Thanksgiving Week Devotional…

Hey girlies, what an honor it is to be the ones tasked with setting the mood in our homes all year long, and even more around this time of year! What a joy it is to be a display of the work that God has done in us since last year, laying down our need for control by setting the mood with reverence for the One who keeps on saving us from ourselves!

A few years ago, I wrote this devotional for another purpose, but used it specifically during the week of Thanksgiving to challenge myself to be who God -- through His grace and patience -- has made me to be! I encourage you to take little bits of this each day this week, beginning tonight or in the morning, letting it develop as you go! It’s amazing what happens to a heart...and a tongue...saturated in the will of God through His Word!

We have been called by God to guard our hearts, because the heart is the root of the tongue, and most often it is by the tongue that people are won or lost for Jesus....

Unfortunately, it is a regular part of our rotten human nature to exalt ourselves by tearing others down. Throughout Scripture, there are multiple times where we hear the do’s and don’ts of gossip, slander, or any other misuse of the tongue. However, until we go to the root of the problem — seeing ourselves more highly than we should and our love of sin more than our love for God — we will continue in that self-serving direction.

Think about Matthew 5:3-12, The Beatitudes. Here, Jesus teaches us how to live humbly. These verses indicate a heart that has decided to follow Jesus, no matter what has happened or what has been said about them. This level of decisiveness will always warrant a godly pattern in word and deed, but it takes more than just a personal decision to follow God. It takes an encounter with his holiness to truly be changed.

Now, look at Psalm 19…This is where that encounter with His holiness will happen, and that encounter will produce reverence…if you let it!! The main point there is not gossip, but his entire message will ultimately guard and guide a heart and tongue that is willing to obey.

Before you go back and dig into these scriptures…and I am not above begging you, don’t skip them(!!!)…ask the Holy Spirit to open the eyes of your heart to understand what Jesus was saying in the Beattitudes, and what the Psalmist is expressing here. Read it out loud!! Let the beauty of these passages affect your inflection and intonation.

Take time to write Psalm 19:12-14, asking the Holy Spirit to physically affect you with the character of God, so much so that the inflection and intonation of your heart is changed, and you no longer have the ability to speak in any way that would grieve him or hurt another. Let the Word of God dwell in you so richly that others are compelled to know HIM by the words of your mouth!!

You might say this is valuable wisdom, but you just don't have time to invest in it, and my word to all of us...myself included...WE DON'T HAVE TIME NOT TO DO THIS!

"Let your gentle spirit [your graciousness, unselfishness, mercy, tolerance, and patience] be known to all people. The Lord is near...Whatever is true, whatever is honorable and worthy of respect, whatever is right and confirmed by God’s word, whatever is pure and wholesome, whatever is lovely and brings peace, whatever is admirable and of good repute; if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think continually on these things [center your mind on them, and implant them in your heart]." Philippians 4:5,8

"May the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable and pleasing in Your sight, O Lord, my [firm, immovable] rock and my Redeemer." Psalm 19:14