Morningside Devotionals

View on Vocaroo >>   Remember the courage to overcome. Overcoming is part of faith. When people read the statement in Hebrews, that faith is the evidence of things hoped for, they don't realise that that's a description of courage.  Because anytime that you determine that something actually needs to take place, because it's self-evident. We hold these truths to be self-evident. One of the things about self evidentiary, uh, matters is that it takes courage to jump into them. Let me make that make sense. When you are faced with things that you recognise are evil in their nature and should be corrected, because your faith eyes see them, it takes courage, remember that.  Courage to act upon what you realise what you see and what you hear. So what you're doing is you're recounting the times that your eyes were opened. And your ears were opened and you saw and heard with faith. Don't expect that during those times people are going to applaud your actions....

View on Vocaroo >>   Remember the importance of your presence and the things that you talk about 'n discuss with your disciples; with your learners. You wanna remember that you're pointing them back to Jesus?  As you get involved in their lives, your task is to be with your Saviour and to listen to the Holy Spirit. And to guide your learners to Jesus, that's making disciples, your job is not to do anything else. Because if you get into doing anything else, that's going to be on your own time; and do you have any of your own time? Remember who's life it actually is; remember who's heartbeat it actually is; who's food it is; who air who's everything it is who's life it is we owe our lives to Christ. We are the creation of God, the father. And we do not own anything. We are just sojourners travelling through this existence, and our purpose remember is to do what make disciples off Matthews end chapter of chapter 28.  Recount, The Times that...

View on Vocaroo >>   Are there difficulties in following Jesus? There are; there are many difficulties in following Jesus, not to mention some that are more  and some that are less distracting and less difficult, but following Christ is never easy.  First of all, the word became flesh and dwelt among us. We take that to mean in Jesus as the incarnate. But there's a tertiary meaning to that, which is you, you're a physical being so when you read the Bible, you're reading the word Jesus is the Logos; the word; and it becomes physical when it imparts its power of truth to you, then Holy Spirit interacts with you.  So remember that one of the things that you're a part of is following Christ. You're following him through the word of God through the Bible, through the holy spirits guidance.  So it's not so easy to get off track, but we do get off track, and so one of the things we want to recount, one of the things we want to recount in awareness; is the ti...

View on Vocaroo >>   Sure fire you ever hear something called a sure fire cure for something, was it? How often are sure fire cures really cures? Remember Aha, yes, that's right, remember; that those things that are often called surefire turn out to be fires that had water poured on them.  And one of the things that if we have described as working at, in remembering is remembering with a purpose, remembering with some subtlety and some nuance to it, because we control the memory process, we control what we remember and how we remember it, we control the things that we choose to make significant. And sure fire cures I'm pretty much sure  are guaranteed not to work, aren't they?  So as you're recounting your walk with Jesus, and you're recounting the things that you're remembering recount to things, count them again The Times that so-called surefire. Things it didn't work out. And then take a look at the many things that he accomplished in the mi...

View on Vocaroo >>   Ever get dried lips? I get dry lips all the time. They get cracked even sometimes. And so I use a product called a chapstick@ there's other products Vaseline@, etc.   I'm just a chapstick guy, I like it. So I went and bought two, because with me; I'm going to always leave one somewhere, and do not remember -what? Remember(?)Yeah, not remember where I put it, but I'll remember where the other one is. And I'll go get it.  So with 2 of them, you'd think that I would always have somewhere around where I needed a chapstick. In a nutshell. I managed to wear one of them out, so I was down to just 1 and keeping knowing where that was at;  and lo and behold, somehow it got misplaced. Or got left in a pocket of a Jean somewhere, and I didn't remember where?  So when it comes to recounting things that seem oddly miraculous like odd reminders, this morning, I'm doing wash, and I look at the bottom of the wash basket after I get the ...

View on Vocaroo >>   In one of the scriptures, Paul says, I must be out of my mind to talk to you people this way. And he's talking about his experiences with serving Jesus and the various things that have happened to him; how many times he's been whipped, how many times he's been shipwrecked, and he says that it sounds like boasting at some point and that he would never want to be guilty of boasting. Except in what?  Except in the strength of Jesus, because Paul had realized that when he is weak, Jesus is strong, and there is an ancillary statement to that that we want to remember, we're talking about, remembering it, and what we want to remember is: We're weak. We are weak. And that's beyond honesty and beyond confessional, it's beyond the fact that we're sinners, who find it nearly impossible to escape the lies of satan, he's clever, so we do sin.  But we can what confess and Jesus does what? Forgives and so when we come to recounting...

