Seize the Moment – Day 1005
“Angels from the Realms of Glory”
Who will shepherd My people Israel.’”
Angels From the Realms of Glory
Angels from the realms of glory,
wing your flight o’er all the earth;
ye who sang creation’s story
now proclaim Messiah’s birth:
Come and worship, come and worship,
worship Christ, the newborn king.
watching o’er your flocks by night,
God with us is now residing;
yonder shines the infant light: [Refrain]
brighter visions beam afar;
seek the great Desire of nations;
ye have seen his natal star: [Refrain]
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Seize the Moment – Day 1004
May God Take Note of My Hardships!
Do you feel seen in your suffering?
After a long review of Israel’s history of broken promises and rebellion against God, Nehemiah 9:32-33 signifies a change of emphasis in this thirty-three-verse psalm, as it transitions from a confession to a petition:
Now therefore, our God, the great, the mighty, and the awesome God, who keeps covenant and lovingkindness, do not let all the hardship seem insignificant before You, which has come upon us, our kings, our princes, our priests, our prophets, our fathers and on all Your people, from the days of the kings of Assyria to this day. However, You are just in all that has come upon us; for You have dealt faithfully, but we have acted wickedly.
The petition was for God to “not let all the hardship seem insignificant” before Him. They were asking God to see them in their suffering. “The term hardships (Hb tela’ah) occurs only rarely in the OT, but it is used to refer to times of great distress or trials, such as the exodus (Ex 18:8) or Jerusalem after its destruction at the hands of the Babylonians (Lm 3:5).”[1]
There are two practices found in this petition that we can apply to our own lives. First, we all want to have our own suffering taken seriously. People need to feel validated, especially in times of hardship and distress, which is why Hagar called God, “You are a God who sees” when He visited her as she fled from Sarai’s abuse (Genesis 16:13).
Second, the leaders and Levites took responsibility for their situation. They didn’t blame others; rather, they put themselves at the mercy of their God – “a God of forgiveness, gracious and compassionate, slow to anger and abounding in lovingkindness” (Nehemiah 9:17).
Seize the moment and ask the “God who sees” to take note of your hardships and to forgive you of your sins (1 John 1:9).
God bless you!
If you would like to receive a personal phone call today, all you have to do is dial the phone number below right now and one of us will call you soon.
YOUTUBE:
If you prefer a video, Pastor Jerry reads his devotion on YouTube as well. Click HERE to visit the page.
Videos are posted about a week after the devotion appears in the blog.
FOOTNOTES:
[1] Carl R. Anderson, “Nehemiah,” in CSB Study Bible: Notes, ed. Edwin A. Blum and Trevin Wax (Nashville, TN: Holman Bible Publishers, 2017), 735.
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Seize the Moment – Day 1003
Finding Shelter in God’s Joy!
Nehemiah 8
Good morning! This is Pastor Jerry Ingalls from New Castle First Baptist Church and today is Thursday, December 15.
Dry Tortugas National Park is one of the most remote parks in our national park system. It is seventy miles off the coast of Key West, and you can only get there by seaplane or boat. As part of its natural wonder and historic significance, Dry Tortugas is the only deep-water safe harbor in that region, making it a strategic location when ships were the key to both commerce and security for our growing nation. For this reason, Fort Jefferson, a massive stronghold, was built on the island, to protect American ships and sailors.
Whether it’s from the storms of life or the dangers of enemies, we all need a safe harbor – a stronghold to find shelter or refuge. Inside the stronghold of Jerusalem, with its finished walls and restored gates, Nehemiah the governor and Ezra the priest taught the nation of Israel where they would find their safe harbor – not in a walled city, but in God’s Word. Nehemiah 8:9-10 captures the moment they first heard the Torah:
“This day is holy to the Lord your God; do not mourn or weep.” For all the people were weeping when they heard the words of the law. Then he said to them, “Go, eat of the fat, drink of the sweet, and send portions to him who has nothing prepared; for this day is holy to our Lord. Do not be grieved, for the joy of the Lord is your strength.”
The Hebrew word translated “strength” means stronghold, refuge, or fortress. The joy of the Lord is both our safe harbor from storms and our stronghold from enemies. As Psalm 18:2 declares, “The Lord is my rock and my fortress and my deliverer, my God, my rock, in whom I take refuge; my shield and the horn of my salvation, my stronghold.”
Seize the moment and find shelter in the safe harbor of God’s joy – put your faith in Jesus Christ!
God bless you!
