesus restores my soul. Jesus is the only one who can do this. We can't do it, and yes we do try, with all types of things...But we can do only one thing. To turn to Jesus. You see that deep need is to be brought back into a right relationship with God. The relationship that we have broken; unlike the example above with you or another breaking the relationship. We must come to terms with, we broke the relationship and that God restores it through His Son Jesus Christ. That we broke it with our actions, be it bad behavior, bad thinking or not doing what we are suppose to... "All have sinned" Romans3:23a. We all have gone amiss or astray; that is away from God. So God reaches out to us, "God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish, but have eternal life. For God did not sent His Son to judge the world, but that the world might be saved through Him. He who believes in Him is not judged, he who does not believe has been judged already, because he has not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God." John3:16-18. So there we have it, it is Jesus Christ who restores, gives us life. Who forgives us our sins...1 John 1:9 " If we confess our sins, He is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness." Thank you Jesus!

Psalm 23 Fresh water

Sometimes just a large cold glass of spring water, is what is needed. Isn’t it true when working on a hot summers day. It’s refreshing! “He leads me besides still waters.” Psalm 23:2b. So last week we were in the green pastures, resting. An important part of life. But we need more than just rest, we need water; for refreshment and more. It’s a basic need we have, we can’t live without it. Now for almost all of us we really don’t have a lack of water. But that spiritual water, that flows from Jesus Christ, now here’s where some problem’s begin. As Christians we use phrases like, fill my cup, rain on me, spiritual drought…it’s true; sometimes we don’t feel God’s presence or see Him working in our life. Even when we think we are seeking Him. Have you ever read your bible and nothing, just nothing, empty words? The same with prayer, its like you were speaking… into the wind. Praise, the same emptiness. Remember, that your in the pasture, resting, you look over and there’s the shepherd. You know you can look right past Him and forget how you got there, not recognizing Him and giving credit to _____. Here’s the deal guys we do this unawares, sometimes who knows what happened. And then we go and do our own thing, even trying to find our own drink. You see it is much more than water, it’s spiritual water. A water that brings peace…that leads to eternal life, John4:13-14. Water that surpasses our understanding. The water that comes from Jesus Christ. Now are we being lead? Is it Jesus who is leading you? Isn’t it so easy to do the leading and then there we are, thirsty. So what do we do? Stop and seek Him, seeking to let Him lead us. Take the time to seek Him!

Psalms 23 The lord is My Shepherd

“The Lord is my Shepherd, I shall not want.” The last two weeks did we deal with this truth? Is the Lord your Shepherd? Are you satisfied with his provisions? You see if you are not, the next portion of the psalm will be a little bit of a struggle. You might not be able to realize that the Lord is leading you to a better place, or you may be fighting Him all the way to were He wants to bring you; jumping over to the other path…or even stopping thinking you are fine, happy…where you are now. Let’s be real here, it is not easy to allow Jesus to Shepherd. After all, don’t we have the ability to think for our selves? And sometimes we are too busy and we just go forward, side wards,…with out looking for the Shepherds guidance. But deep down have you and I let Jesus be the Shepherd? If we have, we also can say, “He makes me to lie down in green pastures.” There are several points in this statement. The first is “green pastures”. Do you believe that the Shepherd knows were the pastures are? Look it’s pastures, more than one. So as we walk here on earth, no matter where we are, what we are going through, there are pastures. Sometimes don’t we feel that they are far and few! If we trust the Shepherd, He will bring us to them and sometime when we turn around we are surprised at how close they may be. Point number 2, “He makes me to lie down”. When you get to the pasture the Lord, makes you to lie down, rest. Did you get that, rest. Oh, how we do need rest; isn’t our modern world busy? You know what’s great about His rest is that it’s in the middle of the pasture, there’s plenty of food….no worries. Even in this busy world we can have rest, knowing that God is still in control. Even when our lives seem to be upside down, we can turn to Jesus and He gives us rest. We can lay down look over, and there He is he, the Good Shepherd. Jesus says in, Matt. 11:29 “Take my yoke upon you, and learn of me, for I am meek and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your soul.” Sometimes when we think of rest, we only think of not having to work hard or no work. An easy life…no problems. You know, we need to find the rest of knowing Jesus. The peace that passes all understanding. It’s hard to rest if you have no inner peace. When you are trying to figure it out, life’s problems, on your own. Also sometimes we can think that being on vacation is a rest, going somewhere…but you know what’s so great about Jesus; He can give you rest while you are in the storm of life. His rest isn’t just a get a way. It’s rest on a daily bases, a peace and joy of being with God almighty, no matter what is going on around you or where you might be; you can find rest in Him.

