All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting, and training in righteousness, so that the man of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work. – 2 Timothy 3:16-17.

Your past sometimes gets in the way of your vision for the future, doesn’t it? If you allow yourself to dwell on the areas where you’ve failed or on losses and disappointments that hurt you, you might find it difficult to look forward to the future God has for you.

King David is a man who dreamed of building a magnificent temple. When he commissioned his son Solomon to do the work he said, “Be strong and courageous, and do the work. Don’t be afraid or discouraged by the size of the task, for the Lord God, my God is with you.” (1 Chronicles 28:20) Many years later the apostle Paul said, “We who believe are carefully joined together, becoming a holy temple for the Lord.” (Ephesians 2:21)

Just as David dreamed of building a magnificent temple, you can dare to dream of building a new life. God has the blueprint already drawn up: just follow it by faith. You may be afraid that you will start and fail, but in the words of David, “be strong and courageous, and do the work.” As someone once said: Beginning is half done. In other words, take the first step, it’s the toughest.

What dreams have you been quietly suppressing? Perhaps you have dreamed of becoming a missionary? Maybe you have dreams of adopting. Or dreams of starting a new career. Maybe you’ve been dreaming about building deep friendships or making an impact on your community. Don’t be frightened. When God begins a good work, He is faithful to complete it.

It’s a shallow life that doesn’t give a person a few scars. – Garrison Keillor

The more we let God take us over, the more truly ourselves we become – because He made us. He invented us. He invented all the different people that you and I were intended to be. – C.S. Lewis

Blessings,

Chaplain Rob

But now that you have been set free from sin and have become slaves to God, the benefit you reap leads to holiness, and the result is eternal life. – Romans 6:22

My life has been littered with mistakes—my own mistakes and the mistakes of others. And in every one of those incidents, God came along, picked up the litter, and put it back together in a way that transformed it into a monument for faith. I can look back and say, “It was at that very point, in the midst of that adversity, that this part of my character began to grow and my relationship with God really deepened.”

It’s our nature to seek quick relief from pain. But Helen Keller—a woman well acquainted with adversity—said, “Character cannot be developed in ease and quiet. Only through experience of trial and suffering can the soul be strengthened, vision cleared, ambition inspired, and success achieved.”

Let God transform and redeem the suffering in your life.

God whispers to us in our pleasures, speaks in our conscience, but shouts in our pain: it is His megaphone to rouse a deaf world. – C.S. Lewis

Chaplain Rob

I pray also that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened in order that you may know the hope to which He has called you, the riches of His glorious inheritance in the saints. – Ephesians 1:18

Are you going through difficult times? If it does nothing else for you and to you, it will open the eyes of your heart. Walking through troubled waters is one way that God has of shifting your vision. When your heart breaks, there’s an avenue for God’s compassion to trickle in and envelop your heart with His. You’ll begin to look at others through the eyes of your heart and not through the eyes of quick judgment, harsh conclusions, or self-interest.

Your trip to the grocery store, to church, to Wal-Mart or Starbucks will take on a new hue. You’ll look at people and wonder what their story is; what their childhood was like; what caused them to be so happy or unhappy, why they seem this way or that.

Their job titles will be less important, their type of car won’t impress you, what kind of clothes they wear, or whether they’re wrinkled or stylish won’t matter anymore. You’re more likely to understand that they are in some pain and trying to run from it or trying to hide. Or, you’ll see their smile and demeanor and wonder if they’re truly happy or masking some inner, silent suffering or anger.

Now, you won’t get answers to all that you wonder about people and their stories, but your heart will be softened. You’ll find that you have a level of compassion that most people don’t have. If your heart is broken, let His compassion trickle in to your heart through the brokenness. Let Him open the eyes of your heart today.

A kind gesture can reach a wound that only compassion can heal. – Steve Maraboli

What value has compassion that does not take its object in its arms. – Antoine de Saint-Exupery

Blessings,

Chaplain Rob

I tell you the truth, if you have faith as small as a mustard seed, you can say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there’ and it will move. Nothing will be impossible for you. – Matthew 17:20

A wise sixteenth-century Christian once said we can only love God to the extent we know him. Think about it. Can you surrender to God if you don’t know his character? Can you trust him with your life, here and hereafter, if you’re not sure he’s willing and able to care for you?

That takes faith. And the Bible says faith ‘is the confident assurance that what we hope for is going to happen. It’s the evidence of things we cannot yet see.’ And the Bible says that faith is grounded in our very understanding of God: ‘Anyone who wants to come to [God], must believe that there is a God and that he rewards those who sincerely seek him.’ Before you can really seek God, you’ve got to truly believe that your search will lead to something, somewhere, and most importantly, to Someone worth looking for.

If you don’t have faith, ask God for it. If the faith you have is not as strong as you think it ought to be, ask God to help you strengthen your faith. This might seem like putting the cart before the horse, but the Bible speaks of faith as a gift rather than something you obtain by your own efforts.

I fear one day I’ll meet God, he’ll sneeze, and I won’t know what to say. – Ronnie Shakes

Blessings for a wonderful week!

Chaplin Rob

“Father, if you are willing, take this cup from me; yet not my will, but yours be done.” An angel from heaven appeared to him and strengthened him. – Luke 22:42-3

Have you ever heard someone say, “If you had your act together, you wouldn’t be struggling with knowing or following God’s will.” Don’t believe it! It’s a common, mistaken belief, and Jesus’ own actions teach that this isn’t so.

Jesus’ final moments before his crucifixion were spent in prayer in the Garden of Gethsemane. There he prayed three times. Each prayer was a step in letting go of things that would hold him back so that he could take hold of God’s will. The first prayer was an outburst of grief. Jesus shuddered at the chill of death’s dark shadow. Prayer seemed his only refuge.