If you would like to receive a personal phone call today, all you have to do is dial the phone number below right now and one of us will call you soon.
YOUTUBE:
If you prefer a video, Pastor Jerry reads his devotion on YouTube as well. Click HERE to visit the page.
Videos are posted about a week after the devotion appears in the blog.
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Seize the Moment – Day 1002
Qualified to Lead by Faithfulness to God!
Good morning! This is Pastor Jerry Ingalls from New Castle First Baptist Church and today is Wednesday, December 14.
There are many qualifications for church leaders that are hotly debated in today’s world, but there is one qualification that is not being debated within any church that I know of – maturity in Christ. Paul taught in 1 Timothy 3:6, regarding the qualifications of the elders in the church, “not a new convert, so that he will not become conceited and fall into the condemnation incurred by the devil.” We know Paul was not talking about age as a disqualifier because in 1 Timothy 4:16, he exhorted his protégé, “Let no one look down on your youthfulness, but rather in speech, conduct, love, faith and purity, show yourself an example of those who believe.”
People are qualified for leadership when their lives consistently demonstrate their faith in God. As Jesus taught, “You will know them by their fruits” (Matthew 7:16). Nehemiah expressed this same focus on the qualifications of leaders when he chose Hananiah to oversee Jerusalem in Nehemiah 7:2, “for he was a faithful man and feared God more than many.” Qualified leaders stand out because of their faithfulness to God!
As God transplanted His people back to Jerusalem, into the good soil of the Promised Land, He used godly people like Ezra, Nehemiah, and Hananiah to lead them. Their primary task was to teach the people to fear the Lord and not return to their father’s former sins, which had caused the destruction of Jerusalem and the Babylonian exile in the first place. For this reason, Nehemiah appointed Hananiah – “a faithful man [who] feared God more than many.”
If your local church was looking for new leaders to serve, would the same be said about you? Are you looking for success in the world or faithfulness to God? Are you free to lead because you fear God more than the people?
Seize the moment and live for the approval of God, until you hear Jesus say to you face-to-face, “Well done, good and faithful servant” (Matthew 5:21).
God bless you!
If you would like to receive a personal phone call today, all you have to do is dial the phone number below right now and one of us will call you soon.
YOUTUBE:
If you prefer a video, Pastor Jerry reads his devotion on YouTube as well. Click HERE to visit the page.
Videos are posted about a week after the devotion appears in the blog.
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Seize the Moment – Day 1001
Stick Around!
Good morning! This is Pastor Jerry Ingalls from New Castle First Baptist Church and today is Tuesday, December 13.
As a pastor, I have been tempted to leave my pastorate for greener pastures. But God’s call upon my life has been to stick around – to remain faithful to New Castle First Baptist Church because the work God has called me to do has not been completed. Even after thirteen years, there is still a long way to go so my plan is simple – to stick around! I am to persevere until the work is completed or until the Lord makes it clear that it’s time for me to pass the baton to the next generation. My calling is a long slow obedience in the same direction of faithfulness to Christ and His church!
Nehemiah is a wonderful example of the importance of sticking around until the job gets done. People need faithful leaders to inspire them to persevere through the daily temptations of bailing before the blessing. As the people of God, we must learn to keep our commitments – to obey Jesus and let our yes be yes (Matthew 5:37). In Nehemiah 6:11, Nehemiah asked the question in the face of deception and opposition, “Should a man like me flee?” He decided to stick around and complete the job, as he testified in verse 16, “When all our enemies heard of it, and all the nations surrounding us saw it, they lost their confidence; for they recognized that this work had been accomplished with the help of our God.”
We don’t need showy leaders who are always seeking the next best thing; we need faithful men and women who are willing to suffer for righteousness and endure hardship for God’s will to be done in and through them (Matthew 5:10; 1 Peter 3:14; 2 Timothy 1:8; 2:3; 4:5).
Seize the moment and stick around – make a commitment to not bail before the blessing by taking a vow of stability to your local church.
God bless you!
If you would like to receive a personal phone call today, all you have to do is dial the phone number below right now and one of us will call you soon.
YOUTUBE:
If you prefer a video, Pastor Jerry reads his devotion on YouTube as well. Click HERE to visit the page.
Videos are posted about a week after the devotion appears in the blog.
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Seize the Moment – Day 1000
Be the Solution!
