NLDC BACKSTAGE: FEBRUARY 2009

Hungry Why Wait Grab a Bible!

“You’re blessed when you’ve worked up a good appetite for God. He’s food and drink in the best meal you’ll ever eat.” Matthew 6:5, MSG.
Have you ever longed to have more of a hunger for the things of God? Notice that the bible doesn’t say that this hunger just magically appears it said it is worked up. Building up an appetite requires doing things, it requires moving around, getting out of bed, you know, those kinds of things. There is a verse in Proverbs that says, “Appetite is an incentive to work; hunger makes you work all the harder.” This is true in the physical as well as the spiritual. When we hunger after God that makes us desire him even more and give us the will to do His.

Or maybe not working isn’t the problem. As passionate as we could ever get for God though, we are never at a point where we can allow sin in our lives. I’ve seen so many wonderful, godly Christians let in just one sin and it ruined their taste, their desire for God. In the same way we can work up an appetite for Christ, we can work up an appetite, a craving, for the things of this world. “Do not love this world or the things it offers you, for when you love the world, you do not have the love of the Father in you. For the world offers only a craving for physical pleasure, a craving for everything we see, and pride in our achievements and possessions.” (1 John 2:15-16)
In compromising our purity as the temple of God, we allow something else to become what we hunger for, and by its presence you give it permission to take space so that the appetite for it grows. Couch potatoes eat all the junk food they crave, only to end up with more aches and pains than the average human as well as a shorter life span. Lazy people finally die of hunger because they won’t get up and go to work. (Proverbs 21:25 MSG) If we don’t actively pursue the righteousness of Christ and the glory of God by standing up against sin and ungodliness, then we will lose that hunger and desire for our Maker. As we begin this New Year, I encourage you to examine yourself, your desires and your inclinations. Work up that appetite for the things of God and see where God will lead you.
~Apprentice Lisa Stallings

 

Testimony from the Road

My team ministered at a service where we did a skit called Giants that’s about conquering all of your doubts and insecurities, your “giants,” and accomplishing God’s will in your life. A lady from the congregation sat and talked with me after the service and told me that her life was really touched by the skit. She said that she had been facing a lot of her own giants lately and that seeing that skit had really changed her life. We prayed for her to have strength and guidance and wisdom from the Lord and we took authority over the enemy in her life.

When we finished, I continued to minister to her through what I felt God was telling me that she needed to hear. I told her that letting yourself “what if” every situation is a trap that is hard to get out of and that if you second guess everything all you will do is tear yourself apart. She said that I was right and thanked me for saying that because she had been saying “what if” a lot. I was so honored for God to be able to use me in this aspect.

~Tim McMeen