The second prayer was one of release. Jesus was faced with two choices: If he saved his life, he would lose us. But if he lost his life, he would save us. Christ desired to do the will of his Father, and so he accepted his calling to die for us.

The third prayer strengthened his resolve. It was like the tempering of steel, in which the refined metal is reheated a second time to increase its strength. As a soldier readies himself for battle or a patient prepares himself for a difficult surgery, so Jesus gathered strength from his Father for the task and left all his anxiety with him.

If Jesus can struggle, then I guess it’s o.k. if I do, too.

Pray often; for prayer is a shield to the soul, a sacrifice to God, and a scourge for Satan. – John Bunyan

Chaplin Rob

Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles, and let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us. – Hebrews 12:1

Our culture has become enamored with instant results and quick fixes. E-mail, on-line banking, fast food, instant mashed potatoes, hair implants, liposuction, and countless options like them have eroded our capacity for patience and perseverance. So when it comes to spiritual growth, we tend to expect instant transforma¬tion rather than viewing our growth in Christ as a long-term—and potentially costly—endeavor.

Yet I’ve learned an important truth that’s been verified time and again by the testimony of Scripture: It’s not how you start that’s important; it’s how you finish.

Finishing well in the Christian life requires purposeful planning and a clear view of reality on your part. It won’t happen by accident. On the other hand, expecting instant results and quick fixes will result in disappointment, and ultimately, discouragement.

The world is moving so fast these days that a man who says it can’t be done is generally interrupted by someone doing it. – Harry Emerson Fosdick

Chaplin Rob

When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I put childish ways behind me. – 1 Corinthians 13:11

When was the last time you tried to break a habit, an old idea, a negative behavior pattern, or an unhealthy emotional recording from the past? It’s not easy! Even though you know you need to, even though you know it would be a good thing to do and will result in a healthier or happier state, it’s just a pain. And you’d rather live in the comfort of your misery, or so you think.

We often react like two year-olds whose parents are taking the bottle away. Tantrums, meltdowns, and tears always seem to be a part of the process.

What are you holding on to? What from the past are you hanging on to that you need to let go of? You know the things that tear you down and keep you from emotional health, but you just hang on to.

How many times has God given you the opportunity to give those things up because they keep you isolated and stuck, even poisoning your spirits? But it means letting go. There’s that “S” word again . . . surrender.

It takes a willing spirit. But you can walk in the victory that the Lord has already given you, if you choose it. Choose it today!

Faith, as Paul saw it, was a living, flaming thing leading to surrender and obedience to the commandments of Christ. – A.W. Tozer

Blessings,

Chaplin Rob

I know that you can do all things; no plan of yours can be thwarted. You asked, “Who is this that obscures my counsel without knowledge?” Surely I spoke of things I did not understand, things too wonderful for me to know. My ears had heard of you but now my eyes have seen you. – Job 42:2, 3, 5

Here’s a paradox for you. Those of you with a healthy sense of self are in the best position to exercise true humility. Why? Because the person with a healthy sense of self has nothing to prove. No agenda to push. No ego to shield. And no need to fret over what others think of you. When you encounter a problem that exceeds your knowledge, you admit without pretense that you don’t know the answer.

Sometimes we Christians can really fool ourselves. We think that since God is all knowledgeable and wise, and since we have His Holy Spirit within us, we should be able to dispense pearls of wisdom like spiritual gumballs. The truth is, the more we come to know God, the more we realize what we don’t know. And that’s O.K.!

The more we experience God’s grandeur and the more we understand our dignity as his sons and daughters, the lower we’ll bow before His throne—with nothing to prove and everything to gain.

My dad used to say, You wouldn’t worry so much about what people thought of you if you knew how seldom they did. – Phillip McGraw

Chaplin Rob

But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where moth and rust do not destroy, and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also. – Matthew 6:19-21

In his classic novel, The Screw tape Letters, C.S. Lewis writes of the subtle way that prosperity knits a person’s heart to the world. Growing reputations, widening circles of acquaintances, a per¬ceived sense of importance, and the increasing pressure of absorb¬ing and agreeable work, argues Lewis, builds up in a person a sense of really being at home on earth. But while people are finding their place in the world, Lewis concludes that the world is finding its place in them.

The truth is each of us longs for a sense of belonging. It’s the way we’re designed, and it’s a good thing. But what the world has to offer is incapable of producing what we too often seek to find in it, so it can’t help but leave us disappointed.

Don’t become a collector of empty treasures in your search to find belonging. Possessing things that belong to you is no substitute for choosing to belong to God, and possessing eternal security in Christ.

No man can swim ashore and take his baggage with him. – Seneca the Younger

Blessings,

Chaplin Rob

Which of you, if his son asks for bread, will give him a stone? Or if he asks for a fish, will give him a snake? If you, then though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in Heaven give good gifts to those who ask Him. – Matthew 7:9-11

Are you reluctant to ask for help? You’re definitely not alone. Too many of us are unwilling to admit we need help. We think it’s a sign of weakness. But it’s really a sign of pride and self-sufficiency, both which go against the grain of a healthy dependence upon God and the power of His Holy Spirit in our lives.

God wants to give you good things. He’s hoping you’ll humbly admit that you have needs. Don’t be afraid to ask others for help. Remember, God made us to relate to one another, to love one another. We weren’t made to live life alone. If you’re “the strong” one that is always lending a hand and seeing to it that others are taken care of, it’s hard for you to let someone know you need help, but it’s important that you do. We need more two way streets in our Christian community.

There’s an old saying that goes something like this, be smart enough to know when you need help and brave enough to ask for it.

Refusing to ask for help when you need it is refusing someone the chance to be helpful. – Ric Ocasek

Chaplin Rob