View on Vocaroo >>   Remember that there are times when what we want to be is still and remember that being still, it's something that actually needs to be practiced certainly in our age, certainly in the United States of America in 2025. Being still is very far from the norm, it would seem there's an awful lot of noise in our culture. For example, almost everything is portrayed with music in midst. You almost never go into any situation without some music in the background somehow being involved in life. I think we got trained to experience that through the movies of the 50 60s and 70s and the 9 into the 80s, 90s in 2000 etc. All of those stories had music in the background. Called background music.  So when we recount those times that we're remembering situations where we were trying to be still, it might be helpful to recount the fact that there are very few moments, where we're not somehow trying to interject music into a life that may not have music. Bec...

View on Vocaroo >>   You may hear some background noise in this recording, because I'm recording on our porch outside. Hearing all the great sounds of nature birds chirping, the wind blowing; whispering through the trees. Surrounded by all this beauty surrounded by these miracles. I'm often reminded, Ah, remember, I'm often reminded of the miraculous powers that we're in the midst of that, we do not realize. So remembering is a way of fronting or bringing to the forefront of your consciousness; it's the miraculous, uh, experience that we are in the assemblage of.  So much matter in creation, in a constant creative force. And what this realization can help us with is a recount of a day. You know, this moment on this porch saying, these things with you that is, in effect, a miracle and it is no small thing to recognize what is actually taking place in terms of creation. We call God Elohim, creator God, almighty. God. We say that almost as a by word or a ...

View on Vocaroo >>   What's the most beautiful place that you've ever seen? The place that just takes your breath away. I can think of so many really beautiful places in nature that I've seen, and some places it architecturally, made by man that I've seen like the Cathedral at Rheims, France; takes your breath away.  The Grand Canyon takes your breath away, really beautiful, magnificent things that are so big and so massive and so awesome and so pretty when you remember them. They bring back that sense of breathlessness, an anticipation in your life. That's a massively important aspect of our emotional component of happiness and joy, isn't it?  When we talk about recounting, that's a moment where you think about that miraculous reconnection, that just took place, you've thought about something so totally beautiful and so magnificent that it took your breath away, and for a moment, your mind goes back to that point and you recount that and is that...

View on Vocaroo >>   Now, folks don't normally think that our lives as Christians, it could contain miracles within them. We just, we don't objectively, or subjectively consider; that it's not part of our normal way of thinking.  We think and go through life as; this, I have to do today. These are the things I have to do. This is what's going to go on. We almost never begin our day by asking God, what would you have me do today? That's just not our lifestyle, certainly not in America, in 2025. Our lifestyle is, get it, get it done, and if you're a young man, it's get it, get success, get more and really, is there anything wrong with that?  Because, you know, have we got our priorities upside down? I don't know, have we got our priorities inverted? I don't know, I wrote a book called inverted culture and how to happily survive in it. My friend was a best selling author Dr. Stephen Covey, who wrote the 7 habits of an effective leader? ...

View on Vocaroo >>   Stay seated, if you got up and walk round in between these pages, go back and sit down. Because while my first entry about recertifying and serving had to do with conflict in a general; but a funny sense; about what's the worst thing that could happen to you. Now, I'm going to share something with you that is , I consider; it is vastly stranger.  But a great learning lesson, there was an elder in our church who was just a magnificent dude. I mean, he's, he's so cool that it's hard to explain how deep his faith was. I'm gonna call him Red. Now here's the thing, I went on a mission trip. I was brand new I was going to seminary. I basically had only been a Christian for maybe 3 years, we went to a mission trip out in New Mexico. It was a mountain top of mountain top experiences and some day, I'll share with you about the prison visitation and going out, and witnessing on the streets of New Mexico I think Albuquerque out there....

View on Vocaroo >>   Sit down, if you're standing up, sit down, if you're sitting down, stay there, but get ready, because what I'm about to share with you is not the traditional thing that you hear shared. And so I want a kind of preferences by suggesting to you that you understand yes, I've walked with Christ for 50 years. Been called into the ministry for 47 of those, and probably was called before then. Been to seminary, been trained, have a doctorate in theology.   I'm fairly well, a scholastically educated individual academically, trained a better professor; did a little bit of academic training of others. Bucked up against that system, and when you buck up against the educational system, what happens, you get eliminated, and I got eliminated, I had no idea what the battle that I was in. Went to be a pastor at one time. Got eliminated; had no idea the battle I was in.  Here's the thing that I'm going to suggest here, listen to this stor...

View on Vocaroo >>   Miracle, it's such a great word, and it's such a great event. It's such a great happening in your life. Miracle, but how do you recognise a miracle? I'm gonna suggest to you that often times when a miracle is happening, it really doesn't look like a miracle.  It looks like pain or it looks like suffering or it looks like something disastrous. There's something in the scripture, which says that something that happened didn't look like it was intended for good, but that God intended it for good. Now that's real hard for us, because we we proof text Romans, 8:28, when we shouldn't. We shouldn't proof text it.  We should just take it as it is, but actually put it in context, look at everything, Paul had been through and yet, this man who had been nearly beaten to death. Moreover, on occasion, I think I it happened 3 times. Shipwrecked, which we think "ah shipwrecked," understand that means nearly drowning...

