Enjoy Life's Pleasures, but...

Luke 8:7,14 “Other seed fell among thorns that grew up with it and choked out the tender plants…The seeds that were planted among thorns are people who hear the word, but as life goes on the worries, riches, and pleasures of life choke them. So they don't produce anything good.”

Riches and pleasures – that’s the second half of the equation that Jesus talked about saying that the Word of God sometimes is choked when we are too busy enjoying life.

But wait – look at what the Bible says in Ecclesiastes 5:19, “And it is a good thing to receive wealth from God and the good health to enjoy it. To enjoy your work and accept your lot in life – this is indeed a gift from God.”

Health, wealth, pleasure...these are gifts from God.  In and of itself, there is nothing wrong with enjoying life.  It’s when we forget to include God in our life, when we forget to thank Him for our blessings, when we get so wrapped up in having fun that we eventually forget God is the One responsible for all the good we enjoy – that’s the kind of behavior that leads to low productivity.

Actually, Jesus says that when we are consumed with riches and pleasures we don’t produce anything good, and this makes perfect sense to me.  If always having fun and the money to finance all that pleasure were enough in life, rich and famous people would never commit suicide or get in trouble for bad behavior. 

I have often heard that, “So and so had everything.  Why did he kill himself?”  I have had that reaction myself.  This proves that wealth, fame, prestige, and fun are not enough.  There has to be something more to make sense of life.      

The key is to enjoy these gifts from God but not at the expense of God.  To live life joyfully but with the awareness that God is our Father, Protector, Provider, and Source of every blessing, and to always have a prayer of thanks at the ready.

That is the formula for true success.  When the seed heads our way, we water them with gratitude and stay connected to Christ.

PRAYER: Dear Lord, We thank you for blessing us with so much.  Forgive for those times when we have been too busy having fun that we have forgotten about You.  Sometimes we only come to you when there a crisis and completely ignore You when everything is going smoothly.  You are the reason we are breathing, and wealth and health come from You.  We never want to choke the life-giving seed You desire to plant in our lives by being too busy for You.  In Jesus’ name, AMEN~

The Perfect Seed~

Greetings, all you precious saints of the Lord!

Today we continue with our lessons in farming.  The most important thing to remember is that God has given 

each of us the perfect seed; if we plant it in rich earth, it guarantees a bumper crop!  What is this seed?  

Luke 11:8 “The seed is the Word of God.”

God’s Word needs to be planted and take root in our lives because, “There’s nothing like the written Word of God for showing us the way to salvation through faith in Christ Jesus. Every part of Scripture is God-breathed and useful one way or another—showing us truth, exposing our rebellion, correcting our mistakes, training us to live God’s way. Through the Word we are put together and shaped up for the tasks God has for us (2 Timothy 3:16-17).”

After reading these two verses I realize that there’s a lot at stake.  I want – make that I need – to make sure that the soil of my heart is receptive to receiving God’s Word because when my faith is optimized, when I have all the truth I need to address the problems in my life, when my hard-headed and prideful ways get in the way of enjoying relationships and God gently nudges me to make things right, when I love the way God wants me to love, and when I am able to serve my family and others, well then, that’s when life is joyful and worth living!

The key is to plant in rich, fertile soil because while God offers the same seed to everyone, where it’s planted is quite another.  This paragraph from yesterday’s DEVO reveals some hindrances to that seed being successfully planted:

Birds eat up the seeds, seeds land in gravel

and don’t grow for a lack of good roots, and

seeds fall on weeds and try to grow but those

weeds strangle them. 

How do we prepare the soil to avoid these pitfalls?  We will continue with our farming series next week, but in the meantime, let’s ask God to begin the process by protecting the seed He has given us from those hungry pesky birds and by gently removing any gravel or weeds that might be growing in our gardens.

PRAYER: Dear Lord, So much gets in the way of Your life-saving, joy-giving Word from taking root and growing into a beautiful crop of blessings.  Help us today to be receptive and ready to all the good You want to do in us and to all the good You want us to do.  In Jesus’ name, AMEN~