Psalm 23 two

Have you ever dreamed or thought, if only I had…, if only I was some where…If I had better…? Then we end the dream with how much better we would be…. How many of you are like me and thought about all three of the above? Sometimes even when things are going well, we can find ourselves wanting more or better. Sometimes we look around seeing stuff and others; then start thinking if I had….Isn’t it true of us in varying degrees? The old saying, the pasture seems to be greener on the other side of the fence, fits all to easily. “ The Lord is my Shepherd, I shall not want.” Psalm 23:1. Last week we talked briefly about letting the Lord be the Shepherd of our lives. That a shepherd tends the sheep (flock). That word tends, means a lot more when put into practice. Last week we added guards, guides; now here is some more.. feeds, washes, sheers (clothes), heals (sickness), comforts and seeks. The bible tells us that Jesus is the “Good Shepherd”. He knows how to tend sheep very well, let’s say that He is the best. Also let’s say that He is so good at tending sheep no one else compares. Everyone else who does do some tending goes to Him for help (wisdom). Now here is the problem, we as people have wants; be it big wants or little wants. Let’s face it, sometimes we are not satisfied when our needs are met. O.K. an example, you are going out or invited out and there seems to be not the right type of food there; at that particular time you wanted such and such or you just didn’t care for what was being served. “I shall not want” has to do with things, being content with what has been provided, not to say we can’t pray for needs and wants…its that contentment when God answers, yes, no, or wait. Or when He provides something different. Now one more point, Sometimes as believers we can get frustrated with God. We become disgruntle and start looking for another shepherd, a part time shepherd lets say, to fill our wants and desires. Like the nation of Israel following God in the desert to the promise land and then all of a sudden wanting to go back to Egypt, captivity. Another shepherd; sometime it is us who want to be the shepherd of our lives, we start to take things into our own hand…and forgetting God we go our own way…Oh, that our true want is to want Him, Jesus Christ, the Son of God, to be our/my shepherd.

Psalm 23:1

“The Lord is my shepherd,”; last week we talked about who/what do you believe. The Lord, Jehovah, is He the one you believe in? Is He your God? Now all of us need to answer that question. You see this is a statement, “The Lord is my shepherd“, this is what he believes. The psalmist is not wishy washy or maybe he believes, on some days, but on other days not so much. Our God is Lord over every thing, even time…; all the time, so for us we need to recognize this and also recognize the 3 persons of God; Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Then also we can say this, the beginning of Psalm 23, “ The Lord is my shepherd”. Now there is also the word, shepherd, that we need to associate with God in this statement. What is a shepherd? One who takes care of sheep; I just said that off the top of my mind. Not to far off, a shepherd is one who tends sheep. Also has the idea of, guiding and guarding…Before we go too far let’s see the word picture (allegory) that is being revealed. That is that God is a shepherd; which makes us sheep. Now sheep need the shepherd, they are lost without Him. They tend to wander and get in all kinds of predicaments. Isn’t that true of sheep? Isn’t that true of us? So we must recognize in our own lives, deep down, we need the shepherd, we need Jesus Christ. If we really think about it we all know that we can’t do it on our own…but more than that, that people and things can’t take the place of being taken care of (tended) by God, His son Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit. So again, are you going to let Jesus be the shepherd of you? It is some times easy to say that phrase, but is it your desire, my desire to have the Lord as our Shepherd? In John 10, the parable of the good shepherd, verses 11-14 “I am the good shepherd; the good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep. He who is a hired hand and not a shepherd, who is not the owner of the sheep, sees the wolf coming and leaves the sheep and flees and the wolf snatches them and scatters them. He flees because he is a hired hand and is not concerned about the sheep. I am the good shepherd, and I know My own and My own know Me.” He is good!!!