Good morning! This is Pastor Jerry Ingalls from New Castle First Baptist Church and today is Monday, December 12. Today celebrates the one thousandth day of making these daily calls. May you grow stronger in your daily walk with Jesus by taking on His easy yoke to learn from Him and find rest for your soul. May you join me in reading and meditating upon God’s Word.
Good leaders don’t ask anything of others that they wouldn’t be willing to do first themselves. Nehemiah was a great leader! During a time of economic hardship caused by heavy taxation by the Persians, a famine, and internal greed (Nehemiah 5:3-5), Nehemiah demanded that the wealthy of his nation stop being a part of the problem and be the solution (6-12). Unlike many leaders in our world today, Nehemiah was setting an example of economic justice for the rest to follow – He was being the solution!
Nehemiah was authorized a governor’s food allowance, but instead of taking that which came from the taxation of his people, he fed them out of his own resources – over one hundred fifty people (14-18). Nehemiah worked side-by-side with the people, he lent them money and grain, and he expected the rich and powerful to follow his leadership, without exception. In a powerful display of leadership, in verse 13, Nehemiah held himself and the rich to the same standard of God’s judgment:
I also shook out the front of my garment and said, “Thus may God shake out every man from his house and from his possessions who does not fulfill this promise; even thus may he be shaken out and emptied.” And all the assembly said, “Amen!” And they praised the Lord. Then the people did according to this promise.
Nehemiah was being the solution, and he will always be remembered as a leader who cared for his people (19). The people followed him because he was a leader of integrity.
Seize the moment and be the solution – Live in such a way that others want to follow you as you follow Jesus!
God bless you!
If you would like to receive a personal phone call today, all you have to do is dial the phone number below right now and one of us will call you soon.
YOUTUBE:
If you prefer a video, Pastor Jerry reads his devotion on YouTube as well. Click HERE to visit the page.
Videos are posted about a week after the devotion appears in the blog.
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Advent 2022 – Week 3
Welcome Home: Inviting Jesus to Make My Heart His Home!
A Home of Joy
Something interesting you may not know about my family is that years ago Kimberly and I named our home. This is the first house we have ever owned, having previously rented or lived in military housing. The naming of our house didn’t happen for years, but after the first five to six years of pastoral ministry here in New Castle, we decided to call it, “The Haven.” The definition of a haven is, “any place of safety and shelter.” Some synonyms for the word haven are “retreat, anchorage, cover, harbor, sanctum, or sanctuary.” We want our home to be a space for grace – a sanctuary where God is at work in and through us, a retreat to find rest for the soul, a safe harbor from the storms of life, a sanctum from the insanity of the world, a cover from the attacks of the enemy, a sacred place where we will love and disciple our children to walk in the ways of the Lord.
Additionally, years ago, we named our home school, “The Little House Discipleship Academy.” This merges our family’s heritage with my sixth (or seventh) Cousin Laura Ingalls Wilder and her famous series of books, The Little House on the Prairie, and our focus on raising our children in the Word to train them to walk in a manner worthy of their calling. As a family, we intentionally and diligently protect our home to be a home of hope, love, joy, and peace. To do this, we must very intentionally and diligently walk in a personal relationship with Jesus Christ so that our hearts and minds are a haven of God’s presence before we can work together as husband and wife to create a home that lives up to its own namesake, “The Haven.” Friends, nothing happens by accident nor happenstance; you must be diligent.
This Christmas, I am inviting you to surrender your heart to be Christ’s home so that your home may become a home of hope, love, joy, and peace – a place where the weary of mind and body, a place where the heavy-burdened of heart and soul, can come and find rest (Matthew 11:28-30). If you want to transform your home, you must start with your own heart – you must become a person of hope, love, joy, and peace.
In the first two weeks, we focused on transforming our hearts into homes of hope and love, today, the message will focus how our faith invites Jesus Christ to transform our hearts into havens of joy. There is great joy you receive through a relationship with Jesus Christ! This is not only the joy of our eternal salvation, secured through the indwelling of the Holy Spirit, but this is the work of the Holy Spirit, the fruit of God’s presence in and though our lives that gives us a joy that will empower us through the mountaintops and valleys of our emotions and life experiences.