View on Vocaroo >>   Recertify by recertifying, is part of the process of certify done over again. Certify over again. Bring a disciple back to Jesus if they've drifted, even if they haven't drifted in the process of bringing them back to Jesus, it should be an encouragement, and it can be an encouragement. And as you develop  The idea of working with recertify, you may find yourself having the ability to work with a person and be encouraging (another) one, and at the same time as recertifying your presence as one who follows Christ, the Greek term is gnorizo ( gno-rid'-zo) and gnorizo has an interesting uh, context to it.  It's used in a lot of scripture, for example, gnorizo, is used many times like in John 17:26. It's used to say it's a declaration in John 17:26 says, "and I have declared onto them by name, and I and will declare it." it can be as a declarative, Ephesians 6:21 says that you may know how Paul has been conducting himself...

View on Vocaroo >>   Recertify has contained within the term an idea. We've been talking about bringing people back to Jesus, working with disciples to keep them engaged with Jesus.  It's a different process, than what we would normally call witnessing. It's a different process than martyring. Martyring is when the authorities or someone in authority isn't in agreement with you about your Christianity, it can take many different forms. For example, some folks are forced to work on Sundays, even though Sunday is a day when they would want to go to church and worship. So that's a form of martyrdom now it's not a very a deep form, but nevertheless, it is true that is a form of martyrios or being a witness.  Because what you intend to do is go worship, and what they're saying is, no, you can't, that's authority coming in over the top of the proper conduct of a person who wants to worship God. So that is martyrdom, that's not martyrdom in th...

View on Vocaroo >>   Ad aspera ad Astra.  It is a rough road that leads to the stars. There are times in following God, when seemingly simple concepts like Genesis, 3;8 God walking in the cool of the day, 'rua yom'. They get past us, we let them go by, because we don't want to grasp is a significance of them simply because we do not know the language.  So when it comes to a process of recertify, perhaps one of the first things that we really ought to dig into is certifying itself. How genuine? In faith, if you are very genuine, in friendship with someone who does not speak your language? But you're genuine, in your friendship, you like being in their presence, they like being in your presence, you share with them, they share with you. It is an exchange. You are friends, you smile together in a way that only you can, but your language separates you, your kindness and your congeniality and your love, unite you and especially in Christianity.  But you do...

View on Vocaroo >>   Recount mountain types. Recount standing at the top of the mountain and seeing other peaks, Dr. Schuler in his book, the Peek to Peak Theory, I think it's called the Peek to Peak Theory?  Peek to Peak Success something like that; Robert Schulher was such a genius; but his peek to peak, that is p e e k, to, p e a k. Well, it's very simple. What he suggests standing at the base of the mountain, you can see the top of the mountain, and that's the peak. That's all you can see. You see that mountain now when you get up to that peak, you can look out and you see many, many other peaks. Now, that journey is how Robert Schuler described the journey of life. That is p e e k, to, p e a k.  In other words, the way of looking at life, it's okay. We arrive at peaks. Now, we had a peek at the peak before we climbed up that mountain to get to the peak. Recounting peaks means that you're not looking at the journeys involved in the peaks, you...

  View on Vocaroo >>   Recount.   Those moments. Recount those spectacular moments, those impactful moments that aren't necessarily pleasant.  Let's stop think about the fact that sometimes we don't want to consider that the best thing that can happen for us isn't positive in nature, but negative, or at least seems negative.  Actually, many times what seems negative turns out to be positive, so we count not necessarily pleasantries. But bear in mind, things that may not seem to be so pleasant. We live in a culture in 2025, especially in America that has something in it called the cancel culture, and this is absolutely deadly to faith and people of faith don't realise how deadly this is. This is; here's the theory; If you don't like something cancel it out eradicate it, take it out. Why(?) because it's not pleasant, it's not good, it's not positive. Well, here's a hint from the Bible. Not everything is.  God is love. Love, isn...

View on Vocaroo >>   Recount other angles, other ways, other side views to things instead of straight on and head up. What does that mean? It's the nuances of life that can sometimes add joy to your experience and happiness, and sometimes those are difficult to see when you're just looking at things headon. Have you ever had an incident where someone just filled you with joy, you were just almost overwhelmed with joy? It was just such a relief, such a spectacular moment when they told you, for example, I have a friend who was cured of cancer, and it was just mind-boggling that that actually happened now, you say, well, that shouldn't be the case, because we believe in faith, when we pray that Jesus is going to take action on our prayers?  Sure, but we've also become very adept at accepting the idea that there are 3 different responses that are possible in prayer. Yes, no and wait. And of course, when it comes to health issues like cancer, we pray for healing, bu...