Into Psalm 23

What I would like to do, is to start a new series on Psalm 23. Yes I did some of this a while back but it would be good to go through the whole Psalm. The first would ve an introduction if you will and then we will start the Psalm 23. What do you believe? And with that we can also ask the question, what don’t you believe? Why are those 2 questions so important? Well the first is important as to believing in truth, facts….versus not believing in truth, facts…Or secondly we could believe in things that are not true, facts.. and not to believe in the truth, fact…Sometimes it is very easy to get confused in what we believe and what we don’t believe. Sometimes we believe something, a truth, but in actuality we don’t believe all of what it means…and sometimes we want to mix the truth with non-truth to fit our own desires or reasoning. Sometimes we compromise the truth, to fit in with society…compromise in some areas is not good. In Ex.3:16 “The Lord, the God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, of Isaac, and of Jacob has appeared to me” God tells Moses to say to the elders this; the history of the one true God. It is important that we also believe in the one true God. So often in the Old Testament we see the phrase God of Abraham….This is the God we believe in. Now let’s go forward to the New Testament and also look at the Lord Jesus. In Matt.3:17 “and lo a voice out of the heavens, saying, This is my beloved Son, in Whom I am well pleased.” Now we can read a lot more in the Gospels about our Lord. We must remember that He is the Son of God, He is God….and we must never diminish His position of God and the things He said or the things He has done or the things He is going to do. If we look around today we don’t see a lot of idols (statues) around; some but not many. But there are a lot of religions around pulling or trying to pull us into compromising our faith; that is to accept that there are other god’s just like the one true God. Now I’m not talking about being radical…but rather to be on guard, to hold fast to the one true God and His son Jesus Christ. To follow Him and Him alone.

Along the way

As we go through life it is important to learn things, ways... that help us to live life. Last week we talked about, yes and no, how it is important to grasp this concept. For if one has a problem with that one, more than likely they will have trouble with this or these next sections. That would be to follow the rules. When we were young we grew up with rules, for the most part we did not see them written on paper... that we had to sign but more they were general knowledge...things we learned through life, at home, school and ... O.K. let me step back a bit. When we were real little we had to ask for this to do that.... Mom can I ____? Dad can i___? As we get older there became more freedom... Mom I am going... Dad I am doing... more of the sense of communicating of were or what one was doing. Let's call this the high school years. The yes and no's of earlier should have taught us some of the do not do...for later in life. How to act in school, around adults.... Now that we are older how to act at work, how to play, how to be responsible... For the most part when one turned 18 no one gave them a list of rules, or a book of rules that needed to be followed... now I am not talking about getting a bible. You see as we grow up, we all should learn some basic rules or ways of life, along the way. Yes we should learn ways of life from our parents... hopefully. Proverbs 1:8 "Hear, my son, your father's instruction And do not forsake your mother's teaching." Also read Proverbs chapter 4.

Trust

Last week we talked about learning, no. We really only talked about obeying when we are told no. Obeying is only one part of learning no. The other would be to have respect for the one saying no; or even a trust for the one saying no. We use the example of Moses in Ex. 33; What if Moses disobeyed God and took a peek. Let me offer up the three reason's he might have thought of why it would be ok to take a peek. The first would be that rebellious spirit; no one is going to tell me what to do! Did you get that; we want to do what we want...yes it is true think about it. The second would be that you did not respect the person saying, no. It could be for many reasons. For example a dislike or political difference or religious difference or race or place you live or ... Now to the 3rd, the lack of trust. For us this is big. If you take the time to think about it, we are not really trusting people. When we were little we trusted mom and dad.... but as we grew up we saw their weakness, faults... and we started not to trust them like before... Now I know I am not the only one with imperfect parents... or parents that have disappointed... A funny thing happens as one get's older they have a hard time to trust their children to do things...we even have a hard time trusting other people...
In Gen. 3:1-6 We have the account of "the fall of Man". How did that happen? How do we fall in our modern lives? As we look at this passage, the "serpent" goes to Eve; his main objective to have Eve to start to question what God has said. Then to put an idea before her, that God is with holding... if you will, something that she needs...In verse 6 we see that the damage is done, Eve is rationalizing on her own... What has just happened? Satin persuaded Eve not to trust God... You see Moses could have taken a peek but instead he trusted what God said...and stayed in the cleft of the rock. We today need to trust God; to rely on His word the bible. Most important not to read between the lines and add or subtract from God's word; to make it say something or imply something...to fit our situation, thinking... that is what the serpent did to Eve. Fast forward 5 thousand or so years and we see Satan(the serpent) trying to do the same thing. This time He fails, thanks be to our Lord Jesus Christ. That would be in Luke 4, known as the temptation of the Son of man. Fast forward another 2 thousand or so years, Satan is still trying to do his work, getting people to not trust God. Are you standing strong against him, like Moses and like our Lord Jesus? Trust God!