To illustrate my emphasis on our hearts being havens of joy so that we can create homes of joy, I want to emphasize the famous passage from Nehemiah 8:10, “Do not be grieved, for the joy of the Lord is your strength.” As most of you know, I am currently studying the book of Nehemiah for my daily devotional phone calls, which then is transformed into the material for my Seize the Moment devotional books with AGF Publishing. As I was studying this passage, I wrote this devotional for this coming week’s daily phone call:
Dry Tortugas National Park is one of the most remote parks in our national park system. It is seventy miles off the coast of Key West, and you can only get there by seaplane or boat. As part of its natural wonder and historic significance, Dry Tortugas is the only deep-water safe harbor in that vicinity, making it a strategic location when ships were the key to both commerce and security for our growing nation. For this reason, Fort Jefferson, a massive stronghold, was built on the island, to protect American ships and sailors.
Whether it’s from the storms of life or the dangers of enemies, we all need a safe harbor – a stronghold to find shelter or refuge. Inside the stronghold of Jerusalem, with its finished walls and restored gates, Nehemiah the governor and Ezra the priest taught the nation of Israel where they would find their safe harbor – not in a walled city, but in God’s Word. Nehemiah 8:9-10 captures the moment they first heard the Torah:
“This day is holy to the Lord your God; do not mourn or weep.” For all the people were weeping when they heard the words of the law. Then he said to them, “Go, eat of the fat, drink of the sweet, and send portions to him who has nothing prepared; for this day is holy to our Lord. Do not be grieved, for the joy of the Lord is your strength.”
The Hebrew word translated “strength” means stronghold, refuge, or fortress. The joy of the Lord is both our safe harbor from storms and our stronghold from enemies. As Psalm 18:2 declares, “The Lord is my rock and my fortress and my deliverer, my God, my rock, in whom I take refuge; my shield and the horn of my salvation, my stronghold.”
Seize the moment and find shelter in the safe harbor of God’s joy – put your faith in Jesus Christ!
Your home becomes a space for grace when you have become a safe harbor of God’s joy. This happens by inviting Jesus Christ to make your heart His home. The Christmas story, in Luke 2:9-14, foretells the purpose for Christ’s coming into the world:
And an angel of the Lord suddenly stood before them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them; and they were terribly frightened. But the angel said to them, “Do not be afraid; for behold, I bring you good news of great joy which will be for all the people; for today in the city of David there has been born for you a Savior, who is Christ the Lord. “This will be a sign for you: you will find a baby wrapped in cloths and lying in a manger.” And suddenly there appeared with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God and saying, “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace among men with whom He is pleased.”
Christ came to bring us “great joy!” This is as applicable for your heart and your home, as it is for world peace. Let’s do a quick survey about what the Bible teaches about God’s joy:
- Psalm 16:11. “You will make known to me the path of life; in Your presence is fullness of joy; in Your right hand there are pleasures forever.”
- Psalm 118:24. “This is the day which the Lord has made; Let us rejoice and be glad in it.”
- Proverbs 15:13. “A joyful heart makes a cheerful face, but when the heart is sad, the spirit is broken.”
- John 17:13. “But now I come to You; and these things I speak in the world so that they may have My joy made full in themselves.”
- Romans 15:13. “Now may the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, so that you will abound in hope by the power of the Holy Spirit.”
- Galatians 5:22-23. “But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law.”
- Philippians 4:4. “Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, rejoice!”
- Hebrews 12:2-3. “Fixing our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of faith, who for the joy set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. For consider Him who has endured such hostility by sinners against Himself, so that you will not grow weary and lose heart.”
Joy is not a response to circumstances; joy is the rock of our well-being – a firm foundation from which we can experience all other emotions and respond in covenant faithfulness to God, according to His promises for our lives. When joy is the deep bedrock of our souls we can experience the human realities of anger, grief, and sadness without being displaced from the rock of God’s joy into the shifting sands of human emotions. You can experience the hardships and injustices of real life while finding the security of God’s stronghold, which has been strategically built in the only safe harbor to be found out in the open seas of life. The King has made a way for this to be done for you! You can respond authentically as a child of God, and authoritatively as a soldier for Jesus, because you are secure in the Father’s love and safe in His sovereign grace.
It takes diligence to make your home a haven of joy! It’s not a response to our circumstances, it is the stronghold of our lives, the haven of our sanity, the sanctum of our peace, the rock on which we build our lives – it is the victory of our faith in Jesus Christ! Always remember, joy is the fruit of the Spirit, not a manifestation of the flesh. It is so much more than an emotional response to our circumstances. I close with this prayerful exhortation from 1 Peter 1:3-9:
Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who according to His great mercy has caused us to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, to obtain an inheritance which is imperishable and undefiled and will not fade away, reserved in heaven for you, who are protected by the power of God through faith for a salvation ready to be revealed in the last time. In this you greatly rejoice, even though now for a little while, if necessary, you have been distressed by various trials, so that the proof of your faith, being more precious than gold which is perishable, even though tested by fire, may be found to result in praise and glory and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ; and though you have not seen Him, you love Him, and though you do not see Him now, but believe in Him, you greatly rejoice with joy inexpressible and full of glory, obtaining as the outcome of your faith the salvation of your souls.