View on Vocaroo >>   Recount, for clarification, because it’s one thing to remember any event, it’s another thing to itemize or account for the different aspects of that event. So now you see kind of the accounting background to recount. And it isn’t a bad thing at all—it’s a very good thing—because it’s important to understand what it is that you perceive as having taken place in your life, relative to Christ, in a numeric set of values. This time He did this, this time He did this, this time Jesus did this. That’s how the Gospels break out the interaction between Christ and His disciples.  Therefore, does it not make sense that we should break down our existence with Christ in the same manner? Doesn’t it seem wise—perhaps wise as a serpent and harmless as a dove—that we would learn to recount and consider as accurately as possible the times that Almighty God, Elohim, in the point of the Holy Spirit, has brought us to a point of committing something as an action tha...

View on Vocaroo >>   The impossibility of recounting your Christian experience makes an idea about recount very susceptible to criticism. After all, when King David took an unnecessary census in the Old Testament, look at what followed behind that. Recounting is not that kind of taking a census. Rather, recounting is looking realistically at what has taken place, in terms of the many and various things that you can actually recall and recount.  These things have developed you into the kind of disciple maker that you are today. If you are not a disciple maker, recounting will sometimes give you that deep breath that says, “These things has my Lord Christ done for me. How dare I not listen to His command to make disciples?” It can be a centering kind of objective.  The other thing about recounting that we want to get out of the way at the front end is that this is not just remembering. Remembering is sweet—it has the flavors of the event, the ideas in the event, th...

View on Vocaroo >>   Memory is a strange thing. It’s attached to emotions, and as you age and experience life again and again, memory begins to change. It tends to drift toward certain objective events that, in the past, felt significant, and it tends to float toward the ones you want to remember. Memory is odd.   In people, memory becomes even stranger as aging and experience pile up across a lifetime. A thirty-year-old may have a sharp recollection of things from their teenage years. By forty, the mind starts to blur the edges, remembering more of the positive outcomes than the negative. At fifty, memory becomes more selective, pushing away things that weren’t pleasant, though some of them still remain and cannot be erased. By sixty, memory has become almost entirely selective.  A person remembers what they choose to remember, and the rest is pushed back into the recesses of the mind, where it no longer functions in daily thought. Remembering is vitally i...

View on Vocaroo >>   Purpose. Remember. With purpose — remember purpose. Remember that not only does your life, your witness, and your helping people become better learners, being taken back to Jesus has a purpose. But there is a purpose behind that purpose. Which is that there is an overall, overarching purpose that is taking place.  We’ve all heard the mysterious tales — or shall we say truths, as the best description — from Isaiah of the war in heaven. Michael and the angels, and in the Revelation of Christ, this is going on. We see these massive displays of power. And we know that at one time, Lucifer and a third of his angelic host turned against God and were thrown down to earth. We know they are eternal beings. We know they don’t just go away. Where are they?  Well, there are lots of mysteries in the Bible. There are lots of mysteries in worshipping God. There are lots of mysteries in loving, in worshipping, in asking forgiveness. Human beings confessin...

View on Vocaroo >>   A popular phrase in our culture, 2025 is feedback, which is, I guess responding to inquiries or answering questions or stating an opinion about a situation, I bet you're in. So when we're talking about disciples and we're talking about, remember; remember? The Times When feedback was positive for you? Remember the times when feedback was negative for you and remember the times when someone gave you feedback that was just extremely useful and remember the times when people gave you feedback, but it was useless.   What feedback really worked for you, what feedback did something for you that was beneficial? And what feedback did something for you that wasn't worth 2 cents in a spit storm? Feedback in a sense is essential in communication if instruction is all one way, but then it really isn't working? Remember that they were out in the desert and Jesus was talking with the disciples and he had just told Peter, how good they had done and h...

View on Vocaroo >>   So now we come to the matter of remember when it comes to paradigms. Paradigms are a very interesting set of presumptions. They are what we believe to be true, even though we have no cognizance of why we believe it, to be true. We just accept it, to be true, like fiat currency, a dollar bill, we believe that a dollar bill has a dollars value when we buy, for example, half a piece of bubblegum, today in 2025. For a 1$, because a dollar used to buy us about 10 pieces of bubble gum, they were a dime a piece, today; it will buy about half a piece of bubble gum. And inflation is out of control. Meanwhile, what do we have going on in terms of paradigms, we have beliefs, we have beliefs, for example. That certain things are the way that they are, and that's the way they're always going to be. None of that, according to the Bible is real because, according to the Bible, God is in charge. And God is not going to be mocked, and God will have the final say, ...