No looking

As we go through life there comes points in time that one will learn something that he wished he learned earlier in life. Now some of those things were things that we were made aware of, taught.... but for some reason or another we just didn't get it or we just fought against the principle... Seriously, think about it! Don't we all have things that are just hard for us to learn...or put into practice.... Or things that we heard about and thought "that doesn't apply to me." I will not do that... That is for so and so or for people like... The list goes on and on...
Now before we go too far let me remind us all that we are talking about "good" principles... and that we use the bible, Gods word, as the final test if you will. Now where do we begin. Let us go back to our earliest days. For all of us let's say around or before the year of our 2nd birthday. As a parent have you heard the expression of the "terrible 2's"? So that is where we will begin. Now in those early years one would think that a child so dependent would learn things easily or fast. Well they do. So what is this that some of us or maybe all of us have a problem with? When one says no, it means no, and yes means yes.
Think about it. That more and more that in our society when parents say, no. More and more it seems to mean maybe. Or even that if you do it that no means yes, because you have done it. Now as we go through life this conflict of "no" seems to reek havoc with us. We tend to fight with it and this fight comes unaware, that is that we don't even realize that we have a struggle. That as we get older this struggle affects so much. As I was thinking how to write this devotion let me close with 2 thoughts. The first would be the struggles that I have with this concept of "no" and how inadequate I am to talk about such things. The second was were in God's word did He say, no, or did He imply, no. Some come to mind, what I would like to use is Exod. 33:20 "But you cannot see My face, for no man can see Me and live." This is when Moses is on Mount Sinai to get the 10 commandments. So here God says, no; but allows Moses to see His back side. What I would like us all to notice is that when the answer is no, there may be a good reason behind it...or even a protection... Think about it what if Moses took a little peek? No looking...

Marriage to be honored

It's been a few months! But here we go again. Do you all remember our theme? "We are men and we do what men do! So what do we do?" Now we have been talking about honor. Now I would like to address one more topic dealing with honor. Even today I have heard of a situation that warrants this topic. Now this topic will equally address both men and women. I would like to say that this topic was something that needed not be addressed 20-30 years ago but that is not the case. But at the same time it seems that now, it needs to be talked about even more. So what is this last topic dealing with honor? That will be to honor marriage.
That us as men and women will look at the institution of marriage in honor. That we would not be the one to break up a marriage. That as a man you would not get involved with a girl who is married or even with one who is engaged...that also a women would also do the same. It is a shame that you hear of a married man going after another women or a married woman going after another men. It seems to be a common thing. I mentioned that even today, I talked with a man who just got back with his wife; leaving his girl friend.
That even the ones who are married would not give up so easily. Yes I do mean so easily. I was watching a movie the other day, a sci-fi , in the movie there were good aliens that were just like humans...to make this short I will try to quote the line that an older one said to the younger; " We are not like the humans, when we marry it is forever." Now that is the thinking that we all need. How does one fall out of love after one, two, twenty...years? Let's not think that it does not happen. We all need to be working on our marriage all the time... that we will have the resolve to honor marriage. That we would have a resolve to honor our own marriage; to do those things that will make it better and better... For us men to love our wives... to appreciate them.... to do things...Now one more thing, you do not honor marriage when you are living with someone(not married), seeing if you like each other...Marriage is marriage and it is not o.k. to do the things of marriage without being in a marriage; for those things are reserved for marriage. -------Hebrews 13:4 "Marriage is to be held in honor among all, and the marriage bed is to be undefiled"