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Seize the Moment – Day 998
Today’s Christmas hymn focus will be
Adore
Psalm 95:6 (NASB95)
“ Come, let us worship and bow down, Let us kneel before the Lord our Maker.
Written in 2013 by UK Worship Artists Graham Kendrick & Martin Chalk, it later became the featured title song of Chris Tomlin’s Christmas album in 2016. Graham stated that he was inspired by one of the greatest Christmas carols, “O Come Let Us Adore Him”, when Martin started playing the music for this song and it had the word adore in it. He went on to say, “It very simply just tells the story of God made flesh and enables us to respond to it.”
Adore, o come let us adore. O come let us adore Him
The Lord, worship Christ the Lord. Let all that is within us, adore!
As we are halfway through the advent season, we need to wake up to the fact that we can’t just assume that the world knows what Christmas is all about. God sent this precious gift to us to give to others. It is up to us to share the blessed hope of God’s amazing grace that came to earth that night in a manger. And His name is Jesus!
If you would like to receive a personal phone call today, all you have to do is dial the phone number below right now and one of us will call you soon.
YOUTUBE:
If you prefer a video, Pastor Ken reads his devotion on YouTube as well. Click HERE to visit the page.
Videos are posted about a week after the devotion appears in the blog.
If you would like to listen to this song, click on this link:
Adore
Humbly you came
God of all creation
Here with us
In a starlit manger
Emmanuel
Light of the world
Here to save
Come let us adore
Oh come let us adore him
The Lord, worship Christ, the Lord
Let all that is within us
Shepherds bow low
Angel voices sing of peace on earth
What have I to offer
To heaven’s King
I’ll bring my life, my love, my all
Come let us adore
Oh come let us adore him
The Lord, worship Christ, the Lord
Let all that is within us
Adore
Peace on earth, here with us, joy awakening
At your feet we fall
Adore
Come let us adore
Oh come let us adore him
The Lord, worship Christ, the Lord
Let all that is within us
Adore
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Seize the Moment – Day 997
Overcome Discouragement!
Good morning! This is Pastor Jerry Ingalls from New Castle First Baptist Church and today is Friday, December 9.
It is easy to become discouraged when we experience criticism or intimidation. Nehemiah’s successes in Jerusalem led to opposition from their neighbors. Nehemiah 4:1 reports, “Now it came about that when Sanballat heard that we were rebuilding the wall, he became furious and very angry and mocked the Jews.”
People oppose the work of God when they feel threatened by it. Sanballat was the governor of Samaria and the last thing he wanted was a revitalized Israel. The refortification of Jerusalem would provide a haven for the Jewish exiles to return from Babylonian captivity in droves. He first opposed the work with mockery to discourage the workers, and when that wasn’t enough to stop them, he intensified the opposition with fear and intimidation.
It would have worked if it wasn’t for Nehemiah’s efforts to counter the discouragement and oppose the threats. His first tactic to overcome discouragement was to seek God, as recorded in verses 4-5, “Hear, O our God, how we are despised! Return their reproach on their own heads and give them up for plunder in a land of captivity. Do not forgive their iniquity and let not their sin be blotted out before You, for they have demoralized the builders.” Prayer is our first response to overcoming discouragement.
Second, Nehemiah took active steps to embolden the workers with a higher calling. Nehemiah 4:14 narrates, “When I saw their fear, I rose and spoke to the nobles, the officials and the rest of the people: ‘Do not be afraid of them; remember the Lord who is great and awesome, and fight for your brothers, your sons, your daughters, your wives and your houses.’” Nehemiah led his people in prayer and then in setting up a defense (9). He gave their lives and work meaning (9-23). Living with purpose is our second response to overcoming discouragement.
Seize the moment and seek a higher calling for your life and work (Colossians 3:23-24).
God bless you!
If you would like to receive a personal phone call today, all you have to do is dial the phone number below right now and one of us will call you soon.
YOUTUBE:
If you prefer a video, Pastor Jerry reads his devotion on YouTube as well. Click HERE to visit the page.
Videos are posted about a week after the devotion appears in the blog.
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