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For long ago I broke your yoke and burst your bonds; but you said, I will not serve. Jeremiah 2:20 Nearly 20 years ago, though I didn’t feel sick, I was diagnosed with an illness, which if left untreated, would have taken my life. The treatment was fairly simple – a surgeon removed my thyroid…
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For my people have committed two evils: they have forsaken me, the fountain of living waters, and hewed out cisterns for themselves, broken cisterns that can hold no water. Jeremiah 2:13 It is not uncommon to meet a suffering patient, who wants to feel better, while hanging on to that which is making him sick. The…
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Then I said, “Ah, Lord God! Behold, I do not know how to speak, for I am only a youth.” Jeremiah 1:6 I’d like to think that if God showed up and commanded me to do something, that I would do it, no matter how crazy it seemed. It’s God, so I’d obey no matter what,…
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We are the clay, and you are our potter; we are all the work of your hand. Isaiah 64:8 Have you ever believed a thing to be true and then acted in a manner completely inconsistent with that belief? There are those for whom right belief just naturally leads to right behavior. I don’t understand…
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We have all become like one who is unclean, and all our righteous deeds are like a polluted garment. Isaiah 64:6 As I ran a race with thousands of others last weekend, I found myself people watching . . . and comparing. One of the worst parts of running a race is being beaten by those…
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Arise, shine, for your light has come, and the glory of the Lord has risen upon you . . . for in my wrath I struck you, but in my favor I have had mercy on you. Isaiah 60:1,10 Yesterday at 9:45AM, I ran under the I-35W bridge in Minneapolis while running the Twin Cities Marathon…
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Your iniquities have made a separation between you and your God, and your sins have hidden his face from you so that he does not hear. Isaiah 59:2 I occasionally meet those who believe that, because we are forgiven in Christ, God cannot see our sin. Based on passages that say, I will remember their sin…
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If you pour yourself out for the hungry and satisfy the desire of the afflicted, then shall your light rise in the darkness and your gloom be as the noonday. Isaiah 58:10 For the most part, whatever depression, despair and anxiety I’ve experienced has been self-inflicted, resulting from my destructive behavior. I don’t know your situation.…
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Behold, in the day of your fast you seek your own pleasure . . . Fasting like yours this day will not make your voice to be heard on high. Isaiah 58:3-4 In chemical dependency treatment, everyone was committed to following God’s path . . . when it came to drug use. There were those guys though,…
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“There is no peace,” says my God, “for the wicked.” Isaiah 57:21 I’m no stranger to jailhouse confessions of faith that dissolve when the inmate is released. Incarcerated, with a life in shambles, it is not uncommon for the inmate to ask for divine assistance. God, get me out of this and I’ll go to church…
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