The struggle---bible reading

It has been a while since I wrote. If you want to know it has been way to long. Let me fill you all in, and maybe this will encourage you in your walk. Let's all be honest, the Christian walk can get really rough....
So I will say that these events have happened over the last 6 to 12 months. I will not put them in order but will try to put them together in a way that will be helpful. Let me start by saying that the "Stay Strong" ministry has been going on for about 3 to 4 years and like most ministries if not all there is opposition... Yes we all should know that we have an enemy(s), that he is very strong and cunning or better yet let say he is smart. He can use whoever he can; even with them being unaware...Now that in of itself is a hard thing to deal with.
Also during that time sickness came upon me. Let me put it like this I thought I was getting the flu... then I would start feeling better for a few day... then sick then better then sick...then one day the sickness hit me like a ton of bricks I could barely stand...the next day to the doctors...a bad infection where you don't want to have infections...Iv therapy... Can you believe I got a little better but I was still sick. How did the doctor put it, it is very uncommon for someone to have 2 serious problems at once. Well another specialist...and test...
You know when you get older and sickness comes and it is not the common sickness that you had thru the years... and things hurt...that never hurt before... it get's one a thinking. Then when something is found and you here those words, we will send it out to see if it is cancer... Wow, or better yet whoa, hold on what did you say? The feeling... it is hard to describe...the days seem to go by so slowly... Well I don't have cancer... What a relief! But what is with us men? Why are we so hard, so callous, so insensitive...
So during that time pain killers...it is hard to think... it's so hard to read... Let me tell you what happened one day. I was sitting there in my house, just resting...not really doing anything, recoupperating but at this time I was feeling a lot better. A thought came in my mind to read the word, the bible. The bible was there on the table just out of my grasp; I looked at it and looked at it. I just could not pick it up and read it. I would like to say that this was just a 5 minute ordeal but no it was much longer than that and I do mean longer. The whole time the feeling to read the word of God was there, but for me to get up and move that 5 feet was so hard. I was frozen. I just sat there; what a sight that must of been! Let me tell you I enjoy reading God's word. But as I recollect on those weeks it seemed that I was reading less and less without being aware of it. Then bang that day hit! You see it is a slow progression that we all must be aware of; that is we read a little less... pray a little less or quickly... give thanks a little less... forget to ask for forgiveness... then before you know it your thought's are not on God... but more on the world... and yourself... your going your own way...thinking your own way. You see for me I need to read God's word, it is a live, it is fresh, it is food for my soul... It helps through my day... it helps me to focus on God the father, Jesus the son and the Holy Spirit. It helps in prayers... It helps me to draw near to Him. So Let's go back to that struggle. The struggle of reading God's word, yes it is real! Yes, it is one that can be won. Was the struggle one that was in of itself in my own will? Or was the struggle brought on by the evil one? I'm not sure but I do know this; that this struggle and ones like it come. We all need to stand strong in our resolve to follow Jesus and our resolve to draw near to God. James 4:7-8 "Submit therefore to God. Resist the devil and he will flee from you. Draw near to God and He will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners; and purify your hearts, you double minded." You see when we distance our self from God our hands(deeds) start to not be "good"... and our hearts(thinking) starts to be a miss... so let us all read God's word daily.

Honor your wife it's the right thing to do.

Can I be real with you all? Seriously! The next topic of our devotion is a real hard one for me. Let me say not a new topic but a continuance of what we have been talking about. That would be honor. Now, let it be known that I do try in this area, and try hard; but I also find that I tend to get lacks in this area. So where do we start? Let's start with the verse, 1Peter3:7 " Likewise, husbands, live with your wives in an understanding way, showing honor to the women as the weaker vessel, since they are heirs with you of the grace of life."
Wow! More to do for our wives. Yes, more. If you are like me, I am still figuring out how to love my wife, how to cherish my wife... and when I think that I'm doing well then bang. You see for us we tend to think that when we start doing these good things that we have arrived, if you will. Almost like one plus one equals two thinking. If I do this, this is what should happen... Now let me give us all an example that will help us with loving, honoring our wives. You wife's favorite meal is____. So you desire to learn how to cook that meal, in a gourmet style if you will. Done just right... to perfection. You do it out of love... or you do it to honor her on a special occasion... Well it worked out so well, you decide to do it again and again and again; twice a week, maybe more. Guess what? The impact it once had starts to diminish. It can even get so bad as to having a reverse effect.
The moral to our story is that it is not a one thing(deed) that will equate to filling the requirement of love, honor... That it is the sum of a lot of deeds that will say loudly, love. And not only that that these deeds seem to change, yearly, monthly, weekly and yes even daily. Our verse is about honor, to show honor by doing loving deeds... it is a good way to show honor. I like what it says in our verse, " understanding", to learn what see likes...and needs... Now why do we need to honor her, because she is the weaker vessel. Now we will not try to explain all that or any of what weaker vessel means. All we need to know is that God wants us to honor our wives. And I believe that this honor thing goes hand in hand with love. So us men need to step up more in this honoring thing.

