Morningside Devotionals

Do you like feeling loved? Perhaps you aren't in that place right now where you do? Isn't that a sad place, to not feel love, but some people are in that place, they don't have someone they know who loves them. They don't know the sort of savior who would do what our savior does, in order to love them, so they don't feel love. These people may feel something, in other words they have feelings, they have even, love feelings, but it is the sort of love that says that the world has to be on an even keel. What scares me is all the preaching I hear today about balance- that's very scary theology and very scary thinking to me, you see, I don't see balance anywhere in the Bible? I see faith, and in faith, balance isn't part of the deal. It's laughable to me that preachers today want to consider dulling down the faith, can't you see Joseph saying to the Angel, "well now wait just a sec, you know, I'll be out of balance if I go ahead and lo...

Does there come a time when you can't back away from someone, you might want to, but you cannot, they are someone you care about, someone that matters to you? Does there come a time when you have to back away, when it looks hopeless, when everything that you know says that it isn't going to work out, when your best senses tell you to "Run!" Ever been in such a situation? They exist, people find themselves in them all the time, and usually not because of anything bad, necessarily; for example the salesman says "aw go ahead and take it out for a test drive." The man at the service station says, "we've seen a lot of those like that, it'll probably not be much." Should we go into insurance and, on and on...and you get the point, sometimes life throws curves at you, that you aren't ready for. "Now Dana c'mon I don't care about a car salesman," which is good, that isn't who I'm referring to you caring about th...

Imagine that in your culture a virgin will be betrothed to a man by the two families involved. Odds are they will love one another, because during the time of Christ villages were tight knit groups, and marriages were a very big deal, for the families and the virgin bride involved. A big deal that would have been nicely passed down to the western culture had they realized that what God said about treating a woman as a precious gift of God in the man's life was the intent all along; but, sadly the West missed it! Back to Nazareth, the village that was now a hotbed of buzz, the virgin, wasn't a virgin! The families knew, but nobody else,(at this point), would; but they knew, soon Mary would begin to show, and then what? Joseph was facing two very immense decisions regarding this lovely woman, the first; if she loves me why did she go against every belief we have and give herself to another man? Second, what ought I, as a man who believes somehow God has me in this mix for a ...

The way you look at someone you love says it all. They mean more to you than you can ever express in words, and how you look at them, says that. How they see you, however, may be totally different than how you see them. Oddly, this is a surety about how we are. We are involved with people, we love people, we worship with and witness with our lives and people; and we strive mightily to be as sincere as we are able to be. At that same instant we are also aware that we don't have a particularly great record at what we would expect of others. We don't like to admit it, but we are better at spotting their problems than our problems. So the way you look at someone you love says it all. As Pastor Melissa Scott says, "you see, it is little subtle things," she is so right, when it comes to loving Jesus, it isn't the great big gigantic meetings with incredibly excited people all gathered to hear the message, no, it is the single time you give up your pride to put you...

When they first told me the news somewhere inside me went numb, it wasn't that I couldn't handle it, it was that I didn't want to handle it. Ever go through something like that, it's not that you can't handle it, you can handle just about anything; you know that; but it is that you don't want to have to handle it. If you've been through something like that; then you can identify with that feeling. We call it, "darned if I do, darned if I don't" (being polite here, some Christian's might get really uptight if I said this the way most folks have learned it). Another way that you may have heard this said is, "caught in the middle of it." Stuck; don't want to handle it, but there you are, and there I was. I don't know what the man was expecting me to say; but evidently, my silence wasn't expected? Ever been there, where you don't say what they expect, and they look at you with that look, you know the one? That...

It's finally here, the month of month's for those who follow the King of King's and Lord of Lord's, the month when it all began. Now you may not believe that this story of the birth of Christ is real, a lot of people don't, to which I've only question, why is it still around? See what I'm really asking is this, I'm sure when Ceasar was born, there was a lot going on, and in fact, if you look in history books, you will find some Ceasar as a baby stories, but you don't hear about them, do you? And we don't celebrate them, do we? And yet these men, these very powerful rulers of the entire planet, for longer than any other nation has ever ruled the planet, well; they aren't talked about; let's just get down to it, name their mom! Go ahead, without Googling her...can't do it, can you...now..Jesus mom, her name is Mary- and "Hey howdy," notice how she's for sure and certain known. Take it for what it is, the truth. Luk...

Shock - like burning your hand- ever done that? If you haven't don't do this just to find out, but I've done the really "stupid" electrical burner thing- didn't know it was on, it wasn't glowing, BUT, it was HOT! But the burn wasn't the worst part, get ready- cause I'm gonna share with you, it was the smell- that got to my senses, all the way down to my tum tum... SO- Shock- set in. Shock is weird- your mind goes to a place where there is peace, and, the pain, you know it's there, but it just isn't as big a deal- your body is defending you against dying from your heart exploding if I understand the medical need of shock? NOW- what in the world can that have to do with the wonderful birth of our Savior! Just this- some folks unfortunately have a bad idea about God - they believe that when man fell, it was a shock to God. Hmm- isn't that odd? How would that be- since we clearly know from the Bible that God clearly overwhelmingly thre...