Love the key to honor

Honor it is hard to give! We have been talking about honor and obeying the past few weeks. Have you found it hard to give honor? It is hard to give honor we need to think about it...Now there is a way that makes giving honor a lot easier. That would be with the help of our Lord Jesus Christ. Now let me take a step back. One needs to honor God, the one true God, the God of all creation. The one who created you and me...Why you might ask? Because He deserves it, He is the one who does great things, has a position...Never mind all that He is...Perfect, Powerful...
Now with that we need to honor what He says needs to be honored. That would include His son Jesus Christ. Yes, we need to honor Jesus! If we are to put things in order of positions, that deserve honor, Jesus would be first, for He is first. Until we can give Jesus and God the honor they deserve, giving honor to others will be hard or harder than it needs to be. What I want to do is give us a few verses to help us with this honoring thing. The first would be Rev. 4:11"Worthy are you, our Lord and God, to receive glory and honor and power, for You created all things, and by your will they existed and were created." John 5:23 "that all may honor the Son, just as they honor the Father. Whoever does not honor the Son does not honor the Father who sent Him." Yes we need to give honor to our God and His Son, the Lord Jesus Christ. We sing songs to Him, about Him... giving him honor but there is one important "ingredient" if you will; that will be LOVE. One last verse, John 14:23 "If any one loves Me, he will keep My word; and My Father will love him...". You see we obey the commandment because we love the one who gave them, by keeping them we also give honor to the one who gave them. Honor is more than "lip" service; it comes with an action too. That love is the deep, deep part of why we honor...So put love into the equation when you want to show honor, it makes a difference.

Everyone

The last few weeks we looked at obeying and honor. We started with obeying our parents and then moved to honoring people in positions. That will also include honoring our parents too. As mentioned before there is a lot to the word honor, and there are a lot of ways to demonstrate honor. But who are we to honor? Only the ones in positions, parents, the ones who have done something great... Special people! Yes, that is the way we think, believe it or not. Now in the bible there is this verse; 1Peter2:17 "Honor all people, love the brotherhood, fear God, honor the king."
" Honor all people"; that puts a whole new perspective into our lives. If you are like me it gives me a lot to think about. We are to honor everyone. Doesn't one need to do something to be honored? Seriously, did that question come up in your mind? Yes, everyone deserves honor. Not because they are so and so or did such and such, but because they are a person. Or better yet a person created by the one true God. Now some that we honor are children of God, "believers". We even have a hard time with that. Think about it we have a hard time showing honor.
Like holding a door open for someone...helping one in need, letting another go before you; saying thank you; welcoming each other; being happy for someone; crying with someone; giving to someone...but the most would be in our minds to think, everyone deserves honor. From the "lowly"--to the "highly" and we must be aware not to get caught showing partiality. Everyone deserves honor. Yes, I too need to work on that. James2:1-4 "My brethren, do not hold your faith in our glorious Lord Jesus Christ with an attitude of personal favoritism. For if a man comes into your assembly with a gold ring and dressed in fine clothes, and there also comes in a poor man in dirty clothes, and you pay special attention to the one who is wearing the fine clothes, and say, 'You sit here in a good place', and you say to the poor man, 'You stand over there, or sit down by my foot stool.'"
Let me say it is not only limited to the rich and poor. It reaches over to all aspects of life; race, culture, countries, towns, cities....Showing honor is a hard thing to do. We must begin showing honor more and more to everyone.